Mike: 0:00

what is this from the leaderboard stuff? That's in the doc

Brent: 0:03

Oh, you haven't seen this

Mike: 0:04

now.

Brent: 0:06

You're sleeping on the greatest new thing on the internet. Julian H he is, he is some awesome polka dad who is like cranking away on a. So I'm like interesting Pokemon coding problems and he built this thing that scrapes a Pokemon every 20 minutes and updates all the key data for every player and gives you tons of data. So you can go to this guy's website. Um,

Mike: 0:35

Yeah, I'm on it now. I just found it

Brent: 0:37

yeah. And you can search for magnet shoe up in the, uh, upper right corner and see how magnitudes at 73 keys, because if he doesn't win, he gets third place or second place, second place.

Mike: 0:56

and it has like a little even like, like a little chart for everybody. That's this cool.

Brent: 1:05

You're currently ranked 125 with 73 points. That's super strong now,

Mike: 1:10

dad.

Brent: 1:11

although the problem is, so the problem is so you scraping it, but the result is he, he doesn't know how many keys anyone's blown

Mike: 1:20

Right,

Brent: 1:20

you don't know how many keys people got zero for, because the zero is the same as not playing in the way that he scrapes it.

Mike: 1:28

Yeah. It'd probably be like really hard to get that data unless you like had their backend data.

Brent: 1:34

right, right. I mean, they would, they would somehow have to feed that to you. So, so all, so, so it's unfortunate cause you don't really, really, really know like what's happening because you can't tell how far in people actually are. Right. So how many, how many keys have you spent so far?

Mike: 1:53

23.

Brent: 1:56

1314, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19. So you had four keys with no outcomes. I mean, that's how you win, but like, yeah, they don't have the record of the four zeros you got. It's just like, you didn't agree with it.

Mike: 2:12

I see. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That makes sense.

Brent: 2:15

Right,

Mike: 2:16

Because those are the times. Cause that it's cause what he's measuring is not like the event itself, but like the change in

Brent: 2:24

exactly. Exactly. Having said that, uh, uh, super, super awesome. It's going to give us just so much juice for this podcast. Welcome to the treasurer Lynch. Uh, it's me Brynn Halliburton here as always with Mike Bushay and Britt 5s. Uh, attendance continues to be 100% where are going on? Uh, we're rapidly closing in on a year of a hundred percent attendance. Uh, someone should give us a gold star. It's pretty impressive. Um, uh, five star review updates. Uh, we did not get additional review reviews, however, uh, uh, chartable tells us that we are now number 15 on Apple podcast games.

Mike: 3:08

wow. We're just like, we're racking up all these interesting countries who.

Brent: 3:13

I mean, it makes me feel like, uh I'll although I know the United States was on our list, uh, what a week or two ago? Uh, uh, it probably doesn't take a whole lot of movement for us to like, Got there. Having said that we moved it, we take all the credit for everything we did. I also wanted to note that, uh, my kids thought I was very tough on Matt w 66 last week, Matthew 66. We appreciate the first review. We appreciate a more voluminous review. We appreciate the fact that you left a review and nobody else did this week. So you are the goat. Uh, you know, on the one hand I could be a tough one reviews, but, uh, uh, people that review are the people doing the work on this pod and we appreciate it.

Mike: 3:56

definitely. Yeah.

Brent: 3:59

Uh, I also thought that I should mention, God forbid, we are now live on Stitcher and iHeart radio. If that is your thing, if for some reason you were listening to us and you always catered the fact that we were not on those things. I mean, I don't know. Yeah. Like, I don't know how you would hear this and be a Stitcher person. But there you go. Uh, uh, I think the highlight of knowing this information is that I had never gone to the trouble of getting us live on Stitcher and I heart radio, because I always thought I would probably cancel the whole pod before that,

Mike: 4:33

was it pretty easy to get on there?

Brent: 4:34

as it turned out, I mean, you know, 99% of it is create an account and all these like podcasts things, it's like, you just run around, creating an account, creating an account, creating an account. And if you're like willing to create 20 different accounts, you can have your pod in 20 different places. And, you know, I just tried to kind of go down the list of things that seemed like they had good volume. And I was like, well, I'll do these three. And then I won't do any others because you know, it's only going to be four episodes and then we'll stop it. So why bother?

Mike: 5:03

Now we're going on 40. We're getting close to 40 minutes.

Brent: 5:06

Exactly. Exactly. And here we are today. Um, I, you know, I always have a note in our Google doc that I should mention that, uh, if you're one of those Twitter people, we all have Twitter accounts, we're all pretty active on the tweeting, uh, ad BPI bus at Mike Boucher at B Halliburton. Uh, they're they're great Twitter accounts. Uh, Brett has all the good means. uh, that is the thing that I've like have on our agenda for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks. And we can spend five seconds discussing that before we dive into player's cup is, uh, I, and I always push it because I'm always like, nah, let's not discuss it. Is, do you guys have any good names for fans of the pod? Are they just, are they trash ranchers? I think they are.

Mike: 5:56

That feels too long of a word.

Brent: 5:58

It does. It does. Like you could say, well, they're trash, but like maybe they would take that the wrong way.

Mike: 6:06

hers track trashy years.

Brent: 6:09

Yeah, I think, I think I didn't pick a name really thinking about how you do this. And like, I recognize like Azule, uh, now calls his advocates or rats, and I don't know how you get from here to rats. Uh, maybe, maybe the moral of a story like that. That's uh, that just goes to show him that one. Cause I, I don't know what the little inside jokes are on his stream, but uh, yeah, maybe it'll come to us later, but I am monitoring that if people want to tweet at us, the answers to these big problems is the big problems branding. It's a, it's a, you know, Britain knows it's always top of mind always working on the branding. All right. So let's, let's dive right into player's cup guys. So, uh, Mike, I know you said, uh, right as we kick things off that you have not seen Julia and H is amazing, uh, pokey data leaderboards. Let me tell you one or two of the amazing things that I have learned from the pokey data leaderboards. Um, I didn't update the charts. You might have to just click on that link and go directly to the website. But, uh, so the first chart on the right, he shows that in a top 256, um, last year you had that or LA for players cup three, I'd have around like 92 to get in. And right now, like if it all stopped today, it would be like 57 and we're on pace to have it be like over 140.

Mike: 7:36

no. Wait, what? Wait. Not, not to qualify. You mean like

Brent: 7:39

Yeah. Qualified. So, so are you looking at, are you looking at the, the, the, uh, chart on the leaderboards website?

Mike: 7:46

Yeah. So like with

Brent: 7:47

So you saw

Mike: 7:47

green, red

Brent: 7:48

here's the green line below the green dots, right? That green line is just like, so the green dots represent the top 256 each day.

Mike: 7:59

Yeah.

Brent: 7:59

Like, like the cutoff for the top two 56. So then he just runs that line out and projects where, where you would have to be to be North America, top 256 at the end of the player's cup period. And then the green dotted line shows where like the 93 was last year. Right. So you can see, like for Europe, it's gone right now that it's trending that you have to do a little bit better, but not like wildly better, but for North America, it's like wildfire

Mike: 8:32

So, so the projected for an a is like almost one 60 from this, uh Hm. That seems ridiculous. Right?

