It's the Trashalanche attendance is again, 166% Brit pvis, Mike Fouchet, Brent Halliburton, Liam Halliburton, Caden Hyatt. All here. We're bringing you tons and tons of E U I C stuff. Uh, uh, super fun weekend for people who were there, which was not my son, as I heard about pretty much every hour on the hour. Uh, uh, good times. Um, no new five star review updates. Guys, we see the listeners increase every week. Uh, those are all people who could be leaving a review. Uh, all the other podcasts say that when you leave reviews, it makes other people listen to the podcast. So we would appreciate it if you left a review and we will read it on the pod and discuss. If you look at the other reviews people have left, they're amazing and fun and, uh, you'll be a legend when you leave it at Dragon Shield sponsor stuff. I still have a stack of Dragon Shields to give Brit Pybas the next time I see him, which will hopefully be soon, will definitely be. Milwaukee.
Brit:Yeah. I, I, I hope you're Milwaukee. 100% Milwaukee.
Brent:Alright, um, guys, before we dig, dive into, uh, uh, how E U I C went for you guys, I, I have a couple of like, I think top level E U I C topics, but we should start with just how jetlagged you guys are so we can kind of set the context for the
Mike:pod. I'm, I'm not that bad. Um, I slept quite a lot on the plane back yesterday, and I took a nap when I got back, so I'm, I'm feeling much better than I thought I would at this moment.
Brent:All right. Caden, you had five more hours of plane time. That's quality.
Mike:Yeah. Yeah. I, I had quite.
Kaden:Quite a lot longer plane, larger time difference. Um, but surprisingly, I'm doing great. Uh, I did not sleep at all on the plane and I, I just stayed up and then went to bed when I got, got home, which was like, I don't know, maybe like 10 11 p s t and my body naturally woke up at like 7 38. So, so fingers crossed that were fully, were good, but we'll see how tonight goes because it feel, it feels like for me it's always one night after that's when you wake up at like two, 3:00 AM wide awake.
Mike:For, for me, one of the, I stayed up till like three or 4:00 AM almost every night when I was in London. So that's basically staying up to like 10:00 PM on East Coast time, so,
Brent:and, and then what time were you waking up when you were in London?
Mike:Well, So just since I did not make day two, I only had to wake up early on Friday, but Saturday I slept till like 11:00 AM. Gotcha,
Brent:gotcha. Alright, so, so you basically kept East Coast hours,
Kaden:that's pretty strong. Yeah. Yeah. I made the horrible mistake of, of playing in the cup, so, oh yeah, that was, I, I did also have to wake up early on Sunday. No, yeah, it was a bad call. Not, would not recommend.
Brent:Uh, uh, so couple of things I, I wanted to just chat about before we dig into the meat of things so people could hear all of the like, absolute nonsense that I thought about, uh, over the course of E U I C. Um, seniors has kind of bounced back. There were 165 players at E U I C seniors, uh, that made me think, um, if they don't announce a plan to have like a day two for seniors for NAIC, like I think there's gonna be enough attendance to justify that. Like traditionally, seniors always starts the day after. Like at u I c seniors was on Saturday, but like if they have to have a day too that there will be chaos cutting from 165 players to like a top eight. My experience is that's very, very, very
Kaden:ugly. And I mean, yeah, but honestly, that's how, this is how it was pre covid. Like pre covid seniors were having like, yeah, you know, a hundred, 2,050
Liam:regionals. If you remember pre Covid, the senior division and junior division, like they weren't dead yet, so there were a lot more players. We actually had like day twos, like top 32 cuts from like 200, uh, like 2 56 or something.
Kaden:You had top three? I, uh, I don't know what's going on with your East coast regionals.
Mike:I,
Kaden:I West coast regionals? Never. Never had a day two. No,
Brent:no. NAIC. There was a day two.
Kaden:Oh. At an I, uh, oh. There was.
Brent:Yeah. That, like, they're, they're, I I think if they had 165 seniors at E U I C, they're easily gonna cross the 228 mark for NAIC. And like, I don't know if they've planned for that from a floor place perspective. I mean, I know they anticipate NAIC being huge, but like, that's just another thing they're gonna have to do. And seniors who, you know, for e UIC and traditionally at ICS get to wait and see what decks do well and then just play that deck are gonna have to like, be a little more ahead of the curve, which I thought was interesting. Oh, they just asked top masters, right? Right. But, but, but that like, but then they, they get the additional input of seeing which Masters actually did well before they ask them for their lists, uh, at the end of day one. Right?
Kaden:Yep. Yeah, I think it'll be interesting. My guess is, uh, they're not gonna do a day two at for NAIC. I think it's gonna be one of the most brutal senior and frankly junior tournaments, um, that, that, that we're ever gonna have. Um, I think it's gonna be like eight, nine rounds, cut to top eight and, and it's gonna be, it's gonna be pretty bad. I think
Liam:they have to do a day two cuz that means the hip whatever thresholds, right?
Brent:Yeah.
Kaden:Yeah. I wouldn't be surprised if they even don't do a day two. You know, that's like
Brent:they structurally Yeah. Like they have to recognize that they have enough registrations to make sure they do that. Like, that's probably fine registration first. But I know, like, like, I mean, so I looked at the round before the final round for seniors, so going into the final round for seniors, there were 24 people that had one loss. Yeah. So like by definition they're gonna be people who bubble that were like 6 1 1 and they bubble cut. I'm like, that sucks, man.
Brit:Yeah. It's like the, the vgc issue, right? Like that, that they've, they've been like that until recently, finally. But, I don't know how you solve it. I don't know, pods or something. Even for something like that, like I feel like that would work. Yeah, I
Liam:think you do
Kaden:like a day two. Yeah, I think you do a day two. The question is whether structurally they'll do that for NAIC, I don't think they'll do it for NAIC. Um, if, if, uh, attendance for, uh, ICS continues to be this good in for next season, um, I would anticipate them making that shift and starting to do day two for seniors, um, and juniors. Cuz juniors and seniors are both hitting hit, starting to hit those numbers, um, next, next season. But I don't think they'll do it for NAIC. That's my prediction.
Brent:Uh, you know, I've always said that they should just do day twos for juniors. Like, like, just have twice as many rounds because it ain't like juniors have anything to do on that Friday. The ic, like, I mean, they, they're there to play Pokegear, like they didn't come to London to see the city. They, you know, trust me, I would say, Hey kids, let's go tour the city. They'd be like, tour the city sucks. Um, I'm,
Liam:I'm also glad anytime like there's like, like a practice like that would discourage people from, uh, what I call fiending, where they realize somebody good's playing on stream and then they spend like six hours just trying to get the list, which is just like God,
Brent:right. Slow, slow motion frame by frame. Going through Sanders game. Yeah,
Brit:exactly. I just,
Liam:you should be playing instead of doing that
Brent:all Friday. Alright, so question I had for you, Mike, and, and, and, uh, Brit was the other thing that I thought was like just a tendency Great for this event. Um, and the thing that stood out to me was, so there were 700 UK players that attended and it made me wonder if they had a regional, in a real city, would they be able to like easily cross the 2000 or 3000. Like I wondered if they said, we are getting the Javits Center, we're doing it. Like, would 2000 New Yorkers show up to play Pokegear? Just cause like they don't know better and they're like, let's play Pokegear.
Mike:Well, so let me clarify a couple things. Do you, when you said 700 uk do you mean, um, masters? Yeah. Okay. So that means, so I think there was like 14, 40 Masters, something like that. So that means half of the masters were from the uk, which is pretty cool.
Brent:Yeah. Like I just felt like that implied to me that there were quote, like a lot of like casual UK players.
