SP Hate

[Porii Sames]

The fact is that ONLY Sp gets to use Power Spray. The fact that ONLY SP get Trainer and Supporter support. The fact that SP GOT very powerful basic AS LV X Pokemon. No other cards are as fast as SP. SP got Poke Turn, which lets them pick up ANY SP they have in play with any attachments, thats better Scoop Up, Power Spray kills games. I'm thinking of running Volkners over Uxie.
Arceus gets to play 0-60 Arceus in a deck. I mean come on. That, like, breaks the rules of the game. What gives? Plus, it can attach 6 energies for nothing, and snipe for 80, in addition to hitting everything for weakness. This, like, breaks the rules. Add to the fact they have Lv.X that can use any Arceus attacks in play. And ONLY Arceus can do this. Oh, and they also have an exclusive trainer that gets them set up even faster, in addition to an exclusive Stadium that gives you extreme energy manipulation prowess.

SP isn't the only "special" card. :/
The main issue is that ONLY SP got access to the engine and can still use other cards like Pokemon Communication. Look back at the EX series. The Holon engine was for Delta Pokemon what every deck could use it. There were some cards that only targeted EX Pokemon, like Ray* and some trainers did not work on them. SP does not get this. The game treats them better then every other Pokemon.
Read above. SP isn't the only card that breaks the game rules.
---------- Post added 03/27/2011 at 03:17 PM ----------



See, Vilegar can be stopped. Umbreon UD and Dialga G X slows the deck down. Umbreon blocks the whole deck. Lostgar as well. Just SP not so much. Its the fact that the deck can tech against your techs and not risk the matchups against other players.
SP can still be stopped...my friend built Machamp/Vileplume to auto-pwn SP nearly no matter what, what with 3 Judge, 2 Looker's, Champ Prime/SF, AND Plume, there is very very little SP can do when it gets fully set up.

Bold replies


@Lotad

QFT on everything

 

[vaporeon]

Arceus is not broken because any combo deck can play on par with it. How many people do you know running 60 Arceus in a deck? Most of the Arceus would be techs anyway. Arceus does not have Cyrus, Arceus does not have Poketurn, Arceus does not have Power Spray. Garchomp does 80 for free. Arceus does 80 and put all Energy into the Lost Zone. At least with Garchomp, there is a chance you get your DCE back.

Dont get me wrong, Arceus can be good, but its no tier 1 deck like LuxChomp.

Its not a matter of breaking the rules but how cards affect the game. Arceusis not a big worry because a good spread deck would own it. The thing is that SP LIMITS what people can play. I have a Pidgeot Control deck that sits there, My Leafeon deck can hold its own against other deck but LuxChomp, a deck people PLAY in my area. A lot of really good Pokemon can not be played. Look at Ninetail that does a Power draw, that card can be really good in other deck but Garchomp kills it. What about Crobat G. The fact it is SP makes it broken.

 

[Porii Sames]

Arceus is not broken because any combo deck can play on par with it. How many people do you know running 60 Arceus in a deck? Most of the Arceus would be techs anyway. Arceus does not have Cyrus, Arceus does not have Poketurn, Arceus does not have Power Spray. Garchomp does 80 for free. Arceus does 80 and put all Energy into the Lost Zone. At least with Garchomp, there is a chance you get your DCE back.
It isn't broken, and neither is SP. Arceus is, in my opinion, by no means a great deck. Arcues has Ult. Zone. Arceus has Beginning Door. Arceus has the ability to be used in high numbers. And how on earth would you get DCE back? Oh, and Garchomp does require energy for Drush. In fact, only 1 less than Arceus.
Dont get me wrong, Arceus can be good, but its no tier 1 deck like LuxChomp.
Ditto.
Its not a matter of breaking the rules but how cards affect the game. Arceusis not a big worry because a good spread deck would own it. The thing is that SP LIMITS what people can play. I have a Pidgeot Control deck that sits there, My Leafeon deck can hold its own against other deck but LuxChomp, a deck people PLAY in my area. A lot of really good Pokemon can not be played. Look at Ninetail that does a Power draw, that card can be really good in other deck but Garchomp kills it. What about Crobat G. The fact it is SP makes it broken.

