Brent: 0:09

All right. It's the accelerated version of the Trashalanche podcast. Cause we're gonna get through it quick. People gotta get ready for Orlando. We gotta get ready too. Welcome to the Trashalanche. Mike Fouchet. Brit Pybas. Me Brent Halliburton. We're here as always, with our sponsor, dragon Shield. No new five star reviews. We encourage you to leave a five star review. Guys, let's let's jump. We should kick things off with, I, I feel like we, we absolutely buried the lead on the last pod with the 2005 scandal that Mike uncovered, and it sounds like we have an update. I know everyone is tuning into the pod to get the update.

Mike: 0:45

So, a couple things. One, I messaged Noah, who, I'm not sure if that was made it on the pod last week, but I, but. Messaged Noah. And he said to talk to Franco Takahashi. So I messaged him cuz he talks to both y brothers. I haven't heard back from him. However, one of the listeners on the pod messaged me and said that there was a note on the Pybas Palkia page of that world's deck saying that in fact, I am correct that the DCIS were incorrectly. You know, placed right on that. So this is somewhat of a known issue already is, seems very niche. And then I also talked to my friend jp Jonathan Perata. And he was like, Mikey, we've talked about this before. And yeah, we confirmed, we confirmed it a long time ago. And I'm like, oh. Okay. two,

Brent: 1:39

2005 was a long time ago. We could have solved this mystery like five times in the last you know, exactly.

Mike: 1:45

I just hadn't thought about it in however long. Right. And I was, oh, I don't know if we ever like actually confirmed it from, I don't remember like actually getting a confirmation from anyone in Japan. But there seems to be enough evidence. Right. Scattered throughout the web. That, that it is confirmed

Brent: 2:04

it well. It, it, I imagine previously access to Japanese Pokegear players might have been more limited the last time you tried to solve this, so Yeah, that's probably true. The, the like, oh, someone, someone could just reach out to the Japanese players and ask them solution that the internet presents us with today may not have been a solution. The last time you saw this, my. Right.

Mike: 2:25

So I'm gonna, I'm, I'm, I'm hoping Franco actually does reach back out and say like, yeah, you know, I talked to the yada brothers and they a hundred percent confirm. Just cuz I think that would be cool. But it seems pretty, pretty confirmed right now. I.

Brent: 2:39

That was that was very anti-climactic But I like that there was so much action behind the

Brit: 2:46

scenes Yeah. Yeah. It should have, it could have turned into like the, the documentary where you have to go to Japan. It's the only way for you to really get to the bottom of it.

Brent: 2:56

That's, that's what we want. That would've been great. The, the, like, you will have to come meet me in Japan at the World Championship to find out the truth to the question. And then like, like we just track here every step that've been great. Alright, let's show, should we talk about the sum lot retro tournament?

Mike: 3:15

Yeah, just wanted to mention it quick. So like played another of the retro events last week. I ended up getting second. I played the Gardevoir GX Swamper Solgaleo deck that Jimmy Penn Darvis won. Was it a Virginia regionals? I think that year. I. So it, it's a fun deck to play, you know, any chance to play Gardevoir, GX? I'll take it. I didn't actually play almost at all in that format. I think I played one League Cup. That was the year that I took a break. So I wasn't super familiar with that format. And I posted on Twitter. I had done, I didn't think the format was all that great. To be honest. And I've, the only reason that I posted that is because I feel like I've seen people. Post that they really enjoyed that format and they held it in high regard. And as I was playing it, the games were both players set up that are very interesting and the Pokegear themselves are extremely interesting, but it just felt like. There was a lot of potential to not set up because the support the, the supporters weren't very strong. The items were not that strong to search cards out and the existence of Mar Shadow let loose. Going first is pretty toxic, and I got let loose multiple times before I got a turn, and it just made the game, you know, al almost, you just kind of like can lose on spot. So I, I had fun in that tournament, but I, I can't see how that format is. So

