The Trashalanche Pokemon Podcast

Charlotte: Playing it out at 6-2, DQs, Mew, Eternatus, Ft. Wayne, EUIC & More!

March 28, 2023 Brent Halliburton Season 1 Episode 127
The Trashalanche Pokemon Podcast
Charlotte: Playing it out at 6-2, DQs, Mew, Eternatus, Ft. Wayne, EUIC & More!
Transcript
Brent:

welcome to the National Ang, uh, uh, Chris Webbys Webster's Laboratory is the interest song. We like to mention that from time to time attendance is 100%. Mike's here. Britt's here. I'm here. We're all here. We're on Twitter too. If you wanna follow us on Twitter, we could always use more follows. Uh, my, my children tell me it's all about the. Um, Lord knows half their tweets are just farming impressions. So we know that that's true at Five Star Review. Update, no new reviews. If you leave a review, we will read it on the pod. It's a great way for you to, uh, uh, say something that you want said on the pod and then we will talk about it, which is great. Uh, dragon Shield is sponsors us. Uh, we appreciated last week how Dragon Shield is trying to make right some quality control problems. I look forward to quality controlling, uh, even, even better quality sleeves in the future. Um, exciting agenda today, guys, because, uh, Charlotte is in the rear view mirror. Fort Wayne is the next stop, and E U I C is right around the corner. Yeah. Um, should we talk about Charlotte for a minute?

Brit:

Yeah. Um, interesting Meta game relatively, I

Mike:

think. Oh yeah. And I feel like we can start with, uh, your son's.

Brent:

Uh, you know, he, he might join us for a second. Why don't we start by talking about DQ for for 30 seconds and then we'll, we'll move on to the Charlotte Meta game. All right,

Mike:

so if you are on Twitter, you could not have missed this if you are not on Twitter. To give you some background, uh, a player was DQ at Charlotte Regionals. McConney Tran, who's I believe is a first year master, uh, and has been doing quite well this year. Um, during his round five stream match, it was very weird. Nobody really knew, uh, that was watching the stream, what happened, but him and Alex Chumanski played a game and then it kind of cut away, and then all of a sudden there was two new people sitting in the seats. And so it was very confusing as to, as to what had happened. Nobody really knew until last night, or this morning, McConney made a, a big post on Twitter saying he was disqualified because as him and Alex were walking up to the stream, Table. They asked about his pronouns and MCC claims. He was very nervous, uh, with the whole situation going on stream, playing against Alex Schmank, who's one of the best players in North America and the world, and, uh, kind of like giggled and gave his pronouns. But anyway, long story short is apparently he made, uh, a, a judge or a staff member feel uncomfortable with how he handled it. And halfway through the stream match, he was disqualified. So we, if, if you are interested in reading the full twit longer, um, you can go find that on Twitter. Um, all we have is McConnell's perspective. Alex did post a little bit and say that he was, uh, pretty unaware of the whole situation. Um, he said that he doesn't think McConney was doing anything malicious, but he also could see how it could come off as, um, Potentially off-putting, um, to someone else. So Alex kind of took a little bit of a middle ground, um, and we're not gonna hear anything from any official judges, so this is probably all the information we will ever get. Um, so if we take everything at face value that we've heard, it seems pretty ridiculous, but it's unclear, you know, if we should take everything at face value. Um, the two points that I will say resonate the most with me is one, Connie's a kid, he's 17 years old. Kids are gonna be nervous, they're gonna be giggly, they're gonna make mistakes. Um, and de Qing a kid for something that is even somewhat gray like this. Maybe there should be some discretion. Um, I know I had a friend. Great. Did you ever know Alex Wooten from California? I don't think so. Okay. So he is, he is a really old player. He's, he's about my age. Um, back in like 2007, 2008. He did something really stupid at, you know, how they have the big Pikachu balloons, um, that they kind of hang at nationals and worlds. Um, at the end of the event, they like brought it down cuz they were breaking it, uh, breaking it down. And Alex took a sharpie and put a teardrop on the big Pikachu balloon, you know, and this is probably like a$50,000 at least piece of thing. Uh, and they, you know, they, they found out who it was. He, he was like in a big crowd. We were taking a picture in front of it, so he kind of snuck it in. But they did the, they, they checked the security cameras, they found out it was him and they were gonna ban him from organized play for the rest of his life. And he was like a 16 year old kid, 15, 16 year old kid at the time. Um, He was devastated. Of course he realized it was stupid, it was a mistake. Um, my mom actually went to, uh, Dave Schwimmer and some of the other organized playhead and kind of was like, he's a kid. Like, you need to understand. He's, he's, he's a child. He made a mistake, he's remorseful. Give him some way to, you know, get back into the game. And to their credit, they really did. They listened to my mom's feedback. They had Alex do some like volunteering. Um, and, and he was allowed to stay an organized play. So, um, I think that's kind of like a, a, a great example of Pokegear overreacting a little bit. And then, um, you know, switching, uh, recognizing that, that these are kids that play the games, uh, and, and they're gonna do stupid things every once in a while. And there's teachable moments in there. Um, and I feel like there could be some parallels going on here. I feel like a judge could have easily. Hold MCC aside after the match and had a, had a very nice conversation about him. Be like, you made this person uncomfortable. We're trying to be inclusive, blah, blah, blah, et cetera. Um, so that's like one big thing that I wanna say. And then the second thing is Peter Keka posted on the, on the Twitter post that based on the timing of it, it really seems like they deed McConney without even talking to him first. Um, which is probably the worst part about this, um, because. Why else would they stop the stream match every other time they would allow the match to finish probably, and then talk with Connie and then, you know, if they still want to do dqm, then they would do it after the fact. But it seems like since they broke up the middle of the match that they had already decided with only hearing from one perspective, which was the staff member's perspective. So I think that's something else to consider. Sorry, that was a bit of a long, uh, response to that. Um, what do you guys got?

