Back-to-Back Battle Roads Victories in Ohio with Troll and Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX

Hello SixPrizes community! My name is Gage and this will be my first tournament report, so I’ll give a little background info about me. I am an Ohio resident who has just started playing Pokémon this year after playing Yu-Gi-Oh for the last 13 years. (I am currently 19.) I have been doing lots and lots of playtesting and reading to improve my game. My tournament records have increased greatly from the knowledge I have gained from SixPrizes and playtesting, so I thought I would give something back and do a tournament report!

I played Troll last Sunday on the 20th at the Cuyahoga Falls Battle Roads and took 1st place in Masters. I honestly did not expect to do that well and did not take any notes throughout the day, so I will not be doing a full report for that tournament, but decided that I would do a full tournament report for Massilon, OH Battle Roads the following weekend.

Because I had actually made somewhat of a name for myself as a new player who came out of nowhere to steal a win, I did not particularly want to run the same deck. I decided to run what I thought was the new BDIF, Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX. I was convinced of this fact after reading Kenny Wisdom’s article and I give a major thanks to him for selling me on the idea.

I built the deck from the ground up after reading his article and it played every bit as well as I hoped it would, even if several of the cards I play are different than his list. To my surprise I was able to once again secure the 1st place Victory Cup marking two Battle Roads wins, two weeks in a row. Before I get into the full report, I will give a quick recap of the matchups I faced with Troll on the 20th and how the tournament played out for those interested.

Match Recaps

BulbapediaRound 1 vs Groudon EX/Terrakion (Win) – My Mewtwo EX donked his Cleffa.

Round 2 vs Tornadus EX/Mewtwo EX/Darkrai EX (Win) – He played two Supporters and I won because he shuffled his hand into his deck before I realized his mistake. I felt bad, but there was nothing we could do.

Round 3 vs ZekEels (Loss to Adam)

Round 4 vs Empoleon/Terrakion (Win)

Round 5 vs ZekEels (Win)

Round 6 vs Chandy Beach: Chandelure NVI/Darkrai EX/Tropical Beach (Win)

Top 4 vs Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX (Win)

Top 2 vs Zekeels (Win)

Top 4 – Final Results

1st – Gage Tice – Troll

2nd – Adam Hartman – Zekeels

3rd – David Cook – Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX

4th – Matt Nawal – Durant

And after my first time top cutting, I won my first Battle Roads. Sorry for the lack of names and details.

Here is a slightly improved list I am currently using for Troll.

Pokémon – 9 2 Groudon EX 2 Mewtwo-EX NXD 2 Tornadus EPO 2 Terrakion NVI 1 Shaymin UL

Trainers – 38 4 Professor Juniper 3 Professor Oak’s New Theory 3 N 3 Random Receiver   4 Junk Arm 3 Exp. Share 3 Dual Ball 3 Pokémon Catcher 3 Switch 2 Eviolite 2 PlusPower 2 Lost Remover 1 Super Rod 1 Revive   1 Ruins of Alph

Energy – 13 9 F 4 Double Colorless

I will also provide a skeleton of the decklist I used for this Battle Roads. I apologize for not giving the exact list, but there is a good chance I will be playing this deck at least once more, so I do not want to give away all my tricks and exact counts. Instead I have variable counts on the cards used in the deck that will also help others looking to build this deck but still put their own original touches on the deck.

The strategy is simple. Go for the donk and apply pressure early on the opponent by hitting large amounts of damage Turn 1. This is accomplished mainly by using Smeargle + Skyarrow Bridge + Switch + Super Scoop Up to use multiple Portraits in one turn which will greatly increase the chances of getting the cards necessary to get a donk the opponent or at the very least hit them for large amounts of damage Turn 1.

