I don't know why people are cutting them, bro. like...
Mike:So this, this could be our, this could be our soft
Liam:a full brick brick a thon to like, literally, like, the best I could format. Like, uh,
Mike:mean, I, I, I agree. Actually I have one, one gardy question to kind of follow up from our discussion last week. If you were going to cut something from towards list to play a penny, because I do think penny is pretty reasonable right now, I actually think Mawile probably should see a lot more play than it is. Like, what would you actually cut? Because I've thought about this, and like, it's obviously not Luminion. So, what do you cut? Do you cut, do you cut a Research?
Brent:that cut the Lumineon and is like, I regret it now that I went.
Mike:Like, you could, you could cut a Research, maybe? Um, you could cut a Rare Candy, I guess? Maybe that's like... But that seems bad, too.
Liam:I'd, I'd probably dig into like the items somewhere, maybe a Fog Crystal, although that's
Mike:Then you play one Fog Crystal. I don't know. Like, you can't, you can't cut Lava Ball, that's not happening.
Liam:yeah, yeah,
Mike:like I would probably drop Candy. Penny does seem good, like, Penny seems really reasonable to play Empyrea.
Liam:might have to be a supporter,
Mike:Yeah.
Liam:good cards in that deck, right? cards.
Brent:It's all the good cards.
Mike:All right, Brent, welcome us.
Brent:All right. Welcome to the Treshalanch podcast. It's the only podcast about the Pokemon trading card game. There is no other. It's Mike. It's Liam. It's me, Brent. The three of us are here. We're gonna do a quick, quick pod to talk about Peoria prepping. We're on Twitter if you want to find us. You can leave a five star review, and if you do, we will read it on the pod. If you tweet at us, it seems like historically we also read that on the pod. There are many, many ways to get us to shout you out on the pod. Dragon Shield is our sponsor. They have said they're sending us more sleeves, but they haven't arrived yet. We're hoping they arrive soon, so we will have some new sleeves for Peoria. And, uh, uh, with that in mind, let's, uh, uh, take it away. Mike, uh, my impression is, uh, at the end of the last pod, there's a 5 percent chance. But I get the impression that, that that dwindled quickly because I did not hear another peep from you about that.
Mike:That's true, I did look up some flights, they weren't ridiculous, um, but a couple things came up this weekend that I'm gonna do with family, and I actually got my first couple gigs with this education job, so I'm gonna be doing some other traveling over the next few weeks. to go into some schools. Uh, so, it's just, it'd be a little too much traveling, I think. Uh, I, Toronto is still on the docket right now, but I haven't, like, finalized any plans for that, but I'm still planning on it as of right now.
Brent:Nice. Liam, you are going to Peoria. Are you ready? I
Liam:You know, um. Yeah. There's too much Chimpow now, it's scary. I was gonna play Gardi, like, a pretty dead set on it, um, cause the deck is really good into everything but Chimpow, and now it seems like every YouTuber out there has made a Chimpow video, and I saw like four people post like cups of Chimpow or something, so, I mean, maybe I'll play it anyway, Gardi's still insane, it still beats everything else, but, definitely scarier now. Um,
Mike:when, when, when Liam was saying this the other day, I don't know, I think Chien Pao's good, but I don't think it's, I still don't think it's gonna be more than like a six to eight percent deck, so it's not something I would Go out of my way to worry about, personally, like, yeah, it's, yeah, it's the worst matchup for Guardi, but it's still like, it's not 90 10, it's probably like a 70 30 for Qi and Pao, which is pretty bad, I
Brent:mean, that's as bad as it gets in Pokemon, right? The 30 percent is variance, right? I
Mike:yeah, um,
Brent:I guess the question is, are good players going to play Chen Po?
Mike:yeah, that's a good question.
Liam:Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Brent:Yeah, like could you see, could you see Bradner's group saying, we've, we've optimized Chenpao and here we come?
Mike:Well, their optimal, their optimal Chiempow is not optimal. Like, their
Brent:Right. Why not Kyogre?
Mike:Chiempow is already optimal. Like, Cheren and Lucas is the list that they played at Worlds and at Pittsburgh is, that is the list.
Liam:I also don't see, like, Bradner playing a deck that inconsistent ever. Like, I think he'd just, like, brick once and be like, oh, I've never played this deck. Oh, so bad. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Mike:Yeah, yeah, I mean, if I was going I would almost certainly play Garde. I think as I've played this format more and more, it's just, it's the deck that does the most broken stuff the most amount of time. I feel like,
Liam:no, I definitely think, like, I will look back on this format and be, like, kind of disappointed if I didn't bring Garde to a single event, because it's, like, it's so clearly, like, you know, just an amazing deck, like, if not the best deck in format. Um, it's, yeah, it's definitely, like, a really fun deck to play. Really busted, so. a good chance I play it, unless I find something really cool.
Mike:um, if I, the answer for me would be, what'd you say?
Liam:It's fine, but, like, why Kyogre? Like, I don't... I don't know why I'd be, like, so much better into anything. Um, like, like Guardia, like, it seems like every single match is, like, a grind to play. like, you're not really, like... Like, what are you, like, better into? I honestly don't even know.
Brent:Right.
Liam:It's off the top
Mike:yeah, I get.
Liam:I should know, but...
