{"id":387,"date":"2014-08-10T09:03:42","date_gmt":"2014-08-10T09:03:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bbs.studio-revolution.net\/magazine\/?p=387"},"modified":"2015-01-04T22:49:53","modified_gmt":"2015-01-04T22:49:53","slug":"cheating-in-my-vgc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=387","title":{"rendered":"Cheating? In my VGC?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pok\u00e9mon has always been one of those games where players have access to cheat codes and devices, going all the way back to the first two generations. The Game Shark and Action Replay were staples and made you the cool kid of any school playground. After all, what kid wasn’t amused by the idea of a Sunkern with 999 stats and moves like Flamethrower?\u00a0<\/span>

But there’s the other side of it. People don’t exactly like it when you beat them up with hacked Pok\u00e9mon, and that can be a fair enough viewpoint. Throw in a recent event in this year’s Pok\u00e9mon VGCs (Video Game Competition) in America, and you get an interesting topic of discussion. Here we look at both sides of the debate on how ‘right’ it may be to use the newest of the external devices – the Power Save – to help you prepare for a Pok\u00e9mon competition, and let you weigh up both sides of the debate. Warning – a few battling terms exist in this article.<\/span>


The Issue<\/strong><\/p>\n

So what is the issue mentioned in the introduction?<\/span>

\nIn early July, an official VGC event was held in the U.S. in Indianapolis, Indiana. A stream of the event was hosted, so people could watch battles over the internet. During this stream, a battle started involving a player named Ray Rizzo. Besides being an arguably snazzy name (that alliteration!), the name is actually rather large in the VGC and Pok\u00e9mon scene. After all, he’s won the Pok\u00e9mon\u00a0<\/span>World<\/em>\u00a0Video Game Competition\u00a0<\/span>three times<\/em>\u00a0within the last five years. That’s no small achievement.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, officials at these events do at times check the legality of Pok\u00e9mon used – that is, whether they are hacked, particularly to have impossible stats or moves that would give a player an unfair advantage. But they missed this event, which occurred the moment Ray Rizzo sent out his Pok\u00e9mon, an Aegislash.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Why can’t enchanted ghost swords have a pink aura, huh?<\/em><\/p>\n

While it had the right stats and all the moves it had were legal, the issue that wasn’t picked up by officials, but was by a lot of the watching fans, was that the Pok\u00e9 Ball the Aegislash was in is a Dream Ball. Any casual Pok\u00e9mon fan would know there are different types of Pok\u00e9 Balls – Poke, Great, Ultra, Master being the main ones. A Dream Ball is a 5th generation Ball that was only assigned to Pok\u00e9mon found in the Dream World feature in BW\/B2W2. You can tell the difference between it and any other ball from the animation that plays when you send out a Pok\u00e9mon. The obvious problem is that Aegislash is a 6th generation Pok\u00e9mon. While you can pass down the Pok\u00e9 Ball a Pok\u00e9mon has via breeding in 6th Gen, Kalos Pok\u00e9mon like Honedge cannot get the Dream Ball. It’s only passed down via the mother only, and Ditto cannot pass them down.<\/span><\/p>\n

In short – the Aegislash was obtained with an impossible Pok\u00e9 Ball. This meant that this Pok\u00e9mon was either hacked, or bred from a hacked Pok\u00e9mon. Ergo, he had broken the rules of the tournament.\u00a0<\/span>Take this version of the rules for Australian VGC for example<\/a>:
\n<\/span>
\n2.1. ILLEGALLY MANIPULATED POK\u00c9MON<\/span>
\nThe use of external devices to modify or create items or Pok\u00e9mon in a player\u2019s party is expressly forbidden. Players found to have Pok\u00e9mon or items that have been tampered with will be disqualified from competition, regardless of whether the Pok\u00e9mon or items belong to that player or were traded for.
\n<\/em>

\nWhat’s the big deal with this?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Naturally, something like this draws different opinions. If Ray used a hacked Pok\u00e9mon that had better stats than possible or the such, then it would be clear cut – he cheated to gain an unfair advantage, end of story. However, the only thing that sets this Aegislash aside from any other is that it has a differently coloured Pok\u00e9 Ball, hardly something that will decide the outcome of a battle in itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

He may also have just bred his Pok\u00e9mon from a parent hacked Aegislash, so in a sense people may say this one is ‘legit’. (<\/span>And in fact, Ray later claimed he got a Dream Ball Aegislash from a trade, and hadn’t realised until it was too late, and would have stopped using the Pok\u00e9mon as well<\/a>). And let’s not beat around the bush – a lot of people this Gen still breed Pok\u00e9mon from hacked, perfect, 6IV Ditto that beat PokeBank’s problematic hack checks. The only benefit they have in doing that is saving time spent in getting a good Pok\u00e9mon.<\/span><\/p>\n

So how does one hack?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There’s a few ways, ignoring sending over a hacked Pok\u00e9mon from a previous gen into X&Y that isn’t caught by the Poke Bank filter. But this gen, the most known method involves the Power Save.<\/span>

