0:05

Welcome to the Trashlanch

0:07

podcast. It's the only

0:09

podcast about the Pokemon trading card game.

0:12

Our intro is from Chris Webby's Webster's Laboratory.

0:14

We like to just give him some credit from time to time

0:17

because it's awesome. We're

0:19

all on Twitter. Attendance is 100%.

0:21

Cam's here. Liam's here. I'm here. That's

0:24

enough to get us to 100. It only takes

0:26

three. Dragonshield, it's the official

0:28

sleeves of the Trash Lounge. When

0:31

you are using Dragonshield's sleeves,

0:34

then every time your opponent plays an item card,

0:36

he loses a little bit of willpower, leading

0:38

to his eventual destruction. That's

0:40

just a fact, I don't, I don't make the science.

0:43

Science makes the science. Cam

0:45

and Liam are back from,

0:48

I won't say a disastrous Indianapolis,

0:51

but, but it was not

0:54

Disastrous!

0:55

Yeah, it was not, it was not the double finals that we

0:57

were expecting.

0:57

Yeah, man, we got cooked, bro. Jesus

0:59

Christ, it was terrible.

1:01

Cam, you, you, you

1:03

want to go first? You dropped a little faster.

1:06

Yeah, I just played intro box,

1:09

I 1

1:11

0'd the first three people, and

1:13

then I just kind of,

1:16

Didn't couldn't close it out in the next three rounds.

1:18

One was a double brick, one was due to

1:20

prizing some ancient

1:23

cards in the last two cards of my prizes,

1:26

and then the third one was due

1:28

to seeing I

1:30

mean, I'm not sure I could have played around it, but I

1:32

saw Someone playing a Zard

1:35

list that looked very similar to Liam's

1:37

list with double Charmeleon. And

1:39

so I was just playing with using

1:41

my items, and I ended up getting Eerie'd

1:44

in the late game, which I was not expecting. And

1:47

so, that, I just, at that point, I was like,

1:49

I'm not gonna try to tie you and put us both

1:51

out of Day 2, and I already have my Invite,

1:53

so. Just ending

1:55

a subpar run.

1:57

I played a Pidgeot

2:00

box build. It had a 102 Charizard

2:02

line. It was pretty similar to the Wigglytuff

2:05

list, but a little bit more focused on consistency.

2:08

So it ended up looking like a Zard list, kind

2:10

of, with, like, Pidgeot techs included.

2:12

But you know, it was just somewhere kind

2:15

of in the middle. I thought the list was

2:17

pretty good, I was pretty happy with it, I think

2:19

maybe some room for improvement, but I

2:22

generally thought it was pretty good, and

2:24

I just hit some abysmal matchups like,

2:27

that's always, that's always the downside when you play

2:29

something that's so heavily Tech

2:31

to beat, like, specific meta decks.

2:34

I was, I was not preparing at

2:36

all for decks like Dialga, Guardi,

2:39

Arceus, and I hit

2:41

a lot of those. So, so my tournament didn't go

2:43

so well. Yeah, it was not a great

2:45

run. However, Liam Hyatt who

2:47

played the deck in Seniors managed to

2:49

make it all the way to Top 4, where he ultimately lost

2:51

to Dialga. Same as me, and

2:54

it ended his run.

2:56

And he was undefeated, I, I, just as

2:58

you started I had the realization that we should have had him

3:01

on to talk about how to play

3:03

your list because apparently he knows.

3:07

Yeah, I, I was really proud of him. He he

3:09

picked up the list, I think, at, like, it

3:11

was the night before, and,

3:14

I mean, it's the list has a lot of options, and

3:16

so it's, it's really boxy, and

3:19

in some ways can be hard to play, but,

3:21

I mean, he, he obviously did a great job piling it. Made

3:24

it all the way to top four, and I think even got himself into a pretty

3:26

good spot in top four. The Dialga matchup

3:28

is really, really hard, and he

3:30

was able to create at least some winning chances,

3:32

although they didn't pan out. So, yeah,

3:34

he did a really great job with the deck.

3:37

I think that also is,

3:41

that finish was also

3:43

paired with a win by control in

3:45

the juniors division, and then Grant Manley also

3:47

got top four, so, not, I

3:49

think all three lists were not Not

3:51

exactly the same, but 3 controls

3:54

back in the top 8 for all 3

3:56

divisions. I think it was bound to

3:58

happen at some point with Zard becoming

4:02

more and more popular. And then the other

4:04

deck, obviously the one Dialga also

4:06

took Grant Manley out if

4:08

I'm not mistaken, Hedrick took took

4:10

down Grant Manley. So that was the other

4:12

deck of the tournament, which there was three

4:15

Dialgas in the top eight

4:17

of Seniors, and then Hedrick

4:20

winning in Masters.

4:22

So, it was kind of, and

4:24

then obviously Chen Pao, the

4:27

same group that kind of has been running around

4:29

with it. So those really were the

4:31

three decks of all

4:33

three divisions.

4:37

So, correct me if I'm wrong guys, I

4:39

felt like the meta was different than

4:41

you guys expected. Like

4:43

it seemed like, coming out

4:46

of day one. And then coming

4:48

out of Day 2, it's a level like, so

4:50

much Chen Pow, a lot

4:52

of Dialga? Like, or maybe just

4:55

good players play Dialga? Like,

4:57

was super prepped for Chimpow. Er, I

4:59

didn't bring a super teched out list, but I

5:01

had, I think, a solid strategy to beat it. And

5:04

I knew Chimpow was going to be popular. I think it was going

5:06

to be Zard and answers to Zard. I

5:09

did not expect Dialga to be such

5:11

a popular answer to Zard. But

5:13

yeah, I think for the most part it was Zard

5:15

and answers to Zard. I think Gardi

5:17

was a little bit more popular than I expected. But

5:21

yeah, other than that I was pretty close, pretty on

5:23

point I think.

5:27

Yeah, I mean, I wasn't expecting Galaga to hop up,

5:29

that's really just the surprise one. Everything

5:31

else is kind of feels

5:34

Relatively the same, but I

5:37

feel like Dialga's here to stay for the rest

5:39

of the format.

