Hi! My name is Federico Camporesi and I recently got Top 4 at the 2023 Pokemon World Championships, my best placement in an official tournament nowadays, also the reason why I’m writing this.
I started playing tournaments in 2017 in the Senior division, where I played until the circuit stopped in 2020 getting good results like 3 Regional wins and 2 International finals.
But I never cut worlds in that division, I had another attempt in Masters at the 2022 World Championships, but I lost the win-and-in again.
Table of Contents
Teambuilding process
Before chosing my final team, I struggled a bit in my first prep phase, that started about 3 or 4 weeks before Worlds, also because of the new ruleset that didn’t have any official tournament play yet. So I had to try every kind of team to understand what fits my playstyle better and which archetype was the strongest for Worlds in my opinion.
I started my prep with a Tailwind team, that was the most popular archetype on the high ladder and also saw it doing well in many Japanese tournaments and in the Malaga tournament won by Eric Rios. I stayed in the top ladder of showdown for a week, peaking at 1950, but every day I felt more that the team was a “ladder garbage” and didn’t feel good about it in best-of-3 sets, especially in a tournament like Worlds where you are most likely facing only very good players.
It was about one week before Worlds and I didn’t have a team I was confident with, so I decided to try a new archetype. I decided to move to a Trick Room archetype, since I felt I wanted to have some kind of speed control on my team, regardless if it was Tailwind or Trick Room. I wanted to have a team that was not forced to have the Trick Room on the field to work, so I was looking into a fast and offensive core to pair with Ursaluna and Cresselia, the best Trick Room duo in the metagame.
I found my solution so fast, by just playing some ladder games. I matched with a guy that ended up being Nikolaj Høj Nielsen, who also got Top 8 at Worlds. He had 4 accounts over the 1900s on the ladder, and was playing the Trick Room duo alongside Speed-boosting Flutter Mane, Dragonite, Single Strike Style Urshifu and Iron Hands.
It was exactly what I was looking for, so I decided to copy the open teamsheet, change and improve what I didn’t like about the original team and give this team a try in the ESM Open, my last online tournament before worlds. I ended up winning the tournament, so I kept the most of the sets I played in the tournament and brought the team to Worlds.
The Team
Get the team’s paste here!
Ursaluna @ Flame Orb
Ability: Guts
Level: 50
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def
Brave Nature
IVs: 0 Spe
– Earthquake
– Facade
– Swords Dance
– Protect
The main damage dealer of the team, also the main Trick Room abuser. I think Swords Dance and 0 Speed IVs is the best way to abuse the Trick Room. Also I just went for a 252 HP, 252+ Atk EV spread, since I think you need to have the max amount of available damage to abuse the advantage that a Trick Room gives. I just used 4 points on Defense to optimize the rolls of Urshifu’s Wicked Blow and Surging Strikes.
The Ghost Tera Type is basically the best to avoid Fake Out that can stall the Trick Room turns otherwise, and is also good for Fighting-type moves, of course.
252+ Atk Urshifu-Rapid Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Ursaluna on a critical hit: 204-252 (86 – 106.3%) — approx. 12.5% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Urshifu-Single Strike Wicked Blow vs. 252 HP / 4 Def Tera-Ghost Ursaluna on a critical hit: 204-242 (86 – 102.1%) — 12.5% chance to OHKO
Cresselia @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Levitate
Level: 50
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 252 HP / 156 Def / 100 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
– Lunar Blessing
– Trick Room
– Ally Switch
– Moonblast
Cresselia is the main support of the entire team, and of course the best partner for Ursaluna. I went for a spread that allowed me a balanced bulk in both defenses, something that allows Cresselia to set up Trick Room without being forced to Terastallize in most situations.
I went for a Water Tera Type despite the fact that most players were playing the Fairy Tera Type, since I liked to be allowed to use it in front of Chien-Pao + Rapid Strike Style Urshifu, Chi-Yu + Flutter Mane and Steel types like Gholdengo.
I think Moonblast and Ally Switch is the best way to close the moveset, with the first move giving you a good coverage to hit some common Pokémon despite the low Special Attack, while Ally Switch is so good with open teamsheets even when you don’t want to click it, since it creates mindgames for your opponent. Also it’s possible to use it to sometimes escape bad situations or to just try to get a better turn in some passive situations (for example, avoiding opposing Grimmsnarl’s Parting Shots).
