Everyone, welcome to the final day of our Rising Rivals
Trainer week, ending with Bertha's Warmth, one of the
new SP related Supporters! Now, the effect is rather
simple, healing 5 damage counters from one of your
Pokémon SP, which might sound quite good, since healing
such a large number of damage counters with certainty
with few costs sounds good when your nearest rival is
Life Herb. I, however, think it might sound better than
it actually is, and I beat a lot of other people have
already thought about this as well. Getting the
supporter exactly when you need it is probably the first
problem with the card since, even though it's
searchable, it's only thanks to another Supporter that
it is so, thus you'll have to plan ahead very carefully.
Maybe Porygon 2 (GE) helps this a little due to it's
Poké-Power, but honestly, how many decks that play SP
Pokémon outside of the likes of Crobat G (PL) will
actually play Porygon 2 to actually make it worth while.
Another problem about it is the restriction on only
being able to heal SP Pokémon with it. Every main
attacker at the moment has the potential to deal a lot
of damage to SP's, generally with OHKO's and 2HKO's
being most likely, and the healing effect of removing 5
damage counters will probably not really effect those
numbers much (maybe a 2HKO will get changed to a 3HKO,
but otherwise, not really a big difference). Now, I
think I may be a little too harsh on this, and could
possibly see this card being effectively used as a 1-of
or maybe a 2-of card in an SP deck, but I still wouldn't
be confident enough as to it's use to actually put it in
my own deck.
Ratings:
Modified: I think this card could see maybe a slight bit
of play, but only if the SP deck in question could
withstand at least 1 hit from the most popular Pokémon
at the moment, and if the play has absolutely perfect
prediction skills to know when to search for it and keep
it in their hand, and when to get rid of it because it
will be useless. Given all of this, it's use in the
majority of decks will be, or should be, none, since it
probably won't work or have any real use. 1.25/5
Limited: My thoughts here are that it becomes better,
since with fewer Trainers and specifically Supporters
that you'll have the choose to use from here, this card
becomes quite a viable choice, especially when you
consider that many Pokémon here are both SP's, and have
a higher enough HP to survive most hits that will come
there way at least once. Alright, it can't be searched
for, meaning you have to hope you draw it when you need
it, but that's the same for most cards you'll have in
you deck unless you managed to get at least 1 of either
SP Radar or Bebe's Search or, indeed, both. 3.5/5
Meganium45
OK, this is the one supporter that does not make a lot
of sense to me.
Removing 5 damage counters from a Pokemon SP may make a
great deal of sense at some point, just not in this
format. It doesn’t remove special conditions, or switch
you out, so…who knows. What it does do is keep your
tools and energy attached, which is an advantage over
Poketurn for that limited scenario.
OK, now for the ratings on this quick review.
Modified…1.5/5 Not much use, and much better supporters
and trainers to use in this format. Leave it go here.
Limited… 3.5/5 Yes, supporters are usually great in
draft, but this set is so full of them, this may
actually hamper your deck. Given the number of SP
Pokemon in this set, I did rate it good enough to
play…so who knows…may actually be good here. If I was
going SP in the draft, I may just take it to have it, in
case I needed to toss it in. Is that wishy-washy enough
for this card?
Thanks and see you soon! Get that testing in for
Nationals! Held in my hometown!!!
Baby Mario Top 4 UK Nats
Bertha’s Warmth
Wow . . . Bertha is like TWO AND A HALF POTIONS!! Your
Pokémon will NEVER DIE!!!!
Bertha’s Warmth is yet another supporter that benefits
only SP Pokémon. Its effect is simple – remove 5 damage
counters from one of your SP Pokémon. I guess Dialga G
just got even harder to KO.
Now, removing five damage counters is nice, but is it
really worth your one Supporter per turn? In my opinion.
most likely not. There are simply better options, such
as Poke Healer, which can remove 8 damage counters and
all Special Conditions (and is a Trainer, not a
Supporter), Blissey PT, whose Nurse Call PokePower gives
you constant healing, or (best of all), simply Poke Turn
the heavily damaged Pokémon to deny your opponent a
Prize. Alakazam 4 LV X is another option from Rising
Rivals, letting you move damage on to a ‘sponge Pokémon’
which can then be Poke Turned or Lost Cycloned. With so
many Pokémon doing huge damage for little Energy, and so
many Pokémon being knocked out in one hit, 5 damage
counters is really too little to be worth playing your
Supporter.
Rating
Modified: 1.5 (other cards do a better job)
Limited: 4 (less competition for Supporter use here)
Steel_Winger
Welcome back to the Pokemon COTD!
Today's card features yet another member of the Elite 4
in her own supporter: Bertha's Warmth!
This card is the same as a Super Potion in the games,
but it only works for SP Pokemon. You can provide a bit
of stalling with this card. It gets really frustrating
for your opponent when you manage to heal your Pokemon
when they're close to KOing it. This can help you buy
time to get that last energy on your SP Pokemon to power
up that huge attack. At the very least, if you're set up
already, it provides a bit of insurance against your
opponent breaking through. Imagine going up against
Dialga G with a couple of Special Metal Energies
attached to it and, finally, it's on the ropes.
Suddenly, your opponent uses Bertha's Warmth to heal a
good chunk of damage.
How would you feel about that?
...
...Exactly.
However, it can't get rid of Special Conditions like
Life Herb can, and it heals a litle bit less... but at
least you don't have to flip for it. That's nice.
There's just one problem: Bertha's Warmth is a
Supporter. People will find that they usually have
better things to do with their once-a-turn Supporters
than healing their Pokemon. However, it is useful to
stave off a loss when it's down to the wire and you
don't have a Poke Turn in handy. But then again, when
you're playing with SP Pokemon, why wouldn't you have a
Poke Turn in handy?
Ratings:
Modified: 2/5 Healing is a good thing for a card to do,
as there are relatively few cards that do it, but a
Supporter that heals only SP Pokemon? Notable lack of
versatility.
Limited: 3.5/5 In cases like these, there won't be many
Supporters to use. Healing an SP Pokemon here could
probably win you the game if you can dish out that
powerful attack afterwards.
