necronzero
New Member
I am aware of the ruling that says Super Boost Energy only provides the 4 rainbow energy effect when it is attached to a Stage 2, but I personally feel like that is unfortunate ruling that is somewhat unfair towards super boost.
The card text reads as such,
"This card provides Colorless Energy.
While this card is attached to a Stage 2 Pokémon, it provides every type of Energy but provides only 1 Energy at a time. If you have 3 or more Stage 2 Pokémon in play, it provides every type of Energy but provides 4 Energy at a time."
So there are three separate effects here, even though there are only two blocks of text.
The first effect,
The card text reads as such,
"This card provides Colorless Energy.
While this card is attached to a Stage 2 Pokémon, it provides every type of Energy but provides only 1 Energy at a time. If you have 3 or more Stage 2 Pokémon in play, it provides every type of Energy but provides 4 Energy at a time."
So there are three separate effects here, even though there are only two blocks of text.
The first effect,
"This card provides Colorless Energy. "
The second effect,This one is really obvious.
"While this card is attached to a Stage 2 Pokémon, it provides every type of Energy but provides only 1 Energy at a time."
The third effect, which I think needs a different ruling is thisThis one is also not really confusing in any way... standard rainbow energy effect.
"If you have 3 or more Stage 2 Pokémon in play, it provides every type of Energy but provides 4 Energy at a time."
First thing to that I would like to point out is that this is a new conditional, meaning that you need to satisfy this condition to gain this effect. This means that if we go by the wording of the card, in order to gain the 4 rainbow effect, you simply need to have three stage 2 pokemon in play since nowhere in this sentence to it mention having to be attached to a stage 2, whereas the last effect it did. Now as for the reasoning as to why I disagree with the ruling other than simple grammar. Does anyone remember the Miracle Sphere cards back from the Skyridge set? Well, they had similar effect text's in that they had multiple conditionals in the same block of text without a paragraph break, which is something my friend tried to argue was why the second effect was predicated on the first. In case you don't remember it, or have never even heard of it here is a link to the bulbapedia page for one of them.
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Miracle_Sphere_γ_(Skyridge_131)
Anyways, as you can see the effect is all in one block of text. So if we were to rule it the same way as we did super boost energy, in order to receive the effect of the water and lightning energy, you would first have to meet the condition of having a grass and lightning. I thing most people would safely say that wasn't what was intended to be the case right?
Well, this is something I believe should apply to Super Boost Energy as well. Super Boost Energy, like all cards that require a lot of set up should provide a large payoff in return otherwise there would never be any benefit to play a card that requires lots of investment.
Given that and the fact that things like Miracle Sphere don't follow the same logic of the second effect being predicated on the first one, I don't think it's too unfair to have Super Boost Energy apply it's second effects to non-Stage 2 pokemon, as long as you meets it's condition of having at least three stage 2 pokemon in play.
In the interest of making sure that it wouldn't be too unfair, I put some thought into comparison of value to other prisms and just investment in general. Given the fact that special energies are not hard to deal with at all i.e. Enhanced Hammer, Eneporter, and many others, I feel that Super Boost Energy is a powerful yet balanced card that is very hard to set-up, easy to remove, and hard to maintain and that's exactly what a card like Super Boost Energy is supposed to be.
It's a powerful card because it creates 4 cards for the price of one, but requires the investment of requiring at least 9 cards out of your deck to currently be in play, aka the cards required to get three stage 2's into play. So including the Super Boost Energy, that literally a 6th of your total deck size, and that means you need to have at least a 6th of your deck in play and setup before it's even close to being called useful, otherwise it's not better than a basic energy card. So if we were to compare this to say, Beast Energy, it's trading the "ultra beast" tag for a "Stage 2" tag conditional. It is then trading the +30 damage buff for the other conditional based effect of providing even more energy, and the conditional isn't all that easy to set-up let alone maintain.
Your opponent has several ways of dealing with super boost. The first way is of course to remove the energy with a Trainer card or ability. The second way is to knock out the Pokemon it's attached to. The reason I feel that it's not unreasonable for a prism card like this to be very powerful is that super boost cannot be recovered if it ever goes to the discard pile, and given how easy it is to deal with, I don't see it as unreasonable to let it's second conditional effect apply to non-Stage 2's as long as it's being met.
