How to Suck Less at Animé-Style Battling: A Beginner's Guide

Animé-style battling is a text-based forum game, not quite unlike a text RPG, in which players can select a team of Pokémon and battle other trainers. Sounds basic enough, and probably similar to the video game series, but it's quite different—as one might infer from the name (animé-style battling) the battles in ASB play out almost like narrations of matches from the animé. They are much more involved than just "spam Tackle", "use Defense Curl and then Rollout" or "Baton Pass a Substitute and some speed boosts to Tyranitar". ASB is more than just knowing the bog-standard effects of attacks and pressing a button. You have to take into consideration whether Attract will really work on your angry and jaded opponent. You need to decide whether or not Ember might actually be a more beneficial choice than Flamethrower in the long run. You need to think about how much energy your Pokémon exerts in that outer-space arena, as you don't want it to use up too much of its oxygen performing strenuous attacks. ASB gives you all of the Pokémon you love but in a more involved, active manner that requires entirely new strategies. And I might be saying so myself, but it's a lot of fun.

Maybe you think it sounds like a lot of fun, too, and since your favorite Pokémon forum happens to have a league you decide to give it a shot. So you spend a little time checking it out, read a few battles, glance through the registration thread. But maybe things start to seem a little more confusing the more time you spend looking at them. Or maybe you think you're really ready to get started, but the ASB staff or other members have to correct the numerous mistakes you didn't realize you were making. It can definitely be puzzling, perhaps even overwhelming, because there are a lot of rules to follow and you have to approach Pokémon battling in a way you probably haven't before.

I've been kicking around an ASB league or two long enough that I've seen plenty of new members try to start their ASB careers and slip up. A lot of these mistakes are easily prevented with a nice, thorough read through the rules thread and other important threads, but some people still don't understand, miss something or just don't know exactly where they should look so that they can make sure they know what they're supposed to do. I've also seen a few newbies here and there do things that aren't so much "mistakes" or against the rules as they are the member not quite realizing that he/she isn't using the ASB system to its fullest potential. To that end, I've assembled all of these tips and reminders. They'll tell you where to look to find out what you need to know, why it isn't a good idea to do certain things and maybe point you in the direction of a neat little trick that members don't usually figure out until they've been ASBing for a good while.

This guide assumes that you have at least a general understanding of ASB structure and terminology, such as what "DQ" means. It is not intended to teach you the detailed rules, terms and guidelines of your specific ASB league. If you see something you don't understand, read your ASB's rules thread. Everything you need to know about that sort of thing should be in there, and that is, of course, the best starting point for any beginner's sojourn into ASB anyway.

The Cave of Dragonflies ASB League is really the only one I participate in these days (although I do occasionally lurk around a few other leagues). As such, most of the information in this guide is written with the TCoD ASB in mind. I have tried to be as general as possible, so the gist of everything should apply to other leagues as well; if not, however, be sure to figure out whatever the closest approximation for your league would be.

General

The tips in this section cover the bare basics and will apply to just about everything you do in ASB, from battling to buying new Pokémon. The information here should make your early ASB experience a lot less painful and confusing.

Read the rules. No, seriously. Read the rules.

Such an obvious first step, and yet one that is missed more often than it should be. You have absolutely no idea how much confusion and general stupidity could be prevented if people would just read the rules thread properly. Yes, the rules thread is probably quite long, and you might not think you have time to sit through the whole thing. But then... if you don't have the time to make sure you understand how the system works, do you have the time to do a proper job of participating in ASB? Reading the rules thoroughly one or two times seems a small price to pay if it means you'll have a better understanding of what to do the first time you have to do it. There are some threads it's okay to skim, but the ASB Rules thread, as with any other set of forum rules, is not one of those threads. So please. Save yourself some confusion and save the more experienced members the headache of constantly correcting you or having to hold your hand and walk you through things. Read. The. Rules.

Read the rules again every now and then.

Never hurts to brush up on the rules, especially if you've been away for a while. You'd be surprised what even the most conscientious ASBers can forget from time to time.

Follow any and all proper formats and procedures whenever posting, and make sure you post in legible English.

Formats for whatever you're trying to do will vary and should be explained clearly in... whatever thread should explain it. It depends on what you're doing. But once you know that format, stick to it. If the team approval thread says you need to post your Pokémon in a format like

[Nickname] Species (Gender) <Ability>
Signature Move:

then please post your Pokémon in that format (or, at the very least, an easy-to-understand alternative that includes all of the same information). Something like

Nickname Gender Signature Move

and nothing else is incomplete and potentially hard to read. And if combining two out of three attacks in a battle is usually listed as

Attack + Attack ~ Attack

then posting your orders as

Attack+Attack + Attack

is misleading. Don't do it if that isn't how it's done or isn't otherwise clear.