Pokémon – 10-13 3-4 Darkrai-EX DEX 2-4 Smeargle UD/CL 2 Tornadus EX 1 Tornadus EPO 1 Mewtwo-EX NXD 1 Shaymin UL

Trainers – 34-37 4 Professor Juniper 4 Professor Oak’s New Theory 2-3 N 1-2 Random Receiver/Sage’s Training   4 Junk Arm 3-4 Dark Patch 3-4 Pokémon Catcher 2-4 Dual Ball 2-3 Switch 2-3 PlusPower 2-3 Super Scoop Up 2 Eviollte   2-3 Skyarrow Bridge

Energy – 13 9 D – Basic 4 Double Colorless

Card Explanations

All Basic D Energy: You want to hit the Turn 1 Night Spear with this deck as much as humanly possible, and that means you need your energy acceleration (Dark Patch) to have targets in the discard, which makes it necessary to run as many Basic Darks as the deck can fit.

In addition, Lost Remover is going to be targeting your Tornadus EX when going up against Fighting deck already. Do you really want them Lost Removering Special Darks and DCEs? Also Darkrai only hits for 100 damage with Special D Energy, which is not fantastic, so I’ll take my chances with the type neutral Junk Arm-able PlusPower, thank you.

Mewtwo EX is in there for the easy counter for other Mewtwo EXs, and as always the donk possibility. This is an idea that I totally stole from Kenny that works really, really well.

Tornadus EPO: When making this list I decided that having at least 1 non-EX attacker was necessary in order to force my opponent to take a “7th” Prize, and Torandus filled the role very well as well being used to hit for 80 and keep energy on the board to start charging up Mewtwo/Darkrai/or Tornadus EX.

Before getting onto my report, I just want to give a huge thanks to my new friend Mark for lending me the Tornadus EX I desperately needed as no one there was selling or trading one and he was awesome enough to lend me it no questions asked the first time meeting me, so thanks a lot man. There is no way I could have ran this deck without it.

And a big thanks to ussgordoncaptain for the advice to cut Super Rod and Revive for the SSU. Because I ended up having to last second drop to 1 Tornadus EX, I threw in a Revive as a replacement 2nd, but I was still able to get in 2 SSU that were invaluable in my matches, so thanks again guys!

Also, Revive does not work well in this deck even though I did have one in the list that I won with, you are WAY better off running the 2nd Tornadus EX.

And now, let us get onto the report.

Round 1 VS Doug Lough (Durant)

pokemon-paradijs.comAs we both draw our opening hands, I get a little bummed out when I see the Revive I had to quickly swap in for what would have been an awesome open, but instead is just a mulligan that reveals that I playing Darkness. He only gets an active and I get a lone Smeargle off of the new hand and win the flip. And then I see… Durant.

Although Durant is never my favorite Pokémon to stare down, it made me very glad I didn’t Troll today as I don’t exactly have an amazing Durant matchup with that deck. We both get awful starts where he Devours for two or three turns in a row before I finally have to play an N to get something going, even though I know he has an awful hand. I get Darkrai charged up from here with Dark Patch even though he hits 2 heads on Crushing Hammer while I am getting it set up.

I eventually am able to SSU Smeargle, making it so Darkrai is my only Pokémon in play with an Eviolite for added Mewtwo and Rotom UD protection. I then just stop playing cards and try to keep hold of an energy at all times in case he hits heads on Crushing Hammer which only happens once after I get Darkrai set up, but I have the energy to attach again to keep steam rolling through the ants.

Even though he hits the 4-mill off of Devour every turn after I play N onwards, it is too little too late and I’m holding N with 12 in the deck and eight in hand excluding N as I draw my last prize. Interesting side note: he was running a tech Coballion NVI, although it never hit the field. GG.

1-0

Round 2 vs Foisy (Mewscoops)

This was my first time fighting a deck with Mew Prime in it in anyway shape or form, much less this specific version or against a player as good as Foisy. I had at least heard of it though, and I decided that I would do what I used to do against VVV, and that is to go for the Victini as long as there are two Oddishes on the bench, otherwise kill the Oddish.

