Contest January 2021 CaC: New Year, New Type (Results Up!)

Entry:
[Drampa V
Type: [P] – HP 210
Basic Pokémon (Pokémon V)
V Rule: When your Pokémon V is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.

Ability: Maniac Frenzy
Once during your turn, you may discard your hand. If you do, put 1 damage counter on one of your opponent’s Pokémon for each card discarded in this way. During this turn, your Pokémon in play have no Abilities, except for Maniac Frenzy.

[P] Spectral Vengeance 10+
This attack does 20 more damage for each Pokémon in your discard pile. If this attack does more than 240 damage, shuffle all Pokémon in your discard pile into your deck.

Weakness: [D] X 2
Resistance: [F] -30

Retreat: [C][C]

References
HP/Retreat:
Drampa GX GRI
Type:
Duskull VIV

Ability:
Rose VIV
Charizard VIV
Dragapult VMAX RBL
Leon VIV

Attack:
Karen
Charizard VIV

Notes:
This card is supposed to be based on the Ultra Sun Dex entry (about burning down houses). I’m not quite sure on the wording of the second part of Spectral Vengeance. There is an obvious synergy between the ability and the attack, but I hope that by forcing you to discard your entire hand, its not too strong. The shuffle all Pokémon clause in the attack is also supposed to make the card a bit weaker in the late game.]
 
Question: you've mentioned custom types, does that also include existing Pokemon types that we haven't seen in the TCG yet, like Poison?
 
Yaginku said:
Question: you've mentioned custom types, does that also include existing Pokemon types that we haven't seen in the TCG yet, like Poison?
Click to expand...
The short answer is that "custom type" refers to anything outside the existing 11 TCG types, those being Grass [G], Fire [R], Water [W], Lightning [L], Psychic [P], Fighting [F], Darkness [D], Metal [M], Dragon [N], Fairy [Y], and Colorless [C]. That is, for this month, your card should be one of those 11 types.

It's a tricky question, though, because the TCG types aren't perfect 1:1 correlations with in-game types. "[P]" doesn't just mean Psychic, it also means Ghost, sometimes Fairy, and sometimes Poison. The caveat I think you might be looking for is, you can reimagine a non-Poison-type Pokémon as a Poison-type Pokémon; you would just translate the Poison typing into its TCG counterpart, because the final card has to be *an existing TCG type that it wouldn't be under normal typing rules*. (This is basically what DashKing did in the entry above your post, only with a different example.)

Hope that all makes sense; lmk if you have any further questions. :)
 
I'll try my hand at image-based, then.

PS. I hope you don't mind some explanation in a separate spoiler, but you can always skip it if you want the design to speak for itself.
 
Would I be penalized if I reimagine, say, Kantonian Muk, as Fire/Poison, but submitted a Fire-type card? Do you only care about the card type, or do you want a completely different typing (and sub-typing)?
 
PMJ said:
Would I be penalized if I reimagine, say, Kantonian Muk, as Fire/Poison, but submitted a Fire-type card? Do you only care about the card type, or do you want a completely different typing (and sub-typing)?
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Card type; the above is fine. You can re-imagine the in-game types however you like as long as the final card is a TCG type the Pokémon wouldn't normally have.
 
Here is my entry.

Basculin HP: 80 [D]
Basic
basculin.png

NO. 550 Hostile Pokémon HT: 3'03" WT: 39.7 lbs.
[D] Injury Sensing
Put up to 3 damage counters on 1 of your Benched Pokémon. For each damage counter put onto that Pokémon by this attack, search your deck for a Pokémon with "Basculin" in its name and put it onto your Bench. Then, shuffle your deck.

[D][C] Feeding Frenzy 20x
This attack does 20 damage for each Pokémon in play with any damage counters on them.

Weakness: [G] x2
Resistance:
Retreat: [C]

Savage, violent Pokémon, red and blue Basculin are always fighting each other over territory.

