Hello Smogonites, this is the warstory of the germans DaFlo aka chico and Yoshi aka 13Random37 and their journey through the 2012 season, which ended in 3 participations and finally 2 trips and the qualification for the Pokemon World Championship.
DaFlo's warstory about the trip to Essen:
Hello Smogonites, I would like to introduce myself in a few sentences.
First of all I am 17 years old and from Germany, Bavaria . I have been
competing at the Video Game Championships since 2010 but never reached
more than top 16 but I have been two times at Worlds as a spectator
because my sister won two times in Germany. This year I finally did it
and won a trip to Hawaii when I placed 4th in Germany, Essen. Some of
you know me as DaFlo on the Skarmbliss server, others know me as chico. I
have been training for this year´s VGC since the rules were announced. I
was testing stuff a few months and so it came to my mind that Volcarona
is such an awesome Pokémon in this year´s metagame. So I was building a
team around Volcarona. It worked but perfectly but after a while,
everybody started playing Heatran or Terrakion. This was the reason I
was testing other stuff but in the end I went for Volcarona and it
definetily worked. So I had to choose five other pokémon. I was training
a lot on the Skarmbliss server and it was pretty fast clear that the
top Pokémon would be Latios, Zapdos, Garchomp, Hitmontop, Metagross etc.
I did choose Garchomp, Hitmontop, Zapdos, Tyranitar and Abomasnow as
partners for my Volcarona but did not play them completely standard. I
will explain that later on.
So let´s start with Volcarona.
Volcarona @ Charty Berry | Flame Body | Timid
6 HP | 252 Sp.Atk | 252 Spe
Quiver Dance | Heat Wave | Bug Buzz | Protect
My start of the team ! Awesome lead with Fake Out Hitmontop ! Most of
time it has got +1 and then there are only some Pokémon who can really
stop Volcarona. Would definetily play it again !
Garchomp @ Haban Berry | Sand Veil | Jolly
6 HP | 252 Atk. | 252 Spe
Dragon Claw | Rock Slide | Earthquake | Protect
I was expecting much more Sandstorm teams, so I went for Garchomp. I
prefered the faster version of Garchomp over the bulky one because I
tested both of them and the faster Garchomp was in my opinion better
because I was also afraid of random Hidden Power Ice attacks. It also
saved me in my Top 8 match against tblakey.
Hitmontop @ Fight Gem | Intimidate | Adamant
96 HP | 252 Atk. | 4 Sp.Def | 156 Spe.
Close Combat | Mach Punch | Sucker Punch | Fake Out
Pretty fast Hitmontop, had to be faster than other Hitmontops in order
to be able to quiver dance with my Volcarona. Worked pretty good and
then on my best decision, I chose Mach Punch over Wide Guard. I really
liked that Mach Punch Fighting Gem. Thanks to Mach Punch I could deal
two battles when my opponent was leading Weavile | Chandelure. Love it
<3.
Zapdos @ Sitrus Berry | Pressure | Modest
124 HP | 252 Sp.Atk | 80 Sp.Def | 48 Spe
Thunderbolt | Heat Wave | Discharge | Protect
I know this seems pretty random. I thought there would be much more
rain. I really like the Discharge combo with Garchomp but most of time I
was using Protect + Discharge. I do not regret playing Discharge
because in my R3 battle I had to play against rain and attacked with
Discharge and got the double para. It was also kind of defensive which I
also do not regret playing, it really saved me in my Top 8 battle.
Tyranitar @ Chople Berry |Sand Stream | Adamant
128 HP | 252 Atk. | 124 Spe
Crunch | Rock Slide | Low Kick | Protect
Pretty standard Tyranitar, saved me from rain. Played it a little bit
faster in order to be faster than random Metagross. Nothing more to say
about that.
Abomasnow @ Choice Scarf | Snow Warning | Naive
6 HP | 252 Sp.Atk | 252 Spe
Blizzard | Giga Drain | Ice Shard | Shadow Ball
Was also a nice check against rain but never really played it. Only
picked it a few times. I really liked it in my team preview because many
people were choosing there Chandelures etc. against it so I could
easily lead with Tyranitar and clean everything up.
09.03.2012 :
It was just one day away from the VGC. I did not feel good that day so I
did not go to school. Overmore still had to train some of my Pokémon
and some of my sister´s. Was a litte bit skyping around with Massi and
when he left, I went to the barber shop and let my hair cut off because I
knew I was gonna win and knew that I would be on the pictures :3. Well,
just kidding ^^ So my dad, sister and I were driving all the way to
Essen.
10.03.2012 :
We arrived about 5am in the morning and saw the first people standing in
front of the location. We were searching for a parking lot and when we
finally found one I went out of the car and was refreshing up myself.
Was a little bit relaxing in our car and then saw Massi, Yoshi etc.
walking to the location. So I went out of the car and went to them, when
they were standing in the line. Met all of my friends there and so we
were waiting for the start of the tourney. Registration went fast and so
R1 began. I cannot remember that much, only that I was leading
Hitmontop and Volcarona while she was leading Terrakion and Carracosta
which I was really afraid since I was not playing Wide Guard. So I faked
out her Terrakion and went for the Quiver Dance while she flinched with
Terrakion and attacked with Waterfall. She was burned by Flame Body and
next turn I went for CC and Protect and won easily afterwards 4:0.
Second match I cannot remember anything, I just can remember that I won
4:0. Third round I had to play against a pretty solid rain team. It even
had Ferrothorn but as mentioned before, I started with Hitmontop and
Zapdos, went for Discharge and went for the double para. So the next
turns were not that difficult and once again I went 4:0. So i made it
to the finalists lounge. Was hackchecked etc. and of course everything
was ok. But now, would I lost my concentration like last year or was I
am going to handle the situation and just continue playing well? We will
see. I think we were 28 player in the finalists lounge so only 4 people
got a bye. I was not one them. So I had to battle Saika, a member of
the Bavarian Pokémon Elite. She played Weavile, Chandelure, Garchomp and
Zapdos. I led with Hitmontop and Tyranitar. I protected with Ttar and
mach punched her Weavile, which went down with sand stream damage and
she attacked with Heat Wave. Cannot remember much more, only that I
played safe and won in the end with Garchomp. Then I went for my T16
match and had to play against a member of a Pokémon community called
Filb. Was not that difficult so I won 3:0. Then I was only one win away
from Hawaii. I could friend clause with Flame who placed later on 2nd
and had to face tblakey. I saved the video and uploaded it on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcN1FoOEbuE&context=C44db2bdADvjVQa1PpcFOV79lGpdqIe3Qj6O7goxJzgc4Gtl0z8W8=
I did it. I fucking did it. This moment was so amazing. I cannot really
discribe it. I just did it. So I had to battle Flame in the semi final
but did not care much about that and was selecting my Pokémon with a
dice and let the moves select randomly by letting the time run out ^^
Lost 0:1 to him but still did not really care ^^ So it was over. I did
it. I was so happy but on the other hand I was really sad because Massi
and Yoshi, my friend I was practising all the time on Skarmbliss were
kicked out. Massi was haxxed pretty bad and Yoshi just missplayed. So we
made some photos and all the stuff like that. Then I waited for my
sister who was still playing seniors. She lost in T16 due hax. After
that we went home and arrived at home about 11pm. Now I can go to Hawaii
for the second time. I still cannot believe it. I am really hyped for
Worlds.
