Table Of Contents
1. Introduction
2. 2019 Regionals
3. 2020 Dallas Regional
4. Online Competitions
5. Locals
6. NPA Highlights
7. A Brief Note on Teambuilding
8. Conclusion
Introduction
Hi there, I’m Joey. If you don’t know me, I’ve been playing VGC since 2015, when I was 13 years old. In that time, I’ve gathered a sizable 8 regional top cuts, 3 bricks, 2 worlds invites, and one top cut disqualification. I use this blog to write stuff about VGC once in a blue moon. I used to go by Life Orb, but now just go by Joey, because I’m old enough to vote and realize that’s a ridiculous alias. Prior to this report I sort of “vanished” from the community for a little while, partially because I was swamped with school work but also because I just kind of felt frustrated with my place in the community and needed to blow off some steam. Sappy stuff aside, I felt like writing a little season report because I said I would do one for 2018-2019 and never finished it (it exists in about 65% completion, so if that’s something you’d like to see let me know).
My 2020 season started in the late summer of 2019, right before my senior year of high school was about to take place. I realized that the DC Open was fast approaching and that I should probably build a team for the event, as the Kangaskhan/Tornadus team that my teambuilding partner Kyle Livinghouse used to get top 8 at NAIC didn’t click for me, and neither did the Xerneas/Kyogre team I had helped my other partner and good friend Stephen Mea create. Like I did when I built my favorite VGC team of all time, Triple Roar, I decided to start with Tapu Koko and Lunala. Easily my favorite two Pokemon in 2019 for a large amount of reasons, I figured it was a relatively safe bet. I expected Pokemon like Primal Groudon and Stakataka to have a large presence at the Open, and therefore I elected to use Primal Kyogre instead of my usual Xerneas with my trademark Tailwind/Wide Guard/Roar Lunala, which still happens to support Primal Kyogre pretty well. Since both of my usual testing partners were busy preparing for day 2 worlds, I ended up working with VGC’s most brilliant intellectual, BIG MIKE Spinetta. Below, I’ll continue my analysis on this team as well as the two other teams I used at 2019 regional events.
2019 Regionals
DC Open: Top 64 (6-3) +50 CP
This team essentially aimed to use Kyogre and Metagross in Tailwind to power through obstacles. Lunala and Tapu Koko typically enabled this setup with Tailwind, Wide Guard, Electroweb, or Sky Drop. Incineroar and Smeargle were used as general support Pokemon, but unfortunately I never really found much use for Smeargle over the weekend. Maybe if I had planned more I would have found a better usage for that slot, but I really did rush this team and have no one to blame for myself. The team was REALLY fun however, and the Open plus the experience of hanging out with my friends in DC for Worlds was sick. It just felt like another regional to me until I got to see my best friends like James Baek and Edu on the big screen.
Who flexed hardest in this picture?
I would say being at worlds definitely motivated me to try harder for the following season. As most people know, An Unnamed Series Of Unfortunate Events lead to me just narrowly missing my invite to worlds 2019 by 50 points. While making those 50 points “back” at the open was a nice consolation prize, I knew I could do better. However, when exactly I was going to be better I actually had no clue. My plan was just to attend the Richmond regional in November, right before my 18th birthday, and as many locals as I could. However, I became frustrated with locals early on into my 2019 season and decided it probably wasn’t the best idea for me to keep going to every one I saw on the event locator in a 100 mile radius.
I really liked VGC 2019 and so I would build a lot teams in my spare time, just for fun. One day I decided to refurbish one of my old NPA teams, which you might recognize as the team Kareem Muakkit used to win NAIC 2019 in the seniors division. In a completely joking manner, I suggested to him that Gallade worked better than Lucario on the team, and Tapu Lele was now irrelevant because every dragon type in the format seemed to be running enough special defense to tank a Moonblast from a Choice Scarf Lele unless you were boosted by your own Fairy Aura. Gallade boasted a variety of ways to complement Lunala, such as putting pressure on Incineroar and aiding in Lunala’s longevity and damage dealing capabilities via Wide Guard and Helping Hand respectively. After changing around a few sets and adding a Crobat where Tapu Lele used to reside, I finished the team for the day and dubbed my mission complete. I finished that team on a Monday. What I wasn’t aware of, however, was how quickly I was actually going to need to push that team to its limits.
