Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Johnny Blaze's PCNY Gym Challenge Report

JohnnyBlaze

New Member
Pokemon Center Gym Challenge Report
Sunday May 16, 2004
66 Participants

We leave around 5:30am in the morning to drive to the Poughkeepsie Train Station to catch the train to Grand Central Station. On our way walking to the Center we literally run into Greg Sauk and his 2 sons. Greg tells me his youngest son already has a won a trip to Worlds by winning the Gym Challenge in Pennsylvania. Later info on that one. We shortly arrive at the Center and there is already a huge line starting waiting to get in. We see a lot of familiar faces: LuMAga, FireFighter, Flare Starfire, Jimmy O., Bolt from Zeo, PokePop and his sons, BJJ and his family, Frankie and Anthony. It was myself running Swampert/Cune, my son Nick playing his BAD deck(see below), and his friend Jacob playing Cradily EX with Sceptile EX. There were 11 kids in the 10 and under, 14 kids in the 11-14 division, and then a whopping 41 people in the 15+ division. There was a delay prior to the start of the tournament. But at least John Hershberger is back running the tourney and things finally start. Here is my decklist followed by my report:

Pokemon – 21
4 – Mudkip (Target Promo)
2 – Marshtomp (Dragon – Bench damage it works)
3 – Swampert (Water Call)
1 – Swampert EX
2 – Suicune EX
4 – Dunsparce
2 – Skitty
2 – Delcatty
1 - Wobbuffet (Will regret only using 1 later)

Trainers – 24
4 – Oaks Research
3 – Oracle
3 – Rare Candy
3 – TV Reporters
2 – CopyCat
2 – Switch
2 – Fisherman (Energy Draw then Water Call)
2 – Pokemon Nurse
2 – Crystal Shards
1 – Town Volunteers

Energy – 15
13 – Water
2 – Multi

Round 1 vs. Charles with BAR
I was able to get a quick setup and pick off his Quazza on the bench with Suicune. He then retreats his active and does 80 to Suicune with the damaged Quazza. I shard his Quazza next turn. I have a built up Swampert EX also. He is able to ko Suicune. Then my Swampert EX takes the rest of his Poke. I win by prizes.

W: 1-0

Round 2 vs. Evan (GOROY)
I met Evan earlier with Dark T-tar and his son Anthony. Evan is running BAR. I get some damage and move energy around with my Suicune. He attaches a Multi to his Quazza then Fire Starts and moves the energy. Boom theres goes my 1st Suicune. I strike and Run and to my biggest fear no Wobby in my deck it is in the prizes. I could have won with the Wobby. I was holding another energy and Crystal Shard. The same thing happens 3 turns later. Right before I could attach the Shard and knock out Quazza BAM another 120 damage to my last Cune.

L: 1-1

Round 3 vs. BJJ
I figure BJJ is running Sceptile tech so this is going to be a tough match up for me as Scep is resistant to Water. I was able to administer bench damage to his 2 Treeckos to take them out. He has all early draw power but then has an energy drought. I get rolling and knock out his lone Wobby for the win.

W: 2-1

Round 4 vs. Daniel
Daniel is running BlazeQuazza. I get a God start and go 1st. Basically by Turn 2 I have my combo up with a Suicune active. He thinks his Water resistance will help. I Oracle for the Crystal Shard and ko his Quazza. He sends out another Quazza I Oracle for my other Shard and ko his Quazza. I then proceed to ko his Delcatty and Dunsparce for the win.

W: 3-1

Final Round 5 vs. Cory Ace
Cory is also running Anti-Blaze using Muk EX with Sceptile EX and Energy Trans Sceptile. We both decide that it is in our best decision to ID as at least one of us will make Top 8 and possible both depending on the other match ups. We do play for fun after that and he ends up winning. Again the Water resistance was a huge hassle for me even with the Shards.

3-1-1 with 10 points

So Top 8 is called and Cory is 8 so that means he won on Tie Breakers. I end up in 9th place. We were hoping that both our decks would get in as the rest of the Decks in the 15+ were all Blaze variants.

