With the new Battle Styles cards coming out with text relating to "multi-prize" cards, are you going to keep yours how its written or change it to be in the "official" style?
You mean the "Pokémon with a Rule Box" thing? That's a good question. Guess the short answer is I haven't decided. \o/
Strictly speaking "Pokémon with a Rule Box" isn't the same thing as "Multiprize Pokémon," since Prism Stars and BREAKs (for example) have Rule Boxes without being Multiprize Pokémon. Wherever "Multiprize" appears in this set, the intention was definitely for it to affect ... y'know, Multiprize Pokémon, as opposed to anything with a Rule Box.
But "Rule Box" is undoubtedly a more official way of doing things. If that wording continues for a while (which it probably will), then everyone will get used to effects like that affecting Prism Stars and BREAKs and my use of "Multiprize" will seem wrong by comparison. So that's a big argument in favor of changing it.
I think I'm leaning toward changing it, honestly. Getting rid of the reminder text, though, cos that takes up wayyy too much space.
I forgot about BREAK... it kind of ends up being a weird odd one out here.
I feel like they had to come up with this terminology because of Scoop Up Net making ShayminEX busted in expanded... I hope it sticks around because its much better than specifying GX or V or EX on the cards, especially because the cards never refer to all of them at the same time.
Bulbasaur:
— Bulbasaur art by hftran on dA
— background by Ho-oh on Pixiv
Ivysaur:
— Ivysaur art by hftran on dA
— background by Ho-oh on Pixiv
Venusaur:
— Venusaur art by hftran on dA
— background by eesnaxs on dA
This is a whole line of cool Pokémon and it deserves more love. There's a lot of good art for them out there, but I went with hftran's for all three. I think the backgrounds for these go really well, too — see Pidgey for further extolling of how well hftran's art works with Ho-oh's backgrounds.
Bulbasaur and Ivysaur have some nifty setup attacks, and Venusaur has generic Energy acceleration — though it's quite limited, and I'm not sure what kind of deck would benefit from it. The intent was to have an acceleration Ability that didn't limit itself by type, but also didn't make too big a splash on the metagame overall. I might've lowballed it, but I think that's better than highballing in this case.
Graveler has a repurposed version of an Ability I tried to include in the community set — I think it was ultimately cut because we decided there were too many Abilities overall, and we already had at least one other major Energy acceleration Ability. I liked the concept, though, so I'm bringing it back here.
Again, the intent is to avoid making too big a splash. Some [F] decks will really benefit from this, but it's not an auto-include, because the self-damage really adds up.
Geodude's Mad Mountain could have some utility if you have a way to better your odds, and use it through a Shrine-of-Memories-like effect on a Golem. Golem itself could have some utility if you can give it Graveler's Ability through something like the Ability Capsule card already in Lackey. Apart from that, you've got Underground Boom for some good, solid damage.
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Debatably, these cards should have come in an earlier update, since they're not really archetypes by themselves but rather support cards for other archetypes. But there aren't any clear combos with either of them in my set — they're just good cards to have around, that might find good partners elsewhere or at a later time. So we've got that to look forward to.
In other news, can't believe I'm already past 75% of the way through the set rollout. I gotta figure out soon what I'm gonna do for the next EX — I think I mentioned earlier, it was supposed to be Bastiodon, but some things didn't work out, so I gotta find a different Pokémon. So that'll also be coming soon.
I forgot about BREAK... it kind of ends up being a weird odd one out here.
I feel like they had to come up with this terminology because of Scoop Up Net making ShayminEX busted in expanded... I hope it sticks around because its much better than specifying GX or V or EX on the cards, especially because the cards never refer to all of them at the same time.
Yeah haha — I mean, I'm partial to Multiprize (obviously), but I guess Rule Box works, and if that's what I have to go with then that's what I'll go with.
Some weird gimmicky mons. Ninjask seems good in theory, but its HP holds it back — it seems best as a tech for the Ability, but I guess the attack is nice and splashable too.
