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Made this back during the Art Submissions. Of course I've altered it accordingly, which mostly involved deletion of moves. (Swords Dance, etc...) This has made my moveset seem somewhat minimalist. But that's OK! There's nothing wrong with that. So let's begin!
Level Up Moves:
1 Tackle
1 Leer
5 Force Palm
8 Astonish
13 Pursuit=
18 Vacuum Wave
19 Low Kick=
25 Bide
33 Bite
40 Skull Bash
50 Dark Pulse=
57 Trump Card
62 Close Combat=
69 Superpower=
75 Punishment
80 Baton Pass=
Unique VGMs: Pursuit, Low Kick, Dark Pulse, Close Combat, Superpower, Baton Pass.
In the above list, I've placed "=" signs next to the Very Good Moves. There are 16 moves in the level up moveset.
TM Moves/HM Moves:
TM01 Focus Punch=
TM06 Toxic=
TM08 Bulk Up=
TM10 Hidden Power=
TM11 Sunny Day
TM12 Taunt=
TM15 Hyper Beam=
TM17 Protect=
TM18 Rain Dance=
TM20 Safeguard
TM20 Frustration=
TM26 Earthquake=
TM27 Return= ***
TM29 Psychic=
TM30 Shadow Ball=
TM31 Brick Break=
TM32 Double Team
TM41 Torment
TM42 Façade=
TM43 Secret Power
TM44 Rest=
TM45 Attract (if this Pokemon is going to have a gender)
TM46 Thief
TM48 Skill Swap
TM52 Focus Blast=
TM58 Endure
TM63 Embargo
TM66 Payback=
TM68 Giga Impact
TM70 Flash
TM71 Stone Edge=
TM73 Thunder Wave=
TM78 Captivate (if this Pokemon is going to have a gender)
TM79 Dark Pulse=***
TM80 Rock Slide=
TM82 Sleep Talk=
TM83 Natural Gift
TM90 Substitute=
HM01 Cut
HM06 Rock Smash
HM08 Rock Climb
I think I took a little bit longer on this than I thought I would when I started to keep forgetting stuff. I hope that this hasn't caused any weird illegalities, lol. I also kind of skimped on the egg move list, but I made it Humanshape / Ground so it should be OK. Regardless, I'm quite sure you guys will find something to talk about, lol. For now, I'm just glad that I finally finished this thing. It was fun doing this, but it was harder to keep track of everything than I thought it would be.
Unique VGMs are bolded. That is, a VGM is bolded once only (including equivalencies like Return/Frustration) and as soon as it appears. Repeat moves are starred. This is to ease counting.
WARNING: The level-up explanation dropdown contains LOTS OF TEXT.
EDIT: SolarBeam -> Acupressure and Roar -> Psychic.
EDIT2: Forgot to list Swagger as a repeat in the TM list, so SolarBeam is back in.
General explanation
I don't know how many other people did this, but choosing the VGMs that I wanted was the first thing that I did. This is probably why no one seems to have given Psycho Shift a look but me <.< (It was admittedly hard to put in since it comes from the Flying egg group and nowhere else.) The moves required to make the mixed Life Orb set tick are basically the only ones I picked with the competitive aspect of Voodoom in mind. The other moves chosen, including non-VGMs, are entirely flavour-inspired. My reason for this is that Voodoom has already fulfilled its concept of forming a formidable offensive pairing with Togekiss. Seriously, it's as if we thought to ourselves, "Wouldn't Lucario have been an awesome Togekiss partner if it resisted Electric, had a strong Dark STAB, and didn't die horribly to Fire!?!?" The job is already done. The rest is flavour.
I did my best to follow existing protocol in the games, and a lot of the moves that I rejected came with this in mind. For the purposes of this movepool, I considered a move a minor violation of protocol if Voodoom would be the only Fighting-type OR the only Dark-type with the move as a status move or non-STAB attack. Of course, it follows that a major violation of protocol occurs if Voodoom would be the only Fighting-type AND the only Dark-type with the move as a status move or non-STAB attack. In particular, this meant no signature moves like Needle Arm and Twineedle. I took this seriously for most of the process so I could fit in blatant violations of protocol due to VGM inclusion or painfully fitting flavour reasons. Psycho Shift is the one "troll move" that sticks out in this regard. Following this protocol, I fortunately got extremely close to the move limit, ridding me of the justification to look through rejected moves again for more flavour goodies.
One thing that bugs me, though, is having Grudge as the final level-up move. No existing Pokémon has Grudge as its final level-up move. Oh, well. The seams of protocol will inevitably break when dealing with the nonexistent Fighting/Dark typing on Voodoom.
Master "safe" VGM list
The following VGMs are what I considered probably allowed based on the allowed/disallowed lists and what was said in the OP.