Brent: 8:45

Yeah. Like, so, so I, you know what, you know, what I guess would be funny and he's super, he's super data science. He, I like loved the nerdiness that he is bringing to these problems. Like, I guess what you can do is you can try to say, Hey, can we look at the people who were top two 56 last period and see like what pace they are on? Or like, like to try to get a sense of how aggressively they're burning keys and maybe

Mike: 9:12

Like normalize the data somehow based on

Brent: 9:15

yeah, yeah. Or, or like, uh, maybe you could try and go back and look at players cup three data. Although the problem is he doesn't have the snapshots anymore, uh, um, to try to figure out like whether where that curve levels off.

Mike: 9:31

Yeah. Yeah, probably now that he's tracking it for this one, like the next one, he'll be able to be way more accurate.

Brent: 9:39

Right, right. Like, like, I guess what's interesting is you would think at a certain point as, as players, like coming out of the gate, it's all up, up, up, up, up, up, because everyone has keys and now we're starting to reach the point where some people have finished their keys. But, but I also know, I mean, we know from last time we know like every time, like there's also people that haven't even started their keys yet. So like, I don't know. But, but when those people start their keys, this number won't move. Cause this is an, in a top two 56 number. Right. So like right. It won't, it won't, it won't move until they get into the top two 56 by burning their keys. So theoretically this number probably levels off at some point.

Mike: 10:25

yeah. Maybe, maybe like two thirds of the way through the month or so that'd be my estimate when, like, when there's cause then probably like you probably have a solid 152, because once you have like 200 people and that are going to make the two top two 56, it's not going to move that much.

Brent: 10:46

Right, right.

Mike: 10:47

That's pre critical mass.

Brent: 10:48

But, but it is interesting that like, he was running a little ahead of, of like the pace LA Latin America is basically on pace OCS basically on pace.

Mike: 11:00

Yeah, they're all a little bit higher. So you're seeing that trend across the board, right? It's not unique.

Brent: 11:05

Yeah. But, but North America is

Mike: 11:09

Yeah. It's a big difference.

Brent: 11:10

much higher.

Mike: 11:13

I wonder what that says about us, where overeager, maybe there's more people playing. I don't think that that might be true, but I, uh, some people have made the argument that since this is the first one that has cash prizing, some people might be more enticed to play that didn't play in the first few.

Brent: 11:34

Right, right. That's that's true. Yeah, there's definitely. Uh, um, and yet, like, I know, I mean, even though Alex Szymanski is currently number one of the leaderboards, he was like, Oh yeah, I didn't feel like I was trying as hard this time. Um, I mean, last time he, I mean, he was, he was a top 10 finisher last time around. Uh, so I guess that implies that he could have squeezed out a little bit more, but I know maybe, maybe what he took away from players go three is, you know, the important thing is to be in the top 256, and he's like, we got their fam.

Mike: 12:07

Yeah. And, um, and it doesn't matter, like placement doesn't matter as much or at all, as far as I know, like before it was, if you finished in the top, like 10 to 20, you got to buy in the double elimination, but now it's Swiss. So, um, a little bit less incentive to shoot for the moon.

Brent: 12:27

That's a really, really good point. That's a, I mean, the, the format is much clearer and you know exactly what you have to, uh, do. Right. Okay. So, so the other two graphs that I stole from his, uh, page that I thought were kind of interesting was I had him pull like essentially tournaments by hours. Okay. Uh, right. So it was just like, every time you see like a five point Delta, like make a note. Right. And so he pulled this out. Cause I was trying to kind of figure out like, Is there a time that I can. I mean, I essentially, at the same time that I saw all those tweets where it was like, somebody was like, Oh, I'm in a, I, it was a Brophy or something was like, I'm going to tournament with roll and ship right now. This is terrible. Like all that kind of stuff. Um, uh, so I was like, is there a time you can play where you don't have to play against trip, tripping role? Like when is there a time where you can farm keys more efficiently? And so, so he pulled this data and this data is no surprises. Like, uh, it's like very early Eastern standard time was the answer, right? Like,

Mike: 13:40

the least amount. Is that what?

Brent: 13:42

Yeah. So th the, this, this is the graph below the other graph on our, uh, on, on the leaderboard document,

Mike: 13:49

So these times, these times are like,

Brent: 13:51

GMT plus two.

Mike: 13:53

okay, so what's that? So like 12 for that is what an EST 12:00 PM is like 8:00 AM EST. Is that right?

Brent: 14:05

Yeah, I think so.

Mike: 14:06

So like morning waking up.

Brent: 14:10

So, so like if those surprise, right, like when the Europeans get off work, like two or three hours after that, the Europeans start playing, probably like, there's no way to like dissect this. Cause we don't like, there's no geographic constraints in the game, but, but it's like, you know, starting around like 11 or 12 o'clock Eastern standard time, people be grinding keys basically nonstop until six in the morning. So, so then I, I said to him, well, wait, can you go peel off the top 100 in a N E U players? And. And give me that data back and that's the next graph. Cause I was like, okay. So, so I know when there's not a lot of tournaments, so it might be hard to get, to turn it off. The question is, are our role and chip play and, and the answer is

Mike: 15:01

pretty much the same.

Brent: 15:02

yeah, it's basically the same. Like there's no, there's no secret window where lots of people are playing, but the top 100 or not.

Mike: 15:11

Yeah. I mean, that makes more or less sense. All right. So, so the best time to play key is for people on the East coast is like six, 7:00 AM. That looks like the best time to play,

Brent: 15:22

Yeah. Well, so it depends if, if your goal is to get your game to fire off quickly, it's like the worst time,

Mike: 15:29

Yeah, I guess. Thanks, Joe.

Brent: 15:31

yeah, like, like, yeah. But, but the odds that there's a top 100 player, like I, you know, I guess what's funny is, I mean, yeah, I don't want to get all mathy, but like. If the moral of the story is that the shape of the curve is the same. Does that just mean like there's equal odds that you're gonna have a top 100 player in your game? It doesn't matter when you go.

Mike: 15:52

So that's actually that, yeah, I just, I think I take back what I said. I think it's actually better to play when everybody's playing then if there's no difference because. When you have more tournament's going on, like it's kind of like law.

Brent: 16:06

Yeah. There's, there's only, there's only 200 top 100 EU and

Mike: 16:10

Yeah. Right, right. So it's kind of like law of large numbers and like variants. So like if you're, if you play at a time when there's not a lot of tournaments, like it's just your small, uh, the, the randomness of it, like you could, you could have a really low pool of skill or a really high pool of skill. Right. Like more and more of the time. Cause there's, there's more variants with a lower sample size, I guess if that makes sense.

Brent: 16:35

I guess, I guess the thing to do. And the thing that I didn't do is you could just. Pull out his data source and like, look at the slope of the curves and figure out if that's really true. Like, we kind of say the shape of the curves is the same, but like, you know, are they like really, really the same? Or are they just kind of like, I'm looking at it, they look the same,

Mike: 16:53

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. You get more nuances,

Brent: 16:56

Yeah. Yeah. We're going to leave that to another podcast. Although I can't imagine another podcast cares as much about this is what you do.

Mike: 17:06

Yeah. I mean, I think, I think you can just take away the, uh, the, the main things though, and that's, that's what most people care about that there's really not a big difference.

