Pokémon Announces Standard Format for VGC ’14 Season
The official rules document for the VGC ’14 season has been updated by The Pokémon Company International and is more or less what we reported on a few weeks back.
Standard Ruleset (VGC ’14)
- All matches are played in Doubles format
- Pokemon above Level 50 will be brought down to 50 for the match while those below 50 will stay as-is
- Players choose 4 of their 6 registered Pokemon after team preview
- Pokémon must meet all three of the following conditions to be eligible for use:
- Pokémon must be found in the Coastal Kalos, Central Kalos, or Mountain Kalos Pokédex (Full list can be found here)
- Pokémon must have been obtained in Pokémon X or Y (identifiable by a blue pentagon on the stats screen)
- Mewtwo, Xerneas, Yveltal, and Zygarde are banned
- Species Clause: No two Pokémon can share the same Pokédex number.
- Item Clause: No two Pokémon can hold the same held item.
You can find the full rules document here with the key bits taken out for you below:
Pokémon Organized Play supports several tournament formats for sanctioned play of the Pokémon video games. This document covers each of the approved formats and their variations. Tournaments that do not use one of the formats described here may not be sanctioned.
7. Standard Format Style
All sanctioned Pokémon video game tournaments require players to assemble a team of Pokémon, with items, prior to the start of the event. The standard format style for all Play! Pokémon tournaments is Double Battle.
7.1. Double Battle
In Double Battles, each player selects four Pokémon from his or her party of six to battle with. At the start of the battle, players send out the first two Pokémon in their party, making a total of four Pokémon on the battlefield. Game play continues until a player makes all four of his or her opponent’s Pokémon faint.
8. Standard Team Construction Rules
- When building a team for a Play! Pokémon tournament, all players must adhere to these standard construction rules.
- A player’s team cannot contain two Pokémon with the same Pokédex number.
- Each Pokémon on a player’s team can hold an item, though no two Pokémon may hold the same item.
- A player’s team cannot contain two Pokémon with the same nickname.
- A player’s team cannot contain a Pokémon nicknamed with the name of another Pokémon (for example, an Unfezant named “Pidove”).
- Pokémon may only use moves that have been learned through one of the following methods:
- By leveling up
- By TM or HM
- As an Egg Move, through breeding
- From a character in the game
- A move already known by a Pokémon received at an official Pokémon event or promotion
9. Sanctioned Format
Pokémon Organized Play supports one format for sanctioned play: Standard. Sanctioned events are listed on the POP website, and the results are reported to POP after the event concludes.
9.1. Standard Format
The Standard format is the standard tournament format for Play! Pokémon video game events. This format will be used at all premier events unless specified otherwise. The Standard format for the 2014 season will use the following restrictions:
- Only Pokémon X and Pokémon Y Game Cards or downloadable versions are permitted for use.
- Players may use Pokémon from the Central Kalos Pokédex from #001 to #150, Coastal Kalos Pokédex from #001 to #153, or Mountain Kalos Pokédex from #001 to #147.
- Pokémon must be placed in the Battle Box.
- Pokémon are allowed to Mega Evolve.
- Pokémon above Level 50 are permitted, but they are auto-leveled down to 50 for the duration of battle.
- Players may use Pokémon with Hidden Abilities.
- Players may use items that have been officially released via Pokémon X, Pokémon Y, the Pokémon Global Link, or an official event or promotion.
9.2. Kalos Native
Pokémon used in the Standard Format must be native to the Kalos region in Pokémon X or Pokémon Y. A native Pokémon is a Pokémon that is hatched or caught in Pokémon X or Pokémon Y. Pokémon that have been transferred to Pokémon X or Pokémon Y via Pokémon Bank or Poké Transporter are not native.
The primary difference (aside from everything that comes with using Pokémon X and Y of course) from the last season is that there will be a restriction on the Pokémon used based on Pokédex much like there was in the VGC ’11 season. Using Veekun’s filter, you can get a full list of Pokémon allowed (minus Xerneas, Yveltal, Zygarde, and Mewtwo). Additionally, the moves Sky Drop and Dark Void are no longer banned from use and we once again lose move tutor moves from previous generations.
