Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Is the TCG going downhill?

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ArmoredMewtwo said:
But in the case of decks such as Machamp, it's true. Some decks are auto-pilot decks, no question about it.

And we do have quite a few auto-pilot decks in the format, at the moment.
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yes but afstand was using that ridiculous agument for LuxApe, one of the most skill intensive decks in the format.
 
^actually, they do completely different things. Read the cards closely.

I'd say Luxape is one of the most skill intensive decks, and most everyone will agree with me. Just ask Pooka! He won NATS with it, I think he would know best out of anyone.
 
If you mean that they both force switch, then yes. If you mean that one is actually a Gust Of Wind, then no.

But in all seriousness, I can't stop thinking about meta decks being boring, easy on the brain (Proof to me that it actually takes skill to use a Power and screw your opponent over with LuxApe. Really, I have yet to see it.) and unoriginal.

Then AGAIN there is the 'powercreep'. First there was a card named Walrein (MT) that had a Power that could discard the Defending Pokemon if you got 2 heads without drawing a Pize for it. Then SF came along with Gengar and suddenly only 1 flip is required for a KO this time, which means a free and easy Prize. See what they did there?
 
afstandopleren said:
But in all seriousness, I can't stop thinking about meta decks being boring, easy on the brain (Proof to me that it actually takes skill to use a Power and screw your opponent over with LuxApe. Really, I have yet to see it.) and unoriginal.
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None of it is rocket science. You can make ANY deck seem simple if you want to. Are there any Powers that take more skill to use than the ones in LuxApe?

I bet they can be made to sound easy too.
 
BUT GUIZE! ITS OBVEUSLY UNBALENCED! ALL YOU AHVE TO DO FOR EVRY DEK IS SET UP AND ATAK!
^ ow I'm reading all the comments that basicaly say the same thing. This format reminds me a little of the Ruby Saphire on format, although IMO this is a little worse. A little Worse, but not bad.
 
afstandopleren said:
If you mean that they both force switch, then yes. If you mean that one is actually a Gust Of Wind, then no.

But in all seriousness, I can't stop thinking about meta decks being boring, easy on the brain (Proof to me that it actually takes skill to use a Power and screw your opponent over with LuxApe. Really, I have yet to see it.) and unoriginal.

Then AGAIN there is the 'powercreep'. First there was a card named Walrein (MT) that had a Power that could discard the Defending Pokemon if you got 2 heads without drawing a Pize for it. Then SF came along with Gengar and suddenly only 1 flip is required for a KO this time, which means a free and easy Prize. See what they did there?
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Give me one of your "skillfull" rogue decks and I'll make it sound ridiculously easy to play by a silly blanket statement. =/
 
My Café Decks are prime example to be used here to back up my 'silly blanket statement'. You actually have to know what to get out when, instead of being able to deal with things to come with a single card like in many other decks.
 
If the game is going downhill at all, it's due to the sheer amount of players. In such a large group of people, there are bound to be some...not-so-nice players. And really, that's what ruins games. On a small scale, if you've ever played Settlers of Catan with the one person who will never trade, you know what I'm talking about. We have a big group of people in Pokemon who play to the game rules, but not to the player-created rules.
 
Why do people look at the number of people playing the game? I mean the quality of the game itself, not th huge bunch of newbie kids that have joined.
 
There have been a lot of cards to hate in the last set. Kingdra, Machamp, Rampardos, Sableye, all of them promoted speed play. And there is stuff like Gengar that decides games with a coinflip. There were a lot of skill cards as well - just look at Magnezone, this offers options like in DX-on decks. Unfortunally, the donk cards were just stronger so everyone played them. With Crobat G and Toxitank, there was a whole new possibility to donk. However, some G-decks like Legos were interesting and - even if it was very annoying to play against - took a lot of skill.

Now we have a lot of different SP-decks, and a lot of other super-strong cards. The good thing is that the new good cards don't base on either speed or luck. Flygon and Nidoqueen are the most important stage 2 Pokémon in Rising Rivals. They both are a little too good, but at least they promote a game that lasts longer than 2 turns. We also have Upper Energy as a first step away from quick knockouts.

Looking at the next sets, there are some ugly cards. Absol G Lv.X is highly luck based, but maybe brings a new kind of strategy to the game. The there's Gengar Lv.X - of course it's a good thing to have a counter against Dialga G, but putting it on a card that's already top tier without the Lv.X is ridiculous, as well as 140 HP on that one while even Gardevoir Lv.X had only 130. But there are also cards like Spiritomb that are a good way to block donks and put some more strategy to the game. At all I think it's getting better with the next sets, but we'll see.
 
I'm not enjoying a lot of the discussion happening right now, but...

I don't think the TCG is going downhill. I think, if anything, it's the best it's been in a long time. The format has more than a few decks, there seems to be quite a few competitive players, and overall things seem to be pretty good right now, from my view, anyway.

There is quite the power creep, but that's been kind of evident from the start, and a lot of games suffer from that problem. Donks can also be a problem, but didn't we have a thread just a few weeks ago proclaiming that donks were dead?

I like Pokemon.
 
Well, we saw this trend from the start of Diamond and Pearl. PCL started making cards more and more broken with the release of each new set.

I really must agree, I miss the days of RS-on and HL-on that involved steady, slow-paced, setup decks, with those 1 or 2 speed decks that could also do fairly well.

