Hey guys, if anyone is interested, this is my tournament report for the 2011 US PTCG Nationals. This was my 1st experience at Nats, and my 3rd pokemon tournament overall - and needless to say, I am now hooked. I had a great experience and came with a great group of people, but before I start going on about that, here are my matches in general order:
The person going first is in bold. I have really bad name amnesia, so please excuse that! And please also excuse this perhaps overly lengthy report.
Match 1: Me Vs. New Guy (Team Warp Point) w/Magneboar
This guy was actually in a hardcore band on tour and just started to play the tcg a couple of weeks ago. Cool dude, but really not much to say about the match… he whiffed his collector draw both turns and I donked his tepig after it attacked twice. T2 yanmega for the donk.
1-0
Match 2: Me vs. Colin Moll w/Mewgar
Most definitely one of my most feared matchups. Running 26 pokemon and not being able to 1hko a gengar is not exactly ideal. To further the shenanigans, the t1 see off scared the muk out of me. And t2 did see off on 2 of my pokemon. Anyways, I manage to set up trainer lock t2 and he did not hit a collector for the match. What he DID manage to do is lost zone 6 of my pokemon in 4-5 turns. Lost world was already down, and all that had to happen was for him to declare himself the winner next turn. He had gengar active with 70 on it from my Yanmega, and a cleffa on the bench. Seeing that he had not hit collector so far, the previous turn I used sages training in hopes to mill into my one-of seeker in my deck in hopes to donk. Well, I got insanely lucky and nailed it. I hit the Gengar prime for 70 and just hoped that he didn’t top deck into another pokemon or a means to get it. He didn’t. He proceeded to lost zone my 5th and 6th with see off. His hand was really small since the beginning, so luckily for me I had enough energies on yanmega to attack without manipulating my hand to use Insight. I seekered up his cleffa and sonic boomed for the win. Nice guy and very friendly. I knew he went hard since he even took notes during the match!
2-0
Match 3: me vs. Guy with Yanmega/Donphan/Cincinno/Zoroark/Noctowl
Not much to say about this match. He sets up before me, but the t3 trainer lock paired up with 2 serperiors royal healing is just lethal. I keep retreating my Yanmegas while healing 4 damage counters to all of my pokes before he can heavy impact me again. I get to the point where I just ignore the active donphan and snipe his bench up. I thought noctowl was an awesome tech for extra draw power and a sick RDL counter. GG
3-0
Match 4: me vs. Eden w/Donmega
Wow. This was probably one of the most frustrating games I’ve ever played. He goes first and from the beginning, QQ’s hard about his bouffalaunt start. He then proceeds to shut up and attaches a DCE to the bouff, plays down double plus power and hits a heads on reversal to mow down the oddish I started with on the bench. Cool trick, but I thought I could recover. I collector on my t1 to get another oddish, yanma and sunkern, and then pass. Well he does it again. He uses junk arm for the plus power, plays another plus power, and hits a heads on reversal to knock out my trainer lock element completely since I do not run FSL. I thought things would still be ok since yanmega and serperior can still wreck a donmega, but then he does something insane for the deck he runs. He plays down ruins of alph, making my yanmegas not-so-great against his donphans. To cut to the chase, he proceeds to hit heads on every reversal he has left and junk arm and drags me up and k.o’s my pokemon 4 more times in a row. I just couldn’t touch that. Outside of everything else, I got rules lawyered by not royal healing on time supposedly and by not tossing my dice high enough (keep in mind I was losing horribly at this point already). Anyways, it was just a harsh match that’s hard not to QQ about lol.
3-1
Match 5: me vs… ????
Dang. I don’t remember ANYTHING about this match. It must have been a dream. Anyways, I won, but it is kind of unsettling that it is erased from my memory. Huh. GG?