As far as time goes, you will be allowed to take notes at any time during the match rather than just after you’ve taken your move. You will have 45 seconds to make your move as opposed to 60 seconds last season and we will return to a 15 minute time limit for each match like in the VGC ’12 season rather than 20 minutes.
4. Time Limits
Tournament staff is responsible for running a timely event. To assist in this effort, POP has established guidelines for time limits during various portions of the event. Players may take notes at any time during their match but must begin each match with a blank sheet.
4.1. Pre-game Time Limit
Players will have 90 seconds to view their opponent’s team and select their Pokémon.
4.2. Mid-game Time Limit
Any mid-game effects, such as selecting a move or retreating Pokémon, are to take place within the 45 seconds allocated per turn.
4.3. Match Time Limits
Single-game matches will be 15 minutes. For best-of-three matches, each game in the match will be 15 minutes.
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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More worried about DV in the Junior division: it requires such inane solutions that I expect especially Scarf Smeargle to be very frustrating for the kids. Rules are the one thing that is never just an us issue. Though I think people are vastly overestimating how easy it is to shut DV down too, since they’re speaking as though they’re playing against an AI using it that doesn’t have just as many options to play around counters as they do. For all the “we learned how to deal with it before!” I seem to remember it doing pretty well in most tournaments when it was allowed until Ubers were present in 2010… so obviously most people didn’t. While she was pretty caustic about it I agree with Trista, too — another dumb strategy that’s too easy to use that will lead to players doing well who shouldn’t.
While we like to look down on them some here too sleep is not very popular among casual players and I can see another season of obnoxious YouTube comments and Reddit posts about (the unneeded) Sleep Clause.
Looks like the rules for Pokemon this year went just like expected, which I don’t really mind all too much. Dark Void and Sky Drop are now unbanned, which is quite interesting, but nothing overly destructive (but I am expecting a clever way to use sky drop, such as disrupting TR by using it on the user of it.)
It’s not even that it’s impossible or even ‘hard’ to beat by itself. It’s the fact that a good chunk of the solutions require you to sacrifice the integrity of your otherwise well-balanced team just to beat a bs strategy you may or may not face. If you don’t… well.. you WILL lose to it. That’s the way I feel about the “actually having to fight it” part. The people who could “let” dark void win matches are not limited to “bad” players, just anyone who is not extremely careful.
Sorry for potential dumb question…
But say I want Bug Bite and Superpower on Scizor… so I move tutor them in BW2. I Pokebank it over, and I breed it. Will the move tutor moves be egg moves?
I’m just trying to see if all BW2 Move Tutor moves will now go extinct, and just want extra clarification. Thanks!
Move tutor moves don’t pass down by breeding, so no.
Long live simulators.
This, I think the other problem, too, is that Dark Void Smeargle itself is not strong ENOUGH competitively. It’s got a strong effect but 60% to hit both Pokemon is really low, especially when Smeargle itself is so frail that most things it misses with Dark Void will KO it before it can attempt to do it again. Probably most of the players who receive worlds invites won’t use it much, if at all, but not too far beneath that there will be plenty of players who actually do get a fair bit of mileage off scarf Dark Void and all manner of players, even worlds-caliber players, can get screwed by Dark Void in one of “those” kinds of games (missing with Metagross and getting slept despite Lum Berry was a horrifying situation in 09 and it can happen here too). Rather than being universally good, Dark Void is that aggravating middle ground where you find that it won’t get you very far if YOU use it but other people will so you have to prepare for the worst-case scenario anyway.