Brent: 4:38

One question. Having, having never played in one of these retro tournaments when you say the supporters are bad, I admit it's not great. It's still not great. There's no scenario where it's great. But does the pass pass thing, like the fact that that completely destroys right. Like, how much of that do you think makes it seem really, really bad versus just not

Mike: 5:00

great? Yeah, I'm sure that impacts it a bit. So like the Gardevoir list that I was gonna play ran three Cynthia, one Lilly, and I just changed it to four Cynthia. So I mean, like that's a change, but I, that's not a huge impactful change. And I feel like the Cephalon deck that I played against, they weren't running Lilly anyway. I think they ran. The whatever card is, you discard two cards from your hand and draw four cards, I forget what it's called. But some other supporter, maybe they would run one Lilly. My guess is looking at some lists from that format. A lot of decks just ran one Lilly to be able to laylay for it, turn one right. So I'm sure there was some impact, but I, I, I don't know, hard to

5:42

say.

Brent: 5:44

Right. Well, you, I mean, even, even if the plan was to I mean, consistently lay for a turn one, like all of a sudden you're like, well, you can't do that now. Yeah. Right, right, right, right. Exactly. Drawing a cards, it's like, not gonna happen anymore. Mm-hmm. you're like, oh, that's a bummer. Yeah. So, so Liam played in the same tournament and I have always told people, and I will continue to tell people I thought, He had a list that he thought was very, very good and I kind of lacked faith in it and convinced him to play, I don't know, like Zekrom pod or like whatever other people were playing at the time. And then after he did like, he like, Top 16, like Memphis or something with it. Then he came back. He came back and the next day played like the League Cup they had for seniors with his list and he went undefeated and like destroyed everyone he played. And I, I continued to think it was like a Tapu Bulu Koko spread deck and. I continue to th I, I've told people all the time since then, I thought he cracked the format on like the last day. It was a format, and it's a sad thing that he never got to play a little more with that deck. So he was like, okay, I'm gonna play it. I'm gonna play it, I'm gonna play it. And he, it played three lilies. And he was like, okay, so my draw engine's totally screwed up. And then he also decided to make some changes to the deck list and those completely bit him in the ass, virtually instantly, And he went like one, one drop He was like, oh, I, I don't need all these rescue stretchers. Oh, I need all these rescue stretchers.

Mike: 7:23

That deck looks fun though. I think if I had play. I think I might have played a similar deck in the One League Cup that I went to, to that, but if I had played that format, I'm sure I would've played a lot of that deck. That looked pretty fun.

Brent: 7:34

Yeah. Yeah, it was, it was a really, really good list. He, he just could not lose games with that. Yeah. That's now, I mean, I think, I think in kind of the, the great roko and tradition, he was just like so close to the deck. Like he had a plan for every single strategy, every single moment mm-hmm. And that, that always helps, like Yeah. Just really knowing your deck and that'll help you. Yeah. Great things about it. I know the retro tournament that they're running tomorrow night is 2014 worlds.

Mike: 8:00

Hmm. So, The one that, the one that I won like a month ago. Yeah.

Brent: 8:08

Yeah. Oh, right. I thought, I thought the one that you won like a month ago was 2014 NAIC.

Mike: 8:13

No, it was, it's the same format. It's

Brent: 8:15

the same format maybe. Yeah. I was about to say maybe it was the same format. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was, it was Tilly. I, I said, it's a shame they're running it on the Thursday right before Orlando. I feel like we're busy Thursday night.

Mike: 8:26

Yeah, I'm probably probably not gonna play that one. Yeah. It's

Brent: 8:30

a great, great format, but I, I, I assume lots of people will be busy. Yeah. Orlando. Should we talk

Mike: 8:38

about it? Yeah. So I'm going Brent's going, Liam's going. Brit not going. It's, I think it's looking to be the biggest regional ever again. We broke the record once again. And maybe the biggest. Tournament. I don't, I don't think it's gonna be bigger than the biggest NAIC ever, but it's pretty close. So that's cool. Hopefully the venue's really big

Brent: 9:03

Yeah, I can only imagine. And, and I recognize they still haven't announced NAIC and they still haven't, like, announced dates for worlds. And I wonder like how they feel about the fact that they can sell almost 2000 tickets to this. Yeah. It influences

Mike: 9:17

the thinking. You know, I've seen some hopium that the reason that they haven't announced any IC yet is they see these huge numbers and they're like, oh, we have to reconsider where we booked our venue

Brent: 9:30

Right, right. I mean, that like everybody would like to think that, but like, that's not possible. Right?

