The World Cup of Pokémon 2024 - Introduction

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Using this thread real quick to bring attention to Rio Grande do Sul floods.

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-latin-america-68969337
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/08/world/americas/brazil-flooding-photos.html
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/08/flooding-in-brazil-then-and-now-in-pictures

On April 29th, several rainstorms hit the entire Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul (the southernmost state of the country, bordering Uruguay and Argentina). The area is commonly subjected to heavy weather due to the clash between tropical and polar air masses in the region. However, this year, the effects of it were greatly intensified by El Niño and climate change.

The rainstorms caused widespread flooding, resulting in landslides and a dam collapse. Hundreds of thousands are displaced, and hundreds are dead or missing. It is the worst flooding in Brazil in over 80 years:

https://estado.rs.gov.br/defesa-civil-atualiza-balanco-das-enchentes-no-rs-8-5-18h

Part of the flooding has also hit Uruguay. The two countries are helping each other with military equipment for rescues:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1786757203321405855

If you'd like to donate, you can donate directly to the Rio Grande do Sul government here: https://www.instagram.com/governo_rs/?img_index=1.

There are other donation channels set up by local groups such as MTST and CUFA, and influencers such as Whindersson Nunes, I believe they can't be linked directly here, but you can find them quite easily.

Thank you, and don't be a sucker about climate change:

https://science.nasa.gov/climate-change/effects/
https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/what-is-climate-change
https://climateknowledgeportal.worldbank.org/overview
 
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Team-Canada-WCOP-2024-1A.png


new canada logo courtesy Blazenix :boatogostandode:
 
Hello everyone! WCoP 2024 avatars are (basically) complete at this point and I wanted to showcase the ones I had the pleasure of working on with y'all. But first of all, I want to thank my fellow artists sharpclaw, Clementine, Irpachuza, Altthiel, Brumirage, and kyledove for their amazing work--we had 40 avatars to make for this edition of World Cup and it was no small task. They deserve every ounce of appreciation and support. Also a big shoutout to Marty for uploading the avatars, Kalalokki for overseeing things and supporting us, and ken for helping with team management.

Without further ado, I proudly present my WCoP 2024 avatars!

Germany
wcop2024germany.png
wcop2024germany2.png

Germany was an absolute blast for me to work with, when I saw Achimoo's ideas I fell in love and knew I needed to give them a shot. They came out even more beautifully than I could've asked for. I added almost all of the effects on the male avatar, giving Kingambit a bow tie and towel to make it look like a waiter. Credits to Clementine for the recolor of the male and kyledove for the original Richboy-Gen6 sprite. As for the female, I recolored kyledove's Dana sprite and gave her a plate with a tipping beer. Definitely my favorite avatar of the tour! Also huge credits to Soulja for letting us use their Kingambit sprite.

Oceania
wcop2024oceania.png
wcop2024oceania2.png

Oceania was also a really fun team to work with, their ideas and creativity know no bounds. Credits go to Drifting (and kyledove for Lance-LGPE) for the majority of the male avatar, I just cleaned up the sprite after it had been drafted. As for the female, however, I recolored kyledove's Fisher-Gen8, added a variety of effects, and completely redrew Smoochum entirely to look like it had been caught.

India
wcop2024india.png

This avatar was a pretty simple one on my end, and I did something similar for the last edition of RBTT. I recolored Brumirage's Adaman sprite to match Hisuian Samurott, and I always love the blended ombre hair effect with Adaman. Credit to Clementine for resizing Hisuian Samurott!

Spain
wcop2024spain2.png

Spain's avatars were really as much of a team effort as you could get, with Brumirage drawing the Flutter Mane from scratch, Clementine drawing up the Shadow Ball, and myself recoloring and editing kyledove's Elesa-Masters sprite. The colors work really well together I think!

Chile
wcop2024chile.png
wcop2024chile2.png

For Chile's avatars I recolored the Swimmer-Gen4 sprite to match Weavile, thank you to sharpclaw for the idea and execution of putting Chile's flag on the cap! The edits and recolor of kyledove's Zinnia-Masters sprite were a bit more intensive, but the end result definitely exceeded expectations. I also added the Ice Ball effects, while Mako added the aura and water effects!