First paragraph I mostly disagree with. I’m sure juniors get mad playing against Politoed+Kingdra, or Zapchomp (or Thundurus/Landorus last year) too but they shouldn’t be banned. Smeargle just isn’t that good. As someone who played in 2008 and 2009 and even used Smeargle for all of 2008 and a decent amount of 2009 I can back that up. If you just throw 2008 out the window because there was no random wifi unless you had PBR, and there was no online simulator, and no one had even played doubles until then, it was only natural a gimmicky team with smeargle would do well. 2009 most of us were still noobs and there was a lottery keeping half the good players from even playing, but more people got into VGC and NetBattle supremacy came out even though it was glitchy as hell so at least we were a little better. Smeargle did decently with a top 8 at worlds and a finals appearance at nats, but it was not close to being overpowered. It didn’t do Grimer in the much stronger Japan metagame, even MOLF didn’t do anything that year. 2010 had misaroom but that didn’t win anything, it did decently though. I think people act like sleep is an auto win. Smeargle isn’t that fast, his stats suck, explosion is nerfed now so it can’t even do anything. If it’s scarfed it definitely can’t do anything. People were going nuts over Breloom thinking he was some god. I’ve heard the Breloom is a top 5 Pokemon in the game before and didn’t agree with that, not gonna agree on this. Smeargle just isn’t that good. It’ll be a good option for teams like perish song or some old schoolers bringing MOLF back, but it just isn’t that good. But some of these “new” counters like crafty yamsing shield and water shuriken and the cotton candy mon, come on! These aren’t good counters! Gonna disagree with ryuzaki too about how you need to screw up your whole team just to deal with sleep. She’s just paranoid since she used scarf safeguard Terrakion before. Lum berry was already on almost every team, it’s a good item. Use that on a mon. Use a mon that’s naturally faster than Smeargle and can one shot it. Not hard to do. If it’s scarfed it’s not a threat at all and that means no sash. Use your own Scarfed mon. Use priority. Talonflame, Azumarill, Conkeldurr, whatever. Play the odds game. There’s only a 64% chance both your mons get put to sleep. You could end up waking up with at least one of your mons in one turn too. Or even let yourself get put to sleep and play your way out of it. When they use Smeargle they are putting themselves at a 3 v 4 disadvantage.
I think the second paragraph brings up a really interesting point. I would hate to conform to these noncompetitive players on smogon, gamefaqs, reddit, youtube comments, or wherever they are from, but they are absolutely obsessed over sleep clause, and sleep in general. We saw what happened when Arash won with Amoonguss. Obviously it was unwarranted as we all know, but look at all the trolls who popped up because of “sporini”. I really wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t lying when they say they won’t play VGC simply because of sleep clause or dark void being allowed. At some point you have to make compromises to get the noncompetitive players to come to the tournaments in order to grow the game more, and if banning dark void would actually influence that, I think you need to do it. It’s no doubt an annoying move to play against, but it’s not like having it unbanned brings anything to the table. Sure this is very smogon-like, but I just don’t see a reason to leave it unbanned. As I spent a paragraph explaining, I don’t think smeargle is very good even with dark void, but I just don’t see any value in having it unbanned.
At least it’s being monitored, that’s all we can ask for. I don’t have a problem with dark void being allowed because obviously I don’t think smeargle is very good or centralizing or anything. But I do care about the future of the game and if there are actually a decent number of smogon, reddit, whatever people who won’t show up strictly because of stupid reasons like dark void being allowed, then I think it needs to be banned.
I think it’s a little different for the kids facing Smeargle than one of the offensive combos you mentioned. They’re all strong, but you beat them by playing Pokemon… Smeargle’s kinda doing something else that I think is a lot less intuitive to play against before you even look at qualities like fun. Some subjectivity there for sure, but it just feels appreciably worse for the kids to me, there.
It is not the first definition of may as in expressing possibility. It is the second definition of may as in expressing permission. So you have permission to use the pokemon in the Kalos dexes. Obviously, that means you do not have permission to use pokemon other than those.
Just gonna go out on a limb and state that (at least in my opinion), Kalos dex was clearly designed to be a competitive ruleset. You look at what’s banned now, and most of it is either outclassed or just bad, or is one of those centralising mons.
Though while nobody should be missing Grimer like Landorus-T, Cresselia and Thundurus that invalidated dozens of similar mons by sheer brute force, it’s a shame to see stuff like Jellicent banned. I think they probably just tried to have an even spread of typings, and balance a lot of mons out (like Zapdos, much more manageable without heat wave).
And I do think they’ve done a good job. I’ve had so many really, really good games this gen, already. With megas, a more balanced item selection, well-placed nerfs to autopilots and crits and the ease of getting things ready ingame, never before has there been so much power in the hands of the player.
