GrandmaJoner
Active Member
Ok so lets get right down to it.
I played Tyranitar and did well all season until RR came out
where Nidoqueen and Lucario just wrecked it. So, I had to make a switch for nationals. I sucked at playing SP decks so I went with Flygon/Weavile and got 3rd place. I ran well here, but overall I was not really satisfied with the deck as I thought it just needed too much to get going consistently.
In all my years of success I have definitely not been known as a deckbuilder. I take decks and test with them for hours, perfecting lists over time and using my playing ability to win me games. But I don't think I have ever really created a deck that has done exceptionally well.
After nationals, Mikey Fouchet showed me this deck he made, Flygon/Gliscor lv X which would paralyze the opponent forever and deck them. I liked it, but I thought that with power sprays/other things it was a little bit too vulnerable. So, a week or two later, he showed me another list, and this time I really liked it. Tyler Ninomura had come up with a deck using Flygon lv X, Palkia, and Memory Berry on Trapinch's Sand Tomb that would lock the opponent forever until they decked. Ever since 2006 when Jeremy Maron won a game using pidgey's corner lock on a holon's castform I have been looking for a way to exploit this, and this seemed like the perfect idea. And combined with the fact that I play on average faster than almost anyone I can think of, decking was a viable strategy for me. In my 5 years of playing Pokemon, I have only lost on time ONCE.
The original list with average at best but the concept was very intriguing. I have never been a player who keeps decks secret, but this time I acted differently as I really thought this could be the deck. I spent my summer only playtesting with literally 3 people (Mikey, Gordon, and Pooka) and revealed this deck only to them.
I knew that in order for the deck to win masters the "surprise" factor would be there. Even playing against Pooka with Luxape he will be the first to admit he fell right into the trap the first 2 or 3 games, and I ended up winning all of those. If the US national champion misplayed against this deck (using Sp nonetheless, which was supposed to be Flygon's closest matchup), who's to say anyone else wouldnt.
So the week of worlds rolled around, and I was feeling confident as ever using this deck that if I got through the swiss rounds (avoiding bad starts and potentially losses on time) I could really do some damage in the 75 minute 2/3 rounds. I expected the metagame to be a lot of SP/Gengar/Machamp.
Over the weeks of testing this is what the decklist had become:
3 Trapinch SW
1 Vibrava SW (greater HP, avoids luxray KOs, has free retreat when Flygon has F energy, and Sand Wind can be used when you have their claydol up etc.)
1 Vibrava RR
3 Flygon RR
1 Flygon lv X
2 Baltoy
2 Claydol
1 Nidoran RR
1 Nidoqueen (won Gengar matchup and Kingdra Matchup single handedly, and I surely expected more Gengars and Kingdras than Flygons, as there were like 0 at US nats. If I had known there was gonna be this many Flygon I would have ran Dusknoir :/)
1 Palkia MD (100 HP, only +20 weak to L)
1 Palkia lv X (IMO won me every single matchup vs non SP deck)
1 Unown G GE (enough to win you the gengar matchup, only need to G claydol and you can deck them)
1 Uxie LA
1 Azelf LA
1 Chatot MD (more important than Uxie in this deck IMO)
1 Mewtwo MD
1 Mewtwo lv X (done extensive testing on whether mewtwo or machamp was better, I went with Mewtwo as 1/0/1 Machamp I felt people could play around. And also, hey, Mewtwo can autowin you games if people run no counter. And even if they play a counter in SP, read on to my trainers to find out what I had planned for them)
4 Roseannes
4 Bebes
4 Rare Candy
2 Cynthias
2 Premier Ball
2 Night Maintenance (awesome, for energies as well)
2 Switch (2nd was last minute addition, GREAT call, thanks to tyler N for the input)
2 Memory Berry (was thinking about 3, but vs SP it did not always get used much and I figured SP would be the main threat)
1 Luxury Ball ( i cannot stand 2 in basically any other deck than Kingdra)
1 Broken Time Space (sort of like 5th rare candy, I had tested 2 all summer but dropped the 2nd one for the switch, this was the correct move. I like having at least one, I hate the possibility of my Claydol being Luxrayed and not being able to respond with another one immediately)
1 Bubble Coat (originally I came up with this idea the night before worlds to avoid Mewtwo being one-shotted by Ninetales or any other SP counter *still not sure about the mismagius ruling, if crash chant would apply weakness or not lol* so that I would autowin basically vs any SP. I would just keep doing 60 with mewtwo and if they brought up Ninetales or w/e I would do 120 and still be alive. Who knew that it would be so key for all the Flygon Mirrors I would face =\)
4 Call energy
3 F Energy
3 P energy
2 W energy
If anyone has any questions about the list please feel free to ask and I will answer them. But I felt super solid about this list prior to leaving for SD and was ready to roll.
The goal of this deck was basically to deck everybody expect SP, where you would generally go for the prize win. Dusknoir was a card that for sure hurt us but if I knew they played dusknoir I could usually get the lock down and play smartly and win.
I am not scheduled to arrive to SD until Thursday so I talk to a friend from BC on the computer, who is already at worlds. I ask him, so, any secret decks rolling around? (having a smug grin to myself as I am typing this) He says "yeah, for sure." I say, what? he says "Flygon with Memory Berry and Palkia."
I'm like .............. to myself and was extremely rattled. I had been working so hard all summer to keep this deck secret as I knew surprise factor was SO huge in its success. If it did well in the grinder, big deal, I don't think people would really have enough time to get a solid list and practice. But no one outside of our little group could know about it in order for it to work really well. Unfortunately, the deck had been played in the open and as always, when people see a new deck they jump on it and it spreads like wildfire, whether it is a good deck or not.
