ECC Report

Bridge over troubled water

Hey all The Deck Out followers!


First of all, sorry for the late entry but as you probably know, this weekend I played in ECC and lost in top16 due to my own misplay(if you didn't know that you should start following my Facebook!). The weekend was a great success and I had a lot of fun and even learnt a thing or two about playing, which really surprised me. I apologize for the late report since I came home yesterday evening at 1 AM. I got to writing as soon as I woke up so my English may be a little rusty in this report so forgive me about that.

Anyways, the tournament was a very big one so I’ll get to report now.

We came to our Arnhem’s hostel on Friday evening (the tournament began on Saturday) and the whole team Finland started to make deck lists. I wasn’t making a deck list because I wasn’t sure what to play. The last weekend, when I tested the HGSS-NEX format, I only learnt that there were some decks I didn’t want to play – Zekrom and Durant. Durant isn’t just a deck for me and I didn’t want to play Zekrom because I feel uncomfortable with Eelektrik because it just sits on the bench. The two decks, I were debating between, were ReshiPlosion and Celebi/Mewtwo. And yes, it wasn’t a CMT (hate the name by the way) but a plain Celebi/Mewtwo.

ReshiPlosion would have been a great choice if the metagame had been a full of Durants (autowins for ReshiPlosion) but I just decided to go with Celebi/Mewtwo because it’s the deck, I have tested the most and I felt the most comfortable with. I played a few test games and went 5-1 against Zekrom (The Finnish player who ended up placing 3^rd in the tournament) and settled for Celebi. It’s not probably the most difficult deck to play but you have to have a correct strategy with it to be able to win games. It’s fast and punishes for every bad start your opponent gets. It also takes the first prize almost 100% of time so it’s a perfect tournament deck.


On the Friday evening the final list looked like this:

Pokémon:

4x Celebi Prime
3x Mewtwo EX
=7

Trainer:

4x Professor Juniper
3x N
3x Professor Oak’s New Theory
2x Copycat
3x Pokémon Collector
3x Dual Ball
3x Pokegear 3.0
3x Eviolite
4x Pokémon Catcher
3x Switch
4x Junk Arm
2x Skyarrow Bridge
3x PlusPower
1x Revive
=41

Energy:

10x Grass Energy
4x Double Colorless Energy
=14


I went to sleep and was pretty confident even though, I hadn’t tested with this exact list a lot of matches.


On Saturday I registered and went to Eskil’s (Tego) Deck check. He remembered that he had e-mailed me about The Deck Out goes global and we talked a bit. However, if you paid attention, the deck list, I listed earlier had 62 cards. Eskil said that he counted 62 cards and I was like “what”. In the end, I also counted the cards and there were 62 cards. So, I took 2 cards off and the final list looked like this.

Pokémon:

4x Celebi Prime
3x Mewtwo EX
=7

Trainer:

4x Professor Juniper
3x N
3x Professor Oak’s New Theory
2x Copycat
2x Pokémon Collector
3x Dual Ball
3x Pokegear 3.0
2x Eviolite
4x Pokémon Catcher
3x Switch
4x Junk Arm
2x Skyarrow Bridge
3x PlusPower
1x Revive
=41

Energy:

10x Grass Energy
4x Double Colorless Energy
=14

I took off 1 Collector and 1 Eviolite. In the end, I did nothing with Collectors and Eviolites during the whole tournament so they were the correct cards to take away from the deck list. Anyways, the tournament started only a bit late, which was good because the tournament was so huge. Masters had about 230 players so we had 8 Swiss and top32.

I won’t be having names of my opponent’s in this entry because I don’t remember all of them. I will list the deck and nationality so that you can see what was the metagame like and how international the tournament really is.