On to my son’s deck. He decides to run BAD (Blaziken, Ampharos, Delcatty.)

Pokemon – 24
4 - Torchic (Target Promos)
2 – Combusken (Flare)
3 – Blaziken (Firestarter)
2 – Blaze EX
2 – Mareep
1 – Flaffy
2 – Ampharos
2 – Skitty
2 – Delcatty
4 – Dunsparce

[B]Trainers - 21[/B]
4 – Oracle
4 – Professors Oaks Research
3 – TV Reporter
4 – Rare Candy
2 – Warp Point
1 – Pokemon Nurse
1 – CopyCat
1 - Town Volunteers
1 – High Pressure Stadium

Energy - 15
12 – Fire
3- Electric

Nick goes undefeated until the 5th round when he plays Ben Sauk who is 11-14 division. At this point there were screw-ups with the pairings. As 2 other matches were out of age divisions. FireFighter09 plays one of PokePop’s son and Magnechu is also in the 15+ group. Nick loses his last match. The Top 8 are called and Nick is 1st seed. Due to the lower amount of players in the 2 younger division, each were only Top 4. Nick ends up seeded against the other Sauk kid I think Jeff is his name. Who already won a trip to Worlds. Luckily Nick beats him best 2 out of 3. Ana noouncement is made that the rest of the finals will be moving upstairs to The Pokemon Center Store. When we get up there, there is a Birthday party going on so we all squeeze over to the far side of the store across from the GameBoy stations. Nick is now faced up against Michael who is Dark T-Tar’s son. Michael is playing Gardy EX. Michael wins the 1st match by dominating with Wobby. Nick goes 1st the 2nd match and gets a God Setup by Turn 2. Hw ins that match. So it is tied 1-1. The 3rd match ended up a little longer with prizes going back and forth early. I think Michael ends up with an energy drought or something like that and Nick is able to Volcanic Ash a Dunsparce on the bench for his last prize. That was a great Match-up and both players were deserving the trip. We shake Michael and Tony’s hand for a great game. Magnechu ends up winning the 11-14 division with BAR vs Gardy too. And BAR wins the 15+ division. See everyone in Florida.
 
GJ JohnnyBlaze, I know how you feel, at the PA States I was in 9th place....
Hopefully we can say hello next time and have an even cooler battle!
 
ouch, ID-ing for 9th place. :(

Knowing how messed up the old TMS tiebreakers were, I'd hate to rely on them. Hopefully, the tiebreakers were correct in the TMS version your TO was using.

Gotta agree with the mistake of only using 1 Wobby. Our 11-14 CO States Champ used Swampert/EX with TWO Wobby "techs." Too many EX's to using only one.

Also, Swampert/EX is SOOO good with LatiasEX as an anti-gardy deck. Add SuicuneEX, and it can just about take on anything.

Nice report JB.
 
Hey "J-B",

It was nice meeting you at the NY Gym Challenge. (In addition, it was nice doing that trade as well - PM me if you will so we can complete the trade, along with possibly adding some more cards into the mix).

Sorry to hear that you got squeezed out of the final rounds in 9th place. (Like Goroy, I also know how that feels).

Congratulations, though to your son Nick, for that very well fought and fun-to-watch final battle with Michael.

Take care and I'll be looking for you-guys at future Pokemon events.

- Tony
 
GOROY - It was apleasure meeting you and playing you. MAybe next time I'll win. :rolleyes:

Dark T-Tar - Nice meeting you and your son. That was one of the best Final matches I have watched. Tony once I get my list up I'll PM you.

Steve P - I did run 2 Suicune EX and they helped tremendously. I posted my deck in the Deck section so explain to me how the Latias works against Gardy. I'm not sure I want to run it with all the Quazza'a in our Metagame.
 
Latios EX is also worth a look if you have Boost Energy in a Grass or Electric deck.
Discarding the Boost satisfies it's discard requirement!
 
Latios EX is also worth a look if you have Boost Energy in a Grass or Electric deck.
Discarding the Boost satisfies it's discard requirement!

