No, I haven´t qualified, but still had a great time. I´m not going to post my team either (sorry), because of potentially going to Milan. Nevertheless, this is still rather text heavy, but I also added some pictures for those who don´t like to read much.
Also, even if you´re not interested, you should at least read about my round 2 and round 3 battles, maybe it could help you in your qualifier.
Let´s begin...
My plane left Bratislava at 7:15 PM and arrived at 9:00 PM at Beauvais, around 20 minutes ahead of time. It was foggy so the landing was a bit rough.
Oh yeah, I´ve decided to mention it right at the beginning, but the most beautiful woman I saw in France during my 3 day trip was the British (judging by her accent) flight attendant on this flight called Danielle. She was a natural beauty and so adorable, I mean wow (supermodels should look like that). Me and my sister were wondering why such a cute lady would do this kind of job, because with a smile like that I thought she had more options (in a good way). My sis thought she was married to the pilot (yeah, obviously she meant something inappropriate lol), I thought maybe Danielle liked the job. Asking such questions would have been really rude, so I let it at that and enjoyed the flight with a smile on my face, thanks Ryanair :)
Anyway, you pretty much have to take the airport shuttle (bus) for 15 € / person to Paris from the Beauvais airport located about 85 km from Porte Maillot in Paris. It took about 70 minutes to get to Porte Maillot. Our hotel, the Boissiere, is located around 750 m away from Espace Champerret, where the tourney was held, and 700 m from the Louise Michel metro station. We decided not to take a taxi from Porte Maillot for 25-ish € (which would make the whole shuttle/taxi ride cost almost more than the plane tickets), but rather took the RER from Neully-Porte Maillot to Levallois-Perreire and afterwards the metro from Perreire to Louise Michel. I think we passed by a slow, large and loud guy with his family along the way out of Louise Michel, I thought it was Food King but I don´t know him...anyway, we came to the hotel at 11:30 PM. I couldn´t fall asleep for a while, was probably looking forward to waking up early.
Woke up at 6 AM, prepared my bag and the plan was to eat breakfast at mc donalds along the way before walking to Espace Champerret around 7 AM (drug_duck told me that was roughly the time they planned on coming). OK, mc donalds opens at 7:30 AM, great. I can´t live without breakfast and I wouldn´t even survive the registration process, but the thing is I also forgot my cereal biscuits (for the actual tourney) at the hotel, what a good start. I said a quick hello to the Germans and went to find food. Subway was already open, so I bought a sandwich that saved me. Back at Espace Champerret, I met a ton of people and then the obligatory standing in line began. Everywhere I looked, I recognized a competent player. This would be fun. My sis decided to be nice and get me more food and the biscuits while I was standing in line. Thanks for the support.
After the registration I intended to choose someone not-so-tough-looking for round 1 and also tried to be in a part of the queue with the least strong players. Didn´t work as good as planned but there were so many strong players that there was almost no way to get to the finalists lounge without facing at least one of them.
It was possible to sort of choose your round 1 oponent as they always took the first person from each of the two queues to play against each other, so by simple math and letting people pass, I chose a French woman, I know that´s kind of a weak thing to do but whatever...
The thing is, when you then lose round one, oh boy.
Round 1 vs French girl/woman:
She had a rain team (politoed, ludicolo, kingdra, thundurus, scizor, something else) so I frowned. I´d much rather played a random team or goodstuffs team round 1 than a rain one, because rain is somewhat easier to play even if you´re not the best player. She chose Politoed-Kingdra-Ludicolo and something else, probably her 6th that I don´t remember.
There were times I though I could´ve lost if she made the right decisions, she didn´t and I played well. She missed with Focus Blast once or twice, I missed the first Leech Seed, she then missed a Draco Meteor that I wanted to hit me lol. Basically my own Ludicolo won the match for me, because she couldn´t kill it and didn´t gang up on it. The match finished with 23 seconds to go on the clock...
2-0, gg
Not an ideal start of the tournament but a win is a win.
After my round 1 win, I saw 3 other guys that made it as well, waiting for seats to open in round 2. I recognize two are strong Spaniards and one is the Belgian guy in the blue shirt that I recognize from every VGC tournament I´ve been to (3). I consider strategically falling back a bit, maybe waiting for a 5th person to get here and let those 4 battle and get someone else as my oponent. Well, it was obvious the Spanish wouldn´t want to battle each other. The Belgian whose nick slipped my mind asks me who I was and after hearing I was from Smogon he didn´t want to play neither of us 3 lol.
After a minute or so, there were two tables open at the same time, the Spanish guys went separate ways (they were actually the first two in line for round two but they simply friend ruled)...anyway, I thought to myself, oh well there´s so many strong people in this tournament, I will have to beat them one by one if I want to qualify. I went to one of the tables, but I found it amusing that the Belgian guy simply didn´t want to battle the other Spaniard and even left the table to go back and ask the next one in line to go to the table instead of him lol. I don´t know how that ended up and whom he battled, because I was focusing on the battle and my oponent.
