HGSS-ON poll : make yourself heard

Hi TCGone community.

After discussing with an admin about the administration of the HGSS format they have expressed that they would take in consideration the opinion of the community on what format would be part of the HGSS-on format.

The reason why I bring this topic is because the HGSS-on format lasted trough, not 1, but 2 years world championship. So theres an HGSS-on format for 2011 and 2012.

The problem is that one of those 2 years of format was incredibly inferior to the other.

The 2012 format saw the introduction of EX pokemons in Next Destiny and Dark Explorers. Because of the powercreep the EX pokemon brought and the fact that 2 of them (mewtwo and darkrai EX) were so much stronger than all the others, the meta was centralized around 2-3 decks. Also, the HGSS support made basic pokemon deck so good, only one evolution line was good enough to make it to a world championship deck. I know now this seems normal, but this was the first year of this era of the game.

The 2011 format was in my opinion far more balanced and quite frankly more fun. I think the world championship deck of that year speak for themselves.

I would therefore like to propose the HGSS-on to stop at Black and white or at least to offer a choice between HGSS 2011 and 2012.

I hope you guys have a great day everyday,
blason24

1 Like

HGSS lasted 2 worlds formats and three rotations because it was a 5 set series.The powercreep of every rotation brings in new cards and ends old cards; Pokemon TCG is what you’d call a live game. There were plenty of Stage 1 and Stage 2 decks that made it into 2011-2012 like Mismagius, Vanilluxe,Magnezone Prime, Scizor Prime, and Chandelure. Just because TPCi didn’t sell these decks doesn’t mean they’re completely invalid to the format.

Most new career players for 03-04 jump to Team Magma as their decks simply because it won worlds, but in hindsight the deck I can argue isn’t nearly as effective.

HGSS-on should stick to the course the admins already have planned, which is the world’s format of that year, HGSS-DEX.

That being said, TCGOne already has an Ecard series format, and custom formats that limit based on the set’s main-game series would be interesting. HGSS-CoL, BW-PLB, XY-EVO, etc, which I am not opposed to.

I haven’t played this format very much but I am interested in trying out both versions to understand why there may be an issue with EX era cards in the format.

These are lists of the top decks for :
2011 : http://www.topcutevents.com/2011.html
and for
2012 : http://www.topcutevents.com/2012.html
The 2012 meta was far more centralized around big exs and/or stall decks, which was in all pretty toxic and no fun at all. This is why I want the format to at least be separated.

3 Likes

I’m all for playing pre-EX format if it means I can win using the best named deck I’ve ever seen ‘SP Obama’

3 Likes

SP obama will be a little later, it was before the hgss on rotation.

1 Like

2011 is the best format by far. Big basics like darkrai ex , mewtwo ex, terrakion, and tornadus centralize the meta. Decks like CMT, junk hunt darkrai, darkrai terrakion, and mixes of them force out cards like machamp and donphan prime that turn into worse versions of a retaiate from terrakion.

2012 was the start of mewtwo wars, and heavy switch/sky arrow bridge lines to move around the same 5 pokemon to avoid resistances. If your opponent has darkrai active, switch terrakion. Terrakion active? switch mewtwo. DCEs and dead draws decide games rather than deck building and well thought out play.

2011 on the other hand has at least 5 good cards of any type you could imagine. Although 2011 giants could still compete in 2012, stage two decks became harder and harder to pull off when reshiram and zekrom can do 120 as a basic. Magnezone prime allows you to run through your deck for resources, yanmega prime rewards thought out play with copycats, judges, pont, and search/discard cards. I could write pages about why 2011 is one of, if not the best format.

Almost every card printed in the triumphant set has a niche and can be used well. Triumphant Best Set

HGSS format should be from: HeartGold &SoulSilver-Call of Legends, and include promotional cards (HGSS01-HGSS025) and Victory medal. Im basing this on Jason Klazynski’s Blog where he talks about Retro PTCG. He talks about the meta and includes a bunch of playable decks. There is a lot of potential in this format, definitely my favorite.

jkclaczpokemon.wordpress.com/hs/

I think there should also be a D&P/Platinum Format: D&P-Arceus and promotional cars (DP01-DP56) and POP Series 6-9 and Victory Medal. There are many fun decks and other OP ones.

2011 had five decks in worlds top 16. 2012 had five decks in top 16 and 1 more in top 32. US nats for both years had similar variety. Two decks dominated 2011 in terms of popularity, while 1 did in 2012 . They were both very centralized and 2012 only a bit more so and that year had a few nats topped by rogue decks like klinklang and quad terrakion. Either way that doesn’t really determine the quality of the format it is just a vague indicator of how quickly the format gets boring. I believe that both formats are quite skill testing and deep outside of deck choice and think that there should be a split between worlds 2011 and 2012. In terms of deck variety I think hgss-nvi is far superior to both and similarly skill testing. I would prefer all 3 being offered.

. I played a lot at my LGS in the 2011 AND 2012 standard format and from my experience the 2011 gameplay felt less like a game of rock-paper-sissors. HG/SS brought cards with very unique and interesting pokepowers/pokebodies (Celebi Prime, Magnezone Prime, Smeargle, Pachirisu, etc.)but the mons to abuse these methods of acceleration/card draw were not pushed to the point that ex mons did.

We already have formats where EX Pokemon reign as the best haymakers and the best support pokepowers/bodies; mixing the power crept 2012 haymakers with the powerful 2011 evolutions of hgss would create another ex centered format where Prime pokemon dont matter unless they have a absurd ability because the ex mons have superior setup speeds and rate for their cost and deck slots.

If the problem is EX Pokemon, why not stop HGSS-on at Noble Victories? It was a cool cities format that featured a variety of playstyles and less linear gameplay than 2011 worlds format. There is definitely a community of hgss-nvi players that want a home.

2 Likes

I agree

I can definitely get behind that. My memory of that relative time period is not perfect, so when i mentioned the 2012 and 2011 formats i just thought of how standard felt before the release of Next Destinies and Dark Explorers versus afterwards. With a permanent format on a site like tcgone I know from playing a lot of Base-Gym that a large cardpool can prevent formats from feeling stale or solved, so including more legal sets into a new format like this would be good.

I agree. We should have a format for this. We should also have an expanded anything goes. I wanna test around with cards that got banned because pokemon is too soft.

High activity on this thread. How 'bout you guys actually played this format?

There isnt much to do with only 2 packs available… You arent too quick are you?

There isnt much to do with only 2 packs available… You arent too quick are you?

Don’t you mean sets?

Yeah, he means different types of packs.