Max Potion

TAndrewTourney: Spring Battle Roads 2012 (St. Louis Park, MN) with Klinklang EX

Welcome, you OHKO’ers, to Battle Roads! As a Poképarent, and as an active member of the Twin Cities Pokémon TCG community, I have always felt there is a lot to love about the Battle Roads season. Battle Roads tournaments are worth very few Championship Points, and this gives them a more relaxed and informal feel than larger State or Regional Championship tournaments. Battle Roads tourneys are also a great place for new players to start their experience with Competitive Play. I should know, because a 2010 Fall Battle Roads at Dreamers Cards in St. Louis Park, MN, was the very first Pokémon tournament that my son Paul and I attended. I will never forget that, during round 3 of that Battle Roads, Andy Wieman played our entire match with his cards upside down, just so that I could read the text on each card more clearly. And other Minnesota-area opponents gave Paul and me tips on play during our games that not only helped us become better players in the long run, but even resulted in us winning a couple of matches in that very tournament. So I have always been excited to return to Dreamers for Battle Roads.

This season, though, I was even more eager to play because I feel the format has loosened up since Regionals. Just a month ago, it seemed like play had boiled down to a couple of dominant decks, with just one, ZekEels, winning all but one of North America’s eight Regional Championships. But the release of the Dark Explorers has created some brand new deck archetypes, and has also added some new tools to existing decks. In fact, I think that most top deck types now have more options than they have room for them, and this means that even mirror matches will involve a lot of different cards that aren’t shared by both opponents. Against this backdrop, Battle Roads is a great opportunity to test out new deck ideas. Or, as Pokémon players sometimes say, it’s a great time to try and “break the format”. And the more obscure the deck idea, the better to shock and awe your friends at the tournament while you break it.

I had thought about bringing the Groudon EX tank deck that I wrote up in my last OHKO article, but in testing, it always seemed as though QuadGroudon couldn’t keep up with opponents who played a lot of Tornadus or Mewtwo. Even though the deck was designed to heal away damage with cards like Potion and Moomoo Milk, the amount of damage that could be healed with those cards was just too low. Mewtwo piled on damage too fast, and Tornadus’ resistance to Fighting types was too just difficult to surmount. EX tanking, I thought, would work much better if multiple different EX’s could be used in the same deck to counteract resistance, could be switched at will, and could be healed more quickly and completely than I wrote about just two weeks ago.

As it turns out, one of these problems was solved by a new card in the Dark Explorers expansion, Darkrai EX. Darkrai EX has a hefty 180 HP, and a single, powerful attack: Night Spear does 90 damage to the opponent’s active Pokémon, and 30 more damage to a benched Pokémon of your choice. Darkrai is weak to Fighting Pokémon, which is a big liability. Terrakion, for example, can OHKO Darkrai EX immediately after a KO with Retaliate for just two energies. But Darkrai makes up for this with its incredible Dark Cloak ability, which grants free retreat to any Pokémon with a Darkness Energy attached. In principle, Groudon EX, Kyurem EX, and other hefty EX’s could all be switched for one another at no cost, as long as they had “Darkness Energy” attached. This includes not just Basic and Special Darkness Energy, but also Prism and Rainbow Energy as well. (Prism Energy must be attached to a Basic Pokémon for it to count as Dark.) And the great thing about these special energies is that they also count for the typed energy costs of the EX’s they are attached to.

But how can these EX’s be healed more efficiently? This other problem was solved by an older Black & White combo, Klinklang BLW and Max Potion (EPO). Max Potion heals all damage from the target Pokémon, but at the cost of discarding all attached energies. To avoid this, my Battle Roads deck ran Klinklang, a Stage 2 Pokémon that can move energies around the board at will with its Shift Gear ability. Again, this includes Rainbow and Prism energy, and so Klinklang works with the same special energy set that Darkrai does. Klingklang is durable, with 140 HP, and his effective HP can be increased by attaching Special Metal Energy. Klinklang is weak to Fire, a pretty unusual type right now, and resists Psychic, which makes him very difficult for Mewtwo to KO. A couple of players mentioned to me that I might try using Meganium Prime for this deck instead, which has 10 more HP and shifts Grass energy; this would also allow the deck to accelerate energy attachments with Celebi Prime. But Meganium can’t be searched out with Heavy Ball, so I didn’t go that route. In “Klinklang EX”, the strategy of the deck would be to tank with one or more EX’s, Shift Gear energy around the board as necessary, Max Potion away any damage that your opponent delivers, and always retreat for free.

