Battling / Before The Battle

Introduction

In VGC, it’s important to learn how to approach both best-of-1 and best-of-3. The in-game ladder and International Challenges (online Wi-Fi tournaments) use the best-of-1 format, while most major IRL tournaments use the best-of-3 format. My goal is to break down various components of the game (team building, team preview, battling) and help you think about how you should approach each.

Best of 1

Team Building

Note: Wolfe covered the difference between teambuilding for best of 1 and best of 3 in this article.

If you are team building explicitly for best-of-1, the element of surprise can give you huge advantages during a battle. It’s no surprise that many of the #1 teams in best-of-1 tournaments feature unique sets that are generally difficult to predict. You don’t necessarily need any surprises to succeed in best-of-1, but they can give you some major advantages & swing the battle heavily in your favor from just one turn. Examples of surprises include the following:

• Taking a conventional Pokémon and running it in an unconventional way (e.g. offensive Dynamax Porygon 2)

• Using attacks or items that your opponents generally would not expect (e.g. Iron Defense/Babiri Berry Calyrex-I)

• Using an unpopular Pokémon that players will likely have little experience battling against

• Using an unconventional EV spread to catch opponents off guard (e.g. max speed Incineroar + Tailwind to outspeed Zacian)

• Taking a popular team and slightly modifying the moves/EV spreads

Another factor to think about is the context for which you are building for. For example, if you expect to grind out lots of games because you are playing in an online International Challenge, which can give Championship Points towards Worlds, you’ll want to think about the pace of your team and how quickly you can win battles. I generally value teams that can win quickly and have fast paced offense, rather than slow paced teams that are more vulnerable to critical hits/secondary effects, for these kinds of events.

One last area you may want to think about for best-of-1 is your general comfort and knowledge with a team, especially as you’ll often be playing against unorthodox Pokémon/teams. Best-of-3 events generally are a bit more centralized, while best-of-1 ladder/tournaments can feature a much more diverse pool of Pokémon & strategies. If you understand your team deeply, you’ll be able to adapt & improvise as you go up against surprising Pokémon/strategies. 

Team Preview

When approaching team preview in best-of-1, you have to be extra cautious as games can often be decided solely from a bad lead match-up/turn 1, especially in a Dynamax format. Our team preview guide covers principals you’ll want to think about, but here are the main rules I generally try to follow:

• Pick risk-averse leads: Falling behind quickly due to a bad lead match-up is incredibly stressful in best-of-1, so I generally try to find a lead that doesn’t gamble the game away on turn 1 (the one exception to this is when I recognize my team just matches up poorly vs. my opponent’s)

• Cover for your opponent’s strongest combinations: I generally try to highlight the most overwhelming offensive combinations on my opponent’s team (e.g. Weezing + Regigigas, Charizard + Groudon) and make sure they can’t just win the game off a strong turn 1

• Have answers against all 6 of your opponent’s Pokémon: I try to ensure that between the four Pokémon I’ve selected, I can deal reliable damage to each of my opponent’s six Pokémon to make sure I’m not super weak to any certain Pokémon

• When lost, go with comfort: I play towards my team’s core strengths/leads rather than trying something that I’m unconfident in when I don’t really know what to pick

Battling

When battling in best-of-1 specifically, here are some general principles you may want to consider:

• You’re often working with very limited knowledge of your opponent’s team (e.g. sets, EV spreads, items). As a result, try to assume they have all their strongest attacks (generally, their top 6 most common attacks, as seen on Pikalytics) until they reveal otherwise. 

• It’s especially good to lean into any surprises that your team may have in best-of-1 as your opponents will often not be prepared for them, and subsequently, not be able to adequately predict your moves.

• Understand the dynamic between how your teams match up and play accordingly. If you feel like you have a neutral or positive match-up, you can afford to play a bit more risk averse. If you feel like you have a bad match-up, you’ll probably have to make more predictions throughout the course of the battle.

• It’s very possible that you essentially win, or lose, the game from just a single turn. Always try to identify what the worst case scenario is on each given turn and do your best to prevent that scenario from happening. In Sword/Shield, be extra wary of ways that your opponent can one-hit KO your Dynamax Pokémon. 

• Accept that best-of-1 is very volatile (especially in Sword/Shield) and be ok with losing. Pokémon is unique as a competitive game in that team-building adds a whole layer of depth - a single smart teambuilding choice can lead to a quick victory in best-of-1. You are going to lose to lots of unexpected Pokémon & strategies throughout your VGC journey, and that’s totally OK. What’s important is learning from these losses.

Best of 3

Note: This section is generally meant for closed team sheet tournaments (you are not given any information about their team), which is the standard for IRL events. Some online tournaments use an open team sheet format (you are given your opponent’s six Pokémon & their respective moves/items). 