Mike:Yeah, I mean, I guess I kind of agree with that, it's like, it's matchups are, at best, the same as Gardea's, but it's like, way higher variance, and harder to play. Um, the thing that I really don't like about Lost Zone decks, just in general, I think Giratina a little bit less so than the other decks, and Kyogre more so than the other decks, is you have to constantly, constantly, constantly adjust. What your game plan is because of flower selectings and bad loss zones that, I mean, it's what makes the deck also fun, um, but it also, it can be extremely frustrating to play when you have to pivot multiple times in a game because your prize map that you thought one turn ago is just not going to work out because you hit Kyogre and Energy Recycler off of Flower Selecting, or you hit Dragonite and your third Mirage Gate and your fourth Mirage Gate's prized, and it's just not gonna work, um, the way that you thought it was last turn, or like, even at the beginning of your turn.
Liam:Yeah, absolutely. I think it feels like... And, like, I think this is, like, purely emotional. It's not, like, um, you know, like, a great argument against the deck. But it really does feel bad when, like... You know, like, the deck has so much potential if you're able to just, like, attack with your attackers every turn that you want to attack with them, but, like, because of the resources you have available, you just, like, miss. Like, you just, like, do not have the ability to hit with Sableye every single turn the entire game. You, like, you can't spam Dragonite the way you want to. Like, you have to, like, mix in, like, these, like, subpar attackers because you just don't hit, like, you know, Energy Switch, Ness, Mirage every turn. Um, and, like, just try to deal with it from there. Um, so, like, even if, like, you know, you think you're doing well, you just, like, hit with a bad attack or one turn randomly, and, like, all of a sudden you're, like, way far behind.
Brent:Yeah, yeah, I guess I asked because when you talk about like doing broken things, I'm like, Attacking with Sableye repeatedly and then Kyogre ing for 250 is like, like, probably the most broken thing. I mean, that's why, that's why that deck is so good. It's like, you're like, Sableye, that's a completely disgusting attacker. Kyogre, like, if you do the thing, you probably win the game, because it's crazy.
Liam:for what?
Brent:Uh, but, but, yeah, I recognize, and, and I, and I think the magic of Lostbox and the magic of Guardi are both, like, I mean, historically, decks that let you draw tons and tons of cards are super good. Introducing Iono just makes decks that let you draw tons and tons of cards even better. Guardi probably has a more natural draw engine, and that's probably why it, like, feels better right now, because you don't have to find switch effects to make your draw engine go off, right?
Mike:Yeah. Right. Exactly. I mean, I do think that if people, the people that have been playing Lost Box, Probably should just continue to play it like it. We're not saying it's a bad deck. It's just that like it's not our preferred Deck like that I think Liam and I just like if we're gonna pick between those two decks We're always gonna pick Garde we played it more. We like it better. We think it's slightly better, but I mean Kyogre's And Lawsone is still very strong. If I was going to play a Lawsone deck, it probably would just be regular Turbo, um, and not Kyogre. Um, I think it's just a little bit more consistent, it's a little bit faster in Best of Three in particular.
Brent:Kayogre is difficult to, it's difficult to do the thing, right? Like, conceptually it's amazing, and that's why people do it, but, like, it is hard to do the thing. Um.
Liam:think I do like Kyogre more. I was going to play one of the two. Um, it like, I just like single prize Lost Box more. I think like it's, it's more appealing to me, like having more time with like a Deck by Gloss Box. Um, And like, yeah, I mean, Kyogre hits really, really hard at the end of the game. I think Kyogre is like, pretty well positioned against pretty much everything except Zard. Um, yeah. Yeah, it's also like, it's definitely lighter on the resources as well. Like, know, you have way more ways to like, recover energy, recover Pokemon and all that stuff. So, you know, I don't feel like I'm running out of attackers as much as I do with Terrible.
Brent:Do you think a lot of people that play Lost Box, kind of to your point, will they play the Shaman thing? Like, I feel like I see the Shaman thing show up, I don't know, like a third of the time now? Like,
Mike:I
Brent:and it seems like people play it and then they hate it, but like, they play it.
Liam:people will play it, um, I think people will play it in day one, but people will not be playing it in day two.
Mike:I feel like tr might be better. I know it doesn't one shot of C Zd, but it's a one prizer and like what does it, what does it do? It does one 20, right? So it's doing two 40. So, so you basically, um, trade two for two as well.'cause you're doing like troia plus either a creme or a save eye to finish it. But you don't have the risk of, like, starting it. But it is more resources, I guess.
Liam:like, Tropius doesn't, like, seem like an awful card. It's just, it's fine. Bye.
Mike:It also is much better against Lugia. Uh, against Tyranitar. Like, Shaman, Shaman kind of sucks as a counter to Tyranitar, because you're just trading two for two. But, Tropius is actually good there. So, I would pro Yeah, I'd probably lean
Liam:is actually a good thing to talk about, um, at least from what I gather, I think, and like online results seem to indicate, like, single strike is not going to be the most popular Lugia variant
Mike:Yeah.
Liam:Peoria.
Mike:Yeah. Colorless will Um, I don't know. I feel like it'll be pretty close to evenly split. Just cause, like, people... It's still, like, unclear what the optimal colorless Lugia list looks like now. Like, obviously you include some amount of Mew EX, but is that one? Is that two? Do you play one Snorlax? I've seen lists up to three Snorlax. Two is probably the right amount, but it's still kind of awkward. Like, there's so many, like, weird cards you could play. Like, the first list that I just pulled up on Play Limitless, that one 8 0. Dude, this plays the Ditto from the new set. It plays, like, why would you play that card? That doesn't make any sense. Uh, that card sucks, as we've talked about already. Um, it plays the Luxray, which is okay. Doesn't play the Radiant Zard. I've seen Radiant Zard in and out of lists. Um, what's the other thing I was gonna say? Oh yeah, some lists play the Path, some don't play Path.