OK, great, so the deck ended up taking 3rd in masters and 2nd and 3rd in seniors if I am not mistaken, and after the deck was made public sure I am happy about these results. But to be honest I really don't care about anyone else doing well with the deck,outside of myself and my circle of friends, and there were 4 of us who were planning on using the deck in the main event. I am quite confident that if the deck was still a secret I would have had a much better chance at getting a higher placing.
Due to people's knowledge about the deck, this is what occurred:
- Additions of Warp Points and more Unown Gs
- People teching in Dusknoir
- More people playing Flygon variants (Flygon variants are not really a problem for the deck unless they run Dusknoir or extra G's/warp points)
- People teching in Ditto
- Biggest of all, people being AWARE the deck existed and knowing what to do against it. AKA not playing down full benches, making sure you attached unown Gs to pokemon like Claydol and stuff, and saving your warp points for times when you got locked. people adjusted their play when they saw my deck to EXPECT the lock coming.)
So after all this disappointment I was still gonna run the deck as I was hopefully relying on my playing ability and I still thought I had good matchups against the board. I had NO IDEA that there were going to be THAT MANY flygons in the main event though, my god.
Well anyways, onto my games.
Round 1 vs French Player (Gyarados)
So I have a brutal start and when I open with a trapinch and my opponent tells me that he is going first I am like jesus am I really gonna get Sableye donked first round haha. Anyways, I survive the first turn and use Call energy to start getting setup. He then plays down a Magikarp, and I'm like OK, great, I get to play vs some noob for an easy opening win. But then I realize I have noidea what Gyarados does, and look how well they did in the event. He surprises me with a turn 3 90 damage with a Registeel (another card that I have no idea what it does) and KOs my trapinch. So I was really stuck after that. I was claydoling and not drawing into anything. I kept having to sacrifice stuff and ended up going down 6-2 before I finally setup and got the lock. He had a Claydol and 2 Sableyes in play with no unown G and had used 3 Scoop ups and 3 Poketurns on Crobat. At one point he cosmiced some cards to the bottom of his deck to draw 0 and he was like "oops, misplay" and I was like OK, take it back (I always let ppl take stuff back unless they didnt let me do it earlier). And later in the game for some reason I thought I could KO his gyarados instead of going for the lock and win, so I retreated when I should have used Restructure instead. I asked him if I could take that back, and sure enough, he let me, because I had let him take back that Cosmic Power earlier. That's how I operate and that's how I beleive everyone should play. What goes around comes around, and I needed to make that correct play to win.All in all I locked his Sableye with Sand tomb and discarded his last scoop up and warp point (wouldnt have mattered, as I could have pushed up Nidoqueen to take a gyarados hit) and he didnt take another prize. I had him down to like 6-7 cards and he scooped.
1-0
Round 2 vs German Player (Flygon)
So I get going pretty well, and I get a lock going pretty early I believe. I also use Palkia to my advantage and get some KOs. I also make the mistake of filling up my bench. I then discard Dusknoir with wind erosion and I'm like crap. Well he sure enough ends up NMing and warp pointing out of the lock for a huge turn with Flygon X/Dusknoir. But I had built an early lead and still thought I had the game sealed till I saw Ditto. My bubble coat came in handy as he was forced to attack me with Blissey to discard it. It ended up being a close game down to 2-2 in prizes approaching the end of the time limit.
This is basically why I was frustrated that the deck had been exposed. Let's run through what he had in his deck, no exaggerations.
- Dusknoir/Queen
- TWO Bubble Coat
- TWO Warp Point
- Ditto
- Blissey
- Flygon SW
Most of those being techs specifically for Mirror IMO. Great. WELL, after ALL OF THAT, it was 2-2 tied in prizes and time was called on my turn, all the time realizing i had the win. I played Trapinch, Broken Time Space, Vibrava, Energy, Baltoy Claydol, to enable myself to draw the last 7 remaining cards in my deck to make sure I could draw my switch (1 NM and 1 Switch were my last 2 prizes) and did 160 with Vibrava. I would have definitely lost if the match had been played out, but it was my opponents fault as I was, as usual the one playing faster and he took longer turns. And to lose to me when he had THAT MANY techs to beat me is his problem, I did not feel bad at all. I was so frustrated after this match as I really realized how much people knew about my deck :/
2-0
Round 3: Karl Blake from UK with Flygon/Weavile
Woo another Flygon matchup. Ok well I started out OK and had a lock going on his weavile. I basically had the game won as I had another Pokemon to Lock on his bench and had Palkia in play, so I could deck him. However, I saw that my 2nd memory berry was prized and that if he had warp point I could very well lose the matchup. I really don't think that most people would play Warp Point in a Flygon deck (that gives everybody free retreat anyways :/) unless they had a specific reason to. Also, sure enough, I discarded a Dusknoir off the top of his deck, which he later Nmed in to screw me over. Sure enough, he draws the warp point, and I had laid down 4 on my bench ( I think I had to, but this was before I saw the Dusknoir. Probably my fault though as I should have assumed by playing against any FLygon deck that they would have dusk in it), and the warp point was definitely the TSN Turning Point. He got out Dusk and I took one prize in an effort to get my 2nd memory berry ( I could not play azelf, that would be autoloss), and it didnt happen, so I lost. If I have the 2nd memory berry in my deck I win. Oh well, thats the risk I took by only playing 2.
2-1
Round 4: Guy who grinded in with Palkia Luxray
Ok so I open Ok and start getting setup, after he takes 3 prizes I am finally able to get Mewtwo out and it eventually becomes my lone Pokemon in play and he just scoops. (Mewtwo>Machamp vs SP for sure I think.)