Brit: 9:35

Yeah. Like they're, they're locked into, you know, years long contract or something like it's, you know, probably just in the same place again. And that there, there isn't, you know, like that they're not telling us things. because they just don't like telling us things like Right. You know, it's largely, you know, set in stone. I would think.

Brent: 9:52

You know I mean, they could say the dates and if they're trying to convince, like the Columbus Convention Center to give them like a, you know, an extra hall or something like that, like that's uncorrelated, right? Mm-hmm. Now, I would like to, when they announce the dates, they also put the tickets on. Or they put the tickets on sale like a week after that instead of like, you know, three weeks before the tournament starts. Hints of Australia. Like, it's crazy that so many people book travel reservations to a place before they have tickets for the event. It just seems like, like living dangerously. I know. Yeah. I cannot be that guy. I don't know I dunno what it is about the how I'm wired, but like, I'm like, I'm not gonna book a plane ticket before I have tickets to the event. No matter how easy or likely acquiring those tickets may seem to be, to acquire. I wanna ask how your, how your deck selection and stuff for Orlando is. Yeah. I should just ask you how's, how's like Strat strategizing for Orlando?

Mike: 10:50

Well, so, you know, we have basically three new cards and considering how they impact the Meta game I think Radiant Eternatus will be the least impactful of the three. I think it is the only one that kind of spawns a quote unquote new archetype.

Brent: 11:05

But I don't think I agree that It's sad to hear you say that cuz that's the fun card. Right? Right.

Mike: 11:10

I think there is some possibility that someone kind of cracks the code and brings like a really cool deck that ends up being successful, but we haven't seen that yet. And I think the, kinda like the standard law zone. Aldon decks are like, fine, but they're not great. I think, you know, it'll be played in some amount of numbers, but it's not gonna be a high amount of numbers nor so. I'm not really worrying about that too, too much. I think the other two cards, Zamazenta and Sky Steel, Skye Stone, I think I mentioned last week, that they're both also fine. They both kind of slot into Lost Box the most. We saw the late night event last night. I think about. Of the lost box deck, something like 40% of the non rayquaza lost box decks played Asta, maybe a little bit more than that, maybe 50%. But it's weird cuz you kinda have to change the whole deck. Like it doesn't really fit into Rayquaza because it doesn't run enough Melmetal energies in Rayquaza and Rayquaza kind of fills a lot of the. Utility that Zamazenta does anyway. And then Kyo doesn't run Melmetal energy, so you have to completely revamp the energy that's played in that deck, which may be worth it. But you just, you definitely have to change how the deck is built. And so I think some people plays Amazon. It'll be moderately successful, but I don't think it's going to be, you know, hugely different. And then Skye Stone is a really weird card because it's really powerful. But in something like a lost box deck, a you have to completely build the deck almost around it. You have to play a bunch of Vs. But. You also like don't always find it when you need it and lost box decks already were a little bit weak to Marnie and now you're kind of adding in this strategy of finding this one of item card that you have no way to search maybe except Han at like a very specific time. So. I am not really sure how good it'll be in Lost Box. I've been playing it in Vico, Boltund. I think it's pretty good in Vico, Boltund you have a little bit more search options there cuz you have the Muse. But even there it hasn't been like super, super good. So other than that, the format's like more or less the same. So I think there's gonna be a lot of different lost box decks. I think Lost Box Ray Crobat will be the most popular, but I think they'll. It's kind of like when Lost Box first started as a deck where you're like, well, you know, you're playing against the comfy, you know, they got Cran Ranch, you know, they got stabilized. But other than that, it could be a lot of different versions of the deck or a lot of different you know, tech cards to play around. I think overall Lost Box variants will probably be the second most popular deck next to Lugia. And then you, and then kind of the, the usual culprits from there, like Udra, Reggie's. Et cetera. I

Brent: 13:49

was gonna say, so I recognize so I mean, how, how big is guru gonna be?