Liam:I think the funniest thing about that is, like, the deck so, like, it has, like, an excess amount of space that you're trying to allocate, like, somewhere where you can actually do something, because you don't have, like, any ideas that you can, like, try to pull off, because, like, there's literally nothing in the deck, like, you just get Archeops and, like, you don't have anything else, and, like, you're trying to figure out what else to do with the deck after you get that out, but, like, it's really hard to make it work It's funny, you can only use colorless attackers, there's no, like... Really strong heavy hitter.
Mike:yeah, uh, one of the, it's probably just like PTCG Live syndrome, but I did try some colorless Lugia when 1. 51 came out, played four games, three out of the four games queued against Maridon, because it's PTCG Live, and that matchup is actually unwinnable. You cannot win as colorless Lugia. You have nothing that one shots. Um, a Moridon, except your Lugia will just die immediately. Um, doesn't, like, it's so bad. You have to play Dunsparce, I guess. Um, so I don't know if people, maybe, maybe Colorless Lugia should play Dunsparce.
Liam:Might be better if you play like the, the Radiant Sword. Can you play that? I don't know.
Mike:Uh, I,
Liam:also one hits Maraadon,
Mike:yeah, but it's just a 2 for 2.
Liam:yeah, you, you do go behind him.
Mike:Yeah, you're, you can't trade 2 for 2 in the matchup, right? Because they're going to take the first prize.
Brent:Um, how much, how much do you guys think, like, uh, uh, I mean, I recognize, I feel like everybody's talking about how much Moriarty there is on PTCG Live right now. That doesn't translate to actual Peoria gameplay, does it?
Mike:I think we're...
Liam:I think Maraenon's going way down.
Mike:You think it's going to go way down?
Liam:Yeah. do you
Mike:I think it'll be as popular as Chi Pao. However much you think Chi Pao is, that's how much I think Miraidon will be. Hehehehe 8% ish. Hehehe
Liam:I mean, maybe you're just saying that because people are going to do what people do, but I mean, we both know, right, like, Chimpow's a good deck, Maraenon is like a bad deck.
Mike:Hey, I don't disagree, but people are still going to play Miraidon. Uh, they're gonna, like the Miraidon, everyone that was playing Miraidon before, there's not a good enough reason for them not to play it. If anything, there's a reason for them to play it because they want to try out. The Mew and the Zapdos. So I feel like, I feel like it's gonna be a similar percentage to Pittsburgh, which was like in that eight to ten percent range.
Liam:I... I don't know what drives these people, dude. Like, what do you think your good matchups are going into an event with Maraida? Like, you're good into Lugia.
Mike:Good
Liam:there anything else? Like... There's really nothing else. It's also, after Pittsburgh as well, we had the Charizard Regional in Latin America or whatever, um, and Charizard's, like, really bad for that deck, so.
Mike:I think Path Maridon is probably like okay into it, like it's probably not favored, but it's probably closer to 50
Liam:I think any deck with Judge is, like, okay into that Charizard
Mike:Right, right, right, right. Especially the, uh, especially the Brazil list. Like, that deck cannot play with a four card hand.
Liam:Yeah.
Mike:Um, yeah.
Liam:I don't know why you'd ever play three Charizard EX in that deck, but drawing the raw Charizard is so important.
Brent:so how widespread is Mew gonna be?
Mike:Wait, wait, Mu EX or Mu Fusion Strict? Oh, Mu EX. Um, hmm. It's a good question.
Liam:was,
Mike:Like, do we want to give, like, a percentage of decks that it's in?
Liam:They don't even
Brent:um, yeah, both for Day 1 and Day 2. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Mike:I mean, it's going to be impossible to evaluate
Brent:1, right? People wanna play it, right? Like, that's a fun card, but like, the problem is, it's fun because it only works at certain moments, but when it works, like, it works super good.
Mike:Yeah. I wouldn't be su so we'll only be able to evaluate the Day 2. Um, but I, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it's in like 1, 1 third of Day 2 decks. That might be high, but I'm gonna,
Brent:that's a lot!
Mike:I'm gonna be bold and say 1 third.
Liam:I think, yeah, day, day one, I, I, I can't really tell. Um, day two, I think it's like, I think it's just going to be like 20%, and I think there's going to be like, out of everybody playing Mew, there's going to be like, two or three people who are doing it the right way. And just, like, destroying everyone with it. and then everybody else is just going to be, like, throwing it into their, like, you know, guardi deck or whatever, and it's super good.
Mike:Yeah. Well, okay, let's have a brief discussion about Mew, cause we did talk about it, I don't know, a
Brent:I wanna I wanna go very deep on this, cause, yeah, I feel like people have thought a lot about, like, what you do in different situations, and I'm interested in how you guys, Think you would play in various rounds in Peoria when there's the possibility of Mewing?
Mike:Yeah, well, so there's that, and there's also, like, what decks are actually gonna play it? So, I feel like, personally, I feel like it's not very good in Gardevoir. Um, I don't really see a good reason to play it, like, there's just some, as we've talked about, there's so many other good cards, and, like, what is it really doing? You already, like, Like, trading two for two, which is pretty much the best thing that Mew can do, is not very good in Gardevoir. Because you're going down in prizes, you need to actually up trade and trade Arcanas into two prizers in order to claw back into the game. Um, so it's not great in Gardevoir. I feel like there's probably some Lost Box deck that utilizes it really well. I've, like, messed around a little bit, but I feel like I haven't cracked the code yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if someone did. Eh.