3-1
Round 5: Player from Denmark with Gengar Dusknoir
So he shows me his mulligan and I see a Gengar I believe. Well long story short I dont see a Duskull till a few turns into the game and by that time my bench is already past 3 (jesus, how many dusknoir are there). I have a lock going with a Flygon X but then of course, he has warp point, moonlight stadium, and dark palm to basically seal the game. Night Spin screwed me over as I thought I would get a KO one time, but basically what sealed him the victory here is that he had the Dusknoir Self damage one so he could have an alternate attacking threat. I only ran 1 G, and had to G claydol to avoid gengar knocking it out. He made numerous what I thought were misplays in this game, but there was no way he was going to lose with his Dusknoirs/Warp/Moonlights and my only real attacker being Flygon. Friday evening I knew that I might end up playing him again if I were to make top 8, so I schemed about how I would beat this deck and I thought I could do it by attacking with Nidoqueen. Ends up I didnt play him again, but o well ;/
3-2
So great, now I had to win out.
Round 6: vs Gino with Flygon
Well, this ended up not being much of a game. I go first, and he starts with a lone Nidoran, and ends up going for a T1 Nidoqueen and uses Mega punch lol. Well he had nothing else so I took my sweet time and got setup, and literally for 4-5 turns he attached energy and Mega punched or something. So while I was setting up all he had was a Nidoqueen and a Trapinch. Once I got a flygon out I just started killing everything with Palkia, had my own Nidoqueen to heal, all he could do was mimic for like 4 turns, and 6-0d him. Although ya he got a bad start, but I think that it was for sure a misplay to go for Nidoqueen t1 when you have nothing else in your hand -_- He could have got chatot and started to mimic, is not like I was gonna KO his chatot right away. He played upper energies I think as well so he really could have had a shot in this game.
4-2
Round 7: Japanese player with Luxape
Ok, so this was do or die. Pretty intense and I really wanted to win OBV. I got out Mewtwo pretty quick and he responded with a Dialga. I took I think 2 prizes before he leveld up and used unown Q to retreat it. So he had a Dialga on the bench shutting down my bodies, including my free retreat. Annoying. It was a really close game, but he had burned all of his Poketurns as well early on and sometimes did not have the 2 Luxray in play to get the crucial gust turn after turn. He was really nice as I used bebe's for Nidoqueen before realizing he still had dialga in play, so I asked him if I could get something else and he said yes. (I would have done the same, I always let people take back stuff, assuming its not like 3 turns after you played the card). So in the end I built a Flygon level X and after him using like 3 Power Sprays I finally got it out and just extreme attacked for the last 3 prizes, he had like 4 lv X pokemon in play haha (Luxray, Infernape, Uxie, Dialga) and I ended up winning by 2 prizes. One time he accidentally discarded his Energy Pickup for wind erosion while he had Dialga in play and I had not noticed it till a turn later. I let him shuffle it back in, but in the end even if he got heads it wouldnt have mattered, as he already used like Aarons/NM/Premier Ball and had no way of killing my flygon or gusting something else. A key switch in the middle of the game enabled me to get my Palkia X out of the active and unleash the extreme attack. He never killed my mewtwo, just went for cheap KOs on other stuff.
5-2
Top 32 vs Michael Chin (MIRROR :/ :/ :/ literally exact same deck, like 1-2 cards different)
Wow ok so we are the only 2 decks remaining that ran flygon palkia, and we play each other lol
Well I open with Palkia and have Palkia X and Chatot in my hand so I thuoght that this was the perfect start. I could get to messing him up right away. Well, it really didnt work as well as I had hoped, and I was missing some key energy drops and was only able to build one Flygon. I knew that locking would not win me this game because he would save his unown G and he had 2 switches. I got up a prize and Bubble Coat left me with 10 HP so I thought I had the advantage. However, he then got his own Palkia out with a Switch and extreme attacked my Flygon X and started messing me around. Having used both my night maintenance and switch, I believe I had nidoqueen and maybe a 1 energy Flygon in play. I was really in bad shape after missed energy drops/evolutions. He then laid down a Mewtwo to get more off his Claydol (his Palkia was already dead and I knew he only ran 1 NM, and already used it. It came down to this. He had a 3-1 prize lead and I had a Flygon X Active with I think 70 damage on it. He could KO it with Nidoqueen next turn. This was already 50 minutes into the round so I was like wow how did I misplay and lose this game after getting t2 Palkia X. Then I see my only potential hope. He has about 6 cards left in his deck and a lot of stuff discarded. So...I go through his discard pile.
6 Energies, including 2 P energies. In play, he has...2 Call Energy on Chatot (Yes, during the game we both used CHATTER to lock), PWCall on his Nidoqueen and F on his Flygon. So....assuming he played the same energy I did...he had no more energy left in his hand/deck. I was like wow, I might have a shot here. I had memory berry on my active flygon X and inviting trapped the 0 energy mewtwo. I had my own nidoqueen healing so if I survived that turn his only OHKO thread would be Mewtwo X, as I knew there was no way he had TWO energy left to put on Flygon to KO me. So, I discard from his deck. He then uses energy absorption to put 2 P energy on his mewtwo, and then I use Sand tomb, and have 120 Hp remaining. If he has any kind of energy left, he wins... He has 2 cards left in his deck. He plays rose from his hand and flips them over...no energy. He can retreat the mewtwo but his nidoqueen cant KO me and i win by decking him :/ This was probably the craziest game of Pokemon I have ever played, and my brain was seriously fried. Like without a doubt the most bizarre and difficult match I have ever played. Both running Palkia, both have the lock option...crazy.
