A Pokemon Trading Card Game player by the name of Matthew Verive has competed in the North American International Championship with a deck made of only novelty jumbo cards because the rules never said he couldn’t.
As spotted by IGN’s Joshua Yehl, Verive’s 60-card novelty jumbo card deck was brought to the judges of the tournament and they “debated and ruled it was legal because card size is not specified in the rules.”
This madman entered the Pokémon TCG North American International Championship with a 60 card deck made purely of novelty jumbo cards. The judges debated and ruled it was legal because card size is not specified in the rules.😂 pic.twitter.com/82qwN2UAuY
— Joshua Yehl (@JoshuaYehl) June 24, 2022
His deck includes such Pokemon as Lance’s Charizard, four Pikachus, six Snorlax, eight Eternatus, four Dubwool, a few Sobble, Scorbunny, and Grookey, and more. As Joshua notes, the “funniest part of this already hilarious stunt is Pokémon never printed any jumbo Trainer or Energy cards so all he could do was play the Pokémon but not attack.”
Speaking of the cards, here’s the deck in its full glory! I couldn’t fit it all in one picture. Makeshift deck “box” to the left. pic.twitter.com/eSSOqJAwxs
— Matthew Verive ➡️ NAIC (@immewnity) June 24, 2022
As for how he fared in the tournament, Verive said that he “lost game 1, my opponent scooped game 2 (just to force a game 3, for funsies), and then got deck checked.” He then officially lost game three and then dropped, just as he “has intended to no matter what.”
For those that want to follow Verive in building a jumbo deck for tournament play, he warned that no one should follow him in this journey as he expects the “rules will be modified soon to clarify the size of usable cards.”
While Verive wasn’t able to win the tournament, Nathan O. won the Juniors Division, Rune Heiremans won the Senior Division, and Azul Garcia Griego won the Master Divison.
For more on the Pokemon Trading Card Game, be sure to read our guide on how to check Pokemon card value and appraise your collection.
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Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.
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