Mike: 13:53

It probably takes over a lot of archist or Allons Meta share. It just has like better matchups and it's a similar style. It's a little bit harder to play. But I'd be surprised if it's more than like 5%. I think probably around that 5%, four, four to 5%. Do

Brent: 14:12

you think, do you think every good player is gonna have like a guru tech? Like is there a thing people do to beat Guru?

Mike: 14:20

I don't think there's like any one thing. I think different decks have to do different things. Like Mew is already strong into it, so it doesn't really have to worry Lugia if they wants to be a little stronger. They can just play well, like an extra vacuum or an extra stadium because the main way they lose is just getting locked out from Syno. Reggie's can't do anything, so you just take the L and lost box. I don't know what lost box does. I think it depends on the version. Zamazenta is like okay against it. Sky seal Stone is also not bad against it, drawing an extra prize at some point, but you usually have to two shot it, so it's a little awkward. Like Udra is an Inteleon. Inteleon is is a deck that like, You can, you can attack it in slightly different ways depending on the deck that you're playing. So there's not like one catchall thing. But I do think there's things that I just wonder if like,

Brent: 15:09

like people like add an extra escape or up to their list or something. Right, right,

Mike: 15:12

right, right. That's a good, yeah. Yeah. That's a, that's a really good yeah, that's a good idea. Two. And just like in general, it's nice when you're able to play cards like an extra vacuum or an escape rope where they have utility in other places as well. Yeah.

Brent: 15:26

So my other question was gonna be how popular Will will the VECA Volt deck that had previously done so well and then was like nowhere in Liverpool? I think it'll

Brit: 15:36

be at its most popular. I think that's, you know, a fairly uncontroversial take. You know, I've seen a lot of people express this, like verbatim, really something to the effect of just like, it's everyone's sleeper choice right now. You know, if it's everyone's sleeper choice and it's, you know, no one's that kind of thing too. But yeah, I, I definitely, like, I don't think it, it will ever. I saw someone's Meta game predictions that looked right. I think it was Luke more so maybe I don't, I don't remember. But yeah, like 15 ish, 10, you know, somewhere in that, or definitely more than the before. I think we'll definitely see the most of it in day two overall by quite a bit. And then just kind of like, you know, sliding from there. You know, more in top 16, but maybe, you know, will it. Maybe, you know, I, I'd be optimistic in predicting that one will make top 16 or better, but I, you know, I don't think it's a good deck, but I don't think it's like a shoe-in to just like, do automatically do well no matter what. Especially as, you know, lists may adjust and so on. Predicting that, you know, trying to get ahead of the item lock, maybe building your, your supporter accounts a little different and things like that.

Mike: 16:45

Yeah, I agree. It'll be like a bit more popular than it has been. I don't think it's gonna be popular. I think it'll be less popular than UDRA, for example. I think Udra has more of a mass appeal. It's a little bit easier to play. It looks on paper like a, like a real deck. Enviable on paper does not look like a real deck. But I agree it probably will be more popular than it ever has been. And that might. 4% of

Brent: 17:10

the Right. Right. eight people will play it. although a 2000 tournament, everyone has played for hundred people, play it for it to be 4%.

Mike: 17:20

Yeah. Right, right. That's crazy to think about. Right. You know, if you have 1500, 2000 people, like 1% of 2000 is still 20 people Yeah. Yeah. It's,

Brent: 17:32

and a lot of people playing it.

Mike: 17:33

Veal is a deck that I am considering. I'm not a hundred percent sure yet, but it is a deck that I enjoy playing. It's pretty fun. I think it has decent matchups, so it's something I'm considering along with some lost Bo variants and Lugia. Those are kind of the three things that I'm considering the most.