The proper English thing should be self-explanatory, honestly. Chatspeak and other such lazy methods of communication are generally frowned upon in most ASB leagues. Even if you aren't using chatspeak, making sure that you have spelled everything correctly and used proper grammar is quite important and makes everyone's life easier. Not only does it prevent confusion—you might just be in trouble if your ref can't tell whether you've ordered your Onix to use Bide or Bind—it is a lot less annoying than having to read large, ponderous walls of misspelled text with no spaces after punctuation and no distinct paragraphs. This is generally more important for ASBers with jobs in the league, especially referees, but in general you should try to write in a way that would not give your English teacher a heart attack if he/she were to read your posts.

Try to be timely in replying to battles/reffing battles/handling any jobs, and be sure to let people know in advance if you'll be away or busy.

While everyone has a life outside of ASB and there will be plenty of times when you can't make ordering commands in your battle a priority, it is still polite and proper to make sure that you keep up with any responsibilities you might have. Write yourself a note to help you remember DQ times so you can stay on top of things wherever possible. Manage your ASB procrastination the same way you manage your real-life procrastination. If you're not procrastinating and life is really getting in the way, it's okay to take a break from ASB. Just be courteous enough to tell people the reason for your expected absence. Which brings me to my next point:

If you know in advance that you'll be unable to participate in your ASB for a few days or more, you need to let people know about that so they don't think you've just up and disappeared. Your league should have a thread called the "Absence Thread" or something like that; you post in that thread to tell people how long you think you'll be away. This keeps other members from getting upset when you fail to post your attacks by your battle's DQ time or haven't reffed their battle for weeks. People are understanding, but you in turn need to be understanding enough to give them a heads up; they don't have any reason to be mad that you've been quite sick lately, especially not when you take just a moment to tell them that that's the situation.

In the event that something unexpected happens and you just plain can't post in your ASB league or talk to another member, even just to tell them that you'll be absent for a while, don't sweat it. Again, people understand and accept that life happens. When you are finally able to return, just find a way to explain what happened and why you were gone for a while. Now, that doesn't automatically mean that you'll be able to get back into any battles you were disqualified from, get your jobs back or get access to anything else you've missed. The staff might be understanding and let you slip by, but you have to remember that life in ASB can and generally does go on without you. Even when people want to give you the benefit of the doubt there are times when it just isn't practical to wait for you any longer. You might miss something or run into a DQ deadline, and there might not be anything you can do to make it up, but at the very least you can tell people what was going on and they won't have any reason to be upset with you.

Don't be afraid to ask questions, but be sure to try and answer them yourself first.

It is inevitable: there will be times when you just plain don't understand something, and you'll need to go to the ASB staff or more experienced members for help or a nudge in the right direction. There is nothing wrong with this. As with anything else in life, it is better to ask what you think is a stupid question than it is to just plow ahead assuming you're doing the right thing only to discover you've made a huge error later. PM the ASB head, post a question in the rules thread... whatever makes the most sense given the question you want to ask, simply go ahead and ask it. (Posting the question where everyone can see it is usually the best course of action; this way, anyone else who has the same question later can learn from the answer you were given instead of having to ask the staff the same things over and over.)

Try to ask others for help only as a last resort, however. If you are mature enough to be posting in a forum and participating in an ASB league then you are certainly capable of being at least a little self-sufficient. The answers to most questions can generally be found in the rules thread or other relevant information thread (the attack guide, for example), so check places like that first and try to find your own answers. It will only annoy the other members if you repeatedly ask them things that are very easy to look up on your own. If you've searched and searched and still can't find the answers, however, then by all means ask for assistance. The staff or other players are usually more than happy to help.

Lay off the "Edit" button.

The "Edit" button in the corner of your posts is a wonderful little tool. It lets you clean up any oopsies you might have made or add relevant afterthoughts to whatever it is you were saying. And since most moderators don't appreciate double-posting in most threads, using the Edit button whenever you have something to change or add is a good idea. It is not, however, such a good idea to use the Edit button as often in ASB. First of all, it is generally considered cheating to edit your attacks after you have already posted them for a round. This is especially true if you ordered commands first, your opponent ordered commands based on a loophole you missed and you, determined not to be taken advantage of like that, change your commands in such a way that they remove the loophole and effectively nullify your opponent's attacks. Even if you attack second in a round you shouldn't change anything; you never know whether or not your ref has already started writing up the round using your old commands, and this could cause confusion. As a general rule you shouldn't edit your attacks after a day has passed since you've posted them, after your opponent has posted their attacks OR unless the referee tells you that you've made a mistake and need to fix something. Luckily, most people are generally quite honest, will accept that they've overlooked something and resolve to do better next time, so cheating isn't a huge issue in most ASB leagues I've seen.

