My Vivid Voltage journey & results - Sticking with the trusted formula the entire format (4 months worth) - Centiskorch VMAX

So Centiskorch VMAX did a whole world of good for me back in the Team Up to Darkness Ablaze format and with Vivid Voltage (and Shining Fates for that matter), not really giving us any new stuff to work with, I thought why not stick with Centiskorch and keep making it better for this particular format. I enjoy playing the deck, and I have said that I will continue to play Welder until the day it rotates, so why not keep representing the Skorch Gang at these online events? 

So I pretty much decided early on that I was mainly going to focus on Centiskorch for the entire TEU to VIV/SHF format just to see how I could keep improving on the deck and also to prove the doubters wrong about the deck. Everyone has this weird illusion that the deck is bad and it's easy to play but once you see the results, you'll know the truth. And I can say for a fact, just because it's a Welder deck, it's not that easy to make Centiskorch work, you don't just stack all the energies on one guy and attack, that's just stupid.

But first of, I might as well share the backbone of the deck that I have been playing for the past 4 months (and also the previous 3 with the Darkness Ablaze format). I wanted to see how I could use one base list, work on it for an entire format and see how far my friend Thomas Brophy and I can push it, use the deck to it's most potential and get the very best out of it. 

And I'd like to think we did prove that the base-line works but I never expected it to have seen as much success as it has, and with many others playing the base-line list too which makes me really happy and proud. That just shows that people believe we made something that was good but also consistently getting high placings. I've tried to make my own lists work many times before so it felt good to know this one was well received by many others (and that hey, maybe I can make something work). But of course, without the help of Thomas, Jake Pilch, Alex Schemanske, Josh Frink and a few others, this would have never taken off as it did. 

The Deck

The base line I'd like to think are made up of these 50 cards that have been a constant the entire time I've played Centiskorch VMAX in this format. So no matter how the list looks like, these cards will 100% be in them:

Pokemon: (14)

x2 Jirachi - TEU
x2 Volcanion - UNB
x3 Centiskorch V - DAA
x3 Centiskorch VMAX - DAA
x2 Dedenne-GX - UNB
x1 Crobat V - DAA
x1 Eldegoss V - RCL

3-3 Centiskorch V-VMAX has been a constant for me, you don't need a 4-4 line since you're heavily reliant on the support Pokemon in the deck. I have tried the 4th Centiskorch V but whenever I try it, I seem to have a much harder time to get them out, which is weird is the odds of getting them should be better but it never works out that way. 2 Volcanions have been fine so far to help get the first turn Flare Starter or to counter stuff like Decidueye or Altaria.

As for the support Pokemon, I personally prefer 3 Jirachi but 2 is a definite must no matter what. 2 Dedenne-GX to help you speed things up as would Crobat V does (I personally prefer having 2 of them). And of course Eldegoss V to get you the Welder you need or the game winning Boss, or even that Bird Keeper to help you get out of a mess.

Trainer & Energy: (36)

Search: 
x4 Quick Ball
x3 Pokemon Communication

Switch Outs:
x4 Scoop Up Net
x4 Switch

Fire Energy Engine
x3 Giant Hearth
x1 Fire Crystal
x4 Welder
x11 Fire Energy

Gust
x2 Boss's Orders

7 search outs doesn't sound much but it works well for me, 4 Quick Ball is a must and 3 Pokemon Communication is alright, if there was extra space a 4th Comm would be ideal.

8 switch outs is perfect. The deck relies heavily on Jirachi so you need the 4 Nets but the tech options like Zigzagoon and Giratina will come in handy. 4 switch is a must.

The 2 Boss's Orders have been alright, I recently tried 3 and it just never quite worked strangely enough so I prefer the Great Catcher and Phione as my other gust options.

As for the Fire engines, 3 Giant Heart is a must, and I personally prefer to have 2 Fire Crystal which helps against Swell and even help in niche situations whenever one big attacker goes down. 11 energy seems to be the perfect number for the deck. And of course, 4 Welder is a must. Need I say more? Without Welder, you can't hit for crazy amounts of damage or draw more cards.

Now with the base-line set, it's time to fill up the last 10 spots in the decks with various tech options to choose from so this is what I've got for the last few spots in the deck at any given time:

Spot #1 - Alternate Attacker

• Reshiram & Charizard-GX (My Preferred Choice)
• Heatran-GX
• Talonflame V

Spot #2 - Chance of Comeback

• Cramorant V (My Preferred Choice)
• Reset Stamp

Spot #3 - 3rd Consistency Booster

• 3rd Jirachi TEU (My Preferred Choice)
• 3rd Volcanion UNB

Spots #4, #5, #6 - Single Prize Tech Options

• Galarian Zigzagoon SUM (My Preferred Choice)
• Giratina UNM (My Preferred Choice)
• Phione CEC (My Preferred Choice)
• Marshadow UNB
• 4th Jirachi TEU

Spot #7 - More Support

• 2nd Crobat V DAA (My Preferred Choice)
• 2nd Eldegoss V RCL
• Professor's Research
• Marnie
• 4th Pokémon Communication

Spot #8 - Additional Supporter

• Bird Keeper (My Preferred Choice)
• Mallow and Lana

Spot #9 - Additional Item

• Great Catcher (My Preferred Choice)
• 2nd Reset Stamp

Spot #10 - Additional Energy

• 2nd Fire Crystal (My Preferred Choice)
• 12th Fire Energy
• Ordinary Rod

So just to make it easier for anyone, I'm not saying you should follow this, you can pick a different card from those spots or just mix and match and take whatever you please, those are just my reasoning for those cards. I mean for the most part Reset Stamp was the must include in my deck and now it's just not even a preferred choice for these additional spots, just to prove that it can be a mix and match however you like it.

For the additional attackers, I personally prefer Reshiram & Charizard-GX as it can apply early pressure to stuff like PikaRom and even Eternatus at times and can be annoying to deal with late on. Heatran-GX is good to absorb all of Centiskorch VMAX's energy but I'd rather not go down that route, that just tells me the Skorch is not even doing it's job. 

I've been cutting Reset Stamp because Stamp IS A LIE. So I'd rather get Cramorant in as my comeback attacker but it's also very useful as a first attacker against stuff like Eternatus VMAX and even in the mirror match.

As for the 3rd spot of Volcanion vs Jirachi, I prefer Jirachi to get out stuff I need like Quick Ball or Comm or Giant Hearth since you're most likely going to made to go first so I'd rather make full use of Jirachi whenever I can.

As for the tech spots, Phione, Giratina and Galarian Zigzagoon are the choices for me. Goon helps with many numbers you need to hit and can help stop some stuff from working. Giratina helps massively against LMZ and even decks like Eternatus and Coalossal that heavily relies on special energies. As for Phione, it's amazing. It pretty much helps you beat ADPZ without ever needing to hit the big boy and catch people out when they bench just one thing. 

For the additional support, I prefer the 2nd Crobat over Eldegoss or Research or even Marnie since you'll likely get Marnied or Stamped and an additional Crobat gets you out of bad hands. You can even try a 4th comm to get some of these stuff but that's the 61st card in my deck most of the time.

Bird Keeper > Mallow & Lana every time. I just prefer it since I can draw additional cards of it too. 

If I need another item, it's always going to be Great Catcher since it helps massively against PikaRom, ADPZ and Blowns.

As for the last spot regarding energy, I'd go for the second fire crystal since you're bound to hit Swells and with Cramorant as a new addition, it makes perfect sense to me. And now with that, onto the journey that was the Vivid Voltage/Shining Fates format.

