Tag Call #10 – Top 12 Pokemon Cards of 2019

Otaku

Tag Call (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 206/236, 270/236) is our 10th-place pick.  We just reviewed this as our 5th-place pick for SM – Cosmic Eclipse a little over a month ago.  This Trainer-Item lets you search your deck for up to two TAG TEAM cards, be they Pokémon or Supporters.  Both kinds of TAG TEAM cards have a major presence in our modern metagame, and you’re able to get two at once with next-to-no cost.

TAG TEAM Pokémon didn’t even need the help – as Pokémon-GX, they have Cherish Ball – but it really enhanced the TAG TEAM Supporters.  They’d still be useful in many decks sans Tag Call, but with it, they can either run lower counts of TAG TEAM cards without taking a big risk, go for incredible reliability with heavy counts of the Supporter(s) and Tag Call, or a mix of both.  TAG TEAM Supporters don’t do big draw or general search well enough for decks to run purely on them, but with a few regular Supporters and/or Abilities supplementing things, it is a great deal.

For Standard, that isn’t Theorymon, but me reporting what tournament results suggest.  For the Expanded Format, it is Theorymon and probably not quite as good of a deal; Item-lock, more Supporters for the TAG TEAM Supporters to compete with, and less specialized search options for Tag Call to compete against.  Yes, not quite as rosy a prediction as I made in the previous review; not due to actual data but reconsidering what I already had.  For the Limited Format, you run it even if you have no TAG TEAM anything, just as an excuse to look through your current deck and then shuffle it.

Ratings

• Standard: 4/5
• Expanded: 3.5/5
• Limited: 4/5

Tag Call was also my 10th-place pick, some I’m pretty happy with it placing here.  I will explain my reasoning, though.  As mentioned in the article, it is a great card and used in many decks, though not all.  It makes all the other TAG TEAM cards a bit better, as opposed to winning you games directly.  It is also only just joined the allowable cardpool, so it hasn’t had as much time to leave its mark on 2019 as the cards released earlier.  All this is why I didn’t want to place it too high on my own list, but definitely wanted it to show up somewhere on it.

Vince

Tag Call might not have time to effect the year of 2019, being released on SM Cosmic Eclipse, but it grew to become an important card from the get-go for certain decks. Being able to fetch two TAG TEAM cards helps consistency a lot and it’s definitely been used in a variety of decks not limited to:

• -Pikachu & Zekrom
• -Reshiram & Charizard
• -Mewtwo & Mew
• -Arceus & Dialga & Palkia
• -Gardevoir & Sylveon
• -Various TAG TEAM Supporter cards

-Sylveon for its Beloved Pulse attack.

Obviously the limitation of what it can fetch also limits how it can be used, but that’s not to say it’s a bad card. It goes with being able to be maxed out in few decks and maybe a loose staple in other decks due to Tag Team Supporter cards. Expanded wouldn’t change things much, but there’s more item lock strategies in that environment.

Ratings:

• Standard: 3.7/5
• Expanded: 3.6/5
• Limited: 4.5/5

aroramage

The only Cosmic Eclipse card that really made it this high, it’s apparent that Tag Call has had about as immediate an impact on the game as Arceus & Dialga & Palkia-GX, and while the latter made up an entirely new deck archetype on its own, this card pretty much helped out a variety of decks already around.

It’s no question: Tag Team-GX completely changed the landscape of the metagame in 2019. So why wouldn’t having a card that grabs you any Tag Team-GX you want – let alone 2 of them – be included in every deck that runs one? There’s also the Tag Team Supporters that came out this set as well, which added on to Tag Call’s impact by being able to grab onto those cards too!

So while it didn’t make my list, again I’m not surprised at seeing on the overall list. It’s a pretty powerful card, made it into the Top 5 of our list for Cosmic Eclipse, and it’s already made its way into a ton of decks. So yeah, good card here!

Rating

Standard: 4/5 (supports a ton of deck archetypes for the game)

Expanded: 4/5 (pretty much only in a specific group of decks, but still strong enough for any deck that can play Tag Team Supporters)

Limited: 5/5 (plenty of Tag Teams to nab here)

Arora Notealus: Having so many Types in the game, it’s understandable that there are a lot of different ways to play the game. But not every Type is particularly strong or great at what it does, or at least what it’s usually able to do, in any given format. So my third wish is to really strengthen the Types in what they’re able to do – whether that’s Water’s ability to rain Energy from their hand, or Grass’s Statuses and healing, or Metal’s durability, or Fighting’s offensive power, or even just Psychic’s plethora of damage spreading effects. Obviously there’s not a whole lot that can be done without breaking the game in certain ways, with what I describe, but taking Hearthstone as the primary example here, all I’d like is for there to be a focus on what makes each Type unique, and what can be done to bump up those strengths and accentuate their Weaknesses, outside of just the one printed on the card.

Next Time: Never go to war without a well thought-out plan.