This weekend in Seattle was a bit... odd. Like when I was imagining MUs, this was the plan. Hell, on Live (not saying it represents reality), I haven't seen Absol Box in who knows how long. Also, definitely a lot of bricks. Lillie's into 8 items under item lock? Damn you, Tymora!

Okay, quick complaint time: If you mandate 4 days in the office, it isn't a "hybrid" system. You want the label because you know it is a lot better than a full RTO but at that point you just want someone who is trapped in the city.

So, @pftompkins.bsky.social, based on that off the cuff w/r/t Robin Hood on Make Some Noise, one of us?

So, even though Live is on Ascended Heroes, my Slowking testing has been chugging along. And honestly? Powerglass may be my new favorite tool card and I think I have my 60 locked in for Seattle. This was turn 3 of my game against Gholdengo, going first.

PSA for all those out there: While I normally advise against dropping from a tournament, there is no shame in doing so if you think continuing on is going to be worse than dropping, especially mentally. World sucks enough, you're allowed to say, "Nah, I'm good" when you brick 3 times in 4 games.

I am trying to decide if I need an Apcarnist Rants edition of this but honestly: if we are trying to push our society into oblivion by use of generative AI that my manager feels the need to tell us, and I quote, "drink the Kool-Aid a little bit," we have failed as a society for all sorts of reasons.

So, going to give a hot take: 4-0-4 should not be an acceptable record to get to Day 2 of a regional.

So, another Top 512 in Toronto but no Day 2 for me. Surprise, having like 700 fewer players makes getting to Top 512 easier, even with a worse record. I did brick a lot more than expected yet was a less to play through most of them.

So today I've changed a single card from my Vegas list. So, let's see if that's enough to day 2.

Time to start on the road to Toronto (by first picking up a medication). Slowking is coming back for a round 2. #pokemon

So because my mind so badly is not wanting to work tomorrow, it is trying to focus on testing for Toronto. Weeee. Why have I picked Slowking as my ride or die deck.

As a random note, I've been back playing the Pokemon TCG on going on 4 years with hundreds of games and the worst I experienced is someone attempting to cheat me once and being called "the luckiest fucking player" by a former Yu-Gi-Oh! player. I've only played like, I dunno, 10 Commander games

So, even as a Professor, there are days I kind of have to play Pokemom (TCG), but really don't want to. For such days, Pechurant is a best bud.

So Kalvi is trying to nudge me to go to EUIC in spite of actively listing the cost. So, um, would anyone want to split a hotel right next to the convention center? May put my mind at ease.

So who do y'all think would be harder to convince to let me go to this: @kalviberry.bsky.social or my job? (Easy question, certainly my job.) Good luck to those going, maybe I'll hit NAIC? (Big maybe.)

So one of the people I interacted with at a card store tried to give Tucker Carlson "a hand" based on his interview with Ted Cruz and paraphrasing dril, I noted he did not have to give a hand to a white nationalist. He tried to complain about me being a millennial wanting to call everyone a Nazi.

Hey all. Want me to crash out and rant about this same co-worker? Because it only took one sentence from him with regard to me sharing my Vegas result to want to do so.

After a rather long day, let me finally get around to talking about the matches! Let's start with Phase 1, so Rounds 1 through 8.

At Harry Reid International before my flight boards, so I am going to spend that time actually going over the experience of this regional rather than the match-by-match details.

So, I kind of want to do a mega thread about my Las Vegas Pokemon regional experience but there is a lot to go through. I do need to get some sleep so let me lead off with the two things people are most curious about: my deck and my results before I get into the details.

So I failed to do logging of my tournament in real time, basically never getting around to it here and stopping after Round 5 in my notes, but I will attempt to once I've returned to my hotel room.

2-0-1 so far!

A nice to have here in Vegas would be that if they are going to ask us to get here by door opening at 7 so they can get everyone in, have Round 1 pairings early enough as there won't need to be a mass migration because everyone is waiting.

Highest table number for TCG Masters is 1556, suggesting 3112 matched players. May fortune not drag me anywhere near those depths. Lol

So, it is 6:16 AM in Las Vegas as I am typing this. For a Pokemon Regional, I feel oddly at peace? Not worried about my performance, whether or not I get to Day 2, even my deck list. It is a bit odd, genuinely. Will I get to Day 2? Statistically, no. But I feel like I am happy with my decisions.

