Doing some writing about Toronto Regionals as a personal attention span challenge. If you’re reading this, thanks for clicking!
Preparation:
My main goal when traveling for Pokemon TCG is to use tournaments as excuses to visit cities I like. Performing well at majors is good but having a backup plan in case of bombing is pretty important to me. On that note, I definitely should have gone to Las Vegas, but I skipped and suffered massive FOMO the entire weekend. Oh well, Toronto in mid January.
Leading up to the event I was pretty interested in playing Gardevoir. The power level of the Froslass Munkidori deck I had been playing when compared against its difficulty/complexity just wasn’t that appealing. Meanwhile, Gardevoir won LAIC and had a predictable down tournament in Stuttgart (EU Gardy) so it seemed like a strong play for Toronto.
I really liked the Flutter-Devo version of the deck my friend killerkeldeos had been playing, winning Full Grip’s 3k tournament and placing T64 in Stuttgart. I myself won a decently sized local league cup (before Stuttgart) with the list and felt pretty comfortable on the deck, easily climbing to 1800 on the PTCGL ladder.
Molerator, I hear you ask. What changed? We all see the Pidgeot pile you posted on twitter instead of Gardevoir ex.
A few things shifted in the meta that caused me to question and eventually forsake my purple lobotomy.
First, the arrival of Dawnzard, winning Stuttgart and immediately spiking in playrate. While I don’t think the deck is that good, and the matchup with Flutter/Devo was honestly fine in my limited experience, Dawnzard is an uncomfortable deck to play against, and you can get run off the board easily.
Second, and more importantly, the development in Gardevoir lists moving toward a build with 8 psychics and Luxcape. A Gardevoir list coming straight from Henry was likely to be the most popular list in Toronto within 1-2 cards, and the Flutter/Devo matchup into this version with multiple +hp tools was really unpleasant to play. I also noticed Makani, one of the primary believers in Flutter/Devo, faded the list in favor of Luxcape/8purple, so I assumed I wasn’t smarter than him and more or less dropped the deck.
I put in a decent amount of games on ladder with Luxcape/8purple but I did not like playing this version nearly as much and started considering other options. I briefly tried Grimmsnarl because KK was having ladder success with it but the deck is miserable to play. I tinkered with a bunch of Hero’s cape Charizard lists but the power level felt too low. I resigned myself to playing Gardevoir and played a bunch of ladder games around 1700 with purple raging bolt. Bleh.
Yay! I had played some games with the various Pidgeot decks that had been floating around since Mega Evolution (Psyduck’s) release, but these decks had fragile/suspect matchups into Gholdengo that became worse with all of them shoving Lopunny into their lists, so Pidgeot wasn’t really on my radar as a serious candidate. However, I figured since I wasn’t going to be the one to mess with a Henry list I could spend theory time on the bird instead while practicing Gardevoir.
Over the next few days I worked on testing and refining the list through mostly ladder games, noting my many gameplay errors due to rust, as well as opponents unfamiliar with the deck throwing games for free. I was climbing a lot faster than I was with Gardevoir, and started really considering Pidgeot for Toronto.
An early draft of the list, featuring Shuckle, Cpao, StarGrunt, and Vest.
I kept playing Pidgeot and got deep into the 1800s while continuing to refine the list, but the amount of mistakes opponents were making was a bit concerning. I continued laddering to clean up my gameplay and got to a better list. A few issues with the deck prevented me from fully locking it in, primarily clean, patient play from Dengo and Dawnzard, as well as a lingering fear of jank + watchtowers.
After some focused “lab” testing with AOB, we decided to put a Golduck in the deck to shore up the Dawnzard matchup, and I just decided that Dengo players couldn’t resist clicking the buttons because I, the control player playing the Dengo side, was having urges to click the buttons. Watchtower continued to haunt me the week of the event, and I decided to put in 1 stadium. At some point we learned that Ciphermaniac is pretty good in the deck because of its synergy with our non-pidgeot engine, and squeezed in 2 copies.
