Since I'm turning 30 this year, I thought why not create a few Top 30 lists of things that I like or have done so I've done a few list that covers my interest in just about anything, be it Motorsports, Pokemon, Wrestling, Gaming and also some general things.
Most of you reading this probably know me from playing the Pokemon Trading Card Game (most likely from these online events too) and hearing about these tourney graphic reports I share with the rest or the stuff I do for Pokestats but that's not all I've done in the game. Ok, I've not really done much, there's still more to do but I've only gotten back into the game. It's been 4 years since I went to the Evolutions Pre-Release and it's been fun the whole way ever since.
Sure the current pandemic means most are taking a break but not me, I have to keep training, keep improving, keep playing, all to better myself so when IRL games are back, I can be fighting for wins in big tournaments. But how about a little stroll down memory lane for today, most of these aren't really ranked, just wanted to share 30 moments I've had from the game, (the top 10 and the first few ones are the only one ranked).
#30 - The Start
The game released back in 1998 and I was already into Pokemon from the first Gen, playing Red/Blue, watching the anime so of course when I found out there were cards, I just had to get them too. Gotta collect them all right?
And of course, one of my first holo cards was the Hitmonlee from Fossil set and if you don't know, Hitmonlee is one of my favourite Pokemon of all time. I tried to make a deck out of it and Gengar back then. Still one of my most treasured cards I have with me.
#29 - Addicted to the Game Boy Pokemon Trading Card Game
And to help my obsession with the game, GameBoy released their own version of Pokemon TCG. I played it way too much, I'll be the first to admit it. Sadly it was just the original 3 sets but that was good enough for me since those were the ones I was more interested in anyway. I liked the game so much I've bought it in my Nintendo 3DS and hopefully someday it'll be on the Switch too. I still do plan to play it whenever I feel bored.
#28 - Pulling a Shiny Pokemon!
I preferred playing the game (and still do) but of course the concept of buying single cards was alien to 10-year old Kash so of course I'd keep wasting money on buying packs (mostly Pokemon TCG and WWE Raw Deal). My biggest pull was Shiny Kabutops from Neo Destiny. Pulling a holo foil doesn't often happen but pulling a Shiny was super rare. My friends and I went crazy when I pulled it, we'd never seen a Shiny pokemon card before. I still have it with me!
It was the most rarest card I ever pulled until this happened...
#27 - Interested Again
I stopped playing the game back in 2003 to focus on my studies, not playing or collecting for a good 14 years. Main reason I stopped was because I couldn't find a league or a shop to play with others nor did I have the money to buy the good cards so I didn't feel there was any point to continue.
I did get the bug for the game back around 2014 with the new Pokemon Trading Card Game online, playing it and then forgot about it for a while. Then I visited my brother in Japan. I was still into the Pokemon video game but visiting some shops, I saw Pokemon cards and saw this Mega Charizard EX and thinking to myself, "wow cards sure have changed, they look interesting. Maybe I should get back into this hobby." And I did.
#26 - Back to Buying Cards
Once I got back to Singapore, one of the first few things I did was to check where I could get my hands on Pokemon cards and sure enough, I bought a starter deck to get myself started and a few packs. My brother and I started playing around with our starter decks and we had a lot of fun with it. It became a weekly thing for me to buy 2 packs a week. And then finding boxes to buy, then Elite Trainer Boxes and even more collection boxes. I probably should not have spent so much money on them.
Not sure how but I still have the very first picture of me playing the game with my brother after we both got back into it. I had to buy the Noivern theme deck as it had Gengar in it, since it was one of my favourites.
#25 - First Ever Tournament - Evolutions Pre-Release - 29th October 2016
I came cross one of the websites that were selling the cards advertising this event called a Pre-Release for the new Evolutions set (which also happens to be one of the reasons why I got back into the game, I wanted to collect some of these cards that were re-made from my childhood). This was a fun new experience, and right off the bat I got the Charizard promo which I was really happy about since Charizard is one of my favourites after all.
I went onto YouTube to find out what to expect, got myself some sleeves, some coins, some dices and I was ready. I met a few people there, played some games but mostly had fun. I was hooked onto the game after that and I would not miss a Pre-Release after that until Rebel Clash with the pandemic going around and me not risking my health for games.
#24 - First Real Tournament
From my pre-release, I kept in contact with one of my opponents who I met in the Sun and Moon Pre-Release too. He invited me to join his shop as he was hosting an in house tournament. At this point, I didn't really have a proper deck but I still wanted to know what it would feel like to play in one. At this point, I was fully into playing PTCGO and I had built a few fun decks so of course I went around to look for cards I needed, found a few shops that had it and boom, I was fully into the game now. Things were never the same.
