22.12.2014

Battle Festa Sendai

Hisashiburi (Long time no see),
I hope you haven't missed me to much.


The finals and last classes are finally over and i have time to write articles again.
This first one will be about my second Battle Festa tournament in Sendai.
It was similar to the Tokyo one but only a one-day tournament.
There were probably about 300-400 competitors and the style was the same as in Tokyo.

But let's go chronologicaly.
I went to Sendai the day before the tournament to go to the Pokémon Center. At the same time my friends got to the Pokémon Center in Sapporo. I managed to make them get me some of the cool Greninja sleeves that were sold out everywhere else.
The Center in Sendai was really nice and small and after I was finished there I took a look around the famous shopping street in Sendai.





16.11.2014

Pokemon Card Hunting in Japan

Hello people,

It was requested, and I also know, that many of you want to know more about this, so I decided to give you a deeper insight on this with a special article.

Content:
A. First Hand Cards
 1. Packs
 2. Theme Decks
 3. Promos
B Second Hand Cards
 1. Singles
 2. Bulk
C Special Promos
D Merchandise

A. First Hand Cards

First, I'll tell you about the easiest way to get Pokémon cards in Japan. Many of you will already know what I am about to tell you, but some don't, so I'll give it a look.
This way is buying them in store - either in standard Packs, or in Theme Decks.

1. Packs

 













03.11.2014

Battle Festa Tokyo Tournament Report

Hello people,

I know, I posted this article already on 60cards.net, but I also wanted it here, just for completeness,and because I promised it to you. 
I was looking forward to this for since I am in Japan, and I was not disappointed.
The Battle Festa tournaments are some of the biggest tournaments in Japan every year, with easily over 1000 competitors and many of the strongest players in Japan go there to participate.

Table of Contents
1. The Preparations
2. The Deckchoice
3. The Tournament Rules
4. The First Day
5. The Second Day
6. Afterthoughts

1. The Preparations
Already about 2 months before the tournament I started to think about what deck to play, how to get to Tokyo, where to stay there, and so on. About a month ahead I learned that my friend, whom I always tested with, wanted to go, too. Also a good friend from uni had decided to visit her family in Tokyo that weekend, so we could all go together. My friend booked the night bus to Tokyo, and from there on there was no going back. I started testing all kinds of decks excessively, which was hard, because no online-playing portal had Phantom Gate scans back then. My only chance was playing with friends, only with the decks I built myself. It was a great challenge, and I know that's not the optimal way of testing, but it was the only way that was practicable for me.
A couple of weeks before, I decided on my deck and started gathering the cards. I already had quite a number of trainers and Pokemon I needed, from those big packs you might remember, I bought really cheap.

23.10.2014

The Lightning Strikes Again

Hello people,

I'm back with a new deck archetype:
Mega Manectric EX.

Wait, that's not new!!!

Well, until now, I was looking for possible partners to play MManectric EX with.
That was until I realized, how powerful the card itself is.

That's why the new deck, I came up with, is just straight MManectric - without partners.


THE POKEMON
First, ill give you a small review about the card itself:
M Manectric-EX - Lightning - HP210
Mega Evolution - Evolves from Manectric-EX
When 1 of your Pokemon becomes a Mega Evolution, your turn ends.

[L][C] Turbo Bolt: 110 damage. Choose 2 basic Energy from your discard pile and attach them to 1 of your Benched Pokemon.

When a Pokemon-EX has been Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness: Fighting (x2)
Resistance: Metal (-20)
Retreat: 0



16.10.2014

New Decklist and Battle Festa Preparation


Hey people,

I am finally back with a new article.
The midterms in my uni have started, so I will have to concentrate more on those, but I will still try to write articles on a regular basis.

This one will revolve about another deck, and my preparations for Battle Festa, which gets closer and closer.

Many people found my last article, in which I featured MManectric and the Night's March deck, very interesting, and I got lots of feedback. I want to thank you all for your support.
Thats how my blog can get better.

Also I want to announce, that I will change this blog's name.
I was designing a logo for this one, but then stumbled upon the problem of copyright for the Pokémon logo, why I cant use I in the way I wanted to.

06.10.2014

New Phantom Gate Decks

Hello people, and welcome back.
This time, I will talk about decks that revolve a little bit more around the new Phantom Gate cards.