Was very worried about this change when I first heard about it, but over the last few days, I’ve definitely grown more liking towards it. The removal of all those popular Pokes from last year that have all been brought up before has definitely had me thinking harder and deeper into team building: not having to think about how I go and counter Landorus-T, Cresselia, Thundurus, Eruptran, etc., has given me more of a focus to center my thoughts on other threats, which have been extremely varied since the month I’ve been playing for. However, these threats seem to not be as hugely dominating and arguably “broken” as the other top-used mons from Generation 5: even crazy attackers like Mawile and Azumarill are manageable to a decent assent without having to change up one’s team incredibly much. Sure, we’re most likely going to have something equivalent to Cresselia/Heatran that everyone seems to use, but I think even then they’ll still be manageable.
Definitely happy to see Perish Trap getting better in this new format, I felt like that strategy always seemed to have been undermined in the Gen 5 days, but even though Perish Trap teams are annoying, they’re still able to be played around.
tl;dr, from what I’ve experienced this mixup to the metagame looks fun and a nice change of pace, but like everyone says we need some kind of in-game ladder for it
Kalos Dex is a refreshing change. End of. I don’t see why everyone’s getting their knickers in a twist. Just because some staples are gone, it doesn’t mean it’s going to be a bad meta. We’ve got a decent handful of new toys to be playing with, and plenty of old ones that were maybe overlooked because some of them had better counterparts. It’s a new meta, and it’s going to encourage new teams to be built, and get people out of their comfort zone, but pretty much everyone is, so It’s not that big a deal, surely? Everyone complains now, but I’m sure the good players, will rise back up to the top soon enough, and this argument will look somewhat silly in months to come.
I think the toys are out the pram a bit in the Dark Void argument. It’s just a new (well, returning) strategy we’re going to have to look at when building our teams, just like preparing for swagger/twave spam and such. We’ve got it easier than the earlier years, in that we have team preview, and a better sleep mechanic. Why can’t we all just take it in our stride, and let it become part of the meta. We’re still in a really raw time for it, in that it’s only been established on Battle Spot, and not at events, but I’m sure come Nationals, it will have found its rightful place in the meta. That said, I think we’ll deal with it a lot better than Juniors and (some) Seniors, where it could be pretty bidoof disruptive if it gets into the wrong hands.
For once, I agree with Zog, I think the Kalos Dex is a good competitive dex, which was well thought out, and we’ve got a tonne of improvements. We can’t always have our cake and eat it too. The only bit of cake I do think we deserve, like most people in here, is a proper place to practice, and I’m sure we’ll see something like that roll around soon enough.
I’m the only one who thinks that this is terrible?
“Players may use Pokémon from the Central Kalos Pokédex from #001 to #150, Coastal Kalos Pokédex from #001 to #153, or Mountain Kalos Pokédex from #001 to #147.”
I can’t understand this. Why they don’t allow at least national pokedex? ok, we can only use pokemon hatched or caught in X/Y, but why they don’t allow pokemon from Pokemon Safari or pokemon from previous generations breeded in X/Y? I don’t understand their decision and I don’t understand why you aren’t upset with this =S
Can you tell me what’s so gimmicky about having a ruleset tailored to a metagame that would otherwise be 1 month old instead of what we would currently have with 3 months (at the time of the first regional)? I think the impact of trying to mash the metagames would be too much to handle at least for a first regional, so I am completely okay with this decision. Pokémon is probably never going to be a “true e-sport” at least not as big as the more mature-looking and live-action-non-turn-based games are, and calling down upon this ruleset as gimmicky when people make a decent team for wifi now and then have to test again because “Crap. Now I got to build with and against Cress/Thundurus/Latios/other near-legends. Time to start over.” Scott, I really like what you say about other subjects because most of the time you are dead-on with what you say. However, I know it’s hard to admit being wrong sometimes, and I almost get the feeling you take it personally like I do. Just accept that what BadIntent said was right and move on. Easy.
Or at least put a line through the part where you see a “cute” metagame happening because that’s just silly.
Also would like to take the opportunity in my post to thank AZ and TCPI for actively listening to us and actively changing the meta in a way that seems mostly positive. It was really cool for you to act on what most people were saying and actually making the rule changes. Even if I happen to fall under the camp of what Ray said of his post (15mins/game with 1min decision) I can respect 45 seconds because that’s what I usually make save for maybe a few game-breaking turns in which I could probably train myself to think a little faster anyway.