I decide to go aggressive quickly before he can get moving, since I’m not really sure how to play the matchup. I think I’m doing pretty well as I take four early prizes by KOing a Victini, then Mew Prime, then a Cleffa, and then another Mew Prime before he is fully set up, although he does hit the Turn 2 Vileplume.

pokemon-paradijs.com

He is fully set up at this point with Vileplume UD, Victini NVI 14, and Mew Prime in play with two energy and Vanilluxe NVI and Unfezant BLW in the Lost Zone with the game at 2-6 on prizes with me in the lead.

He then Double Freezes my Tornadus EX down to 10 HP with his Mew Prime and then uses Fly for the KO and hits heads. I promote a Smeargle and Portrait and then promote Darkrai EX which I realize is awesome against Mew since Mew Prime itself is not a Water type and Darkrai has resistance.

I try to hit his Victini on the bench for an eventual 2HKO via Night Spear to which he responds with Pokémon Center, destroying that plan and my Skyarrow Bridge. He eventually kills off my Darkrai and I promote Tornadus EPO so that he will have to take “7” prizes since he is not an EX, and the longer I keep making him Double Freeze, the greater the odds of his 6.25% chance of 4 tails coming up allowing me to break the Paralysis lock and sweep.

I promote Tornadus EPO to take another prize off of his active Mew Prime making it 1-2 on prizes with me in the lead. I am terrified of how he was able to make such a comeback without me being able to do much about it. I just keep waiting on double tails and passing as my deck gets smaller and smaller.

He KOs the Tornadus EPO with Fly and hit heads again making it 1-1 with me not being able to damage the active again. He uses Double Freeze a few times and then hits double heads followed by a Frost Breath for game off of my 2nd Darkrai EX.

He never got tails after getting the Victini in play with Flower Shop Lady + next turn Collector, and it was a great game against a deck I have never played before. I would later find out he went 6-0 in Swiss. GG.

1-1

Round 3 vs Anthony Anatra (ZekEels)

pokemon-paradijs.comHe starts lone Thundurus EPO and I start Smeargle with a Darkrai on the Bench and I win the opening flip. I Dual Ball and hit heads to grab another Smeargle and bench it. I then Portrait into Sage’s Training where I pull a Switch and Dark Patch and toss some dark energy and other stuff.

I Switch into Smeargle, Portrait again for some cards, then play Super Scoop up and hit heads and bench Smeargle again, and then play Switch for another Portrait and hit Sage’s Training again. I then play a Professor Juniper and end up with a fully charged Darkrai EX on the bench and a double PlusPower for the donk along with a Skyarrow Bridge in play to get Smeargle out of the way.

I felt bad, but a win’s a win. He handled it well and didn’t get too mad which I give him major props for. GG.

2-1

Round 4 ??? (Empoleon DEX/Terrakion NVI)

This was starting out to be a great, high intensity game where we both got solid starts where he had a full bench and 2 Prinplup DEX in play and a full bench that had a Terrakion with Exp. Share attached and an energy ready to make the return KO on my Darkrai EX.

I Catcher up his Prinplup and am about to Night Spear his Prinplup and Pichu for a double KO when we hear a judge make a comment about how she was relieved that no one had forgotten to lay out prizes so far, and then we hear the person next to us realize that they forgot to lay down prizes.

Then my opponent looks down and due to a large amount of dice and Pokémon coins he had on his playmat neither of us caught that he had not placed down prizes. He was pretty mad and was a player I had heard of before playing; he asked me not to put his name down and just call him mystery player in this report, so I obliged. I asked if he wanted to finish the game to see how it would have played out, but he declined. I felt pretty bad, but things happen, I guess. GG.

3-1

Round 5 vs Sam Robinson (Dark Rush) (Zoroark/Weavile/Darkrai EX)

BulbapediaI was originally going to play Dark Rush instead of Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX and had logged some serious playtesting with it. In the end, I decided it was not the deck I wanted to play because it was too difficult to keep the bench full and keep streaming Zoroark throughout the entire game, so I decided not to play it. That being said, it is still a good deck and I was glad to see it doing well in the tournament.