Brent:

No, I mean,

Brit:

I, I think that's a good, you know, sense. I think we, you know, all the three of us had, you know, a similar position going into it and like if we wanted to talk about it, what we wanted to say and you know, that we are sort of, you know, you know, just as Mikey said, like if we, as you know, take it all at safe value. Even, you know, even assuming, you know, perhaps some of that is wrong, you know, even still like, is this like the right treatment? Is it warranted? And, you know, I think almost even still, you know, let's pretend that, you know, maybe he was saying some things that he shouldn't, um, but like in the ban or, you know, like DQ from the event without even being talked to and things like that, it's just, it's so strange to me in that, you know, to contrast us with like the other judging points that we've talked about recently, say with Ahmed and sleeve issues and things like that. Why? I just feel like if intent does not play a meaningful enough role in how we analyze these situations, you know, how, how it's structured within the rule book. And I feel like if we gave more space to trying to assess it intent, then these things get a whole lot easier. Right. You know, in this, in this example is that, you know, say we, we send the investigator out to sort of scrutinize things properly and he says like, you know, even still here, like. That, you know, he is a kid and that, you know, even if he is, you know, laughing at something that he shouldn't have, you know, that's how, you know, is the intent malicious or something, or is he just sort of nervous or throwing a joke or something like that. You know, con contrast that to the incidences we've had with people getting caught cheating and things like that. And there's just like, you know, you're obviously engaged maliciously, you know, when you're caught cheating. Like there, there's obviously, there are cases, there are instances where, you know, you accidentally fail to maintain the, the game state truly, truly mistake, truly aren't paying enough attention. But Mew for the most part, you know, cheating, drawing an extra card, um, being deceitful and the things that you say to your opponent and things like that, that you know, to be doing that in the first place implies you know something. You know, not necessarily whether. You know, it's wrong or not, like presumably you do, of course, because it's against the rules, but even still that you're, it's, you're intentionally doing it. You're, you're wanting to achieve this end, right? You know, you're breaking the rules so that you win more or something like that. And I think if we an analyze these sorts of things more particularly through that perspective, and again with, uh, meds, you know, example where if we really sort of think about what, what would he accomplish with these being his marked cards, you know, that argument fell apart, right? You know, if the, these are the cards that he, he's marking and things like that. For an Arceus, Lugia, Archeops stack, it's, you know, the lines sort of fall, fall from there because it wouldn't be consistent or it wouldn't be useful to him if he was cheating in this sort of way. And that, I just feel like if we could start applying things more generally like this, but it is just strange, even, even more generally to say that like this, you know, again, this person was just immediately deed for saying something wrong to the wrong judge or something like that. But like, That doesn't happen when Zacian Cooper got caught. Like, you know, they, they just handle things in these strange ways and it's just, it's these, like, these other instances that they really care about, you know, and it's strange to me that just like the actual cheating is like so hush hush, or like, even, even more like, difficult to deal with, if that makes

Brent:

sense. Yeah. Uh, the only thing that I, I was gonna add, uh, is, um, obviously like we don't know the whole story. We'll never know the whole story. Uh, I recognize, uh, it doesn't matter if you're, um, uh, black, trans, gay, non-binary, like whatever it, like, it's not your job to make people feel comfortable with your identity and like, uh, the burden people face with all that stuff is already huge. So, I mean, uh, um, on the one hand you could say like, as a judge, you would like to feel like they have, you know, almost like a, a academic, like, teaching moment kind of responsibility. But I also recognize that like, that, you know, they're judges, they're not a teacher. They're like, they're, they're speaking. They're not paid. Like there's a lot of stuff going on there that, you know, it's not their job to take responsibility for fixing his issues if he has issues. And like, um, if he made them feel uncomfortable, like that's a real thing. And, you know, I, I don't want to not acknowledge that that is a real thing. So, um, you know, we'll never know. The, the, I think real truth of, of what happened and we, we won't have all the details, but it, it's unfortunate if he made people feel uncomfortable and if he made feel, people feel uncomfortable, unintentionally, um,

Liam:

uh, it's a tragedy for both parties. Yeah,

Mike:

I think that's probably good

Brent:

Let's talk about Charlotte Alright. Yeah. Well we can start with my son who I, I thought was gonna hop in and give us some commentary, but, but did not. So both of my kids decided to play a little Charlotte. Let me tell you about seniors and, and my youngest for a second cuz you guys will, will find this funny if you haven't heard. Um, uh, so he's playing at his first tournament since the London Open. and he decides to play Mew. Okay. And it might almost be hard to believe, uh, uh, for someone playing Mew. And he was playing a pretty standard, like, uh, uh, you know, just double tur, straight double Turbo list. Um, he didn't play the same list as Liam. He did not play the same list as Liam. Okay. Um, uh, Ty's his first game, Ty's his second game. And after both of them, he's like, the other guy was just playing so slow, the other guy was just playing so slow. Uh, and after the two, we were like, okay, Walker, you're gonna get paired against another oh oh two person. Like, if you're thinking that they're gonna play faster, like there's a, there's a way they got to oh two. Like you gotta tell'em to like be a little snappier. comes back oh oh three. Wins. Win's the next game. Ties the game after that. Oh man. So I think he ended 2 24.

Mike:

Yeah, let's

Brent:

go. Um, but, but yeah, that's pretty much how that goes Oh wow. But there, there was a moment where he was 2 0 3 and he was like, I'm undefeated. We can still pull this out.

Mike:

That's funny. Um, real quick, Pablo went undefeated this weekend, but he went like 9 0 7

Yeah.

Brent:

And I rec like such a tragedy that he could not cut. Yeah. Yeah.

Mike:

So this is too many ties. Okay, now, Liam? Yeah.

Brent:

Which, which brings us to, to Liam. So Liam played a Mew list that was pretty interesting and we could talk about it a little bit, especially if he shows up to talk about it. Um, mm-hmm. I think the, the highlight was, uh, he played double Turbo Mew with a capture energy and a V guard energy. Um, because if you have a little extra energy and you're playing aerodactyl, it's like pretty good. Um, so he goes, uh, six two and, uh, gets to the ninth round and decides to play it out. And as, as I think you guys know, he's like, man, I don't wanna go into tomorrow 6 21 and have to go undefeated. That's ridiculous. You know what, he already, I've already got my invite, like, and we're not gonna get a stipend. Like we might as well just go so. I'm here to win. Let's play. So he sits down with, with the guy, the guy says, you want Id, let's, ID, and Liam's like, no, let's play. So, uh, turns out it's a mirror. Other guy goes first, uh, pops him like super fast. First game like hits the air. Redact just, uh, uh, grinds him the dust. Um, right after that. And, and the whole time the guy's friends are apparently standing there saying, dude, we have dinner reservations. We gotta go

Mike:

That's

Brent:

funny. So, so he wins game one. As, as Liam one, ID now like, let's, ID, I gotta go. We got, I. And Liam's like, no man.

Brit:

please just play day two. I'm, I'm begging you. Just take it play five more rounds, bro. I promise. Oh,

Brent:

here, here comes, here comes the man. Enter, enter the man himself. Alright, you heard where we are in the story? You wanna, you wanna tell the rest of it? I didn't wanna play there too. I

Brit:

respect not wanting to play for sure. Yeah, I thought I thought about that. I put it in our group chat, but like, I'm curious if you differ at Al Mikey, but like, I don't think there's ever a scenario where I, I refuse the initial id. I lose a game and they offer it again. I think I always take it 100% of the time, but I'm not confident. But very close to that. I

Mike:

think, I mean, I, it

Liam:

wasn't a bad matchup to not take the ID too. Like if it was Lugia or something like Lugia, Amir. Sure. Because I, I'd be guaranteed going second one of the games. Right. But it was Mew Mirror. So like, I always have like Roxanne Path Comeback potential. Mm-hmm. and it's more so just like a gamble in both the games. I thought it was winnable.

