Tackling Inconsistency: A Cities Report

Hi, readers, my name is Lane Tower and I’m a relatively new Pokémon player in the Masters division in Washington state. This is my first serious competitive season, but I’ve been passionate about Pokémon for some time and have applied a lot of time and effort to learning the ins and outs of the Pokémon Trading Card Game.

After snagging 20 Points during the opening day of Cities with a fairly standard RayEels list, I fell into a bit of a rut.

I was confident that my deck was the optimal choice for my meta, and it was performing wonderfully in all the test matches I did in the garage with my dad. Not to mention, it used multiple copies of some of the most expensive cards in format!

pokemon-paradijs.com
My dad is Mr. Fuji and I’m Pikachu.

However, I noticed on Sunday, that in a lot of my games I just didn’t draw into the cards I needed. (In the garage, my dad lets me look for them if I don’t draw them, but the people in my area are sort of jerks.) This was causing me to lose games I certainly deserved to win.

For example, on Sunday I was battling fellow SixPrizes writer Kenny Wisdom and I opened Rayquaza EX, Tynamo, Tynamo, Tynamo, Fire, Lightning, Lightning. No Supporter! Uggh! Luckily, I did top deck a Juniper, and managed to attach the fire to my Rayquaza EX, but off the Juniper I only managed to get TWO Eelektrik and ONE Raikou-EX.

To make matters worse, I only hit two L Energies off of my Celestial Roar, so I was only able to do 180 damage on turn 2. This was enough to KO his lone Deino, but Kenny easily could have Knocked Out the Tynamo I failed to evolve, and this really upset me.

I knew it was time to take a radical approach to this horrendously unstable format. It was time to go rogue.

Here’s the deck:

Pokémon – 4

4 Lillipup BLW 81

Trainers – 44

4 Professor Juniper
4 N
4 Bianca
4 Cheren
4 Cilan
4 Skyla

 

4 Xtransceiver
4 Random Receiver

4 Level Ball
4 Super Rod

Energy – 12

8 R

4 Double Colorless

Welcome to consistency central, everybody! The main goal of the deck is to set up every single game by abusing Lillipup’s Collect attack, and then whittle away your opponent’s HP with a barrage of brutal Tackles.

20 damage might not seem like much, but when you realize you can start attacking as early as turn 1 (I have never managed to do this, but in theory, it IS possible), you should be able to see the inherent power of the deck.

Plus, many of today’s common meta-decks rely on Pokémon-EX, which are easily 9-shotted by Tackle and give up a grotesque 2 Prizes when Knocked Out! Clearly, the deck works. Without further ado, here’s my report!

Round 1 vs. Corey M. with Darkrai/Hydreigon

pokemon-paradijs.com
<3

I start Lillipup, he leads Deino, and I crack a devilish grin knowing that in 3 to 4 turns it will be TACKLED into oblivion. 60 HP is just embarrassing, honestly.

I have the DCE in hand, and contemplate going aggro-Lillipup, but I’m not really one of those YOLO players, and I figure he probably has an Enhanced Hammer in hand, so I play it safe and Cilan for a R Energy.

I only get one, because I don’t want to run the risk of decking out, and when you play Cilan, you don’t actually HAVE to get 3 Energies (read your cards, people!). I attack with Collect, because at this point my hand only has 3 draw Supporters, and I’m worried about getting Hooligans’d.

Unfortunately, I whiff the 4th Supporter and draw a Level Ball. He responds by Ultra Balling 2 D Energy for a Darkrai EX and then Junipers away a Catcher AND a Max Potion. He plays two Dark Patches to the Darkrai then Ultra Balls again to get another Deino.

At this point he only has one card in hand. I can see that it’s a Juniper (he holds his hand low), but I laugh, knowing that his reckless play style leaves him really open to opponent’s Hooligans and Honchkrow DRX.

The next turn I play my Level Ball, and, oh, NO! One of my Lillipup is prized. With luck like this, there really isn’t anything you can do. I scoop up my pup and shake his hand. I say good game, but it wasn’t.

0-1

Round 2 vs. Alan-Luc N. with Empoleon/Roserade/Landorus

pokemon-paradijs.com
70 HP? Are you kidding me??

I start Lillipup and he starts Emolga. I cringe when I see it has 70 HP… this behemoth is going to take 4 Tackles before it goes down! He wins the flip (of course!), and then sighs. He attaches a W Energy and uses Call for Family.