Pidgeot ex!
The Actual Regional Championship:
I was excited to go to Toronto, I hadn’t visited Canada since I was a kid and I heard good things about the city. Cold weather wasn’t that scary since I live in Chicago, but the approaching snowstorm did make me worry a bunch on Thursday night when I scrolled Twitter and saw a million delays and cancellations from other competitors. I was lucky enough to get away with only a 1 hour delay on my Friday afternoon flight, and arrived in Toronto excited to play with pokemon cards. I ate a delicious Thai meal at a highly rated restaurant with my friends, resleeved my deck in the hotel room and went to sleep.
Round 1
Alakazam WW
I arrived at my table and greeted my opponent. We chatted about our travel experience and he told me he was nervous because it was his first regional. I gave him some words of encouragement and we flipped over our starters when the clock started.
Alakazam lol. All my preparation was focused on the Big 4 and I instantly pair jank. Luckily this matchup is fine if they don’t instantly pop off and blow up kang. I played Xerosic like 4 times, used Elgyem to move his energies around the board and he conceded g1 with like 8 total cards and 3 prizes left.
Game 2 was a little more interesting because I didn’t prize check like an idiot. If I had, I would have known I prized Latias, both Penny, and Ticket, so when I went to Quick Search and pick up my damaged Kangaskhan I learned I could not move it and was just going to feed 3 prizes for free. Luckily, this game my opponent started Psyduck so I got him with CC Elgyem since he missed a second psychic attachment. He maybe could have gotten some prizes out of a Wonder Patch play but he doesn’t attack for the rest of the game and I win 2-0.
Round 2
Dragapult Dusknoir WW
As we’re setting up for G1 my opponent grumbles about his opening hand and flips over a bear. I go first, Run Errand for 2 and get down a Pidgey. I’m drawing really slow so he eventually gets into Phantom Dive but since he had to Latias out of the bear I’m able to establish Mentally Calm Milotic and Sudowoodo trap his Latias with a combo I Cipher stacked on top of my deck the turn before.
G2 I have to use Brock and then Cipher for my first few supporters under item lock and have to pick between Genesect and Psyduck, but when my opponent plays Hilda for Pult + Neo Upper he finds out there isn’t a pink card in his deck and instantly concedes rather than try and win the game with Jet Headbutt.
Round 3
Gholdengo WLWMy opponent, a pokedad, flips over a Lunatone and passes. I get into my Pidgeot pretty fast while he isn’t able to get anything besides 2 Solrocks and continues to miss Gimmighoul so I just hit him with Blustery Wind 3x and win.
G2 he drops a Watchtower before I’m done setting up and I’m not able to find Artazon or Penny before he can boss KO my Kang for his last 3 prizes.
G3 I set up a little more cleanly but he plays a Cipher on a turn that I’m still not stabilized since I had to feed my Genesect as a sacrifice. I’m scared I’m gonna get primed, but luckily he misreads the boardstate and put Turo on top of his deck so I block that with Milotic and re-establish Genesect, then use Nacli to corner his Lunatone and Fezandipiti 20x until he decks out.
Round 4
Dawnzard LWTMy opponent is a name I recognize and we make some small talk before the round. I can’t find a second tool to fan my active Kang as well as Genesect block prime catcher so my Kang gets freely punched by Charizard and then bossed the next turn because I miss Penny. He knocks out my Elgyem the next turn then gets me with Kieran + Klefki to activate prime on Latias for game.
Game 2 I get into Pidgeot very cleanly and he uses a boss to hit my Pidgeot for 180. I respond with boss Elgyem to disarm his Zard and he blunders, playing prime to switch his Zard into the active and trying to attack with 1 energy to finish off my Pidgeot. I inform him the attack fizzles and then proceed to put every fire energy on his Dusclops for the rest of the game under Golduck. He eventually refuses to play the game so I start hitting him with Blustery Wind and take all 6 prizes.
