10 years of competitive TCG: The failed experiment of PUI

Hello everyone!


Today I’m doing my most controversial entry of the 10-years of competitive TCG –series.

One of my favorite cards EVER.

However, I’ll leave all the names and too sensitive information out of this entry to avoid as much controversy as possible. Today, I’ll be discussing my -and only - my point of view about the 2006-2007 season and you’ll see that the season was not only the worst and most controversial out of all the seasons in the history of this game, but also the season when I was probably at the top of my game.

I have had a decent amount of controversy in my blog the previous weeks, so I wanted to just get this out of the way as soon as possible, so I don’t have to concentrate on controversy as The Deck Out is going to start a new chapter in its existence VERY soon (what might that mean??). The 2006-2007 season is also the season I am most disappointed of and it’s good to notice that all the things in this entry are only my own opinions – not absolute facts. I also hope to hear from the players that played this season that how YOU experienced the season and did you encounter the things I encountered during the season.

Anyways, before reading this, you MUST read the previous years in order to know how I ended up here and what has affected my attitude. Click below to read the previous parts.


- 2004
- 2005
- 2006


A quick recap of where we are now. It’s autumn 2006. I am 15-years old and just failed in the World Championships in my first year in Masters by going 3-5 with the same deck as Jason K used to win Worlds. I was hungry for success since over 300 hours of playtesting (and my whole summer had gone in vain). Miska Saari had also just become the first non-US or Japanese World Champion. Pokémon TCG is booming in Finland thanks to our great Local Distributor and OP Admin, the game is growing all the time. The final needed boost was Miska’s World Championships victory, which blew up the attendance in leagues all around Finland. On the other hand, I had almost succeeded in destroying the Hyvinkää league and we only had 7 attendees per week. However, my big brother finally came back from Germany and was ready to save our league. Will he succeed and what makes this season the most controversial ever?

The failed experiment of PUI

The season got a REAL interesting kickstart as it was revealed that World Championships will be held on Hawaii for the first time ever. On top of that, only 60 invites will be awarded for players around the world (the rest 4 will be awarded in the LCQ) and only 64 players can attend Worlds per age group. And how were the invites and travel awards distributed? With Nationals victories and…ELO RANKING!!!! In Europe the top4 of each age group in Elo Ranking got the travel award. As Finland still had a relatively small Masters division compared to other countries, it would be virtually impossible for anyone to get the travel award unless they win like 97% of the games that season. Well…. Challenge accepted! Of course we also had National Championships, where we could get the travel award and invite (for the winner), but the ELO ranking was my number one goal.

When PUI released the info, I though it wouldn’t be a bad thing. It rewarded those who played and did the best. At that point, I didn’t know it was the worst decision ever made by PUI and I’m sure they didn’t understand the impact of their decision either at this point. In the end, distributing the travel awards with Elo Rankings proved to be the wrong decision, but why? That I’ll explain later on.



Hyvinkää league rises

Meanwhile in Hyvinkää my big brother had returned to be the league leader and quickly thanks to Miska’s success, he got the league back on track. In the 2^nd week of the league, the player base had increased from 7 to 14. After that it was over 20, and in just a month our league had over 30 players who would come every single week. It’s crazy how much one GOOD league leader can affect the popularity of a league. We always joked that every city in Finland should have one Isto (my big brother’s name) and we would have over 1000 active players in Finland! The funniest part is that it’s the truth…

Pokémon TCG has endless potential as there are so many children who buy the cards, but don’t even know you can play with them. All they need is a league leader “good” enough and they will be sucked into game. It was very easy for Isto to “sell” the game as well as the Miska was a recent World Champion and he could tell story about the prize money of 7,500 dollars etc. In my opinion, my big brother is the most fluent and convincing speaker I have ever met – a complete opposite of me that is.


