Brent: 0:00

The way you win the podcasting game is every week you record a podcast. And that is what we do. Here we are, recording yet another podcast. Welcome to the Trashalanch podcast. It's the only podcast about the Pokémon Trading Card Game. Oh my god, Cam, I forgot. You had said you had a filter in Story for us.

Cam: 0:19

Oh,

Brent: 0:20

Cam?

Cam: 0:21

heh, I am ready, this is I just wanted to, I had already kind of told Liam this a little bit, but I just wanted to say how inspired, not only myself, but my coworker Navarro has been from just the Liam Halliburton mindset of optimizing and always just trying to get better, and doing everything you can, we were playtesting, and I'm kind of like slumped over in my seat, not really Pay attention, and I look at my friend, who listens to the podcast and he's, and he's sitting at, you know, perfectly upright, at an 80 degree angle, he listened to last week's episode, he's optimizing the sitting angle and then I immediately sit up and now optimize my sitting angle you know? And, you know, whenever we're trying to test, or whenever we're trying to keep going, the other person says, Oh, I'm kind of tired, I want to go home, and they're like, we just hit them with, Oh, I guess you just don't want it enough, you know, I guess you don't want it bad enough, and it usually keeps the person to stick around for a couple more hours for testing.

Brent: 1:24

And did you find sitting at an 80 degree angle produced better testing results?

Cam: 1:29

I don't know if that's the sole reason of better testing, but just kind of all of it together, just trying to be at the, you know, peak discipline when testing, I think it all helps when it comes together. So, thank you Liam. Thank you for inspiring us to be better trading card game players.

Liam 2: 1:50

had this thought recently, about, you know, You know, when you think about, like, going on the grind for Pokemon and, like, some of the Twitter discourse online recently surrounding that's kind of sparked up again, like today ish with, like, worlds invites and stuff like that. Pokemon is unique, I think, in that it's the, it's a it's a competitive event that's trying, like, that people talk about as if it should be, like, geared towards players who don't have time to play the game. And I think Of course, that's like a, you know, a real issue for many people, right? Like, you don't have enough time, enough resources to, like, invest a ton into Pokémon. But, like, when you compare this to other competitive events, like basketball, like chess, like football soccer, any of these events, the discourse surrounding what it takes to win is so different from Pokémon, where they're like, players need to be able to get, like, you know, a world's invite by going to local events on the weekends. As opposed to like, when people talk about basketball, like you have to literally spend every second of every day that like that, that you can allocate outside of like school and stuff. Just playing basketball and trying to get better at the game. Like NBA players, they, it's literally their entire lives. They don't do anything else for any second of, of any day except for like, grind the game of basketball

Brent: 3:16

Except for Jokic, cause he's like going to the club and riding horses.

Liam 2: 3:19

except, except for Yoki, bro.

Cam: 3:21

The goat.

Liam 2: 3:22

Yeah he just got cucked by Ant, Ant Man, Ant Man, he's too tough but, like, yeah, it's, it's like every other game, like, the expectation is you're going to put in a ton of time if you want to be good and reach, like, you know, this, like, world class of players, like, a little different, like, Joshmo's got to be able to qualify by going to League Cups on the weekends and

Brent: 3:46

You know what? At least Liam is super internally consistent about this stuff, Cam. Like, like Liam is also, Liam has always been a like, Also, there's no luck involved in Pokémon. It's skill and willpower, and you gotta get more of it. And that's how you win. So like, like all that, I mean, I feel like if people thought Pokemon was just like, skills cap game all the way to the ceiling, then like, nobody could yap about how, all that stuff. So, so in that way, Liam is like, a perfect circle of internal consistency. It's a beautiful

Cam: 4:17

Yes. Can't knock him. He, he just, he stays true.

Brent: 4:22

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're definitely like on the the thing. Liam, we have not discussed this. So this is like podcast revelation. I reached out to, I was able to track down the person at the University of Maryland who is in charge of D1 sports team's nutrition programs, and they agreed to do a Zoom call with us to talk about optimizing nutrition for grueling days of Pokemon tournaments.

Cam: 4:49

Oh.

Liam 2: 4:50

that is super cool. I, I appreciate that. Wow.

Brent: 4:54

so we, eh, eh, eh, she's out of town this week, but next week we'll zoom it up, and then we'll report back on the pod with, like, optimal Pokemon regionals nutrition trac tactics. Ah ha ha

Liam 2: 5:08

I don't know if we'll do that. I might have to put that behind a master class.

Cam: 5:12

Oh, yes. We might have to do that. Might have to do that.

Brent: 5:17

Mike Fouchet reached out to us and asked us to talk about prize checking masterclasses.

Cam: 5:21

There's a, there's a Masterclass for everything. I, I wouldn't be surprised if there's a Masterclass for how to optimally shuffle your deck and sleeve your deck and to, how to eat breakfast. What's the optimal breakfast before an event? Like, there's just like a Masterclass for everything now.

Liam 2: 5:35

I, I swear, man, I, like, we talked about this a bit, I think, last week. Go get that bag, congrats to Zach LaSage, he's doing a business move right now. He's got 13 people signed up, did you see? 13 people! Like, I don't know how hard of like, op activities this is, that I could engage in. I mean, I obviously couldn't, I'm on my Twitter silence vow, but somebody else could engage in. All you have to do is quote tweet that and be like, I will send you this little paragraph that takes me around like 10 seconds to write if you just DM me saying, I don't know how to price check. And it tells you how to price check. Actually, I'll do it on the pod for everybody who doesn't know how to price check so that you don't have to, you know, spend however much money Zach Lassage is charging you. Well, that's, that's op activities, that's what I'm saying, like, You price check by knowing what your decklist is, and then you look through your deck, and you see what cards aren't there that are on your decklist. There's some optimization

Brent: 6:35

having bad Wi Fi problems, but it does give me the chance to jump in and be like, Liam ain't lyin

Liam 2: 6:43

no!

Cam: 6:44

I just, it's, I mean people got bills to pay man, I, I, I, you got to do what you got to

Brent: 6:50

So, Cam, how do you price check?

Cam: 6:52

I typically push all my Pokémon to the front of

Brent: 6:58

you're one of the deck sorters?

Cam: 7:01

deck sorters, yes, and then I push energy and supporters to the back, and then I'll do, check both of those, and then I'll Kind of go through the middle of the deck and kind of count any maybe important tools or items or whatever else, kind of card stadiums if I have any.

Brent: 7:20

Right, right. How much do you change your process depending on the matchup?

Cam: 7:27

Matchup, not really, deck. Potentially, like, I feel like Ancient Box is kind of important in what you prize. There have been times where I've played Moridon and maybe I've like done like a general check, like, oh, do I have both my Iron Hands? Do I have my DT? But I might not have done the Swording or even like a real in depth check for something like Moridon where it's like, yeah, I'm just kind of like the game's gonna be over in like three turns.

Brent: 7:53

and I think part of it is if you have a tech for the matchup, people like to check the tech first just because it's like a comfort thing, right?

Liam 1: 7:59

Shadow

Brent: 8:01

and you ran Drapion. You'd be like let me just check my 5 by Drapion. Okay I don't even need to check any prizes anymore. We're good. We're good. It's gonna be fine people. Liam, welcome back. How's your Wi

Liam 1: 8:15

bad, but, yeah, we're talking about price checking method. Y'all watch the Orlando stream. I'm not the the ideal price checker. but,

Brent: 8:26

as I say, not as I do. That should be the first things Aklasash says in his class.

Liam 1: 8:30

I, As with anyone though, I can be a very good prize checker. It's not a skill. It's not a skill. If, like, the thing that makes me so ticked off about prize checking is if you're a bad prize checker like myself, but you want to commit to wasting people's time, people for some reason are completely content with stretching the pace of play expectations when it surrounds prize checking. And, like, what if I'm terrible at price checking? I only check two counts every time I search. Well, good thing for me, because I can take two, three minutes. I mean, I've never, ever seen a single person call a judge, no matter how much time was taken. And even if you won game one, it doesn't matter. Because people are just, they're blatantly willing to stretch it, and it's hard to call a judge on that, because they can wrap it up whenever. I mean they can wrap it up whenever, and it's like, it's the first search of the game. I probably, like, should be more aggressive about calling a judge on that kind of stuff, but it's it's also hard to, like, maybe if you time it, so that you can, like, give the judge some evidence, like, this search took over X amount of seconds, X minutes, like. But like, it's just, it is just egregious, and like, it doesn't matter how bad you are at prize checking, all that means is you have to take more time, and time is always allotted for you. Always allotted. Yeah. But yeah, just flick through your deck and check your prizes, I guess. No,

Cam: 10:08

consistent, just like Tord.