Special thanks to Massi, drug_duck and Yoshi for training with me all
the time on PO. Also many thanks to wii, SolaR and daatengu ! I also
hope that tblakey can still make it to Worlds. He does deserve it !
Yoshiiiiii's part:
Since I might be quite unknown here, let me introduce myself a little bit before going into details about pokemon :)
I'm 16 years old master and playing Pokemon on a competitive level since 2008. My first appearance at a VGC was in 2010 in Cologne and I attended 2011 in Paris and Cologne again, but couldn't place any better than Top16. However, my online rankings and tournement results were quite good in those years and I trained really hard, so I didn't want to give up on Pokemon without having been to worlds even once, so I decided to give it a last shot this year and do the whole training and preparation once again. So like in the years before, I started playing in early September some weeks after the rules were offically announced because I wanted the metagame to be stable. Rain seemed to be a huge threat, Trick Room as well and Hail, too. It seemed to be difficult to use goodstuff without hard counters to rain like Ludicolo, Gastrodon Cresselia or Abomasnow and even with those you could lose. The first Pokemon I had a special ''feeling'' about was Rotom-W, which was, in my opinion, a good answer to Rain and a good Pokemon for goodstuff in general. But I stopped playing on PO because I felt the meta was too random to think about concrete teams. I started playing again in the mid of October, with a rain team I built with Dark_Psiana this time. Politoed, Toxicroak, Thundurus/Zapdos, Kingdra, Garchomp, Scizor which was quite successful, but stopped by certain things. After that, I had funny teams with Yanmega and Sharpedo, who did hilariously really decent. On the 15th of October (yeah, I looked that up :D) I made a great decision in uniting the teams of Massi, drug_duck and me to form a team of Meta, Chomp, Zapdos, Cresselia, Hitmontop, Ludicolo. Funny how Hitmontop, Zapdos, Chomp and Meta was using the basic strategy of Tailwind along with bulky heavy hitters like adamant bulky Chomp and Meta. Massi and me started to perfect the team in November. Chople Tyranitar, Flying Gem Scizor, Bulky Adamant Haban Chomp, Hitmontop, Ludicolo and bulky Sitrus Zapdos with Tailwind was able to secure us high rankings (cheaphunter #1 for a long time, a lot of accounts in Top 10, Massi's and mine). We were really confident only changing little things like EV spreads on Zapdos and Tyranitar and replacing Ludicolo with Latios in the end of December. In January, I consolidated my time with shinycarletto who contacted me in order to get some training and do team building. We built a team around Volcarona with the mons I was used to use. It worked wonders! I was so sure to be able to win a trip that time because no one was prepared for Volcarona and I could easily get 3 accounts in Top10 and was very confident. I talked to the best players on PO at that time, like Matty85 or Ben7000 who gave me great input for my teams and helped me fixing little issues, thanks! Me and shinycarletto stopped using Volcarona, because we felt that it was a little bit overpowered and we didn't want to publish it too much, but it was too late. When I tried using the team 1 month later, it didn't work as well as it did before and I was quite sad tbh :( We came to the conclusion, that we needed to change Volcarona and Latios joined the team once again. In the following testing, I made everything less bulky and faster after I lost to random scarfers because I didn't outspeed them in Tailwind. This is the final version I got 2 weeks before the VGC in Germany, when I finally started to collect my mons (thanks to Billa and Massi!) and EV train them:
massiBOSS / 13Billa37 @ Fight Gem
Trait: Intimidate
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Fake Out
- Sucker Punch
- Close Combat
- Wide Guard
Really standard in the current Metagame. It's used to support Latios, Zapdos or even Meta to get their moves like Tailwind of. I toyed with Helping Hand here, but didn't use it in the end.
Zapdos @ Electric Gem
Trait: Pressure
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Tailwind
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Thunderbolt
- Heat Wave
Standard as hell but with a cruel surprise for the likes of Garchomp, Salamence and so on. I had to forego Protect/Detect, but it worked out for me quite nice, at least in Single Elimination. Tailwind is really nice to have, but with this version of the team, I didn't need it necessarily. Thunderbolt is very powerful with Modest and Electric Gem and Heat Wave obviously helps a lot against steel- and grass types and multi target moves are always nice to have!
mEteoR @ Dragon Gem
Trait: Levitate
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Draco Meteor
- Protect
- Psychic
- Tailwind
Pretty standard, too. I considered replacing Tailwind, but I kept it and it helped me to win the semifinal in Paris!
cHamP @ Haban Berry / Focus Sash
Trait: Sand Veil
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- Protect
- Dragon Claw
- Stone Edge
My personal hero of this years metagame. I started with 124 speed EVs and adamant, but it got faster all the time lol. In the end I had 244 EVs iirc ^^ It saved me so many times, it is hilarious :D Stone Edge was chosen over Rock Slide because it's not blocked by Wide Guard and deals so much more damage against Zapdos.
hAvoC @ Sitrus Berry / Dark Gem
Trait: Sand Stream
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Crunch
- Rock Slide
- Low Kick
- Protect
Tyranitar is my main check to TR and was used to stop special based teams with cores like Cresselia, Zapdos, Chandelure for example. In addition to that, it checks Volcarona, Latios.
rYzoR @ Flying Gem
Trait: Technican
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Acrobatics
- Bullet Punch
- Bug Bite
- Protect
In Essen, I used Scizor which was a huge mistake... I knew it wouldn't be that great because of the PO glitch, which makes Technican effect Acrobatics and therefore deal >90% to Garchomp e.g. I thought I might have problems with Cresselia, because I didn't like to pick Tyranitar against goodstuff with Hitmontop/Garchomp. As I will explain later, it was the reason for my loss in Essen.
But now I will finally start with my experiences at the VGC ^^ I took the train on Friday before Essen to get to Massi's where I slept. In the night we went through the opponent's teams we knew and I decided to use Sitrus Berry on Tyranitar with a nice spread. We had a great time and got up after 3 hours of sleep in order to get to the train. We arrived at 7am and met up with drug_duck, Flame, Fatum and the other german pros :D
At the location, we met the British and I finally saw Pokerob for the first time <3 We had some nice chatting while the queue was starting to move and we we're standing next to each other later on while waiting for the first battle. I met a great number of good players, but I'm not able to remember them all and in fear to forget somebody, I just won't try to name everybody xd
But now for the Battles:
Round 1
I played versus some mid-20-year old guy who was using Quiver Dance Volcarona + Fake Out Ambipom, but Hitmontop + Zapdos was able to shut that down after Zapdos first tbolt para'd Volcarona and the second tbolt critted. He switched Starmie in CC, but was finished of by Sucker Punch. Idk what his last mon was, but I won 4:0, gg ^^
Round 2
He led with Follow Me Togekiss + Shell Smash Omastar, but since he had no Wacan Berry, but White Herb on Omastar, Thunderbolt and Close Combat got me the 4:2. He seemed to had a tiny chance when his Politoed Water Gem Hydro Pump ohko'd Hitmontop and Raikou's LO Thunder ohko'd Zapdos, but TTar and Chomp in the back cleared it easily. 2:0, gg!
Round 3 vs Gatr
Unfortunately I had to face Gatr this round, even though he went to the toilet when he saw, I was waiting for my next opponent and we tried to friendrule, but there was no one else winning at that time, so we just sat down and played. I'm not sure if I can reveal his team, it is quite unique and uses rare, but effective strategies and it really got me in quite some trouble. With a key prediction, however, I could secure a close 2:0 victory with two Pokemon surviving with only about 20 HP left. gg!