Brent: 17:15

Yeah, it does. It doesn't seem on face. Like, like there's a secret strategy. Uh, I know people who've listened to our podcast for the last year, know that I'm always trying to suss out, like, is there a secret time? Is there a time to start? Do you start late? You start early. Do you know, like save all your keys to the end? Uh, you know, there's some secret code there. I have not yet cracked it.

Mike: 17:35

Well, I will say that perhaps the way that the first graph was looking in terms of time to play, um, like throughout the month, looking at what we've see so far, I'm going to guess that the second half of the month is significantly easier. Well, um, uh, if we, if the prediction right now is that the qualifying number will be much, much, much higher. Well, that means that I don't think that trend will continue. And I think it, I do think the cutoff will be, you know, around a hundred still. And so that means that there's been a lot more competition in this first week than there would be in the next three weeks. I think this next week we'll probably be pretty similar in competition to this past week. But I would imagine that the last two weeks, because of

Brent: 18:28

Yeah. I mean, I recognize the, like the way we're looking at this data, it's almost true by definition because like the top 100 become more fixed over time. Right. So, so like if he went and said, let me pull out once again, like the top two 56 from player step three, and like, try to map the data in that way, you might get a different result. It'd be more, uh, um, maybe more interesting. I'm glad we're coming up with this homework assignments. Um, All right, guys, we should acknowledge that Mike was on another podcast, uh, the, the leg, or, you know, you were on a YouTube

Mike: 19:05

yeah. YouTube video. Not exactly a podcast.

Brent: 19:07

that way. Wait, wait, wait, wait to show solidarity with, cause um, so you were talking about LMC versus peek around, uh, that was a super fun video.

Mike: 19:18

I, we were so Melo and I are both teachers. I think this like lends itself to a video of that. Type, you know, where we're really essentially trying to teach the matchup. Um, and so like we, we spent, I don't know, 10 minutes before we started recording and kind of hashed out, you know, made a lesson plan. Um, and so, and yeah, I, I very happy with how it turned out. The, the game itself, we were also super lucky. We only played one game. I was anticipating that we might need to play two or three games to get, uh, to get a good one in that that was our first game. And it was a really, I think, very educational game. Um, and like I went and rewatched it, cause it was such an interesting game. And I do think like I would have changed some of my plays in it as well. Um, so yeah. Yeah, really

Brent: 20:09

Different than you watch this video at all.

Brit: 20:11

Hmm. Yeah, it was good. And I was happy to see, I don't know again, um, I guess a lot of it is, you know, Mikey sort of putting his money where his mouth is and it's like, yeah, it's matched. It's good for me. Let me show you. I'm tired of people saying otherwise. And I've, um, you know, I've always felt the same way, but I always, I don't quite always trust my judgment about the game these days. Um, so it's always nice to be verified in that way as well. It's like, I might think it, but it doesn't really mean it's anywhere close to being right.

Mike: 20:43

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, no, it was super good game. The w the one play for him that I'm not sure of is when he used boss to full metal on my other peek at you, you guys probably don't even know what I'm talking about. I just I've replayed the game a couple of times. So like, I know all of the points in the game now. Yeah. It was such a cool game to watch, uh, to play. And, um, yeah, like the, the couple plays that I could've done differently, I probably shouldn't have set up, set up the MuTu. I think I placed my big farm in the wrong place. And then I think he should have researched funny bosses ordered, um, my other peaker. Um, but. Yeah. Yeah. So very, very cool experience. And he actually did a video with Josh Sutherland. Um, maybe yesterday or two days ago, it came out and Josh kind of talked through the LMC side. I don't think it was quite as good a game as we had would have still a pretty good one. Um, and LMC won that game. Uh, so it's good to see the other

Brent: 21:47

obviously incorrect, but

Mike: 21:50

Good educational experience.

Brent: 21:54

so, so, uh, um, just to wrap up this part of the discussion, one of the notes that I had written down after our pod last week was. I actually, I actually almost felt like I got the impression from you last pod mic that you like might be a little burnt out or something after the big players cup run. And I was going to ask you if you were like, feeling all burnt out and then in the interim, you like tear off all these keys and pilot, tons of points. And you record those video, like walking people through peak, Rob, and you have all these fire tweets about, uh, uh, peak around. Um, are you feeling burnt out these days? Are you feeling fantastic? Like what's your like Pokemon and energy level after, uh, uh, so much grinding this the last couple of weekends.

Mike: 22:40

Yeah. Um, I haven't really, I mean, I've signed up for some of the tournament's. I feel like that's kind of where I've taken my break from a little bit. I've signed up for them, but I haven't really taken them all too seriously. I played mad party in the last two that I. Signed up for just cause I was playing it for some keys and I was having fun. Um, and I've been playing a lot of the, uh, certain shield tournament. So those are a little bit chiller. I can just think about, I, you know, I can't, you can't test in the format, so there's no reason to play games in it. So I just kinda like, think about what I want to play and then play it. And the games are different enough from standard. Uh, even though the formats, whatever that, that I've kind of been doing that, but, uh, the keys themselves, um, and maybe this can lead us into, uh, uh, my tweet and thought, and I know Britt wanted to talk about it as well, playing keys. Like I feel like I've been lucky in my matches on average, but I do find that the games are more. Intellectually stimulating than if I'm just playing on ladder. I think on average, people are taking them more seriously and it feels more competitive and therefore, since it feels more competitive, it it's more fun for me. I feel like, uh, you know, I'm, I'm having more of a challenge than if I queue against, even if I queue against a, you know, a metadata on the ladder, it feels like people aren't paying attention. Sometimes they make stupid mistakes and understandably there's, there's no incentive. And I do that sometimes too. Um, but it's just not very good practice. Um, and I feel like this is better practice overall. Um, and so that's why I tweeted out the other day that I don't understand since I've, since I've been having a good experience with them. It's, uh, I don't know why people are not when like, this is, this is the closest thing, in my opinion, in, in. Outcomes and con concepts that we've had to rank ladder of, like trying to make a more competitive online environment that you can play more or less whenever you want. Obviously there's restrictions on it. And a ranked ladder itself would be way a million times better. But, um, yeah, but so that's kinda, um, my segue from your question into, uh, into this thought, Brett, what, what did you think about this?

Brit: 25:10

Uh, well,

Brent: 25:11

Okay.

Brit: 25:12

I don't know if I really have it anything to add or disagree with there. I just don't think my only really point was, and I don't even think based on how you've just phrased it there. I don't even think you even have this in mind, but I was really my only point was I just don't, you know, it's just too, still a little too punishing, I think, as a best of one for it to like quite beat the ladder experience. Like that was, that was really my only point. I'm just sort of against that, that the, the best of one single elimination is just really rough sometimes. And not to say that that's, you know, I don't really actually, I don't think. Hmm, any of my sort of keys involved, bad match-ups at all. Um, so yeah, I actually, you know, I think that's part of it, at least with the game right now. I do think generally speaking, it's pretty open. Like there's not like one clear deck, In terms of just like it being a better environment, like, I think that's definitely true at the same time too. I can't help but feel, and I, so there's just a lot of variants when you play. I don't know. I've just seen a handful of like, uh, Twitter, screenshots of people being like, how is this, how has this deck in the finals? know, just playing it against some goofy, goofy decks. And, um, you know, it's not, not everyone's experience, but again, I, at least in my experience, I remember the first two players cuffs, like. At first, I was getting a lot of that, but as time went on, I think they learned their lesson and stopped joining them. But I don't know how much of that is true, but I still, you just like, I don't know. You never know. And like a random Rose is going to come out of nowhere and be like, that's the ladder. It's more so for the most part though,

Mike: 26:51

I have, right. I have been keeping track of my matches again. And I just want to, whenever I play against like a, not real deck, I just write that, not real deck. I think I've had three in 23 keys so far, and I've played like, definitely a lot of games in these 23. I feel like I

Brent: 27:10

If you're, you're averaging like more than three points a key right now.

