Baby Mario
2010 UK
National
Seniors
Champion |
Metagross
EX
Outside of tin reprints, promo EX
cards are pretty rare things. Even rarer are the
promo-exclusive EXs. Generally, they turn out not to be
very good: that’s probably just as well, considering
that it’s not always easy for people to find all the
various Collection Boxes, Elite Kits and the like. I
think most of us remember promos that were virtually
unavailable in certain geographic regions (like the
Plasma Landorus in the USA).
Being a Metal Type Pokémon means that
Metagross has potentially
somewhere to go already: the
Bronzong PHF-based Metal deck that has seen
some success
recently.
With such excellent acceleration available, the fact
that his attacks are expensive shouldn’t be so much of
an issue. What
is an issue is that they are quite bad. Magnetic
Laser’s Energy manipulation may dovetail nicely with
Bronzong’s Metal Links
Ability, but 20 damage is not
what you want from an EX Pokémon (unless it came with an
utterly devastating effect like
Seismitoad EX). The bigger problem, though, is
Squared Attack. It doesn’t matter how much Energy
acceleration you have if it is being used to power an
awful attack, and this one
is pretty
awful. Four coin flips for 50 damage per heads may offer
the promise of 200 damage, but rarely is this achieved
(even with Trick Coin or Fliptini),
and never reliably. If you really want to play a ‘flip
and hope for the best’ card, you’re better off with
Malamar EX (relatively
speaking).
However . . . Metagross does
have a Mega Evolution which we will be looking at
tomorrow. If that turns out to be any good, then
Metagross EX’s deficiencies
won’t matter so much, as it could function as a step on
the road to something better. Will that turn out to be
the case? Tune in tomorrow to find out (though you
probably know already . . .).
Rating
Modified: 2
Expanded: 1.75
Limited: 3.75
|
aroramage |
Metagross was already an
interesting Pokemon, but the SHINY version of Metagross?
Just SO COOL!! And the geniuses over at the Pokemon
Company designed a card to commemorate the Shiny Beldam
giveaway that was going on for Pokemon ORAS as a Shiny
Metagross - not to mention his Mega Evolution is a card
too! Did they also design him well enough to be
playable?
...not...exactly...
The basic Metagross-EX only has two
attacks, and...well, neither's overwhelming. The first
attack, Magnetic Laser, does a measly 20 damage for 2
Energy, but it does give the player the option to move
Metal Energy off of a Benched Pokemon to Metagross-EX.
That's actually not that bad, since it leads up into M
Metagross-EX's own attack, but we'll save that for
tomorrow. Right now, the big thing is that Metagross-EX
can effectively equip Metal Energy from the discard pile
via Bronzong's Metal Links. Granted the initial damage
output could've been much MUCH higher.
And speaking of high damage
outputs, Squared Attack can potential do a lot! Or
pretty good! Or decent. Or terribly...or nothing at all.
Yeah, it's one of those "flippy" attacks that relies on
coins to deal damage. Granted, it's four coins for 50 a
piece before any Muscle Band is involved, so you're
aiming for around 0-200 damage before that. You're going
to average out 100 damage a piece, which is still enough
to 2HKO most Pokemon-EX, but while there are attacks
that CONSISTENTLY do this, Squared Attack is NOT one
such attack.
So regrettably this Metagross-EX
isn't a great attacker, but hey, maybe Mega Metagross
tomorrow will be worth it! If not...well, don't expect
to see much of them in play.
Rating
Standard: 2/5 (a disappointing EX
to say the least, though Magnetic Laser will set-up his
Mega counterpart)
Expanded: 2/5 (let's be honest,
you've got better EX to use here)
Limited: N/A (if he were in a set,
you'd run him, but since he's not, you won't)
Arora Notealus: THIS GUY IS
CRUSHING GEMSTONES IN HIS ARTWORK AND HE'S SILVER AND
HE'S A GIANT ROBOT SUPERCOMPUTER THAT CAN Levitate or
fly or something, I dunno, HE'S SO COOL
Next Time: RUN MEGA.EXE
|
Otaku |
This week we are going to look at some of the recent
Black Star promos. Today we look at
XY Black Star Promos
XY34,
Metagross-EX.
Of its Type possibilities, this one is Metal; besides
being fun to say this means it can tap direct Metal-Type
support like
Steel Shelter
and will likely work well with indirect Metal-Type
support like
Bronzong
(XY:
Phantom Forces
61/119;
XY Black Star Promos
XY21). Metal Weakness isn’t abundant but several sets
after the introduction of Fairy-Type Pokémon its no
longer especially rare (as it was when it was only
really found on certain Water-Type Pokémon that
represented the video game Ice-Type). While not yet
relevant to Organized Play,
XY: Primal Clash
looks like it might provide a great attacker to Fairy
Transfer decks - this could become an important Weakness
to hit or it might just remain handy. Metal Resistance
is something you’ll probably come across as most
Lightning-Type Pokémon (namely those released in the XY
sets) once again have it. All in all, I’d consider this
to be a slightly beneficial type, maybe even a “good”
Type though its far from as potent as being a
Fighting-Type (for example).