5:40

For sure, deck's good. Dude,

5:42

I have no clue how, man, but somehow

5:45

that deck always opens Poffin, bro. I,

5:47

like, I don't know how, and I think you

5:49

just instantly lose if you don't get, like,

5:51

multiple Beldums down turn one. But,

5:54

they just, they somehow do it every single

5:56

game. It's insane. Yeah,

6:00

that deck doesn't make no sense to me, but, I

6:02

mean, like, like, it obviously is good, once

6:04

you've set up. I just, man,

6:08

like a deck like effectively playing like 20 energy

6:10

cards with the super odds and the energy somehow

6:13

setting up and needing like multiple pieces

6:16

to set up. You have to find multiple basics turn

6:18

one into multiple stage ones turn two

6:20

and somehow stay consistent is

6:23

just a miracle. I, I

6:25

cannot believe it.

6:27

LA coming up. Cam, I'm assuming you're going

6:29

to LA. So, so how does this

6:31

shape your thinking for, for LA? Liam,

6:34

not going to LA. Me, not going to LA.

6:36

I would say, one,

6:38

if I had any hopes of running

6:41

a control deck you know, maybe

6:43

after getting some reps and

6:45

seeing both Liam's play it at this last,

6:47

cause I wasn't, I saw Liam's list, I

6:49

thought, I thought it was good, I just wasn't gonna switch

6:51

last second to a deck like that. Now

6:54

I probably don't even put in reps to that deck

6:56

because you take a

6:58

pretty hard loss to the

7:00

Tang. I don't know if I want to

7:02

keep running back Ancient Box. We've

7:05

been trying some things, we've been trying to see

7:07

what can beat Dialga. I'm sure

7:09

we're gonna see a ton of it. I saw on Hedrix

7:12

Tournament report, that

7:14

he went 11 1 3, and

7:16

I think his loss in two

7:19

of his ties were to Chen Pao, and

7:21

but he won a total of 4 1 2 against Chen Pao,

7:23

and the third tie was an I. D. in round 15

7:25

to a Chen Pao, but that doesn't matter. And

7:28

then the other one was round 7

7:30

against Jose Marrero, he went

7:32

loss win win, But he won

7:34

Game 3 due to a

7:36

game loss, and then Jose was

7:38

playing Goldango. So we tried that last

7:41

night, and Goldango's

7:44

alright, it went like 50

7:46

50 into Diago. Whoever went first felt

7:48

favored. Diago did Cooldango doesn't

7:50

feel great into many other decks. We

7:52

was gonna say, I feel like the downside of that strategy is

7:54

playing Goldengo. I

7:56

I'm, like I, given

7:58

that I have my Invite and I

8:01

am not like actively chasing Stipend,

8:03

I might throw a tournament

8:05

at something like that. I might be willing

8:07

to, but it is is like very

8:10

run hot it's very dependent on like do

8:12

you get your basics I'm I'm certain

8:14

the same way Dialga is

8:16

with the way Liam's talking about like you'd need to get multiple

8:19

basics multiple stage ones to turn to

8:21

and if you get it all it feels really great and

8:23

then sometimes you're just like oh I just I

8:25

don't have it this game.

8:27

feel like what Liam would say, so Liam, you can

8:29

tell me if you already said this, is, If you've already

8:32

got your invite, then you can really focus on just

8:34

winning this tournament instead of just trying to get

8:36

points.

8:37

I hope that's Cam's focus at this point. I'm

8:40

more confident that it is.

8:41

Yeah, don't, don't, don't be like, oh, you

8:43

know, I, I'm, I'm gonna just sell this tournament

8:45

because I already have my invite.

8:47

Nah, I'm not gonna sell it,

8:48

not the, that's not the kind of thing we, we

8:50

if I believed Goldango was real

8:52

I would play it but I have a feeling that

8:54

it's not quite.

8:57

No, yeah, Kim's talking about taking risks, and that's a,

8:59

that's a real thing, like, there's always a,

9:01

you can always just play the BDF, play Zard, probably

9:03

lock up 5 2 2 or something, or better,

9:05

right? But if you wanna,

9:07

if you wanna win the event, you have to take risks. Just

9:10

having us.

9:11

dig it. I dig it. Is there

9:13

other stuff we should talk about from Indie?

9:17

I, I'm fully on to NAIC. I

9:19

don't know if y'all saw my post, yes sir, I'm

9:21

tough, I'm tough. Ha

9:23

ha ha.

9:25

I did not see your

9:26

my,

9:27

Yeah, you probably

9:28

you didn't miss much.

9:30

Oh my

9:31

Apparently, apparently this guy's radio's

9:33

silent until NAIC he will

9:36

I deleted Twitter off my phone. I'm,

9:38

Oh, oh,

9:39

now. Yeah

9:41

I believe Liam did tell me

9:43

he has decided to fully embody LeBron.

9:46

Oh my goodness,

9:48

yeah, dude, I, I talked with Nabil,

9:50

Liam Hyatt's dad, a little bit over the weekend.

9:52

I'm on the performance optimization

9:55

train now, bro. I'm on the train. I

9:57

woke up at 6 a. m. for

9:59

like, maybe the First time in,

10:01

yeah, maybe, maybe like the first time in my

10:03

18 years of life so far and

10:05

went for a run. Maybe the

10:07

Oh, you worked out too, oh!

10:09

Okay, Liam

10:09

no, I didn't work out, but did a little

10:11

cardio,

10:12

run, that's okay.

10:13

yeah, exactly. Yeah, dude,

10:15

and I went to bed at 10 p. m. for like maybe

10:17

the first time in like the last like six years.

10:20

Dude, I'm really like that, bro. I'm really

10:21

you really have, did you still have nerds for dinner?

10:24

Or, That's

10:30

Alright.

10:37

That's crazy. Yeah,

10:40

you know, a man can only do

10:41

like, eating food I don't like is a bridge too far.

10:44

Yeah. Well,

10:48

we're gonna see an optimized Liam at NAIC

10:51

yeah, dude, I'm actually getting teed, bro.

10:53

I'm getting teed. I'm like that, bro. I'm

10:55

like that.

10:58

Oh my goodness.

10:59

Yeah, I guess that, I

11:01

think if we're all done with indie, we

11:05

can talk about, more generally, something that

11:07

Cam's been wanting to talk about, which is This

11:10

is how we prepare for

11:12

events,

11:12

I love this topic.