As for the tourney, I didn't expect much since everyone had proper top decks while I had my own Gengar deck that I created, not knowing if it's good or not but it was the only thing I had. I couldn't afford to just go out and buy top decks as I didn't have the budget nor did I have the knowledge of what the top decks were, I didn't have those information unlike the newer players. I did alright considering my lack of experience and having a rouge deck, taking 2 wins out of my 5 games, one of them was me beating the Zygarde EX deck and that dude had been the top seed for most of the day. I was way out of my league but I still had fun, I wanted more!
#23 - First Booster Box
So this was a mistake. Sure I wanted to know what it was like to get a booster box and crack packs too but I've learnt to know that spending $160 hoping to pull good cards is just a waste of money when I can use that money to get exactly what I wanted.
Sun & Moon base set is still one of only two booster boxes I've ever bought, with Sword & Shield base set being the other since it was new and I thought why not. I don't think I'll be buying any more booster boxes, I'm not making enough money to go that route and I'd rather just buy what I need.
#22 - First Tournament Win - Qishan Weekly - 27th October 2017
I started playing in Weekly in house tournament from May onwards and almost exactly one year on from the first time I played Pokemon TCG in any manner in a proper setting, I got my first tournament win. It was just a three round swiss, but it was nice to finally get that 3-0 score after trying so many times. Gardevoir-GX was big during this time so I went with my main deck for that period, Metagross-GX but with a new partner is the newly released Zoroark-GX!
It was cool to win with my own creation as I'm pretty sure Zoroark and Metagross has never been played together but anyone else. My thinking was Metagross always lacked a draw supporter and Zoroark could help in different matches and I wouldn't need DCE too. And it worked, giving me my first ever tournament win. Was nice to finally win one!
#21 - First Big Result - Singapore SPE 2018, 26th out of 74 players - 9th June 2018
At this point, I was still considered a newbie to the game, having played in just one big tourney before this event, that being last year's SPE where I showed up with Yveltal-EX in a Decidueye-GX meta, yup I was way out of my league.
This time around, I had my new favourite deck, Ultra Necrozma-GX with Malamar. And it worked quite nicely, giving me a 4-3 score which I was pretty happy with as I wasn't expecting to get more wins than losses going into the event. Sadly we didn't get 100+ players if not I would have scored my first CP but I was still happy with my best showing to date.
#20 - First Championship Point scored - September League Challenge, 7th out of 24 players - 22nd September 2018
It took me almost 2 years into the game to finally score my first Worlds Championship Points and it came in the first League Challenge of the new 2018-2019 rotation. I had been working on Zygarde-GX mostly leading up to the rotation and felt good going into it.
A 3-2 score was enough to get me my first CP but it could have been better, I should have gone 4-1 but got really unlucky in my last game whiffing the win and the card I needed, as usual, was the very next card I would have drawn into. Didn't feel nice when my opponent started laughing at me after he saw that, because that was a game he didn't need to win since he was a junior and all he did was take away 2 points from me.
#19 - First Final - PokeBeach Monthly Tournament - September 2018, 2nd out of 98 players
A week after getting my first CP, I got into my first finals ever. It was an online event, the old PokeBech Monthly Tournament (which would morph into the JGB series which now has become the Atlas Series), and I was rocking Zygarde-GX again, still with my own creation with interesting techs like Tapu Koko and Magcargo.
It turned out to be an all Zygarde final and I bricked in both games, giving my opponent the easiest of wins. I was still happy to go 5-1-1 in Swiss, one of my best records to date and I was just happy that my own creation could make it into the finals of a brand new rotated format. And hey I got a mention on Pokebeach!
#18 - Collecting Japanese Cards
Yes I was a collector too, not so much these days but if anything, I would rather collect Japanese cards, they just look way better than the ones we get. I have spent a decent amount on singles while I was in Tokyo, including a certain Shiny Charizard-GX because why not? I will continue to collect their cards, and they do tend to get some exclusive rares like this Blue's Tactic with Charmander on it!
Let's not forget, they do tend to get some special reprint sets where you can get two GXes or Ultra Rares in one pack or even sets where an Ultra Rare is a gurantee, now I don't mind spending money for a pack with those odds! Way more fun to collect than the usual English set and it's a lot cheaper too.