Okay, Kirby Air Riders demo? It takes a second to get used to things if you haven't played since the '00s but like, once it gets going, it gets going. I even screwed someone over in City Trial by literally destroying their machine with less than a second for time to be called. 10/10

So I just got an ad about Kalshi, one of those "prediction markets" (read: betting websites) where it is encouraging people to "trade" on how long the US government will ne shut down. Fuck right the hell off with that shit ok so many levels. It is distilled corpo evil if I've seen it.

Bluesky, I get it, I am a self-identified furry and I have follows that are furry or furry adjacent. Sometimes I ever enjoy some spice in my feed. But is there a way to go no to cub furs when I decide to want over to the Discover feed or am I doomed forever?

Breaking from my Professor code for a moment: Is this what will finally get the Pokemon TCG scene to move away from that fucking hellhole? Where only clickbait survives and their genuine achievement or usefulness is smoothed by an AI-shaped pillow? Or is the false outreach that important still?

@panikarcade.bsky.social Just so you are aware, I have managed to crash the game twice while getting to the E27 deadline. It has been random but also kind of funny because I suspect it is because of how many Agains the game is processing due to multiple Number 2s in a single round. Lol

NEW VIDEO! FINALLY! Beast Wars Is Shakespeare: The Value of Garbage Media I truly hope this one was worth the wait, because I've never made something so huge. Massive thanks to Dr. Drew Lichtenberg for sitting down with me for this one. youtu.be/8y_KsFaHRQk?...

@lordravenscraft.bsky.social You clearly know your audience, since I just reached a certain joke after watching YGO: Dark Side of Dimensions right before booting up your video.

So, 3-3-2 for Pittsburgh for a perfect 1234th place (based on 3rd party approximations). Lots of unlucky things with Poison Bolt but yeah. Oh well!

So, testing against Tera Box as Bolt, the answer is "don't". The match up sucks, hard.

Random side thought: I probably should make a Pokemon specific account so I can say what I want on main.

We know so many choose not to read past the headline but for some reason, despite my Discover feed usually being full of random animal pics, it decided to feed me a TERF who apparently couldn't even read the headline properly. Whoo boy.

So I couldn't sleep and I decided to go through memory lane (reading through old posts) and I found the Valve dev I argued with months ago still spending all their time on BlueSky arguing that LLMs are actually good, y'all. I wish I could just bullshit everything all the time like techbros.

The more I am playing Magic, the more I have to ask does my local Magic crowd suck or is really asking someone to sit at a table for an hour for a Commander match "too much".

It's technically been a day and a half but officially a Pokemon Professor as a TCG Judge! Starting local on judging but yeah.

So, shit is bad out there but I will use my (very) small platform to remind folks that this is the perfect time to stop giving a fuck about certain judgments and pursue what makes you happy.

So just had a random "Web 3.0" (yes, crypto and metaverse shit) "founder" randomly follow me. Ah yes, please ask me opinions about your shitty tech; I certainly haven't done an edition of Apcarnist rants in a hot minute.

Uncontexted quote of the evening: "We just got Symphony of the Night'd."

Ever randomly been behind a @foldablehuman.bsky.social and was thinking of saying "Love your work" but figured let him be a normal human being? >.>

So I am bored and have an hour to kill so I want to do an edition of Apcarnist Rants here on Bluesky. So, weekend prior to last, I won a local Cup with the deck below, right? 50 Championship Points for me, yay. Come Monday, I decided to share the image (not the Bluesky post) with my coworkers!

Took a cup win with Slowking box. Tis a bit small town but after messing up my last one taking 2nd, managed to lock in and get blessed by Tymora. Deck list in alt text, match-ups below. #pokemon #ptcg

So I made a Slowking deck before rotation intended for after rotation, but I did go 3-0 at locals with it. Now looking at TCG previews, it is like, "Ooooh, does this non-rulebox Pokemon have a good attack?" and thinking, "Do I just put in the Annihilape with Destined Fight in this deck?"

You know, like, it has been almost a year and a half since the video, but can we add this to @foldablehuman.bsky.social's tally just for shits and giggles?

Well, I have hit Arceus rank again in PTCGL . . . and it honestly doesn't feel great? So many games decided by Budew or bricks (on both ends of it) and honestly, I'm kind of tired of the format? I am already looking for rotation and would love to never see so many support Vs (Lumineon, Oranguru),

So I don't remember the exact context of it but in January 2020 @iwriteok.bsky.social made a joke about people who wore khakis/jorts year around including a joke about a junta to deal with it. Somehow it doesn't seem as bad of an idea five years later, even if I would still be caught up in it. >.>

Naturally I get a fucking AI/LLM bot liking this post since they are automated to just see "LLM". There is not a jerk off motion large enough for these people.