I have a Mewtwo EX and a Shaymin in my opening hand and just play the Mewtwo holding the Shaymin. Unfortunately for my opponent, I logged such a large amount of test games in such a short time with it I knew the deck’s weaknesses pretty well.

If you can keep KOing Zoroarks as soon as they hit the field and spread to other Zorua DEX 69 for the guaranteed Night Spear KO for 90 or just spread to Sneasel UD for the 2HKO or 3HKO if they evolve it, the win is yours.

He played a great game, but ran into the same problems I was having with the deck, which is that he started out pretty strong T2, but he just couldn’t keep the bench full. While Darkrai/Tornadus EX is swinging T1 and is just as scary in the late game. Eventually he abandons Zoroark and concentrates on his two Darkrai which he gets both charged up while he has a lone Zorua with 30 damage on it.

If he can hit the Zoroark and I whiff the Catcher the game is still on, otherwise I will win as we are at 1-4 on prizes. But then he hits the Ultra Ball and grabs his last Zoroark and plays it. (Curses foiled again!) He swings with Darkrai and puts 10 on my Eviolited Mewtwo EX with 2 Energy which leads me to believe he runs the Mewtwo tech and is setting up for 2 Prizes off of it after he Night spears my Darkrai for KO.

It all depends on whether I can hit Catcher or not. I search my discard and see 4 Junk Arm and 1 Catcher, I only have 1 Prize left and have 16 cards left in the deck I just have to hit one of them for game and my hand is Juniper, Professor Oaks New Theory, and a DCE and I have 16 left in the deck.

I top deck a Random Receiver and there are now 15 cards in the deck I play it and reveal both Catchers in the deck before grabbing a Juniper and shuffling. Now there are 14 cards in the deck and neither catcher is prized so I go for it and Juniper hitting both Catchers. I play one and drag up Zoroark for KO and game. GG.

4-1

Round 6 vs Nicholena Moon (CMT)

BulbapediaThis was by far the most nerve-wracking game of the day. It was intense, as I had to pull a majour come from behind victory here. I start lone Darkrai EX to her Celebi Prime and Tornadus EX. She Dual Balls for a Smeargle and benches it. She Forest Breaths onto Tornadus EX and retreats into a Smeargle under Skyarrow and Portraits my amazing hand of…. 6 Trainers, attaches a Grass for her turn, and then plays a Switch and uses Blow Through for 60 on Darkrai.

I have nothing and topdeck a D Energy which I attach and pass. She hits another G Energy and uses Power Blast for 100 putting me in a horrifying spot. I finally pull a PONT to get moving and fill up the bench. I still don’t have much, but at least I won’t lose this turn.

I then Shaymin all of my energy off of Darkrai onto Mewtwo EX and go for the SSU on Darkrai and fail it. I am in such a bad spot I had no real choice but to start a Mewtwo war against CMT which is almost always a death sentence, but I really did not have much choice.

She plays Dual Ball for a Mewtwo EX, attaches a G Energy to Mewtwo with Forest Breath, then plays a PlusPower and Junipers. To my amazement she whiffs all energy completely and then uses Skyarrow to retreat into Smeargle and uses Portrait on my hand of 2 Junk Arm and a Catcher and has to pass.

I topdeck a DCE and play it on my Mewtwo and Catcher hers for the KO. This ties us at 4-4, but I still have a Mewtwo EX in the active with 4 energy, so it is still not looking very good for me. She clearly drew an awful hand because she plays N and brings me up to four and herself down to four.

She has to swing at my Mewtwo with Tornadus EX for 80 because of my Eviolite with Power Blast. The hand I draw off of N gives me the chance I need to seal the win in the form of SSU. If I can hit heads and get Shaymin off the bench and Celebration wind my energy off of Mewtwo and onto Tornadus EX it is more or less game for me. And then I see… tails.

I retreat Mewtwo manually by tossing a DCE and promote Darkrai leaving Mewtwo at only two energy. I Power Blast for 100 on Mewtwo. She Catchers my Mewtwo and KOs it with Power Blast + PlusPower, bringing the prizes to 4-2 her favor. I play N and finish charging up my Darkrai and Night Spear for KO on Tornadus EX and 30 on Celebi Prime, bringing us to 2-2.

