Entrance Requirements, Prizes, and Travel Awards Announced for 2015 Pokémon US National Championships
In a few short months, players from all across the United States and Canada will be flying to Indianapolis to play in the most important event of the season for those qualifying for the 2015 Pokémon World Championships. As the only National Championship in North America, it is a make or break event for most players. The players at the top of the standings will be trying to secure their Day 2 invites while the majority of players try to secure their standings in the Top 40. Today, The Pokémon Company International has made quite a few more details available for the event happening July 3rd to 5th, 2015.
Registration Requirements
You will require 5 Play! Points to play in the Pokémon US National Championships in the Masters division and 1 Play! Point to play in the Junior and Senior divisions.. You earn 3 Play! Points for participating in a Regional Championship and 1 Play! Point for participating in a Premier Challenge or attending a League.
Travel Awards & Stipends
To help make it easier to attend this crucial event, The Pokémon Company International has set aside travel stipends for top performing players throughout the season to make it to Nationals. This is what you’ll want to aim for before June 12th:
- 1st–16th: Flight, Hotel, and $300 Travel Stipend
- 17th–32nd: $1,000 Travel Stipend
- 33rd–64th: $750 Travel Stipend
All travel awards and stipends are awarded for each age division using the rankings for the US & Canada region.
Prizes
The prizing for the US National Championships will be better than ever with scholarships added to the prize pool this year:
1st Place
- $5000 Scholarship
- 32GB Nintendo Wii U Deluxe Set
- Travel Award to the 2015 Pokémon World Championships regardless of CP Ranking
- 72 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 600 Championship Points
2nd Place
- $3000 Scholarship
- New Nintendo 3DS XL
- 72 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 500 Championship Points
3rd & 4th Place
- $1500 Scholarship
- New Nintendo 3DS XL
- 72 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 400 Championship Points
5th to 8th
- 36 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 300 Championship Points
9th to 16th
- 18 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 200 Championship Points
17th to 32nd
- 8 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 150 Championship Points
33rd to 64th
- 4 Pokémon TCG Booster Packs
- 100 Championship Points (if attendance in the age division is 128 or greater)
65th to 128th
- 50 Championship Points (if attendance in the age division is 256 or greater)
About the Author
Firestorm is one of the co-founders of Nugget Bridge and the Community Manager for eSports Tournament Platform Battlefy. He has been playing Pokémon since 1999, competitively since 2007, and attending tournaments since 2010. He lives in Vancouver, Canada with a degree in Interactive Art & Technology + Communications. You can follow him on Twitter at @rushanshekar.
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Lookin’ at that $5000 scholarship for first place. That’s incredible. Thanks to Nintendo and friends for making this year’s US Nationals more hype than ever.
Was really worried about “entrance requirements” at the start, but I’m pretty sure that most everybody planning to attend either already has their 5CP or can scoop it up fairly quickly by attending some League stuff.
Hot bidoof.
Wait, so I can’t just go to Nats and play? That ruins my chances at playing considering I’ll get to attend basically no events between now and then.
you mean 5 play!points, which are not the same as CP?
Was really worried about “entrance requirements” at the start, but I’m pretty sure that most everybody planning to attend either already has their 5CP or can scoop it up fairly quickly by attending some League stuff.
Hnnnggg these stipends are so good
Though I find it funny that you can easily net more money with the top 32 stipend than with the top 16 stipend. I wonder if you could opt into the “lower” $1000 cash stipend if you end up with the free trip + $300 from top 16?
That’s a whole lot of CP they’re giving away.
Guess I’ll see you guys there ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Hm, 5 Play points are disappointing to hear for me as well. Do Play points from league TCG play count towards this? I’d hate to go to those, sign in, and then immediately forfeit as I don’t play TCG but I don’t have a ton of other options…
If I have a friend coming from a country without play points does this mean he would not be able to play?
No. Last year hundreds of people pre-registered and didn’t show up so it was only a matter of time before we had an entrance requirement to play. Unless I’m remembering your name / state wrong you have two PP and will get three more if you attend your closest spring Regional which is enough to qualify. Not do well in. Participate. Or you can visit your closest League and make sure your League Leader marks you down as attending once per League Season (every 6 weeks).
