Pokemon.com Looks Back at the Autumn VG Regional Championships

With the Autumn Regional Championships occurring so late in the 2015 Video Game Championship format, there was little question about which Pokémon would be the most common. Trainers knew they would face down teams full of Mega Kangaskhan, Landorus Therian Forme, Amoonguss, Heatran, Thundurus, Cresselia, and Aegislash. Armed with the suspicion that most top teams would probably be composed largely of a few select Pokémon, Trainers needed a plan to open up a format that felt small.

Many Trainers formed their strategies by trying to improve on the way past teams had used the format's defining Pokémon. The top teams from the 2015 World Championships inspired many Trainers, leaving a visible impact on many autumn teams. We saw Trainers continue to veer away from giving their Landorus Choice Scarf, more Trainers teaching their Thundurus Protect, and we even saw a rise in Cresselia that knew Skill Swap.

The challenge Trainers faced this autumn was much more difficult than borrowing from the top teams from Boston. After a World Championships dominated by a handful of Pokémon, savvy players realized that the best way to finish near the top would be to find new strategies that could defeat the predictable field of Pokémon. While Kangaskhan and Landorus each chalked up their share of victories at Regionals, we saw a much greater variety of Pokémon finish near the top over the last few weeks than at the World Championships.