A Cinderella Run
How I Have Balanced Playing Two Trading Card Games at a Top Level
After playing in my first two Pro Tours and getting top 8 at both, I thought that playing two card games at once was easy and was going to be easily manageable. I was wrong. For people who do not know me, I have played in every single Pokémon World Championship since 2011, and while I have casually played Magic: The Gathering my entire life, I never took it seriously, as I became entrenched in the Pokémon world at a young age. This changed when I decided to visit my friend in Washington, D.C., for my birthday for a Magic: The Gathering Regional Championship in 2024. I had zero expectations as I qualified for the main event itself at 7 pm in the final last chance qualifier the night before the event, and was super excited just to get to play in one major tournament. Zero expectations.
My relationship with Magic changed forever after having a magical run where I reached the top 8 and qualified for my first-ever Pro Tour, something that, if you told 12-year-old Ian, he would cry from excitement. Luckily, my good friend Alex Rubin came to Pokemon came from the Magic community, so I was able to quickly get on a team for my first Pro Tour. Now that I have played in four Pro Tours and a Magic: The Gathering World Championship, I have learned a few things about attempting to balance the two games.
Mistakes That I Have Made
The biggest regret that I have had is trying to play events for both games, either back-to-back weekends or even in the same month. Due to how different Pokémon and Magic play, I have found that I need a few weeks of ramp-up to be tournament-ready and be in the correct mindset for the game. This has been much easier for Magic as I have been able to do week-long bootcamps for each Pro Tour and the World Championship, so I am sharp by the end of the week, but I can not say the same for Pokémon. Each of my worst results in Pokémon the past year has all been near Magic: The Gathering tournaments, and at each one, I can tell I am not sharp due to not having the time to play the endless amount of games I personally need to ensure I don’t make mistakes in a tournament.
The other mistake that I have found hard to overcome is trying to give myself tournament breaks. Each circuit does not overlap very much, so it is quite doable to attend each major tournament. This past year, I have had months where I burn myself out due to intense practice for a Pro Tour being followed up by an International Pokémon event, which makes it difficult to prevent burnout. Not only do I recommend not attending events without time to transition games, but I would also recommend giving yourself long breaks from playing card games, as you will become burntout quickly if you do not.
Things I Have Done Right
One thing that I am proud of is identifying early on in my Magic career, realizing what my role is on a team. A weakness of mine in Magic is that, unlike in Pokémon, I am a weak deckbuilder due to my lack of experience competing at the top level. This has made my focus when attending a boot camp or online practice beforehand, helping others with experimentation and learning how decks interact - something that I feel is my biggest strength. Along with this, I have put a massive focus on another one of my weak spots, Draft. A draft is something that does not exist in Pokémon, so I have attempted to brute-force the learning by watching endless amounts of Pro Tour recorded drafts to learn how the best players process the draft process, along with conducting numerous drafts myself to practice. Identifying your weaknesses by attempting to be as unbiased as possible and relying on your previous card game experience is crucial when trying to learn another game.
Would I Recommend Playing Two Card Games Competively?
To be honest, I would not recommend it unless you are willing to put in the time and effort to learn the new game. It has been quite difficult to balance both games this past year, and I have had bad events in both games due to burnout that I did not realize I had. But, do I regret it? Not at all. Getting to make so many friends from across the world and getting to play in competitions that I have always dreamed of playing in, along with getting to work with some people whom I saw as idols growing up, is a dream come true. I am going to try my best to compete in both the Pokémon World Championship and the Magic: The Gathering World Championship this year, as it will likely be the last chance I will ever have at playing both in one year.