Aura Sphere Y
Baton Pass !E
Blizzard N
Block N
Body Slam N
Brick Break RM
Bulk Up RM
Close Combat Y
Counter !T
Crunch N
Dark Pulse RL
Earthquake YM
Facade RM
Focus Blast RM
Focus Punch RM
Frustration RM
Glare N
Gravity N
Hidden Power RM
Hyper Beam RM
Ice Beam N
Ice Punch N
Knock Off !T
Low Kick !T
Mach Punch !E
Mean Look N
Night Slash YE
Pain Split !T
Payback RL
Perish Song !E
Protect RM
Psychic !M
Psycho Shift !L
Pursuit !L
Rain Dance YM
Rest RM
Return RM
Rock Slide RM
Shadow Sneak N
Sleep Talk RM
Stone Edge YM
Substitute RM
Sucker Punch N
Superpower N
Taunt RL
Thunder Wave !M
Toxic RM
Vacuum Wave RT
Legend
R = Required move
Y = A move I absolutely wanted on Voodoom, or a required move stemming from such a move
! = Leftover move to fill up the VGM limit
N = Not chosen
L = Level-up move
M = Machine move
T = Tutor move
E = Egg move
Level-up moves
H Charge
S Shock Wave
S Astonish S Pursuit S Taunt
*5 Pursuit
7 Faint Attack
*9 Taunt
14 Acupressure
17 Pin Missile
21 Swagger 26 Payback
31 Dark Pulse
37 Aura Sphere
42 Close Combat
47 Psycho Shift
51 Snatch
58 Grudge
Concept
This level-up movepool concentrates on a duality between light and darkness (Aura Sphere and Dark Pulse), as well as the psychological aspects of the mythology behind "voodoo" and related belief systems. The idea is that each of the two halves that make up Voodoom is imbued with a blessing and a curse respectively, but the cursed aspect is what gets the attention usually. Indeed, many of the moves seem to be of an "evil" nature, but in reality many of them are "neutral" psychological weapons that feed off of the paranoia of anyone who looks at it.
Voodoom evolves from its pre-evolution by leveling up knowing the move Charge. It learns Shock Wave upon evolving, signifying a discharge of the electricity it received after the lightning strike that triggered its evolution. The mindgames start with the basic Astonish and Taunt, as well as Pursuit to follow the victim even when it tries to flee. The psychological warfare gets more advanced when Voodoom starts to make use of its pins with Acupressure and Pin Missile (Doug's "throwing knives" idea), as well as showing definite signs of movement (Faint Attack and Swagger) to taunt the foe further.
Now the victim has really struck a nerve. Payback and Dark Pulse really bring out the vengeful "dark side" of Voodoom (I couldn't fit in the actual move Revenge... whatever), but then the "light side" balances it out with Aura Sphere. Eventually, it starts to get desperate and tired of the keep-away game, and it suddenly rushes the enemy with Close Combat. The attacking movepool is now complete. The final three moves, however, finish off the victim through the ultimate mindgames. Voodoom's hypnotic powers (Hypnosis doesn't exactly work considering what's going on) culminate with Psycho Shift and Snatch. Finally, the foe finishes Voodoom off, only to find that Voodoom has the last laugh with Grudge!
Inspiration
My inspiration for this concept came from several sources. The move progression itself is mostly derived directly from several other Pokémon. The transition is Honchkrow -> Infernape -> Sharpedo -> Lucario -> Banette. The four main exceptions are seen in Psycho Shift, the needle moves and the lack of Mach Punch, the last relegated to egg moves because I saw Voodoom's Speed as being derived from the sneaky tactics that tend to characterize the Dark type.
The duality concept was the result of looking at existing Pokémon concepts and rejected concept art from this project. I felt that Voodoom could be more fleshed out than just a generic evil popular-voodoo doll. Some of the artists (Yilx comes to mind at the moment) utilized the "misunderstood but benevolent" concept that is prevalent in some Dark-types (particularly Absol), but they seemed like a watering-down of the mystique of the Dark type. (Absol made up for this with its appearances being warnings of disaster rather than bringers of disaster.) I considered the fact that real Louisiana voodoo was extremely different from "popular voodoo" in that the pins are meant to bless, rather than to curse. I then realized that Voodoom consisted of two halves stitched together and came up with the duality concept.
There are two ways to consider the halves. The first, probably more obvious, way is to consider the left and right halves. The second way is to consider each color as representative of each "side". Right now, I'm inclined to go with the latter.
