#I was sinnoh and hoenn champ + galar fire gym leader

[tetrafy]

[floaromaxtowns]

StS x Pokemon AU brainstorming stuff

Now I'll have to publicly share some flow of thoughts rambles, I've been accumulating for an year now.

Bless @ectogusher for listening to my rambles, and @doodlingwren for busting my door open to finally share what I got.

Excuse me as I talk in my notes as if these things were like a guide/romhack shit

All under read more bc it gets long c:

Here's the main skeleton of this whole deal-

Sanctuary = Its own region. No new fakemons, but it's a sizeable piece of land that has gathered up a wide variety of various species found across the globe. This worldwide thing also influences the type of trainers and people from all over the world going there. If we were to touch on the subject of game mechanics: There would be most of them (Mega evolutions, terastalise, Dynamax even Paradox pokemon forms) further showing how mysterious and mythical this region is.

PC - Seiya / Shoko Rivals - Seiya -> The other bronze boys / Shoko ->The other saintias

With Ikki being the Silver-esque type of rival, meanwhile Shiryu/Hyoga/Shun all follow the same line of friendly rival archetype. I still haven't thought that far on the Shoko route.

Other prominent NPCs:

Professor Shion: Former gym leader, he was once offered the champion title but refused it. Claiming that his passion was in research and studies, rather than the battlefield. Due to stepping down from battles, his friendship/relationship with Dohko has strained over time. Shion is the one who brought Mu to Sanctuary down the line.

Schoolkid Kiki: Catching Tutorial NPC. He can be usually found at the Pokemon School in Mu's city. He will inherit Mu's mantle down the line. The pokemon he uses in the tutorial is a Noibat;

League Chairwoman Saori Kido - With Julien Solo and Hades coming in as other seemingly "investors" on the project

Gym leaders: Most of these guys' aces aren't fully evolved, bc they chose to keep them like that. Yadda yadda friendship boosting their favorites.

Mu: Sinnoh - Dragon - Dragonair

Aldebaran: Hoenn - Ground - Rhydon

Saga/Kanon: Alola - Water - Gyarados (Saga)/Kingdra (Kanon)

Deathmask: Kalos - Dark - Murkrow

Aiolia: Sanctuary (native) - Electric - Electabuzz

Shaka: Kanto - Psychic - Alakazam

Dohko: Johto - Fighting - Mienshao

Milo: Unova - Bug - Volcarona

Elite fours:

Aiolos: Sanctuary - Fire - Charizard

Shura: Galar - Steel - Metagross

Camus: Sinnoh - Ice - ? (Either Froslass or Glaceon)

Aphrodite: Paldea - Poison - Roserade

Champion - ??? (the plot twist is that: the PC wouldn't fight the 3rd gym leader, bc Saga was pretending to be the champion. When he really wasn't chosen or appointed to that position)

Evil organisations: They definetely do exist, and they are obviously tied to the aforementioned Julien and Hades figures. But I still haven't thought that far.

Worldbuilding notes:

Muvians are similar to draconids (introduced in ORAS), a small tribe that originates from Sinnoh and has some deep connections and bonds to dragon types. Which means, any muvian = dragon type specialist or in the very least owns one. Muvians are also meant to have a foot in aura sensitivity (see characters like Lucario, Riley, etc.);

Sanctuary's League has a rampant corruption problem, as seen by what I mentioned about Saga. The two evil organisations are basically being pitched against one another, as smokescreen for the real problem. Their current champ is this sort of "elusive" figure. There hasn't been a proper champion in a long time. And yet, according to paperwork and the system, it states that the role is currently filled by someone. Anyone that isn't tied to Saga's schemes is left in the shadows, even those that allegedly should be the closest to him (Aiolos for SURE has no clue of what's going on. He's probably hiding or declared missing in action during the events, and only shows up when the time comes to challenge the E4).

There's a small timeline:

ND folks (a good few years into the past) -> Classic folks -> Omega folks (+20 years into the future)

In ND's setting we see how odd and hapharzadly the League was instated in the region. Which sets up the perfect grounds for Saga to exploit down the line;

Shion and Dohko are recently turned gym leader here. Mu comes onto the picture a good few years after ND's events; In a way, since Tenma would be the PC here and Alone his rival. It could be the Red vs Blue type of ordeal.

In Omega we'd see how the League is trying to remedy its reputation & amend for Saga's schemes, with an entirely new set of gym leaders and League members. + Former league members can still be found and fought in the post game, Silver/Gold style.

