I was thinking. I don't know, just when I was play testing earlier today that I like right now, just because stakes are so low, like I was just thinking that it's like such a great time to really be truly experimented and your debt building and stuff like that. there's just a little to lose, play your goofy day and the heck, sir, tournaments twice a week, stuff like that. Like just encouraging this kind of like positive, creative energy.
Brent:You guys ready to jump in? All right. It's another intro time. Welcome to the trash lanch. It's Brent Halliburton. I'm here as always with prescribers and Mike crochet. It's been more than a month, whereas still at a hundred percent attendance. The first thing that I want to discuss as always is five star review situation. We have not gotten another five star review since the first one people you got to put five star reviews. And if you want us to talk about it, what would you like us to talk about? This is your chance. You can post the deck list and give it a five star review. And we will read that deck list and comment on it. This is the podcast that you can craft and shape. It's your chance to participate. All right. That's enough, five star reviews. That's a, that's an example of the kind of advertising power that the podcast can bring. let me talk about, I don't want this, this would be the worst kind of podcast. If we were like, let's go over results. So I'm going to do results in 10 seconds. And then Mike and Brad, I just want to get your reaction to all the action that happened this weekend. what you guys think is good and what you guys think is bad and all that stuff players come with better. Cardio melt metal closed down finals toward blade Telium frost, muck, hyper Luxe. Ben crier. One with internet is Jose Marrero got second with blondes. OTX is a Hexter mutual and welder. Both did well at those tournaments. it's not obvious why I'm used to, there was not played at any of these other tournaments at the JGB tournament. all but two of the decks were either nadis or ADP station, of the 15 players. They don't need us. 10 of them made money out of the event. That's a tweet from someone, not enough talk guys. What does that mean? I feel like what that, I felt like that meant every deck is good or bad.
Mike:the only additional information, the Hexter that happened on Monday, Blawnde did, I would say it was like the biggest surprise deck at one. And I think it also got top eight. So I think, this past weekend saw a trend of blinds coming back into the meta,
Brent:Or was it, actually this is an interesting question. Is it that this weekend, Macario, Mel metal moved to a place of prominence in the format. And then on Monday, blinds became a good deck because of it. Yeah. Like I wondered if the, having so many tournaments instead of this normal league challenges on weekends league cups, regionals every two weeks kind of thing. If the Metta is changing faster as a result,
Mike:I've thought about that a little bit. I think that's probably true to a large extent. And I think that's why to answer one of your questions you asked, like why was MuTu welder? Not in some of the earlier tournament's into, because, people didn't really catch onto it. So sometime last week, and then it started picking up some steam and yeah, now it's a pretty, tier one tier two deck, at least. Amongst a lot of people talking about it. That's pretty well established now. and it's just moving so fast. So lots of tournament's just don't have people, it didn't have people playing it. so yeah, and I think Brown's also, people were scared, just scared to play it at first. I do think the Metta has shifted to a place where it's better, but that doesn't mean it was bad before it just, I think people were scared because fiery Flint rotated, which is. in theory, a really big deal. but the shift to the list has been to now play more energy and prioritize getting the energy in the discard even before you necessarily attack where you might have a quick attack and not take a knockout just to get the energy in the discard. So the way you have to play blend is a little bit different. Yeah. As well. Yeah.
Brit:I definitely agree. with everything that was just sad. I think just where the game is in 2020 is, we didn't, we don't have results in the way we'd would before. And trends are happening a lot faster too. And I think the way these trends themselves happen. Are a lot more particular. So like with a lot of events say, like a percentage of players playing events, but with like decks going popular, like toward played and tele on, and now people are playing and Talia on, right? Like it's a little, it's a little more like focus. And so he did well with it too, but I think we would have seen a lot more IntelliJ on just strictly because he played it. And then similarly with the MuTu deck and this, maybe it's just my own impression, but. It was just entirely off my radar. Like I just thought maybe the rotation it would hurt. And so I just, and I just didn't put any thought into it. And so I think maybe a lot of players thought that, but then as soon as I saw it and I mentioned this last week in the podcast, as soon as I saw it as a little playlist, I was just like, okay, this deck is probably really good. Still. I don't know why it wouldn't be, it has the same sort of strategy against ADP. It always has. And if that's a good deck and you are fighting against it, it's in a good spot. And then Raul played at Danny played it, good players. I think the, these trends, are fast, really influenced when good players are posting their lists faster. There's just less content, I think. but yeah, in terms of the results themselves, I don't know. The players cup is really interesting. I, I think last week or in, maybe the consensus would be, it would really be the template for a lot of our lives, some stuff like that. And I don't think that's the case or at least not entirely, but perhaps we can get into that.
Mike:so I think it's a combination. I think it's a consequence of. I was having so many tournaments and the Metta moving so fast is that, that, and it happened a full week before we saw and, in a normal season a week, wouldn't be long time at all, but right now, A week is a long time, especially at the beginning of a format, maybe in a month or two a week, won't matter as much because things will have leveled off. But at the beginning of a format, when there's a ton of online tournament's a week is incur an incredibly long time. You see this in Hearthstone a lot when, when, Set comes out in Hearthstone. The first two weeks are like crazy. Like every, if you want to be at the top of the ladder in Hearthstone during the first two weeks of a new set, you have to be like checking Twitter every single day. Sometimes the Metta changes like hour to hour because people are posting new decks and they're coming up with innovations and whatnot. And I think we're getting a similar effect in Pokemon maybe for the first time, which is pretty cool.