Before Game 3 he floats the idea of a GA. I am skeptical that he understands the matchup well enough to resolve one, so I don’t commit but I agree to discuss. He starts decently fast but plays 2 gusts on 2 Pidgeys and commits 2 fires to Zard, 1 to Terapagos as time expires. I am holding CC Elgyem Fan Psychic Trolley in my hand so obviously I am going to get him in permanent energy debt but he tries to convince me that he’s massively favored since i don’t have a Pidgeot. I can tell that I’m never going to be able to get a concession so I just circle tie even though my position is about to be insane. Bleh.
Round 5
Raging Bolt WW
I pair into a well known latam player that I figure is playing the same Raging Bolt deck he’s played to the last few events. The list I look at has Iron Leaves but no Turo, so I set up my board to block prime and start planning around how to beat the Iron Leaves stadium bump trick. I lock a Noctowl in the active for a few turns and he concedes, so I assume his switching out is prized.
Game 2 after I open raw trolley going first, he sets up a very thin board, and when I gust the Noctowl he uses for his first knockout, he responds with Turo and cleans his board of liabilities. I’m now scared that there is Iron Leaves and Turo in the deck and that he can recycle the Iron Leaves to take all his prizes even if I catch a liability, but when I rip my flute and catch Fan Rotom he concedes again. I ask him about the list and he says Turo prized game 1, no Iron Leaves.
Round 6
Curse of Leap Out. I sit down next to KK and he says “I hope you lose.” I ask him not to curse me, he asks me if I’m playing Feebas with leap out, I say no comment, he curses me again. This match is completely scuffed and I get swiftly farmed. Even though my opponent voluntarily benches Munkidori, he immediately finds his Turo and then proceeds to discard every single liability in his deck over the next 3 turns. My Pidgeys die to scream tail turn after turn and I don’t have enough space to use Elgyem to disable anything.
Game 2 I again fail to find any trappables and also prize both of my Boss, so after my Pidgey is spawn killed for the 3rd time and I miss gust I flip over my prizes and reveal both copies of Boss and a Counter Catcher. Thanks KK.
Round 7
Dragapult Dusknoir LL
As much as I would love to blame KK and Curse of Leap Out for this one too, I make such an insanely bad pair of misplays that this brutal loss in an extremely favored matchup can only be attributed to me being bad at the game.
Under item lock with an active Kang, a benched Pidgey, and a Ciphermaniac, what I should do is Cipher for both the Pidgeotto and the Pidgeot and start playing the game after that. Instead, in my infinite wisdom, what I do is Cipher Pidgeotto and Brock, because in my head Brock is Pidgeot, but it could also be 2 useful basics if I sack into Pidgeot off the topdeck or the Kang draw. I do not sack into Pidgeot OR a useful basic so I tilt, play Brock for useful basics, then get phantom dived on the next turn and spawn camped out of the game.
In game 2, I go second, play my Arven and discover that my trolley is prized. Nice. I tilt, forget to attach luxcape/charm to my backup Pidgey and get boss dived (no jamming tower) and lose the game over the next few turns.
Going from 4-0-1 to 4-2-1 by getting swiftly 2-0’d by two relatively good matchups has my head spinning. I go sit on the floor by myself and eventually get found by my friends, who decide that the best use of time at that moment is to talk about how we could all pair round 8 at 4-2-1. I ask them nicely (maybe not that nicely) to shut up, and jet out of there the instant pairings are up.
Round 8
Dawnzard (Flareon?) WWMy opponent flips over some owl stuff and sets up what looks like normal Dawnzard, but on turn 2 he Noctowls for Crispin Crystal and uses Crown Opal on my Kang? Midway through my turn I realize that I had Genesect + tool and inform him he can only use a relatively weak Unified Beatdown instead. We rewind the damage and I Penny Kang that turn anyway so no foul. He uses a jet to get out of my early retreat lock, but when I trap another Noctowl his Hilda does not get another jet. I guessed but wasn’t sure that his crystal build often only plays 1 jet, which is good! Unfortunately, the 1 jet can be infinitely recycled with Torrential Pump, but he doesn’t know this and now his only switching out is gone. He tries to power up Noctowl to attack my Sudowoodo but my Handheld Fan Penny loop disables this attempt and he scoops.
