Hey everyone, this is David Sun from Toronto, Ontario, Canada writing about my regionals journey that happened this weekend. I am a new master division player who started my competitve pokemon TCG career this season at battle roads, although I started doing research on the competitve metagame during cities of the 2011-12 season.
Here is the decklist I used for Virginia Regionals:
Pokemon (14)
Rayquaza-EX x3
Rayquaza x1
Zekrom x1
Tynamo (thunder wave) x4
Eelektrik (dynamotor) x4
Ditto x1
Supporter (14)
Professor Juniper x4
N x4
Bianca x4
Cheren x2
Stadium (2)
Skyarrow Bridge x2
Item (15)
Computer Search x1
Ultra ball x4
Level ball x2
Tool Scrapper x2
Super Rod x2
Switch x4
Energy (15)
Fire Energy x6
Lightning Energy x9
As you can see right now, my list is extremely unorthodox as it plays no catchers. In fact, I have played Ray/eeles with no catchers for the last three cities in a row and all made top cut. Pokemon catcher is a very broken card by all means, but my build of Ray/eeles focuses on to use every single resource to do 180 damage turn after turn to guarentee OHKO everything. When I am able to do that consistently enough, there is no need for catchers. The extra room allowed me to play more supporters, more energies and more search cards to ensure my consistency.
I came up with the idea of not playing catchers first in Emboars decks last season, since I should be focusing on dropping as many fire on Mewtwo-EX as possible to KO my opponent's active (where normally all the energies are). This idea was solidified many times over the course of a year. Esa Juntunen once posted a Reshiboar decklist in his blog that favoured energies and pluspower over catchers to ensure OHKOs. Top Canadian players Curtis Lyon and Matthew Koo played Magneboar in the 2012 World Championships and both went 5-2 and whiffed top cut on resistance. I believed Magneboar was a really good play for the Worlds meta since it can OHKO any EX pokemon and can use Rayquaza & Deoxys Legend to KO everything else. This means if it gets set up consistently it will win the prize trade against all the tier 1 decks in that format everytime (Darkrai/Mewtwo, CMT, Zekrom/Eelektrik). In that deck pokemon catcher becomes of much less importance. They both only played 1 catcher and I like that since single item techs were justified by junk arm that format. I didn't think highly of Ray/eeles when it just came out, because I thought to do 180 turn after turn takes too much set up with eeles. When Boundaries Crossed's scans were just released on playTCG, I immediately tested Blastoise/Keldeo with no catchers. As we all know, Keldeo-EX has the ability to OHKO everything too. It ran well but had a bad Ray/eeles match-up since I need to drop 6 energies every turn while they are pretty much on auto-pilot when they set up 3 eeles. That's when I started serious testing with Ray/eeles without catchers.
Other things I like to note about my decklist: I played all thunder wave tynamos because in literally every single game I played with Ray/eeles, spark tynamo never helped me (I played Ray/eeles with no catchers for the majority of cities). Ditto is a great card in this deck as it is so versatile – it can be a 70 hp tynamo, it is my free retreater under skyarrow bridge and I can attach energies to it in advance when I can't find a rayquaza-EX fast enough. There are many other cool tricks I can do with ditto that I can't list them all. 2 tool scrappers are critical against Garbodor since I don't run catchers to potential KO all their garbodors. They are also essential to score OHKOs against eviolited EXs. Many players play only 1 super rod but I believe only 2 super rods ensure me to be able to play 1 in most of the games as 1 of them could be prized or discarded by juniper early on. 15 energies may seem too many but that allows me to celestial roar turn 1 with more confidence.
There are quite a few tech cards I have considered: Mewtwo-EX gives me a more direct response to opposing mewtwos, energy switch can be useful in many situations (at least there are many situations where I wished I played energy switch) and a single “tech” catcher can avoid my opponent forcing me to take 7 prizes and maybe stall some time. In the end, I stayed loyal to my gameplan: set up 3 eeles and do 180 every turn.
I came to Virginia with some very good Ontario players: Geneses Pabuna (2007 national champion), Rob Davies (2012 Ontario fall regionals champion AKA #1 pokedad
), Kevin Lee (consistent veteran player since base set) and Rob's son Jackson who did very well in the last two seasons in the junior division. They helped me test out the deck a lot the night before in the hotel which I am very thankful for.
I'm pretty bad with remembering names so forgive me on that.
Day 1
Round 1 VS Darkrai/Hydreigon
We both set up quite well and I started OHKO his darkrais. He wasn't able to charge up other attackers in time so by mid-game it was settled. His name is Steve and he is a really nice sport.
