Lana’s Fishing Rod – Cosmic Eclipse Pokemon Review

Otaku

Lana’s Fishing Rod (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 195/236, 266/236) is a Trainer-Item that lets you shuffle a Pokémon and a Tool from your discard pile into your deck.  If you only have one or the other, do as much as you can, but if at least one of each is in your discard pile, you’ll have to recycle both.  This doesn’t seem like too strong of an effect… and it probably isn’t.  Rescue Stretcher lets you recycle up to three Pokémon in this manner or add one directly from the discard to your hand.  Eco Arm lets you shuffle three Tools from your discard to your deck.  Both are also Trainer-Items.  Neither is Standard-legal.

In the Standard Format, you’ve got to either burn a Supporter or use a Pokémon-based effect to recycle Pokémon or Tools.  Admittedly, the cards in question might add the card(s) directly to your hand, recycle more of them, or affect a wider range of targets but they also cost more to use.  This has left a hole in typical player strategies for Standard, or rather a deck slot that Lana’s Fishing Rod has claimed.  It might be worth it in the right Expanded deck, but now it isn’t filling a hole but occupying a niche… that I’m not sure actually exists.  Unless you’re running a +39 deck, include Lana’s Fishing Rod in your Limited Format decks should you pull a copy (or copies).

Ratings

• Standard: 3/5
• Expanded: 2/5
• Limited: 3/5

Lana’s Fishing Rod is a handy card now, but it probably takes a hit soon(ish); if the translation is accurate, the new “Fishing Rod” Trainer-Item will let you shuffle up to two Pokémon and two basic Energy cards from your discard pile into your deck.  I’m not seeing a similar trick for Tools, though.

aroramage

It goes without saying, but you should never leave your fishing rod at home when you go out to your local game store to play Pokemon TCG…I mean that’s obviously what it’s there for, right?

Lana’s Fishing Rod is an Item that shuffles back into your deck a Pokemon and a Tool from your discard pile. It’s another one of those recursive effects that sees some use every now and then, so how does this help out with certain decks? Well let’s take a look at a decent example in Malamar-Giratina, a top performer out in San Diego.

With Malamar-Giratina, you want to be able to use Malamar’s Psychic Recharge to fuel up your Pokemon with Energy while stacking damage through effects like Giratina’s Distortion Door and Spell Tag. This in turn lets you set-up for a brilliant sweep with Garchomp & Giratina-GX, which can deal 240 with Calamitous Slash if there’s already damage on the Pokemon it attacks. Put enough damage down, and well that’ll KO just about anything! So where does Lana’s Fishing Rod fall into place in that deck?

Spell Tag just so happens to be a Tool in the deck, and there are usually a few different techy Pokemon thrown in for good measure – stuff like Blacephalon (CEC) with Fireworks Bomb, Mimikyu with Shadow Box, and even Mew with Bench Barrier. Or you could use Jirachi for sifting through the deck for the Trainer you need, and so we come across the main reason for Lana’s Fishing Rod: recycling those resources! Getting Jirachi back lets you search for more Trainers, Spell Tag lets you keep spreading damage around, or you can grab one of your tech cards to keep circulating play with those in case they get KO’d!

Truth be told, this is just one way of working Lana’s Fishing Rod into your deck, and while it won’t necessarily land it anywhere near the top of the meta, it can help out your deck in a number of ways. And hey, people have gotten as high as 5th place with this card in their deck, so it’s gotta be doing something!

Rating

Standard: 3.5/5 (can’t say it’s exceptional, but it is handy for that small amount of recycling to use)

Expanded: 3.5/5 (I do feel like there are some better cards to use here, but I also think Lana’s Fishing Rod deserves a second look in consideration with the performance)

Limited: 2/5 (…well, you can get Pokemon back for sure, but there’s not a lot of playable Tools here)

Arora Notealus: This week is really about looking at cards that otherwise might have been overlooked because of flashier mechanics or better cards that came out around these cards. Stuff like Lana’s Fishing Rod provide useful effects for the game, yet we barely notice them until they start showing up in top-tier lists. It’s one of the coolest things about card games that there are always new ways to use older cards, new interactions being created with each release, and new thoughts going into the deckbuilding process as a result! It’s great to see cards like this take the spotlight every now and again, even when their role can seem so minor in the deck they show up in.

Next Time: Awakening a power unlike anything the world has ever seen! Now featured in a new card!