Because I don’t want 2 points deducted, just want to say that I got the spoiler tags wrong.
Fixed. ~~Jabberwock
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Contest September 2020 CaC: Weather (All Results Up!)
- Thread starter Jabberwock
- Start date
Fixed. ~~Jabberwock
There hasn't been a Feraligatr card in 2 years so here's one
Feraligatr VMAX – Water – HP320
Evolves from Feraligatr V
[W][W] G-Max Downpour 60
Starting at the end of this turn, the effect of any Stadium card in play becomes “The attacks of [W] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 more damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance). The attacks of [R] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 less damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).” This effect ends when an attack with the word “G-Max” or “Max” in its name is used (except G-Max Downpour), or whenever either player plays a Stadium card from their hand.
[W][W][W] Riptide Slash 120
Weakness: Lightning (x2)
Resistance:
Retreat: [C][C][C]
VMAX rule: When your Pokémon VMAX is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
Evolves from Feraligatr V
[W][W] G-Max Downpour 60
Starting at the end of this turn, the effect of any Stadium card in play becomes “The attacks of [W] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 more damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance). The attacks of [R] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 less damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).” This effect ends when an attack with the word “G-Max” or “Max” in its name is used (except G-Max Downpour), or whenever either player plays a Stadium card from their hand.
[W][W][W] Riptide Slash 120
Weakness: Lightning (x2)
Resistance:
Retreat: [C][C][C]
VMAX rule: When your Pokémon VMAX is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
To clarify this point — as is standard for the CaC, though you may submit any number of additional cards for context, we'll only judge one card for the purposes of the rubric (i.e. wording mistakes and such in the second will not count, and creativity and believability will be judged only on the first card as much as is possible). By default, since the card you submit for this competition must be a Pokémon, Frosmoth V is the card we'll be judging in this way.
My Entry:
[/SPOILER
Mew
Type: [P] – HP90
Basic Pokémon
Pokédex: Apparently, it appears only to those people who are pure of heart and have a strong desire to see it.
NO. 151, Wish Pokémon, Height: 1′04”, Weight: 8.8 lbs
Ability: Creation Magic
Once during your turn, put one Call Counter on this Pokémon. You may search your deck for an Item card, reveal it, and put it into your hand for each Call Counter on this Pokémon. Then, shuffle your deck. In between turns, place one damage counter on this Pokémon for each Call Counter in play.
[.] Climatic Selection 10
Move any number of Call Counters from this Pokémon to any other Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent's) in any way you like. Choose 1:
During Pokémon Checkup, put one damage counter on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it. If the Pokémon is a [W] Pokémon, heal 10 damage instead
During Pokémon Checkup, put two damage counters on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it that is not a [F] Pokémon or a [M] Pokémon.
Whenever a [W] Pokémon, [L] Pokémon, or [C] Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
Whenever a [R] Pokémon or [G] type Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
If more than 2 Call Counters are removed from play in any way from any player’s Pokémon, remove all remaining Call Counters in play from each Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent’s).
Weakness: [D] X 2
Resistance: [F] -30
Retreat:
References:
Ability:
Drizzle SSH
Order Pad ULP
Attack:
Geovanni’s Scheme BTH
Roselia RBL
Tapu Lele Promo
Rhyperior SSH
Sunflora CSE
Giratina LST
Vitality Band SSH
]
Mew
Type: [P] – HP90
Basic Pokémon
Pokédex: Apparently, it appears only to those people who are pure of heart and have a strong desire to see it.
NO. 151, Wish Pokémon, Height: 1′04”, Weight: 8.8 lbs
Ability: Creation Magic
Once during your turn, put one Call Counter on this Pokémon. You may search your deck for an Item card, reveal it, and put it into your hand for each Call Counter on this Pokémon. Then, shuffle your deck. In between turns, place one damage counter on this Pokémon for each Call Counter in play.
[.] Climatic Selection 10
Move any number of Call Counters from this Pokémon to any other Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent's) in any way you like. Choose 1:
During Pokémon Checkup, put one damage counter on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it. If the Pokémon is a [W] Pokémon, heal 10 damage instead
During Pokémon Checkup, put two damage counters on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it that is not a [F] Pokémon or a [M] Pokémon.
Whenever a [W] Pokémon, [L] Pokémon, or [C] Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
Whenever a [R] Pokémon or [G] type Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
If more than 2 Call Counters are removed from play in any way from any player’s Pokémon, remove all remaining Call Counters in play from each Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent’s).
Weakness: [D] X 2
Resistance: [F] -30
Retreat:
References:
Ability:
Drizzle SSH
Order Pad ULP
Attack:
Geovanni’s Scheme BTH
Roselia RBL
Tapu Lele Promo
Rhyperior SSH
Sunflora CSE
Giratina LST
Vitality Band SSH
]
Thundurus V HP210 Lightning
Basic Pokémon
/Ability/ ~ Brutal Weathering
When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may use this Ability. Until the end of your opponent’s next turn, each Pokémon in play takes 10 more damage from attacks (after applying Weakness and Resistance). You can't use more than 1 Brutal Weathering Ability each turn.
[L][L][L] Storm Plow 140
If your opponent’s Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, before you put any Prize cards into your hand, you may attach them to your Pokémon as Special Energy cards in any way you like. Those cards provide [L] Energy only while they are attached to a Pokémon.
When your Pokémon V is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness - Lightning x2
Resistance - Fighting -30
Retreat - 2
Basic Pokémon
/Ability/ ~ Brutal Weathering
When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may use this Ability. Until the end of your opponent’s next turn, each Pokémon in play takes 10 more damage from attacks (after applying Weakness and Resistance). You can't use more than 1 Brutal Weathering Ability each turn.
[L][L][L] Storm Plow 140
If your opponent’s Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, before you put any Prize cards into your hand, you may attach them to your Pokémon as Special Energy cards in any way you like. Those cards provide [L] Energy only while they are attached to a Pokémon.
When your Pokémon V is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness - Lightning x2
Resistance - Fighting -30
Retreat - 2
Also, I don't know if I should have used Jirachi Prism Star over Billowing Smoke, but I chose that because it sounded like you are given an option with Jirachi's wording, which is what I wanted to aim for.
Also, I didn't forget the accents!
Okay, let's see how I make this work... I was going to drop out but I've had this sitting around for some time. Maybe it'll work. Maybe not... Probably not.
Tornadus, Thundurus, & Landorus-GX - Colorless - HP300
Basic [TAG TEAM]
[L][F][C] Storm Caller 160
Discard an Energy attached to this Pokémon. You may choose one effect of this attack:
Switch 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon with their Active Pokémon. If this Pokémon has at least 3 extra Energy attached to it (in addition to this attack's cost), discard 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon and all cards attached to it. If your opponent has no Benched Pokémon, this attack does nothing. (You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)
Weakness: - Resistance: - Retreat: [C][C]
TAG TEAM rule: When your TAG TEAM Pokemon is knocked out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
Told you it wouldn't be that great. Sorry!
EDIT: Taking the two point penalty and editing a couple of capitalizations and a word that was driving me insane.
EDIT 2: I worded the attack effect terribly, thanks to @bbb888 I noticed it and changed it to be slightly different than their suggestion. It's not quite the same but it makes more sense now. I wish I noticed earlier...
Tornadus, Thundurus, & Landorus-GX - Colorless - HP300
Basic [TAG TEAM]
[L][F][C] Storm Caller 160
Discard an Energy attached to this Pokémon. You may choose one effect of this attack:
- Discard a [L] Energy attached to this Pokémon. Until the end of your next turn, this Pokémon is [L] Type. Flip a coin. If heads, your opponent's Active Pokémon is now Paralyzed.
- Discard a [F] Energy attached to this Pokémon. Until the end of your next turn, this Pokémon is [F] Type. This attack does 20 damage to each of your opponent's Benched Pokémon. (Don't apply Weakness or Resistance for Benched Pokémon.)
Switch 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon with their Active Pokémon. If this Pokémon has at least 3 extra Energy attached to it (in addition to this attack's cost), discard 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon and all cards attached to it. If your opponent has no Benched Pokémon, this attack does nothing. (You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)
Weakness: - Resistance: - Retreat: [C][C]
TAG TEAM rule: When your TAG TEAM Pokemon is knocked out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
I wanted to go for the Forces of Nature, since they really do feel like some of the quintessential "Weather" Pokémon. I was trying to make a sort of "High risk, high reward" type card that can just do some nominal damage if you don't discard any additional energy, but if you do, you're able to hit for weakness as well as get added effects that could be of a potential benefit. I didn't want to make the card abuseable either, which is why I added the added discard requirements for the optional parts of the attack.
