I'll be honest, I wasn't sure if I wanted to finish this. I had been working on this for a few months, in preparation for the Championships this past weekend to look back at the season but it also reminded me of how this season went. But as much as I hate talking about my bad results, it's good to reflect on them and see what went wrong and try to do better and be better next time out. I'll re-cap the Championships event on here as well, which pretty much summed up my season in all fairness.
- Town League 1
- Town League 2
- Town League 4
- Town League 5
- Regional League 2
- Town League 7
- Town League 8
- Regional League 3
- Town League 10
Season Recap
If I was playing in a TPCi circuit, maybe I could have gotten another Worlds invite because I kept scoring points (see here for my friend Jake Gearhart's topic on something similar). He felt as if he got his Worlds invite with mediocre results. That can work there. The problem is, that just doesn't cut it in our system. Even if you're consistently scoring points, that just won't do.
I honestly do feel a bit down on how my season went. I felt like my results, as consistent as they may be, have been quite rubbish. Very mediocre. Nothing to be happy about. I've only got one top 8 result this season and even then, that was because I was the lucky bugger that bubbled in. And the worst part is, I feel like I've played my best this season, even better than last season when I did get my Worlds invite so it's really confusing.
One thing you will notice is, for the most part of the season, I just played Charizard ex decks apart from two events, both with reasons for the change.
Town League 1 (23rd September 2023)
Deck: Lost Zone Box
Result: 23rd/105 (+75 CSP - not counted after hitting BFL)
Score: 5-2
- R1 (W) vs Matthew Lee [3/4/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- R2 (L) vs Lee Jia Sheng Farrell [3/4/0] - Gardevoir ex
- Dead drew this game, too slow to comeback into it
- R3 (W) vs Nuttawat Pipithsuksunt [1/6/0] - Origin Forme Palkia VSTAR
- R4 (L) vs Benjamin Isa Roberts [4/3/0] - Lost Zone Box
- I whiffed a switch out that cost me the game
- R5 (W) vs JohnKRIA [3/4/0] - Lugia VSTAR (Single Strike)
- R6 (W) vs Brandon Yap [3/4/0] - Mew VMAX (DTE)
- R7 (W) vs Edmund Khoo [4/3/0] - Gardevoir ex
Main reason why I played Lost box in this event was because I was on the waitlist, and at #61, I wasn't expecting to get in to play so I just brought whatever deck I had with me just in case. If I had known I had a chance to play, I would have asked my friends to lend me the pieces to play Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex easily.
Town League 2 (8th October 2023)
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 13th/64 (+100 CSP)
Score: 4-2
- R1 (W) vs Hizaruddin Bin Zainal Abidin [2/4/0] - Gengar VMAX
- R2 (W) vs Desmond Ong Shi Jie [3/3/0] - Miraidon ex
- R3 (W) vs Alvin Lim [2/4/0] - Gardevoir ex
- R4 (L) vs Dionsius Lee [5/1/0] - Arceus VSTAR/Alolan Vulpix VSTAR
- Horrible matchup for me since Vulpix walls everything out and having a Charmander prized hurt my plan for that matchup
- R5 (W) vs Bryan Quah [4/2/0] - Lugia VSTAR/Archeops
- I didn't even realise this, I got a win against Singapore's #1 player this season haha!
- R6 (L) vs Kai Wen Ronald Seet [5/1/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- Prizing two Charmanders killed the game for me, I had no real outs since I had a slow start and the first Charmander got KO after Turn 2. Could have still made a comeback if I had taken any of the Charmanders out of the prizes (2 Rods is the way to avoid this)
Town League 3
(Wasn't elected to play in this event)
Deck: -
Regional League 1
(Wasn't elected to play in this event but also because this was the one weekend the whole season I was overseas and it had to happen during this weekend. And I live 10 minutes away from the venue.)
