SirScrubbington's VGC 2019 Moon and Worlds Ultra Report
Introduction
Hey guys! It’s been about three months since I posted anything here, and I felt like after worlds and my draft leagues had finished it was time to upload my moon and ultra series team report. After a strong Sun Series showing, my Moon and Ultra series results are not nearly as impressive. However, I still earned my worlds invite and worked hard to earn the best results I could at the tournaments I played, and had a lot of fun teambuilding for both formats. This article will go through all of the tournaments I played since the start of Moon series, through to Ultra Series and up to the Pokemon World Championships in Washington DC, which was held on the 16th to the 18th of September, 2019.
Tournaments
Moon Series
January 12th, 2019 - Neo Tokyo Premier Challenge - 1st Place
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This was my first moon series tournament of the year, and I honestly had very little idea of what I wanted to use. On the drive to the tournament, I decided to use the Zygarde Solgaleo core which was popular late in Sun Series for two reasons - It looked like a fun team that I could play defensively, and it was a team I was sure people wouldn’t expect from me and prepare for. I had used nothing but Xerneas or a single Yveltal centric team up to this point un Sun Series, so I felt that I was safe to use a different archetype and not be counterteamed. I opted to use the fighting Z-Move on Solgaleo rather than Solganium at this point in the metagame as I wanted to test a bulky Solgaleo which could still OHKO Incineroar without needing a Life Orb or Expert Belt, and I felt that avoidng the attack and defense drop was a good justification for running Fightinium Z. I also opted to run Nature’s Madness over Light Screen on Tapu Fini, as I preferred the chip pressure Tapu Fini would provide against my opponent’s team. The only matchup I was concerned with was choice specs Kyogre + Lunala, which I had a feeling Graham (@AmedeeGraham) may use but he did not use the team at that tournament, and we did not face as he lost in Top 4. I did not drop a set all day with the team, however I dropped a game to a variant of Graham’s Xerneas Groudon team in swiss and Lochlan Janke (@MudcrabV)’s Kyogre Yveltal team in finals. Overall I felt the team was extremely strong, and I absolutely loved playing it. It quickly became one of my favorite archetypes to play around with in Moon Series. The only change I really felt was necessary after the tournament was changing Venusaur to a more useful Pokemon, as I had teched it on for Groudon matchups and did not even find that I could bring it versus that core.
January 28th, 2019 - Fastbreak Sports Premier Challenge - 2nd Place
After the last tournament I won with Zygarde, I felt like moving back to a more standard Lunala Xerneas team. This team was built on the same engine as the specs Koko Toxicroak team, but I adusted it to have a more defensive core in Assault Vest Tapu Koko and Amoonguss to offer redirection for my restricteds. Kommo-o was teched on as I saw it was getting used on quite a lot of Xerneas Lunala teams at the time, and liked its utility versus archetypes such as Yveltal Groudon or Yveltal Kyogre. It also allowed the team to automatically win versus any teams built around Dragon-Type restricteds such as Palkia. In theory, it helped with my Zygarde matchup as well however I was not able to break through Henry Rich (@HobbitVGC)’s Zygarde team, which was my singular loss in the entire tournament both in round two of swiss and in finals. Overall, I felt like this team was strong however I feel like it was a little bit rough around the edges in places and needed work before I would be comfortable using it at a major.
February 24th, 2019 - Fastbreak Sports Premier Challenge - (1-2 Finish)
This was a very small tournament, and also the first time I tested one of my favorite Moon Series teams. I go into more detail about this team in a later section, where the team was improved upon for a later event however at this tournament I lost to Lachlan How (@BattleDolphin) who beat me pretty convincingly in three games with a Mono-Steel team which was actually pretty hard for my core to break. In hindsight, I realised that there were gameplans I could have taken which allowed me to win vs. the team consistently however that is on me for not realising how to play the matchup in the moment.
