Pokémon Divine Sword & Blessed Shield - v1.1

I can't believe I am finally writing this, but Phives and I are proud to finally present Pokémon Divine Sword & Blessed Shield, a difficulty romhack. Why release another romhack when Sacred Sword & King's Shield is out, you may ask? Well to be quite honest, that project was rushed and is not something we are particularly proud of. So, we have been working on an entirely new one ever since the release of the Crown Tundra. Now, over half a year later and a LOT of hours sunk into playtesting, we are finally ready to release the first version!

Intro - What is Pokémon Divine Sword & Blessed Shield?
Pokémon Divine Sword & Blessed Shield is a difficulty romhack, taking inspiration mostly from Drayano's work. However, I also played Radical Red last year and took some inspiration from that, although outside of QoL features those are purely optional. So don't worry if you want to play in Switch mode and use healing items in battle! We've made edits to nearly every Pokemon, mainly focusing on making egg and tutor moves available through normal level up movesets as well as providing buffs and new moves to tons of different Pokémon. Of course, there is documentation for everything included in the google drive folder with the download. We've of course redone the team of every single trainer in the game, and hope to encourage team building in order to over come these challenges. However, it is important to remember that all of this is done within the confines of Sword & Shield. We cannot make the AI super smart, nor can we force certain aspects like a level cap, etc. However, we have gone to great lengths in order to make it the best we possible could.

Notable Features:

Spoiler

• Completely reworked Raid rewards system
• All 600 Pokémon from Sword & Shield (including DLC) catchable outside of the Isle of Armor and Crown Tundra
• Overhauled boss battles
• Quality of life features such as purchasable EV reducers
• Shop overhauls in order to make competitive items easily accessible
• Healing items disabled during trainer battles (THIS IS OPTIONAL)
• Battle Items removed from the game (not optional, as X items are the new purchasable EV reducing items)
• Edited Adventure Guide for in game documentation
• Edited Pokémon & various buffs/moveset edits.

Screenshots (there are lot of them and they are BIG so here is your warning):

Spoiler

v1.1 Changelog: Return of the EXP. Candies

Spoiler: Changelog v 1.1

!!SELL ALL OF YOUR "MEDICINE" ITEMS THAT ARE IN YOUR "ITEMS" POUCH PRIOR TO UPDATING IF YOU DO NOT USE THE USABLE HEALING ITEMS PATCH!!

Healing items have been moved back to the "Medicine" pouch, and are still not usable in battle without the patch.

EXP. Candies make their return, obtainable through shops in every Pokecenter. They appear as you get Gym badges in the following tiers:

• XS - 0 Badges ₽600
• S - 2 Badges ₽1,000
• M - 4 Badges ₽3,000
• L - 6 Badges ₽9,000
• XL - 7 Badges ₽27,000

All changes regarding EXP. Candies are tentative and subject to change. Please provide your feedback!
In addition, all Nature Mints are now purchasable from the start of the game at all Pokecenters for ₽7,500.
Wishing Pieces are also in every Pokecenter for ₽5,000

As a test, Ballonlea's Pokecenter has a new NPC behind the left counter that will offer to feed your pokemon Max Soup for 3 Max Mushrooms.
Max Mushrooms can be purchased at any Pokecenter after receiving 5 Gym Badges.
In future updates, this NPC will be in all Pokecenters.
Max Mushrooms are now in the "Items" pouch.


Hammerlocke City - Centeral Pokemon Center (Right Counter) Now has the following items:

• Power Bracer
• Power Belt
• Power Lens
• Power Band
• Power Anklet
• Power Weight
• Destiny Knot
• PP Up
• Razor Claw
• Protector
• Reaper Claw
• Whipped Dream
• Sachet

Motostoke City - Souther Pokemon Center (Right Counter) Now has the following items:

• Speed Down
• HP down

Hammerlocke City - West Pokemon Center (Right Counter) Now has the following TMs:

• Bounce
• Fling
• Power Swap
• Guard Swap
• Speed Swap
• Drain Punch
• Trick Room
• Wonder Room
• Magic Room
• Razor Shell
• Mystical Fire

Hammerlocke City - East Pokemon Center (Right Counter) Now has the following TMs:

• Fire Punch
• Ice Punch
• Thunder Punch
• Solar Blade
• Self-Destruct
• Giga Drain

Video Detailing the Changes

Details for how to install are in the README included in the Google Drive folder. Please read it. Documentation is also in that folder, which is linked at the bottom of this post.