Brent: 17:48

All. Alright, I'm, I'm interested in, in you guys Hot Takes Will the like Azul grant, blah, blah, blah. Show up and play. Lost Box.

Mike: 18:01

I'm, yes, I think so.

Brit: 18:04

I'm, I'm a little torn, just so you know, if. You know, this tornness being motivated just purely by like Grant sort of expressing that he was tired of the deck, you know, and he says like, playing the same deck, every single event is cringe, or something like that. Like that was the tweet. So that like, just makes me think maybe there at least he specifically might just be. Board and just truly want to try something else. You know, again, with these Calibrative players, it kind of doesn't matter. Like they're probably a shoeing to do relatively well, you know, picking any, you know, of these powerful choices. But yeah, I, you know, I guess I would be surprised if they really diverge. You know, the question, I guess is really more so like, What's the newest card? You know, like what, what's the one, the one card swap this week from last time? Like, either way, like, seems likely and also probably that there's more, you know, more people other than them gonna be playing Kyo and Dragonite and friends.

Brent: 19:00

Alright. So will, will team Isaiah Bradner show up with Reggies?

Mike: 19:06

No, I don't think so. I think Reggie is still a fine pick if that's, you know, what you are wanting to play. But I would be scared that like Guru is almost unwinnable matchup and there's almost nothing you can do with it. Yeah. For it. And I think Udra will be like popular enough for those players to not wanna take like a hard auto loss.

Brit: 19:32

Yeah, I don't think top players are bringing Reggie's exact for that exact reason. No, nothing more to say. Nothing to add, but that was, that was my sense of where things are going. People are still gonna play it, you know, perhaps like other people that are. More committed to being a Reggie specialist. Like, you know, Raul just playing it because it's a good play. Not because I think he's like, you know, sees himself as like a specialist in the deck or something like that. And so like people are gonna play it. But yeah, it stings in Audra, so I, I think it's kind of an in awkward place in the Meta game right now. Yeah. And has similar problems, or at least, you know, like Lugia can be, the Lugia matchup isn't all that bad depending on what you're playing and so on. Or the Lugia player,

Mike: 20:12

I mean, My guess for that group is they go and play Lugia again. That would be my presumption. I think Lugia is a really good play this weekend. I think the lists that kind of came out of Liverpool with kind of like you're, you're playing like one of a bunch of items with the skylight, uda. I think it's actually a pretty cool approach to the format where you have a lot of, a lot of, you cover a lot without having to commit a lot of spaces to any one thing. But it's still finding those things relatively consistently with the Double O Minion and a way to search them. So I think a lot of people will recognize that and realize that Lugia has a way to deal with almost all of its, you know, shaky situations.

Brent: 21:00

Right, right, right. So, so when you say red specialists might come off at, like, when I think of red specialists, I think of, of Drew Ben. Does, does like the Drew Bennett, Kenneth Frank Persik wear candy crew end up on like some janky control or playing radio alternatives or something like that? Or, or are they just gonna play Reggie's?

Mike: 21:19

They actually seem like the Radiant E alternative type of person.

Brent: 21:22

Yeah, that's exactly

Brit: 21:23

I was just gonna say like, I know Frank was working, like we talked about Orbital, you know, when I wanted to think about it a few weeks ago. So like Elise. Yeah, I think that that's definitely, like if there had to be a group, it would for sure be them But no, I, you know, I'd not to say that I know what they're playing, but I wouldn't expect it or I also wouldn't expect them to play Eternatus again. Maybe I'm, you know, I could be wrong though. But yeah, I wouldn't expect that from any top players. Again, I think we sort of like, you know, not to say that the results we got weren't the exact ones that I was expecting, but we kind of had this just like, oh, it did well in Japan. A couple of people are gonna try it over here and it, you know, it just didn't pan out. A couple of them made day two and that page is

Mike: 22:04

behind us.

Brent: 22:10

I, I think, I think we've now covered all of my like all, all the crazy stuff that I'm looking for when I go to Orlando. Is there anything else that, that we should talk about before we talk about PTCG L Live?