One idea that immediatly came to my mind when I saw MManectric EX was to combine it with Virizion/Genesect. This deck has shown great potential in many tournaments since it appeared with the release of Plasma Blast.
It has a consistent, fast setup and is able to deal with any threat.
The strategy revolves around using Virizion EX's Emerald Slash to power up as many Genesect EX as possible, to then use Genesect EX to clean up the board and getting rid of threats as soon as possible by using the Red Signal Ability. In situations where it is neccesary you also have the possibility of using G-Booster to hit everything for 200 damage.




 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
With the release of Flash Fire, though, Virizion/Genesect's natural enemy appeared:
Pyroar
This card gives VirGen a hard time and players piloting VirGen at tournaments usually try to avoid the match-up by all means.
Another problem that came up in VirGen decks after the rotation is the lack of Super Rod to get their energies back. With this you have to be much more carefull with discarding energies, than before.

MManectric EX solves the Pyroar problem as no other card could.
An evolved Pokémon, that does 110 damage for 2 energies, and then even gets 2 energies back from the discard pile.
This second effect of the attack solves the energie recovery problem.
 
Now you just have to find a way to fit this card into your VirGen deck.
 
I'll first give a decklist for expanded format, since that's what we play here in Japan in, and then try to help you convert the deck to standard.
 
My decklist is:
 
Pokémon:
3 Genesect EX
2 Virizion EX
2 Manectric EX
2 MManectric EX
1 Tropius PLB
10

Trainers:
4 Professor Juniper
4 N
4 Skyla
1 Shadow Triad
1 Colress
2 Skyarrow Bridge
3 Ultra Ball
3 Energy Switch
3 Muscle Band
2 Tool Scrapper
1 G Booster
1 Professo's Letter
2 Enhanced Hammer
3 VS Seeker
2 Manectric Spirit Link
36

Energies:
4 Plasma Energy
2 Lightning Energy
8 Grass Energy
14

Card choices:
 
Tropius PLB:
This card is a nice addition to the deck, since it makes your opponent draw odd prices and has fighting resistance. It helps in the Donphan match-up and it is also nice if you are stuck and just want to draw some cards.







3 Energy Switch:
This card is awesome!!!
You have so many two-energy-attackers, that as soon as you have one energy in play you can just slam down a fresh attacker, attack an energy, Energy Switch, and you are ready to go again.
I would never play less than 3.
 
2 Enhanced Hammer
Even though I don't play Balloons I can still take advantage of this card. It makes so many match-ups so much easier and helped me a lot in the meta here in Japan, that I wanted to include 2 of them.
 
Strategy:
The Strategie in this deck revolves around using Virizion and Genesects power to hit the opponent fast on a constant basis. Then, when the game is developed use MManectric to finish the opponent off by having the board advantage with many energies.
MManectric and even its basic EX do wonders against every lightning weak Pokémon like Yveltal EX, or Lugia EX, or even Empoleon.
On the other hand, it makes your Donphan match-up worse, but if you just don't play your Manectrics down it is just like playing with straight VirGen.
 
 






29.09.2014

Revisiting an old Friend

Hey people,

I'd like to have some fun here. 
Don't yell at me for doing this, or tell me, this is not a viable deck anymore.
I just want to do this - because I can.

So, I will update my beloved Blastoise deck to the current set in Japan: Phantom Gate.


First I will tell you about the cards I can see in there, and why:

- VS Seeker:
Well, I hope this choice is pretty obvious for you. 
This works well with Battle Compressor, and other discarding mechanics. And also with the many one-of supporter counts will be playing in this deck. 
Being able to play more than 4 Juniper, or N is also a too tempting possibility, to not play this card.





28.09.2014

Deck-Choices for Battle Festa

Hey people,

as already stated in my previous article, this one will be about my deck-choice for the japanese Battle Festa in Tokyo in November.

Choices are:

Fighting
A deck, that has the power, to hit for high numbers for low energy-cost.
My favorite build would be the Tyrantrum-version, since it has pretty good matchups all over the current meta. But that build would have a bad time against the new Metal decks, because of Aegilash EX, that can't be attacked by Pokémon with special energy attached. Another build would be Big Basics Garbodor. With a heavy Garbodor line it can do pretty good against Metal and Pyroar and has some really good consistency, so I think thats the way to go.

25.09.2014

Battle Festa (バトルフェスタ)

Hey people,

Time for a new article.
Sorry I didn't write one for quite some time, but I had lots of stuff to do here in uni.