I wished him good luck and we shook hands, upon seeing his nickname Albert I asked "you´re Albert from Spain? I´m Peterko from Smogon". Then he was like I´m going to lose...actually I thought the same thing when I saw his roster, I admit it wasn´t what I expected, although I´m sure he was thrown off a lot more by what he saw then I was.
Round 2 part 1 vs Albert from Spain:
I take quite a while to choose my team as I see a team advantage on his side, with some troublesome Pokémon that my team doesn´t like. Finally, I chose my four like 8 seconds before the end of time limit, only to forget clicking confirm, which I figured out when I saw my leads. I though crap, now you have an even worse chance to win.
I didn´t want to use Ludicolo at all, but it´s second in my team and it was chosen automatically and in hindsight, saved me. Yep, the luck was on my side. I don´t remember every detail, but his super-effective Hidden Power did max or close to max damage (I just calculated it) first turn against my other lead (53% damage) and afterwards a few turns later it failed to KO that same Pokémon by a mere 3 HP (close to or minimum damage). My Ludicolo survived an onslaught in the meantime and later double Protected. He seemed annoyed, I said I was sorry, that it was my only chance to win.
The battle was intense and very close and came down to a timeout decision that I was winning, or so I thought.
I was leading 3-2 with the 3 HP Pokémon in the back. It was the last minute of the battle and I wanted to make sure that I win by Protecting with both of my Pokémon in the last turn, even though one of my Pokémon (a Dragon) could have attacked for STAB SE damage on each of his remaining Pokémon (Fighter and Dragon) and probably KO the one it attacked. I wasn´t sure though if one of his Pokémon didn´t have a resist berry and had that one killed my attacker while the other protected, I would have lost the 2-2 tie, because I had the 3 HP Pokémon in the back.
Sorry, this is confusing, but I don´t want to reveal his team nor any more of mine for the time being.
So, basically I thought I would win if the timer ran out during the last turn I protected with both my Pokémon thanks to my 3-2 lead. Well, after the time ran out, we had to play one more turn, go me.
I chose my moves, he chose his moves, he kind of moved his DS
...
...
...
nothing happens. The last turn isn´t played out, I wonder what happened. I ask the Pokémon professor to come and check. Apparently, it looks like Alberts game froze. I´m like, well it was the last turn and I had the 3-2 lead and would have won and my game isn´t frozen, I have the win, right? Albert is saying that he would have won the last turn and he tells me what he chose and that he thinks it would have ended 2-2 with him being the winner thanks to my last Pokémon having only 3 HP. I still think I would have won and I know why.
But, the argument begins. I feel like what the hell, I flew over 1000 km for this and I was about to win, it was not my DS/game that froze, I think he somehow moved his DS, maybe that´s what happened. The Pokémon professor said moving the DS won´t result in such a freeze. I´m like how do you know? How many times did this actually happen? He said once last year, and they had to replay the game. I´m like there is no such rule why should we replay if after such an intense 16 minute battle I was winning and would have surely won.
Each side gave their arguments and simply put, I really didn´t want to rematch because I already had the battle in the bag, hax or no hax, it was still my win. I though I would lose the second game for sure this time, seeing as how I felt he had the team advantage plus now he knew my strategy/movesets so all elements of surprise were lost.
During all of this, I´m looking over to my sis standing at the side line and she´s like wth´s happening right now and I´m shaking my head in disbelief lol. Also, at the table beside us, Rob was playing his round 2 match and I said sorry for not letting you guys play and he said something along the lines of that´s OK this is interesting, I want to know what happens.
The Pokémon professor asked us if we wanted to rematch but then he spoke to some of the other staff...
The options we were given:
a) you have to play another match, but you will be given different oponents ,
b) you replay the match,
c) you get both disqualified and none of you moves forward.
And I´m like what? I won this intense match and now I have to play again? I look around, behind me. I see only 8 persons playing in the round 1 area, which means 4 winners and we can´t play someone else. So I tell the professor and he speaks to the staff and we´re told that those 8 are actually round 2 players, because they didn´t have enough tables in area 2.
So yeah, there is no other person to play against, awesome. The professor says he understands what I´m going through and that I feel robbed, but he can only give us these two options:
a) you both get disqualified
b) you replay the match
Obviously, we had a rematch.
Round 2 part 2 vs Albert from Spain:
At this point, I didn´t care that much anymore and just used something, telling Albert that I have no chance of winning and he told me I would win again lol. Anyway, I chose a different team, he did as well.
He set up a Reflect turn two, but not before one of my leads got a flinching 45% dmg +2 NVE attack on his other lead and afterwards CH one shot the first lead through the screen. My second lead was never fully paralyzed and his double protect didn´t work in the later stages of the game.
I won 2-0 I think. I apologized for the hax.
You can imagine, that by the time my battle(s) against Albert finished, everyone in round 2 was already gone for a long time and also round 3 was almost finished as well.
I went to area 3 where a guy sat and waited. Yes it´s the French Blissey guy, his ingame name was Ken.
