Platinum Master Contest FAQ (Manipless)

Q: What is this run?
A: This run is to win a Master Rank Contest, in any of the 5 categories (NOT all 5)

Q: Why are you doing this run?
A: Mostly because it's one of the 10 bounties that Sakharu put up in the DS Speedrunning Discord recently. The bounty was for manipless runs of this category, so that's why I'm running manipless.

More information about those bounties here: https://pastebin.com/UR1pC7Hj

Q: Do you plan on doing any of the other bounties?
A: Yes, but given the timeline ends on July 1st, I won't get a chance to do all of them. But I'd like to try a couple.

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Q: What do you have to do to win a Master Rank contest??
A: To enter in the Master Rank, you have to win all the ranks below. So once you reach the Contest Hall in Hearthome, you have to win a Normal Rank, Great Rank, Ultra Rank, and finally a Master Rank contest - all the the same category (Cool/Beauty/Cute/Smart/Tough)

Q: So what is the route for this run?
A: There are two different routes you can do.
The more reasonable route (that WR does, and I'm doing for this run), plays a manipless run up to Veilstone (minus catching a flier, plus getting Poffin Case). At Veilstone Dept Store, you can buy Level 32 Poffins for 6400 each, and by getting a bunch of Vitamins to sell for money, you can buy a whole lot of them to increase the condition of the Pokemon you enter (Monferno), giving you enough to somewhat comfortably win while playing reasonably well.

The far more luck dependant route (that I was doing), plays mostly the same as a manipless run, but only to Hearthome. It saves about 19 minutes by not playing up to Veilstone, but tries to win the Contests without raising the condition of Monferno to get any hearts for the Master Rank contest. To compensate for this - you have to get a few more accessories in Floraroma and the Flag after Cycling Road to try and get a couple of hearts from them (ideally you get 3 hearts in Master, if you get a super lucky theme you can get 4).

In addition, you try to keep Taunt on Monferno for the whole run because it's a good contest move, which changes a few of the battles. Because this route doesn't play past Hearthome it can just give both Cut and Rock Smash to Monferno, so it doesn't need to catch anything either. As a result the best move for the 4th slot ends up being Grass Knot and playing in the Smart contest - as that allows you to pivot to try and fluke a max Voltage bonus from one of the judges too (since both Taunt and Grass Knot are Smart moves)

You are heavily favoured to *not* win doing this strategy, you are playing from well behind going into the final part of the contest (Acting, where you use moves), and need really good luck from the AI to either not choose the same judge as you but the same as each other, so you get more hearts from bonuses, or to someone fluke a max bonus.

My win rate on the Master Rank doing this strat so far has been about 5% (as in I've tried 20 times and won once). No idea what the actual chance of winning would be.

Q: What's the current record?
A: 2:00:50 by Bounxii - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp8luHViozg