So we have about 20 minutes for game 2, and he gets off to a killer start. But I tell myself there is no way he is taking 4 prizes on me in ths time. So lol I intentionally open with Azelf and use Lock up and start locking his Chatot. I got out Palkia X and was using Chatter during the game as well. After a while, he did find both switch and had the game for sure locked up, but time ran out with him being up 6-4. He needed 2 more turns to force sudden death but I was not going to let it happen. I did not slowplay, but just adjusted my play to win on time as opposed to going for somthing else.
Sucks I had to eliminate him as I was rooting for him too, but one of us had to lose.
Top 16: Jayson Harry with Palkia Luxray
I was told prior to this game that I would get a prize loss for "marked sleeves" lol because they were in such bad condition, even though they were official Pokemon sleeves that I had only used for the tournament yesterday, and had been changing them throughout the day. I would have been more upset if I didnt know I basically had an autowin. What really bothered me though is that one of the judges said the "important cards" were marked which I found rather annyoing as this challenged my character and integrity regarding the game I have been playing for 5+ years. This clearly showed me that they were just unnecessarily overreacting as there was no way I had done any such thing. The sleeves were just poor quality and they broke easily, they were the only sleeves I had for the deck as I did not get my welcome package till Friday morning. Especially frustrating is that they are Pokemon sleeves (the weavile ones I think) so what kind of product are they trying to promote if they can't even last a day of competition. Again, I would have cared more if I didnt have autowin, but what really bothered me was the hint that I could be cheating. Frustrating and dishreatening, but whatever I know I did nothing wrong. I felt that other than this the judges did a great job during the event.
After my top 32 game I knew I was playing against Jayson H. with palkia luxray with no mewtwo counter. So obviously I get mewtwo out I win. And I ended up getting it out T2 both games :/ lol, first game he said he was a cyrus away from KOing it, and second game he lets me go first, I open with Trapinch and draw for turn...Mewtwo lol ;/ Play it down and bebes next turn for the lv X.
He was really nice about it, I know it sucks, but it's a risk he took by not playing any counter, and like he said the cards that he put in over the Mewtwo Counter won him games earlier on.
Top 8 vs Sami Sekkoum (Flygon/Machamp/Nidoqueen)
So I had been thinking about this and thought I might have the advantage here because of Palkia, but I knew that Machamp X as an alternative attacker to Flygon could win it for him, and this ended up being the case.
Game one I opened fairly slowly and missed energy drops, could only build one Flygon, and could not find Bubble Coat. He played 2 unown Gs and dropped them early on so locking was not going to be an option. I then made what might have been a mistake of leaving my Nidoran active (that I opened with, I could not find RC Queen) so he could take an easy prize with Machamp's take out. He ran Upper Energies as well so I knew that I would not be able to win unless I kept behind one prize basically the whole game. A lot of things would have to go right in order for me to win this. I start power swining but I think I could only find one Flygon to build up, even though I had 2 claydols in play. After Machamp took him 2 prizes I started taking a few, but he always had a 2 prize lead. Ditto really made things a lot worse, and even though I had palkia he always had an answer for my KOs. I missed key evolution drops for Power swing KOs as well as key energy drops that I could just not recover from. Ditto and Machamp lv X won him the game when he used take out for 100 on my Nidoqueen with 20 damage. TBH I did not see it coming, I thought he would have to flip for hurriance punch (oops) but I don't think there was antyhing I could have done anyways. He had even whiffed on the Lucians a couple of times to essentially seal the win, but even then he was just too far ahead.
Game two I opened horrendously and had to Mimic while he got out flygon t2. I was way too far behind, and he dropped a Trapinch to fill up his bench so I could have won with a lock, but then he quickly took it back to his hand lol and roseanned for 2 unown Gs and played them first on his azelf and claydol. He was up in prizes 4-2 I think after I made a mini comeback while pulling off a Palkia X/switch KO on his flygon. He had Machamp up and my level X was up with 2 damage counters on it. Time was ending on his turn so he won for sure anyways, I just wanted him to hit the 120 on Hurricane punch to make me feel better about not scooping game 1 earlier. He did and that sealed it right there. Good games Sami, youre an awesome player and I was rooting for you to win the whole thing. I didnt feel bad, knowing there was nothing I could have done to avoid this given the cards I was drawn. To his credit, Sami played it extremely well, executing the match almost flawlessly.
Well, it was a good run and I had a great time and at least walked away with something to show for my efforts. Like I said, I really think I would have done a lot more damage if the deck had been kept secret, but what can you do.
Thanks to Tyler and Mikey for showing me this deck, as well as Pooka especially who helped me test a lot for worlds.
A special thanks to Patrick C for everything throughout the season, including helping me with cards as well as letting me stay with him and Connor in SD. Having a really good sleep both nights helped as my brain really was wrecked from all the thinking involved with the deck. Sucks that Connor couldnt top cut, but it was great to see that he had a fun time. Too bad you were one win away from grinding in as well with the same deck, it shows that it really was a force to be reckoned with
Another special thanks to Tracy and the whole Canadian crew who raised money for the 3rd place finishers at Canadian nationals to attend worlds. This really helped a great deal, and I truly appreciate everyone's interest to make sure Canada was well-represented on the world stage.
It was great to see everyone again, and even though I was only there Thursday-Sunday I had a great time hanging out with all my friends.
Congrats to the winners and final 4 of all the divisions but masters especially, and a gold star to Steve who won with a creative deck that was a huge gamble, but ended up being great for this metagame.
Thanks to our BC PTO Steve for once again committing so much time and making sure all our events ran smoothly.
Sorry if I forgot anyone or anything and I may make some edits, but it was a great event and a really enjoyable season. See you all in the future!!!