I had taken this theme to mean "Giving Pokémon a type they wouldn't normally have in the TCG a fitting type", which, to me, mostly meant trying to come up with single-type Pokémon that could have a reasonable secondary type without reimagining them entirely or coming up with a new regional variant for them. This led me to the idea of Basculin becoming a Dark (or "evil") type. A naturally aggressive and territorial Pokémon, it will quickly deplete or scare off the Pokémon in any habitat it enters. Despite this, humans still introduce them to new waterways because fishermen enjoy the challenge of catching them. Aren't humans wonderful?

I would hope to call this card deceptively simple. Injury Sensing is your setup attack. Basculin bites one of your benched Pokémon, and a few other Basculin sense the figurative blood in the water and show up. It also helps you get your second attack going somewhat, but not enough to make the card entirely self-sufficient, as that wasn't something I wanted to do. I wanted this card to be good when paired with other cards, not just good on its own.

Feeding Frenzy is a strong attack. In the best-case scenario, it does 240 damage on a single-prize basic attacker. That's a lot, although the Primeape that was revealed between my making this card and my getting around to submitting it makes it look a fair amount weaker. Hopefully it being a basic makes up for that somewhat. I actually really like this attack as it forces you to come up with creative ways to spread to both sides of the field to maximize damage output. Some ideas I've come up with in standard include using Mawile GX + the Galarain Zigzagoon line to put Pokémon onto your opponent's bench and damage them, or that with Orbeetle VMAX, although that's already a good deck on its own. Spreading to your own field is a little harder, though. The best idea I've come up with that doesn't rely on Aurora Energy would be using Spikemuth + a bunch of switching cards to quickly spread damage to as many of your Pokémon as possible. It probably wouldn't be meta-defining, but it's a fun challenge to try and think of efficient ways to damage as many things as possible.

I hope you enjoy.
 
In for text!

Porygon-Z [P] 130HP
Stage 2- evolves from Porygon-2

NO.474 Virtual Pokémon HT:2'11" WT: 75.0 lbs
Ability: Dimensional Analysis
As long as this Pokémon is your Active Pokémon and has less [C] in its Retreat Cost than your opponent's Active Pokémon, that Pokémon cannot attack. If this Pokémon's retreat cost is changed in any way, this Pokémon cannot attack, unless it is Confused.

[P] Improbable Calculations 210-
This attack does 100 less damage for each [C] in this Pokémon's Retreat Cost (before applying Weakness and Resistance).

Weakness: [F]x2
Resistance:
Retreat: [C][C]
This Pokémon is the result from an error in its code. It was originally designed to cross dimensions.

References:
Vileplume BUS
Float Stone
Seviper BUS
Milotic V


Thoughts:
I wanted to do something with porygon Z, as he is one of my favorite pokemon. I figure he is a lot like a psychic type, but the typing doesn't really matter for this card. I like how the attack is opposite from the ability, so you could either go for a more stally strategy or you can just garb float stone and whack for a lot of damage. I figure that the attack takes a lot of setup on a stage 2 so its only fair that it does a lot of damage. I think this card is better as an attacker but a stall deck could easily be built from it. It might remind you a lot about Ultra Necrozma, because it is very similar. However, porygon Z usually has some wacky effects on it and I think that changing the retreat cost to prevent it from attacking is pretty wacky. Some interesting counterplay for this card would be to use Galar Mine + float stone or air balloon if it is a stall type build. Anyway, i probably missed something but I don't really care lol

edit: i wanted to fix some wording, nerf it a bit, make it so it doesn't completely rely on garb, change the attack names, and remove the adp joke
 
Last edited:
IggyKoopa849 said:
Is it ok if mine is a Pokemon EX Full Art card?
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In general, unless the theme specifically says otherwise, you can submit any type of card you want (except usually trainers and energies, for obvious reasons). And if you want to get spicy, you can even submit combinations of lots of different gimmicks (possibly at the expense of some believability points) like Jabberwock did once upon a time. :D
 
What about custom Pokedex entries? My Pokemon has a gimmick that the Pokedex won't shut up about and I'd like to not write about it. Assuming I don't write something dumb like "This Pokemon is known for pwning n00bs" and keep it relatively believable, would using a custom entry hurt my believability score because it's not an official Pokedex entry, or do we kinda get a pass since we're meant to be reimagining them as a new type?
 
