The Trashalanche Pokemon Podcast

Ep 20 - Paralysis, Battle Styles, Decidueye, Aegislash V, LMZ, Players Cup II in depth, ADP, Pikarom in depth, Primal Flygon in depth, Spiritomb!

December 15, 2020 Brent Halliburton Season 1 Episode 20
The Trashalanche Pokemon Podcast
Ep 20 - Paralysis, Battle Styles, Decidueye, Aegislash V, LMZ, Players Cup II in depth, ADP, Pikarom in depth, Primal Flygon in depth, Spiritomb!
Transcript
Mike:

Explain just play a second ride shoe. Like I prized at one game and only priced at one game and I lost because I practiced it. It's just so good. 10 shock is just so good.

Brent:

Paralysis is just very good.

Mike:

Yeah. I've been thinking about that a lot. Like, is there anything that does paralysis better than Pika does? I haven't figured out anything, but.

Brit:

That's a pretty good attack. I think in general, paralysis is just always the best one for whatever reason. Like even, even when forced switch is kind of the Metta paralysis, always just, just so good.

Brent:

Yeah. I mean that particularly when there's disruption. Like, if you stamp and paralyze a guy, like he needs stuff.

Brit:

yeah, it was kind of the power of the Les score, spirit tomb deck. It could disrupt you wallet infinitely, paralyzed you as well. Like the gloss score, spear tomb.

Mike:

Oh, yeah, yeah,

Brit:

That deck was super frustrating to play against.

Mike:

yeah.

Brit:

There is like, Zach's Maura who always just plays creative rogue decks, like that was his deck. And so it was like last that like people would be playing the score spirit too. And it was just that I wouldn't have to personally deal with his incarnation of it. I mean, he's very good too. So whenever he made cut at nationals that year with it too, and she just feels that it was so hard for SP.

Brent:

welcome to the trash lunch. attendance is always a hundred percent. I'm here with as always. Our intro song is Chris Webbies Webster's laboratory because. Songs about Pokemon are the kind of songs that should be our introductory songs. We have no new reviews in the five-star review update, so people should leave reviews so we can read and discuss them at link. As we always do every podcast. It's your chance to, have us read your review on the podcast and talk about stuff. As you guys know, as we were just discussing, I have an absolutely action packed agenda. I'm just going to grind through it if that's okay with you guys and, ask you a million questions. But the first thing, I thought we should talk about because it's timely. Is there anything that we should say about, battle styles?

Mike:

It seems like a cool mechanic. if they're going to do something like this, I kind of just hope they continue it for at least a few sets to really flesh it out and see how it works and not do like a one set and done type of thing. It'd be cool if this became like a new Delta species type of thing, where. I think Delta species had three or four sets, but they, like, I remember they like skipped a set. So it, it, it really was fleshed out over like a year, maybe even a year and a half. so if they did something like that, where each set introduced even just one new battle style, or, and, or added back to these two, I think it could be really, really cool. Yeah.

Brent:

It was aggravated like, like the fact that the whole tag call engine, like never got more interesting aggravated me. So I don't, I don't go back as far as you guys do to like, you know, the whole lawn stuff and things like that. But like, like plasma, I guess, was the closest thing I got to that and that there were like unique cards that were plasma e-cards yeah, me, I feel like there's, there's not much there, there at this point,

Brit:

Yeah, I sort of have pretty mixed feelings. I think on one hand, I think it looks interesting and I think it's like Mikey says it with, it has the potential to be, kind of a very. unique mechanic to the card game in a way that you don't like with the Delta spaces and things like that. You never got that in the video game. So I think these moments for the card game to really branch out and do something different are both, desirable and something to look for that too. And it seems like. They do kind of have the engine structure to it. Like the artillery is searching, you know, it's tribe or family or whatever, the particular battle style and so on. But at the same time, I'm also just like, like we've said with, the tag call engine, really, even the plasma engine, I felt like, sort of also had the potential to be something kind of cool and different, like as P and it just really wasn't. At the end of the day, at least for me, maybe, maybe it's different enough, compared to what we have now and compare it to the sorts of thing back then. But I just really love, you know, team rocket, the gym leader, Pokemon, these sorts of mechanics to find the game kind of in its earlier stages. And I, you know, started with the game around SP and I really want it to be something unique and interesting, but I'm skeptical that. they'll do it well over a long period of time. I, I, I wouldn't be shocked to see this kind of go away as soon as, you know, maybe it started this kind of middle. Yeah, no period. When the, whenever we're in between the video games or something, that's when we get the tag, the tag teams and things like that, we get these kinds of filler mechanics, even in like the, the GX, the beast, the ultra beast GX was like really supposed to be different, but they just, they just interacted with your prize cards. It was just still a GX attack. That was just rather, you know, what have you. and I guess my last thought then too, is that, I look forward to these Pokemon, but so many of them are not the big basics, which makes me sort of skeptical that there'll be playable even the activity again, for instance, to reference a car that seems to be like that is, do these cards really have a life in the format with these other huge Pokemon, the kind of, support themselves, even in a lot of, a lot of scenarios. So if the deck, so you get to make out of these are. You know what single prize attackers of either of the battle styles. I can't imagine there'll be any good, but my hopes are high. I like seeing something different. It's better than just seeing them reprint Lysander or research or something again, but

Brent:

Yeah, I pulled them doing something different, but yeah, like if, if they had printed, like single prize tag themes of like, I don't know, you know, Equally buff and munch lacks tag team. That was like one prize. And like a thing you could get with, you know, like, like stuff like that, they could have made you need two or three sets of stuff before you have like enough diversity in the carpool to be able to do interesting things. Like I call it slam, it, it did make me think, I don't know how I feel about the cards, but the video is amazing.

Mike:

yeah. It was really cool. And it's cool. It, someone, someone mentioned, I think it's really nice that they drop that video the same day that these translations leaked cause like, or I don't even know if they leaked or if they were officially released in Japan, but like, you know, every other time we see the translations and then like four months later, we get the advertisement.

Brit:

Yeah, I think this was announced officially too. I saw a speculation that like this, we probably would have gotten this at worlds. You know, how they always tease something on their horizon. Typically it can mechanics, they showed, they showed peaker Rome at world's and then they also showed the. The ultra beast GX kind of thing that I was mentioning too. And so I can't remember who I saw it from, but that seemed like a pretty good guest to me, I suppose. I can't remember if we would have like it back in August if like these. If the DLC for the video game had really been thoroughly announced yet. Cause obviously the, the first DLC is where these, I don't, I don't have a clue how to say the name, but the little, the little karate bear thing are from the, not from the base game, but from the first little experience impact.

Brent:

Yeah, and it made me wonder, I tried to Google for a second. If one of our loyal listeners has answers here, you should, you should write a review and tell us, but like, I wonder if Pokemon is making more money now. Like with the whole like collecting craze and all that stuff. Like, I wonder how all that's affected them compared to like pandemic bad for business. I mean, maybe this is the kind of video that they were just planning to make for worlds anyway. And they just throw it out there. But like, I was like, it seems like high production value.

