Since the Sun & Moon TCG series, the Pokémon Company (TPC) and Pokémon Korea have been promoting the “Sealed” game format through releasing expansion sets compatible for Sealed games regularly and organizing tournaments with such expansion sets.
Each summer, a special sealed “HR” tournament would be held. In 2022, this tournament would be themed after Lucario, The Aura Pokemon. The tournaments would be played with the just-released Incandescent Arcana expansion set (expansion mark S11a).
This event would be held in all major territories that the Pokemon TCG was distributed in, with each region hosting their own tournament series. Participation promos for all events was a Barry trainer card promo, while winners would receive Lucario cards.
Much of the research and writing work for this article was performed by Rabby250, Major thanks to them and their efforts in documenting this multi-country campaign.
Sealed Tournament rules
Unlike traditional tournaments where players brought their own decks, “sealed” tournaments involved building entirely new decks on the day of the competition. Every year since the first sealed tournaments started in 2018, special promo cards were issued as prizes for participant and winners.
The one exception was the summer of 2021, when the event cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Eevee evolution prize cards meant for this event in Japan were instead distributed by lottery.
Each region had their own schedule and high-level tournament format, but they all applied the same match rules derived from TPC’s official Sealed game format guidelines:
- All participating players were required to pay an entry fee equivalent to the price of 10 Incandescent Arcana booster packs, and will be given the packs after checking-in. They will also receive their participation prize Barry along with the packs.
- Players could not bring their own decks into the tournament, and instead were required to build the decks they would be using with only cards listed below:
- Any card they pulled from the given Incandescent Arcana booster packs, with no more than 4 copies of the same card (or 1 for Radiant Pokémons)
- Basic Energy Cards lent by the hosting Gym – 12 of each type including Grass, Fire, Water, Psychic and Metal
- Barry (Reverse Holofoil), the participation prize (limit 1 per deck as each player received only one copy)
- All decks must contain exactly 40 cards
- Each game except tie breakers was played with 4 prize cards on each side.
In addition, regions whose tournaments were organized by TPC shared the same organization and tie breaking rules described below:
- All tournaments were held by Pokémon TCG Gyms (Pokémon Centers and local game stores authorized by TPC to hold organized game events).
- Players were given 30 minutes to build their decks, and each game had a time limit of 25 minutes (30 in Japan). If the play time ran out while the player going first was playing, the player going last would get an extra turn.
- If a game ended in a draw or timed out without a winner, the result of that game would be decided by the following rules:
- If the game was played in a round-robin group, both players would be declared as losing the game.
- If any player had 2 or less prize cards left, the player who had less prize cards than the other player would immediately win the game. If both players had the same number of prize cards left, the game would continue overtime until a player won or had fewer prize cards.
- If both players had 3 or more prize cards left, the game would continue overtime until a player won or reached 2 or less prize cards.
- If the game ended in a draw after applying all the rules above, the winner would be decided in a sudden death with 1 prize card on each side.
Japan
Japan would be the first region to host these sealed tournaments. Incandescent Arcana was released in Japanese on September 2, 2022, and Battle for Lucario HR was held in Japan between September 30 and December 31, 2022.
Pokémon Card All Stars – Battle for Lucario HR
As with all previous Sealed format tournaments, the first copy of the tournament’s grand prize, a rainbow rare Lucario VSTAR, was given out in the Pokémon Card All Stars – Battle for Lucario HR invite-only celebrity exhibition tournament held on September 23, 2022.
The following 8 celebrities were invited to compete in the single-elimination tournament:
- Kanata Hongō (本郷奏多), actor and the winner of Summer Pokémon Card First Battle, an exhibition tournament held in 2021
- Nashiko Momotsuki (桃月なしこ), professional cosplayer
- Sunshine Ikezaki (サンシャイン池崎), comedian
- Kanta (カンタ) from Mizutamari Bond (水溜りボンド), YouTuber
- Kengo Kawanishi (河西健吾), voice actor
- Sayaka Okada (岡田紗佳), professional mahjong player
- ZweiLance, professional Duel Masters TCG player
- Raibarori (ライバロリ), Pokémon TCG commentator and the winner of the exhibition tournament of Battle for Zekrom HR held in 2018
TCG player ZweiLance eventually defeated Raibarori in the finals to claim the first Lucario VSTAR of the tournament.
Two campaigns were also held within the tournament for viewers to have a chance to win the cards:
- One campaign required viewers to guess the winner of the tournament and tweet their guesses with the #ポケカオールスターズ (Pokémon Card All Stars) hash tag before the tournament finals. One lucky viewer who guessed ZweiLance correctly would win both the Lucario V and Lucario VSTAR promo cards.
