Philadelphia Regional Championship Report

The day started off well, I came in early and played some practice games. After my poor states performance with LuxChomp I decided I wanted to go with something different. I did a bunch of play testing the night before and I went with Shuppet. My deck featured Shuppet and a bunch of techs. A couple of my techs were Relicanth from Supreme Victors and Zangoose from Platinum.

Why Relicanth and Zangoose in Shuppet deck? Relicanth is a good sniper and makes the Dialga G matchup less of an auto-loss. Zangoose is good at pulling up opposing benched Pokémon that are posing a threat. Zangoose is also good at taking your final prize, you can load Zangoose up with your PlusPowers and an Expert Belt and Invite and Strike a benched Pokémon for a final Knock Out.

Round 1 vs Sceptile/Shaymin:

I draw my initial hand and it was great! …except I had no basics, so I show my opponent my hand. I shuffle my deck and start off with 2 Mr. Mime, 3 Poké Turn, and 2 Pokémon Rescue, what a bad start. I start with the double Mr. Mime wall, my only hope is that it slows my opponent down enough that I can draw into something good. My opponent has a slow start which is extremely lucky for me with my awful start.

He gets a Claydol out turn 4 and begins to set up which worries me because I have yet to draw a single thing I can use. By turn 7 he has a Great Encounters Sceptile and a Arceus Sceptile out. The Arceus Sceptile has 3 energy cards attached and he does 120 damage with Leaf Blast to Knock Out my first Mr. Mime. At this point I’m very worried, but luckily I top deck a Pokémon Collector. I’m only down 2 Prizes so I’m pretty confident that I can come back and take the win.

I collector a Shuppet, a Uxie, and a Crobat G. I Knock Out a Treecko on his bench with Flash Bites, then I load up a Shuppet with 3 PlusPower and an Expert Belt and use Fade Out for 80. My opponent Knocks Out my Crobat G by using Leaf Blast again. I then Knock Out his Sceptile with Shuppet. I Invite and Strike his benched Claydol with Zangoose, then the following turn I use Shuppet to Knock Out his Claydol. At this point I never look back, I keep taking prizes almost every turn until I win.

1-0

Round 2 vs Mind Flood:

You are probably thinking that the name doesn’t sound familiar, and that’s because its a starter deck. How he got a round 1 win, I have no idea. Anyway, I start with Shuppet and Unown R. He starts with Totodile and attaches an energy and uses Gnaw for 10 damage. I play double Poké Drawer and get an Expert Belt and a PlusPower. Attach them to Shuppet along with an Energy. Fade out for the Knock Out and the game.

2-0

Round 3 vs Jumpluff:

He starts out with a lone Hoppip and I start out with Shuppet and Mr. Mime. I go first and use Hypnotic Gaze to put him to sleep. He remains asleep between turns, benches a Baltoy and passes. I Pokémon Collector to get 2 Crobat G and an Uxie. I Knock Out his Hoppip with Flash Bite’s then Knock Out his Baltoy with Shuppet.

3-0

Round 4 vs LuxChomp:

I start out with Shuppet and Unown Q. He starts out with a Ambipom G and Luxray GL. I go first and Hypnotic Gaze to put him asleep. Drops a Crobat G and uses Flash Bite on Shuppet, then attaches a Double Colorless Energy to Ambipom G and uses Snap Attack for the Knock Out. We trade off a couple prizes. I end up only taking 2 Prizes and getting my first loss of the day.

3-1

Round 5 vs Gardevoir/Gallade:

We both have very poor starts, it’s a slow game on both sides. He keeps rushing me while I’m taking my turns and its getting me frustrated. I end up losing a long, slow, and frustrating game. Made me even more frustrated at how much he was rushing me even when he was ahead, but it’s alright. If I win the rest of my games I probably still have a chance to top cut.

3-2

Round 6 vs Blaziken/Blaziken FB:

I start off with Mr. Mime and he starts with 2 Torchics. He goes first and uses Focus Energy. I start off fast taking a prize nearly every turn. He ends up only taking 1 Prize by the time I take 6. Don’t remember much from this round sorry.

4-2

Round 7 vs Eeveelutions:

I start out with a Shuppet and 3 Unown R and he starts out with a lone Eevee. He goes first uses Signs of Evolution. I drop a Crobat G and use Flash Bite, attach a PlusPower and Fade Out for the Knock Out. Once again I get a turn 1 win.

5-2

At this point I feel pretty good about making top cut because the top cut is 32. The standings went up and I made it in 29th place!

Round 8 vs Gardevoir/Gallade:

Game 1:

He locks me down from turn one with double Spiritomb so I couldn’t even RegiMove it away. He takes a few prizes and I take none. I scoop pretty fast.

Game 2:

He gets another turn 1 double Spiritomb. At this point I knew I had lost but I felt pretty good about top cut. Me and him joked around for a bit. I send up Regice and he keeps Knocking it Out every 2 turns. I keep using Pokémon Rescue to get it back. I kept joking around about me RegiTanking it up. It was a fun game. Of course I ended up losing.

So at this point I was eliminated from the top cut. This was only my third premier event ever so I was happy with how I did.