Mike: 27:14

But so like, I feel like I've played like only three. Not real decks feels like less than I did last time. Brett, do you, have you

Brent: 27:23

mean, I think, I think you had said last time you felt like, like every key you would play one, not real deck at some point or something like maybe it was like every two or three Ks. I think you were telling Brittany, you played not real backs all the time and Britain. I were like, what the heck?

Brit: 27:41

I don't have any games again. I have all my games recorder, and I don't have a single game against an art real deck.

Mike: 27:47

man.

Brit: 27:49

I do bad lists and I get, I think that's part of the frustration I've played some just truly atrocious ADP lists, um, and things like, I don't think, I think that was really the only bad lists I've seen. Most of the, most of the other things I've played against have been

Mike: 28:07

no. The funniest one was when you sent us the giant hearts mad party.

Brit: 28:11

Yeah.

Mike: 28:12

That was hilarious. I was cracking up at that.

Brit: 28:15

That was good. Yeah, that was one of my.

Mike: 28:17

Yeah. It's not like the most ridiculous idea ever, but come on.

Brit: 28:24

smoked by the mad party tech or the giant hearts tech and med party.

Mike: 28:29

Hmm. Oh, that's too funny. Like there's some synergy obviously, but like why would you ever play it?

Brit: 28:37

it was weird too, because he, at one point it looked like he was gonna, I thought it was, it wasn't actually a terrible idea, but he played basic energy for some reason too. And he attached a basic psychic, um, I guess for the sinister, I has, uh, an attack, I suppose. I don't know why you wouldn't just play the hardest. Well, I guess

Mike: 28:57

Yeah,

Brit: 28:58

the fires, aren't going to do anything for you, but anyways,

Mike: 29:00

play. You can play welder though.

Brent: 29:01

That's what I was like, he's going to start welding.

Mike: 29:04

Yeah. Well they're mad party. I'm I'm down for it, Paul. They both

Brent: 29:08

do the double fire attach. Psychic. Go.

Brit: 29:13

The next time Danny gets mad or something, he can, he'll be his punishment will be playing welder, man party and a LTE CG regional or something. That'll be his like his penance.

Mike: 29:24

you could add, like, if you, there's probably a list that you could actually reason that like just don't play any of the, um, so then you can't play triples. So you're like you're forcing yourself then to play well there. And then you build the deck more around welder.

Brent: 29:44

Uh, yeah. You know, I still am. The zero key is played and it's the exact same problem I had last better stuff. It's that I say, okay, I got to sit down and I got to like warm up and I got to like practice a little bit before I go risking a key, because I think to your point, Mike, like a key is real, like you mus value when you play a key. And if you don't extract the value by like doing well, you're like, Oh, why did I do that? Uh, uh, whereas ladder you're just like, whatever ladder let's go. But like, I sit down to quote, like practice and, uh, uh, I feel like the games are very, uh, like bifurcated in that either. Like they're drawing really well and we kind of go to the end and they light me up at the end somehow. Right. It's always like, they're playing attorney this and I play Sikh rom and they're like, yeah, yeah, it's gonna be, I'm gonna just play this out. Or, or like, yeah. ADP and turn to, they missed the water or it hit heads on the water and they just immediately school.

Mike: 30:47

Yeah.

Brent: 30:48

you're just like this complete waste of time. And so you do like three rounds of that. And then, and then yeah, you, you bumped into, uh, a horrible matchup and the body and you know, I'm happy to play it all out. Cause I feel like I get something out of playing it all out, but like the only way it was, they want to play it where they're like, yeah, I'm going to get this guy. So, so, uh, uh, yeah, ladder just seems like, uh, it's 70% wasted time, you know, you, you spend so much like there. Yeah. I mean, these, these ADP decks where it's like, well, my hands not great, but like, his hands seems like it's not great either. Oh, he's still, we'll never know, like,

Mike: 31:31

well, and the problem is exacerbated during keys, right. Because a lot of people that would be playing ladder or just playing keys,

Brent: 31:38

right, right.

Mike: 31:39

the

Brent: 31:39

yeah. That's

Mike: 31:40

more

Brent: 31:40

That bladder quality is declining.

Mike: 31:42

Yeah.

Brent: 31:44

So, so the result is I never feel like I'm like, Oh, yay. Okay. I'm like good at my deck because all the games where I have favorable matchups or I think things are going all right, the guy scooped like halfway through term two, and then all the other games that get bodied. I'm like, wow, this is terrible.

Mike: 32:00

So you just got to start, you just got to say, just go for it. Just play the key.

Brent: 32:05

That's that's that's right. That's right. I have to rise up. Uh, I'm I'm, I'm still trying to answer, like, the fundamental question for me is like, I think Urrutia food just feels like the kind of deck that I really understand how to pilot, but I suspect that peak arounds a better deck. And, you know, I have to like figure out, do I want to play ADP or Shifu where it's like, I'm so comfortable playing the deck or do I want to just play a better deck? I should play a better deck, you know?

Mike: 32:34

I mean, our is still very good. Like, I don't know. I think it's really good. I would just play that. There's not I've I haven't played like more against more. The only matchup you really don't want to play against is LMC. And like, there hasn't been more of that than anything else.

Brent: 32:52

So, so speaking of sad stories, playing keys, Brit,

Brit: 32:57

A lot, tragically,

Brent: 33:01

how's it going?

Brit: 33:02

not great. I've played 13 keys and I have nine points and I just like my motivation and it's not like anger, like, Oh, why would I play? And, you know, you know, maybe keep losing. It's just like, feel like I've just already used all my freebies and I just have to play immaculately for so long. And it's just a daunting task, but I don't know what's going on. Like in theory, I would think I should be getting better because the number two was a steady improvement from number one that I just kind of punted in the end. I really think probably should have qualified, but I don't know. I've been, definitely been a baby at part of it. Like my first, like I've only played Pico like twice and both times, like the first one I got dunked. I like when it first bolt-on like play a swell and passed and they just charged started me. Um, and then the next one I like got to finals and just flipped really bad against a dragon pole that flipped really good. And obviously like, that's fine. Getting the finals isn't that bad. Right. I just haven't played Pika sense. And like, obviously a LMC is a great deck on I've played at once and didn't play a supporter for 14 turns. That was the, I almost won. That was against the terrible ADP deck. Um, they just, uh, they just did that. The list was so bad and there were so many things wrong. I got a boss. I like eventually found a Zetia in which eventually found me a boss. I was the only supporter I play it. And I just like, they had prize like one card. I actually thought I had them too. Cause they were down there out of tools and they had played like four switching cards. And I guess then they just had a fifth one for whatever reason, they played three switch and two rope and that, and that got me, but all that to say, and then I played Rilla bloom too. Um, and just had some, I mean, I did really well. I won my first key with really boom, but then, then the next to where I like drew into a monkey and had a monkey prized, or I like drew into a monkey and then they immediately had the Kao on the real, on the real boom and scoop from there. And I think the deck's pretty good, but I I'm definitely, I'm definitely apprehensive about AR now. And those are definitely frustrating too. Cause I distinctly remember in one of those games, I like, it's not that I like, you know, I was like, Oh, I just might as well play this Chromat for no reason. Oh no, I drew those. I drew the evolution cards. What bad luck it was like, no, I actually like refuse to play a CRO bad. I had like a two card hand and then I top decked it. And then, and then on my turn had to finish with the evolution, uh, the, the attack after drawing it and then just hope they didn't have the boss. They did, um,

