Subject: A Logical Reply to "The Folly of LC"
Reply to "The Folly of LC"
By Chris "Baboon" K., Staff Writer at Pokeschool.com

Before I begin my reply, I'd like to state that I don't usually write articles on this sort of topic. I usually only write about Single card strategy, as Ness does (did). But, I felt this required a response from an article writer...

All of the beginning sentences that were from Mr. Hornberg's article, about the rumors not coming true are hardly worth mentioning. EVERY set that Wizards has released in the U.S. has had numerous rumors shrouding the set. You've got to learn from that. Every set, while it's still in the drafting stage, can have questionable reliability. Nobody knows what will happen, not even Wizards employees! Sure, I believe that Wizards is holding much knowledge back from the public, even making false information, but what else would they do? If they came out, before LC was released, and said "This set contains 100% reprints, and nothing special besides reverse holos", do you think they would have sold boosters? Probably not.

"Unfortunately for us, Wizards best kept secret was the greatest flop in the Pokemon TCG History."

Actually, Base2 was the biggest flop, in my opinion. Back in January 2000, Base and Jungle boosters STILL overrun store shelves. LC DOES have a purpose, as Mr. Hornberg doesn't seem to understand. While I don't 100% agree with the Legendary Collection, it did serve a purpose of adding to the Modified format, which was getting quite dry after the length of time it's been in effect.

"Nothing new came from Legendary Collection. Players were provided with an abbreviation of the first four sets of the game, with nothing of major power reprinted. "

Ok, I'll agree there. Nothing new DID come from this set. BUT, I do have to put my foot in the door in the "nothing of major power reprinted" idea. Wizards created this set to help in the Modified format. NOT to help Unlimited (Standard as I call it). There is no way you can compare any of these cards to Sneasel, Rocket's Zapdos, Professor Oak, or Computer Search! And they don't HAVE to compare. The 4 I mentioned aren't allowed in Modified anymore! But, these cards, such as Base Charizard, Venusaur, Ninetales, Dark Vaporeon, etc. ARE good in comparison to many other Modified cards, from the Neo sets. There ARE major power cards here, for MODIFIED.

"Chansey, Hitmonchan, Double Colorless Energy, Jungle Scyther, Base Electabuzz, Super Energy Removal, Clefable, Itemfinder, and Computer Search were most likely the first nine cards R&D threw out."

Wizards originally stated, back around the time of Gym: Challenge, that Modified was placed into effect because the existing environment was imbalanced. While I love using Chansey, DCE, and Clefable, I cannot say that these cards would have helped Modified. It would be just like when Feraligatr first poked his head out of the Neo Genesis booster packs. Total chaos would break loose, simply because of these cards' ability! In Standard, these cards are very strong, but when placed in a format without Oak and crew, they're broken beyond belief. If Wizards started a format without the super-broken cards, they'll have to follow up with it, and tone all of the other sets following down also.

"This looting the game of Pokemon’s “Power Nine” is a tragedy in my mind. As of right now, evolution decks dominate the scene. Wizards has dumbed the game down to mind numbing proportions, making it truly the game people stereotyped it as. The format is slow, incredibly simple, and it painfully screams with all the agony and horror it can muster up to supply it with a fast haymaker-like deck, that packs a powerful punch within the first 6 turns of the game. "

Well, what else do you expect?!? The IDEA of Modified is to make evolution decks. While I'm not necessarily a supporter of Modified, I agree that this change to evolution decks was necessary. You can STILL have a Basic Pokemon deck. It might not be a decent Haymaker, but 1999 is 1999, and 2002 is NOW. I'm a fan of quick games, and I DO like Standard, despite everyone else's complaints. It is broken, but I just don't like Modified. Deeming this format "slow" is appropriate, but originally, having a format where about 25% of the victories came in the first couple turns, had to go. Once a new (or revived old) Haymaker comes back, EVERYONE would go back to using the SAME cards in the SAME decks...etc.

"It’s time that they think of the advanced player for once in their time as a company and throw us a real bone, in this case, they should have reprinted at least some of the greats from way back when."

By all means, they ARE thinking of the advanced players. I don't know the difference between advanced players where I live, and where he lives, but the advanced player should look upon this as a challenge. Taking semi-decent cards from the past, and making them good takes SKILL!

"Then again, Wizards must want to do away with that era in Pokemon TCG history, especially when they banned Sneasel, who was single handedly building a speed deck for the Modified format."

While I agree 90% of the time, that 10% has to be spoken. Wizards does NOT want to eliminate that time period. That was the basis of this card game. Without the years of 1999 and 2000, we wouldn't be up to where we are today. And, Sneasel is 150% broken. Once you allow ONE power card into a limited format, everything suffers.

"...slow, evolution decks, who all share a common goal: get a powerhouse on the bench, build him up, and let him loose on your opponent."

Um... Isn't that the point of EVERY deck...?

"No one would make a cake without flour. Well, we have all the necessary sides for Raindance – Fossil Articuno, Gyarados, and other good stuff to supplement them in the other Neo sets. Yet, where’s Blastoise?"

Where's Blastoise? Back at Wizards, where it should stay. Blastoise isn't super-ultra-powerful, but it's the fact that once you get one into play, you can literally DUMP down (W) Energy! That's too powerful for a limited format. Also, in Modified, you CAN use some of these "ingredients" as self-sufficient cards. I've been writing single card strategy articles for MONTHS, and had my 35th article posted on June 25. I know, and many others know that even though the main supplient is missing, cards can STILL be used. It's just not as effective. So? Doesn't bother me too much. Modified is built on Energy-sucking Evolution Pokemon! That's what Articuno, Gyarados, and many others are!

"One thing that I find ingenious about it is that the packs are now friendly to the new players. They are now organized to provide players with 2 sets of 2 different basic Pokemon, and 1 evolution from each, a rare, an energy, and a reverse foil."

I'm agreeing here. The Reverse Holo cards are most likely one of the biggest sellers of LC to the public. Very wise move on Wizards' part by doing this.

"The cards they reprinted also fit into this format incredibly well. Almost all of them are grubby energy eaters, who can do cool things when built up."

Ok, I'm confused now. It makes it look like two different people wrote the parts of this article. For the beginning, Mr. Hornberg was thrashing these "nothing of major power" cards. Now, he's saying they're cool? I'm confused.

"Legendary Collection does more harm to the game of Pokemon than it does help."

Maybe, maybe not. The idea was to modify the Modified format. For collectors, there's now shiny "new" reverse holos. For players, the actual LC CARDS aren't as useful, however, because the Base, Jungle, Fossil, Rocket, and Base2 versions of these same cards may still be used. This set wasn't a horrible choice.

""It fails to help Unlimited in any one way, thus giving old school players yet another set to shrug off as “useless.”"

To Wizards, Unlimited, or Standard, is a thing of the past. It's not like they don't care about Unlimited, but it's not on their list of priorities. They're trying to make Modified succeed, and that's it!

And, Mr. Hornberg mentioned how "players are through pleading for a good set". Um...Last I checked, over half of the Pokemon players that frequent the message boards and websites, like, or appreciated the release of LC. I do like this set, simply for the addition to Modified, but I do feel that Wizards should have had another set release scheduled for shortly after LC, due to the lack of new cards.

While I disagreed most of the time, there are a FEW decent arguments written by Mr. Hornberg. Every person is entitled to his or her own opinion, and if I offended him, or anybody, I'm sorry, but that's how I had to write my article.

Thank you for reading.

~Baboon
Baboon@pokeschool.com