Week 1 (Nov 14th - 15th 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 1st - PokeX S3 Online Challenge #4 - 8/2/0

PokeStats Points: (5 points total)

• 1st - PokeX S3 Online Challenge #4 - Centiskorch VMAX - 5 points

PokeX S3 Online Challenge #4

Winning one of the first TEU-VIV events felt great, I usually don't start a season off quite well. I'm typically a slow starting, always struggling at the start and finding my footing only later on. We tried Talonflame V to see if it was any helpful and while it did help in a few games, I found it wasn't the biggest of help. 

Week 2 (Nov 16th - 22nd 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 4th - Coffee Cup #4 - 4/2/0
• 7th - PokeMob Standard #1 - 4/2/1
• 7th - Atlas VIV Mini 2 - 5/2/1

PokeStats Points: (3 points total)

• 7th - PokeMob Standard #1 - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 15th - E&D's S2 Qualifier #2 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Coffee Cup #4

I just was never a fan of Stamp, be it 2 or 1, in Centiskorch so I thought I'd cut one to add in space for more stuft to try out. I wanted to test if Dubwool was a viable alternate attacker seeing as it could take a clean KO on PikaRoms and Mew3 but this is when people starting to play Big Charm so that idea was out. Tested Ordinary Rod over the 2nd Crystal more to see if I can keep recycling Heatran for some quick damage and it worked a few times.

Week 3 (Nov 23rd - 29th 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 7th - Jal Cup #5 - 4/2/0

PokeStats Points: (1 point total)

• 12th - Chrollo's Flygon Open - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Jal Cup #5

I took Great Catcher out to see if Phione would be better and right from the get-go I could tell Phione might become a mainstay in the deck, it single-handely won me my Top 8 game in the Jal Cup. But I did regret taking Zigzagoon out for the 2nd stamp, the Goon would have come in handy in certain matches.

Week 4 (Nov 30th - Dec 6th 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 9th - PokeMob Standard #3 - 5/1/1

PokeStats Points: (1 point total)

• 9th - PokeMob Standard #3 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

PokeMob Standard #3

I needed to be sure if Zigzagoon was really needed and while I did alright, I was pretty sure it had earned it's merit and I still wasn't keen on the 2nd stamp. 

Week 5 (Dec 7th - 13th 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 5th - Atlas VIV Mini #5 - 6/2/1

PokeStats Points: (3 points total)

• 5th - Atlas VIV Mini #5 - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 15th - PokeMob Standard #4 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Atlas VIV Mini #5

Same list as above and by this point I was pretty sure on how the perfect 60 should look like for the next few weeks.

Week 6 (Dec 14th - 20th 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 4th - E&D's S2 Qualifier #5 - 6/2/1

PokeStats Points: (5 points total)

• 4th - E&D's S2 Qualifier #5 - Centiskorch VMAX - 3 points
• 11th - Atlas VIV Mini #8 - Eternatus VMAX - 1 point
• 16th - DaxPTCG Stones Series Weekly #1 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

E&D's S2 Qualifier #5

After losing to a few PikaRoms, I had to get Great Catcher back in and I sure missed it, it came in super helpful to get me into top cut of E&Ds. By this point I was pretty happy with the list but I kept losing to dead draws, either off Marnies or Stamp so I wasn't completely happy with the list yet. I was also having doubts on whether Heatran-GX should be the alternate attacker.

Week 7 (Dec 21st - 27th 2020)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 1st - Hegster S3 Top Deck 16 - 10/2/0
• 2nd - E&D's S2 Qualifier #6 - 8/2/0
• 2nd - Coffee Cup Invitational - 4/1/0

PokeStats Points: (11 points total)

• 1st - Hegster S3 Top Deck 16 - Centiskorch VMAX - 5 points
• 2nd - E&D's S2 Qualifier #6 - Centiskorch VMAX - 4 points
• 13th - Chrollo's Holiday Bash - Reshiram & Charizard-GX - 1 point
• 16th - Chrollo's Tournament #4 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Hegster S3 Top Deck 16

And now it's almost perfect. I decided to cut a Stamp for a 2nd Crobat V to help me get out of dead draws and it paid off right away, helping me to win Hegster S3.16, getting me out of a few bad hands on many occasions. By this point I was happy with 59 cards of the deck apart from Heatran-GX, even though it could have won me the game in finals earlier, I still for some reason wasn't getting much use of it. And that's when we (Thomas, Jake and myself) thought, why not go back to Reshiram & Charizard-GX?

Week 8 (Dec 28th 2020 - Jan 3rd 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 3rd - Advant-Edge Tournament #5 - 7/2/0

PokeStats Points: (4 points total)

• 3rd - Advant-Edge Tournament #5 - Centiskorch VMAX - 3 points
• 16th - Mew Squad Tournament #1 - Eternatus VMAX - 1 point

Advant-Edge Tournament #5

And here we have what I would say is the perfect 60 for our deck in this format. I had tested ReshiZard-GX in the deck a couple of times in the TEU-DAA format and thought to myself, wait this could actually be better than Heatran since ReshiZard can give cheese out some donks and it was helpful to take out support Pokemon like Crobats and Dedennes and it worked right away. It gave me a top 4 finish on my 31st birthday too!

Week 9 (Jan 4th - 10th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 1st - Coffee Cup S2 #1 - 7/0/1
• 2nd - Hegster S3 Top Deck 18 - 10/2/1
• 7th - Atlas VIV Mini 14 - 6/3/0
• 7th - Sunday Open - 7/3/1
• 11th - GGToor Chill TCG Showdown #2 - 9/3/1

PokeStats Points: (9 points total)

• 2nd - Hegster S3 Top Deck 18 - Centiskorch VMAX - 4 points
• 7th - Atlas VIV Mini 14 - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 7th - Sunday Open - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 11th - GGToor Chill TCG Showdown #2 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Every tourney this month

So I made myself this challenge to play the same 60 for every tournament I could enter in the month of January, just to see how good it really was and if there was any changes I could make to make it even better. The only thing I found I might be missing was Cramorant V which I thought would be helpful in the mirror but at this stage, no-one was really playing Centiskorch VMAX anyway apart from us.

Week 10 (Jan 11th - 17th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 4th - Coffee Cup S2 #2 - 5/2/1

PokeStats Points: (0 points total)

• Nothing here to see :(

Week 11 (Jan 18th - 24th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• Nothing here to see :(

PokeStats Points: (0 points total)

• Nothing here to see :(

Week 12 (Jan 25th - 31st 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 2nd - Garnai Nameless Tourney #2 - 4/0/0

PokeStats Points: (1 point total)

• 12th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 24 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Nothing for these 3 weeks since I spent 10 days away for my Army reservist so the only time I got to play was the weekends. I didn't play much during Week 10 as I was preparing myself for the army stuff and when I did play, I just didn't do so good sadly.

Week 13 (Feb 1st - 7th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 2nd - Hegster S3 Top Deck 26 - 7/1/2
• 2nd - Gazerbeam Tourney of Dreams #2 - 10/2/1
• 6th - Garnai Cup #0 - 4/2/0

PokeStats Points: (10 points total)

• 2nd - Hegster S3 Top Deck 26 - Centiskorch VMAX - 4 points
• 2nd - Sunday Open - Arceus & Dialga & Palkia-GX/Zacian V - 4 points
• 14th - Advant-Edge Tournament #9 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point
• 15th - Professor Oak's Paradise S3 #4 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Gazerbeam Tourney of Dreams #2

For Gazer's tourney, since ADP was banned, I took Phione out since that was my ADP counter and put Dubwool in thinking it'll help vs PikaRom and Mew3. Although I made it to the finals again, I just couldn't take it home. Dubwool didn't help much either. Also a funny note, I finished 2nd in the Sunday Open with ADPZ, losing to Thomas who played the usual 60 we had been for the month of January.