Tournament season and the pressure

Now to the second most depressing part of the season – the playing! I played the first two CCs (there were no autumn BRs back then) with Flygon d EX/Eeveelution and won both of them by only losing once. And the person who I lost to was obviously the soon-to-become World Champion Tom Roos. After that I switched to MetaNite, which I played THE REST OF THE SEASON.

MetaNite is easily the most techable, consistent and BEST deck I have ever played. I modified it differently for every tournament, because the metagame in each tournament was different. I had enormous success with it during the season, but before I get to that, here’s the skeleton, which I used in all of the tournaments I played.

Pokémon:

4x Beldum d
2x Metang d
3x Metagross d
1x Metagross (EX DEOXYS)
3x Dratini
1x Dragonair
3x Dragonite
4x Holon’s Castform
1x Treecko d
1x Sceptile EX d (the best card ever)
2-3x Mew* d/Mew d(Promo)/Latios EX/Lugia EX
=25-26


Trainer:

4x Holon Transceiver
3-4x Holon Mentor
1x Holon Adventurer
1x Holon Scientist
1x Holon Farmer
4x Rare Candy
1x Switch
1x Warp Point
2x Windstorm
1x Holon Ruins
=18



Energy:

4x Special Metal Energy
9x Lighting Energy
1x Holon’s Voltorb
=15


The deck was so consistent that I never doubted if I had a good opening or not. I KNEW I wouldn’t ever draw into rubbish and from all the 72 games I played that season; I only had a few bad opening hands (which most were still winnable). It wasn’t the most difficult deck to play, but I can say I mastered the deck so well that I have never ever played any deck as well as MetaNite that season.

But how well did I play? VERY well.

I continued to have a lot of success and in just 4 or 5 tournament, I were leading Tom with over 200 Elo Ranking points. However, soon I realized, I couldn’t lose a single game, because I dominated Finnish players so much. If I ever lost to a mediocre player, I would lose 30 points, whereas if I won them I would get only 6-12 points. It was a real uphill battle as the Finnish player base in Masters wasn’t as big as the rest of the European’s player base.

However, thanks to my unbelievable success with MetaNite I could hold on to the 2^nd and 3^rd spot of the rankings when I was 32-1 in my games played that season. However, I couldn’t afford losing a single game. If I ever did, I would drop out of top4. Well, eventually in one Hyvinkää City Championships, I did lose my second game of that season. Thankfully it was to Tom, who was 2^nd in rankings, so I didn’t lose that many points. I can’t really describe how distressed I was playing the whole season during a huge pressure. Playing wasn’t fun anymore, because in all the games I played I only had one goal – to win. Losing wasn’t an option. And this continued through the whole season. It wasn’t fun, believe me. It pretty much reflects the game all around the world. This year we saw more drops and concedes than ever in the game even in tournaments like the U.S. Nationals. The points system wasnt' healthy.

Later on in the tournament season I faced one Finnish player in top8 of States Championships, who had something like 1500 Elo ranking points. I got 3 horrible opening hands in a row and lost the game 1-2. I would have lost my chance to Elo ranking trip with that loss, but as she was a good friend of mine, he gave me the win. At that point I understood how flawed the system was. All the top4 players who would get the Elo trip, will get autowins from people who didn’t want to take away their points. I know this happened all over the world and there was a lot of discussion about whether conceding a game was a right thing to do or not. What made things very difficult for me was that Tom didn’t for some reason want to scoop me the games even though he admitted I was the only one from Finland who would have a shot with the rankings. Of course it was his decision and thankfully I only lost him once during the time I knew I would be the only one who would be able to get the trip with Elo in Finnish Masters. Masters indeed…

Finnish Nationals 2007

I decided to sit out Finnish Nationals, because I wanted to give the travel award from Nationals to someone else (which would probably be Tom as he was easily the 2^nd best player in Finland at that time and back then skill mattered a LOT more than nowadays), so I judged the Nationals. I had a blast judging and Tom not-so-surprisingly won Masters. I was happy for him as he was from Hyvinkää league as well. However, our Juniors and Seniors players who had the Elo invite bombed in the Nationals big time. Some players who already had the trip went 3-4 and due to the harshness of the system, they lost their invites and travel awards, because of playing badly in that one tournament. It was a sad tournament for many Seniors and Juniors from Finland. Miska was in top4 of the Nationals once again, but conceded to the winner of the tournament in top4, because he already had the trip to Worlds thanks to his Worlds victory last year.