Brent:Yeah. I feel like when I look back on our like traditional Pokemon experience, after a tournament, Everybody's got this one, like big travel thing, you travel home from wherever the heck you were. And like you get back and you were exhausted. And, we would typically take two, three, four days off before anybody would pick up a car to get it. And then you'd be like, okay, we have another tournament this weekend. So by definition metal, wasn't going to change for four or five days. But now, the people that were playing at. Henry band played on Saturday, but Henry band was playing in Hexter on Tuesday, right? he's right back at it. Like new lists, new texts, new innovations, like a very little downtime between a tournament.
Mike:Yeah. It's a really interesting time to play, for sure
Brit:maybe we can get into this, the segue into that. Whether or not to ban ADP or something like that. that
Brent:Yeah, let's talk. Let's talk about that. That's definitely the thing that people want to talk about on Twitter, for sure. If you're, if you follow the Zul you get it every 24 hours, should we ban ADP?
Mike:So I like, pardon me says yes, for sure. And part of me says is maybe it won't change as much as we think, I think Zander Perot brought up probably the best counterpoint is that like single prize decks further, since basically MuTu, the X came out have been on the decline. And so ADP was really the, has really been the card that has really pushed that even further. But just if that gets banned, that doesn't necessarily mean single price decks are going to be. Know, great again. and I know that's not the only reason to band ADP when we can get into the other reasons, but at least for this reason, like single prize decks, like spirit tomb, for example, they need. In order to be able to give up for six prizes, they need so much more right to rebuild each of their attackers where he's, GX or the deck. If they're giving up two or three prizes, each time they only have to set up two or three attackers throughout the game. So just resource wise, they're more efficient. and so ADP punishers that more, but getting rid of, it's not necessarily going to make the single prize stuff. better. maybe you guys can hit on some of the other reasons that you would want to ban ADP.
Brit:Yeah, I lean towards, maybe it's fine, but I think a lot of the. The counterarguments are at least worth considering for sure. And so like with the, on the point of the single press attackers, it's just, it's not even the ADP as the, the straw that broke the camel's back. Like they've just been so bad for so long. Like it's just so rare to even get. One or two like competitive stage twos from cassette, and that's been the case for so long and there's going to be exceptions here and there. especially the further back you go, like even after MuTu, there is occasionally, you're in poli on things like that would maybe be tier two or something like that, but That they're just too bad that I just don't think ADP is really even part of the problem. it's so much deeper. so many of them could do 56 days more damage per attack with 30, 40 more HP per attack for one less energy and would still be bad, would still be bad in a format without ADP, I think. but maybe that's being a little too cynical. but I think banning ADP on its own. I don't know what that metagame looks like. And I think it's too optimistic that it wouldn't be fine. And that there wouldn't be something just as bad. And maybe your creativity, it's, there's more room for creativity, but I saw, may of islet on Twitter. Posted, the, this exact counter-argue so not mine from them. Yeah. but just maybe like Lou Carrio Mel metal with maybe that would just be too good then, like there's just a lot of checks I think. and I think it would maybe just have to be more substantial than just one card. And at that point, maybe it's just too complicated, but I'm not sure.
Mike:I can't even think of a, like a good enough stage one stage two, or even basic single prize deck that would become viable, more viable except spirit tomb, like spirit tomb is the only deck that I think, and spirit team probably doesn't even become tier one. Like it becomes a bit better, but, like there's not really any other Pokemon. So I think the real change would be if you ban ADP, is it just makes, All the other decks, not be able to be as punished versus ADP for playing things like the Denny and Crow bat. which is maybe fine, but maybe that's worse. I don't actually think that list would change significantly,
Brent:some people would be able to come up with some sort of control archetype if you had to take six poses to get there. but I don't think banning ADP so we can bring control back. And then the format is.
Mike:that's the goal, right? That's the secret agenda behind ban ADP is make control viable again.
Brent:I am this, extradural deck. That's going to blow people's mind. It would just been any fee. That's what people want.
Mike:yeah. All so some alternate ideas that I've seen tossed around, our band bosses order, I know poker stats is running, gonna run an event with no boss disorder, and that, may have a similar effect, but it's a little bit more far reaching, right? Cause every deck plays bosses. and we might see the effect of people just running Pokemon catcher and the same thing's happening. Just coming down to a flip, I don't know. We'll see. the other thing that I find. perhaps interesting to explore is like ADP was good before as Aisha and came out, but it wasn't like ADP Kelly was fine. It was like a pretty good deck, but it wasn't like a, Metta breaking deck. Like Zakian was really the thing that put it over the top. Cause Ashley and is one of the most broken cards ever printed. you could ban Sasha or just, or say something like ADP and Sasha and can appear in the same deck list. I think maybe that would do a similar effect as Ben ADP.
Brent:Zaption is another thing that the constraints, my ability to build control, decks.
Mike:Yes. yeah. That's true too.
