Hot Springs AR CC Report

Being my very first CC, as you could imagine I was a bit apprehensive about going, but also wanting to see what exactly the experience would merit I found myself wanting to go more so then not. So that very morning I loaded the car as myself and another group set out on the three hour drive to Hot Springs Arkansas. I will spare you the details of the drive but let’s just say it was less then spectacular.

We arrive more early then we hoped so we decided to go across the street and replenish our caffeine levels at the local star bucks, seeing as how McAlister’s wasn’t opened yet. An hour later the doors open and we make our way in to signup and deck registration. As I await the parings I am approached by a kid that looks to be playing in the seniors division and he of course challenges me to a quick game.  

I accept and start to regret accepting it almost immediately. Seeing as how I have only been playing for a month, I’m almost positive this kid is going to cream me. Turns out he is playing Torterra / Sceptile, and I happen to start with Blaziken FB and Tangela. He rolls and I get to go first. I attach an energy and luring flame one Treecko for another. He sets a tadium (Contest Hall), rolls for it, gets tails, so he searches for Grovyle with Luxury Ball, attaches an Energy to his benched Treecko and passes. I draw a card, level up Blaziken FB, roll for the stadium get a heads and so I pull out Infernape 4 and attach an Expert Belt, add an Energy to Blaziken LV.X and proceed to KO his Treecko.

He sends up Treecko with an Energy, then evolves to Grovyle, rolls for the stadium, gets another tails, seeing as how he doesn’t have any trainers to pull a basic and no basics on his bench he tries to use Grovyle’s “Detect” attack it also fails so he concedes.

Round 1: Strange Fellow with Garchomp / Dragonite          

He starts with a lonely Gible, I start with Tangela, Surskit, and another Surskit up front. I go first, and attach an Energy to Surskit and attack for 10 plus another ten because I rolled a heads. He draws and adds another Gible to his bench. Sand Attacks with Gible and ends his turn. I draw, evolve Surskit to Masquerain, and Tangela to Tangrowth attach an energy to Tangrowth and attack with “Skim Attack”, roll for the attack and get heads knocking out his Gible and drawing two cards and a prize.

He sends up Gible from his bench evolves into Gabite, attaches an Energy, sets Dratini on the bench, and uses Gather up, to pull the energy from the discard. I draw, attach an Energy to Tangrowth, Roseanne’s Research a Paris and a Energy, set Paris on the bench and attach an Expert Belt to Masquerain and Skim Attack for 50 and draw two cards. After that everything went pretty quickly. He tried to cheat a couple of times and the judges caught him; I didn’t mind because I don’t think he even drew a prize on me.

1-0

Round 2: Giratina

It’s sad I can’t remember this guys name because he was by far my favorite match. He played extremely well and was an excellent sport. He started off really strong and ended up leveling up his Giratina quickly and had me discarding cards every time I wanted to attack. I ended up getting out Parasect and putting him to sleep where he had to roll two heads in order to wake up, which didn’t happen, then I proceeded to send out Tangrowth and level him up and pretty much cleaned up after that. He never could keep damage on me long enough to do anything so I took my final prize and won. Excellent game, I hated winning against him because the match was just awesome.

2-0

Round 3: Robert Long with Luxray

Robert Long is a great friend of mine that rode up with us from Oklahoma. Poor guy wasn’t having much luck that day but played very well despite only being a first time player like me. I started really well again and pretty much mopped him up before he could establish anything. At one point he almost took out my Tangrowth with a Manectric with too much Energy on it to count and an Expert Belt but I recovered for the win.

3-0

Round 4: Hariyama / Flygon

I don’t remember this guys name either but he started horrible with a single Trapinch and I immediately got my Tangrowth out and my Masquerain was helping my draw out the rest of my set up when he turned it around with Hariyama. I was down to my last prize after I KOed two of his Flygon and two of his Hariyama, and one stray Trapinch. He still had another Flygon and another Hariyama. I attacked with Tangrowth and used Stick and Absorb to keep him from retreating, but forgot to enforce it on his turn and he retreated Hariyama and knocked out my Tangrowth with an Expert Belt drawing his last two prizes. All I really had to do was either remember to tell him he couldn’t retreat or stall out for the last minute before time would have been called, but I didn’t want to stall and I forgot he couldn’t retreat so I ended up suffering my first loss of the day.

3-1

Round 5: Machamp / Leafeon

This match was won 100% by Machamp. There was nothing I could do and being the first time I had ever seen that particular Machamp I had no way of knowing what was about to happen. He took out everything in the first five minutes and won. I asked him to play again for fun and he agreed. This time I got down to my last prize but he still ended up taking the win. Excellent playing on his part and I was glad to have learned from the match.

3-2

So I didn’t make the top cut because one of the other guys in the master’s went 5-0 but I learned a lot about what other people were running, and that I needed many more trainers in my deck in order to set up quicker. All in all it was really fun and I look forward to playing in every other tournament I can travel too. Since this day I have completely changed my deck around and I now run Gengar SF / Tangrowth SF. I do well for myself but it would be nice if I could get a Claydol in there to draw with instead of using Masquerain and Uxie.

Here is the deck I was running for the tournament in Hot Springs:

Deck Name: Giant Growth