aroramage |
Yep, Bronzong gets a new BREAK
evolution as well, and it's...well, something.
Its only attack is Metal Rain,
which at 2 Energy has a bit of a hefty effect. First,
you discard all the Metal Energy attached to Bronzong
BREAK. Then for each one of those cards discarded, you
get to deal 30 damage to one of your opponent's Pokemon.
In a way, you can pin a lot of damage onto one target or
split it up among multiple targets to spread out the
damage as much as you can and set up for later. So
that's not too shabby.
But generally speaking? I'm not
really a huge fan of this. Sure, you can choose how much
Energy you discard and where all the damage goes (and
yes, it does "counter" Night March by dealing a lot of
damage to claim multiple Prizes at once), but it's not
really designed to work with the newer Bronzong from
this set. In fact, it's designed with the older one in
mind. It would at least explain the 130 HP and the usage
of all that Metal Energy that I'm pretty sure Bronzong
(PHF) would be hording.
Never mind that he's not exactly
"attacker" material. Metal Rain isn't really as
offensive a move as it could be - it's only dealing 30
damage for every Energy, and while for some Pokemon
that's more than enough to KO them, for most you're
going to need 2 or more Energy. For a basic Pokemon-EX,
most of the time you need 6 Energy, and for Megas,
you'll need 8 Energy. And that is way too much Energy to
be throwing away for this attack.
That being said, it's not a bad
idea on pecking damage here and there, so try him out
while Bronzong (PHF) is still in the format and see how
you like it. Then we can lament peacefully together when
it disappears and we're only stuck with the Bronzong
from this set.
Rating
Standard: 2.5/5 (it looks great in
theory, but in practice it's generally an okay attack
that's stellar against one deck)
Expanded: 2.5/5 (and that's not
usually enough to justify running it, but who knows?)
Limited: 4/5 (I mean, I'm no expert
on Bronzong-based Abilities)
Arora Notealus: All I know of
Bronzong's abilities are that he can summon rain clouds
and sleep for 2000 years. But ya know, details, am I
right? Where's my water-supporting Rain Dance Bronzong
anyway?
Next Time: Special delivery!
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Otaku |
As promised today
we at Bronzong BREAK (XY: Fates Collide
62/124). Time is fleeting for me today so I will
be assuming you read
yesterday’s
CotD and only touch upon what was said. Like every
other currently legal Bronzor and Bronzong
it is a Metal Type, though it is a Metal/Psychic Type in
the video games. The Metal Type seems about
“average” for the the TCG right now, both that it
doesn’t seem to be the best or worst type and that the
good and the bad about the Type seem to balance out,
though in the end I think it is a minor net positive (no
seems really bad). Being the BREAK Evolution of a
Stage 1 is like being a Stage 2 card, which includes the
difficulties of getting a Stage 2 into play but without
the perks. 130 HP is about where a Pokémon goes from
being more likely to be OHKO’d to more likely to
survive, though this is not a carefully measured
quantity but a guess based on my own experiences and
recollection. As a BREAK Evolution Bronzong
BREAK will get its Weakness, Resistance, and Retreat
Cost from whichever Bronzong it from which it
BREAK Evolves. Since they all have the same bottom
stats unless we are in Unlimited - which we only discuss
for a lark if we discuss it at all - Bronzong BREAK
is going to be Fire Weak (s’okay), Psychic Resistant
(somewhat handy) and have a Retreat Cost of either three
or four (bad, though it makes Heavy Ball an
option).
Bronzong BREAK
brings one more thing to the table; the attack “Metal
Rain” for [MC]. Just to get the shallow side of
things out of the way; I love that name though I’m not
entirely sure why as it just “sounds cool” to me.
Metal Rain allows you to discard as many [M] Energy
cards from Bronzong BREAK (or anything copying
the attack) as you wish. Each Energy discarded in
this manner allows you to select an opposing Pokémon and
do 30 damage to it. You do not apply
Weakness or Resistance to the damage being done but
you care able to select the same Pokémon more than once.
You wouldn’t apply Weakness or Resistance to Benched
Pokémon anyway so this only really matters for the
opponent’s Active. Normally it is a bad trade to
miss out on damage doubling Weakness just to avoid the
-20 from Resistance but one of your targets is likely to
be Joltik (XY: Phantom Forces 26/119),
which is a 30 HP, Metal Resistant Basic Pokémon you
really wanted to be able to OHKO for a single Energy.
In fact Night March gives us a good way to explain the
effect. Say your opponent has one copy of that
Joltik and one Pumpkaboo (XY: Phantom
Forces 44/119) Benched while Mew (XY:
Fates Collide 29/124) is Active. If
Bronzong BREAK discards five [M] Energy cards from
itself with Metal Rain, you can choose to do 30 to
Joltik, 60 to Pumpkaboo, and 60 to Mew
to OHKO the lot of them. You can spread the damage
as you wish though, so if you say only discarded two
Energy you could take out the Joltik while
injuring one of the others or even just injury
everything but the Joltik.