Deck: -
Town League 4 (25th November 2023)
Deck: Charizard ex/Bibarel
Result: 8th/64 (+130 CSP)
Score: 4-2
- R1 (W) vs Chan Yu Yang [3/3/0] - Gholdengo ex
- R2 (W) vs ? - Gardevoir ex
- R3 (W) vs ? - Miraidon ex
- R4 (W) vs Jin Xuan [5/1/0] - Chien-Pao ex/Baxcalibur
- R5 (L) vs Koh Wee Siang [6/0/0] - Lost Zone Box
- Dead draw
- R6 (L) vs Jason Let [5/1/0] - Lost Zone Box
- Another dead draw, had to do a risky play which didn't work
Town League 5 (9th December 2023)
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 14th/64 (+100 CSP)
Score: 4-2
- R1 (W) vs Cui Hongjian [3/3/0] - Gardevoir ex
- R2 (W) vs Zhou Jingsong [2/4/0] - Entei V/Moltres
- R3 (W) vs Lok Wei Ye [2/4/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- R4 (L) vs Fayyadh Salleh [6/0/0] - Lost Zone Box
- Big misplay, didn't bench my Manaphy down early and got punished
- R5 (L) vs Kang Yu Xian [4/2/0] - Lost Zone Box (Radiant Charizard)
- Whiffed a Rare Candy to take the win
- R6 (W) vs Jason Song [3/3/0] - Gardevoir ex
Town League 6
(Wasn't elected to play in this event)
Deck: -
Regional League 2 (3rd February 2024)
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 54th/308 (+100 CSP)
Score: 5-3
- R1 (W) vs Jen [1/7/0] - Wugtrio Mill
- R2 (W) vs Goh Wee Siang Zachary [4/4/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- R3 (W) vs Jin Xuan [4/4/0] - Chien-Pao ex/Baxcalibur
- R4 (W) vs Jordan Lau [5/3/0] - Lost Zone Box (Radiant Charizard)
- R5 (L) vs Jason Song [6/2/0] - Gardevoir ex
- Game went to time, I was convinced I could win first, he said the same, we couldn't figure out who would win and I didn't want to risk a DGL so I just scooped to him on board state
- R6 (L) vs Jefferson Lim [6/2/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- Had a much slower start, TM Devo was my route to comeback but it was still prized when I needed it
- R7 (L) vs Ikuma Ueno [6/2/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- Similar story to last game, couldn't set-up properly. We went to time, he was leading on board state so I gave him the win
- R8 (W) vs Jason Let [4/4/0] - Lost Zone Box (Radiant Charizard)
- Also went to time, I was sure I had win, he showed me he also had the win but he gave me the win instead
Town League 7 (23rd March 2024)
Deck: Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
Result: 33rd/90
Score: 4-3
- R1 (L) vs Jason Song [5/2/0] - Gardevoir ex
- Another slow start vs another Garde at Agora haha
- R2 (W) vs Gan Kwok Chuan [3/4/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- R3 (W) vs Ong Wen Hui [1/4/0 Drop] - Miraidon ex
- R4 (L) vs Troy Lam [2/2/0 Drop] - Gholdengo ex
- Slow start again
- R5 (W) vs Keith Ting [3/4/0] - Lost Zone Box (Radiant Charizard)
- R6 (W) vs Terry Tai [3/4/0] - Gholdengo ex
- R7 (L) vs Kelvin Ching Kay Feng [5/2/0] - Gardevoir ex
- Could not set-up at all
Let's be honest, I should have just played Zard. This event ended my 100% points scoring run for the season, and I did have a Zard list with me which would have probably done better but at this weekend, Zard felt like the worst possible play and I wanted to see if I could do well with Tina for once. That failed. This was the Zard list I had prepared:
Also why did 3 of my opponent drop in this event? Especially my R4 opponent, he beat me and dropped. All of that was the difference between scoring points and not. And yes this was the only event I didn't score points in the whole season and it was only because I bubbled out. What a horrid way to lose a 100% record streak.
Town League 8 (24th March 2024)
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 20th/66 (+75 CSP)
Score: 4-3
- R1 (W) vs Lok Wei Ye [3/4/0] - Lost Zone Box
- Pretty much a donk, evolved into Zard, KOed his lone Sableye
- R2 (W) vs Tang Jia Tat [4/3/0] - Mew VMAX (DTE)
- R3 (L) vs Samuel Tong [5/2/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- His Roxanne late on got me good, drew into nothing when I was in a winning position, we went to time and I ran out of time to recover the pieces I needed to win
- R4 (W) vs Ng Cheng Wee [3/4/0] - Roaring Moon ex
- R5 (W) vs Ao Yichen [3/4/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- R6 (L) vs Raymond Huynh [6/1/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- Same story as my R3 loss, Roxanne cost me game. All I needed was to find Super Rod to get my energies into the deck to retreat for game but it never showed up
- R7 (L) vs Haruki Okunishi [5/2/0] - Roaring Moon ex
- Dead drew, had both my Charmanders sniped by his Radiant Greninja even with a Manaphy on board, no coming back from that especially after a slow start
Town League 9
(Wasn't elected to play in this event)
Deck: -
Regional League 3 (14th April 2024)
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 35th/342 (+100 CSP)
Score: 6-2
- R1 (W) vs Chole Tan [2/6/0] - Hisuian Goodra VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- R2 (W) vs Keith Ting [6/2/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- R3 (L) vs Edmund Khoo [6/2/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- Dead drew, had to set Pidgeot up just to stay in the game and he KOed it in the next turn
- R4 (L) vs Dave Wong Wei Jie [5/3/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- Dead hand at the start, only had Rad Zard and Zard ex to work with
- R5 (W) vs Tan Yuan Jun Darwin [2/3/0 Drop] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- R6 (W) vs Charmaine Han Huiyi [3/5/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- R7 (W) vs Norman Chan Yu Da [5/3/0] - Lost Zone Box
- R8 (W) vs Jackson Tham [5/3/0] - Gholdengo ex
- Somehow cameback from only having Lumineon V and Rotom V on board and having both Charmanders sniped T3 with Manaphy on board!