0 SpA Cresselia Moonblast vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Urshifu-Single Strike: 172-204 (98.2 – 116.5%) — 87.5% chance to OHKO
0 SpA Cresselia Moonblast vs. 0 HP / 4 SpD Chien-Pao: 80-96 (51.6 – 61.9%) — guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Black Glasses Urshifu-Single Strike Wicked Blow vs. 252 HP / 156+ Def Cresselia on a critical hit: 188-224 (82.8 – 98.6%) — guaranteed 2HKO
252+ SpA Choice Specs Flutter Mane Shadow Ball vs. 252 HP / 100 SpD Cresselia: 182-216 (80.1 – 95.1%) — guaranteed 2HKO
Iron Hands @ Assault Vest
Ability: Quark Drive
Level: 50
Tera Type: Water
EVs: 140 HP / 156 Atk / 4 Def / 204 SpD / 4 Spe
Adamant Nature
– Heavy Slam
– Fake Out
– Drain Punch
– Wild Charge
Iron Hands is basically the most solid Pokémon in the metagame, and also the best way to connect a Trick Room core to an offensive one. It is a very good support to set up with Fake Out, and also abuses the Trick Room itself. That’s why I went for a very offensive and slow spread, that also allows to win the most 1v1s with the other Iron Hands, that frequently are less physically bulky in order to have more Speed.
I went for the Water Tera Type for the same reasons as Cresselia. It is also one of the best defensive typings, and the team doesn’t have problems with Amoonguss (which would be the only reason to run Grass over Water) thanks to the Safety Goggles Cresselia with Lunar Blessing.
I don’t have anything to say about the moves, which I think are basically the best four you can run.
Iron Hands ended up being the Pokémon that I used the most times during Worlds, bringing it almost every battle when using both the Trick Room mode and the fast mode.
156+ Atk Iron Hands Wild Charge vs. 4 HP / 0 Def Urshifu-Rapid Strike: 168-200 (95.4 – 113.6%) — 75% chance to OHKO
156+ Atk Iron Hands Drain Punch vs. 140 HP / 4 Def Iron Hands: 66-78 (26.7 – 31.5%) — guaranteed 4HKO (8,2% to 3HKO after a Fake Out)
236+ Atk Mystic Water Sword of Ruin Tera-Water Urshifu-Rapid Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 140 HP / 4 Def Iron Hands on a critical hit: 210-252 (85 – 102%) — approx. 6.3% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Guts Ursaluna Earthquake vs. 140 HP / 4 Def Iron Hands: 206-246 (83.4 – 99.5%) — guaranteed 2HKO
116+ SpA Protosynthesis Tera-Fairy Flutter Mane Moonblast vs. 140 HP / 204 SpD Assault Vest Iron Hands: 204-244 (82.5 – 98.7%) — guaranteed 2HKO
Flutter Mane @ Booster Energy
Ability: Protosynthesis
Level: 50
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 116 HP / 60 Def / 196 SpA / 4 SpD / 132 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
– Moonblast
– Shadow Ball
– Icy Wind
– Protect
Speed-boosting Booster Energy Flutter Mane with Icy Wind was a very good way to make the fast core stronger with more speed control. The Speed was meant to outspeed Regieleki, the fastest Pokémon of the ruleset, with the Booster Energy activated. It also allows to be always faster than the Adamant Chien-Pao and Modest Flutter Mane even when the boost isn’t active. I decided to speed-creep this amount by 1 (189 instead of 188) since I thought it would have been a common Speed. I then went for a very high Special Attack, since I felt I needed to fix the lack of firepower due to not having an offense-boosting item. This ended in a spread with very low bulk that is still enough for some specific important calcs.
252+ Atk Sword of Ruin Chien-Pao Sucker Punch vs. 116 HP / 60 Def Flutter Mane: 120-142 (82.7 – 97.9%) — guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Mystic Water Sword of Ruin Tera-Water Urshifu-Rapid Strike Aqua Jet vs. 116 HP / 60 Def Flutter Mane: 118-140 (81.3 – 96.5%) — guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Black Glasses Urshifu-Single Strike Sucker Punch vs. 116 HP / 60 Def Flutter Mane: 115-136 (79.3 – 93.7%) — guaranteed 2HKO
Urshifu-Single-Strike @ Focus Sash
Ability: Unseen Fist
Level: 50
Tera Type: Dark
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 Def / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
– Close Combat
– Wicked Blow
– Sucker Punch
– Protect
Nothing special to say, Urshifu has the most broken ability of the game and it is a must for every offensive core, since it pairs very well with the Speed-boosting Flutter Mane and Ursaluna. It fits perfectly in this team! The Dark type allows this Pokémon to destroy every Ghost type, which also is a Tera Type commonly used against this team since it protects from Ursaluna’s Facade and Iron Hands’s Fake Out and Drain Punch.