Bronzong BREAK
has to come from a Bronzong, and Bronzong
has to come from a Bronzor. I went through
both yesterday but the highlights are that the only
Bronzor to avoid is XY: BREAKthrough
95/162, the others have HP (BW: Next Destinies
75/99), a low Retreat Cost (XY: Phantom Forces
60/119), or an attack that might protect it during the
next turn (XY: Fates Collide 60/124). None
are exceptional in these areas, just better than the
rest. Bronzong though are a different matter.
Technically all could be useful in different ways with
BW: Next Destinies 76/99 blocking healing
(amazing when it matters but usually useless), XY:
Phantom Forces 61/119 (or XY: Black Star Promos
XY21) providing Energy acceleration from the discard
pile, XY: BREAKthrough 96/162 brings the best
attacks, while yesterday’s XY: Fates Collide
61/124 has a Bench protecting Ability that blocks both
damage and effects of your opponent’s attacks. So
do you run one of each? Nope. Bronzong BREAK
may only need two Energy to use Metal Rain, but
to use it well requires much, much more. 30
damage per Energy is “okay”, with its true value being
how you can divvy it up, but you still need to
hit hard against most decks. Night March is
probably the only place you’ll really benefit from
hitting multiple targets. In most other situations
you’ll likely Metal Rain all on one target to get the
desired OHKO. You still need four [M] Energy to
OHKO a Benched Shaymin-EX, and even an Active one
requires discard three and have a Muscle Band
attached. Your typical Basic Pokémon-EX runs more
like 170 to 180 and that means discarding five Energy
even if you have some other damage boosting trick (Muscle
Band, Silver Bangle, or Hypnotoxic Laser/Virbank
City Gym), or six to do it on its own.
Once you get to
things boosted by Fighting Fury Belt or
Wailord-EX or Mega Evolutions you might have to
discard all the Energy you would normally be running,
since one of the heavily relied upon benefits of
Bronzong (XY: Phantom Forces 61/119) is that
you get by on less Energy because you can constantly
reattach it from the discard pile. If you run into
a Wailord-EX with a Fighting Fury Belt and
can’t discard the Pokémon Tool, you’re in trouble.
So is there any hope for Bronzong BREAK?
Yes, but it is pretty simple; you have a deck that
already runs Bronzong (XY: Phantom Forces
61/119), preferably at a three or four count, and
you still have space for a Bronzong BREAK.
In that case you run Bronzong BREAK mostly
because you have a decent chance of getting three or
four [M] Energy onto Bronzong BREAK so that you
can Metal Rain a Jirachi-EX (with three) or
Shaymin-EX (with four) Energy as your game winning
attack. Basically, you’re bypassing your need for
a Lysandre while several very minor benefits make
the trade (since you probably could just run a third or
fourth Lysandre) worthwhile. If the deck
was focused mostly on attacking with Basic Pokémon or
Pokémon-EX, this gives a way around the protective
effects that completely wall against damage from those
sources, gives you an option if you’re stuck attacking
with Bronzong, etc.
At first I thought
there might be a combo with Bronzong (XY:
BREAKthrough 96/162) but I realized it made more
sense to spread the damage another way, especially as
Metal Rain actually does damage instead of
placing damage counters: Mountain Ring, Mr.
Mime (BW: Plasma Freeze 47/116), and Mr.
Mime (XY: BREAKthrough 97/162) can stop all
the Bench damage with ease. So for Expanded and
Standard, TecH attacker/finisher in a deck with a heavy
Bronzong line is pretty much it; if you have
another way of piling a lot of [M] Energy onto
Bronzong BREAK like Klinklang (Black &
White 76/114). I have seen some Klinklang
decks use a Bronzong or two to reclaim/speed up
Energy attachments, but even splitting the Klinklang
line to bring in Klinklang (BW: Plasma Storm
90/135) to protect everything from Pokémon-EX, I can’t
see it working as the deck’s focus, just a surprise
final attack. For Limited play, this is a decent
pull, provided you also have Bronzor and
Bronzong (preferably in multiples). You’ll
still be saving Metal Rain for a finisher (or at least
the final attack before Bronzong BREAK is KO’d),
but the pacing makes this more plausible.
Ratings
Standard:
2.25/5
Expanded:
2.3/5
Limited:
3/5
Summary:
Bronzong BREAK is the kind of card that needs to
attach massive amounts of Energy each turn to exploit
what it can do, and by massive I mean at least five
Energy. Even using the Bronzong with the
“Metal Links” Ability, attaching five [M] Energy
requires a full four of them in play and your manual
Energy attachment each turn, plus a way to easily Bench
and promote Bronzong BREAK, each and every turn.
Did I mention that wasn’t even enough to OHKO everything
but was more for multiple KOs on smaller targets?
It still has some chops because yeah it can punish Night
March (especially if they don’t see it coming),
Shaymin-EX, and Jirachi-EX usage. It
also can be used as a final finisher if you can load up
the Energy onto it, but that will require 6+ [M] Energy
most of the time so doing it in one turn is unlikely.
So maybe consider a single copy in a deck that already
runs several copies of the correct Bronzong, but
probably nowhere else.
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