White 2 Champions Tournament FAQ

Q: What is Champions Tournament?
A: Champions Tournament is a tournament in the PWT where you and all champions from all regions (except Iris) fight in a bracket styled tournament. It is unlocked after completing the World Leader's Tournament 10 times (same thing except for gym leaders from all regions) which is unlocked after completing each regional leader tournament (Unova, Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh) at least once.

Q: What team will you be using and why?
A: Dragonite, Excadrill, Starmie.

Excadrill was chosen because it is, by a *very* long shot, the best pokemon to complete the game with. It has a massive attack stat, powerful moves learned early on (such as Dig, Iron Head, and Earthquake) and amazing boosting moves in Hone Claws and Swords Dance (meaning x items are rarely needed). Drilbur isn't great but Excadrill is so good, that it's more than worth it. Excadrill is probably the best PSR main, and that's considering Raikou in the Johto games. It's also solid in the PWT, as high attack and STAB Earthquake is an amazing combination and it has a great defensive typing as well. Its speed isn't great but beyond that, it gets the job done.

Dragonite was chosen because it can be obtained with its hidden ability, Multiscale, in a hidden grotto in Route 18. Multiscale Dragonite is, by far, the best set-up sweeper available as Multiscale makes it extremely reliable at setting up Dragon Dance, and its high attack, speed boost from Dragon Dance, and Outrage means that it can easily sweep through many different leaders. It also synergizes with Excadrill terrifically, as it's resistant or immune to all of Excadrill's weaknesses while Excadrill resists Dragonite's Rock and Dragon weaknesses. It takes a long time to get but it finishes fights so quickly, that it's well worth it.

Starmie was chosen because it can be obtained relatively quickly and it has high speed and terrific coverage, making it great against a lot of offensive pokes. It's also good against ice types and bulky water types which both Dragonite and Excadrill struggle with. Its special attack is rather average but it gets the job done.

Q: Isn't Multiscale Dragonite absurdly good? How is this challenging?
A: Multiscale Dragonite IS absurdly good, and when I first started routing this, I thought that Multiscale Dragonite would make every battle an instant-win and thus, make the run not fun at all. However, as I tested it, I quickly realized that Multiscale Dragonite isn't even close to an instant win button. There are plenty of focus sash and sturdy pokemon and almost all of them carry a super-effective move against Dragonite. Its speed and severe Ice weakness can be frustrating as well and there are a decent amount of physically bulky pokemon that can handle it. It's still the best poke to use in the PWT by a pretty notable margin, but it's by no means an instant-win button.

Q: D-did your opponent just use a Ground move against Dragonite?
A:...yeah I don't get it either. For some reason, the AI has a chance to use Ground moves against Multiscale Dragonite. This doesn't happen if Dragonite has Inner Focus nor against any other Flying type, nor poke with Levitate.

My best guess as to why this happens is that the AI does not take into account hidden abilities and expects Dragonite to only be able to have Inner Focus so when it sees that it *doesn't* have Inner Focus, it gets confused and starts randomly choosing moves. It's still an extremely weird interaction that I have no concrete explanation for.

Q: Bulldoze? Why not Earthquake?
A: The TM for Earthquake takes too long to get, requiring a detour to Marvelous Bridge and Route 15. While Earthquake would be helpful in a number of fights (most notably Steven and the electric leaders) but it doesn't end up being so essential or helpful, that it's worth the detour. Bulldoze's speed drop actually ends up being really helpful in a number of fights such as Drayden, Pryce, Maylene, and Cynthia.

Q: Why did you pick Tepig as your starter?
A: The starter only gets used until Burgh, afterwards, it's replaced with Drilbur. Tepig just does that portion of the game the fastest. Both other starters struggle with Burgh and Snivy is overall really bad.

Q: What else do you catch?
A: Pidove for Fly and Psyduck for Surf and Strength.

Q: Why don't you nickname Tepig?
A: Text moves very fast in gen 5 and Tepig's name doesn't appear enough times to be worth nicknaming.