Since I had a free Focus Sash, I used it on this Pokémon with a Dark Tera Type to just have a better Wicked Blow spam.
Dragonite @ Choice Band
Ability: Inner Focus
Level: 50
Tera Type: Flying
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
– Tera Blast
– Ice Spinner
– Extreme Speed
– Stomping Tantrum
The exotic pick of this team. Dragonite used to have Normal Tera Type and not be that fast in most teams, also being played only alongside Chien-Pao. Its use dropped in the last period before Worlds.
This max Speed Flying-Tera Type Dragonite pairs very well with the Speed-boosting Flutter Mane, since they both are immune to Fake Out. Flutter Mane + Dragonite is a lead with a very high offensive pressure that can be deadly if your opponents don’t read it well. Furthermore, many people didn’t expect Dragonite to be that fast, with a Speed that allows it to be faster than almost every Pokémon in the metagame after an Icy Wind. EV spreads are the only way to get a surprise effect by playing with open teamsheets, so a strange spread was something that was missing in the team.
Regarding the moves, I chose Ice Spinner as the filler slot to get a good damage on Rillaboom without being forced to Terastallize, which also removes the Grassy Terrain that decreases the power of Ursaluna’s Earthquake. It is also very good against Indeedee.
How to use the team
I didn’t have a lot of specific plans, also because of the very few time I had to prepare after I decided to use that team. I still had some standard leads for the games 1 of some matchups that I’ll show you. The thing I liked the most about the team was the possibility to completely change your mode between games, so also the way the best-of-3 sets goes during game 1 influences the choices in games 2 and 3.
Click on the tabs to see some notes!
Lead +
Back and a filler
That lead is almost a must. You won’t be able to set up the Trick Room every time because of Covert Cloak or Ghost-Tera Type Tornadus, but forcing the opponent to lead and Terastallize with it is a very good thing to manage the match in a better way. Cresselia can also be saved to set up a Trick Room in the late game or use Moonblast to deal high damage to many common Pokémon that are used in the Tailwind archetypes, like Chien-Pao and Urshifu.
Lead +
Back
Ursaluna without Cresselia is fine in the mirror, since you have a higher firepower than your opponent. You can abuse the Trick Room if the opponent sets it up themselves, while if they don’t you just have Dragonite and Urshifu, powerful and offensive Pokémon outside of Trick Room.
Lead + /
Back, /
This is a very tricky match-up and depens on the plays turn by turn. The plan can be adapted in so many ways; the Flutter Mane + Dragonite mode is very good too, but you need to hard-read the opponent’s lead.
So Cresselia + Iron Hands is the plan I went for in game 1 most times (you can always use the other mode as well). An Ursaluna lead is a good way to surprise the opponents sometimes, and to get a very tough offense faster, also being allowed to use Swords Dance if the opponent doesn’t lead with Amoonguss. Never lead Ursaluna if the opponent has Taunt Urshifu, since you would need the Fake Out to set up Trick Room.
Lead +
Back
Nothing special to say, just spam attacks with the lead while also removing the terrain with Ice Spinner, then clean up with Ursaluna in the back. As I said before, I don’t have any other specific plan, because of the few time I had to prepare and also the fact the team was based so much on adapting game by game, so I thought it was not important to flowchart everything.
Tournament run
Day 1
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R1 | WW |  Lauri Halonen (Latsu7) |     |  |
| R2 | WW |  Francesco Pero (CICCIOTT) | | |
| R3 | WLW |  Adam Cherfaoui (Shao) |   | |
| R4 | WLL | Francesco Iozzia (Young Nova) |   | |
| R5 | WW |  Akatoki Sakamoto (syaronalex) | | |
| R6 | WW |  Tang Shiliang (20亮亮) |  | |
Click on the tabs to see some notes about my matches!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R1 | WW | Lauri Halonen (Latsu7) | | |
I started the tournament facing Lauri. He is a good player, but this match was a pretty easy win, probably also because of the match-up being good for me.
