Your Tournament Experience

JRank

Jonny
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
Now that the 2012 WiFi Friendly is over, it's time to share your experiences! Post warstories, your team, or whatever thoughts you had about the tournament. However there are just a few rules to keep in mind:

-This is not the place for accusations of people disconnecting. It is hated that this even has to be a rule, but for whatever reason some Smogonites have disconnected on other Smogonites to preserve their ranking. While that is unfortunate and seriously discouraged, discussions of it will not be tolerated.

-Along with the above rule, discussion of disconnections (and disconnectors) should be kept to an absolute minimum. Mentioning it in your overall record is fine, but complaining about the quantity of disconnections (however high it may be) is discouraged.

With that in mind, have fun!
 

JRank

Jonny
is a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
I guess I'll go ahead with mine.


Hand kept shaking, crooked picture resulted

I excluded my team (from the picture) because even though I'm probably not going to use it again (not really nats quality), I think it's really creative and original and I don't want anyone to use it/counterteam it if I do.

Log of my battles

YES AARON I USED YOUR FORMAT

Record: 61-12-12 (85 battles)
Rating: 1821
Average Opponent Rating: 1556(.3)

Game 1: Kwame | United States, Maryland (1500) | 4-0 Victory
Game 2: Sinasar | United States, Pennsylvania (1500) | 1-0 Victory
Game 3: Nick | United States, California (1487) | 3-2 D/C
Game 4: ANDR3S | Canada, Quebec (1499) | 2-0 Victory
Game 5: Lucho | Spain, Galicia (1518) | 2-1 D/C
Game 6: TREE | United States, Washington, D.C. (1500) | 1-0 Victory
Game 7: Zero | None (1500) | 3-0 Victory
Game 8: ADZ | United Kingdom, North West England (1588) | 2-0 Victory
Game 9: CHRIST | United States, New York (1539) | 4-0 Victory
Game 10: Alex | United States, New York (1500) | 3-0 Victory
Game 11: Laura | Spain, Andalusia (1474) | 3-0 Victory
Game 12: Jose | United States, Michigan (1500) | 3-0 Victory
Game 13: Maxime | Canada, Quebec (1497) | 4-0 Victory
Game 14: Sylvia<3 | None (1500) | 1-0 Victory
Game 15: BRANDON | United States, Minnesota (1500) | 4-0 Victory
Game 16: Roz | Canada, Quebec (1638) | 2-0 Victory
Game 17: Groose | United States, Texas (1722) | 0-1 Loss
Game 18: Ryan | United States, Pennsylvania (1519) | 0-2 Loss
Game 19: Ash256G | United States, Texas (1500) | 4-0 Victory
Game 20: Eliza | United States, Virginia (1602) | 2-0 Victory
Game 21: Matthew | United States, Ohio (1380) | 4-0 Victory
Game 22: Chinese Player | None (????) | 0-2 Loss
Game 23: CHESHIR | United States, Washington (1458) | 4-0 Victory
Game 24: Axel | United States, Texas (1509) | 0-2 Loss
Game 25: Fredy | Mexico (1752) | 0-2 Loss
Game 26: Alec | United States, California (1723) | 4-1 Victory
Game 27: Utopia | United States, Nebraska (1268) | 4-0 Victory
Game 28: Khali | United States, New York (1663) | 2-0 Victory
Game 29: Sid | Dominican Republic (1652) | 3-4 WFC D/C
Game 30: Ash | United Kingdom, South East England (1679) | 1-0 Victory
Game 31: Grimm | United States, Kentucky (1430) | 4-0 Victory
Game 32: Nick | United States, California (1478) | 3-0 Victory
Game 33: Malik | United States, Pennsylvania (1454) | 4-2 D/C
Game 34: BADHAIR | United States, Hawaii (1730) | 0-2 Loss
Game 35: Lucho | Spain, Galicia (1523) | 3-0 Victory
Game 36: SF | China, Hong Kong (1811) | 4-2 D/C
Game 37: JEFF W | None (1567) | 3-0 Victory
Game 38: Stan | Australia, New South Wales (1466) | 4-0 Victory
Game 39: CLAUS | None (1889) | 1-3 D/C
Game 40: DiddyK. | United States, California (1831) | 0-2 Loss
Game 41: Alberto | United States, California (1547) | 2-0 Victory
Game 42: Jacob | Unknown (????) | 1-0 Victory
Game 43: Hilbert | Australia, New South Wales (1446) | 0-2 Loss
Game 44: Gabriel | Chile (1474) | 3-0 Victory
Game 45: RYU | United States, New York (1717) | 2-0 Victory
Game 46: Shock | Australia, Queensland (1525) | 4-0 Victory
Game 47: Tay | Unknown (????) | 2-0 Victory
Game 48: julien | France, Ile-de-France (1485) | 4-0 Victory
Game 49: Alex | United States, New York (1496) | 2-0 Victory
Game 50: RAYAD | None (1837) | 1-0 Victory
Game 51: Odin | United States, Pennsylvania (1423) | 3-0 Victory
Game 52: Chris | Canada, British Columbia (1557) | 1-1 Forfeit
Game 53: Sarah | United States, Michigan (1500) | 3-0 Victory
Game 54: Bryan | United States, North Carolina (1185) | 4-0 Victory
Game 55: MATTY | Italy, Marche (1902) | 0-3 Loss
Game 56: ASH | United States, Colorado (1939) | D/C before Team Preview
Game 57: R | Mexico (1787) | 1-0 Victory
Game 58: Shadow | None (1315) | 3-0 Victory
Game 59: STARK | Mexico (1424) | 1-3 D/C
Game 60: Tommy | United States, Florida (1511) | 4-0 Victory
Game 61: 7014* | United Kingdom, Greater London (1926) | 3-0 Victory
Game 62: BRYAN | None (1488) | 3-0 Victory
Game 63: SIAMEZ | Mexico (1648) | 0-2 Loss
Game 64: Omar | United States, Illinois (1493) | 4-0 Victory
Game 65: Ashley | United States, Kentucky (1456) | 3-0 Victory
Game 66: JERIC | United States, New Jersey (1763) | 3-0 D/C
Game 67: Matthew | United States, Florida (1644) | 3-0 Victory
Game 68: RAYOZKA | Mexico (1654) | 3-0 D/C
Game 69: triple | None (1509) | 0-1 Loss
Game 70: KENNETH | None (1426) | 1-2 Forfeit
Game 71: MIKE | United States, New York (1340) | 4-0 Victory
Game 72: Cenobia | Gibraltar (1437) | 4-0 Victory
Game 73: Dani | Guatemala (1496) | 4-1 Forfeit
Game 74: KELLY | Canada, Quebec (1528) | 3-0 Victory
Game 75: KELLY | Canada, Quebec (1528) | 3-0 Victory
Game 76: DAFOR | Dominican Republic (1802) | 4-4 D/C
Game 77: ANDY | None (1409) | 3-0 Victory
Game 78: Oscar | None (1435) | 2-0 Victory
Game 79: Darwin | Venezuela (1479) | 4-3 D/C
Game 80: D-MAN | United States, Illinois (????) | 2-0 Victory
Game 81: Sol | United States, Arizona (1713) | 4-3 Forfeit
Game 82: CALVIN | France, Pays-de-la-Loire (1341) | 3-0 Victory
Game 83: Xui | None (1583) | 2-0 Victory
Game 84: Leo | Brazil, Rio de Janeiro (1568) | 3-0 Victory
Game 85: EN | None (1482) | 3-0 Victory


