Hello fellow Pokémon Trainers! Today I come to you with my first tournament report for Pokémon TCG Pocket! I participated in the Ursiiday Pocket Weekly tournament and out of 1764 players I ended up as 316th. Not my best showing this week, HOWEVER, come explore some of the choices I made in the first tournament since Space Time Smackdown was released!
Preparation
Usually for tournaments, I playtest with some of my friends and I play quite a bit of ladder games where I have time, but with the new set being released this week and also having a heavy workload, I did not have the time to test as I would have wanted. I initially considered sticking with what I know well and playing Gyarados EX, but after a few games with the new Manaphy from Space-Time Smackdown, I realized that I was losing out to some of the faster decks that played cards like Darkrai EX and also Palkia EX. I realized that I needed to really dive into the set if I were going to make any kind of headway on what to play.
After some fiddling around with Palkia EX/Vaporeon, I felt that the deck was very vulnerable to losing if they could manage to KO your Palkia. In quite a few of my testing games, I would get very far ahead in energy with Manaphy, and it would be the first card my opponent would KO, with it being so squishy (and adorable) at 50hp. After getting ahead on energy, Palkia would be able to KO one of their Pokémon. Then if they could KO the Palkia in return, the game was over for me as that would be 3 points. I didn’t like the experience I was having, and as an avid Misty enthusiast, I was a little disappointed that I wouldn’t be playing my favorite Trainer for the time being.
After shuffling through Celebi, Charizard, Infernape, Venusaur, Mewtwo, Togekiss/Cynthia, and a few more decks, I found Darkrai to be a common denominator of powerful play and decided that whatever I played would center around that card. I recognized the speed of the game and the difference between this set of cards and what I had grown accustomed to in the Mythical Island meta, which was a slower game where setting up was important and most decks gave a bit of time for it. This set, however, is vastly unforgiving to bad set ups. There are more ways to generate energy and a lot of very quick, high damage output decks that make things a bit more difficult if you intend on setting up.
Weavile EX seemed like a good companion to Darkrai, being able to deal 90 damage with the use of only one energy with the right hand (Darkrai, Sneasel, Weavile EX, Dawn), so I decided that would be the second set of Pokémon I would play. In testing, I felt a bit vulnerable with both of my Pokémon being EX Pokémon, so I decided to play Weezing and Koga. I figured this accompaniment would allow for a few things:
Being able to wall up against other aggressive decks, and effectively nullify their early push by retreating Weezing with Koga.
Playing around the new trainer, Cyrus, by having Weezing take early damage, and then either removing it with Koga, or letting it be KO’d for only a single point and using the second Weezing to continue blocking if I still needed time.
Setting Weavile EX up by doing chip damage to my opponent's active Pokémon via Weezing’s “Gas Leak” ability, which poisons my opponent’s active Pokémon.
Having an attack that only requires 1 single energy, which means while it walls, I can continue chipping away by attaching energy to Darkrai. Less investment when it inevitably leaves the battle via KO or Koga.
After ALL of that, this is the deck I ended up with.
A few notes about choices:
Due to my unfamiliarity with the meta, I was unsure whether I needed to include more copies of Cyrus, Dawn, or to include Sabrina or Leaf at all. I also had some reservations about the Pokémon tools. Including Cape instead of Rocky Helmet was a nod to some of the damage breakpoints I was figuring out. Most notably, I needed Darkrai or Weavile to survive a hit against Palkia (I almost included no tools but this felt important enough for Cape). Lastly, I chose this version of Koffing as opposed to the copy that uses “Division” because damaging the opposing Pokémon is important for Weavile. Hindsight notes will be listed at the end.
The Tournament
The part you’ve actually come here for! I’ll get right into it
Round 1: Darkrai Weezing
This match was interesting because his only heavy hitter was Darkrai. He played Weezing and Spiritomb with two copies of Cyrus. The issue he was facing was that I had TWO forms of pressure, one of which was really easily accessible, as well as all of the chip damage from Weezing. I was able to secure this win in a 3 game set.
1-0
Round 2: Dialga Melmetal
Immediately after Round 1 I was chatting to a friend of mine about how I think Dialga is a bit too slow for the way the game is going right now. I immediately got paired into this deck and got destroyed 0-2. I didn’t draw any of my pressure cards and was sitting on Koffing and Sneasel without being able to evolve, while my opponent was able to set up using Dialga in both games directly into Melmetal. I ate my words in this match, but overall, Dialga had a poor showing in the tournament.
At least my theory was correct, right?
1-1
Round 3: Articuno/Palkia/Vaporeon
This opponent played a non-Manaphy list that sought to capitalize on the ability to retreat and redistribute energy. Essentially the deck never wanted to lose the Pokémon that had all of the energy on it, as they didn’t have a reliable(Hello Misty) way to recreate the energy lost if their attacker was KO’d. I understood the assignment and fought through to a victory by setting up positions to counter KO an attacker, stopping the onslaught.
