Reported by Joeno on Wed 07 Mar 2012 19:08:50 UTC
Last updated by Typhlosion on Thu 08 Mar 2012 11:02:32 UTC

Kyriakou, a member of our forums, has come first place in the UK VGC Nationals 2012!

This news item is more than 45 days old. Updates are unlikely and newer information may already be available.

On a foggy Saturday morning in March, the NEC in Birmingham was swarmed with sleepy, but excited, Pokémon fans, each wanting to prove their worth in battle. The queue for Masters Division (ages 16+) opened at 8 in the morning, but it's well-advised to arrive at least an hour beforehand, so most of us had gotten up pretty early to be there. The weariness quickly wore off though as we waited, more than a few of us frantically trying to finalise our teams before registration, and everyone eager for the tournament to begin.

VGC Nationals are held in Double Battle format, in a single-knockout tournament. If you lose, you're out - a rather flawed system as anyone who comes up against the guy that goes on to win the tournament is pretty screwed early on, but hey. You each get to see your opponent's team of six, and then you choose which four of your team you want to battle with. It's a very different metagame to singles; the average VGC match only last about five turns, nearly every set runs Protect, and some Pokémon such as Cresselia and Hitmontop really coming into their own while Blissey is almost never seen.

Now most of our group had attended the 2011 VGCs and none of us had gotten past the second round, using teams we'd built in a very standard manner. This year, then, we decided to make things a little more fun and take some of the pressure off ourselves by taking very.. unusual teams. We all cosplayed as the Champions from various regions, and restricted ourselves to only using their Pokémon. This way, it didn't matter if we were knocked out in the first round, because we knew our teams weren't particularly good, and we could just enjoy the day without being disappointed that we lost!

Naturally, we all ended up with very different teams and strategies. I went as Cynthia, with a team of Togekiss and Braviary as my usual leads to set up Tailwind and either flinchhax or hit hard with Brave Bird; Eelektross for coverage; Garchomp for brute power and to perform the EQ/Discharge combo with Eelektross; Lucario for priority and general support; and Spiritomb as a solid Latios counter. I got knocked out in the second round by Shell Smash Cloyster, of all things, but I didn't especially mind and at least went on to win 5 out of my 7 casual battles outside the tournament. It's a wonder I had a Togekiss at all, considering the one I bred specially for the tournament got left behind in York! Kyriakou and Enigma helped me to raise a new one just in time and I finished evolving my new Togekiss just as I got to the front of the queue to register - talk about cutting it close!

Most of the rest of the group ranked similarly: Enigma (Steven Stone) and his friend Clare (Wallace) lost in the first round; Me (Cynthia) and my friend Dan (Burgh, as we ran out of Champions) lost in the second; The Last Sheikah (Alder) lost in the third, which was a pretty surreal feat considering he was restricted to Alder's exact team; and Anarcree (Lance) and Piccolami didn't arrive in time to compete due to illness. Shadow / Sam from the forums also showed up to take part, but he too fell in the first round. It was all good though, and we spent the rest of our time wandering around the little Pokémart with its overpriced plushies, watching battles on the big screens, meeting new friends and having our pictures taken quite a lot.

Kyriakou (Blue / Gary Oak), also known as Ben, was another matter. Thanks to Gary having appeared in the animé, 4 games with a different team each time, and further teams depending on which starter the protagonist chose, he had a huge number of Pokémon to choose from, not to mention about five cosplay outfits. He ended up with a dual-weather team consisting of Tyranitar, Scizor, Nidoking, Machamp, Exeggutor and Ninetales. And purple trousers.

We watched in delight as Ben battled his way up the ranks (there was a slightly embarrassing moment where I ducked under the barriers to give him a congratulatory hug and one of the official cameramen decided to film it), winning 8 battles in a row to earn himself a place in the grand finals. Many of the top teams do tend to look pretty similar to each other (Zapdos / Hitmontop / Chandelure / Metagross were on pretty much every team I saw from the top 16 at least), so it was a huge surprise to everyone to see such a weird team in the finals! About two hundred people stuck around to watch a Gary Oak cosplayer face off against Ruben, who was the previous year's UK Champion, and lots of people even cheered him on with "Gary! Gary!" - pretty sure this confused the organisers, as neither finalist was called Gary! Ben actually lost to Ruben, who has godly prediction skills and is generally regarded as one of the best. However, The Pokémon Company released a statement a few days later that Ruben had been disqualified, leaving Ben to claim the top spot. This doesn't actually change much, as first and second place win identical trophies and prizes, but it's still pretty nice to see Ben's name listed at the top on the official website.

Ben has won a trip to Hawaii for six days to represent the UK - and PKMN.NET - at the World Championships in August. Wish him luck!

Thanks to Kay for our write-up!

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