4-1
Match 6: me vs. Tavish w/Magneboar[/B]
Now this might have been one of the most intense matches I have ever played in. It looks REALLY bad for me t1 and t2. T1 he promopig burns my snivy off the bat and I take 2 from the burn flip. I then proceed to paralyzing glare, but it fails. Next turn he evolves into pignite and magnezone. A small part of me dies seeing this because I know that he doesn’t even have to rely on rare candy in trainer lock I’m getting online next turn. Another bad thing was that he ran the pignite that did 20 for a DCE. And 20 he did, x2 b/c of snivy weakness so my snivy gets KO’ed. I promote cleffa, set up my trainer lock, and eeeeek like a scared girl. I miss my sleep flip and he retreats the Piggy, evolves it into emboar, evolves into magnezone, and sends out the tyrogue to beat up my puff ball. At this point, I was pretty scared. I was now going up against a Magneboar I haven’t even touched damage-wise yet, and he was already up 4 prizes to my 6. Well, I start sniping things with yanmega as he roflkicks me with tyrogue turn after turn., slowly adding damage. I end up sniping his cleffa for a prize, putting 80 on magnezone, 40 on defenseless tepig, and then ultimately taking out the rampaging tyrogue insomniac. By this time I am crazy suspicious about what he is doing. He really has not played any supporters or even energy for that matter. The prize count is 4 to 4. He sends out a magnemite (maybe?) with an energy, LAYS DOWN RDL and inferno fandangos it up to instantly fully load it up with a lightning attachment for turn, proceeds to retreat his magnemite. And 1HKO my yanmega. The prize count is now 2-4 in his favor. After something between defecating a pile of bricks and slapping myself for not judging his 11-12 card hand before, I send out a fresh yanmega and smack it for 70. I’m praying that he cannot load it up again for the 2 prize grab next turn. And he doesn’t! he misses his energy by 1 fire, and is forced to retreat. He brings up something like a magnemite and passes.I proceed to take two turns to snipe out the damaged rdl with yanmega as he whiffs a fire again and even up the prize count miraculously. I then KO his tepig on the bench to go down to one prize. He uses twins and loads up his now damaged active magnezone and koes my second to last yanmega. The prize count is 1-1. Luckily, I had one yanmega left. I proceed to promote it and judge for the game. Great match. I was literally shaking it was so close!
5-1
Match 7: me vs. New York guy w/Kingmega
UG. I was just not meant to win this match. Here was my opening hand:
1.Vileplume
2.Snivy
3.Gloom
4. Vileplume
5. Rare candy
6. Grass Energy
7. Dual Ball
I go second, and proceed to dead draw into a sunflora as I roll a slick double tails with my 1 dual ball. I stave him off with my promo snivie’s paralyzing gaze for a couple of turns, but I continue to draw into junk. The crap hits the phanpy as he gets his yanmega and kingdra out, and he rofl donks me t3 or t4. I then flip my prizes, and realize both sunkerns were prized. Oh the HORROR. We end up playing a freebie match afterwards after he insisted (was a great player and really cool). I end up going first (lol) and t2 pluming him. I go 6-0 and we say good luck to each other and head out of the playing area. Very frustrating, but great player and bad luck just happens.
5-2
Match 8: me vs. Team Warp point dude w/ Tyranitar toolbox
I finally get to go first. Freaking whoopee! Sadly it will be the last time for the rest of the tournament. ._.
Anyways, the poor guy starts with unown dark and its all downhill from there. I get my t2 lock and Serperior heals off darkness howl from a t3 t-tar. Yanmega takes down 1 tyranitar and I snipe a larvitar for 40, securing the ko if he should decide to go to another pupitar in trainer lock. Great sport, even though he was shafted by bad luck of not going first and a bad start.
6-2
Match 9: me vs. Ayden Airesw/Mirror Matchup???? No serp though. (hooray)
The mirror match I was waiting for! I finally ran into another Mega/Plume player and he was a pretty chill dude. I was pretty scared in going second, so I collectored for 2 sunkerns on my t1, being paranoid that he would snipe a lone sunkern out with yanmega. Well, he ended up not being able to because of a cleffa mini-coma. He did proceed to t2 plume me though. That was fine of course. I thankfully milled into my one sunflora, and then faced something that used to be totally unnecessary – I sunflora’ed for a sunflora, and then sunfloraed again. Not going to lie, it felt pretty awesome. I knew the biggest key to this match was getting my 2-2-2 serperior line up ASAP, to revolve my yanmegas around and heal so I would basically take no damage. Once they were up it was basically GG. I was really hoping serperior would help the mirror match-up and it really did! It sucks that we basically played for top cut, but I found out later from him that he won the professor cup with reshiphlosion! Congrats man.
