With current state of the game, as nice as it is to see Inferno Fandango back, I am not convinced Emboar would be able to compete. If Inferno Fandango were reliable to set up, it does have a good toolbox of attackers right now, including Reshiram ex.
Zekrom ex is useful for a late game...
So far, convinced the strongest Rocket strategy is Spidops for consistency. Articuno helps that a lot. A bunch of these strategies are just less reliable to set up.
There are a few control pokemon, but not enough to make up a cohesive deck without just stuffing them in a current control...
It’s sorta Primal Groudon but we’re missing a key piece primal Groudon had that this doesn’t: cards that can reliably buffer while this powers up. Were also in a meta where it is way more likely to find a matchup where something can immediately KO it in retaliation to attacking.
Persian looks at your opponent's cards, which is far less reliable. Gives your opponent the means of taking away your strategy by selectively thinning their own deck.
I don't think we are there on a competitive deck yet. Spidops hits too low of a top-end to function by itself (180, or 240 with Area Zero). Mewtwo despite the raw stats doesn't have the best of energy acceleration. Porygon-z sounds fun but also high maintenance for setup.
However, if any...
Now I have actual time to post more than a sentence.
200 points is probably about as fair as they could do for 1 releasable promo for everyone. Enough to encourage going to regionals, but still low enough to be doable for only locals. I would very much like to see a second tier of a promo...
It also has a better type for this, too. One shots and lives a hit from Cornerstone ex. This will probably get tested in immunity / tank decks as an option.
We took a theme that had 3 cards shown and an interesting enough idea, and gave it straight filler to follow. Lost almost all remaining interest I had in this pack.
Everyone is talking about how these are VMax again but almost no one has mentioned that mega Basics will be tag teams again.
I am not very fond of this being a new precedent for the game, regardless of how these 2 cards turned out so far.
I don’t mind them as much having retreat locks that damage and therefore have a time limit before needing to swap targets, not to mention an energy need. Pre-rotation having multiple ways of retreat lock for no damage, as well as Snorlax and a really ugly cardpool to back it getting rid of...
Assuming this is the last of the Ethan’s Pokémon, I still don’t have much confidence in Ethan’s Ho-oh as an engine or deck. It’ll be a new fire box at most, which wasn’t showing much late in the current western format. Arc Armor fell like a rock and Armor-Ho-oh will probably be a very similar...
I'm sure this is a joke but if we are going strictly off Scarlet-Violet, Charizard is the only pokemon to have 3 SARs this gen. Ogrepon has 2 SARs for each mask and an art rare for Teal Mask already, among other special printings and alternative arts for different rarities. We absolutely can...
Would have been neat if we had a theme that could tank Dragapult hits and clean off damage. That is, a theme that didn’t take forever to also take KOs.
You want a theme better built for tanking and KOing stuff? So far, that’s Steven.
The deck has some good ideas to start with, mainly Gabite being a really good stage 1, but Garchomp still has an energy acceleration problem and damage problem. Not being able to hit the 260 attack in consecutive turns is gonna hold it back against decks that will try to go for OHKOs...