Mike:

Yeah, that's true. Personally, I'd be a little, well, I don't know. You could probably view it either way. whether they're making more or less, they're probably making a lot less from the. You know, random six year old walking past the aisle and target buying random packs, but you're potentially making more from people that know anything about buying stuff and buying stuff from Pokemon center and et cetera.

Brit:

I mean people I haven't seen, I I've had, I have friends there, people in the Pokemon community corroborate similar accounts, but I have not. I've I live in a small college town. We have a couple of Walmarts and that's about it. one card store that's, you know, kind of a typical card store. And by that, I mean, they don't care about Pokemon. So, you know, they're not getting any of these cards anyways. But anyways, I have not, I have not seen a single anything for champions path or vivid voltage. So if it's coming to my Walmart, someone is there to get them, every time. And so I think that's definitely true. I think just the general collecting trend is, you know, Pokemon the card game specifically, I think, is doing very well right now, but I don't really have any sense of, you know, the I've always told, like Mikey was saying that like, well actually they make most of their money. from children buying booster packs or something at the grocery store and not really some of the, the card competitive card game players make of the very small, sort of side of things. But I don't actually know how the collecting stuff I can imagine. Pokemon's really cause especially, I guess, since it was older cards that are, wizards of the coast anyways, like there's no sort of. Pokemon is not generating value because they set cards. There were thousands of dollars. I would think that's strictly

Brent:

I think, I think if basically a thousand dollars people want to buy the current cards because they think they might be worth thousands of dollars in the future.

Brit:

Yeah. I mean, I mean, I think that definitely helps. I think too, just the fact that. you know, it's not just a general interest in the cards. It's literally that there is a char as art in the sat. Like no, like the, the streamers and people like that are. you know, I guess obviously you make your content, however you need to following the trends and such they're not, I don't think would have bought the sat if it was just like, there are indiscriminate Pokemon in this set that are worth money. It was just sort of clear from the get-go that you wanted, the black chars ARD. And that, that was sort of your, your, your Willy Wonka ticket or what have you

Brent:

All right. so moving on, do you guys have a, I wanted to ask you, is you have goals for winter break? Like, I feel like my big goal from a Pokemon perspective is I'm going to try to play in a freaking tournament, but I like, I feel like I tell myself that I should. Actually playing some of these tournaments all the time, but I just have a lot of fun stuff going on in my life, apparently, because I'm like so busy every night. Maybe that's how it is. When you

Brit:

you need to find a. teen challenge, you Liam and Walker should all play in the play in them together. And then when you win the, you know, you'll be the representative for the, the card store.

Brent:

And so, so how's how's team challenge going, can we get a quick team challenge update?

Mike:

Brent, do you have an update?

Brit:

I saw that I've seen one of the local, the, one of the Kansas city stores. Post about it. And they pulled that. I missed their first one. but it it's, I'm just friends with them on Facebook. The Tito said the next one is in, I think maybe the first week of January or something. So I plan to at least participate in that. But yeah, it seems, I don't really see people participating in them. I don't see peop I don't see them being advertised. I think a lot of people are probably in a similar situation to me in that like, I would play in them, but I don't like there no, there isn't like the there's no play limitless website that has your options listed or anything like that. It's basically just like the tos have to be pretty good about advertising on Facebook, I guess, are reaching out however it is. It's just, it seems like it's like a failure on a, on a couple of different levels I would say, but I would participate if I knew more, but. Sadly, I don't know very much beyond one potential opportunity.

Mike:

Well, I got a little lucky, since I lived in like Jersey Philly area for awhile, drew Gretzky reached out to me and said that he was running one. So they've had two of their tournament so far and I actually won the first one. So I am officially on that leagues. Yeah. I think Justin Bokhari won the second one. So me and Justin are for sure together. And so there's two more. he's had somewhere around somewhere between like four and 10 people in each of the events, I think so far. So we'll see.

Brent:

I think my experience has been like your Brit. I, I lack confidence that our like local card store even knows how to contact, any of the players.

Mike:

Yeah.

Brent:

Like I, I mean, if they're, if they're not, like, if they're more of like a card store than like a Pokemon T O I, I don't know that they have the relationships to do that thing. It's weird.

Brit:

Yeah. I just think it's, an idea that to be executed route while it really takes a little more coordination from the tos and. that's just not there and not to fault them or anything necessarily. I'm sure it's crazy for them too. They've got a normal lives, just like each and every one of us, but, you know, I think they just, people are organizing and needed to just like step up to make this a success. And it's just clearly gotten lost somewhere in translation. I think.

Brent:

Well, and they, like, they did away with the whole like state CEO thing, like a couple of years ago, like, you know, and I assume that that essentially was replaced by some like direct relationship with the stores, but I don't know, who's like driving out the stores really like engaging around this, you know, and. Project management problems. So, so do you guys have other stuff that you gonna be trying to do over winter break from Pokemon perspective? Are you going on the tournament grind? Are you going off the tournament grind?

Mike:

personally, mine will be less than or equal to what I've been doing. one, I am planning on going home to New York for about 10 days. And so any day that the first couple of days I have to quarantine because you know, COVID stuff and then I'm going to. Following the whole procedure. So during those like three or four days that I'm quarantining, probably be normal. And then after that, I'll probably not really play those days cause I'm hanging out with family and friends and that I haven't seen in awhile. so yeah, like the one, the one that I know that I'm almost certainly gonna miss that I'm a little disappointed in is the day after Christmas. There's the. Chill TCG$3,000 regional style event. And I don't think I'll be able to play in that one, but that one's a good one. If you're thinking, if you got a goal, I would recommend playing that. That sounds like a sweet event.

Brent:

Oh, man, I don't need to play against good players. Played out limitless. And I was like, Oh, here's a tournament with like a hundred people signed up and he started with 10 and maybe I can set up holiday plans.

Brit:

Probably doing more or less the exact same, like, I am not a, not a grinder, I suppose. I'm not playing every single tournament I can, but I do like to have the one or two a week I play every week. so I imagine I'll do that if I'm not entirely sure on my schedule, but hopefully that, that big, chill TCG one will work out. That one seems worth it, but Def otherwise I'll probably just, the Sunday opens and the heck stairs that it just happened to be around four. I'll probably continue to play. The one thing I will say though, I suppose, is that I keep, actually, I'm not sure about the second one, but I couldn't make Pablo's first tournament because, it was when I was, I had a class, but now that I'm on break, I think I would like to maybe play one or two of those. They just seem like a lot of fun.

Brent:

I had the same feeling and the fact that he's going to, to like the, do them on some Saturdays, uh, it works much better with my schedule than these

Brit:

So we'll see. We'll see if I find a deck that. I want to try it. I don't think I'll be too motivated to play. Zay Sheehan, that deck, that seems to be the best sparring decidual I, and things like that. Like, I don't want to show up to display that. but if I find like a fun Dawn fan list or something, I think I'll definitely be interested in it.