In making this, I wanted each of the trio to be represented in the attacks. Thundurus being represented with the Paralysis effect, Landorus being represented with the spread damage attack (A staple for many Landorus cards), and Tornadus with the GX attack, as well as referencing the trio's known collective term. I wasn't sure what the weakness could have been given these Pokemon create immunities that would neutralize eachother's weaknesses, so I gave them no weakness. The only thing they would collectively share is a weakness to water (due to the ice type), but I can't recall if a colorless Pokemon weak to Water is a thing in recent memory. I also debated on whether or not the attack had too much text, but given how long Rowlet/Alolan Exeggutor's attack is, this doesn't seem too bad.
I also can't recall if a Pokemon has ever used bullet points in their attack before. I know it has existed in some XY trainer cards, but I think I got it as close as I could?
References used:
Tapu Fini-GX
Bewear-GX
Tag Team-GX for the attack cost in the GX attacks and the rulings.
Guzma (Burning Shadows)
In making this, I wanted each of the trio to be represented in the attacks. Thundurus being represented with the Paralysis effect, Landorus being represented with the spread damage attack (A staple for many Landorus cards), and Tornadus with the GX attack, as well as referencing the trio's known collective term. I wasn't sure what the weakness could have been given these Pokemon create immunities that would neutralize eachother's weaknesses, so I gave them no weakness. The only thing they would collectively share is a weakness to water (due to the ice type), but I can't recall if a colorless Pokemon weak to Water is a thing in recent memory. I also debated on whether or not the attack had too much text, but given how long Rowlet/Alolan Exeggutor's attack is, this doesn't seem too bad.
I also can't recall if a Pokemon has ever used bullet points in their attack before. I know it has existed in some XY trainer cards, but I think I got it as close as I could?
References used:
Tapu Fini-GX
Bewear-GX
Tag Team-GX for the attack cost in the GX attacks and the rulings.
Guzma (Burning Shadows)
Told you it wouldn't be that great. Sorry!
EDIT: Taking the two point penalty and editing a couple of capitalizations and a word that was driving me insane.
EDIT 2: I worded the attack effect terribly, thanks to @bbb888 I noticed it and changed it to be slightly different than their suggestion. It's not quite the same but it makes more sense now. I wish I noticed earlier...
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Hey,
I know I'm not a judge but I felt compelled to comment on one of the most talkative users on PokeBeach!
First, unless otherwise stated, effects of attacks usually come AFTER doing damage, so I would instead write something like "Before doing damage, you may change _____'s type to ___ until the end of your turn." to take advantage of weakness.
Second, as for Colorless types being weak to Water... in the Delta Species, there is a Fire type that's weak to Grass!! It makes no sense but crazy things can happen!
Let your imagination run wild! That's where all great ideas come from.
Loving everyone's entries so far! Lots of creativity and variety!
Hah, thanks for that! I do talk a lot on here, huh? Lol.
Yeah... I actually noticed my wording made no sense once you mentioned it, so I took another two points off just to fix it. Wish I had noticed when I posted it though. Thanks for making me aware of the issue.
Here's my entry! I didn't have time this month to go full GX-crazy, so hope this suffices. Weather inspiration is fog / snowstorms.
The effects are designed to synergise with Town Map. By extension, Seel could work as a [W] attacker in Fairy Box archetypes. They usually run Town Map, meaning Flip-Flop can hit for 140 damage after band on Pokemon with [W] weakness.
Credits:
@aschefield101 for the blanks / holosheets / resources
all0412 for the art
Aaaaaaand that's a wrap on this round of the CaC! Stay tuned for results toward the end of the month! \o/
Image-Based Results
Judge: @Jabberwock
We broke a record with image-based turnout this month! Just … not the record we’re usually looking to break, haha.
I had some conversations with members of the community over the course of the month to see what they look for in a CaC round, and what this round didn’t have. It seems like, for the most part, themes can be a heavily make-or-break factor (which we expected), and some themes, like this one, were much harder to achieve inspiration for than others (which we didn’t).
For the record, we do like to test your creative abilities in ways you might not be used to. As much as we’re sticklers for believability, we’re also fans of unexplored design space, so some of our themes in the past have tried to prod you toward underused mechanics, or tried to get you to consider how to implement a certain concept in TCG form. However, clearly this month’s theme fell short of the mark in that.
If any of y’all have any further thoughts about this theme or others, or any suggestions on how to make CaC a more enjoyable contest to enter for you, let me know! Feel free to bring it up in this thread or PM me anytime.
That being said, this month’s entries were both solid work. Flashy aesthetics took a backseat to well-thought-out effects this round, and it clearly worked out well in that neither entrant took too big a hit in the newly expanded Believability/Playability category. It’s not a very big sample size to work with yet, but from my end on the judging side of things, it’s feeling like a more effective rubric to work with. (If you missed the announcement, you can read up on what changed and why here.
The text-based results, and the November round, will be posted shortly. See you then!
~~Jabberwock
Solid take on two different aspects of weather. I’m not sure they necessarily tie into each other — it feels like two different Pidgeots, one dealing with “clear skies” and one dealing with “hurricanes”, rather than a single cohesive card — but the individual effects are nice and thematic as far as that goes.
Using Stadiums (or the lack of them) to evoke Clear Skies seems good. There’s probably an argument to be made about whether clearing a Stadium is really clearing the skies, since most Stadiums tend to be ground-based, but that argument is dealing with a gray area at best. Clear Skies brings to mind cards like Castform GRI, which makes an explicit connection between Stadiums and weather, so I think you’re definitely in the right space here.
Hurricane, in contrast, treats weather as an Energy-based mechanic, apparently treating a hurricane as an unwieldy and randomly destructive force that gets a lot less random when you add rain. Essentially it’s an effect that you can always use, but you can increase its effectiveness by using it in the right weather conditions. I think that’s another totally valid and possibly even more unique way to incorporate the mechanic — but it is very distinct from the Stadium-based mechanic of Clear Skies.
Power-wise … I think Hurricane is fine. 3-for-160 on a Stage 2 isn’t game-breaking, but it’s not underwhelming either, so that seems like a good place to be at. I particularly like that the nature of the attack cost means you could cheat out some fast damage with Triple Acceleration Energy (or other multi-[C] Special Energy). You’d only get about 80 damage on average, but sometimes that’s all you need. It makes it more versatile than a standard 3-for-160 attack, and I think that’s neat.
Clear Skies seems less good, though. I can’t decide whether one would rather use it for the Stadium discard, or try to play it at the right time to get the draw. If the latter, it’s really inefficient — we see cards like Bewear GRI, which are Stage 1s with a straight-up draw-3-on-evolve Ability, and they never get used. If the former, it seems like there are much better ways to discard Stadiums — hell, even just play a Stadium of your own. So while it’s a nice and thematic Ability, I don’t think it’s the main selling point of the card.
As a note about art, All0412’s pieces tend to be really dark in color, to the extent where you probably want to add a Brightness filter or two in order to make the Pokémon stand out. It’s especially noticeable on a [C]-type blank. Fonts/placement and wording look pretty close to perfect, though, so props for that.
Wording errors:
- I waffled a bit over the last sentence of Hurricane, but there’s no good reference for it, and I think your wording makes as much sense as any, so full marks here.
Fonts and Placement errors:
- The Pokédex text for “NO. 018 …” is incorrect. It should be some variant of Frutiger, and after fiddling around with some settings in Photoshop on my end, I was able to get pretty close with Frutiger 55 Roman at 90% height and 102% width, with Optical kerning and a Smooth anti-alias setting (and whatever point size is correct for the size of blank you’re using). [-1 point] here because Gill Sans is far enough off from Frutiger that you should probably look into fixing it.
- Everything else looks pixel-perfect, so props.
Creativity/Originality: 12/15
(Two distinct takes on weather, each of which I like individually. I think they’re just a little bit too distinct to make sense on the same card, though.)
Believability/Playability: 12/15
(The Ability’s utility seems really niche, to the point where it’s almost like an extraneous part of the card. The attack’s balancing is fine, but for the Ability to be noticeably worse than existing effects that are never played (like Bewear GRI) is a concern.)
Wording: 10/10
(Looks good.)
Fonts and Placement: 4/5
(Close enough, but keep an eye on that Pokédex text.)
Aesthetics: 2/5
(Art needs some brightening; at the moment it just looks like a dark square in contrast with the bright blank.)
Total: 40/50
I always appreciate a good BWXY card, so I’ll gladly forgive you the lack of GX madness this month! I think you’ve done a good job with the holosheet, even if it’s a bit non-traditional for the era, making it look like it’s snowing. The art absolutely works for the attack names, so either you chose a good piece for them, or you designed the attacks well to complement the art.
Outside the holosheet being a nice nod to the snowstorm angle, though, I’m not sure I really see the weather connections. One of the attacks is named Foghorn, sure, but what’s the connection between fog and Items and Supporters? Maybe the deck being a non-public zone of the game makes its contents “foggy,” and Seel’s Foghorn is allowing you to pierce through the fog to find whatever it is you’re looking for? Or like there’s a ship carrying cargo/Items and passengers/Supporters and it got mired in the deck en route, and Seel’s helping them reach you?
