Edit - I just realized how long this post is lol, I like to type.
I know ahead of time they said that the 128 who got in would be random and fully accepted that. Perhaps I thought some sort of edge would be given to people who showed up earlier. Nope. I then realized that is one of the poorest ways to run a tournament.
I used to live in Philadelphia all up until a week ago when the lease on my apartment expired and I decided to live at home for the summer to catch up on cash. Home happens to be near Atlantic City in Jersey, so I didn't want to travel up Saturday morning. I found a friend's place at college to stay over on Friday night. I woke up just before 8am Friday to make it to class on time with my commute time of like 2 hours to college now, did my classes, met up with my friend, etc. We haven't chilled for a while, and a bunch of other friends showed up, and before I knew it, it was 4am. Looks like I'm not going to sleep! I had planned to leave early to get a great spot in line and hopefully nab some breakfast on the way since the last time I ate was around 8PM the night before. I leave at 5:30am for a bus that left at 6:20am which was like a 20 minute walk away. Why? I don't know. I thought I would find a place to eat on the way and my friend was asleep anyway. There wasn't anything, and I stood at the bus stop for a good half hour.
Took a half hour bus ride to the convention center, thinking there would be a food place nearby... nope! Walked into the convention center at 7am, a cool hour and a half before registration starts. I'm tired and hungry, I was nearing being up for 24 hours at this point. I'm falling asleep as I'm checking stats of various pokemon on my laptop in line still practicing making sure I have everything down.
The line I was in was ridiculous. It got more and more jumbled, and eventually they just said it wasn't really a line, so of course people from the back tried to rush up towards the front. I kept my same general placement though. We got into the giant area it was held in where a line was immediately formed for reg. More waiting... When I finally got up to the desk it was about 9am, so after standing in line for about 2 hours tired and hungry all in a crowd, I found out I was #108 in line - Lickitung. Uhg, I hate Lickitung...
Still however, seeing that I was within the first 128 people gave me a good feeling, despite it not meaning anything.
While on the search for food I found some vending machines. I eventually went right for the Red Bull machine for a $3 can to help keep me awake, and then found that I had no more change for the snack machine :/
I got word that there was food stuff upstairs - there wasn't. The breakfast concession stand were pretty terrible, I didn't want to pay so much money for that food. To give you an idea, a bottle of water was $3.
Eventually around 10am or so a lunch concession stand opened up. Things were still overpriced such as a small cheesesteak and fries being $8, but I opted for the nachos and cheese - a plentiful serving for $4. It sucks, but it was probably the most cost effective thing on the menu. While walking around the venue, I gotta say, it was extremely tough trying to carry around my very heavy bookbag (with all my school books from the previous day and stuff like clothes I needed when stayin' over my friends place), having very baggy jeans on without a belt since I lost my belt when I moved out of my apartment, and while trying to hold an order of cheesy nachos and eating them without making a mess. There was no seats practically the entire time, so I had been standing since 7am this whole time. I felt like I was going to die.
I kept optimistic however, as that morning I finally found the last key pokemon my team needed, which I think had what it took to get to the top. I guess I'll post my team...
... I don't remember all of the EVs and Natures off the top of my head, but they're pretty obvious considering the sets I'm running.
-Main 4-
Ambipom @ Life Orb
-Fake Out
-Last Resort
Porygon-Z @ Choice Specs
-Tri-Attack
-Ice Beam
-Dark Pulse
-HP Fighting
Gengar @ Focus Sash
-Shadow Ball
-HP Ice
-Thunderbolt
-Explosion
Garchomp @ Choice Scarf
-Outrage
-Dragon Claw
-Fire Fang
-Earthquake
-Alternates-
Zapdos @ Leftovers
-Thunderbolt
-Heat Wave
-Roost
-HP Grass
Houndoom @ Choice Specs (Houndoom was originally used in Porygon-Z's place)
-Flamethrower
-Overheat
-Dark Pulse
-HP Ice
Ambipom is a monster as a lead in doubles. Fake Out lets me choose one of their starters not to go first, normally the one that would outspeed Porygon-Z. The only problems Ambipom has are with Ghost and Steel pokemon which Porygon-Z handles with HP Fight and Dark Pulse. In the approx 50/50 chance that Z's download ability increases his SAtk, it's pretty **** amazing, and Tri-Attack will start like OHKO'ing anything if I don't use an element attack for a super effective hit.