Brent:

All right, Lauren. So let let's, let's use that as a, an amazing segue into talking about real, both of my problems, because I have so many. Any real Pokemon problems for you guys typed up today? Ah, so one of the things I've put in my notice, why has the Metta kind of, centralized around Dessie goons and Altera is basically gone now, can you guys just explain that to me? Because I do not know.

Mike:

Well, I wouldn't say the Metta as a whole has shaped her into you just mean like why isn't Altera being, why is decidua being played overall to Aria?

Brent:

Yeah. I mean, no, one's playing alternaria and now, like, I there's, there's like one or two people out there, but like people are actually playing the situ I like that. That's a deck that ends up on tier lists. I think Alterra is so lightly played. It's not even on the list. Right.

Mike:

Yeah. So a couple of things that come to mind immediately, a lot of the counters that are played just naturally to Alterian deciduous. So I'm thinking of things like taboo, cocoa, and peaker I'm, I'm thinking of vol Canyon and center scorch, things that you would be playing in your deck anyway.

Brent:

They want hit Alterian

Mike:

They want to hit the Alterian. They don't want to hit the decidual eye. So, or at least in the case of our Canyon. Right. As long as you have the weakness, energy. so I think that's a large part of it. is that yeah. even if people aren't playing specific texts, they still can beat alternaria a lot of the time, but they can't really be disappointed in the same way. Yeah.

Brit:

Yeah, I'm not sure to be honest, I've thought that I'll Terria would be fine too. A lot of the times. but I think it's just what. Mikey has said, and then I think more over to at least if we were talking last night or the night before, is that the meta-game seems to just really shift within one, maybe two tournaments. Now that it's just really this guessing game between all the top players, And Danny always really, really, really seems to get it for whatever reason he was. He's. I mean, he, he, he was messaging Mikey and I had a play decision to I, Monday morning, and then he, he obviously stuck to his word, played it himself and won the tournament. and so it's just kind of this, I don't know what to call it. Ebb and flow song and dance or something like that between. I'm Lou Carrio Mel metal and sent a scorch and kind of depending on where one is, the other comes back or is pushed back and then, you know, say, say us the meta game where you're not anticipating as much center scorch. and then like LMC comes through, but I Z while very, very good against a U turn, not us and really pretty good against ADP. I've seen people sort of start to contest this over Twitter, but I really do think that LMC is favored. for the most part in that matchup, but then they don't have any counters and then decidual, I wins and then decidual, I comes back and, then the, the metal decks with ages slash with the center scorch with good answers, because I know Danny wasn't playing the, bronze zone, which is now. thanks to Gustavo. I believe initially, an option you have for your decidual iTech. Now you can just play a two, one, one, one bronze online and maybe, be good enough to be, decks with Volcani and, but yeah, I see, I wonder if it's that the decks that try Alterian just aren't ever any good. Anytime I see all, all Terria it's like. They fit like a two, two line of it and an already too goofy deck. And of course like, it, it doesn't matter. Like, you know, you're not proving that Altera isn't good enough in those scenarios. It's just that, you know, your arrow pod with all Terria, isn't suddenly winning way more matches for instance, like those are the kinds of decks. I see. All Terria and, A lot of the time. And I guess personally, that's sort of what I started doing when the card came out, I was just like, well, what if I just play one, one, can I win some games that way? And of course the answer is no. but you got to try it, I suppose, but yeah, I, I think it's just the natural answers and your attack isn't any good. Decidua has a pretty good attack. For the most part, especially if it takes some time for it to get knocked out, that damage really starts to add up on your Chrome apps or your identities. so I mean, I guess it's just worth it because you have to play Rosa and Geraci anyways, having to evolve, needing where candy is not like that bad.

Mike:

Yeah. Yeah. And just like another matchup, like, that Ataria is worse, I think is, is the LMD matchup, right? Like I'll does zero damage after full metal wall and metal goggles. And so you can. Just either deck them out, even if you don't have a counter, like you're just never doing damage. So, that match either goes to a tie or someone decks out. but decidual, I even through resistance deals tend damage and that's not a lot, but like 10 damage, every turn takes five seconds. Right. You're still doing 10 damage every 10 to 15 seconds.

Brent:

All you need is 30 turns.

Mike:

Right. Exactly. So like, and plus the bench damage, if there's bench things. So like, it can actually beat LMC in a town in a time game.

Brent:

Yeah. So, so how important is is at Atrius life would be these days and should everyone just be playing agents' lives should be.

Mike:

I mean, it kind of goes back to a bread set, I think is like, The there's a lot of things that are dependent on a lot of other things in this game, like ADP and P rom are just always going to be solid choices. They're always going to be around. They're always going to be, pretty good decks and then everything else is kind of dependent on what you predict. So, Turnitin gets better or worse if LMC is going to be big, LMC gets better where sub-center scorch is going to be big. Dessie gets a better or worse if set scorch is going to be big. And so it's just kinda like these decks, like everything below the tier one is kind of like a circular thing. Like what's what's happening. and so Asia slash slashes sometimes probably a good play and sometimes not a good play like today. I'd be surprised if you know, more. Well, I won't be surprised if more than half of the ADP's plagiar slash, but a couple of days ago it was like 40%. And so I don't know. I have been like trying to note, you can go on UN on the limitless pages now. And if you go to like the metagame. Tab and you click on a deck. They have their like card breakdown thing now that they had on their main website for a long time. And now it's kind of transferred over to each individual tournament. So I looked at a tournament a couple of days ago and like, I think age slash V was in 40% of the decks. So that you could always use that as an indicator, you know, it's not a good card age slash V is not a good card in any other matchup pretty much so like you're really only playing it for that.

Brent:

Right. I mean, it's amazing, obviously, when you say 40% of ADP decks are playing this like essentially hard counter to decidual. I, I would never, think a decision like that sounds like the plan.

Mike:

Well, the other thing, like if you look at, Last night, there was four people that played decidual app skew. Danny obviously won the event. The other three went like one, three drop. So like the, was it a good play? Maybe? I mean, four is too small of a sample size. I would argue Pika rom was the best play last night. When you look at the results, zero ADP's made top 16, five peak rounds made top 16. so I don't know, like it, it, it it's it's so it's so weird.

Brent:

40% of the ADP's played it. It played the EJ slash fee. So, so that tells you something like, as we've always said, I mean, the real question is, were the good players playing games life.

Mike:

right, right, right, right,

Brent:

Cause like, yeah, like all the, all the guys like me can take out their decks to the gills. Like it's not going to fix my problems. Just like misplaced. All right. let's talk about LMC for a second. And then we can like really talk about peak around. so Jimmy McClure at a tweet earlier this week where he said he was confident that LMC is the best deck in the current format. And, and provided a list that he believed was the best list of his deck at, Jimmy was one of the first people I met in Pokemon. I'm a true believer in, Jimmy. And when he rises up and says, something that's really good, I tend to believe him, but, but of all the people that would respond to his tweet, it was Brit saying he was like messing up,

Mike:

Okay.

