Dray's FAQ

Welcome to my frequently asked questions page! This is just a little collection of questions I've been asked by several people in an effort to cut down on repeat questions and also give more detailed answers.

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Q: What mods have you made and when?
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A: The mods I've made and their year of release are as follows:
- Fire Red Omega (FR, 2009)
- Blaze Black & Volt White (BW, 2011)
- Sacred Gold & Storm Silver (HGSS, 2012)
- Blaze Black 2 & Volt White 2 (B2W2, 2012)
- Rising Ruby & Sinking Sapphire (ORAS, 2016)
- Renegade Platinum (Pt, 2018)

I've also partially contributed to Blaze Black 2 Redux & Volt White 2 Redux (2022), but AphexCubed is the main developer of these.

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Q: What upcoming projects do you have?
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A: My current project is a version 2 of Sacred Gold and Storm Silver which effectively makes it equal to Renegade in terms of features. It's been a long time coming but we'll get there eventually!

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Q: Do you have any plans to do a mod for <game>?
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A: If it doesn't already exist, then no, probably not. However, I can give you a list of somewhat similar mods for each game that I'm aware of...

RBY: Red++ (RomhackerMateo); Shin Pokémon Red (jojobear13).
GSC: Polished Crystal (Rangi); Sour Crystal (BlazingMagmar).
RSE: Inclement Emerald (Buffel Saft).
FRLG: Radical Red (soupercell & koala4).
Colosseum: Grand Colosseum (Kya).
XD: XG: NeXt Gen (StarsMmd).
XY: Eternal X & Wilting Y (Buffel Saft), Ancestral X (Axyn).
ORAS: Rutile Ruby & Star Sapphire (Dio Vento).
SM: Nova Sun & Umbra Moon (Dio Vento).
USUM: Photonic Sun & Prismatic Moon (Buffel Saft); Supernova Sun & Penumbra Moon (Dio Vento).
SwSh: Divine Sword & Blessed Shield (Kobazco).
BDSP: Luminescent (@LuminescentTeam - lots of individuals!).

I've skipped the four sets of DS games since realistically I'd just recommend my own (or BB2/VW2 Redux for B2W2).
Fire Red Omega is very old, the only reason you'd pick it over Radical Red is if you wanted lighter changes, or only Gens 1-3.
Rising Ruby & Sinking Sapphire are a bit less polished than Rutile Ruby & Star Sapphire, though there are some gameplay differences between them so that may influence your decision on which to play.

If, for the DS games, you're looking for some alternative playstyles, hacks that touch a bit less (ie are more for QoL improvements on the base game than changing all the wilds/Trainers etc), or some that are harder than my own, then you can try:
DPPt: Refined Platinum (RefinedPlat).
HGSS: Refined Gold (RefinedPlat); HGSS Golden Edition (BlazingMagmar); SoothingSilver (Dracandre aka HighFrequencyOcelot); GarbageGold (sauceyaTTa).
BW: Vintage White (NotSuicuu).
B2W2: Primeval Black 2 (NurseEita).

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Q: How can I learn to make a mod for <game>?
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A: The answer to this will change depending on what you're looking to do.
- GBA has changed completely since I touched it, but you'd want to look into using CFRU or the pokeemerald decomp these days. There's lots of resources on PokéCommunity.
- DS is going strong right now. The best resource for learning this is probably Jay-san's YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/c/JaySan) which has tutorials for most major elements you'd want to change. His videos also have a Discord link to the Kingdom of DS Hacking where there's plenty of people who will share stuff and be willing to help you.
- 3DS I don't really know a whole lot about, but I mostly just used PK3DS a bunch to do changes to that (https://projectpokemon.org/home/files/file/2106-pk3ds/).

No clue on the other generations really.

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Q: What's the shiny rate in <game>?
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A: Renegade Platinum is 1/512 by default, though it does have optional patches you can apply to change it to 1/4096 or back to the original 1/8192 if you wish. Redux is also 1/512 but doesn't currently have patches to modify it.
Sacred Gold & Storm Silver v1.05 are the regular 1/8192 rate, but if you're using the v1.1 Fairy patch then the rate is 1/257.
Fire Red Omega, Blaze Black (2) & Volt White (2) and Rising Ruby & Sinking Sapphire just have the game's regular shiny rate.

