Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

HP-On: Am I the only one in love with it?

F

Flareon

New Member
I keep hearing people complaining about how "x is dominating; this is format is so dumb- I cannot wait until DP-4". The thing is... Everyone is mentioning something different! So far, the most complained about cards I can think of are (for being OU or broken):

Blissey
Gallade
Krikitune
Absol
Honchkrow
Electivire
Magmortar
Empoleon
Riolu (not Lucario, mind you xD)

People! That's 9 DIFFERENT cards! And I'm sure I left some out. It's not even like they all use the same strategy.

OU (Over Used)/ Broken Cards

The people complaining that they cannot beat these cards are BAD players, no two ways about it. I'm not saying it to make fun of them- heck, I'm not an uber player. I've only come up with a few decks that have actually peformed well in tournament play. I'm saying this because it is just a fact. They either haven't been playing long enough/playing seriously enough, aren't very talented, or they are just opting to act like scrubs (complaining about a card rather than taking the leet player's direction- beat it or use it).

HP-On

This format isn't even like past formats where one deck might beat the popular one, but it does so HORRIBLY against EVERYTHING else that it cannot win a tournament, making it unplayable. No, there are almost always more viable deck choices then there are PLAYERS at any given event!

Noobs Getting Smashed by T280

Noobs SHOULD get obliterated at tournaments and by tournament worthy decks! If not, would you be playing this game? Think about it: A kid walks in, puts his favorite pokemon cards in a deck and wins a CC beating you and many others who have practiced this game for years, staying up until 6am playtesting on appr and looking through the PokeBeach galleries and PokePedia trying to metagame the enviroment! Who, in a skill based strategy game, should win? Any Tom, Dick or Harry? No! It would make Pokemon a terrible game. Pokemon is fun because it is challenging, and there never is a person or deck that will always win. Good players should win the majority of the time. A little luck gives some hope, and that's what noobs have.

Noobs Never Winning

Sure, it is frustrating to lose a lot. But guess what? Not everyone can win. Noobs shouldn't win tournaments or even have a fair chance to. However, (at tournaments) they can have fun, participate, learn new skills and see what the competitive world of Pokemon is like first-hand. How to get better? We are nice people! Even MOST of the people acting like jerks on here help new players. I give away cards all the time! I never turn down games to newbies unless I already promised someone else a game. The average player will bend over backwards for new players, so don't bring the few that don't into this discussion. Newbs can have fun and get better at league, THEN win tournaments.

The Decks
I will admit control decks are lacking. All the control based cards seem to be in one deck right now. However, there are a lot of options for winning tournaments right now. I've seen a lot of fancy plays and there are a bunch of cool, playable cards out right now that people aren't even considering! From reading remarks on this forum you would think the format has only 1 or 2 cards! Look at what is legal, and WINNING:

Absol/Krow
Absol/Pom
Absol/Pom/Krow
Blissey
Blissey/Magmortar
Blissey/Lucario
Blissey/Empoleon
Blissey/Vire
Blissey/Delcatty
Blissey/Whatever Pokemon is your favorite
InferCatty
Hurricane
Mario
Banette.dec
QueenHatter
Gallade.dec
MegGatr
Krikitune
Ampy.dec
Flygon/ex/techs
FlyVire
EmpCario
And more!

Guys, I'm not even grasping at straws. Counting Bliss and Absol varients as 1 each, that's still 14 decks that are actually viable. That's not even counting the decks that creative people are making and WINNING with. I keep hearing stories of off-the-wall decks made to counter local metas. The cards and decks are still good enough to take on the randoms. People, there are so many viable cards and decks out there, even excluding everything I've mentioned. The choices in this format are not something to complain about, IMO. Learn to counter and outplay. That, or use what's winning.

Thoughts?

Sincerely,
~Carlos
 
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I do have to agree I like this season because a person who has been using one pokémon they like can get better with the release of each set and make a strong reliable deck...
 
The only thing that makes Wailord less horrible is Holon Energy GL to get rid of special conditions, but even after that, it's attack is still too weak
 
I don't *hate* the HP-on format but I do miss a few things.


OU/BC

It's a CCG. Some cards are going to be better than others. You are 100% correct. You have to either play or be able to beat the good cards.


HP-on

Just imagine for a moment that LM was still in format. We would have Cursed Stone, Giant Stump, Strange Cave, Banette ex, Mew ex, and RAINBOW ENERGY among others in format. How huge would that be? Banette would probably still be a major force. Rainbow Energy might make some cards like Gyarados playable. Cursed Stone would be amazing in some of the anti-powers decks. In short just adding one set could increase your list of playable decks by at LEAST 25% IMHO.

Take it further and imagine that our foramt was like Japan's and was FRLG/TRR on. The number of playable decks and fun combinations would be crazy.

Even last year there wasn't one deck that beat everything. Metanite, R-Gon, Flygon, Absolutions, Banette, Destiny, Ambush, and more all did well at various points. Rogue decks regularly won events. I remember reading about Charizard d, Arcanine ex, and more in event reports.

HP-on isn't too restricting to play, but it is a pretty small pool of cards trainer wise and, IMHO, accentuates he difference between DP and Pre-DP cards since so many of the good pre-DP cards are gone.