Brent:

Brett, let's talk about it.

Brit:

well, I think one thing worth noting, if you, if you know Jimmy well is I would, I would say it's not unfair to, know that he kind of has a reputation for making big, bold statements like this, whatever deck he likes. I feel like it's never. It's never just like, yeah. You know, I guess it's the best deck is just like, no, this is the new Lux trumpets, BDA. Yeah. Hear me out. It's always, it's always something very emphatic like that. So I'm glad to see him sort of still passionate and that way too. But for one, I don't think you can call. LMC ever the best deck, because it's very, metagame dependent. You cannot do well in a fire medic game, no matter what. I mean, I suppose you could go back to trying bronze on like we saw on the first players cup, but that doesn't really see much experimentation anymore and probably for good reason, I would say. And, even if it is, I do like the tech in fact it might even be my favorite deck still, but, Yeah, I think your match-ups are really 50, 50. Even it turned artists with just like one Sable eye and some hypos can be really hard sometimes. but then I would say, ADP is probably 50, 50, depends on where they are list wise in the meta game. Currently, they don't really play tool scrapper. It's kind of rare. Or it was last week. I haven't, I didn't play any tournaments over the weekend or in the past couple of days. So I'm probably behind the trends, but there was this moment in time, a week or two ago, and just no ADP lists were playing tool scrapper. And, at that point it's probably 55 45 in your favor, but if they play tool scrapper, it's probably, It's 50 50 or they're slightly favorite in that case? the same is true with Pika. I would say, regardless of the build, hammers are not four bolt under, not like it's a tough matchup, but very, very even I would say. and you're new. You're not the best deck when you're going, even with the other best techs. You're the best deck when you're crushing them or something like that. but that's just my, my general assessment. And also too, we have decision-wise is back in the forefront. and you, you lose that. I suppose you can go back to playing your counter. I always liked the sunfish. I think there's an interesting, split, I suppose right now where there, which one you're supposed to play, if you choose to play stun Fisk or of slash I know we didn't, I don't think we talked about that at all last week, but. I know the list that Danny was floating around initially played stun Fisk. And I think Mike asked me, you know, why not just Asia slash, and I'm not quite sure what the right answer is there. I think both have their pros and cons. yeah. So the next thing, I guess to where we're saying is that his main, the main part of the list is crushing hammers, which are fairly common. Or have been common at certain points of time in LMC. but the list I was playing last week, which is Danny's Louis with the polka gears, doesn't play them and I don't think you need them, any I there. And so the crushing hammers are you sort of, you just get rid of them for consistency and his rebuttal is that crushing hammers, make your deck more consistent. And I think that's. That's just an equivocation. There's the you're using, you're using consistency to mean two different things. because obviously crushing hammers don't make your deck more consistent. They can make your strategy more consistent, let's say, but again, those are. That's a different usage of the word, but also like, you know, if we, if we revert to kind of the more normative use of consistency, which is not just like the things you do, but it ensures that you draw the right cards. It's the right times to, in a reliable sort of manner, then obviously crushing hammers don't help that at all. Whereas, the pokey gives do and are not situational. Like I think so his sort of his counter response to is predicated on, Because he says, I think cameras are more consistent. and it's, but then the reason for why they aren't consistent as applicable to the deck, regardless of if you play crushing hammers or not. and so I think it's, I think that the dispute is pretty clear. It's about consistency or disruption, and I think LMC does have consistency issues. It doesn't have to DNA or Chromat and sometimes you just get marinade into awful hands and. Crushing cameras. Aren't solving those hands phobic years. Well, that, that's my rebuttal.

Brent:

I assume the like mathematical way to think about this. If I want to put my, my, Matthew hat on for a second is like, if hitting a hammer, turn one against ADP takes it from like a 50, 50 to a, a 60, 40. But, but obviously you only do, you only hit heads like 50% of the time. So it's like 55% and you only get, get to like play a hammer 50% of the time. So it's like a 52.5% versus like, yeah, like you lose four kind of outs to draw and that's probably worth two and a half percent. So like it all it'll. Yeah. Or maybe more so like maybe it's net bad. I don't know. I mean, I know hitting a hammer on turn one against ADP is a really good, Mike, any, any, any, reaction commentary in LMC? Are you ready to just dive into people around?

Mike:

Nah, I played a little bit of LMC recently, but not really enough to have a strong opinion.

Brent:

All right. Let's, let's talk about, peek around. I felt like there was a lot to talk about because I felt like this was real proof that the Metta has shifted to be dominated by the opinions of the trash lanch podcast, where we see the players cup to get closed out by peak around in the finals, clearly influenced by the pod. And we appreciate the fact that they listened to us and make all their decisions based on what we tell them to.

Mike:

Yeah.

Brent:

so did you guys watch a lot of players cup too?

Mike:

How much? A good amount of it.

Brent:

So, so I, I took a bunch of notes and you can tell me, what you saw that was different. so day one I realized, watching ADP is so much worse than playing it. like it was, it was interesting. It was a big realization for me because like, I've played a lot of ADP and I was always like, yeah, like I get how ADP, like makes decks on fun and like keeps you from L it keeps alternate strategies from being able to participate in the game and all that stuff. But like I was watching, I mean, there were some games where like the other guy just couldn't play cards because like he has outs to draw or data and Chromat, and he was like, well, I can't play those. So like I have to just sit there and meanwhile, the ADP guys like de de de de like he's playing a data, every single turn. Cause he doesn't even care. And, and the other is like having to manage his bench because it's like, it's so unfair. And I realized watching it was horrible.

Mike:

well, and you get, sometimes you get the, you get the extreme, so you have that, or you have where the ADP player's just like totally missing everything and like Intrepid sorting and miss their energy attachment and, or like discards. You know, for boss off their DNA, turn one. And then it's like the other side where you're like, well, there's no way I can win now.

Brent:

Yeah, it was, it was miserable. Watching other people play ADP. Because like, they were like never punished for mistakes and, and the other guys would just be punished relentlessly.

Mike:

The one, the one exception I will say I did watch, the game where Diego used marble Isles, GX attack, and almost stole a game that he a hundred percent, I mean, he did lose, but he was in like a hundred percent lose situation and use my Wiles GX attack and like actually gave himself a percentage to win, which was insane.

Brent:

Nice, props to, I think it's Lorenzo poli. He played same 60 as Mike.

Mike:

Oh, really? Where did you, did they post their list?

Brent:

He posted his list on Twitter.

Mike:

Oh, nice. Sweet.

Brent:

Yeah. Yep. And he got, I think top eight at the event. So clearly a wise wise decision he lost in top eight, two, a Zach and Zach hit everything. Lorenzo goes second, both games. He's forced to electrify two back-to-back turns in both games because Zach hits, hits heads on every hammer.

Mike:

Yeah. Yep.

