Pokémon TCG: Tournament Report - Liga Fest Standard LCQ with Gardevoir EX!

Last weekend (July 5th and 6th), one of the most highly acclaimed competitive tournaments in Brazil took place at the Frei Caneca Convention Center in Sao Paulo. Besides featuring many formats and TCGs, it was centerstage for anyone who wants to shine in big Pokémon TCG tournaments, like Regional events.

It spread across two days. The finalists fought for the big title on Sunday, whereas other events with big prize pools and spots for anyone who hadn't yet classified for the finals throughout the season took place on Saturday. I was one of these last-minute players who ended up competing for a spot to play the main tournament on Sunday.

In this article, I'll go over each of my matches so you can get a taste of this incredible event!

Ever since Kirlia SIT 68 and its ability, Refinement, rotated out of the format in April, I've been looking for a new deck to play. The new Gardevoir ex sv4pt5 29 is a bit clunkier and relies a lot on supporters and Fezandipiti ex SFA 92 for card draw. This means your opening hands with this Pokémon are often quite bad, sometimes so bad they cost you the game.

However, I was interested in the versatile attackers and strategies this deck uses and the fact it creates board states that don't rely on these supporters to win games. In any case, I also believe this deck became harder to pilot, and I definitely felt this as I played my rounds.

At the same time, this deck has great matchups against Raging Bolt ex TEF 123 and Dragapult ex PRE 73, so it's decent against 40% of the meta, and that's also quite attractive to some players, myself included. My second deck option was Dragapult, but I thought too many players would bring Gardevoir and that they'd punish me for that choice. So, I picked this list, which turned out to be a great choice.

Another unusual highlight was Technical Machine: Turbo Energize sv4 179, which many players considered adding to this list after Isaiah Bradner was so successful with it. It makes the Marnie's Grimmsnarl ex DRI 136 matchup a lot better. I also didn't use Mew ex sv3pt5 151 because of board space. Usually, this deck needs 2 Munkidori, 1 Kirlia, 1 Gardevoir, and 1 Fezandipiti on the bench before anything else, so our bench slots are already mostly full.

Round 1: Dragapult (Win)

This round was quite uneventful because my opponent was a beginner and was playing the new precon deck. However, this matchup is typically quite hard for Dragapult EX, and, as I mentioned before, this is a great reason to use Gardevoir EX in general. Throughout the two games, not once Lillie's Clefairy ex svp 195 was in my Prize cards, and my opponent couldn't manage to disrupt me with Iono sv4pt5 80.

Please note that new players often try their luck at open tournaments like these, so you must be polite with them. Some of us have been playing Pokémon for quite some time, but we must still welcome new players with kindness and respect!

Round 2: Mirror (Tie)

This mirror match is usually long, complex, and won by whoever prepared against it with a specific tech card (Flutter Mane PRE 43, 4 Munkidori SFA 72, or another) or by whoever calculates their damage output correctly. "Adrena-brain" can easily Knock Out any single prize attacker, and Counter Catcher sv4 160 is one of the best trainers for this match.

The baseline for this matchup is quite simple: Budew PRE 4 delays this strategy quite a bit, and that's why the early game typically becomes a Budew duel. It is a race, and whoever sets up a Gardevoir ex or Budew with Bravery Charm sv2 173 first without using items gets a huge early advantage. Then, in the midgame, you can play this matchup in two ways: either use Scream Tail PRE 42 or Kirlias to Knock Out enemy Munkidoris. In other words, whoever has more Munkidoris, or a well-stablished Gardevoir ex, usually wins.

That's precisely what happened in this round: in game 1, my opponent set up a Gardevoir even though I had a Budew, kept more Munkidoris on the table, and won. In game 2, it was the other way around: 3 nicely set up Munkidoris on my side won me the game. As this mirror match usually takes a while, we couldn't play a third game and ended up with a tie.

Round 3: Grimmsnarl (Win)

This matchup is unfavorable to Gardevoir ex, but you can win it if you play it right. Though Gardevoir ex is weak against Darkness Pokémon, Grimmsnarl can't get Boss's Orders (Ghetsis) sv2 172 that easily, which makes things easier.

That's when my special tech, Technical Machine: Turbo Energize sv4 179 entered play: when my opponent evolved their first Snorunt, I had already set up 3 Munkidoris, and so I could move damage counters and use this in my favor. I spent the entire game afterward Knocking Out benched Munkidoris and Marnie's Impidimp DRI 134 with Scream Tail, and built an advantage of 3 Prize cards.

In game 2, this matchup became a lot harder because my opponent decided not to use Froslass TWM 53 after what happened in game 1. It was basically Grimmsnarl against the world because I only managed to move damage counters to Pokémon I was about to Knock Out anyway. After getting 2 Prize cards with Drifloon sv1 89, my opponent and I were on equal footing in terms of Prize cards, but, as they couldn't move damage counters, I was able to lead the match from then on.

Round 4: Raging Bolt (Win)

This is also a good matchup because of Clefairy's "Fairy-Zone", which makes all enemy Pokémon weak to Psychic Pokémon and, as such, forces your opponent to use Prime Catcher PRE 119 or Boss's Orders (Ghetsis) sv2 172 on Raging Bolt ex TEF 123. A good plan is Knocking Out their benched Hoothoot SCR 114 with Scream Tail while you move damage counters to their Fan Rotom PRE 85, until you can find the perfect time to get all 3 Prize cards on the same turn. Iono sv4pt5 80 is also essential to disrupt your opponent.

Both in game 1 and in game 2, I managed to push my opponent against the wall: Gardevoir ex was my active Pokémon, and another was on my bench next to Lillie's Clefairy ex svp 195 with energies attached. My opponent couldn't really deal with my board by Knocking Out a single Pokémon.

Nonetheless, let me note that I was up against a young player who competed in the senior category and was top 10 in the LATAM rankings, so the match was quite balanced, and they played incredibly well!

Round 5: Draga Zoroark (Tie)

This matchup is still favorable to Gardevoir ex, but I hadn't trained much against this version in particular. N's Zoroark ex JTG 98 draws many cards and can also easily Knock Out Gardevoir ex.

In game 1, I Knocked Out my opponent's Budew with Munkidori and I kept mine on the board and 2 Kirlias on my bench. After that, and after looking through their deck for some cards, they noticed that their 2 N's Zorua JTG 97 were in their Prize card pile and decided to concede the match.

As for game 2, I had a small opening hand, and my opponent locked one of my Gardevoir ex in my active spot while there were no Psychic energies in my discard pile. This, alongside the two Munkidoris set up on their bench, let them Knock Out my two Gardevoirs with a single blow, which cost me the game. We didn't have time to finish game 3, but I was quite unfavored from the start.

For technical reasons, my opponent was desqualified, and I ended up with a win instead of a tie.

Round 6: Raging Bolt (Win)

My opponent was already qualified and had already won the best prize in this step, so they didn't want to play anymore. If we had played this round, though, the same plan I used for round 4 would be useful, and I would have probably won.

This was the final round, so I came out as the runner-up at this tournament, got my prizes, and a spot in the Finals Master Standard tournament on Sunday!

Gardevoir ex can be clunky but can stand up to the best decks in the format as an equal and does play very interesting strategies. At the same time, it also turned out to be a great choice for this tournament, considering I faced mostly Raging Bolt ex and Dragapult ex.

Big tournaments like these always make me anxious, but I believe they're a great way to train if you want to compete at a high level in Regional tournaments.

What do you think? Tell us your thoughts in our comment section below.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!