For me, the voodoo doll concept is all about the paranoia and misinformation arising from popular distortions of the original mythology, notably horror movies (I mentioned Child's Play in the name submission thread). Subtle nods to Voodoom's real nature include Aura Sphere and Psycho Shift. An idea I had is that one side can only use Dark Pulse, and the other only Aura Sphere. Additionally, Psycho Shift plays on the placebo effect, as the victim believes that it is being cursed when it's all merely a bodily reaction to a trick of the mind.
More on the concept, particularly aspects that seem curiously absent, is explained in explanations of the rest of the movepool.
Unrepeated VGMs: 7
Unrepeated moves: 16
Machines
TM01 Focus Punch
TM03 Water Pulse TM06 Toxic TM08 Bulk Up TM10 Hidden Power
TM11 Sunny Day
*TM12 Taunt TM15 Hyper Beam
TM17 Protect
TM18 Rain Dance TM21 Frustration
TM22 SolarBeam
TM23 Iron Tail TM26 Earthquake *TM27 Return TM29 Psychic TM31 Brick Break
TM32 Double Team
TM39 Rock Tomb
TM41 Torment TM42 Facade
TM43 Secret Power TM44 Rest
TM45 Attract
*TM49 Snatch TM52 Focus Blast
TM58 Endure
*TM66 Payback
TM68 Giga Impact
TM70 Flash TM71 Stone Edge TM73 Thunder Wave
TM78 Captivate
*TM79 Dark Pulse TM80 Rock Slide TM82 Sleep Talk
TM83 Natural Gift
*TM87 Swagger TM90 Substitute
HM04 Strength
HM06 Rock Smash
HM08 Rock Climb
The idea is that Voodoom's "magic wand" capabilities aren't natural, but rather an artificially devised vessel for channeling the TMs that trainers give to it. Thus, Voodoom is rather brutish with its wand and can cast only specific, beam-like variations of various elemental spells, such as using Water Pulse but not BubbleBeam or any of that. It's also not that good at casting more environment-altering moves, so the optional Hail and Sandstorm are out. Some extra tools that couldn't make it to the level-up list are also present, as well as some rock-related moves like the chosen HMs and Rock Tomb. Finally, I sneak in a little humor move, Iron Tail. (Just imagine Voodoom using Iron Tail, man. Just do it.)
Unrepeated VGMs: 19
Unrepeated moves: 36
Tutor moves
Icy Wind Knock Off Vacuum Wave
Snore
Spite
Swift
Mud-Slap
Twister
Headbutt Low Kick
Pain Split
Worry Seed
Role Play
Double-Edge Counter
Defense Curl
Really more of the same idea as the machine moves. Some of the remaining chosen VGMs find their way here. A lot of the mimic-based moves are here as well, notably Pain Split. I also added a slightly trollish move in Worry Seed, since it does fit the concept pretty well other than the seed part, which one could say that Voodoom conjures.
Unrepeated VGMs: 5
Unrepeated moves: 16
Breeding (Humanshape / Ground)
Baton Pass
Imprison Mach Punch
Night Slash
Perish Song Screech
SmellingSalt
Oy, I didn't pay a lot of attention to the finer details of getting these moves bred when I made this last part of Voodoom's movepool, and I honestly don't intend to. Like I said in the beginning, the legalities should be fine, considering one of the egg groups is the infamous Ground. Actually, Ground was the egg group that I had to add in order to get my last chosen VGMs in there, particularly Baton Pass.
You may have been wondering what happened to the swordplay aspect of Voodoom's concept. See, the thing is, Voodoom's "sword" is a sewing needle. A sewing needle does not make a good sword or even a good claw implement. Nonetheless, I felt a need to include either Night Slash or Crunch, and Crunch was kind of bad to put in for obvious reasons. Thus, the only cutting move, Night Slash (a.k.a. "Blade Testing"), is an egg move. I also really wanted to put Acupressure here instead of on the level list, so that Voodoom had to blend with an Eastern legend or something to get it, but alas, Voodoom must breed with Bug or Water 3 Pokémon. Eww.
VGMs: 4
Moves: 7
Total unrepeated VGMs: 35
Total unrepeated moves: 75
Important omission: Ice Beam
You may have noticed that, despite my fighting for Ice Beam in the allowed list, I have decided not to use it. This is because the ultimate purpose of Ice Beam over Hidden Power Ice is to lessen pressure on fighting a specific Zapdos set (SpD Zapdos) that is IMO inferior to the other major variants of Zapdos anyway. Plus, even SpD Zapdos is forced to spam Roost to survive ten (!) of Voodoom's attacks, one of which may critical-hit at any time (about 47.55% probability of happening, more if Voodoom decides to mix it up with Dark Pulse flinch attempts). I attempted to consult reachzero about excluding Ice Beam, but in the end I decided that Ice Beam wasn't needed. I have, nonetheless, included Psychic for flavour, despite potential cries that it tips the scales against Tentacruel, because I am pretty confident that 4MSS will balance this out, and Tentacruel isn't that important a threat, anyway.
