DCL II Coverage

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Introduction

Draft Champions League, or DCL, is the Draft League forum's most prestigious team tour. The tournament format this edition almost mirrored that of the last, with three SV slots, one SS slot, one USUM slot, one ORAS slot, and one VGC slot. However, in place of the second SS slot from DCL I, a flex slot was introduced. This slot rotated between ORAS, USUM, SS, and VGC on a fixed schedule during the regular season. Then, during playoffs, the higher seed would choose the extra metagame.

With nearly 400 player signups came an incredibly strong lineup of longtime Draft managers from across the Draft scene. Returning from last DCL was DPL-owned King L5, fresh off of a DLWC win with US West, now alongside DPL champion AsterJ, and GeniusX alongside fellow double Draft and Smogon format threat 100percentpureheat. New to managing this edition were longtime DPL player SkyhorseTamer and Eye Aye, widely regarded as one of the best USUM Draft players ever, a pair who have managed together across four different team tours and longer than any other pair in the community, longtime consistent first seed DPL manager KCric12 and newly the newly unretired DPL heavyweight LOQP, a recent standout in the Draft team tournament circuit in blittius joined by reigning WCoP champion zioziotrip, DCL I winner PZZ alongside fellow reigning DPL champion Zooch, coming off of an incredible 8-1 run, and top SV Draft player JCMShadow with longtime strong all-rounder SlickPanther, and a pair of successful players in HarrisIsAwesome and reigning DPL champion 2playaluffy.

Draft (Players)

Notably, almost every manager opted to buy themselves, with the exception of Zooch—a surprising choice, since he was coming off of a considerably strong run in DPL. The most expensive player at auction was Habaduh to the Nightclub for 32k, a third of the team's auction budget. Old gen talent seemed to be a priority for managers in this auction with the addition of the flex slot, with four of the other five players who cracked 20k (HunterZinfected, Professor Shuckle, iPro, and Addison) starting in one of them, and SoggyDoggySage being the only SV starter besides Habaduh to go this high, resulting in many of the tour's strongest SV players being 15k manager self-buys or costing below 10k. Despite also having a place in the flex slot, VGC saw similar deprioritization, with VGC starters averaging around 7.5k at auction and the most expensive being tyo for 10.5k.

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Draft (Pokémon)

SV

It is safe to say that a year is a long time in a format like draft, especially for a current generation metagame. The difference between the SV metagame played in this year ago compared to now is drastic to say the least. Ogerpon is no longer one Pokémon with access to all four formes (good riddance), an entire new DLC launched, bringing approximately 100 new Pokémon into the metagame, and the power level of Tera Captains was reduced to then be increased at a slower rate over time. We waved goodbye to some top-level threats that were deemed too much to handle, such as Ursaluna-B and Volcarona's access to Terastallization. However, they were quickly replaced by a combination of new toys and some new threats rising up from previous obscurity.

Despite the fact that SV is the most unpredictable generation when it comes to drafting philosophies, the first round of every draft contained a lot of similarities. Iron Valiant, Tornadus-T, and Great Tusk were the top three picks in every draft, and those were quickly followed by Enamorus, Greninja, and Meowscarada. The latter two were of particular importance due to a lack of reliable natural Speed in the tier in its current state, with the order varying due to the belief that they were on par with one another and offered different options to a squad. Meowscarada did prove to be the superior of the two Protean Dark-type starters by the end though, boasting impressive results as Greninja drafts as a whole appearing to struggle,

This event proved to be a great one for Grass-types in general. Tera Captain Zarude dominated the event from start to finish, proving to be by far the most effective Tera Captain and sweeper. Zarude was the kill leader in SV by quite a distance, as well as having one of the highest win rates for a Pokémon that was drafted more than twice. As well as this, Tera Captain Sinistcha also had some impressive performances in individual games despite a mixed bag of team results, and Abomasnow unexpectedly made its way into the top 5 kill leaders in the event. This is an incredible feat for a Pokémon that is only priced at 5 points, although it has to be admitted that it was aided by many freezes.

One thing that did remain the same for both DCL iterations was the decision to implement a two-Tera Captain system with a restricted budget. This was expanded upon with the introduction of a Tera tax, meaning that a Pokémon could be more expensive if chosen to be a Tera Captain compared to its base counterpart. This was a successful system for the most part, allowing for there to be separation in cases where a Pokémon as a Tera Captain is considered vastly different to its regular state. This did not come into play super often in the drafting phase, but there were some niche cases where it came into play, such as Ogerpon. This system also allowed for some lower tier Pokémon to shine under certain circumstances, and there were many examples of this in a variety of different games. Excluding the aforementioned Sinistcha and Abomasnow, this ruleset allowed for Pokémon like Bastiodon, Okidogi, Glastrier, and Bellibolt to shine, showing that the rule implementation is a healthy one for the time being.

On the topic of Tera Captains, there was also some variety in the top end too. It is hard to deny that there are going to be Tera Captains that always get picked up, such as Tornadus-T, Raging Bolt, and Enamorus, but there was a lot more variety on display this time around compared to previous iterations of team tours incorporating the SV tier. Alongside the aforementioned demon that is Zarude, which has now safely secured itself into the always going to be drafted category, Pokémon like Salamence and Iron Moth were getting a lot of love as Tera Captains, potentially due to its great partnership with a slightly more expensive secondary Tera Captain. This approach was also taken in a different manner, which produced some of the most successful teams in the tournament. Examples of this include Walking Wake, Urshifu-R, Thundurus-T, and Ceruledge, all of which produced performances that will make them much more common occurrences to face in high caliber events.