Brent: 35:47

Good.

Brit: 35:47

I played it. I played a few of, um, single strike. Um, and that's got, I've got, I've actually gotten a few points. So a single strike. I have two top fours with it. Um, and then I had another game against screens, drag polo, I guess I played pick a one more time where I stamped them to one. I hammered them down to one energy, stamp them, the one and their two cards were boss energy. And it was like a green stack. He like genuinely had 30 cards left or something like that. And one, and had played a boss already and presumably played three. Um, yeah, just some bad variants. And so like, I think the format is still in a relatively good place. Um, and I'm sure I'll, I'll slog through this, but I just basically think I've done. That's that's my, my attitude more than anything is that I've, I've thrown my freebies at already. And I'm not confident enough to play perfectly for 37. How many I have left? Yeah. 36.

Brent: 36:44

Well, we'll try to block out some time on Saturday or something and we'll, uh, we'll play some keys. That'll be great.

Brit: 36:51

I'll find it, that I should have just played Pika. I think I'll just

Brent: 36:54

Yeah, the, yeah, the answer is Pika, right? The answer is always bigger.

Brit: 36:58

I was just trying to try and trying these other strategies and like, I don't know. I was thinking I played two keys with decidua uh, just hit counters, but like, I understand that like it's just smashing decidua for all of them is like probably a strategy that will work. But gosh, your games are just so long. So everyone's going to try to time you out and they might just have the counters, like, that's just what happened. Like I, I spent over an hour to get like one point because the first one I had to be like, uh, uh, Turner artists that play for Eva tall and spirit tombs. And then the second one I play against LMC and. You know, I, I was going to win the deck out war. I knew what I was doing in the deck out war. And like, I, it didn't seem like he knew what he was doing. And like he's down to like two minutes left and just like out of nowhere plays an age of slash down. And I'm just like, where did that come from? It wasn't prized. Cause he hadn't taken any prizes. And it just, I was just like, well, why wouldn't you have just shown me that immediately? You just wasted my time. You would look genuinely wasted just like 45 minutes.

Mike: 38:09

that's terrible.

Brit: 38:10

And so anyways decision why might be a great strategy and I commend you. Should you qualify only with decidual I've got, I've got better things to do.

Brent: 38:20

Yeah, that that's, uh, um, and as Mike was the testing, I, I recognize the part of the challenge is when you're doing well, it's just takes so long. You gotta get those points. Um, so Mike, it sounded like you played some med party. It sounds like you've actually flipped Becks around a little bit too.

Mike: 38:39

I played a lot of different things. Um, I played Pika at the most, maybe like six or seven keys. I played rapid strike for four key is I played L M Z for three or four keys. I played the Rilla Boomi two deck for three or four keys. And I played mad party for three or four keys. And then I played Lounds once I think as well. So I feel like I've just been playing whatever I feel like in the moment. Um, but most of them have been like strings, like I'll play like, like I played all of the railroad boom deck games in a row. I played all the mad party games in a row, played all the alums and

Brent: 39:19

so has one worked out better than others?

Mike: 39:22

Um, well, I mean, it's a little hard to tell it's such a small sample size. Uh, I think the real boom deck, it probably performed the best. I think I won, I won three out of four that I played it and then I lost in the first round once with it. So I mean, winning three out of four is amazing.

Brent: 39:46

Three to four is a yeah. That's, that's how you look like. You're really good at Pokemon, right?

Mike: 39:51

Yeah. But, but then I had like a game that Brit described where I just, I think it was against a turn. Oh yeah. Yeah. It was against the tinnitus and that's already a bad matchup and I prize big charm and like, didn't get out the turn to super growth and you know, those things happened, but the, for the, the real boom U2 deck is much better than I expected it to be. I think I talked, I might've talked bad about it a few weeks ago. But it's actually pretty good. Like when it, when it gets going, it's, it's pretty strong against a lot of decks. Um, I think it turned to this as a torch matchup, but, uh, it

Brent: 40:33

Yeah. Is there, I noticed both of, you said you tried to plan it. Is there, is there stuff we should say about this tech or the things people in the pod need to know?

Brit: 40:40

I mean, I think the, I think fire's relevance and the mental game has to do with the success as well. Like obviously you can't beat fire, but. You're not really quite immune to deck or anything like that. Like the cause if you, I mean, I suppose there are scenarios or in the discard, the executor, like, and get them U2 on the first term. That to me, that's asking for a lot that, that doesn't play a whole lot of draw. You have to kind of go patient with your tag calls and your Guzman Hallas. Um, but I think that, I think that, I thought I've always thought that that was really good. I thought I thought it just kind of had a, didn't have a great sentence court matchup, um, when sinus Carter was a lot more relevant, um, that idea, I mean, I don't think it's ADP matchup is great. Um, my Kiana is when I just talking about my games and the other group chat that we're in seemed to have shared a similar experience. Like we beat them, I beat VD ADP three times in a row. And the one key I did well. With, but it never, I felt like I got lucky in all three

Mike: 41:41

Yeah. Yeah.

Brit: 41:42

should have lost all of them. Like off the top of my head. I do think at least one of those games, something went my way. But for two of them, I don't think anything really particularly did maybe very, very minor ones. But I just, like, I was just on the, I felt like I was on the verge of losing the whole time. Like I just, like, I had them, I had the Mewtwo and if they had the sword, I would just lose stuff like that. Like I would didn't I had the MuTu, but not the big charm thing, things like that.

Mike: 42:10

Yeah. That's, that's exactly how I felt too. There was one game that my only wind condition was like to set up the tropical, our GX attack. And if he had a, if he had the sword, the next turn I would lose, um, yeah, it's such a weird matchup.