Week 14 (Feb 8th - 14th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 2nd - Hegster S3 Top Deck 27 - 9/1/2
• 2nd - Advant-Edge Tournament #10 - 6/2/1
• 4th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 28 - 6/2/1

PokeStats Points: (12 points total)

• 2nd - Hegster S3 Top Deck 27 - Centiskorch VMAX - 4 points
• 2nd - Advant-Edge Tournament #10 - Centiskorch VMAX - 4 points
• 4th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 28 - Centiskorch VMAX - 3 points
• 16th - Chrollo S3 #2 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

Hegster S3 Top Deck 27

Same list but now I was starting to wonder if Giratina and Stamp were needed. I was never a fan of Stamp to begin with since I felt it usually helped my opponent out more than it did to hinder them. As for Giratina, with LMZ not seeing much play and Etern not using special energies, I wasn't sure if it was needed anymore.

Week 15 (Feb 15th - 21st 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 3rd - Garnai Cup #1 - 6/2/0
• 9th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 30 - 5/2/0

PokeStats Points: (8 points total)

• 3rd - Garnai Cup #1 - Centiskorch VMAX - 3 points
• 8th - Mew Squad Tournament #7 - Mewtwo & Mew-GX/Welder Toolbox - 2 points
• 9th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 30 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point
• 12th - E&D's S3 Showdown #1 - Arceus & Dialga & Palkia-GX/Zacian V - 1 point
• 16th - Atlas VIV Mini #24 - Pikachu & Zekrom-GX - 1 point

Garnai Cup #1

Decided to put Cramorant V in Giratina's place with the rise of others playing Centiskorch since Cram helps massively in the mirror match. This is where I realised Giratina was still useful to slow other decks down when needed.

Week 16 (Feb 22nd - 28th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 2nd - E&D's S3 Qualifier #4 - 6/2/1
• 4th - Coffee Cup Season 2 Invitational - 2/1/0
• 6th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 31 - 7/2/1

PokeStats Points: (10 points total)

• 2nd - E&D's S3 Qualifier #4 - Centiskorch VMAX - 4 points
• 4th - Mew Squad Tournament #9 - Turbo Zacian V - 3 points
• 6th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 31 - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 14th - Jal Cup #8 - Centiskorch VMAX - 1 point

E&D's S3 Qualifier #4

Hegster S3 Top Deck 31

I decided to mess around with a few stuff from tourney to tourney, playing with and without stamp, with and without Giratina while keeping Cramorant in more for the mirror match.

Week 17 (Mar 1st - 7th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 1st - E&D's S3 Qualifier #5 - 8/1/0

PokeStats Points: (5 points total)

• 1st - E&D's S3 Qualifier #5 - Centiskorch VMAX - 5 points

 E&D's S3 Qualifier #5

Back to the original list and it got me my first tourney win after 6 straight 2nd place finishes in finals so that was nice to end that run. 

Week 18 (Mar 8th - 14th 2021)

Top Centiskorch Results:

• 1st - Saturday Night Nitro - 10/2/0

PokeStats Points: (10 points total)

• 1st - Saturday Night Nitro - Centiskorch VMAX - 5 points
• 7th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 36 - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 8th - Hegster S3 Top Deck 35 - Centiskorch VMAX - 2 points
• 13th - Chrollo S3 #5 - Reshiram & Charizard-GX - 1 point

Saturday Night Nitro

Went back to Cramorant but decided to take Bird Keeper out with PikaRom starting to see less play and it worked out nicely in the Nitro event. Was my 50th win in a PTCG tourney too.

And finally the PokeStats TEU-VIV/SHF Invitational:

Thomas and I decided to go back to the orginal list without Cramorant V, thinking it'd do well. I used 30 of my in game tickets to play in 8-man pod tourneys to practise for the event, winning 16 of them so I felt confident going into it. I went into this event as the 2nd place qualifier so I was putting too much pressure on myself to finally get a big result in a big event.

But alas it just wasn't meant to be. I never found the time to rest up before the event, and since it started at my 12am (and I had to get up at 5am the morning prior), I was going in very fatigued. In fact I was struggling to keep my eyes open at 11.30pm while watching the F1 Bahrain GP too. 

We won the first set vs my good friend Joshua Sutherland, he played Lucario & Melmetal-GX. It went smoothly for me, winning 2-0. Then on to winners R2 where I lost to eventual winner Vitor Lugon. I prized 6 energies in Game 1 and 4 energies in Game 2. So yeah that was fun. The event was closed decklists as well.

Now we're moved down to Loser's bracket for Round 2 vs my good buddy Tate Whitesell and his Ditto VMAX deck. It wasn't the cleanest of games for either of us, I made a horrendous error of not benching a Centiskorch V thinking I played Cramorant in the deck only to realise it after my turn was done (it was my 3am at this point and I wasn't really out of it physically and mentally). I got a bit lucky that he missed the KO so I got the win there.

Round 3 of losers I played Jonathan Smiley and his EggRow deck, again I didn't play well in this set and got a bit lucky in Game 3 when he couldn't find his Rillabooms after I KOed the first two.

Round 4 of losers I was up against Eddie Bulmer and his Eternatus VMAX deck. And this is where I was completely out of it. I for some reason chose to go 2nd in Game 1 not realising I'm playing against a guy who's only been playing Eternatus! I managed to beat him Game 2 but the two other games in the set were a shocker. I pretty much played myself into a losing situation by going after the wrong attackers and then in the last game going for the risky play since I missed energies, not realising there were two Crystals in my hand, which pretty much meant game over for me. I ended up 9th, so yup, I still can't break into a top 8 finish at a big invitational. I just can't seem to do well in them and I honestly don't know if I ever will.

And now onto the next format, TEU-BST. Even though Centiskorch will pick up at least 3 bad matchups now, I'm still going to try to make it work at least. Thanks for reading!

And one last fun stat, the points I scored with each deck from this past PokeStat TEU-VIV season: 

My Darkness Ablaze journey - Finding the comfort deck right away for once! - Centiskorch VMAX

Darkness Ablaze time and this time I'll do this a bit differently, it'll be more of just a recap of things that happened with stuff I tried, things I did, what worked and what didn't. It may or may not turn out that way since I tend to add more stuff after finding ideas for it. Most of the focus will be on Centiskorch VMAX since it was my most successful deck during this format. I will share what I did with the other decks as well.

Topics

• 1. 2020-2021 Rotation
• 2. The Journey
• Week 1 & 2 - Testing
• Week 3 - Sunday Open Win
• Week 4 - Hegster Win
• Week 5 - Hegster Top 4 Finish
• Week 6 - Two Top 4 Finish in Three Days (Hegster and Sunday Open)
• Week 7 & 8 - Top 16 Limitless Weekly two weeks in a Row (Perfecting the list)
• Week 9 - PokeGear Version
• Week 10 - Still messing around
• Week 11 - Finals of Gazerbeam's Tourney of Dreams
• 3. The List
• 4. Matchups and stats
• 5. Next format thoughts
• 6. The other decks I played and stats

2020-2021 Rotation

Early impression from looking at the set was that obviously, Eternatus VMAX would be insane so I completely ignored it right away (it also meant I had to put Dragapult away) since I always try to work on a deck that's no considered the best. We were also in the middle of the 2020-2021 rotation so I had a few things factored in my mind:

• Goodbye Malamar
• Electropower/Thunder Mountain gone so PikaRom is worse now?
• Escape Board gone, is Jirachi still good enough to help with consistency?
• Heat Factory, Blacephalon GX and Victini Prism all gone. Any like-for-like replacements?
• Does ADPZ even lose anything?
• Shrine/Doom Count Yveltal gone, some rogue ideas are gone
• Magcargo-GX and Solgaleo-GX gone, can Mew3 Welder survive without these two?
• Energy Recycler gone. RIP the Charizard TEU dream.
• Ditto Prism and Zebstrika gone, less tech options
• Oranguru gone, is Control finally dead? Haha, problably not

So early impressions for me was that ADPZ was still the thing to beat but I had plenty of reasons to continue working on decks like Centiskorch, Mew3 Welder, Blacephalon (yes, I'm a Welder fan), Inteleon VMAX now that PikaRom was gone and maybe even try out this Eternatus thing if I was bored of the rest.