The List

Keeping in mind that I’m not the most skilled deckbuilder, here’s what I brought to Dreamers:

Pokémon — 15
4 Klink DEX
1 Klang DEX
2 Klinklang BLW
1 Klinklang EPO
2 Darkrai EX DEX
1 Groudon EX DEX
1 Kyurem EX NXD
1 Mewtwo EX NXD
2 Smeargle UD

Trainers — 35
4 PONT
3 N
2 Pokémon Collector
1 Professor Juniper
1 Twins
4 Heavy Ball
4 Max Potion
4 Random Receiver
3 Junk Arm
3 Rare Candy
3 Eviolite
3 Pokémon Catcher

Energy — 10
3 Prism Energy
4 Rainbow Energy
3 Special Metal Energy

A couple of comments on some of my unusual choices:

4 Klink DEX. The Klink from Dark Explorers has a retreat cost of 3, which would normally be terrible, but in this deck it allows Klink to be searched out by Heavy Ball. In fact, this is true of all of the Pokémon in the deck except Smeargle, Darkrai and Mewtwo.

1 Klinklang EPO. This deck has real trouble with energy denial. If the opponent plays a couple Lost Remover, well, it might survive that. But if the opponent plays Crushing Hammer as well, and sends some special energy cards to the discard, the deck gets into trouble fast. Klinklang EPO’s first attack, Charge Beam, does 30 damage and rescues an energy card–any energy card–from the discard pile onto Klinklang, back into play. But I only used this guy once in the tournament, and he could easily be replaced with a third Klinklang BLW.

1 Mewtwo EX. One effective strategy against this deck is to load lots of energy onto a Mewtwo, and then repeatedly strike the active Pokémon for a lot of damage. Mewtwo EX is the only real counter to this strategy right now, so I included one. But you can really only use Mewtwo near the end of the game, because he is so easy for your opponent to KO. If your opponent forces you to use Mewtwo early, you may have already lost.

10 Energy: 3 Prism, 4 Rainbow, 3 Special Metal. As I mentioned, Prism and Rainbow count as both Dark and Metal, but only Rainbow can be Shift Geared onto and off of Klinklang. Meanwhile, Special Metal is key to raising the HP of Klinklang above what your opponent can deliver. Zoroark DEX usually hits for 140-150 (with Dark Claw and Special Dark Energy attached), and ZekEels players can easily double-PlusPower a Zekrom’s Bolt Strike for 140. Parking 1-2 Special Metals on Klingklang can foil this strategy.

2 Pokémon Collector. When I showed Ed Mandy the list for this deck a few days before the tourney, he suggested I switch entirely to Ball trainers for searching Pokémon, and I can understand why. But after some testing, I found myself unable to search for all of the guys I needed, and Pokémon Collector is great for searching out lots of Pokémon at once.

1 Juniper, 1 Twins. I don’t know. Other than Professor Oak’s New Theory and N, what other Supporters does this deck want to run? I included a copy of Twins because the deck is frequently behind in prizes, but Twins only nets you two cards, so I actually don’t even like it that much when I am behind. And there’s very little in this deck that I like to discard, but Juniper is powerful, so I included one.