Brit:

See, my consideration there isn't even really matchup dependent, like the initial conversation is, but, but like the, I've lost the first game. It doesn't matter if it's an auto win or not. Like I, I think I will ch let, I'll, I'll opt into the idea at that point. I think every time

Mike:

I had a, I had a situation at a regional a long time ago. Um, it was the one I got second at with ael Gore. Garbodor, not ael, go Garbodor, uh, ael Gore Waba and expanded. And I was playing against, um, Aaron Tarbell. He was playing. Which is a terrible matchup for AEL Gore, like really, really, really bad. Um, and it wasn't like a, I forget, it wasn't like a Winnin, but it was like late in day two where like, I think I, I think we both needed like a tie and a win or something like that to make top eight. Um, and I offered the id of course, he was like, no, no, no, we're not taking it And, and then I win Game one and then I offer it again after I win game one. And he took it. And I, like, I was really actually surprised that he took it because I feel like in his situation like that matchup is like 80 20 for in, in his favor. Like I feel like he was still favored to win two games. Um, but that was the only time I've been in that situation on either side. Um, So, I don't know, Brit, I, I, I think I agree with you that I would take it, but I understand Liam's conviction and I, and I admire your conviction.

Brit:

Yeah, I mean, Mewtwo like I'm saying, you know, I'm saying I'm the, the coward here every time, you know, no regrets, but definitely like, if you're gonna stick to it, you don't, you know, if you're committed into the day two, you don't waiver on that just because you've lost be like, no, I still need to win this spirit to matter. I don't wanna actually have to play six in a row. But

Brent:

yeah, Liam was comforted by the knowledge that had Jesper Erickson went 5 0 1 the next day, did not cut.

Mike:

Oh, and he started 6 2, 6

Brit:

1. Yeah. Yeah.

Brent:

Like there's, there's no other scenario where you, uh, but like yeah. The fact that you could still with cut going 5 0 1 doesn't matter what your record was like it tells you that's bad. Right,

Mike:

right. And I guess, like, Liam, I saw you post that, uh, Like the odds of winning two games in a row, there are probably better than like going five Oh. The next day. Which is very true. I think,

Liam:

I mean, that's not the whole story. I talked about Isaiah a little bit about it and he was like, you still have to go five, one, even if you win the two. Sure, sure. Um, I mean, it's not much better, but I don't know. I, I was playing the game and I was like, these two games are very winnable. I, I, I wanna go for it and didn't work out. But, you know, I wanted to try

Brent:

Yeah. I thought, I thought as a parent, like if he's gonna be like stipend chasing next year or some nonsense like that, like if you're gonna do it, you might as well do it when you have your invite. And also you're completely eliminated from all possibility of stipends. So like, there's never gonna be a better time in his life to, uh, uh, make, uh, high roll decisions than, than right now. Right. Yeah, that's

Mike:

true. So Liam, the three interesting cards from your list, I think are the, the, the one V guard, the one capture like your dad mentioned, but also the one professor's research Yeah. So do you wanna talk about that? Why'd you include that?

Liam:

Yeah, I, uh, I love said it in the comment, like the comments under the list, but I wanted to play six energy because when you're using aerodactyl, if you like eyes and energy or discard one and then you attach one to the aerodactyl, um, you suddenly only have like two energy left and to, to like begin to convert that position, you obviously have to find another energy and it can often be pretty difficult to find, especially with your seal stone turned off and you're only drawing five cards off Gensec and you only have like two hits in deck, right? So having extra energy is just good. It also means that the aero deck of itself is more consistent because instead of having to find, uh, like off of gens X for five, one of your four outs, you now have six outs. Uh, that works just as well. Um, And also, yeah, just for like converting the position in general after you get the aerodactyl, having more energy is generally good and a lot of aerodactyl. Let's play Cy, but I don't like Cy Cline is like not a good card. Um,

Brit:

I, I, I disagree with you there and like, definitely like noticed it between like Xander's list and your list. When I was playing Mew a couple weekends ago, I think, I swear thats is so good. It's just like, it's insurance on like every card in your deck. It's just, yeah,

Liam:

I find it is insurance, but when you build your deck with better consistency, you often don't have to, you, you don't find yourself in those positions where like you're throwing away tablets for draw and then all of a sudden you're like, oh my God, need an extra tablets saving me because you know, your decks more consistent so you're. I mean, I,

Brit:

I think more particularly in cases, you know, I think that's true, like when you're drawing like pretty well, but sometimes you might have hands where you, you don't have the Luxray of saying, I need to hold onto this card. You know, you just have to draw, you have to discard everything. You have to draw five. And it's more, more so in, in scenarios like that where like I have just like, in the very limited games I've played of Mew, I just like had a game where I opened or like, not necessarily open, but like saw three of the four energy, like on within the first turn or two. And like I just had to discard them there. There was nothing else I could do. And of course theres ends up being very useful. So of course like, you know, it's hard to, that would be like a biased argument to be like, aha. And that's, you know, you should always play s you know, of course. But it's just like, it's insurance even still. But

Liam:

I, you know, I think, I think that's true. But the other argument against C that I think is pretty compelling for me is, There's like a 25% fail rate on the card, like the card just 25% of the times, it just fails. And like every time you say lean, you bas you basically always need a heads or else you're gonna like lose on the spot. Usually. Um, you're like, you're not going for gusts that turn, if you're not playing a switcher list, you, you basically give up your entire turn to try to get back a key resource. There's also not even like, um, I think like flip side compensation of having like a 25% chance of like winning on the spot when you hit double heads because you never, you never like build a game plan where you're playing for a double heads. Um, like, uh, if possible at least. So it's, it's very rare that you actually get like a 25% chance to win on the spot and it just like, you have a 25% chance to like lose every time you play the guard. Um, and sometimes that's not true. Like sometimes you play cy for consistency, like you c um, something that's not completely necessary, but if you draw it, it's like good to help you continue playing the game. But, uh, like often other consistency cards fill that void, um, or. Fill that purpose just as well. Yeah,

Brit:

it's a lot different. I think, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think like when Cline sort of first made its appearance in Mew that like lists were all still playing POW Pad then still and like no one plays POW Pad anymore, but we still play Cy. And your point to,

Liam:

it's still pretty popular, I think. Like, especially on the CY list. Um,

Brit:

okay. Guess just

Liam:

the, I didn't just, A lot of people are cutting down to two Boss and they justify it with the PAL Pad. I cut down to two Boss, I didn't play Pal Pad and I lost, I lost Game three of round nine because of it. Um, I didn't get punished the rest of the tournament though, so it's good.

