Jay Hornung
Author Archive
Bio: I was a professional Pokémon Player from 2004-2013. While I’m officially “retired” from the game, I still enjoy discussing, playing, and creating content for retro formats. My goal has always been to share my experience and help grow this game we all love.
An In-Depth Look at the 2010 DP–UL Format, Part 2 “At the end of 2009, Pokemon announced that Worlds would be returning to Kona, Hawaii in 2010. Invites to the World Championships were given to the Top 4 of Worlds 2009, Top X of Nationals 2010 (the US was Top 4; most other countries got fewer invites—paid/unpaid—depending on size), and then the Top 40 in the Elo rating system. The last way to qualify was through the Last Chance Qualifier affectionately called “the grinders” by players. I went in depth on how the Elo system worked and my feelings about the system in my 2011 article. I’ll go ahead and…
A Deep Look into HS–BLW, the Wild-Ride Anything-Goes 2011 Nationals and Worlds Format “If you asked top players what their favorite format to play at the time was, you would get mixed answer. The format was considered highly luck-based, filled with donks and some consistency issues. The randomness and uncertainty of the format caused me to sit out US Nationals that year to make sure I secured my Worlds invite. However, it’s also a very unexplored format which leaves a lot of room for creativity and rogue decks to shine. Many of the reasons I hated playing the Worlds 2011 format at the time are the same reasons I enjoy playing the format…
A Complete Guide to Gardevoir, the Best Deck of the 2010 DP-on Format “I want to start out by thanking Jonathan Paranada who does an excellent job of helping to set up these events and collecting the results and lists. Jonathan has all of these results posted on the Facebook Group Snowpoint Temple which is an outstanding resource for anybody who has an interest in older formats. There is a lot of discussion about decks of different eras, upcoming tournaments, and tournament results. As these are all decks of the past, players are very open with information and helpful to anybody with questions. The tournament had 50 players attend and, with such a…
The PTCGO vs. Hearthstone Article, Part Two “Before I dive into the article there are a few underlying points I want to discuss and I feel are important to establish. 1. I love online gaming and I feel it is the future as far as gaming goes. There could be a very long discussion involving whether or not this is a good thing, with talking points around human interaction, screen time, etc. The truth is though, the convenience of being in your own home and finding a game whenever you want is amazing. There is no traveling, no scheduling conflicts, and relatively minimal costs. In the last…
A Look Back at the Radical and Still Not Yet Fully Explored 2004 EX–HL Format “As I’m writing this, I’m slowly realizing that this was 12 years ago and how far I’ve come in those years, both inside the game and outside of it. At the time I was only 14 years old and knew almost nothing about the game. I had played when the game first came out, but the fad had faded and it had been years since I had really played the game. However, my younger brother who was eight years younger than me would still play. One day he asked me if I wanted to go to a Pokemon tournament with…
On days when blizzards blow through, it comes down to where people live. It stashes food in the snowball on its head, taking it home for later. (Galarian Darmanitan)
Primal Clash Creations for Florida Regionals and Beyond “Jirachi-EX Discussion Kingdra Mega Aggron Mega Kyogre Emboar/Camerupt Diancie Toolbox Mega Gardevoir Sabelhaus Special Virizion/Genesect Conclusion It seems like everybody has their own opinion on whether or not Jirachi-EX should be played ubiquitously. The discussion never seems to revolve around a certain deck; instead it’s more of a general attitude of whether Jirachi-EX should be run at all. The answer seems to come down to personal preference — some people run it in every deck and others run it in none. In my mind, I feel Jirachi-EX should be played in just about everything right now with the exceptions being decks that don’t run…
What PTCGO Can Learn from Hearthstone, Blizzard’s Latest Cash Cow “Blizzard Entertainment is probably a company that most of you are either familiar with or have at least heard about. Some of their biggest successes include StarCraft, Warcraft, and World of Warcraft, which are well known in the gaming community. Blizzard excels at two things: making highly addictive strategy games and getting its customers to eagerly open their wallets. Recently Blizzard branched out from its safety net of genres and decided to try its hand at an online card game based off the Warcraft mythology called Hearthstone. The reputation of the company alone made me eager to try the game and…