Actually, it may not have been immediately clear to me, but the more I think about it, the more I like that angle. Connecting fog to non-public zones seems like a truly unique take on a unique type of weather. I’m not sure if it’s what you intended, but I like it. xD
If it is what you intended, I think one of the main things preventing me from seeing it (fogging it up, if you will) is that the second attack is just … Flip-Flop? It also deals with a traditionally non-public zone of the game (in this case, the Prize cards), so there could be huge potential there to hammer in the connection between non-public zones and fog/snowstorms, but the name implies it’s just whimsical Seel behavior that we could see on any card, weather theme or not.
I do like the effects, though. Versatile search for [C] is a boon for any evolving Basic, and it’s got a powerful damaging attack in its own right in Flip-Flop. I don’t think it’s necessarily true that Fairy Box archetypes “usually run Town Map,” but it’s definitely a card you would include to get some good power out of this Seel. I also like that you’re clearly thinking through the numbers game to ensure it’s good without being overpowered.
Wording errors:
- “Then, shuffle your deck” -> “Shuffle your deck afterward” — before SM, anyway [-2 points]
- The “That Prize cards remains face down for the rest of the game” clause only started to be italicized in the SM era. Before then, I guess the wording was considered ambiguous enough that it qualified as a necessary extra clause, rather than reminder text. [-1 point]
Fonts and Placement errors:
- The Pokédex text for “NO. 018 …” should be some variant of Frutiger. As I noted for PMJ’s card, I was able to get pretty close with Frutiger 55 Roman at 90% height and 102% width, with Optical kerning and a Smooth anti-alias setting (and whatever point size is correct for the size of blank you’re using). The different fonts in the Frutiger family are close enough that you’d probably be able to get close with any of them, but docking [-1 point] because Gill Sans is pretty far off.
Creativity/Originality: 12/15
(There’s some good synergy work with Foghorn searching out cards like Town Map or Muscle Band to boost the damage of Flip-Flop. The weather connection seems so subtle I’m not even sure it’s entirely there, though.)
Believability/Playability: 15/15
(The balancing seems great, actually — it can do some heavy damage in specific circumstances, making it a great candidate for box decks, as you mentioned. But it’s so situational, it’s also not outside the realm of possibility for an evolving Basic. Good work here.)
Wording: 7/10
(A couple errors. Been working with SM cards lately?)
Fonts and Placement: 4/5
(Close enough, but keep an eye on that Pokédex text.)
Aesthetics: 4/5
(You’ve managed to manipulate the art, holosheet and all, to give a good impression of a Seel in a snowstorm. The last point here would come from a “wow factor,” like making it full art or something, but it does look very good for what it is.)
Total: 42/50
2nd Place: PMJ’s Pidgeot, with 40/50 points.
1st Place: bbninjas’s Seel, with 42/50 points.
Judge: @Jabberwock
We broke a record with image-based turnout this month!
Just … not the record we’re usually looking to break, haha.I had some conversations with members of the community over the course of the month to see what they look for in a CaC round, and what this round didn’t have. It seems like, for the most part, themes can be a heavily make-or-break factor (which we expected), and some themes, like this one, were much harder to achieve inspiration for than others (which we didn’t).
For the record, we do like to test your creative abilities in ways you might not be used to. As much as we’re sticklers for believability, we’re also fans of unexplored design space, so some of our themes in the past have tried to prod you toward underused mechanics, or tried to get you to consider how to implement a certain concept in TCG form. However, clearly this month’s theme fell short of the mark in that.
If any of y’all have any further thoughts about this theme or others, or any suggestions on how to make CaC a more enjoyable contest to enter for you, let me know! Feel free to bring it up in this thread or PM me anytime.
That being said, this month’s entries were both solid work. Flashy aesthetics took a backseat to well-thought-out effects this round, and it clearly worked out well in that neither entrant took too big a hit in the newly expanded Believability/Playability category. It’s not a very big sample size to work with yet, but from my end on the judging side of things, it’s feeling like a more effective rubric to work with. (If you missed the announcement, you can read up on what changed and why here.
The text-based results, and the November round, will be posted shortly. See you then!
~~Jabberwock
Solid take on two different aspects of weather. I’m not sure they necessarily tie into each other — it feels like two different Pidgeots, one dealing with “clear skies” and one dealing with “hurricanes”, rather than a single cohesive card — but the individual effects are nice and thematic as far as that goes.
Using Stadiums (or the lack of them) to evoke Clear Skies seems good. There’s probably an argument to be made about whether clearing a Stadium is really clearing the skies, since most Stadiums tend to be ground-based, but that argument is dealing with a gray area at best. Clear Skies brings to mind cards like Castform GRI, which makes an explicit connection between Stadiums and weather, so I think you’re definitely in the right space here.
Hurricane, in contrast, treats weather as an Energy-based mechanic, apparently treating a hurricane as an unwieldy and randomly destructive force that gets a lot less random when you add rain. Essentially it’s an effect that you can always use, but you can increase its effectiveness by using it in the right weather conditions. I think that’s another totally valid and possibly even more unique way to incorporate the mechanic — but it is very distinct from the Stadium-based mechanic of Clear Skies.
Power-wise … I think Hurricane is fine. 3-for-160 on a Stage 2 isn’t game-breaking, but it’s not underwhelming either, so that seems like a good place to be at. I particularly like that the nature of the attack cost means you could cheat out some fast damage with Triple Acceleration Energy (or other multi-[C] Special Energy). You’d only get about 80 damage on average, but sometimes that’s all you need. It makes it more versatile than a standard 3-for-160 attack, and I think that’s neat.
Clear Skies seems less good, though. I can’t decide whether one would rather use it for the Stadium discard, or try to play it at the right time to get the draw. If the latter, it’s really inefficient — we see cards like Bewear GRI, which are Stage 1s with a straight-up draw-3-on-evolve Ability, and they never get used. If the former, it seems like there are much better ways to discard Stadiums — hell, even just play a Stadium of your own. So while it’s a nice and thematic Ability, I don’t think it’s the main selling point of the card.
As a note about art, All0412’s pieces tend to be really dark in color, to the extent where you probably want to add a Brightness filter or two in order to make the Pokémon stand out. It’s especially noticeable on a [C]-type blank. Fonts/placement and wording look pretty close to perfect, though, so props for that.
Wording errors:
- I waffled a bit over the last sentence of Hurricane, but there’s no good reference for it, and I think your wording makes as much sense as any, so full marks here.
Fonts and Placement errors:
- The Pokédex text for “NO. 018 …” is incorrect. It should be some variant of Frutiger, and after fiddling around with some settings in Photoshop on my end, I was able to get pretty close with Frutiger 55 Roman at 90% height and 102% width, with Optical kerning and a Smooth anti-alias setting (and whatever point size is correct for the size of blank you’re using). [-1 point] here because Gill Sans is far enough off from Frutiger that you should probably look into fixing it.
- Everything else looks pixel-perfect, so props.
Creativity/Originality: 12/15
(Two distinct takes on weather, each of which I like individually. I think they’re just a little bit too distinct to make sense on the same card, though.)
Believability/Playability: 12/15
(The Ability’s utility seems really niche, to the point where it’s almost like an extraneous part of the card. The attack’s balancing is fine, but for the Ability to be noticeably worse than existing effects that are never played (like Bewear GRI) is a concern.)
Wording: 10/10
(Looks good.)
Fonts and Placement: 4/5
(Close enough, but keep an eye on that Pokédex text.)
Aesthetics: 2/5
(Art needs some brightening; at the moment it just looks like a dark square in contrast with the bright blank.)
Total: 40/50
I always appreciate a good BWXY card, so I’ll gladly forgive you the lack of GX madness this month! I think you’ve done a good job with the holosheet, even if it’s a bit non-traditional for the era, making it look like it’s snowing. The art absolutely works for the attack names, so either you chose a good piece for them, or you designed the attacks well to complement the art.
Outside the holosheet being a nice nod to the snowstorm angle, though, I’m not sure I really see the weather connections. One of the attacks is named Foghorn, sure, but what’s the connection between fog and Items and Supporters? Maybe the deck being a non-public zone of the game makes its contents “foggy,” and Seel’s Foghorn is allowing you to pierce through the fog to find whatever it is you’re looking for? Or like there’s a ship carrying cargo/Items and passengers/Supporters and it got mired in the deck en route, and Seel’s helping them reach you?
Actually, it may not have been immediately clear to me, but the more I think about it, the more I like that angle. Connecting fog to non-public zones seems like a truly unique take on a unique type of weather. I’m not sure if it’s what you intended, but I like it. xD
If it is what you intended, I think one of the main things preventing me from seeing it (fogging it up, if you will) is that the second attack is just … Flip-Flop? It also deals with a traditionally non-public zone of the game (in this case, the Prize cards), so there could be huge potential there to hammer in the connection between non-public zones and fog/snowstorms, but the name implies it’s just whimsical Seel behavior that we could see on any card, weather theme or not.
