In brief
- Luc Gantner wins the Nice Regional: his Basic Box with Iron Crown beats Frenchman Maxime Launay's Hide 'n' Sneak 2-1 in the final. He finishes 15-1-2, with a single loss in the entire tournament.
- Dragapult is the most-played deck but doesn't reach the Top 4. The Top 4 features four different archetypes: Basic Box, Hide 'n' Sneak, Ogerpon/Meganium and Festival Lead.
- Launay's day: he eliminates Tord Reklev in the quarterfinals and Paulo Mimoso in the semifinals, and comes within a whisker of winning at home.
- Italy is the best-represented country in the upper standings: 12 players in the top 64 and 5 in the top 32. The best is Alessio Di Pofi, 13th, the only Italian in the Top Cut.
- Juniors and Seniors: Mateusz wins the Juniors with Dragapult/Blaziken, Cedric the Seniors with Festival Lead.
The final standings
- 1. Luc Gantner (CH), 15-1-2: Basic Box with Iron Crown.
- 2. Maxime Launay (FR), 14-2-2: Hide 'n' Sneak with Spiritomb.
- 3-4. Paulo Mimoso (PT), 12-1-4: Ogerpon/Meganium.
- 3-4. Oscar Rivas (ES), 13-3-1: Festival Lead with Seaking.
- 5-8. Yuya Kogai (JP), 13-2-1: Dragapult/Dudunsparce, first after Swiss.
- 5-8. Tord Reklev (NO), 12-3-1: Dragapult without Crushing Hammer.
- 5-8. Rob Van de vijver (BE), 12-3-1: Mega Audino/Mega Absol.
- 5-8. Luka Levain (FR), 12-3-1: Ogerpon/Meganium with Hydrapple.
From 9th to 14th, out in the first round of the Top Cut: Emma Hagen (Basic Box), Owyn Kamerman (Dragapult), Tomás Malaca (Slowking), Michael Hessing (Alakazam), Alessio Di Pofi (Big Basic Box) and Hugo De Torres, whose deck wasn't shown.
How you get to the Top Cut
After the four Swiss rounds of Day 2, rounds 11 to 14, 14 players move on to an asymmetric Top Cut, with at least 34 points. Kogai (37) and Launay (35) go straight to the quarterfinals; the other twelve play for six spots. In the last round, Michelangelo Meulli, Matteo Fellico, Emanuel da Silva and Maciej Chojnacki miss out by a single point. Alberto Benvenga ties Kamerman in a match that went to extra turns and then loses to Gantner. The Top Cut has at least nine different archetypes: for the commentary booth, the most varied in a long time.
The bracket
- Top Cut round one: Rivas beats Malaca, Van de vijver beats Kamerman, Gantner beats De Torres, Levain beats Hagen 2-0, Mimoso beats Di Pofi in game 3, Reklev beats Hessing.
- Quarterfinals: Rivas eliminates Kogai, Gantner eliminates Van de vijver, Mimoso beats Levain in the Ogerpon/Meganium mirror, Launay beats Reklev 2-0.
- Semifinals: Gantner beats Rivas 2-1; Launay beats Mimoso.
- Final: Gantner beats Launay 2-1. Launay takes game 1 with Bloodmoon Ursaluna, Gantner levels it with a Raging Bolt ex for about 490 damage, then takes game 3.
The meta: Dragapult dominates the room, not the bracket
In the second phase Dragapult climbs from 29% to 36% of the room, and more than half of its versions play Dudunsparce. Slowking becomes the second most-played deck. In the Top Cut, though, Dragapult has only 3 players out of 14, and 2 out of 8 in the quarterfinals. Nobody reaches the Top 4: "Dragapult, Alakazam and Slowking are out, two niche decks remain." Hide 'n' Sneak was barely 5% of the room and made it to the final. In recent European Regionals, according to the study, the Basic Box vs. Hide 'n' Sneak matchup ends 56% to 27%, with 17% ties. In Nice it ended the way the numbers said it would.
The decks of the day, in brief
- Basic Box (Gantner, Hagen, Di Pofi): only Basic Pokémon with lots of HP, which give up one Prize at a time. Mega Kangaskhan ex draws two extra cards every turn with Run Errand, Iron Crown ex spreads 50 damage across two targets, Raging Bolt ex closes out by discarding Energy, Lillie's Clefairy ex beats the Dragapults. Gantner plays the same 60 cards that got him 77th in Frankfurt.
- Hide 'n' Sneak (Launay, Benvenga): the Ability negates the effects of attacks and Abilities, so no damage counters from Phantom Dive and no damage moved by Munkidori. Dhelmise does 170 with four of these Pokémon in the discard pile, Banette searches for any card and Spiritomb finishes the job when there are 13. Legacy Energy takes one Prize away from the opponent.
- Festival Lead (Rivas, Cedric among the Seniors): Seaking draws and attacks twice with Festival Grounds, Thwackey searches for cards with Boom Boom Groove, and the 70-HP Goldeen shrugs off spread damage. Moltres is enough to KO Teal Mask Ogerpon.
- Ogerpon/Meganium (Mimoso, Levain): Meganium makes every Grass Energy count double, while Bug-Catching Set and Forest of Vitality accelerate. Briar lets you take an extra Prize in the endgame. Levain's version has a 330-HP Hydrapple.
- Dragapult (Kogai, Reklev, Kamerman): there's Kogai's Dudunsparce version and Kamerman's control version, with Crushing Hammer, Watchtower and Handheld Fan. Reklev, on the other hand, cut the Hammers: "sometimes they're a dead card."
- The one-of-a-kind deck: Mega Audino with Mega Absol from Van de vijver, heir to Reklev's old Kangaskhan/Absol.
The featured matches
- Round 12: Kamerman (Dragapult) beats Sander Wojcik (N's Zoroark ex) 2-0, coming back from three Prizes behind.
- Round 13: Benvenga (Hide 'n' Sneak) and Kamerman tie 1-1 in extra turns.
- Round 14: Van de vijver beats Matteo Lupica 2-0, in a match with two judge penalties.
- Top Cut: Levain (Ogerpon/Meganium) beats Hagen 2-0.
- Quarterfinals: Launay beats Reklev 2-0. A coin flip decides game one, a Night Stretcher drawn at the last moment decides game two.
- Semifinal: Gantner beats Rivas 2-1. Rivas wins game 2 with Moltres, then draws nothing in game 3.
- Final: Gantner beats Launay 2-1.
The Italians
Di Pofi is the only Italian in the Top Cut and finishes 13th on 34 points, eliminated by Mimoso after beating EUIC champion Edwyn Mesman. Next come Meulli 15th, Fellico 20th, Benvenga 23rd and Fabio Battistella 24th, all out of the Top Cut by one or two points. Among the top 64 there are 12 Italians, ahead of France and the United Kingdom with 7. Cristian Sarnataro, the only 10-0 of Day 1, loses four matches on Day 2 and finishes 48th.
Voices of the day
- Gantner: "Iron Crown brought me the win. Against Festival Lead, otherwise, I don't have many answers."
- Launay: "Find a deck you love, even if it isn't strong. Before Frankfurt, Hide 'n' Sneak wasn't even in the top 12."
- Kamerman: "With this Dragapult every matchup is 50-50, then the Ability decides."
Sources. final standings and Top Cut results from Limitless Labs (labs.limitlesstcg.com/0077); meta, decks, interviews and featured matches: summary and data processing from the Day 2 official live broadcast. Decks as shown or mentioned on air.