Shedinja's probably the main attraction here. It's the sort of thing spread decks might like to ensure they don't waste any damage — overshoot their HP? just keep all those mons in play, you can manipulate the damage (through Ninjask, maybe?) to other mons. You also essentially lock your opponent's current board in play for as long as you can keep Shedinja around; unless they have a way to pick up those Pokémon through Super Scoop Up or something, those Pokémon aren't leaving. It's a niche use, but it seems like it could be quite strong in a deck built around it.
So what balances it? It only has 10 HP, for one thing. If your Nincada has any damage at all, it can't evolve into Shedinja. (Or, it could, but that would just set you down a Prize. I guess that might be an efficient way to get behind on Prizes for Jumble Energy or something, but I'm not sure how easily you can get damage on Nincada on your own. Sandstorm Stadium doesn't work.)
Your opponent can also just get rid of it by playing their own Stadium. There's Terrain Extender in Lackey, but even that's not indefinite. (And actually, I think Terrain Extender is what makes this playable in the first place.) So you're on a clock — Time Stop won't stop time forever, and you gotta make use of it while you've got it.
Worth noting: There are no [F] type Nincadas or [C]-type Ninjasks. Until now!
Shedinja is a very cool idea, but I'm a bit concerned that it forces every deck to run Stadiums or Stadium discard tools, especially if the inevitable "Stadium lock" (looking at Ninetales PRC) is released.
Shedinja is a very cool idea, but I'm a bit concerned that it forces every deck to run Stadiums or Stadium discard tools, especially if the inevitable "Stadium lock" (looking at Ninetales PRC) is released.
You make a good point. I think I'll keep it how it is for now, see how the Lackey format develops — basically every format with usable Stadiums has had every deck want to play some kind of removal anyway, and Lackey probably isn't an exception — but worst case scenario, I can impose an additional timer on it, like it only sticks around for one turn cycle, or until you play a Supporter card, or something.
You make a good point. I think I'll keep it how it is for now, see how the Lackey format develops — basically every format with usable Stadiums has had every deck want to play some kind of removal anyway, and Lackey probably isn't an exception — but worst case scenario, I can impose an additional timer on it, like it only sticks around for one turn cycle, or until you play a Supporter card, or something.
An additional limiter does sound like a good idea. I think the action of playing a Supporter card might make it a bit too unreliable. I would aim for something that in general any deck is capable of, but something that generally isn't terribly common. Something like retreating or having fewer than X amount of cards in your hands between the two players, though ideally something more thematic to Shedinja.
I am all for turning more Pokemon into Stadiums, but I don't know why you would ever play this line. What is the strategic value in keeping your opponent's Pokemon alive longer than necessary? Any turn your opponent has a threat on the board is one turn the opponent can use that threat to try to turn the tide of the game. Spread decks want to take KOs on as many Pokemon as possible, so preventing yourself from doing that seems counterintuitive.
Ninjask's spread is too weak to reasonably threaten Pokemon from outside its era, or even Pokemon from inside its era. It's a weak attack on a Stage 1 that has no other real options. It would likely best be used with some fatty sitting up front to absorb damage eternally while Ninjask slowly picks away at their field. My first thoughts are a Poison build with Venomoth and Toxicroak-GX, but once the community set is done in 2024 and we get Lysandre this strat will be dead.
I am all for turning more Pokemon into Stadiums, but I don't know why you would ever play this line. What is the strategic value in keeping your opponent's Pokemon alive longer than necessary? Any turn your opponent has a threat on the board is one turn the opponent can use that threat to try to turn the tide of the game.
That's still a minimum of 4 slots if you're looking to use it with any sort of consistency, and Terrain Extender still only works for one turn. I'd rather fill those slots with better consistency cards or something I can get more mileage out of than staying alive for a single turn.
Back to updating this — and we're getting toward the end! Should be wrapped up in two more updates after this one. How exciting.
Anyway, we're kicking things off with the fifth EX of the set, and the last card I actually completed for it, since it took me so long to decide not to use Bastiodon. I asked around for renders, and rex came through in a big way!
The Ability is a bit of Special Energy hate — doesn't reduce the damage by much, but can be teched into anything. Special Energy were in a weird place for most of the BW and XY blocks, being simultaneously really strong and really hated. Lackey doesn't actually have any Special Energy yet, but I've been promised they're coming, so this might make things interesting around that.