Brit:Yeah, I think that's, I think that's, really maybe the strongest point, the strongest, at least part of a counter argument is maybe that is just realization. It's quietly the problem. more so than ADP. And yeah, I think my Mike, his suggestion, that maybe they just can't. They have to be limited in conjunction with each other somehow, but that seems fine. and all this to say, too, that I think experimenting, like this should be encouraged. Like we, we have nothing to lose, might as well play around with a few different ideas, maybe it's really fun. some strange, some sort of strange, cultures and sub cultures pop off this way. So Justin weird offshoots of things like league of legends. One of the biggest video games is just a mod from another old video game. I'm like stuff like that. So you never know, maybe it's the perfect format waiting to be found so you can try and try multiple ideas. Try banning ADP, try panning them in conjunction.
Brent:do think you make a good point, Brett. I think we've seen at Pokemon staff events, they've done things where they're like, we're going to ban all the Xs and the GDX is, and logically now it'd be the B's and the BMXs and. I don't think the result was some super great format filled with innovation. I think they were like, wow, we can play a lot of Pokemon that really suck now. And some suck like slightly less than others, don't think anybody was like, Oh my God, we've found the joy in Pokemon again.
Brit:that's the fine line for me with the professor cups format, so to speak. Cause sometimes they're really fun and sometimes, and this is why I don't enjoy and I've never been to. A prayer primarily since they've been updated to the little kit system, but why I didn't like old going to old pre-releases because it was just terrible car. You just, your decks were unplayable, BA unplayable, bad, just a bunch of basic Pokemon and basic energy is just not, never particularly much fun. At least for me.
Brent:Exactly. Exactly. I didn't put this in the show notes, but it's worth discussing for one second. I feel like a week ago we were the people who were saying people should start introducing terms where they just make their own format. Like. Why be constrained in this new PTC geo world. if anybody hosts the tournament, anybody can make their own rules. Why doesn't somebody create a longitudinal set of like you get points. So when you go to a tournament and those points accumulate into something magical and low Atlas collectibles has rolled out this whole tournament structure. I think that's probably mostly because we are the most influential podcast in Pokemon history.
Mike:Yeah, I think you nailed it.
Brent:Yeah. Ahead of the trends influencing the business.
Mike:so one other, one other point for the ADP discussion, I think. Part of the core problem and then this has to do with ADP, but it also has to do with three predators, I think in general, is that. Pokemon games right now on average are about five turns, four turns, five turns maybe, which is really short. and so I think Britt, you said something like this last week where it just feels like you're sequencing against each other. and when the games are so short, that is exactly what it is for the most part. There's not a whole lot of decision making. That really impacts the game beyond sequencing. I, we can, we'll get into it in a little bit, but the old format tournament that I played this past week, it was 2013, 2014. And, on average, the games were like 15 turns to 18 turns. And so many more decisions, throughout a whole game. And it really. It makes a difference. and, but like it's, but it's not ADP just ADP, like a turn it is can win the game in three or four turns center score
Brent:feel like this is like Japanese car designers have to say we, we want to have a fundamental shift in strategy to where we want it. Encourage people to play evolution, Pokemon, and you want the game to have interaction and go back and forth. And like the more you play this, like just like big basics. Yeah, hit for 300, kind of things. the more that just disables that whole
Mike:Yeah. Yeah. So also, before we got into this, Brent, you asked what we've been playing testing with. I have some stuff, but Brett, what have you been messing around with?
Brit:nothing off Metta. I didn't get, I haven't had, I've been really busy. this afternoon was like, I played a little bit yesterday or the day before, but this afternoon was the first time. I've really had a chance to sit down and. Play post rotation. So I didn't play anything, but just all the metadata from the past weekend or so. and yeah, I think this is another point too. And I think we talked about this in last week's episode, there's all the rockets around wanting to get rid of ADP, but it's mantra, they sell some pretty close and again, they are, they're maybe not fun or maybe not all then that interactive, but. any deck really seems like it can be at any deck. Blaume's is definitely new and I think will shake things up and bad ways. Like it was nice not to worry about Blaume's because for a lot of three prize attackers, there's just never, if you don't have a good answer to dealing with a one prize Pokemon that can deal 300 damage, 350 damage. but I think that. Look, it turned out as can be sent a score. It's on a scorch can be an ADP. They can all beat each other, but and I think ADP is probably marginally favored for the Inn. That's why marginally favored versus everything. And the reasons why it's marginally favored are these problems with interactivity or because like sometimes you don't get to play that game. Sometimes you go, you get a turn one. GX attack and then a gust and then a great catcher or something. And then you've won the game with three attacks or something. yeah, I'm not sure where it'll go from here. I don't. Cause I don't think that, the deck that won the players cup. is good, but I think that it just was a really good medical, there was not a lot of fire and none of the fire there had an answer for Bronson, which I think is pretty easy to deal with. Like he just played double or something. and yeah, that's another reason why I was initially saying that. I'm just not sure how to take the players. Cups result is because so much of it, it was just really hard medicals. It seems like they were all. I'm just trying to guess each other, And so that's why, I don't think we'll really see much more of that. Really the Geraci catcher ADP list that will Jenkins played. but maybe I'm wrong. Maybe that will end up being the best way to play it still. I don't think so.