This new article is going to be about something some of you might already have heard about:
The japanese Battle Festa (バトルフェスタ) which will be held this fall in the bigger japanese citys.
Maybe you've seen these cards, which people can get there:



13.09.2014

Phantom Gate Release

Well,welcome back, for the long awaited article about the new set Phantom Gate (Phantom Force in English).
I'm Hannes bloggin for you, right from Japan about the Pokémon TCG.

I went to the city today, on a special mission:
Buy as much Phantom Gate stuff, as you can find!
And that's, what I did.
I looked up every toy store around, to get, what I wanted, and it was successfull.

As I said in my last article I bought some packs, and of course - more or less - every other Phantom Gate stuff (sleeves, becuase nobody wants deck boxes).

Go ahead and take a look:

08.09.2014

Manga MANIAAAAAA!!!

Well, well...

It's time for a new article, isn't it?

So, what have I got for you?

Alright!!! Yes!!!

Let's go!

As you may know by now: This is Hannes, blogging about the Pokémon TCG, - more or less - right from Japan, just for you!
First  week of lessons is over, so I'll give a small review on that, for all the people, that are not so much into the Pokémon TCG.
I got some interesting courses, like "criminal justice in film and literture" or "history of economic thoughts", of course Japanese language course, and some others, more traditional like calligraphy.
And then, there is "MANGA MANIA"!!!
Awesome!!!
Who wouldn't want to be in a course called Manga Mania?!?

01.09.2014

What a weekend!!!

Hey guys,

It's Hannes blogging about the Pokémon TCG right from Japan, just for you.

Lots of stuff happened the last few days, and I'm gonna give you a short overview.


Saturday 30.08.

Trip to Akita City. 
I knew there would be a gym challenge near the university at 10:00, but I slept in (happens, if you go to the bar, the evening before.. ^^'). So I was a little bit late, but not too much. I went to the university, but I just couldn't find the shop. So after 2h I got back to the station and decided to get a map, but I couldn't find it on there either.  

I gave up on my initial plan and started to explore the city a bit, it was beautiful.
 


The seaflower field in front of the park. 
Those seeds freaked me out. O______O

27.08.2014

Starting to feel home here

Hey guys,

This is Hannes blogging about the Pokémon TCG right from Japan, just for you.

So now that I am here for a few days everything is starts to stabilize a bit and to get normal.
The placement test and all the orientation courses are over and the matriculation ceremony is right ahead.

Since I should concentrate on my studies first I wanted to wait a little before rushing out to meet people playing the Pokémon TCG.
But I couldn't help myself from buying a few packs of Flashfire, which is ワイルドブレイズ (Wild Blaze) here, on my first visit at AEON mall in Akita.





25.08.2014

First day in Japan

Hey Guys,

This is Hannes, blogging about the Pokémon TCG right from Japan.

As I heard, there are not so many sources about the meta, deck strategies, or tournament coverages from Japan, and many people would like to hear more about that stuff.
Since I've been playing the PTCG competitively for about a year now, and moved to Japan recently today, i decided it's time that someone takes onto that task and started this blog.

First i'd like to introduce myself:
My name is Hannes, I am 20 years old and currently studying International Business Management East Asia in Ludwigshafen, Germany. As part of my studies i will stay in Japan for one year, where I reside in Akita. 

I can still remember getting in touch with the PTCG for the first time. I got some Pokémon cards from a friend, one of which was this holo Hitmonchan, which still has a special place in my binder.

01.08.2014

My Collection

Well, this is not an article, just an up to date list of my collection.
I am trying to keep this updated.

I am willing to sell or trade stuff, but this site is not inteded to be a sales-site.
If you are interested in something special, contact me over facebook:
Decks

 1. Binder, Japanese Cards, and some random ones

2. Binder, Legends


Ancient Trait Cards


Special Binders
11x Yveltal EX
 11x Xerneas EX
Battle Festa Pikachu Promos
 Mega Tokyo Pikachu Promos

Nearly Complete Tidal Storm Master Set
 
Nearly Complete Gaia Volcano Master Set





















Primal Clash EXs




 


LOOSE CARDS
old ex
 Charizards
holos
old Lv.X/ Prime
BW/XY holos
earlier holos
more ancient trait cards
 Energies
Reverse Holo Trainer Lot
Western Trainer Lot.
Western Holo and Rare Lot.

Thanks for looking through the whole thing.
I hope you enjoyed it!