Bangladesh
wcop2024bangladesh.png
wcop2024bangladesh2.png

Last but certainly not least, I got to work with Bangladesh once they qualified. Given the time constraints we were working with (like literally one day), I think these came out fantastic. I recolored both Brumirage's Turo-AI sprite and kyledove's Cynthia-Masters3 to match Gouging Fire. These recolors were pretty complicated with a lot of detail but I think they both work really well. Of course, credit to KingOfThe-X-Roads for Gouging Fire and Clementine for resizing it!

Good luck to all the teams in the tournament, and represent your country with pride!
 
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You already know what's going on, it's time for 2024 World Cup of Pokemon custom avatars!
I would like to thank sharpclaw, Irpachuza, deetah, Brumirage, kyledove, Altthiel and ken for all their hard work this year, it's been a hell of a ride and this season is by far the one we had to work the most for. I mean, 40 avatars in a month? Genuinely can't believe we got all of them done.

Before actually posting these avatars, I would like to take this opportunity to thank managers who were overall quite nice to you, and understanding when we had to play fun police and enforce rules about these avatars.
Since people have raised concerns about certain parts of these rules, we are going to update them before SCL to make the whole process as smooth as possible, and no, we're not going to allow your trainer to be a Pokemon character edited to ressemble an anime or movie character (please do not ask for those anymore im begging you).

So without further ado, here are the WCoP 2024 avatars I worked on!

Belgium:

wcop2024belgium.png
wcop2024belgium2.png

Both trainers were made by kyledove, check out his Twitter

France:

wcop2024france.png
wcop2024france2.png

Surfer sprite by kyledove, Nessa sprite by Brumirage
Iron Bundle sprite by kiriaura on DeviantArt

Canada:

wcop2024canada.png
wcop2024canada2.png

Both trainers were made by Kyledove, as well asthe incredible Baxcalibur sprite!
Edits on Kahili were made by Baloor, with some slight touchups on my part
I'd like to apologize to Baloor for kinda being a dick these past few days, as we were approaching deadlines I was more and more burnt out by the month of sprite work I had went through and wasn't necessarily the nicest to him who was just trying to get his team the best possible avatars :(

Italy:

wcop2024italy.png
wcop2024italy2.png

The Dondozo sprite was made by KingOfThe-X-Roads, check out their DeviantArt and Twitter
Both trainers were made by kyledove (again!), edits on the the Lisia sprite by Marty
And the super nice Tatsugiri sprite with a hat and glasses was made by Altthiel

United Kingdom

wcop2024uk.png
wcop2024uk2.png

Both trainer sprites were originally from kyledove, and I made the Gliscor sprite on the female avatar.

My work on these avatars is decidedly free, and although I appreciate everyone who has offered to pay/tip for the work I put in, I do not want to be paid for these. However, if you think my work is worth paying for, here are things I'd rather have you do with your money:

- World Cup is all about fighting for your country but you can donate to the people of Palestine to help them save theirs. Operation Olive Branch is an organization made to support & amplify aid requests of Palestinian families.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/operationolivebranch?igsh=MXF6ZmZxbmFscW51OQ==
Linktree: https://linktr.ee/opolivebranch

- You can also donate to help the population affected by the environmental disaster that occurred in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, south region of Brazil. A Brazil Charity Bowl took place last Saturday, here are the links they encouraged people to donate to:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cufars/
PIX: doacoes@cufa.org.br
PayPal: doacoespaypal@cufa.org.br

- In honor of Mr.Bossaru; for those unaware, we recently lost a very active community member and tournament player to Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), and there are lots of organizations raising funds to help people get diagnosis and treatments. You can donate to a few of those with these links:
cureduchenne.org
duchenneuk.org
walkingstrong.org

- A more personal cause, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), also known as Charcot's Disease is subtype of muscular dystrophy. It's a fatal disease, and people diagnosed with it progressively lose the ability to walk, move, speak, and even eat.
You can donate to:
ALS association
Fondation Charcot
ARSLA

Huge thanks to everyone who will donate, and if you're not able to, feel free to share these links around you.

Feels good to finally be done with those, hope everyone enjoys this season, and GO UK!
 
Another year of WCOP spriting! A wild and crazy one to be sure, as the field expanded to 20-count-em-20 teams; thanks especially to ken for coordinating the whole thing, and of course our intrepid overseer Kalalokki.

Thanks also to the core spriting team, Clementine, deetah, Irpachuza, and kyledove; I learn from y'all every day and am in awe of your collective imagination and talent.