Sebastian
I played Tyranitar and did well all season until RR came out
where Nidoqueen and Lucario just wrecked it. So, I had to make a switch for nationals. I sucked at playing SP decks so I went with Flygon/Weavile and got 3rd place. I ran well here, but overall I was not really satisfied with the deck as I thought it just needed too much to get going consistently.In all my years of success I have definitely not been known as a deckbuilder. I take decks and test with them for hours, perfecting lists over time and using my playing ability to win me games. But I don't think I have ever really created a deck that has done exceptionally well.
After nationals, Mikey Fouchet showed me this deck he made, Flygon/Gliscor lv X which would paralyze the opponent forever and deck them. I liked it, but I thought that with power sprays/other things it was a little bit too vulnerable. So, a week or two later, he showed me another list, and this time I really liked it. Tyler Ninomura had come up with a deck using Flygon lv X, Palkia, and Memory Berry on Trapinch's Sand Tomb that would lock the opponent forever until they decked. Ever since 2006 when Jeremy Maron won a game using pidgey's corner lock on a holon's castform I have been looking for a way to exploit this, and this seemed like the perfect idea. And combined with the fact that I play on average faster than almost anyone I can think of, decking was a viable strategy for me. In my 5 years of playing Pokemon, I have only lost on time ONCE.
The original list with average at best but the concept was very intriguing. I have never been a player who keeps decks secret, but this time I acted differently as I really thought this could be the deck. I spent my summer only playtesting with literally 3 people (Mikey, Gordon, and Pooka) and revealed this deck only to them.
I knew that in order for the deck to win masters the "surprise" factor would be there. Even playing against Pooka with Luxape he will be the first to admit he fell right into the trap the first 2 or 3 games, and I ended up winning all of those. If the US national champion misplayed against this deck (using Sp nonetheless, which was supposed to be Flygon's closest matchup), who's to say anyone else wouldnt.
So the week of worlds rolled around, and I was feeling confident as ever using this deck that if I got through the swiss rounds (avoiding bad starts and potentially losses on time) I could really do some damage in the 75 minute 2/3 rounds. I expected the metagame to be a lot of SP/Gengar/Machamp.
Over the weeks of testing this is what the decklist had become:
3 Trapinch SW
1 Vibrava SW (greater HP, avoids luxray KOs, has free retreat when Flygon has F energy, and Sand Wind can be used when you have their claydol up etc.)
1 Vibrava RR
3 Flygon RR
1 Flygon lv X
2 Baltoy
2 Claydol
1 Nidoran RR
1 Nidoqueen (won Gengar matchup and Kingdra Matchup single handedly, and I surely expected more Gengars and Kingdras than Flygons, as there were like 0 at US nats. If I had known there was gonna be this many Flygon I would have ran Dusknoir :/)
1 Palkia MD (100 HP, only +20 weak to L)
1 Palkia lv X (IMO won me every single matchup vs non SP deck)
1 Unown G GE (enough to win you the gengar matchup, only need to G claydol and you can deck them)
1 Uxie LA
1 Azelf LA
1 Chatot MD (more important than Uxie in this deck IMO)
1 Mewtwo MD
1 Mewtwo lv X (done extensive testing on whether mewtwo or machamp was better, I went with Mewtwo as 1/0/1 Machamp I felt people could play around. And also, hey, Mewtwo can autowin you games if people run no counter. And even if they play a counter in SP, read on to my trainers to find out what I had planned for them)
4 Roseannes
4 Bebes
4 Rare Candy
2 Cynthias
2 Premier Ball
2 Night Maintenance (awesome, for energies as well)
2 Switch (2nd was last minute addition, GREAT call, thanks to tyler N for the input)
2 Memory Berry (was thinking about 3, but vs SP it did not always get used much and I figured SP would be the main threat)
1 Luxury Ball ( i cannot stand 2 in basically any other deck than Kingdra)
1 Broken Time Space (sort of like 5th rare candy, I had tested 2 all summer but dropped the 2nd one for the switch, this was the correct move. I like having at least one, I hate the possibility of my Claydol being Luxrayed and not being able to respond with another one immediately)
1 Bubble Coat (originally I came up with this idea the night before worlds to avoid Mewtwo being one-shotted by Ninetales or any other SP counter *still not sure about the mismagius ruling, if crash chant would apply weakness or not lol* so that I would autowin basically vs any SP. I would just keep doing 60 with mewtwo and if they brought up Ninetales or w/e I would do 120 and still be alive. Who knew that it would be so key for all the Flygon Mirrors I would face =\)
4 Call energy
3 F Energy
3 P energy
2 W energy
If anyone has any questions about the list please feel free to ask and I will answer them. But I felt super solid about this list prior to leaving for SD and was ready to roll.
The goal of this deck was basically to deck everybody expect SP, where you would generally go for the prize win. Dusknoir was a card that for sure hurt us but if I knew they played dusknoir I could usually get the lock down and play smartly and win.
I am not scheduled to arrive to SD until Thursday so I talk to a friend from BC on the computer, who is already at worlds. I ask him, so, any secret decks rolling around? (having a smug grin to myself as I am typing this) He says "yeah, for sure." I say, what? he says "Flygon with Memory Berry and Palkia."
I'm like .............. to myself and was extremely rattled. I had been working so hard all summer to keep this deck secret as I knew surprise factor was SO huge in its success. If it did well in the grinder, big deal, I don't think people would really have enough time to get a solid list and practice. But no one outside of our little group could know about it in order for it to work really well. Unfortunately, the deck had been played in the open and as always, when people see a new deck they jump on it and it spreads like wildfire, whether it is a good deck or not.
