Hey Beach Bums – here’s my data analysis for February. I didn’t win quite as much as last month but still had a very respectable 55.4% win percentage. And the decks that I played the most all had terrific win percentages:
Tauros Decidueye 27-9 75%
Turbo Darkrai 44-22 66%
Darkrai Dragonair 37 -19 66%
Lurantis Vileplume 24-15 61%
The reason I had only a 55% win rate was because I played so many unusual, experimental decks. I played 370 matches and used a total of 29 different decks. Outside of those 4 main decks, the average number of times I played a deck was 7 times. The past couple of months I have really been focused on one or two decks, sometimes playing as many as 200 matches with a single deck. This month I definitely spread it around. The most matches I had with any one deck was 66. Moreover, the main four decks went through several different iterations as well. In summary, it was a month where I tried a bunch of different things. I’ll probably focus in on Decidueye Tauros and Darkrai Dragonair next month and play a bazillion games with them, but this month it was kind of nice to just play around and try different things out.
Out of the 370 matches, I had the advantage 135 times (36%), my opponent had the advantage 112 times (30%), and neither of us had the advantage 119 times (33%). There were 4 matches that I played against a friend online that I tracked. I usually don’t track matches I play online because I chat A LOT and it’s too hard for me to gab and keep track of everything. Plus, they’re not always random – a lot of times we’ll pick which decks we’re blasting each other with.
When I had the advantage, I won 67% of those matches. When my opponent had the advantage, I won only 43% of the time. When neither of us had the advantage, I won 53% of the time.
My opponents played pokemon with abilities (other than Shaymin, Hoopa, and Talonflame) 74% of the time. Not surprising with all of the really cool new pokemon with fantastic abilities. I won 54% of matches against decks with pokemon with abilities. I won 57% of the time against non ability decks.
Only 14% of the opponents I faced played hammers, team flare grunt, or team skull grunt. I went 26-27 in these matches (49%). I won 56% of matches in which my opponent did not play disruption. This is definitely something to think about. As much as I don’t want to, I really should consider running hammers … but probably not E hammers because of how few decks are now running special energy.
Only 55% of the decks that I faced ran special energy. I won 52% of the matches I played against SPE decks, but I won 59% of the matches against non SPE decks. So on one hand, maybe I should run E hammers as I struggle against decks with SPE. On the other hand, I would then have at least 2 dead cards in almost half of the matches I play. However, the bottom line is this: a majority (granted a slight majority) of decks run special energy. I have more trouble against decks with special energy. Opponents who play me do better if they run disruption cards. A+B+C = I need to put hammers in my deck.
The most common pokemon I faced in the month of February and the number of times I saw them:
Darkrai EX_35
Garbodor_31
Oranguru_25
Tauros GX_25
M Mewtwo EX_25
Yveltal_24
Volcanion_24
Manaphy EX_23
Volcanion EX_19
Lurantis GX_19
Yveltal EX_18
Octillery_17
Talonflame_16
Giratina EX_15
Umbreon GX_15
Zoroark_15
Typhlosion_13
Starmie_12
Glaceon EX_11
Lapras GX_11
Espeon GX_11
Mew_11
Flareon EX_10
Decidueye GX_10
Greninja Break_10
Regice_10
Lugia EX_10
Passimian_10
Solgaleo GX_9
Palkia EX_8
Hypno_8
Vileplume_8
M Rayquaza EX_8
M Gardevoir EX_8
M Scizor EX_8
Lunala GX_7
Carbink Break_7
Unown_7
Golduck Break_7
Bunnelby_7
Electrode_6
Gyarados_6
Slowking_6
Yanmega Break_6
Jolteon EX_5
Gumshoos GX_5
Rainbow Road_5
Articuno_5
Vespiquen_5
Primarina GX_5
M Audino EX_5
Raikou_5
Of all of the 855 pokemon I tracked (again, not including Shaymin and Hoopa), 126 of them were GX pokemon (a fraction less than 15%). 104 of the 370 matches were against decks with at least 1 pokemon GX (28%). One thing to note here is that multiple GX pokemon in the same deck were counted as 1 pokemon. If you had 3 Tauros GX in your deck, it was counted as only 1 pokemon, if that makes sense.
