Hello, ever wanted to just start buying into a new set? How bout Summer Pockets? Or maybe you’re new and interested in it but because it’s a Japanese set you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed. Don’t worry though, that’s what this guide is for.

Youkoso miina san, to the first of the new set reviews I will be starting on sets that barely anyone cares about… JK everyone is on this bandwagon these days. Today, will be going over the tearjerker series no one outside of Japan has read because it hasn’t be translated in English yet; Summer Pockets.

Here’s how this is gonna work; I’m going to go over what I think are the key cards to success with this set and maybe put in a few alternatives/techs. Unlike deckprofiles which usually go from level 0 to 3 in a very specific order, I will go over the core cards of the deck in what I think are the most important. If you’re wondering why I’m not going to go over every card like TopTierTears or a bunch of cards like Connor’s English Corner, bitch please this is a blog not some 1 hour youtube bullshit. I know how puny your attention span is.

Here’s also a ranking system we will use so this thing doesn’t seem too similar to the average deck profile that I, Saltnori, makes for you lil shits:

Subarashi (toptier)

Sugoi (good)

Kimchi (playable)

Salty (ehh..)

I’M NOT COPYING TTT OR ANYTHING. THAT WOULD MEAN WE’RE DOING META SHIT… Although admittedly interest in Summer Pockets is spiking which is kind of why we’re even doing this.

Before we start. Here’s the usual reminder that all card images are from Little Akiba and translations are from HeartoftheCards. Now here’s a picture to get you interested.

INTRODUCTION: THE CORE…MEADA…or META CARDS

(You will always see these cards in every meta summer pockets deck… At least the ones that people believe are relevant)

“Summer Pockets” Ao

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, you may put the top card of your Clock in the Waiting Room.

[A] CX COMBO RECOLLECTION [(2) Choose a ‘”Thinking of Little Sister” Ai’ in your Memory and put it face-up under this as Marker] This ability activates up to once per turn. At the end of this card’s attack, if “End of a Long Dream” is in the Climax Zone, you may pay cost. If so, choose 1 of your “Ai Sorakado”, put a Marker from under this face-up under that Character, Stand that Character, and this does not Stand during your next Stand Phase.

Oh man, I only just began and this card basically spoiled the VN for you. GOOD JOB BUSHIROAD. Anyway, other than appreciating its AMAZING flavor, this card is good for several reasons. First, it combos with a Standby, which can summon your target (and you can stand it with a certain other card which we will talk about on this list), meaning it’ll cost efficient compared to playing it from hand. It also doesn’t have to reverse your target, which is extremely beneficial for the re-stander type profile. Most of all, it’s a HEALER finisher, my favorite kind.

At first, you might be concerned because you might not have a lot of soul damage compared to other finishers since your climax combo uses Standby. But this problem will be offset with the next card we will go over…

Ranking: Sugoi

Ai Sorakado

[C] If there’s a Marker under this, this gains +2500 Power.

[C] All your other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters gain +1500 Power.

[C] During battles involving this, your Opponent cannot play Events or BACKUP from hand.

[A] When this attacks, if you have 2 or more other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, choose 1 of your Characters, and that Character gains +1 Soul for the turn.

She makes your Ao THICC! Take note of how when it attacks, your opponent cannot play events or backups… This is HUGE since your opponent is unable to play tap/rest counters or anti-damage you, which adds a lot of HNGGG to this card.

You should also remember that you can choose this card and give itself soul with its own effect. You’re going to want to attack with this card first based if your top end is solely based on Ao and Ai, so don’t mess that up!

To play around events, I generally would probably attack with this first against a character and then direct attack if possible with Ao afterwards, pay cost and re-stand Ai. Afterwards you attack with Ai then finally attack with the last Ao which is probably facing another character and do your last re-stand.

Ranking: Sugoi

“Thinking of Little Sister” Ai

[A] [(1) Discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room, Send this to Memory] When this becomes Reversed in battle, you may pay cost. If so, choose up to 1 ‘”Time with Onee-chan” Ao’ in your Waiting Room and put it Rested in the Slot this was in.

[S] [(1) Send this Standing card to Memory] Choose up to 1 ‘”Summer Pockets” Ao’ in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand.