My Battle Roads Report

As it turns out, there was some drama to the Dreamers tournament before it even started. On Sunday only, the MN Department of Transportation closed down Interstate 94–the major east-west freeway through the Twin Cities–but didn’t post a lot of information or detour signs about the closure. I-94 is one of very few access routes to St. Louis Park, mainly because of a chain of lakes to its east that cut off most surface streets. That meant that folks coming to the tournament from the east were dumped into downtown Minneapolis, with no labeled detour, along with thousands of other commuters in the same boat. Paul and I had left very early, and I knew how to detour the closure, so we made it to the tournament just at the end of registration. But ~10 others, including players driving from Wisconsin (such as NA top-50 players Mike Lesky and Andy Reynolds) were stuck longer, arrived to the tournament after the beginning of round 1, and received first-round losses. This meant that there were really only 21 Masters competing for top 4.

Round 1: Jason Crawford (Kyurem/Kyurem EX/Kyogre EX/Feraligatr Prime)

One of the crazy things about bringing a brand new deck idea to a tournament is that many of your matches will be ones you haven’t practiced before, and I sure as heck hadn’t practiced against Kyurem spread. Klinklang EX requires a lot of benched Pokémon, and so when Jason flipped over his active Kyurem, I was very worried. I became even more worried as my start was slow, and Jason was able to spread KO my Smeargle and a Klink. Eventually I was able to catcher up an energy-less Kyurem EX to stall, evolve a Klinklang, and start Gear Grinding his Ice Pokémon for weakness. Still, when time was called, Jason was up one prize, and about to take another prize with his active Kyurem EX. But during Jason’s turn 1 (of +3), he misplayed by piling energy onto a benched Kyogre EX that had Night Spear damage on it already. On turn 2, I Catchered up Kyogre, dropped a Mewtwo to the bench, retreated for it and Shift Geared every energy I had on the field to Mewtwo for the X-Ball KO to tie the game. Jason didn’t run his own Mewtwo, so he couldn’t return the KO, and I took another prize on turn 4 for the win.
1-0

Round 2: Michael Slutsky (CMT w/ Terrakion)

Mike is a very strong player, and I think he’s especially skilled at calculating KO’s and board positions as the game goes along. (To be honest, I think Klinklang EX would be a terrible match for his playstyle–it offers almost no flexibility, and Mike thrives on flexibility.) In this match, Mike knew that Terrakion would be key to KO’ing my Darkrais, but couldn’t use Mewtwo to its fullest potential because his lone Shaymin was prized. As a result, as he piled energy on his other Pokémon (like his Tornadus EX), he just couldn’t deliver the damage he needed to KO my guys before I healed them. He finally tried a Mewtwo gambit at the very end, but I managed to Night Spear it twice for my last two prizes.
2-0

Round 3: Mike Juhl (Donphan/Vileplume)

Vileplume prevents Klinklang EX from using Max Potion or Rare Candy, and I was pretty concerned about that. I became even more concerned when I did my first Heavy Ball search, and discovered that my single Stage 1 Klang was prized. Luckily, I managed to squeeze in a Rare Candy to Klinklang BLW before Mike established the lock. In testing, Klinklang EX had done terribly against status condition lock decks like Vileplume/Lilligant and Vileplume/Accelgor, because there was no way to retreat a damaged EX or heal it. I had considered including a Steelix line to deal with this (because Steelix Prime is immune to status conditions), but I knew that I wouldn’t be able to search for Steelix under lock, and Steelix falls pretty readily to Mewtwo, so I abandoned the idea. Fortunately, against Mike’s Donphan as the only threat, I simply cycled though active EX’s, retreating damaged ones to sit on the bench, while I KO’d his attackers.
3-0

Round 4: Ed Mandy (QuadTerrakion)