Mike:Sure, sure, sure. Mm-hmm. And I'm like, anecdotally, I can tell you that's true in these, I played I think three UK players that weren't like great. Um, uh, but you know, they, you know, one of'em was their first major tournament ever. Um, and then the other two, they had been to one other regional this year they went to Liverpool. Um, And so, yeah, so I do think this attracted quite a big crowd from the uk. Uh, I don't know if we could hit two to three thou. Uh, I guess 2000 seems realistic. 3000 seems like maybe a little bit too much, um, for New York, but I mean, like New York would be probably pretty cheap for a lot of people to get to, right?
Brent:Mm-hmm. And, and there's many, many people in New York I've heard.
Mike:Yeah, there's not that many. I mean, there's a lot of people in New York, but that doesn't mean that doesn't translate to a lot of Pokegear players in New York.
Brent:Yeah. But like, like I just, I mean, I recognize, uh, I mean, so Caden, you were at London Worlds, like somehow London Worlds, they convinced all of London. There was like a Pokegear convention happening and like all of London just randomly showed up at the World Championship.
Kaden:Uh, this was. Frankly, also true for E I C, this time the
Brent:Pokegear Center wonder, like if you told New York City, there's a Pokegear convention happening at the Javit Center mm-hmm. It would be like crazy.
Mike:Right. Okay. Okay. Now I see what you mean. Yes. Yes. Okay. I agree with that. Yeah. I
Kaden:mean, yeah, I mean, the lines for the Pokegear Center were insane. Um, and I would just be walking around and I would see so many people not like the amount of people with spectator badges was really, really large people who were there not to compete in the tournament, but just to hang out, go to the Pokegear Center, get some, get some merch.
Mike:Um, there were, there were a couple times on, on Saturday I left the convention center twice to take the train, um, to somewhere. And both times, like a ton of people were also just getting on the train with bags of stuff to like go back to wherever they were coming from. Um, so yeah. Yeah, I heard all
Brit:the exclusive merch was like instantly gone, like ev everything, but sleeves was just, you know, in the first hour, couple hours. Yeah. Cliff Dialga said, uh, which is, I mean, nuts, like, I mean, this is already the, you know, the biggest brand in the world and like, they're just pushing into new territories, like on that front. Like, I, I was thinking about this speculating, like, I feel like we're just at, you know, in a couple years, five years, we're just gonna have these experiences just like all over the country. Like they're just gonna open up Pokegear centers in the mall and things like that. Like, I feel like that's where this is, has to go. I feel like it's a good direction to go in, but, um, yeah, just very curious as to what they'll do for N E I C. Just everything is gearing up that it's just gonna be crazy and, yeah, I guess the only, they're the only big, the biggest blow in numbers there is Columbus versus New York City or something like that. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Columbus
Brent:is not London, but like seeing how many UK people showed up in London and what a like crazy thing it was, it made me wonder if they would stop doing tournaments in Knoxville. Like what level of insanity they could achieve. Yeah.
Brit:You know, you know the Knoxville and those places are just like, it's just because the to is doing it and that's where they want to afford. Like, I, you know, I don't
Kaden:know. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I think the biggest first step for trying to make that sort of shift would be having Pokegear run regionals and not tos. Right. I think that would be a necessary first step before, because that's
Brit:what the, the Bako games do already. That's what Yugi does. And I, I just my impression across the board, uh, you know, talking to Russell Par and people like that who are more, you know, current to the, both those sorts of games, it just seems like the better idea and again, to say to compare to ICS and things like that, which is Pokegear doing it. Always a good time, always a great event, you know. So it just, it just feels like the best direction to go. Like and as far as like quality assurance is concerned, you just like, they've got the money for it certainly too. So like I get, you know, I guess we go back to the Sam Chan conversation, um, whereas there's obviously not worth it, you know, we're just an extension of marketing at the end of the day and things like that. So, but maybe we convince them, maybe, you know, these numbers are, are the argument that we need more money, you know, to put more money into the community and things like that. I
Kaden:dunno. Yeah, I mean, I will say, I think that, I would say that that argument was true. I feel like over the past year or two years we've, I at least have started to feel a real like tonal shift in the way Pokegear is starting to handle competitive and seeing it and, and the competitive scene and seeing it less as purely marketing to get pe more people to buy product, but also as in and of itself, a way to create. Like events, conventions, um, and I feel like competitive
Brit:necessarily that they're gonna branch out into other avenues is I think, sort of the deeper point there. Yeah, that's true. Specifically competitive is, you know, the minor part.
Brent:Mm-hmm. Yeah, I, i, talking on both sides of my mouth, I, I also had the reaction that like, if it's e if, if, it would probably be easy for them to have a 2000 person regional, they're easily gonna have a greater than 2000 person ic, uh, in, in Columbus. Like the pricing. I mean, apparently they don't have to, and people are still gonna show up and pay$70 or whatever to play. But like, man, it seems like pricing should be better. Like, it just seems like they could, uh, uh, they could make it awesome.
Kaden:Yeah, I mean, that's something they don't really have any incentive to do though. There's no
Brent:reason. Yeah. But like, but like, I recognize when you, if you said we're gonna have a like 2000 person plus. I see. Like we could have a 2000 person regional easily, like in the big scheme of things, it costs you nothing to bump the prizes. You know? I guess that's what everybody's eternal complaint is, is like if you wanted to throw, uh, you know, 50 more boxes, booster boxes of product at like pricing cost them nothing, like yeah, they could just do that, you know?
Kaden:That's true. But like, I mean, every say you don't have to, every tournament, every tournament really is capping out on the amount of players they can let in. Yeah. So like, yeah. Yeah.
Brent:Well that, I mean, I guess the question, the question, uh, uh, is, is like, is pricing designed to drive demand or is pricing just designed to like, make it an awesome experience? Like, you know, is it worth spending a little more money to make an awesome experience? I don't know. I mean, like overload events has like artists come sign stuff and I recognize that attracts a certain crowd, but like, For a fraction of that cost, they could throw 50 more booster boxes at pricing. They just could. Yeah. Um, alright, so the other question I had before we dive into, uh, uh, like you guys' stories from e i c was just, has Senator transcended the game because the only, like when he was five Oh, the only thing I cared about was seeing him on stream and like seeing the madness. You know,
Brit:I mean, that's a good place to start. Cause I really wanted to ask, especially with Caden and Liam, you know, the, the conversation we had before, cause it's really something I thought about kind of all weekend. Just like, can, you know, can Tor do what Sander does? Can Sander do what tort does? Like, and I, I'm just so, I'm really torn at least, you know, obviously I think it really could go in both directions. But I guess just like off the cuff here, I really feel. I don't think Tor could do what Sander does. Like, I I, I, it's a controversial, you know, thing to say, but I, I don't, I don't know if it would work. I don't know if it would be there. I I, it's, it's a very hard debate, you know, semantics are all over the place, but it's something I really thought about, you know, over the weekend just to come back to this conversation. It's just really incredible what Sander is able to do. Like, it just, maybe I'm, maybe I'm overvaluing it, maybe it's not quite as complicated as I think it's just, cuz the cards are so different that, you know, maybe I have a bias in this direction or something. But like, it's a, it's a good question, you know, regardless of where you wanna go with it. I
Kaden:think, yeah, I mean, I think, um, I think it's just about time. Like, I think with practice with time, Tor could definitely do what Sander does and Sander could definitely do what Tor does. It's just about, you know, incentives, whether you really want to, like I, I'm, I'm sure that. Tod wanted to pour in hours and hours and hours and hours trying to create a completely out of the box wild deck to try to win the event with. I'm, I'm confident he could, but I think he just doesn't feel the need to. He's like, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna take a top deck and I'm going to refine the list to perfection, try to build the best version of this list possible, and then try to play better than, than everyone. And I think that, I think that if he wanted to go the Sander route, I think he could, but I, I don't think he, I mean, I feel like it's pretty well proven. He doesn't have to, I,
Liam:I agree, but I, I don't think it's like, uh, something that you can do quickly. Like I think it, it required, like Sandra has like years of experience, just like solely thinking about control. Like even if to, I think like spent. Um, however much time he has before his next tournament, like exclusively thinking about how to build a good control deck. I, I mean, I Sander would come up with something better. I, I'm sure. Um, like it's just something that you need like a lot of experience
Brit:to do. Yeah. At the very least it seems easier, you know? I agree. I mean, obviously I don't think, you know, with infinite time or what have you, obviously I think Tord can accomplish whatever he wants in the Pokegear trading card game. Um, but yeah, I think at least in terms of the turnaround or what have you, it's Sander could probably play the consistent deck quicker, you know, again, to say, like you said, like it's, it's years of conditioning, uh, not just in play, but in in deck building and, and so on as well. And yeah, I mean it's, it's just really astounding to me every time. I mean, both of them, both of'em are such sort of, you know, miraculous stories really odds and a game of variants that they both do, you know, their things so consistently. Yeah.