Brit: 22:23

The only other, I don't think there's been a whole lot of movement on the format. We've kind of, we've hit it in the past couple weeks. There's not a whole lot more to say. I do agree it, I think it seems, it seems like it's time we came full circle. It's lu it's time to win and dominate again. So that, that seems to be kind of like. Just the natural trajectory of things, I think, and that like, Lugia is too good and then people over counter it and then people are having to count as the counters. And now we're sort of back to the Meta game where you're, you're countering the counters, but then in, in doing that you've left Lugia open just to beat you up, beat everything again. Like that seems pretty reasonable to me. But I would, I would guess there will be a, you know, a pretty standard sch trickling of all the decks, you know, through top 32 onward. We'll see. Bit of everything.

Brent: 23:09

Yeah. You know, I think, I think the, one of the points that Mike made is a good one. Like I feel like there will be, somebody will like top 32 with Radiant Eternatus and then people will like grind on that list and make it good, but it won't be like perfect. It'll just be like the like rough diamond of something that could be good. Yeah. And we'll see kind of where Radiant evolves, you know? Yeah.

Mike: 23:30

The only other two decks that I've have been on my mind, but I haven't put any time into I think Giratina. Could be okay, like Giratina lost stone again, because it gains the the seal stone. So if you can find a way to make that like consistently beat lu or more consistently beat Lugia, that could be decent. Cuz Giratina itself covers a lot of bases. So we could see someone do well with Giratina. And then the other thing that I, like, I made a list for and never really tested it was like an Inteleon box. So we've been missing Inteleon really in the format except for Palkia, I guess. And. As I mentioned, one of the issues with Sky Seal Stone is it's really hard to find when you need it and find it when you need it, and Inteleon enables that better than anything else. So there could be some way to make like an Inteleon deck that runs maybe Raku and drap and Radiant Charar, of course. I just like the list that I made just felt a little clunky, and so I didn't really have enough time to test it, but, you know, someone could and end up doing well with it, so I, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw something like that too. All right. PTCG l

Brent: 24:40

Speaking of LS, ls I, I, so the community's freaking out. I guess you can't really blame them because it seems like PTCG l is is not great. I am surprised that people are surprised. I think Brit do you have a reaction?

Brit: 24:57

Yeah, no, that's, that's a good point. I guess I, I, I hadn't really thought of it. You know, just from that pers perspective. Yeah. I guess I'm surprised, you know, just thinking about it here and now, like, yeah, like what else was gonna happen, like, you know, this. You know, did seem to be inevitable. There was no, you know, no way they could have, you know, that the intent with live was to maintain both of the projects at the same time. It was all, and I guess, you know, that's, I guess where so much of like the, the drama, or at least the negative sentiment has like been cast over. It's, you know, recognizing, you know, to reference one of the videos Maho has made. Whereas he is recognizing just like I'm, you know, this is my livelihood, you know, this is my profession, this is what I do as a career, and just like I, this, this is, you know, I'm stuck because I'm gonna, you know, lose know knowing I'm gonna lose this old one, moving for this other one that just like, doesn't even work, doesn't, you know, isn't even anywhere close to fully functional, you know, being in a beta or not.