He seems really frustrated while searching his deck, because he “Prized all his Piplups and Landoruses,” but he does manage to put two Roselias on the bench. They BOTH have 70 HP. Not my day, I guess.

I Ultra Ball to thin my hand and play Bianca for 3, but I whiff the DCE, so there’s not anything I can do at this point. I’m going to lose a mindless Prize race. I scoop.

0-2

Round 3 vs. Tyler N. with RayEels

I win the flip for once! I start Lillipup and he leads a Tynamo. He’s a friend, so I apologize in advance for having to beat him. I explain that we’re both playing seriously, and that I have no hard feelings, etc.

He obviously feels awkward with me being so open with him, so after about ten minutes he tells me to just please start my turn.

I attach a Fire and Collect. He then draws a card and says “Uhh…” over and over and passes. I attach Fire and Tackle. I don’t want to, but this is the twisted game we play. In both Pokémon the TCG and in the American Civil War, it is at times brother vs. brother.

He then plays down an Eelektrik onto his Tynamo and passes. I am shocked. Eelektrik has 90 Hit Points (!!!) and does 50 damage with Electric Ball. That’s just a PlusPower away from a Knock Out. I cannot get a break, so I scoop in frustration.

0-3

Round 4 vs. ????

No one wanted to go to lunch with me, and I got sort of lost on the way back from 7-11 (I had 3 Cheezburger Big Bites, yum!), so I missed this round. Oh well. I decide to give myself the win.

1-3

Round 5 vs. Kenny W. with Darkrai/Landorus

pokemon-paradijs.com
Save the drama for your mama, Kenny.

This round starts with some drama. Kenny says he’s 4-0 at this point and doesn’t understand how he can be paired down to someone who is 0-4 (of course, I know I’m actually 1-3, but I’m too humble to correct him).

The nice man who is running the tournament takes about thirty minutes to try to solve this by announcing another lunch break, but no one goes for it. Kenny eventually has to suck it up and face me.

I don’t remember exactly what happened, but this was a war. On turn 6 or 7 Kenny manages to Knock Out one of my Lillipups with his Sableye’s Confuse Ray attack, but I have another one ready to start Tackling on the bench.

Unfortunately, on this turn I play an N and whiff Super Rod. I know that with only 2 Lillipup left in my deck, I will be unable to keep streaming Tackles, so I scoop. Terrible game, really. Terrible tournament overall.

1-4

Props

  • card-queen.deviantart.com
    #fierce

    Lillipup for being all around the best card in format.

  • Me for coming up with such an excellent deck.
  • My dad for letting me sleep in the garage at night, even though Mom thinks I moved out.

Slops

  • All of my opponents for totally luck-sacking me.
  • The Pokémon Company for making such a terrible, luck-based game.
  • The guy at 7-11 for not giving good directions back to the game store. I told him it was in the red building. What a doofus.

That’s pretty much it, guys. Thanks for reading!

Reader Interactions

61 replies

  1. Sammy Cruz

    Wait.. You dropped Rayeels to run quadpuppies? You sir, are amazing.(This article is the best troll ever)

  2. Austin Lavinghouse

    What is this??? It was a good joke at first, but why not actually discuss the issues you are bringing up instead of wasting time with a “report” that only recycled the same old joke you made in the beginning.

      • Joseph Lee  → Dane_Carlson

        Whether Austin is mean or not, he’s right.

        It starts out funny, but considering a lot of people would like to discuss it, it comes off as an annoying tease.

        Personally I think everyone who votes this up deserves to be told they just managed to make top cut… before revealing “Oops! I mean you bubbled out!” or an equivalent scenario. =P

        • Joseph Lee  → Dane_Carlson

          Try being funny, then maybe it would be more obvious? ;)

          See, that’s a decent joke. A bit mean-spirited, though hopefully the emoticon helps point out that it was meant in a lighthearted mood, and if not I took the risk since I was going to follow up and explain myself anyway.

          I didn’t write an entire faux article about something a lot of people would like to discuss. I didn’t just state my disagreement with someone by mocking how some people actually talk.

          Since the people who don’t find the article funny aren’t really in a laughing mood… making jokes about it aren’t likely to change that.

      • Austin Lavinghouse  → Dane_Carlson

        It isn’t a matter of being mean spirited. With all humor, some people will like it, some won’t.