I had e-mailed Ed my list for advice a couple of days before the tournament, and I knew that Ed was running a very similar list to the one he had used at MN States, because he was once again borrowing many of the cards from me. So I think we both knew exactly how bad this match was going to go for me. Ed’s deck ran 3 copies of Lost Remover and 4 Junk Arm, meaning that he was going to be able to send 7 of my 10 special energy cards to the Lost Zone over the course of the game. My only chance was to start fast, getting energy on the board before he could remove it. But Ed was able to play a Lost Remover turn 1, and then Junk Arm for it multiple times over subsequent turns. By turn 6, I had just 2 energy cards on the board, and had managed to KO one Terrakion, while he had taken 2 prizes and was about to take a third. At that moment, Ed’s daughter Ava came over to say that she had finished in Juniors. Ed looked over at his other 5-year-old daughter Petra–who wasn’t playing, and had behaved so patiently throughout the tournament, but was clearly getting bored. Ed debated out loud, and then decided, that he would scoop and drop. Believe it or not, depending on whether Ed had any Junk Arms or Lost Removers prized, I still think I had a tiny shot at winning, but things were awfully grim for me. Ed’s drop gave me a win that the deck and I probably didn’t deserve.
4-0

Round 5: Soari Phomma (“Dark Rush”, Zoroark/Weavile/Darkrai)

This was a pretty quick loss for me, mainly because I didn’t pay attention to Zoroark DEX’s second attack, Dark Rush, that does 20 damage for each damage counter on Zoroark. That meant that Shift Gearing all of my board’s energy onto my only Klinklang, putting it active, and then Gear Grinding for 80, was probably not my smartest move. After Soari announced his 160-damage KO on Klinklang, I scooped. Soari set up great, so I’m not sure I could have won this one anyway, but my dramatic misplay really didn’t give me much of a chance.
4-1

Top 4: Soari Phomma (again); posted on YouTube by bullados

[youtube width=”320″ height=”259″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Zt5hwGcPPg[/youtube]

I really enjoy playing against Soari–he has a great time playing, and his enthusiasm for the game is totally infectious. We also frequently end up talking about our decks and our strategy during the game, which probably doesn’t make the best strategic sense, but makes our games a lot more fun. But through Top 4 Soari had a really bad headache, and I think the background noise at Dreamers–which is always super loud–made things worse for him. I’m sure that playing against a headache-inducing deck like Klinklang EX didn’t help either. But things looked promising for Soari right off the bat, as in Game 1 he Claw Snagged away my Pokémon Collector to leave me with a Kyurem EX active and nothing but Max Potions and Junk Arms in my hand. Okay sure, that meant Kyurem lasted a long time, but I didn’t draw into anything helpful, and Kyurem eventually fell for Soari’s win. In Game 2 I had a much stronger setup, and Soari struggled to put enough Basics on the field to score KO’s with Zoroark, so I won pretty decisively. In the final game, Soari switched strategy a bit, electing to go for multiple early Claw Snags–which didn’t work this time–and then focus entirely on KO’ing Klinklangs. In the end, he couldn’t stream the Zoroarks fast enough, and I took Game 3 after a truly long Top 4.

Top 2: Michael Slutsky (again); posted on YouTube by bullados

[youtube width=”320″ height=”259″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nt79It37nd4[/youtube]

Mike had clearly thought a lot about how to approach our Top 2 matchup, and had decided on early-game Catcher-KO’s with Tornadus EX, followed by a late game sweep with Mewtwo. In my pre-tourney testing, this was exactly the right strategy for CMT against Klinklang EX. But I had included Mewtwo in my deck to counter precisely this scenario, and after Mike’s deck setup stalled through an early energy drought, I figured I had a chance. My setup was also a bit slow, but soon enough we were both rolling, taking prizes, and waiting for the moment that Mike would load up and unleash Mewtwo. He took out my Darkrai, denying me free retreat because my other one was prized. And then he used Shaymin to Celebration Wind 7 energy to Mewtwo with 3 prizes to go, to KO an Eviolited Groudon with 3 energy attached. This put him in the lead 1-2. In my next turn, my best route to winning the game was to KO his active Mewtwo.