Round 3 vs Ken - Togekiss, Jolteon, Blissey, Dusknoir:
In team preview, I see kiss, jolt, blis, noir, blastoise and something else, I´m like what´s this. After the emotional rollercoaster of the previous round I surely wasn´t at my 100%. Had I chosen the Pokémon that won me the last battle again in my choice of 4, this would´ve been a breeze. I didn´t.
1. Foe Jolteon (Life Orb) uses a SE hidden power, brings my first Pokémon to 32% HP.
My first Pokémon does 66% to his Togekiss.
Foe Togekiss uses a SE hidden power, brings my second Pokémon to 38%.
My second pokémon kills foe Jolteon.
Ken sent in Blissey. I didn´t know what exactly to expect, worst case scenario it starts Minimizing or something, I though it wouldn´t possibly KO both my leads so I had to attack right away instead of scouting and finish off Kiss.
2. My first Pokémon finishes off Togekiss.
My second Pokémon does 45% to Blissey.
Blissey uses Blizzard, both mine faint.
Crap. I sent in Ludicolo and Latios, foe Dusknoir. At this point I thought I would surely lose 2-1. I thought Dusknoir would TR or Gravity or whatever and I hoped that Blissey wouldn´t hit and freeze me and just as I remember Blissey´s ability...
3. Latios Psyshocks, brings Blissey to red (20% I guess).
Ludicolo seeds Blissey.
Blissey Blizzards, freezes Latios and hits Ludicolo.
Dusknoir uses Will-o-wisp and burns Ludicolo.
Blissey recovers HP with Lefties, sapped by Seed to around 16%.
4/4 70% accurate Blizzard hits with a freeze, oh well, shit happens. Now I was sure I lost.
4. Latios is frozen solid.
Ludicolo Giga Drains, but Blissey lives with 1% HP.
Blissey uses Softboiled.
Dusknoir uses Ice Punch, Latios lives with 11 HP.
Crap, defensive Ludicolo can´t finish off Blissey and I don´t have Scald.
5. Latios thawed out, Protected.
Ludicolo Seeded Dusknoir.
Blissey Softboiled.
Dusknoir Ice Punched, Latios Protected.
I thought he would Shadow Sneak. He didn´t and Latios thawed out. I can´t kill Blissey so Noir has to go. I thought maybe Dusknoir is EVd in physical defense so I went for the stronger Dragon Pulse.
6. Latios uses Dragon Pulse.
Latios fainted this turn.
Ludicolo Giga Drain, Dusknoir at 21%.
Blissey used Blizzard.
Dusknoir used Ice Punch.
Oh well, he was definitely EV´d in sD, judging from the damage.
7. Ludicolo finishes off Noir
8., 9., 10. Ludicolo attacks, Blissey Softboils for the rest of the match.
The game ends 1-1.
Here´s what the official rules say:
29.1. Tiebreakers
Should the time limit expire before a player knocks out his or her opponent’s final Pokémon, the winner of the game is determined based on the criteria below.
1. Remaining Pokémon
If one player has more remaining Pokémon than the other, that player wins the game.
If both players have the same number of Pokémon remaining, the result of the game is determined by average percentage of HP remaining, as described below.
2. Average Percentage of HP Remaining
If one player’s team has a higher average percentage of HP remaining, that player wins the game.
If both players’ teams have the same average HP remaining, the result of the game is determined by amount of HP remaining, as described below.
3. Amount of Total HP Remaining
If one player’s team has a higher total HP remaining, that player wins the game.
If both players’ teams have the same total HP remaining, the result of the game is a tie.
So lets´s see who wins:
1. We both had one Pokémon each at end of the battle, when the timer ran out. My Ludicolo vs his Blissey, 1-1. The first tiebreaker rule doesn´t apply.
2. His Blissey was Leech Seeded, so Ludicolo sapped 1/8th of its HP each turn. On the other hand, my Ludicolo was burned, so it was also losing 1/8th of its HP.
I lost.
After the battle I asked him through the Pokémon professor who translated (language barrier, he didn´t speak English that well) how much HP his Blissey had. He said max 328 at level 50. At first I thought this was the rule I lost the tiebreaker to, so I left the tournament and went to calculating things. My Ludicolo has 185 max HP and the burn (23 damage) brought it to 162 HP. Now if his Blissey has 328 max HP, Leech Seed should have brought it to 287 HP.
Ludicolo = 162/185 HP = 87.567567567%
Blissey = 287/328 HP = 87.500000000%
I was outside of the battle area but I came to the sideline and asked the Pokémon professor once again if the French guy said 328 hit points. He said yes, 328. I said hmm then I had the higher % of HP remaining. He said you know that now it won´t change anything and I said OK I understand I just want to know what happened. He watched the battle video, then brought the tournament rules. He read the tiebreakers and said that probably the game was decided by the third tiebreaker rule. There were some Germans standing there listening to this conversation, they also thought the third rule was weird. The professor said well, it´s your choice what you use, which Pokémon, it´s part of the strategy and if the game´s coded this way, I can´t do anything about it.
I apologized once again for bothering him and thanked him for the patience.