Brent: 10:11

Yeah, like if you want to write it down you can write it down Some great players have written it down. Some great players don't check prizes.

Liam 1: 10:18

writing it down is criminal as well. I actually think writing it down is pretty bad, man, because like, once you put it out of, like, The point of writing it down is basically, like, out of sight, out of mind, I guess, or like, you you basically, yeah, you just try to take it out of your mind, so it's always there, and I think that's great for something like Peonia, right, where you're like, it doesn't actually matter where it is, I just have to know that once I'm taking a prize, I have to check this. For, like, prizes, if you're like, okay, I prized X card, let me just write it down so I never have to think about it again, that, that's wrong, because you should be thinking about it, like, basically, like, factoring in. To every play, if it's like a relevant prize.

Brent: 11:00

I mean, aren't I writing it down because I might forget? I mean, I want to think about it all the time, but like, I might forget.

Cam: 11:05

ha ha ha.

Liam 1: 11:07

I mean, you're just cooked. You're cooked to death.

Brent: 11:11

You know what? I mean, hey, I recognize I'm a million times the worst Pokemon player here. If the point of your thing is like, if you can't just remember your prizes after you figure out what your prizes are, you're bad. I feel that.

Liam 1: 11:21

No, I mean, like,

Brent: 11:22

Ha ha ha ha

Liam 1: 11:25

you're like, maybe if you write it down during your opponent's turn or something, but like, you're basically just like, yo, hold up, gang. I have to write some stuff down really quick. I'm not gonna play the game right now. I'm gonna write in my notebook. Do a little doodle, just for

Cam: 11:36

Liam, optimize when you're playing, and you're doing their turn, either doing deck search, count to a minute and a half. If they get to a minute and a half, call a judge, or ask them. I do

Brent: 11:46

Oh man, do do.

Cam: 11:48

got it, they have a minute and a half, bro. Like, let

Liam 1: 11:50

they have,

Cam: 11:51

let them cook,

Liam 1: 11:52

there's no, there's no objective guideline, there's no solid guideline, no, there's recommendations, there's nothing solid, like, there's nothing like if a player goes over this for X action, they get some penalty, there's no guideline that says that, or like rule, there's guidelines for face play, but there's no, there's nothing set in stone, everybody goes longer than the deck search allocation. On the first search. You agree with that, Cam? Yeah?

Cam: 12:23

No, I don't agree with that. I think you just call a judge. Like, seriously.

Liam 1: 12:27

Are you trolling?

Cam: 12:28

Yeah, call a judge. Tell them to make a, make a, make, play faster. Like, count, count, literally count in your head while they're doing it, and if they get to a minute and a half, tell them to play faster. It's that simple.

Liam 1: 12:41

I rock with that. I wouldn't do it if I'd do it if a watch broke. Counting in your head is, like, super suspect. Counting in your head is actually complete troll. Like, people have done tests on this kind of stuff. Like, counting seconds in your head is not reliable at all. That's

Cam: 12:59

Do whatever you gotta do.

Brent: 13:00

One thing you should do is wear a freaking watch.

Cam: 13:04

Mm

Brent: 13:05

'cause you're not already on the watch wear tip. What? Wear a watch man. It's a good start.

Liam 1: 13:10

yeah.

Cam: 13:12

hmm. Hundred percent.

Brent: 13:13

Alright. Alright. That was, that was the filter in, yo, we're on Twitter. We're the only podcast about the Pokemon trading card game. Nobody's left us a review in a while. You, listener, could be the person that leaves us a 5 star review. If you leave a review, we will read it on the pot, and then we will talk about it extensively, as extensively as price checking masterclasses. Dragonshield sends us sleeves, we gotta get some more sleeves, because NAIC be comin that be happenin Guys, is there more stuff we should say about coaching? Because I know we've had coaching on the agenda for a couple of weeks, but the prize tracking masterclass I think might have covered all the bases. It is interesting to me how prize tracking, how coaching has kind of migrated to this, like, classes, like, let me arbitrage more money out of people in an hour kind of model.

Cam: 14:00

I'm interested to see how this continues to evolve, like, right, this is not just,

Liam 1: 14:05

Dude, I'm getting on this

Cam: 14:07

of this, this kind of thing, it's not the last iteration of it either, I'm curious to see, and I feel like people who want to be, like, quote unquote, because no one can see you, like pro players, like, This will be their avenue, right? This will be their avenue to make money. And it's a lot of it is how you can market yourself and how you're perceived within the community.

Liam 1: 14:31

Yeah, I need to win NAIC so I can get on this method, bro. I've already got, like, I mean, you could pump out these masterclasses. If it's how to check your prizes level masterclasses, like, a dime a dozen, right? Like, literally off the top of my head, I could just, I could give like 15 masterclasses, bro. And charge however much, like,

Brent: 14:56

Class one, wear a watch.

Liam 1: 14:58

I'd do that. How to sequence turn one, how to choose going first or second,

Cam: 15:02

We're gonna, Liam's gonna just have a 52 week course plan,

Brent: 15:06

That

Liam 1: 15:06

yeah.

Brent: 15:07

actually what I was about to say. Cam, I was absolutely about to say that. I feel like I've realized where you were going with that. And I can already tell you, here's, so here's the evolution. The evolution is, I'm offering a, like, ten week program. One hour a week, or two hours a week, whatever, right? And, and like I don't know. And I don't even have, like, a lesson plan for weeks 7, 8, 9, 10, because I'm bringing in guest speakers. We're watching film. We're, we're gonna, we're gonna VOD the tournament for the prior week? I don't even care. What?!

Liam 1: 15:44

Dude, that is,

Cam: 15:44

just a complete substitute. Teacher

Liam 1: 15:47

that's actually an insane method, bruh.

Brent: 15:52

Like, you, you sign the people up, and then like, you call Grant Manley and be like, you know, this week's money, I'll split it 50 50 with you if you teach the class for me. And he'll be like, sounds like easy money, and then you're like, I'm a marketing god! I've built a self sustaining money machine! You know?

Liam 1: 16:09

Dude, I'm actually getting on that method, bruh. The weeks between NAIC and

Cam: 16:14

might be

Brent: 16:15

Oh! The pre, the pre worlds prep program!

Liam 1: 16:18

yeah, yeah. The Worlds Prep Program.

Brent: 16:23

Dude, I'm liking this, I'm liking it a lot, I feel like there's a lot here. Be like, be like,

Liam 1: 16:28

I do exactly that.

Brent: 16:29

your sequencing with the guy who does Poké Puzzles. Like, you got a whole thing, you know? He's like, he's a sequencing god, I hear. Or, we're gonna have Dean teach sequencing. That's what, that was what made me realize Guest Speakers. It's like, I'm gonna have Dean come in and do this thing on sequencing, because he did the sequencing for this puzzle. And then you just give him like 20 bucks and you're solid.

Liam 1: 16:51

Dean, Dean's actually so goaded, bro. That's the guy, because he's not on Twitter, he doesn't get a lot of, he doesn't get a lot of, like, rep, or whatever. But, he's, he's actually, like, he might be top 5. Top 5. He's he's pretty insane, bro. Yeah, I gotta Loki him!

Cam: 17:09

I understand why Liam calls LeBron James the GOAT now, just like someone has a good performance and he's just like Oh yeah, he's top 5 and he's just in the yeah. He's him.

Liam 1: 17:20

no, dude, I think I told you man, Dean's my local. I've seen this guy play like multiple times, bro. He's tough, he's tough. Like, he has aura, he's like Ant,

Cam: 17:33

He's over

Brent: 17:34

Yeah.

Liam 1: 17:35

aura. Yeah, bro, like he's, hey, he's got the experience, he's got like, you know, world's finishes, bro, he's lowkey tough. Bye bye.

Brent: 17:46

So anyway I guess the other, the other direction that you're going in Cam, in terms of, like, how, how Masterclasses evolve, is obviously, like, anybody that listened to this pod knows this pod was, like, the Masterclass on Masterclasses, which is, like, like, the obvious low hanging fruit, right? How to become your own Masterclasser on Metafy? Sign up for my class to find out! That's the sell shovels to gold miners, right? Like, we're, we're about that life.

Liam 1: 18:12

Oh my god. So banger!

Cam: 18:14

bubble to

Liam 1: 18:16

elite!