Brent:Yeah. It's a, it's a, it's amazing. Alright, let's, let's talk about, uh, a tournament. Mike, you want to, you wanna get us started? Sure.
Mike:Um, so I ended up deciding to play Gardevoir. Um, and honestly it seems like the mentality of how I decided on the type of Gardevoir list that I played was probably very similar to how Tord thought about the event in the end. Um, we both played, uh, Gardevoir deck with heavy research with no Mewtwo, V-Union, uh, and no real text for lost box except the Kirlia. Um, I was playing a lot of the Gardevoir YouTube V-Union, and I mentioned on the podcast last week that I thought the best part of it was the heavy research. Um, just that it ran much smoother than running heavy judge and. So like the day before, U I C I I, I got in Thursday morning and I built, I kind of just dropped the YouTube V-Union and put in one, one Espeon Espeon VMax and some other stuff, and played two games against Lost Box. And I won both of them, but one of them, I didn't get the Espeon out at all. And the other one, the Espeon was out, but I didn't even feel like it did that much. So I was like, well, maybe this is just fine against Lost Box, um, or just like good enough. Um, and I got to play so many other better cards than the YouTube Union because you drop YouTube Union and you drop Palkia, so that's five spots. Uh, and so I kind of just took that, I dropped the Espeon and I played two other good cards and I was like, this seems great. And I played a bunch of games with that. On Thursday, uh, I was beating Pablo, uh, in the Mew matchup. I was beating Kirin and some other people in the Lugia matchup. And it just felt really, really, really smooth. Um, so I kind of just ended up going with that. Uh, the mentality against Lost Box was, there's gonna be a lot of people that play Lost Box, but not a lot of great players that play Lost Box. Um, and I was try, I, I kind of used the idea of sampling to, to come to this conclusion. Um, I probably talked to like between 20 and 30 players that I would consider in the top like 5% of the game, 10 to 5% of the game, um, before the event. And a couple only maybe like two or three were on Lost Box and the rest of them were like, lost Box is really strong, but I really don't wanna play it to this event. It's gonna be the most. Everybody expects it to be the most popular. It's really hard to play three games. It's a really hard deck to play, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Um, and so I just got the sentiment that even though Lost Box would be the most popular deck, it wouldn't be heavily played by the top echelon of players. Um, and, and I think that was pretty accurate overall. Um, and I think that going into an event like this, I felt like I could beat mediocre lost box players and I felt like almost anything that I put in my deck would not beat really good lost box players. So kind of just avoid good lost box players. That was kind of the strategy. And I do feel like I do really feel like Tord took that strategy as well. Um, so that's somewhat validating. So that's kind like how I ended up on The Guardian list that I ended up, uh, I wrote down the changes from Towards List to my list, and I feel, feel like we could just like run through'em quick. Um, So the first one is mine. He played Zacian and I played two Gardevoir. I feel like that's, uh, kind of could go either way. Um, you need to run three of them in total. I don't really know which one is correct. Um, but so that's like one change. Uh, the stadium stuff was a little bit different. He ran one C oh one collapsed and one worker and I ran two C oh one Champions Festival. So like mi he minus collapsed minus worker, plus C oh plus Champions Festival. My reasoning for running three real stadiums instead of worker is that two things. One worker is just not a very good card overall. Um, and the main reason that you wanna run three, can you say draw three is
Brent:not a good card? What?
Mike:The main reason you wanna run three stadiums is for the Mew matchup. Um, because you need to be able to bump Path to the Peak multiple times. Um, And you, I found that when I was playing against Pablo, like the third one was, uh, you often needed the third one cuz maybe you researched one away early on and blah, blah blah. Um, but workers really not the same as the third stadium. And that matchup specifically, and that's the matchup you really need the third one for because you often need to pair the stadium bump with a more powerful supporter effect, whether that's a gust to knock out, um, like a Gensec or a mute to take your two prizes or, uh, like a research because you got Roxanne at the end of the game. Uh, and you need to, you know, f like draw more cards to get the Seal stone combo off. Um, so like I think that's, I think worker is like fine, but I, I, I think I really do prefer three stadiums. If you can fit it. Um,
Brent:I can imagine like when you say toward played a supporter, let him draw some cards instead of a third stadium. I'm like, that sounds like towards, I,
Liam:I'll also say if. If that catches on and more people are only playing stadiums and Gardevoir, that makes the Shadow Rider path lock a little bit better, which I'd be excited about.
Mike:That's somewhat true, but you can just attach, like you play a lot.
Brent:You can, but it
Liam:does give you, like, if you can go like, um, yeah, I mean I guess spinoffs doesn't really work if you're playing the path, but yeah. Let's you, it lets you like basically develop like s crushing hammer loops, um, on the, uh, which I think is good. It also lets you play like a slower game and then maybe hit like Sydney for the stadiums and then go out of the Shadow Rider. Mm-hmm.
Mike:Yeah, that makes sense.
Brent:Um,
Liam:if you get Shadow Rider path, then there's
Brent:no
Brit:worker. It's much
Mike:better. Mm-hmm. Um, the next change, he had four research and I dropped one of the research for Serena. That feels like a really obvious and good change to me to play a Serena over the fourth research. I think only having one. Like four plate four research looks really good. But like, I don't think the consistency difference is big at all. And I think having the option to have an extra gust effect is just way too powerful in a deck like this. Especially for the matchups, like the Mew matchup, you really need to be able to gu like it. There's multiple times in the Mew matchup, multiple times I played the Mew matchup where you have to, you're forced to discard the sky seal stone too early and then you have to go like gu gus gust and take, go 2 22 on prizes or, um, Against, like in the finals, for example. I didn't actually watch the finals yet, but just thinking about that matchup in my head, the, the best way for tor to to beat a lowland VX is to gust everything else except the vx. Leave Alex with just the VX, and then go in with the routes, especially because of the lost cities. So only having access to one gust effect is really weak, uh, in, in a matchup like that. So I feel like it's a pretty, uh, obvious change to, to just play Serena over the fourth research. Um, yeah, uh, he played 12 psychic energy, which is a pretty interesting, um, There's a lot of lists that were experimenting with, even going down to 10 psychic, which I don't think is correct, but, uh, playing 12 psychic, it's pretty interesting. Um, I had the fourth fog crystal over that. I think either way is fine. The fourth fog crystal is a bit more consistent cuz you, you know, find Mew or rots a little bit early, uh, or more consistently. But I can see 12 psychic seems fine. Um, he had the lumon and I had an Avery in that spot. Uh, Avery was the worst card on my deck, so I would not recommend that. The Lumon is pretty interesting to me cuz he only has three ultra balls as a way to find it. Um, but it looked good when he played it on stream. It's the most to
Brent:thing I was gonna say. It looked amazing. It's the most to thing to do too, right? Like
Mike:Right, right, right. Um, and I think luminum like the collapsed makes a lot more sense. Like the collapsed lumion package makes a lot more sense together right. Than, than individually. Um, so I think Lumin seems fine. I'm not sure I, I'll mess around with it. Um, probably the biggest difference though is he had two rare candy and I did not have rare candies, um, in those spots. So I tried to, as you can see, I'm trying to like, match up, like kind of where the spots go. Um, I would say the equivalent in my list is I had a Clara and a rescue carrier, so Tod only had one Miriam as recovery and I had probably too many recovery cards with Miriam, Clara and Rescue carrier. Um, But I'm really, really surprised that he only had the one. I feel like two is probably the best number.