She plays an N of her own in attempt to get something and then uses a Portrait on my hand of Skyarrow and a Dual Ball. She Retreats to Celebi. I draw and hit a Junk Arm for Catcher and bring up her Smeargle for game by double KOing it and Celebi. GG. That I honestly did not expect to win.

5-1

Top Cut I find out I am the 3rd seeded player and that Foisy is the only one who went 6-0 in Swiss. We have a short lunch break for the players in Top 4, and I talk to some people and make some trades. And then it is time for Top Cut.

I also see that Mark who lent me Tornadus EX for the tournament is watching and I tell him I owe him big time, and that I will hook up with a pack from my winnings (which he jokingly asked for but I took him seriously on it) from which he pulls a Kyogre EX Full Art, the best thing I pulled from the remaining 3 packs was a random receiver and a Dark Patch, but I was more than okay with that I was just hoping for the Victory Cup. Anyway, onto Top Cut!

Top 4 VS Michael Collins “Hulan” (Darkrai EX/Terrakion NVI/Landorus NVI)

Hulan is a judge that I’ve seen at several of AJ’s events and after taking first last week, he asked me what I was doing at one of the bottom tables after my loss to Foisy. I told him who I lost to and that I would climb my way back up to the top tables. I had to do my best to prove I did not top cut and win because of dumb luck last week (which honestly this week, luck played a little too large a role in my games for my liking), but I was thrilled to have made it and to play him in Top Cut.

Game 1

pokemon-paradijs.comI get Tornadus EX going pretty fast and I Catcher around Exp. Share and focus on getting rid of Terrakion opposed to Landorus because they require a PlusPower to KO Darkrai and Terrakion doesn’t. On top of that, Terrakion does not even always need the 3rd energy to do it. Having played Troll just last week at Battle Roads, I have a pretty deep understanding of how the Fighting Pokémon work and the inherent weaknesses they carry with them.

After I KO a bunch of stuff and deny him the ability to trigger his Exp. Shares, he scoops when he plays a search card and sees that he has no energy in the deck or enough on the field to attack.

1-0

Game 2

This game plays out similarly, only this time I lead with a Darkrai EX that I charge quickly by getting Sage’s Training off Portrait a few times. I Catcher around Exp. Share and get Double KOs on Landorus and Terrakion with the help of PlusPowers and Catcher. With him at one card in his hand and five cards in his deck with 4 Prizes left, I am pretty sure I have game when he surprises me by playing a PONT and drawing his entire deck. To his horror he then realizes that his Super Rod is prized which means I win by deck out. GG.

2-0

The one thing that made me mad in this game was when he used Gaia Hammer and I forgot about the 10 spread after running Troll last week lol. Oh well, I guess things happen.

Top 2 vs Foisy (MewScoops)

Let me preface this match by saying that lady luck despises Foisy and that both his coin flips and prizing were terrible this match. I also want to thank a friend’s dad of my friend Seth (whose I name I don’t remember, which I apologize for) who had played the deck himself but with Swanna EPO instead of Unfeasant BLW for advice, and he said that I best bet is to get an Eviolite on Darkrai so that he can only damage me by getting double heads. Now that I had seen this deck in action, I knew how it worked and had something of a strategy against it.

Game 1

pokemon-paradijs.comI go first and by T2 I have two Darkrai EX with Eviolite and one is charged thanks to my hitting Sage’s Training off of Portrait. Unfortunately, I am unable to get Smeargle out of the active and have to pass. On his 2nd turn he plays either a Pokémon Communcation or a Collector and finds out both of his Vileplume are prized and he scoops.

1-0

Lady luck hated on him pretty hard, but I had everything I needed and I think I had a pretty good shot at winning this round, including the N to prevent a deck out later on.