Brent: 18:19

Alright guys, do you have any, like, hot takes or interesting commentary? So before the pod, Liam was asking Cam if we should talk about his deck choice for LA, and he was like this format. So, it just drove home to me how, like, LA is very like this format, like we've worn it out. And then NAIC's gonna be like, a one A one format, a single format tournament, whatever, like, cause then like, Worlds will be a different format, right? It's gonna have the mini set. How, how like, I mean I recognize obviously when it's a new format, quote unquote, like, you have to go figure things out. Is there anything else weird to it where it's both the beginning and the end? Or is it just like, it's the beginning of the format, good luck, I hope we solve the format. Yeah.

Liam 1: 19:09

Yeah, it's just the beginning.

Cam: 19:10

It's just the beginning and you just have one and let's see what happens. And there might be I guess there's like League Cups in this format for next year. I

Brent: 19:20

yeah.

Cam: 19:22

think after the June,

Brent: 19:24

Oh yeah, there might,

Cam: 19:25

Oh no, Locals. Depending, depending on what they decide to do with Locals. Maybe they'll just remove them altogether like, you know. TPCI will grant Lame's

Brent: 19:34

Cam, is, is Liam selling at all by not, like, going on the locals grind to try to, like, get a stipend or something like that after winning Orlando?

Liam 1: 19:42

Yeah.

Cam: 19:43

you know, kind of. It's, it's, it's not that much. I mean, if he's just gonna sit, sit around and talk and beat the, beat a dead horse over and over again with the same thought process and same ideas, he might as well just play. You know,

Liam 1: 19:56

Dude, no, I go to Locals too. Locals, they're freeing, like, every time I have this discussion with somebody, it becomes clear to me at some point that Locals has basically killed all of their passion for the game except at major events. I'm like, dude, people should be able to go to Locals for fun, and they're like, IMPOSSIBLE, IMPOSSIBLE, PEOPLE ONLY GO TO LOCALS FOR CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS. Because, like, they just cannot even fathom a world where, like, everybody meets up at Foster's Grill, and just plays Pokemon because it's fun. Like, I don't know why, but people just, like, cannot fathom that. Like, But locals just don't exist anymore. I would never go to locals if there weren't championship points. I, like,

Cam: 20:44

you just get, you guys have a bad

Liam 1: 20:46

worth anything without championship points.

Cam: 20:49

locals suck, bro. We get 30 to 40 people at Tabletop, we don't give you any championship points. Just the homies, bro.

Liam 1: 20:56

Exactly! Exactly! Like, good local scenes? They're, they're fine! They're fine! Like, yeah man, people are willing to play the game without this carrot on a stick, to use Chip Ritchie's words dangled in front of them, of the world's invite. Like. People play the game for fun play.

Cam: 21:18

So just to go into Star Wars, another thing I like, Star Wars, their League Cup slash League Challenge, they don't have like, it's just one event, their local event, it's called a store showdown. They just give you promos. And it doesn't go towards a Worlds invite. And then they have something that's like States. It sounds like States. I have no idea because it's not, it hasn't started yet. But it seems like States. And that's, I think that's like the first level event that gets starts to count for Worlds.

Liam 1: 21:45

yep.

Cam: 21:46

You know, just give other things to do. I think that was kind of nice. You get like these cool promos that you can't get unless you win. Just add secondary reasons to play.

Brent: 21:56

Liam, are, are the, are the Maryland Virginia locals too competitive?

Liam 1: 22:01

no, we have good players, but there's no such thing as competitive locals. Nobody gets out of bed and wants to compete. That's not why you go to a local. In its current form, you get out of bed. What's the, what's the nearest 60 cards next to me? Let me just grab that. Oh my god. Oh, I can't believe I'm going to this local. Okay, I'll show up. I'll write my decklist there. Right, right, right, right, right, okay. Let me see if I can get like six easy wins. Like, it's like, nobody there is trying. They're, it's not locked in. It's impossible to have a competitive local. Nobody's locked in. Like, Jah Nang, Tournament Time, Regional, is a completely different beast from Jah Nang and Dream Wizards. They're not the same people.

Brent: 22:47

That's probably true. That's probably true. All right, you guys ready? Should we jump in and finish the setlist review? I was loving the setlist review. We're, we're, we're kicking off with the Psychic cards.

Liam 1: 22:59

I think we finished the Psychic. I think we're on Fighting.

Brent: 23:01

Oh, did we finish the Psychic, the fighting? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, are you alright? On to fighting, guys. Post Psychic, that's what I wrote in the show notes. Ayyyy. Camp, take us away, man.

Cam: 23:15

fighting type Pokemon Conkeldurr and Greninja, if you think either of those are viable they're both kind of interesting the, oh and then also the fighting mask, so we'll start with the Conkeldurr, it's a stage 2 that has 180 HP If it is inflicted with a status condition, its attack cost is free, which is usually a fighting and 4 colorless, and it does 250 damage. So, probably won't be good, but if a 1 prizer ever comes around, one that can do 250 for 0 energy is pretty good. And then the Greninja. 1 water also a stage 2, but an EX, 1 water, ninja blade, 170 damage, search your deck for a card and put it into your hand, and then water colorless, colorless, discard 2 energy from this Pokemon, does 120 damage to 2 of your opponent's Pokemon. So, kind of like a successor to Urshifu. We'll see if it ends up being anything. And the last fighting type is this Cornerstone Masked Ogre Pond. Which, it's ability, prevent all damage from attacks done to this Pokemon by opponents Pokemon that have an ability. So I believe that's just Alolan Vulpix V Star's attack, except it's not an attack, it's an ability, so you can't boss around it. And I think those are the three interesting fighting type Pokemon. I don't know if, what obscure GLC card Liam wants to bring up here as a cute engine for his latest control deck, but what do you have, Liam, to add?

Liam 1: 24:57

Yeah, there's nothing in these, these fighting types. This is The okey dokey's kinda cool, but no, yeah, there's nothing. I will say, though, that the, the Ogre Pawn is really funny. They're continuing the, like, two year tradition now of basically making every wall Pokémon have a Shred attack to let Mew EX run through it. It's, it's disgusting, honestly. I don't think, why does Mew EX have these magical powers of getting through every wall Pokémon? I don't know. But, yeah, I guess they're doing that. And it, it persists.

Cam: 25:29

Well, moving on to Darks, what do you, why don't you lead us off,

Liam 1: 25:33

Yeah.

Cam: 25:33

You can go through Darks and Medals, because there's not that many Darks or Medals. Is there

Brent: 25:37

So, quick question, is there any situation, so, Ting 1 fighting energy, a, a 30 spread attack? Still completely unplayable because it turns out 30 just doesn't do what it used to?

Liam 1: 25:47

Yeah, it's not a lot. Manaphy also is in format. Yeah.

Cam: 25:51

yeah, unfortunately, I mean, if Manaphy ever rotates and they don't reprint it, then sure. Could go off. The, the only other downside is it kinda, you need a stadium in play and your opponent will probably not play a stadium at some point, which means that,

Brent: 26:09

Yeah, you gotta find

Cam: 26:10

you will continually have to

Brent: 26:12

a stadium and discards the stadium at the end of the turn. So,

Cam: 26:15

Yeah, so, that,

Brent: 26:16

stream stadiums.

Cam: 26:19

like, yeah, you would be playing six stadiums just to attack six times, that's, that sounds a little bit rough.

Brent: 26:25

Yeah.

Liam 1: 26:26

Those attacks are usually not that bad, especially in a format with stuff like Artisan. Like, getting one sided stadium effects like that is usually not that bad. Like, Artisan has good synergy with this card. But, yeah. Yeah, it's not easy, of course. You have to account for it. Ah, yeah, there's nothing in Dark.

Brent: 26:51

Yeah, Dark's all terrible, right?

Cam: 26:53

But what's the next interesting card to you, is it just the, the, the dragon himself?

Liam 1: 27:02

Yeah. Yeah.

