Recently in Tournaments

By Jellicent. Art by Zracknel and Seaco.

Welcome, everyone, to our next installment of Recently in Tournaments. There's plenty to go over this time around with OST10 finals, ST17 Week 8, the Doubles Circuit Spring Seasonal, various mini-Premier Leagues, and several other tournaments wrapping up. So, why waste time with introductions? Let's get to the coverage.

Smogon Tournament #10

The big news this time around is the finals for OST10. After 3 hard-fought months, the 512 battlers duking it out for the gold trophy had been whittled down to just two combatants, Atticus and Valentine. The first bout was fast-paced, with both sides trading KOs quickly. After Valentine's Thundurus knocked out Azumarill, Atticus was left with just a Deoxys-S. It knocked out Thundurus, but not before getting paralyzed by priority Thunder Wave, which left it easy pickings for Val's final Pokemon, Mega Charizard X.

Atticus started off on the back foot in the second battle after missing twice with Focus Blast. By turn 6, both sides had Stealth Rock up, but Atticus was down his Landorus without doing any real damage to Valentine's team. He quickly bounced back, however, seizing the momentum with Mega Scizor and Breloom. After getting to +6 with Mega Scizor against Val's Ferrothorn, Atticus battered away at his foe's team to tie things up at 1-1.

It was Valentine who was having accuracy issues in the early-game of the last fight, missing a vital Fire Fang and Stone Edge that allowed Atticus's Skarmory to Whirlwind out a +2 Mega Mawile and Roost up from 1%. A constant switching game then ensued, with both sides slowly chipping away at each other. Eventually, Atticus found the opening he needed to clean up with his dragons, winning the final battle after 44 turns. The replays can be seen here, here, and here. Congratulations on your third trophy, Atticus!

Smogon Tour 17

Week 8 of ST17, which featured BW OU, has just wrapped up. Ninety-six battlers signed up Friday night for a chance to earn 10 points. By finals, only Soulwind, Playa, and Ojama were left standing. The three seemed evenly matched, with Soulwind defeating Playa, Ojama beating Soulwind, and Playa winning out against Ojama. A tie-breaker round then kicked in, and Ojama was able to trump Playa in their rematch. Soulwind unfortunately had to sign off to go to sleep, leaving Ojama as the winner for the night.

Saturday had an even greater turnout with 128 sign-ups. In the semi-finals, Nelson proved victorious over DracoMalfoy. Meanwhile, point leader Bloo faced off with Lost in the Storm, a user who had just signed up for Smogon that day to compete. In a complete upset, the new user triumphed over Bloo and later DracoMalfoy, netting himself 11 points for the night. Not too shabby, new guy.

Sunday afternoon wrapped up the week, with another 96 sign-ups and 10 points on the line. Newer users once again proved themselves to be capable in the semi-finals, with Evuelf, bugzinator, and weirdishitsux each beating out veterans Malekith, Laurel, and Tomahawk9, respectively. Evuelf went on to become the day's champion in the finals, earning enough points to tie a spot in the current top 16 with Laurel and Conflict.

Currently, Bloo is still in lead with an impressive 50 points. Aqualouis is in second with 41, and M Dragon is close behind at 40. Ciele and FLCL round out the top 5, both with 34 points. For a complete list of the current standings, click here.

The Doubles Circuit

The Doubles Circuit 1st Spring Seasonal is in full swing. Some of you might still be wondering just what the Doubles Circuit is. Essentially, it's a massive tournament consisting of 8 Mini-Tours (worth up to 20 points each), 2 Seasonals (worth up to 100 points each), 1 Major (worth up to 100 points for the top 4), and a grand finale Invitational for those that amass 100 points or more. The Spring Seasonal uses a Swiss-pairing, best-of-three format with a single elimination Top 8. Each Swiss round win nets you 3 points (towards the Top 8, not the Circuit itself), tying earns 1 point, and losing gets you nothing but tears.

Pinoy Pwnage recently beat out papa noel in Round 5 of the Seasonal, taking the lead position with 15 points. srk1214 and TheForthChaser are paired up and yet to fight, however; both battlers have 12 points, so the winner of their match will be tied for first in the current standings. Shaian and Hantsuki, who were paired up in Round 3 but failed to battle, were matched up once again. This time the actually fought and Shaian won, bringing his total up to 13 points for the current second place position. You can find an up-to-date version of the current standings here.

For those interested in learning more about the Doubles Circuit, check out this announcement. Two Mini-Tours are already completed, the points for which can be found here. The third Mini-Tour, Doubles Ubers, has just kicked off its first round. Be sure to keep an eye on the XY Doubles subforum for upcoming Mini-Tours. If you missed sign-ups for the Spring Seasonal, don't fret. You still have 5 Mini-Tours, the Summer Seasonal, and the Major to look forward to, so making your way into the Invitationals is still very much on the table.

Other Tournaments

The Counterteam Tournament recently came to a close. In this tourney, both players submit 3 Pokemon that they'll be using on their team to the host and then use their other 3 slots to counter what their opponent is using. The finals came down to Tomahawk9, who submitted Mega Charizard X, Landorus-T, and Excadrill, vs Ojama, who turned in Mega Scizor, Garchomp, and Latios. Ojama ultimately succeeded in a well-fought battle, the replay of which can be found here.

Have you been hoping for fun team tournaments to follow between this year's SPL and WCoP? You're in luck, as several tiers have been playing host to their own Premier Leagues lately. Week 5 of UUPL and Week 3 of LCPL both kicked off this Sunday. The Ubers Premier League is set to begin shortly, with teams just being finalized in last night's draft. If you missed your chances to sign up the first time around, there's still hope, as the Mid-Season sign-ups are now up here. You'll have to follow each of these tournaments in their respective metagame forums, but the top-notch battles and inevitable drama will certainly make them worth perusing.

The Hoenn Cup is currently open for sign-ups. This tournament is ADV OU, consisting of 3 Leagues, 4 Divisions per League, and 6 players per Division, for a total of 72 players. There are 5 rounds of 24 pools of 3 players, after which the top 2 in each Division will move on to the Playoffs. With today's recent announcement of Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire, you can expect some third gen love being generated, so sign up quickly for these limited slots!

Several other tourneys are currently in their finals, so this is definitely an exciting time to watch the Tournaments forum. The XY Doubles Tournament (no relation to the Doubles Circuit) has just finished up its semifinals, with McMeghan, Haruno, and kingofmars all making it to the finals. The 3-Mon Tournament III is also wrapping up; Ezio, FLCL, and Temptation have each made it to the finals, and Ezio's already proven victorious over FLCL. Similarly, the Passive Aggressive Tournament, which disallows the use of any direct attacking moves, is down to just Zebraiken, Eo Ut Mortus, and Agnaktor. Zeb claimed first blood against Eo, but lost shortly afterwards to Agnaktor. All three of these tournaments could still go any way, so be sure to go cheer on your favorites. Don't forget, as these tourneys wrap up, even more will be rolling out, so keep your eyes peeled for upcoming sign-ups. Until next time, happy battling.