- The other campaign required viewers to answer a quiz asked during the tournament (which Pokémon did Sunshine Ikezaki last shouted out during his match against ZweiLance) with their answers tweeted with the #ポケカオールスターズ hash tag. One lucky viewer who guessed ZweiLance correctly would win both the Lucario V and Lucario VSTAR promo cards.
Tournament structure
Due to the expected high volume of entries, TPC required all players who wish to compete in the tournaments to register within the registration periods, and the actual list of participants in each tournament would be drawn from the entries on the last day of its registration period:
- Registration period for tournaments in September and October was between September 20 and 26, 2022
- Registration period for tournaments in November was between September 30 and October 20, 2022
- Registration period for tournaments in December was between November 1 and 17, 2022
Entries not drawn were placed in a reserve list and might be chosen as substitutes if previously-selected participants canceled their entries. They were also allowed to register in another registration period as long as they were not selected in any previous registration periods. Each player could only compete once across all tournaments.
Each tournament started with exactly 16 players and was split into 2 rounds:
- In the qualifying round, players were arranged into 4-player round-robin groups in which they played other players in the same group.
- The final round was a single-elimination tournament between the winners from each group in the qualifying round.
Prizes
All participants would receive a reverse holofoil Barry trainer card.
Players who won the qualifying round would receive a Lucario V promo.
The winner of each individual tournament would receive the rainbow rare Lucario VSTAR alongside a display frame for the card.
Sealed Battle at Home Campaign
Similar to the Battle for Charizard HR tournament in 2020, TPC also provided an alternative campaign for players to win the cards without participating in the tournament.
The Sealed Battle at Home lottery campaign was held between September 30 and December 31, 2022. To enter the campaign, players had to register at the Pokémon Trading Card Game Trainer’s Website, register decks they built with cards pulled from Incandescent Arcana booster packs, and provide both their player IDs and the deck codes of their decks in the campaign’s application form website.
No proof-of-purchases were required to enter the campaign, however deck registries including cards outside Incandescent Arcana (except basic energy cards) were excluded from the lottery.
6000 winners were drawn from valid entries:
- 2000 winners received prize A: 305/S-P Lucario VSTAR
- 4000 winners received prize B: 304/S-P Lucario V
While winners of previous campaigns received prize cards in full sets, winners of this campaign would only receive one card as their prize, and were not allowed to choose their prizes. The prizes were shipped to winners in late January 2023. These prizes were shipped in envelopes similar to the ones used in the previous year’s Eevee evolution prize cards.
Japanese Distribution Estimates
As TPC only announced the number of prizes for the Sealed Battle at Home lottery campaign, we had to estimate how many cards were given out as tournament prizes in order to get the overall distribution counts. This was done by searching for all Battle for Lucario HR tournaments on the Pokémon Trading Card Game Trainer’s Website and estimating the distribution counts based on the number of tournaments and allocated entry slots for each tournament:
- Add up all numbers of allocated entry slots to get the number of participation prizes.
- Divide the number of participation prizes by 4 to get the number of Lucario Vs given to qualifying round winners, and add 4000 from the lottery campaign and 2 from the viewer’s prizes of the exhibition tournament to get the total number of Lucario Vs.
- Divide the number of participation prizes by 16 to get the number of Lucario VSTARs given to tournament winners, and add 2000 from the lottery campaign and 3 from the exhibition tournament to get the total number of Lucario VSTARs.
The overall distribution numbers estimated as of this writing were:
- 303/S-P Barry (reverse holofoil): 13648 copies
- 304/S-P Lucario V (full art): 7414 copies
- 305/S-P Lucario VSTAR (rainbow rare): 2856 copies
Note that actual distribution numbers might be lower as we assume all entry slots were filled, and all tournaments were held as scheduled.
Korea
Incandescent Arcana was released in Korean on October 14, 2022, and Battle for Lucario HR was held in South Korea on the following weekends:
- October 22 and 23, 2022 (held in 21 shops)
- November 19 and 20, 2022 (held in 22 shops)
- December 10 and 11, 2022 (held in 18 shops)
- January 14 and 15, 2023 (held in 19 shops)
Tournaments were being held in 8 Pokémon Card Shops and 18 authorized card shops across the country. Pokémon Card Shops might also have held unscheduled SR tournaments during the event period.
Tournament structure
Each shop would hold two tournaments on each scheduled weekend, with either one tournament on Saturday and the other on Sunday or both tournaments on the same day. Each tournament started with exactly 16 players and was split into 2 rounds:
- In the qualifying round, players were arranged into 4-player round-robin groups in which they played best-of-3 series against every other player in the same group. The winner from each group was determined through the following rules:
- The player with 3-0 match record
- The player with the most 2-0 set records
- The better player in head-to-head set records
- If the result was a 3-way tie unbreakable by all rules above, additional matches would be held among the top players to determine the winner
- The final round was a best-of-3 single-elimination tournament between the winners from each group in the qualifying round.