#17 - First time winning money from the game - Singapore Pro Circuit Invitational, 4th out of 32 - 22nd December 2018
I had scored a few good results in these Invitationals before but never one where the stakes were this big, with Top 4 guaranteed $50! During this time I was caught in the middle of two Stage 2 decks, Gardevoir-GX with Ninetales-GX and Zoroark-GX/Decidueye-GX with Ninetales-GX.
ZDT was one of the more skillful deck to play so I wanted to challenge myself to get a decent result with it and I went 5/2/0 in Swiss, beating Malamar in Top 8 before losing to BuzzRoc in Top 4 in a game I could have won. Still, winning $50 just from enjoying my hobby of playing Pokemon cards was a nice reward
#16 - Winning Tourneys with a Rouge Deck
Winning tournaments is nice but winning with a rogue deck is just that bit special and that one deck that kept giving me that satisfaction was Charizard TEU. I had played it to two top 8 finishes in Weekly before winning the tournament in my 3rd event with it. The very next day, I repeated that win, going 3-0 with it again!
Charizard TEU is still my all time favourite rouge deck to play. I liked it so much I piloted it to two Top 8 finishes in two different Singapore Pro Circuit invitational, one of them was a Top 4 finish and a semi-final match I should have won but had the worst hand in that game and we had agreed to do just one game and I got donked. I would end up taking 3 tourney wins with it and it was my second most winningest deck of that rotation with 36 wins, one behind Zygarde-GX.
#15 - Joining the PokeStats crew
As someone who is a super stats and number lover, when I saw PokeStats looking for new members to help them out, I had to jump in! Easily the best decision I've made. I've done my part for the crew, so much so people are now knowing me as the Pokestats guy.
The whole gang have made me feel welcomed for someone who is not part of any of their social circles before this. I've learnt a lot about the game from this games too, anytime I needed advice, they were there to offer it. It's not an official team like other pro teams but who needs a team when you have the Stats Gang! I can even say some of these guys are like brothers to me. So to Tate, Luke, Erik, Scott, Christian, Victor, Brian, Alec, Jared, Jeremy, Erin, Bart, Jesper, Kiernan, Will and Carl, thanks for putting up with me and helping this nobody out when no-one else would and when you didn't even need to.
#14 - First Finals in a day-long Tournament (Sunday Open - 5th July 2020, 2nd out of 154 Players)
By this point, I have made finals of tournaments a few times but not in a day-long tournament so this was something new. I had been playing in the British-based Sunday Open for quite some time, joining in on the fun after 3 or 4 weeks in and made two top 8 cuts in my first four events. But I just couldn't make it past top 4 until this event.
This was a long tournament. First we had to do a 6 round swiss in the first phase followed by a 4 round swiss in the second phase for the top 16 in first phase and after that, a top 4 cut. I barely got in at 16th for the first round with a 4-2 record with my Dragapult deck. Second phase went much better, going 3-1, with my last round being against one of the best players in the world in Azul Garcia Griego. Beating him to that top 4 spot felt surreal, my first real big win against a top name.
Top 4 went brilliantly for me and then the finals happened. I got paired against Arceus & Diagla & Palkia-GX/Zacian V which is a good matchup for me as I played no Dedenne-GX or any 2-prize support pokemon. The problem is that he played 4 Crushing Hammers. And he hit all 4 hammers. And to think I still almost beat him with those kind of odds. His last hammer was the final nail in the coffin. My hatred for Crushing Hammer started here.
#13 - 1st place in circuits (Locally and Online)
One thing I might be known for is being that guy who shows up for every tourney, be it locally or online. I just enjoy the game too much to spend most of my time playing in it, even when the format doesn't feel good, especially the current one where ADPZ/Eternatus/Hammers makes it too luck based. But I'm still playing in every tournament possible, mainly to improve myself. I don't have a team or a test group so these tourney games are my version of testing games anyway.
And it's always a reward feeling to see my name near the top of a circuit, be it the Singapore Pro Circuit, the Hegster Season 2 series or even the current PokeStats Online Tourney standings. I'll keep working hard to make sure I'm there purely on merit, I need to learn how to win tournaments now to keep my dream of making it to the World Championship a reality one day. I do like competiton, I'm a natural born racer so I'm always trying to be the first guy across the line, whether I'm good or not, I have to try my best so topping these standings are always a nice feeling.
