Welcome to the Trashalanche podcast. Attendance remains 100% Brent Pybas, Mike Fouchet, Brent Halliburton. We're on Twitter. Uh, five star review. Update. Guys, we got a five star review Tart Otter writes Top three best Pokegear TCG podcast every week. I look forward to hearing everyone's insights into the current meta and general discussion. As a newer player started playing during shilling rain, it helps me focus on what to play and what to look out for when attending events. Also, dragon Shield sleeves are the best sleeves on the market. I like how he slides right into our, our promo. We'll get to Dragon Shield sleeves in a second because that's, that is a show, uh, solid, uh, review. I like how he did not say we're the third best top three. We could be first,
Mike:we could be, who knows? Um, uh, while we're talking about reviews, I spoke to at least. Two people, maybe the third, uh, of people that listen to the podcast in Arlington. Um, but they're all Spotify listeners, so they are unable to leave a review. But they wanted to let me know and let us know that they really appreciate what we're doing. Had some really nice conversations. Um, so shout out to those of you that came up and talked to me. Really appreciate it. That's
Brent:super awesome. That's super awesome. Um, uh, how was, do, do we wanna give'em the whole Dragon Shield story or do you wanna just talk about your experience with Dragon Shield sleeves? I know people on the pod have been just waiting for this moment. It's been a big buildup and guys, it it was, it was crazier than I would've
Mike:expected. Yeah. Yeah. We can, you can give the whole story
Brent:So, so Mike didn't, Mike's, Mike's flight didn't get in until Friday at like midnight. Cause like he's teaching all day and then he catches a flight. Mm-hmm. so, So I, I drag all of this like pile of Dragon Shield sleeves to, to Texas in anticipation of giving them to Mike. Uh, um, but I know I'm not gonna see him Friday night, like Saturday morning's, first chance we're gonna get. So I ask Liam, like, when do things start? And he says, you know, players meetings eight 30, let's plan to get there at eight 20. So eight in the morning. So, so like, so like we get up at like, mm, seven 15 shower, and then we drive down to this coffee shop because we were staying at the Marriott, which is like a five minute drive from the venue at, there's nothing near the venue. Yeah, nothing near the venue, but we'll talk about the venue. I, I think midway through the pod. But, uh, so we drive to this coffee shop that's like 10 minutes away to order some food, and it took a little while for the food and we're standing there waiting for the food and it's like 8:00 AM and. Text message rolls in, yo, wear those sleeves. Need those sleeves
Mike:So I realized like my placeholder sleeves, like 56 of them were mad at Ultra Pros, and four of them were not mad at Ultra Pros. So like I was otherwise it wouldn't have mattered that much. Uh, but yeah. So anyway, I was with Ross, and Ross had a thing of Dragon Shield, so I was like, this was the tournament, I gotta do Dragon Shield. So I like stole them from him. And then I ended up later giving him one of the boxes that Brent was gonna give me. Um, so I didn't use black or white. I used Blue Dragon Shields throughout the event. And, and how was your
Brent:Dragon Shield experience?
Mike:So, as I told you, the first noticeable thing is that they are thicker. They, you know, the, the deck is bigger when you have dragon shields on compared to. Any other sleeve I've ever used. It's not as thick, obviously, as double slaving. You know, you see some people that double sleeve their deck and that's like monstrous, but this was noticeably thicker. So it took like the first round, I would say, for me to get used to shuffling them properly. But after that I didn't really notice too much of a difference, um, in, in terms of that at least. But they're pretty durable. Um, you know, I shuffle, I think on the spectrum of shuffling, like soft and hard. I'm kind of like on the harder side. Um, so I was able to mash it really good. Um, I think a couple of my sleeves did start to ding at the corners towards like the end of day two or the, or the end of day one, or beginning of day two. So I did have to swap a couple out. But overall, they're a pretty smooth experience, I will say.
Brent:Nice. Um, I don't think there's anything else to say. There you go. People, maybe that was the intermac, but the, the, the adventure was really in, in like, you know, Micah promptly had a sleeve crisis. I, I heard a story related to this that apparently Ross is using, like city champ Hoopa sleeves.
Mike:Yeah. So he didn't have those specifically, but the idea is correct. Um, there's like free sleeves that you get in, I think various product or, um, maybe for like winning small events or something like that. So he had Lucario sleeves, right. That he was using for this event. And they're the cheap Pokegear sleeves. Uh, So he was using those and he gave me his Dragon shields. His argument more or less is, dragon shields are expensive, so I'm only using really good sleeves at internationals and above regionals. They get the cheap stuff.
Brent:So Dragon Shields people, they're, they're apparently for Ross Kahan, the good stuff. But honestly, when you're using those city champ sleeves, you're like an animal I, I like, I, unless he is the just kindest shuffler in the world. I don't know how those could not peel for you like halfway through round one, you know? Mm-hmm. I, I just honestly can't even imagine. I mean, maybe I, yeah, no, I've seen those sleeves, man. Those sleeves suck. Golly gee. I don't know how he, how he holds it together. It's completely insane to me.
Brit:Which ones? The Lucario ones? Yeah, like the Diamond and Pearl
Mike:Lucario ones. No, they're more recent than that. That's what I, as I was gonna
Brit:say, those were like, there was like four sets that were really good pre-release sleeves, and the Lucario ones were the first ones, and they were really good. And then they just got like worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse. And then like, now they're okay-ish with like the ETB sleeves and stuff.
Mike:Yeah, maybe that's what they are. Maybe they're etb sleeves. I'm not sure. Yeah.
Brent:Uh, I don't know. Seems, seems risky. Seems risky. Uh, alright, uh, let's, let's jump right into Arlington. Um, uh, sadly we were gonna try to have Liam on because he did top eight the last, he had picked up a cold in Arlington and has been incapacitated for the last two days. So we'll have to get like stories of top eight, uh, later. Although I'll, I'll provide a little bit of, uh, what I can. The good news is the whole Trashalanche Crew Day tuned. Congratulations, Mike. Yeah,
Mike:it was, uh, it was a good time, you know, as well as Liam, but I had a pretty good time.
Brent:Yeah, you, you, you killed it. So I think let's talk about like high level what happened in Arlington and then let's talk about, uh, um, your run and then we could talk about your list and Versus Connors versus Liam's or whatever and, and see where you ended up. Um, you know, I, I left in the show notes my, my hot takes from last week. Cause I thought my hot takes went pretty well. I predicted vanilla Lugia wins and I think Connor's list is as vanilla as it gets,
Mike:right. At least compared to Liam's. That is for sure. True The only thing that is like a little out of the ordinary, at least going into this event is the Raku that's encounters this. But that was much more common this weekend, as we might talk about than it was
Brent:before. Yeah. Yeah. He, he went, he went Raku v Guard energy and double lumion, I mean, If that's spicy boys, not a lot of spice, you know? Right. Um, uh, and then, then, uh, I said we predicted that uh, uh, team Grant Manley would show up with Lost Stone Box and I heard people, I don't know if people is you, but somebody told me that they were playing the Qua Build, but Azul just played Cayo with Zoroark and drap on. It's like, you know, they changed like the 59th and 60th card. Yeah. But it seemed pretty. I and uh, um, I feel bad for Grant cuz Grant's a friend, but, uh, he did super bad. He, well, and you know, obviously when, I mean, when Grant says he did super bad, he went like 5 22. Yeah, right.