Okay, I was in the finalist lounge now and could relax and hang out with my friends for some minutes. I was happy to see that Flame, DaFlo and Massi all made it through, while drug_duck was facing elimination in Round 2 - we watched that battle on the screen - but got a last turn EQ ch! The crowd cheered for him and he seemed to be a bit sorry about it, considering the fact, that he did a mistake earlier on, but everybody else was happy to welcome the worlds attendee of 2009 in the last 28!
Top28 - Bye!
Because of this odd number, 4 byes were given out to the players and I was lucky enough so get one. It's hard to describe the feeling to wait another 15 minutes, sitting on the chair, waiting for the opponent and knowing, that it's only 2 more matches until Hawaii... I used the time to update my twitter and to focus on the game, while watching my friends win and lose in Top28.
Top16 vs Marco
When my opponent was sent to me, I was quite relieved when I realized, that it was no one familiar. I asked him about his pokemon history and he told me, that he was a TCG player, so I felt quite good going into the match.
I felt even better when I saw his 6 Pokemon: Breloom, Chandelure, Cresselia, Scizor + 2 slow TR abuser.
I led Hitmontop + TTar which was enough to shut down his Trick Room, kill his Breloom lead with Close Combat and Cresselia with Crunch, leaving him in a very bad position and I could take an easy 3:0 victory, gg!
Top8 vs Flame
When I reached the next stage, I saw tblakey89, DaFlo and Flame talking about what to do now. It was quite obvious, that we were 4 of the 5 best battlers left, while a french guy seemed to time stall all the time and another unknown guy had haxxed Massi out in Top16 :(
Flame and DaFlo friendclaused, so they didn't let me do it with Flame again ):
When he sat down, I knew that I would lose... I don't know why, but I felt really bad before the match.
His 6 Pokemon were Zapdos, Latios, Hitmontop, Metagross, Volcarona, Tyranitar.
Since I knew he was liking Volcarona quite a lot and I thought, that he would think, that I didn't expect Volcarona, I chose to pick against Volcarona and hope for the best. I ended up using Hitmontop, Latios, Tyranitar, Garchomp.
He started the match with Hitmontop and Metagross, switching back to Latios with Hitmontop and protecting with Metagross. After that, he made some good moves to shut down Latios with Metagross and I couldn't do anything with Ttar and Chomp, so I was eliminated one win before Hawaii :( 0:3, gg!
When I was out, I was ofc feeling really sad, but I knew that I would have at least one other chance in Milan so I tried to enjoy the rest of the day with the Pokedudes^^, party and the others. Next to us, DaFlo had beaten tblakey and I was quite happy that our training paid off :)
After the event we went to SolaR's and had some great time, miss you dudes^^!
Next day, I got back again but after vgc is before vgc!
On Monday afternoon, DaFlo asked me, if I was interessted to join him on his way to Paris, because he wanted his sister to qualify there, after she had lost in Germany. Of course I was! We just had to find two other people to fill the car and make it less expensive for the rest of us xP We eventually found two guys and I was trying to fix my team for Paris. The first thing, I was sure about was to replace Scizor with Metagross:
mEtaL @ Occa Berry
Trait: Clear Body
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Meteor Mash
- Ice Punch
- Zen Headbutt
- Protect
In order to be able to take on bulky teams and stop Intimidate. In addition to that, I changed my Hitmontop and played a faster one in Paris because I felt that I had too little speed. Besides that, I trusted the same strategy and the rest of the team remained the same.
I didn't play all too much PO, just enough to get cinfidence back after my loss in Essen, but I kept telling myself, that Top8 is great and I will make Top4 in Paris for sure! :D
So when I got home on Friday afternoon, I immediately had to leave for the train to get to Munich. I met up with DaFlo and another guy at the main railway station and we drove to DaFlo's, however made a last stop to buy something to eat and drink for your long car trip all the way to Paris :D
I won't go into details, we had a lot of fun and I comfortably won 4:0 in games against DaFlo and was very confident for the next day. We arrived at about 5am at the location in Paris and I walked around to look for the Spains, because we saw bellanko crossing the street in front of us xD I found them sitting on a bench and chatted a little bit with K-Os, bellanko and flash_mc.
I went back to the car to tell them, that I found the location and to change clothing. When I got back to the Spaniards, drug_duck, Flame and the other Germans had arrived and we acclaimed each other. The Brits arrived some minutes later and it was obvious, that a lot of topnotch players qould attend this qualifier, probably the most difficult to get a trip, but I still felt quite comfortable and confident. I was next to bellanko in the queue and we talked a little bit, while DaFlo was walking around and could just relax could he already had the trip :D
They opened the door at 7:50 am because it was a bit rainy. Registration started at 8 am as usual and I was in the front of the queue but the french staff guy wasn't able to get the registration done with my german copy, even though, I had gone in the menue already and all he had to do was to click the A-button xd They called the jugde and I explained, that I think that everything is allright, but he didn't want to listen to me and got me to quit the tourney lol
When he realized it, he was very sorry and said it was his fault, but it took about 10 minutes, until they erased my stats and I could join again xD No big deal, all in all, I was happy, because he checked my mons and since I got one last mon, I didn't use in Essen, I couldn't be 100% if it's legal, but up to now all the people I trusted have played straight, thanks!
In the queue, I saw only good players around me, it was ridiculous: I saw Peterko behind me, wushl, Carii, Fatum, bellanko in front of me and a great number of other great players, as well! I was really shocked when I saw battles like Osirius vs flash_mc in the first round and that drug_duck lost in round 2 :(
I intended to play some french girl, but I was matched with a guy standing next to her ''at least no one famous'' laughed Peterko and I smiled and walked in the battling area to face my first opponent.
Round 1
The guy was quite nice and I tried to improve my french skills and had some small talk with him ^^ He said, it was his first tournement and he probably had a boom team, but I didn't get to see if that's true because I always double targetted the pokemon which wasn't protecting, netting me the 4:0 without losing a single HP, gg nevertheless ^^
Round 2
I played against a girl with a 6 Eevee-evo team but used semi-competitive moves like Curse on Umbreon and Light Screen with Espeon. I still managed to 4:0 her without losing an HP again xd gg ^^
Round 3
I played a guy from Belgium who used Whimsicott, Zapdos, Cloyster, Garchomp. I didn't want to play at the screen, but they somehow forced me to do, so there's probably a vid of it.
He used TW with Whimsicott and Thunderbolt with Zapdos, while I KO Whimsicott with CC and do tons of damage with tbolt myself. I had control over the match, but a Rock Slide flinch on Zapdos, when I was using HP ice on his Chomp made it a bit more stretching, than it should've been :P 3/2:0 gg!
Finalist lounge again, nice, but I didn't face anybody really good so it didn't mean too much. I was looking for the others and it seemed like some made it, some didn't make it, but that was expected considering the fact, that so many good players were attending.
The germans came and said, they cheered for me and I was told only three germans made it and that Matteo was somehow told do leave the tournement.
I walked around a bit and checked who else got the yellow bracelet and I saw people like Pokerob, KO-S, Gleizzo etc. and was happy for them!