Cam: 27:04

Start us off, Liam, what do you think? Dracloak and Dragapult,

Liam 1: 27:08

I think it's mid. Mid! Well, I mean, it's of course not bad. I think the Dragapult DX is the best attacker in the game right now. For 1 colorless, it does 70 damage, and for 1 fire and 1 psychic, on its second attack, it does 200 damage, puts 6 damage counters on your opponent's best Pokémon in any way you like. That attack's insane. Easily the best attacker in the game right now. It's super efficient on two energies, and it does 260, like essentially, and it's an efficient 260 as well. Damage counter spread is super strong. But the energy requirement's not easy to hit. That's like the biggest thing holding this deck back right now. Like, it doesn't have a way to self power itself up like Charizard. You have to somehow account for powering it up, and it's not easy. So, and the card I don't think is great. It hasn't been super strong in my testing. It's been good. It's a high tier deck. It's a serious competitor. But it's not I have a running bet with Jake Gearheart on NAIC predictions. He thinks, well, this was a few weeks ago. I bet he didn't make this anymore. This card's not that good. He said four of the top eight were going to be Dragapult EX decks. I said no shot and I'm thinking I was right. It's not that good. It's good. It's not that good. The Dracloak is easily the best part. That's the stage 1, and it has an ability. Look at the top 2 cards of your deck and put one of them in your hand, put the other card on the bottom of your deck. The Dreepy is 70 HP, so it's profitable. So it's got like a solid somewhat built out engine, but the engine doesn't actually fuel the attackers, because the attacker requires some alternate engine to get it going, which is what Like, creates some some weird, weirdness, I guess, within the deck, like, your Poffins turn 1 are kind of split, like, on the one hand you'd like to get, like, 3 Dreepies out, so that you can play a bunch of Draclo, and then find your Draclo turn 2 and get something going, but on the other, you have to commit space to something like this. Natu, or Charmander, or Comphase, or Pidgey, so that you can get some other engine out to power up the Dragapult. And that, like, really stretches your Poffins, and it makes it harder to use the Dragfloat and holds the deck back a lot. Cam, your thoughts on Dragapult?

Cam: 29:31

I think it's fire, dude. I, I think it's a really good card. I've been playing it with the Lost Box version, and I think all the issues that Liam has been talking about are like, solved with this. The Lost Box version you have Mirage Gate, you just get the 7, you have Early Pressure, with a Cramorant, it pairs well with a Radzard and a Sableye I'm playing something close to the top 4 list that just did well at, that's on my list, um, yeah, it's, it's just, it's really strong, I won't say it's, like, tier 0 or even by itself in tier 1. At least in my initial testing of the format, but it's good. It has its weaknesses Rhydon can kind of flatten it which has definitely kind of come back, especially since it has typing on Lugia. I'm sure there's other matchups, sure, like Giratina, which we haven't really tested a bunch, and Blissey. Probably some other things that can beat it as well, so I don't think it's unbeatable, but it's it's, it's, you know, quite the deck, drawing a lot of cards. Decks with very powerful stage twos and stage ones that draw cards, you know, it's kind of a recipe for success on some level, maybe not the best deck, but should be competitively viable for a bit.

Liam 1: 30:59

Yeah, absolutely. I've played some games with Camseless. I think it's good. The Dragapult's strong, but I don't think it's It's not unbeatable. There's ways for decks to beat it without contorting themselves too much. So I don't think it's going to be too strong, but it's a good deck for sure. A good card, if you can get it to work. I think Cam does pretty well at that. It's a powerful attacker. I think, honestly, though, the most relevant dragon type is going to be the next one, and the last one the Tatsugiri. Its ability is, when it's in the active spot, you can look at the top six cards of your deck, reveal a supporter, and put it into your hand. It has one retreat, so Rescue Board gives it a free retreat, you can shove it every turn, generate a supporter. That card's insane.

Cam: 32:01

Yeah, I think that is gonna be, kind of, is one of the better cards of the set. Just generally splashable cards into a lot of decks. It's really good in Moridon. You know, like you said, it's, it's really good for those aggressive decks, or really any deck where you put an escape board on it, you get Iona late, you're just looking for a boss, or a research, or whatever you need to close out the game. And, you know, you have something to help you dig. Mm hmm. At least, look at the top 6, so, yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty good. I like the Tatsugiri a lot, and it's 10 HP above Dragapult, so it at least makes it so they have to, like, swing twice to kill it, and

Liam 1: 32:44

Yeah, Survives Dragon Bolt and also has it's Pothinable, so

Cam: 32:47

Poffinball, yep.

Liam 1: 32:48

yeah, the card is really insane. We'll make a lot of engines going forward.

Cam: 32:55

Have you tested Blissey EX at all? That seems like, it seems right up your alley, I, I, you know, just the Liam

Liam 1: 33:02

I don't, I I like cards like that, but I don't the draw after attack is a terrible effect. It basically does nothing. And that's not like completely true, but it's the card's not it's like an upside is the draw engine, but it doesn't it doesn't help you out in the early game. So you have to play a different draw engine to make the deck work. So like, yeah, it's hard to get a lot of value out of cards like that. Of course they do they do come up. The six cards always comes up. You either, like, force Iona from your opponent, get out of bad hands that, like, somehow spawn on you mid game. But it's, it doesn't make, like, the contribution that, like, ability based draw power does to an engine. The ability, however, is pretty insane. Once during your turn, move a basic energy card from one of your Pokemon to another one of your Pokemon. Cards like that give a lot of, a lot of flexibility. It lets you splash in tons of attackers. And just make cool plays. Yeah, you get to pivot into new, surprising attackers on command. So it's a cool card. It has 300 HP and it's colorless, so very versatile. But, nah, I haven't started anything with it yet.

Cam: 34:18

Me neither. It's definitely one of the decks that I want to try ish soon. Kind of as we've, I've started to finish up initial testing with all the main decks. Yeah, but it definitely seems very interesting. The attack you know, you're right, the draw until you have six is kinda nice but it's not great. Mm hmm. You know, it's easily counterable, but the healing seems like a really good way to counter Dragapult. Especially with multiple Mikeydories.

Liam 1: 34:46

Yeah, it has a lot of synergy with the Monkey Dory, right? Yeah.

Cam: 34:49

Yeah, but the next card, and I think it's the last colorless card and I think it's one of the better cards from the set, is Bloodmoon, Ursa Luna EX. I think that card is very, very good for a lot of different decks, adds a lot of different dimensions to even control. It's just can control while also being a good attacker in Lugia, and I'm sure a lot of other decks can splash the Ursa Luna. It's basically Radiant Charizard, except it's an EX with 260 HP basic. It's attack is 5 colorless, 240 damage. But, it costs one colorless less for each prize your opponent has taken, so, unlike Charizard, you can actually have it cost nothing if your opponent's at one prize, and Control can actually do some pretty nasty things with that, if they can you know, put a tool on it, and then Blood Moon, and then continue to penny loop it, and they can actually, if you are not set up correctly, they can actually take six prizes on you, which is pretty cool.

Liam 1: 35:52

Yeah, dude, this card is, it is insane. 260 is a ton. And 240's a lot. It'd be better if it was a little higher, but that'd probably just be broken straight up. Yeah, it's, it's an insane attacker. Stats like this are just unbelievable. It survives Radiant Charizard, which is like, insane. It's easily the best attacker on a basic that we've seen in a while.

Brent: 36:19

It's colorless, so it's like totally splashable. Like, they're, they're like, they're like, we're not, we're not gonna spoon feed you an archetype. Just put this in all your decks. It'll be great.

Liam 1: 36:26

Yeah, this, this card is just, it's, it's BONKERS,

Brent: 36:31

Anybody that goes down to one prize on you, you should have the option to do this to them and see what they do. Oh, okay. Pokemon.

Liam 1: 36:39

Yeah, a really good card. It's going to see play throughout its entire lifespan and have an ex a noticeable impact on the meta. Insane.

Brent: 36:51

Yeah, yeah, people are gonna have to have a strategy for going down to one prize because, like, you just get punched in the face. Right?

Liam 1: 36:57

This

Cam: 37:16

I, there's some. I don't think there's many. The first one is a control one. It's Accompanying Flute. Reveal the top five cards of your opponent's deck and put any number of basic Pokemon you find there on your opponent's bench. Your opponent shuffles the other cards back into their deck. It's A solid control card for sure, I think it's like a 2 or 3 of, it's not a 4 of but, I'll let the control god himself take the 4, what do you think Liam, as he makes weird faces?

Liam 1: 37:48

card looks terrible. It's terrible. I mean, it doesn't We've had a lure module for a while, C0 play. It's Like, it's too iffy. You don't, you don't get any return on it. There's nothing guaranteed about this card, so like, you draw it, and yeah, there's no guarantees you find anything. I think, I think it's actually not like a 2 or 3 of card, it's a 0 or a 4 of. I think if you're gonna commit to it, You have to be getting a lot of upside from it, and it has to be a legitimate threat. Like, if you just play one, and every time you draw it, like, you just play it and see what happens. I don't think you get a lot of value out of it.