It’s Friday, October the 11th. I just got home from my high school’s pep rally, and was absolutely stoked for my final homecoming football game as a senior. Despite the fact that our football team had a strong 0-7 record for the season going into the game, I was still prepared to join the droves of fans in our uncomfortable metal bleachers and cheer on my friends and classmates at what would be the last home game I could attend as a senior. As I was waiting for the game to start, I decided to open Discord and see how my friends were spending their Friday evening. I saw Kyle had posted a screenshot of his driving directions in a server I was in, and noticed Kyle going through Roanoke, a city that I lived an hour away from (and a city with a whole lot of bad Pokemon-related memories attached to it, if you can believe that). If I left the game and packed my stuff in a hurry, I could totally meet Kyle when he passes through and see my friends for a weekend. Of course, that’s totally irrational. It’s just a funny coincidence. The game was about to start and I needed to support my team.
Two minutes had passed.
“Hey, Mom, do you think I can meet Kyle in Roanoke and go to a regional in Knoxville with him for the weekend?”
About two hours later, while waiting for Kyle in the parking lot of the Valley View mall in Roanoke, I sent Kareem some DMs on Discord. I don’t have access to my Discord account anymore, but the DMs went something like this:
joey: kareem.
kareem: h
joey: can you get me the team in game
kareem: gallade?
joey: gallade.
kareem: ok dad
God bless Kareem, who was miraculously able to provide me with the copy of the Gallade team as he made sure to breed one earlier in the week for a local he would be attending. Since I ended up driving, Kyle tethered off my phone’s hotspot to get the Pokemon. Huge thanks to those guys for being absolute bros.
I’d imagine most people reading this report know the rest, but if you aren’t familiar with what happened to Kyle and I along the way, just know that the 4:30 am Subway we had was very helpful with calming my nerves after what was easily the most stressful five hours of my life.
Knoxville Regional: 2nd Place (6-1 Swiss) +160 CP
While I consider Triple Roar to be the magnum opus of my VGC career as a teambuilder, I think that this event has to go down as the one that I will never forget. I sat down to play round 1 against Nicholas Borghi, lost game 1 relatively quickly, and decided I did not go through the hell that I went through only to lose round 1 at a regional with a team archetype that I had popularized, innovated upon, and perfected, for over a year’s worth of time. After feeling that little mental power up, I only dropped three more games for the rest of the day, one of which was to friend and fellow Gazpacho Goat Ashton Cox, and the other two were to our CP leader Joe Ugarte in a nailbiter of a three game set. Pulling a 6-0 Kyle as my last round was relatively fortunate, as I essentially didn’t have to play a seventh round and was free to celebrate since he offered the scoop before I even saw my name on the pairings. My resistance from starting 5-0 was solid enough that I was locked for cut anyway, but it felt great having the ending to the scariest tournament I’ve ever entered be something so symbolic.
I spent the evening preparing for my top cut match against Alex Underhill, who I considered to be the strongest contender in top cut of the regional. In what was easily the greatest set of Ultra Series I ever ended up playing, I managed to narrowly escape elimination with a clutch game three read and move on to top 4. My next match vs my new friend Chongjun Peng was over relatively quick, thanks to some favorable RNG in game one and a really heavy read in game two. Chongjun isn’t the largest fan of 2020 (and neither am I) but I’m sure he will a very strong player once he can find a format that clicks with him again.
You know I’m gaming really hard because you can barely see my face…
This of course leads us to the finals, where I played against none other than Kyle Livinghouse. It felt like all the hard work I had ever put in to Pokemon had already paid off, and this was something like a bonus stage you get to play at the end of a Super Mario game. I was just making the reads my heart told me to read the entire game, there was no point in following the typical plans for the matchup because I knew Kyle’s optimal lines and how to counter them and Kyle knew the same for me. My best friend and I sat on stage and played 4D Chess for 30 minutes and I could not have been having a better time, even if I won the tournament. I love you like a brother Kyle. I know life stuff makes us not as close as we used to be but I hope we can come back for 2021 and rock it like we did VGC 2019.
