>>29144302I don't think it's parabolic or that there's been creep, just more of a paradigm shift. We didn't really need cards like Juniper in Gen 4 because draw power was mostly mitigated to Pokemon abilities, letting trainers take a consistency role instead. This slowly flipped over time to where Supporters are our draw cards and we no longer could sustain draw Pokemon.
For an example of what I mean, look at the Worlds winners between 2010 and 2012, which is where the turning point towards today's meta happened.
In 2010, big draw cards like Oak's existed, but only one deck actually ran it and it wasn't even maxed. Instead, you saw Uxie/Claydol as your draw cards, then a huge amount of search and recycle trainers.
In 2011, Juniper was legal for Worlds, but only a single winner actually ran it. The other two used Magnezone and only 3x Oak, and that was considered enough. Then you see maxed out Pokemon Collector in all decks and 3x Twins in another; imagine a modern deck running 4x Brigette and 3x Teammates.
Then 2012 saw the end of draw support Pokemon, with only an odd Smeargle making an appearance. Juniper, Oak, and N are the only Supporters you see, normally maxed out with 1-3 Random Receivers in the pocket. This isn't because those Supporters are particularly powerful, but because we no longer really had any draw support Pokemon to use thanks to how oppressive Catcher and EX Pokemon were. If you spend multiple turns setting up a Magnezone, your opponent can just Catcher it out and take a free prize with a Landorus.
If it weren't for Catcher back then and the gradual power creep in Pokemon, or for the overall lack of draw support Pokemon in general, our current Supporter lineup would be more diverse and cards that aren't Sycamore/N would be used a lot more often.
I feel autistic for rambling about all this but there you go.