Brent:I, I recognize you. You know what's funny is I, I was gonna say in, in my mind when I think about the games that I played, the, the Clara Maps to the second station v
Mike:Hmm. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Like
Brent:if you're only gonna run one Zation, you, you, you need, you probably want the Clara so you can do the thing if you need to do the thing.
Mike:Mm-hmm. Yeah, that makes sense. Um, the rare candies I really am unsure of. Uh, I mean, they work for him, uh, for sure. And they're, they're probably good, but they feel especially weird in a research list. Um, cuz it's kind of hard to just draw Candy Guardi and it feels particularly weird when he only plays three Gardevoir. Um, but I don't know. They, they, they might be really good. I, I, I should play them a little bit more. I haven't played rare candies in a heavy research list, so I, I shouldn't, uh, dismiss it before trying it out. I mean,
Brent:I guess the, the, the theory of trying to like be Turbo about Gardevoir EX and like, like an ization v right outta the gate is like a thing. But that's true. It's interesting. I will say,
Liam:yeah, may, maybe you can tell, but, uh, if the theory doesn't make sense, I don't, I'll immediately dismiss it. It's fine. I don't need to like play games with it.
Kaden:We, we know this about you, Leah.
Mike:Um, I will say that a large reason why I did not make day two is because in two of my games, in my Lugia losses, I prize two Kirlia. Um, so playing rare candies does mitigate that, but also pricing to Kirlia is kind of unlucky. So I don't, but maybe, maybe rare candies gets around that quite well. Um, and then the very last change is he had penny. And I had a Hasian heavy ball. The heavy ball was incredible the whole day. Prizes als can be really, really, really, really bad. Um, and you prize a basic fairly often with this deck anyway. You play what, I dunno, nine or 10 basics. So you're prize a basic most games. Um, so it's almost always a hit. Uh, like I turn one heavy ball at a ton of games and it's great. Um, penny, I presumably was for, also for Ion and the Maw stuff, but I feel like the maw stuff is, uh, much easier to play around in Gardevoir than it is in a deck like Lugia. Cuz you can just choose to not bench Greninja a lot of the time if, you know, they play mawa. So, but maybe also with the Zacian, the, the penny makes more sense too. Um, so those are all the changes. Um, I was very happy with the play. I don't feel like almost any of my rounds. I, I feel like I played very, very well. Um, and I don't feel like any of my losses were in my control, really. Um, without going into too, too much detail, I'll, I'll tell you my matchups, uh, I beat a lost box round one and I beat a lost box round four. Both of those were against average lost box players where uh, I won game one and then game one was like 30, 35 minutes. And then they were kind of playing slow cuz they were like, they didn't know exactly what they were doing and both matches game two. They probably would've won, but they needed like 10 more minutes. It wasn't like it was particularly close to them winning the game. Um, they need a lot more. And then round. So I played those two lost box and I played one more lost box round three, which I lost two. Um, but they ran cross switchers and canceling cologne. So that was like all like the matchup is already bad. And then game one, he goes, I KO something. And he goes, drap on Rahan, miraj gate, attach cross switcher. My Gardevoir EX KO it. I'm like, what? Like, all right, you got it dude. And then game two, he can cross switcher canceling colognes by Manaphy at KO two Kirlia, like, all right, cool. I deserve to lose that round. Um, so those were the three lost box games that I played, and I went two one, which, you know, I was very happy with going to one against Lost box. Um, I tied Audra round two. Uh, that was probably the only match where I felt like I could have done anything differently. I would've won game three a hundred percent, but I needed like two or three more turns. Um, I scooped game too. Like really quick though. Like you gotta turn two Greninja on, two Kirlia As and I scooped immediately. So it is just the games take a long time in that matchup. Um, okay, so that's the first four rounds. And then I didn't play more law zone stuff. I played against two Muse, one Fusion and one Path to the Peak Mew. Um, pretty straightforward games. The one play I wanna highlight against the Fusion Mew he played, uh, I saw Game one that he played Echoing Horn. So he just like discarded off a cram. Uh, and I saw throughout the first two games that he had played, he played some combination of Lost City and Path to the Peak and Game three, it's a pretty close game. Uh, but he puts Las City out and Koos some Gardevoir. And then I go on with Zacian, Skye Stone Play, and I could bump the las city, but I choose not to. And. Part of the reason that I chose not to is to hold an extra stadium out to Path, to the Peak. But also I was thinking about the Echoing Horn because if he Zacian, uh, I don't, I only have Gardevoir X as a two Prizer. He's going down to two prizes. If I, if I bump the, the Lost City, then Zacian goes to the discard and he can echoing Hornet the next turn to win the game. Uh, so it's actually really funny. He ends up, Zacian lost sums it. I take one prize to go down to, uh, to go down to one prize. I ke Malta to go to one prize. And then he's doing this whole really big play, like digging, digging, digging. He slams the echoing horn down, looks through my discard pile, and is like, ah. Then I'm like, yeah, dude. It's in the law zone. So that was really funny. Um, that's great. So that was good. And then I played against three Legos. Um, one of them I beat pretty handily, and like I said, the other two, um, Well, I got O two in both sets, one in it, one game in both sets. I just like, pretty much dead drew. And then in the other one I prized two cur. I had like a good start, but prize two Kirlia, and then brought it down to a point in the game where I go, Roxanne Cinccinno. And if they, you know, dead draw for one turn, I win the game in the following turn. Um, but both times they hit ultra ball into lu minion, into research, into stadium. So, um, just kinda what happens. Uh, and, and, and the last round was my winning in so unfortunate. But like I said, I was very happy with my play, happy with the event. Uh, and yeah, I, I have one other quick story, but is it, do you, Brent, do you look like you're gonna say something? Nope. Nope. Okay. So this is not, um, Pokegear, this is not like gameplay related, but um, it's worth talking about while I'm talking about my rounds. During the last round, during my winning in, um, I sit next to this player from the UK and he looks over at my match lip and says, oh, you're my crochet. Uh, I followed him on Twitter. I don't remember if he said if he listened to the podcast or not, but um, he's like, I follow you on Twitter. You're a math teacher, right? And I'm like, yeah. And he says, I'm a maths teacher as well. I need to tell you something. I'm like, what? What's up? Um, he's like, I have a student this year whose dad went to high school with your dad. And I was like, what? Um, and so it turns out, and like I know this guy, um, And to the listeners, as you know, if, if you listen to the, my, my, the episode with my mom, you know, my dad passed away almost 20 years ago. So like these connections, uh, are even like, this connection is even like stranger, um, because it's like, it's been so long. Um, but yeah, so this guy, uh, Glenn, who was friends with my dad in high school, moved to the UK like 30, 35 years ago. Um, and I've only met him maybe twice in my life. Um, but I guess like the, the teacher and the dad, Glen had talked at some point and he found out that this teacher plays Pokegear. And he is like, oh, one of my old friend's son used to play Pokegear. I don't think you know him. Like there's no way you would know him, but his name is Mike Fouchet. And then the guy was like, actually, I do know who he is. And we ended up sitting next to each other in the last round. And that was like, Like we, we got to talk about it and he said this and then like the round started and then, you know, obviously I was extremely disappointed to lose my winning in, but just the fact that we had that conversation I think took a lot of the sting off losing it. Cause I walked away and I was like, I do not feel nearly as bad as I should right now. Um, and so that was just a really, really cool experie.