This is the target that you’ll always have in memory. We use it mostly for the bond effect to grab our level 3 and mostly to SEND IT TO MEMORY FOR DANK COMPRESSION. If you don’t have a few of these in memory, you’ll be sad when you hit level 3 so make sure you do!

Ranking: Kimchi

“What I Can Do” Shiroha

[C] For each of your other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, this gains +500 Power.

[A] CX COMBO When the Battle Opponent of this becomes Reversed, if “A Beam of Light” is in your Climax Zone, put up to 1 card from top of your Library in your Stock, and choose up to 1 Character in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand.

[A] When this becomes Reversed in battle, if you have 1 or fewer other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, put this in your Clock.

Despite it being level 2, this is actually our main level 1 game, and a surprisingly effective one at that. We’ll talk about how it gets out early RIGHT after this card though.

This card is an absolute monster. Its base 9500 on defense and can often be 10k, which is definitely a feat to try and reverse. The fact that its level 2 also means it cannot be bombed by level 1 suiciders. Your opponent will be tearing their hair out trying to find a way to reverse this thing. THIS SPELLS “ANTI-META” TO ME.

As for its plussing effect, it honestly feels so good to just salvage instead of topcheck and add (that’s right, FUCK YOU YUNYUN). If you’re worried about blindstocking climaxes, try to attack with this last as long as your opponent isn’t playing one of those disgusting decks with level 1 anti-change. You’re going to be brainstorming like crazy the turn after so honestly as long as you have more climaxes left in deck it’s no big issue.

This card isn’t perfect though. As soon as you play it, you’re going to feel kind of bad because your hand went from like 7 cards to 3 or something. Anyone would suddenly feel alarmed after such a drastic increase. Do not fret however. Even if you don’t actually get your reverses off, you technically get your handsize back as long as your Shirohas survive on the swingback… which they always do as long as your opponent doesn’t bounce it with the sackiest wind trigger in their weiss schwarz career.

In the case that some goddamn weird reason you cannot reverse something because it’s simply too big for Shiroha at level 1, do not fret. To top it all off, she actually combos with a WIND TRIGGER so triggering this at the right time can actually ruin your opponent’s fat wall.

Ranking: Sugoi

“Hinge Ceremony” Shiroha

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, draw a card, and discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room.

[A] CX COMBO [Put this in the Waiting Room] When “A Beam of Light” is placed in your Climax Zone, you may pay cost. If so, choose up to 1 ‘”What I Can Do” Shiroha’ in your hand and put it in the Slot this was in.

This card is EXCELLENT for drawing into your climax combo like the true sacker you are. Anyway its your main costless hand-fixer which you’ll need first in order to SPECIAL SUMMON the 2/1 Shiroha. As you may have guessed, its cost is the reason why you’ll feel underwhelmed at first when you play your 2/1s directly from hand which I talked about in the previous part.

You’re going to have a LOT of stock however. The blind stocks on top of the fact that it actually costs no stock to summon the 2/1 is a huge advantage that should be taken advantage of. If you’re a fan of brainstorming I highly encourage you to give this sort of combo a spin because it’s BRAINSTORM HEAVEN.

Oh by the way, you’re probably playing standby in this build so if you happen to trigger standbys early, get this out at level 1 and have the combo ready in hand at level 0, just meme your opponent if you’re feeling like it.

Ranking: Kimchi

Umi Katou

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, this gains +1500 Power for the turn.

[A] At the start of your Opponent’s Draw Phase, reveal the top card of your Library. If it’s Level 1 or higher, you may return this to your hand. (Climax cards are considered Level 0 for this effect. Put the revealed card back where it was)

This is the card that triggers lawyers apparently because its a rough 50% chance to plus but for some reason everyone gets it off so consistently. Due to Summer Pocket’s ratios, this card is actually a perfect contender for setting up your reverses. It’s a respectful 3k attacker that can trade very well. Due to its timing, you can actually technically have like 8 cards in hand if you had max hand size when your turn ended, which would let u tri-field like a BOSS the turn after. I would argue that because of its color splash and all around usefulness at level 0, it should be run in every Summer Pockets deck that runs the stockcharge plussing combo.