Brent:

The entire, thing. And then Zach has the boss to poke the peek around both times as well. So it's like he electrifies, he hammers off the peak around, he electrifies again, he bosses orders, pokes the peek around and you're just like, I mean, it must be nice. so, so Francesco Catarino, Played your list. Exactly. Except it was plus one Leon minus ones research, I think because that's the list that he had played at a limitless tournament, like two days before or something like that,

Mike:

Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I do remember he was the guy that ran the Leon. I never saw him play the Leon.

Brent:

but he tweeted about how great it was. Right. and, and he, he lost his Zack as well. Just flat out drawing dead, two games back to back. And, you know, unfortunately for him, we will have to say that that's because minus one research plus one, Leon is a bad decision and it causes you to drive that. Although I don't think he ever had the Leon in hand.

Mike:

Leon seems really, really bad to me. I did try it, that one event and I've tried it a couple of times and I've never gotten used out of it.

Brit:

that was a card. I would definitely say I was wrong about it. I was really riding high on it when the set first came out and it's useless. Yeah. It's nothing good. Like even when it seems good, like I think that the most logical choice, like we've said, It's probably, it turned into this, I think that's the first time I've ever said it correctly. but, and even, but still there, just having that, that seems like the deck that I would use it because you've got lots of Crow bats and things like that. You don't always need a supporter, but the tempo's just never quite there. And it's only good kind of in perfect situations anyways. I think it'll be good at some point in time during it's standard. Legality, but for now it doesn't seem to belong in anything. Certainly not peek around.

Brent:

Yeah. So the, the other, the other two notes that I really had on the tournament, things I saw was, Renzo beats James Cox is peek around with a turn one altered creation and then loses to Zack, a drawing dead and essentially draw passing, ADP every time. So like, I mean just, drawing Wells really good. Whereas then Zach, Zach rips the draw energy off a 10 card deck to get his boss's order to win. Like he's got 11 cards, top decks, the, speed energy. It's good to draw two cards and pulls the bosses order out of the 10, the 10 card deck to, to when, when he would have lost like the next turn. Like I love it. And then, and then in the final end game, three of the finals, he did his for six and a 16 card deck to draw the only bosses order index to win.

Mike:

yeah, I saw that one.

Brit:

when you're hot and you're hot.

Mike:

The finals was pretty. I didn't watch every single game, but I watched a good amount cause it went to two best of threes because Zach came from the loser's bracket. And so we reset the bracket and all the mat, all the games were pretty close. fairly indicative of the peak of Mira, Pika, Muir, I think like. If the hammers are 50 50, like obviously if one person gets like a lot of heads on hammers, it's pretty lopsided. But, it didn't seem like that happened most games. and it's kinda like who can hit a tag team for, there's kind of like two routes to victory. Right? You can either like, Two-shot to tag teams or like one shot of tag basically killed two tag teams, or you can kill three, two prize Pokeman. and you saw both of those situations. I think play out in the finals.

Brent:

Yeah. Yeah. So, so now let's talk about, let's talk about the changes that they made to their decks. And, and get your opinion on it. so Brent's deck, he cuts the Vika volts for a type of cocoa GX. He cuts the cherish ball for an electromagnetic radar, and then he cuts the Marty and the yell grind for a big charm and a swell.

Mike:

So none of those, I, I'm not really opposed to any of those except dropping to three Marty. Like I, we mentioned that, Deep dive episode and a peek around. I dunno, that makes absolutely zero sense to me. Research and money are the best cards in the deck, so should play four of each. I do think that I've kind of, I haven't played Vika ball in a while now. I've been playing the second swell in that spot. I feel like they accomplish a lot of the same things. Vika bolt is mainly in there for the bliss Epsilon matchup, and I think second swell is. Probably just as good. and th and the other reason other things have started to play powerplant sporadically, turn it dis specifically. So I would have wanted the second stadium. So I think that's pretty good. I don't mind dropping y'all grant. I don't mind the second big charm. yeah, so, and cocoa cocoa GX is fine.

Brent:

I was going to say, I know you had talked about testing cocoa GX last time, and it seemed like the thing that type of cocoa GX is great at is killing bugs.

Mike:

Yeah, mayor. so maybe it's, maybe it is quite good in the mirror. I haven't played the mirror enough with it.

Brent:

Fair enough. So then Zach's deck is two cards off your list. It's a plus one, a MewMew. Plus one swell minus one big charm minus one research.

Mike:

All right. Well, well, we already talked about the research that's that's silly. but the second mew mew, I remember when, when I was first talking about it, I've mentioned that I didn't see any need for a second MuTu, but. I've been playing it. I put, I played it in the event last night for the first time and it was really good. so I think to me too is, better than I gave it credit for initially.

Brent:

Brett, any, anything to add to any of these things? I'm just like,

Brit:

No, I, I don't have anything positive or negative to say about peaker. I'm just kind of let it pass me by I'm sure I still haven't played it for a tournament. I've played one tournament with. the Aurora version and it didn't go well, I don't particularly remember what my Grong, but I've no, I've, I've actually never really played. I've never, I just haven't given it a try yet. obviously should have. but I just trust Mikey at this point and, have played, against it. Like I, I test against players playing peek around him all the time. But I, yeah, I just kind of, again, I related to just not feeling confident in mere matches, I've just kind of stayed afar, continued to stay, far from it for that reason. It's just like, I've got so much catching up to do. I'll just not play peaker.

Brent:

There you go.

Mike:

It is one of those, it. I've felt this way, many times in my Pokemon career that it can be an intimidating, like one of the more popular decks and especially a deck of this style can be intimidating to play for a lot of players. And like, I, I remember feeling like that when evil tall was very, very good. I was like, I really don't want to play evil tall. It's like a very, it's just, it's not exactly my style. And exactly like you said, the mirror match is very skill-based and, At the time, like evil, tall and dark decks had been around for a while. So a lot of people had, you know, even not in necessarily the inclination that it was at that time. And like people have had experience playing these types of decks for a long time. Right. And peak, I feel like is the same type of thing it's been around for a long time. People have been practicing with it for awhile. and yeah, so I, I very, very much get that mentality because it, it, it has been around for a while. People have been practicing and the mirrors are somewhat, can be somewhat intricate at times.

Brent:

All right. So, so I will, I will blindly assert that clearly. I mean, people ran incredibly hot and yet peek around proved to be like the thing that the players kept to, but all of them are behind the curve. There's let's talk about where, where Mike has gone since then. So at the, at the, Gigi tour, chill TCG showdown, this past weekend, you played peak rom and you got 25th and you went plus one Bolton minus one vehicle, you cut the switches and you added another speed, energy and another swell. And then you came back. Was this last night? The Hexter

Mike:

night. Yep.

Brent:

yeah, you got third place at Hexter. With the plus one Bolton minus one vehicle plus one Mumia and you cut the whole hammer and yellow grant package and brought back to the East switches and added a third at the second big charm kept the second swell and kept the speed energy. So talk to us about how, how things have evolved.