Brent:

Yeah. Uh, so, but, but I think going question. Yeah. Going back to the question that you asked Mike. Um, oh, uh, like, so Walker also played the research over the PAL pad and uh, and I think both of them felt like that was really, really good. Liam, did you, I I feel like you had a specific narrative

Liam:

for like how much you've enjoyed the research. Yeah, the research seems really good to me. Yeah. Yeah. The research, the research is good in a couple situations. It's one good when you've passed your opponent, they've bricked and you don't want to reset their hand. Um, comes up, it comes up in a few matchups. Both of the rounds I had against Mira, there was at least one game where we were both bricked off path. And I drew the research and I researched instead of like playing judge or morning or something. Um, which was obviously amazing. I won those games. I also, um, I also like general consistency in meal. I think the, the deck can brick a lot more easily. Like there, there's a line you can cross really easily with the deck, where if you play like one too many tech cards, all of a sudden the deck, like no longer functions. Um, that happened to Andy Gantner who decided to play. 500 texts in his mute deck, um, and then complained about it afterwards. Um, but yeah, I think like consistency in me is important. I didn't have like a single brick, I think all weekend, um, except off like a judge path or something in Munir.

Mike:

Um, what is, what's the reasoning you played because you played two Marni, one judge, why, uh, when somebody was three judged? Yeah.

Liam:

I think the, the recent judge came about right was because of countering Oranguru, right? Mm-hmm. Marty Marty's just like simply better disruption, honestly, because they often try to stack their hands with good cards. You put those to the bottom, it's just better. Um, and you also draw an extra card. So it's better for your consistency, as I said, is I value a lot. It's also, um, and yeah, so, so the reason that I don't value Guru as much is because lost box is decreasing and also Lus are assuming that you're playing, uh, are assuming that you're playing Judge. So they're less likely to go for the judge. And even if they see that I'm playing Marnie, I still have the one judge that I can like grammatic for if they try to like guru respect their neck or something. Um, that was just the reason behind it. Um, uh, yeah. Another, another funny research story was I got in one of my mirror rounds, they went for the arrow line, right? Where they arrow turned two and tried to brick you, I, the research off of it and got like two back set and just started smashing their board. But I won the mirror that way, which was good. I I never even killed the, A acto, I just kept rotating one nineties. Cause they had the arrow on board. They brick themselves too. Mm-hmm. Um, so they were only drawing five. So, yeah. And, and why

Brent:

they capturing the B Guard.

Liam:

The capture in the V guard, um, primarily because I wanted to play two extra energy and then those were just the best options. The V guard allows you to get to three 40, which against Lugia means that four powerful Choice Belt can't k u. Um, and the capture the capture's really, really good. It's both a consistency guard in general, but it's also really good in a specific scenario when you're going for the Aact and Lugia. I think, I think twice in the tournament I played three Lugia and during two different games out of uh, nine I was able to v i p for Arrow and something else, and then grammatic for capture and capture the Arrow, which both gave me a piece and help me like, uh, continue setting up my board mm-hmm. So yeah, when you're able to get like multiple basics out to a, um, for setup as well as find the energy already for the Airo, it puts you in a really good spot to hit the VStar next door.

Mike:

Nice. So what were your losses? You lost the last round to mirror and then what were your other two? I lost to

Liam:

two blue gis and a mirror. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Um, Lugia matchup. Lugia matchup is not great. There's not like, like if you just play the blue GI matchup enough, you'll lose a bunch because especially with my list, like one, if they hit the door, Arceus, Yelps, you just basically lose. Yeah, right. You, you have to, yeah, you have to like gu the Arceus and try to get a V guard on the mute to stop KO or something, but yeah, they can just like run through your board really fast. I made some mistakes though on the matchup as well, so, and what were the mistakes

Brent:

like for the people wanna know this stuff?

Liam:

Um, I, you want to combine the path with AO when you can? I didn't, I mean, I don't. It like, kind of wasn't a mistake, but I could also, I could feel it cuz I drew the path off Marni. So what happened was, I got

Brent:

the arrow. Well I'm interested in you guys' opinion on this. Actually. I've heard this story. I'm interested in you guys'

Liam:

opinion on this. This is a good question. I got the Arrow VStar turn two and I combined it with Judge, right? So I had Judge Arrow VStar and I drew four cards and I drew the path and a research off of it. So I, I was gonna be able to path and then research. I'm like, maybe it'd be fine if I played the path, but I was also like, if they draw Marni, then they Marni they break me. Obviously converting the position and once you get the iact out isn't like an obvious win. Um, you, you still have like a few pieces you need to find and if they find powerful, powerful DTE Choice Belt and Gus Aerodactyl, um, before you do, which is like three turns and they had, they had a Lugia active, they had read the Wind, so they were gonna dry out like faster if I bricked off Marni. Um,

Mike:

okay, but you were going

Liam:

second. I was going first. I was going first. So I hit, I was gonna hit the arrow of VStar.

Mike:

How did you Wait? They Marnie you?

Liam:

No, no. I, I judged. I judged, but I was playing around

Mike:

Marni. Wait, but how are you doing this? If you went first? Okay,

Liam:

so, so wait, oh, lemme restart. Walk. Walk it back. It is, it's turn two, have the arrow VStar. I judge and I'm drawn to path and research. I, so I was in a spot where I was thinking about whether or not to play the path, because if

Mike:

they hit the arrow, wait, but here's why I'm confused. You're, it's your turn two. Yes. And you didn't, did you just not get the arrow on turn

Liam:

one? No, I did. I, I'm about to aact though, and I draw the path and I'm thinking about

Brent:

playing it. Yeah. So, so he, he, he plays, he plays judge. Mm-hmm. And he draws a, he draws a research and he draws a path, but he's about to attack with aact. If he knows that other guy's gonna be able to read the win the next turn.

Liam:

Yeah. Or so. So what I'm playing, so, so like the calculation I'm making is that if I play the path, I get extra insurance that co like the cologne play won't happen basically.

Mike:

Um, did you know he played Cologne at this point or no? I

Liam:

did not. It was game one. Okay. Um, so yeah, I, I basically guarantee that the cologne play is not going to happen. But the risk is that if Marni, if my point draws Marni and they Marni and then I Brick, yeah, yeah, yeah. They're gonna read the win and I might struggle to convert the win. Right. Okay. Got it. So I'm think I'm like weighing whether or not I should be playing the path and I decide not to. I de I decided to play for like trying to convert the position after, cause I hadn't even seen the Cone, but like, Yeah, they, they immediately cologne's. Yeah. Louie VStar double air Acto.

Brent:

Right.

Mike:

I would definitely not have played the path like, I feel like

Liam:

more sketch than that too. They, um, they drew, obviously they had to draw to VStar. They drew Skylar for Cologne Inn, VStar, Aurora Archeops. Cause they only have one

Mike:

Arceus. They only had one Archeops in the discard, like on turn one. Yeah. But I,

Liam:

Hmm, dude, if, if I played the path, I would've won that round. Like I, I would've won it.