Game 2, he tries to set up a very thin Pidgeot Charizard board but I decide that I do not believe his noctowl deck will function with no Owls. I attach 3x to Kang and start Bossing his Charmanders. Eventually he gets a live Charizard but I hit a flute and pull out Ditto, then boss Blustery wind for game through his Iono to 1. I had Fez, pushed a fresh Kang, and had Pidgeot + many outs to energy left in deck (2 prisms, 2 stretchers) so I felt like this was a reasonable draw.
Going into Phase 2 at 5-2-1 isn’t ideal but it is my first two consecutive Phase 2s and my first (in two tries) with Pidgeot so I experience some mild excitement, yippee.
Round 9
Dawnzard LWTI find a limitless entry for the first time in a few rounds and am a bit scared to see a Conkeldurr on the page. I plan for a Ruffian heavy game and find my table. Instead, my opponent flips over Charmander. Unfortunately, I draw poorly, both my Pidgeys die to Jetki Dusclops + Boss Burning Darkness and my Fez draws 3 irrelevant cards so I scoop and go to game 2.
This game I set up beautifully, and my opponent responds to my CC Elgyem play with jet Fan Rotom. I flute his board out of Klefki then Elgyem 5 Fire energies onto his Dusknoir. At this point my opponent starts counting my cards and I realize he thinks he can deck me out. He plays an Iono or two while I pad stuff back and Xerosic his hand to lock up the game. He plays all the way to the end of deckout and then says he’s okay with a tie. I look at the 5 minutes left on the clock and decide not to donk check the Fan Rotom deck.
Out at 5-2-2 is unfortunate, but at least I get to play another day of Pokemon cards. I get dinner with my friends, watch some of the Seahawks-49ers game, then go back to my hotel and fall asleep without a blanket.
Round 10
Gholdengo WI check my opponent’s name on the tournament page and get some intel from a friend that it’s Dengo with a watchtower. I set up slowly as my first 2 Pidgeys die to Solrock, but I’m able to bump the watchtower with Artazon when it comes down and then get into a Milotic + Nacli lock to close out the game. My opponent plays all the way to deckout.
I shuffle up and draw my opening hand and am a bit nervous to see only a Pidgey going first. My opponent misses the donk and I set up with Arven for trolley, so he concedes with no chance to win the game in time.
Round 11
Gardevoir Jellicent WW
My opponent goes second and item locks me with an active Kang and a Pidgey but misses Ralts so I sit there drawing for a few turns, Arven for Trolley Luxcape to thin my deck and try to draw more basics. He decides that this is the perfect time to go into Jellicent and immediately discovers that i have a Boss in my hand as I play trolley and candy into Pidgeot. I impound Mew and he instantly concedes saying “I shouldn’t have cut Turo, punished.” Armed with this knowledge I set up a clean board game 2, don’t bother with Milotic, and spread all his energies away from his attackers. He counts to 10 energies on board and concedes.
Round 12
Gardevoir W
My opponent opens Fezandipiti, which is not really a trappable but it will cost him the game later. I dishonestly block his Secret Box with the Genesect in my hand and respond to his early Scream Tail with a Boss + Impound on Gardevoir ex with insufficient psychic energy in discard. He plays his Turo to escape. I think maybe he’s not supposed to evolve back into Gardevoir here, but he does. I whiff both flute and Erika so I’m going to have to disable this Gardevoir to win. Through some use of handheld fan retreat lockers and gust Fez + Elgyem turns, we eventually get to a board where he has 1 prize left, a 6 energy scream tail (but only 40 damage), a Gardevoir with 1 Dark 1 Psychic, and Fez. I Iono him to 1, Luxcape my Elgyem, which I have recovered from my Feebas with Penny after he played Turo early, and have nothing his 40 damage Scream Tail can knockout. I shift the last 2 purple energies to Scream Tail, then regust the Gardevoir and survive some Munkidori damage counter movement to close out the game.