Liam:Like, it's just Lugia. At least like what I've seen it slotted into. I think it's really good in Charizard as well. Um, like, I mean, like we were saying, like, Charizard has, like, hand size issues.
Mike:Mm hmm.
Liam:and Mew, like, just the ability kind of alleviates those. Charizard has the ability to power it up. So, like, you get a lot of, you get a lot of value out of the ability. You get a lot of value out of the attack. Seems pretty good.
Mike:Yeah.
Liam:it's been okay in my testing. A pivot's also pretty good for Charizard, at least, like, I play a thinner Pidgeot line, I only play a 1 1, so if you don't have the Pidgeot up, um, having the muted pivot, and I play mine, like, way more boxy, I have the Victini EX, which is definitely the sauce, because you want to beat Chimpows, um, instead of losing every single round. Um, and you want to, like, KO Tinas and KO Lugia, like, play Victini. It's actually leaks, um, but yeah, so like, Free Retreat's good, Tamdraw's good, uh, Attack is good. Um, so I think, I think it's good in Zard and I think it's good in Lugia. I don't, I don't think it slots into anything else too well.
Mike:It's probably, like, I'm not,
Liam:Box though, I, I bought that.
Mike:I'm not a good, like, I'm not a Maraadon player, so I can't really say for sure, but it's probably good enough in that deck, like, it probably replaces the Flying Pikachu. Um, as your fruit treater, you're also going to feel the ability in that deck, probably more so than in any other deck, because, like we were talking in our group chat the other day, we were like, what if you just Iono Maridon?
Liam:Yeah, yeah, they lose! Exactly, like, the deck has, like, such terrible draw issues, you're like, oh, Mew, try to fix it. Mew actually is really, like, much worse than a Rengar in that way, though, like, I thought it was, like, you know, obviously you see the ability compared to a Rengar, but, like, you cannot slot it in the same deck, like, at all, because it's, like, two prisers, and it doesn't work under Path, it's, like, it doesn't fulfill, like, nearly the same role. That are angry dead.
Mike:It's true.
Liam:Um.
Mike:Yeah, so I, so I, yeah, I do feel like, so Lugia number one Mudek, and then Charizard variant. Some probably will play it, some won't. Like, like the, I don't know, like the Lost Box Charizard's not gonna play it, for example, but. Some type of more straight Zard with Pidgeot might play it, and then Meridon, uh, and I guess that's probably it? So maybe my 1 third is too oh, and Lost Box, maybe, there's a Lost Box deck. So maybe my 1 third is too high, but I'll stick with it, I'll be bold.
Brent:I mean, there's definitely Lost Boxes that can play it, right? They're like, I'm gonna Mirage Gate into this and I use it against this other thing and like it goes great, right?
Mike:Yeah,
Liam:like, anything can play, it's
Brent:Yeah
Liam:whether or not it's, like, actually good. It's, like, hard to make work.
Mike:yeah, I feel like the way that, uh, the way that I imagine it in a Lost Box deck is play no other two prisers, and just Mew EX as your only two prizer, and then you use it probably to close out the game at some point, like against Charizard, you just force them to go to one prize left, and then You one shot their Charizard for your last two prizes, or you could do something similar against Lugia, I'm sure, um, or like, and then you could be more aggressive with it against, uh, like a Garde or I guess really just Garde with like a Radiant Greninja play, but they're, they're, they're gonna play Manaphy against you anyway because you're a lost box, so, and if, I guess if they don't play Manaphy, you just use your own Ninja and not use Mute to copy their Ninja.
Brent:Yeah, are there gonna be a lot of people like that have like these deep plays when it comes to like the Greninja, Manaphy, blah blah blah blah blah.
Mike:I think they'll pop up a little bit, but I don't think they're gonna be as, uh... I don't think they're gonna be as common, maybe, as I initially thought.
Liam:Thanks.
Brent:Yeah, like like they're, will people not worry about Uh, like their Manaphy getting knocked out and they'll be just fine saying I'm gonna bench Greninja, I'm gonna bench Manaphy, it's gonna be fine. Or will they be like, I can't bench Greninja because they'll K. O. the Manaphy and then they'll go crazy.
Liam:I think it's totally fine, like, I mean, yeah, we just said, like, the number one and number two decks that are probably playing Mew is probably going to be, um, Charizard, maybe Lostbox, definitely Lugia. of those are decks that don't have, like, great access to bosses orders. Um, if you, like, pair it with Iona or something like that, so, like, you know, and you're definitely not at, like, risk of getting boss KO'd turn 2, so, yeah, like, you can afford to be, I think, pretty bold with your Greninja benching. Um, if you're, like, it's a risk, but it's probably worth it in, like, most spots.
Mike:Yeah, if I was playing Guardia, I probably would not respect a Mew EX play, uh, until it happened. Like, force them to do it, because like, because like, in theory, like, it has to happen at a very, very specific turn for it to be effective. Like, they need to hit you on the turn where you evolve up two Curlias, and like, pretty much exactly two Curlias, right? Because then maybe they hit you with that ninja play, and then if you get a Guardian Axe out the next turn, you just kill the Mew. And you've traded two for two. Like, yeah, you've lost two Curlias, which sucks, but if you're trading two for two, it's still a very winnable position.
