My attempt to for Worlds was quite poor in my opinion. Though nevertheless I had a lot of fun in Boston and I grew a lot as a person and also a VGC player from my experiences there. Even though Worlds 2015 ended, VGC 2015 did not end there. The Asia Pacific region was able to start the 2015-2016 season just a few months after worlds unlike previously where we had no events afterwards till the new year. Meaning while Worlds 2016 will be played in a different format than 2015, we could start collecting Championship Points through events that was ran after Worlds which still would be using VGC 2015 rules until the end of December. While I was back in Melbourne, Australia for my studies, I was not able to attend as many events as my other Asian peers as Australia started having events much later than the rest of the Asia Pacific region. The target for this season unlike last season’s Top 18 placement to qualify for Worlds, is a 200 Championship Points bar. Meaning any player who obtained at least 200 CP will qualify for Worlds which is a much clearer and obtainable target compared to last season. I was able to get some CP from the Boston Open though that was quite low and I’m hoping to be able to overwrite it through other Regional level events. I was actually hoping to be able to be in the 200 CP range going into Nationals when we had no idea what the CP bar was going to be like since I assumed it would be more around 300 CP, but I never expected to reach it this early in the season.
When Premier Challenges finally started in Australia, it was during my University’s exam period though I was able to attend and win one of the first Premier Challenges in Morwell, Victoria, Australia. Unlike the rest of the Asia Pacific, Australia plays their Premier Challenges in a Best-of-3 format for the entire tournament instead of a Best-of-1 swiss + Bo3 top cut format used in Asia and I highly preferred the Bo3 format as it is the format I’ve gotten used to playing since Aussie Nats, Singapore Nats and Worlds. Since I was busy with exams, I made a team on the spot before the Premier Challenge which I was comfortable using and I ended up sticking with it pretty much throughout my entire Post-Worlds 2015 season with only some minor changes between tournaments.
The team has served me well netting me the following achievements.
Premier Challenge Sceptile Series #1 Morwell, Australia – 1st Place/33 Players.
Though after my exams finished, I headed back to Malaysia to spend my Summer Holidays there. This would also mean that I would need to start getting used to playing in a Best-of-1 swiss format again.
I also went to Bristol, UK for my sister’s graduation ceremony and before I went, I had heard that there was going to be a VGC Regionals in London so I made a stop there en-route and finished 31st Place/124 Players.
After spending some time going to Ireland to visit another sister, I came back home to Malaysia and finally played in a local Premier Challenge after so long and finished 5th Place/40 Players actually going undefeated during swiss rounds which was really surprising to me.
Next big tournament was Malaysia’s first VGC Regionals of the Season, at this point, the 200 CP bar had already been announced and I was thinking that I’m not that far off and I’m comfy with my current team so I’ll just stick with it despite some of its more gaping weaknesses such as having a hard time dealing with Aegislash. I was able to reach my target of at least finishing in the Top 16 at regionals placing myself at 10th/107 Players which means that I have safely crossed the 200 CP bar with me currently having 219 Championship Points putting me currently as being 1st in Malaysia as well as 3rd in the Asia Pacific Region in terms of Championship Points.
I’m quite proud of myself for being able to qualify for Worlds 2016 without actually playing any VGC 2016 tournaments yet haha but hopefully I’ll carry on this momentum into 2016 and earn even more Championship Points. In any case, 2015 has been a great year for me as a VGC Player and I hope to do even better in 2016 to make Malaysia proud. One thing I like about qualifying this early is I still relatively have plenty of time to look for cheap flights and accommodations to Worlds next year.
See you all at San Francisco for VGC Worlds 2016.
All Hail Primal Groudon
Hikari0307's Pokémon Blog 