I do like the effects, though. Versatile search for [C] is a boon for any evolving Basic, and it’s got a powerful damaging attack in its own right in Flip-Flop. I don’t think it’s necessarily true that Fairy Box archetypes “usually run Town Map,” but it’s definitely a card you would include to get some good power out of this Seel. I also like that you’re clearly thinking through the numbers game to ensure it’s good without being overpowered.
Wording errors:
- “Then, shuffle your deck” -> “Shuffle your deck afterward” — before SM, anyway
[-2 points]- The “That Prize cards remains face down for the rest of the game” clause only started to be italicized in the SM era. Before then, I guess the wording was considered ambiguous enough that it qualified as a necessary extra clause, rather than reminder text. [-1 point]
Fonts and Placement errors:
- The Pokédex text for “NO. 018 …” should be some variant of Frutiger. As I noted for PMJ’s card, I was able to get pretty close with Frutiger 55 Roman at 90% height and 102% width, with Optical kerning and a Smooth anti-alias setting (and whatever point size is correct for the size of blank you’re using). The different fonts in the Frutiger family are close enough that you’d probably be able to get close with any of them, but docking [-1 point] because Gill Sans is pretty far off.
Creativity/Originality: 12/15
(There’s some good synergy work with Foghorn searching out cards like Town Map or Muscle Band to boost the damage of Flip-Flop. The weather connection seems so subtle I’m not even sure it’s entirely there, though.)
Believability/Playability: 15/15
(The balancing seems great, actually — it can do some heavy damage in specific circumstances, making it a great candidate for box decks, as you mentioned. But it’s so situational, it’s also not outside the realm of possibility for an evolving Basic. Good work here.)
Wording: 7/10
(A couple errors. Been working with SM cards lately?
)Fonts and Placement: 4/5
(Close enough, but keep an eye on that Pokédex text.)
Aesthetics: 4/5
(You’ve managed to manipulate the art, holosheet and all, to give a good impression of a Seel in a snowstorm. The last point here would come from a “wow factor,” like making it full art or something, but it does look very good for what it is.)
Total: 42/50
2nd Place: PMJ’s Pidgeot, with 40/50 points.
1st Place: bbninjas’s Seel, with 42/50 points.
Hey guys, sorry for the (very) late notice, but my judging will be significantly delayed this month. I started early and got about halfway through, but I’m in exam period now so it’s unlikely that I’ll have time to finish it until another couple of weeks from now. It’ll be done by the end of the month, but it unfortunately won’t give much time for people to have a look at feedback before making their November submissions.
That being said, I'm very impressed with what I've judged so far, so keep up the good work!
That being said, I'm very impressed with what I've judged so far, so keep up the good work!
Hi all.
This announcement has been a long time coming, but I’m here to make it public that I have retired as Text-based judge for the CaC competition. This probably isn’t a surprise to those of you who have noted my lack of activity in these forums or in the Discord, but I wanted to announce it properly regardless.
I’ve been on the judging team since January of this year, and honestly it has been a great experience. I’ve gotten to work closely with Jabber, BB and NinjaPenguin, as well as take on a more active role in this growing community, and for that I am hugely grateful. Through the lens of judging I’ve been able to take a deeper look into the history, mechanics, rulings, linguistics and more of the PTCG and the surrounding community than I ever thought I would, and watching you guys improve and compete has been a highlight of my time here.
However, unfortunately as I’ve approached the pointy end of high school, faking and judging has slowly become less and less of something I can do on a regular basis. Rather than just being able to use existing free time to judge every other month, I’ve had to make time. I‘ve always been a very slow and inefficient judge (though as thorough as I can be), even in the SM era where I was most familiar, but since I stopped playing and collecting the TCG by the time the third SwSh expansion rolled around I was finding judging to be a lot less intuitive. Even a relatively straightforward card (say one scoring 13/20 in creativity) could take hours to fully deconstruct and judge, and for cards that were totally outside the box I would need several full days to work on them, which I’ve been struggling to find. I'm not sure if this is a normal experience for judges, but I have the feeling that I'm just slow, haha. I imagine that with experience comes an increase in efficiency, but as July would indicate I am still far from an experienced judge. What with hardcore revision and exams taking place recently, it just hasn’t been realistic for me to complete a judging and I wasn’t prepared to sacrifice my education and IRL relationships for a hobby — even when that hobby comes with a community as great as this. You guys have been super understanding and supportive of that, so from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
To those of you who were in the text category for September, it has been a long time since I was supposed to have returned your results. That judging is still incomplete and it won’t ever be officially finished, but if you really want to see what I have of your individual results, you can DM me and I’ll send them through. At this point I’m just super burnt out as a judge and by extension as a member of the faking community. The past few months I’ve barely been active at all and @bbninjas has very generously volunteered to judge your November cards. I’ll probably still be on hiatus from Pokebeach for another couple of months, but I may eventually make a return as a CaC entrant once again.
And that’s it for now. It’s been a fun ride, if a challenging one. There are some potentially major updates to the CaC in the works moving forward so keep your eyes open for that, but it’s not my place to say what those are.
See you on the other side, and Merry Christmas,
— Almonds
This announcement has been a long time coming, but I’m here to make it public that I have retired as Text-based judge for the CaC competition. This probably isn’t a surprise to those of you who have noted my lack of activity in these forums or in the Discord, but I wanted to announce it properly regardless.
I’ve been on the judging team since January of this year, and honestly it has been a great experience. I’ve gotten to work closely with Jabber, BB and NinjaPenguin, as well as take on a more active role in this growing community, and for that I am hugely grateful. Through the lens of judging I’ve been able to take a deeper look into the history, mechanics, rulings, linguistics and more of the PTCG and the surrounding community than I ever thought I would, and watching you guys improve and compete has been a highlight of my time here.
However, unfortunately as I’ve approached the pointy end of high school, faking and judging has slowly become less and less of something I can do on a regular basis. Rather than just being able to use existing free time to judge every other month, I’ve had to make time. I‘ve always been a very slow and inefficient judge (though as thorough as I can be), even in the SM era where I was most familiar, but since I stopped playing and collecting the TCG by the time the third SwSh expansion rolled around I was finding judging to be a lot less intuitive. Even a relatively straightforward card (say one scoring 13/20 in creativity) could take hours to fully deconstruct and judge, and for cards that were totally outside the box I would need several full days to work on them, which I’ve been struggling to find. I'm not sure if this is a normal experience for judges, but I have the feeling that I'm just slow, haha. I imagine that with experience comes an increase in efficiency, but as July would indicate I am still far from an experienced judge. What with hardcore revision and exams taking place recently, it just hasn’t been realistic for me to complete a judging and I wasn’t prepared to sacrifice my education and IRL relationships for a hobby — even when that hobby comes with a community as great as this. You guys have been super understanding and supportive of that, so from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
To those of you who were in the text category for September, it has been a long time since I was supposed to have returned your results. That judging is still incomplete and it won’t ever be officially finished, but if you really want to see what I have of your individual results, you can DM me and I’ll send them through. At this point I’m just super burnt out as a judge and by extension as a member of the faking community. The past few months I’ve barely been active at all and @bbninjas has very generously volunteered to judge your November cards. I’ll probably still be on hiatus from Pokebeach for another couple of months, but I may eventually make a return as a CaC entrant once again.
And that’s it for now. It’s been a fun ride, if a challenging one. There are some potentially major updates to the CaC in the works moving forward so keep your eyes open for that, but it’s not my place to say what those are.
See you on the other side, and Merry Christmas,
— Almonds
Thanks Almonds and Merry Christmas everyone!
Just an update on this - I'll be judging both November and September. Results out this week.
Just an update on this - I'll be judging both November and September. Results out this week.
Text Scores
Judge: @bbninjas
Fantastic entries this round! There’s plenty of new faces with plenty of fresh ideas to boot. Everyone took the weather theme and ran with it, and it showed - flavour was exceptional! There was some tricky wording and a resurgence in marker-based effects, which means many of you ended up exploring new design space this month. Nice work.
And of course, many thanks to Almonds for all the judging he’s done this year in the text-based portion. We look forward to seeing you around again once you’ve rested up!
~~bbninjas
FireLizard:
Luispipe8:
Raging Sand
If a Stadium card is in play, this Pokémon's attacks do 40 more damage to your opponent's Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance) and this Pokémon takes 40 less damage from attacks (after applying Weakness and Resistance).
Cruel Storm 130
This attack also does 20 damage for each
Energy attached to this Pokémon to each Benched Pokémon. (Don't apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.) If any Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, discard a Stadium in play.
