aroramage |
Our #5 card brings us to one of the
big Supporters from this set, and I'm not talking about
Skyla (who I am SO happy to see return to the game after
a few month's break!). No, I'm talking about Brigette,
who is the sister to the "Bill" of the Hoenn region,
Lanette. Which is to say, Lanette's the one who
organized the PC Storage System for the Hoenn region,
similar to how Bill organized the system for the Kanto
and Johto regions.
Brigette operates in the Pokemon
Bank, these days, and this translates pretty well to her
effect as a Supporter. Search cards are always a big
part of the game, and Brigette offers more than just
search power - she offers flexibility! When you play
her, you're allowed to search for either 1 Basic
Pokemon-EX OR 3 Basic non-EX Pokemon and put them
directly onto your Bench. Course, you may not always
have the space for 3 extra Pokemon, or you may not be
running a deck with at least 3 non-EX Basics, but
regardless, you do what you can.
This is a fantastic effect to have!
With it, you not only get to play out one of your
strongest cards directly, but you also get to speed up
your entire deck! And if you're grabbing for 3 Basics
instead of 1 Basic-EX, that's even better! You can thin
your deck out, thus improving your chances of getting
the card you need, while also setting things up for your
next turn - whether that's Evolving your 3 Basics,
Mega-Evolving your Basic-EX (if it can), or even just
powering up all of your guys at once!
Personally, I think the deck that
will make the absolute MOST use of Brigette will be
Grass decks running the Forest of Broken Plants - after
all, while most decks will be halted by the Evolution
ruling that keeps Pokemon from evolving during the turn
they've been put into play, Grass decks can circumvent
that rule and go straight to their best stuff with ease!
So in a way, this is a great card for most every deck
out there, except for Grass decks who only get that much
faster.
Still, Brigette is bound to be a
staple in just about every deck, everyone should be
running at least 1 copy of her - I'd recommend running
2-3 copies especially for EX-heavy decks, though keep in
mind the more you run, the more you risk potentially
making her a dead draw late in the game. After all, if
you can't grab a Pokemon or your Bench is already full,
she can't do much to help you there.
Rating
Standard: 4.5/5 (an absolute must
for just about any deck, she speeds up your plays and
brings stuff out onto the field faster than ever before)
Expanded: 4.5/5 (ABSOLUTELY)
Limited: 5/5 (you may only really
need 1 copy here, but if you pulled a Basic-EX, you're
solid)
Arora Notealus: You know how her
sister is Lan-ette? And how she's also the main
organizer for Pokemon Box Ruby & Sapphire and, more
recently, Pokemon Bank? It's like she's some sort of
"bridge" between all of your 3rd gen games...... :P
Weekend Thought: Kind of a crazy
week, huh? Two twofers (or I guess threefers, with
Florges BREAK there) in a week? But in any case, do you
agree with our list? Think that there's a card far more
deserving of the spot? I imagine a lot of people's
mileage will vary, especially with Florges BREAK there,
but I imagine there's at least a couple of cards people
are expecting for the Top...4 now, I guess?
Next Time: Well naturally he has to
show up on here.
|
Otaku |
That’s right, our fifth place pick is also going
up today!
Brigette
(XY: BREAKthrough 134/162, 161/132) is a
Supporter, that precious once-per-turn Trainer that
tends to be the backbone of most decks, as it supplies
the primary draw power in the form of either
Professor Juniper or Professor Sycamore, and
in Expanded usually augmented by N or Colress
and then several other tricks. Said tricks are
usually search like Skyla (any Trainer) or
Pokémon like Winona (any three Colorless Pokémon)
or Pokémon Fan Club (any two Basic Pokémon) or
powerful plays like Lysandre (which wins you
games by forcing the opposing Benched Pokémon of your
choice into your opponent’s Active slot). So…
Brigette needs to be really good to see play,
especially in Expanded (there is a power gap in
Standard). So what does she do?
Brigette
allows you to search your deck either for any one Basic
Pokémon-EX or any three Basic Pokémon. If
you don’t need a Basic Pokémon-EX at that moment, it is
a 50% better Pokémon Fan Club; if you do need a
Basic Pokémon-EX, it is only half as good as that other
search Supporter. Such a fine distinction means
this will be pretty deck specific… or will it?
Quite a few decks already include two pretty key cards:
Hoopa-EX (XY: Ancient Origins 36/98,
89/98) and Shaymin-EX (XY: Roaring Skies
77/108, 106/108). Both have potent Abilities that
trigger when you Bench either of these two: Hoopa-EX
and its “Scoundrel Ring” Ability lets you search your
deck for and add any three Pokémon-EX to your hand
(Basic or Mega Evolutions) while “Setup” has made
Shaymin-EX a staple for nearly all decks and often
in multiples because drawing until you have six cards in
hand is phenomenal. So why might these help
Brigette and not make Pokémon Fan Club
more attractive?
In the decks running one or both of these but also
many important, non-Pokémon-EX Basics that aren’t
Colorless-Types (Winona being the choice if they
are) you can still get that key Pokémon-EX with your
Supporter usage if you absolutely must, but you can also
get the Basic Pokémon you really need. If the deck
runs Unown (XY: Ancient Origins 30/98) for
every Basic Pokémon you need less than the full three,
you can convert it to drawing a card (at least if you
have enough Unown left in your deck). Ultra
Ball is another common deck sight and if so, it can
then just grab whatever Pokémon-EX you do need; after
all Hoopa-EX can turn around and grab three of
them. There are some very popular decks that use
small Basic Pokémon that are not Pokémon-EX as
attackers, such as Night March or those built around
Vespiquen (XY: Ancient Origins 10/98) and/or
Flareon (BW: Plasma Freeze 12/116).
The latter which runs both of those Stage 1 Pokémon also
runs multiple Shaymin-EX, a full four copies of
Unown, but no other Pokémon-EX. Bridgette
may have a place there, though as Flareon
[Plasma] means it is an Expanded deck, you probably have
enough superior options. For a straight up
Vespiquen deck in Standard? That seems like a
probable fit. Of course it is a must run in
Limited unless you pull a Basic Pokémon-EX and
plan to run an entire deck built only around it (as in
there will be no other Basic Pokémon).
Ratings
Standard:
3.65/5
Expanded:
3.25/5
Limited:
4.9/5
Summary:
Brigette technically can fit into any
contemporary deck unless it runs just a single Basic
Pokémon, but it won’t be optimal unless you need three
Basic non-Pokémon-EX more than you need two Pokémon
where one or both can be Pokémon-EX. It might
actually be quite valuable to a few key decks and decent
in a few more, but there are also decks where it is
pretty obviously outclassed...
...which is why I had Brigette as my 11th place
pick. At the same time, I’m not all that worried
about her ranking so high; the voting points for this
section of the Top 10 were pretty close together.
Just as a quick rundown, Brigette scored only two
higher than the other CotD for today, Gengar (our
sixth place card). Gengar managed only two more
Empoleon (our seventh place pick), and
Empoleon was just one higher than Magnezone
(the eighth place card). Magnezone was only one
point higher than our tied 9th and 10th place finishers,
the combo of Florges (including Florges BREAK)
and M Glalie-EX. So just six points between
10th place and 5th.
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