SS

SS Draft changed greatly from DCL I to DCL II, most notably due to the banning of Spectrier, Zamazenta-C, and Kyurem-B. In particular, the presence of Spectrier produced incredibly stale drafts in last year's DCL I, as every team had to account for the broken ghost horse by drafting a low-point Normal-type like Munchlax or Greedent, forcing hyper-role compressed balance-style drafts, as all other roles had to be accounted for in 7 draft slots instead of 8. This year, the banning of Spectrier allowed for far more innovative drafting, and in particular, more interesting and exciting low point picks on drafts, as the 8th slot of drafts became freed up to no longer necessitate stale Normal-types. Low-tier picks such as Archeops, Druddigon, Doublade, and Vanilluxe saw play in a meta where fitting them on a draft would be borderline unheard of in the previous metagame.

For the first time in the generation's existence, offense and hyper offense found the greatest success this year—with Addison and 100percentpureheat piloting two undefeated drafts that focused on quickly and efficiently breaking down the opposing team. 100's team featured SS mainstays such as Mew, Tapu Fini, and Zeraora, which used setup to immediately pressure opposing teams and develop early leads. Addison's team featured Kartana and the newly decreased in price Galarian Darmanitan to force absurd damage onto foes, forcing them to make tough predictions. Both teams featured the setup demon Galarian Moltres, which functioned in an incredibly versatile role on both teams as a dedicated lead, wincon, mid-game wallbreaker, or defensive stop to opposing offense. Galarian Moltres was arguably the most successful Pokémon in SS Draft this DCL Season, with a 100%-win rate across eight games total.

Two other notable seasons were from hjkhj and Glop, who piloted closer to more traditional SS drafts. hjkhj mostly piloted a Regenerator team consisting of Tornadus-T, Galarian Slowking, and Audino that featured bulky offense pieces such as Krookodile and Scizor. The team also featured the rarely seen Suicune, which saw individual success in a few matches. Glop alternated between multiple drafts, all of which featured Primarina, a bulky offensive piece that complemented teammates such as Garchomp and Celesteela quite effectively.

Overall, it was incredibly interesting but also peculiar to note that the least successful drafts this season featured the undisputed top two Pokémon on the tier list—Garchomp and Tapu Koko. Garchomp teams saw an overall 33.33%-win percentage (the majority of wins were carried by Glop), and Tapu Koko teams saw a devastating 11.11%-win percentage, only winning a single game across nine total matches. The previously praised Tapu Koko / Victini / Dragonite core, which saw success in DCL I, saw the polar opposite this season, with poor performances on both the Band Chasers and the Dream Walker's teams. Tornadus-T, Landorus-T, and Kartana saw the most success as round one picks, with Tornadus-T and Landorus-T both seeing a nearly 60%-win rate across the season. Kartana saw a staggering 80%-win rate, further pushing the SS offense agenda.

New price drops also allowed for rarely seen Pokémon in the 10–13-point budget range to gain new spotlight. The aforementioned Galarian Darmanitan saw the most success after a price drop to 12 points, paired with other overwhelming powerful attackers on Chrome Cabal's team piloted by Addison. The Chrome Cabal's other draft which finished with a 2-0 record found success with a dropped-in-price Excadrill. However, the real success on the draft was the also-dropped-in-price Tyranitar, which was responsible for a great deal of success in both matches. Tyranitar is usually understood to be outclassed by Gigalith due to Gigalith's lower price point, but as that price point narrows, it will be interesting to see which sees more usage. Gen 3 Smogon main SEA also found surprise success this season on the Phantom Thieves team using a draft that featured staples such as Landorus-T, Latios, and Aegislash, but whose offense was bolstered by the rarely seen Volcarona—a powerful special attacker with difficult-to-stop setup potential. Another breakout performance in Trick of Eye's roster was Creator of Some, who piloted the rarely seen Zygarde, paired alongside Kartana, to success against strong players, working in tandem to break down similar physically defensive checks.

Ultimately this season proved that a new Spectrier-less SS meta is one that is still in development, seeing meta shifts in a generally more offense-leaning way that allows for more versatile drafting picks. Balance however still holds a mainstay in the meta, still finding the most consistent success on average.

USUM

With USUM Draft being a fairly solved meta, it's natural to see a lot of similarities in the drafting phase when you compare it to DCL I. That means a lot of the tendencies we have seen before stayed, especially in the earlier rounds with Pokémon like Tapu Koko, Landorus-T and, Zeraora still the undisputed top three in the format, and the likes of Mega Mawile, Celesteela, Garchomp, and Kyurem-B making up the rest of the first-round pick group. However, with some small changes to the meta as time passes, we saw two major differences: The first one is that from last year's edition, Aegislash has once again caught the ban hammer, as it proved to still be too strong; the second is the rise of Greninja, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone familiar with USUM Draft, since this has always been a fantastic Pokémon in the format, but this is the first time it has been drafted in the first round at this tournament level, due to how much of a priority good speed control has become.