Game 2

Foisy goes first and hits the Turn 1 See Off off of the one P Energy in his deck and gets a great set up. (He also hilariously starts two Emolga EPO). I get a Tornadus EX with Eviolite and 2 Darkrai out with Smeargle and Tornadus EPO.

He Frost Breaths my Tornadus EX down to 10 HP and then uses ACROBATICS for the KO. He then kills Darkrai EX with… MIRACLE POWDER. I promote Smeargle and then Portrait, after which I free retreat under Skyarrow into Tornadus EPO in order to force him to take a 7th prize. Then he kills Darkrai EX for game.

1-1

Game 3

This game was crazy. I go first and open with Darkrai EX and am staring a lone Mew Prime. I hit Skyarrow Bridge, play a PlusPower, and Juniper away my hand with Supporters in it so that I can go for the donk or even just hit an Eviolite. I whiff the donk and pass. He gets an “amazing” pull off of Sage’s and discards 2 N and a PokéCom, then uses See Off and finds both of his Vileplume prized AGAIN. Not having to worry about Item lock, and still staring down a lone Mew Prime, I go crazy playing cards just trying to find a Dual Ball or Tornadus EX or Mewtwo EX as I already have the DCE. I overextend again trying to find the donk and Juniper away a PONT, N, and Juniper and hit nothing.

pokemon-paradijs.comHe gets a T2 Collector to save the day, and I check my discard to find out I have a Juniper and 2 Random Receiver left between my deck and my Prize cards to get me through the rest of the game. Honestly, since my deck is designed to have a high chance of donking the opponent, especially with Smeargle shenanigans, I probably would have done it again, because the odds of me whiffing that badly were incredibly low. The game progresses and I continue to Switch and Super Scoop Up to avoid KOs and paralysis.

The game then reaches the point where I have 5 cards left in the deck and I am going to lose by deck out as I have no cards other than N to return cards back to the deck and all of my N have been Junipered away. And then it happens, Double Freeze (Double Tails), Victory Star (Double Tails), so I KO a Mew Prime with 4 cards left in the deck. He promotes Gloom and uses Miracle Powder (Double Tails after Victory Star). I KO it with 3 cards left in the deck. Mew uses Double Freeze (Double Tails) Victory Star (Double Tails).

0/10 flips on Paralysis for 3 back to back turns in addition to having two Vileplume prized, and my inability to donk a lone Mew for two straight turns made this for one insane game. I felt bad taking my last Prize card when he should have been able to stall it out those last few turns, but he was super cool about it and just said that it was the risk of running a flippy deck. He is one cool dude and I look forward to playing him again sometime.

Props

• Getting Top Cut for the first time ever, and then taking first at both that tournament and the one after that.
• 2 Victory Cups for my collection.
• Mark for letting me borrow the much needed Tornadus EX.
• My friends Michelle, Seth, and Kyle for heading up to the tournament with me and showing me how to find the hobby shop.
• Props to Anthony for not getting mad about the donk.
• Props to AJ and Wings, Wheels, and Waves for holding the tournament.
• Props to Foisy for not getting super mad about the flips and prizing.
• Kenny Wisdom for selling me on the deck idea with one of his articles.
• Props to ussgordancaptain on the advice to run SSU instead of Revive and Super Rod.
• Not running Troll again, as Durant probably would have gobbled me up and the only favorable matchups Troll would have had were ZekEels, which I donked, and DarkArk. So it would have been a really bad play.

Slops

• Not having my own 2 Tornadus EX.
• Vileplume Prizes.
• Whiffing donks.
• Not getting the name of the person who got fourth. I didn’t play him and he left after his round so I didn’t get the chance to ask him. I will edit this article after the results are on Pokémon.com.

Top 4 Results

Mark A. Hicks1st – Gage Tice – Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX

2nd – Foisy – Mewscoops

3rd – Hulan – Darkrai EX/Terrakion NVI/Landorus NVI

4th – ??? – Darkrai EX/Tornadus EX

Thanks to everybody and anybody that read my report and liked it. Feel free to comment on anything, and ask any questions about my tournament or either decklist. Til next time.