Winners of May TCG Cup Crowned! Deck Lists and Interviews!
PokeBeach’s May TCG Cup is over and the winners have been crowned!
The tournament was played in the Standard format, which at the time was XY through BREAKpoint.
Interview with the Champion
Coming in first place is Elliot Sayles from New Jersey! He will be walking away with a Fates Collide booster box from TCGplayer.com. Here’s our interview with him:
Where do you live?
Scotch Plains, NJ.
How well are you performing in Play! Pokemon tournaments this season?
I only got Top 8 at a Cities. I haven’t been playing very much as this is my Junior year in high school, but I make my rounds at some local events to make sure I know what the metagame is like in my area.
What deck did you play for the May TCG Cup?
I played Night March. As much as people hate it, the deck is ridiculously good. It is so fast paced and reliable that I had to play it.
What kind of decks did you play against?
Trevenant BREAK, Zoroark / Yveltal, Greninja BREAK, Rainbow Force and M Manectric-EX / Raikou / Jirachi.
What was your favorite card in your list?
Probably the second Hex Maniac. It is so important in many matchups (Trevenant BREAK, Greninja BREAK, Vileplume) and having two makes it easy to get from the deck with Trainers' Mail, Battle Compressor, or under Item lock with Shaymin-EX and Professor Sycamore draws.
What was your most exciting game?
Definitely the Zoroark / Yveltal game. It is so hard to trade Prizes evenly when you need to bench Shaymin-EX for draw and their Pokemon have effects of attacks that benefit their field unlike Night March. I remember the game took a while because every move I made was so difficult, but in the end I ultimately ended up winning the series.
Would you make any changes to your deck or list?
Maybe removing Buddy-Buddy Rescue. Many times I wanted to play it I couldn’t because it would help my opponent too much. As good as the card is, I think there are better openings in the next set.
What kind of decks give your deck trouble? Which are good matchups?
The worst matchups are Jolteon-EX and Trevenant BREAK decks. Jolteon-EX stops our Basics from attacking, and if it’s up there alone it could be game over. You can run Jirachi and try to discard a DCE from Jolteon-EX to make it possibly not attack for a turn, and if it works odds are the Night March player will win. Trev is pretty hard if it gets a turn one Trevenant. Night March’s only ways out from this are Hex Maniac and Lysandre, and if you get one of the three cards in your opening hand the game can easily swing in your favor. If not, the game can quickly be over in a few turns.
All other decks are good matchups.
How does Fates Collide affect your deck? Is it still viable?
It makes the deck extremely viable. Mew is arguably a better reprint of the Mew-EX from Dragons Exalted. While only 50 HP, it can be boosted by 40 from Fighting Fury Belt and does not give up two Prizes. And most of the time with Mew-EX you only used Night March, not any opponent attacks, which makes Mew so good. There is also N, which is a better replacement for Judge. N is a great early-game and late-game card for Night March as there is usually an out in a 2-3 card hand to draw more. If the deck was tier zero beforehand, it will be tier infinity after next set.
Congratulations, Elliot!
Here is the deck list Elliot used to win the tournament:
For those of you with Nightmarchphobia, we recommend you skip over the deck lists in this article. :p
Other Top Finishers
Coming in 2nd, 3rd and 4th places were Alex Mei (TheAnticipationEevee), Drew Faust (Latte1504) and Julian Hook (Jedithious). All three won a bunch of booster packs from the newest sets. Their deck lists can be seen here:
Alex Mei
Drew Faust
Julian Hook
The top finishers also earned Prize Wall points on TCGplayer.com, which allows them to exchange their points for even more products like booster packs and promo boxes.
Everyone in the Top 32 of PokeBeach’s monthly tournaments will also receive Prize Wall points via e-mail. Be sure to check your inboxes!
Creative Deck Winners
As part of every tournament, PokeBeach’s article writers voted for the five premium members whom they felt used the most creative deck lists.
Frosstoise, Coolpilot, Wil Yates, Yog, and mingming187 each walked away with several booster packs or a specially-selected Pokemon promo product from TCGplayer.com. The decks we saw these players use include Machamp-EX / Ariados, Giratina-EX / Reshiram, Giratina-EX / Seismitoad-EX / Garbodor, Palkia-EX / Empoleon / Archie's Ace in the Hole, and Yveltal / Zoroark.
For every tournament, the five premium members who come up with the most creative decks will win booster packs and promo products.
Want to Become a Premium Member?
July’s tournament will be posted on July 1st, and June’s tournament is currently underway. Each tournament awards up to four booster boxes of product to top finishers plus promo products and additional booster packs to premium members.
If you’re interested in becoming a premium member, be sure to check out this link. All premium members get reserved slots in the tournaments, double the amount of booster pack wins, double the amount of Prize Wall points, a chance to win even more product for using creative decks, and of course all the other benefits that go along with having a premium membership, including weekly articles from the game’s top players and deck help from said players. A premium membership is extremely diverse!
Thanks, TCGplayer!
All of these prizes are brought to you by TCGplayer.com. Their online store offers the cheapest Pokemon cards on the Internet from thousands of different sellers — you will find no better deals! So be sure to check them out any time you want to purchase or sell Pokemon cards!
In the future, you can always use our navigation menu to access their store.
(Note: The Pokémon Company International is not a sponsor or endorser of PokeBeach’s tournaments, contests, or prizes, nor does the company or its affiliates have any formal association with PokeBeach. Our activities are by fans, for fans, and are not sanctioned or approved by TPCi.)