NDPL III Coverage

By Theia and Kaede. Released: 2023/01/14.

Introduction

National Dex Premier League, or NDPL, is the largest team tour hosted in the National Dex forum. With eight teams and eight slots, NDPL gives a spotlight to many of National Dex's metagames, where Pokémon from all generations get a chance to shine. In this edition of NDPL, National Dex RU was given a slot for the first time, replacing last year's second National Dex Monotype slot, and also included in the best-of-three slot alongside OU and UU, replacing AG.

No entire manager pairs returned to manage in this NDPL, but there were several returning managers. ez, one of NDPL II's winning managers, came back to manage the Treehugging Torterras alongside JP192. 2021 National Dex Circuit Champion Kate also returned after her team just barely missed out on the victory themselves with a 1-2 finals tiebreaker loss in NDPL II, now managing the Vice City Victinis with Isza. sasha was also chasing redemption, now alongside gum, after their team's run ended in semifinals last year. The last of the returning managers was longtime National Dex player and contributor adem and self-proclaimed best National Dex player Fc, hoping to put up a better showing than last year's sixth place finish. The rest of the managers were new to managing NDPL this year, including tier leader astralydia alongside former National Dex Grand Slam winner Ryuji with the Galarian Phoenix, well-respected UU player dunoks and Daruma with the Gangsta Darumakas, DerpyBoi and eu with the Limitless Lunalas, and National Dex Room Owner Milo managing the Wildin' Weaviles alongside peap.

Draft

Boots House Down Blacephalons: Managers: sasha, gum; Final Team: Punny, avarice, omicorio, Sage, snaga, jonfilch, Meru, tier, Felines, zee, Revenge Killer, Ducky, dex

Galarian Phoenix: Managers: Ryuji, astralydia; Final Team: Jordy, Clone, pichus, clean, devin, Clementine, gorex, tlenit, Cielau, Mirbro, spoo, Lameflame, Dlayner, Roginald, Jordy004

Gangsta Darumakas: Managers: Daruma, dunoks; Final Team: dunoks, Lily, Trichotomy, bbeeaa, sensei axew, Unowndragon, Magician, Pokémon Trainer 596, Rotten, CMDoge, Phyn

Limitless Lunalas: Managers: DerpyBoi, eu; Final Team: DerpyBoi, MudkipBeans, Raptor, ong, kDCA, Rinda, ADF Test, Dieu Amphibien, Drud, 2020 idm boomer, SpectralThief, zS, Micaiah, Sahki, Axzel, dex, Alkione, Inder

Swagging Summerchus: Managers: Fc, adem; Final Team: Fc, Kyo, Dr. Phd. BJ, Vaboh, DugZa, zioziotrip, Trashuny, Fogbound Lake, Baloor, Dj Breloominati, Career Ended

Treehugging Torterras: Managers: ez, JP192; Final Team: JP192, crying, maroon Nevelle, Lupla, Meminger21, pinorska, R1C3M4N, LBN, AlphaRay01, AtraX Madara, cardinal silver

Vice City Victinis: Managers: Kate, Isza; Final Team: Kate, Isza, AmyQuaris, TJ, Beraldinho, hariyana grande, LORD SAGIS, Royal1604, QWILY, Farce Of The Death, lotiasite, Gray

Wildin' Weaviles: Managers: Milo, peap; Final Team: Will, baconeatinassassin, vstra, ChrisPBacon, Ainzcrad, Spl4sh, Elfuseon, anique, style.css, Reece, Keahi, Ara

The most expensive player in NDPL III was crying with a staggering 35k price tag following her long string of strong showings in tournaments across the site, including being the runner-up in the 2021 National Dex circuit. Highly regarded OU player bbeeaa followed with a 31.5k purchase price. Smogon's tenth Grand Slam winner and owner of a red trophy from the most recent SPL, Punny, rounded out the top three most expensive players at 30.5k.

Early Weeks

As the tournament began, the Wildin' Weaviles took an early lead, with the Boots House Down Blacephalons trailing just behind in second place. Three teams were tied for third place, and the Vice City Victinis and Swagging Summerchus found themselves struggling to keep up, only able to put up two wins between them in the first four weeks of the tournament.

Punny put up one of the strongest performances in the early weeks, going 4-0 in the best-of-three slot against strong opponents like Kate, crying, and Fc. AG duo Nevelle and lotiasite also put up 4-0 records, and vstra and Elfuseon brought four wins each to the Wildin' Weaviles in OU and UU respectively. On the other hand, players like maroon, Kyo, and dunoks failed to live up to their high price tags, with each only putting up a 1-3 record in the first half of the tournament.

