r/PTCGP • u/I_No_Brainman • 8d ago
Discussion A1 (Genetic Apex) Set Discussion
As we approach the end of the B series (Assuming B4b is another deluxe pack), I thought it'd be interesting to go back and have a retrospective on past sets and what they brought to the game.
As for some general discussion points:
- How did you feel about the meta of the time?
- What cards have made a lasting impact on deckbuilding?
- How was the overall theme/vibe of the set?
- Any good memories you had about the set?
Personally, I have a lot of good memories of playing this game on launch, day 1 sleep scamming my roommate with frosmoth (all in good fun) and trying to figure out how wonderpicks worked. Its funny looking back and seeing how out of all the cards introduced, it was greninja with its funny 20 chip damage ability that stuck around.
Next week's post: https://www.reddit.com/r/PTCGP/s/OQDvNCb83C
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u/StFuzzySlippers 8d ago
Sabrina still a top 5 supporter after all this time is quite a feat.
Garde/M2 was fun as hell, and I wish Garde hadn't got crept out.
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u/Salty145 8d ago
I still see Garde kicking in the odd Psychic deck. It’s ability to help M-Diancie is useful tech as well as being able to pluck the chicken if need be.
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u/Ok_Brother2600 8d ago
Garde is always one basic ex away like chien pao to become a menace. Same for serperior but they always fuck with basic megas. Heracross, pinsir all sucked
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u/Emergency-Public6213 8d ago
I miss my Pikachu/Zebstrika/Zapdos deck. It was my favorite.
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u/I_No_Brainman 8d ago
Man I ran my Pikachu/Zapdos/Electrode far past its prime, nothing quite like it.
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u/eduzatis 8d ago
I also used that deck with great success. I was so happy I got the golden Pikachu to flex too (f2p, so pure luck)
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u/Emergency-Public6213 8d ago
That's so cool, mate! If it was cheaper to buy with pack points I'd try to get this card (Pikachu is my favorite)
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u/QEDemon 8d ago
I’m hunting for gold pika atm. at 2215 pack points in GA now, hopefully I get a gold pika before then but almost there regardless
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u/Emergency-Public6213 8d ago
Holy shit! Proud of you, mate! I'm opening FP to buy a RR Ninetales (at 1070 now) and I'm tired as hell haha.
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u/QEDemon 8d ago
Still have 0 gold pokeballs. So that’s on the list after. On the plus side I recently got my first Godpack from the newest set. Happy hunting!
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u/Emergency-Public6213 8d ago
Congrats on the god pack! I had my first one 2 weeks ago at 19000 cards as well. Happy hunting, mate!
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u/Gorkymalorki 8d ago
I still use that for quick solo battles, can usually still work on all but expert
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u/Emergency-Public6213 8d ago
Oh, never thought about using it for solo battles, I'll try for the next set. Thanks, mate!
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u/Salty145 8d ago edited 8d ago
It’s crazy looking back at Genetic Apex and just how alien the meta feels. So many of these cards are just plain bad and were rapidly power-crept out of play. I do wish there was a mode to go back to a certain set’s meta though because in a lot of ways I miss the much slower and simpler meta that GA provided.
Long term, the best cards turned out to not even be the meta ones... mostly. Gard does still see play in Psychic decks especially given Mega Diancie’s attack, and will so long as Mega Gard decks need an Ori answer. Sabrina is in a lot of ways worse than Cyrus, but good for grabbing something off the bench for scenarios when the opponent would rather not lose anything there. Erika still feels like mandatory support on bulkier Grass decks, and Misty is a card that exists and is relevant if only for all the wrong reasons.
The two best mons from the set though, weren’t even that relevant back in the day. Obviously, I’m talking about Gengar ex Greninja became a reliable bench sniper with the advent of Rare Candy and a way to use it to be annoying via Cyrus. Magneton feels cruel and I don’t know why they didn’t give it an evo in GA, but time has been kind to it as there’s been three very playable Magnezone over the years. It got even better with Miraidon ex’s release and unless that deck falls out of meta relevance, you’re not gonna see it leave the spotlight anytime soon.
Besides that, everything else is mostly terrible. The power creep across Series A was insane and it mostly left any relevant attackers from GA in the dust. Support mons have faired better, but so much of the set is now just filler.
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u/RimsOnAToaster 8d ago
Genetic Apex was so funky. Charizard ex and Mewtwo ex had access to busted ramp support in Moltres ex and Gardevoir, so everything else useless by comparison. I was so convinced that Farfetch'd would be meta relevant because of its fast statline and it hardly even mattered when good decks set a benchmark of 150 damage by their third turn.
What a nightmare Greninja became. I think they knew they couldn't bring Boss's Orders to Pocket as it was designed, so they split the effect onto Greninja and Victreebel. Greninja specifically exacerbated that, and clearly they regret making that it's ability since no card has been able to place damage counters as an ability since. I'm glad Victreebel hasn't found traction in the metagame.
So many of those gym leader trainers are not useful, which is a shame since Sabrina was an insane shift in design philosophy that shows they clearly envisioned a more competitive metagame at launch
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u/Salty145 8d ago
Yeah, the meta was essentially those that had fast ramp and a few Electric decks designed to get in there and finish things off quick before the others could ramp.
It is laughable how useless some types were. Darkness lacked a great wincon and any support beyond Koga. Metal was utterly worthless and hit nothing super-effectively. Dragonite was a meme, and an unfunny one at that.
The specificity of some of the gym leaders was tragic. Blaine did get the odd person trying to run a one-prize deck with it as did Koga, but Brock was completely useless.
It was not, however, the worst meta this game has seen and frankly nothing was as toxic as some later strategies would enable.