11:14

I think actually for

11:15

topic. Going into the end, I saw

11:18

like pokey Emmy's tweet,

11:20

how she has one event left. And I think there

11:22

are quite a few people there that are like,

11:25

I have one or two events to close out. My

11:28

invite what is best strategy,

11:30

especially depending on how far away you are,

11:32

I know quite a few people,

11:35

50, 100 points out and,

11:38

so you are the greater

11:41

player than I, you are a former world

11:43

champion, and a

11:45

big regional champion, so,

11:48

Liam, how do you personally

11:51

prepare for events

11:53

and how do you come to Your

11:55

deck decision, because you've chosen

11:57

some interesting decks, you've chosen a

12:00

very standard deck, like in Towards Zard.

12:03

it up a little. I think, you know, I was thinking

12:05

about this a little bit since Indie, which

12:07

is like any, any person

12:09

out there, I would absolutely

12:11

trade NAIC to WinWorlds

12:14

in a heartbeat. I wouldn't even think about it. And

12:16

so, I think looking at NAIC

12:18

as a chance to, to improve my

12:21

my preparation process for Worlds is

12:24

is a logical thing to do. So I'll,

12:26

I'll be, in some sense, like, trying some stuff

12:29

out. I'm, I'm looking into the performance

12:31

optimization stuff. I,

12:33

the the, the newest thing is I,

12:36

I've looked at, like, You know, when you think about improving

12:38

cognitive performance I'm looking

12:40

at the like the, what the chess players do,

12:42

apparently. So, one thing I'm

12:45

gonna try to do over the next coming, next

12:47

few weeks, or at least make sure I do, is this thing

12:49

called interleaving. Interleaving is a

12:51

process where, like, like, in the, in

12:53

the process of learning, you basically try to

12:56

Mix up the ways you learn and,

12:59

so like, the example that Magnus Carlsen

13:02

gives is, he, he'll play,

13:04

like, chess 960 alongside

13:07

his preparation for a typical chess, which is

13:09

basically just starting with, like, a random board,

13:11

so, like, the pieces are kind of randomized to

13:14

basically, like, mix up the way your brain thinks while,

13:16

while kind of keeping it the same, so, like, in that

13:19

sense, I think, I think that's one of the benefits

13:21

of doing something like cubing, which is thinking

13:23

about the game, but thinking about it in like a different way.

13:26

And so I don't know exactly the best way to access

13:28

like custom formats as

13:30

easily as chess does, but trying

13:33

to replicate that same process is going to be

13:35

something I'm going to try to do. Over the next few weeks.

13:38

So there's that. And then there's also like,

13:41

you know, some dietary stuff or whatever.

13:44

Apparently I gotta chew gum during events. I

13:46

also have to apparently like sit in a certain way.

13:49

So yeah, I'm gonna be trying all that stuff out.

13:51

And, and see how far it gets me. Whether

13:53

or not I like it, you know.

13:55

I've not heard about the sitting.

13:57

the sitting is, this is something that

13:59

I've actually seen a lot of Pokemon players

14:01

do, cause I mean, this is the go to, it's very natural, is

14:04

and like what chess players did for many years,

14:06

is basically leaning as far forward

14:09

as you can during games. And,

14:11

what it does, apparently, is it like, puts pressure

14:14

on your lungs, so you take in like 30 percent

14:16

less oxygen, and it, you know, it makes

14:18

your brain function a little worse, so I gotta, you

14:20

have to like, sit up straight, but not

14:22

too straight, where you're like, too far back,

14:25

and you like, lose alertness or something, you gotta sit

14:27

like, right in the, right in the perfect balance

14:29

which is around like, 75 degrees

14:32

from like, your legs, apparently, or something like that. So,

14:34

yeah, we're gonna be going for that. Going

14:36

forward,

14:38

How do you practice that? Like, how do you, like,

14:40

like, obviously what you want to do is train yourself

14:42

so that's a natural thing to do, but

14:45

I wonder how you do that.

14:47

I don't know, I was sitting like that during all of school today. I

14:49

guess

14:49

All right, all right. I like it. I like

14:51

it. Liam, Liam has a situation

14:54

where he has to sit for six hours, and he's like, I'm gonna

14:56

practice sitting like that during my six

14:58

hour sitting practices. I

15:00

dig it. I,

15:02

Mm hmm.

15:03

I do as well, that's awesome. I see that you're,

15:06

you have already, you know, achieved

15:08

a championship and you're like, how can I

15:10

improve myself in other ways to get back

15:13

to the top?

15:15

Ah,

15:15

great Liam Halliburton trying, always finding

15:17

ways to be on the cutting edge.

15:20

I, I, I mean, I, I do my best to improve.

15:23

That's, that's the ultimate goal. I, one

15:27

time regional champion is, is hopefully

15:29

not going to be my legacy. I will,

15:31

I want to leave a greater impact on the game, and

15:34

that requires improving.

15:36

Alright something that I wanted to

15:38

talk about in terms of preparing

15:40

for events, something that I haven't actually

15:42

done in a while, I last

15:45

did this, I know that you've kind

15:47

of done it, we haven't, you and I haven't

15:49

together done it pretty indepthly since

15:51

we've been working together this year, I did

15:53

a lot with Finn last year, and

15:55

it was using spreadsheets

15:57

and doing Metashare And

16:01

I think doing it with

16:03

people that you trust and kind of

16:05

getting information from, you

16:08

know, you're not going to know all the matchups. So

16:10

last year there was a point

16:12

in the season, I think at NAIC, where

16:14

we didn't know the Arceus matchups because I

16:17

never play Arceus. I hate Arceus. But

16:19

I had someone I could trust

16:21

in both Kayden

16:24

and Liam, who were both

16:26

playing Arceus at NAIC, and

16:28

so they could fill out the spreadsheet

16:31

for us in those in

16:34

those matchups, and I

16:36

think using that information I

16:39

think specifically the meta, the meta,

16:41

expected metashare because I think

16:43

something that we can tend

16:45

to do is when we're testing, especially

16:48

in a group, you can kind of get sucked into

16:50

having this little, very narrow

16:52

meta and so I like to reach out.

16:55

So, this is people like Kianamini

16:57

who I've, I've worked with. You know, used to live

17:00

next to near you know, I

17:02

can text him, ask him what he thinks of certain

17:04

decks, what he thinks is going

17:06

to show up, and that kind of removes any bias

17:09

that when you're trying to make a spreadsheet and

17:11

kind of what you expect to come up, you can do like

17:13

an average of like, say, ten

17:15

people, five to ten people, what

17:18

the expected meta share is going to be,

17:20

take the average to kind of Remove

17:23

any biases, or as much as you can

17:26

and then you fill out the information on

17:28

what you think the matchups are. And so,

17:30

the last time I did this was at Worlds. And

17:32

when Finn and I were filling out

17:35

the spreadsheet, the,

17:38

I think the rankings

17:40

of the decks were Tina,

17:43

Turbo, and Fusion Mew

17:46

at the top three. And,

17:49

so you can always pick up the

17:52

best deck if you want to.