Before the new rotation came into works, I had already given Centiskorch a trial run and it was working really nicely. I made top 16 cut in the Epoch DAA Contest, 10th in Tag Bolt and even won the Yoshi Cup with it, which I think started giving many people the idea that the deck was actually good. I really should have played it for the POG World Championships, that was my one big regret out of that format. 

Right away, I knew I had to find replacements for Escape Board, Blacephalon-GX and Heat Factory Prism but the deck wasn't going to lose much thankfully. I was toying around the idea of two Eldegoss in the deck even before the rotation and really liked it. Same for two Fire Crystal which stayed in the deck for the most part of this rotation. Bird Keeper was lost in the shuffle initially but has found it's way back very late on. 

Week 1 & 2 - Testing

I had already sent my mind to playing ADPZ for the JGB Annual Championships, it was the safe pic in a field full of amazing players so I didn't want to bring something not fully tested, which was the case for Centiskorch. First run with it was Hegster S2 Top Deck 4, a decent 5-3 score but bubbling out of points at 33rd out of 126 people which is always frustrating. The first version I went with was the PokeGear version, thinking it'd be the most consistent way to get things done.

Straight away I wasn't a fan of Marnie. 5 support Pokemon also felt a bit much. I was missing Fire Crystal but I wanted to see how the deck could do without it.

For Tag Bolt S2 #8, I wanted to see how a tankier build of Centiskorch would work so I went with this:

It didn't work as well as I wanted it to. Heat Energy felt unnecessary and Big Charm always showed up at the wrong time so I was already turned off by the tankier built. I went 4-3 in the event. Most of my losses at this stage was to Mew3 Welder and Eternatus so the Heat, Charm, Mallow Lana combo was not working at all.

Week 3 - Sunday Open Win

While watching top cut of said Atlas Mini 1, the one deck that caught my interest was the genius himself, Alex Schemanske with his Scoop Up Net build of Centiskorch. It looked great as it finally fixed some of the matchups I thought I was having trouble with so right away, I abandoned ship on my other build to give this one a test run. 

I played his exact 60 in the D52 Bombers Cup, finishing 1st in swiss rounds at 4/0/2 before losing to ADPZ in top cut due to bad hands at the start. I fell in love with the deck right away, it was fun to play and it felt like the abosoulte best way to play Centiskorch. The nets with Goons made things like Blowns, Eternatus and Deci Goon even better and Giratina just gave me outs to beating LucMet and Deci Goon. 

I had planned to give that version a try for the Sunday Open but before that, I went in with a fun version of Centiskorch with Oranguru/Mewtwo in place of Eldegoss/Crobat in an effort to stop giving ADPZ free prize for the very first Limitless tourney on their brand new site, which is where all the events are now using to run these tourneys. I ended up winning it somehow, my first win of the format, I'll take it! 

Then came the return of the Sunday Open. 10 swiss rounds which was really tiring and somehow I ended up 1st in swiss at 9-1, only losing to Greens PikaRom due to brick hands. I was able to beat the decks that had troubled me in the past, that being Mew3 Welder and Eternatus thanks to the new changes. I beat Deci Goon 2-0 in Top 8, Greens PikaRom 2-1 in Top 4 and finally the mirror match 2-1 in finals to get my first Sunday Open win and my first online tournament win featuring 100+ players!

Also, it was two tournament wins on the same day, that's quite a rare feat I'd say!

The changes I made from Alex's list was having 2nd Eldegoss in place of 2nd Dedenne. The 2nd Eldegoss was a gimmick I managed to make work in the previous format, giving me a win in the Yoshi Cup and it worked really nicely here too. 3rd boss was another change I made which felt necessary and made the deck even better. 2 stamps worked like a charm. The only thing I felt that was missing was a straight answer to Zamazenta. 

The week proper started off with a 5-3 score in Hegster S2 Top Deck 10 but only good enough for 46th out of 173 people (it should have been Top 32 but my opponent was being an arsehole and decided to go into action for himself and of course he sacked me), the only change was cutting Mallow & Lana for second Dedenne. Even with the added draw power I still lost two games due to slow starts. 

Ended the week off with PokeX's Last Chance Qualifier, I needed just a top 32 finish to get me into the Invitational and I ended up finishing 6th with a score of 4/0/2 in swiss, missing a straight auto-qualification into day 2 by 5 points. The only change I made from previous list was to cut the 2nd Eldegoss for Heatran-GX as the counter for Zamazenta and it worked beautifully even in other games. This was where I was convinced Heatran was an auto-include, it would end up being my go-to person in matches against ADPZ. 

Week 4 - Hegster Win

I started to play around with different counts, wanting to see how PokeGear would help with consistency and so I brought it along for Hegster S2 Top Deck 12 along with the new addition of one Marnie in place of 2nd Stamp just to see how it'd work.

And it worked really well, I ended up winning the whole event! I went 6/1/1 in Swiss, beating ADPZ and Eternatus in Top 8 and 4 respectively, two of my more trickier matchups before beating Deci Goon, one of my easier matchups but I made it harder for myself with some misplays. I left Heatran and Giratina out to test the new changes out and even though I liked it, I still felt as though I was missing both of those options. 

And that was as good as it got for me honestly! Thanks for reading!

All kidding aside, it's sad to know that those three tourney wins (Limitless Test, Sunday Open and Hegster) with Centiskroch would be 3 of only 4 tourney wins for me throughout this format (the other being with Eternatus). I really thought I hit the jackpot finding my comfort deck early and I could finally call something for my own but it just wasn't to be. Sure I did get more good results later on but just never got a 5th tourney win with Centiskorch.

Went from a 1-2 start to a 5-2 finish at Chill a few days later and this is where I knew I had to get Giratina back in as one of my lost were to LucMet and I had no outs of getting around the Weakness Guard energy and no, Radiating Heat is not the best idea in that match. At least Heatran came in handy vs Zamazenta here. Having Tina and Heatran did help me get a top 16 finish at the very next Hegster event, so I was right to have them back in. 

Later on in the week I came close to making it a 5th win but I lost in the finals of a Japanese tourney called the Jal Cup. I tested Ordinary Rod out in place of 2nd Crystal to see the interaction with it and stuff like Heatran, Eldegoss or Dedenne and it worked nicely, I managed to beat a LucMet relying just on Zamazenta because of it. Sadly I dead drew in the finals vs ADPZ.

Week 5 - Hegster Top 4 Finish

Started the week off with my 3rd straight top cut appearance at the Hegster Top Deck series, finishing 3rd out of 115 players. I made some changes, going back to two Dedenne, cutting Gears, adding Marnie, going back to two Crystals and testing out 4 Comms to see if it helps to solve the issue of whiffing the VMAX evolution that cost me a coupe of wins days prior. It did it's job but I wasn't too convinced by it. 