My Thoughts / Experiences:

-The amount of trainers with a rating below 1500 but were still clearly competent was somewhat unexpected. More than once I lost a lot of points to a 14something who played very well.

-I ran into a lot more Smogonites this time than last time (1 last time and 10 or 11 this time). This made for a lot of intense battles, and a whole lot of fun!

-My team really overachieved. Coming into it I thought my previous WiFi Friendly team (record: 65-20-20, rating: 1702) was much better than the one I used (record: 61-12-12, rating: 1821). It wound up 119 points higher than my last one, and it took 20 less battles, too. Even so the team I used this time was somewhat of a gimmick so I probably won't be using it at Nationals or any other event any time soon.

Overall the tournament was a blast, whether it was actually battling, watching Dad battle, or discussing it with people on IRC. Even though there are still disconnection issues (which were much more prevalent for others; it seems I was one of the lucky ones), I look forward to playing in the next one!

All the Smogonites I played:

Game 16: Roz (Roz) 2-0 Victory
Game 17: Groose (mrbopper) 0-1 Loss
Game 18: Ryan (Knights of Wario Land) 0-2 Loss
Game 26: Alec (pokemaster649) 4-1 Victory
Game 40: DiddyK. (Kingofkongs) 0-2 Loss
Game 50: RAYAD (Rukario) 1-0 Victory
Game 55: MATTY (Matty85) 0-3 Loss
Game 61: 7014* (7014gree) 3-0 Victory
Game 81: Sol (ClearVersion) 4-3 Forfeit
Game 83: Xui (Xui) 2-0 Victory

6-4 vs Smogonites, which is pretty good considering the skill level of all those I played was extremely high. Good games!
 

Dimsun

VGC 2012 Seniors Champion
I had a fine experience. I set a goal for myself, and followed it(got to 1902 in less then 50 battles! w00t!), which made me proud of myself. Aside from that, I didn't actually run into many disconnectors anyways. The tournament has somewhat sparked my creativity running into over 48 different teams(disconnectors) and, although I didn't really try for a top spot although I feel I could have gotten one, I enjoyed the practice and the accessibility the tournament had. I look forward to a future tourney where smogoners and other people will be a bit more mature and the live thread will be full of pleasant stuff, not just accusations of which five year old bit the other, etc.
Thanks eveyrone for a great tourney! Hopefully it was good practice for nats.
 
I'm really happy with the way this tournament went. My team did really great. I only did a total of something like 52 battles, so I probably could have pushed for some more points, but I was happy with my rating higher than the other tournaments.

The competition in the tournament I felt was on the whole easier than the International one with the Japanese players included. The fact that it isn't properly international does take away some of the satisfaction of a high ranking, but it's nothing to think twice about really.

Unlike most of the people posting in the main thread, I didn't have one person disconnect on me mid-battle through the whole tournament. Maybe I got lucky, maybe I did my battles at the right time or something.