Being a Basic is currently the best and that seems
unlikely to change soon. Metagross-EX
is of course a Pokémon-EX and that’s actually a
drawback; all the bonuses associated with it technically
are a matter of suspected design templates and we’ve
seen plenty of Pokémon-EX with attacks and/or Abilities
that aren’t significantly better than non-Pokémon-EX and
the HP tends to only exceed what you’ll find on a
“regular” version of that Pokémon… but the only things
guaranteed is that the card will be worth an additional
Prize when KOed and cards which counter Pokémon-EX or
which exclude Pokémon-EX from receiving benefits will
still apply. Metagross-EX
did cash in on the higher HP cap; its got 180 which has
only finally been surpassed on a Basic Pokémon-EX by
Wailord-EX
(XY:
Primal Clash
38/160, 147/160) and which there is little chance of
seeing anything else hit. 180 is usually going to
survive a hit but OHKOs are still somewhat common, with
some decks specializing in them and most capable of
pushing for one. Fire Weakness will definitely matter;
while Fire-Types are prone to overkill with 180 HP this
will at least save them resources. The Psychic
Resistance is useful though Resistance itself is usually
only dangerous (for your opponent) when it is forgotten
or it was already a borderline case. The massive four
Energy requires your deck dedicate slots to reducing it
or bypassing manually retreating entirely or “tanking”
or some combination (including all three)! Fortunately
that’s still a pretty common part of competitive decks,
so its not adding much of a burden and in Expanded, it
means you could search this card out via
Heavy Ball.
Metagross-EX
has two attacks. For [MC]
Metagross-EX
can use Magnetic Laser for 20 points of damage, plus the
option of moving a [M] Energy from one of your Benched
Pokémon to
Metagross-EX
itself, while for [MMCC]
Metagross-EX
can use Squared Attack, allowing you to flip four coins
good for 50 points of damage per “heads”. That gives
Squared Attack a minimum damage of zero, maximum of 200
and mean/median/mode value of 100 damage. Before even
addressing whether these attacks have good
damage/effects, I want to draw attention to how the
Energy costs do and don’t work well together. You’ve
got no attack you can fuel with a single manual Energy
attachment (even when using
Double Colorless Energy).
This is good for the long term health of the game: part
of why big, Basic Pokémon have run amuk is that they
tend to hit either fast or hard and fast. It is not,
however a good thing for
Metagross-EX,
though neither is it a huge negative. The second attack
can make use of
Double Colorless Energy
(and many other forms of Energy acceleration) which can
shave a turn off of hitting Squared Attack ready, though
it is important to note that without more significant
assistance than
Double Colorless Energy,
three turns is still counting on one more turn than even
big, Basic Pokémon-EX are likely to survive.
So what about after we consider what the attacks do?
Unless we get some bizarre reprintings/rotation
happening this card shouldn’t breaking the format.
Given the damage output we’ve been seeing on
competitive Pokémon-EX, 20 for two just doesn’t cut it.
This isn’t another
Seismitoad-EX;
moving an Energy up onto
Metagross-EX
is no where near as good as blocking Items… and Quaking
Punch hits for 30 damage and only requires [CC].
Squared Attack demands four units of Energy, so it
needed to at least average 100 damage. The odds appear
to be in your favor at a glance, but while at a glance
it is mathematically sound, with odds being about
two-in-three that you’ll at least get 100 damage, those
times when you hit for 50 or nothing are usually
devastating, and as it is all coin flip based so far too
often damage received will likely be much less than
damage done. With Mega Evolutions becoming less and
less fringe, it also helps to show how the damage is
lackluster at all levels; I already said I don’t like
attacks that can completely fail but a single “heads”
can fail to KO even many small-but-played Pokémon, two
“heads” can fail to KO moderately sized Pokémon, three
“heads” won’t take out larger Pokémon and the largest
will survive even all four coins coming up “heads”.
Even with a
Muscle Band,
the numbers are only a little bit better. For taking my
chances with an expensive, coin flip based attack I
really want to know I’m taking everything out (at least
that isn’t boosted).
You’ve got far better options for a big, Basic
Pokémon-EX Metal-Type attacker. Fortunately we’ll be
looking at
M Metagross-EX
tomorrow to see if it is good enough to get this card
into decks and if that is the case, this isn’t a
terrible card to Evolve from, just not very good.
Ratings
Standard:
2/5 - Through the inherent benefits of being a big,
Basic Pokémon, this card still isn’t as bad off by being
mediocre as something much harder to get into play.
Expanded:
2.1/5 - As above, but with a slight bonus for access to
cards like
Heavy Ball.
Limited:
N/A - Not legal, but if it were released in a manner to
make it legal and the set was neither overly biased nor
in favor of Metal-Types, this would be something you’d
make room for with whatever else you were running unless
you pulled a different big, Basic Pokémon for to build a
+39 deck around. Metagross-EX
itself would not be worth the risk of that little trick;
the effect of the first attack becomes even less useful
while you’d be at the mercy of the coin flips. As such
I suspect It would be KOed before you took four Prizes,
at least often enough you should just make a
full-fledged deck.
Summary:
Metagross-EX
doesn’t really do anything exciting, and in a sense its
because the effects are backwards. I’d much rather have
a flippy but potentially hard hitting alternate attack,
and then a big attack that moves Energy
off
of my current Active instead of on to it. We have a
format of 2HKOs and OHKOs; moving Energy onto the Active
is going to increase the damage done by many popular
attacks
against
your Active and as such seems like a risky way to build
but moving it onto somethings else can prep your next
attacker while reducing the damage taken from several
attacks… and if said Active survives it can use its less
expensive fallback attack. At least, that what seems
like it might have worked better than the reality; sorry
for ending this with a Create-A-Card.
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