One Hit KO

A big hello to everyone in Omar-nation.  This is Pikkdogs here with a report on the upcoming state championships.                         

So I had my preview of states all done and written, and I was ready to make some final tweaks to my deck, and then………………………….. The Europeans screwed it up.

Darn Euros!  They had one tournament and with that turned the Metagame on its side.

In case you haven’t watched PokemonDan’s video on the ECC, the talk of the Benelux region was Italy’s Andrea C. and his Lostgar Lock deck.  Its basically just a trainerlock deck but that exchanges 2 Gengar SF for 2 Gengar Primes.  Even though he was very lucky in the tournament, he was at a place where he should have won the entire tournament, but misplayed at then end.  So he basically should have won the tournament, and turned quite a few heads while he did it.  You can bet this deck will migrate to the U.S. and become the biggest Italian import since the Pizza pie.

So what does this mean for …

The European Challenge Cup was this week and it has shown us some great things for the game. It seems to me that the meta is starting to show some light past SP, with many rogue decks and crazy ideas actually doing well in high grade tournaments. This episode will go over the best parts of the ECC which took place last weekend. There are some good things coming from Europe at the moment and wait til you see what Gengar Prime did!

Thanks for watching!
Continue reading "PokemanDan’s PokeClass Episode 21 – The European Challenge!"

Hey everyone in Omar-Nation.  This is Pikkdogs here with a strategy article. This article is all about Pokemon that act like walls in the Pokemon TCG. Wall Pokemon are Pokemon that are defensive in nature and either prevent your opponent from attacking you or getting a knockout on one of your Pokemon.   Walls are on of my favorite aspects of a TCG.  I think its great when you can give your opponent a situation in which they can’t hurt you.  It feels deliciously evil.

Before we get started we have some news to deal with first.  Ed and I are happy to announce that we have a new member to the teamomar.com family.  Renae from the “Renae Collects” Youtube show will soon be joining our team.  I think its great that we are getting some more views from collectors, rather then only competitive players.  So expect some collection videos from her in the future.  If you can’t wait for the first video or article, check out her archive of videos on youtube at this link:

http://www.youtube.com/user/RenaeCollects

Okay, so anyway back to the article.  Just a refresher, we are talking about walls.

You might ask ,”Pikkdogs, Why might one …

Are you guys getting tired of hearing about Gengar Prime?  Well I am getting tired or writing about it.  But I haven’t shared any kind of lists or anything like that, so I thought I would write this one last article.     

I hate to repeat myself, but I probably should explain Lostgar a little.  It is a deck that uses Gengar Prime and Lost World to win the game by getting 6 of your opponent’s Pokemon in the Lost Zone.  This is mostly done by using Gengar Prime’s “Hurl Into Darkness” attack, which lets you put as many Pokemon that your opponent has in his/her hand to his/her Lost Zone up to the amount of energy on Gengar Prime.

Gengar Prime is a card that can be played in many ways.  One way is to play it as a speed deck, another is to play an Anti-Trainerlock Straight Gengar version, a third way to play it is with Cursegar, and a fourth way is to play it with Trainerlock.  Each version of this deck has its own strengths and weaknesses.

Speedlostgar is the fastest version and has the best chance at being a dominant deck.  It …

States are readily approaching and its time to get ready.  You could just pick a deck you like, test it a lot, and then leave for the tournament.  But, if you wanna read up on whats been happening in the game in the past couple months and what will happen, just continue reading this article.    

In this article we will be looking at how cities ended, what changes have occurred since then, how good the most popular decks will do in states, and then I will throw in some tips for S/P/T Championships at the end.

Cities: A recap–

City Championships 2010-2011 did not have surprising results.  One trend for cities was the dominance of LuxChomp.  LuxChomp has now been going strong for a year, and has been the best deck in the format for all that time.  Luxchomp won around half of the cities in the U.S.  It dominates most of the other best decks out there.  It is a great fast and disruptive deck that came strong after cities into States.  The Cities version of LuxChomp included Lucario Gl for the Gyarados match-up, and we should be seeing a similar list coming into States. Anyone who plans to win a States and is not playing LuxChomp need the ability to beat it.

Another trend for cities was the return of Gyarados.  Of course Gyarados first came on the scene at Worlds two years ago, thanks to the help of the French.  “Tail Revenge” has invaded the Pokemon TCG scene like no other French attack has ever before (I’ll be here all week, try the veal, and tip your server).  But it was absent from Battle Roads this season, but has came back thanks to the help of Junk Arm.  Now with Junk Arm, Rescue Energy, and Volkner’s Philosophy Gyarados is ready to run over most decks.  It preforms well against a lot of the best decks, but can never seem to consistently beat Luxchomp.  Gyarados is ready to be a deck to be reckoned with for States, but I feel it won’t win too many because of LuxChomp. The Cities version of this deck should be very similar to what we will see at States.

Continue reading "An Introduction to State Championships 2011"

This episode is all about our new set coming in April along with a jam-packed news section. I have a lot of content on the Black and White set and important information about new rulings for States as well as UK States dates.

Hope you enjoy!
Continue reading "PokemanDan’s PokeClass Episode 20 – The Future in Black and White!"