Brent: 25:57

So, so I'll give you my My hot take that I feel like I haven't seen on, on, on Twitter yet. Although I deliberately have tried not to watch all the videos and stuff that people are, are churning out mm-hmm. that, that I feel like is slightly different. Like, and, and is jaded by I don't know, I guess 30 years of corporate experience. Like so inside of Pokegear, someone like four years ago said, we should hire a whole bunch of developers and build our own client and it'll be. and now they've spent like 10 million and they're still writing like a multimillion dollar check every year to Dyer Wolf. And like part of the proposition of we're gonna hire our own developers is they stop writing that other check. Mm-hmm. And like now they're, so, they, they said, Hey, you know, we're in a beta blah, blah, blah. We're going through these phases. But eventually, like somebody way, way up the food chain is gonna say, what's the deal? When, when, when could, when do I stop writing two different multimillion dollar checks for trading card game clients? And like, like there has to be an answer. Yeah. And, and if the answer. We are doing a terrible job, so you have to keep writing both checks. Oh, buddy. turns out you don't like, like you can't say we fumbled the bag to that guy, right? Mm-hmm. like you have to say, okay, we're gonna do a controlled wine down of the other thing. Now. Here we go. Yeah. Cause like, like, you know, you're all in on that. I mean, there's some, there's some executive that like, he's like, I am, I committed all my mojo in this company to getting PTCG l off the ground, and like, now we gotta do the thing. Yeah. And I, I'd like to hope, and maybe this is misplaced, but like maybe the best news is, eh, I have no idea how much money they give a dire wolf every year. But let's say, I don't know. I mean, I, I'm literally making this, this up, but like, let's say it's 5 million. Maybe he's thinking once they cancel that they can take two and a half million and put it into PTCG L. You know, they're gonna add four more engineers to the team, or, I don't know what. Right. Like, I mean,

Brit: 28:21

hopefully, I've definitely thought that like, you know, just going through. Yesterday being like, maybe there's something they don't, you know, that, you know, they know, some obviously know something we don't, you know, there's, you know, a key part to the story that it'll all be okay or something like that. Like I just, you know, for me this is the hardest part of the, the whole problem is just like, do they understand? Do they know how bad like live actually is? And I, I mean that sort of with no. You know, negativity or mean spiritedness. I, but I mean that just, it's the truth. It's an honest assessment of the situation. Like, I don't know if either of you did the survey that was going around, but like, I, I did the survey. I wrote very, very, very long, like explanations and I of of just like, Just shaking my head, just like, I just don't understand, you know, again, you know, tp c i is this Pokegear is that, you know, they're not sort of the same entity at the end of the day, but even still, it's just like, I mean, embarrassing, frankly. Like, again, just to use like why is Pokegear is so big? Why is this client so bad again? Look at Duelings again. Look at Magic Arena. It just doesn't make sense to me. And I understand that like, you know, there's not an eSports infrastructure to live like this. It's never gonna become anything like that, which of course a lot of the other digital card games like do have the, those sort of facets to it. But I just do. Yeah. Yeah. I just don't understand. Or just like, I, I guess another way to rephrase that perhaps is like, do they see it as problematic, for instance? You know, say the whole game works, but it's only like gift energy that doesn't work well, gift energy was like a very important card for Reggie Gigas, and so as a result, competitive Meta testing was just blocked and is consistently blocked. And so there's this schism, right? Like the, is the game functional? Is the game functional for a competitive player? And like, Do they care or do they know that there's this huge difference between like, the experiences, right? Like if I'm just a nobody, just like, oh, well, you know, here's the cards that I have. I'll just play whatever deck with the cards I have. I might not never know, I might not ever be aware or notice, you know, bug here, this card didn't work properly. Or again, like not just being as familiar with the rules as a seasoned competitor. But yeah, do they understand that? Just that schism, that disconnect too. And like, if they don't like, then there's a big part of the problem. And again, like maybe it's just not a concern. Again, this was like a casual thing, not meant to be anything more than. You know, a gateway and not like an actual sort of consistency platform or, or something. I'm not sure. But there's nothing I can't say on live that I haven't said several times already. Mm-hmm.

Brent: 31:02

Alright. Alright, let's wrap it up. We got, we got stuff to do today. It's a late pod and, and we gotta get it out the door for people to go, go listen to this before they go to Orlando. We'll see, at least Mike and I'll see people in Orlando. Make sure you stop by and say hi, you know Mike always loves that. I love it too. It's all super, super good. If you guys are getting in early Friday morning, send me some Twitter dms cause we getting in early Friday morning and Mike doesn't get until late cuz he gotta teach class. So we'll be looking for people to test with and have a fun time with, and have lunch with and all that good stuff.

Mike: 31:31

All right, cool. Brent, I'll see you this weekend. John

Brent: 31:34

Paul, are our outro. Bye guys. Good luck.