Midseason Standings

Team	Wins	Losses	Ties	Points
Wildin' Weaviles	3	0	1	7
Boots House Down Blacephalons	2	1	1	5
Treehugging Torterras	1	1	2	4
Gangsta Draumakas	2	2	0	4
Limitless Lunalas	1	1	2	4
Galarian Phoenix	0	1	3	3
Vice City Victinis	1	2	1	3
Swagging Summerchus	1	3	0	2

Later Weeks

Entering the later half of the tournament, the Weaviles continued to dominate. The Blacephalons, however, fell short, and unable to win another week, they slipped from their spot in second place. The Gangsta Darumakas found their rhythm as the tournament progressed and were able to climb the rankings to take second place thanks to a series of late wins. The bottom teams continued to struggle, but hope wasn't lost yet. Every team still had a chance to make playoffs as the the tournament entered its last leg.

The Swagging Summerchus needed to defeat first seed Wildin' Weaviles to have any hope of moving from eighth place to playoffs. Despite efforts from zioziotrip and Trashuny to pull their team to victory, anique sealed their fate by defeating Vaboh and bringing the series to 4-2, eliminating any chance the Summerchus had at advancing. The Blacephalons were in a similar position, fighting against the Darumakas, who were already guaranteed a slot in playoffs. They too were unable to overcome the higher seeded team, and their hopes of playoffs ended with a 2-6 loss.

With the Summerchus out of the running, the Vice City Victinis, who had been sitting comfortably in seventh place for nearly the entire tournament, had a chance to steal their way into playoffs. They were up against the Treehugging Torterras, who were just barely holding onto their spot in fifth place. With both teams desperately needing a win to push into playoffs, it would be the Victinis emerging victorious with a massive 7-1 victory.

The Galarian Phoenix were the only team unable to put up a single win in the first half of the tournament, and their struggles continued into the second half as they continued to tie, only able to defeat the Summerchus. Their week seven matchup against the Limitless Lunalas, however, had the potential to shape the playoffs chance for several teams. True to form and with help from a divisive activity call, they tied the week, securing their own spot in playoffs and allowing the Victinis to edge out the Lunalas by four points of differential for the fourth place slot.

As the regular season wrapped up, two players had maintained perfect 7-0 records: Limitless Lunalas manager DerpyBoi in RU and vstra for the Weaviles in OU. Punny continued their impressive run, ending with a 6-1 best-of-three record. On the other hand, the Summerchus and Torterras only had five players with positive records between their teams by the end of the regular season, and through the combined efforts of snaga, zee, and tier, the Blacephalons's AG slot went 0-7 overall.

Final Standings

Team	Wins	Losses	Ties	Points
Wildin' Weaviles	5	1	1	11
Gangsta Darumakas	5	2	0	10
Galarian Phoenix	1	1	5	7
Vice City Victinis	2	3	2	6
Limitless Lunalas	1	2	4	6
Boots House Down Blacephalons	2	3	2	6
Treehugging Torterras	2	3	2	6
Swagging Summerchus	2	5	0	4

Semifinals

After a close race to get into semifinals, the Vice City Victinis immediately found themselves face-to-face with tournament-long dominant first seed the Wildin' Weaviles. Their last meeting had ended in a 5-3 victory for the Weaviles, and as semifinals commenced, it would trend in that direction once again as the Weaviles took a 3-2 lead early on. However, Beraldinho and Kate would quickly swing the week back in the Victinis' favor. lotiasite closed the week out with a close AG victory over Will, bringing the Victinis to the spot in finals that had seemed so unlikely just the week before.

The Gangsta Darumakas had been the Galarian Phoenix's only loss during the regular season, and they looked to defeat them once again to earn their place in finals. The series remained close, with the teams trading wins until the score sat at 4-3 in favor of the Phoenix, but Magician would beat gorex in the final match of the week to tie the score and enter a tiebreaker, where the Phoenix chose AG and the Darumakas chose Monotype. Trichotomy took Monotype for the Darumakas, but the Phoenix returned with a pair of back to back victories from pichus in AG and Roginald in OU to secure their spot in the tournament's finals.

Finals

After a long struggle, two unlikely teams found themselves facing off in the finals. The last meeting of the Victinis and the Phoenix had ended in a tie, with many onlookers predicting either another tie or victory for the Victinis.

