I watched the round 3 video and he played very well. His move sets were great and using Trick Room with a Groudon beside him was a good move I didn't see coming. A lot of critical hits also helped, though.
Uhm... I think you're watching the wrong Finals. XD
I'm not exactly understanding what you mean by "rogue" strategies. Do you mean super original movesets or having a Pokemon do something it's not built for?
For Ray, definitely just the movesets. He took a team of standard Pokemon and used sets that were extremely uncommon on them. Last year (2011) Ray acutally used some non-Standard Pokemon in Gothitelle and Escavalier. Wolfe went rogue by using non-standard Pokemon in Heatran (to an extent; Heatran saw a lot of play during Worlds, whereas prior it wasnt anywhere near as popular) and,
Exeggutor; NO ONE used Exggutor outside of Wolfe.
The important part here is that they knew
how to use these Pokemon. I saw someone try to run Exeggutor and did pretty bad. Wolfe made it to top 2. Ray, as I mentioned, used sets that were set up to take on the rest of the metagame with as little problem as possible.
Honestly, I'm more disappointing than surprised. The more I hear about America's dominance in sports, games, and everything else, the less impressed I become when America wins something.
I guess? I dont think it really see the connect. Plus it kind of degrades the individual's achievement. Sorry if I'm calling you out or anything, I just don't really understand why it's a bad thing...?
I thought I seen this thread before...
Oh it was last year.
I won't be surprise of who wins or not. One wrong move and that's it.
Kinda. I mean. Some people make like 5 wrong moves and still win so.
Oh, thanks for clearing that up!
Although I'm not a fan of Rizzo, I must say that he is the greatest VGC competitor ever. It will be a long time before somebody beats his record. But the question is, when will he be beaten?
Honestly, I'm betting this is his last year winning. Wolfe had the best chances this year of beating him, he just misplayed really badly. I'm thinking next year, someone (possibly Wolfe but who knows) will finally be able to beat him. Not saying that he's a bad player, but three years is a long time, and everyone is actually looking at Ray now.
2010 came as a surprise. Ok, he's good. First American cool, but it's probably a fluke. Good year.
2011 came. Oh. Ok, he's good I guess, but he probably fluked again. After all, this was a very limited metagame.
2012 came. No one can really question him anymore. He outplayed Wolfe, one of the best players in the VGC, the entire 2 rounds. He only lost once, but that person didn't make it past Top 8, I think? His team building is obviously tight. His playing skills are obviously tight. This is the most diverse and expansive the metagame is ever going to get, and he won. Three different metagames, all sorts of rules. Ray is the man to watch out for.
That said, Wolfe, the current biggest contender for his rival, will not likely crack under the same pressure. Wolfe lost to Ray for Top 8 in 2011. Wolfe was going into this battle unsure if he could pull the win, but at the same time, wanted to prove that he could do well. All the pressure was on him, and while he misplayed badly, they were mostly bad predictions. Wolfe made plays that would have worked had Ray not foreseen them and acted accordingly. But this upcoming year, Wolfe will probably be more ready. Wolfe saw his mistakes, and what that could cost him, and will likely come in more confident this year.
But that's just my observations/predictions. It very likely could not turn out this way.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05iN0hq7lUk&feature=channel&list=UL
Posting this so everyone can see the finals.
I'm surprised he won for the third time. And why do I have a feeling he uses Pokegen?
That's a good idea haha.
As for the Pokegen thing, I
highly doubt it. Two reasons.
1.) Pokemon Company International invests
loads of money into this whole event. Just SHIPPING the Floating Pikachu cost about $3000. And the winners of each flight gets a bunch of prizes. A scholarship, a free ticket and flight to next year's Worlds, etc. They are very adamant about the anti-cheating thing, and for their 3 time Masters Champion to be using hacked Pokemon would look very bad on them. Coming in #1 3 times in a row, they more than likely have checked his Pokemon for legitimacy. That's way too much money on the line for them to be lenient. Proof? I know a lot of people who have been DQ'd cos they used BW2 Pokemon (movesets, Ability, etc). Why is that proof? Cos BW2 Pokemon are currently illegal. They do check, thus Ray using hacked Pokemon would be very difficult for him to slide past.
2.) Ray doesn't breed his own Pokemon. Neither does Wolfe, nor half the "professional" Pokemon VGC players. First of all, there have friends who are willing to do that for them. They have breeding circles and such. Second, there are multiple threads where they can get free Pokemon so long as they are for the VGC. Not hacked mind you. Again, that's illegal in terms of Pokemon VGC. They just do it cos they're nice and they want to help expand the community partaking in the VGC.
So it's highly unlikely Ray is using Pokegen.
I'm suprised that Japan is doing so badly, but other than that, the results are nothing too suprising.
Hahah Right? I honestly expected them to do a bit better. I had a lot of hope for Junpei, the other guy (too lazy to get his name) and Sejun. But no, they didn't cut very well this year. Again, most likely cos they were pretty much player targetted. Everyone was gearing up for what the Japanese might bring.
Sorry if I sound pretentious or whatever. I'm just really into this metagame, and I follow it pretty closely (imagine the way some people are for football). I follow multiple sites, listen to various podcasts, and I'm a part of a few forums. I even took over for the current VGC Thread in the Competitive Subforum. Again, I'm not trying to be rude and I sincerely apologize if I come off as rude.
