VGC Events 101: Breaking Down the Circuit

By zee. Released: 2022/01/18.

Getting into the VGC circuit can be very confusing. There's a long list of terms and phrases that are likely unfamiliar to you, all kinds of different numbers and dates to keep track of, and multiple different names for tournaments. In this article, we'll be dissecting all this terminology to hopefully make it easier to understand going forward.

1. The Basics

Before we talk about the tournaments themselves, there are a few terms I'd like to cover in a glossary-style list, as it will make the following explanations simpler.

Glossary of VGC terms

The Calendar: A new VGC season starts every September, which sees play resume in local areas and potentially a regional in the US or Europe. Standard circuit play normally runs from then until the North American International Championships in late June or early July.
How to get a Player ID: When you make an account on the Official Pokémon Website, you'll be able to see your Player ID in your Play! Pokémon settings. This ID is very important, as you won't be allowed to compete in official events without one.
Age Divisions (Juniors, Seniors, Masters): Players at official Pokémon events are separated into three groups based on your year of birth; do note that this doesn't directly correlate to your age. Junior Division players are those around elementary school age, while Senior Division is for young teenagers, and the Masters division is the catch-all category for anyone older. As such, it is the Masters division that is always the largest and most competitive at major VGC events.
Rating Zone: Four clusters of countries that have different qualification procedures and processes for making it to the Pokémon World Championships. These zones are: North America, Latin America, Europe, and Australia + New Zealand. Japan, South Korea, and the rest of Asia are managed independently by The Pokémon Company.
Championship Points (CP): Championship Points are the measurement of reward you earn from high-placing finishes at sanctioned circuit tournaments. More prestigious events like Regionals and International Championships will pay out more CP than local events. Championship Points are not guaranteed, however, which is where the Kicker comes into play.
Kicker: The amount of players required to give Championship Points or prizes to a certain group. For example, players who finish 17th-32nd at a VGC Regional will only earn CP if 100 players enter the tournament in the same age division.
Play Points and Rating: Like Championship Points, you'll gain Play Points and Rating for showing up to tournaments. Play Points are a measurement of how many tournaments you've attended, while Rating is an ELO-like system that adds points for wins and removes points for losses, with the amount of points depending on your opponent's rating. Neither of these factors means much when it comes to qualifying for major tournaments, but it is nice to see them on your Play Pokémon Profile.
Best Finish Limit (BFL): The best finish limit is the maximum number of tournaments you're able to earn points from. For Premier Challenges, this is capped at six. If you were to earn points from eight Premier Challenges, only the six best finishes would be counted. In other words, if you've earned 30 CP, 30 CP, 30 CP, 16 CP, 12 CP, and 12 CP from six Premier Challenges, and go on to win your 7th, you'd gain 18 CP overall, since one of your 12 CP finishes would no longer be counted.
Swiss Format: If you're unfamiliar, the Swiss tournament format allows all participants to play as many rounds of the tournament as granted by size. This size is determined by the ceiling of powers of two, meaning that a 100 person tournament will be 7 rounds, a 250 person tournament will be 8 rounds, and a 400 person tournament will be 9 rounds. You'll be paired with players with a similar record to your own often, though there is the chance that you could be "up-paired" or "down-paired" to someone with 1 more win or 1 less win than you due to an odd number of players with identical records.
Top Cut: The second stage of official tournaments. To reach the top cut guaranteed, you will typically need to finish with no more than 1 loss, though in larger tournaments you may be able to qualify with up to 2 losses. This is a single elimination bracket seeded by the standings at the end of the Swiss stage. The winner of this bracket is declared the winner of the entire tournament, NOT the player who finishes first in standings after the Swiss rounds.
Resistance: Sometimes referred to as the "strength of schedule" in other tournaments, resistance is the combined win percentage of all of your opponents. In a five round tournament, if your opponents went 1-4 (20%), 3-2 (60%), 3-2 (60%), 4-1 (80%), and 5-0 (100%), you would have 64% resistance.

Alright! With the vocabulary words taken care of, we can move on to covering the three tiers of VGC Events: local events, major events, and the World Championships.