One of the best days of my life
Richmond Regional: Top 32 (4-3) +0 CP
The team is a safer version of my Knoxville team that I worked on with Zach Carlson and Chuppa Cross. I figured people knew Gallade’s tricks now and Kangaskhan was just a better call for the tournament. I put in almost 0 additional practice games until a few days before the regional, as I decided to focus my attention to school projects and flirting with the girl from my English class on Snapchat. Games before girls, gamers. Anyway, my 18th birthday was the day after this regional, so I came more to hang out and party than try for another brick. Shoutouts to David, Abdul, Irving, Calvin, Eric, and the rest of the guys for a pretty great Friday and Saturday night. You guys know how to have a good time and I totally appreciated you guys letting me hang even though I’m fairly younger than the rest of y’all.
Apparently I can’t wear hats. Shoutouts to Kyle’s potato camera.
This regional was kind of wack because I got top 32 under the assumption that I got 60 CP but then apparently I didn’t. Virginia regionals has managed to take CP from me two years in a row and I’m probably not coming back to make it three for three. Of course I say that, but we all love Pokemon addiction.
And that’s it for my 2019 regional runs! I had a lot of fun at all three of these events in different ways, and they all also equally had their own little bits of chaos. Life is a game of give and take. I think I grew a lot as a player and teambuilder during these events and left Ultra Series behind with a game knowledge that can be applied to future formats.
Dallas Regional: 139th (6-4) +0 CP
+20 CP from the Sunday MSS
This six looks pretty solid. Fake Tears + Charizard, Shadow Sneak Mimikyu + Weakness Policy Dragapult, Togekiss + Excadrill + Dragapult, etc.. My disdain for 2020 at its start would ultimately lead to my downfall at this tournament, as by the time I realized I needed to start preparing for the event, it was pretty much too late. Already drowning in school work from the new semester, I decided to just cut my losses and use a slightly modified version of the “joeyzard” team I had been using in early December (which had Kommo-o and Snorlax in place of the Mimikyu and Dragapult). This team did not have solid answers to Dynamaxed bulky threats, such as Tyranitar, Snorlax, and Dragapult. I ended up taking my four Swiss losses off of those three Pokemon primarily, and missed the CP cutoff by just slightly over 10 places. I did have some pretty okay highlights at this event including victories against 2009 national Champion Mike Suleski and 2018 regional Champion Matthew Greaves, but other than that the matches were relatively uneventful.
I didn’t deserve CP for this finish so I am in no way upset about it. It was the first time in a long time that I truly felt lost in a format and didn’t just play bad, which was equally disheartening and motivating. Unfortunately, I felt the heartbreak for a long time before I felt the motivation. My advice to those like myself who typically have a hard time when new formats start is to just. grind. ladder. I promise, high ladder before the first big regional is a great way to acquaint yourself with what you’re likely to see at (and what could very well carry you to) the top tables. It’s a tedious process, but if you want it, you have to earn it.
These were the four regionals I attended during this short-lived season. Overall, I’m really proud of the teams that I ended up using, but you probably picked up on the theme that I never really find enough time to practice with them. When I did well at events prior, it was mostly just because my gradual expertise payed off rather than practice I had put in a during the range of 2-4 weeks before a big event. I would love to break this bad habit going forward, but actions speak louder than words, so let’s see if I can hold myself accountable.
International Competitions
February IC: Top 512 +2
This team was ridiculously funny to me for some reason. It utilized Expert Belt Bronzong with Steel Beam and Psychic, further boosted by max Special Attack investment, to catch unsuspecting Togekiss, Conkeldurr, or Sylveon off guard. Bronzong was honestly the star of the show, as I was way too bad at using Tyranitar balance to effectively pilot that to a high ranking. I got bored after about 20 games and stopped because I didn’t desperately need the CP here. Love me some Steel Beam Bronzong.