Mike:He did fine. Yeah, he did fine.
Brent:Um, the standard for bad is apparently, uh, you.
Mike:Yeah. I mean, when you're coming off three top eights in a row, I guess that's bad. Uh, exactly. But he did. Okay. I mean, um, yeah, I had heard really early on in the tournament that they were running rayquaza, but, uh, probably like halfway through day one, I either saw or heard that, you know, they were basically on the same thing as before. Yeah. But I do think, I do think like Prat played a rayquaza build and maybe that's where it came from since like Pratt's kind of friends with them too. Um, so maybe that was it could
Brent:be, could be that, uh, that, that all sounds, uh, uh, credible. Let me, if I, if I scroll down to did PRM make day too? He did, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he was doing super well at, uh, at one point. Yeah. He like
Brit:fizzled in the last three rounds or so. I think I was like kind of in contention for most of day two, I believe. Mm-hmm.
Brent:right. You know what's crazy is he was, he played AAN and Zekrom, but he did not play a qua either. Oh,
Mike:interesting. People. So just like a weird, amazing rare
Brent:deck. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. Totally crazy. And then we, then we talked about whether or not Isaiah Bradner team would show up with Lugia again. And generally speaking, I think the answer to that was yes, although, uh, Raul showed up playing Reggie's. Yeah. Uh, um, so, so a little more diversity, uh, amongst that team. And instead of everybody showing up on the same thing, I think, I think a couple of different people played a couple of different decks, which is interesting. Yeah. 49 of the top 129 played Lugia. It's like almost 40% of the, uh, the field, which is, which is out, represents the, uh, day one crew, which I think it was like 30 something percent,
Mike:correct? Yeah. It was like 30% day one, 40% to day two. So, It still did very well for itself. Um, and yeah, the only other thing with like John and Raul Bradner group, um, Raul played Reggie's and then of the rest of them, they all played Lugia, but they played like two different lists. John played a list with Path to the Peak, and I think like Justin Boari played that list, maybe someone else, maybe Xander, and then a couple other people played a non Path to the Peak list. Uh, so that's just a note.
Brent:Right, right. No, that, that, I, I think that's a good note. So, so you guys are closer to this kind of problem than I am. Do you think that's like, uh, um, I mean that, so that's a situation where the team is not able to come to consensus on what the best deck is, right? Yeah. Or people have like a certain amount of comfort or something like that. Like why, why do you think half of them would say, we're gonna play a Path to the Peak build? And some would say we're not going to.
Mike:Um, I mean Path to the Peak I think was mostly for respecting Archeops. Ordon. Like that was, that was the biggest thing when I was talking to them. Uh, and then other people didn't respect it. I guess I think, I think the people that didn't run the path version ran like Verion V, which is more respect for the special and condition stuff. Um, and I think the people that ran that list did not make day two. And when you look at the results, that is not super surprising. Paralyzed stuff did not do very well while Archist or Allan did Okay. It didn't do great, but it did better than paralleled stuff for sure. So just kind of like we talked about last week, Lugia can tech for a lot of things, but not everything. So it was just like a preference of. Difference. Less, less of what is the best deck, but a difference of opinion of what other people are gonna play.
Brent:Right, right. And you know, it's interesting, there were not that many. I think there was less Dedenne than, I think I would've expected a lot more Reggies in day two than, uh, I mean, there were 19 Reggies decks, like, uh, eight or nine Dedenne deck.
Mike:Yeah. Uh, Reggie's, super overperformed. There was, uh, wait, where do you, are you just on limitless or are you on something else? Yeah, I
Brent:clicked on the statistics tab, but I know, and I see number five is rcs and that's where the Dedenne deck are hiding. But there's, there were a couple of RCS variants.
Mike:Gotcha. Yeah, so Reggie's was almost 15% of day two, but it was like between five and 6% of day one. So Reggie's also really overperformed lost own box. Mm, about the same, a little bit more. I think day one was something like 13%. Day two is 16, so not like a super big jump. Uh, and Mew did poorly. Mew was like 15 or 16% day one, but only 9% of day two. So Lugia, Reggie's where I would say, where the big standouts. Um, and Mia was the Big
Brent:Loser. And then I think the, the big surprise day two deck was Eternatus, which ended up just being okay at the top tables, but like there were five Eternatus Day two and Per six showed up playing it. Jeremy Jalen played it. So, so like good players played Eternatus, which I think nobody expected.
Brit:I, I expected Eternatus to be played. I knew there would be copycats after the, the Japanese tournament, and I would've, I would've bet money that it placed exactly how Frank and Jeremy did. Like, is is it good enough to day two, like clearly, is it a good deck? No. Like it's, you know, it's, it's like quad wheezing or something too. Like nobody played deck and made day two at the last tournament. Like you, it's just a little more versatile version of that deck, I suppose. Like you have like your just beat stick behind the wheezing strategy, and that probably gets you there in a lot of ways. But yeah. Yeah, I, I was both thought that. People would play it and like, I would've guessed about, you know, three or four made day two. Like even, because it would be a pretty small, it would definitely be like a, a small group of Frank and Jeremy Espeon, Claires playing it. So like that was definitely something I felt coming. But I was talking with a friend, my friend Zacian Zoroark has made, uh, day two at all three regionals he's been to this year with, uh, Reggie's. And we were talking about Reggie's on Friday night, and I just, I knew he would still wanna play it and we were just talking about it and I was like, yeah, I think it seems like a good play. Like people are cutting, done sparse, the lost city isn't as prevalent anymore. Like there was that like point in the meta game where like, M was playing two copies of it, and like other decks would sometimes and plays co play copies of it to try to get Charizard and like, that was the wrong Meta game for Reggie's. But now it's just like, yeah, I think it'll be fine. Like you're Lugia matchup. Even even against like manife dun sparse is like, okay, for the most part, like it's pretty even. Um, and like your, your lost buck matchups are pretty even and sometimes favorable depending on where the techs fall and things like that. Mm-hmm. Um, so I, it definitely felt like it was a good Meta game, um, for Reggie's and like that it, overperformed I think like will just kind of continue to be the story of this deck. Um, probably for most of it's legality, like it's the deck that I think is answered relatively easily by, you know, a lot of different decks and a lot of different cards. But like, it will always be a good play if people aren't bringing those cards. You know, just being a consistent, relatively consistent one prize deck that, you know, functions on itself and can play disruption like path and seems to have gotten like, Tiny bit of a power boost with Serena. Like you still, the supporter accounts are still more or less the same, but Serena just like being able to consistently boss is a problem that the deck has always had. And having a card that can kind of help you get stuff in the discard as well as be a boss later in the game, it's like a natural two three of inclusion. Um, but yeah, m underperforming, uh, was interesting. I thought I, I don't remember who said it, but it was funny. Well, it was just like, you know, you know, things are really hope hopeless if even, uh, Maho isn't bringing mute to this is even is switched from mute to Lugia Um, and that's just like, yeah, yeah. Like Mia is good and you know, on paper it can be at everything. It has this, you know, sort of agro cheese potential and almost all of the matchups. But as the LucMetal list skit, you know, we're, we're, we push them forward, you know, a couple more percentage points in terms of there being like, Perfected or what have you. And when, when that happens and the mute decks have, you know, probably already hit their ceiling as far as like power and like list potential is concerned. Like I, I felt like another friend that I, I talked to helped a little bit, prepare, played the judge version, and like, that seemed like the best version still to me going into this weekend. I haven't really been ever really bought into the Meto version being like, relevant again. Like people play it and it does okay here and there, but I've still, you know, is a bigger believer in the double Turbo. Um, but yeah, I think just LucMetal lists were just like five, you know, five to 8% better this time. And in a matchup that's already like really, really close. It just like is continuing to push it over.
