Guides & Resources (Looking to learn more about battling? Start here.)

This thread is a compilation of guides and resources intended for helping you with anything related to battling. This list is especially helpful for anyone looking to start playing competitive Pokémon. However, all guides and resources listed here are designed for fifth generation battlers, but this thread might be updated for older generations sometime.

If you want to help expand this list, please post in the BC Discussion & Feedback thread with links to the resources and explanations on why they should be included. To improve upon an already existing guide, post in the aforementioned thread or send a message to the one who made the guide with your suggestions. To make an entirely new guide, simply post a thread in BC's main forum. But before you do, read the BC Guidelines to see whether your thread actually belongs in BC instead of another forum.

[a id]basics[/a id]— Introduction to Competitive Pokémon
This is easily the best article if you're interested in starting competitive battling and don't know where to start. Smogon gives a good overview of what to expect from competitive Pokémon and what makes it different from in-game play. Keep in mind that some details and links in this article may be out-of-date, since it was meant for the fourth generation games. However, not much has changed since then, so this guide is still very useful for learning the basics.

— Introduction to Smogon's Tier System
Learning how tiers work is extremely important, and is something you should do before starting competitive battling. Learning some of the more in-depth details isn't very necessary (like the equation for usage statistics), but getting a general idea on how tiers work (like why you can't use OU Pokémon in UU) is something you should know.

— PC's Rules for Standard Play (Smogon's BW OU)
This is good to know if you plan on battling here at PC. However, Smogon's BW OU isn't the only tier we battle in; it's just what our standard battling rules are.

— Smogon's BW Pokédex
Smogon's Pokédex is the primary resource for finding good and viable movesets. Most of these movesets reflect what is commonly used.

— Smogon's Usage Statistics
Type Ctrl + F and put in "simulator statistics," then click on the most recent link. Usage statistics are very helpful, because they let you know what Pokémon are currently popular in certain tiers. Knowing this will help you gear your team to more common threats.

— How to Battle and Win
This guide should help you with battle strategy. The Art of Psychological Warfare and UnderUsed 201: Battling are useful as well.

— Competitive Pokémon Dictionary
There's a huge amount of slang in the competitive battling community, and this is a fabulous resource if you ever come across an abbreviation you don't know.

— Smogon's Articles
I could include practically all of these guides in this thread, but I will only add the most vital ones. Feel free to look through Smogon's other articles for additional help on competitive battling.

[a id]wifibattling[/a id]— Introduction to Wi-Fi Battling
Smogon explains the difference between battling on Wi-Fi and simulators, and helps you get started in the Wi-Fi aspect of competitive battling.

— PC's BW RNG Guide
RNG abuse is nearly the only option for obtaining flawless Pokémon without hacking, and this guide helps get you started.

— PC's BW EV Training Guide
EV training is almost a necessity for competitive battling on Wi-Fi because it can cause a drastic increase in a Pokémon's stats. This guide explains what exactly EVs are, how to EV train, and other additional tips on EV training.

— BW In-Game Tiers
This article is incredibly useful when creating an in-game team. You can find Pokémon who have just the right amount of utility in BW by using this article.

— List of Battle Subway Pokémon
This lists all of the Pokémon found in the Battle Subway. So when playing the Battle Subway, you can just search the opposing Pokémon's name (with Ctrl + F) to see what possible movesets they'll have. Credit to Team Rocket Elite from Smogon for retrieving this.

[a id]teambuilding[/a id]— BW OU Threat List
This is a good reference that lists most commonly found Pokémon in OU and has overviews for each of them. If you skim over this, you will likely learn everything you need to know about the Pokémon in BW OU and how to deal with them.

— Assorted Speed Tiers
Simply put, Speed tiers are a list of every Pokémon's Speed stats for a tier. You may be wondering: what are these and why are they useful? Well, if you're like me and prefer to optimize your movesets, then this comes in handy. You can use this resource to figure out what your Pokémon is able to outspeed, then change your nature and EVs accordingly. For example, if you're stuck between choosing an Adamant or Jolly nature Mamoswine, you can check this to help you decide whether the increase in Speed is worth it. After all, Speed is the most important stat in Pokémon.

— Marriland's Team Builder
This tool is very useful for finding your team's type weaknesses. I don't recommend relying on this too much as being weak to a certain type doesn't necessarily give you a weakness to commonly found Pokémon of that type. However, it's still good for general help on your team.

[a id]rmts[/a id]— Threat Lists
These are basically for letting team raters know what Pokémon your team has trouble with, so they can offer solutions to fix those problems. All you have to do is pick the tier your team is meant to be played in (OU is standard play), and just state how you deal with each of the Pokémon and their most common movesets.

— Pokémon Sprites and Art
veekun is useful for getting Pokémon sprites and other official artwork. To change the Pokémon, just edit the part of the URL where it says "garchomp" with a different Pokémon's name (don't include the forme though, like "rotom-w").

— Animated BW Pokémon Sprites
Here you can find animated sprites, which can help make your RMT more appealing.

— Animated Party Sprites
You know those icons in the party in the Pokémon games? These are just that (and animated)!

[a id]warstories[/a id]By the way, the sprite and art resources listed above can be used for warstories as well.

— Tips on Creating an Entertaining Warstory
A lot of the advice mentioned in this guide is something to keep in mind when making your own warstory.

— Zarel's Battle Replay Viewer
This is very handy if you don't want to make an entire warstory, but still want some way to show off a battle. You can post a thread if you would like to share your battle replays.

— Zarel's Warstory Maker
Too lazy to format your own warstory? Gotcha covered.

[a id]calculators[/a id]— Honko's Mass Damage Calculators
These damage calculators are incredibly useful for multiples things, one of which is finding out whether a Pokémon 2HKOes another.

— Cherubi's Damage Calculator
Similar to the 1v1 damage calculator above, but with a different format. Depends on your tastes whether you prefer Cherubi's or Honko's. There many other damage calculators on the internet, but these two are generally the best and most accurate ones.

— MetalKid's IV Calculator
IV calculators are an absolute must for breeding, and this one is no exception. MetalKid's is the most accurate IV calculator available.

[a id]other[/a id]— List of Released Dream World Pokémon
If you ever wondered whether a Dream World ability has been released yet, you can use this in-depth list to find out.

— Compiled Guides - Fourth Generation
Here are most of the guides that have been made throughout years of S&M (see: "Previous Forums" section). A good majority of them are for the fourth generation games, but they're still very helpful for the most part.

[a id]previousforums[/a id]Before BC, there were two forums: Battle Stadium and Strategies & Movesets. Battle Stadium was specifically for scheduling battles, which encompasses tournaments, leagues, and any other similar events or groups. Strategies & Movesets was for team and battling help, as well as discussion regarding any sort of battling. After a while, a second Strategies & Movesets forum was made for reasons I don't remember (likely to start fresh again). BC eventually replaced Stadium and S&M as one main forum for anything related to battling, and that's where we are now.