March 16th, 2019 - Neo Tokyo Midseason Showdown - 2nd Place
I built this team after James Katsaros’s (@ChosenFutureVGC) performance at Oceania Internationals, where he made Top 4 with the exact same team but with Volcarona instead of Landorus. I chose to use Landorus-Therian for my tournament as I was worried about playing against Stakataka, and could not figure out how to break it with James’ version of the team. I lost to Lochlan twice in this tournament, both in the last round of swiss and in finals in very close sets, however it was extremely difficult for me to win the matchup if luck favours him. Between both sets he did not miss a single grasswhistle despite never setting up gravity, however I believe in most situations he made the best play available to him and I respected that. This team felt very strong, and I really enjoyed piloting it. Yveltal and Xerneas in Sun and Moon series had extremely good synergy, with very few matchups that both of these Pokemon fail to handle and it is relatively easy to handle most of these threats (Such as Stakataka) with good supporting Pokemon such as Landorus. Incineroar, Tapu Fini and Amoonguss round out the team with a very strong defensive core which allow you to play safe and set up your gameplan consistently.
March 16th, 2019 - Neo Tokyo Best of One Premier Challenge - Top 4
My second time using this team at a live event, this team was originally built as a Psych-Up Kyogre team with Xerneas however after testing I found that the team was far better with just using Xerneas to set up early and then clicking Choice Scarf Water Spout to clean up threats. This team had a lot of options I really appreciated, however I feel that overall the trick room matchup was weaker than I may have liked. This was a much more aggressive, hard setup version of the Kyogre Xerneas core than the Amoonguss Kartana version, however I felt that having Smeargle and Toxicroak improved the mirror matchup as you had a redirection user which worked on grass types. Follow Me + Tailwind was also good versus faster Groudon teams, as you could then bring in Kyogre and click Role Play and this was essential for early Moon Series events in Brisbane. I ended up losing to Malcolm's Solgaleo Yveltal KokoChu team at this premier challenge, which I felt was a reasonably poor matchup but I could win if I played perfectly. I felt like this team was very strong for this time in the metagame, I felt comfortable piloting it and given the chance I most likely would have used it if I were able to attend the Oceania International Championships.
March 30th, 2019 - Fastbreak Sports Midseason Showdown - 2nd Place
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I was feeling a little bit of pressure going into this tournament, as I knew that if I were able to make at least finals I would achieve my first worlds invite since 2016. I really wanted to make worlds this year, so I was very determined to put on my best performance possible and clutch out my worlds invite. I decided to go back to the Zygarde Solgaleo core, as I hadn’t used it for awhile and felt that people would mostly not prepare for it. This team was a more standard version of the team than my previous team, which featured Light Screen Tapu Fini and Solganium Z Solgaleo. I also switched out Venusaur for Firium Z Volcarona, which provided a means of redirection for the team and still performed Venusaur’s role of cleaning up opposing Groudon. This team was extremely good, and I did not lose a single set the whole tournament against anyone but Graham, who 2-0’d me twice. The matchup vs. Graham’s team was extremely difficult for me to play, and was almost unwinnable as my Volcarona was unable to live his Accelgor’s Final Gambit. My one regret about teambuilding for this tournament is not ensuring Volcarona could take this hit, as it is possible with the right HP investment. Regardless, finals at this tournament was all I needed to achieve my second worlds invite, and I was very happy with the result!
Ultra Series
April 13, 2019 - Fastbreak Sports Premier Challenge (Top 4)
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For my first Ultra Series tournament, we had a small 8-player tournament at Fastbreak Sports with a finals only top cut. I decided to use a team I had been experimenting with revolving around using the disruptive power of Incineroar, Amoonguss Fini and Manectric to support my two setup restricteds in Calm Mind Dusk Mane Ultra Necrozma and Xerneas. This team was relatively strong in most matchups I played, however I had no Ground resists so it was difficult to switch into Primal Groudon. I ended up losing in the second round to Graham at this event, as his Lunala Kyogre core was able to overwhelm my team as I did not have a form of speed control which was fast enough to overpower his and I was knocked out of contention for finals. This team was fun to play, however it had a lot of very glaring weaknesses so I decided to bench it for the moment after playing at this tournament.
May 6th, 2019 - Fastbreak Sports Midseason Showdown - (2-2 Finish)
This was my second Ultra Series tournament, which I did not have too much time to prepare for so I decided to use a standard Groudon Xern Fini team. However, I decided to run Mega Kangaskhan as a secondary mega to better handle Lunala. Overall I felt the team handled itself relatively well, however I lost to both Graham and Paulo (@Mastodon_Swoles) in swiss. Both teams were difficult matchups for me to play against, however if I made a few plays differently I could have won both of the game threes that I lost in these sets. Overall, I felt that I couldn’t complain too much as I had lost both sets to my own mistakes and focused on trying to fix up the team and myself for the following premier challenge.