This year, the tournament increased the number of teams drafted in certain formats, and the USUM playerbase made sure to take advantage of it. Classic top-tier cores like Landorus-T + Kartana, Mega Gallade + Tornadus-T, and Tapu Koko + Mega Charizard X made themselves present as usual with varying results. Some teams took more unusual approaches, especially the weather drafts like the Tapu Koko + Manaphy rain draft, which put a twist on classic Tapu Koko rain structures, and the three different Excadrill sand drafts, which are not always seen at this tournament level. With the large variety of picks in the early rounds this season, we also saw some strong Pokémon fall to the latter half of the second round to pair with some of the top picks to form strong but unusual cores like the Tapu Koko, Zygarde-50%, and Mega Diancie core from the Chasers and the Zeraora + Kyurem-B core from the Armory. Not much changed with the supporting picks chosen this year, as the usual Pokémon like Tapu Fini and Uxie, among others, all got drafted like they normally do, but down to the middle tiers, we saw the rise some uncommon picks, Salazzle and Whimsicott, that were drafted in all three pools, as well as Pokémon like Darmanitan, Celebi, Jellicent, and Mega Houndoom. Teams opted for a lot of different ways to round out their drafts with the low-tier picks, with Spiritomb being the only one drafted in all three pools. Special mention goes to Feraligatr, which was part of the best performing draft this season and was brought to quite a few games.

ORAS

Compared to some of the other generations on show over the course of this event, ORAS is a metagame that has not had any major shakeup in quite some time. As a result, there is not a crazy amount of change compared to last season. The introduction of Landorus to the metagame has been a healthy one, introducing another round one pick and overall improving the drafting process. Round one picks are the same as they have been for quite some time, with Landorus's addition leading to a few minor alterations. The mid-tier essentials are still deemed necessities, and drafts are rounded out in. The additional draft implemented compared to DCL I did however allow for some experimentation to occur, with certain old-school concepts that were seen on a semi-regular basis many years ago, such as Mega Sableye + Talonflame and Mega Scizor + Heatran making their triumphant return. There was also a lot more notoriety of Mega Evolutions this time around compared to last season, where the most interesting topic of conversation regarding Mega Evolutions was the surprise drop of a Mega Gardevoir, considered to be the best Pokémon in the entire tier, dropped right at the midseason deadline to prevent anyone else from picking it up. The appearance of Mega Garchomp, Mega Sceptile, Mega Altaria, and Mega Blastoise had been increasing in recent events, the latter two due to the rising popularity of Mew + Infernape teams that they complemented really well, but this was only the tip of the iceberg. Mega Evolutions such as Mega Absol, Mega Glalie, and Mega Banette (post midseason) were seeing usage, and Mega Manectric was drafted in every pool, with it only joined in that feat by Gardevoir and Gallade in regards to Mega Evolutions.

Aside from the Mega Evolution conversation, there was not a huge amount to comment upon in regards to drafting trends. Metagame staples have become metagame staples due to the existence of this metagame being played to a high standard for over ten years, and that is not going to change anytime soon. As mentioned previously, Mega Gardevoir was becoming a hot topic of conversation following DCL I, with the queen of the ORAS metagame's crown looking vulnerable for the first time in years. Mew and Landorus-T saw great success last time out, with the ORAS dominance of the Timers and Foxes largely associated with these Pokémon as the centerpiece. One year on, this trend did not continue. Mew and Landorus drafts were unable to win more than half their games, whereas Mega Gardevoir shone all season long, being a key member of some of the most successful drafts within the event. On the topic of win percentages, there are two Pokémon that stand out above the rest, Keldeo and Uxie. These two have been long time staples of the metagame, with Keldeo being one of the best offensive Water-types in the tier and Uxie acting as a crucial pivot and occasional backbone to a wide variety of archetypes. Their drafts excelled all season long, being the only Pokémon that were drafted more than once to have a higher than 70%-win rate.

The ORAS player pool this season has seen quite a shake-up compared to last, with no other generation displaying the same variance. Many of last season's guaranteed starters in the tier either decided not to partake this time around or decided to play in an alternative format. This led to a player base containing some old timers that recently decided to come back to the format to play their beloved tier from many years ago, some of last seasons’' returning player base, and some new blood who have recently picked up the tier. The introduction of the flex slot meant that a lot of teams were forced into particular lineups on weeks where there were to be two ORAS games, leading to a lot of players who would be more typically slotted in other generations being present in ORAS due to their varied skill set. This led to a large variance in the records of teams, with Armory, TOE, and Nightclub able to use their reliable cores as a backbone for crucial wins, whereas teams like Cabal and Foxes were having serious issues finding consistency. There were three standout individuals over the course of the event in the tier, Aberforth, profchipboard, and GeniusX. Genius is to the surprise of absolutely no one, as he has recently found himself playing a lot more ORAS in high stake events. Chip and Abe are slightly different cases; both are longtime players who could vary in consistency, but they both thoroughly impressed all event long. Abe's success was pivotal in the Armory's playoff push, constantly providing key wins to wrap up decisive results while also allowing for his ORAS-playing captain in King L5 to succeed elsewhere when only one slot was present. It is a shame that we never got to quite see these three pitted up against each other on fair grounds, with Genius surprisingly omitted from the lineup the week he would have faced Chip and slotting elsewhere vs Abe. Chip and Abe did lock horns in the playoffs, but the matchup on paper made it a rather one-sided affair. Genius and Abe in finals could have been a final showdown for the bragging rights of ORAS MVP, but the game was voided, as a decisive result was already produced.

