Discussion Prism Stadiums and the Meta

monsterenergy77

Aspiring Trainer
Advanced Member
Member
After seeing the winning deck lists for the japan champion league which two of the decks were a Blacephalon GX deck with heat factory prism star, I immediately thought cool this deck looks fun and clearly can do well. But not knowing what japans meta is, its hard to judge if this deck or even other decks that want to run prism star stadiums will do any good here in NA. Currently the decks that are being played most in NA (from what I have seen) seems to be shrine of punishment variants and just knowing that makes me hesitant on picking up Blacephalon decks or other decks that might rely on prism star stadiums. With the only way of getting rid of prism star stadiums by using your own stadium I feel like shrine decks will thrive even more than they do now and might be played even more since they are usually the most consistent on getting stadiums out into play. I'm not sure if I'm just underestimating the Blacephalon deck and over valuing prism stadiums but I'm curious what everyone else thinks though about prism stadiums and the meta.
 

Merovingian

Dead Game Enthusiast
Member
Prism Stadiums are hit and miss. We only know 4 of them so far:

Thunder Mountain Railroad
Life Forest
Heat Factory
Black Market

You have to consider that these stadiums are going to at least be in play for the turn you put them there, so make it count!

Heat Factory: This is the least restrictive of the four because it doesn't require a Fire Pokemon to be active, in play, etc. It's honestly the best one.

Thunder Mountain Railroad - seems pretty meh. Lightning decks haven't had a whole lot of success as of recent. That might change in Lost Thunder, but it doesn't seem to be very impactful.

Life Forest - Special Condition healing isn't much a thing in the competitive meta. Healing for 60 is nice. It's a stadium that wants to be in play for as long as possible and can really put a strain if you can prevent the opponent hitting you in the face for a bit. Realistically, the best you could do is make it so that the healing puts your active within 2HKO range again and then gets bumped.

Black Market - This card sounded really good, then the restriction of it being a Dark Pokemon WITH a Dark Energy made it worse. If you CAN use it, it's fantastic to put a TON of pressure on the opponent to bump the stadium to even advance in the prize race. Honestly, I see the card as more psychological scare tactic--but an effective one.

Like all Prism Stars, they should help supplement a strategy and not be completely relied upon. Right now, aside from Heat Factory, they are just mildly irritating.
 

SquirtleRules

Aspiring Trainer
Advanced Member
Member
Yes, stadiums will have a much larger impact on the meta moving forward. I think Shrine and these Prism stadiums are a turning point to make carrying your own stadiums mandatory. These prism stadiums will see action in the respective decks that use them (e.g., there is no way electric decks go without TM, fire deck without HF, or a dark deck goes without BM. No way.) Having any of these three prism stadiums for 3-5 turns is game changing. And given their immunity to field blowers, it means that adding stadiums to one's deck has value just to get rid of the other person's game changing stadium. Try going against a Shrine deck and having that Shrine sit there for 6+ turns - if you play GXs, that's 120 damage on each GX that started the game, and a tough tough road. Same with these Prism stadiums - if they are out for 6+ turns or an extended period, odds change dramatically.
 

Otaku

The wise fool?
Member
With the only way of getting rid of prism star stadiums by using your own stadium...

This is not strictly true. The protective effect on Thunder Mountain [Prism Star] reads "Whenever any player plays an Item or Supporter card from their hand, prevent all effects of that card done to this Stadium card."

If there is ever a way to play something like Field Blower from the discard pile, it would work on Thunder Mountain [Prism Star]. Any Pokémon-based effects will work. If they ever release such a thing, any Energy-based effects would also work.

I believe the intent is that either you are not supposed to build your deck around a Prism Star Stadium or you do so knowing you're taking a huge risk. It could be Prized. You might be stuck in an "Mysterious Treasure or lose" situation and the Prism Star Stadium is your only discard fodder option. Etc. Your deck probably should be able to at least function, if not perform well, without a Prism Star Stadium; keeping yours in play just makes your entire strategy even better.

Anyway, as has been stated, prepare for Stadium wars. Decks using Prism Star Stadiums are most likely going to run two to four copies of another Stadium card, to try and force the other player to run through all of his or her answers to Stadium cards.
 

SquirtleRules

Aspiring Trainer
Advanced Member
Member
True - there are other ways to get rid of stadiums. There are some pokemon whose attacks ditch a stadium (zygarde ex was popular before rotation) but the current meta has very few of these in regular use. The value of these pokemon/attacks will also rise so maybe their popularity will change - we'll see.

"force the other player to run through all of his or her answers to Stadium cards" - YES. This is such a good point. While a player does not have perfect control for which stadiums one draws in what order, the point is that most opponent's decks have fewer options to dispose a stadium. For BM in particular, this is such a strong play. It will be very interesting to see how this impacts deck construction in the meta moving forward.
 

RiverShock

Aspiring Trainer
Member
I think the point of the Prism Star Stadiums is to encourage players to use Stadiums. (Not so they can use the powerful Prism Star ones, but to counter them.)

I'm sure towards the end of the Prism Star era, we'll just get a Pokemon with an ability that ditches a Stadium anyway. (Either by ditching it from hand, or when you play it into the bench.)
 

Plaquesanta

೭੧(❛〜❛✿)੭೨
Member
One particularly nasty interaction in expanded that no one seems to have talked about is Barbarancle (if you have a stadium in play, your opponent can't play stadium or special energy cards). Archie's Barbarancle + prism stadium seems like a nice hard counter to Zoroark decks.

Or it could provide Sableye/Garb with a prize restriction loop other than life dew.

Edit: reviewed the card and it only restricts special energies. I mean Ninetails could still lock that stadium down until it's knocked out or ability locked, but that isn't quite as good
 
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