Also during this tourney I was convinced 2nd Stamp is far better than a 1-1 split of Stamp/Marnie as I had to rely on it just to ruin my opponent's hand while I was stuck as well. Ended up 6/1/1 in swiss, beating LucMet in Top 8 before losing to PikaRom in Top 4 who never missed flipping heads on Crushing Hammers, even knocking all 3 of my energies out at one points after a Flare Starter. 

Later on in the week for Chill Series, I started testing Reshiram & Charizard-GX in place of Heatran-GX just to see how much better or worse it would do and in it's first match, it took all six prizes vs PikaRom so that went well. Only finished 4-3 in that tourney sadly. I also tested Zangoose in another tourney to see if it would help vs Eternatus and sadly never had the chance to find out. 

It was also during this time where a few others started taking my list to try out for themselves and the first big winner was my guy Edward Valencia, he won the first Limitless Online Series Weekly with 59 cards of what I used in Chill, with Heatran in place of ReshiZard. So that made me really happy!

A day later, I would bubble out of a top 8 finish in the first event of the 3rd season of PokeX. I gave Mallow and Lana another try in the hopes that it'd help get around Raichu's paralysis trick that kept making me lose and well....it just never did that for me. 

Week 6 - Two Top 4 Finish in Three Days (Hegster and Sunday Open)

At some point during the week, I gave Tord Reklev's version of Centiskorch a try with Greens and Magneton and I just wasn't a big fan of it, 5-7 in two tourneys. 

Went back to the normal list for Hegster S2 Top Deck 17, finish swiss with a 6-1 record (might have been 1st in swiss too), beating ADPZ in Top 8 before misplaying to the legend himself Azul Garcia Griego in top 4. I was satisfied with this list but something felt missing. I wasn't sure if 4th comm wasn't needed.

Played the same list for Jonno Cup but had no luck in that and that was also the first event where after 11 mirror matches, I finally lost to one but that was more due to me having a dead hand. 

For the Sunday Open, I kept the same list from Hegster with the only change being ReshiZard coming in place of Heatran to see how it'd deal with the ADPZ/PikaRom matchups and it seemed to do alright too, got me the win over ADPZ twice but I did feel that Heatran was probably better for other matchups plus it only gave up one prize. Ended swiss 5/0/1, beating ADPZ in Top 8 then losing to Mew3 Welder in top 4, I was put in a no win situation. 

Week 7 & 8 - Top 16 Limitless Weekly two weeks in a Row (Perfecting the list)

The Hegster invitational didn't go so well, winning the first round against ADPZ was the only good thing for me. I ended up losing the next two rounds but I liked how the deck was working with the newest addition of Great Catcher. The whole idea of it was me always finding myself in the middle of either needing Welder to power up or Boss to gust someone up in the PikaRom matchup. And then it hit me, why not Great Catcher so I can use both of them?

I kept messing around with ReshiZard for the Limitless WOS #3 and the deck worked really well, got me a 6/2/0 score, 16th out of 178 players which is not bad. Of course I knew right away ReshiZard should be Heatran, Marnie should be 2nd Stamp and one less Energy taken out so Giratina would be back in. That list for me would probably be the ideal Centiskorch list going forward and sure enough, it was! Augusto Beringuer won the PokeX Challenge the next day with those changes so my thinking was on the right path, except he went with one Fire Crystal and 12 energies. 

Now with the list set, it was time to give it a run at Sunday Open, I ended up 5/2/0, 14th out of 80 players, both losses were down to just bad luck, missing two important cards out of a 9 card deck from Dede draw and getting donked but the deck was working perfectly. 

The core idea of the list almost won 3 tourneys in a row, Liam won Sunday Open with it and Vini came 2nd for E & D's qualifier. So we were on the right path now.

While I was happy with the list, I still couldn't shake off the Lum Berry idea off my mind so I gave it a try for Chrollo #7 and got all the way to the finals with it before losing to Poison Eternatus. The Lum Berry did help me win the second game of the series but only having 2 of them in deck, they just never showed up at the right time and it was only useful against those two decks.

Just for the heck of it, I thought "why not let's run Lum Berry again" for the next Limitless WOS. And it didn't hinder me at all, going 6/2/0 for the second week in a row! 15th out of 143 people with a suboptimal version of Centiskorch sure was funny but also nice. But I knew the Lum Berry idea just wasn't cutting it. I'd rather just take the loss to Poison Eternatus and improve my matches agaisnt everything else. Lum Berry did scare the PikaRom players enough for them to make sub-optimal plays so that was nice. 

I went back to the ideal list for Perfection 1 of the 3rd season of PokeX, losing my last round to Eternatus to miss out on a top 16 finish. This was also the tourney I missed Lum Berry the most as I got paired with the combination of Poison Eternatus and PikaRom in 5 of my 8 rounds. Ended up 5-3 in the event which was nice as it was a best of 3 series in swiss but I stayed up till 6.30am so that wasn't good.

Week 9 - PokeGear Version

Went on a bit of a mixed run after that, losing win and in games in 6 tournaments in a row before bombing out of Hegster Top Deck 2 of the 3rd season. I started playing around with the PokeGear version of the list my friend Thomas Brophy had been doing alright with, wanting to see if it was any better but I just wasn't convinced as it made my LucMet matchup way worse. 

I started playing around the idea of Ordinary Rod and Marshadow to see if that would help to beat out the decks using two Chaotic Swell and sure enough, I never played against a deck using just that so I never got to see how it'd work. More testing followed with that combo but I ended up using Ordinary Rod more to get Eldegoss/Heatran/Dedenne back and I still prefered having two Fire Crystal in hand in case of Swell.

Week 10 - Still messing around

I started the week off playing in my first E & D event for their LCQ, going 5/0/2 after swiss rounds before messing up against Blowns in top 8. Had I played well, I had a real shot of winning it as all the matchups were in my favour so that was a real big missed opportunity. I did try out Ninetales V in the Net version just to see how it'd do vs ADPZ and things like Zamazenta and ChuChu, and it worked nicely to be fair. Shame I don't have the space to have two Fire tech attackers in the list.

Week 11 - Finals of Gazerbeam's Tourney of Dreams

And here we go, the last time I'll get to play Centiskorch in this TEU-DAA format and it was Gazerbeam's Tourney of Dreams, a double elimination tourney best of 1 format. I went with the Gear version thinking it'll be better suited for best of 3 not realizing it was actually best of 1! Deck ran smoothly but of course I lost to LDF and his Mad Party deck in winner's finals and grand finals. 

The main new addition (or re-inclusion) was getting Bird Keeper back into the deck for an easier way to get out of Paralysis and getting Heatran into action. So it's funny how I started the format off with Bird Keeper, didn't play it until the last week of the format itself but I always did like the card. 

So that's how the journey with Centiskorch went, just 3 tournament wins out of the 49 I took part in (yes I play too much). 9 Top 4 finishes, 11 Top 8 finishes, 25 Top 16 finishes. So half of my tourneys ended with me inside top 16 so I'm quite happy with that, shows that I'm making some improvements to keep putting myself in a good spot at these events when say a year ago, I'd be struggling to make top 16. 

The List

Going into the next format, my Centiskorch list will be based off this. I don't really see many changes needed since the deck doesn't really gain anything new from the set. So let's start with the 100% for sure must haves:

- Must Have (49) -

x3 Centiskorch V

x3 Centiskorch VMAX

x3 Volcanion

x2 Dedenne-GX

x1 Eldegoss V

x1 Crobat V

x1 Giratina

x4 Welder

x11 Fire Energy

x1 Fire Crystal

x3 Giant Hearth

x2 Boss's Orders

x1 Great Catcher

x4 Quick Ball

x3 Pokemon Communication

x1 Professor's Research

x1 Reset Stamp

x4 Switch

All these are self explanatory. 3-3 line of Centiskorch is usually enough to get the job done. Those 4 support Pokemon I feel will be a must going into the next format, especially Giratina.