My final scores: 48 wins / 4 losses / 3 disconnects - Ranking 1838
 
Overall I enjoyed the tournament. My team did great imho, finishing with a ranking of 1848 in 47 battles. I didn't have a lot of problems with disconnections either, since only 9 people DC'd on me. The only downside is that I didn't battle a lot of smogoners, only 2 (at least that I know of) : JRank and TheHungerSnorlax. Both were great battles and I wish I would've had more intense battles like those 2. Most of my battles were against people with low ratings, so obviously they were not as competitive as people from here. But yep, as I mentioned I had fun playing in this tournament, it was good practice for Nats.
 
It's not the same without the Japanese ;_;

On a side note, from the few battles I played, a few of them were pretty fun thanks to my new (experimental) teammate, Froslass. Most teams that I saw were pretty standard, the prep was decent but I can build on from my crutch team by playing Random Matchup.
 
I hate the "shows in native language" aspect of the game. I really wanted to see my Korean Politoed in all it's glory.

That said, the disconnects are the biggest problem. They need to adopt a "after a d/c, online players get full points" system, preferably with a faux "your opponent conceded" screen. Rather than losing points, I would prefer every battle give you points - even if losing only gives you 1/10th the points winning would. This would be incentive for players to stick around or even to concede proactively.

Also, I think there needs to be an edit to the sleep status such that a strong hit wakes you up. It just doesn't make sense for my sturdy guy to go from full HP to 1HP and not wake up.
 
My experiences in this tournament were somewhat less fun than the other tournaments. The reason was too many disconnections than I had the previous ones. Also it's just not the same without the Japanese. The dc I had, was more than the two tournaments combined! It also made me realized that I need to work on my prediction skills a little more.

My record: 90-11-42 Rating: 1897 (so close ; _ ;......)

Edit: and oh, JRank, GG! My team does seem to need a little more work.
 

Solace

royal flush
is a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Senior Staff Member Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnusis a Battle Simulator Moderator Alumnus
JRank said:
-Along with the above rule, discussion of disconnections (and disconnectors) should be kept to an absolute minimum. Mentioning it in your overall record is fine, but complaining about the quantity of disconnections (however high it may be) is discouraged.
friendly reminder!
 
I only played about 15 matches, and lost only one match, and that was to a Smogonite (7014gree). I played so little because I found out some small ways to improve my team for the US Nationals and I didn't want to go on with my unimproved, registered team when I could be RNGing and training up new Pokemon :\ but it was a great experience, and I got out of it with a stronger team to test out in Random Matchup!
 

kingofmars

Its 2015 somewhere
won the 2nd Smogon VGC Tournamentis a Past SPL Champion
During the beginning of the tournament, I was doing exceedingly well, getting a 30-1 record at one point. then I got into the red the second day, then in the green the third, ending it with 1931 points. The fourth day just left me flabergasted, due to the lack of wins I was able to maintain, with most of them coming from very low ranked players, giving me one or two points max. The majority of the matches I lost were due to some bad luck, and others ruined by luck before I could play an actual enjoyable game. (ie, vs Habak) ending up with around 1819 I think with around 156 games, and a lot more that didn't end up being counted. On the plus side, feeling good about this team due to beating Zheng, Jrank, and Ben7000/1
 
I liked learning some unorthodox strategies from other players, including:

- Virizion+Thundurus, where Virizion casts Safeguard on turn one, and Thundurus uses Swagger on it on Turn 2 for an insant attack boost to sweep.
- LightningRod Raichu absorbing lightning for Azumarril
- Using Inner Focus Alakazam at all, ditto for Inner Focus Dragonite.

EDIT: Thoughts

I think I'm going to try not do a gimmicky TR team for the next tournament. As fun as it is when things go right on an unprepared team, there's a lot of room for error and it's tough to recover if you screw it up. So I'll probably go more traditional next time.
 
I don't know that it's fair to curtail discussion of the d/c problem. I don't remember my cool, close matches. I remember my "I just beat him and he disconnected" feelings. It's a problem and when you don't mention it first, and often, it doesn't get fixed.

Game Freak needs to take account of this for Generation 6. Random wifi battles was a great invention. D/Cs are the unforseen kick in the teeth they need to fix. The moment they say "Yup, we get it, we're sorry - it'll be better next generation", we can stop mentioning it. Till then, it is the first thing you think about in a tourney, and the first thing you should post about.

That said, I will sing my praises for my Quiet Politoed.
Cons: I won 0 "Weather speed wars", as most opponents played water (and I just left mine out in those matches). The one where I was worried about it, the guy had Tyranitar and switched him in 1st turn.
Pros: That thing takes a hit like a champ, and hits like a pro. Sadly it's Ice Beam never OHKOed anything, except maybe a salamence (not that I should expect this from a Politoed normally), but it's Surfs were always champs when they went off. KOed my Mienshao a couple of times with it... strategically the right thing to do, but just reminded me I need to spend more than 4 mintutes picking out a team 2 days into the tourney I forgot about. LOL!
I had a new appreciation for Encore, but I think I only encored twice "right" during the tourney - once on a Protecting Jellicent and once on a Substituting Whismsicot.
I think my Politoed got OHKOed like maybe twice over the 4 or so days I actually played... and it often took less than half damage from discharges and thunderbolts. In fact, I think the only OHKO it had was on a critical hit Thunder...

