Discussion When to KO a Tech or a Primary Attacker

Hamatti

Hamatti

Aspiring Trainer
Member
I've been playing for a while now and one thing that always pops up when playing is this. Given an option to knockout an attacker or a tech, which one should I pick. I know it's something that comes with experience but I'm looking for some hints and tips forwarding me to making smarter decisions earlier.

Let's look at a couple of examples I have in mind.

1. Night Marcher or Shaymin
Let's say I'm playing against Night March and they have Joltik as Active with Shaymin on the bench. Shaymin would give me two prizes and help turn the prize race but I always get the feeling I should be knocking out the attackers in an attempt to make them run out of attackers. Especially if they still have another attacker (even if without an energy) taking their spot on the bench.

2. Attacker or Tech
Say opponent is playing some metal deck and they are still setting up. They have a Bronzong with Metal Links (or similar situation with energy acceleration on bench). Should I Lysandre it up to make their mid-to-late game harder without the acceleration or should I just keep knocking attackers every turn? Does the decision change radically if their attacker is an EX or a non-EX?

3. Jirachi XY67
Jirachi XY67 with Stardust is always scary. But should I always go for it given a chance or should I try to keep knockin' EX attackers and hoping I can Lysandre my way around Jirachi?

How do you go along with these decisions?
 
There's so much more to this and you have to consider the context of each decision. In the beginning I had trouble making the mistake of lysandre'ing the Shaymin-EX and then knocking it out for the 2 quick prizes, but then leaving a good attacker to get clobbered when I might have been able to take out their main attacker. Other times I notice in hindsight that an octillery left too long or aromatisse could have easily been knocked out earlier in the game and that was the advantage that allowed the opponent to win.

You need to have a game plan that takes your opponent's game plan into consideration and uses the information you have (your hand, what your opponent has played or revealed, what you know is in your deck, what you guess is likely in their deck). Maybe your plan is to setup a mega ray and one shot your opponent's field one by one. You may have to adjust your strategy if your opponent is playing giratina-ex, maybe you notice that they wasted a float stone or maybe they are short on energy, this might be the time to lysandre out the giratina and swing with reg ray or a backup. Of course if your opponent is playing escape rope or switch this might backfire because it will take more than 1 turn to ko the giratina-ex... If they are playing giratina-ex I would guess its a pretty tight list and if they wasted a float stone that they probably don't run switch or escape rope. Fight decks, some toolbox decks, and decks with more open space will run switch or escape rope. Possibly your opponent plays zoroark but it will be easy to see that one a few turns ahead of time.

Against night march you need to know how many energy they've used, how many cards they've seen (are they in top deck mode or did they just sycamore a few times?) Did they town map and there's a DCE in the prizes plus 1 in the discard pile and they've only seen 15 cards? How many NMers did they battle compress away? Maybe they are holding onto a joltik DCE and hoping that you take the joltik on the field out. If shaymin is their only pokemon on the bench then it would have to take the active spot and then if it has no float stone or energy they are stuck retreating it (using up their attachment for the turn) or using sky return for an attack. I know my NM deck doesn't run any float stone... I do run a few regular energy though.
 
To save an entire thesis, there is no practical way to tell you what to target at a point in the game. However, there is a general statement that works out pretty well, think out how you are going to win the game. At the start of every turn your goal should be to figure out if you can win in that turn, if you can, then do it. If you can't then, you have to begin setting yourself up to win. Also, because you aren't playing a single player game, you have to consider what your opponent can/will do in his next few turns to give him the best chance of winning. So generally every turn you should be asking yourself these questions:

How am I going to win? How likely am I going to be able to pull it off?
How is my opponent going to win? How likely are they going to pull it off?
What can I do to hinder my opponent? How likely am I going to be able to pull it off?
What can my opponent do to hinder me? How likely are they going to pull it off?

The more and more skilled you get, the better you get at answering these questions and assessing what you should do in your turn.

Now on a more practical answer, there is three types of Pokemon to me, Counters, Attackers, and Supporters, and some Pokemon are multiple types. Supporter Pokemon generally pose the least immediate threat, however they allow your opponents other Pokemon to be threats quicker. Reoccuring Supporter Pokemon like Octillery are something that you generally want to deal with quickly due to how they can give your opponent continuous advantage. One-time use Pokemon like Shaymin or Jirachi-EX generally pose no threat so I generally KO them late game or during a stalemate to either win or progress the game state. Attackers generally require to be at a threshold to be really dangerous, for example, Mega Ray needs 6-8 Benched Pokemon to be really threatening, so I like to prioritize them right before they hit their threshold so I can negate a lot of progress. They are also the focus once they hit their threshold because they will be your opponent's main threat to you. Counters like Jirachi promo are put on a scale from soft to hard counters for my deck. Their position on the scale generally effects how much of a priority they are, unless they take a while to get charged up (like Giratina for example). You usually want to KO their counter either right before you attack their attacker or directly after, depending on how quickly they can get their main attacker online.
 
Thanks tehsquirrel and Chancewoot for the in-depth answers. They were quite inline with my thoughts so I guess there's no silver bullet or shortcuts, just need to play more and keep my eyes open while playing.
 
@tehsquirrel and @Chancewoot have given sound advice. I think I can add one more, which isn't quite specific but neither is it general:

Timing.

This is particularly relevant with things like Shaymin-EX and (in Expanded) Jirachi-EX. If you wait too long to take these out, you might lose before then, your opponent might find a way to get them off the field before then, or you just might not need to KO them for the win (this last one is not a bad thing!). Most people don't struggle with this though, but instead the opposite problem of taking them out too soon.

