Flare Hyper Gear: Hype vs. Reality

Carpey

Carpey

Deck Experimenter
Member
I hopped on PTCGO with my trusty Yveltal/Garbodor and decided to get those shiny new Team Flare cards. Specifically, 2 Head Ringer. From the battles I've done, they seem to be pretty handy and turned out to be a major part of destroying a Virizion/Genesect deck. If their field is scarce of energy and you throw a Ringer on VirizionEX, the game is in your control. Another thing that I noticed is that you have to be more careful of when you play down EX cards. The optimal setting to play down an EX is if you either have a tool ready to attach right away, or when SeismitoadEX is Item locking your opponent. Otherwise you are vulnerable to having a Flare card attached, and fitting Tool Retriever in my decks is not going to happen anytime soon. An alternate strategy (although maybe not as effective if your opponent was around during DP with Mesprit and Power Sprays) that I was able to execute one time is to bench an EX that you know you probably aren't going to use, and if your opponent takes the bait, you can end up tricking them into wasting a Flare card. One last thing I noticed about attaching these cards is your own timing. If your opponent is vulnerable to a Flare card, you still have to think if you might want to Megaphone any tools off of other Pokemon before attaching to ensure that you don't get stuck between leaving the Flare tool on their EX or maybe discarding a tool from Garbodor. Of course, this isn't a problem in Extended with Tool Scrapper.

I'm interested to know, what did you expect (or still expect, if you haven't used any Flare tools yet) of these cards, and how have they turned out so far?
 
I honestly do not like the hyper gear. Its a card that just makes decks that dont have abilities even better. Especially seismitoad decks. Decks with abilities cant afford to play hyper gear since they know they will have to use startling megaphone to knock a tool off garbodor. So now not only does seismitoad/garbodor destroy stage 2 decks, its also has an advantage against VirGen and any other big basic deck that requires abilities
 
Carpey said:
I'm interested to know, what did you expect (or still expect, if you haven't used any Flare tools yet) of these cards, and how have they turned out so far?
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When I saw Head Ringer finally, I knew I would include those in my Seismitoad decks. I've found them to be quite advantageous.

Ivy_Profen said:
... seismitoad/garbodor ...also has an advantage against VirGen ...
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Seismitoad and Garbodor did not give really me an advantage over VirGen decks as much as my Reshirams and Charizards.
 
The Flare Hyper Gear is quite good overall. Since it is a simple Trainer, I could see almost every deck making use of them. Unfortunately, Jamming Net just isn't very good, aside from countering Landorus-EX and Darkrai-EX. Head Ringer is really great, though. I find that it's best use is against Virizion/Genesect. It also is moderately good against Seismitoad-EX, Latias-EX, and some of the newer EX's, like M Manectric-EX.
 
Head Ringer's definitely good, but can become dead weight when playing against a deck like Flareon or Night March, which I expect to see at least a fair amount of in the coming format. It can be particularly nasty when combined with Seismitoad and Enchanced Hammer, as this combination can severely limit the opponent's options, given the right setup. I haven't seen anyone in my area using them (yet), but there's no reason not to at least test it.

On the downside, these tools are somewhat easy to remove. Aside from decks I mentioned already that don't focus on Pokemon-EX, Xerosic and Tool Returner can both remove these, and both cards would see increased play if the Flare tools catch on. They also can't be attached to Pokemon that already have tools attached, so they can be tricky to play as most combat-ready Pokemon-EX will be equipped with a Muscle Band or Float Stone.
 
I play them with my seismitoad/ Garbador/ Hammers deck and it is pretty solid. It would be very annoying to play against. The flare cards just have great synergy with seismitoad EX in my opinnion.
 
I think that the Yveltal EX should make use of the one which makes attacks do one more. Then Yveltal (or Mewtwo EX) can do 20 more.
 
I wanna run four head gear and attach them to all my opponents genesect ex so they can not play g booster.
 
Lensiax said:
I wanna run four head gear and attach them to all my opponents genesect ex so they can not play g booster.
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Oy, good luck finding the space for that. If you can pull it off though, that'd be hilarious to see 4 useless GenesectEXs. :)
 
I find it more devastating to have one on Virizion early game. Turn 3 emerald slash... yay.

I also find these Flare Gear somewhat useful for tool drop. It actually seems viable again. I've been playing it. You have to be much more careful with tool placement. But with the extra 20 per Flare Gear on your opponent can really help, since they can't get rid of those with Startling Megaphone.
 
Ivy_Profen said:
I find it more devastating to have one on Virizion early game. Turn 3 emerald slash... yay.
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Agreed. And I actually found it to be hilarious to me, but very frustrating to my opponent. Lol.
 
Ivy_Profen said:
I find it more devastating to have one on Virizion early game. Turn 3 emerald slash... yay.

I also find these Flare Gear somewhat useful for tool drop. It actually seems viable again. I've been playing it. You have to be much more careful with tool placement. But with the extra 20 per Flare Gear on your opponent can really help, since they can't get rid of those with Startling Megaphone.
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I like it, but online I've tested and it only loses to pyroar...
Probably will have to put in a tech garbodor for the matchup (my only solution thus far in testing).
 
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