Credits & Thanks

• The amazing creators of pkNX, this project would not be possible without their hard work
• Drayano, for allowing us to reference some of their changes from Renegade Platinum.
• The creator of Radical Red, soupercell, for allowing us to use certain Pokémon edits from their romhack in ours
• https://twitter.com/__Toner___ for the logos

Pokejobs being broken is an intentional feature in order to prevent an EXP/EV exploit.
The only part of the Post Game that is currently finished is the Hop & Sordward/Shielbert section. Champions Cup rematches and such are not edited yet.

Download & Documentation​

 

[Pokestuffz]

Do you recommend dedicated EV training? Or just go through the game as normal with randomized EVs from trainers?

 

[Clydefrosch]

not gonna lie, I liked the exp candies a whole lot more than chansey spam.
spreading 600 pokemon over that small world already clutters up every route a lot, why clutter it further with exp mons? you can still force overleveling if you really want to, it's just more tedious this way, but if people wanna level through, they will and if they don't want to, they'd be conservative with the candies too.

even giving 3 evs, the feathers could gladly leave the game forever, cluttering up the bag but taking decades of grinding to be useful once, especially with the buffed ev items around.

are consumable battle items set so they return after a battle? that would be nice

 

[jsn02682]

if i restart the game, sunshine cherrim reverts to overcast cherrim, no matter what i do. i've even tried to fix it using pkhex, but no matter what happens, always overcast cherrim on game restart. really odd bug

 

[Kobazco]

Do you recommend dedicated EV training? Or just go through the game as normal with randomized EVs from trainers?

In my own personal playtesting, I did not feel pressured to EV train my Pokemon until the 7th gym. And by that point in the game, there are more than enough tools available to fully EV train a full team of 6 in under an hour due to the changes in the items.

 

[jirka607]

Is it possible to just have the all pokemon available without increased difficulty and stuff

 

[Pokestuffz]

In my own personal playtesting, I did not feel pressured to EV train my Pokemon until the 7th gym. And by that point in the game, there are more than enough tools available to fully EV train a full team of 6 in under an hour due to the changes in the items.

would training early make the other gyms too easy?

 

[MrBusiness]

Created this account just to post this. I discover you from your Miitopia content, and when I saw that trailer of this on YT I figure I give it a shot. Did my first playthrough back in June, and I had a lot of fun. Most memorable battle was when I nearly got swept by that trainer in route 8 who had Pikachu & friends(one of those friends includes a Farfetch that had murder in its eyes). I did have a blast with this mod, and I just finished my second playthrough with a grass monotype run! Set mode, no items, level cap. Not a nuzlocke because that would require multiple attempts, and I just wanted to have a fun playthrough instead of studying the docs to figure out the most optimal strategy to get through the game with minimal causalities (Maybe someday).
I did write notes on every important trainer battle while playing through the game, so I figure I share the best ones that were Rose & Leon, and the meme battle that was Kabu.

Rose - Hammerlocke
Difficulty: Very hard
Yea, I lost on my 1st attempt. I was thinking maybe bringing back Gourgeist for this fight since it knew flamethrower, but I was determined to win with this team
I lead with Rillaboom & dynamaxed it right away. It literally was my only way of taking down his Copperajah without any casualties. Got up to 3+ attack & took down his Excadrill while weakening his Sivally before going down.
Finished off Sivally with Roserade, then took care of Metagross with Ferrothorn, then it got KO by Melmetal's superpower. Went to Ludicolo that I equip with choice specs just for this battle, and fired off Focus blasts. Manage to hit 2 focus blasts in the row, and took down Melmetal, and OHKO his Ferrothorn with a critical hit, giving me the win on my 2nd try. I knew since I started this playthrough that this battle was going to be the toughest one for my team, and I sure wasn't disappointed.

Leon - Champion
Difficulty: Hard
1st try, but it was a 2-0. I dynamax my Ludicolo early just to deal with his Cinderace while setting up the rain. That made me outspeed and KO his Haxorus too with a ice move that set up the hail,so no more swift swim for me. I survived the U-turn from Dragupult and KO the incoming Seismitoad before finally getting taken down from Life orb recoil. Rillaboom versus his Dragupult hoping to do good damage with Knock off, but it OHKO with a critical hit Draco meteor.
Unfortunate, but it ended up not mattering in the end.
Whimsciott encored its Draco meteor so now it's stuck doing nothing. I was thinking maybe he would switch out so I used charm hoping he switches to charizard but he didn't. So I had to moonblast which didn't KO. It got off a u-turn because it ran out of draco meteors, although moonblast did do half to his incoming Charizard which surprised me. Whimsciott pulled through by getting off a Charm on his charizard, so I can wall it with Cradily, and then took out the weaken Dragupult easily.
That was a good battle. I guess he wasn't lying when he said we were going to have a champion time.