Timid Jynx also performed relatively well, although I was a little suspicious about the odd double-failure rate and double-success rate of Blizzard. I expected far more "this hits 1 guy" returns, but often times found jynx double-missing with blizard. Lovely Kiss was fairly potent as well.

Toxicroak was probably a bad choice, almost always being OHKOed by EQ or a psychic move, which I totally spaced on during team creation. That said, double-spread attacks makes Sucker Punch prediction really easy, and I don't think I missed a Sucker Punch once this week. I did, however, get KOed a lot by by a lot of suckerpunched EQers.

Underperformers:
Toxicroak - one quarter of the time this was a bulky attacker. The rest of the time it was a liability and either OHKOed or on the bench.
Hydreigon - 0 free psychic switchins, 0 free levetate switchins (probably could have had 1 or 2, but attempting to U-Turn it in was too tempting
Breeloom - taking my Stone Edge > Seedbomb Breeloom relegated this guy to the benches in most games. Adamant didn't help. Oops. Should have went with Ludicolo as originaly planned.

Biggest Surprise: Arcanine w/ Snarl. Considering I had Politoed and Jynx out, this was rather tricky. He D/Ced on me, I think, but it was still such a surprise I had to look it up.

Final Thoughts: I ran 3 Fakeout Users, and often times used 2-3 of them and quiet politoed to sweep through my opponents. Needed more status givers on my team, I think, and a Prankster-backed Encore would have been pretty fun to have. Counted 1 dragondance, 1 substitute, lots of protect, and I think 2 or 3 fakeouts. Encoring a Fake Out would have been awesome.

Total Battles: 14. Not counting D/Cs. Score 1580.
 
Well, it's been my second time in an official TPCi tournament and I have to say that this one was awesome!



Shot in Aperture Priority f-stop 2.8 if anyone's interested. Shutter speed 1/13 sec.


That sums it up. 18 matches and no losses throughout the whole tournament. Got D/Ced plenty of times, that probably robbed me of a few points, but I'm really happy to get to 1700+, a huge improvement from 1519 last tournament.

Comparatively, my team's almost identical to last tournament's. The only new inclusion is Virizion to replace my unEV trained Scrafty.

A few words about the team, which was basically pieced together from my singles team:

Gengar is a fantastic lead to put opponents under pressure early. It pretty much runs a standard sweeping set of Shadow Ball / Focus Blast / Thunderbolt / Protect with Expert Belt (I'm too cheap to buy a Life Orb). Focus Blast has it's issues with accuracy, but it feels so good to OHKO Hydreigon when it hits. It's frailty is annoying though.

Suicune's great for giving my team Tailwind support. I'm surprised to see that almost no one else uses this great 'mon. Scald / Ice Beam / Tailwind / Protect, with a bulky EV spread, and a bit of investment in SpA. Worked wonders for my team, almost impossible to OHKO with an unboosted hit.

Gliscor's been brilliant as well. Toxic Orb + Poison Heal gives him amazing longetivity and it can eat hits from fighting types all day. It's moveset consists of Ice Fang / EQ / Rock Slide (flinches have been very useful!) / Protect. It's not the greatest of movesets for something with a 252 / 0 / 106 / 0 / 0 /152 EV spread, but it worked well for the tournament.

Virizion's been the star of this team to take out all sorts of threats. A sweeping moveset of SE / Leaf Blade / Close Combat / Protect. Gave it a Fighting Gem to add that extra "oomph" to Close Combat, allowing it to revenge kill many threats. Pairs very well with Gengar to get Physical and Special coverage and put pressure right from the beginning. It's not uncommon to see this pair get me to 4-2 positions very early on.

I used a sweeping T-wave Gyarados with DD (don't have any Heart Scales left to re-teach DD, so I had to keep it). I used a bulky DD Dragonite as well, but these two Pokemon hardly saw any usage, so I'm not going to comment much on them. Gyarados was a great teammate in many cases because of Intimidate. I don't think I ever really needed Dragonite, not to say I didn't use it.

Most of my opponents were pretty average, mainly in the 1520 range. I had some great games against 1600+ opponents, which resulted in D/Cs from them :(. One of the most notable matches of the tournament was against Matty85, 2011 World's Runner up. He had a rating of 2010 (against my 1698), so I knew I was in for a tough battle. I had a lot of luck on my side and was about to oust a win, when he D/Ced. I was bitter about it, but I managed to get my 1700+ rating against some sub-1500 opponent, so all is forgiven.

Extremely happy with the way I played this tournament. I didn't have much preparation either; just a few Random Matchup battles on the day before the tournament and some training in the Battle Subway.
 