VGC

With the VGC draft metagame evolving to be vastly different than it was last year during DCL I, there have been a lot of changes both in tiering and priorities during the drafting phase. Adding high-tier threats like Raging Bolt, Gouging Fire, and Archaludon has enabled new team compositions that were not possible in the previous edition of DCL. Priority picks trended to notably be Flutter Mane and Chien Pao, which went pick one and one in every draft pool, respectively. There were some surprising previous mainstay Pokémon left undrafted post-midseason, including Roaring Moon, Indeedee-F, and Amoonguss. Every Pokémon in the 20-point tier was drafted in all three pools this year, which supports a better developed metagame than last season. Low tiers showed hardly any overlaps, which provided a diverse set of teams. Out of the tiers lower than 10 points, Lapras and Morgrem were taken in multiple pools. Common cores of high tiers persisted however, such as Ogerpon-W + Gouging Fire, Flutter Mane + Ogerpon-C, and Urshifu-S + Gholdengo. Most teams spearheaded a top-heavy draft this season, with all drafts but three having at least one one- or two-pointer, and most having multiple. Interestingly, every weather draft chose to draft a manual weather setter (Tornadus, Volbeat, Illumise) instead of an automatic weather setter like Torkoal or Pelipper.

The most notable draft this season was the Nature's Madmen's rain team, boasting a 6-2 record. The team consisted of Ogerpon-W, Tornadus, Archaludon, and Thundurus-T, with Comfey as support. This team, while it looks extremely linear, is very oppressive to prepare for due to the extreme natural bulk and Trick Room and Tailwind modes. This archetype typically features Urshifu-R instead of Ogerpon-W; however, the Follow Me support from Ogerpon allows Archaludon to exploit more setup sets like IronPress more reliably.

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Early Weeks

The Band Chasers quickly established themselves as one of the teams to watch out for in DCL II, going 3-0 in the first three weeks and taking the first seed, which they would hold on to for the rest of the regular season. The Infernal Armory and Trick of Eye were close behind, separated only by points of differential, and the Chrome Cabal rounded out the top four of the early season with only one win. Three teams had zero wins, but it was the Nature's Madmen who sat at the bottom of the standings despite having won a week, since a 5-3 victory wasn't enough to offset back-to-back 2-6 losses.

The oldgen slots saw the most dominant players early on, reflecting the focus on them in auction. Addison went 3-0 in SS, iPro went 3-0 in USUM, and dawnmidst and Aberforth went 3-0 in ORAS, while GeniusX went undefeated across a combination of ORAS and USUM. Kaif was the only SV starter to go 3-0 in the early weeks, with the other 3-0s (King L5 and JCMShadow) doing so across a combination of SV and oldens. On the other hand, Trick of Eye's SS slot notably suffered, combining to go 1-3 across three different starters, and the Dream Walkers saw a similar struggle with a 0-4 USUM slot. The Nature's Madmen also struggled significantly in SV, only putting up one win per week across three slots

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Midseason Standings

Team	Wins	Losses	Ties	Points
Band Chasers	3	0	0	6 (+8)
Infernal Armory	2	1	0	4 (+6)
Trick of Eye	2	1	0	4 (+6)
Chrome Cabal	1	2	0	2 (+2)
Nymble Nightclub	0	1	2	2 (-2)
Phantom Thieves	0	1	2	2 (-2)
Dream Walkers	0	1	2	2 (-4)
Nature's Madmen	0	1	2	2 (-6)

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Later Weeks

The Band Chasers only won one more week in the back half of the tournament, losing one and tying the remaining two, but this combined with their early lead was enough to put them firmly in the number one seed going into playoffs. The Infernal Armory slipped out of second seed as Trick of Eye were able to put up two wins, one loss, and one tie compared to the Infernal Armory's one win, one loss, and two ties. Entering into week seven, only the Band Chasers had locked their spot in the final four, while the Dream Walkers, after a four-week loss streak, and Nymble Nightclub, who simply hadn't been able to win a week the whole season, were mathematically out. Trick of Eye, Infernal Armory, and Chrome Cabal sat at seven points each, with the Nature's Madmen at the fifth seed after clawing their way up from last place and the Phantom Thieves in sixth at five points and hoping for a miracle.

Trick of Eye beat the Dream Walkers to secure the second seed and extend their losing streak to five weeks, and the Infernal Armory and Chrome Cabal tied, putting the Armory safely in the third seed but leaving the Cabal's fate in the hands of the matchup between the fifth and sixth seed. The Phantom Thieves needed an 8-0 week win to get into the fourth seed, but their hopes were crushed in the very first game, as manager SlickPanther suffered a narrow 0-1 defeat at the hands of Jesse504 to end his team's season—though his team didn't find out about the game until the win was posted. The Madmen themselves needed to win 6-2 to tie the Cabal or 7-1 or better to take fourth seed on battle differential, and they ended up with the tie, heading to a head-to-head best-of-three tiebreaker with the Cabal.