1-0
Round 2 VS Landorus/Terrakion/Empoleon
He drew very dead early game to the point where I had no clue what he was playing until T5. This gave me way too much time to set up and took the game from there.
2-0
Round 3 VS Klingklang
This game I got paired up with Geneses so that's a big bummer. It sucks to play against your friend so early in the tournament. Despite being a favourable matchup for me, he can take full advantage of knowing that I don't run catchers which can turn the game around completely. Starting from T2 he drew dead and again I got extra time to set up. But he knew about my secret so he walled with Sigilyph mid-game which forced me to go Rayquaza. He made me go down to one prize, N'd me, and Koed my eelektrik. I drew dead from the N and although I still had 1 eele in play (I think) it wasn't enough for me to OHKO the attacking darkrai back. I carefully considered my options as I know his list as well as he knows mine. Using Rayquaza's shred to do 90 would be absolutely pointless since even if he whiffed max potion he can just retreat to another attacker. So I send up a halfly charged Rayquaza-EX and celestial roared and got 2 lightning energies. I know there's nothing left in his deck that can OHKO a full hp Rayquaza-EX and that was game.
3-0
Round 4 VS Rayquaza/Eelektrik
I recognize my opponent Angel from clash of the tournaments which was pretty cool. Funny thing is the mirror match is the matchup that I have the least confidence (even less than Landorus beatdown). In playtest, it seemed extremely brainless as going first pretty much gurantees you the win. I went first this game but prizing 3 eeles just negated that advantage. Although I couldn't blame luck as I made a misplay not to charge up Rayquaza-EX on T1 and instead start building a non-EX rayquaza. He sees this and promoted a Zekrom on his T1. There is no way a non-EX rayquaza can OHKO a Zekrom and without catchers, he gets first blood.
3-1
Round 5 VS Darkrai/Terrakion/Landorus/Roserade
My opponent Tyler often goes to Ontario for the primier events even though I did not recognize him. This game is defnitely the closest game I had in the whole tournament. He went first and T1 junipered and got a bunch of dark energies into discard but whiffed a T1 energy attachment. Still he managed to apply a lot of early pressure with hammerhead with night spear following it up. I managed to keep up and I was one or two turns late to realize his mid-game gameplan shifted from kill eeles to killing ray-EX. At one point I realized all he needs is a dark claw and a catcher and he will score a 4 prize KO to seal the game in one turn. I didn't play max potion so I could not prevent that whatsoever. I checked his dicard and there was an eviolite, a dark claw and 2 catchers in there so I just attacked and hoped he didn't have the response. He computer searched and biancaed which I thought he had game but instead he just catchered an eele and passed. I assumed after that he had his other dark claw prized. Unfortunately I was forced to discard and use all 4 of my switches early on so there was no way to retreat the eele in one turn. I attached to eele and passed. He got another sableye out, N'd my 6 card hand that was full of energies down to 1 and junk hunted for catcher and dark claw. I was extremely nervous since if I don't draw another energy I lose without a doubt. Luckily I did.
4-1
Round 6 VS Landorus/Tornadus/Bouffalant/Garbador
He got out 3 trubbishes very early but failed to find garbodor which allowed me to dynamotor without wasting tool scrappers. Mid-game I tool scrappered him to dynamotor, which he responsed next turn with a bouffalant which surprised me with its bouffer ability since there are no more tools on garbodors. In the end the early game advantage I had won me the game.
5-1
Round 7 VS Quad-Sigilyph
He took first prize on T2 catchering a tynamo, while a responded with a T2 bolt strike. I was hoping much more for a shred KO instead since now he has the possibility to mewtwo DCE KO my zekrom and I need a rather big combination of cards to pull out a dragon burst return KO. Unfortunately for him he whiffed a basic completely and I benched him out next turn.
6-1
Round 8 VS Blastoise/Keldeo
My friends were facing Blastoise all day while this was my first Blastoise match. Looking back at this, I was over-confident with the Blastoise matchup. I will explain later but for this game, he took early 6 energies KO on my ray-EX and took a premature prize lead. I N'd him to 2 and he got nothing from their on. Had he drawn a 6 energies combo from that 2 card N he would've won – of course, the odds were in my favour but like I said, I was over-confident.