Individual notes:

Mu - Obligatory pokemon Aldemu food

Mu used to own a Gible and Alde once owned a Trapinch, at some point they traded pokemon. So now, Alde has a Garchomp in his personal team and Mu has a Flygon;

Mu's battle team against young trainers has a Swablu, which is used as a messenger to carry mail exchanges between him and Alde;

Mu LOVES pokemon dolls and has a huge collection of it. In the post-game: PC can find Mu and Alde on a date at the region's big mall, with them looking at a shop's display window. Mu gets mad at PC for ruining his date, but would give out his pokegear number;

Aldebaran -

Aldebaran gym's city is also where the pokemon day-care can be found. He may not run it, but he often helps out the elderly couple currently in charge of it;

In the post-game: After adding Mu's re-match call number. Alde can ba found on the route between his and Mu's towns, he was on his way to take a meal for him, and he also shares with PC that they bought the doll in the end

Saga/Kanon -

PC doesn't really get to fight for the 3rd gym badge. Rather, it's simply handed out by Kanon, who approaches them to talk about how the leader hasn't been seen in so long;

Saga's "fall from grace" comes from a humiliating match against Aiolos, originally fighting for the E4 member promotion which he lost. Despite the clear type advantage;

It's left implied that these two were meant to be gym leaders, the matches would have been double battles.

Deathmask -

DM gym's city houses a Game corner (Casino) and a contest hall. First sighting of an E4 member is Aphrodite, who introduces PC to them;

DM is a sore loser AND has no qualms with cheating against his challengers, if it means he gets to maintain his "streak". In the battle against PC he would use an overleveled Crawdaunt;

In the post-game: PC will get a hint from Shaka's radio talkshow mentioning DM's whereabouts, in the city's underground game corner;

DM's strength is everything philosophy = DM's entire personal team consists of very strong dark types with some form of 4x weakness;

DM is well in kahoots with Saga's schemes;

Aiolia - TBA I haven't thought anything for him c':

Shaka -

Shaka gym's city is meant to be the largest and the most advanced one (Saffron and Goldenrod cities style), it has the region's largest shop for expensive and important items. It also has a radio tower, which broadcasts various programs (professor talk, loterry ticket, poke flute, etc), Shaka hosts a talk show where he commentates on PC's progress, all while actively putting down/poking fun at his defeated colleagues. Under specific time slots, he will have a guest join him, which will be an exchange between the various league's members. But the most important one is where he will be joined by the region's "champion";

Shaka is a fan-favorite across several trainers in the region, with many NPCs commentating how much they love tuning in to hear him talk & so on;

Shaka is also well known for his psychci prowess (Sabrina style);

Shaka is also deeply involved in Saga's schemes;

Dohko -

Dohko gym's city also houses the pokéathlon. With Dohko going undefeated in all the challenges, until PC comes along;

Post-game: to get Dohko's number for rematches. PC has to visit Shion after obtaining a certain number of species then, take a mail key item to Dohko. And THEN they get Dohko's number. it's a love letter, an invitation for some tea at noon

Milo - TBA I haven't thought anything for him c':

And "unfortunately", that's all I got x)

I suppose this is a lot better than trying to find all my notes scattered around all over the place. Hope it makes sense or that in the very least, it's fun to read through.

RN I focused on the classic folks bc it's the one I've been working and thinking of for the longest time.

[littleeyesofpallas]

Finally... where this whole rambling thought process started, Pokemon legends. They're a lot less gym leader-y than Alola's Trial Captains were but in Japanese both the Trial Captains and Wardens are just called "Captain."

Funny enough Mai's name in Japanese is Yone, but Marley's name in Japanese was Mai. Both Mai and Yone are pronunciations of [米] the kanji for "Rice."

I covered Lian along with Clay in the Unova post, but his name is Kikui, referring to the Jerusalem Artichoke.

Arezu is a unique one. Her name was Hinatsu, from hinatsu-boshi[火夏星] which is an old outdated term for the planet Mars, lit. "Fire Summer Star." With Arezu being a play on the Greek god, Ares, both English and Japanese names are precursors to Mars, her descendent in Sinnoh.

Calaba's name in Japanese was Yugao, from yugao[夕顔] a specific variant of the calabash gourd. Oddly it's the same plant they took Roark's name from, but the two don't appear to be related... And Calabash is where they got the English name. Also she has an obvious korpokkur look with her diminutive size and the giant butterbur leaf, yet she wasnt named after the butterbur in any way????

Iscan's name is Susuki from susuki[芒] Japanese name for "silvergrass." Scientific name Miscanthus sinensis, gives us the English name. Still no idea who he's related to, if anyone...

Palina's name is Garana Japanese approximation of Guarana. Scientific name, Paullinia cupana, gets us the English name. Same boat as Susuki, no idea who she's related to, which is hilarious because trying to puzzle these two out was literally the entire point of this whole dive into everyone's names....

Melli's name I brought up along with Karen. Tsubaki[椿]:"Camellia." Weirdly no apparent relation to Karen's name at all, but tied to Sanqua's; sazanka-hana[山茶花] the "sasanqua camellia."

Ingo really doesn't fit this series on plant names... Ingo and Emmet's names are Nobori and Kudari from the rail terms [上り] and [下り], literally just meaning "Up-going" and "Down-going," respectively. Nobori being terminus-bound, and Kudari being origin-bound.