1. Round (Vanilluxe/Vileplume/Kingdra Prime) (The Netherlands)

It was ironic. This was the same player, I played against in top32 of ECC last year. That time I won a Luxchomp mirror 2-0. I was very surprised when I saw Horsea as his active Pokémon. Soon I realized that it was a Vanilluxe deck. I got a T1 40 with Mewtwo EX even though he started the game and since his opening hand wasn’t too good, I pretty much steamrolled through him. He was able to do 50 damage with Kingdra Prime before I OHKOed his Kingdra Prime. It was all the damage he was able to inflict during the whole game.
1-0

While looking the pairings for the 2^nd round, my 1^st round opponent stopped me and gave me the ECC die, I forgot to leave to table. Thanks a lot for that! The ECC die was very cool looking.


2. Round (6 Corners/without Mewtwo EX) (Denmark)

He opened with Virizion and I immediately realized that I would be against Six Corners. In the 2^nd turn of the game, I knew that I would have the game. The reason for this was that he sought for Cobalion after he saw my Mewtwo EX. That could mean only one of the 2 things – he either didn’t have Mewtwo EX in his deck or it was prized. As soon I realized this, I started to load my every energy on the active Mewtwo EX and Catchered any Pokémon he attached energy to and OHKOed them. He did 0 damage during the whole game and took 0 prizes.
2-0


3. Round (Zekrom/Eelektrik/Magnezone/Mewtwo EX/Zekrom EX) (France)

He opened with Zekrom so I didn’t get a donk even though I went first. I decided not to attack to Zekrom because of Outrage but settled for set-upping 2 Mewtwo EXs on the bench in T1. He was struggling with his set-up and it felt like he was pretty inexperienced against playing a deck, which had 3 Mewtwo EXs in it. He used one Mewtwo EX to counter OHKO mine and the rest of the game I took care of Eelektrik because Magnezones arent’ a match for Mewtwo EX if they don’t have energy accelerators with them. It was the most difficult game so far because of his 2 card N but since I had saved resources, I managed to draw a PONT from the 3^rd card and took the remaining 2 prizes with Catchers.
3-0


4. Round (Celebi/Mewtwo/Tornadus/Shaymin/Shaymin EX/Terrakion ) (Belgium)

We both opened with Mewtwos and I knew that this game would be very difficult. I think this player was the first one, who mentioned something about my blog. It was very nice to hear. For some reason, his opening hand wasn’t that good and I took 5 prizes easily with one Mewtwo EX. For some reason, I wasn’t able to draw energy for my 2^nd Mewtwo EX, which was on the bench and when he N’d me to 1 card(which I was prepared to with saving a lot of draw cards into my deck) and started using Shaymin EX to kill my Pokémon I was in problems. I kept topdecking trash card after trash card while his Shaymin EX killed everything. In the end, I lost the game even though I was in a 5 prize lead. It was pretty frustrating because I thought I had the game and that I would draw SOMETHING within 5 turns because I conserved my every draw card and over 50% of my deck was draw cards.
3-1

5. Round (Durant) (Great Britain)

Durant wasn’t a deck I wanted to play against after a frustrating loss. Well, my opening hand was just bad (Mewtwo EX and 3 Grass energy). Or so I thought before I saw his Durant. In fact, the opening hand I had in this game was a optimal start against Durant – a lot of Basic energy. The game would go down on his Crushing Hammer flips and when he flipped 3 tails in his first turns from Crushing Hammers, I knew that I had the game. He flipped the rest of the Crushing Hammers heads but it really didn’t matter even though he Devoured all of my DCEs into the discard pile because he wasn’t Devouring for 4 all the time. I had about 15 cards in the deck and N in my hand when the game ended.
4-1

Durant was the match-up I was the most afraid of and I was glad that I was able to defeat it. I thought I wouldn’t meet Durants in 4-1 because it isn’t THAT good even if it’s that played.