So, what I´m thinking here is that there is no definition of "average percentage of HP remaining" that I know of. Maybe there´s someone ho knows how the game determines that number, feel free to tell me please. I don´t think I can test this "average percentage of HP remaining" unless someone is willing to do some test matches over wi-fi.
I lost, which means the game either doesn´t calculate this stuff that exactly or rounds down to an extent or maybe Ken told me the wrong number and his final % was slightly higher.
3. The other, more likely option is that the game considered our "average percentage of HP remaining" as equal (both at 7/8 or 87,5% or I don´t know simply 87%) and decided upon tiebreaker rule 3. The thing is, there is no way to win the third tiebreaker rule at 1-1 against a Blissey as it has naturally the most HP.
I think this rule is quite unfair in this particular scenario compared to the first two. The first two tiebreaker rules consider "objective" stuff like number of Pokémon left and % of HP left, I mean they don´t consider what Pokémon the person has. The third rule basically says that Blissey wins no matter what incase of a 1-1 tiebreaker and equal % of remaining HP, because it has the highest natural HP.
Oh well, if the game´s coded this way, there´s no point in asking for a reconsideration of the third rule of some sort. A loss is a loss, I can take it.
If any of you guys know the game mechanics of this scenario, please post them. Maybe this kind of information would help some of you while preparing for your regional/national/worlds tournament.
What I´d also like to know is whether you guys know about game freezes and rematches (how these things are normally handled) like the scenario in my round two match against Albert and if you remember anything like this being in the rules.
Ken was on the screen in his top 16 match where he froze the oponent´s Chandelure but later missed Zapdos with Blizzard like twice and also missed Gastrodon with Sing (oh boy) and after his PPs were depleted he lost in a close game...
Out of the top 8, 3 were German, 2 British, 2 Spanish and 1 Italian. The battles were enjoyable, but it felt a bit weird to see standard stuff prevail in the end, once again. I felt that I would have a better chance at beating those teams than the ones I actually battled.
After the finals were over, there was still an important thing to do, getting the group pic. I told the Germans, drug_duck told the few Spaniards that stayed and tblakey told the British people. We had to wait quite a while for the top 4 guys to finish their business, but it was worth it, in my opinion.
Susie, Viper´s gf, the very nice outspoken lady, that seemed to organize it :) told me that the group was meeting in front of Notre Dame at 6:30 PM to celebrate and that they would split until then. I said goodbye and me and my sis went sightseeing as planned, we saw the Basilique du Sacre Coeur and the surrounding streets, also Moulin Rouge, afterwards went to the centre where all the various top fashion brand shops are to get my sis the shoppaholic her dose.
We actually did go to the meeting point of the Germans in front of Notre Dame and later went with the whole German/British group to Saint Michel. Some of them didn´t even notice we were there and thought we were stalkers or something :)
The group split for half an hour to eat/drink and me and my sis found a Latino bar to sit and have a coctail. Afterwards I went back to the meeting point to tell the others to maybe come to the bar as there were still many seats not taken. Noone else had a different plan so they went along.
We had a fun time there, although you should not underestimate a Latino bar that has "crazy nights" in its name/description in Paris. In the 1,5 hours we spent there, some of the female groups that were apparently at bachelorette parties got 3 strippers to dance with (I mean on) them...oh well lol.
Then came a point where suddenly everyone was leaving for their hotel / ride home, so we said goodbye and thanked for the nice time and having a chance to meet each other. Me and my sis still wanted to stay at the bar a while longer, but the male stripper thing went a little bit overboard so we left. At Louise Michel metro station, we met the British boys again lol. Rob was so happy and jolly all day, he´s such a funny guy who can´t stop talking :p.
Anyway, we said goodbye for the nth time only to wave at the group a minute later at the same metro station from the other side of the railway.
On sunday, I went for a nice 6 hour marathon walk in Louvre, I´ve seen all the exhibitions and been on all of the floors. Long story short, it´s wednesday and my legs are still a bit sore. Louvre was awesome though.
Apparently, this is what kids do to Ducks.
And this is how you handle Hydreigon.
Zap...I mean Zeus.
Omg a blueish Hippo!!!
Yo, Mona, what´s up?
Cour Marly in the Richelieu part.
Hmm, which monarch used this?
On monday, we still needed some presents for our parents because my sis spent all sunday on Champs Elysées shopping...for herself. The airport shuttle would leave at 1:15 PM so we didn´t have much time.
I still wanted to see the Eiffel Tower at least for a minute or two as I fell in love with it last year, but the RER C stopped at the Invalidés station and wouldn´t continue, 5, 10 minutes. It was 12 AM already, so we decided to just go to Porte Maillot, took the metro to Champs Elysées Clemencau and then Metro 1 to Porte Maillot.
The rest of the day was spent waiting and travelling back home. I had mousse chocolat at the airport :)
Unfortunately, Danielle wasn´t on the second flight :/
All in all, I had a great time without regrets despite losing as soon as in the third round (after winning three matches lol). It was nice meeting all of you guys and hopefully will see you again some other time, maybe in Milan.