Sabi's name was Wasabi. Just straight up, wasabi[山葵]... Totally unrelated her descendent, Cheryl's real name is Momi from momi[籾]: "unhulled rice," reflected in her braided hair design. It aligns with the Sinnoh stat specialist trainers' theme of grains.(Mai:Rice, Momi:Unhulled Rice, Buck:Wheat, Mil:Millet, Gen:Brown Rice)

Gaeric's name is Hamarenge, which is the common Japanese name hamarenge[浜蓮華] for the Weaselsnout plant, aka Uruppu-so[得撫草], which is where Wulfric(Urup) gets his name. I talked about it a little more at length when talking about Kalos.

and so long as i've got space to fill on this last image...

Irida's name is Kai, a rather weak reference to shinjugai[真珠貝]: Pearl oyster, (kai[カイ] from shinjugai[シンジュガイ]) technically if isolated kai[貝] just means "shell."

Adaman's name is Seki, similarly a heavily cropped bit of kongoseki[金剛石]: "diamond." If taken alone seki[石] just means "stone," but obviously the two clan leaders just being "shell" and "stone" without the added context doesn't really make much sense.

And just to reiterate the Three Friends of Winter bandits were covered back in the Sinnoh post.

[Kanto] [Johto] [Hoenn] [Sinnoh] [Unova] [Kalos] [Alola] [Galar] [Hisui] [Champs] [Paldea] [Paldea2] [Paldea3] [Teams] [Misc.]

[littleeyesofpallas]

Finally, in the home stretch! Last set of proper gym leaders to date, until Scarlet and Violet drop!

Milo's name in Japanese is Yarrow, which is still visibly the basis of his Galar written name on his card and his uniform. And Yarrow is a common herb with a long history of medicinal uses. The Common Yarrow's scientific name is Achillea millefolium, where they might have gotten "Milo" from for his English name.

Nessa's name is Rurina, nickname: "Ruri," from ruri-nigana[瑠璃苦菜], meaning "Lapis Lazuli(colored) Ixeridium dentatum" it doesn't appear to have any common names in English. Not sure where they got "Nessa" for the English.

Kabu's name is kabu. Kabu[蕪] is "Turnip." It refers to the same Brassica rapa as Candice's(Suzuna) name, although hers uses an older outdated kanji. Also has a homonym thing with Kabuto[兜] the traditional samurai helmet which is also incorporated into the fire(火)type Iogo on his jersey

Bea's name is Saito referring to saito[菜��]: "Kidney bean"/"Haricot." Her English name is also Bea(n).

Allister's name is just Onion, which I find really funny. Possibly alluding to him being a crybaby.

Opal's name is Poplar, like the tree.

Gordie's name goes back to using Japanese; Makuwa from makuwa-uri[真桑瓜] the "Oriental Melon." It ties into...

...Melony's Japanese name just being Melon(Meron[メロン]). I just kind of assume they had the Winter Melon in mind specifically, from her hair color and the ice type.

Piers' name, Nezu is from nezu[杜松]: "temple juniper." Like Clair, I assume this is meant to reference both the spiky leaves/needles as well the dark colored and sometimes toxic berries. Also homonym with nezu[鼠] meaning "rat" but can also refer to a certain dark gray or black color(I assume the color of rat fur) which sort of plays into the dark type too.

Raihan's name is Kibana from kibana-fuji[黄花藤] the Laburnum anagyroides, "Golden Chain/Golden Rain." Same family of plants that Drake's name is based on. Although Drake's association with it seemed a little weaker, Raihan has some unique added context; his league sponsor is MC Bank, which I assume is, along with the Golden Rain/Chain, a play on a Dragon's hoard of gold.

Bede's Japanese name was just Beet(biito[ビート]) as in the vegetable.

Marnie's name in Japanese was just Mary[マリィ], presumably from Rosemary, as it doesn't seem to relate to any plants on its own otherwise. As I recall, back before the game's release had been cause for a lot of speculation about her and Chairman Rose.

Figure I'll throw the expansion (ex)gym leaders to round things out, although half of them aren't that interesting or complicated.

Klara's name is just romanized from Kurara[クララ] and kurara[苦参] is the name of the Shrubby Sophora. Various species of the plant have uses in traditional Chinese medicine, although appropriately for Klara's type specialization, the plant's roots are poisonous.

Avory's just cropped from Savory(Seiborii[セイボリー]) the herb savory, of family Satureja.

Mustard is Mustard(Masutaado[マスタード]) sounds like Master(d) and obviously the mustard plant. (Oh and his wife's name is Mitsuba[ミツバ] from mitsuba[三つ葉] the japanese wild parsley, aka honeywart.)

Peony was also still just Peony(Pionii[ピオニー]) as a kind of joke on being the brother of Rose. His daughter Peonia's name was Shakuya[シャクヤ] from shakuyaku[芍薬], the chinese peony(Paeonia lactiflora).

[Kanto] [Johto] [Hoenn] [Sinnoh] [Unova] [Kalos] [Alola] [Galar] [Hisui] [Champs] [Paldea] [Paldea2] [Paldea3] [Teams] [Misc.]