May 6th, 2019 - Best of One Fastbreak Sports Premier Challenge - 2nd Place
This team was modified to go back to Payapa amoonguss, as the previous team had Coba (and the only flying move I took was a banded dragon ascent, which it dropped to) and fixed the HP stat on my Tapu Fini so that it would activate the super sitrus berry on taking a Guardian of Alola Z-Move. I had much better luck with this version of the team, where I played the entire tournament losing only to Malcolm twice, both in the last round of swiss and in finals. I felt like my matchup to Mogar’s team was unfavourable, however it was on me that I did not realise a lot of key information about the Pokemon on his team until it was already too late for me to capitalise on it.
May 24th, 2019 - International Challenge May - Top 512
A little different from most of the teams I’ve used this year, I don’t generally enjoy playing online tournaments but I though I would use this one to practise a little bit with an archetype I had seen picking up recently - Soft Perish Trap Groudon Fini Incineroar + secondary restricted. The original team I got the inspiration for my version from was Case Bongirne’s (@CasedVictory)’s Groudon Rayquaza variant, however I opted to use Yveltal as I felt that the team had an awkward Lunala matchup. I had a very good day one with the team, going 13-2 in sets however I started struggling to continue with a better than neutral win-loss in matches once I broke through to the mid 1600s, and I end my tournament run there. I felt that overall the team was very fun, however I think core always had glaring unfavourable matchups somewhere depending on the secondary restricted used (Xerneas, Rayquaza, Yveltal etc.) and this discouraged me from using the archetype further. I also felt that my version of the team was suboptimal, as I chose to use a Super Sitrus berrry on Amoonguss rather than the almost optimal Focus Sash item for this point in the metagame which would have greatly helped my Rayquaza matchup.
June 16th, 2019 - Fastbreak Sports Premier Challenge - (1-2 Finish)
For the last ever VGC tournament held at Fastbreak sports before it closed permanently, I decided I wanted to practise using a variant of Pado’s (@PadoVGC) standard Rayquaza Xerneas team which had not too long before won the European International Championship in Berlin, Germany. I opted to use Stakataka over the standard team’s Nihilego as I felt it was a good Pokemon for handling the mirror matchup and I wanted to be able to handle trick room teams more effectively. I felt that Wide Guard was also a strong option offered to the team by Stakataka, and it also served as a Xerneas answer which is one of the main purposes of Nihilego on the standard build. In this tournament I lost to local player Teagan Stiga (@KaraikouVGC) piloting a Kyogre Solgaleo team as she played very well to prevent me from breaking her Solgaleo, which I felt that this team struggled with greatly.
Pokemon World Championships Preparation
I had a reasonably long drought of events between my last premier challenge and worlds, so I went through a lot of different team iterations before deciding on what I wanted to use at the tournament. I’ll go into each of those teams a little bit below, then over what I actually decided to use and my tournament run itself.
The first team I built, I felt pretty comfortable using this team and really liked playing it however I didn’t spend enough time practising with it before the tournament to feel confident piloting it at worlds. I decided to run Gengar on this team over the standard Nihilego as I wanted an answer to common pokemon such as Lunala, and felt that the team autolost to a well-played Solgaleo without it. Ghostium Z was my item of choice on Gengar as it was able to clean up both of these Pokemon and also offered a similar role to Nihilego in pressuring Xerneas with Sludge Bomb and somewhat Groudon with Destiny Bond.
Heavily inspired by Graham's US Internationals finalist team, the next team I built was a Xernala team which used the offensive engine of Mega Medicham and physical Tapu Koko to break down the defenses of opposing teams. I was fully intending on using this team at worlds up until about a week and a half before the tournament, as early on in testing it was performing very well for me on ladder and I was winning most common matchups consistently. However, I felt the team really struggled with the Shedinja matchup as well as the Lunala mirror and as Lunala Rayquaza became a common archetype I felt that I could no longer rely on this team for worlds.
August 16th, 2019 - Pokemon World Championships - Day One - (4-5 Finish)
Not my team, can't paste this one. Sorry!