A big hello to all members of Omar-Nation, this is Pikkdogs here today with a different kind of article.  Today we won’t be talking about SP decks, Lost World, or Gengar.  Today we will be talking about an overlooked part of the card game, card art.                                                      

There have been a surge in the amount of Pokemon TCG information in the past year or so.  If you want to read or listen to information about the game, just turn on your PC and you will hear all about the latest tips and tricks to win card games.  But, one aspect of the game that has been overlooked by these new websites is collecting.  There are a lot of people who only participate in this game to collect em all, so its nice to connect with these people at times.   While Pokemon players mostly care about the playability of cards, Pokemon collectors look at card art.  So thats why I thought it would be nice to have an article on Pokemon Card Art.

Everyone looks at the art on the cards when we open them, but most of us don’t give the pictures a second look.  Art in the Base Set days was fairly simple.  There would be a simple depiction of a Pokemon just standing around against a mono-chromatic  background.  Today card art is more complicated with a lot of different backgrounds and situations.  The art today is varied and sophisticated, enough so that I think that it should be looked at more closely.

So that’s why we are here today.  I am not an art person, I can’t judge or appraise art, so I will not be ranking any art today.  Instead, I will give several cards awards in different categories, Oscar style. The only rules of this contest is that to be considered for an award, a card must have be in the current modified format.   So without any further wait lets get to the Art Awards.

Continue reading "The Best of Pokemon Card Art"

A big hello to everyone in Omar-Nation.  This is Pikkdogs here with a Stupid Deck Idea.  A Stupid Deck Idea is a deck idea that may be just for fun decks or may be just 1 card or two away from being a good deck, this deck I think can fit into both categories.  Since Pokemon first came out Pokefans have loved Pikachu.  But as far as I know, Pikachu, and its evolved form Raichu, have never been great Pokemon for the Trading Card Game.  This could be changing.  

It started in the Undaunted set when Raichu Prime was first released.  Raichu was the first Pokemon Prime that could benefit from a Level X card, not only that but the two seem to work together.  Raichu Lv. X has a Pokebody called “Link Lightning” that lets you attack after you use Raichu Lv. X’s attack “Voltage Shoot” (which lets you snipe for 80 damage), but only on the turn that you play Raichu Lv. X on to Raichu.  The ability to snipe for 80 and then do 120 damage is pretty amazing.  Even though the two cards work together, it was still hard to imagine getting enough energy to use both attacks and satisfy their energy discard requirements.

This problem recently just became a lot smaller with Pachirisu Cl.  Pachirisu lets you attach two lightning energy cards to Pachirisu once you first play him to your bench, thanks to his “Self Generation” Poke-Power.  This works well with Raichu Prime’s “Voltage Increase” Poke-Power, which lets you move lightning energy cards around as many times as you want.  If you play down one Pachirisu and play an energy to Raichu you can have enough energy to use Raichu Prime’s “Mega Thunderbolt” attack in just one turn.  But there are problems with the discarding of Energy.

Continue reading "Pikkdogs Stupid Deck Idea: Raichu"

A big hello to everyone in Omar-Nation.  This is Pikkdogs here ready to give you another Pikk Three article.  Of course, the Pikk three articles contain three reviews; one for a popular card, one for an underused card, and one for a card from a new or unreleased set.

I hope you all got to go to at least 1 Pre-Release event.  Even though the Call of Legends Set was not the best, the Pre-Release tournament for this set was amazing.  So now that we have that set in the books, we can start getting our deck choices narrowed down for State/Province/Territory Championships.                            

#1 The Staple-Azelf La

Description-Azelf La has been a widely played card for a while now.  It has been used in most decks since they came out.  It may not be needed for all decks, but its a must play for all decks that run 1 copy of something, like SP decks do.

Azelf has a meager 70 HP, a +20 Psychic Weakness, and a 1 retreat cost.  It …

Alright, so maybe this deck idea isn’t utterly stupid. In fact, I think there is a lot going for it. It does, however, still fall under what I laid out for our “Stupid Deck Idea” article guidelines. I built it on paper (actually on the computer). I obsessed over it for a while. Ultimately, I decided that I won’t be building a physical version of the deck anytime real soon, so instead I’m posting it here for all of you to ponder.

I think it’s the type of deck that can just win any matchup. Unfortunately, it’s also the type of deck that can lose any matchup. It’s got a luck component to it that can end up in either player’s favor. So, take a look at the article/decklists. Maybe you want to build the deck and test it out. Optimizing the lists might just make it competitive. At any rate, I think it would be a fun (and annoying to the opponent) league deck. At least comment and let me know what you think about the idea (or decks like this).

The basic idea here is to exploit the new Mime Jr. from Clash of Legends. He has two features that we want to make use of. First, his FREE attack puts the top card of your opponent’s deck into the lost zone and puts Mime Jr. to sleep. Normally, this would just be disruptive to the opponent, but combined with the new Lost World stadium, this can win games. Second, his PokeBody prevents all damage to Mime Jr. if he’s asleep. Obviously, this can save him from being KO’d.

Continue reading "Stupid Deck Idea: Lost Junior (Mime Jr., Lost World)"