Cam: 38:30

it's been nice, I mean it's, it just makes it so like if you play 1 or 2, plus you play man time, and then Erika's like, you're just a bunny, can't hide anything anywhere. And I know, that's a lot of space, and that's probably

Liam 1: 38:41

but the Retreat Lock win condition has never been It's never been about the, like I'm going to find something and get it, and then I win? It's about the threat of keeping basically everything relevant off the board. I'm going to keep the Bibarel off the board against Baxcalibur, and you're just slowing the deck down by doing that. The threat is like, enough in 99 percent of situations. It's not about like, the game ends if I don't like, Mantine or Erika, or use the Flute and get something this turn. Like that's a very rare scenario to be in, and it happens. But The deck is built to not lose those positions, because when you're in those positions, it's terrible. And even if you have something like the Flu, I don't think it fixes your issues. You're having real issues if you're going to get run off the board, and there's nothing that you can grab. Like, the deck is built to avoid those situations. And so, I don't, yeah, I don't think, like, cards like this are good. Like, it's never a card you want to bank on, and it's not, and if you don't want to bank on it, you end up not needing it. So, like, yeah, it's a hard card to use. There's like, yeah, Jesus, it's, it has to go to their bench too, so like, if they fill their bench, you don't get, you don't get any value out of it.

Cam: 40:03

I think that's perfect. You want them to fill their bench as a control player, especially if you have Snorlax and Mawile.

Liam 1: 40:08

no, I mean, I was thinking there was some synergy with sisters, and that you could thin their deck a little bit before sisters, they can just opt not to, like, it doesn't, there's nothing guaranteed about this card, there's like actually nothing. But,

Brent: 40:25

This card's not nearly as good as the next couple of cards. Let's talk about Bug Catching Set, which is a good, which is a

Cam: 40:30

Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness. Yeah, this is the playable card of the I think it's good that there's just no good Grass Pokemon. Look at the top 7 cards of your deck. You may reveal up to two in any combination of grass Pokemon and gra basic grass energy you find there and put them in your hand. Maybe this feels like a card that might be good at some point when when a rotation happens and maybe consistency is hit and maybe grass is like a semi viable deck and you're like, oh, here's bug catching set. Heh.

Liam 1: 41:08

yeah, I mean,

Cam: 41:08

Maybe.

Liam 1: 41:09

It's so hard to see this card get any play. Like, your deck wants Pokemon, you should play ball cards. If your deck wants energy, you should play Earthen Vessel. And like, of course there

Cam: 41:21

if I want both?

Liam 1: 41:22

There's decks that want both, but like,

Cam: 41:25

heh!

Liam 1: 41:25

you should just build your deck to hit Nest Ball Vessel, as opposed to like, I'm gonna build my deck to look at the top 7 and pray to God I rip them. Like, everything. But you can't even rip everything. Two cards is not a lot. Like, you get one Pokemon, one energy. And the obvious, like,

Cam: 41:41

know in Pokemon that's not a big deal, but in other card games, plus one is a big deal.

Liam 1: 41:46

right? But,

Brent: 41:48

I, I don't know, I feel like, I feel like most of the grass decks that I've seen, like, most of the grass archetypes involve running a lot of grass energy. So I, I feel like if it's, if whatever turns out to be a viable grass deck is like that, you can be like, oh, this is gonna be okay.

Liam 1: 42:03

and

Brent: 42:03

item, you can

Liam 1: 42:04

good if it was, like, if you could grab, like, three, or something like that. But it literally grabs the same amount as Earthen Vessel. It's, it's like, Earthen Vessel, maybe situationally, sometimes better, and then sometimes you just get nothing, and you lose, like, I mean, I don't know why you wouldn't just, like, play Vessels if you're playing for Energy, and play Ball Cards if you're playing for Pokemon, like, the guaranteed, Aspect of Vessel and Nest Ball, or Ultra Ball, make it so much better than this. And of course, you shouldn't Tunnel Vision on the Ogre Fawn, but that has the most obvious application of being a Pokemon that's grass and utilizes a lot of energy.

Brent: 42:46

Alright, alright, Caretaker. Is this a viable control?

Cam: 42:52

No.

Liam 1: 42:54

going infinite doesn't even matter. That's like, probably the most overrated concept.

Brent: 42:58

Yeah, yeah, it's like you can go infinite with nothing, I don't know, like

Cam: 43:03

With an F card.

Liam 1: 43:05

People overestimate, or like,

Brent: 43:08

You can avoid deck out by not having anything good.

Liam 1: 43:12

yeah, no, but

Brent: 43:13

Without advancing the board state at all.

Liam 1: 43:16

deck that's playing for deck out already avoids deck out. Like,

Brent: 43:19

Yeah.

Liam 1: 43:19

there's like exceptions to this, and those are very noted, right? Something like Mewtwo V Union, where the first step is to deck yourself out because you literally have to discard, like, you know, four specific cards from your deck, so you just have to go through a ton of cards. That needs like an infinite loop. But like, I think, like the Pidgeot decks, they don't need an infinite loop as much as people make it out to be. Because You never deck out first. You literally don't play any research. You play an Arven, and then you search for one card a turn. Like, you never go through any amount of cards. Every other deck is like, you know, research, and whatever, every single turn, four Ultra Ball, whatever. Like, you go through so many less cards than them. For most slower decks, the infinite loop is not as needed. And especially in like resource generation, you usually play enough resources, and like, yeah, Silene is the worst way to recover resources ever. Like, just play Alekki. It's just better. And Palpat. Like, that's, that's how you recover resources if you're like, I'm running out of resources with Pidgeot. Just play the cards that like actually put resources back, not like, flip a coin, get a card back. Not as good. Yeah, this card's not good.

Cam: 44:31

Carmine. Next card. Liam. It sounds like a no. This seems like an obvious include into Lugia, as most people would say. And you were pretty adamant in the Discord that you said Carmine is a trap. Don't

Brent: 44:45

Designed to Ben get you to bench La Minons. Would you be doing other things?

Liam 1: 44:49

I'm not talking about my NAIC prep on the pod.

Cam: 44:53

Oh, okay. Sorry. My mistake. My mistake. My mistake,

Brent: 44:58

How's, how's, how's your NAIC prep with Carmine going, cam

Cam: 45:02

It's like, alright. I haven't played Lugia enough to be like, it's great, good or bad. It's probably a trap. You probably need to play it in like, very high counts if you want to play it, because I personally, in minimal games, it didn't feel great to Luminion for it because you're like, I'm only drawing five. What are the odds I need to use my second Luminion, like, after this Carmine because I, like, just draw into an Ultra Ball again? It's just not enough cards to feel super powerful.

Liam 1: 45:38

Yeah, I think it's a cool option. Supporter going first is, I think, a really cool it's, like, healthy for the game. A nerfed supporter going first option that lets you build around Luminia. But, it's I mean, it's just they're, like, giving you a bad research. Like, it's it is a nerfed supporter, so, like, making space for it over research is, like, very hard argument. So you I mean, I'd only most decks will probably only play in addition to research. But, even then, it's not great.

Cam: 46:08

It'll probably have to be in, like, a deck that just absolute wants to be an aggressive deck and just needs to turbo through.

Liam 1: 46:18

I like,

Brent: 46:20

guys hear, hearing you, hearing you guys say all this stuff. Remi it makes me think of the Pokemon Way, which is like in nine months they're gonna reprint this exact card, except you could draw six cards.'cause they were like, well, you wouldn't use it when it was five, but like, one more card then will you use it? That,

Cam: 46:34

it if it was 6.

Liam 1: 46:35

I I kind of hear that

Brent: 46:36

way, right? It's like, every card that they were like, we wish you'd play that card, and then people don't, they're like, well, like, okay, what if we just add like a little, little bit of juice and see if people play it then.

Liam 1: 46:48

I, I, I think that turbo argument makes a little bit of sense. You going first, you get to see 15 cards off supporters over your first, like five turns if you just play heavy carmine as opposed to 14 if you play heavy research. So I think, I think that the argument makes a little bit of sense, but I like the issue is always that you're, you're not going first, you're only going first half your games. At best if you wanna go first, so like.

Cam: 47:12

you're just playing a worse supporter. But as a 6, it's like only slightly worse. But then

Liam 1: 47:16

yeah, I think if it was 6, this card would definitely see some play. I mean, you'd be drawing a lot of cards. That's that's good. The 5 nerf is really, really bad. It's easier to compare to Judge than Research, which is, you don't want to judge yourself too much.

Cam: 47:31

You're judging yourself.