We may hold some sanctioned online tournaments for Masters to get some Play Points but this is not a hard number to hit.
You’re going to have to somehow cover $700 in hotel and travel, I’m not sure if you could easily do that. It’s $300-400 for a round trip flight / travel compensation for most people (assume $300 here) and a four nights’ stay is probably going to be ~$500 (unless you’re you and have hookups) so I’m not sure for most people it’s more economical.
Change what League points count for from TCG to VG on your Pokemon.com profile. You don’t need to pay in a League tournament. You can just go there, play the video game (maybe teach some others about competitive play!) and confirm with the League Leader that you’ve been marked down as attending.
This is nice to know, thank you.
Awesome to know thanks.
I have one PP. I guess I’ll just have to try and get to another PC before Spring. Thanks.
How does TPCI tend to go about travel awards?
I know my plan now.
I’d probably consider against that. While my top 16 award from last year is probably slightly higher due to flights being quite pricey from California my travel award was worth $1400 last year. About $550 for flight, $550 for hotel, and $300 stipend. There are some pretty big advantages when you let Pokemon pay for your flight. Instead of choosing the cheapest flight, you are essentially allowed to pick any flight from any airport. In my case flying from a smaller airport almost an hour closer (compared to the larger usually cheaper one) at a time that isn’t 4 am in the morning was well worth the top 16 travel award. Yeah you don’t get a sick $1000 check, but the hotel and airline tickets can get quite expensive and having those completely covered is a nice piece of mind.
Doesn’t look like I’ll be attending. I have a lacrosse tournament that weekend. 🙁
ill be there
I’m in a pretty unique situation in that I have credits on an airline that expire a couple days after nationals (basically I took a later flight coming home from nats last year and got a stipend from Delta that I haven’t used yet) and I can pretty reliably get cheaper hotel rooms through my father in the industry. So I totally understand what both of you are saying, but, for this year at least, I’d still be in a better spot if I just got the $1000. That being said, I should probably worry about actually staying in the top 16 before I worry about the stipends lol
I was actually in a similar situation last year to majorbowman — commentary changed things a little, but since I was in driving distance of Nationals last year I could have done better with even last year’s lower 16-32 stipend than I would have with the trip from top 16, and I played the last two Regionals I played in a way that ensured I would fall into the 16-32 range as a result (the advantages of not having to play for Worlds, I guess). Honestly though, speaking from experience, I think there’s something to be said for having an excuse to have a nicer room to yourself because you have no choice but to take it anyway at events rather than doing things the more… economical way that I know players tend to. You’d be surprised how much less tiring it makes the weekend not be rooming with a bunch of people to split costs, and it’s pretty hard to be too salty about receiving varying degrees of pretty good prizing.
LCQ and Worlds players should have 3 from those events iirc.
These prizes are amazing. This is reassuring my decision to top cut nats or bust this year.
Is it possible to change the requirement to 3 Play! Points instead of 5? There are some people who are only able to attend 1 regional and nothing more; due to a lack of PCs available around our area. I’m just curious because Juniors and Seniors are only required to have 1.
RIP me. Granted travel to America is expensive as heckles and I probably won’t get a chance to attend anyway, I just wonder if there’s actually enough events where I live to get that many points…
The entrance points really sucks for me… I want able to attend a winter regional due to a last minute issue and I can only go to one in the spring… The closest PC are also 4-5 hours away at the closest and it was hard enough to convince my parents to let me go to a regional…
I have a feeling a lot of the people saying this have leagues near them that they aren’t looking at. There are over 1000 in North America. If you’re close enough to attend a Regional, you’re probably close enough to attend a league.
So these prizes are given retroactively right?
So, if you drive, do they cover gas if you are top 16? 😉 It seems silly that we could fly for free from Chicago to Indy if my daughter can move up those few spots to top 16, but we get more if she stays in the next tier and we drive!