While the Ability is easily splashable, though, the attack decidedly isn't. I had Terrakion-EX in mind for this one, which is to say it's not good enough to build a deck's whole Energy acceleration line around unless you have some additional support. In Lackey, Flareon, Turtonator/Sunny Park, Elixir, etc might provide that. Or not. We'll see!
Growlithe:
— art by Steve K on Tumblr
Arcanine:
— Arcanine art by HarlequinWaffles on dA
— background by Raimey-L on dA
A pretty linear attacker — does damage, burns resources, then can get those resources back if you overextended. Not much to say about this one.
Except, apparently Growlithe had 80 HP as early as Next Destinies. Who knew?
Steff's art is brilliant — I know I say that a lot, but I love this piece in particular. One of just a few cards in the set where the effects were designed based almost entirely on the art.
So, more Special Energy hate! Kinda Jirachi XY67, but your opponent needs to switch their Pokémon, not your Pokémon, to get out of it. Also less splashable, since it requires a [W] Energy. I think this one's pretty safe even for an ever-expanding format. It's nichely powerful, but those niches are pretty narrow.
Patrat:
— Patrat is official art from PokéPark 2, an old Pokémon game for the Wii
— background by Birritan on dA
Watchog:
— Watchog by hftran on dA
— background by Ho-oh on Pixiv
An archetypal glass cannon. You can do some big, cheap damage with it — if you're willing to discard your Benched Pokémon and leave an 80 HP Pokémon Active going into your opponent's turn.
Propagation would break it, but Propagation would break a lot of things. Another major thing balancing it is the fact that it's Colorless, and so it can't hit for Weakness.
Strut is just the sort of attack I'd picture Watchog having as a Pokémon — it lets you be a huge pain to your opponent, but doesn't really do much to advance your own game state. It's also not really versatile enough to engender a whole stall archetype on its own. It's just annoying, which is exactly what I think Watchog ought to be.
Dragon Scale:
— the scale itself is from Pokémon GO, developed by Niantic
— background by me
There aren't very many Dragon-type Pokémon in this set — you've only seen one so far, and there's only one more (Stage 2) line coming. This is sort of my concession to that. Neither of the Dragon-types in the set really wants to take advantage of this; their Energy costs are too low to warrant it. But it can provide some (additional) support to other Dragon-types, which the rest of my set isn't really doing.
Now, I know what you're thinking. More Dragon support heading into Lackey? Surely I can't be serious!
I'll admit, it might be a flawed idea. But the intent is that it lets you do more with high-cost Dragons if you're willing to invest the necessary switching cards. Goodra's a concern, of course, but Goodra's a concern whether this card gets released or not, and I think the problem is with Goodra moreso than anything else. Does Turtonator make this obsolete? As far as I know, Turt is also likely to be nerfed soon, leaving this to fill a hole it's leaving. Roughly the same power level, but less reliable.
At the end of the day, this is a card that will probably require some re-evaluation. But I like it in theory, and I think it's feasible to introduce more Dragon acceleration in some form, so we'll see where it goes.
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Glad to be back updating this set again — and like I said, there aren't too many cards left! We hit the hundredth card with this update, meaning that there are just 17 more cards coming. Till next time! o/
Imagine intentionally buffing the BDIF. What a madman.
This will be less of an issue once the BW/XY eras and the SM era are separated into their own thing, but for now I can't see why this wouldn't be an easy four-of in any Dragon deck.
Don't underestimate Strut's potential, especially in Lackey where Energy retrieval is limited pretty much just to Max Rod.
Gimmicky couple o' cards. Not intended to be its own archetype (though I think it would be cool if that happened), but with enough other Poison support, maybe something can come of it.
Hypnotoxic Laser shouldn't be a consideration here — that was a format-warping card and it's not making into this set. Nor, I hope, any sets that would get played in an ever-expanding format alongside this one.
Trubbish has some solid attacks too; Garbage Collection in particular might see some play as a worse version of Junk Hunt in decks that can afford to play it.
Girafarig:
— render by Arrancon on dA
— background by Deaths-stock on dA
Another gimmicky one — pretty severely gimmicky, in this case. I like cards that ask your opponent to make a choice; Cinccino CIN is probably one of the best examples of this in terms of making it useful. In the case of Two-Faced Offer, the stakes are high — either your opponent can take a Prize card, opening the door for you to spread a ton of damage, or they can not let you do that, and let you Paralyze a Pokémon of your choice instead.