Shinxed3:
Kaizaac:
47bennyg:
DashKing:
Babywinds:
Ashco:
Tornadus, Thundurus, & Landorus-GX - Colorless - HP300
Basic [TAG TEAM]
[L][F][C] Storm Caller 160
Discard an Energy attached to this Pokémon. You may choose one effect of this attack:
Switch 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon with their Active Pokémon. If this Pokémon has at least 3 extra Energy attached to it (in addition to this attack's cost), discard 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon and all cards attached to it. If your opponent has no Benched Pokémon, this attack does nothing. (You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)
Weakness: - Resistance: - Retreat: [C][C]
TAG TEAM rule: When your TAG TEAM Pokemon is knocked out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
3rd Place: Luispipe8’s Tyranitar, with 42/50 points.
2nd Place: Babywind’s Thundurus V, with 45/50 points.
1st Place: Shinxed3’s Alolan Ninetales with 46.5/50 points
Judge: @bbninjas
Fantastic entries this round! There’s plenty of new faces with plenty of fresh ideas to boot. Everyone took the weather theme and ran with it, and it showed - flavour was exceptional! There was some tricky wording and a resurgence in marker-based effects, which means many of you ended up exploring new design space this month. Nice work.
And of course, many thanks to Almonds for all the judging he’s done this year in the text-based portion. We look forward to seeing you around again once you’ve rested up!
~~bbninjas
FireLizard:
Politoed&Kingdra-GX [W] HP 230
Basic Pokèmon
TAG TEAM
[Ability] Dance of the Rain
When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may search your deck for up to 2 [W] Energy cards and attach them to 1 of your Pokémon. Then, shuffle your deck.
[W][W] Massive Storm 30+
This attack does 30 more damage for each [W] attached to all of your Pokémon.
[W][W][W] + Water Trumpet GX
Your opponent shuffles their Active Pokémon and all attached cards into their deck. If this Pokémon has at least 3 extra Water Energy attached to it (in addition to this attack's cost),this attack does 100 damage to each of your opponent's Benched Pokémon. (Don't apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.)
(You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)
Weakness:[G]x2
Resistance:None
Retreat Cost:[C][C][C]
TAG TEAM Rule
When your TAG TEAM is knocked out, your opponent takes 3 Prize Cards.
Basic Pokèmon
TAG TEAM
[Ability] Dance of the Rain
When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may search your deck for up to 2 [W] Energy cards and attach them to 1 of your Pokémon. Then, shuffle your deck.
[W][W] Massive Storm 30+
This attack does 30 more damage for each [W] attached to all of your Pokémon.
[W][W][W] + Water Trumpet GX
Your opponent shuffles their Active Pokémon and all attached cards into their deck. If this Pokémon has at least 3 extra Water Energy attached to it (in addition to this attack's cost),this attack does 100 damage to each of your opponent's Benched Pokémon. (Don't apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.)
(You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)
Weakness:[G]x2
Resistance:None
Retreat Cost:[C][C][C]
TAG TEAM Rule
When your TAG TEAM is knocked out, your opponent takes 3 Prize Cards.
Nice card FireLizard. None of the effects look particularly new, but you’ve certainly chosen effects that synergise well with each other, netting you a 13/20 in creativity. Flavour is great, especially Water Trumpet, although I would’ve liked to see something a bit more creative and inspired by the flavour, opposed to a simple shuffle-and-snipe effect that we’ve seen a lot in the official TCG.
Massive Storm looks fine on a Tag Team, but Dance of the Rain and Water Trumpet are both a little concerning. Compare Water Trumpet to Magikarp & Wailord-GX’s Towering Splash effect, which does the same thing except for 2 more [W] Energy and without the “shuffle your opponent’s Active Pokemon in the deck” part. Yikes.
Dance of the Rain is broken, even for a Tag Team. You can play 4 Politoed-Kingdra in one turn to accelerate 8 Energy in one turn. You can play Super Scoop Up to accelerate even more Energy. With the attack especially, you’re taking KOs every turn. Compare to Rillaboom DAA which has the same effect on a Stage 2 in an era which is already considered to have overwhelming power creep.
Wording errors:
- “all attached cards” should be “all cards attached to it” in SM-era. (-1pt)
- Both reminder texts in brackets should be italicised. (-1.5pts)
- Need to specify “[W] Energy” in Massive Storm. (-1pt)
- “Water Energy” should be “[W] Energy” in Water Trumpet GX. (-1pt)
- In the TAG TEAM rule, “Knocked Out” should be capitalised, while “card” shouldn’t be. (-1pt)
Creativity/Originality: 13/20
(Good synergy, but the synergy isn’t new.)
Wording: 9.5/15
(Minor errors.)
Believability/Playability: 10/15
(Several broken effects.)
Total: 32.5/50
Massive Storm looks fine on a Tag Team, but Dance of the Rain and Water Trumpet are both a little concerning. Compare Water Trumpet to Magikarp & Wailord-GX’s Towering Splash effect, which does the same thing except for 2 more [W] Energy and without the “shuffle your opponent’s Active Pokemon in the deck” part. Yikes.
Dance of the Rain is broken, even for a Tag Team. You can play 4 Politoed-Kingdra in one turn to accelerate 8 Energy in one turn. You can play Super Scoop Up to accelerate even more Energy. With the attack especially, you’re taking KOs every turn. Compare to Rillaboom DAA which has the same effect on a Stage 2 in an era which is already considered to have overwhelming power creep.
Wording errors:
- “all attached cards” should be “all cards attached to it” in SM-era. (-1pt)
- Both reminder texts in brackets should be italicised. (-1.5pts)
- Need to specify “[W] Energy” in Massive Storm. (-1pt)
- “Water Energy” should be “[W] Energy” in Water Trumpet GX. (-1pt)
- In the TAG TEAM rule, “Knocked Out” should be capitalised, while “card” shouldn’t be. (-1pt)
Creativity/Originality: 13/20
(Good synergy, but the synergy isn’t new.)
Wording: 9.5/15
(Minor errors.)
Believability/Playability: 10/15
(Several broken effects.)
Total: 32.5/50
Luispipe8:
Stage 2/ Tyranitar // HP180
Evolves from Pupitar
NO. 248/Armor Pokémon/HT: 6'07/WT: 445.3 lbs.
NO. 248/Armor Pokémon/HT: 6'07/WT: 445.3 lbs.
If a Stadium card is in play, this Pokémon's attacks do 40 more damage to your opponent's Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance) and this Pokémon takes 40 less damage from attacks (after applying Weakness and Resistance).
This attack also does 20 damage for each
( Weakness:
x2 ( Resistance: ( ( Retreat:
(
If it rampages, it knocks down mountains and buries rivers. Maps must be redrawn afterward.
52/101
Well ‘ello there Luis! Good greetings to you.
The Ability relying on the Stadium to dish out more damage and Cruel Storm discarding the Stadiumonce the storm is over upon KO is a nice inter-effect interaction. The flavour is also very nice; you’ve certainly leaned into the theme with Tyranitar getting stronger when there is “weather” happening. Otherwise, this feels like a fairly standard high-damage attacker; no particularly new design space here. Tyranitar itself feels it would slot nicely in some weather-themed set (with weather inspired stadiums, for example), but on its own it feels a bit underwhelming, netting you a creativity score of 14/20.
Balance looks fine to me. Tyranitar will be taking consistent KOs after a few rounds of splash damage on the Bench, but with Tyranitar being a Stage 2 and being susceptible to revenge kills, power levels are kept in check. Everything else looks good.
Wording errors:
- “if a Stadium card is in play” should just be “If a Stadium is in play” in SSH-era. (-1pt)
- “if any Pokemon” should be “if a Pokemon” (see Alolan Marowak-GX). (-1pt)
Creativity/Originality: 14/20
(Fun flavour and synergy, minimal design exploration.)
Wording: 13/15
(Minor slips.)
Believability/Playability: 15/15
(Would slot right in to an official set.)
Total: 42/50
The Ability relying on the Stadium to dish out more damage and Cruel Storm discarding the Stadium
Balance looks fine to me. Tyranitar will be taking consistent KOs after a few rounds of splash damage on the Bench, but with Tyranitar being a Stage 2 and being susceptible to revenge kills, power levels are kept in check. Everything else looks good.
Wording errors:
- “if a Stadium card is in play” should just be “If a Stadium is in play” in SSH-era. (-1pt)
- “if any Pokemon” should be “if a Pokemon” (see Alolan Marowak-GX). (-1pt)
Creativity/Originality: 14/20
(Fun flavour and synergy, minimal design exploration.)
Wording: 13/15
(Minor slips.)
Believability/Playability: 15/15
(Would slot right in to an official set.)
Total: 42/50
Shinxed3:
Alolan Ninetales – [W] – HP 110
Stage 1 – Evolves from Alolan Vulpix
Ability: Retribution Blizzard
As long as this Pokémon is your Active Pokémon, put 1 Snow Marker on each of your opponent’s Pokémon between turns. Whenever your opponent takes a Prize Card, put 1 damage counter on each of your opponent’s Pokémon for each Snow Marker on it. Then, remove all Snow Markers from play.