In the end, I decided on using Calvin’s (@CalvonixVG)’s which he sent to me in the week before the tournament, after we discussed what we expected to be common at worlds and that my Lunala Xerneas team really just wasn’t performing consistently enough for me to feel comfortable using it at worlds. Calvin had recently used this team to win two online Nintendo Switch invitational tournaments, and it met all of the requirements for a team I was comfortable using going into worlds - I just wanted to use a team which had Incineroar, Amoonguss and Xerneas as I felt I was best practised with those Pokemon and could play with them more consistently than any other core. I spent the week before the tournament practising with this team as much as possible, as well as interacting with the discord where I could to learn how to play the team before the world championships.
When it came to the actual tournament, I had a really good start, beating a Japanese XernDon player and then winning against @Redo_VGC who was piloting Xerneas Yveltal Metagross. In round three, I played versus Hippolyte Bernard (@RedSilverVGC) who was piloting XernDon Torn Kang, which was a favourable matchup for the team however I got very unlucky in games one and three to lose the set. From then on, my luck didn’t get a whole lot better where I lost to Zhengle Tu’s Haze Light Screen Madness Tapu Fini on XernDon, which I was not able to break with the core and then @UncleLouPKMN’s Rayquaza Lunala team after missing a single target Origin Pulse on his Stakataka game three for the set. From then on I did my best to win out, as I did not want to drop from my first world championships and was chasing the x-3 run however I lost again to LunaDon and XernDon in rounds 5 and 9 respectively.
I felt that Calvin’s team was really good, and by no means regretted using it however I felt that after my initail loss, a lot of things which I couldn’t control went against me to lose out of the tournament. It’s always possible to look back and think that there were things I could have done differently to prevent it, and in this case there was at least one play I could have made which would have changed a game I lost. However, for the most part I felt that I played the best I could have given my circumstances in the tournament. For my first worlds, it was an eye-opening experience to the calibre of play I should come to expect from a high level tournament such as worlds, and showed me that I still have room to improve if I want to become a top level player.
August 17th, 2019 - Washington DC Open - (1-2 Drop)
For the open, after playing Day One I regretted registering for this tournament a little bit as I wanted to spend the day checking out the venue and hanging out with friends but I didn’t want to waste my registration so I decided to sign up with a fun team I hadn’t had the chance to use yet. I didn’t stick in this tournament for very long, as my round one and round three matches were very unfavourable matchups which I were able to play to a game three scenario, where I choked the mindgames in the endgame and called the 50-50 wrong both times. This frustrated me immensely, as both sets had been very difficult and I had played well to get to that point and losing it all that way really bothered me. After this, I decided that it was better for me to just drop from the tournament and spend time hanging out with friends rather than keep worrying about it.
Overall outside of my underwhelming tournament performances, the worlds run was amazing! I got to meet a lot of absolutely amazing people for the first time at the event, such as one of my close friends Nils Dunlop (@Invicnati) who I’ve known online and practised with for over three years now but never had the chance to meet in person. I had a lot of fun meeting people who I both had and hadn’t interacted with before, and overall it was just an amazing experience! I didn’t have too many expectations heading into the event, as it was my first time attending and I was really excited for a lot of the thing I hadn’t experienced before such as the popup Pokemon Centre, and the Competitor Kit with both made me extremely happy.
Conclusion
I wasn’t planning on returning to worlds next year if it was held in America again, as I was considering putting Pokemon aside for a bit to focus on other priorities. However, worlds in London has me really excited and I absolutely want to attend and compete again. This year was my first time travelling to America (Or outside of Asia Pacific, for that matter) and it was an amazing experience overall and I’d really love to experience Europe too. There are also a couple of European Pokemon players who I was unable to meet at worlds this year, who I’d love to meet next year!
While this year definitely wasn’t my best year for Pokemon after Sun Series, I’m really proud of how I’ve worked on improving my tournament mindset this year. I’ve been able to stop myself from tilting after losing a game in most situations, which has been a major issue for me in the past as I often felt that after losing a game I would lose confidence in my ability to take the set. This has become much less of an issue for me after really focusing on improving my attitude towards playing the game and the way losing affects me mentally. Overall, I think this has been a great year for my development as a player, and I don’t regret any of it. Thankyou so much for reading this, and I really hope you enjoyed it!