Day 1:
Game 1: 2-0 win
Game 2: 3-0 win
Game 3: 3-0 win
Game 4: 4-0 win
Game 5: 4-0 win
Game 6: 2-0 win
Game 7: 4-0 win
Game 8: 0-1 loss (because of perish song politoed and then a bad misplay)
Game 9: 4-0 win
Game 10: 2-0 win
Game 11: 4-0 win (he/she didn’t even have the chance to damage my Pokémon)
Game 12: 1-0 win (flinched Togekiss with rock slide with 1-1 situation. Was really close, would have lost if he didn’t flinch)
Game 13: 0-3 loss
Game 14: 3-0 win
Game 15: 3-0 win
Game 16: 3-0 win
Game 17: 0-1 loss
Game 18.1: 2-1 DC
Game 18.2: 4-0 win
Game 19.1: 4-4 DC (Rock Slide flinch…)
Game 19.2: 2-0 win
Game 20: 3-0 win

Day 2:
Game 21: 4-0 win
Game 22: 2-0 win
Game 23: 2-0 win
Game 24: 4-0 win
Game 25.1: 4-1 DC
Game 25.2: 0-2 loss (I thought I would win with Shedinja, but then his Metagross used rock slide…)
Game 26: 3-0 win
Game 27.1: 4-4 DC (before there was moved, but after teampreview)
Game 27.2: 4-0 win
Game 28: 4-0 win
Game 29: 1-0 win
Game 30: 3-0 win(broke 1700)
Game 31.1: 4-0 DC (because of error code 40755, just when I won)
Game 31.2: 2-0 win
Game 32: 3-0 win
Game 33: 4-0 win
Game 34: 2-0 win (I noticed I am a bit Durant weak lol, but still won easily)
Game 35: 3-0 win
Game 36: 2-0 win
Game 37: 3-0 win
Game 38.1: 3-0 DC (Yoshi from Germany, Hesse. Not only did he DC, but he also used a hacked Raikou: Aura Sphere + probably timid nature + non-shiny).

Day3:

Game 38.2: 3-0 win
Game 39: 3-0 win
Game 40: 3-0 win
Game 41: 4-0 win
Game 42.1: 4-0 win DC
Game 42.2: 2-0 win (against GARCHOMPZILLA)
Game 43: 0-2 loss (against 7014gree)
Game 44.1: 4-2 DC
Game 44.2: 3-1 DC
Game 44.3: 4-0 win
Game 45: 4-0 win (same person as game 44.3, she had a rating off 1266)
Game 46.1: 2-1 DC
Game 46.2: 0-2 loss (I noticed I am a bit sun weak)
Game 47: 4-3 win forfeit (first forfeit, he didn’t stand a chance and knew that)
Game 48: 0-2 loss (best battle off all battles, was going to win, if not for a discharge paralyzes in the second last turn. Battle took about 10 minuts.) 94-50102-59038
Game 49: 3-0 win
Game 50: 4-0 win

Day 4:

Game 51: 2-0 win
Game 52: 4-0 win
Game 53: 4-0 win
Game 54: 3-0 win
Game 55: 2-0 win
Game 56: 3-0 win
Game 57.1: 4-4 DC
Game 57.2: 2-0 win
Game 58: 2-0 win (same guy as battle 46.2, now I won against his sun team)
Game 59: 3-0 win
Game 60: 3-0 win


W/L/DC: 54/7/11
Battles played: 72
Rating: 1829 (I think. I could be one point off because it haven't seen my rating after the last battle and I can't check it now because of maintenance of GBU, it was against a low rank opponent so didn't get that many ponts)


Zoroark (F) @ Life Orb
Trait: Illusion
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SAtk
Lonely Nature (+Atk, -Def)
- Sucker Punch
- Low Sweep
- Protect
- Taunt


Shedinja @ Focus Sash
Trait: Wonder Guard
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Lonely Nature (+Atk, -Def)
- Will-O-Wisp
- X-Scissor
- Shadow Sneak
- Protect

The team began with these two, but in the end, I almost never used Shedinja (only against Rain, but I saw those only twice) and Zoroark. Zoroark was used a bit more, especially against Trick Room to get an unexpected taunt off or when one of the other mons would be kinda useless. Because of this, my team was almost a four man team.


Scizor (F) @ Flying Gem
Trait: Technician
EVs: 84 HP / 252 Atk / 172 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Acrobatics
- Bug Bite
- Bullet Punch
- Protect

Scizor is standard exept for the EVspread. The speed is there to outspeed Cresselia and hit it hard with Bug Bite. Scizor is still pretty bulky so he doesn’t need all that much EVs in HP. Everything else is Standard.


Latios (M) @ Dragon Gem
Trait: Levitate
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SAtk / 252 Spd
Timid Nature (+Spd, -Atk)
- Draco Meteor
- Psychic
- Tailwind
- Protect

The standard Latios for me. Draco Meteor + Dragon Gem KOs almost everything that doesn’t resist it (except for Cresselia/Suicune or something like that). Tailwind was awesome against other Tailwind teams, and against really fast teams (Rain, Sun and Sandstorm with there abilitys).


Terrakion @ Air Balloon
Trait: Justified
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Close Combat
- Rock Slide
- Protect
- Substitute

I first had a gem on Terrakion, but I saw I had a big weakness for Excadrill in the Sand so I gave him an Air Balloon. It worked really well as a check for Sandstorm in general. Substitute was cool to stall a bit longer and just for cool protection.