Mike:Probably not, I haven't tried that version. but okay. So I played in a Hexter on Monday. I played ADP Z, took a break from spirit tomb. and my three losses were all pretty much. I don't know. There. Whatever, like one, I lost the blouse ones. Cause I went first, started my, while he got to turn one Kao, he got to turn to Kao on my ADP and I just lose then. and then I lost a game to decidua because my last prize was Daralyn Don. and then I lost the game to MuTu where I played for boss and. I had three left and they were all in deck and I didn't AE with it. So then, or no, like I research, one turn and then I Intrepid sword and I have eight cards left and deck, and then I don't draw in the next turn. So like ADP can just lose because of wifi thing. or like weird things like that. So it's not infallible for sure. So I've been messing her. I played around a little bit with the template of the players cup winning deck. I agree that Brian's young is definitely not good now. almost every center scorch deck is running either crammer, ant or double or something like that. but I like the template of it with like only running like the metal Pokemon for ashy to the car and my metal to a lot of the other, A lot of the other, like Luke metal decks were running things like elderberry or Geraci or, MuTu or CRO bat. So I liked the idea of just running the metal Pokemon. So I've been messing around with that. I'm actually going to play that in the Hexter tournament tonight. And I run instead of the two, two Brown tongue three or four weakness guard energy. I don't think it'll make the fire match-ups favorable, but I think it makes them, winnable and Lou Carrio doesn't care if it has a metal or a weakness guard on it and can afford one as well. So it's pretty okay. So I've been liking that deck cause it is, it slows the game down and it kinda like addresses part of the point of, games being so short is no matter what the game is going. Eight, nine turns usually. so that gives me some chance and the outplay, the opponent, I've been messing around mostly with that. I've played a bit of center scorch cause I got centers, Gorge cards this week. I liked Geraci center's Gorge. The best, by the way, I, the players cup, like deck box and sleeves, I traded them for a hundred packs. I was like, of course I would do that. I don't care what my deck looks like. So that was pretty sweet. So I got the whole center scores deck, and a bunch of Crow bats for her.
Brent:Dude. All right, I'll have to go check after this player's Cubs sleeves, man. That's the new market.
Mike:Yeah, I was super surprised. so yeah, I've mostly been playing the said the metal deck and center scorch, and both are pretty fun. I tabled spirit tomb for now. I think the list is as good as it's gonna get, and it's just not good enough to, with ADP in the format. It might be worth three visiting in these tournament with ADB band, but. We'll see.
Brent:Man. I was going to do a whole introducing a weekly spirits, him segment, where we. Talk about how spirits is the greatest thing ever. Eh,
Mike:I still think, I still love the deck and it's the most fun deck to play in the format. Dustin played it, in the hyperlinks tournament. So I talked to him a little bit, about it. He had a cool idea that I I got to mess around with it, more of playing to Lily's poker doll in the deck. So that lets you a stall a little bit in the beginning, especially against ADP, if you're able to put a, poke it all out. The turn, like if you can't kill them, the ADP after they GX and you put, poke it all out and they have to ultimate reign to that, you actually can stay in the game. It forces them to have a gust on that turn, which, if they have it, but it at least gives you an out. but the other really cool thing is you can, it gives you another way to retreat or switch into something, takes spike, Madame image, and then just put it to the bottom. which is pretty sweet actually. I think it's a cool idea. Might mess around with that more. That's my spirit to update.
Brent:Segment. Yeah.
Mike:I can still do a segment every week. It just might be short.
Brent:it's nice to know that there's a single prize attacker that has a fun design that rewards skillful play. to me, that seems like the nice thing about spirits, human spirit to him seems like it should be at least somewhat relevant. until it rotates. if only because you can splash it in on the internet now,
Mike:Yeah. I think a lot of, I think that's the best single prize attacker to play in it. It turned into this tech. I haven't seen it as much as I needed. Expect it to just seem to me, it just seems like the best, cause it can hit the most damage.
Brent:Brett any, any insight into the Metta these days?
Brit:No. maybe in this sort of rooted in ADP, I just, I wanted to, I thought Israel did well that Butterfree deck. That seems interesting. but yeah, I guess I'm just not too interested in. New ideas. Like I'd like to iron gig, get better with all the metadata, particularly in YouTube. I think there's just a lot of good options with it.
Brent:I feel like the results that I've been seeing bore out your choice a week and a half to go to play a turn at this. that's a good guy. You can just play that deck.
Brit:Yeah, until I get there's that's why I feel like I don't. even though we're not talking about them, like a turn on us is still really good. Like I'd like to play center scorch, but all the match ups are just so even I think, even, not even, cause I do think ADP is probably favored versus everything, but
Mike:Like favorite and like 52 40.
Brit:Yeah, like 55, 45, 64 days. Like they're not that bad. You can win with the right. I mean, you just have to hope they miss hope. Your Marnie is a good hope you stamp is good. You never know, there's no reason not to just play AP. if you're like a stats player or something, and that's never how I am as a player, but maybe I would have had more success if I just played the numbers game a little more often.
Mike:Yeah, the eternity is less of definitely. I think it's interesting that there still isn't like a huge consensus of the best way to play it. I do think the lists are starting to converge, but there's still like a ton of variability. I mean, like the biggest one is like Marnie verse peers in the deck, and then some people are playing Dane. I think dangerous drill is slowly becoming a staple in lists. But Marnie versus peers, I think is still really up for debate, which is interesting.