Brent:Uh, you know, Mike, I don't know, uh, uh, what your experience was, but I know when I was talking with Liam about his Mew matchups, he ran into a fusion Mew and he said the, the problem with fusion Mew was like, the good thing about fusion Mew is. They have Melo Etta, and they go for that like big knockout going second or big knockout going into turn two. And the problem with fusion Mew is they discard everything to try to hit that. And then if they whiff it, they're like, oh, now I just completely lose Right? Like they're just throwing stuff away in a desperate attempt to find all the pieces to take this big KO turn one. And if they whiff it, they're like, Hmm, I just discarded half my
Mike:deck. That was great. Yeah. Well, and even further, I think the fusion Mew is generally an easier matchup for Lugia because one of the things that's hard about playing against you is they enforce. Two V Maxes and the double Turbo version, I think does that a lot better because it also has disruption against the TTA version. They don't have very much disruption. And you can pretty easily go like 1, 2, 3 on your prizes. You kill alotta, you kill a Mew, VMax with an evil to, and then you kill a genocide. But against the, you know, if you're trying to kill two muse, you canol one, and then the second one is like kind of awkward to, to kill. So then you're forced to sometimes like boss three times, um, or, you know, kill the one Mew and boss two times. And I feel like that's just awkward, more awkward. So I, I feel like the fusion Mew is, uh, better matchup for, for Lugia
Brent:sounds, uh, sounds very, uh, reasonable. Sounds very reasonable. Um, oh, so, uh, I guess before we, before we grind through Mike stuff, uh, uh, tournament in general, uh, People have probably seen my tweets. I thought the venue was way too small, but the tournament was well run.
Mike:Yeah, the venue was pretty small.
Brent:If, if you weren't there, it was not quite San Francisco worlds, but it was like, not, not San Francisco worlds
Mike:The other thing about it, and I know they can't really do that much about this because you need the wristbands, but you only had the one entrance and exit as well. So I think it would've felt much bigger if you, there was like two or three doors open, um, that just let people kind of go in and out a little bit more fluidly. But yeah, I know I did talk to Jimmy a little bit at the beginning of the event, and that was the one thing he was concerned about. He's like, it, it's a little cramped in here. So they were aware, um, that it
Brent:was, yeah, I think everybody, everybody knew the situation. Like the fact that there was no place for the parents of juniors to sit was like, uh, uh, extremely awkward day one. Um, but, but, you know, uh, uh, space in the room really opened up after like around six or seven. Mm-hmm. like, I, you know, I can appreciate all that. But, uh, and, and I know, um, I'm on the record saying like, they assume they locked up all these spaces like four months ago or six months ago or something. But, uh, is it not possible for them to get more space to like, have more players? I don't know. I mean, if, if I were the San Diego people, I would be saying I should get a whole second conference room. Like, it seems like we could have 2000 player events, just like Japan does. And absolute chaos. Yeah, I know. Very strange. Um, the other question I, I wanted to ask you guys was, uh, I recognize the Connor Popoff tweets. Everybody's talking about it on the Twitter net. Um, Do you guys have any, uh, hot takes on that? Did I tell you guys my story about, uh, uh, Liam at Worlds? No. No, I don't think so. Oh, this is, this is, this is a, this is a great story for the pod. I, so right before the finals of the World Championship in the senior division, I, I took Liam and Sebastian and I said to them, guys, I'm gonna tell you this. I know when the round ends, you're gonna wanna like be respectful to your opponent and all that stuff. Nobody wants that right? Pokegear is gonna grab a, a video clip of that moment, and if that moment is dramatic enough, you'll be in every Pokegear video clip forever. Right? Think Diego Casa Ragga. Think like, uh, Robin Schultz. Think Jacob Ben Wagner. Like, you gotta show us something. The people want it. And you know, whichever one of us loses. You gotta just accept it. And frankly, if you show an expression of emotion at having lost, that will also be good. And I know it will be hard in that moment to do that thing, but the people want it And you know, Liam, all Liam did what Liam gave the, like fist pump, he gave kind of the Isaiah Bradner fist pump. Um, uh, so, so we didn't quite go as far as we want, but I mean, totally respect Connor. Uh, I think it's totally cool. Yeah, there's definitely,
Brit:like, I don't know if you, if you're familiar with Melee, there's a, a melee player named Hungry Box who I think goes very consistently, goes too far in his popoffs, just like. Actually actively makes a fool of himself and like gets close to hurting other people. Um, but outside, outside of that, like, yeah, these are great. Like, I thought that was a good, you know, good popoff. And like, there's even comments like, uh, like I saw, like I had to translate the tweet as from a Japanese player just being like, I, you know, sort of noting the cultural differences. Like, definitely couldn't do this in Japan, but I wish we could. It was, you know, more or less the sentiment, right? Like, just kind of like
Brent:not respectful. I'm glad I have you to translate cause I didn't know what what was said there, but I, I remember seeing that tweet. But like, uh, yeah, you know, uh, running into the stands to hug your wife, we approve. Yeah, yeah, of course.
Mike:Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.
Brent:Absolutely. Like, like she, she's on the journey as well. It was obviously an emotional moment for him and like, you can say, oh, that like sucks for Alex, but like Alex growing up, you know, it's cool. I think people just gotta recognize that, like, eh, you know, it's a big moment.
Mike:While we're talking about the finals, did you Brent, I know you guys were probably in transit during like the semi-finals and finals, correct? We were,
Brent:we were, we didn't really watch it. Right. Didn't watch
Mike:it at all. Did you? Yeah. Great. Did you watch or were you busy?
Brit:No, I didn't get to catch any of the stream this weekend. I like, again, my time, my availability is always better for international events. But yeah, I even had like a moment where I like, Hey, I don't have anything to do. I hope the stream's on. And it wasn't but that was kinda the only, the only time I was trying to watch it and it hadn't started during day two yet, so I missed it all and was just keeping up in the group chat.
Mike:So I, you know, I went to the airport after, during, during top eight. And so by the time we were settled in the airport top four, we caught most of top four and the finals. I think John probably knows this so I'm not gonna belabor the point, but pretty sure John kind of threw game two against Connor. He benched a second Lugia in the matchup when he was going first. I really don't, I, I, I kind of see the logic in why he would do it, but it ended up losing him the game and I think he probably didn't need to bench it. Um, and then in the finals I also feel like Alex kind of threw, so there's this situation like game game one. Connor went first. He just drew the absolute nuts, like totally avoided the lock. Like, like Alex missed the turn one item lock. Connor got the turn two like double Arceus ops and just won the game. Game two, um, it kind of looked like it was going that direction again. But then Alex Marnie Connor into nothing and. I don't even know if he item locked that turn. I don't even think he item locked, but he just marinated him into nothing and Connor basically just passed back and then like he didn't do any. And then Alex had the opportunity to either KO the active with Raku V or item start item locking with Veco Boltund before he set up the aerodactyl and he opts to just take the KO instead of item locking. And then the next turn, Connor Topex and Ultra Ball already has the Arceus gaps and the discard ultra balls for the VStar blah blah blah. And then ends up winning the game. But if he had just item locked, like I felt like that was such an obvious play to item lock when your opponent did nothing like it prevent, it makes evolution incense, like the Arceus are already in the discard. So like it makes incense and ultra balls not out. Like the only out then becomes a supporter and a VStar. Um, and it gives you one extra turn. All you need to do is set up the Air Acto at that point to probably win the game. So, I don't know. I felt like both in both top four and finals, I don't wanna say Connor's not deserving, of course he's deserving, he won a lot of rounds and whatnot, but I do think, um, he got a, you got, you gotta get lucky too to win an event like that. Yeah. Um, and I think he got a little lucky in, in, in those games.