Pop - Doesnt Boost have to be attached to an evolution card?
 
JohnnyBlaze said:
Steve P - I did run 2 Suicune EX and they helped tremendously. I posted my deck in the Deck section so explain to me how the Latias works against Gardy. I'm not sure I want to run it with all the Quazza'a in our Metagame.


Yah, Gardy is the currently the big meta in Colorado (although that may change since BEX/REX won our 15+ Gym). One of my players used a Swampert/EX/LatiasEX/Magneton at the UT States and beat all Gardys except the his finalist opponent (my player had a terrible draw). Despite, he came within 4 cards of decking his opponent. Latias, with Psychic resistance essentially make Wobby useless.

You're deck obviously does better against Fire. The LatiasEX/Magneton version targets Psychic. I was just considering that a lone SuicuneEX in my friend's deck would've been a good anti-Fire tech.
 
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Heya J-B. It was cool to get a chance to hang out with you over the course of the day. I wish I'd thought to check the stats they'd posted before agreeing to the draw, since I think they included the tiebreaks in there. I'm really sorry the draw-to-get-us-both-in didn't work out, especially since I got eliminated right quick in top eight. In any case, it was a good time, hopefully we'll see each other again in New Jersey.

The thing with either of our shots in top eight was this- Sceptile/Muk lacks the offensive power to win if they can get a quick Blaze ex up, even with Muk stopping Firestarter. They just use the two energy attack (Flame Kick or whatever it's called) to eliminate Muk and then start doing the Firestarter thing for the win. With your deck, you can't stop Firestarter early, so getting the Swampert/Wob/Suicune set up out before they start rolling through is rather difficult. Both decks rely on the Blaze getting a less than ideal start.

For that reason, I don't think I'll run Sceptile in NJ, but it's great fun, as demonstrated by our mirror match while your son was playing top eight.
 
Cory - I did end up 2-1 against the Blaze decks I faced. So I thought I fared well. If I had the Wobby I probably would have been 3-0 against GOROY's Blaze. Either way I thought that you deserved to get in after I saw that you would have beaten me after we drew.

Steve - It was all Blaze variants in the Top 4 in the 15+. So there is definately a difference in Metagame from the different regions.
 
Two years ago my daughter played Ben Sauk for the Washington DC Gym Challenge while, at the same time, I play Ben's father. My daughter won, winning the trip to Worlds, but I lost (although I still won the 15+ tournament - no trip though, just some cards).

Interestingly, my daughter lost one of her fancy dice at that tournament. When we got to Seattle (4 months later), Ben came over and gave it to her. He had found it after the GC and kept it for her. That was really nice.
 
i wish i had gone :( I heard that 3/4 of the decks were blaze, man i wouldve pwned but whatever. tell nick i said good job, ill see u on sunday :)
 
Great report blaze and awesome deck idea. I watched it in action tonight at leauge. its a nice combo. It does suck you got the tail end of an ID but hey milford may be better. who knows. See ya sunday.
 
FireFighter095ReBorn said:
It does suck you got the tail end of an ID but hey milford may be better.

It will be cuz i won't be playing and bringing Johnny's Resistance down. Sorry about that, next time i'll just have to try harder or just beat you!
 
Ouch, Good job at pulling a ness!

And just so ya know, I'll never go to New York again. Reasons:

1.) They marked me down for having a loss when I won, then refused to change it, and
2.) Things are SO DANG EXPENSIVE, and finally
3.) IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO SLEEP THERE!!!!!!!! So much beeping below the window it's horrid.

Props tho, for the ness-age. And I liked your swampert deck. It's interesting. Maybe you should be running reversals???
 
Fuji - I dont rememeber meeting you. Which one were you? lol of all the reasons you wont go again. Ive said that before and look my son got a Trip to Worlds out of this last visit to PCNY. So you never know. One thin is that you have to stay on top of Pairings and stuff and report a discrepency right away to the judges there so it can be resolved.

I'm thinking seriously about reversals.
 
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