Brent: 47:33

Alright, alright. Community Center, Cook, and Festival Grounds. We got two stadiums, one that heals 10 from each Pokemon if you play a supporter card, one that says if you have energy attached, you can't be affected by special conditions, and then Cook is a supporter that heals 70 from your active. Any of these good?

Liam 1: 47:52

Cook is a reprint, and it's good. We already have

Cam: 47:56

is,

Liam 1: 47:56

Sigara, though, which is, like, pretty good, and probably better with Dragonfall.

Cam: 48:02

yeah, I mean this cook is definitely optimal though, because the art is way better than the other one. I mean, that, what is that, a sandwich that this cook is holding? This, this

Liam 1: 48:12

no, this art's pretty good, for sure.

Brent: 48:14

It's got an egg on top of a sandwich, it's like, it's pretty strong.

Cam: 48:20

Yeah,

Brent: 48:20

what he's throwing down.

Cam: 48:22

Community Center, like maybe if, like, maybe if, you know, people might use it as a, you know, way to heal against Dragapult or like other spread decks. Probably not, but, you know, that's kind of what it's for.

Liam 1: 48:38

Yeah, maybe better than the Festival.

Cam: 48:40

yeah, I mean, Festival Grounds might be,

Liam 1: 48:44

No, I mean, I mean Champion's Festival,

Cam: 48:47

oh, Champions Festival,

Liam 1: 48:49

maybe.

Brent: 48:50

The healing 10 from Pokemon

Cam: 48:53

Just because you don't have to have a, yeah, just because you don't have to have a full bench and it's cheaper, probably.

Liam 1: 49:00

Yeah.

Brent: 49:03

Enhanced Hammer, now guys, this leaves like a, it might be a really good card.

Liam 1: 49:08

Yeah, I mean, this

Cam: 49:09

I think it might be okay, like, I don't know if we've, you know.

Brent: 49:12

I don't know if there's ever been a card like this in the history of Pokemon, but it seems like a good card.

Liam 1: 49:18

I mean, it's a lot worse now than when it was printed

Brent: 49:21

Yeah.

Liam 1: 49:22

a few years ago. The games are so much faster. Like, it's going to be a good card, of course. It's going to be relevant but it's worse. I mean, you feel it too. The

Cam: 49:33

Yeah, and I think you're just also going to wait for the right deck to come around. Like, it doesn't do enough against something like Lugia, because obviously one hammer is not going to do enough there, and if you're trying to control Lugia, you're probably playing, you're trying to control them, then you're probably playing Giacomo over Enhanced Hammer. Enhanced Hammer would have been really good against something like Mew, VMAX. So, if something Like that comes back around, where it's just like, like a Toad, or a Mew, or something that's just reliant on one DTE, then maybe.

Brent: 50:09

That's very specific tech for a very specific situation there. That's a sad story.

Liam 1: 50:13

a lot better when the game takes a lot longer. Like when you're against Toad, if you're somehow able to get an enhanced Tameroth, I don't know how. But like. Energy Disruption there is a lot more felt than against something like Mio, where they're like, I need to get three attacks off and I play 4 DTE. Like, Enhanced Tamer just does not affect that. They're like, they're gonna run through you. It's, it has, the game has to like, slow down, this card was obviously a lot better when the game was slower, the game's never slowing down. It's going to be so fast forever. But, yeah, like, faster formats, cards like this, they're, have like a much smaller impact, and there will be decks that use this, and like, commit to it, enough to where it's able to like, actually swing matchups, and it does swing matchups, but, you know, Like, the impact is a lot less felt, when decks are like, so much faster, because they're over resourced, because they don't have to go through as much stuff for each knockout, like, or like, to finish out a game, because they win so fast. Thank you for joining us.

Brent: 51:20

Yeah. By all that.

Cam: 51:23

Alright a card that I actually think is really interesting Handheld fan if the Pokemon it's tool card, if the Pokemon this card is attached to is your active Pokemon and is damaged by an opponent's attack, even if it's knocked out, move an energy attached to the attacking Pokemon to one of your opponents benched Pokemon. So basically end a porter on a tool if Pokemon gets hit. I think it's pretty cool, we've been messing around with it, I'm not totally sold on it, but it's like, cool as a way in Control to kind of mess with, with energy counts, if you can penny loop. Made, you know, I'm not sold on it being like, entirely a broken Control card, but it's something that's kind of interesting.

Liam 1: 52:13

yeah, the card's really good. It basically just lets you turn any wall into a cloth. That's really good. It's, it takes the tool slot, and like, the best walls, of course, like, kind of by definition, will have Bravery, Charm, or Hero's Cape attached. Like, those are just better walls that have more HP. And it's hard to find, like, a tanky enough wall where, like, ideally, of course, you want to be playing, like, Penny on the thing that has the handheld fan. But, it's, yeah, it's, it's really good. If you can get something to hit into something with handheld fan, and, like, they don't take a KO. You're probably winning. That's really hard to do. Like easier said than done. But it's, yeah, it opens up like a new way to, a new way to win off of basically every wall in the format.

Brent: 53:03

Yeah. I, I feel like they've printed this ability on Pokemon before and it was always bad because that was the ability, but like, if you could put this on a Pokemon that has a good ability, you're like, oh, now we're kind of doing

Liam 1: 53:16

Yeah, exactly. That's like, similar to what the cloth did. It was discard the energy, but like, same thing. Like, you just get rid of the energy.

Brent: 53:22

But, but walling people with it. That's good.

Liam 1: 53:26

Yeah,

Cam: 53:33

Hassle, because I don't think that card's good. Sorry. I'll go J Jamming Tower. Now, I don't know if this will get played immediately. I do think this card's really good. It's basically Lightsander Labs Pokemon tools in play have no effect. It's a Stadium. Stadiums are kind of good right now, or tools are kind of good right now, in, or, especially for NAIC, Heavy Baton in, and Bravery Charm, and for Sealstone with all their tools Charizard if you want, The Charizard's still a thing, I don't think it is relies on Forest Sealstone Escape Ward's kind of prevalent right now with Comfey and Tatsugiri, I don't know, I think it's a good stadium, it just, you know, I don't know what deck will it'll find itself in.

Brent: 54:20

Easily the best stadium in the set.

Liam 1: 54:24

this ADM is insane. Oh, I should probably try it out in Lugia. This ADM is insane.

Cam: 54:31

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Liam 1: 54:34

Yeah, I'm definitely going to do that. Geez, I don't know why. I'm sleeping on it, Big Cam.

Cam: 54:39

Yeah, I was telling you about

Liam 1: 54:41

I know, I know

Cam: 54:44

What are you

Liam 1: 54:44

Yeah, you can, you, you can hit me with that. I told you so, bro. All right. Yeah. You can actually say the whole thing if you wanna say right now.

Cam: 54:50

No, it's all good, it's all good.

Liam 1: 54:52

Oh, okay bro. I got yeah.

Cam: 54:54

what do you think about Cheren? Do you think that card's good or nah?

Liam 1: 54:57

Yeah. Card's gonna be good.

Cam: 54:59

For the second ability, right?

Liam 1: 55:02

I mean, for both. It's, it's the flexibility.

Cam: 55:06

So Cheren is a supporter that says, choose one, either switch your active Pokémon with one of your benched Pokémon always kind of decent against control and then during this turn, your opponent's your Pokémon's attacks do 30 more damage to your opponent's active EX or active Pokémon V which is not Bad, that's a choice spell, a defiance spell and then if you add that on top of that, it's plus 60 and then that can help you reach some of these 300 HP Pokemon potentially.

Liam 1: 55:37

Yeah, I mean, switch effects are just good. That's like, a constant in deck building. And something I'm like, sometimes kind of surprised about is like,

Cam: 55:46

Mobility's

Liam 1: 55:47

if you're not expecting it, they're, they're just good. They're good for unexpected situations. So yeah, having, being able to fit a switch effect in, while not having to commit the spot to the switch effect, is like, like, you also commit the spot to something else is an option that like, decks will consider. It's of course not going to be heavily played. Have, like, a huge effect on the meta, but it will, it will win games at some point in it's lifetime. So, yeah, it's a notable card.

Brent: 56:18

Lana's aid put up to three of any Pokemon that doesn't have a rule box and basic energy cards from your discard pile into your hand seems

Cam: 56:29

It, it's, yeah, it's a nerfed Klara it'll probably get played on some level, it could get played in Sablezord or in

Liam 1: 56:36

Dude, it doesn't get the Radzard back, though! Like, it's such an

Cam: 56:39

Yeah, it's nerfed, it's nerfed for

Liam 1: 56:42

Yeah, but, no, yeah, you're right. It is supporter recovery for Pokemon is, is good. And

Cam: 56:47

Especially since it

Brent: 56:47

Yeah. Thi things that get discard pile cards outta your discard pile and into your hand are almost always good. This does that it, it doesn't get the cards that you want to put in your hand into your hand, but put some other good cards in your hand.