Rating: Kimchi+

YOUR SUPPORTING CARDS/TECHS:

(Expect to see most of these cards in most decks)

“Shiroha’s Oral Tradition” Shiroha

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, look at the top card of your Library and put it either on top of the Library or in the Waiting Room.

[S] BRAINSTORM [(1) Rest this] Flip over the top 4 cards of your Library and put them in the Waiting Room. For each Climax card revealed this way, choose up to 1 Character in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand.

THE BRAINSTORM OF MY CHOICE. It lets you scry and dig even further for a successful plus and technically confirm your first attack (pretty useful when trying to go for lethal at level 3). Since this is a tap self, I would encourage you to have two of these in the back and start tapping this every turn after you pull off your combo for the maximum GAINZ. Trust me, you’re going to have plenty of stock to abuse.

I try not to play other brainstorms because they’re either: tap 2, doesn’t plus or simply not selective (draw brainstorms). The tap self is extremely important in order to go through first refresh quickly so you don’t take buttloads of damage because you’re out of climaxes.

Ranking: Sugoi

“Place for Each Other” Shiroha

[A] When this attacks, if you have 2 or more other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, look at up to 2 cards from top of your Library, choose 1 of them and put it on top of the Library, and put the rest in the Waiting Room.

[A] [(1)] When this attacks, you may pay cost. If so, perform Trigger Check twice during the Trigger Step of this attack.

Use this to trigger more standby. NO SERIOUSLY, it works.

When this TWIN DRIVE profile first came out, I was a non-believer. But in decks where they blindstock heavily AND HAPPEN to run standby, this is a sweet card to run since not only can u liken the chances to trigger standby more but you can also try and pay out the climaxes you confirmed triggering.

If you noticed, both the acts happen simultaneously. This means you can choose to resolve which effects happen first. If you attacked with some other card first and triggered a climax, you can use the pay cost effect to pay it out with this card first then use the top check 2 to trigger clean. If you want to be a total sacklord and trigger standbys with other attackers first and want to pay it out, attack with this card afterwards. GG EZ.

Ranking: Kimchi+ (in this niche role)

“Twilight Lighthouse” Tsumugi

[A] At the start of your Opponent’s Attack Phase, you may move this to an empty Slot in the Front Row.

Perhaps more reliable than the coinflip Katou but not as high roll. Regardless, I prefer to run this alongside that coinflip Katou to just make aggressive swings at level 0, bounce katou then have more spaces to run which. GOOD SYNERGY especially for dodging other on-reverse combos while it sets up yours quite beautifully. For once though you don’t necessarily have to run this as a 4 of if you want…

Ranking: Kimchi

“Dish That Came to Mind” Nanami

[A] When you use the BACKUP of this, if you have a ::Summer Pockets:: Character, choose 1 of your Characters in battle, and that Character gains +1000 Power and ::Fried Rice:: for the turn.

[S] [Counter] BACKUP 1000, Level 1 [Discard this card from your hand to the Waiting Room]

Ahh, the classic 2k costless backup and its here to bring despair to your opponents. Use this to save your Shirohas and deny your opponent’s reverses at level 1-2. Highly encourage running at least 2 in your builds since the longer Shiroha survives, the higher your chances to win the game get.

Ranking: Kimchi

“Future Seen Sometime” Umi

[C] If there are 2 or fewer Climax cards in your Waiting Room, this gets -1 Level while in your hand.

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, if you have 2 or more other ::Time:: Characters, you may choose a Character in your Clock and Send it to Memory.

SUGOI. Not only is this a decent EP condition but you also dodge anti-heal! For the most part you want to choose “Thinking of Little Sister” Ai from clock if possible and send it to memory so you can get your dank re-stands.

I want to remind you guys that you play a cost-less level 1 game so there really shouldn’t be an issue with early playing if you choose to play this card even with all the brainstorming you’re doing. If anything, it’s a great way to pay out climaxes that are buried deeper.

Oh by the way some of you guys will totally forget that you need time trait on the field in order to heal but that’s quite easy to do when you have 2 of the “Shiroha’s Oral Tradition” Shiroha in the backrow. If you don’t just make sure you have some 2 other Shiroha or Narumi cards otherwise you’ll goof.

Ranking: Kimchi

“Time Remaining” Ao

[C] All your other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters gain +500 Power.

