Team Magma Not Bad?

[yorepoor]

I was looking through the Double Crisis set, and the Team Magma cards might actually turn out semi-competitive. These are the cards that caught my attention.

Team Magma's Camerupt - Fire - HP110
Stage 1 - Evolves from Team Magma's Numel
Ability: Burndraft
Once during your turn (before your attack), you may choose 1 [R] or [D] Energy card from your discard pile and attach it to this Pokemon.
[R][C][C] Fireball: 60 damage. Move 1 Basic Energy attached to this Pokemon to 1 of your Benched Pokemon.
Weakness: Water (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 3

Team Magma's Claydol - Psychic - HP90
Stage 1 - Evolves from Team Magma's Baltoy
Ability: Magma Switch
Once during your turn (before your attack), you may move an Energy card attached to your Pokemon with Team Magma in its name to another of your Pokemon.
[P][C][C] Power Beam: 70 damage.
Weakness: Psychic (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 2

Team Magma's Groudon-EX - Fighting - HP190
Basic Pokemon
Ability: Power Saver
If there are 4 or less Pokemon in play with Team Magma in their name, this Pokemon can't attack.
[F][F][F][C] Magma Quake: 80+ damage. If your opponent's Active Pokemon has any damage counters on it, this attack does 80 more damage.
When a Pokemon-EX has been Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness: Grass (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 4

Edit: More stuff I found that makes this way more interesting. Especially Sharpedo.

Magma Pointer - Trainer
Item
Pokemon Tool: Attach a Pokemon Tool to 1 of your Pokemon that doesn’t already have a Pokemon Tool attached to it.
Your Pokemon with Team Magma in its name that this card is attached to can also use the attack on this card. (You still need the necessary Energy to use this attack.)
[F] Magma Pointer: This attack does 20 damage to one of your opponent's Pokemon. (Don't apply Weakness and Resistance for Benched Pokemon.)
You may play as many Item cards as you like during your turn (before your attack).

If you want to hit with Groudon later on.


The main idea is to strike hard with TM Groudon. To do this, we use Lasers and a combination of Claydol and Camerupt maybe Golbat/Crobat. I think it kind of speaks for itself.

The catch is of course Groudon's ability. Filling up your bench with Team Magma Pokemon isn't always ideal. So we could use Garbodor. The idea is to drop it as soon as Groudon has the right amount of energy.

It's an idea at least. It's probably not going to perform too well, but it might be worth trying out when the set comes out.

 

[Talkingcat]

I don't think they will be competitive.

Camerupt and Claydoll's attacks are not good for 3 energy, and their HP is lacking. About the best you can say for them is that the combine to make an ability-based acceleration effect. But it is pretty weak compared to pretty much everything that accelerates (two cards needs to combine to get an energy from the discard and get it to 1 other Pokemon).

Magma's Groudon is pretty horrible. 4 attachments for an attack that *might* do 160 if you have 5+ Team Magma Pokemon.

Looks to me that they've basically ensured that Magma will be a joke deck or I guess a superior theme deck.

 

[Camoclone]

Based off what scans we have now I don't think it will be Competitive. Everything just seems to be outclassed (The attackers are bad, Claydol < Aromatisse, Camerupt has a bad attack). It could be competitive depending on the other support that we get in the set though.

 

[DreamingMunna]

Can a veteran player answer this: When was the last time the TCG had archetypes??
As a Yugioh player they're very common, kind of glad to see them in Pokemon. The last time I played Pokemon TCG was in the Base Set days, and I remember Dark Pokemon and Team Rocket Pokemon but that's it.

 

[yorepoor]

I don't think they will be competitive.

Camerupt and Claydoll's attacks are not good for 3 energy, and their HP is lacking. About the best you can say for them is that the combine to make an ability-based acceleration effect. But it is pretty weak compared to pretty much everything that accelerates (two cards needs to combine to get an energy from the discard and get it to 1 other Pokemon).

Magma's Groudon is pretty horrible. 4 attachments for an attack that *might* do 160 if you have 5+ Team Magma Pokemon.

Looks to me that they've basically ensured that Magma will be a joke deck or I guess a superior theme deck.