Mike:

Yeah. But I think it's very reasonable to not play

Liam:

it No, yeah, for sure. But I don't know, like the risk wasn't even that much. Like, when I think about it, because the, the chance that they draw marnis, like they're drawing like five cards and they play two, maybe three Marnis. So that's like pretty low to begin. And then even after that, like, even after Marni, I, I played like four outs to the, um, to stadium bumps. I play crams, play Rotem phones. Like, and even if I don't find that, if I just find like d t e, I'm still attacking, like I have a lot of outs in deck. The Marni, the Marnie doesn't hurt Mewtwo bad, probably. I don't know.

Mike:

It's, you know what's less likely though than having their two, one of two or three Marnis is having the one Skyla

Liam:

But like, um, you know, if they drew, if they drew draw supporter, they could still draw into the Cohen raw. So Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's true. Um, I don't know. Unfortunate around for sure, but there, there, there was some stuff I could have done better. And I also, I think I was just, I think I was missing a lot of plays. Um, one thing that happened, it was, it was something small, but I was sitting on like lost City, lost vacuum, and I wanted to bump a path while playing the Lost City. And I was like, Um, what was the situation? Oh, yeah. I was like, thinking about whether or not I vacuum. Um, I, yeah, I somehow like tunnel visioned into this thing where I was like, if I play the vacuum, I have to discard the velocity so I won't be able to play the velocity afterwards. And it was against Arceus D but they played a drap. So I was like, I want to play the Velocity City and I want to play the Lost Vacuum to like, for, for some reason. Um, and like, yeah, I was like, I'm gonna lost Vacuum in Lost City. And I ended up not lost vacuuming, and I just played The Lost City Down because I was like, uh, I'll just play around like any recovery for the draping. But like, I was literally sitting on like an aerodactyl piece in my hand. I could have just like lost vacuumed and then played the Lost City. I'm like, I dunno why I didn't. And then as soon as I Marnie after that, I was like, what am I doing? I, I don't know. You just like miss a lot of plays, especially after like a long day.

Mike:

Um, yeah, for sure.

Brent:

So, so, uh, when you guys get to like round eight or nine, uh, uh, is there something that you guys do to stay sharp? Is like, should I be telling him he needs like a better workout program so he has the stamina to last? Should I be giving him more caffeine? Should he be eating like healthier, uh, snacks and like after round seven? A good question.

Brit:

I mean, I don't know if you've ever looked or read about, um, kind of training that like Magnus Carlson does, but like, I, I find that very interesting and like, I mean, just reading it for the first time, I would just remember this like, Phenomenon of you know, just going to events and like coming, you know, not only like there would be some nights after day one Swiss, maybe day two, where I just like, I was so tired but I couldn't fall asleep. Like I physically couldn't move anymore, but I just was not tired to the point of drowsiness or what have you. And then also I would always just like even, you know, not nationals where you're there a few days, but even just like a weekend regionals, I would always lose a ton of weight. You know, I would always be down a couple pounds coming back. And it's even when I eat a lot, even. Then it was cool to read how, you know, how the calories, you know, work even during something like chess. But yeah, I mean, I don't have a good answer here. I'm dead at that point in the day. I definitely don't like, want more caffeine or anything like that. I feel like everyone's around eight or nine is just like, kind of ugly or something. Like everyone is just tired at that point, almost. Like, regardless of if you're doing well or like ideally you, you do, you do, you do so well. You've I'd a time or two and like that's your break. Something like that. Um, but yeah, I don't, I don't have a good answer. I don't, not a model of good tournament hygiene or what have you. Um, do focus on the sleep and eating in the morning, but I don't have a, a strategy as the day goes on. I mean, presumably cuz I've dropped at that point. But, um, yeah, it'd be good to know. I should think more about snacking or caffeine or something. I'm just gross and want water at, at that point. That's like, all I think about is a shower. Mm-hmm.

Mike:

I definitely drink a lot of water throughout the day, and then probably around around six or seven I'll often get another coffee. That's like the thing that has helped me the most. But, you know, I don't have, I don't have anything too crazy either. I also get super exhausted. One of my friends went to his first regional this past weekend in Charlotte. Um, a kid that I knew from high school actually, and he messaged me, he like dropped after around six or seven and he is like, dude, I never understood how exhausting these things are And I'm like, yeah, you can't understand unless you do it. Like it sounds silly when you talk about it, right? Like, oh, I'm just playing Pokegear for seven hours. But it is, it destroys you

Brent:

Yeah. You know, I think when, when Liam was younger I would always tell people he had like a tireless capacity for play. And I think as he is gotten older, I think. The way he thinks about the game has evolved more and the result is like, it's more stressful each round, you know, uh, um,

Liam:

so there's also just more rounds, like Yeah,

Brent:

yeah. I mean, when you're playing, but, but like, you would finish six or seven rounds and you'd be like, I'm ready to play some more. Yo, let's go. But like, maybe, maybe because it wasn't like, it wasn't a real round or something. Like you were a little more casual about it. And like, we've been to tournaments where they were like, we're gonna play out the top eight and the top

Liam:

four, like tonight. Here we go. That's, um, that's something funny that I've, I've at least kind of noticed in Masters. It's like they, like, they don't give up as easily as seniors. Like, they just like, don't scoop even when they're losing. Like, and like clearly lost positions. They're just like, they keep playing. Um, and yeah, in seniors, I, I feel like they give them like, way more when they're like losing like the obvious line. Mm-hmm.

Mike:

that's like good and

Brent:

bad.

Liam:

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's not like, Um, they're playing for some like super like, or like super realistic win con that's like, actually they're just kind of hidden. It's just like they like keep playing and you have to like, keep figuring things out. Um, yeah. I've also, I've also played I think, like much trickier decks. I basically played like Inteleon, um, to the like masters tournaments. I think almost every tournament except for the ones that I picked up with meted or play control. And it's, it's exhausting. Like, especially when you're playing a bad Inteleon deck, like I was playing Dragapult and stuff like you know, I'm like, yeah dude, I have like, I have no options. I have nothing. And I'm like trying to figure out how to beat a good deck with like, just like awful junk. Mm-hmm.

Mike:

Um,

Brent:

yeah. So I, I, I think Liam looked briefly at the numbers for me, but I thought m share kind of increased at this tournament. I felt like, uh, I think we thought going in that m was gonna be more popular because people, like, there was all this momentum for reasons somewhat unclear around like Darrell Ladon mm-hmm. and people were looking for decks that had like pretty clean answers to it. And they were like, you could play mute.

