Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

2013 Season Modified Format Announced: BW-on

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eriknance

Active Member
Changes to the Play! Pokémon Modified format for the 2013 tournament season have been announced.

Effective: 9/1/2012

In the interest of maintaining a healthy tournament environment, Pokémon Organized Play removes older sets from the Modified format at the beginning of each new tournament season. Each rotation challenges existing players to create new strategies while enabling new players to get into Organized Play with a minimal investment.

The 2013 season will be starting on July 9th so that players can get an early start on working towards the 2013 Pokémon World Championships, but in order to avoid confusion we will rotate sets on the more familiar date of September 1st.

The 2012 Pokémon World Championships being held on August 10th–12th in Waikoloa, Hawaii, will use the 2012 format and rules as are currently listed.

The Modified format for the 2013 season will consist of the following expansions:

Black & White
Black & White—Emerging Powers
Black & White—Noble Victories
Black & White—Next Destinies
Black & White—Dark Explorers
Black & White Trainer KitBW Trainer Kit
McDonald’s Collection
Black Star Promo Cards BW01 and higher.

In addition, future Pokémon TCG sets will become legal as they are released, per the Pokémon Organized Play Tournament Rules.

Announcement here:

http://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-news/op_2013_format_rotation-2012-06-15/

Great decision!
 
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Thank god that abomination junk arm is gone.. If worlds is somewhere affordable I might actually start to play a bit more seriously :D
 
yeah and apparently the 2013 season starts june 9th, so now we know why there are cp for worlds, any events for non- worlds atteendees?
 
While this was pretty much assumed to be occurring, I think another big thing is that the new season starts in July. That means that any cp earned at worlds will count for qualifying at next year's worlds.
 
Ah. Looks like I shouldn't have invested in Dual Ball. Would have much rather seen CoL-On, much more balanced IMO, but this should work fine.
 
good this is what i expected no real crazyness to it, course this leaves us with a lot slower deck with 6 supporters and mostly various pokeballs to get things out of our decks.

also only dce, prism the upcoming blend and regular energies
 
I'm predicting many epic high fives at league this weekend. This is easily the best rotation IMO... can't wait to get owned by Darkrai... WAIT! That's already happening :(
 
I'll miss you Vileplume and Shaymin.

But I am still happy, and excited that Junk Arm is gone.
Long Live Sableye and Excadrill!
 
The biggest loss: Leafeon UD. My favorite Pokemon is no longer even Semi-Viable.. :( RIP Leafeon!

And search in BW-on is going to take a lot of balls. (lol). Level, Heavy (maybe), Ultra and maybe even Great Balls will be used.
 
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All I can say is, "Thumbs Up *does that very action as well*!" That's the format I wanted to see for next year. BW-on, so far, is looking to be one very good format. Just look at the Japanese metagame for proof; there is a lot of nice diversity in this format. Also, no more Junk Arm! Finally, the day has come for Junk Arm to leave. Now I just hope they don't reprint it anytime soon.

The two problems with BW-on though:

1) Lack of Supporters - I'm sure we all knew about this for a while, and now, it looks we are going to get ready to face this ordeal. The only real good supporters we'll have so far are Juniper, N, and Bianca (and to a small extent, Cheren). Thus, you can imagine the counts for each of those cards in decks. Juniper will be the only real effective way to draw now, and you have to be careful with what your discard from your hand as well. There is also no real way to refresh the hand other than N. Hopefully, we'll get more better draw supporters as the year progresses, and maybe some search supporters too (a reprint of Roseanne's Research, Bebe's Search, and Steven's Advice would be pretty cool).

2) 2012 Worlds CP applying for the 2012-2013 year - This problem kind of bugs me. The winner of worlds gets a huge head start already at 25 Championship Points, and the points can be pretty big as it can be seen in this link here (scroll all the way down to see the Worlds' Championship Points). I kind of don't like how only a few players can get a huge point lead already, nor do I like the fact that there will be quite the minority (because it is an exclusive tournament) that will have such an opportunity (unlike BRs, for say, where the fact that these tournaments are for everyone in that many can walk out with championship points). I'm guessing for some people, it is not such a problem, but that's just me. I just think it isn't really that fair to start off the championship points with worlds because there only be a few that can actually have this opportunity.

Also, a few ideas for the 2012-2013 year that should be considered (all ready looking good b/c of BW-on, so let's continue to make things good):
-Lower the CP amount for Cities and States
-Improve the kicker in tournaments (a.k.a, do not make the kicker at 64 to allow only the top 8 to receive CP in Battle Roads. That way, we won't have to deal with disappointing bubbles)
-If the previous option won't be, than just expand the top cut limit in tournaments (a top 8 in Battle Roads and a top 32 in States as good examples).

In these ways, the BW-on format will be an awesome year for Pokemon.
 
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