Brent:I dig it.
Liam:mean, yeah, like, that definitely is the logic, like, I think if you just lose to Mew, you, like, have to do something about that, um, but, like, You're usually not losing when they, or like, losing on the spot, at least, like, when they, when they do pull it off, um, but it definitely, it definitely is a hit. Pretty, pretty fast, eh? Take two, you're curly.
Brent:Uh, um, any chance that there's a spicy deck that does well, or, or is it, I mean when Liam talks about playing Garde, you must know that apparently all the spicy decks are dead.
Mike:Hehehe. Hehehe.
Liam:No, I really think there is something good. I just, I'm struggling to like, like pull the pieces together, I think, and I um, in a way that just like works, like where you get the card draw and stuff, I don't, I haven't been able to like build a good engine, um, but like. Yeah, I, all these decks are like, they're very, very easily answered I think right now by like, let's look at a few cards. Like, Charizard I think is like the most egregious example that comes to mind. Which is like, it's like a deck that plays very little switch effects and it's damage cap is super low. Like, if you want to beat it, you just can. Um, I think like, like playing cloth and like three penny is enough to just like beat the deck. Um, like, you do have to worry about Radiant Zard a little bit, but there's like, there's a bunch of stuff. I've also been playing, like, in a lot of my lists, because of Pivot's just good, uh, generally. Um, I've been playing the, it's the other 30 HP one, oh, the Bonsly, that confuses. And like, you just confuse Zard, and like, they don't, because they have very limited energy acceleration, and benching extra tar Zards, like, creates boss targets. So like, it's really awkward for them to try and, um, To try and, like, continuously accelerate to, like, new Charizards. Um, at least, like, you know, against decks that are aiming to buy time wide control. Um, so, like, yeah, just confusing them. They don't have, like, a lot of answers to that. Uh, and they don't want to bench new Charizards. Like, they have very limited energy acceleration, very limited switch effects, very limited damage output. The deck's, like... So easy to beat if you just, like, put the right combination of cards in. But, like, obviously stuff that beats those qualities doesn't really, like, beat other stuff generally, because, you know, other stuff is, like, pretty good.
Mike:decks against Charizard, in particular playing Garde against Charizard, like using The Memory Skip Ralts on turn two is so good against them, like it's, sometimes it, like often, it'll buy you a whole turn, and even if it doesn't, it means that they have to like use their quick search to find a card,
Liam:have to really dig deep to try and beat it.
Mike:yeah, so like Memory Skip is great, um, I've also had games where they like, Basically play like their whole handout turn one to get like the Pidgeot Charizard on turn two, and then I just like boss a Charmander or boss a Manaphy, and then again, they have to use like their whole quick search just to move their active in order to attack the next turn, which means that they're not quick searching for a research or they're not quick searching for a boss to put more pressure on your Kirlia's
Liam:it's like the only card they got the entire turn, so
Mike:Right, right, right, exactly. So like that is like some I think that's like a pretty big reason why I feel like, especially the Gardevoir matchup, because Gardevoir plays so well from behind, and it can afford to like, do something just even slightly disruptive to buy, to kind of like, buy an extra turn, and then you, and then you just win the game. From there. Um, so, I feel like especially from Gardevoir's perspective, you need to look out for those plays against Charizard.
Liam:I, I put four memory skip routes in my binette list at Pittsburgh, I hit one Charizard, and... That was a really easy round. Like, four memory skip routes is literally all you need to win the matchup. It's just, it's kind of hard to play with, like, because the Kirlia engine feels, like, so bad right now. Uh, like, like, if you're building anything besides Guardi, because boss Cresselia and Qingpao, like, and Lostbox to an extent as well, both just, like, or all of them just, they do so much damage to the engine, it's hard to build something around the Kirlia engine. But yeah, if you play four memory skip routes, you can literally just memory skip every turn and you'll beat Zard.
Mike:Yeah. Hehehe.
Brent:Did it take a long time to win that game?
Liam:Yeah. Um, Nick Moffett asked me after the round if I enjoyed watching paint dry. lot of Psybeam in that
Brent:I mean, memory skip is one way to deck a guy out, but like, if you're, if you're like, starting turn two, I'm gonna memory skip to the end of the game, you're like, appetite for pain. Appetite for pain. Guys, this answers all my questions for Peoria. You didn't go to Peoria last year, right Mike?
Mike:I did not.
Brent:okay, yeah, we can't do a Peoria Tips and Tricks. We did not go to Peoria last year either. But I'm assuming that, as somebody who's not actually playing, I'm going to get to Peoria and be like, God, Peoria sucks.
Mike:I bet like, yeah, I bet it sucks, but I feel like the commentary center will probably be pretty nice because it's in some random place and they have...
Liam:round.
Mike:The space
Brent:Yeah, yeah. I'm assuming, I'm assuming this is going to be one of those places, uh, like Fort Wayne, where, like, we've rented out the entire massive convention center.
Mike:is basically the equivalent of like renting out the whole city.
Brent:Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're like doing something here now. So
Mike:Hopefully there's, hopefully there's enough like food options around, because I remember that was like one of the biggest issues in Fort Wayne, was that there was just no food within multiple blocks.
Brent:Yeah, that, that, that was a problem. And it's weird for a convention center to not have a better plan in that regard. Like, I mean, hey, I recognize, like, Baltimore kind of, like, should have theoretically been okay, and in practice was not okay. Like... Like, uh, uh, yeah. This is a problem that convention centers are supposed to know that they have to solve, right?