Mike:

Yeah. D I mean, and um, Gure, like both of those I think were pretty big and, you know, GJA plays drap on, but it's still not great. Uh, so yeah, I saw the Meta share from day one, at least I haven't seen it from day two. It was 25% Lugia. So one of the lowest Lugia shares that we've seen. And then Mew is 17%, which is definitely the highest that we've seen. Mew is like mostly around like 10 to 12%. So 17 is a pretty big jump, uh, law stone. Kind of came back a little bit. That was the next pop, most popular at 14. Then Arceus Dura nine. Udra six and a half. So yeah,

Brent:

I, I'm surprised to hear there were that many people playing Lost Box. I, you know, I, I felt like, I felt like Liam's process was, uh, okay, you got me, I'm gonna play like a med deck, but I don't wanna play Lugia. So Mew and, and he didn't wanna play Aldon or Gure and like, you know, lost Box didn't seem like a good play. So it was like, well, you know, there's these four decks and we're definitely not gonna play any of these three. So it's like Lugia or Mew.

Liam:

Mm-hmm. I just Mew I think in a really good spot. And that's why it's so popular. It's one of the only decks that can, has like a statistically good win rate against Lugia. Um, I say statistically because there's not really much you can do, like there. The win rate doesn't change. It's literally just whatever the arrow gives you and Judge Path gives you, there's like no nothing, um, you can do to change it based on like how you play or something like that. It's first two turns, coin flip, that's all that decides the win rate. Um, and so yeah, it's like super set stone, but it's good. I mean, you have like a 90 10 of winning off the arrow or 80 20 if you don't play that heavy ball or something, it'd be like 85, 15 if you play the heavy ball. But yeah, you, you have a really good win rate going first and like you're probably like 30, 70 going second. So like, you're good. You're good against it. I felt

Brent:

like,

Liam:

uh, uh, one of the things obviously beats everything

Brent:

bad. One of the things you complained about during the tournament was like, you felt like m ended up being a decked. You felt like you didn't have a lot of agency. Like you were like, oh yeah, I'm gonna judge path them and we're gonna see how it goes.

Liam:

Yeah, EX, I mean, um, yeah, that's what, that's what I mean by like your win rates really set in stone. You've. Is one of the first X that I've played that has like, no way to slow your opponent down. That's why I think the, the dream ball thie thing that Sanders group was working on, um, and brought to the, the special event is, is interesting because like you, you can stop them from taking prizes even when there's like easy prizes on the bench. Right? But like with, with standard Mew lists, like they, they take two prizes, like every turn you, like, you can't stop them. Mm-hmm. um, unless it's one of the like really good matchups. Um, but yeah. Um, so, so yeah, you can't, you can't slow your opponent down at all. And like you, you don't really have a way to win faster. You just, you judge path and you see what happens. Like, so, so we were

Brent:

at the airport on a plane for top eight. Did, did you guys, did you guys watch, uh, how it ended and uh, uh, draw any conclusions?

Mike:

I didn't really watch too much of the day two stream. I mean, alternative wheezing was on stream a lot, which was not super exciting either.

Brit:

It's surprising though, to see it do well. I mean, I'd not a deck I would've ever expected to win a tournament or do have this kind of placing again. I've sort of been a singer of its being a bad deck, and I guess it's not. I guess it's all right.

Liam:

Yes, it's

Brent:

alright. I couldn't tell What was it, what does it turn out that Arceus is actually good or does it turn out that when everyone shows up with Mew and you show up with Eternatus, you're like, wow, this is a great, this is a great game. I mean, it's just, you know,

Brit:

like a local tournament or something like that where, you know, you only have 18, 20 people, like round one, two bad people play, one of them wins Round two. You've got like a two bad people that played two bad people and you know, so on and so forth. But this person just makes it all the way to round four with, you know, without playing a real game. It's just that, it's something like that. Well it's like, it's not a good deck, but it did get the right Meta game.

Liam:

I told y'all before the tournament tournaments was good. Yeah, yeah. I was saying it.

Brit:

Yeah. Sorry. Is that it's good or that it's a good play? Those are different statements.

Brent:

Yeah, those are, those are, that's true

Liam:

that, that's easy to beat if you wanna beat it. So it's not like good in that sense. Right? Like stuff like Lugia is not easy to beat if you wanna beat it. Um, Palkia wasn't easy to beat if you wanna beat it, but I mean, I said it was good. I thought it was a good play. Um, and it certainly isn't lacking like in like raw power. If you like hit a theme deck, you'll blow it to shreds. Um, so yeah, I mean it's a solid deck and it was a good meta call I thought. Um, it's got a good league game matchup. I think

Mike:

it's, yeah. Well and I think ironically Brent, the Mew matchup is like it's weakest matchup of the top deck. Um, like we saw Soso was on stream one round and he played a drap on in Eternatus. Yeah. And I think you probably have to do that to have a favorable Mew matchup because otherwise, like they can get around like some, some musers still playing cross switchers, right? Um, so that's bad. And then even without cross switchers, if they hit a boss, they get to draw so many cards while other decks, you know, they boss, but then they can't draw cards that same turn. But you can do both. Um, and it's just pretty powerful and can. It doesn't always need to KO the alternative VMax. As long as they take the first KO, they'll be ahead in the price trade. So I think the Mew matchup is probably the sketchiest out of like Mew Lost Box Lugia, um, which is funny. it's just,

Brit:

I just like us getting so tired of like, you know, that being true of m or how Mew is the, the, the path deck now and things like that. And I just feel like we're just gonna get, uh, more and more of that for the next format for all of next year. It's just like this just overpowered set design is just like gonna ruin an entire year's format because it's too powerful. It's like my bold prediction for a lot of next year.

Liam:

It's,

Brent:

and can continue

Brit:

to adapt and iterate. Like, I don't know, there's more, you know, more tech technology out there to be found, whether it's, you know, dream ball stuff that doesn't rotate. I'm actually, no, but, um, but yeah, it's

Liam:

just does, yeah. Yeah, I mean the, the engine's really, really strong. So like, that's what I was saying, as long as you, you have to make sure the engine stays intact and like it takes a lot of work to do so, but the deck can look at like upwards of 20 cars in a turn, like pretty easily. So you can pull almost anything off and tech whatever you want and do it. Yeah. Relatively

Mike:

easily. Yeah. The only other deck I wanted to comment on from Charlotte is Justin Aria's lost box deck, which is like, I saw him on stream for the first time. I, I saw a little bit of his top cup match and I was like, the, these are a lot of cards in here that don't normally go in the same lost box list. And then he posted and I was like, oh yeah. So he is got, he has Crobat V en Lumion V, he's got Dragon iv, which is normal. He's Gotze Aura. Okay. Then he is got Aact. In his lost box, he's playing ultra balls, which I guess makes sense if you were playing, uh, aerodactyl. He's got two forest seal stones. He was playing all these vs. I guess it's fine. Uh, it's just like a very strange, uh, list that was thrown together. Um, there's like a lot of ways to beat Lugia, I guess, with this list. Um, between Aerodactyl and Zoroark Ora, uh, and and whatnot. And then ironically, the one round we saw on Stream, he played against the Lugia. He didn't use Zara Ora or Aerodactyl the whole match because the dude, just the, the Lugia player just attacked with Snorlax and, and kept falling asleep. So Justin was just s lying around it two matches in a, two games in a row. I,

Liam:

I will say one important thing to note about the list is that it doesn't run choice builds. So the ze aura, like seems much weaker to me. Yeah.

