POKEMON CONTESTS GUIDE - for Pokemon Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald
Last Updated: 14th November 2006
Contents
1. About Pokemon Contests
1a. What is a Pokemon Contest?
1b. Where can I enter a Pokemon Contest?
2. Preparation - what to do before entering a contest
2a. Picking a Pokemon suitable for Pokemon Contests
2b. Pokeblocks - what you need to make them
2c. Pokeblocks - what to make
2d. Using the Berry Blender
2e. Feeding a Pokeblock to a Pokemon
3. Entering a Pokemon Contest
3a. Preliminary Judging
3b. Appeal Round
3bi.   Gain/Damage Hearts
3bii.  Manipulating applause
3biii. Making the other Pokemon nervous
3biv.  Calming your Pokemon
3bv.   Stealing attention
3bvi.  Changing the order
3bii.  Appeal Combos
3c. Judging Time - Contest is over
4. Afterword and Contact info
----1. About Pokemon Contests----
--- 1a. What is a Pokemon Contest? ---
A Pokemon contest is a new way of competing your Pokemon but not in battles, but
based on showing off moves of a certain type to a group of judges. There are
five different types of contest: Beauty, Cool, Cute, Smart and Tough, if you
look in the summary pages of your Pokemon you will notice that all Pokemon moves
have been assigned to one of these five types. There are also four different
ranks in each type: Normal, Super, Hyper and Master. Obviously you start on
Normal and work your way up.
---1b. Where can I enter a Pokemon Contest? ---
If you are playing Pokemon Ruby or Sapphire there are four locations to take
part in Pokemon Contests. For Normal rank you need to visit Verdanturf Town, for
Super you need to visit Fallarbor Town, for Hyper its Slateport City and for
Master its Lilycove City. If you are playing Pokemon Emerald there is just one
Pokemon Contest centre in Lilycove City, this centre accommodates all four
ranks.
----2. Preparation - what to do before entering a contest----
--- 2a. Picking a Pokemon suitable for Pokemon Contests ---
The first thing you need to do before entering a contest is to see what kind of
contest your Pokemon will be good at. What you need to do is pick a Pokemon from
your party and go to the last page of the Pokemon Summary marked "Contest
Moves". Here it will display all the moves in your Pokemon's current moveset and
also what type of move they are (ie. Cool, Tough etc). You need your Pokemon to
have at least 2 of the same type of move but more is definitely advisable. Now
that you have established what kind of contest your Pokemon will be good at you
need to check the kind of nature your Pokemon has, it says this on the first
page in the Pokemon Summary, marked "Pokemon Info". Make a mental note of the
nature and what kind of contest you're going to enter your Pokemon in and now
it's time to move onto the next step - making Pokeblocks.
--- 2b. Pokeblocks - what you need to make them ---
First off, you are going to need a Pokeblock Case, if you have Pokemon Emerald
you simply talk to the lady at the reception of the Pokemon Contest centre in
Lilycove City and she will give it to you. If you have Pokemon Ruby or Sapphire
you need to ask the girl in the Slateport City Pokemon Contest centre for it.
Now that you have your Pokeblock Case you are going to need to make some
Pokeblocks for your Pokemon to eat before entering the contest. To do this you
are going to need berries, it's advisable to pick up all the berries you see
when playing the game and also to try to remember some places where you can
plant some to grow more should you run low on a certain type of berry. Now that
you have your Pokeblock Case and some berries it's time to head to one of the
contest centres to make some Pokeblocks using the Berry Blender. Pokeblocks are
used to enhance the look of your Pokemon in the five different types of contest.
--- 2c. Pokeblocks - what to make ---
Now that you are ready to make a pokeblock you need to ensure you are making the
correct type based on your Pokemon. First off, all the berries have a
combination of five different tastes - Spicy, Sour, Dry, Bitter and Sweet. These
five tastes correspond to the five different types of Pokemon Contest.