Tiebreaker

Entering into the tiebreaker, the Cabal were favored to win—they had a more dominant regular season, 7-0 Addison in their SS slot, and 6-1 manager KCric, widely considered to be one of the best Draft players ever, against 4-3 Glop. The Madmen were, however, favored in VGC, with trace having put up a solid 4-2 season and having the support of Jesse504, while the Cabal's VGC slot had struggled to find their footing the whole tournament, with Lindwurm and DeskSmash combining to go 3-6, including Desksmash losing to Lemurro in week seven just before the tiebreaker. Unsurprisingly, trace would draw first blood, putting the Madmen up 1-0. Addison would bring the score to 1-1, but a Rapid Spin-less Tentacruel from KCric and a particularly hardy Bellibolt from Glop would seal the Madmen's place in the semifinals.

Final Standings

Team	Wins	Losses	Ties	Points
Band Chasers	4	1	2	10 (+5)
Trick of Eye	4	2	1	9 (+6)
Infernal Armory	3	2	2	8 (+6)
Nature's Madmen	3	2	2	8 (+4)
Chrome Cabal	3	2	2	8 (+4)
Nymble Nightclub	1	2	4	6 (-1)
Phantom Thieves	1	3	3	5 (-6)
Dream Walkers	0	5	2	2 (-18)

Addison was the standout of the season, securing an incredible undefeated 8-0 record in SS. There were few other standout records from the eliminated teams, however: KCric going 6-2 for the Cabal and Phantom Thieves manager JCMShadow going 6-1 in SV and SS for his team. Several of the tour's most expensive players didn't end up panning out - manager self-buys HarrisIsAwesome and SkyhorseTamer went 0-5 and 1-5 each, HunterZinfected's 20.5k price tag only netted the Phantom Thieves a 1-6 USUM record, and Habaduh, the most expensive player at auction by a wide margin, only put up a 2-4 SV showing for the Nymble Nightclub.

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Semifinals

Despite the difference in their seeds and roads to playoffs, the Band Chasers and Nature's Madmen tied in their regular season encounter. Being the higher seed, the Band Chasers chose SS for the series' flex slot, slotting in 0-1 1v1 player Potatochan alongside captain 100percentpureheat. The first match of the week was Jesse504 against Luxanse in SV, which got the Madmen off on the right foot and started them off 1-0 in the semifinals. A last-minute substitute of Sylvi over VGC powerhouse MichaelderBeste2 for game two seemed like a good sign for the Madmen, but Sylvi took the win over trace, bringing the score to 1-1 and setting the tone for what was to follow. Kaif, iPro, and HJ5ean won in quick succession to establish a dominant lead over the Madmen, then the two Band Chaser captains secure back-to-back victories to end the series in a crushing 1-6 loss for the Madmen and make the Band Chasers the first team in the finals.

The Infernal Armory and Trick of Eye had been fairly evenly matched the whole season, both hovering around the second and third seed for all seven weeks, and their playoff series was similarly even, starting off 1-0 for Trick of Eye with Tjb145's win over King L5, only for baconeatinassassin to beat SkyhorseTamer and bring it back to 1-1. The SV slots would end up being a shutout for the Infernal Armory as SoggyDoggySage and Nick6564 took the remaining two wins there, while profchipboard defeated Aberforth to secure both of the week's ORAS slots, as Trick of Eye had chosen ORAS for the matchup's flex slot. hjkhj took ORAS for the Armory in a dominant 4-0 victory over Creator of Some, while tyo won a VGC series featuring a four-turn game three to bring the score to 3-4, though it was still in favor of the Armory. USUM was the field of the deciding game, and it would be two captains, Eye Aye for Trick of Eye and AsterJ for the Infernal Armory, competing for either a tiebreak or a pass into finals. Ultimately, it was AsterJ and their Dragon Dance Zygarde that emerged victorious, bringing his team into the final round.

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Finals

This finals matchup, despite only being the second one in DCL history, already carried a bit of history with it. GeniusX captained the DCL I team Zero Fox Given, a team with a dominant regular season that made it all the way to the finals only to fall to a swift and decisive 0-5 loss to the Land Before Timer. King L5's Infernal Armory was a returning team from DCL I, a team that fought its way through the regular season and into a semifinals tiebreaker, where their run would be stopped short by none other than Zero Fox Given. As far as DCL II, the regular season matchup between these two teams ended in a 5-3 victory for the Band Chasers.

As the higher seed, the Band Chasers once again selected SS as the final flex slot, once again putting in 100percentpureheat and Potatochan, while the Armory put hjkhj in his usual starting spot and King L5 down in the flex slot, a change from their regular season SS flex player in Padox. The series commenced with a hat trick of SV wins from Nick6564, SoggyDoggySage, and baconeatinassassin, putting the Armory up 3-0. 100percentpureheat took an SS win off of hjkhj to begin mounting a comeback for the Band Chasers, hoping to rally his team to victory. However, a pair of back-to-back victories from captains AsterJ and King L5 meant that GeniusX watched yet another DCL victory slip through his fingers as a 5-1 victory sealed the Infernal Armory as the DCL II champions.

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Highlight Games

lax vs King L5 - SV

This game had high expectations for multiple reasons: a clash between one of the all-time draft league greats and a Smogon player that has been producing incredibly consistent results in the scene ever since he started. These two were considered to be the top two players in the event at the time, and they were using two of the most unique drafts to be seen in the event, with Tera Captains such as Urshifu-R and Ceruledge taking center stage. Looking at the matchup in a bit more depth, L5 decided to leave his Moltres and Sableye at home, with Lax not bringing his Gliscor or Farigiraf. None of these were particular surprises, with the biggest toss-up appearing to be L5's decision to bring either Moltres or Clodsire.