17:55

The top two were Lostbox in that

17:57

case. And, I kind

17:59

of played Lostbox during the year, but not

18:01

Finn. That great, and not to a high

18:03

level, so I

18:06

didn't feel comfortable switching to the top

18:08

two decks in that case, but

18:10

I had played Mew a lot, and

18:13

I think using

18:15

the spreadsheet information

18:17

to the best of your ability it wasn't

18:19

safe for me to switch to

18:22

A deck that I wasn't comfortable with, but I'm going to switch

18:24

to a deck that is still in the top

18:26

three, top five, and then

18:28

just hope to go on a run. And so that's,

18:31

I think, what I usually try to do for

18:33

events. I'm not someone who just

18:35

picks the number one deck because I'm

18:37

not usually comfortable with all

18:39

decks, and I usually have a particular

18:41

playstyle. But

18:44

I think I try to trust

18:48

the data a lot when it comes to

18:53

You know, what I choose, and then a lot of it

18:55

has to do with playing the best deck. I

18:57

think when preparing for an event,

18:59

I know people will say like, Abon

19:02

and Liam have said that Ancient Box is a bad,

19:05

potentially a bad pick for events

19:07

because it loses to Charizard, but I have

19:10

practiced a lot against Charizard. So

19:12

I think even if you want to play a deck that

19:14

loses to the best deck, you still need to practice

19:16

the matchup a lot. I still feel

19:18

like I know the outs from

19:20

Ancient Box into Charizard decently

19:23

well. And I think that's hopefully

19:25

something we can start doing more,

19:27

Liam, as we prepare for NAIC.

19:30

Because I think Abon is also locked

19:33

in on preparing for NAIC and it's

19:35

gonna be kind of exciting seeing the,

19:38

some of the results out of Japan.

19:40

Are Bonds doing NAIC?

19:42

Is he? Or maybe

19:43

read all the group chat messages. Go look at that, bro.

19:45

Oh yeah, I'm,

19:47

Yeah,

19:50

I, I heard he's betrayed you.

19:53

yeah.

19:55

Oh, how has he betrayed you? What happened? I

19:57

don't know.

19:59

Not going to NAIC?

20:01

Yeah, yeah,

20:02

People unable to register for tournaments are traitors,

20:06

Yeah, but around like

20:08

even

20:08

three days ago, Cam gave

20:10

me the like, yo, Liam bro, let's lock

20:12

in friendly. I see you, me, a bong. Let's let's

20:14

do it. Let's really grind this out. We got

20:17

this, man. Come to find out the

20:19

big guy, Abad, and he's goaded.

20:21

He's literally goaded. He's

20:23

not gonna be there. Like, what?

20:27

That's okay, he'll still help. I'm sure he'll still

20:29

No, no, no. The reason he

20:31

said he's not going to NAIC is because he does not have

20:33

time to help. Abad's a busy man. He's got

20:35

finals apparently, and he's doing LA. It

20:37

does seem like a lot. And

20:40

so, I'll respect

20:42

that a little bit, I guess.

20:44

I guess.

20:45

Yeah, I mean,

20:47

let me ask you a couple questions that, that a dummy

20:49

like me has gotta ask. First question

20:51

is, like, I recognize

20:53

the days of spreadsheet

20:56

ery like, like things have changed

20:58

a little bit. How Valuable

21:01

or not valuable is online

21:04

tournament input.

21:06

Very valuable, I think, especially for NAIC.

21:08

Yeah,

21:09

Like, like, Trainer Hill is just dumping

21:11

out matchup spreads, and I recognize,

21:13

like, I recognize, we all

21:14

go for it, I don't go for it,

21:16

when you look at the Trainer Hill matchup spreads, the problem

21:18

is janky lists, janky players,

21:21

and, and the nice thing about, like, maintaining

21:23

your own spreadsheet is circle

21:25

of trust in terms of, like, quality list,

21:27

quality player.

21:28

Yeah, no, use your own spreadsheet for matchup

21:30

data. But, online

21:33

data is still important for developing lists.

21:35

Like, these are the lists you're going to hit. Like,

21:38

the online list or the list you're going to hit, maybe you have

21:40

some like, inside information that some random group

21:42

is playing X, and it's this

21:44

list, and you have to account for that a little bit.

21:46

But like, all of the rounds,

21:49

everybody you're going to hit day one, you basically have

21:51

access to their lists online if you just

21:53

care to check. You should go check. I

21:55

think it's good data. I, yeah,

21:58

I base a lot of my decisions on the online trends,

22:00

at least in lists. Like, if they're playing

22:02

1 or 2 Vacuum, I base that

22:05

on online, it's not like you know, whatever

22:07

my testing group was playing.

22:09

But, but the, but the matchup spreads that come

22:11

out of of those? Disregard it.

22:14

Solidly, I think, I

22:16

think there's a, there's a bit of a danger in

22:18

that, I've seen a lot of people, like,

22:21

they're like, oh man, you know, they

22:23

basically disregard all of the data without

22:26

putting it into context, which is like, oh man,

22:28

like, anytime they see data that they disagree

22:30

with, It's like, oh, you

22:32

know, it must be because the players

22:34

are trash. But I like,

22:37

I, I think it's still, it's still

22:39

a piece of information you should take into consideration,

22:41

but yeah, the, the quality of play is a little

22:43

lower, it should be taken

22:46

with caution, but it should still be taken in and should

22:48

still be factored, factored in.

22:50

No, I agree, and that's kind of, there's

22:53

so many online tournaments, it's all we have

22:55

to go off of now, I think, for

22:58

a while now, like, has

23:01

been going online into the ICs,

23:03

into the new formats, has kind of

23:05

been the same. So, Kind

23:08

of agreeing with your point. So I think

23:10

you kind of, but the matchups very

23:12

similarly I think you kind of use

23:15

them to get a gauge and then you have to

23:17

feel them out for yourself with your group

23:19

and then you have to see and

23:22

then that could be swayed

23:24

a bit if you have attack or

23:27

A couple of texts for the matchup. So, I

23:29

mean, I think you use those matchup

23:32

points those data points, like, to

23:34

start with, but then you have to use your

23:36

own information, your own testing,

23:38

to kind of take you from

23:40

there and see which direction you're going.