A more common problem is people editing posts in official threads, such as bank records threads and team approval threads. If an approver tells you that you've made a mistake in your post, make a new post with all of the correct information in it instead of editing the old one. I don't know of any forum software that explicitly notifies people when a post has been edited, so the approvers will not see the changes you made and the post will just sit there until you come back and complain about how you have been overlooked. The thread will update, on the other hand, when a new post is made, so the approvers are much more likely to notice your corrections. Also note that you'll probably need to repost everything that was in the original post plus the corrections, if only for clarity's sake; the approvers aren't guaranteed to know or remember what you're talking about if your only correction is to post "Oh, sorry. Her ability is Insomnia."

Editing spelling mistakes and things like that is generally fine, but make sure that that's all you change.

Battling

Ah, battling. The meat and potatoes of ASB. After all, most of the fun of Pokémon is taking your favorite adorable li'l critters and having them rip somebody a new one. There can be a lot to remember about battling in ASB, however. There are all the little details and instructions pointed out in the rules, of course, and it can take some new members some time to figure out that ASB is not the the same as the mainstream video games and that their available options are totally different here.

Read the attack guide.

I'm not suggesting that you read this from beginning to end, as it's probably at least three times longer than the rules thread. Rather, just make sure you give it a look while preparing your commands for a round of battle. This is "Animé-Style Battling", after all, and anyone who has seen even one episode of the Pokémon animé knows that battles don't always work the same way they would in the video games. While ASB attacks tend to avoid defying all logic (Swellow thunder armor wtf?) they make an effort to be more "realistic" and rely less on heavy calculation and excessive random number generation. This means that some attacks simply can't be recreated the way they work ingame, and others have been reinterpreted for other reasons. So while there probably isn't much confusion surrounding a move like Tackle, for anything else you should probably search through the attack guide and see how it'll work in your match. Misinterpreting an attack's effects in the heat of battle is at best embarrassing and at worst could cost you the game. The guide can also show you a few new ways you can use certain moves and some new limitations they might have, so reading it is also beneficial from a strategic point of view.

Don't order too many attacks.

Some new trainers seem to get a little over-excited when they hear they can use more than one move per round, or perhaps they don't understand how combination attacks or conditional statements (more on those later) work. The end result is that they order more than three attacks, usually looking something like this: "Agility + Tackle ~ Growl ~ Ember". Those commands might cover only three actions, but that's four attacks, not three. You need to remember that even when you use a combination attack, you're still only limited to three attacks per round; your Pokémon will just do nothing for an action or more because it's already used its attack for that action previously. So, for example, if I tell my Charmander to use "Scary Face + Growl ~ Scratch", Charmander will combine Scary Face and Growl on the first action, use Scratch on the second action and do nothing on the third. (It is possible to specify which action you want your Pokémon to do nothing on.) Ordering too many attacks when trying out a conditional statement is usually just the trainer losing track of what they're commanding and going overboard. You have to be careful and stay on top of how many attacks you are issuing so you don't list more than three.

Don't order too few attacks.

The reverse, as it happens, is also a common mistake: beginning trainers ordering less than three attacks. I assume it is because they are still thinking ASB will work a little more like the video games, which allow only one command per turn. (You have to remember that ASB is a different game and must be approached with a different mindset!) While there is nothing technically wrong with ordering only one or two attacks you will be putting yourself at an extreme disadvantage if you do. If you tell your Eevee to use Tackle and stop there then, yes, it will Tackle your opponent's Mankey... but then Eevee will sit there and do absolutely nothing for the other two actions while Mankey nails it with three Cross Chops in a row. Ouch. The strategic options available to a trainer in any given situation are many and varied, and there's always something else you can do. But literally doing nothing is an incredibly dangerous and wasteful thing to do in most situations, and it isn't something I would advise you try in your first few battles if it can be helped.

Most referees and more experienced opponents are kind enough to point these mistakes out to you and give you a chance to add or remove attacks as necessary. Just to be on the safe side, though, these are things you really need to watch out for yourself. Read the rules, make sure you know how many attacks you're allowed to use and don't venture outside of that number, up or down.

