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Alola League: What Would You Have Done Differently?

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Welp. The Alola League is over, and everyone's favorite never-aging 10-year-old is the winner. But this League also had its fair share of dislikable elements for many. If you could change something about the Alola League, what would it be?
 
Don't have Team Rocket present, let alone take part. Have Bewear keep them at its den for the whole conference

Keep the Battle Royal round but give it more screen time

Have 3 on 3 rounds with the final round being 6 on 6
 
Give each participant a full team.
Make 1st and 2nd round Battle Royale but from SM games where 4 trainers battle for the win, then Top 8 and so on.
Make Ryuki and Molayne show up.
 
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Well first of all, Ash would have been the only major character competing. No classmates, no TR, no extras like Oak, just Ash. There would have been a qualification of needing to beat trials to compete.

2nd and most importantly, no dirty fake-out with Hau. Just have him lose to Ash fairly in a battle of Decidueye vs. Torracat.

Less 1 v 1s and more 3 v 3s. Final battle would have been a full battle.
 
Welp. The Alola League is over, and everyone's favorite never-aging 10-year-old is the winner. But this League also had its fair share of dislikable elements for many. If you could change something about the Alola League, what would it be?
Make Ash Vs Hau a Double Battle.

Well first of all, Ash would have been the only major character competing. No classmates, no TR, no extras like Oak, just Ash. There would have been a qualification of needing to beat trials to compete.

2nd and most importantly, no dirty fake-out with Hau. Just have him lose to Ash fairly in a battle of Decidueye vs. Torracat.

Less 1 v 1s and more 3 v 3s. Final battle would have been a full battle.
Rowlet is Deciduye's Rival tho? I would have personally done a Pikachu and Rowlet Vs Alolan Raichu and Deciduye. Also only trial-completers competing means no Hau and Guzma as well. That's bad in the sense that we won't get to see Guzma compete. Guzma would have need to be written in a different way as well. The thing is we already know several trainers in the League like Guzma and Kiawe who were strong but never undergoed a Trial.
 
Well for starters, I would've had Hau do more before the League so as to give Ash more motivation for wanting to beat him. I also wouldn't have had any of the classmates participate since they just took screentime that should've belonged to Ash, Gladion and Hau. Team Rocket competing was fine in my book since they deserved a shot at participating since they've been around for more than 20 years and I actually liked Jessie vs. James; I just wish that their subplot with the mecha hadn't been written since I just think it's a waste of time. I also wouldn't have done the battle royale round since the animators couldn't handle a true battle royale and what we got instead was a store brand variety, whereas I wanted classic Coke. Guzma's redemption also shouldn't have been so sudden and he should've crashed the League in anger after he lost.
 
Assuming the same entry rules:
-Battle Royale lasts 2 entire episodes.
-Ash vs Faba starts in medias res, Jessie uses Mimikyu and James doesn't feel intimidated by her, and Lillie lands more hits on Gladion.
-Ash vs Hau only last one episode and is a 2vs2, Rowlet doesn't learn any move. However, I think giving Ash a pity victory would be a good chance for Guzma to insult him later. The other quarters would be 2vs2, with James using Meowth.
-The semis are 3vs3 and the finals 4vs4.

Changing the actual participants, well, that would be one hell of a rewrite. One option would be to allow everyone who has 2 or more Z-crystals, so Lana and Kiawe could enter and showcase their skills, and another option would be only Island Challenge winners but it would require Ilima to have a larger role. In the later case, Ash would battle new characters, then Hau, then Guzma and finally Gladion, who beat Ilima in the semi finals.
 
  • Improve the transitions during the battle royale to make it more cohesive.
  • Make Hau himself notice that Rowlet was sleeping instead of celebrating until Hala pointed it out. I feel like that alone could have made the fake out less frustrating.