The master plan breaks down

So, I was 2^nd in Elo Rankings when the season after Nationals ended. The only player above me was Arco Oliemans from The Netherlands, who had the most Elo ranking points I have ever seen in Masters. However, I believe he got them fair and square. There were also two Danish guys if I remember correctly with me in the top4. I had a nice gap to 5^th place, so I would be guaranteed to get the trip no matter what happens. However, the unexpected happened… The master plan I was aware of broke down and I was the only one who suffered from it.

Finnish tournaments had ghost players. An unknown person contacted PUI about this and they contacted our main TO about this. It was illegal (of course), so Finland got punished by that. Premier tags were taken away from 3 tournaments, where the ghost players were. In the end, the only person who suffered about this was me, because I was the only one who didn’t have a HUGE gap to the other players.

Even after the punishment, I still was 3^rd in the Rankings, so I had the invite and the travel award. All the Nationals were played, so I was safe, right? Well, someone disagreed. There were Battle Roads after Nationals with K-rating of 32 (same as City Championships K-rating) and the two Danish players rose in front of me in points. We had only 2 Battle Roads after Nationals, so I was at disadvantage especially since Tom didn’t want to attend the tournaments, because he didn’t want me to get any use out of his points. And then the unexpected happened.

An unnamed person started his HUGE rise in the ELO-ranking points after Nationals. I think he had something like 1700 points after Nationals, but suddenly started to get 100 points per each Battle Road. It was something, I did not expect and before I realised it, he was above me in points as he had suddenly won all the games after Nationals in the Battle Roads he played. The funny part of this was that his dad a TO of most of these tournaments…  And as much as I would like to think he just got lucky, I know that isn’t the truth. Also, don’t bother searching for his name, because I don’t think he is active anymore and you can’t find it from Pokemon.com either.

Well, as we discussed with the main TO of Finland about the situation, we tried to sanction more Battle Roads in Finland and didn’t succeed. This left me with no invite or travel award after a season, where I couldn’t lose a single game and had huge pressure in every single game.  I went 56-2 in my season’s games that season and what did I get? The bitter 5^th place in rankings and nothing else.  

I cursed what happened and contacted PUI about this. Dave was nice and understanding and replied me that they would look into problem of having Battle Roads after Nationals next year. They did change it the season after, but it didn’t help me now. And those who don’t understand why Battle Roads shouldn’t be after Nationals with ELO-rank, the reason is this: people who have done well in the Nationals have a lot of points and they can pretty much GIVE the points to the players who need them the most. I know for fact that this happened at least in two countries and suspect that it happened everywhere where players had still a chance for the ranking trip, but of course I don’t know it for sure. Since Tom didn’t even want to play in our Battle Roads after Nationals, because he didn’t want me to get the trip to Worlds (I don’t know why, because I pretty much gave him the win and travel award from Nationals), I was at huge disadvantage and lost the trip.

I had just worked my butt off the whole season, played as well as I could and had given someone else to have a chance at the second trip from our Nationals and what did I get? A huge dissapointment and no support from the fellow Masters (especially Tom who got the trip from Nats). As I was only 16-years old back then, I think you can believe how awful and confused I felt. Lesson learned.

Anyways, I knew the player who got the sudden rise in Elo Rankings wasn’t that good and hadn’t played that well during the season. I knew that there were at least 100 players in Europe who would have deserved the trip more than he did. Prior to Worlds I joked that at least I know who will go 0-6 in the World Championships. Well, whaddya know…



2^nd Finnish World Champion!