A good player keeps track of the Prize counts. If you rush to take out Shaymin-EX (as an example) then your opponent is less likely to drop another. This can be pretty huge considering you might be able to take out two Shaymin-EX and snag two-thirds of your Prizes! Even if there is just one, it is often better to hold off, so that it will be the game winning KO. This means your opponent is less likely to expect (and thus counter) it, and N hits you just a wee bit less hard. All of this is subservient to the earlier points though; if you can run your opponent out of attackers, or out of Bench-sitters that are key to how his or her deck works, do that. Most of what I just said though was how you basically ought to save that Shaymin-EX for the final two prizes. ;)

Now for the part that makes me unpopular: language! Short version is that I recommend Chancewoot use "Support" instead of Supporter to avoid people confusing this Pokémon role with the Trainer card, and... I'm not sure how "tech" is being used here. I mean I know the term; its use in TCGs originates with Pokémon, back in like 2000 or 2001. Just doesn't make sense in how it is being used here versus what it usually means. ;)
 
@Otaku, yeah, while I was writing it, I noticed that there might of been some confusion. I'm thinking about doing an article soon so hopefully I can be confusion free in that.

As far as discussion goes, I feel like Timing is something that eludes a lot of players. So many players when they face me would rather take my Shaymin than my Lugia, because 2 Prizes is better than 1 and most players don't want to play a 7 prize game. Then I can take advantage of the situation because you didn't KO one of my real threats, and now I have the overall tempo of the game in my favor. I want to talk about Tempo more and how important it is, but this isn't the place for it.
 
@Chancewoot

Yup.

Night March is probably the best example. Knowing which targets to focus on early, taking advantage of things like using a Shaymin-EX (probably fueled by Double Colorless Energy) to attack and KO Joltik for a Prize while getting said Shaymin-EX out of harm's way is an important anti-Night March skill. Setting up for N at the right time is also key. Night March is a great deck but unless the player is also great, you're going to have a chance. I know both from running Night March (sometimes winning, sometimes losing) and from beating Night March at times. Keep in mind, I haven't been using Vileplume (AOR), Giratina-EX (AOR), Trevenant BREAK, or Seismitoad-EX decks either.
 
Hamatti said:
I've been playing for a while now and one thing that always pops up when playing is this. Given an option to knockout an attacker or a tech, which one should I pick. I know it's something that comes with experience but I'm looking for some hints and tips forwarding me to making smarter decisions earlier.

Let's look at a couple of examples I have in mind.

1. Night Marcher or Shaymin
Let's say I'm playing against Night March and they have Joltik as Active with Shaymin on the bench. Shaymin would give me two prizes and help turn the prize race but I always get the feeling I should be knocking out the attackers in an attempt to make them run out of attackers. Especially if they still have another attacker (even if without an energy) taking their spot on the bench.

2. Attacker or Tech
Say opponent is playing some metal deck and they are still setting up. They have a Bronzong with Metal Links (or similar situation with energy acceleration on bench). Should I Lysandre it up to make their mid-to-late game harder without the acceleration or should I just keep knocking attackers every turn? Does the decision change radically if their attacker is an EX or a non-EX?

3. Jirachi XY67
Jirachi XY67 with Stardust is always scary. But should I always go for it given a chance or should I try to keep knockin' EX attackers and hoping I can Lysandre my way around Jirachi?

How do you go along with these decisions?
Click to expand...
One very important aspect of my decision-making takes under consideration is the game state or board position. For example, when weighing which Pokémon I can KO during the turn, I consider "regular" stuff like:
  • Opponent's hand size and potential cards opponent might have in hand,
  • Opponent's discard pile contents and size, and
  • Opponent's board contents and size.
But in addition, I try to quickly review and analyze:
  • Should I disrupt my opponent's hand and/or bench first (via Delinquent, N and/or Parallel City) before attacking.
  • What are opponent's most likely response(s) to my KOing his/her Pokémon... what are the pros and cons of that response... am I ready to counter his/her counter...
  • Will my opponent's Pokémon KO increase my game winning chances, place my opponent at a "significant" disadvantage, buy me needed "time", etc.
In most matches, Shaymin EX(s) are used to help setup and no "real" attack-to-KO-my Pokémon threat. So, I tend not to focus on KOing opponent's Shaymin EXs unless its for game/board advantages. I tend to focus more on my opponent's main or core Pokémon before addressing either the techs or supporting Pokémon. But, you also want to know the core Pokémon of most popular decks so that you can cripple your opponent's setup too (e.g., KO Remoraid perhaps knowing that Octillery may be your opponent's primary card-draw engine) IF in doing so, you gain some advantage(s).

IMO, after assessing the potential results of any Pokémon I might KO, if it doesn't yield increased game state or board position, then other Pokémon should be better or more important targets for KO.
 
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I've always found that PTCGO punishes me in making the right decision.

Examples
N to 1 = Opponent Top Decks Professor Sycamore
Delq to no hand = Opponent Top Decks Shaymin EX or P Sycamore.
Parallel City = Opponent Top Decks Sacred Ash
Team Flare Grunt = Opponent Top Decks Mega Turbo
First turn Judge = Opponent Receiving P Sycamore
First turn HEX = Opponent Receiving P sycamore
Lysandre for Stall = Opponent Top Decks Float Stone

Yep, that is my life on PTCGO. A whole bunch Quagmires.

Pokemon needs to make a character like that, where he makes all the right decisions and is constantly quagmired.
 
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