23:43

Can you count, like, just PTCGL

23:45

ladder at all towards input into your,

23:48

into your process? Or do you, do you, like,

23:51

can you only test with people you trust because

23:54

PTCGL ladder's bad players?

23:58

PTCGO ladder is terrible. It

24:00

is terrible. It, I mean, it's

24:03

not a bad software, er, it actually

24:05

is a pretty bad software, but it's not

24:08

bad for Solitaire. That's what I use it for.

24:10

You get to, to basically just see how

24:12

your deck works. You get to look at a few, like, opening

24:14

hands. Limitless Tabletop is probably just

24:16

better. But the, the

24:19

PTCG Live client is, like, Somewhat

24:22

easy to use. I, it's something

24:24

I'm more familiar with like the drag and drop as

24:27

opposed to the import. So I, I end up

24:29

like anytime I build a new deck, I usually build

24:31

it on TCG Live and

24:33

play a few games with it there. But yeah, any,

24:36

any testing and like serious decisions

24:38

should be done or like serious

24:41

consideration on matchups or anything like that

24:43

should be done in person. Or

24:45

if, if you have to play online, play it with

24:47

like somebody you trust. Like,

24:51

like a dedicated testing partner because, I

24:53

mean, dude, the people on TCG Live

24:55

are, I mean, they're genuinely insane.

24:57

It's you, you drastically overrate

24:59

your chances if you go off of what

25:01

TCG Live does because, like, the

25:04

Chen Pao players you hit will not

25:06

go for the Greninja if they have it on turn two

25:08

and it will wreck your setup. And so you,

25:10

like, you basically go into the tournament, you're

25:12

like, bro, Chen Pao only hits the turn two Ninja,

25:14

like, 10 percent of times. But in

25:17

reality, It's only 10 percent

25:19

of TCG Live players that go for the Turn

25:21

2 Ninja. So, I

25:23

mean, you overestimate your chances if you

25:25

take anything on TCG Live seriously.

25:28

I kind of, I mean, I

25:30

think I agree with Liam to a point,

25:32

but I do think that, I

25:35

do think there's actually merit

25:37

to passing, your deck

25:39

passing the TCG live check

25:42

Yeah, I mean, that's, I, I, it

25:44

sounds like you're agreeing. Like, Liam's like, you play some Solitaire,

25:47

and if it doesn't work, you're like, well

25:49

that's terrible. I can't beat

25:51

drones with this.

25:54

but I think like, the differing point

25:56

is, so, I think

25:59

this is what I was telling Liam going

26:01

into Indianapolis, is

26:03

that he was like, Oh, I'm

26:05

expecting to play certain decks,

26:07

and I was like, I think you guys

26:09

are over annexing on, or

26:11

over indexing on Zard and

26:13

you, you are gonna hit other stuff. I know I have a bad

26:16

matchup into Zard, but you're gonna hit other stuff.

26:18

And I hit a lot of Arc, and I hit a lot of

26:20

weird stuff, and like, I hit

26:22

a lot of weird stuff in Orlando, so I think

26:25

you're just going to. And

26:28

I think, when I was playing Liam's

26:31

deck, this like the past few

26:33

days the Zard Control

26:35

with like a 1 2 Zard line. Like, I play

26:37

it online, on live, and I play against

26:40

these random garbage decks,

26:42

but for some reason, it's

26:44

just very, very annoying to deal

26:47

with and try to beat them with Liam's

26:49

bro.

26:51

Like, I'm playing against some of the most god

26:53

awful decks. But, they

26:55

seem to be, like, kind of tailored

26:57

to beating me and it's crazy

27:00

how you know, streamlined

27:02

this deck is to beat certain decks, Liam's

27:05

deck, but if you do not hit those matchups,

27:07

you are struggling a

27:10

lot

27:10

dude, this is exactly what I'm talking

27:12

about though, bro, because I played the deck.

27:15

I told you when I, when I make a new deck, I play a

27:17

few games with it on TCG Live. And

27:19

I, I played a few games,

27:21

and like, I'm like, oh man,

27:23

you know, I like, queue into some random guy playing Deaga,

27:25

and it goes like 50 50, because the guy never

27:27

uses the Zam, or whatever, like,

27:30

it's like a close game, and I'm like, oh, I'm, I'm in

27:33

this, I guess like, you know, my matchups

27:35

against these god awful fringe decks aren't even

27:37

that bad. And then, you know, I

27:39

go to Indie, and like, players

27:41

aren't even amazing. But,

27:43

Yeah, no,

27:44

the TCG Live players are so much

27:46

worse! And like,

27:49

I agree, it's,

27:50

and then I, and then I get cooked against these

27:52

god awful decks, man. Yeah,

27:55

don't, don't trust TCG Live for

27:57

anything, bruh. I, I think Cameron's

28:00

right, like, it should pass

28:01

make sure your deck works,

28:03

but, it, yeah man,

28:05

like, the players there are not credible,

28:07

you, you can't trust that anything going

28:09

on on the other end is, like, actually legit.

28:12

It is.

28:14

Fair enough. Fair enough. You

28:16

know, there's no response to that.

28:19

So are you, do you have any thoughts

28:21

on what you would, I know you're not going to

28:23

LA, I know that you

28:26

are now locked into NAIC and

28:28

you're optimizing that, but just

28:30

as a brief Exercise,

28:33

like, taking the information that you

28:35

have from the results

28:38

of all three divisions and the new deck

28:40

on the scene, like, what would

28:42

be, where would you start for

28:44

testing? Would you continue with this

28:46

Zard deck? Would you, you know, try

28:48

something else?

28:50

one of my big regrets that I

28:52

was feeling at Indie was not having played Lost

28:54

Box all season. I,

28:56

dude. Dean Nezum

28:58

is one of my locals. He's been playing basically that same

29:00

Lost Box deck for like forever.