I didn’t really feel like playing Pokémon obviously in the summer, but went to the Miska Camp of course. I playtested with everyone and Tom visited the camp as well. I played against him with my Mewtric/Eeveelutions rogue and was able to beat him 3 times in a row when he was playing the Absolutions deck. He asked me to show my own Absolutions list, becaause of this, which I did and well… he copypasted it. If you want to see my Absolutions list, you can just check the list from the Worlds booklet. It’s card-by-card the list I gave to Tom and which he used to win Worlds, lol.

Anyways, after Miska camp I just waited for Worlds to come. The time difference to Hawaii is 12 hours from Finland, but didn’t’ stop me. I was awake during the Swiss and top cut of the tournament and asked my big brother for information (he was the Finnish translator). Miska was playing a crazy rogue and had made it all the way to the top8 once again! What I was shocked about was that Tom was in top8 as well with the Absolutions. However, after Miska lost in top8 when not drawing into energy in 8 turns (yes, the games were slower back then) and Tom beat Yamato in top4, I lost my faith into humanity and went to sleep. And after I woke up, Tom had won Worlds! Good for him, frustrating for me.

Some of you may remember the 400-elo ranking rise guy, who got the 4^th trip from Europe. Want to know what happened to him? Well he went 1-5!!! And guess who did he beat? *drumrolls* a BYE!!! Seriously! I didn’t know whether to cry or laugh when I saw his results from Worlds, because I knew he didn’t deserve the trip and that he was a worse than a mediocre player, but as he and his dad beat the system, at least they got a nice free Hawaii vacation. Well, good for them and as the system was flawed I can’t really blame them for exploiting the holes, because there was so much rules breaking all over the world.

Moral of the story: When life gives you lemons, you can try to make grape juice out of them, but sometimes it just does not take the bitterness away.



So, this was probably the most chaotic entry and year of mine so far (and the grammar is horrible), but I think it pretty much strongly I feel about this season. I am happy that I got finally a chance to write about it since even though it doesn’t really bother me anymore (it’s been 6 years already), writing always helps me clear my thoughts. And believe me, I wanted to get this season out of my system as quickly as possible.

Anyways, in hindsight, this season had more positive things into it than negative things. I really grew up and understood the realities of life since I was just a teenager back then. As a person, I believe this season helped me to grow up the most. And in the end, a second World Champion from Finland was a GREAT thing even though I didn’t feel good about it back then. Finland was officially one of the most competitive countries in the world and everyone recognized this, because winning Worlds in Masters is a huge deal. But what would have happened to me in the Worlds since I had an unbelievable track record during that year and “even” Tom was able win Worlds? I knew I was at the top of my game that year. Would I have become a World Champion instead of Tom? That I doubt, but I’m sure I would have done extremely well. And since the season was very skill-intensive I can sincerely say that Tom deserved the win, because he beat a lot of good players along the way.  

Ok, so the past two seasons had been HUGE disappointments for me Pokémon TCG-wise. Will the gods of Pokémon TCG ever smile to me? I really started to doubt that at this point of my playing career, but as always, I was proven to be extremely wrong right next year… But more about that in my next entry! I'm also glad to inform that rest of the entries will be mostly with positive tone and that this season was the only season when I was disappointed at virtually everything considering Pokémon TCG.




Conclusion


This time the entry wasn’t as long as usually, but I knew the grammar was so bad and it was probably a bit painful to read that probably the short length is only a good thing. I hope I was able no to offend anyone and those of you who didn’t play that season really understood the big problem with the PUI’s experiment. I’m glad they learned quickly and the invitation and points system has been developing ever since.

I can’t wait to write about the next year, and I hope you enjoyed this one too even if it was a bit confusing at times. Feel free to ask anything or everything about the season and this entry and I would love to hear from the European players who played back then, did you see anything questionable anywhere and how often did you see players conceding to each other (I believe too often).

Thanks for reading!


P.S. Miska camp is this weekend so look for photos once again next week!