There was this one time where I finished a circuit in 1st place and it had been set that the person who finished 1st would win a Worlds 2019 Dice Set, which I though was cool but I never really intended to win that but after a few good results, I found myself in 1st place and I just kept grinding until I ended that circuit in 1st with a shiny new dice set from the previous Worlds championship. I still have not opened it up yet!
#12 - Travelling to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for my first Regional - 22nd December 2019
After a long time playing, one of the few things I had not done yet was playing in a Regional and I just could not pass up the chance to play in this one even though the timing was tricky as it was scheduled to happen one day before I flew off for Japan for my New Year's/30th Birthday trip.
It was cool to travel to an event for once, staying in a hotel, self testing and just relaxing for the most part. I made the mistake of thinking I could make my rogue deck work (Charizard TEU) when I should have just gone with the safe choice of Mewtwo & Mew-GX. I went 3-4-2, my four losses being mostly ADP/Keldeo, which I thought was a good matchup but I was completely wrong.
#11 - Featured in "Worlds" POG stream with a Rouge Deck
This one was a really cool moment as I was not expecting this to happen. With the Worlds Championship cancelled, a number of tourney organisers came together to create an online World Championship and of course, I had to get in on the fun! I started the day off 2-1 with my Dragapult VMAX deck, hoping to make my risky meta-call work and sadly it didn't.
But I was featured on stream in Round 4 against my good friend Kyle Vincent Imperial from the Philippines with his own rouge choice of Mewtwo & Mew-GX/Malamar toolbox, for sure a matchup no-one was expecting to see. I got super lucky in the end to top deck the one card I needed to win the game.
#10 - Making New Friends
I'm not kidding but I can't even count how many friends I have made just from being in this new hobby of mine, not just locally but internationally too. After all, the whole idea of playing Pokemon is to meet up with friends and to make new ones too right?
Also, people can say all they want about online tournaments being unimportant, useless and pointless but for me, if it wasn't for these online tournaments, I would not have made the friends I have had in the last few months! It doesn't matter where they're from, locally or international, be it from America, Canada, UK, Brazil, Chile, Phillipines, Iceland, Germany, Norway, Japan and anywhere else you can possibly think of, I've gotten to know so many good people from all around the world, all with the same passion of enjoying Pokemon TCG.
From playing in the PokeBeach tourney to the JGB tourney, the Hegster tourneys, the Sunday Open tourneys, the PokeX tourney and everything else in between, I have made way too many friends than I really should, especially for someone who has always had trouble talking to people or making friends growing up so the lot of you, thank you, it's been fun and let's keep having fun! Here's to meeting new friends and making more in the future, and I really do want to travel over to the UK/USA/Canada to meet some of my friends there in a future tournament.
Also a side note, I'm glad everyone is enjoying the tournament graphic results I have been putting out for online tournaments, a lot of guys have made it their mission to be on it and I'm just happy whenever someone says it's cool to see themselves in one of it. I'm just glad that I can help make things easier for everyone and make their day. I've done this graphics before for my local scene and no-one gave a shit about it so it's nice to see that others in the online world are actually liking it and my hard work is paying off.
#9 - Travelling to Melbourne, Australia for my first International & playing against the defending World Champion at OCIC League Challenge
Travelling the border was nice but travelling overseas for a tournament was something completely new. My last major event before the 2020 season was suspended was the Oceania International Championships, one of the 4 biggest tournaments in the entire season. I had been playing to finally make the trip to test myself against the best players in the world.
That entire week was fun, the event being held in Melbourne was icing on the cake as I have been to Melbourne 3 times before, all for the F1 race. And this was my first ever solo trip which was cool. I picked the right deck, going with my usual Fire Box but I had no luck in my games, going 3-5-1 which hurt as I had put so much time for this event only to go home with nothing to show for it. I did have fun overall, meeting many familiar faces and making new friends. I just wished Asian players were still allowed to compete in future Internationals as I really wanted to make the trip to NAIC in the future.
(editor's note, this was meant to be a separate entry but a last minute addition meant I'm combining these two together)
Speaking of OCIC, maybe my favourite moment came in Round 3 of the most stacked League Challenge I've ever seen. Names included Pedro Torres, Isaiah Bradner, Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi and the defending World Champion himself Henry Brand so imagine my reaction when I found out I got paired against him in Round 3.
He was playing his interesting version of Mewtwo & Mew-GX with Sogaleo-GX, and he mentioned that he had matched me with online in a game before, that's where I've seen this deck! I remember seeing someone play it and thinking, wow this is a cool version of the deck.