When we were told to come back to the area for the final battles, I was a little bit nervous, but when they said, it would be 12 Byes, I was very confident to get lucky again. When I got the card, I immediately put my hand on the written ''BYES'' and pokerfaced. The Germans looked at me curiously and I pretended not to have a bye but then I turned back, smiled and said something like ''You didn't think, I was unlucky this time, did you? ;)'' They laughed, and I got over to a chair, when a French sat across. I asked him if he was on Smogon and he said no, so I was quite confident going into the match :D But we needed to wait until the others played and I saw Pokerob vs KO-S -.-
Round 4 - Bye!
Round 5 - Top16
After some time, we we're told to start and I had the worst VGC2012 battle for quite some time... He had a competitive team: Rotom-W, Metagross, Latios, Hitmontop (Cresselia + XX in the back). I started the match with my loved Zapdos + Meta and he leads Rotom-W + Metagross. I was about to double-target Rotom-W, but I didn't want to risk something at the very beginning of the match and therefore, I click tbolt on Meta and Zen Headbutt on Rotom. He protects with Meta and Hydro Pump hits Zapdos. ''No Water Gem, yes'', I think to myself, but the HP go down and down and down... A critical hit! -.- Well, okay, I can still win! Zen Headbutt does only 40%, so it was a very bulky Rotom-W with lefties... I switch in Garchomp and click Protect to scout, while Meta should Zen Headbutt Rotom again. Rotom-W uses Hidden Power against Chomp, most likely ice, and Zen Headbutt... misses. His Meta uses EQ for about 45% on mine. I switch Chomp to my TTar to take the incoming Hidden Power, but Zen Headbutt... misses again ._. I looked to the others, thumbdown and shake my head. His Meta, however, protected. I switch Meta to Chomp to take Thunderbolt, but he doulbe-targets ttar and Bullet Punch + Hydro pump of two bulky mons kill my Ttar even with Sitrus, it must have been nearly max damage, I calced :(
At this point, I was thinking about how much time and effort I put in this game for 3 years and that I didn't get anything out besides good friends. I know friends are great, but I really wanted the trip this year :P I was sure to quit after this battle, I didn't even consider going to Milano anymore because I felt like the outcome would be the same again, hax.
I send in my Meta, being behind 2:4 and really nothing is in my favour. I simply click DC on Rotom-W and protect with Meta, hoping for Hidden Power to miss, but my DC crits! Finally I get some luck lol. But I knew it wasn't enough yet. His EQ did maybe 30% to Chomp. He sent out Hitmontop without Intimidate! I use DC and Zen headbutt on Hitmontop, he Fake Outs Meta and his MM misses against my Chomp, after DC did 65% against his Hitmontop. Yeees maybe! I hope he doesn't use Wide Guard and use EQ with Chomp and Protect with Meta. Hitmontop detects and Meta uses EQ after it took about 70% from my EQ.
From the team preview, I knew he might have Latios in the back and that I needed to go for the double K.O. if I wanted to win because my Meta was damaged to hard to win the 1v1 and has no Bullet Punch... I thought a long time about what to do now and when the Timer said 15 Secs left, I decided to try it.
mEtaL uses Protect!
I swear the game froze at that point or something lol...
It took soooo long unless the screen showed:
mEtaL protects itself!
Opponent's Hitmontop uses Mach Punch!
mEtaL protects itself!
Opponent's Metagross uses Bullet Punch!
cHamP lost 10%-15% of it's HP!
cHamP uses Earthquake!
Opponent's Hitmontop fainted!
Opponent's Metagross fainted!
omg it worked... That one time I needed a double protect I got it ^^ The french guy stopped singing along the songs they played and told me that it was a good move and the only way I could win. I know that he should've won if he played smarter, but well... xd
The match, however, wasn't over yet. He sent out Latios and if he targets right, he will win!
Normally, one would predict Protect by Chomp and DM meta, but I somehow felt, that he would attack Chomp and protected and yeah, he Ice Beam'd (lol ok) Chomp and I win with Ice punch + Dragon Claw in the following turn. 2:0, gg lol...
I jump of my chair and ran to the others to tell them why I was looking so sad and disappointed.
Okay, once again, I reached the top8 and I need to win only one remaining battle.
Top8 vs Hogan
This was the most challenging match of the day, of course it was the deciding battle.
I won't reveal his team, because he will try to win the trip in Milano, I really hope you can do it after that great battle! It was nearly no hax, I got an attack boost with MM and was Fully Para'd 1 or 2 times. I think I played really good and deserved the win, without being arrogant :S
He played really good, too and is a really nice guy! When I realized, that I would win the match - no other pokemon, but Metagross, that I just added to the team, was able to secure me the win in a great fight - I started to sing, just like my opponent did
Even the lyrics fit to the moment. When I KO'd his last Poke for the 2:0, I just couldn't hold my feelings back, stood up and probably started to cry a little bit, because I looked to the other side of the battling area and all the Germans we're shouting and jumping after they saw my lips moving to the lyrics. Thank you sooo much for this great moment, when all my effort and time spent finally paid off and I was sure to go to Hawaiiiii.
GG
I didn't save the vid unfortunately, not sure if he did, I will ask him ^^
After my win, I ran to my supporters was hugged, shook hands etc soo nice :3
When I tourned around, I saw Pokerob playing against another guy from UK and he was eventually winning and omg not only I, but also my long-time friend Pokerob finally made it to worlds :D I ran towards him, when he stood up, he just asked ''You, too? YEEEEES'' and we hugged in front of the crowd man, that was so awesome, reeeaaally looking forward to seeing you at worlds, man <3
Top4 vs. Luna
I don't remember all too much about this match, since it wasn't that important :D
He used a semi-rain team and used Meta, Cresselia, Politoed, Ludicolo and didn't pick Rotom-W + XX. I started with Zapdos + Hitmontop with Latios and Chomp in the back and could somehow manage to land some Sucker Punches and Tbolts on Cresselia, when Meta protected. In addition to that, he made a mistake and sent out Ludicolo when there was no rain and I predicted the switch to Politoed and Draco Meteor'd it. His Meta died to EQ and he sent out Ludicolo. I protected with Chomp and used TW with Latios, which survived his Ice Beam with 28 HP. Luckily -2 Draco Meteor + Dragon Claw was enough to win me the match 2:0, gg!! :)
Final vs. Gleizzo
Here's the final, I won't comment on it, just watch it yourself ^^
The official vid isn't out yet, here's it filmed by Tyvyr, thanks for uploading it that fast :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTNfFC0p7A4
0:4, gg and congratz!! xD
We watched the Eiffel Tower and went to the Hotel after the tourney I really needed to relax a bit, I was so tired lol Because of that, we missed the party with the germans and the brits, sorry mates :( We will repeat that sometimes, I promise :P
Special thanks go out to:
- Massi for being such a nice guy, thanks for team building and everything. I'm sorry I can't take you with me to Hawaii x(
- drug_duck for being an awesome person and pokemon trainer ---___------ :D
- Flame and DaFlo for endless skype sessions with Team building, theorymon and everything :D
- SolaR, daatengu, Ariana, wii, daatengu, Massi weil ihr die coolsten pokedudes^^ der welt seid mann, ich liebe euch <3
- DaFlo's parents for bringing me to Paris!
- shinycarletto for teambuilding and testing!! I hope you can make it in Italy, bro!
- Matty85, Ben7000, bellanko and many others for fun matches and theorymon on PO
- Sewadle, Toast, Pantaly, TV-Rocka, Terraquaza, Dark_Psiana, sasu, and many more, thanks for making Pokemon a game worth to play!
Thanks for reading, I hope it is somewhat understandable :)
DaFlo's warstory about the trip to Essen:
Hello Smogonites, I would like to introduce myself in a few sentences.