Volcarona (F) @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Flame Body
EVs: 228 HP / 252 SAtk / 28 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Heat Wave
- Bug Buzz
- Rage Powder
- Protect

I really love this Volcarona. It can take so many hits it’s not even funny. Just keep it away from Rock Slides (which are extremely easy to predict). It also hits really hard with Modest Nature. Rage Powder was the coolest move. I haven’t seen that much Hitmontops as last tournament when Rage Powder was even more cool, because it could Rage Powder Fake Outs from Hitmontop and have a good chance to burn it.


Gonna use the last 4 in a new team, with 2 new teammembers to have a complete team for the next online tournament. It says a lot about these 4 Pokemon when they can get you to 1800+ with only 4.
I didn’t have many good battles (most where easy wins or battles with a lot of hax), but this battle is worth watching I think: 94-50102-59038
If someone could put this one on Youtube, that would be really cool.
 
I had an amazing Tournament experience. Even with a few complications (sorry once again for that), I still had an amazing time here on the forums. This was my very first tournament to be doing with smogon/updating scores on smogon and it was amazing to see so many people being kind and helpful throughout this entire experience. Thank you, and see y'all at nationals. (or the next online tournament if they have another one between now and nationals :P)
 
Alright, since everyone has been wondering...

Dat team was basically doing work like none other on noobs, and getting lucky against some good players. TheAshAttacks, me, and Crow350 were using it. This was the same team we ran at regionals- Crow and I both won our respective regionals with it, and Ash took 6th at his. Lucien Lachance also used it and got 11th.

This time we actually used an EV'd Mamoswine :P. Congrats to Ash for doing so damn well with it, I was shooting for 2000+ but didn't have the time as finals were on Tuesday and I could not play at all Monday and not much on Sunday either, and was at school until Friday, so it didn't work out =/...

Ash finished top 3 for sure at 2050+, I finished at 1928 (probs top 30), and Crow finished at 18-something, but he wasn't even trying.

So the team? Since it's basically not going to be used at nats unless someone is really that desperate for a team, I'll post it here.


THE TEAM (Hidden to preserve space)

"WUMBO JET"
Amoonguss (M) @ Chesto Berry
Trait: Effect Spore
EVs: 244 HP / 12 Def / 252 SDef
Sassy Nature (+SDef, -Spd)
- Giga Drain
- Spore
- Rage Powder
- Rest

Amoonguss was the TR counter. It was at level 49 to counter things that tied with it in TR like Reuniclus, Slowking, and Snorlax. This thing could also be used against rain teams that did not contain a hard counter to it. It really scared people, and really the entire idea behind putting Amoonguss first in the party was for people to bring their Amoonguss counter along somewhere- usually a fire, flying, ice, or psychic type...and we'll get to that whole idea with the next mon.



"JhenMohran"
Tyranitar (M) @ Choice Scarf
Trait: Sand Stream
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature (+Spd, -SAtk)
- Crunch
- Rock Slide
- Fire Punch
- Low Kick

So I mentioned Amoonguss counters were fire, psychic, flying, and ice types? Tyranitar laughs at those types of mons. I don't think people realized how dangerous of a combination this mind game was- they HAD to bring something to counter Amoonguss, but it was already weak to Tyranitar. So it was a double loss for them, and a couple of people credited me for making them nearly wet themselves at regionals because of Amoonguss's butt buddy...that never was next to it, because I only brought Amoonguss to TR and Rain, things that Tyranitar had no part of until the end of the battle.
Also, scarf Tyranitar took care of a lot of things that needed to die before they did anything, and offered a surprise factor as well. It's become less and less of a surprise now that this team has been spammed a lot, but regardless while it lasted it was a phenomenal thing. OHKOing Latios and Chandelure before they could get an attack off was a huge advantage.




"Dat Zapdos" (Thank you Brandon for getting this for me!)
Zapdos @ Sitrus Berry
Trait: Pressure
EVs: 216 HP / 252 SAtk / 40 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Thunderbolt
- Heat Wave
- Hidden Power [Flying]
- Protect

Got a problem? SLAP A ZAPDOS ON IT. Zapdos did a lot of work for my team, and small wonder- it is quite possibly the most consistent mon in VGC 2012. It countered rain really hard with Hitmontop with its bulkiness. It stood its ground against things that needed to be hit hard (Hitmontop, Ludicolo, Gallade) with HP Flying. It did work, and was the most consistent thing on the team. It also amused me a lot...because some people out there seriously believe Electric Gem Thunderbolt actually OHKOs things, particularly other Zapdoses (which it NEVER does if you're one of those dipshits that think that and are reading this), and I just laughed at their tiny brains when it did 75% and I healed back to >50% health in their face with the Sitrus. This thing did not get OHKO by many things, only Dgem Dmeteor and Overheat Fire Gem...and it hit hard enough on things like Top and Metagross (things that gave me problems) for me to say it efficiently did its job.