Mike:

Yeah. And your, I guess your only response to Stoutland is, well, I guess you can kill the Stoutland with aerodactyl.

Liam:

can the, the deck's also harder to beat you. You can no longer beat it with flying Pikachu unless you bring like some she package or something really weird. Um, if people bring Aerodactyl, which also makes the act like a little bit harder to counter, I think, going forward.

Brent:

So, so what does this mean for, for Fort

Mike:

Wayne? Yeah. Because you had to go to Fort Wayne too, right? Indeed. We are right? Yes. What, what, what are you thinking for next week, Liam?

Liam:

Uh, I have some controlled ideas. I think control's good

Brit:

is control good. In a format where people are probably gonna correct. For the heavier increase in Mew, I either playing more draper on than before. Isn't that bad for you as a control player? I mean, I wouldn't be,

Liam:

I wouldn't be playing in control. Okay. Yeah. It was like some four evil tall, and then Shadow. Rider is good, I think.

Brent:

Yeah. You know, RA Raul obviously chose to play control that. It's interesting how that that team ends up playing a million random decks when Isaiah Redner like skipped a couple of tournaments. Comment was not completely off base. I thought it was pretty funny. But, but, but Ra spent most of the first like six hours of the tournament going around telling everyone I will never play control again.

Mike:

what, what kind control did he play? Mewtwo. Mewtwo, okay.

Liam:

Yeah. Um, yeah, he had some pretty awful matchups. He hit Switch plus Draping Lugia. He had Tina with three paths, so he, Sid and he got two and then the other one was there, And, and that one, he, the guy forgot to play the path and announced the VStar and he was like, nah, you're done, you're done. And then he finally burned it. And actually won that one. Um, but yeah, I think he had a lot of draping and like a lot of weird stuff. So Yeah. His, his tournament was over pretty quick. Yeah.

Brent:

Yeah. I, I think to your point, a lot of, uh, he, he ran into every person that said, you know what, I'm just gonna add DRAP into my list and see how it goes. which was, which was all over the place. Like, I mean, there, there were people who were like, I'm gonna run double draping at the, uh, tournament. And like, I guess not a completely insane thing to do, but yeah, a real psychopath to say that's where we're, that's where we are now. Um, we'll, so I'm interested in you guys' opinion. Like, I recognize theoretically it's like the last game of the, it's the last tournament of the format. We thought it would never come, but it's here. Mm-hmm. um, will a lot of people be like one last ride with Lugia or like, Does, does everybody say it's time for me to pull out my comfort deck and just like, give it one last go? Or are uh, are people gonna be like, trying to be tricky? I

Brit:

think some people will play Lugia for that exact reason. I anecdotally, I, I know someone who's, you know, I don't know if the whole argument is one last ride. You know, I, I'm sure there's more going on there, but I, you know, know that at least one person that I know is doing that, so perhaps more will be doing it as well. Um, but otherwise most people are probably gonna try to win. That might mean playing Lugia. That might not. Um, but I, I think that, you know, just as these Meta games shift and so on, that probably seems, seems about right, you know, trying to think of the exact cadence we've had so far. Like, Lugia counter, Lugia counter, like, it's about like one, you know, Lugia wins and something else wins and Lugia wins. Like roughly it's been that, I think so. I, I think li it'll be Lu's

Brent:

turn again.

Mike:

We'll see though. I would definitely just play Lugia if I was going well, I think too hard about it. Brit,

Brent:

are you going? Mm-hmm.

Brit:

No, I'm gonna try to be going at the next ones. I have some, I have something this weekend, but all the other ones after this weekend are potentially on the table, I think. Especially the drivable

Brent:

one. Gotcha. Alright. How about we talk about E U I C for a second. How, how is preparing Gardevoir for E U I C going?

Mike:

All right, let's just talk about it for a second cuz we've been going for a while already. Oh man. Good times. Yeah. Uh, I don't know if you guys saw, you probably saw my post from earlier this week. I think, uh, Guardi. Guardian is interesting because it beats all of the tier two and tier three decks pretty solidly. Like it's, it's good against Mariah, it's good against Arceus stuff. It's good against, what's the other deck that I said before? Oh, it's pretty good against Lugia. Um, but it's not great. It's not terrible, but it's not great against the tier one stuff being lost box Giratina and Mew. Like, you can beat those decks, but like, I don't think you're ever gonna be favored against them. Like at best you're probably 50 50. Like they're just two. Like you're, like your game plan against Mew is to, um, you Skye Stone and take two prizes first. But like, judge Path really hurts you. They can, you know, if you're not able to get it off, maybe you have to play into a Roxanne play. It's just kind of sketchy and Mew just is like gusting up your stuff and killing it, you know, as the game goes on. Um, so you have a game plan to beat them, but it's not great. Giratina and Lost Box kind of similar, like you just need a lot of stuff really early. Um, if they get a Gringer playoff, cuz you with Manife you lose the game immediately. Um, again, Giratina they threaten, they're always threatening, uh, boss Star Requiem on your Guardian X. Like, there's just so many things to play around and there's so many games where you're like, where you hit everything and you win the game. But it's like if you missed one thing out of like 12 throughout the game, you lost the game immediately. So it kind of feels bad to play a deck like that. I think when you and the loss index are probably gonna make up 40 to 50% of the Meta game. So I think people. Will and should play Guardi. Like it's a good deck, but I don't think I'll be playing Guardi at this point, uh, because of, it's, again, not unwinnable, but just weaker matches again, matchups against the, the top three decks. Holy

Brent:

cow. This is, I I must have missed this tweet. This is breaking news for me.

Mike:

Oh yeah. Well, I had, I had the, you at the beginning of the podcast, you, uh, said something about your son's Twitters and, and Twitter clout and stuff. And I was like, well, I had, I, I had two Twitter clout posts this past week. Uh, the second one being, uh, I made the tier list of, or my, my top 10 card from Scarlet Violet, and it was in a tier list format and the top two was Nest Ball and Beach Court, cuz they are played in Lawson decks. Halluc. Tier two cuz it's sometimes played in law decks and then everything else is Tier D because they're not played in law stone decks, Um, so I think law decks are just like pretty by and far the, the best deck in the format. I think they can lose. I think they lose to stuff like, uh, I was playing a little bit of Archeops Giratina this weekend. Uh, and that beats um, it beats lost box pretty solidly and I think it like, is pretty good against Loston Giratina. Um, but like I said, Archeops Giratina, it loses to all of the other decks. Like it loses to me, it loses to, uh, loses to Guardi. So I don't know if that's a great deck, but it does beat the lost one deck. But I feel like that's the only deck that is pretty solidly favored against lost box. Everything else feels, um, pretty sketchy into it. So I. I don't know. I feel like Giratina is like the safest play lasso, Giratina. It just kind of has a check for everything.