May IC
CP was not awarded for this tournament
This is the team I used in hopes to qualify for the Player’s Cup in July. Primarina really impressed me in testing with its massive Special Attack and high power moves, so I decided to go with it. This team had some neat tricks like max Attack and max Special Attack Weakness Policy Tyranitar, Helping Hand Dusclops, and Hydro Cannon Primarina coupled with my beloved Swords Dance + Lum Berry + Trick Room Mimikyu (try saying that five times fast).
Unfortunately I got a little ahead of myself and played into the fatal trap of playing one too many IC games, and you can probably figure out the rest. Best of one in this format can certainly amaze me at times. Regardless, I’ll work harder when VGC makes it’s official return with the 2021 season. Since this my last 2020 event, I’ll take a brief break and move on to practicing my teambuilding and best of one skills once the Isle of Armour dex expansion comes out next month.
Locals
For a variety of reasons, I’m really not the biggest fan of my locals. Still, I went to a few this year because I’m addicted to Pokemon and need to scratch the itch more than once every two months. They aren’t entirely worth going into, so I’m just going to list the event and the six I used with the CP earned and provide some explanation afterward.
September Raleigh PC: 4th (+12)
October Fincastle MSS + PC: 5th + 1st (+30)
January Raleigh PC: 3rd (+12)
February Roanoke MSS: 18th (+0)
For the first PC I went to this yearI tried out KangTornOgre and decided it did not like going against Nightfront’s Ferrothorn. The Fincastle Double Header was where, after giving Mega Gallade its VGCStats debut just a week before, I decided to do some more megas a favor. I put everyone I know going to the event in a group DM and we all agreed to use megas with no CP for the 2020 season. Of course, one person said lol nah, left the group DM, and won the MSS, but I won the PC with Latios YvelDon so I’m pretty sure I’m the real winner.
The 2020 locals were kind of mixed experiences. I took two of my high school friends to Raleigh for their very first Pokemon tournament, got paired up against one of my friends round 1, and got instantly yelled at by the TO for playing best of three when “The Pokemon Event Locator Said Best Of One” even though literally every other 4 round PC organized by this host had been best of three. On the other hand, Marthe Honts is a wonderful TO for Southside Virginia but for whatever reason I just can’t earn points in Roanoke it seems. I swear that venue is cursed. But seriously, if you’re in the southside or central Virginia area please come out to Marthe’s events. She’s a wonderful TO and hosts events monthly!
NPA Highlights
This isn’t going to be a season recap or a match analysis, but rather a breakdown of the teams that I truly enjoyed using during the 9 weeks I played the season. I finished 4-5, which is definitely a far cry from the 7-4 I had during NPA 8’s regular season. I’d like to take a moment to thank Tommy, Jake, Burns, Emilio, Jackson, Keith, and the rest of the Monarchs for yet another fun season.
Week 4 VS PPl-Dorian (LWL)
As you can see, this team was pretty wild. Probably the most in-your-face team I have built and actually used this season. The team’s vision was pretty simple, run over your opponents with Weakness Policy boosted Dracozolt. Its coverage lines up really well with Gengar and Bisharp’s fast pace and it appreciates the Icy Wind from Gengar as well. The last three Pokemon were mostly for support, but all were vital to the team’s function. This team was actually the most successful I’ve been on ladder all format, getting top 20 on Showdown and top 50 on Battle Stadium.
Week 6 VS Alaka (WW)
Pretty simple Fake Tears Persian offense. Persian has a lot of nice benefits like Fake Out, a fast Fake Tears that affects Dark-types thanks to it not having Prankster, and Icy Wind that make it great to pair with middling speed special attackers such as Duraludon, Togekiss, and Rotom-W. Dusclops + Rhyperior was just a pocket option because Alaka is well known for max Special Defense Tyranitar, which I was scared could give my team trouble otherwise. I’m not sure if Persian is too good or not in the current meta, but it was essential to this particular team’s function. Hope I can check it out again in a later format during this generation, I really enjoyed using it.
