Pojo's Pokemon news, tips, strategies and more!

Pokemon Home

Pokedex

Price Guide Set List

Message Board

Pokemon GO Tips

Pokemon News

Featured Articles


Trading Card Game
- Price Guide
- Price Guide
- Card of the Day
- Professional Grading
- Killer Deck Reports
- Deck Garage
- William Hung
- Jason Klaczynski
- Jeremy's Deck Garage
- Johnny Blaze's Banter
- TCG Strategies
- Rulings Help
- Apprentice & Patch
- Apprentice League
- Spoilers & Translations
- Official Rules
- Featured Event Reports
- Top of the World
- An X-Act Science
- Error Cards
- Printable Checklist
- Places to Play


Nintendo Tips
- Red/Blue
- Yellow
- Gold & Silver
- Crystal
- Ruby & Sapphire
- Fire Red & Leaf Green
- Emerald
- SNAP
- Pinball
- TCG cart
- Stadium
- PuPuzzle League
- Pinball: Ruby/Sapphire
- Pokemon Coliseum
- Pokemon Box
- Pokemon Channel


GameBoy Help
- ClownMasters Fixes
- Groudon's Den
- Pokemon of the Week

E-Card Reader FAQ's
- Expedition
- Aquapolis
- Skyridge
- Construction Action Function
- EON Ticket Manual


Deck Garage
- Pokemaster's Pit Stop
- Kyle's Garage
- Ghostly Gengar


Cartoon/Anime
- Episode Listing
- Character Bios
- Movies & Videos
- What's a Pokemon?
- Video List
- DVD List


Featured Articles

Pojo's Toy Box

Books & Videos

Downloads

Advertise With Us
- Sponsors
-
Links

Chat

About Us
Contact Us


Magic
Yu-Gi-Oh!
DBZ
Pokemon
Yu Yu Hakusho
NeoPets
HeroClix
Harry Potter
Anime
Vs. System
Megaman



Pojo's Pokemon Card of the Day

 

Expert Belt

Arceus

Date Reviewed: 12.16.09

Ratings & Reviews Summary

Modified: 4.67
Limited: 4.50

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale.
1 being the worst. 
3 ... average.  
5 is the highest rating.

Back to the main COTD Page

Baby Mario
Top 4 UK Nats

Expert Belt

 

First off, I just want to say how great the art is. A martial arts belt in a ‘come and get some’ pose . . . hilarious!

 

Expert Belt is probably the best and most game-changing Trainer since Poke Turn. Remember the EX Pokémon? High HP and big attacks, but when they are knocked out your opponent gets two Prizes? Well, Expert Belt effectively transforms any Pokémon into a Pokémon EX.

 

When you attach Expert Belt to a Pokémon, it gains 20 HP and each of its attacks do 20 more damage to the active. Remember that spread damage to the Bench is NOT boosted by Expert Belt, and it doesn’t affect attacks which place damage counters either. It return for this surge of power, your opponent gets an extra prize if a Pokémon with Expert Belt is knocked out.

 

Experienced deckbuilders will straight away see how powerful this card is, and how many ways there are to abuse it. Kingdra LA now does 80 + 20 damage for one Energy, Flygon RR no longer relies on benched Evolutions to do decent damage, and Dialga G becomes ridiculously hard to knock out and is able to hit for 30 while locking Trainers with Deafen. Probably the safest way to use the card is in decks with low Energy attacks that can be recovered with Super Scoop Up and re-played (maybe using Broken Time-Space). SP decks that have access to Poke Turn also have plenty of ways to avoid the double-prize KO.

 

Really, though, players are only starting to discover the many ways to use and abuse this card. Two or three Expert Belt is likely to become a staple of offensive decks for the remainder of the format. That can only be a good thing, as it adds an extra dimension of skill and strategy to the game as players seek to exploit the benefits that this card brings while avoiding its downside as much as possible.

 

Rating

 

Modified: 4.75 (changes the game . . . for the better!)

Limited: 4.5 (great here too, but losing 2 Prizes is more of an issue)

 

Guy

Expert Belt:

Expert belt is one of my favorite cards of the Arceus set, and I believe it will battle with Spiritomb for title of "Best Card of the Set." I personally use two in my deck. Yes it gives your opponent another card when the pokemon it is attached to is knocked out, but the extra 20 hp and 20 damage can be CRUCIAL to the game. For example, I was playing a Flylock deck the other day, and my opponent locked my Claydol active with a Trapinch and was going to trap me for 8 turns while he got his bench totally set up. Turn 1 of this trap I accelerated an energy, attached an energy, and attached an Expert Belt to Claydol and knocked out the Trapinch to get out of a sticky situation 7 turns early. Yes it gave the opponent two prizes next turn, but I ended up pulling the game out 6 prizes to 5 because of Expert Belt's crucial extra 20 damage. One example that happened to me, I was playing against an Expert Belted Dialga G level X with 2 special Metal energy. In other words it took 160 damage to knock it out...something my deck was incapable of doing. If I got close to knocking out the Dialga, it would get Poke Turned back to the hand along with the Expert belt and I would have to deal with another one. I lost this game 6-5. Expert belt is helpful in Flygon, Salamence, Dialga G (in my opinion), Super Uxie, Tangrowth, Machamp, and practically any other stage 2 deck. I say it's one of the best cards in the game. Try it out, but be careful with it. Expert belt is not a card that should just randomly be played; it does have consequences.

Modified: 4.5/5
Limited: 4.5/5


CopyrightŠ 1998-2009 pojo.com
This site is not sponsored, endorsed, or otherwise affiliated with any of the companies or products featured on this site. This is not an Official Site.