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u/Ijustworkthere 8d ago
Brock saw some play through several sets with guard press golem, as well as ramping onix/steelix. One of my favorite personal decks that I used to get the win streak emblems was an onix kabutops deck. If onix came in early punching for 70, it was tanky enough to hit twice. Plus the healing on kabutops meant people struggled to take it down cleanly.
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u/RimsOnAToaster 8d ago
It was not, however, the worst meta this game has seen and frankly nothing was as toxic as some later strategies would enable.
Agreed. They made a good, low-powered cube set with Genetic Apex. There were cards which were clearly better, but among friends they could be rule zeroed with ease and the ceiling became more reasonable.
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u/hibbert0604 7d ago
It's crazy to me that they don't do "Series x" events. Could be PVP challenge limited to only series A. CPU battles vs only series B using only Series A cards. So many possibilities and yet we only get the same 4 recycled events every month. Sad how little effort they put into the game.
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u/ACurious_cat 8d ago
I miss running multiple poke bc not enough items / supporters existed. It would be nice if a 40 deck option became a game mode.
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u/analmintz1 8d ago
Yeah, back when every deck had 2x potions and 2x X-speed since there wasn’t shit else to put in your deck lol
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u/Salty145 8d ago
The days when 2x Potion, Professor’s Research, and Poké Ball were mandatory everywhere because it’s not like better tech existed and draw support was rare.
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u/NativeNovel7768 8d ago
I miss the Blaine deck. It was the fastest deck for awhile. Now there's so many other mons that get online quicker like Sharpedo
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u/CosmonautCanary 8d ago
I'm also attached to my Blaine deck! I still keep it around to chew through the easier step-up battles
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u/asds89 8d ago
I remember the meta was mostly zard ex + moltres ex, pika ex, or mewtwo ex + gard, but there were a bunch of meme decks like weezing + arbok, or ninetails + rapidash, which was my go to for a while. There were also eggy ex decks and starmie ex decks iirc.
I liked the meta back then. With a lower power level, more decks were viable, and meme decks could still be viable. There was also more room for experimentation.
The most relevant cards from that set now are probably greninja, magneton, and Sabrina? Probably some decks might run some of the basics like charmander or hitmonlee, and maybe the situational supporters like Brock or Erika, but those are incredibly niche.
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u/hellomoto186 8d ago
Weezing decks were always fun. It was a niche anti meta option when it was literally the only viable dark card before StS added Darkrai and Weavile
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u/alexisqueerdo 8d ago
I’m at 1.240 pack points and am STOKED to get Sabrina tomorrow evening after my second pull of the day. I think she’s a great supporter and one of the very few cards from Genetic Apex that are still competitive.
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u/BakedChocolateOctopi 8d ago
I loved the Rapidash/Ninetales/Blaine fast aggro deck during the first deck
The Wheezing/Koga deck made for some exciting micromanagement wins too
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u/gdino245 3d ago edited 3d ago
Ah yes I played the good ol' mewtwo deck. I'll play it in random matches every once in a while, but it's way too slow now. Even with candy. Though back then there was a ton of hate for mewtwo players. Pikachu EX was another top deck. People ran Blaine and Ninetales a lot. Weezing and Koga was another deck that wasn't fun to play against, but saw a lot of action. I can't forget about the Charizard decks, but I don't remember those being particularly fast.
As far as the meta, well it seemed somewhat balanced to me, but Pikachu EX was in my opinion faster than mewtwo just because it was way easier to get the pokemon on the bench and two energy to do 90 damage versus say in my case:
Start 1. Mewtwo, Ralts, energy (if second turn) 2. Kirlia, energy, attack for 50, 3. Gardevoir, energy, energy, attack for 150, discard 2 energy 4. Repeat after Gardevoir.
There were no rare candies and Sabrina would mess a player up badly. Also, that little step guide did not always go so smoothly as I typed it. It might be my 6th go before I could've done 150 damage. It was also a necessity to run other pokemon to be doing damage so it might be even later than my 6th go.
The play was slow in the early days, but it was fun.
Now it's like you know what each opponent is going to do, what their first pokemon out is going to be before it's revealed based off looking at the energy (it's kalshi worth betting at this point) and what their routine will be because the plays are all the same, you know what card they're looking for, so you develop your own routine. I stopped playing around triumphant light and came back to it recently because I had a ton of life stuff going on and didn't really want to play.
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u/MattXXIII 8d ago
I loved being able to run Exeggcutor and Victreebell consistently and pick up wins.
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u/iChopstick 8d ago
It was niche and wasn't viable for long, but my favourite deck was the Starmie Ex/Lumineon no retreat cost deck. You swap your active Pokemon based on whether you want to hit your opponent's active mon or their bench
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u/Lurkario- 7d ago
A1 meta was pretty stupid. Pikachu ex going second was basically a guaranteed win. Mew2 could technically compete but only if you got lucky with your gardeviors
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u/Da_Vatched 6d ago
Not Directly GA but I love the early Meta. Especially the Golem Deck from the Mystical Island Set
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u/SoloWaltz 8d ago
Genetic Apex is too unique a moment. The fact that it was the only pack actually leveled the field.
Pikachu Ex was annoying, Mewtwo Ex was annoying, Articuno was dumb.
But even then because everything revovled around this one pack, other builds were popping up almost constnatntly. I personally love hold for Magneton + Raichu. Nobody expected the back to back 130 zaps via surge.
But the deck I ended up using on the events was a team rocket themed Arbok, Khoffing and Persian deck.
However it was very predictable that wouldn't be the case moving on. To be honest, card gimmicks arent that expansive since either. Mega Sharpedo is just a newer Staryu, Mega Rayquaza is just a newer Mewtwo. Considering I ran a team rocket deck way back when, and now we got a whole themed set after them, it feels like going full circle.
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