7-2 – on to top cut!
Top Cut 128 – me vs. Kim Allen w/Zonemega/ Megajudge / whatever they call it these days
Game 1: Down to the last prize! I t2 plume but she has her stage 1’s handy and a 4-2-4 zone line to back it up. I get lucky for the fact that her last Yanmega was prized! I felt pretty cheap getting that win…
Game 2: I go second by force this time, although there was not much difference. I draw a great hand, but she t1 judges me and my hand went AWFUL. She sets up like mother Teresa, and I see where this is going pretty fast. To ensure that I would go first the third game, I scooooooped.
Game 3: I FINALLY got to pull it off. I choose to go first (hooray) and get a decent setup. I set up the lock, jump ahead a prize, and she sends out cleffa. I have a full bench, one of the spots being taken up by my serperior with energy. I seeker serperior up, sunshine grace for spinarak, and trap the cleffa for the win! Spinarak finally came in handy. Spinarak FTW!
8-2
Top 64 – me vs Martin Moreno
Oh you have to be kidding me. I have ran into this guy all of the three tournaments I have played and each match has been crazy in its own right! The first one at OK states I scrubbed for the win somehow with Yanmega/Umbreon and the second at TX states he owned me partially because my whole machop line and azelf were prized. and now this one. Oh boy.
Game 1: I draw my opening hand, and want to cry. CRY. I think I start with sunkern or snivy, and that is about it. Rare candies, grass energy, and oddish evolutions galore. Needless to say, not a supporter for miles, and I ragescoop!
Game 2: I get to go first. HUZZAH. And man does it make the difference. T2 plume online and all of my crap running optimal. My set up was pretty dandy. He understandably scoops to ensure the g3 going first. cool.
Game 3: ......... I QQ hard into my pillow even thinking about this match. He goes first and apparently has a slow start. This is exciting to me as I eventually use my collector for my usual three – oddish, sunkern, and yanma/snivy/cleffa. I know that trainer lock really does a number on a slow starting kingmega deck, so I excitedly search for one of my two oddishes.
I search.
I search.
I search again.
And BAZINGA. Not a honking oddish to be found. They were both noodling around in my prizes. I died inside. I knew that the chances for both of my oddishes being prized was around .85%, but I struggled to even grasp the statistical probability in how this could happen to me in a second meet up against him in a row and how I have played him all the three tournaments I went to. Anyways, I cannot even get a t2 yanmega and my deck basically clams up and dies after I even have cleffa prized. I slump into depression knowing that the end has come for my Nats run… I guess it was not meant to be. On a different note, Martin was a great and friendly player as usual, and even got some major SOTG points by stopping me from drawing a card before I laid down my prizes. The guy’s a freaking legend, and I wished that he could have gone further than T32. I'm getting you next time Moreno. dangit.
8-3 FIN
Overall, I had the time of my life. Here comes the Party Fouls and Party Wins section. I will do the Party Wins last, so it doesn’t look like I come off as a QQ’ing nancy.
PARTY FOULS:
~ Not being able to play Mario kart at the La Quinta, even after buying an expensive modulator for their ghetto tv. Dreams = crushed.
~ Indianapolis Drivers. Where do I begin? A car even swerved to hit one of my crew once. Geez.
~ Going first a grand total of ONE TIME. Each game was a bit of a heart of attack at first. I dreaded the t2 yanmega to oddish/sunkern snipe more than anything. Broken.
~ Reversal flip shenanigans. Screw 50% probability.
~ Dead hands and crap prized when everything was on the line! I tested over 150 games with the version of the deck I brought and those shenanigans should NOT have gone down that much. >:
~ My new player friend being ripped off. He said a guy at Troll and Toad even helped the other dude out by persuading him that celebi prime was a fair trade for kingdra! I don’t even…
~ The Moreno Prize Curse put on me ever since my OK states shiny yanma + Snowpointe > Dragonrush win. Heavy shenanigans.