Morten dealt with it. Curran dealt with it. Played new rogue decks that beat SP and got them their own successes. Also the guy that won with Scizor.

Pidgeot Control or whatever is probably beyond terrible, Leafeon isn't that great in the format anyways and loses to decks besides Luxchomp (Steelix and Charizard immediately come to mind). Ninetales is a good card in the right deck, and Crobat G is played in numerous decks besides SP.

Bold are replies.

 

[LoTad]

@ Porii: Idk what QFT means.

So basically what you guys are saying is that the whole sp concept is unfair because it is able to run off of an sp engine? Does that engine happen to consist of a supporter, of which you can only use 4, and a load of trainers? If only there was some way to beat that....

I came up with a gdos deck that used giratina's let loose, sableye, and cyrus's initiative to counter that idea. My brother (Ty Wheeler) is in seniors. He ran my list at Indiana and Ohio states. He didn't lose a match.

Just because none of the boring standard decks in the top tiers seem to be better than luxchomp, doesn't mean that the whole concept is unfair.

 

[Porii Sames]

Quoted for truth (which means I agree)

 

[Scipio]

So hey, how about answering that whole stopping from playing argument I made?

 

[LoTad]

I answered it by saying that there are plenty of ways to stop you from playing, not just sp. Disruption gigas can power lock you from turn 1 until turn 10 or so. Sablelock can stop you from playing without power spray by judging and then impersonating iniatitive, followed by a chatot g drop. Vilegar can stop you from playing by not letting you play trainers the entire game. Uxie/beedrill/shuppet donk can stop you from playing by actually stopping you from playing. Lostgar can stop you from playing by picking out and lzing your key pokemon. Steelix can stop you from playing by not letting you do any significant amounts of damage and not letting you take any prizes. Machamp can stop you from playing by outspeeding you, like sp's. Mewtwo lv x could stop you from playing by not letting anything attack it.

Sp's are not as unique as you think they are. They are, obviously, limiting the format by forcing you to play quicker decks, but it is not unfair. If anything, plox in the '08 season was unfair. Stopping powers for the entire game almost every game starting at turn 2 or 3 sounds like it would be less fair than just a deck 1 turn quicker with the ability to stop a single power early on if you get a great hand.

 

[gallade]

"Here, let me just play this 60 HP bas-"
"LOLBRIGHTLOOKFLASHIMPACTROFLLOL"
"Alright, I'll evolve this other one into an 80 HP stage 1 and..."
"LOLDRAGONRUSHKTHXBYETROLOLOL"
"Sigh, fine, lets play this Uxie, hope I'll get a Can.."
"NOPOWERSPRAYHERPADERP"

Yeah...I'd call THAT prevention of play.

You had a wee spelling error.

 

[Yoshi-]

Against gengar you at least get to do something, you might have to play without trainers but if youre somewhat prepared you can still freely play.


"SP can still be stopped...my friend built Machamp/Vileplume to auto-pwn SP nearly no matter what, what with 3 Judge, 2 Looker's, Champ Prime/SF, AND Plume, there is very very little SP can do when it gets fully set up."

Auto-pwn win? I build that exact deck, its inconsistent and slow, has terrible matchups against anything non sp and still just beats sp slightly.

THe thing is, if I play against sp I dont think "I wonder how my opponent plays / if I can outplay him" but "I hope I have call+tomb or collector+tomb and dont go first/second (depending on hand)". Why so many sp mirrors go to time? Because they either cripple each other or no one dares to do the first strike I guess. But r u telling me that you cant tell the winnero f a match by looking at the opening hands all the time?

