VolcanTurtleTCG's Take on Ancient Box

[Volcan] Orlando was just this past weekend and I wanted to recap my weekend playing Ancient Box aka Dino Box! I was able to place in the top 128 and I am proud of my little Dinos! Before I go into how it went for me, why I chose it, and more, I just want to congratulate all my amazing teammates here on The Shuffle Squad! It was an amazing weekend, and you all are my absolute hero’s, inspirations, and idols! #TSSWIN

So for Orlando, my friend Jon and I decided to cook a little. I was originally on Chien-Pao for the regionals. However, Jon insisted I tested his new deck. This was before EUIC and how it was revealed then. I was super hesitant at first but the more I tried it the more I liked it. It had a fantastic matchup spread, was a single prize deck, and could keep up, damage wise, with some of the strongest decks. However, we faced a few issues. Once EUIC was completed we saw how the deck functioned in a tournament setting and realized we were not that far off from the lists seen in London. So, we got to work. We outlined our best matchups and decided to ignore those as Gardevoir, Chien-Pao, and Lost Giratina were extremely favorable matchups. We decided to ignore them for a time and focused on other decks like the Mirror, Arceus, Lugia, and Charizard.

We made small decisions like adding a second boss and cutting a catcher for in a lot of matchups you end up ahead and in other matchups like Turbo Hands you’d want to get a boss ASAP to boss KO an Iron Crown ex with Roaring Moon. So, we made those small adjustments. We also came to one HUGE conclusion. We couldn’t beat Noivern ex. If we saw it- we would just lose 100% of the time. However, Koraidon has the shred attack that required fire energy. Once we added that in, we made the matchup favorable and felt confident to go into Orlando. The last change we made was we noticed no other Ancient Box list was using Lost Vacuum. This would help us in the mirror majorly as we could swing 150 into a Capsuled Moon/Koraidon. Vacuum the capsule next turn and then attack to get 2 prizes in a single turn while they respond by only taking one. It also has the same benefits going into the Moon DunDun matchup as you can revert the Moon ex back to 230 and take an easy 2 prizes.

So, that is why we picked the list- huge matchup potential in our favor, felt good, and most importantly, it was SO MUCH FUN to play. I highly recommend trying it sometime if you want to just mess around with the list! I’ll post it with this article! So, let’s talk about Day 1 of Orlando!

Round 1: Arceus Giratina. This matchup is extremely difficult. My opponent was a very nice guy and had so much fun playing. In game one- I was quicker and easily getting KO’s left and right. The second Boss’s orders was coming in handy here as swinging 220 on an Arceus V was much easier than swinging 280 on the Vstar! It was very run of the mill and textbook. Game Two- Thing were interesting! My opponent was able to get to only 3 prizes remaining while I still had 6. They had used Turo, Cheren’s Care, Judge, Turo AGAIN. They were popping off before I could really get a prize. However, while all this was happening, I was drawing well. Before I knew it, I had 21 Ancient Cards in the discard. My opponent made a fatal mistake and Iono’d me to 5 as I had boss’d out their only Biberal and took a KO on it the turn prior. This was a huge mistake as they could NOT recover or get another Arceus down. I ended up coming back from that game and taking the first W of the day!

Round 2- Lost Tina I’m going to be honest- I cannot remember how this game went. All I remember was getting KO after KO after KO. They were not able to keep up with my damage output and refused to put down a Giratina. This just let me steam roll them for a quick Win Win.

Round 3- CRAZY BOX I’m dubbing this deck crazy box because it was crazy and super fun to play against. Of course- it was Victor Aung- TSS Commentator and all-around amazing player. I don’t want to spoil what it was as Vic deserves all the glory of their deck. This was a super fun matchup and chill! We both made small mistakes and we allowed each other to take them back so we could play optimally and have some fun. It felt like a challenge match or just a straight up testing match with a good friend. It recharged my batteries and got me pumped for the rest of the day! This is why I love Pokémon so much! If you’re not having fun, you are straight up not playing the game right! Thanks again to Vic for such an amazing match!

Round 4- I paired Mark Daizon from the EXP Share Podcast! Mark was extremely nice and super skilled! Mark was playing Gardevoir ex and it was a really good back and forth game one. I just got really lucky with getting the first KO before them and we traded back and forth until the game was finished. Game 2, Mark got extremely unlucky and started a lone Jirachi going first. I got lucky and started Moon, Vessel, dark energy, and Sada. Winning combo for a donk in game 2. Thanks again to Mark Daizon for the fun match!

Round 5- Gholdengo We hit the ONE matchup I never expected to hit nor tested against. However, since it’s a 2 prizer deck with no efficient way to get multiple KO’s against me it was really straight forward. My Opponent was very smart and understood the value of saving time. However, it came down to the same strategy of hit twice, KO. Until I could hit for one shot on Palkia’s and Gholdengo’s. That’s the major advantage of this deck. The longer your opponent’s let the game go on- the stronger the deck becomes!

Round 6- Zard We finally hit the first zard of the day and it was as stressful as ever. Game one- I was fortunate enough to have gone first. This allowed me to start building up my discard quickly due to strong Pokestops and hitting everything I needed from Pokegear 3.0. It was as optimal as it gets for Dino Box. We took game one with very little problems. However, Game 2 came around and I couldn’t keep up with Turo in the later half of the game. Game two took long so when they won game 2 by the time we started game 3 we took the tie. To be honest, I would rather take a tie to Zard over a loss to Zard with Dino Box. This left me at 5-0-1 so far and had me feeling confident to make day 2!

Round 7- Zard My brain was spinning at this point. Did I really go 5-0-1 just to hit Zards in the last few rounds and not make it to day 2?! No, I had to keep focused! My opponent was an absolute KING. They offered a gentlemen’s agreement on if we go to time- after turns- whoever had less prizes would be given the win. I fully agreed and asked if they realized it would be easier for me to get in that position. They 100% realized but said they really wanted one of us to get to day 2 in this match. So, this is exactly what happened. I Won Game 1, Lost Game 2, and it came down to prizes in the end. However, I got VERY LUCKY! I had pokestoped a boss’s orders away earlier in the game. I couldn’t remember if I had the second boss or the pal pad still in the deck because I had 3 prizes remaining to their 4. This was the LAST turn and they had Rotom on the bench. I top deck a Nest ball giving me the much-needed search to find out if I had boss! I still had it so with how small the deck was I was able to Pokegear 3.0 for the Boss to win the set! They kept their word and I am forever grateful to all the honest Pokemon players out there! However, the key take away from this is Double Boss is INSANE in Ancient Box and always remember to take notes on your prizes!

Round 8- Zard Yet another Charizard match that I unfortunately lost too. It was a double brick after the deck running so hot all day- match itself wasn’t interesting but my opponent was fantastic and a great player! This round had more to do with AFTER than anything else. The judges requested our decks for deck check after this round and told us to stay seated while they check our decks. This whole thing took around 45 minutes. We were both SO mad about the situation. They had judges waiting for us at our next table to inform them we would be late because the staff members that took our decks misinformed us, and we were supposed to go to a different area all together. This meant we went STRAIGHT to our round 9 opponents. I had to use the restroom so badly I threw round 9 all together for a double loss due to disinterest in the game because I really needed the restroom. That was my day 1 at Orlando. I really wish day 2 was more interesting but we finished with 4 ties and 2 wins. I really feel like if I won those matches, we would 100% earned a top 8! This deck was on fire and so much fun to play. I plan on running it at cups and challenges locally to me!

• VolcanTurtleTCG