Ignatious
New Member
I'm not doing well at all this format. I have top 4ed one event and whiffed cut 7 other times. It is litterally the worst cities run I have ever had in masters (I usually win 33ish% of cities). I will say though; this format has plenty of GREAT things about it.
1A) First off, there are tons of playable pokemon. Tons. Including different stages. Two of the best decks in our format right now include stage 2s. Blastoise and Hydreigon. Anyways I could type a huge list of all of the different playable pokemon right now, but there is no need. All of you can think and know my point here.
1B) Of course Vaporeon will say there are so many more playable basics than evolutions, but that is the simple nature of the pokemon trading card game in its design. I don’t see how this is the fault of our powerful Exes. Even in LBS and Metanight days there were more playable basics than evolutions. Think for a moment exactly how many basics could be teched or splashed into a deck. Easy to forget cards are Tauros that discarded stadiums, and Lunatone and Solrock (although I do forget what they actually did). All of the mews were playable, there were plenty of Pokemon star that saw play and plenty of basic exes were amazing as well. Some even made their own deck. (I faced a Quad Rayquaza ex D in the top 4 of masters states). The list goes on. We’ve always had a great number of amazing basic pokemon. What we lack now is a good number of amazing evolutions to match, which isn’t too terribly bad IMO.
1C) Come to think of it, the only formats I can think of where we had more playable evolutions than basics were GardeGallade and Riptide. Only one deck was playable in both of those cases. Just food for thought.
2) Secondly, the format does take tons of skill. I would consider myself fairly good at the game. I’ve been playing for years and have done well since year 1 in masters. Yet I’m now fairing poorly. I have misplayed in this format much more often than ever before. There really are various different ways to play any given had in our current game. Choosing what supporter to play actually plays a large role in this, and is way Oak coming back to our game would destroy a lot of the skill it takes to play. Without Junk Arm, it takes skill determining what to discard with Ultra Ball or Comp Search. Managing resourses and knowing which items are more important in what situations that will come up is huge as well. Also, because of the plethora of basics that are good, deciding who to attack with can be tricky. Risk attacking with Mewtwo, or attack with a Tornadus and do less damage? These choices come up a lot, and honestly, if you think the game’s choices are obvious; you probably are pretty bad at it.
3) Every game is different. While this contributes to randomness, which IMO is usually bad, it can be good. The game can no longer be won by sheer muscle memory. “I did this last game and won, so I’ll do it now too and win” isn’t good logic with this format. Between how each deck is setting up and who discarded what cards, every game is drastically different from the next. It takes actual “in the moment calculation” to win. In the past, winning was pretty much about testing enough.
4) our metagame isn’t the notorious rock paper scissors fest that cities usually has. Some match ups are lop sided, such as Landorus vs RayEels, and Quad Sigilyph vs Keldeo, but other match ups can go either way. RayEels vs Keldeo is an extremely even match up that plays differently every time. I could list them all but hopefully you guys can catch my drift.
We also have some bad thing as well.
1) Randomness. While there is a lot of skill in the game, you need some luck to do anything with your skill level. If decks run supporter dry, they crumble and die. Tough luck? Going second against anybody is just awful. Especially if you are me. I’ve kept track since the rule change, and there have only been 2 modified tournaments in which I played 1st more often than 2nd. Tough luck? Both of these issues are huge and garbage and should be dealt with. Each any every deck has random qualities. I played Rayeels in a tournament this weekend and the amount of Tynamo I dropped turn 1 varied so much it was kind of gross. 5 rounds. 1st round was 0 Tynamo. 2nd round was 2 Tynamo. 3rd round was 3 Tynamo. 4th round was 1 Tynamo. 5th round was 2 Tynamo. So random. Also, Keldeo blastoise is so much random jacked into one deck it’s not even funny. When will you just drop 6 energy and OHKO an EX? Or will you ever? Will you turn two? So much crazy “it just so happens…” situations happen that luck determines a lot, and if it were to be reduced we could truly see the skill the game takes shine.
2) Coming back from behind is just stupid. This has also a lot to do with randomness, but it’s different enough imo. While skill is a big factor in the game, skill just keeps you and your deck “on pace”. There are very few ways to jump ahead in the pace of a game through skill. Almost none. If you are getting tossed from a bad start skill won’t save you. A good player also cannot out play a bad player and 6-0 them or anything like that. Honestly if you are falling behind in a game due to the above stated randomness, you just have to N your opponent to a small amount and pray. That’s it. Coming back from behind is pretty much completely luck based.
All in all I do like the format. If we just had some pokemon draw options we’d be in great shape. If our first turn rule was fixed we’d be in even better shape. Fix both and we have an awesome format. It’d just be so easy to fix the first turn rule too…. Sigh….