Spicy - Cool
Sour - Tough
Dry - Beauty
Bitter - Smart
Sweet - Cute
So if you are going to be entering a Cool contest, you are going to want to make
Pokeblocks that have a Spicy taste. But there is a little more to it than that,
it is also advisable to include an additional flavour based on the nature of
your Pokemon. Most of the natures have a favourite and least favourite flavour,
feeding a Pokemon a block of their favourite flavour will give a higher increase
in the stats in that field, and likewise feeding them a hated flavour will give
a lower increase. Once you know what nature your Pokemon has, check it below to
see what its likes and dislikes are:
Flavour[-Natures that like this flavour--][-Natures that hate this flavour--]
Spicy--[-Adamant, Brave, Lonely, Naughty-][-Bold, Calm, Modest, Timid-------]
Sour---[-Bold, Impish, Lax, Relaxed------][-Gentle, Hasty, Lonely, Calm-----]
Dry----[-Mild, Modest, Quiet, Rash-------][-Adamant, Careful, Impish, Jolly-]
Bitter-[-Calm, Careful. Gentle, Sassy----][-Lax, Naive, Naughty, Rash-------]
Sweet--[-Hasty, Jolly, Naive, Timid------][-Brave, Quiet, Relaxed, Sassy----]
If your Pokemon's Nature is not listed, then they don't have preference and all
kinds of flavours will yield the same result.
If you are lucky, you will have a Pokemon who is entering a contest that
requires a berry taste that they like, e.g. A Pokemon entering a Cool contest
that has a Brave nature. However if your Pokemon's nature and contest type means
they are going to be eating a flavour they don't like it's wise to either find a
berry with two flavours (or more), one of which is their favourite, or to have
someone else mix in a berry with their favourite flavour. You can check all
berries flavours by going into your Bag and heading to the Berries section, then
when you click on a berry you get the option to "Check Tag", this will display
the kinds of flavours it has.
--- 2d. Using the Berry Blender ---
Now that you know what type of flavour to give your Pokemon you need to head to
one of the berry blenders which can be found in the Pokemon Contest centres,
these look like little tables and have people around them. In general, the more
people around the table, the better the berry will turn out as there are more
berries going into it, plus more people to spin the blender. Now that you've
thrown the berry into the blender a dial will starting moving around in a
circle, you need to hit A when the dial matches up to the arrow on your side to
keep the blender going at a higher speed. This will go on until the bar at the
top is filled and you will have a Pokeblock!
--- 2e. Feeding a Pokeblock to a Pokemon ---
Once you've made a Pokeblock and you want to feed it to a Pokemon, go into your
Key Items and bring up the Pokeblock Case, this is where all your Pokeblocks are
stored. Here you can check the flavour(s) of the block, to see if it turned out
like you wanted. Also it will tell you the "feel" and the "level" of the block,
the lower the feel and the higher the level, the better the block will be. If
you're happy with the block you can now feed it to your Pokemon, after which you
will be shown on a spider diagram what it's Contest "stats" look like. You can
feed your Pokemon multiple blocks up to a certain point, so it's best to only
give them good quality blocks, and blocks they like the flavour of.
---- 3. Entering a Pokemon Contest ----
---  3a. Preliminary Judging ---
The Preliminary Judging is where the crowd rate you on the look of your Pokemon.
This is all based on what Pokeblocks you've fed your Pokemon so you don't
actually do anything in this stage. You'll be given a vague indication of how
well you, and your three opponents, have done by the number of hearts the crowd
display when you show your Pokemon.
