Locals tonight were a "normal" League night, playing 30 Minute, Best-of-1 Rounds. I was playing a Festival Lead Dipplin deck built around, well, the Festival Lead Dipplin from the Twilight Masquerade set, along with a suite of various other single prize Pokémon for support. The only "rule box" in my deck is my Ace Spec, Maximum Belt.
With 16 players to start out the night - one player dropped after round 2 - we played 4 rounds, and I went 1-3. Technically. My one win was getting a Bye round in round 3 after the drop.
Round 1 vs. Lugia VSTAR - Loss
This game went poorly for me right out of the gate. The Lugia player managed to have a practically ideal opening setup, and they had an Iron Hands ex set up on their second turn, at which point things were pretty swiftly over for me. They got two knock outs with Amp You Very Much by the time I was able to get a Dipplin set up to take down the Hands, and the turn after I did that, they had set up a Minccino, and then Lugia VSTAR itself.
I don't think I necessarily did anything wrong this game, I just had the misfortune of my opponent getting a near-perfect start.
Round 2 vs. Festival Lead Dipplin - Loss
Not quite a mirror match, as the other player had a very different take on the Festival Lead Dipplin list. Among other things, running Teal Mask Ogerpon ex and Hydrapple ex meant a completely different suite of "support" options on the bench compared to my purely single prize selection.
I lost in large part because I got stuck with a Thwackey in the active spot. My mistake was in evolving the Grookey that I was forced to start in my active spot, because while I was able to attach a Rescue Board to it, Thwackey had too expensive a retreat cost. Thwackey's Boom Boom Groove is an incredibly strong ability, but it can't do anything when it is in the active spot. I evolved it because I was worried about not getting a replacement when I played an Iono to get a new hand. Much like my Round 1 game against Lugia, two turns of my opponent managing to hit 2 prizes a turn before I could set up a counter-offensive was too much, and I couldn't catch up.
Round 3 Bye - "Win"
Bye round. No game to speak of. I spent the round chatting with one of the other professors about VGC and the fact that we've officially returned to Regulation G as of a few days ago.
Neither of us is excited.
Round 4 vs. Gardevoir ex - Loss
The only game that I didn't see myself get stuck behind an impenetrable lead, this game was an incredibly fun back and forth. We hit time in the round and went to turns, and we were on pace to wind up in a draw at the end of turns.
Then I searched my deck and realized that after playing a Super Rod or a Pal Pad, some sort of recovery card, I somehow got my deck and my discard pile swapped with one another. Annoyed at myself for making such a ridiculous mistake, but c'est la vie. The damage is done, and it was a casual League night, nothing was on the line.
This deck was a bit of an odd one, even compared to my own Festival Lead Dipplin or the Dipplin I played against in Round 2. Mostly because while it was a Gardevoir ex deck, it was an unusual Gardevoir that was running a variety of Pokémon that aren't normally found in Gardevoir, such as Espathra ex and Xatu.
Ironically, if it had been a more typical Gardevoir list, I probably would've done better against it, but the presence of the Espathra meant I had to work a lot around its ability in particular. My deck only runs 4 energy, since Dipplin's attack only costs a single energy typically, and with Thwackey and Bug-Catching Sets, I don't usually have any difficulty getting what I need.
Alas.
Still, in all, despite losing every actual game that I played, I still think that the Festival Lead Dipplin deck is a lot of fun. It's a cute little budget list, and while I had some unfortunate luck, the deck has some teeth to it. Enough to take to, say, a Regional? Maybe not. Your local League night, maybe even a Cup or Challenge, though? Probably.
I'm almost certainly going to keep playing it for a while at my locals, at least.
No comments:
Post a Comment