Brent:I know Liam was describing, uh, uh, how he lost top eight to a friend of his. He didn't, he did not describe it to me in any detail and it sounded like, uh, uh, he felt like he could have played it better. I recognize people have been playing a lot of games.
Mike:Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's true. by the last round of day two, I was, I mean, part of it was, you know, I was very out of contention, but like by the last round of day two, I was so out of. Like, I was just like, I don't wanna play anymore men, That's
Brit:just how I always am in day two. Like, unless I, well like my experiences are, are super polarizing. Like I, I'm doing really well or I'm not doing well at all. And, but yeah, like I'm just like having the worst time in my life having to play that like 15th round when it just couldn't matter less, just tired and, you know, it's just get bored. I, I know I say, I think I've said this multiple times, I just get so bored a lot of the time of playing the same deck. Like maybe, maybe there are decks out there where like you have lots of options and choices and things like that. But I just, I don't know. I remember I was playing Seism two at Garbodor as one of these experiences I remember most. And I like, I genuinely have two attacks. I guess I have Sky returns, so three But um, yeah, I was just like, ah, I don't even care anymore. Flip, flip, flip. But yeah, I was, I did definitely had some FOMO and like, I, I don't know, I could think of Knoxville will be the one going to next, so it seemed like a good time. In general, felt like I didn't, again, wasn't tapped into the Meta game at all this time. But I feel like, I guess the sort of story of the Lugia list, and this is interesting one that like, it's a little strange that maybe we didn't start there. You know, you saw the la i c list even playing like three Archeops and now we've kind of gotten around to like four Archeops, no deviations regardless of list. Like, I don't think anyone is still playing three, but like the kind of the story of the Lugia line this weekend is like the, the adaptation that Liam, uh, Karen, people like that and the group chat as well as Connor played three three, but like three, two ended up being the, the popular bring this week. Just finding, you know, I think the story is that look after, after the first Lugia, like you want to have the one Lugia for the potential, like huge knockout, but after that you just play it like a single prize deck after the first Lugia. And so like the more, more shifting to, you know, make that end, um, as easy as possible. But otherwise, yeah, everything seems like we might be done iterating on the LucMetal list. Like between Connor, I mean, Liam's is sort of one of the more interesting ones. Plays like definitely some stranger cards with like, uh, the aroma and so on. Yeah, it feels like this kind of, I don't really know how much more you can improve, like, I guess, um, you know, if you have to worry about like Articuno for another weekend, there are of course like more iterations from there, but like in, into a vacuum, I feel like, I mean, I guess this was his claim, right? Connor had like the perfect 60 and I, I really do feel like this seems like about it. Um,
Brent:that's just me. Yeah. Uh, so, so I mean, speaking of the perfect 60 Mike, uh, why don't we, why don't we kick, uh, the boring 15th round off by like, uh, uh, Talking about, I mean, people were tweeting at us, you know, Mike's popping off. Is he playing Zekrom or is he playing Lugia? We, we need to know these things. You, you wanna, you wanna start walking us through your, uh, week, man?
Mike:Yeah, so I, as I said last week, I was kind of deciding between Zekrom and Lugia. Um, um, I ended up choosing Lugia like on Friday. I was, I, I didn't really do any more testing with Zekrom, uh, just because I had already played it. Um, but my friend Sebastian was going, I knew he was playing Zekrom Ross hadn't done much testing, but had played a little bit with Zekrom and it's kind of like his type of deck, single prize deck. So he had kind of decided earlier in the week that he was gonna play it as well. Um, and then we're also staying with Pablo. And Pablo really also had no clue what to play and decided on playing a lost box deck. But, uh, so as you mentioned, Brent, my flight got in quite late on Friday, and so I was just like, You know, I'm gonna just play a deck that doesn't go to time every round. And that was Zoroark. Um, not Zurk Lugia, that was Lugia. Um, so, uh, we had been, we had been talking in our group chat about how to make Lugia, just how to get a little bit of spice and a little bit of edge in some matchups. And one of the ways that we determine could maybe do that is running echoing horns, horns too. Uh, so I ended up playing two echoing horn in my list over the choice belts pretty much. Um, other than that, the list is pretty standard, but I played echoing horns over choice belts. Choice belts I don't think are that good. They're good against you and they help you hit a three 10 to kill a VMax and they're good-ish in the mirror if your opponent goes vigar Lugia. But you also just have evil tall to deal with that. Now I do think it can get a little bit dicey if your opponent knows you don't play choice belts and kind of like. Certain games could get dicey and that they could set up two Lugia and you can only deal with one of them instead of two of them. Uh, but most people, as you said, are not playing Lugia like that. They're playing. You go for the initial Lugia and then you transition into single prize attackers. Um, so other than that, I didn't pay anything too spicy. I had the Snorlax, I had one bird keeper. Uh, I went three Serena and two boss because I had the horn. So I figured some extra gusting to combo with the horn. Seemed like a good idea. Um, but yeah, other than that, not too crazy. Um, day one I started 1 1 11 and then ended up finishing six 12. So pretty good finish for that start of one 11. I was pretty happy with that. Um, notable. Let's see,
Brent:Dallas and, and, and your, was your tie, uh, an ID in the last round? No. Id You didn't play a win. Yeah,
Mike:yeah, yeah. I did not. Id, um, I tied a lost box in round two, like a Char Art lost box, and then I, I lost a Pablo in round three. He was playing the Ryku Las Box. I made like two mistakes against Pablo. That loss was mostly on me. Um, we had a really nice game and it was a very close game, but I think I could have won if I played slightly better. Um, fun fact, it was the first time I've ever played Pablo in a tournament, you know, after almost 20 years of being friends together. So that was cool. Um, other things on day one, I played against Parker Lish, who is the Archist crushing Hammer regional champion from the last spring. Uh, played him. I played Drew Ken. Playing. Uh, both of them had Reggie gig. Uh, Reggie's, um, I beat Parker and I tied Drew. The game against Drew is pretty funny, um, because turn one, he opens Reggie Gigas and plays a battle or he plays a, he like quick balls away, a grass energy to start the game. And I'm like, what is going on? And then he grabs Reggie Drago and then he plays Battle v i p pass immediately after that. And I'm like, what dude? What is your deck Um, but it ended up just being like a super Turbo Reggie build, um, where he played basic energy to just try and ensure like a turn one attack with, uh, Reggie Drago pretty consistently. He ran Rodeem phones and Palkia stops. It was a pretty cool build. Um, it was a little unfortunate. We ended up tying where it was likely he would've won, but it's not guaranteed. He was probably in like a 70 30 situation where the game would've been decided in like, Two more turns, maybe one more turn each, maybe two more turns each. So we still needed a few minutes. Um, and I felt a little bad cuz he was certainly in a better spot, but I still had a couple outs, so I felt a little bad, like not conceding cuz it was somewhat late in the day. Like a tie was not exactly a loss, but it was kind of a loss for both of us. But, and I don't know it, it ended up like putting me at six 12 rather than 6 21, which is not irrelevant going into day two. Um, so I hope he doesn't, I don't think he has any hard feelings about it, but hopefully not. Um, I played against, uh, Yoshi, um, the, I know, you know Yoshi, um, he got, yeah, yeah, he got top four with the Kiem Palkia. He was still playing Kiem um, despite, uh, the new Meta game. Um, so that was another good player that I played against. Um, those were some of the notable rounds from uh, Day one.