Party Wins
~ The awesome group that I was with: My GF Sydney, Austin Baggs, Brandon Hutchinson, Taylor Davis, Josh Morrison, Blaine Peoples, and Jay Johnson. You guys were great, and made the trip a blast.
~ Austin for pro advice about the tournament and suggestion on including a Smeargle tech in the night before it started, I probably can say that it gave me the crucial edge in at least two or three matches. Also for just being a really cool bro in general. Looking forward to grinding in at Worlds man.
~ Josh for playtesting with me with a rough matchup I have – Magnapharos. Cool to hang out with and gave me the ride to the convention center on Sunday!
~Brandon for putting up with us messing with him all the time and putting reverse holos in between his toes while he slept. He also gave me food and card advice. Good times.
~ Taylor for ALSO playtesting with me and being freaking hilarious while at the same time being crazy knowledgeable about how nats works. Also extremely grateful that I’m going to be staying in his hotel room for worlds! Pretty stoked.
~ Kevin Kobayashi - a.k.a Alex2K a.k.a IWS - Freaking stud right here. This guy tested with me via skype and playtcg and gave me countless pointers and freaking pro advice non stop. If it wasn't for him, I probably would have scrubbed out and switched decks last second like so many top players did that did not do well. Who knew meeting through a mime jr. troll thread would turn into having a legit test partner that's got your back. I owe a lot of my successful run to you man. Hope to see you at next years nats!
~John Kettler for explaining mutant draft and creeping out of Kobayashi with his... unique... voice. Poor kid probably clings to that unicorn with a deathgrip every night now. Great to meet you bro!
~ The combination taco bell and pizza hut by the convention center. There is a song for it for a reason.
~ A really cool Judge I met from Missouri named Vince.
~ Troll and Toad for giving me GREAT prices on my bulk cards.
~ Spinarak for being sexy by securing my win in a topcut match! Spinarak + Seeker = <3
~ All of the players that I met and ran into again at Nats. Looking forward to doing it all again!
until next time,
-Michael Magee
The person going first is in bold. I have really bad name amnesia, so please excuse that! And please also excuse this perhaps overly lengthy report.
Match 1: Me Vs. New Guy (Team Warp Point) w/Magneboar
This guy was actually in a hardcore band on tour and just started to play the tcg a couple of weeks ago. Cool dude, but really not much to say about the match… he whiffed his collector draw both turns and I donked his tepig after it attacked twice. T2 yanmega for the donk.
1-0
Match 2: Me vs. Colin Moll w/Mewgar
Most definitely one of my most feared matchups. Running 26 pokemon and not being able to 1hko a gengar is not exactly ideal. To further the shenanigans, the t1 see off scared the muk out of me. And t2 did see off on 2 of my pokemon. Anyways, I manage to set up trainer lock t2 and he did not hit a collector for the match. What he DID manage to do is lost zone 6 of my pokemon in 4-5 turns. Lost world was already down, and all that had to happen was for him to declare himself the winner next turn. He had gengar active with 70 on it from my Yanmega, and a cleffa on the bench. Seeing that he had not hit collector so far, the previous turn I used sages training in hopes to mill into my one-of seeker in my deck in hopes to donk. Well, I got insanely lucky and nailed it. I hit the Gengar prime for 70 and just hoped that he didn’t top deck into another pokemon or a means to get it. He didn’t. He proceeded to lost zone my 5th and 6th with see off. His hand was really small since the beginning, so luckily for me I had enough energies on yanmega to attack without manipulating my hand to use Insight. I seekered up his cleffa and sonic boomed for the win. Nice guy and very friendly. I knew he went hard since he even took notes during the match!