Town League 10 (1st May 2024)
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 26th/105 (+75 CSP)
Score: 4-3
- R1 (W) vs Samuel Tong [4/3/0] - Giratina VSTAR (Lost Zone)
- We went to time again but this time I had the pieces to win the game so he scooped to me
- R2 (W) vs Wayne Tan Wei Peng [4/3/0] - Ancient Box
- R3 (L) vs Daniel Nazri [5/2/0] - Origin Forme Dialga VSTAR/Metang
- Slight misplay but I thought I got the comeback, Iono to 1. He draws Nest Ball to get Mew to get Research to draw more with Ninja to get Prime Catcher for game.
- R4 (W) vs Foo Ming Wei [4/3/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- R5 (L) vs Low Wei Hao [5/2/0] - Lost Zone Box
- Dead drew. Had pieces to get Zard ex up Turn 2 but kept whiffing my Arven/Rare Candy/Iono just to get anything going, even after 3 uses of Rotom V!
- R6 (W) vs Lok Wei Ye [4/3/0] - Charizard ex/Bibarel
- R7 (L) vs Edgardo Phee [5/2/0] - Roaring Moon ex/Dudunsparce
- Same story as R3, was choosing over Roxanne or Iono. Iono failed me the first time so went with Roxanne. I whiffed my Collapsed Stadium to get rid of my Lumineon V that was stuck the whole game. He draws into Boss + Energy for game the next turn.
So really apart from 2 to 3 games, most of my losses were just down to bad variance or bad luck. I felt like I cut my amount of misplays a lot this season, rarely lost a game to it (I still do it from time to time) so it feels frustrating to lose to reasons out of your control a lot of time. Bo1 games am I right?
So just a recap on my season so far:
- Town League 1 - 23rd/105 - 5/2/0 - 75 CSP (not counted)
- Town League 2 - 13th/64 - 4/2/0 - 100 CSP
- Town League 4 - 8th/64 - 4/2/0 - 130 CSP
- Town League 5 - 14th/64 - 4/2/0 - 100 CSP
- Regional League 2 - 54th/308 - 5/3/0 - 100 CSP
- Town League 7 - 33rd/90 - 4/3/0
- Town League 8 - 20th/66 - 4/3/0 - 75 CSP
- Regional League 3 - 35th/342 - 6/2/0 - 100 CSP
- Town League 10 - 26th/105 - 4/3/0 - 75 CSP
My results were consistent, but consistency sadly isn't the key in our circuit. You need to be doing well in the events that actually matter, aka the Regional Leagues and Championships and spoiler alert, I didn't get a top 32 finish in any of the 3 of 4 major events I played in. I was always either 1 win short or bubbled out of top 32 despite having the results to get there. Close is not enough.
Sure, missing the first regional league put me at a real disadvantage against everyone else but still I needed to do well to give myself any shot of getting top 4 but it wasn't to be. So now I had to hope to get 1st or 2nd in the Championships.
Championship Deck List
I did a lot of prep for this one and ended up testing 20 different lists for Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex. I had already settled on the deck during the 3rd Regional and since I had played it pretty much the whole season, why change? My other considerations were Arceus VSTAR/Giratina VSTAR, Lost Box with Rad Zard and Arceus VSTAR/Armarouge.