[A] CX COMBO [(1)] When “End of a Long Dream” is placed in your Climax Zone, you may pay cost. If so, choose 1 of your other ::Twins:: Characters and Stand it.

[S] BRAINSTORM [(1) Rest this] Flip over the top 4 cards of your Library and put them in the Waiting Room. For each Climax card revealed this way, choose up to 1 Character in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand.

Oooooh looks like a fantastic standby target for our level 1 game. This will make your level 2 Shiroha walls a bit stronger and WAIT JUST A MINUTE, is that the SAME MOTHAFUCKING CLIMAX THAT YOU USE FOR LEVEL 3? Holy shizzle, you can actually use this to restand any twin that you play off of standby, therefore REDUCING the stock cost of your level 3 game.

ON TOP OF THIS this is actually also a tap salvage brainstorm which is just perfect for our level 1 game to abuse. This is just so good! It’s almost like you should play a copy of this or two in your Summer Pockets deck or something!

Ranking: Sugoi

“Mysterious Scene” Ao

[C] RECOLLECTION If ‘”Thinking of Little Sister” Ai’ is in your Memory, this gains the following ability. “[A] [Discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, you may pay cost. If so, look at up to 4 cards from top of your Library, search for up to 1 ::Summer Pockets:: Character, reveal it, put it in your hand, and put the rest in the Waiting Room.”

Man, my level 1 game has so much free hand-fixing but what if I’m the type of person who loves free milling at the same time? Fear not the dark my friends, there is a level 1 AZUSA for anyone who misses Ruby from their Japanese Love Live Sunshine decks! You have to make sure you play the memory target Ai though so don’t go messing things up at level 0.

Unlike usual, I wouldn’t say this is technically a MUST in your Summer Pockets deck because you honestly don’t really suffer from burning a shit ton of stock every turn from brainstorming but if you really need the free mill and additional hand-fixing this is your go-to. Expect to see this in some decks that play more blue.

Ranking: Sugoi

“Sleeping Over” Kamome

[A] [(2)] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, you may pay cost. If so, search your Library for up to 1 Climax card with the same name as a Climax card in your Waiting Room, reveal it, put it in your hand, and shuffle your Library.

[A] CX COMBO [Discard a “Chasing Dream” from your hand to the Waiting Room] At the start of your Opponent’s Attack Phase, you may pay cost. If so, choose 1 of your Characters, and that Character gains +4000 Power for the turn.

While we’re on the topic of blue splash, you should highly consider this card for its first effect. Because you have so much stock to burn, paying 2 to search for your climax combo only to loop it again and reverse more shitters is something you can easily do in your deck. You can also use this to grab your level 3 cxc if need be. What a useful 1-of!

Oh by the way, this girl has PIRATE TRAIT!

Ranking: Kimchi

Shiroha Naruse

[A] CX COMBO [Return another Character from your Stage to hand] When “I’ve Started to Love You” is placed in your Climax Zone, if this is in the Front Row, you may pay cost. If so, choose up to 1 ::Time:: Character in your hand whose Level is equal to or lower than your Level, put it in any Slot on the Stage, and this gains +3000 Power for the turn.

[A] When this becomes Reversed, if the Level of the Battle Opponent of this is higher than the Level of the Opponent, you may put that Character in Stock. If so, put the bottom card of your Opponent’s Stock in the Waiting Room.

Uh, remember that time I said that you might start having trouble reversing things with Shiroha once in a blue moon? What if you can’t trigger winds like a true sack? You play this card. Obviously we don’t run the climax combo but the fact that this is a hard removal by sending your target to stock is very useful, especially against Vivid Strike’s Fuuka or Love Live Sunshine’s infamous You burner. This is without a doubt a very useful 1 of that you can play in your deck for those match-ups.

Ranking: Kimchi

“Beast Talk During Test of Courage” Shiroha

[A] [(2) Put a Character from your Stage in the Waiting Room] When you use the BACKUP of this, you may pay cost. If so, choose 1 of your Opponent’s Characters whose Level is higher than the Level of the Opponent and put it in Stock.