OK, great, so the deck ended up taking 3rd in masters and 2nd and 3rd in seniors if I am not mistaken, and after the deck was made public sure I am happy about these results. But to be honest I really don't care about anyone else doing well with the deck,outside of myself and my circle of friends, and there were 4 of us who were planning on using the deck in the main event. I am quite confident that if the deck was still a secret I would have had a much better chance at getting a higher placing.
Due to people's knowledge about the deck, this is what occurred:
- Additions of Warp Points and more Unown Gs
- People teching in Dusknoir
- More people playing Flygon variants (Flygon variants are not really a problem for the deck unless they run Dusknoir or extra G's/warp points)
- People teching in Ditto
- Biggest of all, people being AWARE the deck existed and knowing what to do against it. AKA not playing down full benches, making sure you attached unown Gs to pokemon like Claydol and stuff, and saving your warp points for times when you got locked. people adjusted their play when they saw my deck to EXPECT the lock coming.)
So after all this disappointment I was still gonna run the deck as I was hopefully relying on my playing ability and I still thought I had good matchups against the board. I had NO IDEA that there were going to be THAT MANY flygons in the main event though, my god.
Well anyways, onto my games.
Round 1 vs French Player (Gyarados)
So I have a brutal start and when I open with a trapinch and my opponent tells me that he is going first I am like jesus am I really gonna get Sableye donked first round haha. Anyways, I survive the first turn and use Call energy to start getting setup. He then plays down a Magikarp, and I'm like OK, great, I get to play vs some noob for an easy opening win. But then I realize I have noidea what Gyarados does, and look how well they did in the event. He surprises me with a turn 3 90 damage with a Registeel (another card that I have no idea what it does) and KOs my trapinch. So I was really stuck after that. I was claydoling and not drawing into anything. I kept having to sacrifice stuff and ended up going down 6-2 before I finally setup and got the lock. He had a Claydol and 2 Sableyes in play with no unown G and had used 3 Scoop ups and 3 Poketurns on Crobat. At one point he cosmiced some cards to the bottom of his deck to draw 0 and he was like "oops, misplay" and I was like OK, take it back (I always let ppl take stuff back unless they didnt let me do it earlier). And later in the game for some reason I thought I could KO his gyarados instead of going for the lock and win, so I retreated when I should have used Restructure instead. I asked him if I could take that back, and sure enough, he let me, because I had let him take back that Cosmic Power earlier. That's how I operate and that's how I beleive everyone should play. What goes around comes around, and I needed to make that correct play to win.All in all I locked his Sableye with Sand tomb and discarded his last scoop up and warp point (wouldnt have mattered, as I could have pushed up Nidoqueen to take a gyarados hit) and he didnt take another prize. I had him down to like 6-7 cards and he scooped.
1-0
Round 2 vs German Player (Flygon)
So I get going pretty well, and I get a lock going pretty early I believe. I also use Palkia to my advantage and get some KOs. I also make the mistake of filling up my bench. I then discard Dusknoir with wind erosion and I'm like crap. Well he sure enough ends up NMing and warp pointing out of the lock for a huge turn with Flygon X/Dusknoir. But I had built an early lead and still thought I had the game sealed till I saw Ditto. My bubble coat came in handy as he was forced to attack me with Blissey to discard it. It ended up being a close game down to 2-2 in prizes approaching the end of the time limit.
This is basically why I was frustrated that the deck had been exposed. Let's run through what he had in his deck, no exaggerations.
- Dusknoir/Queen
- TWO Bubble Coat
- TWO Warp Point
- Ditto
- Blissey
- Flygon SW
Most of those being techs specifically for Mirror IMO. Great. WELL, after ALL OF THAT, it was 2-2 tied in prizes and time was called on my turn, all the time realizing i had the win. I played Trapinch, Broken Time Space, Vibrava, Energy, Baltoy Claydol, to enable myself to draw the last 7 remaining cards in my deck to make sure I could draw my switch (1 NM and 1 Switch were my last 2 prizes) and did 160 with Vibrava. I would have definitely lost if the match had been played out, but it was my opponents fault as I was, as usual the one playing faster and he took longer turns. And to lose to me when he had THAT MANY techs to beat me is his problem, I did not feel bad at all. I was so frustrated after this match as I really realized how much people knew about my deck :/
2-0
Round 3: Karl Blake from UK with Flygon/Weavile
Woo another Flygon matchup. Ok well I started out OK and had a lock going on his weavile. I basically had the game won as I had another Pokemon to Lock on his bench and had Palkia in play, so I could deck him. However, I saw that my 2nd memory berry was prized and that if he had warp point I could very well lose the matchup. I really don't think that most people would play Warp Point in a Flygon deck (that gives everybody free retreat anyways :/) unless they had a specific reason to. Also, sure enough, I discarded a Dusknoir off the top of his deck, which he later Nmed in to screw me over. Sure enough, he draws the warp point, and I had laid down 4 on my bench ( I think I had to, but this was before I saw the Dusknoir. Probably my fault though as I should have assumed by playing against any FLygon deck that they would have dusk in it), and the warp point was definitely the TSN Turning Point. He got out Dusk and I took one prize in an effort to get my 2nd memory berry ( I could not play azelf, that would be autoloss), and it didnt happen, so I lost. If I have the 2nd memory berry in my deck I win. Oh well, thats the risk I took by only playing 2.
2-1
Round 4: Guy who grinded in with Palkia Luxray
Ok so I open Ok and start getting setup, after he takes 3 prizes I am finally able to get Mewtwo out and it eventually becomes my lone Pokemon in play and he just scoops. (Mewtwo>Machamp vs SP for sure I think.)