2-1
Round 4: Pidgeot Druddigon
My favorite “fun” deck from the Mythical Island expansion was this very deck, so I was excited to see it being played and having a winning record thus far in the tournament. Luckily I’m extremely familiar with damage breakpoints in the deck and was able to stop my main attackers from being KO’d even after KOing a Druddigon. People ignoring or misunderstanding those damage breakpoints is often how Pidgeot gets the win, as it is extremely face up and easily manipulatable damage output as opposed to other EX Pokémon, who’s damage you cannot control as the opponent.
3-1
Round 5: Palkia Vaporeon
This deck was a Manaphy deck with Palkia being the only big attacker. We went into Game 3 after some VERY tight games 1 and 2 with both of us being extremely careful and passive with our attacks. Game 1 I couldn’t stop his terrorizing of my field after he flipped two heads with Misty. Game 2, Misty was much more tame and I was able to chip away until I finally had a position to counter KO a Palkia via the use of Great Cape.
Game 3 is quite a tragedy as I had 1 point and my opponent had a Palkia that was ready to attack and end the game in their favor. The Palkia was at 110 HP and I was calculating ways to make sure that my damage was correct. I had a Weezing out front and in my hand was Dawn, Koga, Cyrus, X-Speed, and I had access to Darkrai and Weavile on the bench. I needed to make sure that I not only sequenced correctly, but I used the right trainer to make sure I did the 100 damage and also left it poisoned to finish off the extra 10hp.
Well curse me and my affinity for playing shiny cards because while calculating, my turn timer was ticking away. As I finally started to make the moves to clean up the Palkia, I realized that the animations for the shiny cards were taking a touch longer than I had available. I ended my turn without attacking, and lost a game 3 in which I had lethal. While unfortunate, I could have prevented being in that scenario had I practiced more and understood the deck I was playing a bit better.
3-2
Round 6: Charizard EX
The interesting part about Charizard versus a deck like mine is that it HAS to draw the Basic, Stage 1, and Stage 2 before it really starts dealing any damage at all. I was able to take advantage of that as well as Moltres’ 140 HP by positioning Moltres to faint going into my turn via poison, OR faint on my turn from Darkrai’s ability, allowing me to deal the first hit on Charizard before it had the chance to KO me, as I am unable to KO a Charizard in one turn with ANY of my Pokémon. It led me to a quick and decisive victory in this matchup.
4-2
Round 7: Palkia Vaporeon
My theory and hesitancy with Manaphy that I expressed earlier was on full display here. Losing one point immediately and then relying on an EX to get all 3 points for you is really tough, and again I was able to exploit that fact.
5-2
Round 8: Charizard
This was a repeat of round 6 in MOST ways except my opponent was able to play Charizard on curve each game of our 3 game series. In game 3, I needed to access Darkrai earlier than I saw it, and it led to my defeat in the end, as I could not pressure the Moltres enough to stop it from retreating into a fully powered Charizard.
5-3
This is where I dropped. My placing was 316th even without competing for the final two rounds. I did the math and even though this tournament cut to top 64, I calculated no players with a 7-3 record would make it in, which was correct. I enjoyed the deck and below I will list some hindsight notes:
Pokémon - As much as I enjoyed Weezing, having two Pokémon that required evolution was a lot, as there were times where I would have Koffing and Weavile, and then other times where I would have Sneasel and Weezing. Additionally, Weezing’s inability to activate Weavile before retreating against a fully healthy Pokémon proved to be an issue. Depending on my deck to make those hands work for me was unnecessary, as I could choose one evolutionary line and stick to it. I wouldn’t play Weezing and Koga at all going forward.
Trainers - I was waiting to face the most popular deck of the tournament, Darkrai Magnezone, so I could see how it worked. I never faced one but that’s probably a blessing as Sabrina is largely relevant in that matchup to deal with the Magneton before it becomes a huge attacker, and I did not play Sabrina. In terms of Cyrus and Dawn, I definitely wanted more copies of both and I also wanted ways to damage the bench to deal with problems like unevolved Charizard lines, Vaporeon, and opposing Darkrai. Not having that ability caused some games to be much closer than necessary, despite not losing to most of the Vaporeon or any of the Darkrai decks that I did face.
Tools - I thoroughly enjoyed the Great Cape and it kept me from quite a few damage breakpoints, primarily Palkia which was what I was concerned about most. I also had concerns about Infernape coming into the tournament, as all of my Pokémon were 140HP or below, and Infernape can get online and going FAST. I don’t regret playing it and I’m glad that I didn’t play Rocky Helmet. It didn’t fit the game plan that my deck was attempting to execute(insert witty Exeggcute joke here).
All-in-all, with a new meta, not enough practice on the deck I actually played, and working on mostly theory crafting, I felt pretty good about my results. I definitely feel more prepared for this meta, and I can anticipate some of the changes that may come about for future events before the next release!
Until next time Trainers, continue being the very best like no one ever was!
You can find more from Itachi (Dominique Roberts) with his other articles like his Disney Lorcana Chicago Competitor Breakdown article.
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