11 Fire Energy feels just enough to get everything you need. 3 Gust options is the best way to go about it. 7 ball search may not sound like enough but it's been doing alright for me, if you can find a space for a 4th comm that would be even more helpful. The lone Research can come in very handy in very niche situations. So that's 46 cards sorted, all you need to do is figure the rest of the 11 cards and that usuall depends on which version of Turbo Skorch you prefer and also for some card counts.

- Scoop Net Options -

x4 Scoop Up Net

x2 Jirachi

x1 Zigzagoon

If you're going for the Scoop Up Net version, these are the additional must haves. Goon only helps in small situations but when you need it, it tends to be a game changer. Jirachi is a nice pivot to have at times and because of it, sometimes I like having a Bird Keeper in the deck to make full use of it. So that's 56 cards and the last three are up to personal preference:

- Tech Options -

- Either 2nd Fire Crystal or 12 Fire Energy

- Either 2 Stamps or 1 Marnie

- Either Cramorant or Dubwool as your non-Fire attacker

- Either Heatran-GX, Reshiram & Charizard-GX, Ninetales V or 4th Centiskorch V

I personally prefer having 11 Fire and 2 Crystal as it helps me have an out to Swell. As for hand disruption, I've grown to prefer 2 stamps as using a supporter to do that doesn't really suit this deck in particular. As for the colourless option, I'd rather go with Cramorant as the snipe option can come in handy in many situations, even in the mirror match or against unfavoured matchups like Inteleon VMAX. 

And the last backup attacking choice, I've come to the conclusion that Heatran just offers so much more over the other 3 choices. 

• Heatran can help you get donk wins out of nowhere. Heatran is also extremely useful in the ADPZ matchup and dealing with Zamazenta. Also can hit 350 for 7 energies, more than Centiskorch funnily enough who only does 320 with the same amount. 
• ReshiZard can tank a hit and the thing going for it is that it does deal with support Pokemon easier than the rest, but so does Centiskorch VMAX. Giving up 3 prizes for lesser HP than Skorch doesn't feel that good.
• Ninetales I've found to be extremly useful in the ADPZ matchup and also the LucMetZ matchup. It can also copy Tandem Shock to give your opponent's ChuChu a piece of their own medicine. 
• 4th Centiskorch just to make sure you start with it.

However, if you prefer the Gears version

- Gear Options - 

x4 PokeGear

x1 Crobat V or Eldegoss V

x1 Marshadow

x1 Ordinary Rod or Volcanion

PokeGear is self explanatory. Crobat gives you extra draw power but Eldegoss gives you another option for a 5th/6th Welder or 3rd/4th Boss and I've always liked having two Eldegoss in Centiskorch anyway. Marshadow is there just to deal with Choatic Swell. And for the last spot, personal choice, either go for the 4th Volcanion to maximise your Flare Starter odds or the recovery choice of Ordinary Rod.

Matchups and stats

So here's some fun stats part, I'll share how I did against the main decks of the format and instead of giving a guess on how the matchup would go, I'll give actual facts on how it went for me in those matchups. 

vs Arceus & Dialga & Palkia-GX/Zacian V (55 games played, won 33 = 60% win rate)

I did always think Centiskorch was always slight favored vs ADPZ. You had so many options to take all six prizes. If you're able to knock out their ADPZ Turn 2, you're winning 90% of the time. And you have various options to get there. Turn 1 Flare Starter + Welder onto Centiskorch or a Turn 1 Welder onto Heatran to hit the ADP twice. Sometimes you might even get lucky to knock out their Zacians right away. This is also the one matchup that Ninetales V truly shines, if you decide to play it.

But it's not always a give that you'll win. You are quite reliant on Dedenne/Crobat if you have a bad start and one awfully timed Mawile can lose you the game. Sometimes they can even win just from you bricking which probably controubled to 20% of my losses.

vs Eternatus non Poison variant (33 games played, won 19 = 57% win rate)

This one is a close matchup as you need the perfect set-up to firstly take down their first Eternatus VMAX and then be able to tank a hit from the next one to take it down as well. This is one of the matchups where Goon/Nets shines the most. Cramorant tends to be very helpful here too.

vs Pikachu & Zekrom-GX (27 games played, won 12 = 44% win rate)

This matchup, if anything, is slightly favoured to the Peeks as they have various options to lose you the game, either through stupid hammer luck, or the usual stamp to 1-2 and paralyze you out of the game. I never did get a lot of luck in this matchup. Also you need to go 2nd to really stand a chance of winning.

vs Centiskorch VMAX (27 games played, won 21 = 78% win rate)

Now this one is probably the most surprising of the whole lot. It's a mirror match, so it should be 50-50 but I've been able to get the best out of the mirror match many times, especially when I'm forced to go first. In fact I started the format of with an 11 match winning streak in the mirror matches. Unlike ADPZ mirror matches, this one tends to be more interesting. You won't try to aimlessly attack into them until the right time shows up.

vs Lucario & Melmetal-GX/Zacian V (22 games played, won 19 = 86% win rate)

One of your better matchups and the win rate shows. I'm not saying it's a 100% for sure win as weird things can happen as evident from my 3 losses. My losses to this deck was mainly down to losing a Skorch to a Turn 2 fully powered Zacian V + Boss or not having a way to get around Weakness Guard. Heatran-GX made this matchup even better for our side. I've even won 2 games against this with the combination of Heatran-GX and Ordinary Rod. This is also the only match where if possible, I'd choose to go first.

vs Mewtwo & Mew-GX/Welder Toolbox (24 games played, won 15 = 62.5% win rate)

This one is a tricky one as it should be 50-50, Mew3 has various of ways to beat Centiskorch but they always do seem to miss some tricks to get there which is probably why I won more times than I lost. You do need to be mindful of Indeedee V showing up out of nowhere or the usual Nasty Goo-GX trick so not spamming Switches is vital. 

vs Blacephalon UNB (15 games played, won 10 = 67% win rate)

This one is a little surprising as I honestly believe Blacephalon UNB is favoured in this matchup as it can easily get those huge KOs. Them depending a lot on their support Pokemon does help give us free targets and that's how I kept beating them I suppose. If it was a 33% win rate, I wouldn't be surprised. 

vs Poison Eternatus (9 games played, won 2 = 22% win rate)

Yup, this one is just terrible. There's really not much you can do but hope and pray. Your only realistic hope is knocking our their Eternatus VMAX on your 2nd turn with 8 energies on your VMAX and try to survive the next attack. The problem is their Poison trick is a bit too much to handle. 

vs Decidueye/Obstagoon (8 games played, won 8 = 100% win rate)

Normally, I don't like to say a match-up is an auto-win since anything can happen, you could have the worst start possible and lose. But yeah this is an auto-win. Their tricks won't affect you if you play correctly, using your Volcanions and Centiskorch at the right time.

vs Green's Reshiram & Charizard (8 games played, won 4 = 50% win rate)

50-50 matchup and the score proves it. For this, whoever goes 2nd pretty much wins. If you can get your VMAX running quickly, you just run over them. If not, they just run over you easily. 

Next Format 

Right now, I still don't have a clue on what will do well in the next format or not but one thing is for sure, I will still be doing my best to keep making Centiskorch as good as it can be. With LucMet/Zacian projected to jump into Tier 1, that gives us one really good matchup. ADPZ will still be around, so make it two. Jury is still out on the Coalossal matchup but I do hope it scares away the PikaRoms and Eternatus, two of our worst matchups.