First of all I am 17 years old and from Germany, Bavaria . I have been
competing at the Video Game Championships since 2010 but never reached
more than top 16 but I have been two times at Worlds as a spectator
because my sister won two times in Germany. This year I finally did it
and won a trip to Hawaii when I placed 4th in Germany, Essen. Some of
you know me as DaFlo on the Skarmbliss server, others know me as chico. I
have been training for this year´s VGC since the rules were announced. I
was testing stuff a few months and so it came to my mind that Volcarona
is such an awesome Pokémon in this year´s metagame. So I was building a
team around Volcarona. It worked but perfectly but after a while,
everybody started playing Heatran or Terrakion. This was the reason I
was testing other stuff but in the end I went for Volcarona and it
definetily worked. So I had to choose five other pokémon. I was training
a lot on the Skarmbliss server and it was pretty fast clear that the
top Pokémon would be Latios, Zapdos, Garchomp, Hitmontop, Metagross etc.
I did choose Garchomp, Hitmontop, Zapdos, Tyranitar and Abomasnow as
partners for my Volcarona but did not play them completely standard. I
will explain that later on.
So let´s start with Volcarona.
Volcarona @ Charty Berry | Flame Body | Timid
6 HP | 252 Sp.Atk | 252 Spe
Quiver Dance | Heat Wave | Bug Buzz | Protect
My start of the team ! Awesome lead with Fake Out Hitmontop ! Most of
time it has got +1 and then there are only some Pokémon who can really
stop Volcarona. Would definetily play it again !
Garchomp @ Haban Berry | Sand Veil | Jolly
6 HP | 252 Atk. | 252 Spe
Dragon Claw | Rock Slide | Earthquake | Protect
I was expecting much more Sandstorm teams, so I went for Garchomp. I
prefered the faster version of Garchomp over the bulky one because I
tested both of them and the faster Garchomp was in my opinion better
because I was also afraid of random Hidden Power Ice attacks. It also
saved me in my Top 8 match against tblakey.
Hitmontop @ Fight Gem | Intimidate | Adamant
96 HP | 252 Atk. | 4 Sp.Def | 156 Spe.
Close Combat | Mach Punch | Sucker Punch | Fake Out
Pretty fast Hitmontop, had to be faster than other Hitmontops in order
to be able to quiver dance with my Volcarona. Worked pretty good and
then on my best decision, I chose Mach Punch over Wide Guard. I really
liked that Mach Punch Fighting Gem. Thanks to Mach Punch I could deal
two battles when my opponent was leading Weavile | Chandelure. Love it
<3.
Zapdos @ Sitrus Berry | Pressure | Modest
124 HP | 252 Sp.Atk | 80 Sp.Def | 48 Spe
Thunderbolt | Heat Wave | Discharge | Protect
I know this seems pretty random. I thought there would be much more
rain. I really like the Discharge combo with Garchomp but most of time I
was using Protect + Discharge. I do not regret playing Discharge
because in my R3 battle I had to play against rain and attacked with
Discharge and got the double para. It was also kind of defensive which I
also do not regret playing, it really saved me in my Top 8 battle.
Tyranitar @ Chople Berry |Sand Stream | Adamant
128 HP | 252 Atk. | 124 Spe
Crunch | Rock Slide | Low Kick | Protect
Pretty standard Tyranitar, saved me from rain. Played it a little bit
faster in order to be faster than random Metagross. Nothing more to say
about that.
Abomasnow @ Choice Scarf | Snow Warning | Naive
6 HP | 252 Sp.Atk | 252 Spe
Blizzard | Giga Drain | Ice Shard | Shadow Ball
Was also a nice check against rain but never really played it. Only
picked it a few times. I really liked it in my team preview because many
people were choosing there Chandelures etc. against it so I could
easily lead with Tyranitar and clean everything up.
09.03.2012 :
It was just one day away from the VGC. I did not feel good that day so I
did not go to school. Overmore still had to train some of my Pokémon
and some of my sister´s. Was a litte bit skyping around with Massi and
when he left, I went to the barber shop and let my hair cut off because I
knew I was gonna win and knew that I would be on the pictures :3. Well,
just kidding ^^ So my dad, sister and I were driving all the way to
Essen.
10.03.2012 :
We arrived about 5am in the morning and saw the first people standing in
front of the location. We were searching for a parking lot and when we
finally found one I went out of the car and was refreshing up myself.
Was a little bit relaxing in our car and then saw Massi, Yoshi etc.
walking to the location. So I went out of the car and went to them, when
they were standing in the line. Met all of my friends there and so we
were waiting for the start of the tourney. Registration went fast and so
R1 began. I cannot remember that much, only that I was leading
Hitmontop and Volcarona while she was leading Terrakion and Carracosta
which I was really afraid since I was not playing Wide Guard. So I faked
out her Terrakion and went for the Quiver Dance while she flinched with
Terrakion and attacked with Waterfall. She was burned by Flame Body and
next turn I went for CC and Protect and won easily afterwards 4:0.
Second match I cannot remember anything, I just can remember that I won
4:0. Third round I had to play against a pretty solid rain team. It even
had Ferrothorn but as mentioned before, I started with Hitmontop and
Zapdos, went for Discharge and went for the double para. So the next
turns were not that difficult and once again I went 4:0. So i made it
to the finalists lounge. Was hackchecked etc. and of course everything
was ok. But now, would I lost my concentration like last year or was I
am going to handle the situation and just continue playing well? We will
see. I think we were 28 player in the finalists lounge so only 4 people
got a bye. I was not one them. So I had to battle Saika, a member of
the Bavarian Pokémon Elite. She played Weavile, Chandelure, Garchomp and
Zapdos. I led with Hitmontop and Tyranitar. I protected with Ttar and
mach punched her Weavile, which went down with sand stream damage and
she attacked with Heat Wave. Cannot remember much more, only that I
played safe and won in the end with Garchomp. Then I went for my T16
match and had to play against a member of a Pokémon community called
Filb. Was not that difficult so I won 3:0. Then I was only one win away
from Hawaii. I could friend clause with Flame who placed later on 2nd
and had to face tblakey. I saved the video and uploaded it on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcN1FoOEbuE&context=C44db2bdADvjVQa1PpcFOV79lGpdqIe3Qj6O7goxJzgc4Gtl0z8W8=
I did it. I fucking did it. This moment was so amazing. I cannot really
discribe it. I just did it. So I had to battle Flame in the semi final
but did not care much about that and was selecting my Pokémon with a
dice and let the moves select randomly by letting the time run out ^^
Lost 0:1 to him but still did not really care ^^ So it was over. I did
it. I was so happy but on the other hand I was really sad because Massi
and Yoshi, my friend I was practising all the time on Skarmbliss were
kicked out. Massi was haxxed pretty bad and Yoshi just missplayed. So we
made some photos and all the stuff like that. Then I waited for my
sister who was still playing seniors. She lost in T16 due hax. After
that we went home and arrived at home about 11pm. Now I can go to Hawaii
for the second time. I still cannot believe it. I am really hyped for
Worlds.
Special thanks to Massi, drug_duck and Yoshi for training with me all
the time on PO. Also many thanks to wii, SolaR and daatengu ! I also
hope that tblakey can still make it to Worlds. He does deserve it !
