victory_road | Battle Convention!

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Battle Convention!

Early Saturday morning, the doors of one of the largest --if not the largest-- convention centres in Viridian City open to welcome everybody to this years Battle Convention.

Spread out across several floors, and the battling fields outside, the Battle Convention is the place to be for anyone with an interest in pokemon battling. Whether you are a hardcore battler trying to hone your craft even further, or a newcomer to the battling scene hoping to learn, the Battle Convention has things of interest to everybody. It's promising to be a busy event, with trainers attending from all over Johto and Kanto. Famous battlers and gym leaders alike can be spotted in the crowds, hosting workshops or even entering in the tournaments.

The Tournament Ground

Outside of the convention centre, stands have been erected around at least a dozen Pokemon battle fields. This is where the various Tournaments will be held. Throughout the weekend, three tournaments will be held here. There is the Otherworlder Battle Tournament, a separate tournament for native Elite Four Champions, and a third Li'l Champs tournament for trainers under the age of ten.

Viewing the various battles is absolutely free, and could be a good source of insight into battle strategies employed by some of the best battlers in the region. Or, if you are attending the Li'l Champs tournament -- a most adorable insight into the dedication and friendship between young children and their first Pokemon.

Due to the number of battles, at any given time, various battles will be ongoing. The Li'l Champs tournament will be held on Sunday, while both the Otherworlder battle tournament and the Elite Four Champions battle tournament will have most of their preliminary matches held on Saturday, with the finale few matches on Sunday.

So, if you are done shopping (or maybe just ran out of money) and there aren't any workshops catching your eye, why not come down to the Tournament Grounds and catch a few battles?

First Floor

The first floor of the Convention Centre has been reserved entirely for various workshops and battle demonstrations. In essence, whatever topic related to battling you might be interested in -- whether it is using certain moves or items, battle strategies, or even demonstrations on why you should be adding X type to your roster -- you'll probably find someone here willing to talk about it. Even breeders might find something of interest here, as there are a few people giving workshops on how to breed pokemon for battle-minded customers.

Schedules are available so you won't miss anything you are interested in. Some of these workshops might only be given once, while others are repeated a few times throughout the convention, so make sure to check your schedule!

And among the crowd giving demonstration and workshops, you might even find a few familiar faces -- yes, members of the Aurora League have also been given the chance to speak about any battle topics near to their heart. Why not check out what they have to say?

Second Floor

The second floor of the Convention Centre has been reserved for the important business of commerce. Have some money to burn? Want that sweet serotonin boost of buying a thing? Maybe you deserve a little treat after winning (or losing) your battle. If so, head on up here.

Spread across various rooms, the Battle Convention dealers have everything that could be of interest to a trainer. There is, frankly, far too much to list here individually, so please accept this rough list of what your characters can find here.

Held Items -- it is possible to buy held items here, however the vast majority of them are pretty rare, so sellers will only sell you one of each. Buying several different held items is fine, but you won't find anyone willing to sell you five Amulet coins. The only exception is for held items that also double as evolutionary items. Those can be freely bought in any quantity.
TMs -- It is also possible (though might require some searching across various dealers) to buy any kind of single-use TM here. The same rules apply as with Held Items -- TMs that are currently available in stores can be bought at any quantity; TMs outside of that are limited to one per person.
Eggs -- There is also a small group of professional breeders present where you can order eggs with egg moves. The eggs themselves will be delivered to you in the days after the tournament. There is no limit on the amount of egg moves you can request for your egg, but there is a hefty price tag involved! These are professional breeders, so expect a base price of 6000p per egg, with 1000p per requested egg move.
Training Equipment -- it's also possible to buy all manner of training equipment for your pokemon. From weights to training bags to agility aids -- if you can think of something that could help you train your pokemon in a more efficient manner, you can find it here. And the bigger items can be delivered to where you are staying, so you won't have to carry around a giant Wailord Training Bag.
Odds and Ends -- In addition to all this very focused battle stuff, you'll also be able to find general pokemon items, such a wide variety of Pokeballs, Evolutionary Items, Vitamins and Potions and such. All of these will be sold for the same price as in stores.