Brit: 42:33

and to, Oh, I remember this was what it was, it was so much. Um, just like if, if they stuck a big term in ADP, I lost like that. That was just the end of the game. If I, I couldn't blow it up, the dragon I'd attack or if, if I had to two shot and I would be out tempo almost every game, I suppose. Sometimes you may be so pull off the tropical hour in time. Like if they recognize that, you know, you do have the big charm, let's say they recognize that they're all like their win condition is going to be going around you and not through you. And then like, you know, the real well, I mean, I guess then that scenario though, they just knock out the real boom, which makes tropical hour much harder. So I'm not sure if this is even a real sort of situation, but yeah, just there's just a lot. And also too, not even, even just like your, your, one of tools are so important in various match-ups too, that it does feel like it's a deck that prizes matter more men, maybe that's wrong. I don't have enough experience with it, but just not only the scenarios that you have to Dodge drawing and. Um, prizing your evolution parts, but like you play one big charm and it's really important in certain match-ups and you know, the same with the giant hood and things like that. But it's a good, it's a really good deck, I think. And I'm not sure how you would maybe fix the, the evolution line issues. Um, three, two, two. I don't know if that would really make a difference cause it's, it's never, the, it's never the little guy it's always the

Mike: 44:01

The basics, easy to find.

Brit: 44:03

so, and like, it just wouldn't make sense to commit to, I don't think it would make sense to commit to like three, three, two, I think he would have to stay uniform. And then at that point that's just so much more space. Like we're talking four more cards at this point.

Mike: 44:17

Right. Yeah. And. Like a lot of these, one of, so kind of to both of those points, you really need a lot of these one texts, both in the tools, but also in the Pokemon. Um, and so that Pokemon are also something you can prize that really sucks. Like present in center sucks a lot in some scenarios, pricey and, uh, like all, all of them are very useful in very, you know, independent ways. Incinerary is good. And a lot at a lot of times doing, being able to do one 90 for three energy with the fair, most of Buswell comes up a lot actually. Um, I only used beast game once, but the one 90 attack, I felt like I used a lot. So like that can be an awkward card to prize as well. Um, so yeah, prizes are definitely an issue for a deck that plays so many one-ups that you'd need to like access it very specific times as well. Um, yeah.

Brent: 45:16

So maybe we can use this as a, as a stepping off point to talk about, uh, what I felt like. I felt like the, uh, uh, the internet was full of. Talk about G two. do you guys have any hot takes on this?

Brit: 45:29

Where does the name come from? Cause like in my head, I think, um, Jim and the Singapore player who would build a wonderfully goofy MuTu deck, I'm sure. Um, but I know, I know he has, you know, no association here and I, I, it hasn't been explained to me nor do I understand. I've also seen a little back and forth over like there's two decks, I guess, apparently depending on who you talk to, there's G two and like galaxy Mewtwo, and they're not the same thing, but they they're close enough. I think. I don't know. But yeah. Where's the name come from?

Brent: 46:06

Um, I know it, like, my impression is, um, uh, uh, God forbid I don't want to take offense at this, but like, it's one of these teams out there. Uh,

Brit: 46:19

I do think that's, uh, from sort of what I've gathered

Brent: 46:21

yeah, but, but I have to tell you, Brett. I, I thought the exact same thing.

Mike: 46:27

I don't know. I don't, I don't, I don't know, nor do I really care. We can call it Git too. It doesn't matter to

Brit: 46:32

Yeah. I mean, I, I don't, I don't necessarily care how it was. I was just curious and it

Mike: 46:36

Yeah.

Brit: 46:36

it wasn't a name, but yeah, I do think it's a team, uh, like, uh, not, not one of the

Brent: 46:44

Yeah. So I know, I know Francesco Catarina, uh, uh, the Italian, uh, uh, Pokemon player has like 160 points in players, cup four. And he like put out a tweet where he was like, yeah, I think he was like, it's third in Europe overall now. And you said he played that for all his keys and it was absolutely best I can format. No question is mine. Um, I, you know, uh, lots of other people have said nice things about the deck and, you know, I watched Pablo's video on channel fireball or favorite sponsor, and I thought that, uh, Pablo's video was great. Um, But, uh, uh, have you guys messed around with this tech at all? Do you guys have a wave of ethics?

Brit: 47:26

I have, I've played against it. Um, at least once or twice in my keys, but I, I haven't played, played it. And then like, if there's a deck, I don't have cards for online. It's always a Mewtwo deck. I don't, I think I'm missing a part or two for it and just haven't bothered. Cause I, I. I don't think it has a good Pico matchup, but perhaps because isn't super relevant right now, or, you know, you can just get lucky enough or beat it, beat it with a good horror house anyways. Like it seems realistic to me.

Mike: 47:59

Yeah, I also haven't played any games with it, but I have played or I played, uh, against it quite a lot. I feel like. Um, so I've kind of just been learning the deck through a plane people. Um, it's definitely a very cool deck. It has even more options than the really Boone deck does just a little bit less explosive. I wouldn't even say slower necessarily. Um, it's just less explosive than the element that can be. I do think it takes a bit of a rough matchup to Piqua and. I think it's slightly unfavored against the Rayleigh boom MuTu deck. Um, but other than that, it seems to have pretty strong match-ups, uh, across the board.

Brent: 48:43

Yeah, I, um, I, I haven't played any games with it, although, uh, you know, I think anytime I get the, somebody tells me, Oh, a deck with my watch in, it has a really good deck. I'm like, Oh, I would like, I would like to night watch people. I would like to stamp them to three and then Nightwatch them and like, see how the rest of their game goes. Like.

Mike: 49:04

my experience playing against it is. So that's, I, I thought when I first saw the deck that that took what its primary strategy was and you do, and they, you know, they do hit you with it sometimes, but like not nearly as much as I thought, um, they

Brent: 49:20

Yeah. Yeah. I, I felt the same way. Like I, I think I was expecting to see that'd be the primary attacker. And then when I watched like Pablo play some games, he was definitely like leading way more and then center or way more in a biofilm.

Mike: 49:33

And like you, you, can you use Poltergeist? I think quite a lot, uh, in that deck to poultry, this is really good against a lot of decks and super annoying to play on. Even if, even if they don't end up using it against you. Like the, just the fact that you have to play around it is super annoying. Um, I've played mostly against it with Pika and LMC. Uh, Pika doesn't matter quite as much. It's pretty easy to burn trainers and not be too unhappy about it. But like LMC is you like you're, you're the defensive resource conserving deck. And so having to just play some of your cards for very low value makes the matchup super, super difficult. And you're, and half of the turns are Intrepid sorority. And so you don't know what you're going to draw too.

Brent: 50:15

That's what I was about to say. You're like, you're like, do I really want to interpret sword this turn? Uh, I don't know, you know?

Mike: 50:21

Yeah. So I think I thought LMC would be pretty good against that deck, but I actually think the match-ups are now really bad for LMC.

Brent: 50:28

Yeah. Yeah. It's uh, um, th the thing that jumped out to me, I guess what surprises me to hear that it's so good. And maybe the moral of the story is like, if you have answers to power plant, then you have answered to power plant. But like, I don't know. I felt like, I feel like the decks where I run into power plant are alternatives. And so if I say like, it has good match-ups against everything, but a chart is like, I'll just play pickup. That's fine.

Mike: 50:53

Yeah. I mean that, that's fair. This, this, I guess, I guess the big difference, the big difference in matchup now is like the OSHA food matchup. Like this deck destroys their Shifu and Pika is like unfavored

Brent: 51:06

Right, right.

Mike: 51:08

but yeah, otherwise I guess you're right. That the metrics are pretty similar. Like it turns, this is definitely quite bad for the, for this jet to deck. Okay.