From my own research, these 54 cards were always going to be in my list no matter what happened. The core 54 if you will:
POKEMON: (21)
- 3 Charmander OBF + (Last one is either 4th Charmander OBF or 1 Charmander PR)
- 2 Charmeleon PAF (Counter to devo stuff)
- 3 Charizard ex
- 2 Pidgey
- 2 Pidgeot ex
- 1 Bidoof
- 1 Bibarel
- 1 Lumineon V
- 1 Rotom V
- 1 Cleffa
- 1 Manaphy
- 1 Radiant Charizard
- 1 Jirachi (Added for Lost Box)
SUPPORTER: (8) -> Should be 10 or 11
- 3 Arven
- 2 Iono
- 2 Boss
- 1 Prof Turo Scenario
ITEMS: (17) -> + Ace Spec Option + another utility card
- 4 Rare Candy
- 4 Ultra Ball
- 4 Buddy Buddy Poffin
- 2 Super Rod
- 1 Lost Vacuum
- 1 Nest Ball
- 1 Counter Catcher
TOOLS (1) -> Ace Spec Option + Extra Tool
- 1 Forest Seal Stone
STADIUM (1)
- 1 Collapsed Stadium
ENERGY (6)
- 6 Fire Energy
TOTAL (54)
As for the remaining 6, I had a few options:
ACE SPEC Options: (2)
- If Prime Catcher, + Defiance Band
- If Max Belt, + 2nd Counter Catcher
Extra Supporters (1-2)
- 3rd Iono -> More draws + helps consistency
- Eri -> Helps adds % into Chien Pao, Lost Zone and possibly Mirror
- Judge -> Extra disruption, possible replacement for the 3rd Iono spot
- Roxanne -> Late game disruption + gives you more draws but early game useless
- 2nd Turo -> More recovery options and also switching options for stuff getting gusted up
- 3rd Boss -> More gusts but with one less Pal Pad typically
Extra Items (1-2)
- Pal Pad -> Extra options of Boss, Iono, Arven, Eri, Turo mostly
- Hisuian Heavy Ball -> Helps gets stuff like Rotom, Bidoof, Lumineon out of prizes
Tool (1)
- Choice Belt (+30 to Vs)
- Can put on Rad Zard to KO Tina, Arceus and Lugia VSTAR
- Helpful to reach numbers vs mentioned above, Rotom, Dialga, Giratina VSTAR
- Vitality Band (+10 in general)
- +10 good into Chien Pao, helps KO Tina but only with Zard
- +10 to KO Greninja with Pidgeot. And also help Charmander take cheeky KOs or set numbers up
So with those options in mind, I turned to the numbers to decide my final 6 cards:
Extra Supporters:
- 3rd Iono
- Used in 16/20 Lists -> 80% (Tord says 3 is the staple, should just follow right?)
- Eri
- Used in 5/20 Lists -> 25% (Well I wasn’t convinced, seems like most aren’t either)
- Judge
- Used in 0/20 Lists -> 0% (Would be a spicy replacement for the norm of 3 Ionos)
- Roxanne
- Used in 14/20 Lists -> 70% (Comeback potential still popular with many others)
- 2nd Turo
- Used in 6/20 Lists -> 30% (Likely the way to go if you cut Pal Pad from the list)
- 3rd Boss
- Used in 3/20 Lists -> 15% (Seems like Pal Pad is the way to go)
ACE SPEC Options:
- Prime Catcher (65%) vs Max Belt (30%) vs Hero’s Cape (5%)
- Prime Catcher is paired with Defiance Band
- Max Belt is paired with 2nd Counter Catcher
Extra Items:
- Pal Pad
- Used in 15/20 Lists -> 75% (A popular choice amongst people)
- Hisuian Heavy Ball
- Used in 1/20 Lists -> 5% (Only 1 but he did well in Stockhlom, the latest event)
Tool:
- Choice Belt
- Used in 15/20 Lists -> 75% (The numbers don’t lie)
- Vitality Band
- Used in 2/20 Lists -> 10% (If only 2, probably not the best option)
So with that in mind, the remaining 6 slots were filled from the numbers above:
- 3rd Iono
- Roxanne
- Prime Catcher
- Defiance Band
- Pal Pad
- Choice Belt
This is also the first time I tried to make my deck look a bit fancy than usual. I've got the 3 Gym promos in there from the first two sets I pulled (Radiant Charizard from #2, Forest Seal Stone and Nest Ball from #1). I also used the Iono Promo and the Boss's Orders Promo for once. There's also a cheeky Rare Candy promo from League Cups we used to get back in the day. And also for once, yes, there is a gold card in there. I dug up my old Counter Catcher I pulled back in 2017 and used it for the first time. I had the idea that since Prime Catcher is already in Pink, it would make sense to have my other gust card also be a different colour to make prize checking easier.