"Roundhouse"
Hitmontop (M) @ Fight Gem
Trait: Intimidate
EVs: 36 HP / 252 Atk / 220 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Sucker Punch
- Close Combat
- Wide Guard
- Fake Out

Hitmontop was here to support. It just does everything you want a support mon to do, and does it excellently, with a bit of damage and picking off ability to boot. It intimidates, leaving Rock Sliders to 3HKO Zapdos instead of 2HKO, fakes out to help Ttar get off that extra move or Volcarona set up Quiver Dance, and Wide Guards to stop the ungodly amount of Heat Waves, Rock Slides, EQs, and every other spread move that wrecked my team. It also took care of Tyranitar, Terrakion, some Chandelures, and added damage to Rotom-Ws, all things my team had issues with.




"Dat Swine"
Mamoswine (M) @ Focus Sash
Trait: Snow Cloak
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Adamant Nature (+Atk, -SAtk)
- Ice Shard
- Icicle Spear
- Protect
- Earthquake

Dat Swine! What else can I say about this beast? It did so much work with type advantages. Is it frail? Yes. Is it a bit of a noob pounder? Yes. But does it work? Yes. It can be used. It is good enough to work on a team. But it pretty much has to have the exact set that is listed here, or it is not considerable to use on a team. I can only laugh at the people using ice gem or some other dumb item...as Mamoswine is the premier sash user. No other mon is benefited as much by a focus sash than Mamo. It resists both weather types, has the best priority move in the game (STAB too, not to mention), and does a shitton of damage (the main thing like when sashing mons). Mamo needed a lot of support, like Hitmontop and Zapdos, but it worked well with the team, and it was a great mon regardless. I don't think it is very versatile in the fact that it can't be used effectively on many teams and only has one good set, but it can be effective, it just needs a LOT of practice and a good team around it that works with it.




Volcarona (M) @ Charti Berry
Trait: Flame Body
EVs: 44 Def / 212 SAtk / 252 Spd
Modest Nature (+SAtk, -Atk)
- Heat Wave
- Quiver Dance
- Protect
- Bug Buzz

This, along with Hitmontop, was a package deal that replaced the ever-so-lackluster Salamence/Ludicolo duo...and once it stayed it never left. I'll be the first in line to admit it- Quiver Dance Volcarona is a COMPLETE noob pounder. It is no mystery to good players, and it needs to do a TON of work to work around good players. But for someone who does not focus their teambuilding efforts on getting at least one effective counter to Quiver Dance Volcarona, it took their heads and shoved it...somewhere not nice. Anyways, this thing also took care of the dipwads that thought Cresselia-Metagross was a 'genious' counter to Hitmontop-Volcarona leads, and even did some work on sand teams if Hitmontop was next to it, as wide guard and charti + fake out let it get to work at least two turns of damage/quivering, three if it did get a quiver up. This thing was definitely not intended to take out really good players, but for what it did, I'm going to say it definitely worked, and can be run on nearly any team that needs a little noob check or some spread fire damage help.




**WALL OF HELPFUL TEXT**


There was no 'mindset' with this team, it changed every game depending on the team that it faced. The only things that really bothered this team were teams that had multiple bulky water types (Suicune, Rotom-W, Vaporeon, etc) and teams that exploded out of the MOFN. The latter I disrespect so much already and they were not good players so I usually took care of them, but bulky waters are a bitch regardless and having 3 things that were weak to them and with nothing to OHKO them (no, dipshits, electric gem Zapdos does not OHKO these either, l2calc) was not the greatest thing to have on a team, but a vast majority of the bulky waters I saw were not used by very good players, mostly 'fanboys' of suicune and vaporeon, so it was usually beatable, but then you get that wild card every couple hundred battles like Birch running them and it's tough.

Trick Room was another slight issue, because smart TR users would Safeguard turn 1 and set up TR in the back...but for all intensive purposes this team was just fine in Trick Room, because I could Quiver Dance turn 1, protect turn 2/4 or 2/5 of TR, and take hits from any special mon, and switch in top to weaken any physical mons and stall out the TR...or if the TR setup was not next to fake out and was not going to protect and the potential switch mon was not going to bone my move, I could just OHKO with Bug Buzz/Crunch or something. Crow ended up running Whimsicott at regionals and in the tournament because it just had a niche on this team, but I liked Amoonguss because of its consistency. We also agreed that Virizion with Roar is a legitimate mon on this team as a TR counter, but neither of us liked it enough or were comfortable enough with it to use it.

You can't change the sets on any of these mons except Zapdos and expect them to click. This is a unique team and a very fluent team, but it is not very interchangeable. It requires a LOT of practice to be able to understand what you need to do against its nemeses, and it really isn't that great of an option against extremely skilled players. I'm not going to run this team at Nationals, infact I probably will not use more than 2 or 3 of these mons MAX on the team I do run. It is too much of a regionals team and a noob-pounder, and good players already know how this thing works, and a few of the mons are a little too much of a gadget mon to be used "differently" or "surprisingly" at nationals (Mamoswine, Tyranitar, Amoonguss are one-trick ponies).

So was this the greatest team I ever built? Yeah, probably. Crow had a big part in this team too- he brought up the idea of adding Hitmontop and Volcarona, tweaked the sets and TR counters, gave Amoonguss the Resto Chesto idea, and formed some good lead strategies through practice. Could this go down as the best regional team we've seen yet? Maybe. It won two of them and finished top 12 at four. But I'm not here for the glory, nor is this capable of really any major praise, because honestly it's just 150-man regionals and online competitions worth nothing. Nationals is the real prize, and worlds even moreso. That will be the real test for anything, and this team cannot really compete at a national level.