Actively changing the meta is why I think this is stupid and disagree with ryuzaki’s post earlier. A metagame evolves over a period of time by the people playing it. They find dominant strategies and then find counters for said strategies. That’s how you play a game competitively. The fact that people think an external force is needed (be it random format changes, suspect testing, or whatnot) to change the metagame is flat out wrong. I’d rather see a static format with metagame changes brought by players like Wolfe, Sejun, R Justice, etc. It’s especially frustrating to see people say things like this when we’ve had a generation change with a new type, new Pokemon, new abilities, new attacks, new items, base stat changes, and tons of move property changes. Do players expect the game to be the exact same with these?
I haven’t posted too much on this issue because it’s too late and I’ve already slowly begun to accept this ruleset from when it was leaked a few weeks ago. It doesn’t mean I’m happy with it nor do I think it’s healthy in the long term to keep changing up the ruleset. It’s especially frustrating in the best year to attract new players in god knows how long to have an unintuitive ruleset that says you can use certain Pokemon but only if they’re obtained a certain way. At the very least, “Obtained in Kalos” would have been preferable.
Oh and BadIntent’s post would be wrong because unlike 2011, this ruleset doesn’t put the focus on the new Pokemon at all. 80% of the Pokemon used will still be from previous generations.
Or maybe the fact you notice I’m right about other topics might be a good indication that as usual, you are not.
What about Wi-Fi tournaments? do you think that they will have the same rules?
Oh my god yes, someone says what I’ve been thinking.
Only complaints I have:
Nothing to do now but go into the season with our heads held high. Good luck folks. May the best players win (they always have, they always will).
I didn’t take part in 2013 VGC due to how hard it was for me to get competitively viable Pokemon since I couldn’t RNG (as in I don’t have a PC so not just I couldn’t learn, even if I did try to learn I wouldn’t be able to do it). So this rule set allows me to take part in VGC a whole lot easier than before, plus I inherently don’t particularly like the use of legend, non-uber or not so the fact that the only allowed legends this time are the original bird trio who are easily countered and so not almost required on a team is a blessing (plus even if they were really powerful it wouldn’t be hard to get a good one due to 3 certain 31s).
I am ok with the new rules because I didn’t play in worlds before and always do really bad at events
As I said before, the rules were not announced and everyone knew good and well that they probably wouldn’t include all pokemon. You went and made teams anyway and now want to cry because you wasted your time. Boo hoo. (BY THE WAY I AM NOT TALKING ABOUT REUSING A 5TH GEN TEAM. THAT WOULD BE A RETARDED. I AM TALKING ABOUT X Y)
I had Kalosdex legal teams before you even had a gym badge, Trista. I’m pretty sure I just wrote that. You seem to be having trouble reading — gravy on your glasses?
Battle Spot is Kalosdex only??????????? If you have actual Kalosdex only teams how am I supposed to know that? (if you mentioned it in an article or something you should know better than to think I actually read them)
And I’m so sorry I have a job and can’t just play Pokemon all day. I know you were trying to be funny but that is not really the best insult.
No, I really wasn’t. I can’t think of a single Nugget Bridge user other than Cybertron who hasn’t been using a Kalosdex legal team on Battle Spot, because like you just mentioned, everyone knew the rules. You’re totally off-base here, which is what happens when you try to make generalizations like that without having actually played the game. I’m pretty sure what you wrote is the motivation of exactly no one.
Wait wtf what mon on my team isn’t kalos only
SORRY CRAZY
Just keeping you on your toes buddy
Then you must have missed all the people on this and other sites giving away free VGC Pokémon. This actually makes it harder for people who have trouble getting their own Pokémon (though there are fewer of those people thanks to the breeding changes) since there isn’t really a way to clone Gen 6 mons, so we can’t just casually give away our extras to anyone who wants one.
I’m actually pretty upset with this. I don’t get to use any of my Tyranitars from Gen 5, and instead have to breed new ones? I was putting that off in favor of waiting for Pokebank. And losing access to Fire Punch and Superpower is sad as well, unless they can pass them down as egg moves all of a sudden. And no Follow Me Togekiss, either. I am not pleased with this ruleset. Thought the native to Kalos rule will force people to hatch eggs and spend some amount of time breeding in game, and I can see where they’re coming from, putting everyone, new players and old, on a level playing field, at least in the ability to obtain workable teams.