7-1
Round 9 VS Mewtwo/Tornadus/Bouffalant/Zekrom-EX/Eelektrik
This in general was a relaxed game since both of us are guarenteed top cut but I wanted to win to help Geneses's resistance since he was 5-3 at the moment with good res. Overall I had a good start and was leading the prize trade until the hilarious moment in the last turn. I had a big hand, and I needed a 2-card combo to win that turn. My plan is to use computer search to dig for 1 piece of the puzzle and juniper to hit the 2nd piece. My odds were good after looking at my deck with level ball. But as my opponent and I are casually chatting, he reminded me that if I had catcher in my hand that's game immediately. So if I played computer search and didn't use catcher before juniper he would know I play no more than 1 catcher since I had 1 prize left. Geneses repeated told me the importance of hiding a deck secret in a tournament and so far, no one had figured out my secret (same thing in cities). But I wanted to win at the same time for Geneses's resistance. It was a really awkward spot for me and eventually I played the computer search down thinking whatever. The moment my opponent saw computer search he was like, “man u had game already!” and scooped up his cards. I laughed and said I had an oversight.
8-1
I made cut as 5th seed. Geneses and Kevin went 5-4 and Rob went 6-3 whiffing on res. Jackson got top 4 with the exact same decklist his dad used for the tournament which both of them are really happy about.
Day 2
Top 32 VS Jebulan Watson with Darkrai/Mewtwo/Bouffalant
Game 1
We both got relatively slow starts, and start exchanging KOs mid-game. The darkrai player cannot afford to simply exchange KOs with ray-EX, he needs to target down my eelektrik. The 2 super rods definitely helped me out here and he whiffed energies and dark patches late game.
Win
Game 2
I got donked.
Lose
Game 3
It was a more simplified version of Game 1 where I think he benched out late game.
Win
9-1
Jebulan was a good sport about it and it was fun chatting with him throughout the match.
Top 16 VS Michael Skoran with Blastoise/Keldeo
This match was recorded by thetopcut, which I was pretty excited about. I won't go much into it here, but all I'll say is I made the gameplan misplay that I didn't give enough attention in playtest which is I need a second Ray-EX out. I focus too much on getting tynamos and eeles out. Michael played well and I don't think he made any misplays.
Lose
Overall, it was my first time playing in the US and the tournament experience was fantastic. I saw a lot of big name players and had the chance to talk to some of them. Looking back at my decklist, 15 energies in the end is pretty questionable. Even though it helps celestial roar, I often ran into hands where I just have a bunch of energies and can't really do anything. A second ditto would be nice to replace the 9th lightning energy. I don't mind posting the decklist because I don't think Ray/eeles is competitive after Plasma Storm (at least not this build), and I just wanted to share the idea of not running the most broken item in this format. Thanks for reading!
Here is the decklist I used for Virginia Regionals:
Pokemon (14)
Rayquaza-EX x3
Rayquaza x1
Zekrom x1
Tynamo (thunder wave) x4
Eelektrik (dynamotor) x4
Ditto x1
Supporter (14)
Professor Juniper x4
N x4
Bianca x4
Cheren x2
Stadium (2)
Skyarrow Bridge x2
Item (15)
Computer Search x1
Ultra ball x4
Level ball x2
Tool Scrapper x2
Super Rod x2
Switch x4
Energy (15)
Fire Energy x6
Lightning Energy x9
As you can see right now, my list is extremely unorthodox as it plays no catchers. In fact, I have played Ray/eeles with no catchers for the last three cities in a row and all made top cut. Pokemon catcher is a very broken card by all means, but my build of Ray/eeles focuses on to use every single resource to do 180 damage turn after turn to guarentee OHKO everything. When I am able to do that consistently enough, there is no need for catchers. The extra room allowed me to play more supporters, more energies and more search cards to ensure my consistency.
I came up with the idea of not playing catchers first in Emboars decks last season, since I should be focusing on dropping as many fire on Mewtwo-EX as possible to KO my opponent's active (where normally all the energies are). This idea was solidified many times over the course of a year. Esa Juntunen once posted a Reshiboar decklist in his blog that favoured energies and pluspower over catchers to ensure OHKOs. Top Canadian players Curtis Lyon and Matthew Koo played Magneboar in the 2012 World Championships and both went 5-2 and whiffed top cut on resistance. I believed Magneboar was a really good play for the Worlds meta since it can OHKO any EX pokemon and can use Rayquaza & Deoxys Legend to KO everything else. This means if it gets set up consistently it will win the prize trade against all the tier 1 decks in that format everytime (Darkrai/Mewtwo, CMT, Zekrom/Eelektrik). In that deck pokemon catcher becomes of much less importance. They both only played 1 catcher and I like that since single item techs were justified by junk arm that format. I didn't think highly of Ray/eeles when it just came out, because I thought to do 180 turn after turn takes too much set up with eeles. When Boundaries Crossed's scans were just released on playTCG, I immediately tested Blastoise/Keldeo with no catchers. As we all know, Keldeo-EX has the ability to OHKO everything too. It ran well but had a bad Ray/eeles match-up since I need to drop 6 energies every turn while they are pretty much on auto-pilot when they set up 3 eeles. That's when I started serious testing with Ray/eeles without catchers.