I had a couple teams offer to pay for my work this year. WCOP avis, like all team tour avis, are free—but if you're itching to take some community action with your dollars, I'd be honored if you considered donating to, or shared the links to:
The Trevor Project—providing crisis support, mental health services, and advocacy to LGBTQ+ youth
Jewish Voice for Peace—the largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world, organizing Jewish solidarity with the fight for Palestinian freedom
Palestine Children's Relief Fund—what it says on the tin. Gaza is hurting. Free Palestine.
Your local community bail fund—Google "bail fund near me" and pick one to help people in your community avoid indignity and injustice of spending a night in jail

And now, the sprites I worked on this year!

Brazil
WCOP24_BrazilM.png
WCOP24_BrazilM2.png

M1 (Wattson) recolor & edits by ZacWeavile, and me
M2 (Guitarist) record & edits by lydian, and me
Annihilape edits by zacweavile, lydian, and me

China
WCOP24_ChinaF.png
WCOP24_ChinaM.png

F (Erika-LGPE) by kyledove, recolor & edits by me
M (Larry) by kyledove, recolor & edits by Starmind & me
Ho-oh edits by me

Europe
WCOP24_EuropeF.png
WCOP24_EuropeM.png

F (Leaf-Masters2) by kyledove, recolor by me
M (Red-Masters) by kyledove, recolor by me
Ceruledge originally by KingOfThe-X-Roads & Banana Toast, resized by me

India
WCOP24_IndiaF.png

F (Sabrina-FRLG) by kyledove, recolor and edits by me
Samurott-Hisui resized by Clementine

US Northeast
WCOP24_USNEF.png
WCOP24_USNEM.png

F (Aquasuit) by kyledove, recolor by me
M (Magmasuit) by kyledove, recolor by me
Deoxys-A edits by me

US South
WCOP24_USSF.png
WCOP24_USSM.png

F (Nancy) by kyledove, recolor by Xrn and me
M (Musician-Gen9) by kyledove, recolor by me
Skeledirge by Xrn and me

US West
WCOP24_USWF.png
WCOP24_USWM.png

F (Cynthia-Gen7) by Brumirage, recolor by me
M (Giovanni-Masters) by kyledove, recolor by me
Gholdengo by kyledove, edits by me

Stay tuned for Africa...
 
As World Cup doesn't have power rankings, we decided to give it it's own pre-tournament article in the form of some quick team introductions: https://www.smogon.com/articles/wcop-2024-teams

Please note: These are not power rankings and nothing we write in here is the end-all, be-all opinion or statement on you as a player or a team. This is meant to be a fun, dramatic, generally unserious article to drum up some hype for WCoP.

Huge thank you to my lovely and amazing co-writer teal6, without whom this article most certainly would not have been possible, considering it took the two of us four days of near-continuous work over this past week to bring this to fruition.

And a big shoutout to the TFP staff who made this possible on such an insanely tight timeframe and the GPers who turned up at a moment's notice to very patiently add semicolons to all of my writing: Lumari Quite Quiet SolarBeam sunny004

Good luck to all the teams (especially US South) and enjoy the tournament!
 
Even though we had a terrible run and rng overall, I just wanted to say thanks to team Spain for giving me the opportunity this year to chill around and help throughout the tournament. The environment and meta knowledge in Spain is incredible and it is a shame we ended up with this record. Not deserved at all.

Gracias Malekith Dorron reiku por la confianza, estuvo genial y ojalá montéis una buena barbacoa para celebrar que aun somo champs y que faltan 11 meses para la siguiente!

Trosko SoulWind vosotros dos sois las cabezas del equipo, tenía ganas de veros en marcha y superasteis cualquier expectativa que tenía. Reze es la nueva generación que viene con vosotros ngl.

Javi Luispeikou increíble los vibes que traéis siempre. Un placer grandísimo y espero que nos veamos pronto en otros torneos, que últimamente no paramos joder.

Axel el sheriff. Espero que puedas seguir jugando ORAS, ya sé que las nuevas gens están fuera de tu gusto...

Garay oak Eskerrik asko! Fue un placer poder jugar unos tests contigo, perder contra ti da igual de gusto que ganar.