        I check 6P every day for new articles, so I expected there to at least be SOME content included with the humor. This was legitimately a good joke; however, there was nothing stopping the author from discussing why the attitude presented here is not healthy for the game, how to actually build consistency into your deck, etc. There was plenty material here for discussion, instead of dragging the joke out; I’ve come to expect a certain level of content from each update, and 6P delivers 99% of the time. This time it didn’t.

  3. Amanda Kovs

    i started reading this going “seriously? you complain about doing 180 turn 2?” then i kept reading and i lol’d.

    I appreciate this article. +1

  4. David Demaree

    Why didn’t you play the double draw virizion?!?!?!

  5. Ziggmiceter

    Why didn’t you play Emboar BLW 20? It adds so much consistency to that deck!

  6. Obro

    YES! Finaly a surprising tournament report.
    So tired to read the same types of reports all the time, but here is a REAL rogue deck.
    Really sad to hear about your bad luck though.
    Lillipup is SO consistent these days. Especially with Herdier having a Collect attack that draws 3 cards!
    Though it might be dangerous to play evolutions in this fast format.

  7. Chuck Rancor

    It’s about time somebody looked at the problems in our format and had the pokeballs to go on their own tangent into a totally creative, and surprisingly skilled deck. This player is clearly a talented one.

  8. Grant Manley

    I can’t tell what of this report is true and what is not, or if you were silly enough to actually go to a tournament with this deck if you are a competitive player

  9. Dane_Carlson

    Anyone that doesn’t like this article must be a robot, because they don’t have any sense of humor.

    +1

      • Joseph Lee  → Axel

        Or they have a well developed sense of humor so this… just isn’t that funny.

        I mean, it is a little funny, don’t get me wrong… but it’s like that time when you realized something was funny, so you did it again… and again… and again and it became really irritating to everyone.

        The “joke” goes on to long so it becomes annoying.

  10. Dan W

    Wow. This format sucks. Can’t believe just how unlucky you were on that day. I mean I’ve suffered a few losses due to luck but these ones blow them out of the water. Sad to see a really skillful and unexpected play lose just because of how luck based this format is. And basics should never have over 100HP.

  11. Adam Capriola

    We need more comedic relief like this from time to time! Thanks Lane, this was excellent.

  12. Ross Gilbert

    At the risk if sounding old, I don’t like the use of the word dickish in this article. I like ths site bing completely clean. I wouldn’t want my 9 yr old brother reading that and thinking it was an ok word to use when writing for an audience.

    • Adam Capriola  → Ross

      You’re right. I wasn’t sure if it’s acceptable slang or not (I feel old) but I should have edited that. Will change it up right now.

      (Do you actually have a 9 year old brother that reads the site, by the way?)

        • Loren Miller  → DrMime

          I am both old (relatively speaking) and have a 9 year old (son), and I appreciate Ross’s comment and the change. (I don’t have to risk sounding old…too late). My only question was how is the Lilipup against Keldeo? I need to know the strategy so I know what to do when I am up against it in cities with this Lillipup decklist that am netdecking.

        • ErmahgerdSquirtles  → Loren

          I like Squirtles (there’s a pun there on the meme) and I babysit a 9 year old kid.

  13. Chris Nills

    Amazing article. As serious as most players are on six prizes, we do need a good laugh every once in a while. Even if you did not take this deck to a cities, it was still very funny to read.

  14. Joseph Lee

    For the record, my cantankerous responses go away if you don’t give the article a serious name. ;)

  15. stephen shirley

    this is actualy a good article cus it points out just how incinsitent this format is

  16. Matthew S

    I appreciate the idea, but good satire is a little more subtle than this.

  17. Micah Smyth

    Screw all these mixed replies this was a hilarious troll. Anybody who doesn’t like it is a robot or in this case an Elygem. Might I recommend playing 4 Oshawatt Blw promo. Turn 1 sleep followed by turn 2 30 damage. Almost as good as Lilipup himself.

  18. sam woofter

    best article I’ve seen in a while, glad to have some comedic relief on the sight. +1

  19. Stephen Botha

    I’ve wanted to build a deck like this for so long, thanks for the decklist, idea and info! Now I will be the most powerful netdecker in the world! Lillipup for the win!! :D

  20. DevilComment

    Dude, your deck sucks….. i could just use a newbie team deck and beat you up and down…

  21. Tiago Cintra

    Nicely thought, for real. It shows how much inconsistent and how much hand-based and luck-based this format is. Strategies are almost nothing without a good hand and resources. Well done.

  22. Hunter Hawkins

    Maybe you got lucksacked, but at least your opponents had great resistance.

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