Try out some conditional statements, but don't abuse them.

In the Pokémon video games you have no way of knowing what your opponent is going to do next; you just have to choose your attack and hope that the enemy Pokémon doesn't royally screw you over. Since ASB is a post-based game, however, and you can see exactly what your opponent is going to do for each of his or her three actions, you have the ability to plan your own actions accordingly and account for several possible outcomes... when you're going second, that is. When it's your turn to move first it's your opponent who has that advantage, not you, and so you're in a bit of a pickle. For all you know, the attacks your opponent will order will completely shut down your moves for that round.

Situations like these are where conditional statements (or "if clauses") come in handy. Let's say your Diglett is battling your opponent's Magnemite. You want Diglett to use "Screech ~ Rock Slide ~ Earthquake". But Magnemite knows Magnet Rise, which will make it immune to Ground-type attacks. If your opponent tells Magnemite to use Magnet Rise on the first or second action, your Diglett's Earthquake is guaranteed to miss and you'll have wasted an attack! So instead, tell your Diglett "use Screech, Rock Slide and Earthquake, but if Magnemite uses Magnet Rise then use another Screech instead of Earthquake". (The format for summarizing this should be something like "Screech ~ Rock Slide ~ Earthquake/Screech", where the forward slash indicates an alternate option.) This conditional statement allows you to substitute one command for another if certain conditions are met (hence the name). Your Diglett will still use Earthquake if Magnemite doesn't use Magnet Rise and will deal the damage you wanted it to, but this way if Magnemite protects itself from that attack you'll still be able to have Diglett do something useful.

Even if you're going second, conditional statements can still be used effectively. If your opponent's Pokémon has been ordered to use Hypnosis on yours and you're worried that falling asleep will render your Pokémon completely useless, use a conditional statement to substitute a command like Sleep Talk for whatever the original action was. If Hypnosis misses your battler will act as normal, but if Hypnosis does hit then at least you won't be a total sitting duck. There are many opportunities to use conditionals, so keep your mind open and remember that there's usually at least one way you can work with or around a bad situation. (You can never prepare for absolutely everything, of course.)

Don't go overboard with the conditionals, however. If you order too many attacks and try to cover too many different possibilities ("...but if he uses Protect, use Feint, if he uses Grasswhistle and it hits use Sleep Talk, if Grasswhistle misses then use Blaze Kick, but if it's raining use Aerial Ace instead, if his mother's brother's wife's grandchild's cockatoo is singing on a Tuesday afternoon use Extremespeed, and if...") you run the risk of confusing your referee and making a lot of extra work for them; if you're going first, you can also confuse your opponent to the point where they aren't sure what you're doing and how to respond, which is rude. To prevent this, several ASBs put a limit on the number of conditionals you can use per action, per round or per battle. You also need to make sure that you clarify what the different conditions for the alternate attacks are. Just saying "Thunderpunch ~ Fire Punch/Sky Uppercut ~ Agility" without saying when your Pokémon should use Fire Punch and when it should use Sky Uppercut will leave your ref confused, and you'll either be asked for an explanation or the ref will have your Pokémon fail to understand your orders and do nothing.

Know which attacks are available to your Pokémon and which are not.

In most ASBs a Pokémon is allowed to choose its three actions from any technique it can possibly learn, no matter what level, by what method, whatever. Level-up moves, moves from previous generations, TMs and HMs (and TMs/HMs from previous generations), egg moves, move tutor moves, certain special moves from events or spin-off games like Pokémon XD... just about anything and everything. In addition to this, evolved Pokémon can use any move that their lower stages of evolution can learn—Infernape can use Nasty Plot, for example, even though only Chimchar normally learns it. Some beginning trainers appear to be unaware of this and usually end up choosing only four moves and sticking to them, or else thinking that only moves available by level-up or in a certain generation are usable, etc., etc..

The best way to figure out all of the moves your Pokémon can use is to find an online Pokédex (no, the simple Pokédex in the back of the official Nintendo guides will not work—they aren't anywhere near as thorough as a good online dex). I recommend Psypoke and Veekun, as those two are thorough, accurate and easy to navigate (use the "Learnsets" view on Psypoke when looking for moves). You may have to do a little digging if you use Veekun, as its evolved Pokémon pages don't list moves that only the lower stages can learn, but it covers just about everything else. You can also use Pokédexes like these for other information, should you need it.

Know your Pokémon and know them well.