Turn one was crucial for Lax, as his Choice Scarf Meowscarada was able to cripple L5's Tera Electric Urshifu-R with Trick, barely surviving the Surging Strikes due to removing Urshifu-R's punching glove. L5 got himself into the game very quickly though, pivoting around Lax's Thundurus-T with relative ease and getting a layer of Spikes up with Klefki. A double switch from Thundurus-T on Latias by Lax allowed for Tinkaton to get up Stealth Rock. A well-timed pivot around the now Choice Scarf Urshifu allowed for Slowking to get a Chilly Reception off for free, giving Ceruledge the chance to get off a free Poltergeist. After a few hits on a recovering Clodsire later, Lax decided that his Poltergeist PP was too valuable and switched out, allowing for the Clodsire to get back to full. After some pivoting around on both sides, which included a second layer of Spikes going up, Thundurus-T was starting to make some progress. A well-timed Psychic weakened Clodsire, as Latias was too low to risk taking a Thunderbolt, with a subsequent Volt Switch on the incoming Urshifu-R allowing for Blastoise to spin away the pesky Spikes that would knock out Meowscarada.

The first knockout of the game was finally achieved on turn 25 (a rather slow pace for an SV game to be completely honest), with Klefki getting off one last Spikes click in front of Ceruledge. This invited L5's own Meowscarada in, which lost its own Choice Scarf as quickly as Lax's thanks to Pickpocket Tinkaton that had been revealed to be on an Air Balloon earlier in the game. Terapagos came in and caused some hassle, getting up Stealth Rock and forcing KOs on both Meowscarada (to entry hazards) and Blastoise (to remove the hazards), only losing its Tera Shell and getting paralyzed in the process.

Assault Vest Ceruledge got off some nice damage on it, barely taking any damage from Earth Power in return and once again forcing the Clodsire in. L5 decided to finally reveal Curse Clodsire in front of Galarian Slowking, which was unable to do more than 45% with Psychic Noise. This attempt at forcing progress was quickly thwarted by the reveal of Taunt Thundurus-T by Lax, and +1 Clodsire's Liquidation was unable to pick up what would have been a vital KO. These two aforementioned Pokémon were subsequently sacked to Latias and Ceruledge. This gave Meowscarada an incredibly free Knock Off, but Galarian Slowking was able to survive, having consumed its Sitrus Berry earlier in the game during a phase of pivoting. A Sludge Bomb poison turned out to be rather unfortunate for L5, as he was unable to keep his best method of dealing with Ceruledge long-term, with the mascot of the Infernal Armory now looking as though it may be their undoing on this occasion. Terapagos managed to get Stealth Rock back up vs Tinkaton, but Lax smartly went into Ceruledge and forced L5 to give up the Meowscarada. This invited Urshifu-R in, but the Tera Grass was well kept until this very moment. This allowed for Ceruledge to win the exchange with Bitter Blade into Shadow Sneak, despite L5 correctly predicting the Terastallization and going for Drain Punch rather than Surging Strikes. One critical hit Bitter Blade that definitely didn't matter and a Shadow Sneak later, and Lax took the victory in this clash of the titans.

This game perfectly encapsulates the SV metagame in its current state, with a nice blend of really well executed preparation on both sides and in-game management of pivots and sacks. Lax got the upper hand on this occasion due largely to that clutch Trick play turn one, being able to keep hazards off the field to enable Ceruledge, and keeping his Tera for just the right moment to ensure that there was no comeback on the cards.

100percentpureheat vs hjkhj - SS

In the finals matchup between the season frontrunners, the Band Chasers, and the equally powerful Infernal Armory, Armory found itself up 3-0, and hjkhj has the power to make the series a guaranteed tie, with plenty more games in the series to grant a full on win. 100p needs to win to get his team on the board. Both SS players had quite successful seasons, with 100p sporting a 5-2 record without a loss since Week 4 and hjkhj sporting a 5-3 record with consistent performances throughout the season.

Another point to note about this matchup is both players' reputations, with 100p playing aforementioned offense play styles this season and hjkhj running more defensive strategies. In their match during the regular season, 100p defeated hjkhj in 15 turns, blazing through hjkhj's defense with Mew and Krookodile. This game, hjkhj needed to take a radically different approach, by attempting to match 100's offense with his own offense.

hjkhj's Krookodile leads into 100p's Zeraora turn one. Zeraora stays in to click Grass Knot versus Krookodile to claim significant damage, signaling a potential Shuca Berry. Krookodile reveals weakness policy but is unlucky with Scale Shot hits. 100p pivots Qwilfish as a sack as Krookodile reveals no Earthquake but instead Knock Off as its only STAB move, as it would require Stone Edge or Rock Slide for Galarian Moltres. Qwilfish barely hangs on as the two Pokémon exchange Stealth Rock for a layer of Spikes. hjkhj's Krookodile finishes off Qwilfish, but is soon revenge killed by 100p's Bullet Punch Scizor. In this exchange, hjkhj demonstrates the importance of a high-pressuring dedicated lead—Krookodile has gotten up entry hazards, KOed the Qwilfish, and dealt significant damage to the opposing Zeraora.

hjkhj brings in Galarian Slowking on Scizor. Scizor clicks U-turn, revealing it is not Choice-locked, and pivots into Galarian Moltres. Galarian Slowking clicks Trick Room, putting the Speed Advantage back in hjkhj's favor. Galarian Slowking is forced to switch into Diancie, one of Galarian Moltres's strongest checks in Draft. 100p pivots into a Mew that seems to be designed to take two hits from offensive Diancie, but Diancie revealed to be Choice Banded Diamond Storm, effectively 2HKOing the Mew. With one turn of Trick Room left, hjkhj claims 64% damage on 100p's Tapu Fini, as it clicks Calm Mind and the Trick Room ends, now pressuring hjkhj back for the first time in many turns.