Other things I like to note about my decklist: I played all thunder wave tynamos because in literally every single game I played with Ray/eeles, spark tynamo never helped me (I played Ray/eeles with no catchers for the majority of cities). Ditto is a great card in this deck as it is so versatile – it can be a 70 hp tynamo, it is my free retreater under skyarrow bridge and I can attach energies to it in advance when I can't find a rayquaza-EX fast enough. There are many other cool tricks I can do with ditto that I can't list them all. 2 tool scrappers are critical against Garbodor since I don't run catchers to potential KO all their garbodors. They are also essential to score OHKOs against eviolited EXs. Many players play only 1 super rod but I believe only 2 super rods ensure me to be able to play 1 in most of the games as 1 of them could be prized or discarded by juniper early on. 15 energies may seem too many but that allows me to celestial roar turn 1 with more confidence.
There are quite a few tech cards I have considered: Mewtwo-EX gives me a more direct response to opposing mewtwos, energy switch can be useful in many situations (at least there are many situations where I wished I played energy switch) and a single “tech” catcher can avoid my opponent forcing me to take 7 prizes and maybe stall some time. In the end, I stayed loyal to my gameplan: set up 3 eeles and do 180 every turn.
I came to Virginia with some very good Ontario players: Geneses Pabuna (2007 national champion), Rob Davies (2012 Ontario fall regionals champion AKA #1 pokedad
), Kevin Lee (consistent veteran player since base set) and Rob's son Jackson who did very well in the last two seasons in the junior division. They helped me test out the deck a lot the night before in the hotel which I am very thankful for.I'm pretty bad with remembering names so forgive me on that.
Day 1
Round 1 VS Darkrai/Hydreigon
We both set up quite well and I started OHKO his darkrais. He wasn't able to charge up other attackers in time so by mid-game it was settled. His name is Steve and he is a really nice sport.
1-0
Round 2 VS Landorus/Terrakion/Empoleon
He drew very dead early game to the point where I had no clue what he was playing until T5. This gave me way too much time to set up and took the game from there.
2-0
Round 3 VS Klingklang
This game I got paired up with Geneses so that's a big bummer. It sucks to play against your friend so early in the tournament. Despite being a favourable matchup for me, he can take full advantage of knowing that I don't run catchers which can turn the game around completely. Starting from T2 he drew dead and again I got extra time to set up. But he knew about my secret so he walled with Sigilyph mid-game which forced me to go Rayquaza. He made me go down to one prize, N'd me, and Koed my eelektrik. I drew dead from the N and although I still had 1 eele in play (I think) it wasn't enough for me to OHKO the attacking darkrai back. I carefully considered my options as I know his list as well as he knows mine. Using Rayquaza's shred to do 90 would be absolutely pointless since even if he whiffed max potion he can just retreat to another attacker. So I send up a halfly charged Rayquaza-EX and celestial roared and got 2 lightning energies. I know there's nothing left in his deck that can OHKO a full hp Rayquaza-EX and that was game.
3-0
Round 4 VS Rayquaza/Eelektrik
I recognize my opponent Angel from clash of the tournaments which was pretty cool. Funny thing is the mirror match is the matchup that I have the least confidence (even less than Landorus beatdown). In playtest, it seemed extremely brainless as going first pretty much gurantees you the win. I went first this game but prizing 3 eeles just negated that advantage. Although I couldn't blame luck as I made a misplay not to charge up Rayquaza-EX on T1 and instead start building a non-EX rayquaza. He sees this and promoted a Zekrom on his T1. There is no way a non-EX rayquaza can OHKO a Zekrom and without catchers, he gets first blood.
3-1
Round 5 VS Darkrai/Terrakion/Landorus/Roserade
My opponent Tyler often goes to Ontario for the primier events even though I did not recognize him. This game is defnitely the closest game I had in the whole tournament. He went first and T1 junipered and got a bunch of dark energies into discard but whiffed a T1 energy attachment. Still he managed to apply a lot of early pressure with hammerhead with night spear following it up. I managed to keep up and I was one or two turns late to realize his mid-game gameplan shifted from kill eeles to killing ray-EX. At one point I realized all he needs is a dark claw and a catcher and he will score a 4 prize KO to seal the game in one turn. I didn't play max potion so I could not prevent that whatsoever. I checked his dicard and there was an eviolite, a dark claw and 2 catchers in there so I just attacked and hoped he didn't have the response. He computer searched and biancaed which I thought he had game but instead he just catchered an eele and passed. I assumed after that he had his other dark claw prized. Unfortunately I was forced to discard and use all 4 of my switches early on so there was no way to retreat the eele in one turn. I attached to eele and passed. He got another sableye out, N'd my 6 card hand that was full of energies down to 1 and junk hunted for catcher and dark claw. I was extremely nervous since if I don't draw another energy I lose without a doubt. Luckily I did.