Peterko´s Paris VGC 2012 story, the end.
Also, even if you´re not interested, you should at least read about my round 2 and round 3 battles, maybe it could help you in your qualifier.
Let´s begin...
My plane left Bratislava at 7:15 PM and arrived at 9:00 PM at Beauvais, around 20 minutes ahead of time. It was foggy so the landing was a bit rough.
Oh yeah, I´ve decided to mention it right at the beginning, but the most beautiful woman I saw in France during my 3 day trip was the British (judging by her accent) flight attendant on this flight called Danielle. She was a natural beauty and so adorable, I mean wow (supermodels should look like that). Me and my sister were wondering why such a cute lady would do this kind of job, because with a smile like that I thought she had more options (in a good way). My sis thought she was married to the pilot (yeah, obviously she meant something inappropriate lol), I thought maybe Danielle liked the job. Asking such questions would have been really rude, so I let it at that and enjoyed the flight with a smile on my face, thanks Ryanair :)
Anyway, you pretty much have to take the airport shuttle (bus) for 15 € / person to Paris from the Beauvais airport located about 85 km from Porte Maillot in Paris. It took about 70 minutes to get to Porte Maillot. Our hotel, the Boissiere, is located around 750 m away from Espace Champerret, where the tourney was held, and 700 m from the Louise Michel metro station. We decided not to take a taxi from Porte Maillot for 25-ish € (which would make the whole shuttle/taxi ride cost almost more than the plane tickets), but rather took the RER from Neully-Porte Maillot to Levallois-Perreire and afterwards the metro from Perreire to Louise Michel. I think we passed by a slow, large and loud guy with his family along the way out of Louise Michel, I thought it was Food King but I don´t know him...anyway, we came to the hotel at 11:30 PM. I couldn´t fall asleep for a while, was probably looking forward to waking up early.
Woke up at 6 AM, prepared my bag and the plan was to eat breakfast at mc donalds along the way before walking to Espace Champerret around 7 AM (drug_duck told me that was roughly the time they planned on coming). OK, mc donalds opens at 7:30 AM, great. I can´t live without breakfast and I wouldn´t even survive the registration process, but the thing is I also forgot my cereal biscuits (for the actual tourney) at the hotel, what a good start. I said a quick hello to the Germans and went to find food. Subway was already open, so I bought a sandwich that saved me. Back at Espace Champerret, I met a ton of people and then the obligatory standing in line began. Everywhere I looked, I recognized a competent player. This would be fun. My sis decided to be nice and get me more food and the biscuits while I was standing in line. Thanks for the support.
After the registration I intended to choose someone not-so-tough-looking for round 1 and also tried to be in a part of the queue with the least strong players. Didn´t work as good as planned but there were so many strong players that there was almost no way to get to the finalists lounge without facing at least one of them.
It was possible to sort of choose your round 1 oponent as they always took the first person from each of the two queues to play against each other, so by simple math and letting people pass, I chose a French woman, I know that´s kind of a weak thing to do but whatever...
The thing is, when you then lose round one, oh boy.
Round 1 vs French girl/woman:
She had a rain team (politoed, ludicolo, kingdra, thundurus, scizor, something else) so I frowned. I´d much rather played a random team or goodstuffs team round 1 than a rain one, because rain is somewhat easier to play even if you´re not the best player. She chose Politoed-Kingdra-Ludicolo and something else, probably her 6th that I don´t remember.
There were times I though I could´ve lost if she made the right decisions, she didn´t and I played well. She missed with Focus Blast once or twice, I missed the first Leech Seed, she then missed a Draco Meteor that I wanted to hit me lol. Basically my own Ludicolo won the match for me, because she couldn´t kill it and didn´t gang up on it. The match finished with 23 seconds to go on the clock...
2-0, gg
Not an ideal start of the tournament but a win is a win.
After my round 1 win, I saw 3 other guys that made it as well, waiting for seats to open in round 2. I recognize two are strong Spaniards and one is the Belgian guy in the blue shirt that I recognize from every VGC tournament I´ve been to (3). I consider strategically falling back a bit, maybe waiting for a 5th person to get here and let those 4 battle and get someone else as my oponent. Well, it was obvious the Spanish wouldn´t want to battle each other. The Belgian whose nick slipped my mind asks me who I was and after hearing I was from Smogon he didn´t want to play neither of us 3 lol.
After a minute or so, there were two tables open at the same time, the Spanish guys went separate ways (they were actually the first two in line for round two but they simply friend ruled)...anyway, I thought to myself, oh well there´s so many strong people in this tournament, I will have to beat them one by one if I want to qualify. I went to one of the tables, but I found it amusing that the Belgian guy simply didn´t want to battle the other Spaniard and even left the table to go back and ask the next one in line to go to the table instead of him lol. I don´t know how that ended up and whom he battled, because I was focusing on the battle and my oponent.