[W] Frost Twirl 20
Move any amount of Snow Markers from your opponent’s Pokémon to your opponent’s other Pokémon in any way you like.
[W][W][C] Avalanche Crash
This attack does 30 damage to each of your opponent’s Pokémon that has any damage counters on it. (Don’t apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.) If your opponent’s Active Pokémon is a Pokémon-EX or Pokémon-GX and was damaged by this attack, that Pokémon is now Paralyzed.
Weakness: Metal (x2)
Resistance: None
Retreat: [C]
The reason it guides people all the way down to the mountain’s base is that it wants them to hurry up and leave.
Stage 1 – Evolves from Alolan Vulpix
Ability: Retribution Blizzard
As long as this Pokémon is your Active Pokémon, put 1 Snow Marker on each of your opponent’s Pokémon between turns. Whenever your opponent takes a Prize Card, put 1 damage counter on each of your opponent’s Pokémon for each Snow Marker on it. Then, remove all Snow Markers from play.
[W] Frost Twirl 20
Move any amount of Snow Markers from your opponent’s Pokémon to your opponent’s other Pokémon in any way you like.
[W][W][C] Avalanche Crash
This attack does 30 damage to each of your opponent’s Pokémon that has any damage counters on it. (Don’t apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.) If your opponent’s Active Pokémon is a Pokémon-EX or Pokémon-GX and was damaged by this attack, that Pokémon is now Paralyzed.
Weakness: Metal (x2)
Resistance: None
Retreat: [C]
The reason it guides people all the way down to the mountain’s base is that it wants them to hurry up and leave.
The resurgence of markers! I’m not usually a fan of custom markers, but I think you’ve used this design space well to solve a problem in the TCG: how do you keep track of the number of turns that a Pokemon has been active? Not only does delayed damage keep the otherwise standard “damage in-between” turns effect balanced on a Stage 1, the counters naturally being removed if a Pokemon gets KO’d opens the door to some interesting strategies. You could stack up Snow Markers on bench sitting Pokemon that would otherwise usually not see play. You could stack up Snow Markers on Pokemon that you expect will revenge kill you. It also synergises nicely with Rocky Helmet / Rough Skin effects, which is an interesting and underutilised design space in itself. Frost Twirl is a necessary addition and provides more scope for strategic play, and Avalanche Crash is a clever accompaniment of the Ability, holding a subtle synergy that keeps Alolan Ninetales relevant throughout the game. Solid 18/20 from me.
Balancing looks great. Ninetales is weaker in the early game but a force to be reckoned with once those markers pile up. I like how Ninetales can play defensively and stall out Pokemon to get those counters on the board, or more aggressively to try and get as much damage on the board as quickly as possible - both being legitimate strategies.
Wording errors:
- The “don’t apply Weakness…” reminder text should be in italics. (-1pt)
- The “card” part of “Prize card” shouldn’t be capitalised. (-0.5pt)
Creativity/Originality: 18/20
(Cohesive design that uses new design space to solve problems and introduce a new way of playing.)
Wording: 13.5/15
(Minor slip.)
Believability/Playability: 15/15
(Perfecto.)
Total: 46.5/50
Balancing looks great. Ninetales is weaker in the early game but a force to be reckoned with once those markers pile up. I like how Ninetales can play defensively and stall out Pokemon to get those counters on the board, or more aggressively to try and get as much damage on the board as quickly as possible - both being legitimate strategies.
Wording errors:
- The “don’t apply Weakness…” reminder text should be in italics. (-1pt)
- The “card” part of “Prize card” shouldn’t be capitalised. (-0.5pt)
Creativity/Originality: 18/20
(Cohesive design that uses new design space to solve problems and introduce a new way of playing.)
Wording: 13.5/15
(Minor slip.)
Believability/Playability: 15/15
(Perfecto.)
Total: 46.5/50
Kaizaac:
Frosmoth V - [W] - 170 HP
Basic Pokémon
Ability - Snow Cloak
If the Stadium Card “Circhester Bay” is in play, between turns heal 20 damage from this Pokémon.
[W][W] Blizzard- 100
If the Stadium Card “Circhester Bay” is in play, this attack does 30 damage to each of your opponent’s benched Pokémon.
Weakness: Metal (x2)
Resistance: None
Retreat:
When the weather gets viciously cold, this Pokémon protects the young Snom with it’s cloak.
Pokémon V rule: When your Pokémon V is knocked out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Basic Pokémon
Ability - Snow Cloak
If the Stadium Card “Circhester Bay” is in play, between turns heal 20 damage from this Pokémon.
[W][W] Blizzard- 100
If the Stadium Card “Circhester Bay” is in play, this attack does 30 damage to each of your opponent’s benched Pokémon.
Weakness: Metal (x2)
Resistance: None
Retreat:
When the weather gets viciously cold, this Pokémon protects the young Snom with it’s cloak.
Pokémon V rule: When your Pokémon V is knocked out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Nice thematic linking between attacks. Snow Cloak and Blizzard have some obvious synergy, but it would’ve been nice to see you explore some new design space. How could Frosmoth V manipulate Stadiums more? How could you lean into the flavour of Circhester Bay or Frosmoth to inform more unique effects? The effects currently are pretty cookie cutter outside of the “If the Stadium card “Circhester Bay” is in play” clause, netting you a 12/20 in creativity from me.
Stats check out. Blizzard is too powerful for a Pokemon V, however. [W][W] for 100 is already decent, but spread of 30 damage to each Benched Pokemon should you have a specific stadium in play is not difficult to achieve. Compare this to Ampharos V, which has a similar effect but has a higher cost and doesn’t do free damage to all of your opponent’s Benched Pokemon.
Wording errors:
- “knocked out” and “benched” should be in capitals. (-1.5pt).
- “If the Stadium Card “Circhester Bay” is in play” should be “If Circhester Bay is in play” in SSH-era. x2 (-3pts)
- “between turns” should be “during Pokemon Checkup” in SSH-era. (-1pt)
- the “during Pokemon Checkup” clause belongs after the “from this Pokemon” text (-2pts)
- the SSH-era wording for attacks that hit the Bench is “this attack also does XX damage to …”, and needs the reminder text “(Don’t apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.)” (-2pts)
Creativity/Originality: 12/20
(Cookie cutter.)
Wording: 5.5/15
(Outdated wording.)
Believability/Playability: 13/15
(Blizzard is OP)
Total: 30.5/50
Stats check out. Blizzard is too powerful for a Pokemon V, however. [W][W] for 100 is already decent, but spread of 30 damage to each Benched Pokemon should you have a specific stadium in play is not difficult to achieve. Compare this to Ampharos V, which has a similar effect but has a higher cost and doesn’t do free damage to all of your opponent’s Benched Pokemon.
Wording errors:
- “knocked out” and “benched” should be in capitals. (-1.5pt).
- “If the Stadium Card “Circhester Bay” is in play” should be “If Circhester Bay is in play” in SSH-era. x2 (-3pts)
- “between turns” should be “during Pokemon Checkup” in SSH-era. (-1pt)
- the “during Pokemon Checkup” clause belongs after the “from this Pokemon” text (-2pts)
- the SSH-era wording for attacks that hit the Bench is “this attack also does XX damage to …”, and needs the reminder text “(Don’t apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokémon.)” (-2pts)
Creativity/Originality: 12/20
(Cookie cutter.)
Wording: 5.5/15
(Outdated wording.)
Believability/Playability: 13/15
(Blizzard is OP)
Total: 30.5/50
47bennyg:
Feraligatr VMAX – Water – HP320
Evolves from Feraligatr V
[W][W] G-Max Downpour 60
Starting at the end of this turn, the effect of any Stadium card in play becomes “The attacks of [W] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 more damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance). The attacks of [R] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 less damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).” This effect ends when an attack with the word “G-Max” or “Max” in its name is used (except G-Max Downpour), or whenever either player plays a Stadium card from their hand.
[W][W][W] Riptide Slash 120
Weakness: Lightning (x2)
Resistance:
Retreat: [C][C][C]
VMAX rule: When your Pokémon VMAX is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
Evolves from Feraligatr V
[W][W] G-Max Downpour 60
Starting at the end of this turn, the effect of any Stadium card in play becomes “The attacks of [W] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 more damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance). The attacks of [R] Pokémon (both yours and your opponent’s) do 60 less damage to the opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).” This effect ends when an attack with the word “G-Max” or “Max” in its name is used (except G-Max Downpour), or whenever either player plays a Stadium card from their hand.
[W][W][W] Riptide Slash 120
Weakness: Lightning (x2)
Resistance:
Retreat: [C][C][C]
VMAX rule: When your Pokémon VMAX is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
Now this is an interesting take on the weather theme - literally overriding existing Stadium cards, a bit like weather effects in the actual VG! Very cool. Boosting [W] Pokemon damage output and reducing [R] Pokemon damage output works well thematically, although is a bit stock-standard and it would’ve been nice to see this design space explored more. Otherwise, that the effect ends once a particular “Max” attack is used is a unique restriction in itself and opens up some potential new synergies should it be explored further, netting you a solid 18/20 in creativity.
