Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Bigger accomplishment?

There is never a shortage of drama on the Pokegym. Way too much time on people's hands, god I hate the internet.

Venucenter should have taken the ECSTS 2000. Darn IQ and his dumb Wigglytuff deck:(. I still have the Top 8 binder from that event, I sometimes contemplate its value on eBay vs. it's sentimental worth.
 
Joshman said:
There is never a shortage of drama on the Pokegym. Way too much time on people's hands, god I hate the internet.

Venucenter should have taken the ECSTS 2000. Darn IQ and his dumb Wigglytuff deck:(. I still have the Top 8 binder from that event, I sometimes contemplate its value on eBay vs. it's sentimental worth.
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Didn't the unexpected Clefable do good at the 2000?
 
A few things I've got to say...

Moss is right about people that have made Top8 at worlds twice in a row. Out of the 15+ (the only numbers I could find) Tsuguyoshi Yamoto is the only person to appear in the top8 both times.

A top cut that goes to single-elimination is essentially a flawed tournament, it doesn't neccissarily decide who is better, but who gets luckier. (Insert a comment about the Grinder here.)

What was the top prize at the STSs? Wasn't it a box of cards and a hat? (Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.) And whats the prize at Worlds? A minimum $15,000 in $$$ and prizes. If I were going to both, I'd be much more serious when BIGGER prizes are on the line.



As a last comment, I wish Moss's WCSTS report had NOT been deleted. It was an excelent view of what this game had been, and how we've advanced from the time when WOTC ran everything.
 
This is sorta off topic, but since I wasn't playing during the STS days...

Mossy, can you comment on the game compared to back then to now (or last years format at worlds to keep this on topic)? Do you think there was more skill required back then or at worlds last year? Please talk about deck building and actually playing if you can. :D
 
Its curious. When modified first hit, as Fulop and I were discussing earlier, nobody knew WHAT to do. There were no Modified qualifiers and the first real tournament to premier modified was the ECSTS. Deckbuilding became HUGE. The range of just strait up HORRIBLE decks compared to people who found the cream of the crop gave you a TREMENDOUS advantage in those days. Now, we have lots of tournaments to allow us to gague not only format shifts, but how each new set changes the metagame. This can be good and bad: it allows good players to metagame more accurately, but allows bad players a chance to netdeck a very up-to-date list.

As far as sheer deckbuilding was concerned its curious as well. Singles were a little less important because you didn't have Pidgeot/Magcargo to search them out of the deck. However that isn't to say you couldn't run lots of tech. With Cleffa, Elm and Wrath, you were able to cycle through a lot of your deck to get what you needed, and often the singles made the difference. While it seemed like Gatr was the best deck, a LOT of players still didn't run it (the majority, I believe) and there were quite big differences between lists. I find that nowadays people run very similar lists in most decks. Nidoqueen, Rock lock, BSP, Ludicolo, T2, ZRE, etc, lists between top players are often EXTREMELY similar. In fact I remember being very surprised at Vernola's GC Rock lock list last year, even though it was literally like 6-7 cards off mine. You'd be hard-pressed to find even the most cookie-cutter decks exactly the same at the STSs.

Playing skill is odd. I'd have to say it depends on the matchup. I liked the STS formats because it seemed like there were no autolosses. You were never a 70-80% underdog, maybe your WORST matchup was like a 40/60, but even then. You can have really good, skillful matches like Ludi vs. Nidoqueen or whathave you, but you still have the Rock Lock vs. Medicham blowouts. I hate that. You lose the baby factor, but I still feel that Cleffa was very good for the game, even if I cursed my 10th attempt to kill a banded baby.

I can't comment on 15/3, because I wasn't playing pokemon at that point (I had taken a break because of marching band and wrestling). I sucked pretty bad and was a total nub during the first WCSTS days (not much has changed =[ ), so I can't comment really there either. I did think the first modified was a great format. Jason's T4, T2, Hanley's back-to-back, Brook's back-to-back, Seena's T4 - 1st, my T8 - 1st have to be evidence that despite MASSIVE fields and best-of-one matches there was a ton of skill in the format.

My WCSTS report: http://www.pojo.com/Features/WCSTS/sts1211/My STS Report (Matt Moss T8 day1 T1 day2).htm
 
Moss, the way you describe the matchups, it makes it sounds like playing Ludi right now would be like playing a deck back then. If your worst matchups were only 40/60, doesn't that mean your best matchups could only be 60/40? I'm kinda confused by this, do you mean that the deck YOU used was only 40/60 at worst, then all other matchups were highly favorable?
 
The online community was bigger then than it is now.
There were big communities at PokeGym, Pojo, PokeSchool, and a few other TCG sites. Pojo's was probably the biggest, but if I recall the threads at the time, a lot were "noobs" (with notable exceptions)while the PokeGym prided itself on having a more experienced membership.
 
