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The Big Fat 2023-2024 Season Recap Post

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My goal for the 2023-2024 season was to make a legit effort to qualify for the 2024 World Championships. This didn't happen. In all honesty it wasn't really in the cards (lol) to make a push for an invite considering most regionals within driving distance were at poor timing (Toronto on Halloween, Indy at graduation), and the performance I did have at a regional (Peoria) was a bomb. Nonetheless I performed well at locals and snagged a few cup finishes. After NAIC 2023 concluded and the 23-24 season began, I wanted to try the Mewtwo V-Union/Reversal Energy build of Gardevoir because I didn't have a lot of time to practice due to work, but I wanted to experiment with its comeback potential and unique playstyle. I played around with it online and took it to a challenge but struggled with it because of how exhausting it was to play given a time limit. For the rest of August I went back to original Gardevoir and still came back with mid challenge finishes. Around this time my fr

NAIC 2023 - 241st Place + 2022/2023 Season Recap

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  Went 5-2-2 at the North American International Championships placing 241st/1897 playing Gardevoir ex. I've been playing Gardy ever since Fort Wayne concluded and thoroughly enjoyed playing it throughout the BST-SVI format. Paldea Evolved gave it a lot of new tools to work with at the cost of becoming a bigger target in the metagame. Even still, it's a force to be reckoned with once it gets going. Here's how the matchups went: R1: Turbo LZB WW R2: Gardevoir ex W (opponent couldn't play) R3: Arceus/Giratina WW R4: Fusion Mew WLT R5: Gardevoir ex WW R6: Lugia Single Strike WW R7: Turbo LZB WLT R8: Gardevoir ex LL R9: Giratina LZB LL When the deck was hot, it was hot. It's very contingent on getting a solid opening with 3+ Ralts T1 to start drawing cards and if the Kirlias get online, the deck starts chugging. Lost Engine decks were definitely the hardest matches of the day, and even with multiple Ralts early on and damage-soaking mons taking hits in the early game I

Fort Wayne Regionals 2023 - 89th Place

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  Went 8-5-2 at Fort Wayne Regionals placing 89th/1153, putting me at 70/350 CP. Since Toronto I dabbled with some other decks, namely Frosmoth Box and Palkia/Inteleon, but after middling results and a lack of experience with the decks to play them at a top level I went back to my old favorite, Regis. Goodra, Weezing, Eiscue, Flying Pikachu, and others have really made playing this deck a pain sometimes, but I love it too much to drop it. After a lot of matchup preparation for this event, I was reasonably confident going in and was confident my (Rahul Reddy's) list could handle any situation. Here's the game results: R1: Rotom VSTAR WW R2: Arceus/Duraludon LL R3: Palkia/Inteleon WW R4: LZ Goodra WW R5: Lugia WW R6: Lugia LWT R7: Lugia WW R8: Arceus/Duraludon LWW R9: Mew LWL R10: Lugia WW R11: Arceus/Flying Pikachu/Tapu Koko LL R12: Arceus/Duraludon LWT R13: Eldegoss Control WW R14: Arceus/Duraludon LL R15: Lunatone/Solrock LL Rahul really cracked the code for this deck. All the

Toronto Regionals 2022 - 246th Place

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  Went 5-3-1 at Toronto Regionals with Regis, p lacing 246th/1058 . This was my first in-person regional event, so I was nervous about playing on such a big stage. Here's how my matches went: R1: Lugia LWL R2: Mewtwo V-Union LL R3: Sablezard Lost Box WW R4: Blissey WW R5: Mew WLW R6: Lugia WW R7: Regis LWT R8: Lugia LL R9: Regis WW Overall I'd say the list performed pretty well, and there weren't any wasted spots. 3 Ordinary Rod and 3 Scoop Up Net really stretches the deck thin but it's workable with proper resource management. I don't think only having 3 Rod was a direct contributor to any of my losses. Some more info on those losses: Round 1 vs Lugia I had a pretty decent game 1 but dead drew the last few turns as his AR Yveltal swept my board. Game 2 I locked down an early Path with a solid setup and he scooped. Game 3 was very back and forth and it eventually came down to my last few cards in deck. I needed to draw into a Rod to get a Regi back to stay in the pr

Zach Lesage Late Night #65 - 6th Place

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  Placed 6th/265 at Zach Lesage's Late Night #65 event with Regis. I didn't change much from my previous build (which you can find here ), only cutting a 3rd Pokestop and 3rd Trekking Shoes for a Lost Vacuum and 3rd Ultra Ball. The Ultra Ball is for an extra Pokemon search and energy discard option, which I thought the deck was lacking after the performance in the September Limitless tournament. The Lost Vacuum can be attributed to the rise of Goodra as of late and various weird tools that give Regi a hard time, like Big Parasol and Big Charm. I cut a Pokestop for it because Lost Vacuum can also bump problematic stadiums like Collapsed Stadium, Temple of Sinnoh, and Lost City, and also cut the opponent off from use of your Pokestop once you don't need it anymore. While some think Regis is mediocre without access to Gift Energy, I believe the deck is still more than viable in the current meta. In all my games except a few against Mew, I elected to go second, which rewarded m

September 2022 Limitless Showdown - 17th Place

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  Placed 17/654 at the September Limitless Showdown with Regis. Didn't try to get cute with any Thorton/Amazing Rare shenanigans and instead opted for a straightforward Regi build. Even with so many hate cards in the SSH-LOR meta (Flying Pika, Empoleon, Eiscue, Duraludon, etc), I think Regi can still find success. The Lost Box matchup is pretty good since the Regis are too fat to get ohko'd by Cramorant and can be scooped up when damaged and considering 6 of my 12 matches were against Lost Zone decks, I'd say it wasn't a bad play. Shoutout to John Cook and Kyle Pyykkonen for helping me finalize the build yesterday. Path was immensely helpful against Empoleon and random rule box abilities and I think the split between it and Pokestop should always be a staple in the deck going forward. Finding the balance between Pokemon search, draw, energy counts, etc was frustrating but I'd say this is my favorite iteration of the deck I've built so far. Only thing I would wa