29:03

And it's of course updated for Temporal Forces,

29:06

but the, the Heavy

29:09

Switch, Heavy Poffins, or

29:11

Heavy VIP Last Format, like basically just like

29:13

maximum consistency, Poké Stops,

29:16

and just like tons of item cards. He's,

29:19

he's been playing that for a while. He makes it look really, really

29:21

good. And, I,

29:24

I put in a few games with it at the end of last

29:26

format, a few games at the start of this format, and it felt

29:28

really good. And I, I,

29:30

I just like stopped for a little bit because I, I

29:33

think I doubted myself playing Lost Box

29:35

playing Lost Box 2, like a major event.

29:37

I, I think I

29:39

had some like bad experiences testing it,

29:41

like last year. With like the Kyogre

29:44

builds or something like that and

29:46

I found myself making a lot of mistakes So it's just like

29:48

Lost Box Engine not for me But I

29:51

I wish I'd given it another shot and I think I'd

29:54

I'd start trying to play it again if

29:57

I was going to LA I Yeah,

30:00

I really like the deck and I think pushing

30:03

for the Turn 2 Ninja and trying to play the like hyper

30:05

aggressive, hyper consistent build that Dean was

30:07

playing is like a good direction to

30:09

go for in the current meta.

30:13

It's like one way to beat Dialga. And

30:15

so that's that's where I'd start.

30:19

cool? And that it, I think there were obviously

30:22

Dean was the one who did the best, but I think there

30:24

was like four or five kind of similar

30:26

ish. Lost Box lists in the

30:28

top 32, so obviously,

30:30

like, it's a good deck in the

30:32

meta right now. I think it does

30:35

have its issues of sometimes being a

30:37

bit fragile compared to the other top

30:39

decks, but it does have an answer

30:41

for quite a bit right now with

30:45

Hoopa, Roaring Moon, and Ironhands.

30:48

So Liam just jogged my memory on the other

30:50

team related questions. Cam, you were talking

30:52

about how you didn't feel comfortable switching

30:54

to, like, Lostbox the

30:57

last time you were on the spreadsheet grind. How

31:00

much time do you need? Before

31:03

you'd feel comfortable switching. I recognize, like, it

31:05

kind of varies from deck to deck, but, like, let's

31:08

say you, you haven't put in a lot of reps with a deck,

31:11

and you suddenly realize, like, that's the play,

31:13

like, it sounds like nobody

31:15

wants to s I mean, I'm sure everybody

31:17

has done the, like, day before the tournament you switch.

31:20

Everybody's done the, like, two days before the tournament you switch.

31:23

But, like what's the minimum amount

31:25

of time for it to be the right

31:27

answer? Ha

31:30

I

31:31

I think I've gotten better at, like, last second

31:33

switching. I don't think I've done it a lot.

31:36

Don't think Liam's done a I can't remember the last time Liam

31:38

did a last minute switch. Like, I just

31:40

feel like I mean, maybe it's that we just haven't gotten, like,

31:42

quote unquote, like, put on a deck at the last minute? Or,

31:45

maybe I just haven't paid attention to how anxious you guys

31:47

may have been. But I feel like, I feel like there's

31:49

been less last minute anxiety.

31:51

I would say it, I mean, if I'm,

31:54

if it's something that someone I really,

31:57

really trust, like someone in the group, like if it was Liam,

31:59

or Bon, or Derek Hu, and they,

32:02

And there's someone showing me how to play

32:04

the deck, as well as I have the

32:06

list. Maybe a

32:08

week, maybe a little less. I

32:10

mean obviously I had that with

32:12

Liam this past weekend. I think a day is just

32:15

not enough, especially given I am, I

32:17

feel pretty comfortable with Ancient Box. So

32:20

I don't think that was, like gonna one

32:22

day was gonna get me there, but maybe if I

32:24

had started on Wednesday, or Tuesday? And

32:26

that's why I told Liam, like, he had kind of posted

32:28

this list in our Discord, and

32:31

we do a lot of posting lists, and he kind of said it was okay,

32:33

but not great, but then he ends up playing it,

32:35

and I was like, well, you gotta tell me it's, like, Super

32:38

legit, because there's no way I'm gonna try some

32:40

super fringe control deck that you threw in

32:42

the chat unless you let me know, and I'm

32:44

not gonna switch to it last second, but I

32:46

would've been willing to play it with them if I had a little

32:48

bit of time, regardless if

32:50

I think I would've done well or not. Heh heh

32:52

heh heh heh heh heh.

32:55

Okay. Okay.

32:58

I mean, I didn't know if it was super legit, bro. I didn't

33:00

know. And of course didn't work

33:02

out for me. Like, the most

33:05

the most evidence I have is that of

33:07

it being, like, super legit, is a tournament

33:10

run that I didn't even watch. Like, like, I have no

33:12

clue what happened in Liam's games but

33:16

He obviously had a good run, I had a terrible run, and

33:18

like, but the thing is, my run was like, dude,

33:20

I hit 1 Zard, and 0 CPAL, 0

33:24

Athena, 0 Ancient, I'd,

33:27

I'd be cool to run it back and just try to hit

33:29

better matchups next time. I think I made a

33:31

few mistakes as well, but it, it was, it

33:33

was some small stuff. But, so like, I

33:35

don't have a lot to go on on whether or not it was super legit,

33:37

I I just like the deck. I

33:39

didn't want to play Zard, so I went

33:41

with it.

33:42

Why didn't you want to play Zard? After winning

33:45

the event, after truly being at the pinnacle

33:47

of the thing, playing Charizard, going

33:50

to the next tournament, like, why didn't you want to be

33:52

worried that you'd

33:54

too,

33:55

be too countered? Like, it kind of was,

33:58

thought, yeah, I thought Chenpao was going to spike,

34:00

and Chenpao was not great. I

34:02

thought and all the mirrors

34:04

were going to get so much more competitive

34:06

because there was going to be so much more Devo, so much

34:08

more, like, Alekiary stuff, so much more,

34:11

like, Bibarel. All of the lists

34:13

were going to be a lot better, and even when you have experience

34:15

in the matchup, it's If the lists are a lot

34:18

better, like, if

34:20

you have experience in the matchup and your opponent's not playing Bibarel,

34:22

the matchup is like 90 10, and that was how

34:24

I beat my, like, first, like, five Zards and

34:26

I hit, I hit a ton of Zard in Rolando, so, so it was

34:28

all really nice but, when they're

34:31

playing Bibarel, even if you have experience in the matchup, I

34:33

found it's a lot closer, it's like 60

34:35

40, maybe, if your opponent is, like, making

34:37

some mistakes, but, like, The matchup is

34:39

just like super duper close because they

34:42

have like an actual wincon to play for which

34:44

is the same wincon you have which is like going to this

34:46

one prize board as opposed to the other deck which

34:48

is just like there's, there's literally nothing they

34:50

can do when they just have like the straight Pidgeot

34:52

version and then you also have to worry about double D.