As mentioned above, both rounds in South Korean tournaments required players to play in best-of-3 series. Players are given 50 minutes to play the entire series, and the winner of each series was determined through the following rules:
- If the time ran out before the second set started, the player who had less prize cards remaining would win the series. If both players had the same number of prize cards remaining, the set would continue until one or both players took their next prize cards. If the numbers of prize cards still remained the same afterwards, the winner would be decided through a sudden death game.
- If the time ran out before the third set started, the winner would be determined based on whether both players had 3 or more prize cards remaining in the second set:
- If both players had 3 or more prize cards remaining in the second set, the second set would be omitted, and the winner of the first set would win the series.
- If the second set was still in play and at least one player had less than 3 prize cards remaining, the player with less prize cards would win the second set.
- If the set record was 1-1 after completing the second set, the winner would be decided through a sudden death game.
- If the time ran out while the third set was in play, the third set would be determined by rule #1 described above.
In South Korean tournaments, sudden deaths were played with 4 prize cards on each side and would end immediately upon taking the first prize card.
Prizes
All participants would receive a reverse holofoil Barry trainer promo.
Winners of the qualifying round would receive the Lucario V promo card.
The winner of each tournament would be awarded with a Lucario VSTAR promo.
Korean Distribution Estimates
As neither official distribution counts nor details of each tournament were announced, we could only get estimates through the overall schedule and number of shops holding the tournaments:
- Assuming all shops held 2 tournaments on each of their scheduled weekends, there were 160 tournament winners who received Lucario VSTARs.
- Multiply the number of Lucario VSTARs by 4 to get the number of Lucario Vs given to qualifying round winners.
- Multiply the number of Lucario VSTARs by 16 to get the number of participation prizes.
The distribution numbers estimated as of this writing were:
- 184/S-P Barry (reverse holofoil): 2560 copies
- 185/S-P Lucario V (full art): 640 copies
- 186/S-P Lucario VSTAR (rainbow rare): 160 copies
Note that actual distribution numbers might vary as we assume all entry slots were filled, and all tournaments were held as scheduled. In addition, we didn’t have information regarding unscheduled SR tournaments held by Pokémon Card Shops, which might provide extra copies of Barry and Lucario V.
Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau
Incandescent Arcana was released in Traditional Chinese on September 16, 2022, and Battle for Lucario HR was held in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau between September 26 and October 30, 2022, with entry registration starting from September 16, 2022.
Tournament Structure
Each tournament required at least 16 participants to start. In a tournament, players were required to play through 3 Swiss rounds, and players with 3-0 records would play each other in a one-game final.
Tournament rules were similar for tournaments in all traditional Chinese regions. A PDF of the Taiwanese ones can be found below:
Prizes
All participants would receive a reverse holofoil Barry trainer promo.
The Lucario V promo was given to players with 3-0 records in the Swiss rounds and one or more lucky players drawn from players who didn’t win all 3 rounds. The number of lucky players drawn was based on the number of players competed in the tournament:
- 1 lucky player drawn from each 16-player tournament
- 2 lucky players drawn from each 17- to 32-player tournament
- 3 lucky players drawn from each 33- to 48-player tournament
- 4 lucky players drawn from each 49- to 64-player tournament
The Lucario VSTAR promo was given to winners of the one-game finals between players with 3-0 Swiss round records. The number of copies given out was based on the number of players competed in the tournament:
- 1 copy given out in each 16-player tournament
- 2 copies given out in each 17- to 32-player tournament
- 3 copies given out in each 33- to 48-player tournament
- 4 copies given out in each 49- to 64-player tournament
Chinese Distribution Estimates
Although no official distribution counts were announced, we were able to get rough estimates by searching for all Battle for Lucario HR tournaments on the Pokémon Trading Card Game Trainer’s Website (Taiwan) (Hong Kong and Macau) and estimating the distribution counts based on the number of tournaments and allocated entry slots for each tournament:
- For tournaments registered with invalid number of entry slots such as 1, round them up to the nearest multiple of 16 to match tournament rules.
- Divide the number of entry slots for each tournament by 16 to get the number of Lucario VSTARs given to winners and Lucario Vs given to lucky players.
- Multiply the number of Lucario VSTARs by 2 to get the number of Lucario Vs given to Swiss round winners, and add the number of Lucario Vs given to lucky players to get the total number of Lucario Vs.
- Add up all numbers of allocated entry slots to get the number of participation prizes.
The distribution numbers estimated as of this writing were:
- 211/S-P Barry (reverse holofoil): 9812 copies
- 212/S-P Lucario V (full art): 1851 copies
- 213/S-P Lucario VSTAR (rainbow rare): 617 copies
Note that actual distribution numbers might be lower as we assume all entry slots were filled, and all tournaments were held as scheduled.