[S] [Counter] BACKUP 2500, Level 2 [(1) Discard this card from your hand to the Waiting Room]

HOLY SHIT A SACK BACK-UP IN 2018! If you read any of my previous blogs you know how much I love these things. Use this to either get rid of troublesome Early Plays, prevent disgusting damage from going through or even forcing your opponent to attack twice in a turn because they misplayed.

In a situation where you must absolutely dodge a reverse at level 3 because of a Yukina (who the fuck still plays this card) or something and you must absolutely use the opportunity to dodge these crazy on-reverse effects, you can use the sack-backup to kill your own card. Just be careful since you might not have enough stock to play your other level 3s the next turn.

Ranking: Kimchi +

“Large Suitcase” Kamome

[A] [(1) Discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, you may pay cost. If so, search your Library for up to 1 ::Summer Pockets:: Character, reveal it, put it in your hand, and shuffle your Library.

A simple yet important drop-search you can choose to play in Summer Pockets. Unfortunately Summer Pockets suffers from the fact it doesn’t have access to a search Riki and you really need to piece together your combo early on, this is the card you probably want to run if possible. Even then, a search Riki can only search level 1s or under so it can’t grab the important 2/1 Shiroha, which is what this card can do.

Playing 2 or even 3 is definitely a considerable idea. I’ve seen builds that ran 4 which is a bit excessive for my taste but its there for a reason. Setting up for combos is very important in almost all current and relevant Weiss Schwarz decks at the moment so I wouldn’t underestimate this card if I were you.

Ranking: Kimchi

ALTERNATIVES:

(Cards that this deck doesn’t really need but you can still put it in if you really need to…)

“Summer Pockets” Shiroha

[A] When this attacks, choose 1 of your ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, and that Character gains +1500 Power for the turn.

[A] This ability activates up to once per turn. During the turn this is placed from hand to the Stage, when Damage dealt by this is Cancelled, put the top card of your Library in the Waiting Room, and deal X Damage to your Opponent. X = 1 + Level of that card. (Climax cards are considered Level 0 for this effect. Damage Cancel can occur)



Hey look! it’s my favorite finisher when it comes to having no climax combo! If you’re not a fan of climax combos or simply not a fan of the “re-standing” kind of end games, you can try relying on these as an alternative. “Musashi” finishers basically have strength when fielded in multiples and when your deck runs a lesser number of 0s than usual.

Although I prefer triple fielding Musashis when playing them, they’re not bad to play alongside other finishers. This one works better with other finishers than with Ao and Ai since it can’t be fielded in multiples as you’d be focusing on using those slots purely for multiple re-stands. This is why I merely list it as an alternative when it’s actually quite a nice card.

Ranking: Kimchi

“Summer Pockets” Nanami

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, look at up to 3 cards from top of your Library, choose up to 1 of them and put it in your hand, and put the rest in the Waiting Room.

[A] CX COMBO RECOLLECTION [(2) Discard 2 cards from your hand to the Waiting Room] When this attacks, if “The Sewn-Closed Future” is in the Climax Zone, you may pay cost. If so, choose any number of cards in your Memory and put them in the Waiting Room, deal X Damage to your Opponent, and this gains +5000 Power for the turn. X = 2 times # of cards put from Memory to the Waiting Room via this effect. (Damage Cancel can occur)

At first glance you might not like this card so much because of the cost (pay 2 ditch 2) you have to pay for its abilities but it’s actually quite decent. Since you actually dig 3 cards, you can think of it as a pay 2 ditch 1, which is almost like a “Sinon”. You can also control your burns which is a very strong advantage. As long as you do burn you’re almost guaranteed to kill the card in front of it because LUL who survives 16 k attackers. Oh and it combos with a GATE trigger…(or doors if you really want to be that way. WE DON’T TALK ABOUT COMEBACK HERE).

So why are we actually not playing this instead in our build? The issue is that most of the cards that go to memory for level 0 kind of suck… even “Thinking of Little Sister” Ai isn’t that great, it just happens to be the best one out of all of the ones available since it at least sets up for our level 3 easily in the meta build (and it’s also required for our cxc). If you’re okay with running mediocre utility cards that go to memory, then running this card is not a bad idea however.