Brent:Uh, o obviously your, uh, your dad's friend has no idea what a big time internet celebrity you are.
Mike:Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly right?
Brit:Yeah. Sepsis always happens. I just think like, well, one of the biggest things for me is just, well, someone I went to high school with dated one of your brothers. Is Mikey like with
Mike:or My cousin? My cousin. My
Brit:cousin. Your cousin. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was just always strange. How works.
Brent:That's crazy. I've never heard that story. That's crazy.
Mike:Yeah, yeah, yeah. My cousin da for a long time, my cousin dated this girl Brit went to high school with for like three years,
Brit:and it was similarly. He was like, I, he plays Pokegear. He was like, well, there's this guy that I went to high school with who plays Pokegear. He's like, you probably don't know him. And this the same thing.
Brent:Uh, um, you know, uh, uh, speaking of stupid internet things, uh, I, I did a, a much less interesting stupid internet thing happen today. Uh, I saw somebody posted on the, uh, Pokegear, uh, competitive Reddit. Whatever, uh, like PTCG or, or something like that. And, uh, they were like, I just bought all the world championship decks. Uh, you know, which ones are, are the best for playing against each other. And somebody replied like, oh, well they're, you know, these are all the best decks from worlds, so you shouldn't have any problems. And then somebody replied back and was like, well, they're not the best EX. And, and I, I immediately replied, this is the comment that I came here for. Thank you. And then he immediately replies, oh my God, you're the Halliburton for the Trashalanche. I listen to you every week. Shout out my man. We love you Jolteon guy. That's funny. That's great. That is what we're looking for.
Brit:I haven't read that stuff. Read it in a few years. It's usually a treat. Maybe it's gotten better
Brent:that, that's, I, you know, I, I love to just flip through there and see if there's like, anything funny that, uh, uh, piques my interest. Yeah, that is,
Kaden:that's hilarious.
Brent:That is not the best EX. Um, anyway, Caden, talk to us about your, uh, tournament.
Kaden:Yeah. Well, unfortunately I did not have any wonderful stories like, like Mike did to take, to take away from the sting of the event. Um, it was, it was a rough one, I'll be honest. Um, I also ended up picking Guardy, um, a similar thought process, I think, to Mike, although there were a few key differences. Um, I also went no V-Union, um, for similar reasons. I don't think it fixes your lost box matchup as much as you want it to. Um, and five spots is a lot of spots to give up. So I, I opted for a different lost box strap that works quite a bit better. I played, um, three clunky and one Hatter V in order to turn to, to swing with Hatter and switch and kind of just keep under clef lock. Which in our testing, um, worked very well against both the Czar, especially the ARD version of Lost Box. Like you kind of just clobbered the ARD version and it worked pretty well against the Greninja version. Um, but it made for a pretty rough udra and Tina lost box matchup. You don't really have a good way to deal with either of them. Um, but it, for the other two, it, it was pretty, it was pretty great. Um, I ran, uh, one Clara, no, Miriam, no, um, rescue carrier, which honestly felt like enough recovery. Um, I think that maybe I, I would've liked a Miriam, but it didn't feel necessary. I was never, like, I was never sorely needing more recovery, especially since I ran one PAL pad. Um, and the PAL Pad was phenomenal throughout the day, right? Um, it was one of the MVPs of the list. The pal pad was so, so, so good. Um, And on top of that, I also ran the Heavy Ball, um, which also absolutely phenomenal. Um, I would never run, I don't think I could run a Guardian list without, um, heavy ball. But, uh, because I was running the Hating in three clunky, it meant I cut a lot of the, um, other sort of lost box texts that most people ran. Um, I didn't have any Kirlia. I didn't have the Manatee. Um, I didn't have the, uh, uh, champions Festival either. Instead, I, for stadiums, I ran three Temple of Syno to try to help with, uh, the, the matchup, which actually was fantastic. Uh, it felt really, really, really good in testing versus Lugia and in the event. Um, so I was, and of course I also, I went four, I went 4, 4, 4 for ultra ball, v i p level ball and fog crystal to try to max that on consistency in that department. Um, I went, I didn't end up playing rare candy, I think for similar reasons as Mike. Um, but I mean, with towards result, I'm starting to reconsider, I think the most compelling thing about Rare Candy is it the fact, well, it's two twofold. I think one, it really helps against Mirror. It can help you speed up and try to win against me, or if even going second. Um, and also it makes you a little less reliant on having to hit Kirlia, um, which can be tough in this format with, with a lack of really, with only ultra ball and lov ball to be able to search it out. Um, which seems like it should be enough, but it never feels like it's enough. Um, I also ran, um, just like toward Mike, I, I, I'm pretty sure you ran it, Mike? Uh, I ran the one penny. Um, no I didn't. Based off You didn't run one penny. Okay. Uh, I ran one penny just to try to help with concerns, um, about. About Mawi and I also ran two judge and two boss. Um, the, which frankly felt great throughout the day. Um, especially the two judge, the two judge was absolutely fantastic. Um, just disruption in this format is kind of insane, especially when you're under clunky lock. When you're, when your plan is to put them under clef key lock. Having the ability to reset their hand is really, really important in case they break out for a turn. Um, so the two judges pretty necessary there. Um, as for my, my tournament, um, you know, I went into the tournament really trying to make sure lost box was as good as possible, even kind of sacrificing for some, a little bit of consistency in some, you know, a little bit of my other matchups. I ended up only hitting one lost box the entire day. Um, and one, like one lost zone engine deck, that was it. I was, um, I just played against Isaiah Williams. In round six, um, who was playing the ARD variant? Um, we had a, it was a pretty fun match. I mean, I had fun, I don't know if he had fun, but we managed to surprisingly get through three games largely because, um, he Insta scooped game one, like in the first five minutes I Insta Scooped game two, um, when I didn't start clunky and he started going, uh, and then game three took 40 minutes. Mm-hmm. And, uh, there were multiple moments where I thought I was gonna deck out. Um, I went, he ran the mall while, which can make it very difficult cuz you can't, of course you can't retreat into Tering when you're under mall. Wild Lock. Um, now I ran Penny for that. However, uh, game three I prized my penny, um, which made the first half of the game very, very slow. Um, When I didn't have my penny, there was a lot of J jousting going on. Um, but eventually over over 40 minutes, uh, I managed to close out the game three. Um, and it, that was, that was my one lost box matchup for the, for the whole day. Um, besides that, I played against the other big one I played against for Lugia. Um, I went two 11 versus Lugia, uh, largely the two 11. Okay. I have, so the one loss I had to Lugia, um, I, frankly, I misplayed game two. Um, I mismanaged my CNOs. I had, I decided to toss one early, not thinking I would necessarily need it by the end of the game. Um, and I very much ended up needing it. So I, I kind of threw through game two. But, uh, that ma, that, that loss was my bad. But my two wins, uh, very solid with three cno, you kind of just throw out CNO very liberally throughout the game. Um, and the way I sort of think about the Lugia matchup as Guardy is if you're just trading knockouts knockouts, they're gonna win the game basically every time. And I ha so you need to find some way to try to slow them down and get them to miss a turn of knockout knockouts. And my deck had two ways of doing this. One you throw clunky in the active at the start of the match, and tr hope that they threw not being able to lu mini on, they can't get their Archie ups in the discard and they, um, are stalled a turn The other way is just trying to get CNO to stick for a turn so they can't attack with Tatar. And, um, that works most of the time. Um, but sometimes, sometimes it doesn't. That's, that's part of what happened in my one loss against Lugia. Um, you know, they sometimes they just. Find the ultra balls and the capturing aromas they need in order to get their Arceus caps in the Discard without Burnett, um, and without needing to play Luon. But this new LucMetal is very reliant on Luon. And