Brent:Dude, that's a really hard draw. Day one. Yeah. Not, not, not easy. for sure. I mean, when, when you start like 1, 1, 1, and I guess maybe at that point you already played Pablo, but like, then you, then you have to play those guys. That's a, that's a tough, tough
Mike:draw. Yeah. Um, I will say I ended the day pretty easy my last round, which was a winning in, um, I played against this really nice dude from California, relatively new player, like started, I think, right? Um, right before the pandemic. But this was only like his second or third regionals and he was pretty excited. A little nervous cuz it was the first time he could possibly make day two. And we were playing the mirror match and like, ra game one, I went first and he drew terrible and so I won. He scooped in like five or six minutes and then game two he went first and was up and like, was in a really favorable spot. But then he, like I, he cod something. And then I sent up by Lugia and I cod whatever he used, and then he could either co my Lugia with his Lugia or with his yalta. And he sent up the Yalta, uses Archie ops abilities and realized he prized like three auroras and a double Turbo. And so he couldn't actually get the eval off, but he could have cod me with a lu yet. But he had already sent the evil to up. So like, it was like not really possible to get the KO then. And he didn't immediately lose the game, but I think he was like kind of frustrated with himself, so he just scooped. And so I ended up like winning my winning in, in like 12 minutes or something like that. Um, and like he was a good sport about it afterward, but I do, I did feel bad even though it was a really easy way to end the day.
Brit:I've had, I've been on, I've been on a win. And then I've been on the other side of that, that like lot took, it took like 10 minutes to play two games where I, like we, I think we actually, it was like a Zoroark rock mirror and like expanded Dallas. Uh, I forget. When I just, like, it just went like, or game one was really, really close, but it was really, really fast. And then game two, I just like shad and passed and just like picked up my cards and it's just like, ah, it's like one of the worst feelings I guess. That's like, I, I mean, I recognize that I am sort of very, you know, defeatist and self-sabotage as I drop from every tournament while at these records that Mikey's making day two with, but let's just, I just avoid, want to avoid that feeling more than anything It's not that I don't trust myself to win like four, that I don't trust myself to win five in a row and it will just feel that much worse. But it's a, it's a, it's a psychological blocking I, I aim to overcome going into the new year. That's
Mike:funny. Um, so that was day one, day two did not go so well. Um, I knew I basically had to win at least five games to make top eight. Uh, so if you come in, by the way, this tournament, if you came in at 6 21 and you went 5 0 1, you might not even make top eight. There was one of the dudes that bubbled out, came in at 6 21, went 5 0 1 and got 10th place. Like, so coming in at 6 21 is really, really bad. Like Uh, I know there's a lot of people really chastising people, other people for IDing at six two and I get it, people have different priorities, but like if you want a top eight, you should definitely not be IDing at six two.
Brit:Yeah, I mean, if I could chime in on that too, is that I just like, clout is empty so often and so like the people being like, yeah, but I just wanna limitless page. That says you went, went six 10 and one like what's the point? Like there's no, like not having a limitless page and nominally having a limitless page that says like 126 was just like I mean, I get it. And you know, for unlike an individual level, you should compete against, you know, your yourself in previous placements. But at the same time too, like they're just, it's just empty. It's just like an empty sentiment I think, when scrutinized properly. But like, yeah, I think things should be much better. And so like at the end of the conver, like no one's at fault in this conversation. I think that like, there should, you know, I don't, I would hope, I don't expect anything, I guess just knowing how things usually go. But like maybe when we, when we reconvene on like the new format or something when rotation happens. We can revisit the prize structuring. But yeah, like I saw, I forget it was the conversation, but it was, uh, from Alex Krekeler just being like, I just don't know why this game does, doesn't do like tournament promos. Like why, why not have regional stamp promos, um, for just, you know, random cards. It could be like Cobalion or, you know, it could be the cards you get as promos, but that say like top 32, top 16. And like for example, I registered, there's kind of like a regionals for the one piece card game coming up in February and I registered for, uh, one of them. And it's like, there's not, like, there's no circuit or anything yet, so you're just kind of playing for the cash prizes, but it's just like$25 and like all of the promos you will potentially win, like will be worth hundreds. And like everyone gets prizes and it's just like, it's not that hard. There's like a solution and it's like, it's small. It doesn't have to be big. It doesn't have to be like, you know, boxes of cards. It can be a single card. But I think just like something little like that is like, would go a long way and like solving these like, Price point issues.
Mike:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or that would be great giving anything if you make day two, some type of packs like increase the points. Like
Brit:I think, yeah, I think points too would, would make sense. Like, um, you know, I also have have like a, like a rolling sort of thing. Like top 1 28 gets this, but if it's the case that like the top 1 28 is in day two, like they should get more, you know, versus just like not making cut at six at 18 points or something versus, you know, actually making day two. I feel like there should just be like an attendance modifier that would adjust those points
Mike:as well. Yeah. And there's the one dude, this one had 129 people in day two. Like there's one dude that got that got top 2 56 points. That's so bad. That's so bad. Um, all right. Anyway, so I made day two, um, ran one. I played against Azul. Not once
Brent:again the absolute, you just got the worst draws man. Like six 12. Yeah. So you're like, okay, I'm gonna point ahead all the 6 21 s. Like we just gotta go on a good run here. I know
Mike:good. Hit Azul round one. And I draw like the worst I've done drawn the whole tournament, which is not the worst thing if you're playing against one of the best players in the world. Like if you can knock both of those out at the same time, that's cool. Um, like game one, he went first. I opened Lone Lugia, read the win, and then he got turn two Mirage Gate onto Zoroark to win the game. And then, uh, game two, I also like didn't draw that bad, but Archeops didn't hit the discard to like turn four. So like, not great. Um, Yeah.
Brent:That, that's a different definition of not bad than the, uh, definition we like. Right? Yeah, sounds
Mike:bad. Yeah. Pretty bad. So I lost that pretty quickly. Um, round two, I played against another Reggies. So I, I played against four Reggies throughout this whole tournament, by the way. And I did not play Dun Sparse. I did Play Mane. Um, and I went two 11 against Reggie's. I think that's pretty good. Like, I think that's good considering no Dunsparce. So with no Dun sparse, that seems good. And only one collapsed. I think if I had played a second collapsed. Oh. So I played one collapsed, one vacuum, and I was debating between that and just running two collapsed. I think if I ran two collapsed, I would've gone like. Three maybe, maybe four. Oh, against Reggie, to be honest. Um, how, how
Brent:good were the two horns? I assume the two horns were the reason you won to No,
Mike:well, so one of, oh yeah, yeah. Well, one of the games. Yeah. Yeah. One, two of the games against Reggie, not, not two of the round, but two of the individual games. Uh, I don't, I wouldn't say Horn won me the games, but they made it very awkward
Brent:for them. Yeah. They put, put pressure on the guy, at least from a resource perspective. Right, exactly. Like when you, when you play the one horn, he is like, okay, okay, okay, okay. When you play the second horn, he's like,
Mike:Um, so I, so I beat a Reggie round two. I lost to the Reggie round three, then I beat a mirror where I went second both games and still won both. Um, So that was cool. And then the last two rounds. Um, so going into the last two rounds, I needed to win both To make top 32, I needed to win one to make top 64, and then the loss two losses would just mean 1 28. Um, so the second to last round, I played Ross for the the first time also ever in our long history together. So in one tournament I've knocked off Pablo and Ross, uh, as people that, you know, I'm staying with and have been friends with and have never played before. Um,
Brent:and, and you, and you, you saw I took a picture of that to immortalize the occasion.