Unaware Quagsire is brought in on Tapu Fini, but it doesn't matter. Surf into Grass Knot is still a 2HKO. However, hjkhj spots this as an opportunity to regain the Speed advantage by setting up Trick Room again, as Tapu Fini cannot KO Galarian Slowking with any one hit. However, 100p's Tapu Fini reveals Taunt, foiling hjkhj's plan. Galarian Slowking is forced to take massive damage as he KOes the boosted Tapu Fini with Sludge Bomb. Now on Turn 15, Galarian Moltres is brought in to threaten Galarian Slowking. This turn is an absolutely massive turn. 100p knows that Galarian Slowking cannot stay in, as since it is Taunted, it can do nothing to immediately punish a turn of Galarian Moltres setting up. Thus, 100p elects to Rest, restoring Galarian Moltres's HP to full on a switch to Diancie. Unknown to hjkhj, 100p has brought an incredible tech on Galarian Moltres in the form of Steel Wing. It KOs Diancie from 59% with a critical hit! Suddenly, hjkhj has no means of breaking a full-health Galarian Moltres.

Scarf Scizor is hjkhj's last hope, which uses U-turn into a Tornadus-T sack into Bug Bite to KO the Galarian Moltres. However, now locked into a resisted move, 100p can set up with Swords Dance with his own Scizor. He sets up to +4 in attempt to KO hjkhj's Scizor with Bullet Punch from 76%. However, Bug Bite from hjkhj's Scarf Scizor has been doing between 23-26%, and 100p finds his Scizor at 27%. A high roll could end it all. 100p's Scizor fails to KO hjkhj's Scizor, but hjkhj's Scizor just barely fails to KO 100p's as well, leaving both Scizor at very low HP. 100p finishes off hjkhj's Scizor with one last Bullet Punch, then subsequently KOs hjkhj's last remaining Pokémon, Galarian Slowking. 100p has once again defeated hjkhj, but hjkhj put up a much stronger performance than in the regular season, and had either the critical hit on Diancie or the rolls on 100p's Scizor gone differently, the result may not have been the same.

I like to think this battle represents SS draft's modern shift to offensive playstyles, with SS Draft's most notorious stall player pivoting to a very offensive build and nearly taking down one of the strongest players in the format. In spite of the loss, hjkhj's team the Infernal Armory went on to defeat the Band Chasers in finals and claim the title of DCL Champions.

Hikertoad vs HunterZinfected - USUM

Going into week three, both the Thieves and the Nightclub were still looking at finding their first series win, and HunterZinfected vs Hikertoad was going to be a vital game for the result of this series due to how competitive the format was this season. For this matchup, Hunter chose to bring the Thieves' hyper offensive Tapu Koko draft, while Hikertoad opted for the Mega Gallade + Excadrill sand draft the Nightclub drafted. At first glance, this looks like it favors the Thieves' side, as their offense can easily overwhelm the opponent's composition with Landorus, Mega Gyarados, and even Kartana, which can muscle through Zapdos with its access to Swords Dance and a Z-move, while still having reliable defensive options against a threat like Mega Gallade. The Nightclub would need to find a way to win this game fast so it limits the offensive capabilities of the Thieves' draft.

Looking at Team Preview, Hunter decided to bench the low tiers in Roselia and Alolan Marowak, while Hiker opted for bringing the Alolan Exeggutor and benching both Qwilfish and Primarina. The game starts as the lead Landorus goes for Stealth Rock as a way to guarantee residual damage, while the Zapdos goes immediately for Hidden Power Ice to deal massive damage to the point where Landorus can't do much and faints on the following turn. Tapu Koko comes in right after to threaten the Zapdos but goes for U-turn expecting Excadrill to come in as the answer; this puts Hunter behind early as Hiker gets switch initiative with Zapdos also using U-turn and bringing in Gigalith on the Silvally-Ghost. After exchanging some status moves, Mesprit comes in on the Gigalith as a way to pivot and that gives Hunter the initiative when Excadrill is brought in on the U-turn, making it so Silvally-Ghost would be able to come in for free and prevent Excadrill from removing entry hazards the following turn; however, after two turns of sand and Stealth Rock damage, the Silvally-Ghost was just in range for Excadrill to take it out with a Z-Move, meaning that Hiker would be free to use Rapid Spin later. After that, Kartana came in on an attempt to apply pressure and uses Swords Dance as Zapdos comes in. In the following turn, it uses Substitute expecting Hiker to scout for the Z-Move, but he decides just attacking with Zapdos is the safer play as he has faster Pokémon that can still check Kartana offensively. After that, Mega Gallade and Mesprit exchange moves until Explosion Gigalith comes in to open the way for Hiker's game plan: Trick Room Alolan Exeggutor. After setting up the Trick Room, it successfully defeats three of Hunter's Pokémon, only leaving him with his Tapu Koko, which does not have enough health left to defeat both Alolan Exeggutor and Mega Gallade with Brave Bird, which seals the win in Hikertoad's favor. A fantastic demonstration of how any Pokémon regardless of its price in draft can turn the tides of a matchup.