34:54

Va like, The hardest part about beating Zard

34:56

going into this weekend is you're basically playing around, like,

34:58

70 cards, and that's, like, no more

35:00

pronounced than in the mirror, where, again,

35:03

you're, like, a 70 card deck and you have to play 60,

35:05

so you have to make a lot of decisions about what

35:07

you want to beat and what you don't want to beat, so it

35:09

really stretches your resources to try to beat all

35:11

the mirrors, and it's, it's really hard. I

35:13

didn't want to go through that. I figure I'd rather be the

35:16

guy beating Zard than the guy playing Zard, and

35:19

Went for some anti-me yank this weekend.

35:21

you just didn't play any

35:23

So so one question I have for you, Liam, is,

35:25

you, you go into

35:27

round one, and you immediately tie.

35:31

And I know, like, Liam Hyatt's

35:33

dad's reaction was Well that's

35:35

terrible because now you're not going to bump into Charizards

35:37

left and right and body those Charizards

35:39

up. Were

35:41

you thinking, as that round came to a

35:43

close and you realized you were going to tie, did

35:47

you think, hmm, I'm playing a control

35:49

deck, it might be like 5 0 4 challenge? Or

35:51

did you think, should I scoop

35:53

this so I can, like, get paired against Charizards?

35:55

Or were you like, a point's a point, a point, we just gotta

35:58

bank it, like, there's nothing to think about, we're just

36:00

moving on.

36:01

No, I, I I didn't think the tie bracket was particularly

36:03

bad. I thought it was the bottom tables that was particularly

36:06

bad. Um, yeah,

36:08

like it, it was the fact that I was I was going against

36:10

the bottom tables

36:11

Right, so, so, so, losses just

36:13

make it even jankier, like, your next

36:16

matchup, and that would be worse. So,

36:18

kind. Yeah. I kind, I mean, yeah,

36:21

like you,

36:23

you have to hit the players who want to pick the medex

36:25

and that's, that's that generally tends to be

36:27

the the best players. That's like actually

36:29

a really, really big thing, is if you want

36:32

to do really well, you should usually play metadex.

36:34

Those usually do well.

36:36

Think it's just the same thing that I told Polaris

36:38

when we played Vikavolt to Australia. I said,

36:41

look, Polaris, like, we're either going to be out

36:43

or Buy round 4, because we're

36:45

going to be playing against, we're going to lose, like

36:47

we're going to run into some random stuff, and

36:49

then you're going to you know,

36:52

lose to some bad things

36:54

and be out of the tournament, or we're going to hit the meta decks,

36:56

and then continue to hit the meta decks, because if we're winning,

36:59

yeah, exactly, and go on a

37:01

same thing for your deck, so.

37:03

Yep. I I

37:05

was so disappointed losing that first one.

37:08

Yeah, I was so disappointed. I was heartbroken.

37:10

I chewed. It just, it's

37:12

insane. I

37:14

I basically lost. I lost in a

37:16

really weird spot. I think actually, maybe

37:19

because I should have expected that

37:21

going to the bottom tables was like so

37:23

horrific and I think I

37:26

don't even know. It's just, it's

37:28

just terrible. I, I

37:31

hit an Arceus deck round one, and that matchup

37:33

is like, bleh. It

37:35

was Arceus Vulpix. I don't stream

37:37

the Zard very well, so dealing with like, multiple

37:39

Arceus is like, pretty hard to do.

37:42

Yeah, I just like, I did not have a lot

37:44

of answers for that deck. That was like

37:46

actually probably the worst matchup,

37:48

cause they like, they might get you on the judge

37:50

and they have like the late game threats that you

37:53

can't deal with, or like the long term threats

37:55

that you can't deal with, like the other decks kind

37:57

of, that are bad, like stuff like the

37:59

Alga and stuff like that, but like, they

38:02

might get you on the judge and they get you later

38:04

it is just a terrible matchup,

38:06

and I

38:10

try so hard, but it's,

38:13

the matchup, the matchup is hard and like, Oh

38:17

my god, I made an assumption

38:19

about their list, I assumed they played 2 VAC,

38:21

so I was

38:24

very hesitant to go into the Alekki the

38:26

Alekki with the Lux Cape. I of course did, like

38:28

a little bit, but, you

38:31

know, I wanted to make some progress

38:33

instead of just like basically sitting there and full

38:35

looping. And dude, I could

38:38

only do a full loop because I double

38:40

prized the Pal Pads, and I didn't get it

38:42

off the first two when I went into the Zard. I

38:46

couldn't make progress by pal

38:48

padding and essentially buying sonar turns

38:50

for the double penny. And, like,

38:54

I had to basically call whether or not they played two

38:56

VAC. And I ended up just scooping because

38:58

they had, like, they got to a point where if

39:00

they played the VAC I was going to lose.

39:03

Just based on the resources I had left and then the

39:05

Eleki going down. So

39:07

I, I just like scooped and called it quits there. I wasn't

39:09

gonna wait until they, you know, basically decked

39:12

out and then played the VAC. But,

39:15

I mean, to this day I don't know if they had the

39:17

second VAC or not. I, Jesus

39:20

Christ, oh my God.

39:22

Oh, I thought they for sure had the second back.

39:25

I thought you lost because they had a second

39:27

back. You played into

39:29

a situation where you thought they had a second back.

39:31

yes, I, I

39:33

mean, dude, they usually have the second

39:36

VAC, the list that got 40th, I think,

39:38

this weekend, played the second VAC, it was Arceus

39:40

Vulpix Licks, like, the

39:42

second VAC is common in the Vulpix lists

39:45

it's not 100%, but it's common, I've

39:47

seen it going around, and,

39:49

jeez, man, but if they didn't have

39:52

it, and I, That

39:54

literally derailed my entire tournament. That

39:56

hurt so bad, bro. So

39:58

bad. And

40:02

of course I steal the Game 2 by going into the Aggro Zard

40:04

early, and still just pulling

40:06

off insane wizardry to pick up the W.