However in addition to all of these items, the Silph Co. Booth is drawing a lot of attention. There is an announcement that they will be unveiling something truly special on Sunday, so all of Saturday is awash in rumours and guesses. There is talk that whatever they will be unveiling will be one of the prices in the tournament, though who knows if that is true. When Sunday finally comes, there is a huge crowd around the booth, watching as Silph Co. unveils

EXP-Share, the newest held item to make your training a little easier.

The EXP-Share, which will go on sale in the department stores after this weekend, is a new type of held item. Once given to a Pokemon, this Pokemon will receive EXP during battles, even while not battling itself. Have a Pokemon that is difficult to train like Magikarp? Did you just hatch a new Pokemon, but you are in an area where the wild Pokemon are too high in level for them to train against? Why not give them an EXP-Share and have them comfortably gain EXP without risking them in battle.

Battle Convention attendants can get an early start on buying an EXP-Share, though they are limited to one per customer. The price is 40,000p.

Third Floor

This is where you can go if you need a little break from all the hustle and bustle downstairs. Various food vendors and sit-down places have been set up here, allowing characters to grab a meal or something to drink, rest a little, or even go strategise for upcoming tournament battles.

As always with these type of events UBIRDS will be available to fly characters to Viridian City and back to where they were staying afterwards.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Really? I didn't know that they weren't always around. But yeah, I can see that. Given how hard it'd be to go back, it'd make more sense to try taking on the gym while you're there."

That's what she probably would have done too, if there weren't the warp pads to make things easier.

"Yes, there was considerably more emphasis on obtaining Pokemon that could use Fly at the time, too. For example, to travel between Ecruteak and Olivine as quickly as possible, one would need to bring at least three or four flyers and fly them in shifts, so each had a chance to rest. And it would still take nearly a full day to make the trip even so."

Have fun imagining what that was like!

"Of course, that combined with the fact that otherworlders hadn't been in this world long meant that there was, on occasion, a degree of competition between some to see who could set a record for the fastest time to obtain a region's badges."

"Oh yeah. Mira and I traveled between those two cities before the whole...Hisui thing, and it felt like it took ages. But even with Fly it could still take a while, huh?"

The warps are certainly convenient then.

She can't help a light laugh. "Somehow, I'm not really surprised. Given how competitive this world can be, people trying to race to get badges in as short a time as possible makes sense."

"It does, yes. Flying Pokemon are quite fast, but it still takes up to a few hours to cover the same distance that takes about a day to traverse on foot. If you're crossing a route that would take, say, a week normally, you might be able to make it flying in one day... But only if you're will to spend the entire day traveling, and bring enough flyers that they can take turns resting."

Is Sion speaking from experience? Your better believe it. He used exactly this method to cut the total time traveling Victory Road in half way back in the day.

"Indeed. But since the addition of the warp pads it's largely become moot at this point, really. I doubt it's very satisfying to beat an old record when the circumstances have completely changed, after all."

What Sion's not mentioning: that he's probably still one of the top record holders for obtaining a full sixteen badges prior to the warp pads.

Luisa nods. "I guess that makes sense. It definitely cuts the time down, but it would get exhausting for the Pokemon too. Unless you brought more Flying ones, like you said."

It had been about the same the day Mirabel arrived; the Rapidash that Dimitri had let her borrow certainly cut the travel time down, but she had still worried about pushing him too hard.

"That's probably true, although you can't really use the warps unless you've already been to the town they go to, right? So people could still probably try seeing how fast they can go in one run without the warp pads."

"While that's true, it's impossible to complete the full circuit without backtracking a few times, which means it becomes less a question of how quickly you can travel while still training your team to be strong enough, and more a chore of optimizing your route for when you'll revisit cities to cut down on time. Or so I'd presume, at least."

It's part of his theory on why that sort of competition has died out, in any case.

"Yeah, I guess that makes sense. But it is kind of nice too, getting to bond and train our Pokemon without having to worry as much about running out of supplies between towns."

Then again, the days traveling and camping out does help a bit with bonding as well.

It can definitely help with bonding, yes, as well as being rigorous training. On the other hand, though, one was limited to working with whatever six Pokemon were brought along at a given time.