Mike:Yes, I appreciate that. Um, so I played Ross. He was playing Zekrom box. That was a really fun game. We played one game that was, um, about 40 minutes, 45 minutes long. Uh, I obviously knew how to play the matchup very well. Um, so basically the way the matchup goes is, Lugia uses Lumin on to take a prize and then send up a single prize attacker and then Zoroark takes a prize. Um, they tried to chase down the Lugia at some point, but you shouldn't really ever attack with Lugia if you can avoid it. Um, so that's what I was doing. I was keeping Lugia hidden on the bench. He did draw, he was able to gust it up with a Serena before I was able to find my collapse stadium. So that was unfortunate. I did take the first prize, but then he was up on prizes, you know, after that trade. And so then we kept trading. And the way Lugia wins is you can't go to one prize cuz then they just slow, bro. Um, so you have to try and get a Stoutland to win the game. But Ross also knows what he's doing. So Ross makes sure that all his Pokegear are evolved and he scoops up his Oranguru, um, to leave no basics on the field. But I have the horns. So my goal is to try and, you know, get a horn boss turn, uh, on turn one or turn two. I had to research away one of the boss and one of the horns, but I still had the other two in my deck. Uh, I had game in hand at one point, but he Marty me and then, so then I had to like, try and reassemble the pieces. I had put like one of the pieces on top of my deck with Oranguru, but I couldn't hold them all. Uh, and I ended up making a misplay at the very end of the game where basically he was like hitting me for 70 with regular Zoroark, not even transformed. And then, I only had one double Turbo left and so I had to play Lumon down to search for a draw supporter to try and get back into, cause I had to find, I have to find Stoutland Boss and Horn all at once. And like, I think I like put the horn on top of my deck. So I had the horn, but I didn't have access to Stoutland and Boss at the same time. So I had to lumon to get a research, you know, hide the horn again, put it on top of my deck. Um, but then I can't leave Lumion on the field because he only has two prizes left and so he could serene it up. So I need to leave a double Turbo in my deck so that Lumion can use its attack and not kill Azul. Because if he goes to one prize or if I go to one prize, he wins the game cuz it's slow growth. So I like mistakenly had gotten rid of my double Turbo, like the term before that. And so then I played the Lumin on and then I realized, uh, so I ended up like playing this like really nice game, but then in the last two turns, like just kind of slightly miscalculated. That said, we talked about the game pretty significantly afterward and I think Ross like made a mistake, like a turn or two before, where if he hadn't made that mistake, he would've won every time, regardless of what I did. So that made me feel a little bit
Brent:better. Yeah, it, it was funny, uh, standing there while Mike and Ross, uh, dissected the game because yeah, o obviously Mike knows how to play against, uh, Zoroark as well as anybody. And, and Ross knew Mike's list, uh, as super well. Yeah. So it seemed like e every turn as they went through it, it was, uh, very cat and mouse. It was crazy,
Mike:crazy stuff. Yeah, it was a really, it was a really good game. So I, I am glad that like both, both the ra, even though I lost both the Pablo and Russ, both of the losses, like I could have played a little bit better, but they were all, they were both really good games when I played Pablo. We each won like a garbage game, but then we played game three was super great and the one game I played against Ross was also super great. Um, so that was cool. Um, so at this point, like I can make top 64 with a win, and then I play against Mewtwo, V-Union in the last round. And I was like, man, I don't wanna think that hard and like, game one I prize my Snorlax, which is kind of my out to evil to, so I just scooped the game immediately. And then game two, he gets out, man, he got the Mewtwo reunion out on like turn four or five. Like it was so fast. And I was like, ah, I could maybe deal with this, but I'm not dealing with this. And I just scooped. And I was like, It was so fast. I couldn't believe how fast he, he had like 30 card left in his deck and he got the Mewtwo out. It's crazy. Anyway, sounds lovely. So that was my day too, ended up like 80th or so, um, which is fine. I'm okay with that. So how did you
Brent:end up feeling about your list versus. I know you spent a lot of time talking about Liam's list prior to the tournament starting versus Connor's list. When you look back, like are there things that you would change?
Mike:I do think the Raku make made a lot of sense for this tournament. Um, yeah.
Brent:Yeah. The Raku seemed like it was super good. Every time Liam was describing rounds to me it was like Raku taking prizes, Raku
Mike:taking prizes. Yeah. I think Raku probably would've won me, uh, some games that I'm, that I lost, like the, the lost box that I tied early in the early in the day, maybe against Pablo, perhaps against the Reggies. Like it's not great against Reggie, but like you can kill a Reggie Leki and then put one 20 on another Reggie and if they don't scoop it up immediately, you can Stoutland it for two prizes. So that's cool. Um, and then again, to Rajas it obviously would've been great too. So, um, I think the Raku, the Rakus gonna be an interesting thing in Luie in general. I think some tournaments it'll make sense to play it and some it might not make as much sense. But I do think this tournament. It made a lot of sense, and I kind of wish I played that. Uh, I do not miss, I do not miss playing the colognes that Liam played but um, with Raku they make more sense, I suppose. Um, I played a gift energy and it like won me a game and it lost me a game because I was debating gift over, I played three capture energies, so I could have played gift or the fourth capture, like one game I lost because I opened gift energy and no other way to get Lugia. But then there was also one game where I was dead drawing, but I was able to put the gift on an attacker and then it let me draw and, you know, play the game.
Brent:Right. Uh, I, I assume, I mean, how do you feel looking back on, on about V Guard energies? I mean, V Guard seemed like, like, uh, a, the very common tech people. Try to improve the mirror a little
Mike:bit, right? Yeah, I think it's pretty good in mirror putting, being able to put it on Lugia forces your opponent to have a choice belt if they want to kill you with their Lugia. And basically then it forces the yol. Um, another way you can use it in mirror is putting it on the Yalta, um, because a common line is Volta, Lugia, and then they use Lumon to kill your yalta. Um, and so by putting vigar and energy on the Yalta, you prevent Lumion from Ke. So, um, I think it's pretty good. I'm not a hundred percent sold on it, but it's, it's good for sure.
Brent:Yeah. I, you know, I think, uh, I think Liam lost, uh, uh, a mirror match to where Regan, I think Regan was playing the V Guard energy and he thought, he came away thinking the V Guard energy's good. And he played Connor, obviously and lost Connor. Yeah. And he played Riley and lost O Riley. Did Riley play the V guard energy? I assume he, uh uh, no, he played the gift energy.