Liam 1: 56:59

Yep.

Cam: 57:00

Loveable I think is just bad. Search your deck for a Pokemon with the same name as one of your opponent's Pokemon in play. Reveal it and put it into your hand. Disastrous,

Liam 1: 57:10

Nothing would make me happier than playing a deck with this card, but, yeah, I think it's bad.

Brent: 57:14

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you would love to play it on stream. But unfortunately, it's not worth the insane amount of like, times you would be like, I'm so dumb, why did I put this card in my deck, right? Hahahaha.

Liam 1: 57:28

perfectly into Dragapult, in the sense that as long as you hit a mirror, their turn 2 is probably consisting of Dracloak, Dragapult, and now you have a ball card that searches for both. And it's not Ultra Ball. It's not Ultra Ball. You don't have to discard cards, or you get to play 5th Ultra Ball,

Cam: 57:44

It's, it's a master ball! It's like having free A specs in your deck in the mirror. Like, why would you not play Loveable?

Liam 1: 57:52

Yeah, as long as you hit mirrors, it's really good, but you'd also commit to the Pityit engine, so you also get value against Charizard, and anything that runs Pidgeot. Yeah, so cool.

Brent: 58:07

Oh guys,

Liam 1: 58:08

Dude, yeah, I actually, I really want to try that, dude. Play the love ball, and like, every engine piece in the meta, play like one Comfey, one Tatsugiri, 101

Cam: 58:21

Oh, and now, after game one, now it's in their mind? And now they're like Because they know you have

Liam 1: 58:27

Yeah!

Cam: 58:27

they are not playing their own good consistency cards cause they're kinda like, it's almost

Liam 1: 58:32

They're a little scared, bro. They're a little scared.

Brent: 58:34

Liam's gonna be playing this guy and this guy's like, I'm not setting up Pidgey at this game. I'm going without. Hahaha.

Liam 1: 58:41

That's like, actually such a cool engine. That's like, the coolest thing ever, bro. Just play like, four love balls, and one of all these things, and you Yes, sir! I wonder about

Brent: 58:53

deck. You know, side deck to get value out of his Love Ball. He's like completely nerfed his deck in a desperate effort to make sure he gets good value out of Love Ball.

Liam 1: 59:04

That's actually pretty sick. Pretty sick.

Cam: 59:06

Lucian I don't think this card's good.

Liam 1: 59:09

Yeah, this card's terrible. We don't have to talk about this.

Cam: 59:11

no no no, I wanna say this cause I think it did too. Hit top at a Japanese

Liam 1: 59:15

Yeah,

Brent: 59:16

is a bad it doesn't matter. This is a terrible card. Any card

Liam 1: 59:20

flipped out a lot of heads. A lot of heads. The opponent get a lot of tails.

Brent: 59:24

Yeah, any card that involves both of you flipping coins and and bad things can happen to you and good things can happen to them is a terrible card. You should never play that card.

Cam: 59:33

okay, okay, okay, okay,

Liam 1: 59:35

It's an equal chance, actually, of good things happening to them, and bad

Cam: 59:39

yeah, yeah,

Liam 1: 59:40

as good things for you, and bad for them.

Brent: 59:41

Yeah, yeah, like, you're gonna play a card and it's just as likely that they, like, reap massive benefits as you reaping massive benefits. That's crazy. There's no scenario where you

Liam 1: 59:52

It's your supporter!

Brent: 59:53

Yeah, your cards are supposed to help you.

Liam 1: 59:57

Oh, Lucky Helmet's still lit.

Cam: 1:00:00

the lucky helmet, draw two cards if your opponent, if, if if you're active is hit, is damaged from an attack, that's pretty cool. You know, I don't know how much it'll get played, especially in a, in my jamming tower meta, but

Brent: 1:00:14

yeah, yeah, and Liam's gonna be putting a handheld fan on all of his Pokémon gonna be time to put the lucky helmet out.

Liam 1: 1:00:23

Yeah, Lucky Helmet's cool.

Brent: 1:00:24

Like, like, Lucky Helmet was always supposed to make people, like, Lucky Helmet was a classic example of a, like, the guy's like, maybe I should just pass instead of attacking, so he does not draw two cards. But, but, like, handheld fan is just objectively better, right? He'll be like, if I attack, I am punished.

Liam 1: 1:00:42

Dude, one of the things I hate about the current, like, the state of the game currently is passing when you could attack is, like, 99 percent wrong, like, it is, like, one in a million games right now that, like, passing is the correct move when, and instead you should just push for an attack every single turn.

Cam: 1:01:02

unless you're playing Star Wars.

Liam 1: 1:01:04

yeah, when you're playing Star Wars, though, the game is so much better! Yes, sir, Cam!

Cam: 1:01:08

lot of, you know, thinking and potential around passing, but, you know, we don't need to

Liam 1: 1:01:13

Mm hmm. Yeah, exactly. Pokemon is That's what, that's people's, like, biggest gripe with the game is, like, it's just run it down, run it down, run it down, run it down.

Cam: 1:01:25

Paren, double Pokemon communication. Reveal up to two Pokemon from your hand and put them into your deck. If you do, search your deck for up to that many Pokemon. Cool card? Don't think it should

Brent: 1:01:38

a supporter, that's a terrible card. Oh my god. So, so, as a supporter, it's terrible.

Cam: 1:01:44

It'd be cool if something else, but a supporter, not, not

Liam 1: 1:01:48

Yeah, I mean, honestly, this is not a card you play for consistency. This is a card for some combo where you need to put your Pokemon in hand back into deck without losing your hand. And for some reason can't use Super Rod. Wait, this card's terrible. Yeah, this card's terrible.

Cam: 1:02:07

Alright, now, the last card before we get into the A specs, Boomerang Energy. Liam, what do you think

Brent: 1:02:13

No, no, do we, do we need to talk about Reifert? Is Reifert a thing at all? Okay, okay, just making sure. Alright, good deal. I'm happy to skip it. Boomerang energy.

Cam: 1:02:23

What do you think, Liam? Is this

Liam 1: 1:02:24

they're obviously going to print something that's just like, you know, maybe a year down the line or something, where like, the only reason that card is even playable is because of Boomerang Energy, and the only reason Boomerang Energy is playable is because of that card.

Cam: 1:02:38

You don't believe in Greninja? It's not good in Greninja?

Liam 1: 1:02:40

yeah, no, not in the Greninja. Like, the Greninja, you just want to play DTE anyway, or something. Like,

Cam: 1:02:46

Alright.

Liam 1: 1:02:48

yeah, I mean, it's gonna be something where, like, you'll see it. I don't exactly know what it looks like, where it's better to lose, like, you can't afford to just lose more basic energy, or something like that. You'll see it, and you'll know, and you'll be like, Jesus, man, I cannot believe they just, it's disgusting.

Brent: 1:03:07

I mean, is there, is there something that, like, lets you, would let you attach, like, I mean, obviously, like, Lugia would let you attach it, is there a thing that, like, discards and does more damage for every card you discard?

Liam 1: 1:03:18

No, I don't

Brent: 1:03:19

Yeah. I mean, that's, that's the card that they'll print, right, is like, does, you know, 80 damage for every energy you discard from this Pokemon, and

Liam 1: 1:03:26

I mean, the best thing is the,

Brent: 1:03:28

energy, and you're like, brrrr, right?

Liam 1: 1:03:30

the best thing for it is the Golisopod EX. It does 170 for water, colorless, colorless, and it has a hit and run. Like, one of the issues with this card is that the thing you attach it to is most likely going to die anyway. if it doesn't, you should just like instantly win the game in most matches because they haven't run you down successfully. So, like, it has to be something like the Golisopod that gets itself out of the active if you want to see, like, some sort of sustained value from this card. Which, of course, is, like, the whole point of the card. So, Golisopod's probably the best partner right now, but they're not a good duo. They're trash. It's got to be something else.

Cam: 1:04:16

Alright, Liam, I have a there's six A specs here. In your opinion, which one is the best,

Liam 1: 1:04:24

Which one is the best?

Cam: 1:04:26

Generally?

Liam 1: 1:04:27

yeah, generally, of course. Unfair stamp. Yeah, that's an unfair stamp.