Mike:Yeah. Um, I guess, I mean in terms of other decks, there's a lot of other good decks that we didn't really talk about and I don't really feel like we need to talk about. They haven't changed at all. Um, Intellion Archipoo, the Rapidstrike deck, Fusion Mew, I mean Fusion Mew is like maybe in a worse spot than it's ever been, but it'll still be 6 to 8 percent for sure. There's all the different Charizard variants. There's Giratina Lost Zone, which people think that Giratina will still be the most popular deck. I'm not sure if that's true or not. Um, I think it will be popular. I think it'll be in the top three or five, but I don't think it will continue to be the number one. Personally, I think like Gardevoir will probably be number one, but and then maybe Lugia. I don't know. That would kind of be like my
Liam:I, I agree. I don't. I think team is going to be like four and below. I don't, I don't think to see a world like where it's above Turbo, Guardian, Lugia. Yeah,
Mike:Yeah, I feel like those, yeah, I agree. Those would be my top three, and then Charizard, maybe fourth, and then Giratina, number five? That's kind of what I would be thinking. But again, all of these percentages are going to be so close. Like, we're in a, we're in a, we're in a cool format where there's, you know, eight to ten decks that are taking five to fifteen percent of each, which is interesting.
Brent:Uh, so I think the one other question I wanted to ask you guys is, like, how do you feel like, um, uh, like this season is going so far? Like, I don't know if we should say that, like, I think we're still early in and there are people who have, like, more than 400 championship points or
Mike:Crazy.
Liam:Better everyone. This iswant.
Brent:person in the U. S. and Canada that has more than 400. But
Mike:Yeah, this was So you're kind of referencing like the stuff going around Twitter this week Which was like people posting their quarter one results and some people you know went to like ten cups in the first quarter and ten challenges and they have four or five of their placements in which good for you if you're doing it, but Definitely not necessary
Brent:dude, Ryan Sablehouse has 352 points.
Mike:Damn.
Brent:What's that guy doing?
Mike:I don't even think he like, maybe he got like 256 at Pittsburgh, but I don't even think so, so.
Liam:PTCG Live. The
Brent:I guess that's, uh, yeah, I was trying to think, I was like, I don't, I don't remember, I feel like he made Day 2, but I don't remember hearing that he did well Day 2, but maybe I just haven't been paying attention.
Mike:I don't, I don't even know if he made it, too. Let's see.
Liam:please
Brent:I thought he, maybe he just, maybe he just whiffed Day 2.
Mike:Oh no, he did, he did. He made top six, he made top 64. Okay, he made top
Brent:Okay, good times.
Mike:Reasonable. So that's what, I mean, that's only 50, yeah, 64 is 50 points, so he got 300 points from locals, though.
Brent:Yeah, I mean, that is, that is an absolute grind. And I feel like, I feel like all the people who are grinding right now are, are like tweeting about how it'll be a lot easier later. Um, how true or not true is that? Obviously, like, this is, this is the first season where Liam's actually tried to get points as a Master.
Mike:I mean, I think, like, the hard part of getting points is not the locals, it's the regionals and above, so like, if you get 300 points, wait, isn't 300 the max that you can get? Oh no, no, no, that's just from
Brent:That's just
Mike:Okay, okay, so you can get 390. So like, I think realistically for people that are going to a lot of locals, I don't think 390 is realistic, probably, even throughout the whole season, um, but like 300 for sure is. So like, let's say you get 300 points. That's still 300 points you have to get from regionals, and getting 300 points from regionals is not easy. That's like, so you'd, that's like six, six top 64s would get you that. But to get six top 64s, that means you have to make Day 2 six times, and... Like finishing the top 50 percent of day two six times, which is not going to happen in six regionals, right? That's uh, for most players that would take ten regionals, twelve regionals to do that. You can, you have a little bit more leeway if you finish better than top 64, but on average that's what you have to do. And I think people like going to all these locals and burning them, like, I don't want to say burning themselves out. Maybe they're not, maybe they're having a really good time. But, like, that's, it's not the hard part of getting the invite, to be honest.
Liam:390. If you want to go to Locals because, you know, you enjoy playing Pokemon, playing Pokemon Spawn or whatever, you have a nice local community, you have, like, stores that are, you know, within an hour or something like that, like, you know, go to Locals every weekend. It's really fun. Um, but, like, you know, I don't think, like, you should force yourself to get out of bed in the morning because, like, you know, you have to attend Worlds in, like, a year. Like,
Mike:Yeah.
Liam:it's just, like... You'll be able to get the points whenever, and like, you know, if you can, it's not like, it's not like you have to go to Worlds every year and have to qualify or whatever. I, I think it's what Jake said, like, I don't even know how long ago, but like, you know, you should go to each tournament, like, for the sake of the tournament, not like, uh, you know, putting your entire season on, like, one tournament at the end of the, at the end of the year. Like, you should go to regionals trying to win, you should go to ICs trying to win, like, shouldn't be, shouldn't be, like, trying to play for an invite or whatever while you're there. Um, like, so we focus on, like, a tournament in six months or something. I,
Mike:Yeah. Like, for me, I'm hoping to go to Toronto, and, like, that is, my goal is to do as good as I can in Toronto. Uh, and then, if I, if I end up doing well, cool, and then we'll look to see what I can do next, and, you know, if I, if I get to, like, the second half of the year, and I feel like my regional finishes are good enough that I can push for the invite, Then I'll make sure to go to enough locals. In the meantime, I will probably go to, you know, locals here and there. I went to the one League Cup, I've been to a couple challenges, I'll probably continue to do couple cups, couple challenges in Quarter 2, Quarter 3, and then, you know, if I really, uh, feel like I can do the push during, you know, second half of Quarter 3 and Quarter 4, then I'll do it. But I feel like that's, uh, that's kind of my mentality. I want to see if I can get regional finishes first, but... If I, but like I said, I'm looking at each regional individually as a tournament to try and do well at that first and foremost.