In game 2, I attach aggressively to Pidgey to force some action, and end up staring down a 2 kirlia board and 3 card hand. I jokingly consider going aggressive here and my opponent encourages me to do it. I stare at the board for a bit, but eventually pass and he reveals his hand is Gardevoir ex + Iono CC and I laugh at the dodged bullet. We play a few turns and he concedes with not enough time to win.
Round 13
Dragapult Dusknoir WW
My opponent is a familiar face from the ladder, and he is not happy to see me since the matchup is brutal. He also mentions that he had a GA go sour in the last round to knock him out of cut contention. I offer some sympathy and tell him we can have a resolution since we’re still alive for cash. He agrees.
He draws his opening hand, sighs, and flips over Munkidori. I know he’s not playing Turo so I just start to impound the monkey and Ruffian/Fan all his Psychic/Luminous energies away. He scoops quickly and we go to game 2. This time he smiles and flips over a Dreepy but frowns as I play raw trolley going first. He attaches to his single Dreepy/Drakloak 3x in a row as I blunder and forget to prize check my Pidgeotto and am forced to Brock for Pidgeot and hope to hit candy next turn. I get Iono’d and he misses Pult. I look at my hand and see a Cipher so since I attached to my Pidgey already I Cipher for Candy + Pidgeot and Quick Search an energy to Blustery Wind donk his only Drakloak for game. This thing had luminous, neo upper, and fire on it so I legitimately might have had to try to survive 2-3 phantom dives with no Pidgeot which would have been extremely suspect.
Round 14
Tank Kangaskhan L
I look up my opponent and find a Dengo/Lugia player. We shake hands at the table and agree to try and have a match conclusion since a win secures Top 32 while a tie gets 64. He flips over a Kangaskhan and I soon discover a Tank deck which was not what I was expecting. After I Turtonator his Kang attachments a few times he realizes this isn’t going to work and goes into the Buffalo to start attacking slowly, burning a jet in the process. I instantly Ruffian this because I do not want this to be recycled with his Pennys. For some reason when I retreat my damaged Turtonator, he drops a Munkidori and uses Calamitous Snowy Mountain to generate damage to knock it out. I respond by establishing Milotic and impounding Munkidori. At this point I should have realized that since he continued to stay in the game while not attacking he definitely had another jet, and should have prioritized regaining access to Ruffian through Pal Pad. I was unfortunately preoccupied with unprizing my Iono using ticket, so I neglect to get my Ruffian out of the deck in time, and get caught when he plays a second jet and Boss KO’s my Milotic. If I can Ruffian the jet and use Turtonator to disarm the Kangaskhan I should still have enough breathing room to win, but my Ruffian has disappeared into the prizes. I’ve also attached my Luxurious cape to my Sudowoodo for some reason, so when he uses Penny to get out of my final attempt to trap his Munkidori, I lose the game.
I make a halfhearted attempt to win on prizes in game 2 with not much time left, but he flips more heads than I do so I concede. In hindsight, I think I could have made a more viable attempt with Sudowoodo using Try to Imitate instead of looking for 3 heads on my Kangaskhan’s Rapid Fire Combo, but I flipped tails anyway, so whatever. We exchange decks because we are both interested in lists and counts and have a nice conversation before he leaves to turn in the match slip.
Losing knocks me out of cash all the way into T128, but it’s a third Phase 2 entry and my second time in double digits so I’m not too upset about it. Better next time. I stand in a prizing line, exchange round complaints with a friend, then catch a train to the airport and make my way home to Chicago. Toronto was fun! I’d like to come back. If you made it this far, thank you for reading and congratulations on your attention span. Pidgeot ex.