Other options was to Fake Out first turn on whichever one is a threat for Garchomp to safely switch in place of Z, then either switch Ambipom to Gengar while I EQ with Chomp, or continue to sweep with Outrage + Last Resort. Gengar came in use for revenge killing sweeping dragons when Garchomp wasn't available, or possibly using Explosion in some rare situations. I needed a filler move, and I found a couple instances where it could be used as a nice curve ball.
The reason for Houndoom as the old role of Porygon-Z was that it dealt with the Steel and Ghost types Ambipom couldn't handle with ease. Spec'd flamethrower and dark pulse with him is kind of **** with the STAB bonuses. Zapdos is just an overall good pokemon that could have taken the part of Gengar both having the ground resistance, both with electrical attacks (I didn't like Discharge on it though), but Gengar just seemed to work better in the end on average.
Ok so the numbers are finally about to be announced. I'm very anxious about this. Everyone is crowding around the medium size TVs located amongst the room pushing and shoving etc. This was all very hard to stand in with a bunch of cheesy nachos in your hand :/
I had heard people like Marriland (it was funny seeing him there btw, and I chatted with him a lil) saying that this turn out was bigger than all of the past events combined. People at the event estimated it to be in the 600s, but a forum post on Smogon earlier said that it was in the 900s. And so the numbers were shown... No 108. 109 was called, and I was ready to find the person who stood behind me the whole morning and strangle him, but I kept my anger at ease. Not everyone did though lol, as when some people stormed off in anger they knocked down signs, yelled and such - but you really can't blame them. Only taking 128 entrants randomly from about 900? If that many people come - you just have to find a way to let more. I host tournaments for Smash all the time (including the biggest National tournament that Brawl has had), and you just can't let that many people leave unhappy. I'm sure adding an extra round at the beginning wouldn't be terrifying time-wise for them. Also, taking in people randomly... Numbers from the 600s were called, and yet numbers 1-9 weren't called (10 was the first on the list). So that means some players who showed up at the last minute got in over people that waited there from the very beginning - probably around 6am is my guess. I guess since there are so many random elements in Pokemon - why not make tournaments also random lol.
I could have stayed around another 15 min to get the Shiny Milotic, but I didn't care anymore. I just wanted to leave from the mood I was in. All the practicing gone to waste. Finding a place to stay in Philly the night before which inadvertedly led to me being up all night before it went to waste. Buying the game a few days before the tournament for $35 + tax was a waste practically (since I'll admit I was playing a backup of it, but then was able to buy the legit version and transfer my save file onto it through the magic of homebrew), but atleast now I can connect to PBR no problems. The money spent on transportation was gone to waste. The $7 for a Red Bull + Nachos went to waste. It sucked, it really did. There were plenty of people at the event who traveled from NY or MD/VA. I think I also heard of a person or two flying in for the event.
So that was it... I went back to the bus stop to wait for the bus along with a couple other annoyed people who didn't make it. Long story short however, a bus didn't show up for over 2 hours. Two busses were scheduled to arrive during that time, but they just didn't. Fun times. I was even more annoyed as some people started to show up later that were in the tournament but got knocked out and heard some of them talking. One quote in particular that made me cringe was "There we're so many problems with my team, and then I realized what I had to do. I gave everyone Hyper Beam and then all of my problems we're solved." Another person who came out that made it in but was eliminated round 1 was playing some people so I challenged him. I forget his line up, it was practically are starter pokemon. I 4-0'd him, not taking a single hit. The only damage I took was from Life Orb. I was faster every turn, and OHKO'd him every attack except from the first Fake Out. Another person I heard at the bus stop that made it was a kid's dad who didn't know what the status Sleep was.
I just got home and started typing this. I got home around 3:35pm after leaving the tourney at 10:30am. Not having a car sucks. So after everything I went through (and I'm sure there were others that went through just as much if not worse) and all I got was this...
lol I love that costume of Turtwig.
