Note taking has been a part of VGC forever. With open team sheets becoming a thing this year it has changed the way some people take notes, it’s even gotten some people to stop taking notes entirely. It hasn’t changed much for me, but it has given me an opportunity to talk notes and why we take them.
A good chunk of players don’t take notes. Some will even bring a notebook but not really have a system for what they want to keep track of. Once I had an opponent sit down, he opened a new page in his notebook, wrote “SLAYER” at the top in all caps, took no other notes and didn’t speak a word. Not the average note taking, but I guess better than nothing.
For a lot of players, when they take notes it is usually just keeping track of information that is now available on the team sheet. Sometimes with notes on speed as well. In the past this was all information you had to tease out over the course of a set, but now most of it is handed to you at the start of the round.
Some players go a step further and will keep track of what both their opponents and themselves brought and led with each game. In practice this is great for working on matchups, and in events it’s helpful if you want to write the warstory later. It’s a good system and I respect it. Someday I’ll try to work this into my own system, but as you’re about to find out my system is already a bit complicated.
The oldest notebook I have is from 2013, which might be when I started taking notes at events. I’m not sure how I came up with this format, but it’s remained mostly unchanged since then.
So what I’ll do is write my opponents 6 mons at the top of the page and will scribble in any relevant info I tease out next to each mon. Pretty standard stuff. But then I keep track of every turn. Specifically what my opponent does every turn as well as what field effects are up and for how long. When a pokémon is knocked out, I used to write “Dead”, shortly after I would also circle it when it happened so I could see it easier and keep track of how many pokémon they had left. Eventually I just started writing and circling the letter “D”. I also quickly stopped writing the word “switch” to indicate a switch and instead draw a little arrow from the previous turn.
Now you may be telling yourself most of that seems unnecessary since the game interface can tell you pokémon count and field effects now. Which is true, but being colorblind makes reading the pokeball icons for life count difficult. Also having to button into a pokémon information screen on each side to check turns on things like Tailwind and screens is considerably less intuitive than just glancing at notes.
Keeping track of what an opponent does each turn has a handful of benefits. Perhaps the most obvious thing is also the least common in practice, and that’s keeping track of PP. It almost never comes up, but maybe like once every other year you’ll be glad you know how many Sucker Punches they have left.
Less obvious but constantly relevant is reading the opponents playstyle. Do they switch constantly? Do they never protect? Are they constantly going for chip damage or are they taking big swings every time at the plate? These things give you a clearer picture of what they might do at any given turn beyond just your standard matchup flowcharts.
One of my favorite examples is this set from 2016 nationals. I had led Mega Kangaskhan Grininja into their Mega Salamence and Bronzong. Thinking that they wouldn’t want to risk their Salamence dying turn 1 to an Ice Beam, I doubled into Bronzong and sure enough they protected Salamence. From there I made the educated guess that they were in fact too scared of Ice Beam and they switched out. Because of how scared they were playing I ignored the Salamence the first 5 turns it was on the field in the 2 games even though the standard flowchart would have told me to not risk that beyond the first 2. There was a good chance I would lose either game if they just attacked or set up Tailwind while I ignored it. However, the first time they clicked an attack with it that wasn’t Protect was also the first turn I Ice Beamed it and my opponent screamed. The scream is what cemented it in my head as a good example of using notes to make reads.
Obviously, this also comes in useful at events when sharing info with your friends. Being able to give a friend their opponents playstyle and habits on the day does help them a lot. Of course if you and your friend have wildly different teams there’s a good chance the opponent will have a different gameplan, but still it’s good info to have. Info sharing is one of those parts of the game that never feels good but is nonetheless inescapable. With open team sheets the advantage of a bigger network is smaller than it used to be, but examples like this still make them a threat.
So yes for all those reasons and more, I take thorough notes. You should also take notes! Take as many notes as you can! Take them at events and take them in practice. Even if you never plan on looking over them again they’ll still help you become a better battler.
Sidenote: When at an event, trade team sheets with your opponent as soon as you sit down like it says in the rules. It helps both of you set up the battle since trainer names are included so you don’t accidentally connect to the wrong person. (It shouldn’t happen and yet I’ve seen it multiple times now) But also it allows both players to start their notes during the downtime and check for errors so it doesn’t delay the start of the game. None of this “I want to wait until team preview to trade” BS. No one wants to wait until there’s a timer going before getting a crumpled up barely legible team sheet passed to them. Personally, I’m never going to start the timer until I’ve copied their sheet onto my notes, which takes about 2 minutes and can be finished during game setup. Despite me politely conveying that to my opponents, many still refuse to let me see their sheet until setup is complete. Then they have to sit on the battle ready screen for 2 minutes while I copy it over and we both feel like jerks.
