Cheren vs. Sage's Training

Rikko145

Rikko145

I put the "laughter" in "slaughter&
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Sage's Training lets you look over more cards if you need something specific right away, but forces you to discard three out of five of them. You may pull a lot of things that are crucial to your deck and be forced to either save them and ditch what you want, or get what you want and possibly cripple yourself later. And if you pull your recovery card (just assuming most people run one) you're pretty much forced to make that one of your 2 picks.

Cheren, on the other hand, requires no discarding, but you only get three cards. Unless you're looking for something you haven't played much of yet, it's a gamble. However, the stakes are lowed than they would be with Sage's Training.

So, basically, do you go into a high-payoff, high-risk gamble, or do you opt for less-payoff, less-risk? Do you guys think that Cheren or Sage's Training is better? Discuss.
 
I prefer Cheren in most decks as the card's consistent + very uncomplicated (however in reshiphlosion decks I would run Sages)
 
I think it depends on the deck.

Cheren is good in trainer lock decks or decks that don't run a lot evolutions that may have to be discarded. It is played in slower decks, and from what I've seen, mainly in Gothitelle.

Sage's Training is good in quick decks, or decks with techs. It is really good in ZPST because if the player is one card away from a donk, there is a greater chance of the card being drawn then with Cheren. Sage's Training is also good in TyRam because with Sage energy can be discarded allowing a turn 2 blue flare. It is also good in The Truth, because The Truth has a lot of techs in it, and it can afford to discard the techs that it doesn't need (such as Donphan line cards when against TyRam.
 
I run a 1/1 cut of them, because my deck is built to be able to set up fast and still go strong throughout the course of the game. Of course, I do also run a lot of hand refresh.
 
I'm going to agree with glaceon here– Sage's is for when you want speed, but Cheren helps a lot when your un cards that are pretty vital to the deck's success that just can't be discarded. Cheren also gets you more cards, which can be nice in some scenarios.

I personally prefer Sage's Training, especially with Super Rod in the format (after Regionals, that is)– we have some good recovery, which is always nice.
 
Depends what you are playing. Sage is a better card if you have a Stage 2 deck that requires getting Pokemon out ASAP. Cheren is okay in that, but it really shines in Stage 1 where you aren't exactly "fishing"... any three cards you grab will be just as good as any 5 cards you grab. You would rather draw 3 than draw 5 and keep 2.
 
In quick decks like Stage 1s, Sage is actually better. It gives more of a chance to get a Stage 1 that us needed for attacking.
 
Sage is great in things like Stage 1's

whereas Cheren is good in things like Tyram because you dont necessarily want to be discarding everything
 
^That's exactly the opposite of what it should be. TyRam loves Sage's; it can discard fire energy for Afterburner and gets set up nice and fast. There are differing opinions on Stage 1s, but in that case, speed shouldn't be so much of an issue, so Cheren is probably a tad better (Zero put it really nicely).
 
i use bianca
she usually gets me 4-5 cards

between cheren and sages i would say cheren, mainly because when i played sages, i would always get 4 or five cards i needed, but i had to discard all but 2
 
I prefer Sage's in almost anything. I think that Sage is far better in Reshiphlosion, but absolutely trainer-lock since trainer-lock decks need the trainer lock up as fast as they can. Basically, anything with a remotely difficult Pokemon to set up in time will want Sage, so I think Stage 1 Rush and maybe Reshiboar would be the only things in which Sage wouldn't far outclass Cheren. Of course, I sometimes run a 4/2 Sage/Cheren split, but that's only because you can't have 6 Sages.
 
High Junk Arm counts are very beneficial with combo of Sage's. And really discarding 3 of your 5 sounds bad at first, but it is very managable when the deck is built right. It will be an even more positive play when we get good rod.
 
UnknownD said:
High Junk Arm counts are very beneficial with combo of Sage's. And really discarding 3 of your 5 sounds bad at first, but it is very managable when the deck is built right. It will be an even more positive play when we get good rod.
Click to expand...

Good Rod? http://pokebeach.com/scans/unleashed/76-good-rod.jpg

Or Super Rod?
 
glaceon said:
Good Rod? http://pokebeach.com/scans/unleashed/76-good-rod.jpg

Or Super Rod?
Click to expand...

Sage is good with both good rod and super rod. Just no-one bothers playing good rod....
 
Blue_Horizon said:
Sage is good with both good rod and super rod. Just no-one bothers playing good rod....
Click to expand...

Good Rod isn't that good. It was a claification question. Super Rod on the other hand is good,
 
In my Trainer Lock deck I prefer Cheren over Sage's. Sage's usually makes me discard vital cards that I can not get back due to trainer lock, and with Cheren there is no thought process to it, you just draw three. That may sound like a stupid thing to say, but when you are trying to beat the clock in a very slow deck, you do not want to waste time deciding which cards are worth the most without hurting you later.

[Edit] That said, If I was running a deck that is fast and doesn't get hurt from the discard, I would run Sage's.
 
Beating a dead horse with this post, but whatever. Speed decks need Sage's. In a format without a universal draw pokemon (read: claydol, uxie), you really need to get those most out of your supporter draws. Speed decks in particular really need to thin out their deck as fast as possible. The discard can hurt, a lot, but speed decks aren't supposed to be thinking about the long haul as much as they're supposed to hit hard, fast, and cripple the opposing deck and then just rely on the initial momentum to win the prize exchange when the slower deck finally gets online.

As Glaceon noted, speed decks and especially ZPST don't really have a lot of things that will hurt them from a Sage discard provided the player knows what to take and when to take it. Slower decks, like Gothetelle, google, or even Reshiboar, really can't afford the discard, because they have many more variables in their setup due to evolution (for example, you might not need that third oddish NOW, but you might need it later if the other ones get KO'ed by yanmega or something). These slower decks also tend to play catchup, and a lot of them rely on Twins for setup, so running Sage's is fairly redundant unless you gain something from putting something in discard (namely fire energy with Tyram), so in this case, Cheren makes sense. There's no tough decisions that might bite you in the ass later, and it gives you extra cards help get that twins engine going.
 
glaceon said:
Good Rod isn't that good. It was a claification question. Super Rod on the other hand is good,
Click to expand...

There's nothing bad about good rod, you get a card back either way. Just because you consider it a bad card doesn't mean it is.
 
Blue_Horizon said:
There's nothing bad about good rod, you get a card back either way. Just because you consider it a bad card doesn't mean it is.
Click to expand...

If if its such a great card, why isn't it played then? I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks Good Rod isn't good.
 
I run Sage's for trainer lock decks because you can get rid of useless oddishes and trainers with and decks that can afford to discard stuff like reshiplosion with its fire energy. And i run Cheren for decks where you need to make hard descisions with sages
 
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