Noobs

I played my first event last year exactly 3 weeks after looking at a Pokemon card for the first time ever. I had NO direct help from any other experienced players and in fact had not even been by a league at that point. Even so I was able to win a single game, against a good player no less. The fact that I had spent some $$ buying random cards beforehand so that I actually had lines like 4-2-4 and supporters like Rare Candy and 2 Holon Transceivers helped ... as did the fact that I bothered to go online and read about how to build decks.

I was *really* happy with that one win. Heck I would have been satisfied with simply playing and going 0-5 that day. The win was icing on the cake. But that was because I liked the game and realized that everyone has to start somewhere. As an adult I could look past the loosing to see the bigger picture. Namely that in order to win you first have to build your skill ... and the best way to do that is to play other good players and that in turn means frequently loosing, at least at first.

I’ve got to say that nearly everyone I met was super that first event. I got some great advice from folks that I met and played. Meeting friendly people and seeing how much fun the kids had were what convinced me that this was something that my whole family could do.


The Decks

This is just IMHO, but I think that there is less distance between the “tier 1” and “tier 2” decks this year. The changes in weakness, the poison=psychic change so less grass resistance, and number of less easily doinkable basics narrows the gap. Restricted trainer lists also further close the gap. Frankly I would expect more variation this year since I think that a smaller gap means that both skill and luck will play more of a role this year than last. A good or luck (or both) player will be able to win with all sorts of things.
 
I keep hearing stories of off-the-wall decks made to counter local metas.
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I built a Gardy ex deck last year, and gave it to my yonger bro. and he won 4th at regionals, loseing int2 to one of it's only bad matchups, R-k9eveelutions. And if anyone remembers, no one though Gardevoir ex was even remotly playable due to the monster known as Flygon ex. The funny thing was that, it's matchup against Flygon was somthing like 60-40, due to a 1-1 Blastoise d and Latias* tech. Just goes to show you what you can do if you get creative.
 
This is truely the most level playing field that we have had in years. So to the so called noobs I quote a great master
Do or do not, there is no try
 
vanderbilt_grad said:
I don't *hate* the HP-on format but I do miss a few things.
HP-on

Just imagine for a moment that LM was still in format. We would have Cursed Stone, Giant Stump, Strange Cave, Banette ex, Mew ex, and RAINBOW ENERGY among others in format. How huge would that be? Banette would probably still be a major force. Rainbow Energy might make some cards like Gyarados playable. Cursed Stone would be amazing in some of the anti-powers decks. In short just adding one set could increase your list of playable decks by at LEAST 25% IMHO.

Take it further and imagine that our foramt was like Japan's and was FRLG/TRR on. The number of playable decks and fun combinations would be crazy.

Even last year there wasn't one deck that beat everything. Metanite, R-Gon, Flygon, Absolutions, Banette, Destiny, Ambush, and more all did well at various points. Rogue decks regularly won events. I remember reading about Charizard d, Arcanine ex, and more in event reports.

HP-on isn't too restricting to play, but it is a pretty small pool of cards trainer wise and, IMHO, accentuates he difference between DP and Pre-DP cards since so many of the good pre-DP cards are gone.
Click to expand...
Oh yeah, it goes without saying there could be some really cool decks out there if LM were included. I'll admit the idea of HP-on is a little clunky. LM was one of the better sets IMO. But I'm still having fun with it and see no reason to complain.

vanderbilt_grad said:
The Decks

This is just IMHO, but I think that there is less distance between the “tier 1” and “tier 2” decks this year. The changes in weakness, the poison=psychic change so less grass resistance, and number of less easily doinkable basics narrows the gap. Restricted trainer lists also further close the gap. Frankly I would expect more variation this year since I think that a smaller gap means that both skill and luck will play more of a role this year than last. A good or luck (or both) player will be able to win with all sorts of things.
Click to expand...
I agree with you on the tiers completely. Previous tiers were almost Tier 1=Playable and Tier2=Almost-but not-playable.

therage,
Thanks, lol. Sometime soon ;)
 
I really like this format because all of the good cards are cheap, with the exception of Time-Space Distortion. I wasn't totally into this game last year, but it seemed like you needed pricey ex cards like Flygon ex d, Eveelutions ex, Absol ex, Banette ex, and Mew ex. It was really hard for a new player like myself at that time to get the cards necessary to win. This season seems much easier to jump in since the best cards like Blissey and Gallade are dirt cheap considering their playability score.

I like this format!

Flareon said:
(complaining about a card rather than taking the leet player's direction- beat it or use it)
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That is how its done!
 
This format makes it really difficult to decide what deck to play. Everything looks like so much fun. I feel like a kid in a candy store when I sit down and try to build a deck. I'll probably be playing a different deck for each of the three Cities I'll be going to this season.
 
I agree with Jayson on the fact that the format makes it difficult to decide on a deck to play at any given tournament.
 
Jayson said:
This format makes it really difficult to decide what deck to play. Everything looks like so much fun. I feel like a kid in a candy store when I sit down and try to build a deck. I'll probably be playing a different deck for each of the three Cities I'll be going to this season.
Click to expand...

That's exactly how I feel. I have used all differnent decks at all the tourneys ive played at and im still negotiating on what to play.:frown:
 
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