This goes beyond remembering the names, species and genders of your Pokémon and beyond knowing all of your possible attacks. In ASB your team can come up against any opponent in almost any situation, and some Pokémon are better suited for certain battles than others. In the video games you can use your Goldeen to battle in the desert, or you can surf around and and use your Onix to beat up some Tentacool. That's all well and good for the video games, but, as I've said before, battles in ASB generally do a better job of following logic. A Goldeen in the desert would dry up; an Onix in the ocean would sink and drown. So if your opponent challenges you to a match that will take place at the bottom of the sea, which Pokémon is the best choice?

That was a pretty extreme example, but this logic applies even in other situations. If the battle is taking place in the sky (so only flying or hovering Pokémon can participate) with very strong winds, a small or light Pokémon like Jumpluff will have a hard time moving around while sturdier, heavier fliers like Skarmory will be better able to resist the wind. And of course you need to take your opponent's Pokémon into account when you send out second. In addition to thinking about type advantages and disadvantages, think about how well your opponent can maneuver in the arena, how well your Pokémon can maneuver and what you might be able to choose to stay one step ahead. This doesn't require the in-depth analysis of each member of your team it sounds like it does; just listen to common sense. It should be fairly obvious after just a little thought whether a Meganium or a Torterra is better suited to battle a Sandslash in a wasteland.

Now that you know the full range of attacks your Pokémon has at its disposal and have checked them out in the attack guide, put two and two together. An Eruption attack performed at full health has a higher base power than Lava Plume (150 vs 80), so it's a much more powerful attack. But is Eruption always the better choice? First and foremost, more powerful attacks are generally more energy-intensive than weaker ones. If your Typhlosion is at full health but is really tired, Lava Plume is probably the superior option. And there's also the arena and other factors to consider. It may not matter so much if you're battling near an active volcano, but if you're in a dry forest a full-scale Eruption is probably going to set a lot of the arena on fire, if not outright decimate it. In the event that that's not what you want, Lava Plume will probably provide you with a smaller, more concentrated and controlled attack, minimizing any damage you don't actually want to do.

ASB differs from the games in a lot of ways, but there are still some similarities.

I've told you over and over again that you need to approach ASB with a different mindset than the one you use when playing the Pokémon games, and for the most part this is true. That does not, however, mean that you aren't still playing a Pokémon game. Many of the basic fundamentals of the Pokémon world still apply: Pikachu is still an Electric-type and so will still cause extra damage with its Electric-type attacks. Those Electric-type attacks are still going to do bupkus to a Ground-type like Rhydon. Weavile is fast, Bastiodon is slow. These are fairly extreme examples, and this seems like an insultingly obvious thing to point out, but I'm actually quite surprised by how often I see new players ordering ineffective attacks or doing other silly things for what seems to be no reason at all. Why would you use Brick Break (a Fighting-type move) on a Scyther (which, as a Bug/Flying-type, has a double resistance to Fighting)? Okay, so maybe you can't use any super-effective moves like Rock Throw or Thunderbolt for whatever reason... but surely you at least have some neutrally-effective attacks at your disposal, don't you? Headbutt, Psybeam, anything that will do decent damage for a reasonable energy cost, instead of expending the same amount of energy for piffling damage due to Scyther's resistance.

Are there situations in which you would be better off using an ineffective attack or doing something else that runs counter to basic game logic? Of course. And perhaps some of these new players are actually evil geniuses and using these counterintuitive tactics is part of a brilliant plan that I'm just too dumbfounded to see. But nine times out of ten, you're going to put yourself at a disadvantage if you keep using Iron Tail on a Mareep when you could be doing more damage for the same amount of energy with Aqua Tail. Just because this is a new game doesn't mean that you have to give yourself a headache by throwing all your previous Pokémon knowledge out the window and forcing yourself to do things you normally wouldn't because "ASB is different".

Conclusion

With any luck, the information I've provided here will prove helpful. I plan to continue adding to this, so check back every once in a while (although hopefully you'll be enough of an old hand by then that you'll have figured most of it out for yourself). And if you have any questions or suggestions about something you think this guide could answer, let me know! I don't want to go into excruciating detail about anything or discuss the execution of specific ASB strategies (at least, not in this article), but if it seems like a good general topic then I might just throw it in here. And don't hesitate to let me know if I can make any of the information clearer or easier to understand. The guide is here to help you, after all, so your input is quite useful.

Anyway, just keep everything I've shared with you in mind and you should get the hang of animé-style battling in no time. Best of luck to you.

This page was created on 08/30/09 13:54:47 and last modified on 10/22/09 03:27:28.