“Firestorm
Oh and BadIntent’s post would be wrong because unlike 2011, this ruleset doesn’t put the focus on the new Pokemon at all. 80% of the Pokemon used will still be from previous generations.”
Yeah, but Megas are going to be a huge factor in any Gen VI metagame, as seen by the preliminary usage tier list, and they are basically new Kalos Pokemon and are part of the new features of Gen VI.
I honestly do not see how changing the rulesets every year affects the growth of the VGCs. I personally have never seen the VGCs as an eSport in the same light as any fighting game / RTS / MOBA. Like I have said in the previous Kalos-ruleset arguing thread, I think Pokemon is much more like an electronic TCG in terms of luck-management and strategy (in terms of comparing “tempo” and other such lingo in a game like YuGiOh to “tempo” in a game like SSB).
TCGs feature changing rulesets all the time, either in the form of Block formats or something crazy like YuGiOh (changing the rules, which can be insanely convoluted to new players, now on a 4 month basis having changed from 6 months). I hope we would never have something like YuGiOh, because VGC formats need at least a good year to mature (plus, there is nowhere near enough introduction of new Pokemon to warrant some type of banlist as a means of promoting new things), but I feel like Pokemon is getting to the point where a Block format makes sense for the VGCs. There are 729 Pokemon now, and that does not even include Megas or Formes, and as this game hopefully continues with more generations, it will just get that much more complicated. A Kalos-dex format, where 450ish Pokemon are available, helps not only to promote new things, but helps new players learn the game. Plus, with so many different widgets (Pokemon, cards), you can actually make a semi-enjoyable ruleset with a smaller pool of widgits (as seen with the Kalos-dex only list). Obviously, people who have been invested in Pokemon and the VGCs for several years will not be phased by the ever increasing number of Pokemon, but new players always will be, and it just gets more daunting for them every generation.
*This is not to say that a Block format is inherently better, because I really do not think that is the case. But it is simpler, and maybe if the VGCs grow big enough, there could be a Block format and an Extended format running simultaneously.
And even with all that, I do not think the ruleset is the biggest issue here. Pokemon could change the ruleset every 3 months, but it would fail because of the bigger issues plaguing Pokemon as a competitive game, like the fact that the actual game continues to keep most elements relating to the competitive side in a mystical “black box” (and hinting at different aspects does not count). Or like how TPCi does not aggressively use even social media to promote its competitive games (why doesn’t Play! Pokemon have its own Twitter & Facebook that exclusively promotes TCG & VGC news instead of burying this news in announcements of Pokemon Origins episodes and Who’s That Pokemon? – which I guess are important for other aspects of the Pokemon brand). Unless I am completely blind, Pokemon didn’t even announce the release of the VGC 2014 ruleset on its official Twitter page or its Facebook page, which has, you know, 5 MILLION LIKES. If 1% of those people even semi-regularly checked that Facebook page, do you not think the VGC attendance numbers would spike tremendously?
Plus, with the possibility that Pokemon will again make a ruleset that does not have an official ladder to practice on, we are trapped by an officially run tournament system run by a company that is doing everything it can to keep the VGCs a frustrating secret.
tl;dr – I do not think changing the rules is a big deal because the bigger issue is communication (and practice space, but much smarter people have already elaborated as to why this is bad in different threads), but I really wish the ruleset was Blue Pentagon, but then again Kalos-dex is not that bad (especially when compared to 2011).
YGO sure has changed since I last looked at it, they were still doing like yearly ban lists I think.
But like simulakara said, I think communication is probably the bigger issue here overall, if the rules were announced right off the bat a week or 2 after XY were released, there undoubtedly would be some complaining still, but less overall. I know I was half counting on putting off some breeding (like Mawile) so I could just get a perfect 0 Spe Brave one a lot easier with RNG in BW, but I’ll have to rebred it once it gets transferred up now. Which ultimately doesn’t do much besides add a bit of time, and at least I know I don’t have to bother EV training anything I transfer up or to rely on any prior move tutors (RIP Scizor).