That sums it up nicely

And plox had some areas that you were free, you could setup stuff on your bench and chances were good that plox would leave it alone, you cant do anything against sp. It gets you everywhere.

 

[Porii Sames]

Uhh...

Machamp/Plume can get a T1 Tomb T2 Plume quickly, and can swarm Machamps thereafter while Taking Out. And SP can't do a whole lot when they're trainerlocked and getting OHKO'd no matter what. And then there's Fighting Tag for when you are about to KO them. Oh, and Judge (3-4).

It has some nice matchups, against Luxchomp, Dialgachomp (sorta, kinda iffy), and any thing trainer dependent.

I played against a good player once by outplaying him through the whole game while he was playing Luxchomp. Yeah, I still lost that match (prize war and he won) but through the whole game he had like 2 Sprays in hand. I'd use powers that he thought were bait, and were just mindgames. I'd Flash Bite him once, and then end up killing that poke like 3-4 turns later.

So yes. You can outplay SP.

 

[vaporeon]

So, what you're saying is that EVERYONE should play Machamp/Plume? There are facts why people hate SP. It's everywhere all the time. Garchomp X can hit for 80-120 a turn with Crobat and Poketurns. not only can't you safely setup bench Pokemon, You'll need to worry about spray on you powers. You can play a counter but risk losing every other non SP match, not all decks can run Judge without hurting the host player.

SP was a good idea but NO counters were made for it. Just like the Lost Zone, they took an idea and went wild with it. Pokemon should not have a Remove from Play area, and the ONLY Evolved Pokemon that should be basic are Shining Pokemon and Pokemon* and Pokemon* were one to a deck and they all sucked unless they were in the right situation.

 

[LoTad]

But r u telling me that you cant tell the winnero f a match by looking at the opening hands all the time?

Only if there is a large difference in the quality of the opening hands. A much better variable to use to predict the winner of a match is who the player is. A great luxchomp player can come back from a terrible hand to beat a mediocre lc player with a great player. It happens all the time.

Saying that you don't even get a chance to play because luxchomp is quick and it has all areas covered is rediculous. It takes incredible luck to be able to pull off 3 sp's in play turn 1 along with multiple sprays in hand and multiple bright looks/dragon rushes in, say, the first 3 turns. That's generally what it takes to stop you from playing if you have a consistent non-sp deck. If you just play stage 2 decks that don't have any disruption abilities or extra speed, than sp will wreck you early on. But many of the top decks are still stage 2-based:

Vilegar: 2 stage 2's that are essential to have out, and it still has a favorable lc matchup. How?disruption. Lookers and trainer lock mess with lc's beginning game and midgame.

Magnezone varients: All the attackers, whether they be just magnezones or machamps also, are stage 2's. How can mag decks pull this off? Extra speedy draw power + tomb trainer lock + constant judging.

Machamp: Another stage 2 deck! Oftentimes mesprit drops are used to disrupt, and take out is really disruption of its own.

You can't just say that sp wrecks everything because it doesn't let you play when other decks are still, obviously playable. Looking back at states tourny reports and updates, I see that plenty of great players opted to NOT PLAY SP. Just some of the better masters players off the top of my head are Steven Silvestro, Dustin Zimmerman, Mike Pramawat, Curran Hill, Frank Diaz, Aaron Curry, Alex Leachman, and Erik Nance.

 

[Ignatious]

So, what you're saying is that EVERYONE should play Machamp/Plume? There are facts why people hate SP. It's everywhere all the time. Garchomp X can hit for 80-120 a turn with Crobat and Poketurns. not only can't you safely setup bench Pokemon, You'll need to worry about spray on you powers. You can play a counter but risk losing every other non SP match, not all decks can run Judge without hurting the host player.

SP was a good idea but NO counters were made for it. Just like the Lost Zone, they took an idea and went wild with it. Pokemon should not have a Remove from Play area, and the ONLY Evolved Pokemon that should be basic are Shining Pokemon and Pokemon* and Pokemon* were one to a deck and they all sucked unless they were in the right situation.