Mike:Oh, okay. Okay. Yeah. So I had both, a lot of other, so like if you play Raku, you need to have more colored energy. Right. So you don't always have space for the V guard. Right. Um, the horns were like, honestly not great. They were like, okay. Um, I didn't play that many mirror though. I played three mirrors and I used horn no times in the mirror. I don't think. Um, there were times where like, I. I could have, but maybe the game ended earlier or like they whiffed something at some point, and then maybe the horns would've been useful. But just the way the games played out, they were never useful. And that I didn't play it against any Archist or adon, which was That's, that's what I, that's, you know, the big, the big thing. But if, if I had played it, I would've been very happy that I played horns. Yeah,
Brent:I mean, you played, you played four Reggies and Notans. So like, I recognize Reggies kind of, were proportionally more of those, at least in day two than, than Aldons. But yeah, that's, uh, that's a little bit, I, I assume we went back and looked at day one. Day one probably had more aldons and less
Mike:Reggies. Yeah. Yeah. Or I think they were about the same percentage on day one, but the conversion rate of Reggie's was so much better. Yeah. Yeah.
Brent:People, people cutting Dun sparse for, uh, draw on
Mike:text. Yeah. Uh, did Connor play Dunsparce? I don't think he did. Right. Who? Connor, let's see. I know Riley played Dun sparse and John played Dunsparce. Yeah, I
Brent:have no idea. I have no
Mike:idea. That's for, um, no, Connor did not, nor did Connor play Manife. That's pretty crazy. No Manife or Dunsparce? No. Manife I think is a little troll. Manife is really good.
Brent:Well, especially when, when you're playing, uh, I mean he's playing the Riku Win double choice belt, so like he's a believer in doing that thing. Yeah. But he's like, no one will do that to me.
Mike:Yeah. It's also like, it's so good against, like, I think you're pretty unfavor against Azul and Grant's Lost Box if you don't play Manife. So, uh,
Brent:what else should we say about your tournament run? Is that, uh, um, happy with your choice of Lugia, I assume. You would change one or two cards,
Mike:it sounds like. Yeah. Yeah. I think like Kevin made a funny, Kevin and Clemente made a funny tweet. He the after the torn movies, like all these people posting, like they played the perfect deck. They didn't make any misplays and they got a hundred, they got a hundred plays or whatever it was. And you know, I'm kind of in that boat where, you know, I got around that place, but I know I made some mistakes. My play was far from perfect and I do think my list was not a hundred percent optimal. But yes, I am happy with the choice of Lucia in general and I'm happy with a lot of my decisions. Not all of them though. Um, I mean, Lucia won the event and it was the most in the top eight and it had a great conversion rate. So I think it was clearly, uh, a much better play for this event than it was the weekend of Toronto. Yeah.
Brent:Uh, um, were there a lot of Mewtwo players or was that, were they just all scared that everyone was taking DRAP on?
Mike:I don't think there was that much control at all. Yeah. Because of, excuse me, because of that, um, there was a, just a lot of respect for control and paralysis. I think in general. Saw a bunch of people playing Espeon. Pretty much all the Lugia had, uh, at least one bird keeper. Um, and Snorlax. A lot of, a lot of us played Snorlax. Like there, there was just a lot of respect I think for those types of cards. Um, and they're not like that for Lugia. It's not that hard to respect, um, paralysis stuff in particular. Yeah. Like Bird Keep Snorlax is just good in general. Like it's not just good against that stuff. Um, and, and control. Yeah. I think people were probably scared of DRAP on there actually wasn't that much drap on at the top, but I did see just a lot of drap on in general.
Brent:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I, and obviously, uh, like, like Mahone's group ended up not showing up with Mew. I feel like people thought there was gonna be a lot more drap on, I don't know, uh, maybe that the moral story is, uh, uh, standard Lugia beats spicy Lugia, uh, is is the story of the tournament at some level, except for whatever Liam was doing. Uh, uh, um, but, uh, yeah, that there was definitely more drap on. And yeah, I think, uh, I, I don't, I don't think I've seen a list that didn't run Bird keep. I mean, there was just a lot of bird keep mm-hmm. And like, the second you think that that's gonna be a thing, you're like, well, art's gonna be pretty bad. Yeah. I, I don't know. I, I think I, I kept feeling like people kept saying to me, oh, that's okay. You could play around like one switch effect but, but like, nobody played it anyway, right?
Mike:Yeah. Yeah. Right. Exactly. I, and like, I don't even know, I haven't played the matchup enough to really know if. I, I, my guess is like one bird keeper plus like Snorlax is enough to make the matchup like close to 50 50. It probably doesn't make it favorable, but like if you're changing an like a 2080 into a 50 50 with essentially a one card inclusion, like that would make me hesitant to play a deck like the Palkia
Brent:thing. Yeah. So the, I guess the one thing we should talk about with, with respect to Arlington and, and looking ahead, I guess to, uh, San Diego is, uh, any reaction to this VECA Volt, aerodactyl deck?
Mike:I think it sucks. Sorry, Alex.
Brit:I also, I like, I seen the list because I don't know, I think I got bad info and for some reason I thought it was, Regal aerodactyl, which in my head I thought made more sense, but I guess I would get in the way. But yeah, this is just the same, this is the same deck I've complained about like for the last three weeks of being, like, this deck stinks. We've talked about it, just Melony, Mew plus things like it's just that deck again. But this time, instead of playing Palkia, it plays, uh, aerodactyl and like, it's a really strange list. Like even, uh, even like less conventional than the way this deck like usually looks like not as many v i p passes, like different ball counts and things like that. And like the Krekeler are just in general, are so typical to compete against because they, they play these kinds of decks and these kinds of lists. And so just like all the time, they're always, I know, I mean, I've never really, never had to compete against Alex, cuz he was like seven or eight when I was playing for the most part. But anyways, yeah, like, yeah, I, I agree. This deck, it stinks like,
Mike:And like it, it seems like it was a very fine play for this event, but I don't think going forward it matters much at all. Like now that, there you go. I'm sorry. You go ahead. Oh, I was just gonna say kind of like what Brit said, like the list is weird and that takes you really far in a tournament if you're playing a weird list. And so a lot of, a lot of the p pros of playing a deck like this go out the window once the list is out there. Like other than
Brit:the, the, the cheesiness or you know, what have you that Vic Boltund offers. I just think this is just plainly worse than the Catron deck, which people, which saw some day two play, um, at the tournament. And I guess, I guess it seems a little fool hearty to say like, this deck had better results, but this one with worse results is the better one, but, I think I had a couple day twos and like Kieran played it and like just like forgot to turn his deck list in and went six and three. So like maybe could have made day two. Um, but yeah, like if you just want to do like control aerodactyl things, I feel like, I don't know, I would feel better, a little more, a lot more agency and kind of like in control of my games on the Arceus version. And like that version even plays even more like weird answers and like, this is just like, it's vical and stuff. And I, you know, as I say very consistently on here and just kind of a skeptic of vical in general. Like, it gets you there sometimes, but I don't think it does it consistently enough.