I also think another reason for Super Boost to bestow it's 4 energy effect on non-Stage 2's is that your opponent has the ability to turn it back into a colorless energy by knocking out a Stage 2 Pokemon you are using to satisfy the conditional, thereby rendering the Super Boost drastically less powerful, and as any stage 2 player knows, constantly streaming Stage 2 Pokemon is difficult. If we compare this again to other prism cards, we see that super boost clearly requires the most previous investment in order to receive it's most powerful effect. Lysandre Prism requiring your field to be full of Fire type Pokemon, Arceus Prism requiring your bench to contain a Grass, Lightning, and a Water Pokemon to get the energy search and attack, etc. Each of those two prism cards require less cards than super boost energy, and Arceus even provides nearly the same amount of energy, and in a more versatile way to boot.
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Miracle_Sphere_γ_(Skyridge_131)
Anyways, as you can see the effect is all in one block of text. So if we were to rule it the same way as we did super boost energy, in order to receive the effect of the water and lightning energy, you would first have to meet the condition of having a grass and lightning. I thing most people would safely say that wasn't what was intended to be the case right?
Well, this is something I believe should apply to Super Boost Energy as well. Super Boost Energy, like all cards that require a lot of set up should provide a large payoff in return otherwise there would never be any benefit to play a card that requires lots of investment.
Given that and the fact that things like Miracle Sphere don't follow the same logic of the second effect being predicated on the first one, I don't think it's too unfair to have Super Boost Energy apply it's second effects to non-Stage 2 pokemon, as long as you meets it's condition of having at least three stage 2 pokemon in play.
In the interest of making sure that it wouldn't be too unfair, I put some thought into comparison of value to other prisms and just investment in general. Given the fact that special energies are not hard to deal with at all i.e. Enhanced Hammer, Eneporter, and many others, I feel that Super Boost Energy is a powerful yet balanced card that is very hard to set-up, easy to remove, and hard to maintain and that's exactly what a card like Super Boost Energy is supposed to be.
It's a powerful card because it creates 4 cards for the price of one, but requires the investment of requiring at least 9 cards out of your deck to currently be in play, aka the cards required to get three stage 2's into play. So including the Super Boost Energy, that literally a 6th of your total deck size, and that means you need to have at least a 6th of your deck in play and setup before it's even close to being called useful, otherwise it's not better than a basic energy card. So if we were to compare this to say, Beast Energy, it's trading the "ultra beast" tag for a "Stage 2" tag conditional. It is then trading the +30 damage buff for the other conditional based effect of providing even more energy, and the conditional isn't all that easy to set-up let alone maintain.
Your opponent has several ways of dealing with super boost. The first way is of course to remove the energy with a Trainer card or ability. The second way is to knock out the Pokemon it's attached to. The reason I feel that it's not unreasonable for a prism card like this to be very powerful is that super boost cannot be recovered if it ever goes to the discard pile, and given how easy it is to deal with, I don't see it as unreasonable to let it's second conditional effect apply to non-Stage 2's as long as it's being met.
I also think another reason for Super Boost to bestow it's 4 energy effect on non-Stage 2's is that your opponent has the ability to turn it back into a colorless energy by knocking out a Stage 2 Pokemon you are using to satisfy the conditional, thereby rendering the Super Boost drastically less powerful, and as any stage 2 player knows, constantly streaming Stage 2 Pokemon is difficult. If we compare this again to other prism cards, we see that super boost clearly requires the most previous investment in order to receive it's most powerful effect. Lysandre Prism requiring your field to be full of Fire type Pokemon, Arceus Prism requiring your bench to contain a Grass, Lightning, and a Water Pokemon to get the energy search and attack, etc. Each of those two prism cards require less cards than super boost energy, and Arceus even provides nearly the same amount of energy, and in a more versatile way to boot.
So, please can someone give me a reason why they think Super Boost Energy deserves the ruling it currently has? I believe that a card that requires lot's of setup and investment should be incredibly powerful and there is nothing wrong with that, especially since it is also fairly easy to get rid of.
If you can think of a situation where letting Super Boost Energy provide the 4 energy to a non-Stage 2 Pokemon would be way too strong, while still requiring it's condition to be met, please let me know... because honestly, even if it did, I don't see it affect the meta of Zoroark, Buzzwole, Malamar at all. Setting up a Stage 2 is already hard enough, but setting up three and then getting the pokemon you want and the Super Boost is a tall order.
Please, let me know what you guys think or if I have missed anything please let me know.
If you can think of a situation where letting Super Boost Energy provide the 4 energy to a non-Stage 2 Pokemon would be way too strong, while still requiring it's condition to be met, please let me know... because honestly, even if it did, I don't see it affect the meta of Zoroark, Buzzwole, Malamar at all. Setting up a Stage 2 is already hard enough, but setting up three and then getting the pokemon you want and the Super Boost is a tall order.
Please, let me know what you guys think or if I have missed anything please let me know.