Please note the increased shiny rates in these games just change the threshold at which a Pokémon will *appear* shiny, but it's calculated on the fly. As such, a Pokémon may "unshiny" if traded to a different game that doesn't have the modified rate.

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Q: Is <Pokémon> shiny locked?
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A: For the Gen 3 and 4 mods (FR/Pt/HG/SS), nothing is shiny locked in the normal games. This remains true in the modded versions.

In BW and B2W2, the canon Victini, Reshiram and Zekrom encounters are shiny locked. In the hacks, the new Reshiram/Zekrom encounter (depending on version) is a forced shiny, but the existing one will never be shiny. In addition, all Hidden Grotto encounters are shiny locked. However, the added Victini in Blaze Black 2/Volt White 2 is not shiny locked.

However, in Redux all shiny locks have been removed and anything can be shiny.

In ORAS, normally Kyogre, Groudon, Rayquaza and Deoxys are shiny locked. PK3DS allowed removing shiny locks for the individual static encounters which I did take advantage of, so in theory you should be able to get Kyogre, Groudon, Rayquaza or Deoxys as a shiny from their usual encounters. It may also be possible to get them shiny as regular wild encounters in the Mirage Islands. However, none of this has been tested, so try it at your own risk!

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Q: Do Trainers have EVs in <game>?
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A: None of the mods I've made so far have EVs on any of the Trainers (in the main game, ignoring the battle facilities). This is because it just isn't possible - regular Trainers having EVs only became a thing from Sun and Moon onward. Hacks like Radical Red and Inclement Emerald are able to achieve this as GBA is hackable to the point where you can add underlying engine changes like this fairly easily, but for the most part we aren't there with DS games yet except for a very talented few people. However, there are definitely projects being undertaken to bring this sort of thing to the DS games!

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Q: I'm playing Storm Silver but there's no Evolution stones in Goldenrod. Why?
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A: If this is happening, then it's most likely the case that you're playing the v1.1 patch that adds Fairy-type to some Pokémon. This was an add-on patch somebody else made that unfortunately missed out the changes to the Poké Marts. This isn't an issue on the v1.1 of Sacred Gold, so I'd suggest either swap to that version (your save can transfer between the two games no problem), or use PKHeX to edit your save instead. Or you can go the old fashioned route of grinidng out the Pokéathlon! This shouldn't be an issue in v2.

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Q: I'm playing Sacred Gold or Storm Silver and I'm at the Safari Zone Gate, but I can't continue the game. What do I do?
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A: The Safari Zone event in the current version is still quite buggy unfortunately, and one instance of this is that the NPCs near the door to the Safari Zone have a habit of showing up at the wrong time and prevent you from proceeding. If this happens there's unfortunately no fix available, so my suggestion would be to just use a walk through walls Action Replay code to get past the Rocket that blocks the way to Jasmine so you can defeat her, and then you can use the code again to get through to Route 42 from Ecruteak. This shouldn't be an issue in v2!

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Q: I'm playing Renegade Platinum and I can't seem to get the Celebi event to work. Why?
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A: There's a known issue with the Celebi event where if you activate the first part in Celestic Town but you leave the rest of the event until later, it has a habit of failing to trigger. I'm not exactly sure what the cause of this is but if this has happened to you, you can reset it by doing the following:
1) Open up your RenPlat save in PKHeX.
2) Go to the "SAV" tab and click the "Event Flags" button.
3) Go to the "Research" tab and change the "Flag" number from 0 to 2317. This is basically a little switch in the game's internals that checks if you already interacted with the shrine in Celestic Town or not.
4) You should see the box ticked for flag 2317 - untick it and hit "Save".
5) Do File -> Export SAV -> Export Main and overwrite your existing save.
6) Boot up the game again and you should be able to interact with the Celestic Town shrine again and get the GS Ball once more. Then if you go to Eterna Forest from the Eterna City side immediately after you should be able to trigger the event.

Alternatively, drop me a DM with your save file (a battery save, not a save state) and I'll try to help you.

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Q: Did you do any work on Ludwig's Mogul Platinum?
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A: Not directly. It uses my Renegade Platinum as a base, but I wasn't involved in any changes following that like the sprite changes or standard Trainer differences.

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Q: Is it possible to get Blaze Black 2 Redux or Volt White 2 Redux to work with NDS Forwarder?
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Yes, according to @oosumFTW:
"There's an option to force install, and when you boot it up from the home menu on the 3DS, holding down Y, you can make it boot in DS mode and it'll work."