2-0
Match 3: me vs. Guy with Yanmega/Donphan/Cincinno/Zoroark/Noctowl
Not much to say about this match. He sets up before me, but the t3 trainer lock paired up with 2 serperiors royal healing is just lethal. I keep retreating my Yanmegas while healing 4 damage counters to all of my pokes before he can heavy impact me again. I get to the point where I just ignore the active donphan and snipe his bench up. I thought noctowl was an awesome tech for extra draw power and a sick RDL counter. GG
3-0
Match 4: me vs. Eden w/Donmega
Wow. This was probably one of the most frustrating games I’ve ever played. He goes first and from the beginning, QQ’s hard about his bouffalaunt start. He then proceeds to shut up and attaches a DCE to the bouff, plays down double plus power and hits a heads on reversal to mow down the oddish I started with on the bench. Cool trick, but I thought I could recover. I collector on my t1 to get another oddish, yanma and sunkern, and then pass. Well he does it again. He uses junk arm for the plus power, plays another plus power, and hits a heads on reversal to knock out my trainer lock element completely since I do not run FSL. I thought things would still be ok since yanmega and serperior can still wreck a donmega, but then he does something insane for the deck he runs. He plays down ruins of alph, making my yanmegas not-so-great against his donphans. To cut to the chase, he proceeds to hit heads on every reversal he has left and junk arm and drags me up and k.o’s my pokemon 4 more times in a row. I just couldn’t touch that. Outside of everything else, I got rules lawyered by not royal healing on time supposedly and by not tossing my dice high enough (keep in mind I was losing horribly at this point already). Anyways, it was just a harsh match that’s hard not to QQ about lol.
3-1
Match 5: me vs… ????
Dang. I don’t remember ANYTHING about this match. It must have been a dream. Anyways, I won, but it is kind of unsettling that it is erased from my memory. Huh. GG?
4-1
Match 6: me vs. Tavish w/Magneboar[/B]
Now this might have been one of the most intense matches I have ever played in. It looks REALLY bad for me t1 and t2. T1 he promopig burns my snivy off the bat and I take 2 from the burn flip. I then proceed to paralyzing glare, but it fails. Next turn he evolves into pignite and magnezone. A small part of me dies seeing this because I know that he doesn’t even have to rely on rare candy in trainer lock I’m getting online next turn. Another bad thing was that he ran the pignite that did 20 for a DCE. And 20 he did, x2 b/c of snivy weakness so my snivy gets KO’ed. I promote cleffa, set up my trainer lock, and eeeeek like a scared girl. I miss my sleep flip and he retreats the Piggy, evolves it into emboar, evolves into magnezone, and sends out the tyrogue to beat up my puff ball. At this point, I was pretty scared. I was now going up against a Magneboar I haven’t even touched damage-wise yet, and he was already up 4 prizes to my 6. Well, I start sniping things with yanmega as he roflkicks me with tyrogue turn after turn., slowly adding damage. I end up sniping his cleffa for a prize, putting 80 on magnezone, 40 on defenseless tepig, and then ultimately taking out the rampaging tyrogue insomniac. By this time I am crazy suspicious about what he is doing. He really has not played any supporters or even energy for that matter. The prize count is 4 to 4. He sends out a magnemite (maybe?) with an energy, LAYS DOWN RDL and inferno fandangos it up to instantly fully load it up with a lightning attachment for turn, proceeds to retreat his magnemite. And 1HKO my yanmega. The prize count is now 2-4 in his favor. After something between defecating a pile of bricks and slapping myself for not judging his 11-12 card hand before, I send out a fresh yanmega and smack it for 70. I’m praying that he cannot load it up again for the 2 prize grab next turn. And he doesn’t! he misses his energy by 1 fire, and is forced to retreat. He brings up something like a magnemite and passes.I proceed to take two turns to snipe out the damaged rdl with yanmega as he whiffs a fire again and even up the prize count miraculously. I then KO his tepig on the bench to go down to one prize. He uses twins and loads up his now damaged active magnezone and koes my second to last yanmega. The prize count is 1-1. Luckily, I had one yanmega left. I proceed to promote it and judge for the game. Great match. I was literally shaking it was so close!