I dunno what happened, but this whole SP nonsense has turned the game around completely. Now everything must setup within turn 1-2 or else you essentially lose. And due to SP pokemon all being basic, they are naturally fast, and PCL has to create cards like BTS just so that setup decks can compete.

I think what happened was PCL wanted increased diversity in deck choice, to where kids could choose their favorite Pokemon to base a deck on and still be able to make it slightly competitive, but by doing this they also increased the donk factor in the game, and made the game much more speed based.

The game is still thriving though. We have seen amazing growth. And with a larger player base comes more complaining, and increased problems. AND, I do believe that there is a healthy future for the game. Yes, we will have to embrace this fast paced environment BUT in the next couple sets we are going to see cards like Spiritomb which will help slow the game down to a manageable state.

I dunno, next format will be the first format we have ever had where there is literally NO rotation of sets. I know I am personally a little scared. We will see how it goes though.
 
Professor Elm said:
Well, we saw this trend from the start of Diamond and Pearl. PCL started making cards more and more broken with the release of each new set.

I really must agree, I miss the days of RS-on and HL-on that involved steady, slow-paced, setup decks, with those 1 or 2 speed decks that could also do fairly well.

I dunno what happened, but this whole SP nonsense has turned the game around completely. Now everything must setup within turn 1-2 or else you essentially lose. And due to SP pokemon all being basic, they are naturally fast, and PCL has to create cards like BTS just so that setup decks can compete.

I think what happened was PCL wanted increased diversity in deck choice, to where kids could choose their favorite Pokemon to base a deck on and still be able to make it slightly competitive, but by doing this they also increased the donk factor in the game, and made the game much more speed based.

The game is still thriving though. We have seen amazing growth. And with a larger player base comes more complaining, and increased problems. AND, I do believe that there is a healthy future for the game. Yes, we will have to embrace this fast paced environment BUT in the next couple sets we are going to see cards like Spiritomb which will help slow the game down to a manageable state.

I dunno, next format will be the first format we have ever had where there is literally NO rotation of sets. I know I am personally a little scared. We will see how it goes though.
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I agree about the "Speed Deck" thing.

Uxie should not have been printed.
 
yofosho16: I agree. When LA was first released, I traded for 4 Uxie right off the bat. I read the card and immediately thought "BROKEN!" They were easy to trade for at the pre-release because people were so obsessed with the whole Kingdra craze. I turned out to be right, Uxie changed the face of the game. It's power rapidly increased the setup of all decks and made this format so fast.
 
Professor Elm said:
Well, we saw this trend from the start of Diamond and Pearl. PCL started making cards more and more broken with the release of each new set.

I really must agree, I miss the days of RS-on and HL-on that involved steady, slow-paced, setup decks, with those 1 or 2 speed decks that could also do fairly well.

I dunno what happened, but this whole SP nonsense has turned the game around completely. Now everything must setup within turn 1-2 or else you essentially lose. And due to SP pokemon all being basic, they are naturally fast, and PCL has to create cards like BTS just so that setup decks can compete.

I think what happened was PCL wanted increased diversity in deck choice, to where kids could choose their favorite Pokemon to base a deck on and still be able to make it slightly competitive, but by doing this they also increased the donk factor in the game, and made the game much more speed based.

The game is still thriving though. We have seen amazing growth. And with a larger player base comes more complaining, and increased problems. AND, I do believe that there is a healthy future for the game. Yes, we will have to embrace this fast paced environment BUT in the next couple sets we are going to see cards like Spiritomb which will help slow the game down to a manageable state.

I dunno, next format will be the first format we have ever had where there is literally NO rotation of sets. I know I am personally a little scared. We will see how it goes though.
Click to expand...

What I find so sad about this format, OLDER CARDS ARE UNPLAYABLE because they are 'too slow'. With exceptions of some LV.X cards like Vire and Torterra and the already highly broken card for that time: Dusknoir DP.

I get the feeling that the only reason it will be DP-on is because the powercreep would become bloody obvious and the game would take another turn for the worse imho.

And of course, there will always be people that say "Deal with it. Well, I'm sorry, but the game I used to enjoy, is losing it's fun part. It's getting WAY too competitive for my taste. I mean, it's either play this, or lose.
 
afstandopleren said:
My Café Decks are prime example to be used here to back up my 'silly blanket statement'. You actually have to know what to get out when, instead of being able to deal with things to come with a single card like in many other decks.
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That deck is so easy to play! All you have to do is heal Dusknoir with stuff! newbs can play it!

see what I did there? no matter how skillfull a deck is you can make it sound easy.
 
afstandopleren said:
What I find so sad about this format, OLDER CARDS ARE UNPLAYABLE because they are 'too slow'. With exceptions of some LV.X cards like Vire and Torterra and the already highly broken card for that time: Dusknoir DP.
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Funny note about Dusknoir... when DP released in first place (we had a few HL-DP tournaments in Europe), I used it as mainhitter and won some Battle Roads with that deck. But now, nobody could image to play Dusknoir DP as a hitter, even if Unown G wasn't there.

Ariadosman said:
see what I did there? no matter how skillfull a deck is you can make it sound easy.
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And how do you make iPlox sound easy to play? xD
It's so tricky people don't even understand the decklist.
 
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