Also definitely worth noting is that three of the four most common pokemon are weak to fighting. 2 of the top 5 are weak to psychic.
And here is how the most common decks fared against me (W_TOTAL_PCT):
Lycanroc GX_3_3_1
Rainbow Road_4_5_0.8
Jolteon EX_4_5_0.8
M Scizor EX_6_8_0.75
M Rayquaza EX_6_8_0.75
Salamence EX_3_4_0.75
Xerneas Break_3_4_0.75
Zygarde EX_3_4_0.75
Carbink Break_5_7_0.71
Vileplume_5_8_0.63
Tauros GX_15_25_0.6
Giratina EX_9_15_0.6
Decidueye GX_6_10_0.6
Passimian_6_10_0.6
Articuno_3_5_0.6
Vespiquen_3_5_0.6
Garbodor_18_31_0.58
Lurantis GX_11_19_0.58
Darkrai EX_19_35_0.54
Octillery_9_17_0.53
Volcanion EX_9_19_0.47
Umbreon GX_7_15_0.47
Glaceon EX_5_11_0.45
Espeon GX_5_11_0.45
Mew_5_11_0.45
Talonflame_7_16_0.44
Yveltal_10_24_0.42
Regice_4_10_0.4
Manaphy EX_9_23_0.39
Volcanion_9_24_0.38
Typhlosion_5_13_0.38
M Gardevoir EX_3_8_0.38
Starmie_4_12_0.33
Oranguru_8_25_0.32
M Mewtwo EX_8_25_0.32
Lugia EX_3_10_0.3
Lapras GX_3_11_0.27
Zoroark_3_15_0.2
Greninja Break_2_10_0.2
I included Lycanroc because although I’ve only faced it 3 times, it’s extremely impressive. Plus, it’s fighting so a lot of decks it faces are weak to it.
Thanks for reading, hope this gives you something to mentally munch and crunch on. I love data analysis, and I hope this helps you better understand the meta (or at least how I’m seeing it through PTCGO). Let me know if this is similar to what you're seeing or if there’s something that sticks out as unusual to you.
Tauros Decidueye 27-9 75%
Turbo Darkrai 44-22 66%
Darkrai Dragonair 37 -19 66%
Lurantis Vileplume 24-15 61%
The reason I had only a 55% win rate was because I played so many unusual, experimental decks. I played 370 matches and used a total of 29 different decks. Outside of those 4 main decks, the average number of times I played a deck was 7 times. The past couple of months I have really been focused on one or two decks, sometimes playing as many as 200 matches with a single deck. This month I definitely spread it around. The most matches I had with any one deck was 66. Moreover, the main four decks went through several different iterations as well. In summary, it was a month where I tried a bunch of different things. I’ll probably focus in on Decidueye Tauros and Darkrai Dragonair next month and play a bazillion games with them, but this month it was kind of nice to just play around and try different things out.
Out of the 370 matches, I had the advantage 135 times (36%), my opponent had the advantage 112 times (30%), and neither of us had the advantage 119 times (33%). There were 4 matches that I played against a friend online that I tracked. I usually don’t track matches I play online because I chat A LOT and it’s too hard for me to gab and keep track of everything. Plus, they’re not always random – a lot of times we’ll pick which decks we’re blasting each other with.
When I had the advantage, I won 67% of those matches. When my opponent had the advantage, I won only 43% of the time. When neither of us had the advantage, I won 53% of the time.
My opponents played pokemon with abilities (other than Shaymin, Hoopa, and Talonflame) 74% of the time. Not surprising with all of the really cool new pokemon with fantastic abilities. I won 54% of matches against decks with pokemon with abilities. I won 57% of the time against non ability decks.
Only 14% of the opponents I faced played hammers, team flare grunt, or team skull grunt. I went 26-27 in these matches (49%). I won 56% of matches in which my opponent did not play disruption. This is definitely something to think about. As much as I don’t want to, I really should consider running hammers … but probably not E hammers because of how few decks are now running special energy.