Mike:

Yeah. So it started actually. I think last Tuesday, right after we did the podcast last week, I think I mentioned I was going to try the EU version of picker on with the four bolt in the max consistency, no East switch, no hammers. and I top aided that. And so that's kind of like one extreme in the list that I was playing before with the hammers and the switches,

Brent:

right. I left that out because you were just playing the EU list, right.

Mike:

Right, right. So, so, so, so there.

Brent:

list seemed pointless.

Mike:

Yeah. So there's these two, there's these, there's these two, yeah. Extreme to peek around my, I feel like, and so kind of my goal and I'm still like messing around with it, but in the past week, I've kind of just been like testing, trying to test out all the middle grounds of the peaker arms. So like how much can I pull from both the lists with, and trying to find. The, I don't know if there's an optimal 60, I feel like, Pika is a very adaptive deck that there probably isn't ever going to be an objective optimal 60, but you know, Fred, any given event there could be. So I'm trying to get comfortable with the different versions. so yeah, so th so I tried on Sunday. running no East switches, but instead running, you know, three bolt ins instead of two and instead of four. So we're going in between, but we're keeping the hammer package. it was pretty good. and then last night I kind of wanted to flip it around, you know, let's see if we drop the hammers, but keep the switches and have a little bit more room for consistency. And the third bolt in the fourth speed energy. And so, yeah, I mean, that's just kind of like been my philosophy of just kinda like messing around. I don't think the Pika lists are necessarily, all optimized right now. And so I want to try all these different combinations out. so far the li I mean, I'm biased because it's the list that I had the most success with recently. but I really liked the list that I ran last night. I didn't miss hammers very much. And I really, and the switches are really good. I first for sure, one me, one match outright, and then they were just pretty solid throughout. I still beat in alternatice in top 16. I got a little bit lucky, but I feel like that matchup, you know, if you're not running hammers, they just have to whiff like one or two things at some point. So, for example, one of the games he. Didn't get to attack, turn to like, he started with the Zune and he got his double attachment. and he got an attorney to his V max on turn two, but he didn't get his switch to go into the BMX. So that gave me a turn to boss up the alternatives, hit it with Bolton. And then later on in the game, He, you know, he got down to one prize and I was able to stamp paralyze him. And he, with this switch there. Right. So he whiffed two things in a game. and that's, if they win twice, I think you win. If they win, once you sometimes win, if they never whiff. Anything then you lose. but I think I'm okay. Probably taking that approach to that matchup. and then I think ADP is still just fine, even without the hammers I've played it. I played it with the now I played it last night a couple of times. the MuTu is really the key there. and so that's why also. My thought process going into last night was if I'm going to cut the hammers, I need to play to me too, because I can't prize me too against ADP. Otherwise I a hundred percent lose. Cause the way that you go against MuTu or against ADP is, you know, you get your ball in or either way, you're trying to get, you know, your turn to attack with the MuTu and you want to tandem shack their ADP first. And then full blitz. So not the other way around. so it forces them to have the switch. if they don't have it, they almost immediately lose the game. if they do have it, it's still probably fine because you're still setting up the two shot. You can full blitz the next turn and put the energies on MuTu. and most, almost all ADP lists don't have a way to do two 70. so you're setting up like the MuTu is just so, so, so, so, so good against ADP that I think you're okay without hammers. And YouTube is just in general, really good with ease switches. it's much better with these switches because against other decks with Mewtwo, even if you don't have me too on the board, you can build a MuTu and attack with it all in one turn, between type of Coco and energy switch. So, MuTu has a lot of synergy with energy sweat. So I think the second one makes sense. If you're playing two or 300, you switch, But it doesn't really make as much sense if you're not. so yeah, I think so. I'm going to play the same list tonight, but I'm going to play a second ride shoe over. I think the second big charm, two big charm is like, I talked about this the first time we've talked about peak around big terms, like fine. It's like good, but it's not great. So I feel like one is probably fine still. but pricing writes you really, really, really, really sucks in the matches where you need it. So I'm going to try run into

Brent:

It was, the head of reasonability. So, so Logan McKay also had the honor of losing to a Danny playing, but, but he was playing the hammer package. Did you watch that? Or did you reconsider your choice of cutting the hammer back and you sound pretty happy?

Mike:

I mean, it's just one event, so hard to say for sure, but I'm pretty happy so far. I mean, when I played, so actually the reason, one of the reasons probably I probably would have lost anyway, but one of the reasons that I lost a Danny, is now the Dessie goons list. That one over the weekend. Like the other event, the head, the hyperlinks event and the list that Danny played there running the, the, the, the bird keepers. And they're running the rally that does 60 for anywhere. If you play the bird keeper that turn. And so you can't even set up a taboo Coco. Because they just bird keeper, rally that hit your type of cocoa and now decidua kills it whenever it comes out. So like the match is actually the game. The magic was actually, it was already bad, but now it's way, way, way worse with that package.

Brent:

So, what are the things you think about for it? Improving that match up or how you play that match up or is it just way to get slaughtered?

Mike:

I mean, Vika volt is actually pretty good in that matchup. I think that's probably your only. Reel out without totally changing your deck. cause they only play the one dark tricks. So if you can catch them and just item, lock them out of the game, maybe that's good enough. so you know, if you're playing Vika ball, you go that route. But otherwise I don't think it's really worth trying to do anything is electronics even in the format. I don't even know if that's a card anymore. Let's

Brent:

I think it is. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's not.

Mike:

Well, electronics was unified mines. That is where, yeah. If this Pokemon is in your hand, you have at least four lightening green cards in play. Unified mines is legal, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. You could play, you could play the electrons, I guess. Hmm. I guess I could consider that.

Brent:

Well, you can hear the gears, turning people.

Mike:

it doesn't even one shot. The district-wide only does 130, so it's private. Probably not good. If it did one 40, I would probably play it, but I'll probably just keep taking that out.

Brent:

Mentality, man. Your mentality been away from victory. All right. so, so I, I wanted to, I wanted to spend a bunch of time doing a similar drill down on, on primal flagon. But before that I thought the one other thing we should talk about with respect to Hexter is, why it Pell Gouda? I hopefully I didn't mangle it too badly. Went five, three at Hexter playing spirits. So.

Mike:

spirit tomb, Don fan.

Brent:

Why were we salute you? I thought I thought we should take a moment since you were man enough to play spirit to them on the pod to have Mike take a look at this list and give any reaction he had to it off the top of his head.

Mike:

Right. He's got hair across. So he's got kind of an out to, ADP.

Brent:

Yeah. So, so I noted at the top, he lost to LMC center, scorch and blondes, and he beat ADP twice mew, lightening, and Muir welder. Like that sounds like, almost viable that great. Like he could easily have been six, two in a tough cut with you.