3-1
Round 5: Player from Denmark with Gengar Dusknoir
So he shows me his mulligan and I see a Gengar I believe. Well long story short I dont see a Duskull till a few turns into the game and by that time my bench is already past 3 (jesus, how many dusknoir are there). I have a lock going with a Flygon X but then of course, he has warp point, moonlight stadium, and dark palm to basically seal the game. Night Spin screwed me over as I thought I would get a KO one time, but basically what sealed him the victory here is that he had the Dusknoir Self damage one so he could have an alternate attacking threat. I only ran 1 G, and had to G claydol to avoid gengar knocking it out. He made numerous what I thought were misplays in this game, but there was no way he was going to lose with his Dusknoirs/Warp/Moonlights and my only real attacker being Flygon. Friday evening I knew that I might end up playing him again if I were to make top 8, so I schemed about how I would beat this deck and I thought I could do it by attacking with Nidoqueen. Ends up I didnt play him again, but o well ;/
3-2
So great, now I had to win out.
Round 6: vs Gino with Flygon
Well, this ended up not being much of a game. I go first, and he starts with a lone Nidoran, and ends up going for a T1 Nidoqueen and uses Mega punch lol. Well he had nothing else so I took my sweet time and got setup, and literally for 4-5 turns he attached energy and Mega punched or something. So while I was setting up all he had was a Nidoqueen and a Trapinch. Once I got a flygon out I just started killing everything with Palkia, had my own Nidoqueen to heal, all he could do was mimic for like 4 turns, and 6-0d him. Although ya he got a bad start, but I think that it was for sure a misplay to go for Nidoqueen t1 when you have nothing else in your hand -_- He could have got chatot and started to mimic, is not like I was gonna KO his chatot right away. He played upper energies I think as well so he really could have had a shot in this game.
4-2
Round 7: Japanese player with Luxape
Ok, so this was do or die. Pretty intense and I really wanted to win OBV. I got out Mewtwo pretty quick and he responded with a Dialga. I took I think 2 prizes before he leveld up and used unown Q to retreat it. So he had a Dialga on the bench shutting down my bodies, including my free retreat. Annoying. It was a really close game, but he had burned all of his Poketurns as well early on and sometimes did not have the 2 Luxray in play to get the crucial gust turn after turn. He was really nice as I used bebe's for Nidoqueen before realizing he still had dialga in play, so I asked him if I could get something else and he said yes. (I would have done the same, I always let people take back stuff, assuming its not like 3 turns after you played the card). So in the end I built a Flygon level X and after him using like 3 Power Sprays I finally got it out and just extreme attacked for the last 3 prizes, he had like 4 lv X pokemon in play haha (Luxray, Infernape, Uxie, Dialga) and I ended up winning by 2 prizes. One time he accidentally discarded his Energy Pickup for wind erosion while he had Dialga in play and I had not noticed it till a turn later. I let him shuffle it back in, but in the end even if he got heads it wouldnt have mattered, as he already used like Aarons/NM/Premier Ball and had no way of killing my flygon or gusting something else. A key switch in the middle of the game enabled me to get my Palkia X out of the active and unleash the extreme attack. He never killed my mewtwo, just went for cheap KOs on other stuff.
5-2
Top 32 vs Michael Chin (MIRROR :/ :/ :/ literally exact same deck, like 1-2 cards different)
Wow ok so we are the only 2 decks remaining that ran flygon palkia, and we play each other lol
Well I open with Palkia and have Palkia X and Chatot in my hand so I thuoght that this was the perfect start. I could get to messing him up right away. Well, it really didnt work as well as I had hoped, and I was missing some key energy drops and was only able to build one Flygon. I knew that locking would not win me this game because he would save his unown G and he had 2 switches. I got up a prize and Bubble Coat left me with 10 HP
so I thought I had the advantage. However, he then got his own Palkia out with a Switch and extreme attacked my Flygon X and started messing me around. Having used both my night maintenance and switch, I believe I had nidoqueen and maybe a 1 energy Flygon in play. I was really in bad shape after missed energy drops/evolutions. He then laid down a Mewtwo to get more off his Claydol (his Palkia was already dead and I knew he only ran 1 NM, and already used it. It came down to this. He had a 3-1 prize lead and I had a Flygon X Active with I think 70 damage on it. He could KO it with Nidoqueen next turn. This was already 50 minutes into the round so I was like wow how did I misplay and lose this game after getting t2 Palkia X. Then I see my only potential hope. He has about 6 cards left in his deck and a lot of stuff discarded. So...I go through his discard pile.6 Energies, including 2 P energies. In play, he has...2 Call Energy on Chatot (Yes, during the game we both used CHATTER to lock), PWCall on his Nidoqueen and F on his Flygon. So....assuming he played the same energy I did...he had no more energy left in his hand/deck. I was like wow, I might have a shot here. I had memory berry on my active flygon X and inviting trapped the 0 energy mewtwo. I had my own nidoqueen healing so if I survived that turn his only OHKO thread would be Mewtwo X, as I knew there was no way he had TWO energy left to put on Flygon to KO me. So, I discard from his deck. He then uses energy absorption to put 2 P energy on his mewtwo, and then I use Sand tomb, and have 120 Hp remaining. If he has any kind of energy left, he wins... He has 2 cards left in his deck. He plays rose from his hand and flips them over...no energy. He can retreat the mewtwo but his nidoqueen cant KO me and i win by decking him :/ This was probably the craziest game of Pokemon I have ever played, and my brain was seriously fried. Like without a doubt the most bizarre and difficult match I have ever played. Both running Palkia, both have the lock option...crazy.