I wished him good luck and we shook hands, upon seeing his nickname Albert I asked "you´re Albert from Spain? I´m Peterko from Smogon". Then he was like I´m going to lose...actually I thought the same thing when I saw his roster, I admit it wasn´t what I expected, although I´m sure he was thrown off a lot more by what he saw then I was.
Round 2 part 1 vs Albert from Spain:
I take quite a while to choose my team as I see a team advantage on his side, with some troublesome Pokémon that my team doesn´t like. Finally, I chose my four like 8 seconds before the end of time limit, only to forget clicking confirm, which I figured out when I saw my leads. I though crap, now you have an even worse chance to win.
I didn´t want to use Ludicolo at all, but it´s second in my team and it was chosen automatically and in hindsight, saved me. Yep, the luck was on my side. I don´t remember every detail, but his super-effective Hidden Power did max or close to max damage (I just calculated it) first turn against my other lead (53% damage) and afterwards a few turns later it failed to KO that same Pokémon by a mere 3 HP (close to or minimum damage). My Ludicolo survived an onslaught in the meantime and later double Protected. He seemed annoyed, I said I was sorry, that it was my only chance to win.
The battle was intense and very close and came down to a timeout decision that I was winning, or so I thought.
I was leading 3-2 with the 3 HP Pokémon in the back. It was the last minute of the battle and I wanted to make sure that I win by Protecting with both of my Pokémon in the last turn, even though one of my Pokémon (a Dragon) could have attacked for STAB SE damage on each of his remaining Pokémon (Fighter and Dragon) and probably KO the one it attacked. I wasn´t sure though if one of his Pokémon didn´t have a resist berry and had that one killed my attacker while the other protected, I would have lost the 2-2 tie, because I had the 3 HP Pokémon in the back.
Sorry, this is confusing, but I don´t want to reveal his team nor any more of mine for the time being.
So, basically I thought I would win if the timer ran out during the last turn I protected with both my Pokémon thanks to my 3-2 lead. Well, after the time ran out, we had to play one more turn, go me.
I chose my moves, he chose his moves, he kind of moved his DS
...
...
...
nothing happens. The last turn isn´t played out, I wonder what happened. I ask the Pokémon professor to come and check. Apparently, it looks like Alberts game froze. I´m like, well it was the last turn and I had the 3-2 lead and would have won and my game isn´t frozen, I have the win, right? Albert is saying that he would have won the last turn and he tells me what he chose and that he thinks it would have ended 2-2 with him being the winner thanks to my last Pokémon having only 3 HP. I still think I would have won and I know why.
But, the argument begins. I feel like what the hell, I flew over 1000 km for this and I was about to win, it was not my DS/game that froze, I think he somehow moved his DS, maybe that´s what happened. The Pokémon professor said moving the DS won´t result in such a freeze. I´m like how do you know? How many times did this actually happen? He said once last year, and they had to replay the game. I´m like there is no such rule why should we replay if after such an intense 16 minute battle I was winning and would have surely won.
Each side gave their arguments and simply put, I really didn´t want to rematch because I already had the battle in the bag, hax or no hax, it was still my win. I though I would lose the second game for sure this time, seeing as how I felt he had the team advantage plus now he knew my strategy/movesets so all elements of surprise were lost.
During all of this, I´m looking over to my sis standing at the side line and she´s like wth´s happening right now and I´m shaking my head in disbelief lol. Also, at the table beside us, Rob was playing his round 2 match and I said sorry for not letting you guys play and he said something along the lines of that´s OK this is interesting, I want to know what happens.
The Pokémon professor asked us if we wanted to rematch but then he spoke to some of the other staff...
The options we were given:
a) you have to play another match, but you will be given different oponents ,
b) you replay the match,
c) you get both disqualified and none of you moves forward.
And I´m like what? I won this intense match and now I have to play again? I look around, behind me. I see only 8 persons playing in the round 1 area, which means 4 winners and we can´t play someone else. So I tell the professor and he speaks to the staff and we´re told that those 8 are actually round 2 players, because they didn´t have enough tables in area 2.
So yeah, there is no other person to play against, awesome. The professor says he understands what I´m going through and that I feel robbed, but he can only give us these two options:
a) you both get disqualified
b) you replay the match
Obviously, we had a rematch.
Round 2 part 2 vs Albert from Spain:
At this point, I didn´t care that much anymore and just used something, telling Albert that I have no chance of winning and he told me I would win again lol. Anyway, I chose a different team, he did as well.
He set up a Reflect turn two, but not before one of my leads got a flinching 45% dmg +2 NVE attack on his other lead and afterwards CH one shot the first lead through the screen. My second lead was never fully paralyzed and his double protect didn´t work in the later stages of the game.
I won 2-0 I think. I apologized for the hax.
You can imagine, that by the time my battle(s) against Albert finished, everyone in round 2 was already gone for a long time and also round 3 was almost finished as well.
I went to area 3 where a guy sat and waited. Yes it´s the French Blissey guy, his ingame name was Ken.