Pleas do not exaggerate Garchomp's damage. What a silly point to try and make.

The fact herte is that any given deck CAN set up bench. And every deck CAN get around Spray. Play a fast list and go straight from basic to stage 2, then sniping isn't a problem. Running Smeargles, Uxies, Seekers, and a lot of trainers can easily play around one opening hand Power Spray. Machamp can easily do this. Lostgar can easily do this. Gyarados can easily do this. It can be done, I promise. There really is no need to complain about or hate on a concept that has so many outs and counters.

... Wait.

You just said there were no counters.

... Lets talk match ups.

Machamp has an edge against SP. Vilegar has an edge against SP. Mewtwo autowins SP. Steelix beats SP. SP teched SP beats SP. SP teched Gyarados beats SP/ The fact here is, when building an SP deck, all of the above decks need to be put into consideration when building, because if you don't, YOU WILL LOSE TO THEM. They WILL counter you.

SP can tech against a bit of the format, but it can't come close to having perfect answers to everything. Play a deck that has answers to SP. Predict SP players and play a deck within their blind spots. It's not even difficult to do so.

 

[vaporeon]

Pleas do not exaggerate Garchomp's damage. What a silly point to try and make.

The fact herte is that any given deck CAN set up bench. And every deck CAN get around Spray. Play a fast list and go straight from basic to stage 2, then sniping isn't a problem. Running Smeargles, Uxies, Seekers, and a lot of trainers can easily play around one opening hand Power Spray. Machamp can easily do this. Lostgar can easily do this. Gyarados can easily do this. It can be done, I promise. There really is no need to complain about or hate on a concept that has so many outs and counters.

... Wait.

You just said there were no counters.

... Lets talk match ups.

Machamp has an edge against SP. Vilegar has an edge against SP. Mewtwo autowins SP. Steelix beats SP. SP teched SP beats SP. SP teched Gyarados beats SP/ The fact here is, when building an SP deck, all of the above decks need to be put into consideration when building, because if you don't, YOU WILL LOSE TO THEM. They WILL counter you.

SP can tech against a bit of the format, but it can't come close to having perfect answers to everything. Play a deck that has answers to SP. Predict SP players and play a deck within their blind spots. It's not even difficult to do so.

During my testing of Luxchomp, I was able to do all of the above within the first 2-3 turns. I was not making up numbers with Garcomps attack. My opponent have a benched LV X with 110 HP. I advanced Garchomp X, dropped a Crobat G for 10, 2 Poke Turns and Replay the bats for another 20 the DR for 80= 110.

You make it seem like its easy to stop. I I said no counter, I meant no counter were released after the SP, Machamp, Mewtwo were all released before SP came out so those are not valid counters.

 

[LoTad]

Well put, Ignatious. Everyone's acting like there are sp decks, and then like 2 or 3 other weak decks to make up our format and that all lc has to do is tech against those 2 decks. Roughly a dozen different decks won states this season, only 3 were sp based (lc, dialga, and sable/chen). In order to play a somewhat consistent list of lc that could beat all those decks somewhat consistently, you would need 80 cards or so. You cannot get 3 sp's in play with a spray in hand turn 1 the majority of games unless your list is built to be strictly consistent. But everyone on the gym is assuming that it is just soooo easy for an lc to tech in a mewtwo counter, fire tech, dark tech, multiple psychic attackers, all the while keeping all the standard techs (like promocroak, amby, lucario, bronzong, and draggy).

Btw, how do you make that upside down i? jk

 

[StormFront]

SP can tech against a bit of the format, but it can't come close to having perfect answers to everything. Play a deck that has answers to SP. Predict SP players and play a deck within their blind spots. It's not even difficult to do so.

SP's answer to X are....