And I could have. I had Mewtwo in my hand. But I didn’t. If you watch the video, you’ll notice that I missed many energy drops throughout the game, mostly with energy in hand. I just wasn’t paying close enough attention, and misplayed repeatedly. And so, when Michael KO’d my Groudon, I calculated that I didn’t have enough energy on the board to both pay a retreat cost and attack with Mewtwo. But as judge Mark Janssen pointed out to me at the end of the match, I actually did have enough energy on the board; Kyurem’s retreat cost is normally 3, but I failed to calculate in the effect of Mike’s Skyarrow Bridge. That one extra energy, plus a Gear-able one on the bench, would have been enough to fuel Mewtwo’s X-Ball and win me the game. But I didn’t see it. And so Mike–definitely the more skilled player in this match–took a 40-minute Game 1.

At this point, I was hungry, and tired, and I think it was affecting my play. Even worse, I looked over at my son Paul, who hadn’t really eaten anything for many hours, and he looked practically comatose. Paul won (6-0) in Juniors, but that had finished hours before, and the excitement of being at Dreamers had worn off for him. Knowing that I wouldn’t have a great chance at winning a Sudden Death match even if I took Game 2, I decided to scoop. I think Mike would have won anyway. And I’m glad Paul and I were able to get some dinner and get home in time for bed.

Final Words

Alex Solomonson at Battle Roads. Not really related to the article, but fashionable nonetheless!

I’m not a skilled Pokémon player, and so I’m not sure my opinion on Klinklang’s ranking in the metagame counts for much. I do think it’s a deck to contend with, and I think there is room to improve the deck. So I hope that players with greater expertise than me can take this concept and improve upon it. Looking at the “What Won Battle Roads” thread on Pokegym, it looks like other players also came up with this idea–I didn’t know about them when I built this, but I can’t claim to be the only inventor of the deck. I do want to give some credit for the deck to John Roberts II of Missouri, who chatted with me about it on PlayTCG.me. When I built the deck, my very first game against a human opponent was, believe it or not, a mirror match with John on PlayTCG. (That was the only other time I had seen the deck played.) It was clear that both John and I had work to do on the deck; John convinced me to use the three-retreat Klinks, and I suggested that he use Kyurem EX instead of Kyogre EX as his Water tank. Thanks to him for his advice. And as always, thanks to Steve and Mark for judging, to Colleen and Jeff for organizing, and to MN players for maintaining a fun community for Paul and me to play in.

If you made it this far–best of luck to all of you as we approach Nationals!

The Top 10 Impactful Cards of Emerging Powers

Hey all you OHKOers!  Yes, it is finally time for Pikkdogs to release his list of the top 10 impactful cards of the next set.

Emerging Powers is your 2nd Black and White Set.  It is made up of cards that were in the Japanese Black and White sets, along with cards from the “Battle Strength Decks” and random Promotional cards.  A lot of people are a little upset about this set because the current Japanese set seems to be a lot better than our Emerging Powers set.  But, there are some good and impactful cards in this set. It is not one of the better sets we have seen in a while, but at least it’s better than Call of Legends.  The thing I hate most about this set is that there is that it has another rare Unfezant that is useless.  It seems like I pulled just about all of the BW Unfeazants, and now I feel like I’m about to get 150 more crappy Unfezants.  But enough about my hatred of Unfeazant, let’s take a closer look at the set to get at the best cards.

Honorable Mention (#12) Thundurus

Our first honorable mention of the countdown is Thundurus.  Thundrus has 110 HP, a 1 retreat, and a fighting weakness.  It’s first attack, “Charge” lets you attach a lightning energy from your deck to this Pokemon. Its second attack, “Disaster Bolt”, does 80 damage for LLC and a one energy discard.

At this moment I do not really see Thundurus as a great Pokemon in the modified format.  Some people have been talking about Thundurus being a secondary attacker in a Zekrom deck, but I don’t see that either.  It is OHKOable by Donphan Prime, and it takes 2 turns in the active spot to get charged up.  Perhaps later next year if Donphan Prime gets rotated this card could become good, but right now it’s too fragile and too slow.