Vice City Victinis (3) vs (5) Galarian Phoenix
National Dex OU: TJ vs Clementine
National Dex OU: Isza vs Roginald
National Dex OU: Gray vs clean
National Dex UU: Royal1604 vs tlenit
National Dex RU: Beraldinho vs gorex
National Dex Monotype: QWILY vs Cielau
National Dex AG: lotiasite vs pichus
National Dex Bo3: Kate vs devin (1) (2)

The finals match began evenly, with Gray, Beraldinho, and QWILY putting up wins for the Victinis and devin, pichus, and Roginald for the Phoenix, keeping the score at 3-3. tlenit, with help from a little luck, would beat Royal1604 in UU to bring the Phoenix into the lead. Clementine, who was 0-2 entering finals, would face off against 5-2 TJ for the deciding OU match. The game was fast-paced and over in under 30 turns, with Clementine emerging victorious and claiming the NDPL III trophy for the Galarian Phoenix.

Highlight Matches

NDPL is our #1 team tour, so naturally it brings out the best of the metagame and draws out many great matches for each of them, showcasing the metagame at its best and even introducing new innovation to them. Here's a highlight match for each tier in this NDPL to showcase each metagame in tour play and demonstrate what kind of innovation can really happen to a tier.

OU - Isza vs vstra

This match featured two popular tournament players in National Dex OU. Isza brought a balance team to face off against vstra, who brought an offense team, with both showing some innovative sets even at the generation's end. vstra's main star was Substitute Mega Garchomp, which proved to be a constant problem to Isza throughout the match, with support from a Normal Gem Landorus-T to blow away any roadblocks for it. It was also backed by Magnezone to take care of any troubling Steel-type birds. Isza on the other hand brought a mostly standard balance team, with one twist: Cosmic Power Stored Power Mew! This proved to be troublesome in the late-game, but unfortunately it did not stand a chance against the power of Mega Garchomp, leading vstra to win the battle.

UU - tlenit vs Meminger21

Hyper offense popped off this season despite all the nerfs it got this year, but astralydia's team piloted by tlenit here especially takes the cake, even managing to become one of the best current sample teams for SS National Dex UU. It creatively uses Yawn + Flip Turn Swampert to facilitate its offensive teammates while also providing a blanket check to most offense killers such as various Choice Scarf threats. Overall this shows the offensive synergy of the other teammates very well and displays one of the best hyper offense teams for SS National Dex UU.

RU - devin vs Lily

Mimikyu and Klefki completely dropped in the viability rankings in the Mega Aggron meta, which was an almost mandatory pick during the over seven months it was in the tier. After its ban, both Mimikyu and Klefki didn't rise much in usage still, but many matches from the previous Seasonal and this NDPL proved that both Pokémon, especially when paired together in offense teams, were back as metagame-defining Pokémon, giving devin his first win in the best-of-three semis, which allowed the Phoenix to make it to the finals and win the tournament.

Monotype - Cielau vs Trichotomy

Balanced teams always are solid in National Dex Monotype; in this game both players brought this playstyle. Trichotomy's team in particular features one of the most infamous cores in Monotype history, being Steel's immunity core. This core paired with Ferrothorn and Excadrill gives Steel teams a resistance or immunity to most attacks in some way or form, making the team extremely hard to break. Typically in Monotype the best way to get around this team is to either break the wall that affects your matchup or use a strong neutral attack, in this case being Dark. For this game Cielau needed to break Heatran to allow Victini to clean the rest of the team with V-create. However, Trichotomy handled the pressure well, and kept Heatran alive, and slowly wore down the opposing Psychic team, then putting Mega Scizor in a position to win the game. Overall through solid playing and use of an amazing defensive core, Trichotomy prevails in a great match showcasing the metagame at its finest.

AG - lotiasite vs pichus

The NDPL III finals brought together two evenly matched National Dex Anything Goes players with impressive records in an entertaining matchup. lotiasite brought a bulky offense team centered around a Zacian-C and Xerneas core to single out and pressure Necrozma-DM. On the other hand, pichus brought a Toxic Spikes balance team featuring a revenge killer in Marshadow and wallbreakers in Dragon Dance Zygarde and Double Dance Primal Groudon. This was a highlight match where both players brought good teams and played well that helped tip the edge in the Galarian Phoenix's favor against the Vice City Victinis.

Final Thoughts

After a long fight to the top, the Galarian Phoenix emerged on top with a hard-earned victory in the last NDPL of Gen 8. NDPL III showcased some amazing games in National Dex's most popular metagames from veterans and newcomers alike. To see all of the games from the tournament, check out the NDPL III replay thread, and stay tuned for the next edition of NDPL in Gen 9!

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