Brit:Yeah, the hyperlinks tournament was won by appears list, I believe, but I haven't seen it. I don't know what it looks like. I know. Towards list is somewhat interesting. It plays the drill and dark city and just a lot of it plays Marnie and not peers, but that's the only one I've played with. And it's good. I don't know. I just it has too much consistency for me. And again, it's crossed that point where I feel like I just want something else. Like I'm good with four, four supporters, but I don't feel like I want 12. Balls. I feel like I'm fine with 10 or eight, even like I, but I don't, maybe there's nothing better to do with the space, but
Mike:He runs for great button for con. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's a lot.
Brit:And for support is in, it plays a spirit to him. And I couldn't tell, I don't know. I guess they're good enough. Cause they wouldn't help you be the melt metal deck. Cause I would assume all that damage reduction is probably still just going to be too much
Mike:Yeah.
Brit:for them to be able to knock out multiples, Amazon photos.
Mike:No, he doesn't run scoop up net. That's how he has not the space. Gotcha.
Brit:yeah.
Mike:Makes sense.
Brent:So should we talk about old school tournaments guys?
Brit:Yeah, we can.
Mike:Sure.
Brent:so you want to start chronologically and talk about the 2005 tournament Brit.
Brit:Yeah, sure. I know Mikey played in this one too, and we'll be able to speak quite a bit more than me on the format. I just vaguely familiar does from playing at my a little bit myself and hearing friends who played at then, but I played, I made top eight. I lost my top eight match yesterday. but I played Metta CHAM. I guess this goes what we've mentioned before with these older formats. It was some MediTrain was a really big deck. I know at one current Hill, one junior years that year with it. and this'll be something Mikey will have to fill in. I don't know where it comes in the timeline of that season. I don't know if it won regionals or did well at nationals or anything like that. But so it's a good deck, but I changed the world's list substantially. I'm not my idea or anything. Talk to people who knew 2005 months better than me. but I put in a bunch of Island cave for the Neato queen matchup, which needle mean it's probably the best deck in the format. I'm at one worlds and was a secret deck. I believe if I know the story, right? Like it was a surprise deck for a small group of players and they all did really well with it. and I think it was one of the first times to where, it's a format of Vieques Pokemon, and part of why it's so good is that it's just all single prize attackers. And it's just a slug fast for IEX Pokemon to get through a couple Nieto queen, and a pigeon. And they have heel and stuff too, which makes it even harder. but Metta CHAM is a, an ability lock deck when you have an active, This was back before it wasn't all sort of Pokemon powers and Pokemon abilities were a separate mechanic. They weren't all abilities rather. and so it only stopped. It stopped I'm blanking. It was only on basics, right? Yeah. Power is on basics.
Mike:powers on 90 Xs.
Brit:Nani exit. Sorry. and so that shut down out is a very important card. And these older formats, that's a stage two. That was so good that often decks that had no other stage two cards would play them Andra candy, just because of how good it is and its ability as quick search a once per term, search your deck for any card. and so this was just a. And in a just format defining card for you years and years, and Metta CHAM shuts it down. And that's why I met that's a big reason why Metta champions. Good. I actually lost to Nieto queen in the top eight. but it was a close series. Yeah, they had turned on candy, all three games, which is very difficult. and this was back way back when too with rare candy is real. It was really good. You could just play it immediately. so that's, that's another big reason why stage twos have seen such a decline over the history of the game is the Rick handy change because before they've always been reliant on rare candy or Pokemon breeder, even I think, in the base set. and now they slowed it down, in. 2012. It was when unleash came out, I think.
Mike:Yeah, that sounds right. Just so for those of you that don't know what Britt means, it's faster as rare candy. First, it could be used on the first turn of the game. And second of all, you could play a basic and immediately rare candy. You didn't have to wait a turn.
Brent:So if you didn't have the red candy, you still had to wait a turn, but they printed or candy essentially as a evolution accelerant.