Liam:I'm going to like, Uh, at the, like, two closest stores to me. Those are, like, the only, uh, only cup I go to. Um, they're, like, within 30 minutes or whatever. Uh, and, and then I'll try to, you know, do my best at regionals if I get the invite. Get the invite. Huh? I don't... Yes.
Mike:Speaking of locals, quick, quick, uh, uh, aside, quick question. It's something that I've thought about a bit as an organizer and someone, uh, messaged me and said, oh, maybe we should talk a little bit about it on the podcast. I was hoping to get, have Caden here to have, like, one more perspective. But, so, like, what is, like, the entry fees to prize... Situation at some of your local events, because I feel like we've seen some horror stuff on Twitter, uh, and some really good stuff. Uh, and I feel like what I do is pretty fair and reasonable and good for the players, um, so I can share what I do first and then you guys can tell me some of your experiences. So this, the store that I'm at is super nice, they don't ask for really any cut of entry fees, um, all they ask is that it gets paid out in store credit, so, you know, the store is... In theory making money from that, right, because they, uh, get to push some of their product that might not have sold, um, they are actually getting the money, um, but they're, but they're, you know, they're getting rid of product which they're making some type of profit margin on, um, but, you know, if we collect 100 in entry fee, 100 in store credit gets paid out, um, Which I think is pretty fair, uh, uh, for both sides, uh, and, and, and I'm able to give out a decent amount of prize packs as well. I am lucky in that my league only meets twice a month every other week, so I don't feel a lot of pressure on the prize packs, I can be a Generous when I give them out for League Challenges and League Cups. Um, so I feel like, and, and I also wanna say I kept, my entry fees is pretty low, so I see like some of these places do like 10,$20 for a league challenge and then like$30,$40 for a League Cup.
Liam:uh, the cup I had last week was 35
Mike:Okay. And what was the pricing like
Brent:you show how jaded you are when you say 10 is high, it's like, man, 10 is low. 10 is low.
Liam:I, I got like a box. Um,
Mike:for winning.
Liam:it was, it was like a box, but it was like, not all one set, and not all the most recent set. Like, I got like three 151 packs, and like ten Obsidian Flames packs, and like, the rest were like Palladaia packs.
Mike:So that, that feels really bad to me. That's, I mean, that seems really bad. So,
Brent:think, I think it shows you how, how, I think, I think, I feel like our experience with prizing is a little bit like how little can they give us without, like, inducing tweets.
Mike:Oh,
Brent:I feel like the tournaments we go to, that's kind of the mojo. So yeah, I mean, when Liam's like, we got enough loose packs to essentially be a box for winning the cup. And he feels like he did amazing, that
Liam:What did I get on that, too? I got a mat, too.
Brent:Yeah, well, exactly. Yeah, the mat! The mat! Whoa, the mat! I mean, I recognize there are guys that go to cups and win the cup and don't get a mat. And it's like,
Liam:Well, it's in the Met. The Met's, like, pretty good, right? Like, uh, you sell, uh, the Met, like, five years down the line, that goes for, like, quite a bit, right?
Mike:Alright, let me, let me give you some contrasting experiences. So, uh, the cup that I attended, not the one that I ran, was a 30 or 35 entry, I don't remember, but just from making top 8, I got 50 store credit, and then the winner got, I think it was 200 or 250 store credit. So, that's like a lot better than a box.
Brent:Yeah.
Mike:Um, and then the cup that I ran... Uh, it was a 10 entry fee, just 10 for a cup, and the winner got 100 in store credit.
Brent:Mike Fouchet's cups are the best. People.
Liam:Uh, that's good, bro, that's good, well. Thank
Mike:So, a box, like, a not even real box for a 35 entry fee is pretty terrible, in my opinion.
Brent:And, you know, what's interesting about that is like, it just goes to show how weird the price elasticity of the market is. Like, it isn't like when you're, because your cup was 10, a bunch of people came that weren't like planning to come because it was like so cheap. Like, it's just not how people think about the problem at all. So as a result, all these TOs are like, dude, I could charge 35 for a cup and give out crap prizes because it don't matter.
Mike:Yeah.
Brent:Like, that's, that's not how people make the decisions, and, yeah, like, uh, it just underscores how, uh, you know, I mean, Pokemon should do something there. But like, Pokemon's slowly standardizing regionals, and the more they standardize regionals, the better that'll be. So, you know,
Liam:live.