Brit: 51:18

yeah, maybe I should just play a turn it this. Oh, I don't know. There's a good amount of LMC. I don't know how, how good enough that the Phoebe is. Maybe I would have to play a pal pepper. I haven't seen, maybe your experience can counter this, but I haven't, I haven't run into a single issue deck and I've been, I've played single strike myself, but I have not seen rapid strike whatsoever.

Mike: 51:40

I've played seven rapid strikes.

Brit: 51:45

Well, there you go. Maybe not

Mike: 51:48

I thought you were going to say you haven't seen very much alternatives, which I definitely have not seen much alternatives.

Brit: 51:53

I've played one. I think just one.

Brent: 51:57

I get the impression that like, that's kind of a little bit out of the Metro right now.

Mike: 52:02

Maternity test. Yeah.

Brit: 52:03

Yeah. It turned into some fire or both kind of probably the lowest they've been in the, you know, maybe since the, the set with alternatice and, uh, Santa scorch.

Brent: 52:17

Uh, to what do you guys attribute that?

Mike: 52:21

Hmm. I mean, like, it's not like Pika is super popular, right?

Brent: 52:25

Yeah, like, like, I, I, you know, I was going to ask you guys and I recognize that small sample size theater, but like, I don't know if you feel like the Metta has changed over the course of like the keys that you've played or like, but yeah. I feel like you'd definitely that, it seems like the Twitter audio out there. Uh, they're down on Santa Scorge they're down on, I turn into this, but yeah, it's not like they're out there repping rapid strike or peek around, like they're all repping shit too. Huh?

Mike: 52:51

Yeah. I don't know what I'm actually kind of curious about why we haven't seen any Ascendis scorch, like is the rap, is the rapid strike matchup that bad. Yeah. Is the rapid strike matchup that bad? Like, I don't know.

Brit: 53:06

so. I remember seeing people just playing when you, when the format first started and then in my head, I'm like, that seems fine for what, it's not a deck, that's going to struggle with bench space. So like, so I see some decks adding you and just like, Oh, it was, uh, Danny gave me a list for a single strike with me. And I was just like, what? You can't play you in this deck, you need four hound or is out. Um, but anyways, in my head it seems fine. You just, as we've talked about before, I think that the game, you still have options to charge hard to heat ran or both even crammer rant, like part of what makes the blood Cephalon deck. So good. And I guess maybe that's just the difference that. Chris Cephalon tempos. Art is just better. It's just strictly better because the, the, they, they accomplished the same things, but it's less of a package. I'm not sure quite how the card counts differ because obviously it's not just bill Cephalon, you have to play the energy recovery and stuff as well. So it's like comparable space-wise I think because, you know, three, three Santas court races, two plus Cephalon four crystal off the top of my head. That's about the same, but I guess just better, more consistent to basic versus evolving. But I think sentenced court should be fine. Maybe just a solid tier three deck or something, but it's probably a little better than our data might indicate.

Brent: 54:31

Maybe I wonder about maybe it's like, uh, um, I wonder how you would figure out if this is true. Uh, I suppose you would just ask a sentence course player and he would tell you, uh, like as, as like the new sets dropped, maybe it's just harder and harder. Like there's fewer Pokemon, that's in a score to one hits for like six energies.

Mike: 54:53

that's true. Just in general, like as B maxes, get more played. Just those match-ups are harder cause you can't one shot him,

Brent: 55:01

Yeah. Like, I feel like if you, if you're not, if you've attached six energies to one Pokemon and you're not just slaughtering everything, you're like, well, this game is going to go really poorly.

Mike: 55:12

it it's re uh, another interesting thing is like the Luke metal has done really, really well over the last week, two weeks, but all of the loop medalists are built. Like they're all playing this tag call, no research build, which just is inherently much, much, much stronger against fire. So. I, I don't want to say like, LMC is favorite against fire, but it makes the match up pretty close to 50, 50 a lot. Um, and so I wonder if fire is just not doing, being played as much doing it as well, because like your best matchup is now 50 50, um, like in every other matchup. So like you're, if your best mattress

Brent: 55:52

free devils are gone.

Mike: 55:53

Yeah. Right, right. Your free winds are gone. You have close ups against a lot of things, but almost every deck has at least one matchup where it's like, Oh man, if I hit this matchup, I'm winning like 70, 80% of the time. Maybe not 80% of the time, but 70%. Um, and so I wonder if that's playing into it

Brent: 56:13

So th there's no question and you make a good point and one that we should probably talk about, like, uh, people are talking about the tag call engine as, as like the new spicy thing, but my impression is you're down on it.

Mike: 56:26

Yeah, well, I mean, I'm a Pika player. So like, uh, the tag call engine is much better in almost every single matchup, except the peak around matchup peak around matchup professor's research version is way, way, way better. So like as Bekah player, I'm happy all these MCs are playing this dag-gone gin. Um, but I, my view is skewed because I want to beat what I considered to be, you know, the, the best or one of the best decks in, in Piqua. So if I'm playing LMC, I like to play that research version now also, um, the LMC that

Brent: 57:00

for the kids at home. And for me, can you just, can you go a little bit deeper? Why, why is tag calls so much better against everything else and so much worse against Pico?

Mike: 57:09

So against fire, you. With tag call, you play at Guzman holla, uh, and capture energies and, and you have a power plant. Uh, so I guess the fire decks, you very easily find your coding energies, which just that that's the hardest part of the matchup is kind of setting up and finding these special energies that are non searchable otherwise. So a little bit harder for the research version to do that, but the tag called version, uh, you find them earlier, you, um, have a little bit more access to Maulana. So you can like take a hit against like a, a rushees art. Sometimes if you have to Cody and then Al on out, et cetera, um, and you can also find power plant early and that can really screw them over sometimes, uh, also against, so again, and then like against ADP, um, power plant is also very good if they don't play any counter stadiums and find, being able to find that on turn one is really nice. Uh, the capture energy is nice and a lot of match-ups, uh, especially like ADP that you need to. Set up a Luke metal, uh, very quickly. So being able to go second and base, uh, if you have a tag call, you ensure that you attach to a Lucara my metal, which

Brent: 58:22

so I'm on the train. So Guzman Holland. Or like really good cards. Like why, why is it so much worse against speakerphone?

Mike: 58:29

uh, big peak rom is one of the few decks that gets to utilize Marnie in such a strong way. And so being able to play a research off of a Marnie or later in the game or reset stamp is very important because the way that you respond in the matchup is you often need saucers to, or, or switch cards. So like you need saucers to set up kind of early in the game to take quicker knockouts. And then later in the game, if they go tandem shack, you need to find a switch or something like that. So, uh, if, if be ground able to Marnie you two, three, four times in a row in kind of like the, the first

Brent: 59:07

Right. You burned all your tech calls. So your outs to consistency

Mike: 59:10

You're, you know, you're just kind of like drawn. Yeah. You, you need a way to refresh and it's really hard. Um, I guess that,

Brent: 59:17

All right. All right. That'd be it.

Mike: 59:18

but, but yeah, it's, it's definitely a better against like all of these other decks, pretty much.

Brent: 59:27

So, so what's the play for keys this week? You guys have some nominal a plan.