As for new additions, I'll be testing out the new Talonflame V out for sure just to see if it's worth having the new hand after Turn 1. Typically, if I have to go first, I'd rather have my first energy on my Centiskorch V to build up a possibly 200 hit for turn 2 so that is already conflicting with some of my game plans. Ninetales V is an interesting choice with many new interesting attacks to take advantage of.

No new cards really catches my eye as things needed to add into the deck but 100%, Giratina will be good. I might even want to test two of them. I'll likely stick to the Scoop Up Net version since it's working well for me.

Other Decks I Played

I didn't just play Centiskorch the whole way though. I knew that if I wanted to really improve, I needed to get used to playing all sorts of decks and try to get decent results with most of them. The ones I refused to play were decks with Crushing Hammer as I'm not a fan of that card and I don't want to rely on luck to win games and also Control decks, it's just not for me.

• Arceus & Dialga & Palkia-GX/Zacian V
• 9 Events
• 38 Wins/23 Losses/3 Ties - 59% Win Rate
• 0 Wins
• 0 Top 4 Finish
• 1 Top 8 Finish
• 4 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 26.89%
• Best Finishes:
• Atlas DAA Monthly 1 - 10th/94
• Epoch Tuesday Cup 1 - 7th/38
• Hegster S3 Top Deck 4 - 14th/123

• Eternatus VMAX
• 11 Events
• 41 Wins/30 Losses/2 Ties - 56% Win Rate
• 1 Win
• 1 Top 4 Finish
• 2 Top 8 Finish
• 5 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 39.18%
• Best Finishes:
• Atlas DAA Mini 11 - 1st/52
• Coffee Cup #2 - 5th/16
• Prof Oak Paradise S2 Tourney #7 - 9th/39

• Mewtwo & Mew-GX/Welder Toolbox
• 10 Events
• 38 Wins/30 Losses/0 Ties - 53% Win Rate
• 0 Wins
• 0 Top 4 Finish
• 2 Top 8 Finish
• 3 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 35.2%
• Best Finishes:
• Atlas DAA Mini 12 - 7th/60
• Atlas DAA Mini 1 - 8th/69
• Yoshi Cup 15 - 9th/18

• Mewtwo & Mew-GX/Lighting Toolbox
• 2 Events
• 9 Wins/5 Losses/0 Ties - 64% Win Rate
• 0 Wins
• 0 Top 4 Finish
• 0 Top 8 Finish
• 0 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 23.3%
• Best Finishes:
• Chill TCG Series #10 - 18th/121

• Blacephalon UNB
• 2 Events
• 6 Wins/8 Losses/0 Ties - 42% Win Rate
• 0 Wins
• 0 Top 4 Finish
• 0 Top 8 Finish
• 0 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 39.87%
• Best Finishes: 
• Atlas DAA Mini 5 - 30th/75

• Pikachu & Zekrom-GX
• 2 Events
• 8 Wins/7 Losses/0 Ties - 53% Win Rate
• 0 Wins
• 0 Top 4 Finish
• 0 Top 8 Finish
• 0 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 34%
• Best Finishes: 
• Chrollo Tourney #10 - 21st/73

• Lucario & Melmetal-GX
• 3 Events
• 10 Wins/9 Losses/0 Ties - 52% Win Rate
• 0 Wins
• 0 Top 4 Finish
• 1 Top 8 Finish
• 1 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 39.87%
• Best Finishes: 
• 9outofBen DAA League - 6th/11

Others:

Excadrill (1 Event) - 3/4/0

Dragapult (1 Event) - 0/2/0

Deci/Goon (1 Event) - 0/2/0

Fire Box (1 Event) - 1/2/0

Green's Centi (2 Events) - 5/7/0

Inteleon (1 Event) - 3/3/0

Charizard VMAX (1 Event) - 0/2/0

And of course, the stats for the main deck:

• Centiskorch VMAX
• 49 Events
• 209 Wins/120 Losses/13 Ties - 61%
• 3 Wins
• 9 Top 4 Finish
• 11 Top 8 Finish
• 26 Top 16 Finish
• Average Placement - 27.3%
• Best Finishes: 
• Limitless Test Tourney 1 - 1st/17
• Sunday Open (14th Sep) - 1st/139
• Hegster S2 Top Deck 12 - 1st/160

So yup, I can only do well with Centiskorch apparently but I did get some good results with the likes of Mew3 Welder, ADPZ and of course, that rare one-off tourney win with Eternatus. Hopefully I can add to these tourney wins with the new upcoming format. Thank you for reading and I hope you have a great day!

Singapore Pro Circuit - How does it work and history of it

There are many different ways for us to play Pokemon TCG, competitively or casually. Be it the weekly League games at your local shops, League Challenges, League Cups, Special Events, Regionals or the biggest one of them all, World's Championship. But what if I were to tell you that there might be a different way to play the game, in the form of a pro-circuit. Players battling it out to score points in a certain period of a season to see who was the best in that time frame. It's an idea that Project EXT in Singapore has used to introduce the Singapore Pro Circuit with it's weekly circuit leagues, all of which leading up to an Invitational Event for some big prizes.

Singapore Pokemon Pro-Circuit Event is ran by a collective of Trading Card Game Shops around Singapore to promote Pokemon TCG by providing a daily testing ground for the Singapore Pokemon TCG Community. Players get to have Pro-Circuit Points whenever they participates in the Pro-Circuit Events. A Seasonal Invitational with attractive prizes will be held the end of each quarter where the Top 32 Players with highest Pro-Circuit Points of that season will be able to enter for free, to commemorate the changing of the Pokemon TCG meta-game and to usher the new Pokemon Booster Set release.

It started out as an in house monthly tournament which would morph into an in-house league with an invitational even at the end of each season (with a duration of 3 months). The first time a league system was introduced was back in January 2018 with Project EXT doing it by themselves every weekend.

The first Invitational information

The idea was the brainchild of Project EXT and it's founders. We asked Louis Ow what inspired him and his crew to push for the pro-circuit and his goals from having the circuit.

"Back in 2017, when we were trying to grow the community, we realised that there were not many competitive events around. Only playtesting etc but that was not enough to up the players game in the long term. Hence we started our first iteration of the circuit in 2018, and started with a bang. After two successful seasons, we started to approach others to see if we can grow the community even bigger.

Right now we are happy that most of the events are able to fire off and more Singaporean players get to hone their craft, and are now get better results on the regional/international scale. As we move forward, more emphasis will be made on growing the Singapore National brand, we will also start to sponsor players moving forward. More details will be announced after the current worlds in August."


As more players joined in, the circuit grew bigger. The third invitational would go from having 16 players to 32 players, even though the winner's prize dropped from $500 to $400. It wasn't just the group of players growing as in August, EXT announced that it's in house circuit would expand into a Singapore Pro Circuit with the likes of Metagame and Brick's Play host games for the circuit to give players more chance to score points but more importantly to give players the chance to play against more players, some of which may not frequent EXT all that much but now had the chance to partake in the circuit too.

The very first Invitational event, also the first event at EXT's new location in Tai Seng

As of now, the circuit has grown to the point where there are games every day of the week with newer shops hosting some of the games. But it's not just limited to Standard format as there are two Expanded format games for those wanting to get try something different or for older players to bring out decks of past glory again. Starting this season there is also a PTCGO format hosted at EXT, with prizes being packs for the game itself.

With every opportunity for players to take some time off their days and join a circuit day, what did EXT co-founder Thomas Xu think of the effects of the pro-circuit from the store side of things?

"We saw a steady increase in new players as they had more confidence in pro circuit shops because they will find players that play Pokemon on circuit days, and as they play more and more circuit games, they tend to travel to other pro circuit shops together with their new friends which in a way gave pro circuit shops confidence in running the event regularly as they see steady crowd every week. From the circuit we would gradually see 15 to 30 new players who join the events every few season."