Yoshiiiiii's part:
Since I might be quite unknown here, let me introduce myself a little bit before going into details about pokemon :)
I'm 16 years old master and playing Pokemon on a competitive level since 2008. My first appearance at a VGC was in 2010 in Cologne and I attended 2011 in Paris and Cologne again, but couldn't place any better than Top16. However, my online rankings and tournement results were quite good in those years and I trained really hard, so I didn't want to give up on Pokemon without having been to worlds even once, so I decided to give it a last shot this year and do the whole training and preparation once again. So like in the years before, I started playing in early September some weeks after the rules were offically announced because I wanted the metagame to be stable. Rain seemed to be a huge threat, Trick Room as well and Hail, too. It seemed to be difficult to use goodstuff without hard counters to rain like Ludicolo, Gastrodon Cresselia or Abomasnow and even with those you could lose. The first Pokemon I had a special ''feeling'' about was Rotom-W, which was, in my opinion, a good answer to Rain and a good Pokemon for goodstuff in general. But I stopped playing on PO because I felt the meta was too random to think about concrete teams. I started playing again in the mid of October, with a rain team I built with Dark_Psiana this time. Politoed, Toxicroak, Thundurus/Zapdos, Kingdra, Garchomp, Scizor which was quite successful, but stopped by certain things. After that, I had funny teams with Yanmega and Sharpedo, who did hilariously really decent. On the 15th of October (yeah, I looked that up :D) I made a great decision in uniting the teams of Massi, drug_duck and me to form a team of Meta, Chomp, Zapdos, Cresselia, Hitmontop, Ludicolo. Funny how Hitmontop, Zapdos, Chomp and Meta was using the basic strategy of Tailwind along with bulky heavy hitters like adamant bulky Chomp and Meta. Massi and me started to perfect the team in November. Chople Tyranitar, Flying Gem Scizor, Bulky Adamant Haban Chomp, Hitmontop, Ludicolo and bulky Sitrus Zapdos with Tailwind was able to secure us high rankings (cheaphunter #1 for a long time, a lot of accounts in Top 10, Massi's and mine). We were really confident only changing little things like EV spreads on Zapdos and Tyranitar and replacing Ludicolo with Latios in the end of December. In January, I consolidated my time with shinycarletto who contacted me in order to get some training and do team building. We built a team around Volcarona with the mons I was used to use. It worked wonders! I was so sure to be able to win a trip that time because no one was prepared for Volcarona and I could easily get 3 accounts in Top10 and was very confident. I talked to the best players on PO at that time, like Matty85 or Ben7000 who gave me great input for my teams and helped me fixing little issues, thanks! Me and shinycarletto stopped using Volcarona, because we felt that it was a little bit overpowered and we didn't want to publish it too much, but it was too late. When I tried using the team 1 month later, it didn't work as well as it did before and I was quite sad tbh :( We came to the conclusion, that we needed to change Volcarona and Latios joined the team once again. In the following testing, I made everything less bulky and faster after I lost to random scarfers because I didn't outspeed them in Tailwind. This is the final version I got 2 weeks before the VGC in Germany, when I finally started to collect my mons (thanks to Billa and Massi!) and EV train them:
massiBOSS / 13Billa37 @ Fight Gem
Trait: Intimidate
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Fake Out
- Sucker Punch
- Close Combat
- Wide Guard
Really standard in the current Metagame. It's used to support Latios, Zapdos or even Meta to get their moves like Tailwind of. I toyed with Helping Hand here, but didn't use it in the end.
Zapdos @ Electric Gem
Trait: Pressure
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Tailwind
- Hidden Power [Ice]
- Thunderbolt
- Heat Wave
Standard as hell but with a cruel surprise for the likes of Garchomp, Salamence and so on. I had to forego Protect/Detect, but it worked out for me quite nice, at least in Single Elimination. Tailwind is really nice to have, but with this version of the team, I didn't need it necessarily. Thunderbolt is very powerful with Modest and Electric Gem and Heat Wave obviously helps a lot against steel- and grass types and multi target moves are always nice to have!
mEteoR @ Dragon Gem
Trait: Levitate
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Draco Meteor
- Protect
- Psychic
- Tailwind
Pretty standard, too. I considered replacing Tailwind, but I kept it and it helped me to win the semifinal in Paris!
cHamP @ Haban Berry / Focus Sash
Trait: Sand Veil
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Earthquake
- Protect
- Dragon Claw
- Stone Edge
My personal hero of this years metagame. I started with 124 speed EVs and adamant, but it got faster all the time lol. In the end I had 244 EVs iirc ^^ It saved me so many times, it is hilarious :D Stone Edge was chosen over Rock Slide because it's not blocked by Wide Guard and deals so much more damage against Zapdos.
hAvoC @ Sitrus Berry / Dark Gem
Trait: Sand Stream
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Crunch
- Rock Slide
- Low Kick
- Protect
Tyranitar is my main check to TR and was used to stop special based teams with cores like Cresselia, Zapdos, Chandelure for example. In addition to that, it checks Volcarona, Latios.
rYzoR @ Flying Gem
Trait: Technican
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Acrobatics
- Bullet Punch
- Bug Bite
- Protect
In Essen, I used Scizor which was a huge mistake... I knew it wouldn't be that great because of the PO glitch, which makes Technican effect Acrobatics and therefore deal >90% to Garchomp e.g. I thought I might have problems with Cresselia, because I didn't like to pick Tyranitar against goodstuff with Hitmontop/Garchomp. As I will explain later, it was the reason for my loss in Essen.
But now I will finally start with my experiences at the VGC ^^ I took the train on Friday before Essen to get to Massi's where I slept. In the night we went through the opponent's teams we knew and I decided to use Sitrus Berry on Tyranitar with a nice spread. We had a great time and got up after 3 hours of sleep in order to get to the train. We arrived at 7am and met up with drug_duck, Flame, Fatum and the other german pros :D
At the location, we met the British and I finally saw Pokerob for the first time <3 We had some nice chatting while the queue was starting to move and we we're standing next to each other later on while waiting for the first battle. I met a great number of good players, but I'm not able to remember them all and in fear to forget somebody, I just won't try to name everybody xd
But now for the Battles:
Round 1
I played versus some mid-20-year old guy who was using Quiver Dance Volcarona + Fake Out Ambipom, but Hitmontop + Zapdos was able to shut that down after Zapdos first tbolt para'd Volcarona and the second tbolt critted. He switched Starmie in CC, but was finished of by Sucker Punch. Idk what his last mon was, but I won 4:0, gg ^^
Round 2
He led with Follow Me Togekiss + Shell Smash Omastar, but since he had no Wacan Berry, but White Herb on Omastar, Thunderbolt and Close Combat got me the 4:2. He seemed to had a tiny chance when his Politoed Water Gem Hydro Pump ohko'd Hitmontop and Raikou's LO Thunder ohko'd Zapdos, but TTar and Chomp in the back cleared it easily. 2:0, gg!
Round 3 vs Gatr
Unfortunately I had to face Gatr this round, even though he went to the toilet when he saw, I was waiting for my next opponent and we tried to friendrule, but there was no one else winning at that time, so we just sat down and played. I'm not sure if I can reveal his team, it is quite unique and uses rare, but effective strategies and it really got me in quite some trouble. With a key prediction, however, I could secure a close 2:0 victory with two Pokemon surviving with only about 20 HP left. gg!