If you do happen to play this card, I would suggest trying it out with “Future Seen Sometime” Umi and this following card:

“Colors of Wings of Future” Shiroha

[A] [Discard a ::Time:: Character card from your hand to the Waiting Room, Send this to Memory] When this becomes Reversed in battle, if you have another ::Time:: Character and there are 2 or fewer cards in your Memory, you may pay cost. If so, choose a ::Time:: Character in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand.

I find that this is an outdated hand-fixer not only restricts the amount of cards in your memory but also is a bummer for the timing of its effect. By being reversed in battle you’re unable to use it proactively which is a little to slow for my taste. Ultimately, running cards like these can feel inefficient compared to the Ao and Ai top end. On top of this, it’s a salvage instead of a search which is redundant since you run a salvage brainstorm already and it’s stronger to search for your level 1 pieces early in the game. However if you’re okay with this then by all means go for it.

Ranking: Kimchi

“It’s Because of Summer” Ao

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, draw up to 2 cards, and discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room.

[A] [Discard 2 cards from your hand to the Waiting Room] When this attacks, you may pay cost. If so, put the bottom 4 cards of your Opponent’s Library in the Waiting Room, and deal X Damage to your Opponent. X = # of Climax cards among them. (Damage Cancel can occur)

HOW TO REKT HINA LOGIC!!! If you see your opponents running decks that cancel like crazy and refresh quickly because their decks are so small and compressed, this is a nice tech that you can rely on since it’s not climax combo based. It’s ditch cost allows you to run it alongside finishers that pay stock which is helpful for Ao. By the way I’m totally not bias or anything because I like Icy Tail or anything…

Ranking: Kimchi

“Summer Pockets” Tsumugi

[C] During your turn, this gains +1000 Power.

[A] CX COMBO When the Battle Opponent of this becomes Reversed, if “Something Lovers-Like” is in the Climax Zone, look at up to 4 cards from top of your Library, search for up to 1 ::Summer Pockets:: Character, reveal it, put it in your hand, put the rest in the Waiting Room, choose 1 of your Characters, and that Character gains +1000 Power until the next end of your Opponent’s turn.

If you want a more NORMAL level 1 game, this is probably the one you go for which is lame since you’re choosing not to play one of the more unique decks out there. However that doesn’t mean it’s bad… it’s actually a decent level 1 game as you get to mill for free and start field wiping when you get the first one off as long as you played this in multiples. However playing this also means you’re most likely playing 8 gold bars or some shit and you’re also a loser for not playing FLAVORFUL and UNIQUE cards available in the set so in the end you’re losing out :)

Ranking: Kimchi minus for looking like Eiriri

“Special Adventure” Kamome

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, put the top 2 cards of your Library in the Waiting Room. If there is at least 1 Climax card among them, you may put the top card of your Opponent’s Library in the Waiting Room. If so, choose a card in your Opponent’s Waiting Room and put it on top of the Library.

[A] [(1) Put the top card of your Library in your Clock] When this becomes Reversed in battle, you may pay cost. If so, choose a Level 1 or lower Character in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand.

Speaking of “normal”, this is a pretty decent card to run in the average normal looking deck. You get to clock 1 and plus selectively like a salvage riki (Christa). There’s a downside obviously however- this card’s condition is that it has to be reversed in battle. ARE WE NOTICING A PATTERN OR WHAT?

Also, it suffers from a similar problem as “Colors of Wings of Future” Shiroha has… it salvages instead of searching! We want to search for our pieces throughout the game if possible since we already have so many salvage options for our level 1 combo. I guess you can use this if you’re running “Summer Pockets” Tsumugi.

Ranking: Kimchi-

“Glass Beads Memories” Ao

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, put the top 2 cards of your Library in the Waiting Room, and this gains +X Power for the turn. X = 1000 times # of ::Summer Pockets:: Characters among those cards.

[A] [(1) Discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, you may pay cost. If so, choose a ::Summer Pockets:: Character in your Waiting Room and return it to your hand, choose 1 of your other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, and that Character gains +1000 Power for the turn.

THAT’S RIGHT LADIES AND GENTLEMEN. THIS CARD SALVAGES TOO. This is a shame considering how this card is quite nice as it not only provides free mill AND pumps itself power potentially. It can even help our level 1 game as it gives power pump to an on-reverse combo!