5-1
Match 7: me vs. New York guy w/Kingmega
UG. I was just not meant to win this match. Here was my opening hand:
1.Vileplume
2.Snivy
3.Gloom
4. Vileplume
5. Rare candy
6. Grass Energy
7. Dual Ball
I go second, and proceed to dead draw into a sunflora as I roll a slick double tails with my 1 dual ball. I stave him off with my promo snivie’s paralyzing gaze for a couple of turns, but I continue to draw into junk. The crap hits the phanpy as he gets his yanmega and kingdra out, and he rofl donks me t3 or t4. I then flip my prizes, and realize both sunkerns were prized. Oh the HORROR. We end up playing a freebie match afterwards after he insisted (was a great player and really cool). I end up going first (lol) and t2 pluming him. I go 6-0 and we say good luck to each other and head out of the playing area. Very frustrating, but great player and bad luck just happens.
5-2
Match 8: me vs. Team Warp point dude w/ Tyranitar toolbox
I finally get to go first. Freaking whoopee! Sadly it will be the last time for the rest of the tournament. ._.
Anyways, the poor guy starts with unown dark and its all downhill from there. I get my t2 lock and Serperior heals off darkness howl from a t3 t-tar. Yanmega takes down 1 tyranitar and I snipe a larvitar for 40, securing the ko if he should decide to go to another pupitar in trainer lock. Great sport, even though he was shafted by bad luck of not going first and a bad start.
6-2
Match 9: me vs. Ayden Airesw/Mirror Matchup???? No serp though. (hooray)
The mirror match I was waiting for! I finally ran into another Mega/Plume player and he was a pretty chill dude. I was pretty scared in going second, so I collectored for 2 sunkerns on my t1, being paranoid that he would snipe a lone sunkern out with yanmega. Well, he ended up not being able to because of a cleffa mini-coma. He did proceed to t2 plume me though. That was fine of course. I thankfully milled into my one sunflora, and then faced something that used to be totally unnecessary – I sunflora’ed for a sunflora, and then sunfloraed again. Not going to lie, it felt pretty awesome. I knew the biggest key to this match was getting my 2-2-2 serperior line up ASAP, to revolve my yanmegas around and heal so I would basically take no damage. Once they were up it was basically GG. I was really hoping serperior would help the mirror match-up and it really did! It sucks that we basically played for top cut, but I found out later from him that he won the professor cup with reshiphlosion! Congrats man.
7-2 – on to top cut!
Top Cut 128 – me vs. Kim Allen w/Zonemega/ Megajudge / whatever they call it these days
Game 1: Down to the last prize! I t2 plume but she has her stage 1’s handy and a 4-2-4 zone line to back it up. I get lucky for the fact that her last Yanmega was prized! I felt pretty cheap getting that win…
Game 2: I go second by force this time, although there was not much difference. I draw a great hand, but she t1 judges me and my hand went AWFUL. She sets up like mother Teresa, and I see where this is going pretty fast. To ensure that I would go first the third game, I scooooooped.
Game 3: I FINALLY got to pull it off. I choose to go first (hooray) and get a decent setup. I set up the lock, jump ahead a prize, and she sends out cleffa. I have a full bench, one of the spots being taken up by my serperior with energy. I seeker serperior up, sunshine grace for spinarak, and trap the cleffa for the win! Spinarak finally came in handy. Spinarak FTW!
8-2
Top 64 – me vs Martin Moreno
Oh you have to be kidding me. I have ran into this guy all of the three tournaments I have played and each match has been crazy in its own right! The first one at OK states I scrubbed for the win somehow with Yanmega/Umbreon and the second at TX states he owned me partially because my whole machop line and azelf were prized. and now this one. Oh boy.
Game 1: I draw my opening hand, and want to cry. CRY. I think I start with sunkern or snivy, and that is about it. Rare candies, grass energy, and oddish evolutions galore. Needless to say, not a supporter for miles, and I ragescoop!
Game 2: I get to go first. HUZZAH. And man does it make the difference. T2 plume online and all of my crap running optimal. My set up was pretty dandy. He understandably scoops to ensure the g3 going first. cool.
