Tournament Reports - Pokémon TCG Pocket week 10

The cozy New Year week brought together more players than ever, with an impressive streak of four tournaments exceeding 500 participants each—with yet another attendance record! Let’s see into how the Mythical Island meta is evolving, as we approach the halfway point to the next set release.

Pokémon Go Raiders New Year Live

Pokémon Go Raiders, one of the largest Discord communities for Pokémon Go Raids, has ventured into organizing Pokémon TCG Pocket Tournaments. For this New Year edition, they managed to attract 665 players, despite the festive season, with a $90 prize pool up for grabs.

Metagame Breakdown

Following its surge in popularity last week, Aerodactyl ex saw significant representation, with 9% of participants piloting this Fighting deck.

The tournament adopted a Top 64 cut, but for a clearer breakdown, we focus on the Top 32.

While Mewtwo ex was the most represented archetype in the upper brackets, it struggled to reach the very top. Only one Mewtwo ex deck advanced to the Top 8, compared to three Pikachu ex decks. Ultimately, these efforts couldn’t stop sushi5884, who claimed first place with a Celebi ex deck.

The new Snivy from the Blastoise drop event was added as a one-of. It can attack on curve, unlike the Mythical Island Snivy. However, with 10 less HP and no offensive role in most situations, the choice likely has minimal impact. sushi5884 opted to play 2 Exeggutor ex for the early game pressure, but also 1 Exeggutor from Mythical Island to have a reliable beater in the late game.

Another Exeggutor strategy reached the top cut, but this one used a completely different engine. Originally pioneered by Jeff Hoogland and refined with updates from Mythical Island, slowpoky piloted an Exeggutor Greninja list to a strong Top 4 finish.

This interesting combination makes an aggressive deck where both Exeggutor ex and the Froakie line can attack as soon as they're brought on the field. And with Erika and Leaf, your opponent will have a hard time taking a KO in response. The new addition of Mew ex improves matchups against historically tough opponents like Charizard ex and Mewtwo ex; slowpoky has beaten 6 of the latter in his run. This performance demonstrates that the deck has moved beyond experimentation and is now a viable choice for competitive play.

Greninja shined twice in the top 4 with Tander1 piloting a mainly Greninja deck, with some spicy techs.

Alongside the Fighting Toolbox of Hitmonlee and Marshadow, the deck included the early-game sweeper Farfetch’d, the ex-killer Tauros, and the beast-stick counter Mew ex. This toolbox efficiently handles a wide range of matchups with unique and adaptable play patterns. It’s nearly a non-ex list, yet it competes on equal footing with the strongest ex decks!

FrogEX Weekly Cup #1

The FrogEX Weekly Cup launched its first edition on January 2nd, attracting the full player cap of 512 participants. A $50 prize pool was at stake.

Metagame breakdown

The top 8 was claimed by just 3 different decks archetypes and only 1 variant each: Pikachu ex Zebstrika, Mewtwo ex with Mew and Celebi ex Exeggutor. Faramiglio led the deck to victory.

Unlike more Exeggutor-heavy builds as seen above, Faramiglio opted for a minimalistic approach of the splash in his Celebi ex strategy, running just 1 copy of each stage in the Exeggcute line. His purpose is to prioritize consistency when using Poké ball, to maximize the chances of accessing Celebi or Snivy.

Pockets Legends League #14

Shortly after Day 2 of the FrogEX tournament concluded, the 14th edition of Pocket Legends League kicked off, drawing 546 players competing for a $50 prize pool.

Metagame breakdown

Perhaps inspired by the strong performances of Celebi ex decks in the previous events, the popularity of Charizard ex decks rose. Most players leaned toward the Charizard and Arcanine variant.

A decision that paid off, as two such decks reached the Top 4. g_rat's path to this achievement included facing six decks! Certainly, picking up a paid dividends.

His list included Mew ex, which is usually a tech only found in Arcanine ex decks. While Mew ex's Genome Hacking attack has a steep Energy cost of , it doesn’t detract too much from the Energy need of the deck thanks to Moltres ex’s Inferno Dance. Unlike the other Pokémon, Mew ex doesn’t rely on evolving to deal big damages against stronger Pokémon. If the deck struggles to find its evolution pieces in time, it can be a crucial tool to not fall behind.

Despite the strong showing of Fire decks, santymcgoob claimed victory with a Pikachu ex Zebstrika deck... but not just that. He also ran the newly introduced Joltik and Galvantula from Mythical Island.

Galvantula's Electroweb attack is a slightly more powerful version of Arbok's Corner attack as it also traps the Defending Pokémon. The line functions similarly to Voltorb and Electrode as it can potentially knocks out a big threat by turn 2, such as Moltres ex and without requiring Giovanni! The bigger damage output is offset by a much more frail bulk, but the risk paid off. santymcgoob took down 7 Gyarados ex decks in his path to 1st place, another case of a favorable bracket, coupled with the experience of a player with multiple wins under his belt. It takes both Luck and Skill to claim the Victory!

Ursiiday's Pocket Weekly #10

The landmark tenth edition of Ursiiday's tournament set a new participation record with 1,995 players, narrowly missing the milestone 2,000-player mark. This event also boasted the week’s largest prize pool, with $400 up for grabs: the grand finale of an action-packed week.

Metagame breakdown

After relatively tame performances this week, Gyarados ex made sure to know it was one of the top tiers of this meta. Lead piloted the standard decklist all the way to the first place.

What is the Mythical Island metagame looking like?

The metagame has started to solidify around four primary archetypes dominating the competition: Mewtwo ex, Pikachu ex, Gyarados ex, Celebi ex decks (which often include Exeggutor). Fire decks (with Charizard ex and/or Arcanine ex) and Aerodactyl ex decks are also strong contenders. In the events we just covered, these decks have accounted for over 75% of the field.

Higher-tier decks remain strong, but no single deck consistently outperforms the others, as performance varies from one tournament to another. The metagame features more top-tier decks of roughly equal strength compared to Genetic Apex.

Rogue strategies are still present, but trends have shifted:

• While still popular, Pidgeot ex and Koga strategies have largely failed to convince, with no significant placements in big tournament as of late.
• Creative brews featuring Exeggutor, Greninja or the Fighting Toolbox are putting up decent results and have proven capable of competing against the higher tiered decks.

To maximize your chances of winning, the best strategy seems to be anticipating the tournament metagame based on results from previous major events. Alternatively, sticking to your pet deck is the safest option, as your familiarity with its play patterns ensures better optimization through experience.