If you’re looking for red splash however, feel free to add this into the deck since its utility can be very nice. However 4 “Shiroha’s Oral Tradition” Shiroha should be enough most of the time for red splash at level 0 (hint: you should always be playing that brainstorm as a 4 of anyway since it’s a tap self and you’re brainstorming like crazy each turn).

Ranking: Kimchi

“Summer Pockets” Kamome

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, you may put the top card of your Clock in the Waiting Room.

[A] CX COMBO [(1)] When “Starting Point” is placed in your Climax Zone, if this is in the Front Row, you may pay cost. If so, this gains 1000 Power for the turn, and perform one of the following effects of your choice. “Put all of your Opponent’s Stock in the Waiting Room, and your Opponent puts the same number of cards from top of his or her Library in his or her Stock.” “This gains the following ability for the turn. ‘[A] When the Battle Opponent of this becomes Reversed, you may put that Character in Clock.'”

OOH another healer finisher! This card combos with a gold bar and offers the infamous stockswap effect which is very strong against decks with good compression (Rewrite, 2/1 Himari BD/Toilet decks, Hina Logic etc). This alone shuts down many decks.

However, its finishing ability is lackluster as it doesn’t gain too much power and you’re only able to choose one of the effects. Furthermore, clock shoot abilities in today’s meta isn’t so strong outside of Megumin level 3 since so many decks can actually play around it. Its strong stock swap effect is also restricted since it activates when the climax is placed so it also restricts your deck building choices.

Due to the mentioned downsides, I feel like you’re better off playing the Ao combo. You can still choose to play this top end with the 2/1 shiroa since the level 3 game happens to use quite a bit of stock. If you’re playing a green deck however, it’s not a bad idea to use it either.

Ranking: Kimchi

PROBLEMATIC CARDS

(cards you probably shouldn’t try to mix cards into this build):

“Time with Onee-chan” Ao

[C] If you have 2 or more other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, this gains +2000 Power.

[A] ENCORE [Discard a Character card from your hand to the Waiting Room]

Gee I wonder why the main early summoning target of the 4 of staple card we run is doing here (aka “Thinking of Little Sister” Ai). Have you guys noticed that we’re playing an on-reverse deck that runs mainly yellow and sometimes blue at level 1? Have fun running tri-color bitches! Should have left that shit in like 2015. Also, by splashing in a red card that will take the front lines at level 0, you’re doing the opposite of what the deck wants to do; instead of setting up reverses you’re literally walling off your opportunities instead!

Basically this card (even if it’s decent) just does the opposite of what the deck wants to do and we’re better off using those level 1 slots to compliment our early play level 2s instead with utility.

Ranking: Salty

(But would be Kimchi in other standby decks not named Summer Pockets)

“Hard-Working Maid-san” Kamome

[A] [(1) Put the top card of your Library in your Clock, Send this to Memory] When this becomes Reversed in battle, you may pay cost. If so, search your Library for up to 1 ::Pirate:: Character, reveal it, put it in your hand, and shuffle your Library.

WTF, what is this green plussing card doing in this list? While it’s not as great as the traditional riki, it can search which is invaluable to a deck like Summer Pockets so NANDESUKA?

Pirate trait is basically limited to Kamome which is a green color card, which we all know is often useless splash for our deck. Even for the green deck it can’t even fetch the preferred level 1 combo (“Summer Pockets” Tsumugi). So now that we’ve officially settled on the fact that this card is useless for our deck, let me tell you why you don’t even run it in the budget green deck…

Ranking: Salty

“A Dream Always Seen” Kamome

[A] CX COMBO When this attacks, if “Farewell Greetings” is in the Climax Zone and you have 2 or more other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, reveal the top 2 cards of your Library, your Opponent chooses a Character or an Event among those cards and put it in your hand, then put the rest in the Waiting Room.

[A] When this attacks, if you have 2 or more other ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, this gains +2000 Power for the turn.

WTF. This girl got absolutely shafted! This is possible one of the worst selective combos I’ve ever seen in Weiss Schwarz. The fact that your opponent chooses a card for you will heavily play against your favor since they will pick the most useless cards possible. Have fun!

The one good thing about this card however it does kind of provide free mill and it doesn’t require a reverse which is fairly worth mentioning. However it’s still not enough justification to run this card unless you really like pirates that much (LIKE ME!). Stick to your memeing pockets strategy instead.

