I have been a superfan of Pokemon since childhood and I tapped into the VGC scene in 2014. Its pretty common knowledge and as cliche as that sounds, Sejun's Pachirisu had me hooked too. As someone who 'likes to play with their favorites' players like Ashton Cox, Wolfe Click, and all of us VGC lovers' beloved Aaron Zheng A.K.A CybertronVGC caught my eye. later on I became interested in Jamie Boyt's creative teams and stuck around as a showdown noob for most of the years. VGC 2018 and Sword and Sheild was a metagame I largely missed out on, the higher power level and the Dynamax mechanic never really stuck with me in the long run.
I came back to the scene strong with Scarlet and Violet and was ecstatic to see that Champions was going to be an andriod release. So two weeks ago on June 17th, was the first time I logged into a official VGC platform and played my first few games.
What I enjoy most about the game is the creative problem solving in teambuilding, I still consider myself to be a very mid tier player, so the initial phases, as someone who doesn't own any other official mainline games and level looked into the Pokemon Go either, I had no Pokemon Home transfers to carry over for myself. This is a sole Andriod player stepping into a wild west of the well established Champions Metagame. Moving on with the shift from regulation M-A to M-B not alot changed except pokemon like Mega Staraptor, Grimmsnarl and Swampert shining, nothing the well established archetypes couldn't beat.
For me, my first pick was a Charizard, the OG overrated one, but I knew if I wanted any chances to win my early games, I needed to pick this guy. After completing the tutorials and entering the box, my first draft was Whimsicott, Steelix, Gengar, Azumarill and Drampa. A solid roster by all means. Charizard + Whimsicott are two of the most solid Pokemon in the M-A format. Whimsicott + Gengar was another solid pairing I could immediately utilize on the ladder. After training this squad from the VP I got off of trying the tutorials, I got on the ladder.
Earlier iterations of this squad included a part rain mode with Politoed so my early game could be a Sun spam mode and late game was a Charizard often throwing out water type Weather Balls. As a few days passed and I drafted Basculegion (choice scarf Basculegion is my favorite Pokemon to use by far in the Champions era), Incineroar with a Garchomp, I quickly transformed the squad into something much more solid. the last slot I temporarily put a Metagross on, but it wasn't that useful or brought out alot. so I ultimately replaced it with a Mega Gengar to enter the champions tier.
I kept drafting mons in the days to come and building up my roster. It also helped that I kept stacking the daily rewards. If you collect the daily rewards of 1 day you get around 24 quick coupons which are enough to recruit once again. with a 10 million downloads bonus coming my way and me enrolling into and completing the June challenge participation requirements, I also got myself a total of 200 extra quick coupons. These rewards stacked up with buying the M-3 battle pass, which got me Eelektross, said Metagross I tried on this team earlier on and then lastly tons of VP in reward + the VP rewards from completing accomplishments or winning battles with certain Pokemon, I had alot to invest, largely going into stacks of recruits I could pull off with all the quick coupons I had to build up my roster.
During the building up of this roster I have also found 2 total Shiny Pokemon. 1 being Armarouge and the other being Beartic. Neither are super competitively viable but are extremely cool to have even if as collectibles.
Before I could be serious to get on the ladder. I really was inconsistent in my matchups vs the opposing Charizard Y teams and I needed to beat that squad ASAP. I got stuck around the early 1800s on the Champions ladder otherwise. Taking some inspiration from the NAIC runner up Eric Rios and NAIC Champion Francesco Pio Pero, I realized that fast sash Kingambit with Mega Aerodactyl could handle all the Charizard Y teams extremely well. The rest of the squad followed naturally. Farigarad here was excellent to stop Encores from Whimsicott and opposing Trick room compositions from setting up, especially the pesky Blastoise + Farigarad leads. Charizard and Garchomp followed next, part of the original teams. I chose Rock Tomb Garchomp as it can not only launch more accurate, stronger rock type moves into Charizards, it can also help in speed control vs some important matchups. Last slot was my beloved choice scarf Basculegion which helped more vs early game setups on Rain matchups and Fake Out spamming setup teams like those Delphox-Floette teams running around. This squad was solid and it was set.
On a 2 hour grind this past Sunday I was able to reach the Champions Tier and peak at the 170 place. Which is really solid for someone who still considers themselves a mid-tier player at best.
Not only did I grind in VGC, but I also tapped into a more serious run in single battles just today after learning about the metagame a little bit. Mamoswine absolutely smashed through alot of the teams on the lead, I paired it with Mimikyu, Mega Metagross, a partial rain mode with Archaludon and Pelipper and rounded out the team with a Mega Raichu Y. My most used mons were Mamoswine, Mimikyu and Raichu Y and I fell in love with the single battle format too. I touched the Masterball tier today finally too.
Coming into this I felt like my ability to play will be snubbed by the very fact that I am an andriod only player, but knowing what the M-A metagame had molded into and what relevant pieces M-B added on, I was able to build up a solid roster within the first 2 weeks and was able to touch the Champions tier too so I am extremely proud of what I was able to do and moreover so now that the fear has melted away!
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