PMJ said:
What about custom Pokedex entries? My Pokemon has a gimmick that the Pokedex won't shut up about and I'd like to not write about it. Assuming I don't write something dumb like "This Pokemon is known for pwning n00bs" and keep it relatively believable, would using a custom entry hurt my believability score because it's not an official Pokedex entry, or do we kinda get a pass since we're meant to be reimagining them as a new type?
Click to expand...
Yeah, provided it's a believable Pokédex entry, I've got no problem with anyone creating their own. This holds for general months, too; not just the type change theme.
 
Jabberwock said:
Yeah, provided it's a believable Pokédex entry, I've got no problem with anyone creating their own. This holds for general months, too; not just the type change theme.
Click to expand...
Does this mean you can’t use the official Vaporeon Pokédex entry saying Vaporeon has a cellular structure similar to that of water? Which doesn’t actually HAVE a cellular structure? ‘Cause THAT’S certainly hard to believe. ;)
(This is not a serious question and as such it needs no serious answer)
 
The Last Shaymin said:
aw man, now i gotta edit mine. lol
Click to expand...

Don't bother, unless there's something else you want to change. The two points you would lose from editing would outweigh the one point you're going to lose in believability.
 
zLqyLYi.png


I've been wanting to use this artwork for a while and this was the perfect chance for me to do so.

I decided to reimagine Zangoose as Water/Normal, and not just as an anti-Seviper mon. There are water mongooses out there who are excellent swimmers, so I didn't think this was that big of a stretch. I kept the Normal typing because 1) not a lot of Pokemon have a Normal sub-typing) and because I honestly have a hard time imagining Zangoose as a pureblooded Water-type without drastically changing its design.

The first thing you probably noticed, though, was the foils, yes foils plural. Inside the art box is the galaxy foil we all know and love because honestly it's the goat. It is not the typical SM holofoil which is fine because sunlava is the woat. Gross. I did say foils plural, though, and I did end up using sunlava for the reverse foil, Radiant Collection-inspired Zangoose pattern of my own design. The Zangoose head was taken from Pokemon Shuffle. A little bit of moving, copying, and one delete key later and I ended up with this.

The sunlava is on top of the fireworks pattern that asche so kindly ripped for us. Unlike inside the art box, sunlava actually looks incredible over this pattern, so much so that when I looked at it underneath the blank I considered making that into my entry instead. It's hella good. It took a bit of finagling but I managed to keep the foil inside the card border but have it not interfere with the foil in the art box.

The last touch I made to the artwork was to use my newfound pen tool knowledge to give Zangoose's claw a nice little glow effect. It's a minor change but I think it looks pretty nice.

The whole thing looks kinda neat. It's not some complex GX with over 9000 layers and effects but it's a (very) small step up from my usual fare.

Hokay, to the card itself:

Ninety HP is ten less than average for SM era, but I felt that 90 would not be out of line, considering how good the Ability is. Having 90 HP also, by design, limits a lot of what you'd actually want to use the Ability on.

Flush Out is the card's most notable aspect. (Get it, flush, cause it's Water-type, but also because it's a hunter and... I'll see myself out.) Gusting effects are, admittedly, nothing new. It's arguably the most powerful effect in the game, typically reserved for evolved Pokemon (through Abilities), but plenty of Basics have been able to do it too (through attacks). Zangoose also does it through an Ability, albeit a coming-into-play Ability, but that does not mean that care must be taken to balance it. The idea behind Flush Out is to bring out a Pokemon that Zangoose would reasonably be able to threaten, at which point you can do with it what you will. I don't think it thematically makes sense to say Zangoose would threaten some big three-Prizer on the Bench who has more than three times his HP and like ten times his strength. Some little Basic, however, or that same VMAX, drastically weakened through battle... that's another story. And so, the first caveat is that the Pokemon's HP must be less than Zangoose's when Zangoose gets dropped.