6. Round (Zekrom/Eelektrik/Magnezone/Mewtwo EX) (Italy)

This match went just like the previous “Thunderdome” match. My deck is just too quick for Magnezone to handle and there is nothing they can do about it. He N’d me to 2 but it was no use because I managed to draw the needed Junk Arm for Pokegear and sealed the game. I don’t remember much about this game but it wasn’t a difficult one.
5-1


7. Round (Cleffa.dec) (Germany)

I was only one win away from the top cut and I still hadn’t donked a game even though my deck should be THE donk deck in the format. I opened with a perfect donk hand in this game (Mewtwo EX, DCE and PlusPower) and I saw from my opponent’s face that he had a terrible starter. It could mean two things: a Pokémon with big retreat cost or a Pokémon with a very low HP. It was Cleffa. I went first and apologized to my opponent. I hate donks more than anything else in a big tournaments like this but it’s part of the game and there is nothing we can do about it.
6-1


8. Round (Mewtwo EX/Celebi/Tornadus ) (Norway)

I was very relieved in this game because I knew I would be in the day 2. He had a better opening hand but he misplayed at one point of the game because he passed instead of attacking with Mewtwo EX. I let him take back and told him that if it would have been a “real” tournament game, I wouldn’t have let him take back but thanks to my kindness (lol), he managed to win the game. I didn’t enjoy playing this game because he kept asking all the time questions about my deck (which I think is impolite) and kept answering to questions like “how many Ns do you have in your deck ?” and “Do you run Shaymin EX” with answers like “4” and “yeah, I do”. In my opinion, if you want to know about your opponent’s deck concentrate on playing not to asking questions.
6-2

I think I was 18^th in the standings and the whole Finnish team did very well. No player in Masters did worse than 4-4 (11 Masters in the team Finland). Jouni (the Finnish CP leader and the 3^rd of this tournament) was in the top cut as well and surprisingly my big brother went 7-1. It was the biggest surprise for me because he hasn’t played this year that much and isn’t usually doing that well in tournaments. My girlfriend also went 5-3, which I was very happy about because she has played almost no games this year. All in all, the first game was a huge success for team Finland because we had 1 Senior in top16 and 3 Masters in top32.

I slept the night peacefully and went to the second day with full of excitement.



Top32 (Typhlosion/Magnezone) (The Netherlands)

1. Game

In the first game we both mulliganed 3 times and I thought I would meet a Magneboar because I saw Fire and Lighting Energy. However, he played Typhlosion/Magnezone instead. I was very happy when I noticed this because I knew my deck was way too fast for a deck that has to set-up 2 stage2 Pokémon in order to work. I had a prefect donk hand and needed only DCE/Energy+Pluspower from Juniper to end the game T1 but whiffed for everything and just passed. After that, the first game was pretty much just a straightforward beat down from my side. I Catchered anything I could KO and he didn’t get N for the right spots so I got a very easy win. In the last 7 cards of my decks were 5 energy, including 3 DCEs…
1-0(7-2)


2. Game

My opening hand wasn’t as good as it was in the first game and I was pretty sure he would kill my only Pokémon (Celebi) with Cyndaquil because I kept drawing trash. However, the Eviolite I attached to my Celebi in T1, saved the whole game. He wasn’t able to kill my Celebi and after I got a Juniper and Mewtwo EX, I managed to take control of the game with Catchers once again. He had only 1 Cyndaquil on the bench I while I kept Catchering the lone Cyndaquil all over again, he wasn’t able to get a proper set-up. In this game he N’d me to 1 but I had a too strong field already and the N didn’t really matter. I also think that he run pretty much out of resources because he only had 3 cards in his deck when the game ended.
2-0(8-2)



Top16 (Smeargle/Zekrom/Eelektrik/Mewtwo EX/Zekrom EX/) (Great Britain)


1. Game

This game was against Tom Hall, who I knew by name but didn’t know that much about. He was pretty nice and it was great meeting and talking with him during the game. In the first game, I noticed that his deck ran only 1 Mewtwo EX and I took the control of the game with my Mewtwo EX superiority. When I had drawn 4 prizes to his 1 or 0 he scooped the first game.
1-0(9-2)