2. Local Events

Local events are broken down into two subgroups, Premier Challenges and Midseason Showdowns. Premier Challenges are hosted more frequently and can be hosted by more tournament organizers (TOs) than Midseason Showdowns, which can only be hosted during specific time periods and offer more points. You can find these events using the Event Locator on the Official Pokémon Website or by following your local TO on a social media platform like Twitter or Facebook. In addition to being able to find these in your local areas, they are typically featured as side events at Regional Championships on championship Sunday.

Local events are often much, much smaller than larger events unless you live in popular areas like the Northeastern US or major European cities like Barcelona and Milan. As such, they're always run over the course of just one day. You'll typically find these hosted in novelty stores or card game shops, and the environment is very relaxed. To prepare, bring your required game console and game (at the time of writing this, that's a Nintendo Switch with Pokémon Sword or Pokémon Shield), a charger, your Player ID, and either money for food (if any is close by) or light snacks like granola bars to keep your energy up.

3. Major Events - Regionals, Special Events, & Internationals

Regional and International Championships are the best ways to earn large amounts of CP and are how most top competitors string together multiple World Championship qualifications. Regional events are typically held all across North America, some parts of Europe, and Australia. These events offer cash prizing, trophies, and a generous amount of CP, which often results in drawing in a lot of players from the entire rating zone. Due to this, these events can hit upwards of 300 players in larger regions such as the coastal United States and Europe. Special Events are essentially the same as regionals in terms of CP payout, though the lack of prizing typically draws in a smaller crowd.

International Championships are the largest of the major events that award CP and are only one per rating zone. They're referred to as "International" because players from all over the world are given travel awards to attend these events as a reward for earning a lot of CP in a specific time frame. Winning one of these events is so big that it's enough to grant a World Championships invitation all by itself.

However, unless these events are literally in your backyard, travelling to them won't be cheap. You're going to be likely paying an entry fee, and will need to pay for travel such as a plane ticket, gas, or train ticket, in addition to lodging and food. The number one tip to cut down on costs is to find people willing to split the trip with you! If you get involved in your local scene ahead of major tournaments in your area, you'll very likely find a group of people interested in carpooling and sharing a hotel. Splitting a hotel room or AirBnB with four people will drastically cut down on lodging costs. If you're in need of flights, check sites like Skiplagged often in order to find reasonable deals. As for food, just plan your meals out in advance, see what's near the tournament venue and check reviews, or stock up on light snacks throughout the day and go out for a large dinner once the tournament play for the day has ended.

4. Pokémon World Championships

Unlike all other events in the circuit, the Pokémon World Championships ("Worlds" from here on out) is an invite-only event. To qualify, you need to reach a earn a specified amount of points during the circuit year (this is referred to as a CP Bar). The event spans over three days of play, with day 1 being for all basic level qualifiers, day 2 being for those that make it out of day 1 as well as those who have earned a day 2 bye due to earning a large amount of CP throughout the year, and day 3 being for the grand finals for all age divisions. To elaborate on qualifying to day 2 from day 1, you'll need to finish the end of the Swiss rounds with no more than 2 losses, at which point you'll be guaranteed a spot in the day 2 competition. No other players are allowed to play in day 2.

Playing in Worlds from day 1 is, quite frankly, a gauntlet. You're staring down nine rounds of Swiss on day 1, in which you have to win seven rounds, then 7 rounds of Swiss on day 2, of which you have to win at least five rounds, and then anywhere from three to four top cut sets to secure a finals appearance. Don't let that discourage you, however. Multiple Worlds finalists have made their way to the throne from day 1, such as Wolfe Glick in 2016, Emilio Forbes in 2018, and Naoto Mizobuchi in 2019.

Of course, there's much more to do at Worlds than just compete. The event itself is almost like a mini convention, as vendors line the aisles with cards and other merchandise, with side events and other attractions going on all weekend as well. Most importantly, on Saturday, there is a special side event called the [location of Worlds] Open, which gives CP equivalent to a regional. This is a huge opportunity for competitors who didn't make it through day 1, as well as spectators, to get a huge jump on the following season!

5. Final Thoughts

Now that you're familiar with how the VGC circuit is organized and all of the basic jargon the VGC community uses, hopefully it will be less intimidating to jump into events in the future. People play VGC for all kinds of reasons, so whether you're going just to meet some friends or to become the very best, there's something for everyone to enjoy!

HTML by Ryota Mitarai.

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