Honorable Mention (#11) Cheren

Cheren is a supporter that lets you draw 3 cards.  It is kind of like Cheerleaders Cheer, except your opponent does not get the option of drawing 1 card.  I think this is a pretty good card and will see decent play.  If Cheerleaders Cheer were not in the format I think this card would be ranked around #6.  The reason why it is not is because this card will only replace C.C.  If a deck does not run C.C. they will not decide to run Cheren.  Cheren will just be switched in to decks that currently run C.C.  If I thought Cheren was a huge set above C.C. I would asl put it in, but it doesn’t seem to be that much better.

The format right now is really draw/hand referesh supporter heavy.  Cheren comes into a format where Professor Juniper, Professor Oak’s New Theory, and Judge are used a lot.  Cheren is really not in a position to challenge any of these supporters.  I don’t think that Cheren will see a lot more play then Cheerleaders Cheer has, just about the same.  For that reason although Cheren is a good card, it is not very impactful.

#10- Leavanny #7

At first glance Leavanny does not seem like a very impactful card.  It is a stage 2 Grass Pokemon with 130 HP, a fire weakness, and a 1 retreat cost.  Its second attack, “X-scissor” does 30 damage for GC and lets you flip a coin, if heads you can do 50 more damage.  But this card is possibly impactful because of it’s first attack.  “Nurturing” lets you search your deck for a Pokemon that evolves from one of the Pokemon on your bench, and put it on that Pokemon.  The current rules for this type of attack only allow you to place the next evolution line on the benched Pokemon.  This means that you can only go from basic to stage 1, not basic to stage 2 (even though the stage 2 does evolve from the basic).

This means that Leavanny is like a Spiritomb Ar with the “Darkness Grace” like attack.  This attack does not seem to great coming from a stage 2, but if put in the Lost Zone, Mew Prime can use “Nurturing.”  I’m not sure if this is a great startegy with Mew, but it does make it faster to evolve Vileplume, and Vileplume will be very important in the next season.  I am not sold on this card, but it could be somewhat impactful. 

#9-  Swanna

Swanna is a card that has received no hype, but it is good because it is a Donphan counter.  For WCC you can do 70 damage and a discard, with the “Air Slash” attack.  This makes it a pretty good Donphan counter.  Its stats are not all that great.  It has 90 HP, a 1 retreat cost, and a lightning weakness.

This will not be a great card, but if you need a Donphan counter, this card will take it out in one hit.  It also uses DCE, so it hits well into decks that already use that card.

#8- Recycle

Recycle is a simple Item card.  It lets you flip a coin, if you get heads you can put 1 card from your discard pile to the top of your deck.

This is not a great card considering the card does not go to your hand, and you have to flip.  But, this format is seriously thin on recovery cards.  If you do not use a supporter, you cannot get back evolution cards without Recycle.  I could see a lot of people running at least 1 Recycle since you can re-use it when needed with Junk Arm.

It will not change the format, but I think it will see some play initially.  When we get some better recovery cards you probably will never see this card, but I think a lot of Battle Roads decks will run at least 1 Recycle.

#7- Tornadus

Tornadus is a Donphan counter.  It has 110 HP, a 1 retreat cost,a resistance to fighting, and a weakness to lightning. Its first attack, “Energy Wheel”, lets you move an energy from your bench to Tornadus.  This attack doesn’t seem great, but it does work well with Manaphy.  You can use Manaphy’s attack to refresh your hand, then retreat and move the energy to Tornadus.  His second attack does 80 damage for CCC and you must move an energy from Tornadus to a benched Pokemon.

The good thing about Tornadus is that unlike the other BW high HP Pokemon, it can use DCE.  It can also benefit from Emboar BW.  Tornadus’s main job is to stop Donphan Prime, which it can do.  Donphan can only do 40 damage to it with “Earthquake”, and Tornadus can 2HKO it.  Tornadus can be used in almost every deck, and fits well into a Reshiboar or any deck with DCE.

#6- Beartic #30

Beartic is one of the cards that has received a lot of hype since its Japanese release.  I for one am not drinking the Beartic Kool-Aid (and not just because upon searching for the card on Google I once stumbled on a gay pornography site), I just don’t think that it can make a good consistent deck in this format, but I have been wrong in the past.

