Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Thoughts on Poison Hypnotic Beam?

PHB/Virbank isn't just for donks, this is why people will go on to win SPTs and others will just sit back and lose because they fail to grasp how much certin ideas just destroy them. If I play 4 Mewtwo ex/ 4 Tornadus ex/ 4 PHb/ 4 Virbank, and you play ether/dex with random cards, how do you win t1? Al I know is that I will be attacking and winning that game in theory.
 
...why would you compare running Poison Hypnotic Beam and Virbank City Gym alongside two specific, maxed out Pokémon-EX to just running Ether and Pokédex with "random cards"? You should really stick to something a bit more specific, like T1 Darkrai EX decks.

Most are concerned with the two combos above because they contribute to donks... and most people hate being on the receiving end of that tactic. Some even dislike winning via such a thing. Once you move past first turn concerns, both the Poison Hyper Beam/Virbank City Gym combo and the Ether/Pokédex combo can do amazing things in the right decks.
 
If we only look at the current format, we have very little to reference. Hard to go downhill on a flat surface. :wink:

Our side debate largely came up because of disagreeing with supporting arguments and statements (such as the above). I believe Poison Hypnotic Beam is very, very potent, but the format has many such cards so it oddly fits in. I'll resist various super-hero based analogies to explain myself as I have been doing such a poor job of explaining myself here.

Shen: I cannot answer whether or not Poison Hypnotic Beam or Ether is "more broken" or not, but I can tell you if you are starting with your whole deck in your hand first turn... a single Poison Hypnotic Beam is then useful, while Ether will require you use a card combination to put at least one basic Energy card back into your deck.

Yeah, not exactly a useful measure. XD

My bad I should clarify... I didn't mean Ether in comparison to PHB with your entire deck in your hand. I just meant Ether as compared to PHB in general, how most games will be played (albeit a bit luckily).
 
Pokemon (6)
4 Sigilyph
2 Mewtwo EX

That's the Pokemon.
Can there be any better proof for a flawed format than a deck like this counting as "creative"?

(no offense to the creator, compared to the rest of the format it is creative, and that's the sad thing)
 
If you don't like the format, then don't play.

Complaining isn't going to change anything, it's just going to result in more arguing and less becoming better-adapted to the format.

BTW the OP has nothing to do with whether or not you like the format (and it's especially not about Sig/Mewtwo). It's about PHB. Let us get back on topic, shall we?
 
Umm complaining can and has resulted in change before >.> Probably in more ways than we see. I'm sure Pokemon uses the feedback to make decisions.

I hope PHB isn't too hard to get. Every deck right now almost automatically starts at $100 after just 4x Catchers and Computer Search. I can see PHB hitting 15-20 bucks if its anything like Catcher. And then there's Virbank. At least supporters are cheap...
 
I don't know about that. I just looked on ebay and it is selling for three bucks, but it is in Japanese and virbank city is only 99 cents.
 
There's no need for people to be snobby about Quad Sigilyph. I guess a deck isn't 'creative' unless it involves at least 3 rarely played Stage 2 Pokemon and only works via some complex uber-combo, huh?

It was a very creative approach to a metagame full of EX Pokemon. Unless you thought of it first (at had the guts to play it), you have no business belittling the creativity involved.
 
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BTW the OP has nothing to do with whether or not you like the format (and it's especially not about Sig/Mewtwo). It's about PHB. Let us get back on topic, shall we?

Finally someone who talks sense :lol: I was curious to see how long this would drag on.
 
While phb will contribute to turn 1 kos, I don't think the card in particular will contribute to it that much. What cards in our format are donkable? Squirtle, tynamo, deino, sableye, emolga, piplup. 70 hp max? If we use rayquaza we would need a rayquaza start, a lightning energy, a phb, and a gym. We already have tornadus that only needs a tornadus start with dce and any stadium. In terms of donking its actually more difflcult to go the phb route. You do gain +10 damage, but when you comapre that to the less chance of attacking turn 1, and the fact that any of these donking basics are much worse late game than our tornadus ex, this donk deck concept is worse than donk cards we already have.

Of course you can run phb with virbank in a tornadus donk deck, but the damage goes from 60 to 90. This will only really donk the 70 hp pokemon. We can already do that with pluspower. We can already donk out the wazoo, but it honestly isn't a huge deal. I doubt this card by itself will turn things into any sort of a donk fest.

The card is very strong. With keldeo or switches the effect of the card can be limited. +30 damage is nice, but how many 3 hkos become 2hkos, and how many 2hkos will become 1hkos? Most our attackers 2hko all other attackers, with or without this combo. However I'm sure the damage will naturally allow for amazing darkrai 90 + 30 plays. It will also allow darkrai to ko non ex attackers much more effectively. Add dark claw and the damage reaches 140 + 30. This twice will ko 2 exes in two attacks. That is ridiculously fast. This also kos terrakion in one attack. Phb in general will also make retaliate much more difficult to pull off, considering if poison kos a pokemon, retaliate doesn't trigger.

I feel darkrai gets the most out of this card. I can't see a deck like keldeo blastoise running any, though. Those 6 slots for phb and virbank could be 6 energy, each worth +20 damage.

I'm also sceptical of a hooh deck running the card. I feel like darkrai can take advabtage of the combo so much more effectively, that tornadus might be better off countering virbank for 20 more health, and reducing the poison damage. This way tornadus can still deal with darkrai on somewhat even footing.

Landorus can be ridiculous with this card as well. Assuming you can use the combo twice, you can 2hko darkrai with 1 energy. While setting up the bench with 60 damage. This will likely give straight darkrai a bit of trouble.
 
Not sure if anyone's mentioned this, but a deck that inhibits your ability to retreat while simultaneously sniping would work awesome with PHP. Maybe something with Eels/Raikou/Garbodor? Catcher up a Blastoise or Hydreigon while preventing Keldeo and Darkrai's free retreat while sniping around and having the active die a slow, painful death in the active spot. Now if only we still had Crobat G...

I don't think it's as much of a staple as Catcher though, and don't think it will reach Catcher prices.
 
I don't know about that. I just looked on ebay and it is selling for three bucks, but it is in Japanese and virbank city is only 99 cents.

This is because, sadly, the people of Japan RARELY use eBay. (Most of them don't even know what it is!)
This may differ slightly within the Pokemon community of Japan... but for the most part, they aren't buying their cards from eBay.
 
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