And then there was Kabu.

Kabu - Gym Leader
Difficulty: Very easy
Oh no, mono fire.
Turn 1: Lead Cradily & set up Stealth rock to break Blaziken's sash.
Turn 2: Switch to Roselia as a sarcifice, so that I can switch in Ludicolo for free.
Turn 3: Set up Rain dance, and sweep. GG, Kabu.

 

[Kobazco]

Created this account just to post this. I discover you from your Miitopia content, and when I saw that trailer of this on YT I figure I give it a shot. Did my first playthrough back in June, and I had a lot of fun. Most memorable battle was when I nearly got swept by that trainer in route 8 who had Pikachu & friends(one of those friends includes a Farfetch that had murder in its eyes). I did have a blast with this mod, and I just finished my second playthrough with a grass monotype run! Set mode, no items, level cap. Not a nuzlocke because that would require multiple attempts, and I just wanted to have a fun playthrough instead of studying the docs to figure out the most optimal strategy to get through the game with minimal causalities (Maybe someday).
I did write notes on every important trainer battle while playing through the game, so I figure I share the best ones that were Rose & Leon, and the meme battle that was Kabu.

Rose - Hammerlocke
Difficulty: Very hard
Yea, I lost on my 1st attempt. I was thinking maybe bringing back Gourgeist for this fight since it knew flamethrower, but I was determined to win with this team
I lead with Rillaboom & dynamaxed it right away. It literally was my only way of taking down his Copperajah without any casualties. Got up to 3+ attack & took down his Excadrill while weakening his Sivally before going down.
Finished off Sivally with Roserade, then took care of Metagross with Ferrothorn, then it got KO by Melmetal's superpower. Went to Ludicolo that I equip with choice specs just for this battle, and fired off Focus blasts. Manage to hit 2 focus blasts in the row, and took down Melmetal, and OHKO his Ferrothorn with a critical hit, giving me the win on my 2nd try. I knew since I started this playthrough that this battle was going to be the toughest one for my team, and I sure wasn't disappointed.

Leon - Champion
Difficulty: Hard
1st try, but it was a 2-0. I dynamax my Ludicolo early just to deal with his Cinderace while setting up the rain. That made me outspeed and KO his Haxorus too with a ice move that set up the hail,so no more swift swim for me. I survived the U-turn from Dragupult and KO the incoming Seismitoad before finally getting taken down from Life orb recoil. Rillaboom versus his Dragupult hoping to do good damage with Knock off, but it OHKO with a critical hit Draco meteor.
Unfortunate, but it ended up not mattering in the end.
Whimsciott encored its Draco meteor so now it's stuck doing nothing. I was thinking maybe he would switch out so I used charm hoping he switches to charizard but he didn't. So I had to moonblast which didn't KO. It got off a u-turn because it ran out of draco meteors, although moonblast did do half to his incoming Charizard which surprised me. Whimsciott pulled through by getting off a Charm on his charizard, so I can wall it with Cradily, and then took out the weaken Dragupult easily.
That was a good battle. I guess he wasn't lying when he said we were going to have a champion time.
View attachment 275321
And then there was Kabu.

Kabu - Gym Leader
Difficulty: Very easy
Oh no, mono fire.
Turn 1: Lead Cradily & set up Stealth rock to break Blaziken's sash.
Turn 2: Switch to Roselia as a sarcifice, so that I can switch in Ludicolo for free.
Turn 3: Set up Rain dance, and sweep. GG, Kabu.

Really glad to see you enjoyed it!

 

[jirka607]

Really glad to see you enjoyed it!

Hi, is it possible to use only pokemon spawns and not the harder trainers?
thank you

 

[airwall]

Is any DLC included in this hack?

 

[jakeelsier]

So weirdly enough I got the intro to show up as blessed shield and all. Then in game there is some stuff that is from the hack and some not. But the majority of it is vanilla.
I have all the stuff in my contents folder and I even experimented with using mod manager just to see if it works but nothing.
Any ideas. It's the lastest patch of atmosphere and pokemon so iunno.

 

[potchy]

Is it possible to use this on top of my King's Shield save?