Beartic is a 130 HP Water Pokemon with a weakness to metal.  His first attack costs WCC, is named “Sheer Cold”, and does 50 damage and prevents the defending Pokemon from attacking next turn.  Its second attack, “Icicle Crash”, does 80 damage for WWCC. 

Now not allowing the defending Pokemon to attack is really useful.  It will not be as good against Yanmega since it has free retreat, but it is harder to retreat Pokemon like Magnezone, Reshiram, Zekrom, and Donphan.  I could see a lot of people running this card in a BR deck.  I’m still not sold on it being a great card, but I think it will be impactful in the short term. But the lesson we learned today about Beartic is that if you do a Google search for the card make sure to spell the name of the card right, awful things can happen if you don’t.

#5- Great Ball

The #5 card is Great Ball…………..well sort of.  Great Ball was a card that I knew from the LA set that let you search your deck for a basic and put it straight to your bench.  This card was fairly good until most decks used Pokemon like Uxie, Mesprit, Azelf, Crobat G, and Chatot G that had coming into play Poke-Powers.  But this card is not your father’s Great Ball, it is actually your father’s Master Ball.

The text on this Great Ball allows you to look at the top 7 cards of your deck and grab a Pokemon you find there.  If this card came out a year ago I would not even consider running this card.  We had other trainer/item cards like Pokedex, Luxury Ball, Premier Ball, and Bebe’s Search that let you get the cards you wanted fairly easily.  Now a days those trainer/item cards are all gone, all we have is Dual Ball which only works on basic Pokemon and requires a flip.

If you have a deck that has about 20 Pokemon in it, and a lot of them are Legend Pieces or Evolution cards, then this card would work fairly well.  If you are just running a Yanmega deck, your proabably will not look twice at this card.  But, I could see this card being used throughout the time that it is in the format.  It will not be a staple card, but I could see it being used in some decks.  

#4- Crushing Hammer

Our #4 card is Crushing Hammer, which is again just a reprint of another card from our past.  This time it is a reprint of Energy Removal 2.  The text is simple, you flip a coin, and if heads you can discard an energy attached to any of your opponent’s Pokemon.

Now we have a similar card in the format, “Lost Remover”.  Lost Remover also lets you take an energy away from any of your opponent’s P0kemon.  But there are three differences; the first is that thre is no flip involved, the second is that Lost Remover only works on Special Energies, and the third is that energies that have been removed by Lost Remover go to the Lost Zone while Crushing Hammer puts them in the discard.  These differences are very significant.

A lot of people have complained about Pokemon Reversal because it was a very powerful card that required a flip.  If you weren’t happy about that, you probably won’t be happy about Crushing Hammer.  It will be frustrating having a game come down to a coin flip (because that is what removing an energy can do, especially in a format with Pokemon Catcher), but that is what I think will be happening.  Crushing Hammer is much more playable than Lost Remover thanks to the fact that it works on all energies.  I know that I was very skeptical of using Lost Remover because I never knew for sure if it was going to be useful.  You now know that Crushing Hammer will be useful because every deck plays energies of some kind.  The difference in where the energies go is not very substantial because it is hard to get Special Energies back from the discard pile anyway.  The chances are that it will not matter whether you put a DCE in the Lost Zone or the discard pile, your opponent will most likely never get it back.

So after all that discussion do I think it will see some play, yes I do.  I am not sure how much play it will receive, but I’m sure it will at least be in disruption decks.  I could also see it becoming a staple, with Junk Arm being so popular.

#3- Gothitelle #47

The only actual Pokemon to be in the top 5 is Gothitelle.  It has 130 HP, a 2 retreat cost, and a weakness to psychic.  Its ability, “Magic Room”, prevents your opponent from play item cards when Gothitelle is active.  Its attack, “Mad Kinesis” does 30 damage for CCC, and will do 20 more damage for each psychic energy attached.