Q: What fights are the hardest?
A: In the part prior to the PWT: Cheren, Charles, Rood, and the Undella Rival fight. Marlon and Marshall are also worth noting as both can easily cause a lot of timeloss and turn a great run into a mediocre or bad one. There's also a Team Plasma Grunt in Nimbasa City who has a Watchog with Confuse Ray and Hypnosis that can be annoying as well.

For the PWT, the most notable fights are Giovanni, Pryce, Brawly, Roark, Maylene, Candice, Brycen, Blue, and Red. Honestly, every fight that has a Focus Sash pokemon has the potential to be dangerous.

Q: Why is your movement so strange at the beginning of the game?
A: Rng manipulation!

Q: What is rng manip?
A: By setting the time and options in specific ways, and by moving in specific ways, you can manipulate the RNG to give you favorable outcomes. You can do this because RNG isn't exactly random as making a proper random outcome is unfeasibly hard, so the game uses various algorithms to make it appear random.

I use rng manipulation to get good stats on Tepig, Drilbur, Starmie, and Dragonite, a Pidove and Psyduck encounter, no other encounters up until the first badge and a Dragonite to get generated in the route 18 hidden grotto after the first 256 steps

Q: Why don't you manip pokerus?
A: It is possible to manip pokerus but it's way too hard to pull off, requiring 2 frame perfect inputs at 60 fps. Most people struggle to 1 frame perfect input at 60 fps consistently, let alone 2 in a row. It's also difficult to find seeds that have all of the requirements *and* pokerus.

Q: Why don't you manip the PWT to give you good matchups?
A: In order to manip the brackets, you would need to save and quit before each and every tournament and the advantages of getting a good bracket aren't worth a save and quit.

Q: Why don't you manip the Drilbur or Dragonite catch?
A: Simply put, battle manip in gen 5 is impossible. You can actually manip the turn 1 move of wild pokes and you can manip Drilbur to not use Dig turn 1, giving you more chances to catch it, however.

Q: What are Tepig, Drilbur, Starmie, and Dragonite's stats and abilities?
A:
Tepig: 31/31(+)/30/29/30(-)/25 (Naughty Nature), Blaze
25 speed ivs guarantees that you underspeed Cheren's Lillipup and makes it so that you always hit the Lillipup with a Blaze Ember on the 3rd turn.

Drilbur: 31/31(+)/31/20(-)/30/31 (Adamant Nature), Sand Force
Sand Force and enough special attack ivs guarantees a 2HKO with Mud Slap on Colress's Magnemite on Route 4 (since there's always a sandstorm there). Dig cannot do this in 2 turns due to Sturdy.

Starmie: 31/5(-)/30/31/31/31(+) (Timid Nature), Natural Cure
With 10 carboses and a Timid nature, Starmie outspeeds all base 100s in the PWT, a very crucial speed tier to hit.

Dragonite: 30/31/31/0(-)/31/31(+) (Jolly Nature), Multiscale
Adamant's power is nice but Dragonite is not very fast and even at +1, it gets outspeed by a decent amount of pokes when Adamant. It still has speed issues with Jolly but it's much more mitigable and carboses can help with that. Most notably, with Jolly, it can outspeed all base 110s after a Dragon Dance and 4 carboses, Sabrina's Alakazam after a Dragon Dance and 9 carboses, and Blue's Alakazam after a Dragon Dance and 10 carboses.

Q: Why White 2 and not Black 2?
A: The Reversal Mountain layout is different between both games and Black 2 has an extra battle there. Charles is also a rotation battle in Black 2 which is much worse. The layout of the plasma frigate is also different and in Black 2, you end up needing to deal with a *massive* amount of spinners. There are other differences but White 2 just ends up being superior in every way.

Q: Why did you pick the girl?
A: It doesn't actually make a difference, I just chose her cause she's cute

Q: What's your goal time?
A: 5:3x. For now, my goal is a deathless run though.