Discussion Tsareena Not as Broken as We Might Have Feared?

21times

Aspiring Trainer
Member
Hello Beachbums - as there have been a number of sun and moon set reviews online recently (Omnipoke's was REALLY good), I have been thinking more about Tsareena, especially Yellowswellow's video on it about a month ago. Therefore, I decided to replicate his list and attempt to recreate the same scenario he did.

So to be absolutely clear, my sole intention was to see how many cards I could clear from my opponent's hand in the first turn of the game (whether I went first or second). I used the Test Deck simulator on PTCGO, and, again to be completely clear, I was not concerned about getting set up to attack or winning the game or doing anything beyond the first turn. My sole purpose was to completely focus on seeing how many cards I could remove from my opponent's hand on the first turn.

And just to let you know - my list was almost identical to Yellowswellow's - the only difference was that I only have 2 Shaymin and he used three. I threw in an additional Sycamore as a substitute.

Here were my results:

First attempt: I discarded all 5 of his cards in his hand and left him with zero cards.
Second attempt: I discarded both of the cards in his hand and left him with zero cards.
Third attempt: I discarded only 1 card from his hand and he had 5 cards remaining.
Fourth attempt: I discarded 4 cards from his hand and left him with 1 card.
Fifth attempt: I discarded 2 cards from his hand and left him with 3 cards.
Sixth attempt: I discarded all 3 cards from his hand.
Seventh attempt: I was unable to discard any of the 4 cards in his hand.
Eighth attempt: I discarded 2 cards from his hand, leaving him with 2 cards.
Ninth attempt: I discarded 3 cards from his hand and left him with only 1 card.
Tenth attempt: I discarded 4 cards from his hand and left him with only 1 card.

On average, I was able to discard 2.6 cards per attempt. On average, my opponent was left with 1.7 cards remaining in his hand. There was only one time when I was unable to discard any cards from his hand.

The counter to this is that obviously I was discarding resources left and right, and that this list by itself isn't particularly competitive. Tsareena isn't a great attacker, and I doubt that I would be able to discard as many cards if I were considering competitive play beyond the first turn. Still, this is potentially a very dangerous deck, but I don't think it's going to rule the meta like I was afraid it might. I think it'll be more of a rogue deck like Typhlosion or Gyarados or a good mill deck, but I'm sure someone's going to put together a good list for this that will balance disruption with attacking power as well.
 
Here is something I am worried about in combination with it. First you have already disrupted your opponent's hand (2.6 cards is pretty disruptive), then you force them to "reboot" their starting pokemon + any energy generation tricks they may have pulled off (assuming you go second with this one).

#1 Pinsir – Grass – HP110
Basic Pokemon
[C][C] Sky Throw: Flip a coin. If heads, return your opponent’s Active Pokemon and all cards attached to it to your opponent’s hand.
[G][G] Guillotine: 50 damage.
Weakness: Fire (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 2
 
Yeah I saw that Pinsir, that's pretty nasty. I think Omnipoke was talking about how it might potentially give you an auto win if you were able to pull it off turn 1 and your opponent had only an active out and went first, but I actually think it will be more effective just a couple rounds later in say rounds two or three when you get 1 pokemon powered up. A lot of times you can only focus on powering up one attacker at a time and that could really set your opponent at a disadvantage if the Yveltal he just spent three turns getting 2 dark and a DCE on just got thrown back in his hand and he had no pokemon with energy attached on his bench.

But yeah potentially a wicked attacker... I wonder if Magearna protects against this?
 
would porygon z from ancient origins be assit or a liabilty for a tsareena decks? devolving and reevolving sounds nice. Spaming the ability
 
Here is something I am worried about in combination with it. First you have already disrupted your opponent's hand (2.6 cards is pretty disruptive), then you force them to "reboot" their starting pokemon + any energy generation tricks they may have pulled off (assuming you go second with this one).

#1 Pinsir – Grass – HP110
Basic Pokemon
[C][C] Sky Throw: Flip a coin. If heads, return your opponent’s Active Pokemon and all cards attached to it to your opponent’s hand.
[G][G] Guillotine: 50 damage.
Weakness: Fire (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 2
I don't know about you, but this might be a one-of in decks that have a hard time against decks that like to have many cards on one Pokémon. Not just Tsareena.
would porygon z from ancient origins be assit or a liabilty for a tsareena decks? devolving and reevolving sounds nice. Spaming the ability
Way too many Stage 2s. Other than that, that could work.
 
I don't know about you, but this might be a one-of in decks that have a hard time against decks that like to have many cards on one Pokémon. Not just Tsareena.

Absolutely. I think this might become a splash tech in a whole bunch of decks. The good thing is that it isn't Shiftry all over again since it requires an attack. It will still get abused for some cheese wins though.
 
I think we'll have to wait until it actually comes out, but I have a feeling there's a decklist for this out there that will be very effective. Just realize in the testing I did I was throwing out resources like there was no tomorrow. I was trying to max out the number of cards I could discard. This means I was throwing out pokemon and energy at a rate that would undoubtedly be averse to actually winning the game. Still, by being able to choose the cards to discard, you'll almost certainly be able to force your opponent to rely on top decks for the first turn. That's the key though: beyond the first turn, you might not be able to discard many of your opponent's cards, so if you're opponent is playing a deck that can recover quickly (and if he top decks draw support), Tsareena will definitely be at a significant disadvantage the longer the game goes on.
 
Absolutely. I think this might become a splash tech in a whole bunch of decks. The good thing is that it isn't Shiftry all over again since it requires an attack. It will still get abused for some cheese wins though.
If they make Trick Coin or Victini again, this might be the most annoying deck ever known to mankind.
 
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