As I mentioned before, giving Zangoose 90 HP instead of his typical 100 prevents the Zangoose player from simply gusting up popular Bench sitters with 90 HP for free and trapping them (more on that later). I wanted this to be used not as the premier gusting option, but as a 1- or 2-of tech that can help a player take a Prize or two on something wounded that is trying to hide on the Bench. As a hunter, I feel like this makes thematic sense for Zangoose as well. It takes up a Bench space, and its attack, while helpful, isn't great, so including just one or two in your deck makes perfect sense.

The attack, Stalking Slash, went through several iterations before I decided on this effect. At first I thought about using a team up sniping attack, doing some amount of damage to a Benched target for each Zangoose you have in play, kinda like Basculin UNM. Then I decided that instead of that, I would use a sniping attack, but with a coin flip to add extra damage. Snipe damage has never had a coin flip effect to increase it before, but I realized that it would not combo well with the power. I thought it would be helpful to use Zangoose's attack to help weaken something to be later gusted out by a second Zangoose, but that was dumb. No point in gusting them up when you can just hit them on the Bench.

Finally, inspiration hit and I came up with the current effect. It makes thematic sense for Zangoose to sneak up and attack its prey, so you are awarded with some big bonus damage and also lock the opponent in place if you manage to hit the Pokemon you bring out. This forces the opponent to find a way to respond to the trap or likely be killed next turn. Stalking Slash, by design, does not do enough damage to kill stuff with 80 HP. Zangoose is a Basic, after all, and the gusting power was good enough. I wanted the attack to be usable, but not so powerful that it outright kills whatever you gust up. As an extra added bonus, attacks that involve the current turn's Ability usage have never been done before, so that's cool.

Keeping the attack cost at a single Energy was important to keep it easy to use. While it may not be super important because you may just be in a position to bop whatever Zangoose flushes out with your current attacker, but I still wanted the attack to have some sort of use.

Bottom stats are typical for Water-type Pokemon in SM era. Custom flavor text because I would rather die a thousand painful, screaming deaths than write one line about how this Pokemon has it out for Seviper. I feel like, with the way Zangoose looks, training underwater to gain an edge on its on-land opponents is something it would do, so woo.

Balancing non-evolving Basics is hard. Finding interesting effects to use on them to warrant the deck space is harder. I think, with this card, I've done both. It isn't a main attacker or even a four-of in any deck, even with an Ability as good as Flush Out. It is guaranteed to get use, and it is worth noting that even small amounts of ping damage can bring Pokemon into Flush Out's range, so just because something has 90 or even 100 HP doesn't mean they're safe. pls gib fify

Flush Out:

Mewtwo SM214 (When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may)
Lycanroc-GX GRI (switch 1 of your opponent’s Benched Pokémon with their Active Pokémon.)
Blizzard Town UNM (Pokémon with [X] HP or less remaining)

Stalking Slash:

Arbok UNB (If this Pokemon used [Name])
- No card references having used an ability previously, so I used this. Notably the attack doesn't say "if this Pokemon used [Name] attack" or "its [Name] attack" so I didn't use the word Ability anywhere either. "On the Defending Pokemon" was chosen as the best way to clarify that the bonus damage is only applied if you used the ability on the Pokemon being attacked, and only if the attacker is the one who used the Ability.
Silvally-GX CEC (this attack does [X] more damage)
Braviary CEC (the Defending Pokémon can't retreat during your opponent's next turn.)
 
In for text :)

I'd do image because I have art I'd use for it but i don't have access to or proficiency at image editing anymore
 
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