Riptide Slash does feel a bit weak for a VMAX, doing only 180 damage even after a G-Max Downpour boost, considering most VMAX have an attack that can hit in the 200s. You probably could’ve gotten away with a larger damage buff considering how easy it is for your opponent to deactivate it by playing a new Stadium, or by using a VMAX attack (and SSH-era decks are mostly VMAXs, I hear.)
Wording errors:
- “with the word” should be “that has”. (-1pt) (see: Falinks RCL)
- The “This effect ends when an attack with the word “G-Max” or “Max” in its name is used (except G-Max Downpour)” clause should use more active wording. It should be “This effect ends when either player’s Pokemon uses an attack…” (-2pts).
- “except G-Max Downpour” should not be in brackets. (-1pt)
- The reminder text in brackets should be in italics x4. (-2pts)
I realise that this card was designed a couple of months before Shiftry VIV, which provides official wording for an effect that replaces the existing effect of a Trainer. I’ll list the required changes here for consistency’s sake, though won’t be docking any points for those.
- “the effect of any Stadium card in play becomes” should be “any Stadium card in play has the effect”. (-0pts) (see: Shiftry VIV)
- There should be reminder text “(This happens instead of the card’s usual effect.)” (-0pts)
Creativity/Originality: 18/20
(Brilliant flavour, creative exploration of design space.)
Wording: 9/15
(Some minor and major slips.)
Believability/Playability: 13/15
(Both attacks seem a tad underpowered for a VMAX.)
Total: 40/50
Riptide Slash does feel a bit weak for a VMAX, doing only 180 damage even after a G-Max Downpour boost, considering most VMAX have an attack that can hit in the 200s. You probably could’ve gotten away with a larger damage buff considering how easy it is for your opponent to deactivate it by playing a new Stadium, or by using a VMAX attack (and SSH-era decks are mostly VMAXs, I hear.)
Wording errors:
- “with the word” should be “that has”. (-1pt) (see: Falinks RCL)
- The “This effect ends when an attack with the word “G-Max” or “Max” in its name is used (except G-Max Downpour)” clause should use more active wording. It should be “This effect ends when either player’s Pokemon uses an attack…” (-2pts).
- “except G-Max Downpour” should not be in brackets. (-1pt)
- The reminder text in brackets should be in italics x4. (-2pts)
I realise that this card was designed a couple of months before Shiftry VIV, which provides official wording for an effect that replaces the existing effect of a Trainer. I’ll list the required changes here for consistency’s sake, though won’t be docking any points for those.
- “the effect of any Stadium card in play becomes” should be “any Stadium card in play has the effect”. (-0pts) (see: Shiftry VIV)
- There should be reminder text “(This happens instead of the card’s usual effect.)” (-0pts)
Creativity/Originality: 18/20
(Brilliant flavour, creative exploration of design space.)
Wording: 9/15
(Some minor and major slips.)
Believability/Playability: 13/15
(Both attacks seem a tad underpowered for a VMAX.)
Total: 40/50
DashKing:
Mew
Type: [P] – HP90
Basic Pokémon
Pokédex: Apparently, it appears only to those people who are pure of heart and have a strong desire to see it.
NO. 151, Wish Pokémon, Height: 1′04”, Weight: 8.8 lbs
Ability: Creation Magic
Once during your turn, put one Call Counter on this Pokémon. You may search your deck for an Item card, reveal it, and put it into your hand for each Call Counter on this Pokémon. Then, shuffle your deck. In between turns, place one damage counter on this Pokémon for each Call Counter in play.
[.] Climatic Selection 10
Move any number of Call Counters from this Pokémon to any other Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent's) in any way you like. Choose 1:
During Pokémon Checkup, put one damage counter on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it. If the Pokémon is a [W] Pokémon, heal 10 damage instead
During Pokémon Checkup, put two damage counters on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it that is not a [F] Pokémon or a [M] Pokémon.
Whenever a [W] Pokémon, [L] Pokémon, or [C] Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
Whenever a [R] Pokémon or [G] type Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
If more than 2 Call Counters are removed from play in any way from any player’s Pokémon, remove all remaining Call Counters in play from each Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent’s).
Weakness: [D] X 2
Resistance: [F] -30
Retreat:
Type: [P] – HP90
Basic Pokémon
Pokédex: Apparently, it appears only to those people who are pure of heart and have a strong desire to see it.
NO. 151, Wish Pokémon, Height: 1′04”, Weight: 8.8 lbs
Ability: Creation Magic
Once during your turn, put one Call Counter on this Pokémon. You may search your deck for an Item card, reveal it, and put it into your hand for each Call Counter on this Pokémon. Then, shuffle your deck. In between turns, place one damage counter on this Pokémon for each Call Counter in play.
[.] Climatic Selection 10
Move any number of Call Counters from this Pokémon to any other Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent's) in any way you like. Choose 1:
During Pokémon Checkup, put one damage counter on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it. If the Pokémon is a [W] Pokémon, heal 10 damage instead
During Pokémon Checkup, put two damage counters on each Pokémon with a Call Counter on it that is not a [F] Pokémon or a [M] Pokémon.
Whenever a [W] Pokémon, [L] Pokémon, or [C] Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
Whenever a [R] Pokémon or [G] type Pokémon with a Call Counter uses an attack, the attack does 10 more damage to your opponent’s Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance).
If more than 2 Call Counters are removed from play in any way from any player’s Pokémon, remove all remaining Call Counters in play from each Pokémon in play (both yours and your opponent’s).
Weakness: [D] X 2
Resistance: [F] -30
Retreat:
Ohhh boy, this is a complicated card.
And an interesting one, for that matter. I like the flavour and theme of creating Items, but I don’t understand why Call Counters are being placed for doing that. (Also why are they called “Call Counters”?) I don’t understand how Call Counters influence the climate, and how the effect themselves correspond to different climates is a bit unclear to me. I suppose we have Heavy Rain, Sandstorms, Thunderstorms and Strong Sun? I also don’t understand why the climate only affects Pokemon with Call Counters on them.
I’ll give you a 14/20 for creativity because I see what you were trying to do here with the counters, but unfortunately I think it all falls a bit flat - the design would be better off without them.
I’m also not sure whether this card is playable. Free Item search on a Basic is amazing (and would usually be considered broken), but using the Item search essentially puts Mew on a 4-turn timer before it gets KO’d. You also can’t rack up many Call Counters on your opponent’s Pokemon since Mew takes Poison-like damage in between turns when those are in play. Either you only have 1 Call Counter in play at a time, in which case Mew becomes a very fancy and complicated “This attack does 20 damage to 1 of your opponent’s Benched Pokemon” attacker, or you can have many Call Counters in play and do decent damage, but then Mew gets KO’d the next turn. This card would never exist… for many reasons.
Wording errors:
- “one” and “two” should be in their numerical form. x3 (-2pts)
- Reminder clauses should be in italics. x4 (-2pts)
- Missing dot points. X5 (-2pts)
- “with a Call Counter” should be “with any Call Counters on it” x4 (-3pts)
Creativity/Originality: 14/20
(I see what you were trying to do.)
Wording: 6/15
(Minor errors.)
Believability/Playability: 7/15
(Not believable and not playable, unfortunately.)
Total:27/50
And an interesting one, for that matter. I like the flavour and theme of creating Items, but I don’t understand why Call Counters are being placed for doing that. (Also why are they called “Call Counters”?) I don’t understand how Call Counters influence the climate, and how the effect themselves correspond to different climates is a bit unclear to me. I suppose we have Heavy Rain, Sandstorms, Thunderstorms and Strong Sun? I also don’t understand why the climate only affects Pokemon with Call Counters on them.
I’ll give you a 14/20 for creativity because I see what you were trying to do here with the counters, but unfortunately I think it all falls a bit flat - the design would be better off without them.
I’m also not sure whether this card is playable. Free Item search on a Basic is amazing (and would usually be considered broken), but using the Item search essentially puts Mew on a 4-turn timer before it gets KO’d. You also can’t rack up many Call Counters on your opponent’s Pokemon since Mew takes Poison-like damage in between turns when those are in play. Either you only have 1 Call Counter in play at a time, in which case Mew becomes a very fancy and complicated “This attack does 20 damage to 1 of your opponent’s Benched Pokemon” attacker, or you can have many Call Counters in play and do decent damage, but then Mew gets KO’d the next turn. This card would never exist… for many reasons.
Wording errors:
- “one” and “two” should be in their numerical form. x3 (-2pts)
- Reminder clauses should be in italics. x4 (-2pts)
- Missing dot points. X5 (-2pts)
- “with a Call Counter” should be “with any Call Counters on it” x4 (-3pts)
Creativity/Originality: 14/20
(I see what you were trying to do.)