How it does work?

3 rounds of swiss, 50 minutes, best of 3 per round. Number of players tend to depend on the shops, with EXT and Sanctuary Gaming the most popular of the shops according to recent and past attendances.

Everyone gets 1 cp for joining (2cp for Expanded games). For each swiss round win, you would earn that amount of cp (3cp for 3 wins, 2cp for 2 wins, 1 cp for a win and nothing with 0 wins). An additional 1cp is awarded to the top 4 at the end of 3 rounds but this bonus is only activated if there are 8 players registered.

Since the Autumn season, there is now an incentive for players to finish in the top 8 or top 16 in the final standings. 1st to 8th place will go into the invitational event with 2 byes while 9th to 16th gets one bye. Need a bigger incentive, how about a cash prize of $800 going to the winner in the next invitational (Spring), which is doubled from the last two invitational winners. A top 4 finish nets you at least $100, while the rest of the top 8 finishes would get 10 packs each. Everyone who took part in the invitational will at the very least get a playmat with their either the Top 32, Top 18, Top 8 or Grand Champion on it.


Past Results

Spring Season Top 16 Invitational 2018 - June 8th 2018 - BKT to FLI

1. Alex Yeo (13th Seed) - Ultra Necrozma-GX/Malamar
2. Titally Tan (8th Seed) - Zygarde-GX/Lycanroc-GX
3. Bobby Soo (16th Seed) - Lapras-GX/Volcanion Prism
4. Kashvinder Singh (7th Seed) - Ultra Necrozma-GX/Malamar
5. Klive Aw (14th Seed) - Zygarde-GX/Lycanroc-GX
6. Syafiq Affandi (Replacement) - Zygarde-GX/Lycanroc-GX
7. Rauf Fazil (4th Seed) - Zygarde-GX/Lycanroc-GX
8. Mason Lim (15th Seed) - Greninja BREAK

Summer Season Top 16 Invitational - November 24th 2018 - SUM to LOT

1. Klive Aw (4th Seed) - Blacephalon-GX/Naganadel
2. Gerald Ong (Replacement) - Zoroark-GX/Glaceon-GX
3. Eujun Gan (9th Seed) - Buzzwole-GX/Lycanroc-GX
4. Lyn Fara (13th Seed) - Blacephalon-GX/Naganadel
5. Keith Ting (16th Seed) - Buzzwole-GX/Lycanroc-GX
6. Bertrand Yan (10th Seed) - Buzzwole-GX/Lycanroc-GX
7. Kashvinder Singh (1st Seed) - Passimian/Tapu Koko
8. Tan Jun Hao (6th Seed) - Zoroark-GX/Control

Autumn Season Top 32 Invitational - December 22nd 2018 - SUM to LOT

1. Rauf Fazil (4th Seed) - Zoroark-GX/Lycanroc-GX
2. Anselm Sim (14th Seed) - Buzzwole-GX/Lycanroc-GX
3. Tan Jun Hao (6th Seed) - Gardevoir-GX/Alolan Ninetales-GX
4. Kashvinder Singh (3rd Seed) - Zoroark-GX/Decidueye-GX/Alolan Ninetales-GX
5. Rizduan Sukarno (11th Seed) - Shiny Lugia/Malamar
6. Aidyl Adha (2nd Seed) - Rayquaza-GX/Naganadel
7. Eugene Chua (Replacement) - Tapu Koko/Seviper
8. Walter Ho (17th Seed) - Zoroark-GX/Gardevoir-GX

Winter Season Top 32 Invitational - April 6th 2019 - SUM to TEU

1. Bertrand Yan (16th Seed) - Zapdos/Jirachi/Lycanroc-GX
2. Eugene Chua (12th Seed) - Zapdos/Jirachi/Buzzwole
3. Joey Ho (Replacement) - Zoroark-GX/Lycanroc-GX/Buzzwole-GX
4. Rauf Fazil (4th Seed) - Zoroark-GX/Lycanroc-GX
5. Christopher Lim (19th Seed) - Alolan Exeggutor
6. Alphonse Teh (8th Seed) - Zapdos/Jirachi/Jolteon-GX
7. Aidyl Adha (7th Seed) - Zapdos/Jirachi/Lycanroc-GX
8. Kashvinder Singh (1st Seed) - Charizard/Jirachi

A couple of interesting stats you might notice. The finals in all 4 invitational so far have featured a different player, no-one has made a repeat appearance, with Rauf coming the closest to doing that last time out. Also, for the Summer and Autumn editions, even though they were in the same format, none of the decks from the Summer top 8 made it to top 8 in the Autum season, showing how diverse the meta was in the last format.

With the introduction of the 2-bye incentive, have players with that advantage make full use of it? From the last two events, they have indeed with 5 players making top cut in both Autumn and Winter seasons. So it is a nice advantage but there is still the chance of missing out if you don't win your first match in Round 3. 

As for some fun stats, the 4th seed going into the invitational has always had a top 8 finish (aka a top cut appearance with the new structure since Autumn). So no pressure to Luke going into the Spring 19 invitational. The other "lucky number" is 16, with 3 top 8 finishes, the most of the "entrants" not numbered 4. A replacement player has also always had a top 8 finish so even though you may not have qualified for the invitational, if you're one of the lucky guys to fill in for someone else, you might still end up doing well. 

With all that in mind, it seems like a great addition to have the pro-circuit but what about from the players's point of view, specifially one of Singapore's best players and Autumn season grand champion Rauf Fazil.

"I guess before the pro circuit started, there were players who would only play at a certain card shops and not meet more players, old or new. With this, players would be encouraged to play pro circuit tourneys at other shops and meet new players, make new friend and sharing ideas. Naturally it helps all players improve by playing with more players outside their own circle.

While playing a fun deck is fun and all, eventually they meet and play against a competitive player which may inspire them to make the transition into competitive playing or just have more creative (and stronger) deck ideas for casual playing.

It has helped me meet more players like casuals which I think would be impossible without the pro circuit initiative. It widens my eyes and thinking that its not just the meta decks that may be the winning deck, and also I get to see more archetypes which I never knew existed and either borrowed the idea or test my deck against it in case I meet a similar one in the future. Personally as a normal player, it's more fun nowadays playing with more players"

Scenes from the latest Invitational event

On a personal note, I can also say the pro-circuit games have helped me become a better player even though I still consider myself a casual player. The more games I would play, I would start to notice things I may have done wrongly and try to learn from it. I would try to go to as many as 3 pro-circut games per week all in the effort to better myself as a player. And it is a great help to have what I would consider the top tier players like Rauf, Klive, Nicholas and Anselm to name a few, join in on the weekly games. Their presence alone made me want to play better and if not for their guidance and advice after our games, pointing out what I may have done wrong or what I could do to improve myself or techs I may want to consider for decks, I would not have had my top 8 finishes in each of the 4 invitational events so far.

I hope this will help to inspire more places around the world to build up their Pokemon TCG community and help each other get stronger playing the game we love in a new way with perhaps the idea of their own pro-circuit. It's been interesting to follow how the first four seasons has developed in our side of the causeway and I personally have seen many new guys joining us in weekly games, some of whom will take part in their first Invitational event next month. I'd like to think that the one Project EXT developed for Singaporean players will be of some ways to help players improve their game but also to make new friends and perhaps learn from the more experienced players. The more players are having games with one another, the better it is and hopefully that will help to bring in more players and also for the stores, of which may see a rise in players if a successful and enticing system was in place for them. I can say it's helped our players too.