Only 55% of the decks that I faced ran special energy. I won 52% of the matches I played against SPE decks, but I won 59% of the matches against non SPE decks. So on one hand, maybe I should run E hammers as I struggle against decks with SPE. On the other hand, I would then have at least 2 dead cards in almost half of the matches I play. However, the bottom line is this: a majority (granted a slight majority) of decks run special energy. I have more trouble against decks with special energy. Opponents who play me do better if they run disruption cards. A+B+C = I need to put hammers in my deck.
The most common pokemon I faced in the month of February and the number of times I saw them:
Darkrai EX_35
Garbodor_31
Oranguru_25
Tauros GX_25
M Mewtwo EX_25
Yveltal_24
Volcanion_24
Manaphy EX_23
Volcanion EX_19
Lurantis GX_19
Yveltal EX_18
Octillery_17
Talonflame_16
Giratina EX_15
Umbreon GX_15
Zoroark_15
Typhlosion_13
Starmie_12
Glaceon EX_11
Lapras GX_11
Espeon GX_11
Mew_11
Flareon EX_10
Decidueye GX_10
Greninja Break_10
Regice_10
Lugia EX_10
Passimian_10
Solgaleo GX_9
Palkia EX_8
Hypno_8
Vileplume_8
M Rayquaza EX_8
M Gardevoir EX_8
M Scizor EX_8
Lunala GX_7
Carbink Break_7
Unown_7
Golduck Break_7
Bunnelby_7
Electrode_6
Gyarados_6
Slowking_6
Yanmega Break_6
Jolteon EX_5
Gumshoos GX_5
Rainbow Road_5
Articuno_5
Vespiquen_5
Primarina GX_5
M Audino EX_5
Raikou_5
Of all of the 855 pokemon I tracked (again, not including Shaymin and Hoopa), 126 of them were GX pokemon (a fraction less than 15%). 104 of the 370 matches were against decks with at least 1 pokemon GX (28%). One thing to note here is that multiple GX pokemon in the same deck were counted as 1 pokemon. If you had 3 Tauros GX in your deck, it was counted as only 1 pokemon, if that makes sense.
Also definitely worth noting is that three of the four most common pokemon are weak to fighting. 2 of the top 5 are weak to psychic.
And here is how the most common decks fared against me (W_TOTAL_PCT):
Lycanroc GX_3_3_1
Rainbow Road_4_5_0.8
Jolteon EX_4_5_0.8
M Scizor EX_6_8_0.75
M Rayquaza EX_6_8_0.75
Salamence EX_3_4_0.75
Xerneas Break_3_4_0.75
Zygarde EX_3_4_0.75
Carbink Break_5_7_0.71
Vileplume_5_8_0.63
Tauros GX_15_25_0.6
Giratina EX_9_15_0.6
Decidueye GX_6_10_0.6
Passimian_6_10_0.6
Articuno_3_5_0.6
Vespiquen_3_5_0.6
Garbodor_18_31_0.58
Lurantis GX_11_19_0.58
Darkrai EX_19_35_0.54
Octillery_9_17_0.53
Volcanion EX_9_19_0.47
Umbreon GX_7_15_0.47
Glaceon EX_5_11_0.45
Espeon GX_5_11_0.45
Mew_5_11_0.45
Talonflame_7_16_0.44
Yveltal_10_24_0.42
Regice_4_10_0.4
Manaphy EX_9_23_0.39
Volcanion_9_24_0.38
Typhlosion_5_13_0.38
M Gardevoir EX_3_8_0.38
Starmie_4_12_0.33
Oranguru_8_25_0.32
M Mewtwo EX_8_25_0.32
Lugia EX_3_10_0.3
Lapras GX_3_11_0.27
Zoroark_3_15_0.2
Greninja Break_2_10_0.2
I included Lycanroc because although I’ve only faced it 3 times, it’s extremely impressive. Plus, it’s fighting so a lot of decks it faces are weak to it.
Thanks for reading, hope this gives you something to mentally munch and crunch on. I love data analysis, and I hope this helps you better understand the meta (or at least how I’m seeing it through PTCGO). Let me know if this is similar to what you're seeing or if there’s something that sticks out as unusual to you.