Wording: 6/15
(Minor errors.)
Believability/Playability: 7/15
(Not believable and not playable, unfortunately.)
Total:27/50
Babywinds:
Thundurus V HP210 Lightning
Basic Pokémon
/Ability/ ~ Brutal Weathering
When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may use this Ability. Until the end of your opponent’s next turn, each Pokémon in play takes 10 more damage from attacks (after applying Weakness and Resistance). You can't use more than 1 Brutal Weathering Ability each turn.
[L][L][L] Storm Plow 140
If your opponent’s Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, before you put any Prize cards into your hand, you may attach them to your Pokémon as Special Energy cards in any way you like. Those cards provide [L] Energy only while they are attached to a Pokémon.
When your Pokémon V is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness - Lightning x2
Resistance - Fighting -30
Retreat - 2
Basic Pokémon
/Ability/ ~ Brutal Weathering
When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may use this Ability. Until the end of your opponent’s next turn, each Pokémon in play takes 10 more damage from attacks (after applying Weakness and Resistance). You can't use more than 1 Brutal Weathering Ability each turn.
[L][L][L] Storm Plow 140
If your opponent’s Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, before you put any Prize cards into your hand, you may attach them to your Pokémon as Special Energy cards in any way you like. Those cards provide [L] Energy only while they are attached to a Pokémon.
When your Pokémon V is Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness - Lightning x2
Resistance - Fighting -30
Retreat - 2
Some interesting design space exploration here! Brutal Weathering is nicely inspired by the theme and is a fresh take on your fairly typical damage buff effect. The idea behind Storm Plow is something I’ve never seen before - not only are you exploring effects that apply to Prize cards as they are being taken, an underutilised idea in the TCG, you’re also exploring ways of using non-Energy cards as an Energy in a rather ubiquitous way. There’s plenty of potential here! There are a few creases that you’ll need to iron out, though. For example, what happens if you take a Tool or Energy card as a Prize card and attach it as a Special Energy card with the effect of Storm Plow? How are you going to distinguish between it and other attached Tools / Energy? I’d give you a higher creativity score had you implemented some creative way of managing these cases, but all in all, a 17/20 creativity score is nothing to scoff at.
While those aforementioned edge cases could make Storm Plow difficult to use in practice, balance overall looks good. My only concern would be if Brutal Weathering is stackable, but you’ve dealt with that using a once per turn restriction. Storm Plow is a fairly costly attack and won’t be 1-hit KOing pretty easily, so the [L] Energy acceleration looks fine too.
Wording errors:
- Storm Plow’s wording seems quite tricky and the best wording is a bit ambiguous. My best guess for wording is based on the SSH-era Trainer Billowing Smoke: “If your opponent’s Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, you may attach any Prize cards you would take for that Knock Out to your Pokémon as Special Energy cards in any way you like. Those cards provide [L] Energy only while they are attached to a Pokémon.”. But it seems you used a Jirachi Prism Star reference, and that should be fine too. (-0pts)
Creativity/Originality: 17/20
(Ideas are a little under-developed.)
Wording: 15/15
(Tricky wording; see above for a suggestion, but your way is technically fine too.)
Believability/Playability: 13/15
(Some unclear edge cases.)
Total: 45/50
While those aforementioned edge cases could make Storm Plow difficult to use in practice, balance overall looks good. My only concern would be if Brutal Weathering is stackable, but you’ve dealt with that using a once per turn restriction. Storm Plow is a fairly costly attack and won’t be 1-hit KOing pretty easily, so the [L] Energy acceleration looks fine too.
Wording errors:
- Storm Plow’s wording seems quite tricky and the best wording is a bit ambiguous. My best guess for wording is based on the SSH-era Trainer Billowing Smoke: “If your opponent’s Pokémon is Knocked Out by damage from this attack, you may attach any Prize cards you would take for that Knock Out to your Pokémon as Special Energy cards in any way you like. Those cards provide [L] Energy only while they are attached to a Pokémon.”. But it seems you used a Jirachi Prism Star reference, and that should be fine too. (-0pts)
Creativity/Originality: 17/20
(Ideas are a little under-developed.)
Wording: 15/15
(Tricky wording; see above for a suggestion, but your way is technically fine too.)
Believability/Playability: 13/15
(Some unclear edge cases.)
Total: 45/50
Ashco:
Tornadus, Thundurus, & Landorus-GX - Colorless - HP300
Basic [TAG TEAM]
[L][F][C] Storm Caller 160
Discard an Energy attached to this Pokémon. You may choose one effect of this attack:
- Discard a [L] Energy attached to this Pokémon. Until the end of your next turn, this Pokémon is [L] Type. Flip a coin. If heads, your opponent's Active Pokémon is now Paralyzed.
- Discard a [F] Energy attached to this Pokémon. Until the end of your next turn, this Pokémon is [F] Type. This attack does 20 damage to each of your opponent's Benched Pokémon. (Don't apply Weakness or Resistance for Benched Pokémon.)
Switch 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon with their Active Pokémon. If this Pokémon has at least 3 extra Energy attached to it (in addition to this attack's cost), discard 1 of your opponent's Benched Pokémon and all cards attached to it. If your opponent has no Benched Pokémon, this attack does nothing. (You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)
Weakness: - Resistance: - Retreat: [C][C]
TAG TEAM rule: When your TAG TEAM Pokemon is knocked out, your opponent takes 3 Prize cards.
Brilliant choice of Pokemon! I’d have been disappointed had none of the Forces of Nature appeared in this competition, but here you’ve delivered all three!
Storm Caller is a fun and flavourful way to represent different weather. I like how it changes the Pokemon’s type and has an additional thematic effect (paralyze for thunderstorms, splash damage for sandstorms etc), although it would’ve been nice to see more out-of-the-box secondary effects on this one. Forces of Nature-GX actually works quite synergistically with the attack - you can gust in a Pokemon weak to either [F] or [L] type, or discard an annoying Benched Pokemon that is weak to neither. Flavour and synergy is good, but there isn’t too much exploration of new design space, netting a solid 14/20 for creativity from me.
Balance looks great. The damage output is comparable to other Tag Teams which regularly swing for 160 for 3 Energy, and the GX attack is comparable to the GX attack on Garchomp & Giratina-GX.
Weakness and resistance really should’ve been [L]x2 and [F]-20 respectively like Moltres, Articuno & Zapdos Tag Team.
Wording errors:
- “one” should be 1 (-1pt)
- the “effect of this attack” part of “You may choose one effect of this attack” is superfluous (-1pt)
- There should be an “if you do” between the Energy discard and the type change. x2 (-2pts)
- The “until the end of your next turn” clause belongs after the “is [X] type” clause. x2 (-2pts)
- “Type” should not be capitalised. x2 (-1.5pt)
- The TAG TEAM rule should have “Knocked Out” capitalised, and an accented é in “Pokémon”. (-1pt)
Creativity/Originality: 14/20
(Fun flavour and synergy, but lacks much exploration of new design space.)
Wording: 6.5/15
(Some minor and major slips.)
Believability/Playability: 14/15
(Wrong Weak/Resist.)
Total: 34.5/50
Storm Caller is a fun and flavourful way to represent different weather. I like how it changes the Pokemon’s type and has an additional thematic effect (paralyze for thunderstorms, splash damage for sandstorms etc), although it would’ve been nice to see more out-of-the-box secondary effects on this one. Forces of Nature-GX actually works quite synergistically with the attack - you can gust in a Pokemon weak to either [F] or [L] type, or discard an annoying Benched Pokemon that is weak to neither. Flavour and synergy is good, but there isn’t too much exploration of new design space, netting a solid 14/20 for creativity from me.
Balance looks great. The damage output is comparable to other Tag Teams which regularly swing for 160 for 3 Energy, and the GX attack is comparable to the GX attack on Garchomp & Giratina-GX.
Weakness and resistance really should’ve been [L]x2 and [F]-20 respectively like Moltres, Articuno & Zapdos Tag Team.
Wording errors:
- “one” should be 1 (-1pt)
- the “effect of this attack” part of “You may choose one effect of this attack” is superfluous (-1pt)
- There should be an “if you do” between the Energy discard and the type change. x2 (-2pts)
- The “until the end of your next turn” clause belongs after the “is [X] type” clause. x2 (-2pts)
- “Type” should not be capitalised. x2 (-1.5pt)
- The TAG TEAM rule should have “Knocked Out” capitalised, and an accented é in “Pokémon”. (-1pt)
Creativity/Originality: 14/20
(Fun flavour and synergy, but lacks much exploration of new design space.)
Wording: 6.5/15
(Some minor and major slips.)
Believability/Playability: 14/15
(Wrong Weak/Resist.)
Total: 34.5/50
3rd Place: Luispipe8’s Tyranitar, with 42/50 points.
2nd Place: Babywind’s Thundurus V, with 45/50 points.
1st Place: Shinxed3’s Alolan Ninetales with 46.5/50 points