Mike:

Yeah. Hello. Hello, little surprise. You lose to bland, but I guess just the, you lose some consistency with the spirit team stuff when you're playing Don fan. Cause you don't have like, he's got one jinx and he's got the capes, but there's no other way to like really damage yourself. So we don't have a, we don't have the stadium. and there's obviously no rainbow energies. So spirit tombs building up. Well, I guess you have Don fans attack, right? I guess that's the other thing? I don't know. This looks pretty cool. The other highlight in this it's for Pokemon catcher. I probably wouldn't play those. I understand why you would want to like you this a deck where you really need to be playing drought supporters. But still Pokemon catchers, pretty weak card. I think. So I would probably just play like two great catchers, a fourth Marnie and a third boss in those spots and just, and already the deck looks better to me. the other thing I was thinking about, Don fan spear team, actually the other day, and circling back to the alternate discussion. I might try it with like two, two alternaria and just say, that's my out to ADP. If they play your slash I lose. If I don't, if they don't, I win like that. That's a, I think a viable strategy, but I mean, if he's beaten ADP with this list anyway, maybe I should give it a try.

Brent:

Yeah. Like the, I was like, I was like, Oh, you went to old ADP. Like, I mean, kind of your point. He lost a blouse. I was like, maybe like high orangy. I mean, it's Pokemon hard to know what actually happened, but. When spirits and goes five, three. I thought it was something we should talk.

Mike:

Yeah. I'm not surprised at last to LMC, that matchup was always really close and I think without, ways to get a lot of damage on your spirit teams very quickly. To like threaten one, one shots. It's pretty hard, Don fans not doing all that much damage. And so I'm not surprised that that matchup is probably not very good.

Brent:

all right, let's talk about, fly down guys. So Brit, I put a lot of notes in here. There were three people that I saw at the, chill tournament over the weekend that play primal flagon. Brett, you went to three drop Marco. Sufuentes who we've talked about on the pod before and has won tons of these tournaments, went for three drop and then Dante fr 57. I have no idea who that is. When five to one. And, and I thought it was worth, like, I went to all the trouble to kind of line out all the changes they made to their deck, but I thought we should just start with Brett. Did you have, I mean, is this the kind of thing where grinding through the lists will identify some critical thing they did differently that allowed them to be more successful? Or is it just like. And I tried to pull out the match-ups too. Cause I was like wondering if it was just like bad match-ups and it seemed like it was a little bit of that or is it just bad RNG? Like, is this a real deck that just hasn't found the, the right 60 yet? Or, you know, do you have a sense of that after having played it for a couple of rounds?

Brit:

well, I can answer the question about the lists pretty easily. I don't think there's too much to be gleaned from, you know, kind of a comparison in so far as I think there's really just to kind of splits on how you build Feigen. or at least initially one of them was. That you played a lot of Lana and mallow too. And that was kind of part of your, your late game. Your end game plan to win as you would just get one flag on it and then heal it three times and it wouldn't be able to die. And that's kind of where Grant's lists start. and maybe people are still messing with that. I don't think it's as good as this other approach, which I think comes from, one of the Schultz brother who builds it. And he just sort of forgoes any healing strategy and is more sort of reliant on like, okay, maybe to flag on and we'll do the trick or a one and all this I'll manage to get there anyways or something. And by just being a little more concise assistant. And so, but all the, the, all the other players you listed, you know, all of them, our cards are really, really pretty close. There's some cute. inclusions here or there, but the core cards are more or less still the same. but as for the decks success, you know, I know when we talked about it a week or two ago, I think I said it didn't really have the potential to compete in. I think I'm still willing to stand by that. Like, it's fun. It does win when it gets set up, but you're just so. You're very disrupted by consistent Marnie's. and you need, you just need so many pieces too. Like for instance, I had a game where, you know, I powered up my fly guns, but I was just only drawing into basic energy for some reason. And I just lost because I, I wasn't attaching stone energies and it was never, of course that I had one and chose to attach the basic energy. I just couldn't draw them. And then the God. Two-shot and should have been three shot or, you know, whatever, whatever ended up happening. but I'm trying to remember more specifically what happened in my games. I remember just, I lost two irregular Pika and a, AMU one, a MuTu one, and I, Karen, but all of them were really close. Like it was no, I was never just completely blown out of the water. I don't remember what my other law, I think I lost to Aurora peaker, M and S and one regular one. I just got married too many times and when they have crushing hammer and Marnie. It's just that much harder. Cause unfortunately is not as good as Groudon or red Yurok. And so the hammers are always alive on YouTube and that's when you're getting knocked out and are Turner too behind on attacking. Like, you know, I was missing energy jobs too. You don't get them every turn because you can't, you don't dig for them very hard. They're just there when you have to dry into them. And so I know that that ended up being one of the games. It was that. I got hammered and I wasn't attaching and an energy every turn and just ended up being ever so close to winning and not being quite there. So it's not, I don't know. Maybe, maybe I'm warming up a little more to the deck now. because those games are close. It's not like, like I be in the Pteranodon, which is really easy. You don't really ever lose that match up. but I don't think the ADP matchup is any good either. I know Dustin Dustin played the deck guy really. did nothing in terms of, contributing anything to it, but, he played it and I noticed last ADP, I think two or three times, which I think it was probably even harder. Probably probably those games don't go nearly as well. and like I had prized troubles too. And because you're so reliant on a lot of pieces, every prize counts, especially if you just don't take them till the last couple. And so I prized like to vibe Bravo one game, I prize trap inch one game, like it's all these stories you have to just kind of. Every, anytime you try to make an evolution deck work and it just doesn't quite get there. It's like the, these scenarios as well. Like, well, I could only get one trap inch down, turn off and they have the boss. So I lost. Yeah. You know, things like that. It's not just that you have to evolve it's that you have to get multiple Pokemon down at once and then evolve one of them and then also be attaching, you know, and so on and so forth. but I think there's definitely sort of a limit to it. If you're not. clearly auto winning, like at least peaker, um, right now, which I consistently lost too. I don't know really what place in the meta game you have, if you're, if you have, if you're taking, losing matchups to either ADP or kind of any version of the electric deck.

Mike:

my, I played against at one time and one of the tournament's with peaker, um, and. I won because basically, you know, I went second. I electrified and then I think I electrified just two times they had a Snorlax in the active, they got there by Brava, they got their attachment. All good. And then I killed the Snorlax and marinade on the same turn. And then they lost the game because they like, you know, they didn't draw a supporter. And then they just had a couple of Lily's poker dolls. They had a buy Bravo with an energy. so I feel like that seemed like a pretty effective strategy, killing Snorlax and Marnie, and on that same turn. and eventually I was just able to get there.

Brit:

Yeah, I think in my game too, like I even had, I opened the mule or something, I think so they never had the, which I think is part of your strategy is the option is available. You do full blitz or, tag bolt

Mike:

Right. Yeah.