--- 3b. Appeal Round ---
Now this is the round that really counts, your Pokemon's chance to show off
their moves. Your goal here is to over the course of 5 rounds accumulate the
most "hearts" and there are many different ways you can accomplish this. Now
when you choose what move to use this appeal round you will be presented with
your movelist along with a description of what this move does. It also displays
the number of hearts you will receive for successfully performing the move
(indicated by red hearts) and also the number of hearts the move will subtract
from your opponents (indicated by black hearts). There is one important thing to
remember and that is repeating a move twice in a row can often lead to the judge
being disappointed, even sometimes subtracting hearts from you. This is why it
is important your Pokemon has at least two moves that correspond to the contest
type. Now, let's go over what you can do in your appeal round, they can roughly
be grouped into:
-Gain/Damage Hearts
-Manipulating applause
-Making the other Pokemon nervous
-Calming your Pokemon
-Stealing attention
-Changing the order
-Appeal Combos
-- 3bi. Gain/Damage Hearts --
The most basic part of the contest, each move will gain your Pokemon hearts
which is what you need to win. Some moves will also at the same subtract hearts
from your opponents. It's important to read the move descriptions before you use
these kinds of moves because some depend on the order you fall in the appeal
"queue". For example, some moves will only affect those still waiting to perform
after you.
-- 3bii. Manipulating Applause --
Applause is another important part of the appeal round. Every time a Pokemon
successfully performs a move that corresponds with the contest type (ie.
performing a cute move in a cute contest) the applause bar will be filled one
point. Your Pokemon will receive an extra heart each time you fill a point in
the bar. However, if you Pokemon happens to fill the last point in the bar you
will receive around six extra hearts! As you can imagine, this is something you
really want to happen to you, and not your opponents. Also, you can reduce the
applause bar by using an incorrect move (eg, using a tough move in a cute
contest). This will reduce the applause bar by one point which in turn could
prevent someone from gaining a full applause. You should note however, you won't
receive your extra "applause heart" for doing this, but you won't be penalised
any other way.
-- 3biii. Making the other Pokemon nervous --
Making Pokemon nervous is one of the few ways you can "attack" your Pokemon in
contests. Making them nervous means they will mess up in some way and lose
hearts. It's worth reading the description on these kinds of moves because some
will only affect certain Pokemon (eg. the first Pokemon in the list, those who
have already appealed etc). Some Pokemon if made nervous won't be able to appeal
at all, whereas some can naturally be able to calm themselves, this seems to be
random from round to round so there is little way of telling. There is a
definite way to protect your Pokemon from being nervous which is...
-- 3biv. Calming your Pokemon --
..calming your Pokemon! With these moves you can ensure that if a Pokemon tries
to use a move that would make your Pokemon nervous it will be able to deal with
it and you won't lose hearts. Raising your Pokemon's condition will also help
prevent nervousness.
-- 3bv. Stealing attention --
This is another way to manipulate applause. When a Pokemon steals the audience's
attention what they are doing is basically preventing the other Pokemon yet to
appeal of receiving any applause hearts as they are too busy watching the other
Pokemon.
-- 3bvi. Changing the order --
You can also change the order in which the Pokemon appeal, there are two ways of
doing this, either using a move that will put you at the front of the list, or a
move that scrambles the list. The pros and cons of doing this really are down to
what kind of moves your Pokemon has. If your Pokemon has lots of moves that
affect the waiting Pokemon it's better to be at the front of the list for
example. Although if you know one of the opponents has moves that only affect
the first Pokemon in the list it could leave you at a disadvantage.
-- 3bvii. Appeal Combos --
Appeal Combos are difficult to predict because there is little way of knowing
whether the move you are about to use will activate a combo until you use it.
You will know if the move is part of a combo however if the Judge is "waiting
expectantly", you should then select as your next move the move that is
displayed in pink. This will earn you more hearts than usual.
--- 3c. Judging Time - Contest is over ---
Now that you have made all your appeals you will be presented with a display of
how well each Pokemon did, based on the initial judging and the five appeal
rounds, the winner will then be presented with a ribbon. That's it!
--- 4. Afterword and Contact info ---
Well that's all I am aware of typing about for the Pokemon contests, hopefully
this will be of some use to you. If you have any questions, comments,
corrections and extra info you think I should include do let me know by sending
a PM to my Neoseeker account "LanDi Sama"!