Team Building

One thing that we’ve emphasized throughout our guide is the idea of consistency, and that concept is especially relevant for best-of-3 teams. As Wolfe highlighted in his article, strong teams for best-of-3 generally feature:

• Multiple modes, forcing your opponent to guess what threats you will bring (and on that note, multiple consistent lead options) 

• Strong options that don’t rely solely on surprises: even if your opponent knows about your team’s sets/strategies, you shouldn’t be at a major disadvantage

It’s important to point out that surprises can still be extremely valuable in a best-of-3 team. Here are some examples of some different types of surprises & why they were effective:

Meta Call Example: In 2014, Sejun Park won the World Championships with Pachirisu, a Pokémon that did not see much play before the tournament. Sejun chose Pachirisu because it was an effective redirection user. Amoonguss was the most popular redirection user going into Worlds, but since it was common, many players went out of their way to counter it. Pachirisu, on the other hand, was a great call given the metagame as few people had reliable answers for it. Even once everyone figured out what Sejun’s Pachirisu set was during the tournament, they still struggled against it as few players had actually prepared for it during the team-building process. 

Move Set Example: Chongjun Peng won the 2022 Salt Lake City Regional Championships using Charti Berry Ancient Power Charizard and Light Clay Dual Screens Grimmsnarl. The team he used was originally popularized by Rinya Kobayashi, who had Lum Berry Heat Wave Charizard and Iron Ball Grimmsnarl. Many of Chongjun’s opponents likely expected Rinya’s version of the Sun team, and were subsequently caught off guard by the slight modifications Chongjun had made. Chongjun was also one of the first players to use both Ancient Power and Charti Berry on his Charizard, giving him a major advantage against opposing Sun teams. This is an example of a strong surprise - Chongjun didn’t lose very much by giving up Lum Berry + Heat Wave on Charizard, and even if players knew about Charti + Ancient Power, they still couldn’t reliably deal with it. 

Team Preview

Team preview in best-of-3 is a different beast than best-of-1. You and your opponents will make adjustments based on how the previous games went. Our team preview guide covers principals you’ll want to think about, but here are the main rules I generally try to follow:

1. In a best-of-3, you have more room to take risks, especially with your lead choice. You also have more time to gather information about your opponent’s team, which you can use in subsequent games. 

2. Predicting one specific lead from your opponent and countering that lead is much more frequent in best-of-3s, especially in games two and three. This approach is a riskier strategy on best-of-1 since it can be highly volatile, but is a key strategy in best-of-3s once you’ve learned about your opponent’s team & playstyle. 

   1. It’s especially common for a player who lost a game to find a new lead combination that matches up well against what their opponent just led against them

3. During each battle, I constantly think about my opponent’s Pokémon selection - did they have any Pokémon that I struggled to deal with? If so, is there a Pokémon that I didn’t bring or exposed too early that could be useful for me in the next game?

4. If I win a game, I ask myself whether or not my opponent brought their best answer to my team selection. If they did, then it may be ok to just go with the same core in the next game. If they didn’t, I’ll start thinking about ways to counter new Pokémon/leads that they may bring.

5. Conserving information is also critical in a best-of-3 - you want to focus on winning while not revealing unnecessary information. Even a single surprise move or item can lead to major victories, especially on a Pokémon that you haven’t brought out very much during a set. 

6. You can’t always predict what your opponent is going to do - team preview for best-of-3 is one of the most difficult parts of competitive battling. Sometimes, your opponent will switch things up when you don’t expect them to, and other times, they won’t adjust even when you think they will. You should still try your best during team preview, but you can make up for a bad team preview phase by playing well. 

Battling

Best-of-3 battles are a lot more dynamic than best-of-1 as both players will make adjustments and use what they’ve learned from previous games to inform their decision making. When you’re approaching best of 3 battles, you should think about the following:

• You’ll be able to gather a lot more information in a best-of-3 set as opposed to a best-of-1 game - use that to your advantage. One key skill in VGC is being able to make good decisions based on all the information you have available to you. 

• You have to be willing to adjust your strategy. Being able to adapt to your opponent’s play & come up with solutions to strategies they’ve previously shown is critical in best-of-3 play. Thinking on the fly & improvising is a skill that you’ll have to develop, and comes with practice. 

• When you’re up a game, you have more room to work with. This doesn’t mean you should just mix things up for the sake of mixing things up, especially if your winning strategy was consistent. However, it does mean you can play a bit riskier in game 2 (e.g. try to predict your opponent’s specific lead & counter them, take calculated risks that can immediately win you the match).

  • Example: At the 2022 Salt Lake City Regional Championships, I played against Chongjun Peng in the Top 8. In Game 2, Chongjun goes for a play that gives him a chance at winning the game immediately (link) by going for Blast Burn + Max Rockfall. In order for the play to work out, he needs to 1) win a speed tie between our Charizards (50%) 2) connect on Blast Burn (90%) 3) pick up the OHKO onto Indeedee with it (62.5%). All three conditions happen, allowing him to essentially win the game on turn 1 as I’ve lost far too many resources.

• Consider the mental aspect of the game. Best-of-3s can be grueling and can last up to an hour. Stay focused on your overall goals/strategy, even when things don’t necessarily go your way early on. 

In general, best-of-3s reward the stronger player more frequently as they reduce the amount of variance, whether it be from unexpected strategies or luck/RNG. Before we finish, I also want to highlight that as you prepare for events, it’s valuable to get multiple best-of-3 sets in so you understand how you can make adjustments with your team between games. Online laddering is generally valuable for testing an idea & making sure it can win consistently against a wide variety of teams, but since it’s only best-of-1, it won’t teach you how to make proper adjustments.