Finalmente, dar las gracias al resto del equipo con quien he tenido menos oportunidades de habler pero que hemos estado juntos a tope durante estas tres semanas London Beats Dasmer Guille M Dragon @[K-12] The Madchine

Espero que nos podamos ver el año que viene para solventar este rng! :blobpex:
 
I don't mean to derail things or cause any drama. However, there seems to have been some miscommunication regarding team Chile's female avatar: Raptor had initially asked for a Zinnia avatar with some edits plus the weavile, these edits however, according to the avatar qc team, were oddly specific. Raptor had the idea of having Zinnia’s look inspired by Kurumi, an anime character. Let it be know that we were aware of what is and what is not allowed in the avatar since the start, and that we were very upfront about how she’s an inspiration, and this was not done maliciously by us. He and the captains were constantly specifically asking if said edits followed the rules and if they were okay to be put, all of the artists involved were aware of these and approved them during the process.

Unfortunately, a few days after round 1 was posted, the avatar was suddenly removed from every player on the team. Confused, our team asked the artist team or whoever is in charge of it what was up. The response we got was that they decided to revoke it. Apparently, somebody had asked if the avatar was an anime character, and Raptor said yes, meaning that the avatar resembled Kurumi which is what it might look like an anime character. This log was brought up to [those in charge], who then said that they felt 'deceived.' This did not make any sense to us. As stated above, Raptor had brought up the anime character in question multiple times during the process in the channel, so there couldn't have been any misunderstandings for them to not know that he was using her as reference/trying to make it look a little like her. Yes, he did know that outright anime characters are not allowed in official teamtours avatar, which is why he kept asking if the edits he was asking for were fine or not. If our intention was to sneak a Kurumi-like avatar, the last thing we would do is literally link pictures of her in the server lol.

This whole situation seems rather silly so it'd be a shame if it stayed like this, as I think the artist team did a great job overall this year. We are not asking to get that specific avatar back. Whether or not we get some sort of solution, I think it's really disheartening that the whole team was punished for this. They tried to follow the rules as best as they could, asking for every little detail. We felt the communication was clear throughout and that our avatar was allowed, yet they just remove it from everybody without informing us at all.

If possible, we’d like to chance to make a new avatar on our own, that has no relation to any anime character for the team Chile players. If you feel like the captains need to be punished for “deceiving” the artists, then it’d be fine if just the players got the avatar as well.
 
Mako said:
I don't mean to derail things or cause any drama. However, there seems to have been some miscommunication regarding team Chile's female avatar: Raptor had initially asked for a Zinnia avatar with some edits plus the weavile, these edits however, according to the avatar qc team, were oddly specific. Raptor had the idea of having Zinnia’s look inspired by Kurumi, an anime character. Let it be know that we were aware of what is and what is not allowed in the avatar since the start, and that we were very upfront about how she’s an inspiration, and this was not done maliciously by us. He and the captains were constantly specifically asking if said edits followed the rules and if they were okay to be put, all of the artists involved were aware of these and approved them during the process.

Unfortunately, a few days after round 1 was posted, the avatar was suddenly removed from every player on the team. Confused, our team asked the artist team or whoever is in charge of it what was up. The response we got was that they decided to revoke it. Apparently, somebody had asked if the avatar was an anime character, and Raptor said yes, meaning that the avatar resembled Kurumi which is what it might look like an anime character. This log was brought up to [those in charge], who then said that they felt 'deceived.' This did not make any sense to us. As stated above, Raptor had brought up the anime character in question multiple times during the process in the channel, so there couldn't have been any misunderstandings for them to not know that he was using her as reference/trying to make it look a little like her. Yes, he did know that outright anime characters are not allowed in official teamtours avatar, which is why he kept asking if the edits he was asking for were fine or not. If our intention was to sneak a Kurumi-like avatar, the last thing we would do is literally link pictures of her in the server lol.

This whole situation seems rather silly so it'd be a shame if it stayed like this, as I think the artist team did a great job overall this year. We are not asking to get that specific avatar back. Whether or not we get some sort of solution, I think it's really disheartening that the whole team was punished for this. They tried to follow the rules as best as they could, asking for every little detail. We felt the communication was clear throughout and that our avatar was allowed, yet they just remove it from everybody without informing us at all.

If possible, we’d like to chance to make a new avatar on our own, that has no relation to any anime character for the team Chile players. If you feel like the captains need to be punished for “deceiving” the artists, then it’d be fine if just the players got the avatar as well.
Click to expand...
Kalalokki this might not mean much to you, but this is the reward that took many effort from us and is something that identify us as a team. We would like to get a response.
 
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