Decks next season will be unbeliebably trainer heavy, so having a trainer lock will be amazing.  I think trainer lock will be perhaps the best strategy in the next format, but I do not see Gothitelle in those plans.  I think that Vileplume is the way to go.

Even though Gothitelle does not item lock you, it does restrict the amount of damage you can do.  You will never realistically get 3 Psychic energies on it, and if you do that still will not even be 100 damage.  Realistically you are looking at a Psychic and a DCE on Gothitelle by turn 3, this means that your opponent has probably already setup and will probably be able to knock out Gothitelle. This is why I favor Vileplume, you can still attack with whatever Pokemon you want to attack with and have the item lock on.

But a lot of people are eying Gothitelle as a deck worthy card.  You will have the ability to have an item lock, while still use items yourself.  This means you can slow them down by not letting your opponent use Rare Candy, and then Pokemon Catcher up a basic to knock it out.  I think this card will see play early in the season and I think it will see play later, possibly 2 seasons from now when it gets a proper supporting Pokemon to go with it. 

#2- Max Potion

The second to the most impactful card in this set is Max Potion.  This card lets you remove all damage counters and energies on any one of your Pokemon.  While removing the energies is not good, it does work well with low energy attackers like Yanmega and Donphan Prime.

The Stage 1 Rush deck gets a lot better in this set because of trainers like Max Potion.  It is very hard to OHKO Donphan Prime, now with Max Potion most decks can only hope to 3HKO it.

I have tested this card, and although it is very hard to get the card when you really need it, it still is an amazing card.  The only problems I have with this card is that it increases your reliance on trainers and it along with Pokemon Catcher hurt the consistency of decks by making less room for cards like Professor Elms Training Method and Pokemon Communication.

Despite these weaknesses, I think I can still say that this card will see a lot of play and become a staple in a lot of decks.  This card will live up to the hype that people are giving it.

#1- Pokemon Catcher

Of course the most impactful card of this set is Pokemon Catcher.  Heck, Catcher is the most impactful new card since Garchomp C.  Not only will it be a staple, but it will change the way that people play the game.  Of course, like Crushing Hammer, Pokemon Catcher is a reprint of a card that was formally in the modified format.  That card was called Gust of Wind.  Pokemon Catcher is just like Pokemon Circulator in the effect that you get to change your opponent’s active, but this time you can choose which Pokemon gets switched in.

This dyanmic creates a lot scenarios.  You can bring up something that has a high retreat and then attack your opponents bench.  You can bring up something that has a high retreat and then attempt to mill your opponent’s deck.  You can also bring up techs and knock them out before they can serve their purporse.  Or, you can bring up a basic Pokemon and knock it our before it comes a scary stage 2 Pokemon.

I wish I could say more about this card, but all I can say that it is huge.  Catcher will be one of the most important cards in the format.  It will help usher in the rise of Vileplume and item lock, and it will see a lot of success in tournaments.  Pokemon Catcher is kind of like SP Pokemon in the fact that you either have to play it or play against it (item lock).

A lot of people are against Pokemon Catcher, but although it will be very impactful, it will not be bad for the game.  Because the format is relatively slow, it is hard to get Catcher when you need it.  This means that as long as each player is prepared  by either playing 3-4 catchers or playing Vileplume, the game will not be unbalanced. 

Overview of the Impactfullness of Emerging Powers.

Unlike Black and White, there are no big Pokemon in this set to build your deck around.  But, that does not mean that this set is not impactful.  Just one card can change the format around, and that is what we got with Pokemon Catcher.  It may not turn the game on its side, but Catcher will be in all non item lock decks.

Besides Catcher, cards like Crushing Hammer, Great Ball, Max Potion, and Recycle could be very impactful in this trainer heavy format.  And although I do not think they are the best cards, Pokemon like Beartic and Gothitelle could see play in some moderately successful decks.  This set may not be the best, but I would say thanks to Pokemon Catcher this set is very impactful. Feel free to leave your top 10 in the comment box.

So long and thanks for all the fish.