You're more than welcome to use it, no need to keep the nicknames or give credit (except Mamoswine- that one needs to stay :D), just do me a favor and do not make a rip-off of this with different mons and item sets and try to run it. I'll get irritated, because it's basically telling me that 8 months of building, testing, tweaking, and cementing from two different players who put TONS of work into it are not showing anything.

And for the good of all things, don't run Icicle Crash on Mamoswine. It sucks ass. It's like Electric Gem Zapdos...it's used by people who cannot damage calc and cannot understand situational things like Yache Berries, Focus Sashes, Substitutes, and more importantly, getting that damn 50 damage 100% of the time when you need it to happen.

Also on the same topic stop using electric gem Zapdos. Whoever came out with that does not know what a damage calculator is, and whoever actually believes it OHKOs important things is also dumb- people that can actually damage calc will make it resist that stupid crap.

Either way yeah, feel free to use the team, just be aware that when you switch things up, it starts to suck, and HARD. The only things that can be edited without wrecking the team are Zapdos's set/spread and the TR counter (Amoonguss must be Resto Chesto or Mental Herb however, Virizion must have Roar and/or Taunt, and Whimsicott must have Light Screen/Taunt).

Enjoy fellas, hope everyone had a great Int'l Challenge, and hope you also enjoyed this gigantic wall of text.
 
Over all the Tourney was fun, Ignoring all the D/C issues It was alright.
I wish I would have had the Life orb for my Excadrill, but the Air balloon worked, when it was taken out 98% of the time. Why I thought it was a good Idea, is beyond me now, I'm sure Past Exc4l had an Idea in mind. However Present Exc4l thinks, Wtf.

Noteables
Terrakion: Was awesome. Towards the End I started leading with Terrakion and Latios, and the two were an Incredible Duo. Latios with Dmeteor and Terrakion with Close Combat, really helped get those Early Leads.
Latios: He was great, as well. I had him Carry Thunder which Helped cover the major Water Weakness I was carrying with the team. Draco Meteor hit things hard, and managed to Outspeed some opposing Gengar, when I didn't decided to throw caution to the wind instead of Switch to Ttar, speaking of which
Tyranitar: He didn't get used all the time, but this mofo won me some weather wars(with some aid from Landorus), and With Stone Edge (ran over rock slide, incase of that Crazy off chance of Wide Guard ) and got in some decent damage.

Fun Tourney, can't wait for the next one, since I can't go to Nats, due to School.

EDIT: Btw I like How Volcarona was the only one without a badass Nickname on that team Zach xD
 
Wasn't really involved in this tournament as I was with others, but I still felt satisfied. Played around 15 games or so, only had about two losses and 2 DCers. Most everyone gave GG, ended up at about 1610 when all was done.

Special thanks to TheAgonist for most of my Pokemon!
 
Had a rough go this tourney

120+ wins with 34 losses, 26 of which to hax, and around 65 D/Cs.

Without the hax who knows where I would've catapulted to.

Along the way I ended up playing around 12 smogoners or so.

Cybertron, Human, Ryuzaki, & Wolfey (2/3 times) to name a few

Played one guy with two lvl 25 mons, was loling so hard.

Overall it turned out well, actually being able to get to 120 wins was incredible, even though I only hit like 1750 in rating at the end, (catastrophic hax battles near the end, plus the ones early) I was hoping to end with an 1800+ rating but alas, I didn't make it. Hit 1800 like 5 times and then was haxed back down, lol.
 
Had a great time battling, but the fun all ended in despair...
I played 50 battles and could have had a rating over 1900 very quickly but disconnecting just played in well. After 50 matches, I was kicked off the server due to the enormous amount of competitors. Pissed off, I ended with a rating of 1848 and a record of about 50-2 and could not continue. I played great smogonites like 7014 and Unreality? Couldn't tell if I played Unreality, since I had played an Aaron from Massachusetts and he had a sun team. But anyways, both played well and I ended up defeating them unforgettably.
Otherwise, it was fun and I was glad to be playing people who didn't have asian carts and I look forward to the next tournament!
 
I'm looking back at the rankings and there were only 3022 participants. I'm guessing more and more people are losing hope in these kind of tournaments.

I really hope we get a Summer Friendly though, as I feel it'll give everyone a fair shot as no one has school so everyone that's dedicated gets in the same amount of games as everyone else.
 
The 3022 were based off those who actually ranked, so there's probably more participants that got DQ'd for high DC rates.
 
The 3022 were based off those who actually ranked, so there's probably more participants that got DQ'd for high DC rates.
Yeah but it the International Challenge we had over 9000 (lol) participants and in Autumn Friendly we had over 10,000 and those did not include participants that got disqualified as well.
 
Overall I enjoyed the tournament. Yes I could have ranked better had I not been DC'd on so much, Yes I would have ranked better had I had a bit better luck in a few of my losses, Yes I would have ranked better if I had stopped before the final day.

I'm looking forward to the next one despite the fact there will be DC'ers still....it's a game to have fun with and I am keen to keep that going :naughty:
 

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