I think in most cases, your opponent would not take the Prize card. So that makes this quite a drawn-out, sort of chess-like game. You probably play some switching cards, so you have to save those and use them wisely. If you don't take the Prize card, then Girafarig isn't doing any damage, which could turn this into a perfect storm of a stall deck if you're not careful — but then you can always take the Prize card and break the lock that way if you like.
Colress's Expertise:
— art from Pokémon Generations
Zinzolin's Directive:
— Zinzolin art is official art by Yusuke Ohmura for Pokémon Black 2 and White 2
— background is a shot of the Cold Storage from the anime
Last two Plasma Supporters of the set (i.e. last two viable Ghetsis targets, alongside Ghetsis himself and Team Plasma's Assignment).
Colress is a weird one; the intent is that it doubles the Abilities of a single Pokémon for a turn. If you have a passive Ability like Electrode's "Plasma Pokémon do 20 more damage" Ability, then that gets doubled, so your Plasma Pokémon do 40 more damage for that turn. If you have an active Ability like Claydol's Plasma Power, you can use it an additional time that turn. And actually, along with Gyarados, those are the only viable targets for Colress in the set. Which, they're all pretty good Abilities, so I'm happy with that.
Zinzolin is a specialized Boss's Orders. I wanted Plasma to have access to that. Sue me.
Clandestine Maintenance:
— lock by EveyD on dA
— background by me
This card's name is a riff on Night Maintenance, the DPPt-era equivalent of Super Rod. This one has the same sort of shuffle-cards-in effect, but the targets are Plasma cards rather than Pokémon and basic Energy. You also don't get as many, for balancing reasons.
I think of this as a sort of equivalent to Shadow Triad. You don't get the card directly back into your hand, but that's as it should be for an Item.
Plasma Frigate:
— frigate model ripped by Hallow on The Models Resource
— background by ERA-7 on dA
Plasma Ball:
— art by icycatelf on dA, edited for color by me
Plasma Energy:
— background originally from the actual Plasma Energy card by 5ban Graphics, substantially edited by me
— I also put a new orb over it because I wanted the size of the orb to align with the other two Special Energy from the set
Some reprints — I take these seriously; I don't want to just be reprinting Plasma cards willy-nilly. These are the only three from the set, and I think they all have good reasons for being here. Plasma Ball is consistency, Plasma Energy is Plasma Energy, and Plasma Frigate is useful if there's a particular Weakness that nullifies your deck.
I might need to justify Plasma Frigate a bit further, since it was never big in the real-life Plasma formats. That's because the real-life Plasma decks were, by and large, extremely diverse type-wise, so they covered their own Weaknesses really well. I'm not going for any gigantic Plasma Big Basics toolbox deck here, and trying instead to play up Plasma Evolutions, so decks will be less multitype out of necessity. That means it'll be harder for them to cover their own Weaknesses, hence Plasma Frigate.
They also all have new art! Which I'm excited by; I think they turned out alright.
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Anywho, we've only got 7 cards left to get through, so that'll be the last update — tomorrow! Till then! o/
Runerigus-EX:
— Runerigus by @steffenka
— miscellaneous effects by me (some of the lightning taken from an official Pokémon wallpaper)
Last Pokémon-EX of the set! Lots of lasts today.
So anyway, steff agreed to do a bunch of the art for this set, for which I'm eternally grateful — you can see his mark on cards like Pansear, Eelektrik, Shedinja, and so on; they're beautiful — on the condition that I have a Runerigus in the set. Now, I'd already finished the set list, and I was reluctant to introduce a new [P]-type Pokémon line because it would mean shifting half the numbers in the set. But I did have a [P] Pokémon-EX slot in the set, so I was able to swap it out for Runerigus easily enough. And here's the result!
You'll notice the first attack is lifted straight off the real-life Deoxys-EX, name and all. This is an attack that never really saw enough play, to my mind, mainly because it was always outclassed by attackers like Thundurus-EX and Kyurem. The hope is that it would be a bit more useful in a format where all those other Big Basic attackers don't exist.