Well, you shouldn't really care about their attacks, they're really just for energy acceleration. I don't think the energy acceleration is that bad anyway. Well, you can use Garbodor to block the ability. And with lasers, maybe some golbat stuff you can probably hit for 180 most of the time. It's not that hard to fill up the bench with random basics you need for energy acceleration anyways. It's probably really inconsistent but i wouldn't say it's gonna be terrible either.

Based off what scans we have now I don't think it will be Competitive. Everything just seems to be outclassed (The attackers are bad, Claydol < Aromatisse, Camerupt has a bad attack). It could be competitive depending on the other support that we get in the set though.

Yep, probably. Don't really understand why you think Claydol<Aromatisse though. Claydol can move some Strong Energy around and has the same HP. The attack doesn't matter since you can just transfer between your Magma pokes. Camerupt isn't that bad considering his ability. If you have some basic Fire energy discarded you can attack with 1 DCE while powering up Groudon.
But yeah, it really needs some more stuff to work with.

Edit: put more stuff in the first post

 

[Camoclone]

Based off what scans we have now I don't think it will be Competitive. Everything just seems to be outclassed (The attackers are bad, Claydol < Aromatisse, Camerupt has a bad attack). It could be competitive depending on the other support that we get in the set though.

Yep, probably. Don't really understand why you think Claydol<Aromatisse though. Claydol can move some Strong Energy around and has the same HP. The attack doesn't matter since you can just transfer between your Magma pokes. Camerupt isn't that bad considering his ability. If you have some basic Fire energy discarded you can attack with 1 DCE while powering up Groudon. But yeah, it really needs some more stuff to work with.

Claydol can only move one energy once per turn (assuming the translations are correct). Aromatisse on the other hand can move things around as much as it pleases.

 

[GadgetJax]

I know for a fact that a TON of people will play Team Magma. Not because it's competitive, but because of how fun the archetype really is. Because of how small the set is, getting the EX's shouldn't be hard whatsoever, which should make the deck rather easy to get the hold of.

Also, I don't think it's fair to comment on how good the archetype actually is just yet because we still don't have all the Team Magma scans. Who knows, maybe Team Magma Grunt will turn out to be a really strong card, or we could get some other kind of attacker that works really well.

Though, if we're going off of what we currently have from Team Magma scans, I'd say the deck is probably Tier 3-4. I would compare it's strength to something along the lines of Florges EX decks, which almost never see play. Still, if I can get my hands on the tools for it, I think it would be fun to try this deck.

 

[yorepoor]

Yep, probably. Don't really understand why you think Claydol<Aromatisse though. Claydol can move some Strong Energy around and has the same HP. The attack doesn't matter since you can just transfer between your Magma pokes. Camerupt isn't that bad considering his ability. If you have some basic Fire energy discarded you can attack with 1 DCE while powering up Groudon. But yeah, it really needs some more stuff to work with.

Oh didn't see that. Then you're kind of right. But you don't really use lots of different pokemon to transfer between, so it's less of a deal.
Claydol can only move one energy once per turn (assuming the translations are correct). Aromatisse on the other hand can move things around as much as it pleases.

I know for a fact that a TON of people will play Team Magma. Not because it's competitive, but because of how fun the archetype really is. Because of how small the set is, getting the EX's shouldn't be hard whatsoever, which should make the deck rather easy to get the hold of.

Also, I don't think it's fair to comment on how good the archetype actually is just yet because we still don't have all the Team Magma scans. Who knows, maybe Team Magma Grunt will turn out to be a really strong card, or we could get some other kind of attacker that works really well.

Though, if we're going off of what we currently have from Team Magma scans, I'd say the deck is probably Tier 3-4. I would compare it's strength to something along the lines of Florges EX decks, which almost never see play. Still, if I can get my hands on the tools for it, I think it would be fun to try this deck.

Yep, really want to try this out. It's going to be really awesome, and at least stand a chance against competitive decks. We still get more cards though, as you mentioned. Who knows, we may get a Team Magma's Catcher that doesn't require a flip or something.