Okay, I was in the finalist lounge now and could relax and hang out with my friends for some minutes. I was happy to see that Flame, DaFlo and Massi all made it through, while drug_duck was facing elimination in Round 2 - we watched that battle on the screen - but got a last turn EQ ch! The crowd cheered for him and he seemed to be a bit sorry about it, considering the fact, that he did a mistake earlier on, but everybody else was happy to welcome the worlds attendee of 2009 in the last 28!
Top28 - Bye!
Because of this odd number, 4 byes were given out to the players and I was lucky enough so get one. It's hard to describe the feeling to wait another 15 minutes, sitting on the chair, waiting for the opponent and knowing, that it's only 2 more matches until Hawaii... I used the time to update my twitter and to focus on the game, while watching my friends win and lose in Top28.
Top16 vs Marco
When my opponent was sent to me, I was quite relieved when I realized, that it was no one familiar. I asked him about his pokemon history and he told me, that he was a TCG player, so I felt quite good going into the match.
I felt even better when I saw his 6 Pokemon: Breloom, Chandelure, Cresselia, Scizor + 2 slow TR abuser.
I led Hitmontop + TTar which was enough to shut down his Trick Room, kill his Breloom lead with Close Combat and Cresselia with Crunch, leaving him in a very bad position and I could take an easy 3:0 victory, gg!
Top8 vs Flame
When I reached the next stage, I saw tblakey89, DaFlo and Flame talking about what to do now. It was quite obvious, that we were 4 of the 5 best battlers left, while a french guy seemed to time stall all the time and another unknown guy had haxxed Massi out in Top16 :(
Flame and DaFlo friendclaused, so they didn't let me do it with Flame again ):
When he sat down, I knew that I would lose... I don't know why, but I felt really bad before the match.
His 6 Pokemon were Zapdos, Latios, Hitmontop, Metagross, Volcarona, Tyranitar.
Since I knew he was liking Volcarona quite a lot and I thought, that he would think, that I didn't expect Volcarona, I chose to pick against Volcarona and hope for the best. I ended up using Hitmontop, Latios, Tyranitar, Garchomp.
He started the match with Hitmontop and Metagross, switching back to Latios with Hitmontop and protecting with Metagross. After that, he made some good moves to shut down Latios with Metagross and I couldn't do anything with Ttar and Chomp, so I was eliminated one win before Hawaii :( 0:3, gg!
When I was out, I was ofc feeling really sad, but I knew that I would have at least one other chance in Milan so I tried to enjoy the rest of the day with the Pokedudes^^, party and the others. Next to us, DaFlo had beaten tblakey and I was quite happy that our training paid off :)
After the event we went to SolaR's and had some great time, miss you dudes^^!
Next day, I got back again but after vgc is before vgc!
On Monday afternoon, DaFlo asked me, if I was interessted to join him on his way to Paris, because he wanted his sister to qualify there, after she had lost in Germany. Of course I was! We just had to find two other people to fill the car and make it less expensive for the rest of us xP We eventually found two guys and I was trying to fix my team for Paris. The first thing, I was sure about was to replace Scizor with Metagross:
mEtaL @ Occa Berry
Trait: Clear Body
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Meteor Mash
- Ice Punch
- Zen Headbutt
- Protect
In order to be able to take on bulky teams and stop Intimidate. In addition to that, I changed my Hitmontop and played a faster one in Paris because I felt that I had too little speed. Besides that, I trusted the same strategy and the rest of the team remained the same.
I didn't play all too much PO, just enough to get cinfidence back after my loss in Essen, but I kept telling myself, that Top8 is great and I will make Top4 in Paris for sure! :D
So when I got home on Friday afternoon, I immediately had to leave for the train to get to Munich. I met up with DaFlo and another guy at the main railway station and we drove to DaFlo's, however made a last stop to buy something to eat and drink for your long car trip all the way to Paris :D
I won't go into details, we had a lot of fun and I comfortably won 4:0 in games against DaFlo and was very confident for the next day. We arrived at about 5am at the location in Paris and I walked around to look for the Spains, because we saw bellanko crossing the street in front of us xD I found them sitting on a bench and chatted a little bit with K-Os, bellanko and flash_mc.
I went back to the car to tell them, that I found the location and to change clothing. When I got back to the Spaniards, drug_duck, Flame and the other Germans had arrived and we acclaimed each other. The Brits arrived some minutes later and it was obvious, that a lot of topnotch players qould attend this qualifier, probably the most difficult to get a trip, but I still felt quite comfortable and confident. I was next to bellanko in the queue and we talked a little bit, while DaFlo was walking around and could just relax could he already had the trip :D
They opened the door at 7:50 am because it was a bit rainy. Registration started at 8 am as usual and I was in the front of the queue but the french staff guy wasn't able to get the registration done with my german copy, even though, I had gone in the menue already and all he had to do was to click the A-button xd They called the jugde and I explained, that I think that everything is allright, but he didn't want to listen to me and got me to quit the tourney lol
When he realized it, he was very sorry and said it was his fault, but it took about 10 minutes, until they erased my stats and I could join again xD No big deal, all in all, I was happy, because he checked my mons and since I got one last mon, I didn't use in Essen, I couldn't be 100% if it's legal, but up to now all the people I trusted have played straight, thanks!
In the queue, I saw only good players around me, it was ridiculous: I saw Peterko behind me, wushl, Carii, Fatum, bellanko in front of me and a great number of other great players, as well! I was really shocked when I saw battles like Osirius vs flash_mc in the first round and that drug_duck lost in round 2 :(
I intended to play some french girl, but I was matched with a guy standing next to her ''at least no one famous'' laughed Peterko and I smiled and walked in the battling area to face my first opponent.
Round 1
The guy was quite nice and I tried to improve my french skills and had some small talk with him ^^ He said, it was his first tournement and he probably had a boom team, but I didn't get to see if that's true because I always double targetted the pokemon which wasn't protecting, netting me the 4:0 without losing a single HP, gg nevertheless ^^
Round 2
I played against a girl with a 6 Eevee-evo team but used semi-competitive moves like Curse on Umbreon and Light Screen with Espeon. I still managed to 4:0 her without losing an HP again xd gg ^^
Round 3
I played a guy from Belgium who used Whimsicott, Zapdos, Cloyster, Garchomp. I didn't want to play at the screen, but they somehow forced me to do, so there's probably a vid of it.
He used TW with Whimsicott and Thunderbolt with Zapdos, while I KO Whimsicott with CC and do tons of damage with tbolt myself. I had control over the match, but a Rock Slide flinch on Zapdos, when I was using HP ice on his Chomp made it a bit more stretching, than it should've been :P 3/2:0 gg!
Finalist lounge again, nice, but I didn't face anybody really good so it didn't mean too much. I was looking for the others and it seemed like some made it, some didn't make it, but that was expected considering the fact, that so many good players were attending.
The germans came and said, they cheered for me and I was told only three germans made it and that Matteo was somehow told do leave the tournement.
I walked around a bit and checked who else got the yellow bracelet and I saw people like Pokerob, KO-S, Gleizzo etc. and was happy for them!
When we were told to come back to the area for the final battles, I was a little bit nervous, but when they said, it would be 12 Byes, I was very confident to get lucky again. When I got the card, I immediately put my hand on the written ''BYES'' and pokerfaced. The Germans looked at me curiously and I pretended not to have a bye but then I turned back, smiled and said something like ''You didn't think, I was unlucky this time, did you? ;)'' They laughed, and I got over to a chair, when a French sat across. I asked him if he was on Smogon and he said no, so I was quite confident going into the match :D But we needed to wait until the others played and I saw Pokerob vs KO-S -.-
Round 4 - Bye!