Mike:Yeah. And you could, and what was interesting, you could even rare candy, like into the stage run, in a single turn, which was sometimes relevant, like Nitto queen. I think for example, net arena is pretty good at like for color that's at search for, to evolution Pokemon. So sometimes would even be correct to like candy and to knit arena on turn one and then search for two more evolutions. yeah, I got ninth. so just bubbled out of top eight. I played, I mentioned on the podcast last week, I played a Blastoise stoke caddy magnets on deck, which was pretty fun. I lost to a Metta chairman Swiss and I lost to, Oh, I just drew. Okay. Drew really poorly one round. It didn't really matter what I played against. but it was pretty fun. The Metta CHAM matchup was the most fun that even though I lost, it came down to me needing the, like to bubble it. It came down to me, meet in a bubble Bullhead. So bubble is Squirtles attack that paralyzes the opponent. And if I hit a bubble heads, then I would have decked him out. so that was pretty funny. so I think the event ended up being one by Sienna with Metta champ. and to go back to your Ridge, one of the things you said, Brit in the timeline, Metta Chan became a deck because Sina won nationals that here with Metta champ. so it's fitting that he also won this event. He's pretty, skilled with the deck, in general, that, so the Metta CHAM runs off what you would consider the Geraci swoop engine. she is. Pretty similar to the draft sheet we currently have in format. it puts us up to sleep. It looks at the top five cards, but instead of taking a trainer, you can take any card. so it was a little bit better, but sleep was, but like polka powers were worse then, because if you were affected by a condition, you can actually use it. So if you stayed asleep coming back into your turn, you couldn't use the ability or the poker power again. but so swoop and swoop, tele boarder will let you switch one of your basics with the basic in your deck. Or discard the basic and then take it from your deck and play it. So you would use Geraci and then swoop into the meditate and evolve into meditation, quite a lot. Brett, did you play while he's training as well? Yeah. So sometimes you can get the turn one Metta CHAM, which is obviously very strong. So a lot of the draggy swoop engine was pretty popular with a couple of different stage one. He expo it was first popular with McKee X, which has similar to Metta CHAM it shut off. Ability when it was active, but it shut off all abilities, including X's, but its attacks were worse. So Metta CHAM had pure power, which is to colorless spread three counters. And that was J it's just really strong and combination with, Ability lock. So that kinda took over. And then after McKee ex Haryana edX was the next, stage one. I forget what its ability did it was like maybe they couldn't play stadiums or something like that. I'd have to look it up, but,
Brit:And part of why I met it. Another reason why I met a CHAM is so good. It's along with the swoop Geraci engine, another core card in the format is power, hand extension and, rockets admin. which is, and, And then, so that power hand extension is another combat car and it's a trainer card, that when you're using, when you use it, you can either switch them. You have Augusta fact if you're losing or you can, move and energy from their active Pokemon to the bench, is that right? The direction. Yeah. And then, so it's a spread deck. And so I did not always able to do this depending on the matchup, but ideally you're just like, you're playing a very slow methodical game and they're taking their knockouts and then you play three or four of those at once and you rockets admin their hand down to one or two, and then you win the game with two more spreads taking six prizes at once or something like that. It was cool. That's definitely the spread mechanic is something that. I miss a lot that has really been killed by big basics, that I,
Mike:HB.
Brit:lots of spread decks and the earlier years in the game that are easily among my favorites to play. I like that it's not quite a control deck cause you're not just being disruptive or in, preventing them from playing, but you're, you don't do anything the whole time. I love a Bama. Snow Stormfront is one of my favorite cards.
Mike:yeah. I agree. I definitely love those decks as well.
Brent:The last card we had that had a good, like good spread attack. I know my son was trying to do some deck building with that just like a couple of months ago. And he was like, there's no point anymore.
Brit:Yeah, I remember that was, I think mostly around in here. I didn't play, but I knew there was a type of cocoa counter energy deck that year, that. I think always seemed mid tier maybe. but yeah, that was definitely the last, I think a lot of us got our hopes up. A lot of us spread hopefully has got our hopes up with that car. Cause you know, you have the perfect devolution card and SBRT ex at the time still, all the cards were there for it, but not enough evolution decks to take advantage of.
Mike:I remember when Coco first came out, I think about this, like it's so relevant to 2005. I think the deck that got second was the bomb tar at the dark tower and it's our electro deck. And that's a spread deck as well. sometimes, but it can also hit really big numbers, but dr. Editor has same attack as taboo cocoa, but it takes dark, double colors and it's on the stage too. And so like when Coco came out. We are like a basic with free or treat that has spinning tail for a double colorless energy. Like in that card would be super broken in 2005.
Brent:And just going to some power creep, right? Terrible thing. Same thing. not playable today. The best card, the format, 15 years ago.
Mike:So to wrap up the Oh five discussion Metta CIM, Metta CHAM, NATO queen. The bomb tar, we're like probably the three best decks, coming out of the event, not maybe not going into the event, but for sure. Coming out. Oh, one other fun note that I wanted to mention, great. You said Kerryn won world and juniors with Metta jam, which is true. He also won nationals that year. I don't remember if he played Metta jam or something else.
Brit:he did, but I'm not positive.
Mike:And then in the 11 to 14, the seniors division Stewart Benson, who doesn't, hasn't played in a long time, but good player from Washington. He also won nationals and worlds that year. so that was kinda cool. Both in both divisions, nationals and worlds are won by the same person, which is pretty sweet.
Brent:You're supposed to beat those people, man. it. I realized I forgot to really ask you guys. so I'll bring that back. Are those the spread decks back around to, today? Any reaction to, towards it and on frost deck?
Mike:it's fine.
Brent:I could see how like the numbers seem good and it seems like fun to play, but it doesn't seem like broken.
Brit:Yeah, I would pick. Curious, if he wrote, wrote a report or made a video, I would cure it. Be curious to know what his exact rationale was for playing it or something else. Cause it's definitely good. And I think we've mentioned a time or two already. That Inteleos is one of the big winners of rotation. Just all the electric stuff, being a lot worse was one of the main things, holding it back, even pre rotation. And with that gone, it's viable in a lot of different ways now, but. Just seems like a lot of work to do similar things to all the other decks, like your, the three energy attack. And it's just not that good, I think. And you just have to get it so fast. You just really have to get it on your second turn, which requires the frost ma to be honest, same sort of pace with and ADP. And that's, it's just more work for similar things. I think And so you get the freeway and again, send a scorch. But as we've said a lot already, like a lot of these match-ups are close. It's not like Santa scorches, the rock cutting paper to ADP, it's not a triangle or anything like you
Brent:I watched the players cup, like he lost a game. The Senate scored.