 

[Pipotchi]

I have more thoughts that Ill add later but that's Team Aqua's Sharpedo, so unless it has a big change of heart its not going to be helping you get out Camerupts or Claydols


edit: Okay I have looked at the cards for a bit longer... not sure for most of them but Camerupt seems like a strong pokemon. While its attack is "weak", its ability has great synergy with Scorching Earth (which I believe is one of the strongest cards in the last set), and it can power up its attack in a single turn, deal damage, and then move an energy to a benched mon to gain some momentum. With blacksmith, a DCE and enough energy discarded, you have dealt 60 damage (80/90 with musc band/bangle) whilst also putting 3 energy on a benched fire type pokemon. One thing that also seemed interesting to me (although not competitively viable) is that Camerupt retrieves the energy types which the dragon type Mega Charizard EX needs for its attacks... maybe there could be some sort of fun synergy here. Sadly you cant blacksmith onto the Zard after its Mega Evolution though

All the other magma pokemon look okay for now, but im expecting some additional gems to make these pokemon a bit more worthwhile. 1 energy moved per turn with claydol is decent considering its anything, but i cant see this working paired with anything but basics since multiple claydol is preferred and its already a stage 1. Im actually a bit more excited with the team aqua cards so far because there is already a clear + retreat cost theme going on, and this could be paired with fun stuff like beartic and forretress, or even the new aqua kyogre EX. also access to more water pokemon after us getting dive ball is quite exciting

 

[yorepoor]

I have more thoughts that Ill add later but that's Team Aqua's Sharpedo, so unless it has a big change of heart its not going to be helping you get out Camerupts or Claydols


edit: Okay I have looked at the cards for a bit longer... not sure for most of them but Camerupt seems like a strong pokemon. While its attack is "weak", its ability has great synergy with Scorching Earth (which I believe is one of the strongest cards in the last set), and it can power up its attack in a single turn, deal damage, and then move an energy to a benched mon to gain some momentum. With blacksmith, a DCE and enough energy discarded, you have dealt 60 damage (80/90 with musc band/bangle) whilst also putting 3 energy on a benched fire type pokemon. One thing that also seemed interesting to me (although not competitively viable) is that Camerupt retrieves the energy types which the dragon type Mega Charizard EX needs for its attacks... maybe there could be some sort of fun synergy here. Sadly you cant blacksmith onto the Zard after its Mega Evolution though

All the other magma pokemon look okay for now, but im expecting some additional gems to make these pokemon a bit more worthwhile. 1 energy moved per turn with claydol is decent considering its anything, but i cant see this working paired with anything but basics since multiple claydol is preferred and its already a stage 1. Im actually a bit more excited with the team aqua cards so far because there is already a clear + retreat cost theme going on, and this could be paired with fun stuff like beartic and forretress, or even the new aqua kyogre EX. also access to more water pokemon after us getting dive ball is quite exciting

Lol oops I got rid of the Sharpedo. I guess this means Team Aqua has something going for it.
I agree that Camerupt isn't bad. I honestly think the [D] energy is a mistranslation. It would be way more logical for it to be fire and fighting since it's type in the games is fire/ground and it's meant to support groudon. That's why I think the Claydol/Camerupt/Groudon combo will be so good.
If for some reason it is actually supposed to be dragon, I guess it could be cool with Charizard.

 

[Pipotchi]

The D is for dark which makes sense because both of the bad guy teams use mightyenas (way too much).

 

[yorepoor]

Oh that does kind of make sense. Really hope for it to be a mistranslation though, so it works with groudon's attack cost.

 

[thood]

Everyone's been complaining about the Team Aqua's Kyogre and Team Magma's Groudon abilities. If you simply must play either of those cards and find that getting 4 Team Aqua/Magma Pokemon into play is too hard, then play Silent Lab. I think the reason that these two EXs look so bad is because of what we are used to with EXs. With Primal Clash, it looks like we are finally moving away from ridiculously OP EXs and back to more powerful evolutions, which is very healthy for the Meta imo.

 

[Talkingcat]

With Primal Clash, it looks like we are finally moving away from ridiculously OP EXs and back to more powerful evolutions, which is very healthy for the Meta imo.

Good point. Primal Clash and a lot of PUF EXs are quite a bit less powerful than the slightly older popular EXs- Landorus, Mewtwo, Yveltal, VirGen etc. Some of the better ones in PUF are good but not jaw dropping, and have something that holds them back a bit: Gengar has a high cost for Dark Corridor, Dialga can't quite hit 180 and has very high energy costs, Manectric's assault laser is only strong if an item is attached.

Slightly toning down EXs does seem like a great idea. Now, more well designed non-EXs and more non-EX support, please!