I had for my two wins against Lugia, very oftentimes that was because throwing clunky in the active turn one kind of just brick them. Um, and my, my tie round nine, this was winning in for points, um, was a very, very frustrating match. I'll be honest. It's one of the more frustrating matches I've I had ever had in Pokegear. Um, it was Lugia of course, and I, game one went pretty much as, as I wanted to. Um, he did start with raw Burnett, um, in hand and that, so the clef ski lock didn't work and then I, but I managed to stick a CNO two turns in a row. Um, and then he, so I was able to close up the game. Game two. Um, Similar. I got clunky lockup though, and that stalled him a little bit. And it ended up coming down to the last, the last turn where I played down CNO Roxanne and had to hope it sticked. And he managed to top deck his last stadium in order to, in order to bounce the CNO and win the game. Um, which was pretty frustrating. And then, um, we go into game three and I draw past, um, 10 turns in a row. Um, and I had clunky up, which meant that he also was kind of stalling, but I just, I know it was 10 turns because I was jousting for 10 to every, every turn. And that was, that was the, the freakiest game I had all day. Um, and it was, it was a pretty frustrating way to end, end, end out, um, the tournament. So I. Yeah, I ended up not getting in a losing position and kind of just having to play for time and tie. Um, so that was, that was unfortunate. Um, other than Lugia and Lockbox, um, I played against one Mew, one Mew on one Guardi and one Intel Urshifu. Um, I beat the Merak and the Mew, um, pretty, pretty handily. Merak is not a good deck. Um, and it was a pretty, pretty fast and easy win. Um, my Mew game was hilarious. I started game one. He was going, first, I started clunky and he couldn't, he couldn't do anything. Um, he didn't have the pieces he needed in hand, so he kind of just stalled. And then I started hating him and took all six prizes. Um, alright, well I took two prizes and then I broke out of Clef Gate to very quickly finish up the game. And then game two, uh, he searches his deck. First turn with feather ball and scoops up his cards cuz he prized all three VMax. Um, which pretty, pretty, pretty rough. But, um, I, I felt, I felt pretty bad after that game, but that was my win against m. Um, and then I had two, two losses, um, one to guardian, uh, guardian mirror socks. Um, it's, it's absolutely miserable. It is probably, I think, the most coin flipped matchup or coin flip determined matchup in this format. Um, especially when you're not running rear candy. Uh, if you're going second and neither play or bricks, unless your opponent majorly screws up, the odds of you getting ahead in the prize trade are very low. Um, so that was largely how my, my guardian mirror went. Um, and then I played against Intel Urshifu, which without I, of course, cut, I didn't have Manaphy. Um, And it, it's even with Manaphy, to be honest, it's, it's a rough matchup. It's, it's not, it's, I, I think Inteleon is pretty rough regard. Um, game three, I was one turn away from winning after he had been breaking the whole game and tried to attack under Temples, Dino twice. Um, and I, and then he took five prizes in one turn with, with, um, with the yoga, with yoga Loop. So that was, that was also, that was also pretty frustrating. Um, good. Yeah. That was my, that was my tournament. So, so,
Brent:uh, um,
Liam:really quick on your matchups, Caden, did you indeed hit 20% other
Kaden:No. Right. Did I hit 20% other? Yeah. Um, I did not hit 20% other, no. All right. I hit. Oh, I see, I see where you go. Okay. Um, no, I mean I hit almost 50% Lugia, so, yeah. Okay.
Brent:Alright, so let's talk about, let's talk about, uh, um, what you guys took away from this tournament from a Meta perspective and what we should play at League Cups this weekend.
Kaden:Yeah, um, I mean I, my sort of key, my, my big takeaways one, um, don't play Alex Shaman's deck in your league, cups in league challenges. Um, I think that it is pretty easy to tech against and pretty easy to find a way to beat. Um, and I, so I would not recommend that. Um, I frankly think Guardi, uh, is very strong for League Cups and League challenges. That's probably what I would recommend playing and what I'm going to be playing in holidays. Um, I think also mute. To be honest, something like Pablo's List. Um, if you're running Mew, highly, highly recommend. I would highly recommend running Four Path. Four Path is absolutely nuts in Mew and every game when with any deck we test against Mew, um, it always felt like, oh, like, oh, we just hope they don't run Four Path. And if they're running four Path, like it's gonna be a, it's gonna be a tough time. No matter we were playing, if we were playing Lugia, if we were playing, um, if we were playing Guardi, like it's all, it's four Path is kind of killer in a lot of matchups. So I personally would recommend Mew or Guardi, I think for, for cups and challenges. Um, yeah, my, my, my biggest takeaways from U I C I think were the Meta is a lot more diverse than I think I really thought it was. Um, and a lot more decks are. Better than I thought they were. I think I thought a lot going into U I c I thought a lot of the various law zone variants like Tina, like Boudreau were pretty meth. Um, but I think they're, I think this tournament has shown that they're actually quite good.
Brent:So, so are you like, uh, I, I know you, you lost the winning in for points. Are you like on the league Cup grind like a crazy man now?
Kaden:I'm gonna have to, uh, I'm going to a challenge this weekend. I mean, Northern California is rough for cups, man. Um, we, especially given the like, price of real estate around here, um, it's a lot of our game stores closed over Covid. So we are both lacking in game stores and. The amount of good players around here is kind of insane.
Brent:Yeah. You get to, you get to play Keon Infinit every tournament you go to. It's
Kaden:good times. Yeah. I mean, them among many, many others, it's, yeah. So I'm not looking forward to that. Um, we currently, I think only have like one or two cups actually scheduled, um, which is, yeah. I'm not looking forward to it, but I'm gonna challenge this weekend. Um, should be fun and, yeah. Yeah.
Brit:It's like we gets and you guys get state championships fair. Completely fair.
Brent:Mike, how
Mike:about you? Uh, I saw there's a League Cup down in Rockville. Yeah. Dream Wizards. All right. I'm not coming, but I saw it traitor. It's like three hours away from me. It's too a little too far.
Brent:Um, I'll pick you up at Union Station if you wanna hit it, man.
Mike:I think, uh, I think I'm gonna go to a challenge this weekend though. I really just wanna play Lost Box at locals at best of one events. I think because they're best of one and I don't have to worry about time nearly as much. Um, I think Lost Box underperformed in large part because of, as I said before, I don't think a ton of really good players played it. Obviously there was some, like Bradner played it. Boari played it. Moffitt played it. Um, some of the Australians, Torres, what'd you say? Pedro? Pedro. Um, so there was still a number of good people that did play it, but not a super high percentage. Um, and I think even of the ones that did, like they got hurt by the, by the time rules, and I think. Best of one as well as you're playing just locals, you're playing against most locals, you're playing against, uh, players on average that are a little bit weaker. And so you're not, if you make one small mistake with lost box against a really good player, you pretty much immediately lose the game. Um, but that might not always be the case, uh, against a slightly weaker opponent. Um, so I think Lost, I think Lost Box is still, uh, very, very strong and might be in an even better spot if it's not seen as like the best deck. So that's what I'll be looking at mostly. And if I don't feel like I wanna play that for whatever reason, I think I agree that Guardian, you are just really, really, really solid, um, plays, uh, I think. I think if I had played more Mew leading up to E U I C, Pablo could have convinced me to play Mew. Even though Pablo, I will say Pablo did not decide on Mew until Thursday night. So it's not like he was a hundred percent on Mew either. Um, but yeah, Pablo's list with Four Path was great. He told me like multiple times going up to the event that he just wanted to play a deck with Four Path. He sent our, he sent our group our Discord, like a lost on Charar list with Four Path. We're like, nah, I don't think that's the move, dude.
Kaden:Yeah. He desperately wanted to play Four Path. That's, that is
Mike:absolutely true. Uh, but yeah, Mew Guardi lost Box. That's, that's kind of where my head's at. Is
Brent:there, is there a particular lost box list that you like after U I c?