The notable exceptions in this very set would be Heracross and Zeraora-EX. From a design perspective, I think this acts as a good foil to those two — Heracross and Zeraora-EX both care about your side being as big and powerful as possible, while Runerigus-EX cares about Energy on your opponent's side. With Spirit Away, it's also more control-y than those other two. They might be able to form a Big Basics deck if you're able to work out the multi-colored Energy problem, and it would be able to attack in a few different ways, but theoretically it wouldn't be dominant.
And finally, because I know I'll be called out on it, no I didn't want to call it "Galarian Runerigus-EX". There's no non-Galarian Runerigus, so I think that's a dumb convention. And this one's an EX, so it would never interact with Galarian Yamask or other cards that care about "Galarian Runerigus", so it's not an issue.
Larvitar:
— art by salanchu on dA
Pupitar:
— art by @steffenka
Tyranitar:
— art from an old pack art from the TCG set Team Rocket Returns
This line's supposed to harken back to old Tyranitars while also being its own thing, and I think the overall vibe of it achieves that. Essentially, it rampages. But it does so in a new way. :L
For a hefty cost, you can bombard your opponent's Multiprize Pokémon in a Holy Star/Black Ray sort of way. If you're sufficiently loaded with Plasma Energy, you can also opt to do a bunch of linear damage. It's hard to go in for both these strategies at once, though, so your gameplan would probably be very matchup-dependent.
It's the sort of card that would be really good given a DPPt-style engine, where you have access to a ton of draw support and Special Energy that make your life loading up these Stage 2 attackers way easier. I'm not sure the same holds true for a BW-on format. I don't think it'll be bad or totally obsolete, but there are gonna be vastly cheaper ways to get hefty damage out. So I dunno.
So I wanted the last card of the set to be where it all began, so to speak. Almost two years ago now, I made my first Plasma blank modifications and made a Garchomp out of them, and the whole set kinda sprang from there. This Garchomp is a slight rework of that initial concept; I toned down the Ability somewhat (bringing it more in line with the actual effect for Dragon Pulse on Garchomp LV.X), but I knew I wanted to include that first card in the set somehow. So here it is!
Gible and Gabite have some attacks from old Gible/Gabite/Garchomps, which might be familiar if you've ever played DPPt formats. They're not especially good in this incarnation, but hey. References.
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And ... yeah! That's the set! As a reminder, you can view the whole thing here (this link's also in the OP).
I'm really pleased with how it's all turned out, but as with any set, it wouldn't have been possible without a ton of support from artists, both within the community and without. In particular, I'd like to thank @steffenka, @The Ωmega One and @Nyan, each of whom graced this set with art produced specially at my request. It's beautiful, and not only am I exceedingly lucky to be able to feature it in the set, but the set quite literally could not have been done in this form without y'all. So thanks.
The plan is to implement this into the community's LackeyCCG plugin in order to be able to play with the cards sometime down the line, but I have to discuss with the other folks on the reviewing team for that to get a better picture of the timeline. One thing I can say, is it won't be prompt. C'est la vie. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
And hey, if you've been enjoying the set and have any comments, don't be afraid to drop a reply! This is far from the final incarnation of the set; many, many things are still subject to change balance-wise by the time it goes anywhere, and I'm always looking for ways to make my stuff better. Plus I love hearing from y'all, so.
Anyway, signing off — I don't have any other big faking projects lined up for the moment, but I'm sure I'll have something sooner or later. So till then! o/
Amazing work on this set, Jabberwock! There are so many cool cards here and it will be exciting to see them added to Lackey and to get a chance to play with them. I can't wait to see your next project as well!
Art by Autobot.Tesla, a few background effects are stock images, holosheet by Neko, virtually everything else by asche.
Hey ho, looks like I'm doing at least one Full Art after all! I've been toying with the idea for a little while, and made this one as a sort of proof of concept. It's harder and more time-consuming than I remember it being, so I might tackle the others over the next few months, but it's not a sure thing.
Art by Xous54, background by paulthepirateking on dA.
I'm gonna keep adamantly refusing to commit to finishing these Full Arts, probably up until the point they actually get finished. Fun final product to have, but man oh man are they a pain.