Mike:Um, I did not, I, I will say I did not notice that I had a drap on v um, so I mean like the deck in theory should be favored against Lugia, you know, going first. You turn two set up, like you just go hard to set up the Aerodactyl. Turn two. When you go second you wanna get the turn one Veco Boltund into Aerodactyl and like hope that the item lock is enough to prevent them from getting the VStar off. So I think it clearly found success because he probably played against a ton of Lugia. It's also like veal is just solid against lost box, so I guess you could win there. My one main concern was the, was the Mew matchup, but with DRAP on plus ditto, I guess you're probably good against Mew. You only play one stadium though and one lost vacuum. So like a path judge could like really screw you over. Um, so I feel like the meme matchup is probably sketchy and then we saw him beat a Reggie, but I feel like the Reggie matchup should not be great with this. Um, and then like anything else should be really bad.
Brent:Yeah, obviously, uh, uh, I think everybody who listened to the pod heard, uh, uh, me talk about Liam's whatever, like horrible run at Baltimore trying to play Ave Boltund deck. So maybe he'll have some opinions when, when he gets on. But, uh, I, I think his reaction was, um, you know, item locking for 50 just ain't the, ain't the thing these days. You gotta kill stuff. Yeah. and Lu is so good at playing off the board. Like they don't need a whole lot of stuff to just run you over if you're not able to like really execute your plan. Now, hilariously, I mean, he is playing like four tracking shoes. Like he has a plan to burn through his entire deck in the speed of light.
Mike:Yeah, that's true. Hmm. It's cool. I'll, I'll give it Cool. Uh, just skeptic. I think there's like, I mean if you
Brit:just look at, cause Alex Semanski occasionally plays these same decks with Alex and like they're like the more Pika Dusknoir thing that wasn't expanded though. I think Alex, one of them made top eight with it. I can't remember which of these Alex's, but I will say like they like consistently like will like have a spike a tournament with a deck like this and then it just never, never play it ever again. So it just like, it, it's almost, there's never the data to know if it was good or bad or not. It just is. Has these like catches fire at the right tournament at the right time. Um, but yeah, like, like I think Eric Dal's good. I guess to reiterate the rcs point, but I'm just pretty, also pretty cynical of something like this. But you never know, I guess, I don't know, I guess we're done with this format. I'm trying to think of, or is Florida still this format?
Mike:Oh yeah. I mean we get like a mini set. Um, Probably after Florida, but we're pretty much in this format until Scarlet Violet comes out at the end of March. Sands, whatever, you know, is in this mini set.
Brit:Yeah, it's just another promo set for the most part. I think lots of art reprints. Yeah.
Mike:So it'll be, it'll be interesting to see if like where, if any of the format goes, like Lugia is Lugia, it's still should be the big deck. Um, but we've seen, uh, you know, we've seen different amounts of innovation, you know, so I think there's still room for people to like, refine and, and come up with interesting texts. I don't hate this format. Um, I think Lugia is a little too strong, but, uh, I think if I were going to more regionals in the near future, I would probably try to learn how to play a Zul and Grants deck. I think that deck is just really, really good. It's just really, really freaking hard to play.
Brent:Yeah. Uh, uh, so that was gonna be my, my next question, Mike. I recognize, uh, for, for at least like, uh, the last three weeks you've been going as hard as anybody.
Mike:This is the, yeah, I, it's actually funny you say that doing two regionals in three weeks is like insane. I don't know how these people do it all the year, throughout the whole year. I'm so exhausted after like this
Brit:that's the secret is they don't get tired cuz it's just like what they do and like, they don't have other responsibilities because they're, they're college kids without jobs. Like, yeah. I, right. Like I even then, like I, I definitely don't, don't know what it's like to do this, but like, thinking about what I used to do and like it was, it's only facilitated through things like that. Like I just cannot fathom doing it with having to do anything during the day. Like, sure I have classes, but you don't have to go to classes either. Like, Get home late. No problem. Like, it's just, it's just never a big deal. But I just, I find that the top players all have these very clear things in common and other than, you know, Azul or Tour who stream all day and get to compete as sort of part of the job. But yeah, I I mean it's so tiring just to travel on its own. Yeah. You don't have the youth anymore.
Brent:Yeah. Uh uh, this tournament, I mean, it, it underscored that, I guess I felt like I made, uh, something was vaguely the right decision by saying We're not gonna go to San Diego. Cuz the only flight back on Sunday, like the last flight out on Sunday that would get us back here was at like three o'clock. I was like, just goes to show. I mean, we won't be done by one man masters. It's crazy. I know. like, uh, yeah, Mike knows we were scrambling to catch a seven o'clock flight. It was insane.
Mike:If Liam had made it one more round, you might have had to rebook.
Brent:Yeah. Yeah. Uh, totally, totally. Uh, bonkers. Uh, anything else we should say? Guys? I feel like we've covered a lot of ground and we we've put in the time.
Mike:Yeah, I think we've done a good amount. There'll be a lots more to talk about in the future. Um, speaking of which do we want to take next week off? You're going away. Oh
Brent:yeah. We definitely wanted to talk about that. Cuz I think the answer is yes. Right? Yeah. Heck yeah. We'll come back the week before San Diego and talk a little bit about how nothing happened during Christmas
Mike:That'll be good. I'll have put in at least 10 games with the Azul and grant deck then
Brent:Alright. Fan. Fantastic. And what, what are the odds? It sounds like Brit, you're out, but Mike, what are the, what are the odds that you're gonna book a ticket to Orlando?
Mike:Um, I would give it 20%. Not, I mean, that, that
Brent:is another flight that like, it's easier than Arlington. Like you could get in Yeah. Pretty late. And there's no shortage of flights to
Mike:Orlando. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think the travel there would be the issue. The, the block right now is, my friend might be having like a baby shower party that weekend. Um, but it, that might, it might also be too far for me to go to, cuz it's in New England. So we'll see.
Brent:Very good, very good. I, I think, I think we're gonna try and do Orlando and Knoxville. Okay man. I would like to do Vancouver so much, but I recognize Vancouver's just really, really, really far. That is very far. Um, lots of good, uh, lots of good Pokegear tournaments coming up in, uh, uh, Q1 though. Uh, San Diego, not going, Orlando, Knoxville, Vancouver, Charlotte, and Fort Wayne. All in the first three months of next year.
Mike:Yeah. My hope is maybe, probably not by the next time we do a podcast, but maybe in the next three to four weeks we may hear about local tournaments. That is really what I'm most looking forward to. I'd really like to, that's really my only shot and for a lot of people it's really their only realistic shot of getting an invite. Like I have, I think 120 points now from going to three regionals. I got points at all three regionals. You know, I didn't do like fantastic at any of them, but I got a 64, a 1 28, and a 2 56, and I'm sitting at like one, it's 50, 40, 30, so that's one 20 and like, I can't do. even if I do three more of those regionals, I'm still only halfway there So like, I mean,
Brent:what were they saying? Like Piper doesn't have her invite. Right? Right. Exactly. Like, uh, I recognize if they don't have locals, they're gonna have to announce that they're Reba the point structure, even if they're trying to discourage people from going to Japan due to like venue size constraints or something. Like they still gotta, I mean, they want somebody to get their invite. Right.
Mike:I think like Right, right now it's pretty much like the top 16 chasers and that's pretty much the only people that can realistically get even a day one invite right now. Right,
Brent:right. So, yeah. Uh, you know, may maybe, uh, the Japanese people feel like turnabout's fair play. We're gonna, we're gonna invite like a couple, a handful of people, right? um, uh, crazy. Alright. The John Pauls are our outro and we'll be back in two weeks with tons more stuff. Guys, there's so many things that I had to push off the agenda because I knew we had lots and lots of, uh, uh, Arlington.