40:09

But it doesn't even matter, man, because

40:11

it was like, it was a long, drawn out Game

40:13

1, and we don't have time for Game 3. Uhhhhhhh.

40:18

Do you wish you would change anything of your list? Or

40:20

let's

40:21

My list going forward?

40:23

Yeah, because that's quite an interesting, like, take

40:25

on control.

40:27

Going

40:28

know that, like, Cleffa, like, I don't even know if

40:30

you found Cleffa to be useful. If you'd

40:32

yeah, no, I was really happy with the list for the

40:34

event. I told my father, I felt

40:36

like Sitting down every round,

40:38

I was like, as long as they flip over

40:40

something normal, I have an advantage. And that's a,

40:42

that's a really good feeling to have confidence

40:44

in your list like that. They didn't flip over

40:46

a lot of normal stuff, man. Yeah,

40:49

rough event, rough event.

40:52

So, so, would you recommend Cam

40:54

strongly consider playing your list?

40:58

I mean, you need to add something for Dialga,

41:00

and a lot of the attempts that I've seen people

41:02

trying to deal with the Dialga, there's,

41:05

you know, it's like the mawile or like retreat

41:07

lock, something like that. It

41:11

requires cutting back on consistency. Like, you

41:13

have to make some concessions in the list if you want to

41:16

add a package that that's, that's that large.

41:18

I think that's one of the best things

41:20

about my list compared to the standard,

41:22

like, control lists in

41:24

Pidgeot, is I basically

41:27

cut back on the entire recursion package,

41:29

which is, like, Third Pal Pat, Syleen,

41:32

Yelch here, Mawile, like, all that

41:35

junk that's required just to gain access to Pidgeot. to

41:37

Retreat Lock, which is like, not even that

41:39

good against Zard anymore. And,

41:42

and not great in like a lot of matchups.

41:44

I mean, it helps, but it's not, it's

41:46

not really needed. And, and, and

41:48

I put in a bunch of consistency. I get four

41:51

ultra, four candy, three, three nest,

41:53

three poffin. If you want to add that

41:55

package back in, you have to, you have to cut

41:57

back on it. And like all the lists I see are like,

41:59

oh, what if we go down to like one poffin

42:01

and we just play into Arvin for it?

42:04

Yeah, I mean, do you want to talk about the difference between your

42:06

list and Grant Manley's list? Because I'm sure there's

42:08

a lot of people that are gonna say like, Oh, I should

42:10

play the Azul Grant Manley list

42:12

because Azul's good at Pokemon, and

42:15

Grant did well.

42:16

I mean, the list is

42:18

like, fine, it has everything you need,

42:21

of course, it's like, they

42:23

basically take a

42:23

you like your list better than Grant's, right?

42:26

Just to be clear.

42:26

yeah,

42:27

Yeah, yeah

42:28

I mean, I think,

42:29

list is better than Grant's, and Grant got top four,

42:31

so just imagine

42:32

that was that's

42:32

to LA.

42:33

list, by the way, that's

42:35

Right.

42:37

that's where they got the list but, I

42:40

think that list is good, and I like the fact

42:42

that it's at least trying to like, soft

42:44

commit to the, The optimal engine,

42:47

which is like the Arvin Lumidian. Heavy

42:49

Ultra Ball but, I

42:52

think, I mean the harder you commit

42:54

into it, the better the deck works.

42:56

You, you open stronger more often, and,

43:00

so like, I mean you can imagine

43:02

what, if the deck functions better,

43:05

if you get to play 4 Ultra instead of 3, and like,

43:07

3 Poffin instead of 1, 4

43:09

Candy instead of 2. Like, you

43:11

just open with those cards more often, so you get to turn

43:14

to Pidgeot more often. And once you get

43:16

to Pidgeot up, I don't, I don't win quite as

43:18

often. Because, you know, they cut

43:20

all the consistency cards for more stuff to make sure

43:22

they win, they cut them for power cards. But,

43:26

I, I get to, I get to play the game more and I

43:28

think that's like, that's generally

43:30

a best practice you look at all the top decks

43:32

today, right, like decks like Charizard, decks

43:34

like Chen Pao, they're not going out of their way

43:36

to basically cut down to three Ultra, or

43:39

like, one Poffin, and just being like, oh man,

43:41

I'm, I'm just gonna try to Irita for

43:43

it. And see what happens

43:45

so I can add all these power cards, like, you

43:47

know, whatever it would be, like a Kyogre to attack

43:50

with, second Cologne, just random junk

43:52

that you don't really need, or like a boss,

43:54

whatever like, that's generally

43:56

not a best practice for, for solid decks,

43:58

I think, and I don't think I think

44:00

people, like, tend to, like, give control the exemption,

44:03

in that regard, they're like, oh, man, I, you

44:05

just have to have a plan for everything, which is kind of true,

44:08

because you slow the game down, you have to be able to win

44:10

at the end, But you also shouldn't

44:13

completely abandon these principles of like

44:16

your decks should generally have more consistency

44:18

cards than power cards. Your deck should like

44:20

generally function and like,

44:23

it's, it's very easy. Especially when the decks have similar

44:25

engines to compare yourself to top

44:27

decks and see if you're making similar decisions.

44:30

And if you're not, at least have like very, very

44:32

strong rationale as to why.

44:34

Dude, that was pretty spicy, Cam.

44:36

Well is there anything else you guys wanted us to talk about

44:38

this week? I feel like we kind of covered

44:41

what we needed to cover but if anyone else

44:43

has any ideas,

44:45

I think we're in a great place. Next week,

44:47

I definitely want to talk about how I wanted

44:49

to have a tweet that, you know, if somebody wants

44:51

me to host a class about how to host

44:53

classes and market

44:55

Oh my god.

44:56

But let's save that for next

44:58

week because I feel like that's just an easy,

45:01

like, 30 minutes of laughing at people.

45:04

All right, you already know what we're talking about

45:06

next

45:07

Dude, it's, yeah, yeah. There's no

45:09

regional this weekend, right? We

45:12

finally have a weekend off, I know

45:14

we should talk about the cards coming out for NAIC

45:17

because I know Liam's thinking about them, but like, we

45:19

should definitely talk about the crazy

45:22

classes and the

45:25

current of

45:27

coaching, dare I say?

45:30

Aaaaaaah!

45:30

a thing. Alright, John

45:32

Paul's our outro guys, we'll be back next week with

45:35

an awesome pod.