Mike:Um, I think I like the forest seal stone list. I'd probably look at the list that the Australians played, um, like Natalie and whatnot. Uh, I saw Grant post a forest seal stone list that he didn't play. In the event, but he played in the League Cup and it's kind of, I think he called it Turbo Dragonite, um, which seemed kind of cool. Um, and I would really consider running Sky Seal Stone as well. So, uh, maybe some combination of like, fare and Skys seal in the same list just for different matchups. Mm-hmm. Brit, how about you?
Brent:Uh, yeah,
I
Brit:mean, I look a lot of thoughts here. I watched a lot of the stream. I played a local myself over the weekend. I, I sort of am of a, a take of an opinion where I actually don't, at least I'm on the fence. I'm a little skeptical of, you know, should you know the next big, you know, Portland or something like that, demonstrate results contrary to this, it would be easy, very easy to amend my view, but I sort of don't, I think part of the reason why, like, on top of everything else that's been said, I kind of think the, the Mirage Gate lists just aren't as good as people think they are. I think that there's like, when it, when you, when you go off, like you're unbeatable and, but there's just so many games where, and this is why I really like Nick M's List cuz he sort of made somewhere in the middle where he's got Palkia Stops, he's got Pokegear and I really like that. And then, you know, these other versions, just like if you don't see Chorus in like your first couple card, I just feel you just can't do anything. Um, and these other lists are, you know, I mean arguably more consistent. You know, the lost ticker ninja say in the Charizard versions is, is certainly not, you know, it's certainly something you're gonna notice. Um, so I guess that's more of where my head's at. Like, I really like Lost Box. I really like Nick, Nick MZ list. I really like the Charizard idea. Um, and so I I, I'm, I'm going to a cup this weekend I think, and I, I, I'll probably play the Charizard version. Um, I think, uh, we'll see where my head goes throughout the week. But like, I, I, I agree completely. Like Gardevoir seems like a great play. I think, you know, I'm talking with, working with some other players now, um, just like. Um, posted about like trying to coach some and I picked up some clients over the last week and like helping them, you know what, I have one player sort of been on Reggie's like the whole season and trying to find his, his deck since he, you know, there's no real, can't keep playing that. And there's not a great sort of like equivalent single prize deck that's doing similar things. Um, and figuring out like what he wants to play on your his, his head is at, um, I just said like, Mew, you know, off the top of my head is I think just like the safe option, you know, as, as I've expressed personally the basics and killing stuff. Mew yeah. As I've expressed personally, I don't think you'll ever see me playing Mew again, but it's never going to be a bad play. And I think even too, like, I'm not even sure these double drap on lists are even still favored. Like I, I feel, I feel like you could, you can still potentially beat them. Like I, and again, I completely agree with Caden and I don't think Alex's deck is, is very good. Once, once the Meta game adapts, I think there are very easy ways to. Adapt to it. But at the same time, it did make me feel very smart. Last week I talked about my coone deck and I was playing the one, one Voix. I was like, I knew this was good. I knew this was busted. Uh, anyways, I haven't cracked that deck yet, but sometimes I, I have these glimpses. Sometimes I, I find a tech and it, it works out this way. But anyways, um, I mean, I, I think rcs in general can, will remain strong. Um, you know, just counter box rcs will, you know, remain prevalent throughout the format. You, what, what other cards you decide to play with. It will change. Uh, but, but agree that it, it doesn't seem good moving forward. And I think part of, part of why I also, the Mirage Gate list, I think did bad is they don't have a good guru matchup. And Gja obviously, I think showed up more than most people, more than I expected. Um, anecdotally, I feel like it's more than most people expected, but maybe I've just in the wrong conversations or something there. But I think that's part of the story as to why the deck underperformed at E U I C. But Thek, Andre is so bad against Lugia and uh, Gardevoir that I equally don't think it's a good play like at all anymore. Um, I think locals will be, will be Gardevoir inbox, um, for sure. And just sticking with Charles, art seems smart,
Mike:um, trying to
Kaden:figure out how something in
Brent:you buried the lead. Brit, you went, you went to locals. What happened, man? Yeah. Oh, it's cool. So I, I was, you're, you're the first person I think, uh, uh, in the pod to attend at locals. Yeah. So history of the pod, like
Brit:I borrowed a deck. I, I, I went to local, or at least I was just in town. I was in Springfield, which is where the cup is going to be next weekend. I was in town for. My dad's birthday and I went to the shop trying to play one piece with people, but the person I went to play one piece with had had failed to tell me that he had cashed out. So I, I, I only had my one piece cards with me, so I was just fine, I'll play the local. Um, and I borrowed, borrowed one of his decks. He had a couple lost, lost box is built. And so I played a lost box with a split. I played forest, seal, stone and, um, sky, seal, stone as well as Zappos V and some fighting energy. So it was a little interesting. Um, I played an Arvin, which I actually ended up really liking. Um, but o otherwise pretty standard. No coyo, um, no dragonite, you know, no lightning energy. So it was, no, I take that back. There was Raku, um, but there was no dragonite. So, yeah. Um, three rounds. I won the first round against Guardian Mewtwo pretty handily. I, I played very bad. Um, in that game. I made a lot of just minor mistakes. I lost to a mirror where game one I like played three choruses, but just never hidden, just, it was never good enough to get going. Like, he had v i p and I didn't, and it was just like a struggle. And then game two, I just did nothing the whole game. So I lost the mirror really quickly. And two, and like two. The series took less than 10 minutes, I think. Um, and then I beat a Mew. Nice. Yeah. Good. Good. I, you know, I like, I like ideas in the list. I, I don't think it was an optimal list by any stretch. Um, but like the, like the split on the stone still, even though I am torn, um, as I have expressed, I don't think I'm gonna be playing a, a Mirage Gate version this weekend. I too, I feel torn on two, two fors versus a split. There's, there's good arguments for both and it's really hard for me to gauge, at least at the moment. Um, you know, again, to say that results could certainly be the thing that I need to really shift my opinion there. Um, but in theory, I, they're both strong and I think, I guess some of it can depend on your Meta game for the sky, seal, stone, of course. Um, if there's not, if there's not a lot of new, you know, it's probably not that good. Um, but yeah, I really like Nix list and the idea that I'm chewing on in my head, I don't know if it it'll be coherent on, in, on paper at all, is like me trying to merge like. That list, you know, again, with Liam's sort of have been testing this other Snorlax Moltres sort of concept, trying to see if I can figure out something in the middle there. Maybe between the two potentially, like, does, does similar things while still being on the lost box engine. Um, but I just don't like Kyo, I guess is where I'm going with this thought. Like, not to say that it's bad and any stretch more to say that I am bad and I, I don't, I don't feel competent in playing Kyo well enough. Um, you know, consistently, at least at the moment. And perhaps some of my struggle with the Mirage Gate too. It's, it's hard to manage all those resources well in general. Um, of course being amplified with the Kyo play. Yeah. I think Lost Box is safe. I would, I just, I don't have a lot of cards honestly, so there's, what I'm gonna be playing is gonna be borrowing a lot and I just assume that Gardevoir is probably gonna be harder to find. But like in a world where I knew I could have that deck, like it would be more on my radar for sure. But I kind of just assuming that it's not on the table for me, at least for this weekend. Fair enough. Alright.
Brent:I, I suppose it's come to that time, Liam. Yes. There, there is a cup of Dream Wizards this weekend. If you were going, what would you do? Um, I don't know, maybe, maybe throw
Liam:together a lost box last minute. Uh, I might just put the Snorlax deck. Um, yeah, I don't know. I, I'd figure it out, but
Brent:I'm not so,
Mike:alright. Hey, Liam's not going to the League Cup? Nope. Oh, why not?
Liam:I mean, there's no point really. I already have
Brent:my invite.
Mike:Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's true. That's true.