Fun but sad fact, I never once used Counter Catcher the whole event.
Singapore Championships 2024
And now for the main event. Nationals! Or Championships, whatever you wanna call it. The big one!
Deck: Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
Result: 49th/343 (+150 CSP)
Score: 5-3
- R1 (W) vs Jackson Lee [0/3/0 Drop] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- Jackson had told me he was just here for the promo and intended to drop and my heart sank hearing that. Sure I got technically a free win but that means my resistance will go down no matter what I do the whole event so in my head I already knew I had to go for a 7-1 score.
- We did play it out and I did win the set
- R2 (W) vs Jaron Wong [5/3/0] - Miraidon ex
- He had a mulligan and all I saw was lighting energies so I got excited, whether it's Hands or Miraidon, it's a good matchup either way
- I did win but he made it a lot closer than it should have been. His generators hit 2 energies everytime. He told me had had win had he drawn a Cobalion or 5th energy on his Raichu V.
- R3 (W) vs Hannah Koh Shu En [4/4/0] - Origin Forme Dialga VSTAR/Metang
- I was a bit worried about this matchup, in my testing I kept losing to Dialga even though I knew what I needed to do against it
- She did get the Chornos turn but all I had were Charmanders, so I was able to set-up for the comeback win, another close game
- R4 (L) vs Bjorn Soh Cai Wei [11/1/0] - Lugia VSTAR/Archeops
- I knew I was in trouble when I saw Bjorn's name as my next opponent
- And I damn sure knew it when I saw my starting hand, completely nothing
- To make matters worse, I had 2 Arven and 2 Candy prized so I was forced into attacking right away which wasn't ideal but I felt that was my only way to stay in the game but he had his board built up perfectly so I couldn't do much
- R5 (L) vs Loh Ziyin [5/2/0 Drop] - Lost Zone Box (Radiant Charizard)
- Another bad starting hand
- This time I really couldn't do anything, drew pass for 2-3 turns.
- Got a Zard up at one point but it was just too late to do any sort of comeback
- R6 (W) vs peekachun [3/5/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- I kinda misplayed trying to be greedy but luckily I built my board to a state that my opponent couldn't come back in time to win the game
- R7 (W) vs Poh Wei Jie [5/3/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- Opponent had a dead hand, T2 I got my Zard ex + Choice Band to KO his Rotom
- R8 (L) vs Choy Kwok Hoe [6/2/0] - Charizard ex/Pidgeot ex
- I messed up this game. I should have evolved into a second Pidgeot ex to keep my board as safe as possible. My heart was saying that is the right play.
- Then my head was saying...he could be playing TM Devo so I chose not to go for that and got punished. Even if I had evolved and he did Devo, I still would have had my board turn into a single prize board state which was great for me. So me overthinking cost me there as well. I should have taken some time to reasses everything to realise I was in a good spot either way.
5-3 was just not good enough. Even with a 6-2 score, I might not have bubbled into cut. Sure Bjorn would be pushing my resistance up as the first seed but with two opponents dropping, they would have undone the positives so the only real option to make cut was to finish 7-1, which I didn't do.
Simply put, I just wasn't good enough this season. Sure my results were always only 1 or 2 wins short shy of getting what I needed but that just won't do it. I cannot always be 1 or 2 wins short, I need to convert those results so I need to have a real relook into what I'm doing wrong and why I keep putting myself just 1 or 2 wins short. Sure, at least I've improved my game to the point where I can put myself in contention at any event, but that still isn't enough. Only big results matter in our region, nobody cares if you are consistently scoring points. People only care if you are consistently doing well in the big events, that's what gives you a chance to make it to Worlds.
Thoughts on the events
I do have some thoughts I want to share about the Championship event last weekend because a lot of stuff happened that many people might not know about:
- "Deals"
- Really? This is still a thing? I've heard of deals being done even during the last swiss round where people were trying to buy their way into top cut. Me and Kwok Hoe were listening to all of it, looked at each other "we just playing it out". Like I mentioned previously, I could have done the smart thing and done the same but that's not how I play the game. Even if my resistance is better, if I didn't earn it, I shouldn't be there.
- Top cut was full of it. I should know, because one of the guys asked me if I had $800 with me to help settle a deal. Do I look like someone who has that kind of money just lying around there?
- Last season, we had none of this. Everyone was there fighting for the win, fighting to earn their Worlds invite. This year? It was full of it. It was disappointing to see. I wanted to leave at one point, I couldn't take what I was seeing.