What's even more amazing, I somehow managed to get the win here. And better yet, he was complimenting me on how I approached that game which was one of the biggest confidence boosters anyone could get, coming from the Champion himself!
#8 - Winning Atlas Mini Tournament with a deck I wasn't familiar with, 1st out of 52 Players - 21st October 2020
So this was added in just as I was about to post my list up because as of this morning, I won the latest Atlas DAA Mini 11 tournament, which was my first online tourney win featuring best of 3 swiss rounds on a daily basis instead of the usual best of 1 all day tourney.
What made this win that bit special was that I won it with Eternatus VMAX (the poison variant), a deck that I had little to no practice going into that tournament and I picked it only because I thought it looked more interesting and more fun to play than the usual Eternatus VMAX.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/776573414
So I was learning how to play the deck on the go along with testing it on a daily basis on PTCGO, and I was pretty proud of the outcome, as I had to beat a number of bad matchups to take that win, especially in the finals against Blacephalon and also beat LucMet in Swiss, a deck that is traditionally one of Eternatus' worst matchup. So it proves that I can win tournaments with different decks as well!
#7 - Winning back to back Japanese online Tournaments
These days I'm usually in tournaments that don't fit my timezone, either I have to get up really early for the American/Latin tourneys or stay up late for the European tourneys. So when I found out that outsiders were allowed to join in for the fun of the Japanese Kai Cup hosted by Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi, I jumped at the chance of playing in it. I've always said Japanese players, in my own view, are probably the most skilled of any region out there so this was a nice chance for to test again their best. They're the most fun to play against too, never any issue and always very nice.
So to win one was pretty cool but going back-to-back tournament wins was even better. The first one I won with my own version of Centiskorch VMAX which at that point I felt hadn't gotten much respect but this win caught the eye of even the legend himself Azul GG. The biggest eye catcher was playing two Eldegoss V which I don't think anyone had done before that and it won me so many games.
And how could I top that off? By winning the next tournament with a deck many considered dead on arrival of Eternatus VMAX, yes I got Dragapult VMAX a win in a Darkness Ablaze format! I built the deck around trying to beat Vikavolt and some stall stuff and it paid off really nicely, I did end up meeting and beating two different versions of Stall/Control decks.
#6 - Sunday Open Winner - 1st out of 140 players, 13th September 2020
So you saw on post #14 how much it hurt me to lose that final of the Sunday Open so I made it my mission for redemption when the Sunday Open resumed. This format was a one time thing too, the one and only time we did a 10-round Swiss format to see how it'd go (went on quite long) but it went perfectly for me, going 9-1-0 in Swiss, ending it in 1st place going into top cut.
Top cut went near perfect for me, 2-0 win vs Deci Goon in Top 8, the techs coming in handy in this tricky matchup, 2-0 vs Greens Pika and then winning the mirror Centiskorch matchup in the finals. Second game was a disaster for me as I couldn't get anything going but the 3rd was just brilliant.
I refused to attack my opponent, simply focusing on building my Centiskorch up for a clean one shot on his Centiskorch and with his bench full of support Pokemon. I knew I could easily get the win by going that route as he'd need two turns to build anything up and by then I would have the win and that's how it played out, top draw Boss pretty much sealed that game.
That win felt good, as I stayed up until 6.30am in the morning to ride that wave out, I didn't get much sleep the next day but it sure was worth it to get that big win, my first in the new 2021 rotation. It was also the first time I ever got to put my name first on one of my usual entries for tournaments over on PokeStats.
#5 - League Challenge Winner - PokeBar League Challenge, 1st out of 19 players - 24th August 2019
This one was huge for me. The first big event of the new rotation and just like the year before, I scored CP right off the bat but this one was different as I score the full 15 CP for winning the League Challenge. This was my first big win in the game, as before that the closest I came was 3rd in a League Challenge or 8th in the Singapore SPE.
And it didn't come easy as I had to play against, in my view, one of the best players in the world in Clifton Goh in the final round. He was on PikaRom and I still was on my trusty Turbo ReshiZard but in the same build as the one Tord Reklv piloted to a top 4 finish at Worlds the week before and no-one else in my local area were onto it.
I had always played ReshiZard so it didn't take me long to figure out the new way of playing it. And it felt good to beat a legend like Clifton to get that first big win in Pokemon TCG. It was a funny one too as I KOed my own ReshiZard, hitting into his Siglyph-GX so I could get all six of my energies out of the way for my Victini Prism to clean house the next turn.