"I don't think I ever had particular issues with supplies..." says the guy who once spent weeks exploring the Whirl Islands for funsies. "Though it's much easier to keep a balanced training regimen in town."

"It was mostly when I was first starting out, and didn't have a lot of money for things. And it can be hard to really know how of things to get before heading out." She shrugs a little. "But that could've just been me. I was also pretty unfamiliar with a lot of things that most people already knew about."

Like the technology.

"Had you traveled much before, or otherwise had to plan for such?"

Prior experience definitely can make a difference.

"Though, convenient as much of the technology is, there's a certain lack of options available to us when it comes to traveling a route for the first time..."

Like motorized vehicles. It'd sure be nice to have one of those.

She shakes her head. "No, not really. The town where my sister and I came from is pretty secluded and protected by mountains. So it's safe, but it's hard to really...go anywhere."

And with as much as their family did for the Encanto, no one had really ever planned on ever leaving anyway.

"Yeah, especially when we first get here. It's hard to travel to that next town with barely anything."

"Pokémon can often help with it, but it does often involve a lot of roughing it, yes."

He'd never had much issue, but, well, Sion's used to not having a cushy life.

"It's the worst if you happen to arrive during cold weather, though."

"Yeah. I came it was the middle of winter, so it had been pretty tough. But thankfully a lot of people were willing to help out."

She had just been getting used accepting help from people, but having so little when starting out, she didn't have much choice. It was getting easier now.

"That's actually another thing that the warp pads have changed, come to think of it. Unless someone was very lucky and there happened to be someone else in Cherrygrove at the time they arrived, it was a choice between waiting for days in New Bark Town or at least walking as far as Cherrygrove, even for supplies to be brought or sent."

Sion remembers the days of 'I can get to Cherrygrove/Violet City by the time you get there' after all. He can't say it's particularly fond memories, though.

"Oh, I guess that's true, huh? I can't even imagine how tough that must have been for people before."

And this was coming from someone who didn't even have this kind of technology back home.

"I believe that, in a way, it was harder on those already here than on the newest arrivals themselves. After all, someone new to this world doesn't know what to expect, and hasn't had time to start feeling homesick yet. But someone who'd been here for months, seeing that a friend or family member had arrived, only to be on the far side of the region at the time..."

He shrugs. It probably spoke for itself, really.

"But that hasn't been the case for some time now, and there are few people remaining here who were around for it, anyway."

Luisa frowns a little. "Yeah...that's kind of what happened when my sister had first arrived. The warp pads really did make it easier for me to get back in order to help her, but there was still having to travel the route in order to get back to New Bark. Luckily someone had been willing to help both of us out."

She couldn't imagine what it would have been like during the time before the warp pads, if she'd been stuck in a town too far away to get to her sister.

"Really? Were there a lot of people back then?"

Sion's never had someone from his world arrive since he's been here, so he doesn't have a lot of personal experience, but he still can imagine it fairly well.

"I don't know any exact numbers, but I believe there used to be more years ago than there are now, yes. Certainly there was much more activity on the Pokégears more regularly then."

"Wow. It feels like there's a lot of people here already, it's hard to imagine even more."

Then again, she comes from a pretty small town where everyone pretty much knows everyone, so maybe she can't really say.

"Well, I'm speaking just in regards to the otherworlders like us, of course. There's always been essentially the same number of locals, after all."

Really, there's a lot he knows about the older times that's changed in the years since. Years. He's really been here a while...

"Yeah. I always thought there were a lot of us here, but maybe I just haven't met enough people yet."

There did seem to be a lot of people when they were all gathered together, though.

"As I recall, when I first arrived, otherworlders tended to show up in batches of sorts, at regular intervals. Over time, fewer tended to arrive at once, and those intervals became irregular."

He's been here a long time, things have changed quite a bit!

"Oh really? That is a bit strange then. I wonder what happened that less people are coming."

Not that she would really want a lot of people feeling like they'd been abducted and dropped in an unknown world.

"I imagine that if we had the answer to that, we would also be much closer to knowing how to send people home."

Which would be a plus, in his opinion. Especially if they could have some degree of control over it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Battle Convention!

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