One Pyroar, Multiple Manectric, and a Follow-Up on ‘No False Move’ “I recently read Erik’s article “No False Move” and if you missed it you should definitely check it out. To sum it up very quickly, Erik discusses what he feels are some important skills in the TCG and others he feels are no longer critical skills. It is an excellent article and an extremely good topic starter. Our opinions differ in some areas and I’d like to give my viewpoint on a few points he left off the list. With information so more widely available now, it’s extremely important to try and utilize as much in-game skill as possible, such as: 1. Making…
Top 32 Phoenix Regionals Report with Seismitoad/Pyroar and Speed Lugia “Phoenix Regionals Ft. Wayne Non-Regionals Card Predictions Conclusion I can’t even begin to describe how amazing of a weekend this was. It was full of good food, good friends, and of course Pokémon. I suppose I should focus on the later, but it truly was great taking in the culture of Arizona. Heading into the tournament, I was feeling pretty good about my deck choice. Much of my early testing revolved around Seismitoad-EX and Landorus-EX. Essentially I was pairing the two strongest Pokémon in the game together. This led me to start looking for a hard counter to the deck and I…
On Copies of Cards and Virizion Variants for Autumn Regionals “Copies of Cards Virizion/Dragonite/Altaria Virizion/Genesect/Beartic Virizion/Genesect Conclusion Virizion/Genesect is all about numbers and percentages. You want to find that balance between consistency and techs. I’m going to share how I decide upon how many copies of a card to run. Even though Virizion/Genesect is the main focus of this article, this information is extremely useful with deck building in general. This is also very useful information to have regardless if you’re just starting out or if you’re a seasoned vet. I still remember being 16 years old and sitting and talking with my high school algebra teacher trying to find out…
With the hair wrapped around its body helping to enhance its muscles, this Pokémon can overwhelm even Machamp. (Grimmsnarl)
Ethical Dilemmas in the Pokémon TCG “Asking for a concession is when one player asks their opponent to let them have the win. This happens more and more commonly as players get closer earning their World Championships invites. This is a pretty hot-button issue right now and for the first time TPCi has actually made it illegal to ask your opponent for a concession. According to this year’s tournament guidelines (section 10.1), repeatedly doing so can be penalized as coercion. I think it was a smart call by TPCi to stop players from being able to ask for concessions. Being asked made a lot of players feel uncomfortable,…
Patching Predictions for the BCR-on Format “Empoleon/Miltank Pyroar TDK Virizion/Dragonite Plasma/Lugia Big Basics/Garbodor Conclusion I agree with Andrew that between the loss of Tropical Beach and the sure popularity of Seismitoad, Stage 2 decks will take a big hit. However, I’m not as convinced as he is that they are “unplayable” because of these things rather shoved into the lower ends of tier 1 and the higher ends of tier 2. Empoleon is a deck that will see less play in a BCR-on format than it would have in a PLS-on format. Being a Water type, it counters Landorus-EX well and built-in draw power puts it…
An In-Depth Look at the 2010 DP-UL Format, Part I “First, the Nationals and Worlds format of 2010 was one of the best formats this game has ever seen. There were a wide variety of archetypes and many of the matchups were very close and highly skill based. The format is also one of the least expensive “good” formats to build from and more and more players seem to be getting interested in 2010 particularly. Of course, prices fluctuate and increase the more and more players start buying the cards, but when I was building these decks I didn’t pay over $8 for any single card and a majority of…
Early 2014-2015 Standard Format Deck Discussion “Lessons Learned from Nationals Addressing Extended Format Concerns Donphan/Trevenant Speed Plasma Empoleon/Miltank Pyroar Revisiting Dragonite Revisiting Lucario/Mewtwo Conclusion 1. SixPrizes is a really great place for information. I don’t know if you guys all caught this or not, but the deck that won US Nationals was published on SixPrizes just a few weeks before the tournament. Stephen Lewis wrote an article about the evolution of Big Basics and the deck was originally piloted to an 11th place finish at the UK National Championships by Luke Kirkham. 2. Pyroar is really good… or is it? By far the biggest surprise of the tournament…
Rising Fist (Furious Fists) Preview and 2014–2015 Format Predictions “Rising Fist Highlights 2014-2015 Season Format Predictions Early Favorites for PLS-on Lucario/Mewtwo Greninja/Miltank Dragonite-EX Conclusion Rising Fist (English: Furious Fists) looks to be one of the best sets in terms of overall playability that we have seen in a long time. I’m actually really tempted to buy a box of this set because of how many playable cards there are. When doing set highlights, I don’t touch on every card, but I do try to get detailed enough to include most cards that I feel could fit into tier 1 or tier 2 decks. It’s also very important to me that…
This Pokémon will look into your eyes and read the contents of your heart. If it finds evil there, it promptly hides away. (Galarian Ponyta)
55 articles written
10× Worlds qualifier
Playing since 2004
@JayHornung
4.3K
8
8,114
+46(96%)
7