Brit:

A lot of prizes. I remember actually I think the first peak around my loss because of, I prized the non DX, which, I mean, if they have the boss then too, so it's not like I for sure won, but I prized the non-execs and I really, really clutch scenario for it. and again, but that's just more to speak on how, how your prizes hurt more than others. I'm sure you would probably want to try to play gladi on or something, where it to be illegal. That would probably give you a deck some more flexibility, but maybe it's missing a secret ingredient or something still, but I don't think it's, Really all that good. If the fire Brava had resists resilience to crushing am, or I think it would maybe be good enough, but that's just, it's just too much to overcome it in addition to reset stamps and Marnie and so on. Oh no, I remember I lost a control. and I had, I opened Snorlax

Brent:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's terrible.

Brit:

in my head. I was like, okay. I actually think that should be pretty easy. One fly gone and open Snorlax. And so sometimes the, the deck plays one scoop up net, Dustin, whose list I copied played switch instead. So I lost had it been a net actually. So would've lost because their Persian discarded my switch I snore laxed. so it wouldn't have mattered in that game, but I do think that's enough to tilt me back towards the scoop of net instead.

Brent:

Man watching the Snorlax play into a Persian play where they just like disarm you for the rest of the

Brit:

It was miserable. It was really bad. I was just like, I don't, I have to draw half, you know, eventually they, they're not going to be able to discard cards.

Brent:

That is absolutely brutal. so, so what, what's the play for the next tournament? Brit?

Brit:

if I had, I don't think I'll end up playing any this weekend or tonight. but it, it's probably about time for me to apply a peek around list. I think that that would be what I bring, that, or I would play LMC with a stunned Fisk in science. Pretty good for tonight.

Mike:

We've been, Brett. And I have talked a little bit about a deck that got top four opposite me last night. And the HEG stair was a welder box deck with a heavier focus on crammer ant. so had two Cameron's Zune and some other attackers. And I feel like that concept is worth a little bit of exploration. I liked some things about the guy's list and I want to change some things like I want to add a Mewtwo and a heat Tran. But I think the idea was also represented in the player's cup a little bit where the bliss Cephalon player that made top four was playing. I believe he was running to crammer, answered his execution and he was running a Rashis ARD. so a little bit less focused on the Blount, but he still had the blinds. This list doesn't have any blinds at all. it's just crammer ants and other attacking things. So I'm going to mess

Brent:

Russians. Aren't a lot in the games that I watched.

Mike:

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The restrooms are pretty strong actually. I think. so because, and I think, especially in the games that we saw, because he was planning a speaker, I'm so much, so, the Vika bald strategy is not very good against the rachis art. Right. So, but yeah, so that's kind of a deck that I want to explore a little bit, A little bit more. It seems a little bit more consistent than blondes, perhaps because you're on a, like another DNA you're on some cherish balls. You're on some coms. you're on a guru and you just, you don't need quite as much. Right. I mean, you have a, you have a damage cap now, but you don't ever need to build up a, you know, seven energies in your hand. so, so I am interested in kind of exploring that I'm going to try peak it tonight, but maybe in a couple of days, I'm going to might try that in a tournament.

Brent:

That every time you don't play Pika, you'll look back and you think, why didn't I play Pika? It's that? any, any other comments or anything that you guys want to say about the, the players cup or anything else going on in the universe?

Mike:

not about players cup, but so while we were, while we've been recording, Caleb from channel fireball tweeted at tweeted out at me that, he posted a video and said, this is for you. Trash lanch. Well, you said this is for you Mike cliche, but he was referencing the trash lunch. and I only watched the first 30 seconds or so while. Brett was talking, but he made a video based on what we talked about. I don't know how many weeks ago where it doesn't, if you're playing ADP, it doesn't matter what you've played against and you could play blindfolded. So what he did is he, like, it seems like he covered up everything except his opponent's active and there's attempting to win games, with that. So, so shout out to Caleb and, I'm excited to go watch that video now.

Brent:

Absolutely. I find finding out that truly it turns out it does not matter.

Mike:

Yeah.

Brent:

I'll be the, it will be the

Brit:

Sure. Well, I imagine, I imagine you'd probably want to build a list a little more specific for that challenge. Like definitely tomorrow. I'll I'm not sure what else you would need to throw in there, but you can make your deck, I think, a little more efficient at playing, playing while ignoring the act of at all times.

Mike:

I feel like, well, I wonder if he even like, is going to see their bench. Cause if he doesn't see their bench, then, maybe he just like bosses the wrong thing by accident.

Brent:

You know, it's like, it's like a 70% success rate, right? Just blindly bosses.

Mike:

Yeah.

Brent:

How bad could it be?

Mike:

the other thing that has kind of been. Interesting the last couple of days. And I'm interested to see if it, continues is road and phone is seen play in a handful of decks as dual played for road and phone is in his attorney's office last night. And the Hexter, obviously it's been seen play in colossal, which makes a lot of sense there. but I think the idea is in these other decks, It is always playable. And in a deck, especially I can turn into this, that's running for Crow bats. It's an, it's a minus one in your hand. So you can curb it for more cards, but you're also getting the best of those five cards, plus whatever other cards you draw from the Crow bat. so it'll kind of be interesting to see if any other deck tries to adopt that. And if it becomes, you know, the more popular way to play some of these lists,

Brent:

Is it good? I, you know, I. Was listed. My reaction was it looks like a meme,

Mike:

It might be a meme, but it might be good. I don't know.

Brent:

like, like digging in the top five cards of your deck on the odds that you Crow that for very, very few. I mean, I guess that's important, like to your point it's minus one, which is always good, but like, yeah. I don't know. I, I

Mike:

probably never going to be good. Like, it's probably never going to be good in something like LMC, because LMC doesn't have cards that can take, like, I mean, I guess you would play, he could play it and then like Intrepid stored into the energy, but that, that doesn't seem worth. but I, but I think it attorney test and a deck that really needs very specific things in the first two turns like you need the energy attachment bolt turns you need the VMX turn to, so I don't know.

Brent:

I guess my reaction is like the best thing about it is that it's minus one card. Why don't I just like crushing cameras?

Mike:

Yeah. Yeah. That's fair.

Brent:

Like, I feel like if you're Crow batting for two, you know, the one hand, I guess, being able to dig for five. Like, it's really, really important. Cause you're curl bedding for two, but like you're already in so much trouble if you're back. So like, yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's not like the mega positive or you can just play more and more and more like you get one chance. It seems like, I don't know. It doesn't sound amazing to me having played zero games with it, but yeah, I saw that too. And I was like, really? I don't know. Hammers hammers are good and every day, that's all. I got guys. Anything else?

Brit:

are you going to play the incentive Pokemon capture and the spirit to him? Deck you just play a crushing hammer in there instead you would make maybe just buy you time, buy you the time that you're missing. Maybe. That's how they work. I'm told you, put them in your list and then you immediately be turned on us and stuff.

Mike:

could be true.

Brent:

I have a great have a great week. Good luck. So are you playing tonight, Mike? Are you winning? All right. Good luck, man.

Mike:

thanks to you guys.

Brit:

Stay safe.