Round 5 - Top16
After some time, we we're told to start and I had the worst VGC2012 battle for quite some time... He had a competitive team: Rotom-W, Metagross, Latios, Hitmontop (Cresselia + XX in the back). I started the match with my loved Zapdos + Meta and he leads Rotom-W + Metagross. I was about to double-target Rotom-W, but I didn't want to risk something at the very beginning of the match and therefore, I click tbolt on Meta and Zen Headbutt on Rotom. He protects with Meta and Hydro Pump hits Zapdos. ''No Water Gem, yes'', I think to myself, but the HP go down and down and down... A critical hit! -.- Well, okay, I can still win! Zen Headbutt does only 40%, so it was a very bulky Rotom-W with lefties... I switch in Garchomp and click Protect to scout, while Meta should Zen Headbutt Rotom again. Rotom-W uses Hidden Power against Chomp, most likely ice, and Zen Headbutt... misses. His Meta uses EQ for about 45% on mine. I switch Chomp to my TTar to take the incoming Hidden Power, but Zen Headbutt... misses again ._. I looked to the others, thumbdown and shake my head. His Meta, however, protected. I switch Meta to Chomp to take Thunderbolt, but he doulbe-targets ttar and Bullet Punch + Hydro pump of two bulky mons kill my Ttar even with Sitrus, it must have been nearly max damage, I calced :(
At this point, I was thinking about how much time and effort I put in this game for 3 years and that I didn't get anything out besides good friends. I know friends are great, but I really wanted the trip this year :P I was sure to quit after this battle, I didn't even consider going to Milano anymore because I felt like the outcome would be the same again, hax.
I send in my Meta, being behind 2:4 and really nothing is in my favour. I simply click DC on Rotom-W and protect with Meta, hoping for Hidden Power to miss, but my DC crits! Finally I get some luck lol. But I knew it wasn't enough yet. His EQ did maybe 30% to Chomp. He sent out Hitmontop without Intimidate! I use DC and Zen headbutt on Hitmontop, he Fake Outs Meta and his MM misses against my Chomp, after DC did 65% against his Hitmontop. Yeees maybe! I hope he doesn't use Wide Guard and use EQ with Chomp and Protect with Meta. Hitmontop detects and Meta uses EQ after it took about 70% from my EQ.
From the team preview, I knew he might have Latios in the back and that I needed to go for the double K.O. if I wanted to win because my Meta was damaged to hard to win the 1v1 and has no Bullet Punch... I thought a long time about what to do now and when the Timer said 15 Secs left, I decided to try it.
mEtaL uses Protect!
I swear the game froze at that point or something lol...
It took soooo long unless the screen showed:
mEtaL protects itself!
Opponent's Hitmontop uses Mach Punch!
mEtaL protects itself!
Opponent's Metagross uses Bullet Punch!
cHamP lost 10%-15% of it's HP!
cHamP uses Earthquake!
Opponent's Hitmontop fainted!
Opponent's Metagross fainted!
omg it worked... That one time I needed a double protect I got it ^^ The french guy stopped singing along the songs they played and told me that it was a good move and the only way I could win. I know that he should've won if he played smarter, but well... xd
The match, however, wasn't over yet. He sent out Latios and if he targets right, he will win!
Normally, one would predict Protect by Chomp and DM meta, but I somehow felt, that he would attack Chomp and protected and yeah, he Ice Beam'd (lol ok) Chomp and I win with Ice punch + Dragon Claw in the following turn. 2:0, gg lol...
I jump of my chair and ran to the others to tell them why I was looking so sad and disappointed.
Okay, once again, I reached the top8 and I need to win only one remaining battle.
Top8 vs Hogan
This was the most challenging match of the day, of course it was the deciding battle.
I won't reveal his team, because he will try to win the trip in Milano, I really hope you can do it after that great battle! It was nearly no hax, I got an attack boost with MM and was Fully Para'd 1 or 2 times. I think I played really good and deserved the win, without being arrogant :S
He played really good, too and is a really nice guy! When I realized, that I would win the match - no other pokemon, but Metagross, that I just added to the team, was able to secure me the win in a great fight - I started to sing, just like my opponent did
There’s so many wars we fought,
There’s so many things we’re not,
But with what we have,
I promise you that,
We’re marching on,
(We’re marching on)
(We’re marching on).
There’s so many things we’re not,
But with what we have,
I promise you that,
We’re marching on,
(We’re marching on)
(We’re marching on).
Even the lyrics fit to the moment. When I KO'd his last Poke for the 2:0, I just couldn't hold my feelings back, stood up and probably started to cry a little bit, because I looked to the other side of the battling area and all the Germans we're shouting and jumping after they saw my lips moving to the lyrics. Thank you sooo much for this great moment, when all my effort and time spent finally paid off and I was sure to go to Hawaiiiii.
GG
I didn't save the vid unfortunately, not sure if he did, I will ask him ^^
After my win, I ran to my supporters was hugged, shook hands etc soo nice :3
When I tourned around, I saw Pokerob playing against another guy from UK and he was eventually winning and omg not only I, but also my long-time friend Pokerob finally made it to worlds :D I ran towards him, when he stood up, he just asked ''You, too? YEEEEES'' and we hugged in front of the crowd man, that was so awesome, reeeaaally looking forward to seeing you at worlds, man <3
Top4 vs. Luna
I don't remember all too much about this match, since it wasn't that important :D
He used a semi-rain team and used Meta, Cresselia, Politoed, Ludicolo and didn't pick Rotom-W + XX. I started with Zapdos + Hitmontop with Latios and Chomp in the back and could somehow manage to land some Sucker Punches and Tbolts on Cresselia, when Meta protected. In addition to that, he made a mistake and sent out Ludicolo when there was no rain and I predicted the switch to Politoed and Draco Meteor'd it. His Meta died to EQ and he sent out Ludicolo. I protected with Chomp and used TW with Latios, which survived his Ice Beam with 28 HP. Luckily -2 Draco Meteor + Dragon Claw was enough to win me the match 2:0, gg!! :)
Final vs. Gleizzo
Here's the final, I won't comment on it, just watch it yourself ^^
The official vid isn't out yet, here's it filmed by Tyvyr, thanks for uploading it that fast :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTNfFC0p7A4
0:4, gg and congratz!! xD
We watched the Eiffel Tower and went to the Hotel after the tourney I really needed to relax a bit, I was so tired lol Because of that, we missed the party with the germans and the brits, sorry mates :( We will repeat that sometimes, I promise :P
Special thanks go out to:
- Massi for being such a nice guy, thanks for team building and everything. I'm sorry I can't take you with me to Hawaii x(
- drug_duck for being an awesome person and pokemon trainer ---___------ :D
- Flame and DaFlo for endless skype sessions with Team building, theorymon and everything :D
- SolaR, daatengu, Ariana, wii, daatengu, Massi weil ihr die coolsten pokedudes^^ der welt seid mann, ich liebe euch <3
- DaFlo's parents for bringing me to Paris!
- shinycarletto for teambuilding and testing!! I hope you can make it in Italy, bro!
- Matty85, Ben7000, bellanko and many others for fun matches and theorymon on PO
- Sewadle, Toast, Pantaly, TV-Rocka, Terraquaza, Dark_Psiana, sasu, and many more, thanks for making Pokemon a game worth to play!
Thanks for reading, I hope it is somewhat understandable :)