Game 3: ......... I QQ hard into my pillow even thinking about this match. He goes first and apparently has a slow start. This is exciting to me as I eventually use my collector for my usual three – oddish, sunkern, and yanma/snivy/cleffa. I know that trainer lock really does a number on a slow starting kingmega deck, so I excitedly search for one of my two oddishes.
I search.
I search.
I search again.
And BAZINGA. Not a honking oddish to be found. They were both noodling around in my prizes. I died inside. I knew that the chances for both of my oddishes being prized was around .85%, but I struggled to even grasp the statistical probability in how this could happen to me in a second meet up against him in a row and how I have played him all the three tournaments I went to. Anyways, I cannot even get a t2 yanmega and my deck basically clams up and dies after I even have cleffa prized. I slump into depression knowing that the end has come for my Nats run… I guess it was not meant to be. On a different note, Martin was a great and friendly player as usual, and even got some major SOTG points by stopping me from drawing a card before I laid down my prizes. The guy’s a freaking legend, and I wished that he could have gone further than T32. I'm getting you next time Moreno. dangit.
8-3 FIN
Overall, I had the time of my life. Here comes the Party Fouls and Party Wins section. I will do the Party Wins last, so it doesn’t look like I come off as a QQ’ing nancy.
PARTY FOULS:
~ Not being able to play Mario kart at the La Quinta, even after buying an expensive modulator for their ghetto tv. Dreams = crushed.
~ Indianapolis Drivers. Where do I begin? A car even swerved to hit one of my crew once. Geez.
~ Going first a grand total of ONE TIME. Each game was a bit of a heart of attack at first. I dreaded the t2 yanmega to oddish/sunkern snipe more than anything. Broken.
~ Reversal flip shenanigans. Screw 50% probability.
~ Dead hands and crap prized when everything was on the line! I tested over 150 games with the version of the deck I brought and those shenanigans should NOT have gone down that much. >:
~ My new player friend being ripped off. He said a guy at Troll and Toad even helped the other dude out by persuading him that celebi prime was a fair trade for kingdra! I don’t even…
~ The Moreno Prize Curse put on me ever since my OK states shiny yanma + Snowpointe > Dragonrush win. Heavy shenanigans.
Party Wins
~ The awesome group that I was with: My GF Sydney, Austin Baggs, Brandon Hutchinson, Taylor Davis, Josh Morrison, Blaine Peoples, and Jay Johnson. You guys were great, and made the trip a blast.
~ Austin for pro advice about the tournament and suggestion on including a Smeargle tech in the night before it started, I probably can say that it gave me the crucial edge in at least two or three matches. Also for just being a really cool bro in general. Looking forward to grinding in at Worlds man.
~ Josh for playtesting with me with a rough matchup I have – Magnapharos. Cool to hang out with and gave me the ride to the convention center on Sunday!
~Brandon for putting up with us messing with him all the time and putting reverse holos in between his toes while he slept. He also gave me food and card advice. Good times.
~ Taylor for ALSO playtesting with me and being freaking hilarious while at the same time being crazy knowledgeable about how nats works. Also extremely grateful that I’m going to be staying in his hotel room for worlds! Pretty stoked.
~ Kevin Kobayashi - a.k.a Alex2K a.k.a IWS - Freaking stud right here. This guy tested with me via skype and playtcg and gave me countless pointers and freaking pro advice non stop. If it wasn't for him, I probably would have scrubbed out and switched decks last second like so many top players did that did not do well. Who knew meeting through a mime jr. troll thread would turn into having a legit test partner that's got your back. I owe a lot of my successful run to you man. Hope to see you at next years nats!
~John Kettler for explaining mutant draft and creeping out of Kobayashi with his... unique... voice. Poor kid probably clings to that unicorn with a deathgrip every night now. Great to meet you bro!
~ The combination taco bell and pizza hut by the convention center. There is a song for it for a reason.
~ A really cool Judge I met from Missouri named Vince.
~ Troll and Toad for giving me GREAT prices on my bulk cards.
~ Spinarak for being sexy by securing my win in a topcut match! Spinarak + Seeker = <3
~ All of the players that I met and ran into again at Nats. Looking forward to doing it all again!
until next time,
-Michael Magee
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