\n\"\"
\nGotta hack them all!<\/em><\/p>\n

Basically, it works like a Action Replay, and allows you to alter your game’s save file. By inserting the game cart into the Power Save and then connecting online, you can\u00a0edit Pok\u00e9mon on your cart – their gender, whether they are shiny, and also what Pok\u00e9 Ball they have. You can also clone Pok\u00e9mon, obtain as many items as you like, and back up your save file (but not extract it). There are restrictions, such as the inability to trade event Pok\u00e9mon that aren’t officially released yet, and the need for a physical copy of the game (downloaded titles cannot be used). You also can only use specific codes within the device – you cannot create your own.<\/span>

\nThat’s pretty nifty. That said, the rules of the official competition are pretty clear cut. You aren’t allowed to use external devices to help create a Pok\u00e9mon or hold item, and the rules do not make exceptions to having fancy Pok\u00e9 Balls. It flat out states not to use external devices even if you get a hacked Pok\u00e9mon from a trade, and that’s the only way Ray could have gotten such an Aegislash in the end.<\/span><\/p>\n

But many people don’t mind\u00a0what he had done, and that would be the end of the matter, if it hadn’t been for some other online events.<\/span><\/p>\n

You mean there’s more?<\/strong>

\nYep. Someone revealed the following chatlogs on an IRC (Internet Relay Chatroom).<\/span>

\n\"\"
‘f pokemon!!!’ – Three Times Pok\u00e9mon World VGC Champion<\/em>

\nThe general gist is that this is not the only time Ray Rizzo used external devices with his games. This is a direct admission that he used the likes of Pokecheck to gain items. And while chatlogs can always be faked, a number of people followed up by visiting this IRC channel to confirm.\u00a0<\/span>For instance, this is another chatlog confirming that<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The IRC channel in question belongs to\u00a0<\/span>Nugget Bridge, a large fansite dedicated to Pok\u00e9mon VGC<\/a>. While Smogon is more known to the average Pok\u00e9mon fan, they focus on Single Format. When it comes to Doubles and VGC style battling, Nugget Bridge is bigger. And a quote that was found from the site admin:<\/span><\/p>\n

“There’s a big difference between an impossible spread, actual illegal stats, and dumb crap like an impossible ball. People can decide where they want to put their own neurotic line of what shouldn’t be allowed, but it seems pretty clear on TPCI’s end that line is illegal stats or the Pok\u00e9mon itself has shown obvious enough signs of being modified. Really sick of other fansites full of players who have basically zero knowledge of VGC stirring crap in these events about stuff like this. If it was a problem that needed to be solved, it would be.”<\/em>

\nEssentially, staff there have admitted to using such things – if not to hack Pok\u00e9mon, then at least to hack in Pok\u00e9mon for breeding, and items to ease the training time taken.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So… can it be ‘okay’ to hack Pok\u00e9mon?<\/p>\n

That question gets a different answer depending on who you talk to. If you want to go fully by the official rules, then the answer is ‘no’. If you feel otherwise, and only want to use external devices to save time in making your Pok\u00e9mon and training them, you’d say otherwise. And if you don’t care about entering competitions and don’t trade hacks to kids or people who may care about it, then you can also argue that as long as what you do on your game stays there, it’s perfectly fine as it doesn’t affect anybody else. So the general case comes down to whether you feel that, official rules aside, it’s okay to hack only to save yourself time.<\/span>

\n\"\"\"\"
My AR brings all the boys to the yard.<\/em>

\nOne can argue that this isn’t a particularly strong argument these days though. In Generation three, when things about EVs (Effort Values) were not well documented, and there was only one real ‘way’ to EV train that involved beating up specific Pok\u00e9mon a number of times for the exact\u00a0stats you wanted, it was a bother. But nowadays we have the likes of Horde battles to speed up that method, coupled with Power Items (like the Power Brace which give more EVs per battle) and a more common PokeRus (a Pok\u00e9mon in-game disease that doubles EVs gained) thanks to the like of the GTS.<\/span><\/p>\n

And there’s now Super Training, an acknowledgement by Game Freak of the competitive community by implementing a whole minigame to allow for easier EV training. Pok\u00e9miles can be used to buy Rare Candies, and a minimum level of 50 is far easier to reach than level 100 too. Breeding meanwhile has become far more manageable this generation. Nowadays, legitimate 5IV and even 6IV Pok\u00e9mon are far easier to get thanks to the numerous breeding mechanics introduced every generation.<\/span><\/p>\n

But people in general are lazy, and saving time is always a temptation.<\/span><\/p>\n

As for Ray Rizzo, the beef some people have with the whole issue has to do with him being a world champion of the official competitions, three times no less. Sure, his Pok\u00e9mon only had a differently coloured Pok\u00e9 Ball, and as far as we know his other Pok\u00e9mon had legal stats – they were just made and trained quickly via external devices. But that’s not a very good example for a champion to make, especially in the face of such rules. It is also admittedly a bit of a silly mistake by him to not notice the different Pok\u00e9 Ball – he could have used a hacked Aegislash parent that didn’t have a Dream Ball, and nobody would have talked about this in the first place.<\/span><\/p>\n

