Our first Pokémon TCG League Challenge of the new season took place on Saturday, September 26th at the local game store.
My deck choice
I decided to bring my Team Rocket box (list below). I felt it has a good place in current meta as it has a very favourable matchup against Dragapult ex. And equally importantly, it’s the only Standard legal deck I own.
I played the deck also last month at a Worlds Celebration tournament last month but then with an older list. For this season’s first tournaments, I wanted to upgrade it to one that I’ve been playing in Live and that is way better than the older one. The problem was, come Saturday morning, I wasn’t able to source the missing cards so I headed to the store with the old deck.
Luckily, I was able to find most cards from the store’s bulk boxes. I still missed Team Rocket’s Wobbuffet (which ironically I found in the box after round 1…) and Clefairy ex (which is not necessary) and because I didn’t think I’d be able to find the cards, I didn’t bring Secret Box ACE that I normally play.
Good news is that now I have the deck ready for next month’s League Cup.
I really like this list.
Pokémon: 6
2 Team Rocket's Articuno DRI 51
4 Team Rocket's Spidops DRI 20
1 Team Rocket's Kangaskhan ex ASC 162
2 Team Rocket's Mewtwo ex DRI 81
4 Team Rocket's Tarountula DRI 19
1 Team Rocket's Mimikyu DRI 87
Trainer: 17
1 Bug Catching Set TWM 143
1 Maximum Belt TEF 154
1 Enhanced Hammer TWM 148
3 Team Rocket's Giovanni DRI 174
2 Night Stretcher ASC 196
2 Team Rocket's Factory DRI 173
1 Sacred Ash DRI 168
2 Handheld Fan TWM 150
4 Team Rocket's Transceiver DRI 178
2 Lucky Helmet TWM 158
3 Team Rocket's Ariana DRI 171
1 Team Rocket's Archer DRI 170
1 Special Red Card CRI 113
3 Team Rocket's Proton DRI 177
3 Lillie's Determination MEG 119
4 Ultra Ball MEG 131
1 Energy Switch MEG 115
Energy: 3
1 Basic {P} Energy MEE 5
6 Basic {G} Energy MEE 1
4 Team Rocket's Energy DRI 182
Total Cards: 60
The tournament
We had 9 players which surprised me as recently the league and tournaments have been very popular but I wasn’t too sad because lower player count means there’s more space to move around and sit wherever you want to.
Out of my 8 opponents, 5 played decks that were extremely favourable to me: four Dragapult ex decks and one Cynthia’s Garchomp ex deck. The last three were decks with horrible matchups for me: Greninja ex box (that I lost to last tournament) as it can snipe my Team Rocket’s Tarountulas from the bench, Mega Manectric ex/Mega Eelektross ex deck that has high HP and good mobility to tank and cover, and Steven’s Metagross ex/Empoleon ex that resists my grass Pokémon and have high HP.
Wanna guess my three matchups today? Yup, all the three bad ones.
Round 1: Loss against Greninja ex box
I knew I was in for a rough matchup when I saw who I was playing against. He had beaten me previously with this same matchup less than a month ago. Mega Greninja ex has Mortal Shuriken ability that takes out my small bench Pokémon so mid-to-late game, I can’t set up anything new. That’s rough. And with Neo Upper Energy and Ninja Spinner attack, it can be powered up in one turn without having to leave energy on the board to be removed with Enhanced Hammer or a KO.
This time though, the match was way more even than previously. My deck changes were one part of that but also I got a really nice start. Had I found Team Rocket’s Wobbuffet before the tournament started, I might have even won because at one point, I could have healed my Mewtwo ex fully. At the end, we were both at 1 prize and I had played Special Red Card to limit my opponent’s hand size to 3. They pulled Neo Upper Energy and Boss’s Orders from that to win the game.
Their deck also plays the other Greninja ex but so far, they haven’t made the mistake of evolving into it against my Mewtwo ex. Hopefully one day that mishap will happen so I can take an easy KO.
Great match.
Round 2: Bye
As we had 9 players, I got a bye for round 2. Spoilers: they were my only points for the tournament.
Round 3: Loss against Mega Manectric ex / Mega Eelektross ex
This is another tough matchup. Even with Maximum Belt, my damage output caps at 330 (Mewtwo’s Erasure Ball (160) with 2 discarded energies (+120) and Maximum Belt (+50)) and most of the time I don’t have all of that. They also played Hero’s Cape to increase Mega Manectric ex’s HP to 430 and Mega Eelektross ex has 350HP.
What’s even worse is that the deck has so much mobility. Mane has free retreat and Eelektrik has energy acceleration to the bench so discarding energies is not a problem for it either. I managed to do a lot of damage to two of their megas but couldn’t stop them from running over me.
The deck also plays baby Manectric that can stop damage from evolution Pokemon (while the Mega blocks damage from basics). That’s the only part of this deck that mine is able to handle as I have both basic and evolution attackers.
Round 4: Loss against Steven’s Metagross ex/Empoleon ex
The last round was the battle of the bottom table and the third of my bad matchups. Steven’s Metagross ex has high HP and built-in energy acceleration and Genesect ex helps to find the evolution pieces.
The matchup was surprisingly even as we both had horrible prizes. I prized three of my Team Rocket’s Tarountulas so I had to fill my bench with two-prize Pokémon but managed to take 4 prizes.
At the end, I had Team Rocket’s Giovanni in hand to take the last 2 prizes on Meowth ex, just waiting for my turn. Then my opponent played Special Red Card and for the second tournament in a row, I was a dumb dumb and shuffled my hand into the deck, resulting in a Double Prize Penalty due to unrecoverable game state. It wasn’t a big deal though because if I had played it correctly, my game winning Giovanni would have gone to the bottom and I don’t think I had a way to find it.
I really need to start paying attention to the card. It has been played against me in tabletop games twice and both times I’ve misplayed and lost the game.
Final thoughts
I finished with a 1-3 record and last place. The Prize Pack netted me two Hildas, a Brock’s Scouting, a Telepathic Energy and a Moltres.
It’s always fun to play Pokémon but I was kinda sad I didn’t get a chance to test my deck out against the good matchups. I’ll hopefully get another shot next month at League Cup.