- Judges
- I've seen a few really bad judge calls this past weekend which the top people really need to review. The biggest one being OG's game where he asked if his Pokemon was benched, and neither his opponent nor the judges gave him the correct answer and that's why there was that delay during their streamed game. Surely the judges should be keeping track of these things?
- Also, surely they shouldn't be interfering in the matches when they weren't asked to. I saw two such occasions of people playing out their turn, they knew what they were doing, their opponent did too but the judge interfered. Let them play it out first?
- It is just me or are the judges too insistent on Double Game Losses (DGLs)? Every chance they get, they seem to want to implement DGLs to the players. Sometimes I do wonder if they actually know if DGLs hurt both players and nobody wants it. We are all trying out best to avoid it, stop forcing us to take it.
- Rules
- Speaking of DGLs, this has to be easily THE WORST ruling I have ever seen in Pokemon. In these games, there is a winner, or a loser, and if neither wins, neither are technically losers, that means a tie. Everyone else does it. We used to do it. Why are we still doing DGLs when we score 3 points for a win. I still cannot understand why we are using it. As I said, it hurts both players, why not have ties? We could avoid the huge bubbles we see at EVERY MAJOR EVENT. I wasn't a fan of it when I first heard about it, two years later, I still think this rule sucks ass. It's god awful and nobody likes it. You know that rule must be so bad when there is not a single player who likes it, everyone I've spoken to hates it. Get rid of it.
- There's a new rule that caught many people off this past weekend. Apparently we can't concede now when the last turn is played. This just makes things even more confusing to a ruling everyone is trying to avoid. This rule just means we have lesser time to decide a winner since we now cannot play out the last turn. My friend Bryan was the main one hit by it and when I heard what was happening, even I got angry because it's just a silly way to decide who wins and loses
- Again, this is just stupid. So stupid that I completely ignored this ruling to play out one of my final turns in one of my games because I knew I could win and I did. If we had to follow it, me and my opponent would have looked at our hand and had to play a guessing game of who would win or not. That one game proved to me why a +3 turn rule is far superior to settling the result of games over the incredibly stupid Asian ruling of whoever goes 2nd gets the final turn + now you cannot play out the final turn if someone is to scoop. FIX YOUR DAMN RULES.
- For all the bad, the positive is that they now have a counter to show who went 2nd. But again, with the rules as such, the player going 2nd has too much advantage in Asia especially with the time rules.
- That also reminds me, why is top cut games now 55 minutes and not 75 minutes like we had last year? 55 minute doesn't work for top cut, we've seen people get robbed of wins time and time again. CHANGE IT.
- Invites
- Quite simple, can we have more invites? 4-6 is quite small for the amount of great players we have here that should be allowed the chance to prove themselves against the best in the world. There are so many guys I can name of the top of my head who deserves that chance but can't because well bo1 is too luck based. I still think our top SG players can give anyone a run for their money if given the chance to do so.
- Structure of event
- Since we're doing bo1, surely we can change the structure to make things more fair? If timing is the reason we're doing bo1, why can't we just start early and go back to doing bo3 like we used to do. I've gone to events when it started at 9 or 10, it was no issue.
- Also, why not do a top 32 for cut? There's too many bubbles in top 16 at 6-2 for a 300+ person event. We easily have time to top 32 bo3 games, I don't see why we can't do that. Or a better idea:
- Everyone at 6-2 or better goes to Day 2
- 3 to 4 more Swiss Rounds and then we cut to Top 8,
- this seems like a better idea to me, this way we shouldn't have the usual giant bubble we keep getting at our events
I just had to get that all out of my chest. I love this game, I just want to see the game grow and see our players get featured more. I want to keep sharing the love of the game, be it my stats or helping to share my friend's results whatever it may be, but lately the rules and the way things are ran here makes it hard to enjoy the game I love. It hurts. I just want to see things be better for us. It's looks amazing for everyone else, why not us?
But yeah, I'm still hoping we can see some rule changes because some of it just makes no sense and it makes playing the game here even less enjoyable. I mean we're already playing Bo1, it's already so luck based, why make it even worse with all these DGL nonsense?
2024-2025 Hopes
Quite simple, I have to do better. My results this season were unacceptable. No top 32 finishes in any of the 3 major events to me is a failure, no matter if it's two 5-3s and one 6-2 finishes, none of them being at least a top 32 finish is not good enough for me. I have to do better next time out. Thanks for reading!
