Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

G&G, takes lots of skill, but works so well it looks like a noob deck.

I think it depends on how u look at it. If ur tha one playin against gardy gallad,I guess u judge it based on how the opponent plays.The same goes the other way around. That probably doesn't make any sense but I'm sure some one gets the jist of wat I attempting 2 say! But personally, I say the skill factor definely comes in when ur playin mirror.
 
there isnt really much skill involved in it. look at it this way:

options for gallade- 1. reduce them to 50 HP and make them switch.
2. 1HKO almost anything in the format

options for gardy/l.vX- 1. do 60 and shut down powers, which for some decks is absolutely deadly
2. 1HKO anything in play, as long as you meet the requirements.
not only that, but you can use 2 supporters a turn with gardy! its just a destructive deck that you just kill things in your way with. but the mirror is different....
 
I've been watching some GG battles as a judge, so with no prejudice at all. And I have to say that of all the GG victories I saw, about 70% were due to sheer topdecking luck early on. Mirror Matches kept boiling down to "Who Absols The Luckiest", victories against Magmortar were more due to lucky coin flips on cards such as ER2/The discarding of Claydol through Absol rather as any skill...

Thats GG's main problem. Taking the proper decisions takes skill, true, but the deck itself is n00bish in that it always seems to luck out. It forces luck, so to speak.
 
vanderbilt_grad said:
I'm not going to claim to be a "high skillz" player ... but I will say that I'm a LOT better at playing G&G now than I was back when I first started testing before Cities. Knowing when to flip prizes and when not to ... knowing when to block powers ... knowing when to go for the quick early KO and subsequent disruption or for the steady setup. All that and more were not things that I picked up overnight. It took testing, playing, more testing, and more playing ... and I think that I'm still getting better at playing G&G.

Yes Gallade can bail you out of mistakes by OHKOing just about anything and Gardevoir's Telepass makes supporter misplays less punishing ... but just play the mirror or another good deck like Mags and skill suddenly is a much bigger issue.

I think that folks tend to analyze G&G vs. whatever random deck they happen to like and it just doesn't work that way right now IMHO. There are a very few really good cards in format that are significantly better than a lot of others. Gardevoir and Gallade are two of them. Only when you start putting them in the context of other similarly good cards in well constructed decks can you start making comparisons about what skill level it takes to play a given deck.

IMHO it takes little skill to play any deck but lots of skill to play any deck well. G&G is no exception. Its ability to smooth over mistakes in comparison to lower tier decks might give it the appearance of an “easy deck” but only in that context.

In related one of the things I do to see how complicated a deck really is in play is to see if my 6 & 8 year old sons can handle it. My 8 year old can handle G&G ... but has a much easier time with Magmortar and some other decks. It’s easier for him to think in terms of dumping lots of energy on a Mags and KOing stuff than it is to think in terms of prize control. He’s pretty good at sensing where to spread damage to but doesn’t always appreciate how devastating power lock can be.
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Great explanation of how the deck works.

Ya you can pound your opponents into the ground with Gallade, but that IS NOT how the decks should be used.
G&G is a very flexible deck with lots of options, and lots of decisions on what to do. Because your attack power dies out late game you need to be thinking TURNS ahead so it works out for you. You can attack with Gardevoir, the Lv.x or Gallade, and you need to be able to know when to use each one or the deck wont work as well. Yes, a bad player can do ok with G&G because it works really well, but a good to great player can do amazingly well with it because the stratagy is MUCH deeper than it first appears.
All of this is with a BASIC list. It gets even more complicated if you start to add techs, like Cressalia lv.x that bring the the complexity of the deck to a whole new level.

If you want to get down to it, G&G is as complex as the the player that uses it. It can be amazingly simple or very complex depending on the players skill.

I hope this clears things up a little.
 
GG does not take skill to play.
However, it takes skill to play it right.
It takes more skill to play it right everytime.

It is based highly on luck.
The skill is being able to take that luck and abuse it to your advantage.
 
Scipio said:
I've been watching some GG battles as a judge, so with no prejudice at all. And I have to say that of all the GG victories I saw, about 70% were due to sheer topdecking luck early on. Mirror Matches kept boiling down to "Who Absols The Luckiest", victories against Magmortar were more due to lucky coin flips on cards such as ER2/The discarding of Claydol through Absol rather as any skill...

Thats GG's main problem. Taking the proper decisions takes skill, true, but the deck itself is n00bish in that it always seems to luck out. It forces luck, so to speak.
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Good G&Gs DON'T use Absol and DON'T rely on good top decks.
 
Absoltrainer said:
it depends on the regions.

I have seen good GG decks use Absol.
Others do not.

EVERY deck relies on good topdecks.
GG can utilize the top decks better then most decks.
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G&G is much better if its more consistant, rather than disrupting your opponents setup.
 
Regis_Neo said:
So is this another "G&G isn't a deck" sort of trend, like it was with MARIO?
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No, its a G&G takes a LOT more skills to use than most ppl think, and at the same time as Absoltrainer said is an "anybody's deck" deck.

The fact that anyone can use it without to much trouble sadly seems to lead people to think that it doesn't take any skills to use it. :nonono:
 
You all may think that the deck takes no skill to win. My little bro provs all of you wrong. He is a good player of speed decks, but cant hold out with a setup deck, forgetting too many things. I think that it matters what decks you are good with, such as:

1. Str8 decks
2. setup decks
3 speed decks(more than one st1 line)
4. abstract decks ( not setup, kinda speedy like ape.)

A good player can master any of these with practice.
 
DarthPika said:
Good G&Gs DON'T use Absol and DON'T rely on good top decks.
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Good G&G DID use Absol and G&G DOES depend on top decks.

Absol disrupts,discard supporters and Gardy usesthem. How isnt that good in a deck that setup itself regardless of what they play??

G&G takes skill to play,but its a deck that can be used without any skill and still win with.Which makes it like a YGO deck that is used in traditional format that dominants that format,that deck is called CHAOS.

Which would mae G&G a cookie cutter deck.
 
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smacktack15 said:
Flygon ex d DF is an easy match-up (so is Flygon ex PK) but, straight Banette + other psychic Pokemon is hard (BanBliss is so easy). Magmortar/Fire TRUK is also hard but, easily winnable if the G&G list is amazing:)
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that's why wood811 went 3-0 against Ness's GG, Matt Alvis's GG and some other G/G with Flygon Ex D, right?

Flygon Ex D losses to G/G, I think not, get your facts straight.
 
~`Flygon`~ said:
Good G&G DID use Absol and G&G DOES depend on top decks.

Absol disrupts,discard supporters and Gardy usesthem. How isnt that good in a deck that setup itself regardless of what they play??

G&G takes skill to play,but its a deck that can be used without any skill and still win with.Which makes it like a YGO deck that is used in traditional format that dominants that format,that deck is called CHAOS.

Which would mae G&G a cookie cutter deck.
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Good gallades definitely did not use absol. There may have been good lists, but there is one insanely fast version i am thinking of that takes absol apart and out draws and outspeeds absol. Absol relies on topdecks and what you take from them.
 
well there is a noob at the states I'm going to who is going to play G&G that has absolutely no skill whatsoever. If he does well with it, then gardelade doesn't take any skill to play. If he doesn't do too well, then G & G takes skill. END of Story
 
Anyone who thinks G&G doesn't take skill is stupid. End of story. I feel like explaining myself here would be a complete waste of my time.
 
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