Gyarados - Luxray+Lucario GL
Vileplume/Mewperior/Mewtwo - DialgaG
Pixes - Power Spray + Garchomp
Lostgar - Weavile G or Hounchcrow SV
Machamp - Hounchcrow SV + Uxie LvX
Sabelock - Uxie (either top deck Uxie, collector, communication, bebe's, collector or Cyrus)

And guess what? You can easilly fit all into one SP deck. For any non SP deck. It would be impossible to counter all that without majorly hindering your overall consistency.

 

[Porii Sames]

SP teched Sablock pwns SP so badly....

First Dragon Rush=the game normally.

 

[LoTad]

@ vaporeon: 110 with a dragon rush requires the attack plus 3 flashbites. That's either 1 bench space and 2 of your 4 possible poketurns, or 2 bench spaces and 1 poketurn. Either way, that is a tremendous amount of resources, and it is unrealistic that you would be able to get to that soooo early while preparing for the upcoming series of turns without getting an extremely good hand.

And why do you need a counter to everything. I hate that people assume that a deck's abilities are unfair just because there isn't a straightforward, mindless way autowin against it. Get creative or get some skill - that's all the counter you should need.

---------- Post added 03/27/2011 at 11:10 PM ----------

SP's answer to X are....

Gyarados - Luxray+Lucario GL
Vileplume/Mewperior/Mewtwo - DialgaG
Pixes - Power Spray + Garchomp
Lostgar - Weavile G or Hounchcrow SV
Machamp - Hounchcrow SV + Uxie LvX
Sabelock - Uxie (either top deck Uxie, collector, communication, bebe's, collector or Cyrus)

And guess what? You can easilly fit all into one SP deck. For any non SP deck. It would be impossible to counter all that without majorly hindering your overall consistency.

Although the list of things you need counters for seems to be airtight, you're going to have to play a luxchomp deck with a weavile g, 1-1 honchkrow sv, and a 1-1 dialga along with all the colorless techs and aaron's that you need to compete in a tough mirror. And btw, it's not like you can cut any other techs to make room for those cards. Bronzong is needed, so are all the mirror techs, and promocroak (for gigas, magnezone, lux x, ambipom). So.... you're still going to get beat by steelix and by gdos about half the time since you don't have twins + e belt.

And uxie is not an answer to sablelock. If that was true then sablelock would lose every game. What you need in that matchup is plenty of good setup cards to fill your deck with and plenty of colorless techs, which you are going to seriously lack with the other techs you're recommending.

 

[Ignatious]

SP's answer to X are....

Gyarados - Luxray+Lucario GL
Vileplume/Mewperior/Mewtwo - DialgaG
Pixes - Power Spray + Garchomp
Lostgar - Weavile G or Hounchcrow SV
Machamp - Hounchcrow SV + Uxie LvX
Sabelock - Uxie (either top deck Uxie, collector, communication, bebe's, collector or Cyrus)

And guess what? You can easilly fit all into one SP deck. For any non SP deck. It would be impossible to counter all that without majorly hindering your overall consistency.

That's not enough to beat an SP teched Gyarados... They OHKO everything for no energy with Mesprit disruption. Luxchomp needs two energy with a bat drop to do the same.

Dialga doesn't beat Vilegar either. With hand disruption and Level down, realistically you get one turn of trainers and need more supporters to set it up.

Pixies?

Lostgar has a Junk Arm engine. Junk Arm can fetch Bubble Coat.

Machamp kills Uxies Better than Uxies kill Machamp. Uxie needs DCE and Premier balls (two unsearchable cards). Honchkrow is facerolled by Machamp Prime.

What if you DON'T topdeck? Game over.

Realistically every deck has answers to SPs. Just because SP has an answer, that doesn't make it a solid counter. That doesn't even make it good.

 

[Jaeger]

I don't get where all this "no skill" comes from? When your playing SP against SP its incredibly easy to tell who knows what they are doing and who just heard Luxray and Garchomp were good together. There is such a skill gap in mirror its not even funny. I fully admit one player can get a broke hand and dominate the game but you get this in any mirror.