I can't think of anything else. I actually like the fact the entire main cast got to participate, it made it so the League can still center around Ash overall without feeling like the rest of the main cast is relegated to the role of background characters, and honestly, I'm fine with 1v1s, 2v2s and 3v3s. The league was long as it was, and if the trade off for longer battles is skipping half of it I'm not down for it.
 
I'm not gonna focus on Satoshi vs Hau since you guys pretty much have the same opinion as I do.

Now fow what I'd do:

Satoshi vs Sauboh: 3 vs. 3, Satoshi vs. Hau: 3 vs. 3, Satoshi vs Guzma: 6 vs 6 and vs Glazio: 6 vs 6.
Satoshi's 6th Pokemon would be one from the Orchid ranch (like Waruvial, Goukazaru, Jukain, etc...)
No focus on every battle there is, let Kaki be the only classmate to go to Top 16 and focus mostly on Satoshi (little bit on Hau, Glazio, Guzma and Kaki)
More build-up to each battle (instead of nearly every episode being consisted of battles only, show Satoshi coming with strategies, training or just hanging out (like Jouto and Shin'ou did)
Use that board screen to show which Pokemon trainers are using and which have been defeated instead of just trainer's pictures!
 
I have so many notes, but off the top of my head:

If there absolutely had to be a battle royal:

Divide the competitors into groups, each competing in their own battle royal bracket with the top survivors moving on. I would also have that the battle royal would cut the competition down to either 64 competitors.

Team Rocket, Samson Oak and Faba would not compete in this as they are basically joke characters who have no business being in this and get in the way of there being better quality battles.

Allow Kahili, Pikala and Plumeria to advance into the main tournament. Pikala would make it to the top 16, while Kahili and Plumeria would make it to the top 8.

Top 64 and 32 would be the rounds where the battles are 1 v 1. Mallow and Lillie would win at the top 64 to give them some time to shine but get knocked out along with Sophocles in the top 32.

The top 16 to 4 would be 3 v 3 battles and since they didn’t bother giving anyone a full team, the finals would be 4 v 4.

Ash vs Hau would be handled seriously without the fakeout instead replaced by it almost being judged as KOed before getting back on its feet.
 
On my part it would also require a bit of restructuring of other episodes, but:

-Poipole stayed, trained and did battles, and is Naganadel by now
-Rowlet actually overcame its sleeping problem already, and beats Decidueye in a less frustrating way (Among other things, I'd rather have Featherdance decoys be used to avoid arrows entirely, rather than somehow being able to free Rowlet after he's hit)
-Potentially more 3 vs 3 and less padding, but if I were limited to similar time constraints, it wouldn't be vitally important

That's basically it... I kind of have more, but the rest feels more like nitpicking/would require even bigger reworkings of how the SM anime is as a whole
 
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-Hau, Gladion, Guzma and the Masked Royal as the only main rivals.
-The last two battles would have been 6vs6.
-No Melmetal. The last two slots would have been used for four returning Pokemon in the last two battles.
-Ash would have been nervous, at least before the finals. He would have recalled his past losses.
-His past companions would have at least sent him something nice.
 
Some more things to add:

Ash vs Hau would have been the top 16 battle and would have had Ash battle Illima in the top 8. It was such s waste to eliminate someone who has competed in other leagues so early on.
 
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I am disappointed that Hau totally dominated against Ash, not only by the strength of his fully evolved Decidueye but he outsmarted Ash almost the entire match with strategies. It feels strange that Ash uses great strategies in the following rounds but nog against Hau. It's okay to be the underdog, strategies can make the difference in those situations. Unfortunately this didn't happen. He was just lucky and nothing more..

Also, Seed bomb was a wasted move to learn for Rowlet, even Hau realised it when he let Decidueye use leaf blade to throw the everstone away so he can use spirit shackle to prevent Rowlet from moving.

I agree with other people saying this should have been a double battle. Rowlet works better as a pokemon in a double battle. He can lift the other pokemon for example.
This and the incredible amount of reused animation are my two big problems I would have liked to see differently. The rest of the league was pretty great in my opinion.
 
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