#4 - Singapore Circuit Invitational Winner - Summer 2019 Invitational, 1st out of 35 players - August 25th 2019
So how do I top winning my first League Challenge? Winning $162 by taking my first Singapore Pro Circuit Invitiational win 24 hours later. Same TurboZard deck as I used the day before, similar story, the deck just ran super smooth the whole way, ending swiss rounds at 6-0.
And just my luck, this was the one time we trailed an only swiss round format, and since I was the only guy at 6-0, that meant I was the clear cut winner. After coming close so many times, it felt good to finally win one of these. And the 1st placed playmat was a ReshiZard too, how fitting!
#3 - League Cup Top 4 Finish - Project EXT League Cup, 3rd out of 48 players - 12th October 2019
Still my best performance so far in a League Cup and sadly for now, the highest placement I'll get in a League Cup with the new changes. Two months on, still playing Turbo ReshiZard and still kicking it. I did get some funny luck in swiss rounds, getting paired with 4 Gardeon players in a row before sealing my spot in top cut with a win against Malamar, a matchup that can get very tricky.
Both my top cut games were streamed, both being somewhat mirror matches too. The first was TurboZard mixed with Mew3 which I always felt more clunky and it proved in our games. The second was once again the legend himself, Clifton. These were really close games and could have gone either way so I was quite proud of myself that I pushed one of the very best players in our era to his limits and it came down to the last prizes on the last turn of game for both of us, he beat me to the punch here.
#2 - Hegster TCG Top Deck Winner (2 times) - Season 1 Top Deck 26 and Season 2 Top Deck 12
Hegster TCG has become perhaps the biggest daily online tourney out there since the pandemic started and before everyone jumped on the bandwagon, I was already there. In my second event, I managed to get top cut but could never quite get the win until Top Deck 26. I went 3/0/2 in Swiss, and going on to 2-0 all three of my opponents in top cut, first a GreenZard, then the Dragapult mirror and finally PikaRom. So it was nice to finally win an online tournament but the sad part is, no-one really saw it happen as Hegster's stream was cut short as Ethan wanted to practice the new format haha!
I came close to correcting it in the first Top Deck of season 2, playing Dragapult to a 2nd place finish in a format everyone thought Dragapult was dead in. That big moment finally did come in Top Deck 12 of Season 2. I went 6/1/1 in Swiss, only losing to PikaRom and it's silly Hammer luck as usual. My games on top cut went way better than I could have hoped for.
So many times I got the draws I needed to pull off the big combos, beating LucMet first, then Eternatus with the big balls play of putting all my basket into the KO of Eternatus and it paying off and then trying to outsmart DeciGoon in finals and it paying off.
So that win felt so good, as many more people got to see it happen unlike my Sunday Open win, my Kai Cup wins, or my first Hegster win. Even though I made some clear mistaks in those games, I was still proud of how I got myself out of many tricky sitatuins, I still got a lot to learn before I can feel comfortable about challenging for wins on a more regular basis. I'm trying trying to better myself.
#1 - Singapore SPE Top 8 Finisher, 8th out of 75 people - 25th May 2019
And of course, my biggest moment had to be this. So the story goes, I had just finish my exams with little to no testing and practice to prepare myself for the Singapore SPE. I wasn't expecting much either as I had no chance of making it to Worlds unless I somehow won this event and I wasn't really going for points, it was only my first competitive season anyway.
I had already had my mind set on playing Turbo Reshiram & Charizard-GX but I couldn't find the right list until Rukan Shao told me about his list. It was completely different to anything I had seen. It was truly turbo with 3 Dedenne-GX and at that point, no-one had played more than two Dedenne-GX in their decks. Also played just one Jirachi with no Escape Board, something we are now living in.
The event was a weird one, I started out 1/2/0, giving two friends the win as they were both going after their Worlds invite and I didn't really care, I just wanted to play for the fun of it, de-stress myself from exams. And then something amazing happened, I won my next 4 rounds, finishing at 5/2/0 and with results going my way, I snuck into Top 8 of a Regional style event, I never would have guessed that would happen!
My Top 8 game vs Jit Min was a miserable one, I misplayed in the third game and cost myself any chance of a win but to hear him say I played that game really well to the point it got him nervous was a confidence booster, this is one of the best players in the world we're talking about.
That is still my favourite and biggest moment in the Pokemon Trading Card Game so far but of course, I'd like to think that in the future, there'll be more to top this. Even after winning tourneys, my immediate thought is, now to win the next one, don't dwell to much on what has happened in the past. But for this list, I'll make this one exception. Thank you for reading!