Final statement
Whew, I had a lot to say about my movepool! I hope I didn't forget anything really obvious (I almost forgot Acupressure yesterday -.-) and I hope that I've explained some of my zanier decisions to a satisfactory extent!
Noteable Things: I've done something interesting. Voodoll/Voodoom learns Thundershock by breeding so if Voodoll dosen't get Thudershock via Breeding he won't evolve ever.
My second attempt at a moveset submission. No one saw my Colossoil one because I was a tad too late to submit it.
Soooooooo.....
H. Body Slam - Pound - Acupressure - Spite - Bide 7. Spite 12. Bide 16. Imprison 21. Pin Missile 25. Revenge 30. Thunder Wave 36. Payback 43. Grudge 49. Beat Up 56. Substitute 62. Punishment 69. Aura Sphere 75. Pain Split
6 VGMs; 15 total (17 counting repeats)
A little flavor explanation for T-Wave:
"Voodoom, despite having taken numerous electrical shocks throughout its lifetime, cannot utilize the electrical energy it has absorbed beyond weak impulses. However, by channeling these impulses, it is able to use them to immobilize its opponents,making it a valuable asset."
I chose Superpower over CC because 'Kiss would hate the Sp.Def drop from CC, whereas Superpower's backfire is remedied by Bulk Up. Still a bit undecided on that, though.
Got all the essential moves in there, including Ice Beam & Blizzard, and plenty of good flavor moves.
Force Palm (Hariyama) Arm Thrust (Hariyama) Teeter Dance (Cacturne, Mr. Mime) Baton Pass (Mr. Mime) Counter (Hitmonchan, Cacturne) Needle Arm (Cacturne)
2 VGMs; 6 total
To meet both sides halfway, I have Needle Arm, but as an Egg Move, therefore making it even more undesirable due to risk of losing other important moves.
Ice Punch Icy Wind Knock Off Sucker Punch Vacuum Wave
Last Resort Snore Spite Mud-slap Superpower Pain Split
Consider this thread closed to new movepool submissions. Please wrap up any legality or last minute issues. I will be selecting a slate tomorrow.
Incidentally I've seen a few movepools with Endeavor. Right now I'm nuetral on this move, as Voodoom has no immunities to either hazards or weather. I don't think it will be competitive even with priority. Roar is not allowed, phazing is too generically powerful to be grandfathered in with a metagame where Stealth Rock is an assumed battle condition and stall is common.
2nd round:
Utopio:
Vacuum Wave is a VGM, but you're well below the limit anyway (you are at 32 after counting VM), so everything is legal.
capefeather:
Roar is not allowed.
Remove it and you have room for another VGM if you so choose.
doominic77:
It's Acupressure, not Acupuncture.
Roar is not allowed.
Ice Punch is a VGM.
Simply remove Roar and you retain legality.
Heavy Octillery:
Sunny Day is not a VGM, but Hyper Beam is, so that balances out on your TM count.
By my count you're 3 VGMs (38/35) over the limit.
Finish up your movepools, slate selections will be coming up tomorrow.
I love your backstory of your movepool. I think the concept of the doll being frustrated at its uselessness for so long when all of a sudden a freak electric shock powers it up (along the lines of Peter Parker and the spider bite) is genius.
I would definitely vote for it except for a few things. I would apprectiate the additions of Needle Arm and Submission for flavor and the removal of sucker punch for potential to be broken.
Ok, all done. Take this as a changes log for any future changes.
Aug. 14 11:53 MDT - Fixed up some stuff. Added Close Combat to level up moves.
Aug. 14 2:48 MDT - Got rid of Mach Punch and added Psycho Shift. Changed the level that Voodoom gets CC and Dark Pulse. Added Jump Kick (not to be confused with High Jump Kick) to the movepool.
Aug. 14 3:00 MDT - Replaced CC with Superpower. Had to add Rock Smash
Alright, I've fixed my movepool and am now satisfied with it enough...............except that I had to ditch Gravity, which I thought would be cool for it. However, there were so many moves I wanted to keep, so I ditched it, Stone Edge (since CC isn't there, I don't need it), and Low Kick to knock it down to 35 even. Also moved Aura Sphere to the Level Up list since it's an integral move to 'Doom, especially w/o Gravity to offset Fail Blast's accuracy.
All changes will be edited into the original moveset post in just a few moments after this sentence.
I checked over the movepool again. All are legal, but that does not mean all will be entering my slate. I will list those below and will put up the slate shortly.
Unfortunately the Wireless at the resort is on the fritz so I will not be on IRC tonight, I am using the wireless they have in the resort Club House off of my laptop.