I didn’t see so many ways for him to stop a well-placed Ursaluna or an offensive spam from Dragonite + Urshifu, so I won one game with each mode.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R2 | WW | Francesco Pero (CICCIOTT) | | |
A good player and also a friend, I had to play an almost full mirror with Francesco, who had 5 out of the 6 same Pokémon as me.
I had a small advantage because of my Focus Sash Urshifu, while his had Black Glasses.
I still had to make hard reads to win that match, and for example in game 1 I ended up winning by going for Wicked Blow with Urshifu predicting a Poison-Tera Type Terastallization on that turn.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R3 | WLW | Adam Cherfaoui (Shao) | | |
Adam is one of the players that beat me the most times during the season, so I knew it was going to be a tough match.
His team was kind of strange and had the answers to mine. I managed to win the match at the third game by leading aggressively with Ursaluna + Cresselia, taking some risks.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R4 | WLL | Francesco Iozzia (Young Nova) | | |
I then faced my friend Francesco with a tough match-up. I was scared of Fairy-Tera Type Kingambit, since it counters most of my team. I still was able to win by playing very well with my Ursaluna Trick Room mode.
I technically made it and won the set 2-0, but in this round my Ursaluna got removed from my team after the hack check, which also resulted in a game loss for the current match. Since I had to play the third game without Ursaluna, I just lost since I didn’t have a win condition for that match-up.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R5 | WW | Akatoki Sakamoto (syaronalex) | | |
I had to play without Ursaluna starting from this round. My opponent knew it and went for Iron Hands + Amoonguss lead in the first game, a lead that was very tough to face without the bear, but I luckily managed to win game 1 thanks to a double Protect in the late game. I then won game 2 by just spamming Moonblast and Tera Blast on the right slots with my Flutter Mane + Dragonite lead.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R6 | WW | Tang Shiliang (20亮亮) | | |
I had my first win-and-in for the Day 2 against Shiliang, a very good player who also won a Regional this season. Luckily for me, the fact Shiliang had a double Intimidate on his team makes the missing of Ursaluna less important, since I probably would have played this match-up without it even if I was able to. I managed to win both games thanks to Cresselia paired with the offensive Pokémon; it helped me contain the huge offense of Shiliang’s team, and of course to set up the Trick Room and have an answer to the Tailwind.
Day 2 Swiss rounds
Click on the tabs to see some notes about my matches!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R1 | LL |  Maurice Uteg (Miku) |  | |
In the first round I faced Maurice. He is a very good player and also has a team that can be very tough to face for my Ursaluna, thanks to Grimmsnarl + Intimidate. Maurice played very well, also some bad luck made things harder for me in both games, but I can’t complain so much about this since my opponent didn’t make mistakes. Also, I have been lucky enough with the match-ups in Day 1 after my Ursaluna got removed, so it’s fine to start Day 2 in this way.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R2 | WLW | Mizuki Sasaki (しらたま) | | |
I had a very tough match by playing against the most common Japanese goodstuffs, a team which also ended up winning the whole thing. Games always were very close, but I probably could have played so much better the one I lost, since I let my Ursaluna get a free Spore for my opponent and he managed to win by easily stalling my Trick Room. Luckily for me, I started playing well again in game 3 and I won it with the right reads.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R3 | LWW | Baris Akcos (>BillaVGC<) |    | |
Baris had the craziest team of Worlds, and I was so confused in the first team preview. I didn’t know what to do and I was not able to predict his choices at all, which ended up in getting destroyed in game 1. I immediately understood his gameplan and how the team works, so I managed to win the next two games and the set, but it was very tough overall.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R4 | WW |  Jiseok Lee (282) | |  |
I then faced Jiseok, one of the best players in the world, in my opinion. He was playing Suica’s team, but with a few changes. He didn’t have a very solid way to avoid the Trick Room setup, so I went for it both games and won without too many problems. I still had to make some hard reads, but nothing incredible.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R5 | LWL | Shohei Kimura (ナンス) | |  |
And here we are! Of course nobody knew it at the moment of the match, but I had to play the World Champion Shohei. The set was very tough, but I also enjoyed it so much, and it had hard reads from both sides. Unluckily, I had some bad luck with rolls and sleep turns in both the games I lost, and of course it was enough to lose to a top player like Shohei.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R6 | LWW | Ren Kotorii (オレンジ) |   | |
I then faced Ren, another player that got Top 8 at the Japan National. He was playing a very unusual team with Incarnate Forme Landorus. I lost game 1 by losing 2 out of 2 speed ties with my Urshifu against his, but he also played better in some turns. I then was lucky enough to win a game thanks to the speed ties as well, and outplayed him in the last one.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R7 | WW |  Kyle Livinghouse (Animus) | | |
My win-and-in was against Kyle and he was playing one of the teams I lost to most times during my Worlds prep. But just thanks to those many losses I exactly knew what to do in that match-up, and the more experience with it probably is the reason why I got an easy win in game 1. The match was still open and Kyle adapted to my gameplan in a very good way in game 2 and was about to win, but I was very lucky and avoided a Leaf Storm from his Amoonguss to my Ursaluna. This won me the game and saved me from playing a third game, so I can’t complain any more about the previous unlucky losses.
