Ready to battle in a brand-new way in Pokémon Masters EX? Looking to unlock your sync pairs’ EX roles faster? Then you need to check out the Battle Rally—a gauntlet of 10 battles where you can earn battle rally medals, which can be exchanged for Roll Cake Coin Vouchers and other valuable items. With Roll Cake Coin Vouchers, you can trade up for a much-needed roll cake that can give your team’s sync moves a huge boost!

You can get up to 20 Roll Cake Coin Vouchers and 5★ Power-Ups every month via the Battle Rally. These rewards are otherwise very rare in Pokémon Masters EX, so taking on the Battle Rally is worth the effort.

Winning 10 battles in a row and maximizing the amount of battle rally medals earned can be challenging at first, but we’ll help you understand how to succeed in this fun, tricky game mode.

In order to take on the Battle Rally, you will need a battle rally pass. Luckily, you can get one at no cost every week just for logging in! Once you have a pass, the Battle Rally is always open for business, and you can leap in at any time. Just be warned: several aspects of the Battle Rally change each run, so don’t expect the same sync pairs and strategies to always succeed.

At the start of each Battle Rally run, you will acquire one Battle Rally-specific item that will increase the power of your sync pairs if at least one has the matching theme skill. For example, you may start a run with a Fire Upgrade, which raises the Attack, Defense, Sp. Atk, and Sp. Def of all allied sync pairs by 100% when there is at least one sync pair with the Fire theme skill on your team. Whatever this item is, it’ll be the first building block to consider as you progress through the Battle Rally.

Your Battle Rally gauntlet consists of ten battle areas that each feature three different difficulty levels to go up against: Normal, Hard, and Very Hard. The higher the difficulty, the more rally points you’ll earn winning. These points are used to obtain items in the rally shop and eventually determine your final score and how many battle rally medals you obtain. The three battles in each area will also host different opposing sync pairs with different weaknesses and strategies. Since you’re aiming to get as many rally points as you can, you’ll typically want to choose Very Hard.

The next factor to consider when taking on a new battle area is the associated role bonuses. Each battle area has two—for example, a battle area may reward bonus rally points when you win with tech or strike sync pairs. The more sync pairs of those roles that you have on your team, the bigger the bonus payout. Sync pairs with matching EX roles are also eligible, which may cause a single sync pair to trigger both role bonuses. Using sync pairs with EX roles is an easy way to send your rally points to the stratosphere, so be sure to keep obtaining roll cakes.

Finally, an important team-building restriction is in place. You can change the sync pairs on your team at any time, but if you clear a battle area, then switch out any sync pair on that team and clear the next battle area, the sync pair you switched out will become unavailable to use for the rest of the Battle Rally. Be thoughtful about your team choices and keep an eye on HP and MP; those won’t heal between battle areas either!

The rally points you earn for each victory can be spent at the rally shop. Since each battle area increases in difficulty as you run the gauntlet, you’ll need to purchase items here to keep your teams in top shape. The effects these items have include increasing your team’s stats (either for just one battle or for the entire Battle Rally), strengthening specific move types or status conditions, causing or strengthening weather or field effects, and restoring HP or MP. You might even have the opportunity to upgrade items you already have to increase their effects.

It is generally best to purchase and upgrade items that permanently increase your team’s stats for the entire Battle Rally—it’ll save rally points in the long run. You may only need to upgrade such items three or four times to power through an entire run. Items that restore your sync pairs’ HP or MP are crucial if you want to keep a specific sync pair in multiple battles, but you’ll generally want to carefully switch out sync pairs to take advantage of role bonuses. Remember: saved rally points turn into battle rally medals at the end of the run.

Items that temporarily increase your sync pairs’ stats are a great way to support a team that you haven’t powered up, but knowing when to get them can be tricky. The most important item in this category is the Apple Cup, which significantly raises all your sync pairs’ stats, lowers all your opponents’ stats, and more for the next fight. The Apple Cup can only be purchased from the rally shop for the final battle area—and you’ll likely need it to overcome whatever waits for you on Very Hard.

The key to having a good Battle Rally run is to have a deep pool of sync pairs with a variety of roles, types, and moves, all powered up to take on or take advantage of any battle area.

When it comes to role bonuses, sync pairs with EX roles will give you the most value over the course of a run. It’s generally encouraged to change out sync pairs to continue to match the ever-changing role bonuses, but if you have a powerful sync pair with a theme skill that matches your current items and that has their EX role unlocked, it might be worth keeping them on the team a while, even in a battle or two where they don’t increase your bonus. You can also buy the See-noculars and See-all-scope items to peek ahead and plan out your team.

Here’s an example of a team used at the beginning of a Battle Rally run—it features Leon & Charizard, Lana & Araquanid, and Sygna Suit Lusamine & Ultra Necrozma. These sync pairs don’t have any inherent synergies, but they all received the support role bonus (Leon & Charizard and Sygna Suit Lusamine & Ultra Necrozma have unlocked their EX role), which increases the amount of rally points earned. Any support sync pair likely would have performed as well as Lana & Araquanid, but they were specifically selected as the team’s tank because they have the Trial Giver theme skill, which activates the crucial stat bonuses from the Trial Giver Upgrade item. Since tech and support roles were the role bonuses of choice in the next battle area, this mix of sync pairs was well-positioned to receive bonus rally points for both battles.

If you’re consistently optimizing your teams to take advantage of role bonuses (and you should), it is unlikely that your team will also be able to take advantage of your opponents’ weaknesses. Effective team building largely revolves around having at least one of your sync pairs match the boosts that items like Fire Upgrade give, which should help even if you aren’t consistently dealing supereffective damage. You’ll also want to have a look at Boss Hints under Area Details to get an idea of what to expect from any given battle. You can learn about opposing attack types, whether certain status conditions will come into play, and even weather changes.

Excited? Then get out there and start battling and strategizing! Rally on, Trainers!