Mike:Right.
Brit:like that game was just bad, I think. But yeah. And like he beat, I think he beat some ADP in the players cup too. And. And really, probably more a Testament to his ability than anything. Cause his, the only thing that beat him, I think was just clearly an auto loss just couldn't handle Tuesday and presenta with all the damage reduction. But I don't know, I don't know why he played it over something else. Maybe I would think there's maybe something more to his reasoning than just, to be different for the sake of it, but who knows? I think it's good. It's a solid tier two deck eight tier deck. Just not the best deck.
Mike:Yep. I agree. Nothing really more to say.
Brent:Fair enough. let's talk about, the other old school, a tournament that happened was this the next Destiny's to legendary treasures,
Mike:Something like that. Yeah, the events happened. It was like the city championship format, the winter format of 2013, 2014. And so I mentioned last week that I didn't really play that year, which is true is the last season before I came back a lot into the game, but I found out a cup. I realized a couple of days before the event started that I did play decent amount of this format since it was like over my winter break of college. and I. Created a deck that is still one of one of my favorite decks that I've ever played in and made, which was a cell Gore Garber door Flareon, which is like a. a montage of different things, set to, with the intent of trying to counter the Metta games and the big decks that year in that format were dark rye, usually with garbage or darker Garber door. Varese and Genesek Blastoise, those are like the big three Oh and plasma where, so those four were like the big four decks and there were some other good decks, like in poli on it was pretty good. I don't know if it just showed up in this tournament or if it was actually popular at the time, but there's a bunch of people play in Vic teeny to on drift limb, which I guess was trying to do the same thing. Vic Teenie would be version Genesek and tracking on beats, the dark decks and drift Lin beats plasma. but yeah, I, the deck did pretty well, but. At least in this tournament. so I was really excited. So cause this deck is not your typical a cell grow deck because it doesn't have something to send up really, like you're not sending up web effects, like the more modern of saga decks. You're not sending up a safeguard type of Pokemon. You're. Kind of hope. So the weird thing about this for a minute is that switch and escape rope were both equally played depending on the deck that you're playing against. So if you play a wall Pokemon and they play escape rope, then you have to like awkwardly promote not your wall. And then if they escape up, you send your wall up. but if they play switch. And if they play both, then you have to make the guessing game. So I remember I opted. I was like, all right, I'm just not going to play walls. I'm just gonna get my good Pokemon out. if I see if I could bench three shell mint and a wall, let's just bench. But then, and. So then you could you a deck and cover, and then maybe you send up a shell mint or in a cell Gore, and then if they escape rope, then you send up another one. Maybe you send up an EBV or a Flareon. Maybe you're sending up a mr. Mime, have you started with a Dino? And you just let that get killed. and if things get killed, you're also pairing up Clarion. So even in match-ups where you want to focus on. A cell Gore. you do that for a while. And then towards the later in the game, you set up a Flareon or two and you take two, one shots, and you win the game that way. you too, and a couple of max potions, so you can and send up a big Pokemon, take a hit, and then max push away the damage. Max potions ended up being really good against them. Add a victimy tracky on deck because they actually cap out at 90 damage. So I could send up a Flareon or a garbage door, take 90 max, potion it off. And then I'd be good to go. So that matchup was really good. so yeah, so it's pretty fun deck to play. I ended up losing to impose Leon in top four, which seems like it's slightly unfavored I won one game and then the other two games were both really close. He had a lot of, Good tech cards for the matchup. You're in tune to tool scrappers to enhance Emmers to max potions, to escape ropes and dowsing machine. So a lot of the employee index at that time ran to leafy on, but he dropped that, Aye. He told me because he didn't expect anyone to have tropical beaches to play Blastoise. so he had all this room for, for these other cards, which are good and other match-ups to not just match up for me. But the max potions, I think in particular were troublesome because otherwise you can. One of the reasons that, cell growth has been good historically, is that there are certain numbers that you can hit where you are able to loop them. And when I say loop them, Kao them coming back into your turn. And so 70 is the magic number when you don't have any like boosted stuff. Cause you do 50 plus 60 poison, then 70 points and coming back into your turn. I played against dark rye a couple of times in the tournament. And, I would be able to loop stabilize. So that was super important. and that matchup, and then in Pollyannas 140, so that's also, able to be looped. So when I was able to loop and Polian really strong, but if he had an escape rope or a max potion, then that would mess up the math. Yeah.
Brent:So how does is bruising? Genesek just a freebie cause you have flare yawns and you're like, just do, and you put a set of garbage on flare and you just stop them to death or is there any complexity to that match up?
Mike:so they're fast and you're obviously like you have multiple stage runs, but yeah, the general strategy is to set up Garber door and go for a cell Gore early on and just try and set up a, two flare yarns. And usually if you usually, if you can set up two flaring ons to one shot, things you'll win the game. I was looking back, I think I played two cities with this deck, um, and I did lose two of Rosie and Janice act one of the rounds, but I think it's two out of three year super favorite.
Brent:Nice written any perspective on the 2013, 2014 city Metta.
Brit:I'm trying to think. I'm not, I'm. Nothing is greatly jumping to my mind format. I do remember the Vic Vic teeny track Andrew slim deck. got second regionals that year. Um, at
Mike:Everyone was calling it big tech.