Round 3 vs Ken - Togekiss, Jolteon, Blissey, Dusknoir:
In team preview, I see kiss, jolt, blis, noir, blastoise and something else, I´m like what´s this. After the emotional rollercoaster of the previous round I surely wasn´t at my 100%. Had I chosen the Pokémon that won me the last battle again in my choice of 4, this would´ve been a breeze. I didn´t.
1. Foe Jolteon (Life Orb) uses a SE hidden power, brings my first Pokémon to 32% HP.
My first Pokémon does 66% to his Togekiss.
Foe Togekiss uses a SE hidden power, brings my second Pokémon to 38%.
My second pokémon kills foe Jolteon.
Ken sent in Blissey. I didn´t know what exactly to expect, worst case scenario it starts Minimizing or something, I though it wouldn´t possibly KO both my leads so I had to attack right away instead of scouting and finish off Kiss.
2. My first Pokémon finishes off Togekiss.
My second Pokémon does 45% to Blissey.
Blissey uses Blizzard, both mine faint.
Crap. I sent in Ludicolo and Latios, foe Dusknoir. At this point I thought I would surely lose 2-1. I thought Dusknoir would TR or Gravity or whatever and I hoped that Blissey wouldn´t hit and freeze me and just as I remember Blissey´s ability...
3. Latios Psyshocks, brings Blissey to red (20% I guess).
Ludicolo seeds Blissey.
Blissey Blizzards, freezes Latios and hits Ludicolo.
Dusknoir uses Will-o-wisp and burns Ludicolo.
Blissey recovers HP with Lefties, sapped by Seed to around 16%.
4/4 70% accurate Blizzard hits with a freeze, oh well, shit happens. Now I was sure I lost.
4. Latios is frozen solid.
Ludicolo Giga Drains, but Blissey lives with 1% HP.
Blissey uses Softboiled.
Dusknoir uses Ice Punch, Latios lives with 11 HP.
Crap, defensive Ludicolo can´t finish off Blissey and I don´t have Scald.
5. Latios thawed out, Protected.
Ludicolo Seeded Dusknoir.
Blissey Softboiled.
Dusknoir Ice Punched, Latios Protected.
I thought he would Shadow Sneak. He didn´t and Latios thawed out. I can´t kill Blissey so Noir has to go. I thought maybe Dusknoir is EVd in physical defense so I went for the stronger Dragon Pulse.
6. Latios uses Dragon Pulse.
Latios fainted this turn.
Ludicolo Giga Drain, Dusknoir at 21%.
Blissey used Blizzard.
Dusknoir used Ice Punch.
Oh well, he was definitely EV´d in sD, judging from the damage.
7. Ludicolo finishes off Noir
8., 9., 10. Ludicolo attacks, Blissey Softboils for the rest of the match.
The game ends 1-1.
Here´s what the official rules say:
29.1. Tiebreakers
Should the time limit expire before a player knocks out his or her opponent’s final Pokémon, the winner of the game is determined based on the criteria below.
1. Remaining Pokémon
If one player has more remaining Pokémon than the other, that player wins the game.
If both players have the same number of Pokémon remaining, the result of the game is determined by average percentage of HP remaining, as described below.
2. Average Percentage of HP Remaining
If one player’s team has a higher average percentage of HP remaining, that player wins the game.
If both players’ teams have the same average HP remaining, the result of the game is determined by amount of HP remaining, as described below.
3. Amount of Total HP Remaining
If one player’s team has a higher total HP remaining, that player wins the game.
If both players’ teams have the same total HP remaining, the result of the game is a tie.
So lets´s see who wins:
1. We both had one Pokémon each at end of the battle, when the timer ran out. My Ludicolo vs his Blissey, 1-1. The first tiebreaker rule doesn´t apply.
2. His Blissey was Leech Seeded, so Ludicolo sapped 1/8th of its HP each turn. On the other hand, my Ludicolo was burned, so it was also losing 1/8th of its HP.
I lost.
After the battle I asked him through the Pokémon professor who translated (language barrier, he didn´t speak English that well) how much HP his Blissey had. He said max 328 at level 50. At first I thought this was the rule I lost the tiebreaker to, so I left the tournament and went to calculating things. My Ludicolo has 185 max HP and the burn (23 damage) brought it to 162 HP. Now if his Blissey has 328 max HP, Leech Seed should have brought it to 287 HP.
Ludicolo = 162/185 HP = 87.567567567%
Blissey = 287/328 HP = 87.500000000%
I was outside of the battle area but I came to the sideline and asked the Pokémon professor once again if the French guy said 328 hit points. He said yes, 328. I said hmm then I had the higher % of HP remaining. He said you know that now it won´t change anything and I said OK I understand I just want to know what happened. He watched the battle video, then brought the tournament rules. He read the tiebreakers and said that probably the game was decided by the third tiebreaker rule. There were some Germans standing there listening to this conversation, they also thought the third rule was weird. The professor said well, it´s your choice what you use, which Pokémon, it´s part of the strategy and if the game´s coded this way, I can´t do anything about it.
I apologized once again for bothering him and thanked him for the patience.