Cam: 1:04:33

Unfair stamp. Is there anyone who

Liam 1: 1:04:36

You go with the Cyclone, or no?

Cam: 1:04:38

No, I think Unfair Stamp is just straight. I think I I really like Scuba Psyclone but I just think Unfair Stamp is generally just

Liam 1: 1:04:46

Yeah, no, that was an easier question. I probably made it up to be. That Clear unfair stamp.

Cam: 1:04:52

for anyone who played it in the format of Reset Stamp, you can play this card, it's a little bit different than that. You can play this card only if one of your opponent one of your Pokemon was knocked out during your opponent's last turn. Each player shuffles their hand into their deck, then you draw five cards, and your opponent draws two cards. That's pretty good, because it's an item, and it's a Roxanne as an item, except your opponent doesn't have to be three, and then you can also play a supporter on top of that. You can play an Eerie, you could play a boss, you could play, you could do a lot of things, it's, it's good. Grr. Heh, heh, heh

Liam 1: 1:05:30

people don't seem to be doing it this time around, but, like, especially for something like Primecatcher, I think people overestimate it because they look back to Format's past and throw it in there. Like, this card would obviously be insane, like, six, seven years ago or something, but it's just not as good now. There's a ton of onboard draw, like, every deck is just filled to the brim with ability based onboard draw. So it's, it's not as good, but like Prime Catcher, it doesn't mean it's bad. It's still really good, it will still win games, it's just not it's not like, super duper strong, like, I think that's like, oh, you're gonna take a knockout on turn, turn two, and then get unfair stamped and you're completely out of the game, is not going to be very common. It, it may happen, probably will happen. It's not going to be super common. The Unfair Stamp is just going to like shift the game a little bit, kind of like Prime Catcher, like make it so it's a little easier for somebody to keep pace a little easier, and just a slight adjustment. I'm like LeBron. A slight adjustment from the offensive player, that's all I need, right? Yeah.

Brent: 1:06:35

Alright guys, so here's, I've got the TCG player prices for the Ace Specs and Twilight Masquerade in front of me. Which one is the cheapest?

Cam: 1:06:46

Seeker Box,

Brent: 1:06:47

I was about to say, I recognize, I recognize this a

Cam: 1:06:50

or Survival

Brent: 1:06:51

Cam is kind of the cheat code here, because Cam is like selling people all day

Liam 1: 1:06:55

Yeah!

Brent: 1:06:56

But the answer is Survival Brace.

Cam: 1:06:59

It's,

Liam 1: 1:07:00

WHAT?

Cam: 1:07:00

Box or Survival Brace. It was one of the two. Those are by far the

Liam 1: 1:07:04

Dude, Survival Brace is so cool, like, if there's no VAC, this is easily one of the best ASPECs, but, I mean, there's of course VAC, but

Cam: 1:07:14

What are you talking about, bro? Even if there's not VAC, there's the best stadium in the game! Jamming Tower!

Liam 1: 1:07:19

yessir,

Cam: 1:07:21

This card's trash!

Liam 1: 1:07:22

get cooked by the jam tower.

Brent: 1:07:24

stunned that the Hyper Aroma is more than Secret Box.

Cam: 1:07:30

Oh, I think Hyper Aroma is insane, what do you mean?

Liam 1: 1:07:32

Yeah, Hyperrealm was insane.

Brent: 1:07:34

Yeah? I'm not a hyper aroma lover. I

Cam: 1:07:38

think Hyper

Brent: 1:07:39

mean, I guess if you're playing the right deck, then you're like, okay, this is the thing we're gonna

Liam 1: 1:07:42

The secret box would maybe be better if you didn't have to discard your whole hand to use it. Like,

Brent: 1:07:47

yeah.

Liam 1: 1:07:49

it's

Cam: 1:07:49

so I think second best is, I

Brent: 1:07:51

Yeah, what it,

Cam: 1:07:52

to, is Scoop of Cyclone, right? That's, I'm assuming that's the second most

Brent: 1:07:56

that is not the second most

Cam: 1:07:58

Is it, is it Hyper Aroma?

Brent: 1:07:59

Energy is

Cam: 1:08:00

Oh, oh, yes, yes, Legacy, I got it, I got

Brent: 1:08:03

So, so how much and I recognize Cam might be the cheat code for this, how much is Unfair Stamp going for versus Legacy Energy versus Scoop Up Cyclone? Any predictions guys?

Liam 1: 1:08:14

Probably, like, 15, 20, 30,

Brent: 1:08:19

25

Liam 1: 1:08:19

20,

Brent: 1:08:20

for Unfair Stamp.

Cam: 1:08:22

it. That makes sense, I'm like 20 for Legacy. Is that

Brent: 1:08:25

10. 10. Unfair Stamp going for more than two times what Legacy Energy has done. Everybody else on the Unfair Stamp hype

Cam: 1:08:35

That's crazy. That's crazy.

Brent: 1:08:38

Cyclone going for 650, so Legacy Energy going for 50 percent more than ScoopUp

Cam: 1:08:42

That's crazy, actually. I, like, I think these A specs, outside of, like, a lot of these A specs now, yes, Secret Box and Survival Bracer are trash. I think Outside of Primecatcher, like, I like a lot of these A specs more than I liked the first batch of A specs. Legacy Energy's really cool in Lugia. I'm sure there'll be something else with it at some point. Scoop of Cyclone is like my favorite design of a card, a defensive card that you know, allows you to take back a turn essentially without using a supporter. And then, um actually, Hyper Aroma, I think it's just, it's not like the flat out best A Spec, but I think it opens the door for a lot of decks to be played. Goldango, Gardevoir, just like a lot of these Stage 1 decks that you're like, sometimes really reliant on finding multiple Stage 1s on your second turn to get going and to keep up. And Hyper Aroma, being with an Arvin or Irida. for this card and just be like discard one, fine, double Goldango, plus something, or triple Kirlia. It's pretty good.

Brent: 1:09:58

I don't know, like for me, I guess when I think about Ace Specs, Like I mean on the one hand I can't say consistency cards, blah blah blah, no one wants consistency cards, like give us awesome cards. But, because like computer search I guess at the end of the day is like a consistency card. But, computer search is a always incredible, always feeling awesome consistency card. This one is like, you have to find it at the right time to get like good value. I don't know man, I like me some Prime Catcher, I like me some Unfair Stamp yeah, I like the energy. I mean, it seems like there's lots of good ways to go that are Even if I was playing a deck where getting stage 1s out was really important, I feel like you could probably do better. Is that crazy?

Cam: 1:10:38

no, but I do think like, a really strong turn two from stage one decks can be

Brent: 1:10:43

Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure, I'm sure Tord will show up with his optimized Goldengo list, and he'll be like, This is how we do

Cam: 1:10:49

I I played against my friends,

Brent: 1:10:51

There you go.

Cam: 1:10:52

I don't know, I played against Goldango and they grabbed, they went Irida, they went and they grabbed Palkia, V Star, plus the Hyper Roma, grabbed triple Goldango, and then they, yeah. They can ninja that turn too. And they have triple draw. I mean it's, it's gold angleo, but it, it was like, oh, that, that's actually, that's actually pretty cool like that the deck kind of pops off where it's like sometimes with that deck you're like, oh, I got one gold angleo up and I'm drawing two cards and it wasn't enough. Kind of saves you from that.

Liam 1: 1:11:21

in the right decks, it's really good, if you're committing to the item search engine, you play a lot of stage 1s, it's good.

Brent: 1:11:30

Nice. Guys, we'll be going for an hour and 17 minutes. Anything else you need to get off your chest before we call it? We will be back next week, we'll hear about LA and it'll be all NAIC all the time. Cam, you get to give us the victory report, right?

Cam: 1:11:48

I can give you a victory report of my Star Wars. My Star Wars tournaments, I don't know if that will be the same for Pokemon, sorry.

Liam 1: 1:11:56

Bro, where's the confidence? Where's the confidence? You're

Cam: 1:11:58

I'm locked, I'm locked, I'm locked in on the Star Wars man, I'm real locked in on Star

Brent: 1:12:03

Willpower, sitting angle, that's all you need. That'll

Cam: 1:12:06

that's all I need.

Liam 1: 1:12:07

Dude, look at this guy telling me he's doing he's doing interleaving. I'm just interleaving, bro. I'm locked in on Pokemon interleaving. Oh, and the truth comes out. Ahhh.

Brent: 1:12:16

Alright, Jon Palser, our outro, we'll be back next week.