4-1
Round 6 VS Landorus/Tornadus/Bouffalant/Garbador
He got out 3 trubbishes very early but failed to find garbodor which allowed me to dynamotor without wasting tool scrappers. Mid-game I tool scrappered him to dynamotor, which he responsed next turn with a bouffalant which surprised me with its bouffer ability since there are no more tools on garbodors. In the end the early game advantage I had won me the game.
5-1
Round 7 VS Quad-Sigilyph
He took first prize on T2 catchering a tynamo, while a responded with a T2 bolt strike. I was hoping much more for a shred KO instead since now he has the possibility to mewtwo DCE KO my zekrom and I need a rather big combination of cards to pull out a dragon burst return KO. Unfortunately for him he whiffed a basic completely and I benched him out next turn.
6-1
Round 8 VS Blastoise/Keldeo
My friends were facing Blastoise all day while this was my first Blastoise match. Looking back at this, I was over-confident with the Blastoise matchup. I will explain later but for this game, he took early 6 energies KO on my ray-EX and took a premature prize lead. I N'd him to 2 and he got nothing from their on. Had he drawn a 6 energies combo from that 2 card N he would've won – of course, the odds were in my favour but like I said, I was over-confident.
7-1
Round 9 VS Mewtwo/Tornadus/Bouffalant/Zekrom-EX/Eelektrik
This in general was a relaxed game since both of us are guarenteed top cut but I wanted to win to help Geneses's resistance since he was 5-3 at the moment with good res. Overall I had a good start and was leading the prize trade until the hilarious moment in the last turn. I had a big hand, and I needed a 2-card combo to win that turn. My plan is to use computer search to dig for 1 piece of the puzzle and juniper to hit the 2nd piece. My odds were good after looking at my deck with level ball. But as my opponent and I are casually chatting, he reminded me that if I had catcher in my hand that's game immediately. So if I played computer search and didn't use catcher before juniper he would know I play no more than 1 catcher since I had 1 prize left. Geneses repeated told me the importance of hiding a deck secret in a tournament and so far, no one had figured out my secret (same thing in cities). But I wanted to win at the same time for Geneses's resistance. It was a really awkward spot for me and eventually I played the computer search down thinking whatever. The moment my opponent saw computer search he was like, “man u had game already!” and scooped up his cards. I laughed and said I had an oversight.
8-1
I made cut as 5th seed. Geneses and Kevin went 5-4 and Rob went 6-3 whiffing on res. Jackson got top 4 with the exact same decklist his dad used for the tournament which both of them are really happy about.
Day 2
Top 32 VS Jebulan Watson with Darkrai/Mewtwo/Bouffalant
Game 1
We both got relatively slow starts, and start exchanging KOs mid-game. The darkrai player cannot afford to simply exchange KOs with ray-EX, he needs to target down my eelektrik. The 2 super rods definitely helped me out here and he whiffed energies and dark patches late game.
Win
Game 2
I got donked.
Lose
Game 3
It was a more simplified version of Game 1 where I think he benched out late game.
Win
9-1
Jebulan was a good sport about it and it was fun chatting with him throughout the match.
Top 16 VS Michael Skoran with Blastoise/Keldeo
This match was recorded by thetopcut, which I was pretty excited about. I won't go much into it here, but all I'll say is I made the gameplan misplay that I didn't give enough attention in playtest which is I need a second Ray-EX out. I focus too much on getting tynamos and eeles out. Michael played well and I don't think he made any misplays.
Lose
Overall, it was my first time playing in the US and the tournament experience was fantastic. I saw a lot of big name players and had the chance to talk to some of them. Looking back at my decklist, 15 energies in the end is pretty questionable. Even though it helps celestial roar, I often ran into hands where I just have a bunch of energies and can't really do anything. A second ditto would be nice to replace the 9th lightning energy. I don't mind posting the decklist because I don't think Ray/eeles is competitive after Plasma Storm (at least not this build), and I just wanted to share the idea of not running the most broken item in this format. Thanks for reading!