Professor Shuckle vs jscurf - ORAS

Our selected highlight game for this tier was a difficult choice, but this game was a nailbiter from start to finish. These two players had recently faced one another in the semi-finals of the ORAS cup held earlier in the year, with Professor Shuckle taking the spoils on that occasion. A team tournament game is vastly different though, especially since this was Jscurf's first foray into an older gen in a team tournament of this magnitude. Looking at the matchup on paper, it appeared to be fairly even. Both sides had massive threats to one another in Professor Shuckle's Mega Aerodactyl and Jscurf's Excadrill, neither of which appeared to have good immediate responses on paper. The Team Preview didn't surprise many, with the most glaring omission being Professor Shuckle's Stunfisk, but it was completely understandable as to why it was joining Munchlax on the sidelines. Jscurf benching Mienshao vs a Mew + Whimsicott team was not a major surprise, with Mega Sceptile looking just as ineffective.

The game began with Bulk Up Mew getting a free setup turn vs Tentacruel. This set has been a common bring against sand teams for a long time now, so Jscurf was well prepared with a physically defensive Toxic Reuniclus to stop it in its tracks, barely surviving two Knock Offs. Professor Shuckle's offense kept coming though, with Swords Dance Empoleon proceeding to take out Tentacruel with two Facades. After some pivoting around by both players, Professor Shuckle decided to take his damage on a defensive Tyranitar with Mega Aerodactyl. To the surprise of almost everyone, the Mega Aerodactyl managed to survive a Stone Edge on 1%, meaning that this giant threat was around to fight another day. One Air Balloon Excadrill dying to Superpower Landorus in its attempts to set up later, and Jscurf appeared to be in a terrible spot.

After Mew was sacked to Tornadus-T, there was a bit of a lull. There was a lot of pivoting between Tornadus-T and Feraligatr by Jscurf to try make any ounce of progress, but the combination of Whimsicott and Empoleon had the situation under control. Whimsicott was already at low health, so taking an attack on it wasn't an option, leading Professor Shuckle to sack his Infernape. This livened things up again, allowing for the Empoleon to come back in and claim another kill on Reuniclus, despite not having defiant to deal with a Shadow Ball Special Defense drop. Empoleon was KOed by Tornadus-T eventually after some more Whimsicott pivoting, with Mega Aerodactyl looking more and more likely to claim the victory. A twist in the tale was still to be unfolded, as the safe click of Aerial Ace to avoid missing did not get the job done, with Tornadus now set to clean up with Icy Wind. All that remained was a Whimsicott and a dream, which did survive the Icy Wind but was now slower than Feraligatr. Feraligatr however decided to use Aqua Jet and not mess around with Speed tiers. This was Jscurf's undoing, as before generation 7, Rocky Helmet damage KOes the foe before the user goes down, meaning that Professor Shuckle took the 0-0 victory. A wild game from start to finish, and certainly not one that is going to fade from the memory anytime soon.

Lemurro vs Repeat 1 | 2 | 3 - VGC

In draft selection, both teams had a Chi Yu + Whimsicott core and decided to bench them to presumably avoid a mirror matchup. On Armory's side, this leaves a Chien-Pao + Iron Hands draft or a Flutter Mane + Ogerpon-C draft. Lemurro opted for the Flutter Mane draft as a neutral ground play into Repeat's choices. On the Walkers' side, Repeat was left with either an Ogerpon-H + Ursaluna-B Tailwind team, or the Raging Bolt team that was selected. The Ogerpon-H team struggled into Lemurro's Flutter Mane draft, so the Raging Bolt draft was chosen.

Looking into this matchup, Entei looked like it had the tools to adequately keep Flutter Mane at bay, but it needed to be careful of Ogerpon-C and Regidrago from Lemurro's side. Repeat was in a tough situation, almost forced to Tera Fairy Raging Bolt from turn one due to the lack of Dragon-resistant Pokémon. Surprisingly, Repeat chose to bring Entei to no games in the set and instead used the natural bulk of Raging Bolt to his advantage with the aid of Snarl to attempt to force Lemurro into unfavorable positioning. This worked to his advantage in game one. Game two and three, Lemurro took control by opting to bring Incineroar and play into the lack of Fairy-resistant Pokémon with Flutter Mane, using his Tera Fairy to boost Flutter Mane's damage output in both subsequent games. Without Entei to soak up Flutter Mane's damage, Repeat struggled to gain any momentum in games two and three, being on the backfoot for the majority of them and leading to a win for Lemurro.

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Conclusion

With the most consistent SV core in the tournament and top performers in every oldgen and VGC on their roster, the Infernal Armory proved themselves deserving victors, marking trophies in the Smogon Draft Hall of Fame for some of the Draft scene's most well-known names. Check out all of the games from DCL II in the replay thread, and stay tuned for DCL III, which will surely bring even more amazing battles!

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