Exactly.

It seem to me like it would be easier to win an STS because (although there were more people) there were less people that knew what the heck they were doing.
 
I have a comment on this... Having Played In Both STS (On The East Coast)

I am pretty sure that Sneasel Wasnt Banned For That Event If I Remember Correctly, I am Pretty Sure If It Wasnt Allowed I have complete lost memory of it...

Also, A Comment Earlier said you had to be a Semi-Great/Good Player to Qualify to Worlds... I "Strongly" Disagree with that... I mean in all serious, You could have a Awesome Deck (Gotten From Someone Else) but be a horrible player, but the deck is so good that it wont matter, There are a Few That Do That, But I Guarentuee They Exist...
Drew
 
Jermy: I'm letting that one slide because you won WORLDS.

Adam: What I mean by the 60/40s is that if you were playing Gatr vs. Crobat, a deck SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED to beat Gatr, you were, at worst, a 40/60 dog. Depending on how good that player was, and the decks didn't exactly play themselves, so there were plenty of them, you could sway it even to an advantage.

I was just of the impression that, even though Gatr was by far the best deck, you were never guaranteed a win and lots of decks had very legitamate shots at you. Thats part of the reason so many people didn't play Gatr: even though it wasn't the best, you always had a very legitamate shot against it.

Another reason people didn't play Gatr was because there wern't many opportunities to get a thermometer for the format. There were two STSs a year, and thus from one to the other there wern't many chances to get out there and see what was happening. Also the only tournaments between STSs were the QTs, of which people simply didn't travel for because there were no trips for the 15+. Therefore you didn't have many opportunities to gague the larger metagame (such as GCs, Regionals, Nationals). This reduced the ammount of netdecking and made it possible for you to truely come up with a great deck that just shocked the field and plowed through it. Honestly, Gatr at the ECSTS was rogue and I'm positive it wasn't played nearly more than the field at the WCSTS. It did, however, outperform by a wide margin.
 
where is the fun if everyone plays the same deck? it is still just as much luck as it would be 'skill'.

STS is more of a 'big tournament' from either coast, it definately doesn't have the diversity of the current 'worlds'. Not to mention more players doesn't mean harder, i bet back then i participated in local tournaments with as many people as nationals but that doesn't mean that tourney was 'equivalent' to nationals.


Stop living in old glory :wink:
 
Actually that isn't true. They gave trips out in Europe and therefore we had a very nice international scene. The only thing really lacking was Japanese players, but I don't really feel like I missed out because they all herd together and don't speak english. No offense, but you can't really chill with someone who you can't talk to.

In my opinion there were MORE really good players in the game than before. When you think about it, the vast majority of the good players now played back then. However we've lost quite a few amazing players along the way. Hanley, Rudy Rodrieguez, Bomiester, Brooks (he really doesn't play, cmon), etc etc. A good portion of our game's best players from back then aren't here. And they honestly haven't been replaced.

So while there were just so MANY players that you could easily play a very bad one, there were more great players by a long shot.

Sneasel has never been legal in non-unlimited tournament play, ever.

Stop living in old glory.
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Tell that to John Elway.
 
Moss is right, there WERE better players back then than there is now. The game is much different now, there ARE blowout matchups and with so much divesity in deck selection comes the luck of drawing a good matchup. The STS fields were also WAY WAY WAY bigger than Worlds. I also saw someone post somewhere else that "games are won at the tables" well that's true, but there is a lot of prep that goes into deck construction, testing, playing a deck correctly in game, etc. that could possibly have been more effective back in the STS days, I mean friggin Dark Steelix has to be the least skilled deck in the HISTORY of the game and it can top 8 Worlds, that shows IMO.
 
Yeah that's a good point Chad. Decks that take no skill to play shouldn't be able to do well in a tourny like Worlds.

That is a pretty big difference from back then and now I think. I got back into the game right around Super Battlezones, when the format was Neon, and I don't remember any decks that were similar to the turn 2 decks we have today, like Slowking, Zapdos, and Steelix. (I won't include Medicham in those because that does take some skill). Those turn 2 decks do kinda give unskilled players a chance to luck out and do well.

Also, the fact that we have more tournies today does make it easier for people to know what decks are best to use. It's hard to keep a good deck secret. Last year we were able to keep Nidoqueen secret (even though I used it at Nats). If I had better luck, I could have at least made the cut, possibly won Nationals with it, but since I did it the deck stayed on the low down. It was by luck that the deck stayed secret until Worlds.

That is a big thing now imo, figuring out what deck you should play at each tourny. Do I use Secret.DEC at States, or save it until Regionals? Can I win without that deck? How important is it that I win this tourny? Those kind of questions factor in now, but back then I don't see any of those questions popping up. You would just play the best deck possible.
 
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