Week 9 VS Angel (WW)
This was a cool idea for a hard Lapras Trick Room team I wanted to build after seeing a few middling speed variants on ladder and in tournaments. While other Lapras were opting for Light Clay, I chose to use Weakness Policy on mine, activating it with either Brick Break from Dusclops or Rock Tomb from Reuniclus. Speaking of Reuniclus, this was a super bulk Overcoat set with no Special Attack investment. More importantly, this Reuniclus was teched out with Power Swap. Power Swap is really neat for stealing the boosts that enemy Pokemon try to stack up in order to break through Aurora Veil. If time allows, you can even pass those boosts to Lapras, or take Special Attack drops from Lapras should it be hit with a Snarl or something of the like. I’ve since moved on to the Primarina camp, but I still really think this team was, and still could be, quite powerful.
Week 11 VS Polpolpo (LWW)
Six ghosts and still no Dusclops. Monarchs were eliminated from playoff contention the week prior so I decided to vent my VGC 2020 related frustrations and put legitimate effort into building a mono-Ghost team. The objective was to win games either with the fast mode (Dragapult/Mimikyu/Gengar/Golurk) or the heavy Trick Room mode, featuring two setters in Gengar and Mimikyu. Thanks to Golurk’s insane power and bulk and the intricacies of Destiny Bond mechanics, I was actually able to win my match for the week with this beauty. No regrets.
NPA is now over and I’ve been reunited with my long lost lover Duckpond in the expanded Monarchs chat. It was a fun season filled with a lot of cool teams, drama, stress, and new friendships. Not having to have Tommy defend me from The Council to determine whether I should be banned or not this year was a plus. I’m unsure if I’ll be returning for my fourth NPA season or not next year, but what I do know is that I’ll be playing in Wacka World Tour 2, and so can YOU (link here)!
A Note on Teambuilding
One thing you might have picked up on while analyzing the teams in this article is that they’re all a different combination of six Pokemon. However, under further analysis, there’s a lot of overlapping themes. For example, all of my 2019 teams had Lunala, Incineroar, Smeargle, Tailwind, a fast Mega Pokemon, and ways of preventing sleep spam. A lot of my 2020 teams had Mimikyu, a Pokemon that I consider my personal favorite in this format. Even though Disguise received a nerf with generation eight, Mimikyu’s utility and offensive prowess still remain more than significant. If there were any more major events to play in, I would certainly use Mimikyu in them as well.
The point that I’m getting at here is that it’s extremely important to find out what you like about a particular format and how you can extract those elements and inject them into your teambuilding processes. Comfort certainly goes a long way when preparing for larger tournaments, where you have high chances of running into matchups you have little to no experience versus, and where your intuition gained by spending time with the Pokemon you choose to bring kicks in and guides you to success. Not all of your friends are going to have the same preferences as you, and might even outright disagree with you as to what you consider to be “staple” Pokemon to incorporate into your teams. That’s totally okay. If you have valid evidence that you can perform well with whatever you’ve been practicing with, just go for it and don’t look back. That time spent worrying about your sixth Pokemon is valuable time wasted that you could be hitting the ladder.
Conclusion
This season was definitely a reality check that I’m not just going to always be a fantastic player, which was a hard pill to swallow coming off of my Top 4/Top 16/Top 8 regionals run in early-mid 2019. You’d think after bombing one regional and NAIC later that season I’d learn, but I’m really quite stubborn.
If you don’t know, Pokemon has announced that all CP earned in 2019-2020 will rollover to the 2020-2021 season for a sort of super worlds in London. We don’t exactly have confirmation that the bar is 400, but I would imagine it is, which means I’ll only need a little less than 120 points to secure my spot at worlds. While it is a little upsetting that I won’t be able to finish out this season and get an invite that I actually deserve, I am excited to keep pushing for more regional cuts, a decent nationals run, and, of course, that beautiful shiny Pikachu trophy in August 2021.
Shoutouts:
Kyle Livinghouse
Stephen Mea
James Baek
Wacka
Kareem Muakkit
Sam Temple
Chuppa Cross
David Mancuso
George Tivferman
Abdul Barrie
Calvin Nisson
Michael Spinetta
And you, for reading this entirely unnecessary and unimpressive season report!
Life Orb's VGC outpost 