So we have about 20 minutes for game 2, and he gets off to a killer start. But I tell myself there is no way he is taking 4 prizes on me in ths time. So lol I intentionally open with Azelf and use Lock up and start locking his Chatot. I got out Palkia X and was using Chatter during the game as well. After a while, he did find both switch and had the game for sure locked up, but time ran out with him being up 6-4. He needed 2 more turns to force sudden death but I was not going to let it happen. I did not slowplay, but just adjusted my play to win on time as opposed to going for somthing else.
Sucks I had to eliminate him as I was rooting for him too, but one of us had to lose.
Top 16: Jayson Harry with Palkia Luxray
I was told prior to this game that I would get a prize loss for "marked sleeves" lol because they were in such bad condition, even though they were official Pokemon sleeves that I had only used for the tournament yesterday, and had been changing them throughout the day. I would have been more upset if I didnt know I basically had an autowin. What really bothered me though is that one of the judges said the "important cards" were marked which I found rather annyoing as this challenged my character and integrity regarding the game I have been playing for 5+ years. This clearly showed me that they were just unnecessarily overreacting as there was no way I had done any such thing. The sleeves were just poor quality and they broke easily, they were the only sleeves I had for the deck as I did not get my welcome package till Friday morning. Especially frustrating is that they are Pokemon sleeves (the weavile ones I think) so what kind of product are they trying to promote if they can't even last a day of competition. Again, I would have cared more if I didnt have autowin, but what really bothered me was the hint that I could be cheating. Frustrating and dishreatening, but whatever I know I did nothing wrong. I felt that other than this the judges did a great job during the event.
After my top 32 game I knew I was playing against Jayson H. with palkia luxray with no mewtwo counter. So obviously I get mewtwo out I win. And I ended up getting it out T2 both games :/ lol, first game he said he was a cyrus away from KOing it, and second game he lets me go first, I open with Trapinch and draw for turn...Mewtwo lol ;/ Play it down and bebes next turn for the lv X.
He was really nice about it, I know it sucks, but it's a risk he took by not playing any counter, and like he said the cards that he put in over the Mewtwo Counter won him games earlier on.
Top 8 vs Sami Sekkoum (Flygon/Machamp/Nidoqueen)
So I had been thinking about this and thought I might have the advantage here because of Palkia, but I knew that Machamp X as an alternative attacker to Flygon could win it for him, and this ended up being the case.
Game one I opened fairly slowly and missed energy drops, could only build one Flygon, and could not find Bubble Coat. He played 2 unown Gs and dropped them early on so locking was not going to be an option. I then made what might have been a mistake of leaving my Nidoran active (that I opened with, I could not find RC Queen) so he could take an easy prize with Machamp's take out. He ran Upper Energies as well so I knew that I would not be able to win unless I kept behind one prize basically the whole game. A lot of things would have to go right in order for me to win this. I start power swining but I think I could only find one Flygon to build up, even though I had 2 claydols in play. After Machamp took him 2 prizes I started taking a few, but he always had a 2 prize lead. Ditto really made things a lot worse, and even though I had palkia he always had an answer for my KOs. I missed key evolution drops for Power swing KOs as well as key energy drops that I could just not recover from. Ditto and Machamp lv X won him the game when he used take out for 100 on my Nidoqueen with 20 damage. TBH I did not see it coming, I thought he would have to flip for hurriance punch (oops) but I don't think there was antyhing I could have done anyways. He had even whiffed on the Lucians a couple of times to essentially seal the win, but even then he was just too far ahead.
Game two I opened horrendously and had to Mimic while he got out flygon t2. I was way too far behind, and he dropped a Trapinch to fill up his bench so I could have won with a lock, but then he quickly took it back to his hand lol and roseanned for 2 unown Gs and played them first on his azelf and claydol. He was up in prizes 4-2 I think after I made a mini comeback while pulling off a Palkia X/switch KO on his flygon. He had Machamp up and my level X was up with 2 damage counters on it. Time was ending on his turn so he won for sure anyways, I just wanted him to hit the 120 on Hurricane punch to make me feel better about not scooping game 1 earlier. He did and that sealed it right there. Good games Sami, youre an awesome player and I was rooting for you to win the whole thing. I didnt feel bad, knowing there was nothing I could have done to avoid this given the cards I was drawn. To his credit, Sami played it extremely well, executing the match almost flawlessly.
Well, it was a good run and I had a great time and at least walked away with something to show for my efforts. Like I said, I really think I would have done a lot more damage if the deck had been kept secret, but what can you do.
Thanks to Tyler and Mikey for showing me this deck, as well as Pooka especially who helped me test a lot for worlds.
A special thanks to Patrick C for everything throughout the season, including helping me with cards as well as letting me stay with him and Connor in SD. Having a really good sleep both nights helped as my brain really was wrecked from all the thinking involved with the deck. Sucks that Connor couldnt top cut, but it was great to see that he had a fun time. Too bad you were one win away from grinding in as well with the same deck, it shows that it really was a force to be reckoned with
Another special thanks to Tracy and the whole Canadian crew who raised money for the 3rd place finishers at Canadian nationals to attend worlds. This really helped a great deal, and I truly appreciate everyone's interest to make sure Canada was well-represented on the world stage.
It was great to see everyone again, and even though I was only there Thursday-Sunday I had a great time hanging out with all my friends.
Congrats to the winners and final 4 of all the divisions but masters especially, and a gold star to Steve who won with a creative deck that was a huge gamble, but ended up being great for this metagame.
Thanks to our BC PTO Steve for once again committing so much time and making sure all our events ran smoothly.
Sorry if I forgot anyone or anything and I may make some edits, but it was a great event and a really enjoyable season. See you all in the future!!!
Sebastian
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