Brit:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it was, it was, it was like supposed to be, I thought, I thought the deck was bad. It be at Fiji every time. Like it was one of those I think just like, and it did well, like, um, someone did well with it. And then I think another player did that at Fort Wayne regionals too. But it just like, problems. Like it just really struck me as being like. You know, like a more middle of the road player, it's just like, it's the best Decker has answers to everything. You know, you got your 15 UV piece, you beat VG, you know, these two grinds that, you know, obviously it's a little more nuanced than that. Um, you know, it's hard to get sometimes and like maybe you did, win games sometimes with it, but. What the, the blanks that tracking on was supposed to fill in. I'm trying to remember what matchup to Rakeon really was for eels, I guess. Okay. And I think that was the thing. Rails was really It could not be And I think rails was sort of quietly the BDI app. It would do really well in the following weeks of those regionals. If I recall correctly and it couldn't beat that because her tracking can't do anything. It just does 90 and accelerates energy. Um, and so it was, you know, caught the Metta at a good time, but I don't remember what else was good at that cities though. I think so that was, that would have been when. So LTR set. So what was the set before that?
Mike:I'm not sure it was. So I do know this was the first. Like a series of events when catcher was erratic.
Brit:Yeah. right. So frizzy on brilliant MuTu was really big in that regionals format. So maybe what I was saying about those are wrong.
Mike:So I think, yeah, I think jealousy could just came out like whatever's wood because yeah. Cause version came out. I think before Genesek did.
Brit:was, there was some deck that this just couldn't be in I'm blanking on what it was.
Mike:I'm not sure.
Brit:Maybe, maybe it was this V versus on MuTu deck actually. Cause I know that for was not. Because the Arizona, Arizona regionals was the first regionals that year, and Verizon was not big at that And it was the Arizona regionals players that all brought frizzy on MuTu, which I think like a JW would go on to win the Fort Wayne the next weekend. Um, but Israel, Israel would win with darker. I, that was on his sort of tear with dark. Right. But I via took awhile for people to really notice that VG was really, really good.
Mike:the list that so Danielle TVA ended up beating. Aaron, who I lost to in top four in the finals and the VG, this was pretty interesting. It ran a Rosa raid, which is when you play it, search your deck for a card. So I think it ran the two, two or something of that. He posted his list on Twitter so he could check it
Brent:Yeah, it ran. It ran into too.
Mike:yeah, so I do vaguely remember that being an early VG lists as
Brent:yeah, no. So people, I remember people had this like one, one Rosa raid tech that they were messing around. With like up through like the national championship that year and and even worlds. And I guess what was funny for me, it was like, I felt like the deck was becoming more and more streamlined as you went. So like the amount of times when, I always feel like a rosary would be so much more helpful if your deck had tons and tons of one of those, and you were like, let me tech that lets me do this thing.
Brit:would play sometimes too. I even remember playing both. I remember playing a lot of online tournaments I played VG with the one, one electrode and a one, one rosary, I think instead of both of them, um, I liked the
Brent:I never messed around with the alone for a
Brit:kind of for the exact reasons you're describing. It's like, I don't have. I have plenty of ways to search everything in my deck. Sometimes I just need sort of flat car drawn instead.
Brent:It's was just one more way for you to find that V booster. Okay. That's so much of what it was about.
Mike:Yeah, it's true.
Brent:All right. what's coming up guys.
Mike:I know there's two, there's a couple events this weekend. I think poker X is running in a perfection tournament on Saturday. Hyper Lux is running another tournament on Sunday. That is no ADP. I felt like I saw another tournament this weekend as well. So as we said earlier, there's lots of tournament's now, which is great. And now it's almost like you got to pick and choose which, which ones that you actually spend the time. And so I'll probably play one of those. I'm not sure which one yet. Um, and I'm going to keep trying to play the extra 20 minutes Monday, Wednesday.
Brit:Yeah, I don't know what I'll be doing. I'm super busy. I'm hoping to probably really don't have many plans to participate in. Anything, but if there's anything official announced in the, the distant future, I think I can sort of put time aside for that. Yeah. I'm just really busy right now and yeah, but it'll only be for kind of the next month or two after that, I should have a lot more time.
Brent:Yeah, I know hyper Lexis having the no ADP tournament with a thousand. Like prize pool, I guess this weekend. have you guys looked at it all the, I know Atlas, released their whole, there's going to be points and there's going to be a season and there's going to be all this stuff. You guys looked at that stuff at all.
Mike:I looked at it. I, I was surprised to learn that those events are not synchronous. So they're happening, over multiple days where, you know, you figure it out with your opponent, which are good. I'd like the poker stats showing must have been successful, but to run a series like that, where there's points seems. It's not what I expected, So I might play some of them, but, not sure.
Brent:yeah, I wonder, I feel like there's this profusion of tournaments and then inevitably there'll be some sort of pruning where people figure out what the optimal strategy is and where the best place to spend their time is where you get the best bang for your buck. Ah, it'll be interesting to watch how that evolves and how people unwind that process.
Mike:Yeah, the one nice thing about all the tournament's though, is that, you can pretty much play one whatever to whatever fits your schedule, which is cool.
Brent:All right. Let's put another amazing podcast in the books, for my pusher. And number five is the sprint Allard. It's the trencher Lynch.