These are just my thoughts on the format anyways. All statements about past formats were 100% from memory, so forgive errors please.
1A) First off, there are tons of playable pokemon. Tons. Including different stages. Two of the best decks in our format right now include stage 2s. Blastoise and Hydreigon. Anyways I could type a huge list of all of the different playable pokemon right now, but there is no need. All of you can think and know my point here.
1B) Of course Vaporeon will say there are so many more playable basics than evolutions, but that is the simple nature of the pokemon trading card game in its design. I don’t see how this is the fault of our powerful Exes. Even in LBS and Metanight days there were more playable basics than evolutions. Think for a moment exactly how many basics could be teched or splashed into a deck. Easy to forget cards are Tauros that discarded stadiums, and Lunatone and Solrock (although I do forget what they actually did). All of the mews were playable, there were plenty of Pokemon star that saw play and plenty of basic exes were amazing as well. Some even made their own deck. (I faced a Quad Rayquaza ex D in the top 4 of masters states). The list goes on. We’ve always had a great number of amazing basic pokemon. What we lack now is a good number of amazing evolutions to match, which isn’t too terribly bad IMO.
1C) Come to think of it, the only formats I can think of where we had more playable evolutions than basics were GardeGallade and Riptide. Only one deck was playable in both of those cases. Just food for thought.
2) Secondly, the format does take tons of skill. I would consider myself fairly good at the game. I’ve been playing for years and have done well since year 1 in masters. Yet I’m now fairing poorly. I have misplayed in this format much more often than ever before. There really are various different ways to play any given had in our current game. Choosing what supporter to play actually plays a large role in this, and is way Oak coming back to our game would destroy a lot of the skill it takes to play. Without Junk Arm, it takes skill determining what to discard with Ultra Ball or Comp Search. Managing resourses and knowing which items are more important in what situations that will come up is huge as well. Also, because of the plethora of basics that are good, deciding who to attack with can be tricky. Risk attacking with Mewtwo, or attack with a Tornadus and do less damage? These choices come up a lot, and honestly, if you think the game’s choices are obvious; you probably are pretty bad at it.
3) Every game is different. While this contributes to randomness, which IMO is usually bad, it can be good. The game can no longer be won by sheer muscle memory. “I did this last game and won, so I’ll do it now too and win” isn’t good logic with this format. Between how each deck is setting up and who discarded what cards, every game is drastically different from the next. It takes actual “in the moment calculation” to win. In the past, winning was pretty much about testing enough.
4) our metagame isn’t the notorious rock paper scissors fest that cities usually has. Some match ups are lop sided, such as Landorus vs RayEels, and Quad Sigilyph vs Keldeo, but other match ups can go either way. RayEels vs Keldeo is an extremely even match up that plays differently every time. I could list them all but hopefully you guys can catch my drift.
We also have some bad thing as well.
1) Randomness. While there is a lot of skill in the game, you need some luck to do anything with your skill level. If decks run supporter dry, they crumble and die. Tough luck? Going second against anybody is just awful. Especially if you are me. I’ve kept track since the rule change, and there have only been 2 modified tournaments in which I played 1st more often than 2nd. Tough luck? Both of these issues are huge and garbage and should be dealt with. Each any every deck has random qualities. I played Rayeels in a tournament this weekend and the amount of Tynamo I dropped turn 1 varied so much it was kind of gross. 5 rounds. 1st round was 0 Tynamo. 2nd round was 2 Tynamo. 3rd round was 3 Tynamo. 4th round was 1 Tynamo. 5th round was 2 Tynamo. So random. Also, Keldeo blastoise is so much random jacked into one deck it’s not even funny. When will you just drop 6 energy and OHKO an EX? Or will you ever? Will you turn two? So much crazy “it just so happens…” situations happen that luck determines a lot, and if it were to be reduced we could truly see the skill the game takes shine.
2) Coming back from behind is just stupid. This has also a lot to do with randomness, but it’s different enough imo. While skill is a big factor in the game, skill just keeps you and your deck “on pace”. There are very few ways to jump ahead in the pace of a game through skill. Almost none. If you are getting tossed from a bad start skill won’t save you. A good player also cannot out play a bad player and 6-0 them or anything like that. Honestly if you are falling behind in a game due to the above stated randomness, you just have to N your opponent to a small amount and pray. That’s it. Coming back from behind is pretty much completely luck based.
All in all I do like the format. If we just had some pokemon draw options we’d be in great shape. If our first turn rule was fixed we’d be in even better shape. Fix both and we have an awesome format. It’d just be so easy to fix the first turn rule too…. Sigh….
These are just my thoughts on the format anyways. All statements about past formats were 100% from memory, so forgive errors please.