So, what I´m thinking here is that there is no definition of "average percentage of HP remaining" that I know of. Maybe there´s someone ho knows how the game determines that number, feel free to tell me please. I don´t think I can test this "average percentage of HP remaining" unless someone is willing to do some test matches over wi-fi.
I lost, which means the game either doesn´t calculate this stuff that exactly or rounds down to an extent or maybe Ken told me the wrong number and his final % was slightly higher.
3. The other, more likely option is that the game considered our "average percentage of HP remaining" as equal (both at 7/8 or 87,5% or I don´t know simply 87%) and decided upon tiebreaker rule 3. The thing is, there is no way to win the third tiebreaker rule at 1-1 against a Blissey as it has naturally the most HP.
I think this rule is quite unfair in this particular scenario compared to the first two. The first two tiebreaker rules consider "objective" stuff like number of Pokémon left and % of HP left, I mean they don´t consider what Pokémon the person has. The third rule basically says that Blissey wins no matter what incase of a 1-1 tiebreaker and equal % of remaining HP, because it has the highest natural HP.
Oh well, if the game´s coded this way, there´s no point in asking for a reconsideration of the third rule of some sort. A loss is a loss, I can take it.
If any of you guys know the game mechanics of this scenario, please post them. Maybe this kind of information would help some of you while preparing for your regional/national/worlds tournament.
What I´d also like to know is whether you guys know about game freezes and rematches (how these things are normally handled) like the scenario in my round two match against Albert and if you remember anything like this being in the rules.
Ken was on the screen in his top 16 match where he froze the oponent´s Chandelure but later missed Zapdos with Blizzard like twice and also missed Gastrodon with Sing (oh boy) and after his PPs were depleted he lost in a close game...
Out of the top 8, 3 were German, 2 British, 2 Spanish and 1 Italian. The battles were enjoyable, but it felt a bit weird to see standard stuff prevail in the end, once again. I felt that I would have a better chance at beating those teams than the ones I actually battled.
After the finals were over, there was still an important thing to do, getting the group pic. I told the Germans, drug_duck told the few Spaniards that stayed and tblakey told the British people. We had to wait quite a while for the top 4 guys to finish their business, but it was worth it, in my opinion.
Susie, Viper´s gf, the very nice outspoken lady, that seemed to organize it :) told me that the group was meeting in front of Notre Dame at 6:30 PM to celebrate and that they would split until then. I said goodbye and me and my sis went sightseeing as planned, we saw the Basilique du Sacre Coeur and the surrounding streets, also Moulin Rouge, afterwards went to the centre where all the various top fashion brand shops are to get my sis the shoppaholic her dose.
We actually did go to the meeting point of the Germans in front of Notre Dame and later went with the whole German/British group to Saint Michel. Some of them didn´t even notice we were there and thought we were stalkers or something :)
The group split for half an hour to eat/drink and me and my sis found a Latino bar to sit and have a coctail. Afterwards I went back to the meeting point to tell the others to maybe come to the bar as there were still many seats not taken. Noone else had a different plan so they went along.
We had a fun time there, although you should not underestimate a Latino bar that has "crazy nights" in its name/description in Paris. In the 1,5 hours we spent there, some of the female groups that were apparently at bachelorette parties got 3 strippers to dance with (I mean on) them...oh well lol.
Then came a point where suddenly everyone was leaving for their hotel / ride home, so we said goodbye and thanked for the nice time and having a chance to meet each other. Me and my sis still wanted to stay at the bar a while longer, but the male stripper thing went a little bit overboard so we left. At Louise Michel metro station, we met the British boys again lol. Rob was so happy and jolly all day, he´s such a funny guy who can´t stop talking :p.
Anyway, we said goodbye for the nth time only to wave at the group a minute later at the same metro station from the other side of the railway.
On sunday, I went for a nice 6 hour marathon walk in Louvre, I´ve seen all the exhibitions and been on all of the floors. Long story short, it´s wednesday and my legs are still a bit sore. Louvre was awesome though.
Apparently, this is what kids do to Ducks.
And this is how you handle Hydreigon.
Zap...I mean Zeus.
Omg a blueish Hippo!!!
Yo, Mona, what´s up?
Cour Marly in the Richelieu part.
Hmm, which monarch used this?
On monday, we still needed some presents for our parents because my sis spent all sunday on Champs Elysées shopping...for herself. The airport shuttle would leave at 1:15 PM so we didn´t have much time.
I still wanted to see the Eiffel Tower at least for a minute or two as I fell in love with it last year, but the RER C stopped at the Invalidés station and wouldn´t continue, 5, 10 minutes. It was 12 AM already, so we decided to just go to Porte Maillot, took the metro to Champs Elysées Clemencau and then Metro 1 to Porte Maillot.
The rest of the day was spent waiting and travelling back home. I had mousse chocolat at the airport :)
Unfortunately, Danielle wasn´t on the second flight :/
All in all, I had a great time without regrets despite losing as soon as in the third round (after winning three matches lol). It was nice meeting all of you guys and hopefully will see you again some other time, maybe in Milan.
Peterko´s Paris VGC 2012 story, the end.