Brent:

Right? And you hit big numbers, you wanna attack with single prizes, you get your choice,

Mike:

right? Yeah. The, the scariest part about playing that deck is that the list is like, pretty solved already. Like, there's probably like 55, 56 cards that you just have to play. And then, uh, you just have the last couple spots to work with, which never feels great. Like lost box. You have a little bit more room to work with and play weird stuff to keep your opponent off guard.

Brent:

So when, when you guys think of great, great deck builders of our, uh, uh, day and age, I mean, there's lots of people that that like, I don't even know. There's lots of people, but like, I think there's well known names that that came up with like super innovative decks, right? The Sander watch kicks of the world. Mm-hmm. are, are there people that you think of as like incredibly good at grinding out those last three or four cards?

Mike:

I've always thought that that was like something that I, that's probably my stronger suit of deck building. Um, I don't think I'm like the best in the world or anything, but like for me, that's always been my stronger part of the deck building process. It's harder to identify those people cuz they're often like the people that get credit are the people that kind of like either came up with the deck originally or the person that has the most success with the deck. So like who is the person that like chose those last couple cards? It's, it's hard to know like, who is that person in the Bradner group? Is it Isaiah or is it someone else? I don't know.

Brit:

It's, I think it's definitely, uh, Isaiah, I think this is more than just my impression that I think he is the, the ring leader in terms of deck building for sure. For that whole, for that whole group. But yeah, I mean, I just thinking about it, I think to play off some of similar points to Mikey is like, You know, I don't exactly know when this would've changed how much of it is, say, a consequence of the, the current error. But I don't feel like we have deck builders as as much as we did before. You know, like we had, you know, in the past, like. There would be people who made decks, but they never won the events. Other people would win the events with, with their decks. And like that was a more common thing. And I can think of lots of people in the past that sort of fit that role, but now basically just for the reasons Mikey says, we don't, we don't really seem to attribute any success like that anymore. It's just purely like results driven. And at a certain point it just like, almost doesn't even matter who made the the list, because lists are pretty close anyways. And you know, I think that's probably part of it too in terms, you know, deck building used to just be so much more secretive. And so that's where you get these, you know, these masterminds that do, are able to make the 56 cards and then the rest of your group irons out, like the last couple ones and things like that. Um, so I'd guess it's, you know, sort of symptomatic to all these things that the game has changed, so the information is more prevalent and available and things like that. But yeah, I just, I don't have a. Name in mind, you know, for like the limitless group or something. I feel like if that group existed or you know, existed more prominently say in like 2010 to 2014 or something like that, like we would know like one of them is the deck builder or something like that, like in a group like that. But it's just, you know, it just doesn't seem to be how we understand things

Brent:

currently. But maybe the last three or four cards, because they're kind of always changing from tournament to tournament and, and decks. Like people attribute it more to like r and g. Like it's, it's funny cuz I recognize there have been situations where people have been like, yeah, that's a pretty standard list. And I'm like, well, like those two or three cards are really, really important to the list actually. Like, it kind of gets lost in the r and g of all the gameplay that happened. You know? Is it

Brit:

something that I just, that just came to mind that might also, I think will help to answer this, is that I think more of it is also too, We're just more group driven now in, in a lot of ways. Like we just, it's just sort of understood that, you know, that's how it works. And so it isn't just one person giving the necklace to his friends, it's this is what Limitless is up to. This is what Grant and Azul are up to and things like that. And so there it's like, you know, just so much more of a collaboration that, you know, even in that group, you know, I'm sure someone is really sort of coming up with the skeletons and things like that. But, you know, I think that that's part of it too, that we just sort of have, it's these groups that are coming up with the decks, you know, almost that everyone is sort of an equal part of the conversation. Even if like, I came up with the 58th card and you came up with cards 50 through, you know, 54 or something like that, you know, even if it's not equal, the, the

Liam:

process itself is still sort of seen

Brit:

as equal, I think. Um, but mean, you know, you've got Jake Bahar and people like that too, so like, it's someone who's making decks. Sometimes they're good, sometimes they're not. But he's a deck builder at the very least.

Brent:

Alright, you guys got you guys ready for Lele? Let's do a quick wood You rather, and then we'll call it, uh, call it a night all. Let's do it. Alright. Yeah. I figured with, with Liam here we gotta do a wood You rather, so we can get so, so I can, I can develop a deeper understanding of my child. This is great stuff. Alright guys. For the next 10 years, would you rather have really, really chapped lips or every hour you emit five farts and you can choose if they're the loud popping kind or the silent, smelly kind

Mike:

Every wait, every hour. Five farts. Yeah. Hmm. I feel like I'm not, I don't have either of these to the extreme that you're saying, but I already have both of these to some like lesser degree.

Brit:

That was just my exact answer too.

Mike:

I'd probably go with the farts. I have, uh,

Brit:

you may have noticed, you know, just being around me, but I've, if you're ever at me with an event, I have chapstick on me or, and if I don't have a chapstick on me, I'm probably trying to acquire one Um, cause I was, I was on this, a acne medicine twice called Accutane, and it just like dries you out. Um, and so I don't necessarily need it anymore, but I, I'm conditioned psychologically to need a chapstick from living, living on this medication for a couple years where it's just, you're painfully dry. It's a, it's a miracle drug for acne, but it, it's painful. And anyways, I'm, my, my lips are always very, very chap and kind of a, kind of a gaseous person as well, so Um, but I, I think the chap, the chaps, chap lips seems better. Like the other one is just an inconvenience. They're both inconveniences, but like one is more noticeable than the other. So I would choose to just.

Liam:

Have to do more of this. Yeah, I, I'd choose the chap lifts as well. I feel like you, with the farts, you'd have to find like, some private place, like every hour. Cause you're like, like imagine like,

Brent:

I don't know, you're in like

Liam:

some like really not like super type, but like, you know, like, enclosed space with other people for more than an hour. Like

Brent:

you gonna do. Like, I, I do recognize in a row for, I mean if you're Liam, I mean you're in high school. That's tough, man. Yeah. like, like, like there's no, there's no version of those farts that's like acceptable in high school where you, uh, uh, feel like you could survive as a human being. Right. All right guys. A anything else we need to. Um, so next week we have spring break, but I recognize Liam and I might might be bringing it with a Fort Wayne report. We'll see how it goes and, and then we'll figure out if, if we're gonna vacation or if we're gonna do like, quick, uh, quick, uh, Fort Wayne recap, uh, uh, next week. Okay. Sounds good. John. Pauls our outro. We'll see everybody, uh, uh, either in a week or two.

Liam:

Right?

Brit:

Sounds good. Thank you.