Brit: 59:35

well, I might as well, I think stay committed to the variety at this point, even, even

Brent: 59:42

It hasn't worked so far, so.

Brit: 59:45

Yeah. So, I mean, maybe I'm hoping, you know, maybe this is just, uh, uh, you know, the gambler's fallacy or something at work, but I'm hoping that maybe I'll, I think I only want to try one more thing and it's, it's the tempo's art or maybe greens are, those are the other decks that, um, I think I have, I haven't messed with any welder decks and. I don't know the Vic Teenie, I just doesn't seem like the teeny is sort of being worked on like collectively by the community through events as much as like other decks. And so I know I've seen, I don't remember who it was and so I might not follow them, but I also remember scrolling by another tweet with someone who, um, was doing very well in their keys. And it was only playing Vic teeny, but they didn't, they didn't, they didn't have a list attached to it that that's just like, like we've said, there's a lot of it. There's a lot of interesting ways to build it. I don't know quite what a successful Vic teeny, um, deck looks like. But anyways, perhaps related to what we were saying earlier, um, if I'm going to try welder deck, I think people Cephalon burger and just seems to be the safest way to go. But otherwise I'll probably just go back to Piqua and maybe try ADP a little bit more,

Brent: 1:00:58

You should try Pika.

Brit: 1:00:59

probably won't play anymore or HSA Fu

Brent: 1:01:02

As, as a friend, when you say, uh, you know, um, I feel like all the decks, I play have consistency problems. So I'm going to try this while their deck next.

Brit: 1:01:11

And it's kind of like Geraci though. That's

Mike: 1:01:14

For Geraci I just don't play Lee's version. Did you see that

Brit: 1:01:17

I, every time I see that, I just assume he's like lost a bed or is joking or something. It's just so bad. It's a, I just like it. It's just asking to lose to prizes, to play crushing hair. Like it just has to be a joke. I did. He can't possibly be serious, like, like at least play an ordinary rod, I think. Cause like I know Ross has list. It was really pretty skimpy on the Pokemon counts, but here he did play ordinary rod

Mike: 1:01:45

Yeah, I'm playing. Yep. Yep. Yep. That's funny. Um,

Brent: 1:01:50

play a man. That the fourth, uh, the fourth, uh, draw energy, man. That's gonna like make everything magical.

Mike: 1:01:57

drive energy for bolt-in for keys it like, so that's something else that even not talking about specific decks, but I think that lists can be much more streamlined for an event like this, where all you really need to do is set up and there's gonna be games where you still don't, but try, you can like cut a lot of your fluff. Um, and so like the Pico list that I've been playing is, you know, just for speed energies for Bolton's like really just trying to, uh, be consistent. And that's kinda like how I built the LMC list as well as I went back to like the, for research for gear, I dropped coding energies. Cause I was like, let's just lose to the fire decks and beat everything else. Um, so I think you can do things like that in keys, uh, as well.

Brent: 1:02:41

Well, I mean, I know, I felt like we talked last week about how, uh, you felt like rabbits strikers who was just better invested threes. Uh, whereas pig has that chance to give you like game to game consistency.

Mike: 1:02:53

and I played rapid strike for a couple of keys, but you know, didn't, didn't love it. I think that was my worst performing deck.

Brent: 1:03:00

Yeah, I feel like there's more LMC out there these days.

Mike: 1:03:04

it was more, um, yeah, it was more clumsy. There's this psychic me too. I think the psychic YouTube or the G two, whatever you want to call it. Um, I think that might be the deck that I played against the most in keys.

Brit: 1:03:17

against it quite a bit in my smaller, small handful. Yes,

Brent: 1:03:21

So is there, is there some of strategy for dealing with that deck or is it just like do peak of things?

Mike: 1:03:27

Yeah. Hit a hammer heads game over. You hit a hammer heads, turn one, or turn two games over baby.

Brit: 1:03:33

Yeah. And in my experience, and I guess, theory mining, it was like the only, the only games I really think. And as I've had this, I've had maybe more experiences with this back when the like ROTEM MuTu deck was popular, but there it's it's similar enough, I think. Um, but anyways, like the only games you lose or I think when you just get kind of, uh, unlucky against tour house, like when they have sometimes when they, when they have the two energies and maybe like reset your hand with a stamper and Marnie, then like that's a little understandable, but sometimes they just like, you know, Yolo it on their first turn or whatever. And like, sometimes it's great and sometimes they can you open Pekichu and then it's just kind of get knocked out by Poltergeist. Um, so I think, I think in ordinary circumstances it's pretty easy and just kind of your, your typical game plan will work. The deck doesn't play. Um, a ton of switching options. So that's just tried and true classic, right? True stamp strategy will probably do the trick too. Um, so I just think you have a lot of avenues to win and the hammers are going to be very pesky the entire game.

Mike: 1:04:44

Yeah, you can, if you play like a yell grant or a fan of waves, like either one of the fan of waves, even better than yell grant, but either one is a phenomenal on the matchup for the same reason.

Brit: 1:04:54

Yeah. I've seen someone was someone has been doing well with keys. Um, it was one of the games I think with, um, he was only playing three Bolton, but he had, he had the four hammer and one fan I should probably add in the fan. Sounds kind of smart to me. I might just do that.

Brent: 1:05:14

Yeah, I'm a big fan of that idea too. I feel like there's more special energy in the format right now. Maybe just because there's more MuTu in the format, but it, yeah.

Brit: 1:05:24

And more LMC means more coding energy. Generally speaking

Brent: 1:05:28

Right, right. Yeah. Like I that's, I've cut the yellow grant from my list too, but like, uh, the opportunity for there, there's just that opportunity to strip to energy sometimes and like fan of waves and give it to you because the second energy is almost always a special energy. That's I feel like it's the first turn of this. I feel it's true for everything.

Brit: 1:05:47

it's a lot better arrogance. Like decidual I too. Cause I matched up. If you can, you can not beat them sometimes. Um, just by running the amount of energy and that that'll make them dig for, have to dig for cards and things like that. Since it's not going straight to their hand to sit, do I place a ton of special energy? Um, there's like, I mean, probably doesn't end up mattering too much, but that's small difference compared to yell grant. Um, again too, I'm trying to think of anything else, but uh,

Mike: 1:06:14

I wonder if there's a world where like the meta looks like we played three crashing hammering, two fan of waves that would be

Brit: 1:06:21

I always preferred that, um, back in when that was relevant, irrelevant decision for like the dark, just kind of straight dark ride or gray seyval IDEXX. That was always my preference.

Mike: 1:06:32

running like to hammer in three crushing hammer.

Brit: 1:06:34

Yeah. I always loved that. And I obviously was stable. I it's quite a bit different, but

Mike: 1:06:39

And like DC was DC was

Brit: 1:06:41

anyhow, that was the next thing. I was going to say form format, depending on both the power and variety of the special energy cards. So not always the same. And I think I've made similar, as I say, one of the mistakes I make the most is just assuming that the past will repeat itself essentially. And just like we've had similar opportunities and I've done the same thing and it was terrible.

Brent: 1:07:04

We have a podcast. Talk about it. It's amazing. Awesome guys next week, uh, more keys and a more exciting, extra adventure.

Mike: 1:07:14

Have a good one guys.

Brit: 1:07:15

care.