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Name:
Dark Marowak
Set:
EX Team Rocket Returns
Card#:
7/109
Rarity:
Holographic-Rare, Starter Rare
Type:
Darkness/Fighting
Stage:
1 (Evolves from Cubone)
HP:
70
Weakness:
Grass
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
(C)
Attack#1:
(CC) Brick Smash [30]
This attack’s
damage isn’t affected by Resistance, Poké-Powers, Poké-Bodies,
or any other effects on the Defending Pokémon.
Attack#2:
(FFC) Hard Bone [70]
Discard a
Basic or Evolution card from your hand or this attack does
nothing.
Name:
Cubone
Set:
EX Team Rocket Returns
Card#:
51/109
Type:
Fighting
Stage:
Basic
HP:
50
Weakness:
Grass
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
(C)
Attack#1:
(C) Look for Friends
Reveal cards
from your deck until you reveal a Basic Pokémon. Show that card
to your opponent and put it into your hand. Shuffle the other
revealed cards into your deck. (If you don’t reveal a basic
Pokémon, shuffle all the revealed cards back into your deck.)
Attack#2:
(F) Bonemerang [10x]
Flip 2
coins. This attack does 10 damage times the number of
heads.
Attributes:
Dark Marowak is a Stage 1 Pokémon. It is blessed by
being two types at once. Normally, this would be mixed, as it
means twice the Resistance in exchange for twice the Weakness…
but the type mix is Darkness and Fighting. Fighting Types can
get around Resistance via Magnetic Storm and Darkness
Types face very little Resistance to being with. Additionally,
the Darkness trait allows Dark Marowak use the damage
bonus granted by Darkness Energy. Of course, it already
could thanks to having Dark in its name, so here it is
redundant.
Dark
Marowak
has 70 HP, which is a little low. This likely is to fit the
feel of being a Dark Pokémon, as well as offset the
inherent advantage of being not only a dual type, but one of the
better pairings of types. Still, be careful, since most Stage 2
Pokémon will at most need a Strength Charm to reliably KO
you.
Next we come
to Weakness. Dark Marowak is Grass Weak. I have a hard
time quantifying Weakness: no Weakness is good, so it is a
matter of “Which is the least bad?” Right now, it’s hard to peg
down an exact dominant Type. Grass is being played now, both
weird little rogue decks and well known decks that were recently
overhauled and now see some significant play (Muk ex and
Vileplume ex). Sadly, we once against lack Resistance,
so I’ll just move on to the Retreat Cost: one. This is a nice,
low amount that should be pretty easy to pay.
Of course,
Dark Marowak can’t get into play on its own; it must be
Evolved from Cubone. The Cubone from the Team
Rocket Returns set is pretty good. Since it can Evolve once,
this isn’t too bad (60 HP is so rarely seen on Basics that can
Evolve at least once). Its second attack, Bonemerang, is a bit
of a rip-off: you pay for an average of 15 points of damage and
get an average of 10. Fortunately the first attack is rather
useful, guaranteeing you a Basic, albeit random, from your
deck. All in all, I think this is the Cubone to use, but
perhaps that is due to my paranoia about a bad start.
Abilities:
Dark Marowak’s first attack is Brick Smash. Like Hidden
Legends Machamp’s Brick Smash (after the errata),
basically the only thing (that resides on the Defending Pokémon)
that affects this attack’s damage is Weakness. This is
incredibly sweet. It is an inexpensive attack, and will allow
you to put quite a lot of pressure onto decks that feature
Fighting Weakness.
Hard Bone
(Bloody Bone for the Japanese name, if the spoiler I read was
correct) is a solid attack. Most decks tend to have extra
Pokémon, since they are built with intentional redundancies
incase something doesn’t set up. In terms of Energy, you pay
for 40 points of damage, and being an Evolution is usually good
for at least an extra 10, so you’re getting 10 to 20 points of
damage out of that discard. Fairly solid, but not as impressive
as the first attack.
Uses and
Combinations:
Here is where Dark Marowak begins to shine. Its name
open’s so many possibilities. As stated, this card can get the
damage bonus from Darkness Energy. What is extra sweet
is that you can still make good use of Crystal Shard with
this Pokémon, since the name clause will keep the damage bonuses
when your type changes. It also has access to R Energy,
which is significant due to the first attack. While this seems
rather intricate, you can Rare Candy a Cubone into
Dark Marowak on the first turn, drop an R Energy
and a Strength Charm and probably score a FTKO against a
lot of decks. Rocket’s Hideout is the natural Stadium to
use with Dark Pokémon, as it grants them an extra 20 HP
(and a 90 HP Stage 1 Pokémon is fairly nice). Then there are the
rest of the Team Rocket affiliated cards that provide fantastic
back up. Set mate Pokémon Retriever is also useful for
“reloading” and making the initial discard less troublesome to
begin with.
As for actual
deck strategies, I have seen two interesting concepts, which
seem to fit the mold of recent “Voodoo” decks. Granted, the
term is still new to me, so my definition of such a deck is
very, very loose: basically anything that focuses on Stage 1
Pokémon that hit for about 80 a turn quickly and reliably,
usually on their second turn. More than likely, who ever coined
the term is cringing at that definition. Still, given the
extensive use of bones, Dark Marowak indeed has a voodoo
flavor, and would be helpful for Dark Hypno. It can
exploit Fighting Weakness, and gives a back up option for even
Dark Hypno’s attacks: Dark Link may be a flip, but
against the recent crop of control decks, I’d rather flip for 30
or flip and discard for 70 than sit their doing nothing
against Medicham ex… who would be OHKO’d if a Dark Linked
Hard Bone hit.
The other deck
I’ve seen use Dark Marowak is Maroswap. This deck
tries to open with Dark Marowak, and once the discard has
six Pokémon in it, the player will use Surprise! Time Machine
to switch to Fire Red/Leaf Green Marowak and use
Vengeance to his for a solid 90 each turn.
Ratings
Unlimited:
1.5/5-It is not utterly useless, but there are better Fighting
Pokémon available. Also, 70 HP is very low for this format, so
while Hard Bone would be racking up OHKO’s… your opponent will
just OHKO you back.
Modified:
3.5/5-This appears to be a very solid card, but mainly due to
its combo potential, as opposed to intrinsic strengths.
Limited:
4/5-The HP may be low on it, but its low on a lot of Pokémon in
this set, and I already pointed out the Cubone is useful for
setting up… and stock piling for Hard Bone.
Summary
This is a good
card with a slight HP/Resistance deficiency that keeps it from
starring in its own deck, but makes it an excellent co-star or
supporting cast member. Yes, the TV is on right now.