Ranking: Salty-

“Something I Want to Talk About” Tsumugi

[C] RECOLLECTION If “Picture Found in the Storage” is in your Memory, this gains +1500 Power.

[A] When this is placed from hand to the Stage, draw up to 2 cards, discard 2 cards from your hand to the Waiting Room, and put up to 1 card from top of your Library in your Stock.

[A] CX COMBO RECOLLECTION [(1) Discard a card from your hand to the Waiting Room] When this attacks, if “Lots of Memories” is in the Climax Zone and you have another ::Summer Pockets:: Character, you may pay cost. If so, this gains +2000 Power and the following ability until the next end of your Opponent’s turn. “[A] At the start of your Opponent’s Attack Phase, choose up to X of your Opponent’s Characters, and they get -1 Soul for the turn. X = 1 + # of ‘Picture Found in the Storage’ in your Memory.”



At the first glance, this card seems okay until you start wondering “So where’s that condition for its Early Play?” only to realize that it actually doesn’t have one.

This means to get it out early which is arguably when minus soul walls are the most useful, you have to rely on sacking Standbys to get it out. This is a very luck based strategy that will not be too successful, especially when it comes to pumping out these in multiples.

On top of this crippling weakness, the way this card assigns negative soul is also garbage when you can only standby out one. This card unfortunately cannot stack negative souls onto the same card which kind of sucks for a card that probably won’t be played in multiples at level 2. While the draw 2 ditch 2 blindstock 1 is a fantastic effect for drawing into the climax combo, you’re mostly going to be playing multiples of this at level 3 due to being unable to early play it consistently so it would ultimately healing instead would could been preferable in some ways.

Lastly let’s take a look at the card in memory that it needs in order to even assign to two targets…

Ranking: Salty

Picture Found in the Storage

If you have no ::Summer Pockets:: Characters, you cannot play this from hand.

Choose a Character in your Clock and return it to your hand, and put the top card of your Library in your Clock.

Send this to Memory.

[C] RECOLLECTION During your turn, if this is in Memory, all your ::Summer Pockets:: Characters gain +500 Power.

What the actual fuck is this. Get this meme shit outta here. Can’t even grab events or climax and you’re probably going to clock a climax back into your clock off the top of the library.

Ranking: Salty-

BONUS: BEST LOOKING CARD OF THE SET:

Although I do LOVE the climax with Ao’s delicious butt, I think Shiroha takes the cake when it comes to the SP. It just screams “KEY” and really paints the atmosphere of what the visual novel is all about. Bravo in choosing this one Bushiroad… Although clearly Lycee had the better foils overall. I highly suggest you google them to compare them… Weiss Schwarz foils for this set look lazy in comparison.

Ranking: Subarashi

DECK RATING AND FINAL THOUGHTS:

Finally, the moment we’ve all been waiting for…

The rating is….B+!!!!!!!!!

The deck can cuck a lot of JP decks right now that think getting reverses is free and as a result gathers up a shit ton of resources it can abuse as long as their walls survive. However its one of those decks that can lose harder to decks that have a super strong level 2 game and as a result has trouble coming back when bum rushed to deck only to have their walls die the turn after. This can result in a shortage of hand size and that won’t feel great for the rest of the game.

However do not let that dissuade you from staying away from this deck. Summer Pockets is a fairly newer and unique deck that can be very fun to snowball with in the right circumstances. It features a stylish level 3 end game that probably spoiled the shit out of the visual novel and cucks most of the decks out there at the moment during level 1. Summer Pockets is probably one of the coolest sets you can play at the moment and does certainly stand out from the generic looking sets for sure so grab it by all means if you have $$ to spend on Key sets.

There are many cards I did not go over, especially blue and green. There were just too many cards to go over though for one big review and we all know what the average attention span is for any human so I excluded cards that I deemed NOT AS IMPORTANT. For anyone who personally feels offended I didn’t mention a card because they think it’s good just comment or something because that’s the shit that gets discussions going.

Before we conclude this set review, I’d like to (but not really) apologize for how late it took to bring this baby out. Fate Grand Order is just too op and if you have any dank servants please add 134.050,916 (user is Hydralisk69). I’m a complete nub so HAAAAAAALP~