Abstract In a meta that will span four months, including one Champions League, two International Championships, and 19 Regional level events across the world, the following question is extremely relevant: how can one build the best list of the best play for each event? In this article, I will be taking a deep dive into my general plan of testing, metagaming and deckbuilding –  that … Continue reading An Analysis of Metagaming, Deck Choice, and Deck List: How to succeed in any division at any event

Hey everyone! My name is Gabriel Smart, and I am ecstatic to begin writing for Cut or Tap. I am a professional Pokemon TCG Player based in California, and I travel the world playing the TCG. Currently, I am ranked in the top 10 players in US/Canada, and have already achieved my Worlds invite. You might know me from my consistent tournament placements, Youtube Videos, … Continue reading “Wish Upon a Summoning Star:” a Look at Lugia VSTAR/Archeops

Hi everyone! My name is Nicholas Moffitt, and I am excited to bring you my first ever article for Cut or Tap. Today I am going to be talking all about Lost Zone Box decks. I will start with a brief recap of my last tournament in San Diego, where I finished 10th place with a unique take on Amazing Rare Rayquaza. I will also … Continue reading Lost Zone for Crown Zenith Format

Welcome back, Cut or Tap subscribers! Hunter here to present insightful information on the phenomenon that is Vikavolt Melony box. I’ll be setting the stage for how a completely unknown archetype took down two Regional Championships, earning $7,500 and almost 400 CP. More impressive than the prizes this deck has conquered, the sheer size of these tournaments command respect for the placements from both Krekeler … Continue reading “Follow The Lightning Bug:” Vikavolt Toolbox for Orlando Regionals

Crown Zenith has presented some new interesting cards that we all should be aware of going into Orlando Regionals. We have a new archetype in the form of Lost Box Eternatus variants and some other strong cards that will improve existing archetypes. In the first section of this piece I cover these new changes and a few hyped cards. After that, the rest of this … Continue reading Crown Zenith & Eternatus/Flying Pikachu/Duraludon

Logos Howd’y! It’s Michael Perez and I’m happy to share about what I believe is the most interesting engine and revived mechanic since the 2009-2010 era of Pokemon: the Lost Zone. The Comfey + Colress’s Experiment engine is so rewarding, punitive, and fragile. I’ve played over 500 games using a combination of Giratina Vstar, Kyogre CEL, Amazing Rayquaza, Radiant Charizard, and of course a handful … Continue reading Feeling Lost?

This is a very short piece that I wanted to share before San Diego Regionals. I played Lost Box Charizard in a 1K event yesterday and lost in top 4 to a Duraludon deck playing multiple Lost City, along with some other interesting techs. Although I was disappointed by the fact that I lost to someone who hard countered my deck seemingly on accident, I … Continue reading Duraludon & my play for San Diego Regionals

Lugia VStar is fresh off another win at the largest Regional ever, staving off a myriad of rogue ideas, despite the humongous target on its back. With the 2023 San Diego Regionals fast approaching, the overwhelming feeling has been to either give in and play Lugia, or play a deck that has at least an even matchup into the terror of the format. Typically, I … Continue reading “Fusionator 2: Judge-Mew Day:” Mew VMAX for San Diego Regionals

In this article, I cover Lost Box Charizard first and a new build of Mewtwo that fits this format in the latter half of the article. The Charizard section is more focused on list explanation and the Mewtwo section is almost entirely about how to play match ups against opponents with Mewtwo counters (Drapion V, Snorlax LOR, Regice, etc.) It seems most people have pushed … Continue reading Lost Box Charizard & Recreating Mewtwo V-Union

Hello, Cut or Tap! My name is Piper Lepine, and as you may know, I just won the Toronto regional championships with Mewtwo V-UNION control! This article goes over my group’s thought process in building and testing the deck, why we played the cards we did, how to navigate the different matchups, and looking at the deck for the upcoming Arlington regionals. Table of contents … Continue reading Mewtwo V-UNION: the Control List People Weren’t Expecting

I asked my followers on Twitter if they wanted an article about Mewtwo or a piece on options for Arlington. The response was about 50/50 so Cut or Tap is going to cover both bases. The Toronto Regional Champion Piper Lepine will write about Mewtwo and we will be posting an article from her next week. I am very excited about this because Cut or … Continue reading Options for Arlington

This article talks about several decks in less detail than one would normally expect from a Cut or Tap piece. If this article comes off a bit scattered, that’s because my options are still very open and many decks seem to have merit. The power of Lugia is unparalleled and finding the proper counter is not easy. In this piece you will see info on … Continue reading Final options for Toronto

I like to counter the meta. I like to play decks that are very hard to pilot and learn to outplay my opponents. I like to come up with creative takes on strong archetypes or recreate decks that are considered less than tier 1. Lugia is stopping me from doing all of the above. Lugia has been too strong for me to find a proper … Continue reading Type A Lugia (Yveltal & Charizard)

Mew MVax is the best aggro deck in standard and it probably would be the best deck in the format if not for Drapion V having a presence. How can you play Mew, without playing Mew? The best analog is Hisuian Zoroark VStar. Zoroark dishes out big one-shots starting on turn two and draws through almost as many cards as Mew does. The difference is … Continue reading A Better Way to Play Hisuian Zoroark VStar

Ironically, we see decks that are not unanimously considered tier 1 winning events repeatedly. You should not play the best deck if you want to win an event; you need to play the best deck for a given meta. Consider the results from Salt Lake City Regionals. Almost all the decks in top 8 were archetypes that are normally considered to be tier 2 or … Continue reading The Best Meta-call, Not the Best Deck

Have you missed me? I am excited to be writing again. In the traditional Cut or Tap style, there will not be much of an introduction; all meat, no fluff. This article explains how to build Giratina and play Giratina. I believe it is the best deck in the format and hopefully after reading this article you will understand why. Table of Contents – General … Continue reading Giratina Box – Everything You Need to Know

As I am writing this, I just finished my run in one of Pokestat’s old format PTCGO tournaments. The format this time was NAIC 2017, where the legal sets were: Primal Clash through Guardians Rising. I managed to make top 4 with Espeon Garb; a slightly different list from the one that earned me 17th place at NAIC three years ago. In 2017 I saw … Continue reading Revisiting 2017 – Espeon Garbodor

Introduction Good morning everybody! It’s been a while since I wrote my last article for Cut or Tap, but I’m back with some of that new new for everybody. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to even attempt traveling to Toronto, but it all worked out because I had the opportunity to hang with my wife on her birthday. Some of the concepts I’ll talk about today … Continue reading All About The ‘Goon-Jamins’, Baby

Welcome back subscribers! For those who don’t know, I am Hunter Butler – writer and team member for Cut or Tap and the 2020 Dallas Regional Champion! I have been blessed enormously since we last spoke; I obtained my invite to the 2020 World Championship, conquered the Dallas Regionals with an extremely rogue concept, made top 8 at the 2020 Knoxville Regional Championship, and have … Continue reading A guide to rogue – The success and failure