2. Game

This game went pretty much just like the first game because I was able to keep the pressure on with Catchers and Mewtwo EX. We both thought that the game was already settled when he had 4 prizes and I had only 2 prizes. He came to attack with Zerkom EX, Catchered my Celebi and managed to flip heads for the KO. I thought it wouldn’t really matter because all I needed was DCE or 2 energy from my deck with Juniper/PONT for the 2 remaining prizes. The other option would have been to Catcher for 2 prizes but I was afraid of going to 1 prize because I had already lost to 1 card N in the 4^th round. This was the decision (and mistake), which costed me the game (and the whole tournament). I Pokegeared before the Juniper to take something away from the deck to increase the chances of getting 2 energy of DCEs from my deck. I managed to get a Collector but noticed that I also had 2 energy in the 7 cards I Pokegeared. If I had just Junipered, I would have had the game. Anyways, I had half of my energy in the deck (including 2-3 DCEs) and was pretty sure that I would draw the cards I need from the Juniper. Well, I draw only  1 energy from the Juniper and was VERY frustrated. After that I just hit 160 to his Zekrom EX(With 2 PlusPowers I played before Juniper). He used SSU and flipped heads to savedthe Zekrom EX. After that I checked the field and realized, I had lost the game. He Catchered my benched Celebi killed it with Tornadus, Super Rodded Mewtwo EX from his cards pile and took the remaining 2 prizes from my Mewtwo EX with his Mewtwo EX.
1-1(9-3)


3. Game

Of course I was frustrated about the loss but I was pretty sure I had a decent chance in the 3^rd game because the match-up was on my side. However, I managed to get the second most terrible start of the tournament for this game and knew that I needed to N him to one to be able to win the game. When I N’d him to one, he drew PONT from it. I was like “of course!” and he was able to finish the game with DCE and Mewtwo EX he got from the Portrait-Collector.
1-2(9-4)

From an another certain 2-0 to a 1-2 loss. That’s how I felt after the game. I wished Tom good luck for the rest of the tournament and wasn’t that mad about the loss because in the end, the better player won. I should’ve known at that point of the games that he didn’t have a N in his deck but because I didn’t see one during the games I couldn’t be 100% certain about it. I lost the game pretty much due the loss of the 4^th round and the fear that I lived with through the games. I also felt like my deck has a lot more to give because I had controlled all the games I played almost completely. I’m pretty sure that only deck’s that can stand a chance against this kind of Celebi build is a deck that is able to get 3 Mewtwo EX attacking during the game. I would have loved to play more games with this against international opponent’s but it just wasn’t my day.

I’m used to losing due bad luck and not to my own mistakes but I’m very happy that this was “only” ECC, I made this big mistake. If it had been Nationals or Worlds, I wouldn’t have been this easy on myself. However, I learnt from this mistake and am sure not to make it in the future. I still need to perfect my game and that’s something what keeps me playing – if I couldn’t develop as a player, there would be no point of playing.

After the match, I just watched the games of other Finnish players. Heikki from Seniors managed to place in to top8 of the tournament and Jouni – as mentioned earlier – reached the 3^rd place in the tournament losing to the tournament winner David Booij in top4.


Conclusion

The tournament was great fun, I was happy with my result and the whole team Finland’s result. It was great meeting everyone from all over Europe and it was nice hearing from all of you guys that came to talk to me and said great things about my blog! I heard that many players were asking about how do I look like and almost every opponent of my big brother asked him if I was his brother. I’m not used to be a well-known player but nonetheless it’s always more encouraging hearing good things about my writings IRL than on the internet so thanks a lot for everyone who came to talk to me! I’ll be in ECC next year for sure if nothing radical happens and I’ll be looking forward to seeing you everyone there once again next year! Of course, there is Worlds before the next ECC and I’ll hopefully see some of you there as well.

In the end some pros and cons from the tournament:

Pros:

+ I did well
+ Meeting everyone
+ The deck worked well, the player didn’t
+ I still have things to learn
+ Celebi won the tournament
+ The drastically versatile metagame
+ Tournament organizers and judges (especially Hapé who made all this possible!)
+ Team Finland doing very well (especially Heikki, Jouni, Isto and Anni)
+ All in all, a fantastic trip
+ Lidl cookies
+ You for reading my blog

Cons:

-/+ I lost to my own misplay (and a coin flip, lol)
- One hundred grammar errors and typos this report has


Thanks for reading and feel free to leave any comments!