Master League PVP

The gloves are off. You think you're ready to tackle the high-octane, no-holds-barred combat of Master League PvP! There are no CP limits here - so every Pokemon must be leveled to the max, and 9 times out of 10 you'll be fighting with maxed Legendaries. (This means you yourself should be Trainer Level 40!) If you're ready to kiss your Stardust and Rare Candy goodbye and conquer Master League battling, then do your homework, buckle in, and get practicing with your sparring partners!

BEATING OTHER BATTLERS

Becoming a strong competitor in PvP is very different from battling Rocket grunts or Team Leaders for Sinnoh Stones. Your opponent is now another human - complete with their own strategies, tricks, and mistakes. To consistently win Master League battles, you'll need to master a few core PvP concepts:

Team Building: You must learn how to assemble a high-performing team with good type coverage Type Familiarity: You will need to be able to anticipate and react in real-time to opponent Pokémon typings and moveset typings Shield Strategies: Many battles will be won or lost in how you use your shields. It is not a winning strategy to simply use your shields on the first two Charge Attacks that come at you! Energy Strategies: You already know Fast Attacks generate Energy and Charge moves cost Energy, but understanding which Charge move to fire and when - and when not to fire - can turn the tides of battle

To help you master these concepts, the Arena has prepared several articles covering these topics. We recommend giving each one a read!

MASTER LEAGUE MASTERY

Once you have a grasp of the core concepts of PvP, you should begin to familiarize yourself with the resources the competitive PvP community has created and embraced. We recommend familiarizing yourself with these 4 resources as they will aid you greatly on your journey to PvP mastery:

"Meta Simplified" Infographics: For every meta (e.g. Open Master League), content creators and analysts in the community always attempt to "boil down" the hundreds of elligible species to just those you'll most frequently see or want to actually consider using. This is often only a dozen or so species. To truly master Master League, you'll want to familiarize yourself with all potential threats you'll face - and the "meta simplified" graphics make this far simpler to do. Plus, they provide an excellent way to start thinking about your team's coverage and weaknesses! You can usually find "meta simplified" graphics on Silph.gg in the "Resource Highlights" tab. (For example, there's some on this page for Master League!) The PvPoke.com Simulator: PvPoke.com is a staple in any dedicated PvP competitor's regimen. Aside from having incredibly useful rankings for individual Pokémon performance in Master League, PvPoke has a training simulator that will allow you to test out moves (without having to spend TMs or Stardust first!). Run your team (and potential variations on it) through the simulator and examine individual matchups between Pokémon on the Battle page. PvPoke's meta rankings are often the first starting point for competitive PvP players. Silph.gg's Battle Team Rankings: The Arena provides a different type of very useful ranking than PvPoke's individual rankings. On the Battle Teams tab, we rank teams in 3v3 combat to approximate the strongest teams in Master League. This is an evolving algorithm that keeps getting better over time - but you should be sure you're prepared to conquer the highest-ranked teams on the Arena's Battle Team rankings. Type Charts: Until you've memorized Pokémon type interactions, it's useful to keep a Type Chart handy! The Arena has a simple one you may download to your phone here.

JOIN THE COMMUNITY

Pokémon GO PvP has a thriving and growing community of competitors seeking to become the very best, like no one ever was. Join us on the Arena's Discord or Telegram, or on Reddit at /r/TheSilphArena. And don't forget to check out your local area for upcoming PvP tournaments on the Tournament Map - live tournaments are the best part of Pokémon GO PvP! Good luck in your battles - we'll see you in the Arena!