 

[potchy]

edit: oops, posted twice

 

[Eevenin]

I'd love to try out this modhack, but I'm an indecisive person. The lack of EXP Candy makes me worry that I'll be halfway through the game before realizing I could use a level 7 Abra or whatever I've had sitting in a box for ages, but for the fact that it needs levels. There's Chanseys (et. al) to use for leveling along the routes, but wouldn't the Exp Share just mean I'll end up overleveling in the process of catching this new team member up to the rest, and defeat the purpose of EXP curves and edited trainer battles in the first place?

Also, does this romhack make use of increased AI for raid partners, and/or is it compatible with other mods that would improve the ability of raid partners? Since it would be a terrible idea to go online with modded games.

 

[Lamarr]

I just started and was looking at the documentation to see what would be an interesting starter choice. I saw that starters can get their hidden ability and have some egg moves move to their normal move set, but i think that'll end up making everyone avoid intellleon whose ability and moveset is way worse than the other 2 starters. Would you possibly consider buffing intelleon to be on par with the other 2? idk how youd go about that though.

 

[pato19]

I'd love to try out this modhack, but I'm an indecisive person. The lack of EXP Candy makes me worry that I'll be halfway through the game before realizing I could use a level 7 Abra or whatever I've had sitting in a box for ages, but for the fact that it needs levels. There's Chanseys (et. al) to use for leveling along the routes, but wouldn't the Exp Share just mean I'll end up overleveling in the process of catching this new team member up to the rest, and defeat the purpose of EXP curves and edited trainer battles in the first place?

Also, does this romhack make use of increased AI for raid partners, and/or is it compatible with other mods that would improve the ability of raid partners? Since it would be a terrible idea to go online with modded games.

Until 5th badge you won't feel the need to grind THAT much. But after that the level curve is just ridiculous, and without candies, you just need to wait Blisseys with 5% rate to appear on tiny routes like Route 9.

At this state of work of the hack, if your main worry is about grinding, don't play it at all.

 

[Eevenin]

Until 5th badge you won't feel the need to grind THAT much. But after that the level curve is just ridiculous, and without candies, you just need to wait Blisseys with 5% rate to appear on tiny routes like Route 9.

At this state of work of the hack, if your main worry is about grinding, don't play it at all.

That isn't what I was trying to convey. What I meant was that there's no way to bring up any "new" team members in a meaningful way, since the leveling option of choice is the utterly uncontrollable method of farming EXP 'mons instead of being able to curate it to the specific 'mon I want on my team. Ergo, leveling a new 'mon that has started at a much lower level (and requires higher investment) will simply overlevel the rest of my team anyway and make the author's concerns about lack of balance moot. Also, yikes, just thinking about those HP EVs that I'll have to scrape off later...

 

[pato19]

That isn't what I was trying to convey. What I meant was that there's no way to bring up any "new" team members in a meaningful way, since the leveling option of choice is the utterly uncontrollable method of farming EXP 'mons instead of being able to curate it to the specific 'mon I want on my team. Ergo, leveling a new 'mon that has started at a much lower level (and requires higher investment) will simply overlevel the rest of my team anyway and make the author's concerns about lack of balance moot. Also, yikes, just thinking about those HP EVs that I'll have to scrape off later...

Trust me, you'll never get overleveled, and your new pokemons will get there with a LOT of difficulties (again, Blisseys are just scarce with thouse %). I tried to train a Dracovish and it's just boring and impossible. And on top of that trainers jumps 10-15 levels between gyms even if you face just 5 trainers on those routes. You won't get EXP neither for old nor new pals sadly.

Why I'm still playing it? Because trainers' pokemon and moveset choices absolutely rocks and once I'm at gym level it's really fun. But leveling curve is plain bad, with a lot of arbitrary choices IMHO. It's the first time that I want to hack rare candies lol

 

[ZuraJanai]

Really hope we get an update to this awesome mod, I completed the base game and the swordward and shieldbert section, really really wanna play crown tundra and isle of armor with this mod, but I guess trainers havent been edited yet on the DLC?

 

[Nikonyao]

It's an ok mod and I'm doing a playthrough of this on my Twitch channel (italian only), but I'm kind of perplexed. I've got the same confusion of Eevenin and I haven't found a "disable exp share" mod to work with this version.

I'm not sure I'll be able to mod it myself, atleast without knowledge of what to search for... is there any way I can read something about modding Sword/Shield to make the mod myself? That would atleast rebalance the leveling stuff when leveling new pokemons. The only other option I've found is picking up an entirely new team of 6 mons and exping with them instead that my main team, but uuuhh... not cool uh.