Thailand
Incandescent Arcana was released in Thai on September 30, 2022, and Battle for Lucario HR was held in Thailand between October 3 and November 6, 2022, with entry registration starting from 7 to 10 days prior to each tournament.
Tournament Structure
Each tournament started with exactly 8 players. In a tournament, players were split into two 4-player groups playing single-elimination rounds, and winners of each group would play head-to-head to determine the final winner.
Prizes
All participants would receive a reverse holofoil Barry trainer promo.
The Lucario V promo was given to group winners and one lucky player drawn from players who lost in group matches.
The Lucario VSTAR promo was given to the overall tournament winner.
Thai Distribution Estimates
Although no official distribution counts were announced, we were able to get rough estimates by searching for all Battle for Lucario HR tournaments on the Pokémon Trading Card Game Trainer’s Website (link) and estimating the distribution counts based on the number of tournaments and allocated entry slots for each tournament:
- For tournaments registered with invalid number of entry slots such as 12, round them up to the nearest multiple of 8 to match tournament rules.
- Divide the number of entry slots for each tournament by 8 to get the number of Lucario VSTARs given to winners and Lucario Vs given to lucky players.
- Multiply the number of Lucario VSTARs by 2 to get the number of Lucario Vs given to group winners, and add the number of Lucario Vs given to lucky players to get the total number of Lucario Vs.
- Add up all numbers of allocated entry slots to get the number of participation prizes.
The distribution numbers estimated as of this writing were:
- 129/S-P Barry (reverse holofoil): 1844 copies
- 130/S-P Lucario V (full art): 696 copies
- 131/S-P Lucario VSTAR (rainbow rare): 232 copies
Note that actual distribution numbers might be lower as we assume all entry slots were filled, and all tournaments were held as scheduled.
Indonesia
Incandescent Arcana was released in Indonesian on October 28, 2022, and Battle for Lucario HR was held in Indonesia between October 28 and November 27, 2022, with entry registration starting from October 21, 2022.
Tournament Structure
The number of players in each tournament must be a multiple of 8 (8, 16, 24, 32, etc.).
In a tournament, players would first play the elimination round in 4-player round-robin groups, and players who won the elimination round were paired to play a best-of-3 final round.
Prizes
All participants would receive a reverse holofoil Barry trainer promo.
Winners of the elimination round received the Lucario V promo card
Winners of the best-of-three finals received the rainbow Lucario VSTAR promo card.
Indonesian Distribution Estimates
Although no official distribution counts were announced, we were able to get rough estimates by searching for all Battle for Lucario HR tournaments on the Pokémon Trading Card Game Trainer’s Website (link) and estimating the distribution counts based on the number of tournaments and allocated entry slots for each tournament:
- For tournaments registered with invalid number of entry slots such as 12, round them up to the nearest multiple of 8 to match tournament rules.
- Divide the number of entry slots for each tournament by 4 to get the number of Lucario Vs.
- Divide the number of Lucario Vs by 2 to get the number of Lucario VSTARs.
- Add up all numbers of allocated entry slots to get the number of participation prizes.
The distribution numbers estimated as of this writing were:
- 129/S-P Barry (reverse holofoil): 2236 copies
- 130/S-P Lucario V (full art): 564 copies
- 131/S-P Lucario VSTAR (rainbow rare): 282 copies
Note that actual distribution numbers might be lower as we assume all entry slots were filled, and all tournaments were held as scheduled.
America & Europe
In America and Europe, the Lucario V (SWSH213) and Lucario VSTAR (SWSH214) were released as box promos in the Lucario VSTAR Premium Collection on April 8, 2022 and retailed for $39.99.
The American and European version of the box contained the following items:
- 1 etched promo card featuring Lucario V
- 1 etched promo card featuring Lucario VSTAR
- 1 etched oversize card featuring Lucario VSTAR
- 1 colorful collector’s pin featuring Lucario
- 1 metallic coin featuring Lucario
- 1 acrylic VSTAR marker
- 6 Pokémon TCG booster packs
- Each booster pack contains 10 cards and either 1 basic Energy or 1 VSTAR marker
- A code card for Pokémon Trading Card Game Live
Sources
- https://web.archive.org/web/20221229015007/https://www.sealed-campaign.com/register
- https://www.pokemon-card.com/ex/sealed/
- https://www.pokemon-card.com/info/003526.html
- https://www.pokemonkorea.co.kr/PCG_Shield_battle
- https://pokemoncard.co.kr/card/486
- https://asia.pokemon-card.com/tw/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/09/TW_rukario_sohdatsusen_2.pdf
- https://web.archive.org/web/20220928232720/https://asia.pokemon-card.com/hk/archive/special/card/sealed/
- https://asia.pokemon-card.com/th/archive/special/card/sealed/
- https://asia.pokemon-card.com/id/archive/special/card/sealed/
- https://asia.pokemon-card.com/id/archives/2414/