Brit:Yeah. At least for me, I've, uh, I've seen the writing on the wall. I don't think I'm gonna be grinding locals like this one. I'm excited to go to, happy to be a part of this, this scene and community and such, but, Five round league challenges on weeknights. Like, oh, I'm good. You, you guys finish your invites. I'll see you next season, kind of thing. Like I just, I'm, I'm, I'm also imagining again, like this, this cup, this weekend is, the turnout's going to be more than the store can handle. Like, I, I hope the store is not open for anything but the Pokegear tournament because there's not, there's not going to be space for their other games. Like people from Oklahoma are coming, people from Iowa are coming like, it's, which is crazy again, you know, the numbers are just so anything right now. But yeah, I don't, I don't have it in me. I don't think even, you know, it certainly wouldn't in Northern California
Mike:or something.
Brent:Yeah. Yeah. I, I recognize, uh, there, there's tension between like, uh, just hanging out and also like the sheer grandness of it all. Uh, uh, I said that Liam wants fun. I dunno what you have planned on Saturday, but if it's Valor or like Go League Cup, you can go to League Cup. Oh cause all right,
Liam:like this is the same thing about like onlines and like basically any play that's not at a major is like,
Brent:you're, you're guys guys, lemme just preface this with, this is Liam's like universal theory of Pokegear locals. You're about, you guys are, I know where he is going. You guys are about to get a double blast. This is the real spice deposit we're waiting
Liam:for. Yeah. Okay. So like, if you're going to any event that's not a major, you're put in a situation where you either play a cookie cutter list and just like, you know, throw it at the Meta for like six hours. When that time could be like, better spend testing like, you know, decks that you're actually trying to work on. Or you play like your really good spicy decks. Like, you know, like something that you actually think is good that has some sort of tech that gives you like better matchups than, uh, like just a standard list Would. In which case you're gonna leak that, and now you're not gonna do well at Majors because everybody else knows about it, and then they're either gonna counter it or play it themselves. And your win rate's not like considerably higher than everyone else there. Or you play like something really awful, um, which is what I usually do when I play along the lines. But like, you know, you're just wasting time if you're not actually bringing the best deck and like getting good rest with it or something.
Brent:And like Liam is like, if I, if I were to a League Cup, I would either have to just play the deck that won the last tournament, or completely break the Meta game and revolutionize the sport, in which case it would ruin it for the next tournament. Yeah. And
Brit:exactly when you think your concerns would obviously be different if you needed points. I don't feel like you can have this argument for 100% of every season. Like it's
Brent:predicated, you know what, that's a really, we'll see, we'll
Mike:see how Liam's feeling next season. But, uh,
Brit:also on that point, I also think you're, you're overestimating. I think you could, I've played a secret deck. Uh, I've played, so 2016 or I'm sure 2018 nationals. We had the, the EVA to deck and, uh, like tarbell, top eight NAIC with it. And it was a secret, like I didn't, I wasn't sharing the list, but like I played it at a tournament and like wasn't loud about it, and I don't feel like it really got out or anything. Or like, the fact that people, I, I feel like you're overvaluing. I feel like you could stay secretive if you really needed to. If you really wanted to.
Liam:Yeah. I mean, but like, you know, if you're, if you're, if you're trying to keep the deck as secret as possible because you think it's like a really, really good idea, playing it around like even one or two good players who have like connections to like the broader like, you know, like competitive community, like yeah. That's just like introducing unnecessary risk for the idea, like getting out.
Brent:Like John Jon, Eng Gorebyss at our local. So that, that, that's like, uh, Catron might show up at our local.
Brit:That's a fair point. Definitely. I also like, I like, I don't think I was supposed to play it, now that I think about it, I needed the points and so I like,
Brent:yeah. But, but I do think Brit Brit makes a good point. Like you'll have to, you'll have to try to resolve, like if you're, like, if you're stipend chasing next year or just trying to get an invite, like
Liam:I, I'd be happier just like playing a cookie cutter list than wa wasting like eight hours. Cuz it's like less of a waste if you're doing
Brit:it for points. Oh. But I mean, hopefully maybe we, you know, we can be, you know, fancy, full and idealistic here. Maybe next year we'll keep the same best finish limit and then, you know, then it's a whole different ballgame I think too would be nice to not have to play as many. Appreciate it. Yeah.
Brent:The one other question that I had written down was, I wanted to ask you guys, I, I felt like, I felt like in retrospect, uh, uh, Liam had a tweet last week where he was like, everybody, everybody thinks that they independently came up with the same like two card tech to revolutionize the Meta. And, and I feel like, uh, on Monday now looking back at E U I C, obviously like we're talking about maw, will people still play maw in force or is that moment passed already?
Brit:I think it was a dad. I think they, the list more or less are gonna more or less came prepared for it. And I think penny and cards like that are going to only increase in play. Like li listening to lots of people's tournaments reports with these sort of one-off cards. I think, you know, wins wins them a lot of games and things like that. And that will, I think, be a damper, you know, the, these counters cards like Penny, that. You know, it's, it's use use is not specifically for switching. It's use is not specifically for mall while, but the fact that it solves that problem on top of doing the thing that it does, it just makes the card better. Things like that. Um,
Liam:I, yeah, I know I told you guys before Nate Kaplan talked about like the information imbalance, which I think is like really important when you're evaluating mal while, um, maw probably won't be played as much, but it's still not an awful card if you're trying to bump your Lugia match up. Like even if counters spike, uh, to the point where they're in literally every single LucMetal list. Like if they don't know you play maw, they sometimes will get hands where like, they're like, I don't even know if they're playing maw. Maybe I have to research this penny. And then like, as soon as you see it hit the discard, you should win. And like that's sometimes, like, it will probably bump your win rate in the league game matchup maybe in the Guardian matchup, like maybe it's justified. So I assume there will be some people playing it and some list who just wanna like bump their league win percentage. But I mean, yeah, it probably won't be as. Hype among people who think they've found the sauce.
Brent:Yeah. Well also like in a league cup, like that works really well in the best of one to get'em, but by like round three or four after you've sat there for 30 minutes, mowing some kind of death, like everybody knows you got that maw, right? You were the last round of finish.
Brit:I mean, does, uh, I mean a genuine question. Um, does Lugia continue to play Dal on? Is it a surprise factor? Is it just good enough to play in the deck anyways? I do find it funny seeing, I, I think sort of playing off what was just said, but seeing people sort of argue on the originality of it. And I'm just like playing single strike Pokegear in the single strike deck. What are you talking about? Like, calm down, here's no, uh, you know, whether this is original or not. Like it's thematic time right
Mike:there. It's so weird because like, Man, like D on Lu Lugia just makes the Lugia deck even more inconsistent. And, but if you don't have it, then you ought to lose the mirror if they do have it. So it's like, so it's such a weird, uh, dynamic that is gonna have to happen in the format. Best Counter for
Kaden:Dura, if you're playing Lugia is a hundred percent single strike Urshifu. You run a one one line and then you can just kill, kill their, kill
Brit:one line. Yeah. Just play Ion too while you're at it.
Kaden:No, don't. Playground don't play. But I think there is actually some merit for Ersi.
Brent:I, I
Liam:don't, I, I don't really like Ey, I know Yoi was one, somebody who played, um, the Dura at, uh, whatever it was, e y c, and. He hit a, a single strike ey, Lugia, like round four, and he still won because you just like, don't bench the D and you're still okay. Like, especially if you go first. So like, I don't know. The D's so awful though. I, I wouldn't recommend playing stage ones in Lugia, like ever. I, no,
Brit:that was my sense, right? At least seeing enough, uh, enough lists here. Karen? I didn't play it. I would, my, my sense was that you wouldn't want to play it for locals at least. Um, yeah. Wasn't sure. Not a Lugia player. Good question. Good answer. Good times,
Brent:guys. Anything else? The John Pauls are our outro.