Mike:So, like, back in the day, it used to be, like, the city championships, which is basically the equivalent of League Cups. They were always free to enter, um, but Pokemon would provide exactly what the prizes were gonna be. They would send the, the shipped, you know, the product, and be like, okay, first place gets a box, second place gets half a box, blah blah blah blah blah. Um, yeah, now, since everything is run a little bit more independently... I think there's positives to that, like, um, TOs can basically create, quote unquote, 1k events, which is kind of the one that I went to, um, last week, or a couple weeks ago, where it's 30 entry, and they are guaranteed 1k in prizing. Cool. Um, but, yeah, then you have the other end of the spectrum. So I feel like there needs to be, like, maybe some, uh, box that, maybe it doesn't have to be, like, You have to do exactly this, but you can't go, you can't charge more than X and you can't charge less than Y, maybe it's 10 to 25, I don't know. And then the prizes need to be, yeah, I don't know, something a little bit more standard.
Brent:yeah, I recognize there's cost of living adjustments across the country and across the world, but like, but like, surely we could figure something out where people don't feel like they get fleeced every tournament they go to, right?
Mike:Yeah. Like, seeing some pictures of people winning a cup, getting the mat and, like, three prize packs is,
Liam:Yeah.
Mike:like, that's so bad.
Brent:Yeah. Yeah, but I, I don't feel like that is, it is that far off that, you know, uh, uh, for, for our region. I mean, I don't know. Like, 36 loose packs is pretty rough.
Mike:Did you pull anything good, or did you not open
Liam:I got a Mew out of, like, the three
Mike:Oh, okay, okay. Alright, so it was worth.
Brent:Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah, Walker, Walker was like, oh, this all paid off, best cup ever, best cup ever. So, so in that respect, props,
Liam:I was really looking for the loose codes anyway, though, because, you know, PTCGO, like, doesn't, um, like, you can't just, like, get cards. You have to, like, uh,
Mike:Well, you spent all of your credits on some garbage
Liam:Yeah.
Mike:VMAXes.
Liam:Yeah.
Mike:Liam the other day was like, man, I can't, I can't, I forget what card it was. Oh, it was like Giratina V Star. You're like, I only have a 2 2 Giratina V Star, because I bought all the, I bought 4 4 of every VMAX to try in Sherald decks. Like, okay.
Brent:When I gave Walker access to my PTCGL account, I was pretty wealthy, and now I'm completely broke.
Liam:Yeah, like, all the VMAXes have, like, you know, something, something unique going for them. Or not, like, every single one, but, like, you know, I had to get a 4 4 of the Blaziken, the Rapid Strike with Energy Acceleration.
Brent:was about to say uniquely bad.
Liam:4 4 of the Rayquaza, because it draws three, and it's Rapid Strike, you know. Um, there's like a Pikachu VMAX that does Accel 3 from discard, um, which is pretty good. And it only hits for 30, so you can accelerate enough to retreat, and DTEs get the damage to zero.
Mike:On a kind of serious note, you just reminded me, one deck that I've played maybe about like 6 or 7 games with since 1. 51 came out is Turbo Pikachu V. Union. Uh, like four Mew EX, two Squawkabilly, Aluminion, Peonias, yeah, Generators. You're trying to go like turn one, turn two, Pikachu, V Union, uh, Item Lock. It's not the list that I have is
Liam:50 percent of the time, so it's not that bad.
Mike:yeah, the uh, the list that I have is not good enough, but I think there could be something there, like maybe someone could figure out how to like, get it to like 70 percent of the time,
Brent:Liam spent a lot of time on that deck, like, I don't know, three months ago or something. And I
Mike:Gets a lot better with Mew.
Brent:yeah, I recognize the cardpool's changed, but,
Mike:Yeah,
Brent:I don't
Liam:Eh, like, you had Galarian Articuno earlier, which is not that bad.
Mike:yeah, I still played one of those.
Liam:You play one of those? Yeah.
Mike:Yeah. But your bench gets clogged really quick. That's the thing.
Liam:It does. It's like, so shocking how a deck like that can have, like, serious bench issues.
Mike:Yeah, cause like now you go like... You go like, Squawkabilly, um, either Luminion or Articuno, usually not both, and then like, two Mews, sometimes three Mews, and then you need the spot for the Pikachu.
Liam:Yeah. Are you playing Celebrations, Nian, or no?
Mike:I think I had one in and out during the games that I played, but I think I ended up taking it out because of the bench space stuff.
Liam:yeah,
Mike:Yeah.
Liam:I played like a Raikou, I think, too,
Mike:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I played a Raikou as well, you're right. But you need, like, you need a couple Vs for Forest Seal. So, like, Luminion, Articuno, Raikou, they're all reasonable. So, fun deck.
Brent:That, that makes me realize, do you think, do you think we're going to have another midyear rotation?
Mike:Yeah, I do. I think we'll probably rotate after the, like, the early Winter set, whenever that is. That would be my guess. So kind of the same time as last year. Actually, funnily, we're talking about rotation. I was just listening to Chip and Azul's podcast as I was driving home. They were talking about rotation and one of them asked like, oh, when was rotation last year? And then the other one's like, oh, like January, February. I was like, guys, this was like six months ago. Like it happened in April. Like February, January is not even close.
Brent:Hahahahahaaha
Liam:Dude, I would have said, I would have said
Mike:Like, EUIC was the first event and that was like April 10th or something like that. Too funny. So, I think earlier than that because Scarlet and Violet came out so late, um, so like maybe February or March would be my guess.
Brent:Good times. Alright, guys, uh, I have 50 minutes of juice for Peoria. We hope to see everybody there. Uh, it sounds like we will not see Mike there because he has found other things to do. It's crazy.
Mike:Yeah.
Brent:Alright, the John Pauls are our outro, we'll see you guys next week with Peoria stories.