COTD – 25th July 2011 – Twins

My choice for today is Twins which is a supporter from the HS: Triumphant set.

This card used to be a very nice ‘tech’ card in decks that ran Cyrus’ Conspiracy or any other that fell behind early on to give it that boost it needed to come back from behind. Cyrus allowed easy search of the supporter when needed so it fit quite nicely into SP decks and is most certainly a staple in LostGar variants. But since we aren’t in MD-On anymore, let’s have a look at this card in the current format.

What this card allows you to do is choose 2 cards from your deck and then put them into your hand, only if you are behind in prizes. This gives quite a nice form of search when things aren’t looking great or you need that extra boost to turn the tide of the game. What is an added bonus to this card is that you don’t actually have to show your opponent what you search out, keeping your opponent guessing and not knowing what you’ve picked, even when you play them.

Twins has drastically dropped in play since the rotation and hasn’t really seen play in any decks that hit the top tables at all 3 Nationals bearing the HGSS-On format. This is probably because it isn’t as searchable as it used to be, as mentioned above, and drawing into it when you need it doesn’t happen as often as you’d want to.

That being said, however, this card still is a very nice choice to put into a deck. If you watched my latest PokeClass episode, you will have seen my discussion about the first turn and the impact it gives on the outcome of the game and this could be a card to help that. Falling behind after going second is pretty hard to come back from at the moment, but having this card can give you what you need to keep your set-up going strong and grab those cards you’d otherwise have no search of, namely Rare Candy and the appropriate Stage 2.

Even in the late game after being behind in the prize exchange for the most part, you can drop this card and grab two cards that could seal the game for you while catching your opponent off-guard at the same time.

Where this card will see most play is in Gengar Prime variants. Since the deck doesn’t intend to take any prizes,  this card will provide the player with a really nice form of search of any card in the deck at any time in the game. Even though Gengar hasn’t done great since it’s release, it still has some promise in this format and this is card helps to make it what it is.

Overall, this card could be a great surprise ‘tech’ if you have space in your list and if you find your deck falling behind in the early game, consider this as an option to get going. I’m going to give Twins a fairly average 5.5/10. It has some use in this format, but will need proper testing before I can raise the score. It has a very nice effect in tight situations, but without the appropriate search of it when needed, is it more of a liability than useful?

Thanks for reading and make sure you comment below what you think..