Top Cut
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 26 | WW | Anthony Liuzzo (Glum) | | |
| Top 16 | WLW | Luca Lussignoli (MOODY GIRL) |  |  |
| Top 8 | WW |  Abdullah Mohayyuddin (sempra) | |  |
| Top 4 | LL | Michael Kelsch (Michi) |  | |
Click on the tabs to see some notes about my matches!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 26 | WW | Anthony Liuzzo (Glum) | | |
I then had to win one last match to get to the Top 16, and it is against Anthony, who’s playing a kind of strange team. The match-up was not hard for me and I easily won both games, since his team overall suffered so hard from Iron Hands + Single Strike Style Urshifu.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 16 | WLW | Luca Lussignoli (MOODY GIRL) | | |
Another Italian match, Luca was on fire this day and went safe directly to top 16 by going 7-0 in the Day 2 Swiss rounds. Also, I think his team was one of the best calls of this tournament.
He was able to put me in trouble thanks to his Ghost-Tera Type Pelipper with Wide Guard, which can make Ursaluna completely useless if paired well with Gholdengo. I still brought my Ursaluna in every game, since I needed to force him to do this, so that my Urshifu would have been able to get many kills against the Ghost-type Pokémon. I won game 1 thanks to that, but Luca understood very well my intentions and outplayed me in game 2.
In game 3, we got a disconnection that hit the entire top 16 table. It happened in a 3v2 position for me, which resulted in a tie and forced us to go to sudden death. The position was very tricky and it is impossible to define who was going to win if the game didn’t crash. I then won the match in the sudden death by a very aggressive read, going for Stomping Tantrum + Wild Charge on Amoonguss, which switched on Gholdengo.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 8 | WW | Abdullah Mohayyuddin (sempra) | | |
Abdullah is one of the best players in the world right now, but he was playing the exact 6 Pokémon as Luca, so my top 16 was a very good prep match going into this one. Also, his sets were so much worse than Luca’s ones, at least in the match-up against my team, especially since his Pelipper didn’t have the Ghost Tera Type, and his Amoonguss didn’t have a Sitrus Berry.
Knowing this, I played this match in a very confident way since I just beat the strongest version of that match-up. You can see the full match in the link below, since this was my streamed match!
You can watch my Top 8 set versus Abdullah here, starting on 12:23:38!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 4 | LL | Michael Kelsch (Michi) | | |
My run ended when I had to face Michael, an insanely good player who is here at his first competitive season. Unluckily for me, my match-up against Michael’s team was almost impossible to win, and also I didn’t have time to prepare this match after the Top 8, while Michael just beat my same team in his Top 8 match.
This ended up in being destroyed by him, who got a deserved Worlds final. This match was played in a side-stream.
You can watch my Top 4 set versus Michael here!
Conclusion
To be honest I didn’t expect to reach such a high placement. I probably would not have been able to reach it without Il Server, my best friends in the community and also the guys that help me prepare for major tournaments. I also have to thank everybody who supported me from home. Last but not least to all my other friends and family who supported me like always.
With this placement, I’m now already qualified for the 2024 Worlds in Honolulu, so I may take a break from tournaments in the future. I don’t want to do it immediately though, so see you all at Barcelona Special Event in a couple of weeks!
You can watch here a video team report in Italian!
Also, here is the team. Enjoy it!