An important point too is that there is a case where a Pok\u00e9mon in a hacked Pok\u00e9 Ball could have an influence in the battle. If you sent a Pokemon in an Apricorn Ball (back from 4th Gen) that had a Hidden Ability (a combination that is impossible), then the opponent could assume the Pok\u00e9mon doesn’t have that ability and act accordingly. While this isn’t the case here, it does show that even the smallest details can be used in such competitions.<\/span><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Nugget Bridge deleted any discussion on the incident<\/a>. A key point is that here we have people from the most influential and well known VGC community, admitting and even condoning the use of such items. No wonder people feel a bit ticked off, and I personally feel that mere discussion about a rather polarising event for the fandom isn’t something that should be prevented.<\/span><\/p>\n

So where do you stand? Are you fine with people hacking Pok\u00e9mon and using them in competitions, as long as they have legal stats and moves? Or are you completely against it, no matter what?<\/span><\/p>\n

Written by bobandbill
\n<\/em>Edited by Hoenn, Musty and Slayr231
\nSunkern images by Magic<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pok\u00e9mon has always been one of those games where players have access to cheat codes and devices, going all the way back to the first two generations. The Game Shark and Action Replay were staples and made you the cool kid of any school playground. After all, what kid wasn’t amused by the idea of … Continue reading “Cheating? In my VGC?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,23],"tags":[195,189,183,188,184,31,191,190,185,192,194,30,187,186,182,193,112,12,32],"class_list":["post-387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-opinions","tag-195","tag-action-replay","tag-aegislash","tag-ar","tag-banned","tag-bbs","tag-cheating","tag-dream-ball","tag-hacked","tag-nugget-bridge","tag-official","tag-pokemon","tag-power-save","tag-powersave","tag-ray-rizzo","tag-rules","tag-vgc","tag-wynaut","tag-wynaut-magazine"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3SwsJ-6f","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":20,"url":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=20","url_meta":{"origin":387,"position":0},"title":"Pokemon Analysis: Wynaut and Wobbuffet!","author":"bobandbill","date":"April 21, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Pokemon Analysis: Wynaut and Wobbuffet! They sure look excited. Because what better set of Pokemon could one possibly use for the first magazine analysis than these? Other Pokemon to grab the spotlight later on shall be chosen by a random number generator, but these two get the exception solely because\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Articles"","block_context":{"text":"Articles","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":76,"url":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=76","url_meta":{"origin":387,"position":1},"title":"Opinion: Emulator Legitimacy","author":"bobandbill","date":"July 26, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Nowadays Game Boys, Game Boy Colors and Game Boy Advances (SDs) seem out of reach. Impossible to get now. Then great minds decided to dump the files of their GBA cartridges and make ROMs. Then further sciences on the internet made a practical way to play these ROMs or \"Read\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Articles"","block_context":{"text":"Articles","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":498,"url":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=498","url_meta":{"origin":387,"position":2},"title":"Pok\u00e9mon Go Announcement","author":"bobandbill","date":"September 10, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The Pok\u00e9mon Company today has had a press conference - a curious event for them. They have just announced a new game called Pok\u00e9mon Go for a 2016 release, a project for smartphones (Android and iPhones). People can catch, trade and battle Pokemon using their phones and AR technology, a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Articles"","block_context":{"text":"Articles","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":222,"url":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=222","url_meta":{"origin":387,"position":3},"title":"Top Ten Most Annoying Pokemon of All Time (until generation six)!","author":"bobandbill","date":"September 14, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Just like the title says, we will be collecting some of the most annoying pokemon and attempting to organize them into some sort of top ten. After some extensive research and lots of polling, I found a wide range of pokemon excelling in the art of making people rip their\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Articles"","block_context":{"text":"Articles","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10,"url":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=10","url_meta":{"origin":387,"position":4},"title":"Welcome!","author":"An-chan","date":"April 13, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Welcome to the BBS Magazine, Wynaut?! Why did we call it that? Well...wynaut? Wynaut? is a blog magazine dedicated to the more creative side of the wonderfully immense and confusing world of Pok\u00e9mon. Nothing on here is official, of course; it's all run by fans, for fans. This is most\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Start here!"","block_context":{"text":"Start here!","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?cat=10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":196,"url":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?p=196","url_meta":{"origin":387,"position":5},"title":"Nicknames for Lotad, Lombre and Ludicolo!","author":"bobandbill","date":"June 29, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"A while ago, we wrote the article on the Lotad line, and now the Name Rater wants to see what you can come up with in regards to names for these Pok\u00e9mon! After all, he's gotten rather bored with the lack of names to rate since the naming of Wyatt,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Name Rater"","block_context":{"text":"Name Rater","link":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/?cat=22"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=387"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":445,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387\/revisions\/445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.thecoldstorage.uk\/magazine\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}