Name/LV:
Ludicolo LV.47
Set/#:
Secret Wonders 13/132
Rarity:
Holographic Rare (Super Rare)
Type:
Water
Stage:
2 (Evolves
from Lombre)
HP:
100
Weakness:
(L) +30
Resistance:
None
Retreat Cost:
CC
Poké-Body:
Rain Dish
At any time
between turns, remove 1 damage counter from Ludicolo.
Attack:
(WWC) Nature Power [60+]
If you have a
Stadium card in play, this attack does 60 damage plus 20 more damage.
If your opponent has a Stadium card in play, the Defending Pokémon is
now Confused.
Name/LV:
Lombre LV.26
Set/#:
Secret Wonders 54/132
Rarity:
Uncommon
Type:
Water
Stage:
1 (Evolves
from Lotad)
HP:
70
Weakness:
(L)+20
Resistance:
None
Retreat Cost:
C
Attack#1:
(CC) Torment [20]
Flip a coin. If
heads, your opponent can’t play Supporter cards from his or her hand during
his or her next turn.
Attack#2:
(WW) Absorb [40]
Remove 2
damage counters from Lombre.
Name/LV:
Lotad LV.13
Set/#:
Secret Wonders 92/132
Rarity:
Common
Type:
Water
Stage:
Basic
HP:
50
Weakness:
(L)+10
Resistance:
None
Retreat Cost:
C
Attack#1:
(W) Water Sport [10+]
If Lotad has less
Energy attached to it than the Defending Pokémon, this attack does 10 damage
plus 20 more damage.
Attributes:
Ludicolo is a Water Type, giving it a natural advantage against most
Fire-Type Pokémon as they are rarely anything but Water Weak. It will also
give you a leg up against a handful of Fighting-, Lightning-, and
Psychic-Type Pokémon plus one each of Metal- and Dark-Type Pokémon (both a
kind of Charizard). Granted, few of the cards I saw that were Water
Weak and not Fire-Types are apt to be played. Resistance to Water attacks
is still somewhat rare, though it does exist and thus if you plan to run any
Water deck, it would be good to familiarize oneself with said Pokémon.
As a Stage 2
Pokémon, you will of course have to run at least the Basic Ludicolo
eventually Evolves from, Lotad, and will also probably run at least
one copy of its Stage 1 predecessor, Lombre. The newest Lotad
has average stats for a Diamond & Pearl era Basic that Evolves twice, and
somewhat disappointing attacks: given its small stature and standing as a
Basic, how often will you want it to be facing an opponent with more than
one Energy on their Active? Not very. For that matter, you’d probably only
have it Active your first or second turn, and at that point, your opponent
will probably have one or no Energy on their own Active. At least it says
Energy and not “Energy cards” so if someone does drop a Double Rainbow
Energy or Holon’s Castform on their Active, you can smack them
good. Ram has you paying for 25 points of Energy and receiving 20, so I
assume the disappointing Water Sport attack was expected to be a bit more
potent. The Lombre from this set fairs slightly better: its Torment
attack would be great except half the time it just does the 20 damage you
paid for (in terms of Energy). Stage 1 Pokémon, even when they further
Evolve, generally deserve a bit of a cost break. Even as a free effect,
this is a let down. Oh, denying Supporter card usage is very potent, but
only if it is reliable. Otherwise, a well made deck will have enough Poké-Powers,
Poké-Bodies, and Trainers to get by for a turn. Plus, if it fails before it
works, they’ve already begun to set up and Lombre is apt to be KO’d
before it can attack again: it has somewhat low HP for a Stage 1 nowadays,
with the rest of its attributes being average. The mere 70 HP also hurts
the second attack: while 40 damage is good for just two Water Energy and
even better when it includes a free “Potion” effect, if you get
OHKO’d what does it really matter? As for what I recommend a player uses,
still go with the newest Lotad simply because it uses the new
Weakness rules and is thus less apt to be OHKO’d. I would use a mixture of
the two Lombre: the newer version for the same reason the newer
Lotad, the older version because it can discard Trainer cards attached
to the Defending Pokémon, which is pretty vital if you are low of
Windstorm. If you have four copies of Windstorm and can easily
make room for them in your deck, go pure Secret Wonders.
Ludicolo
has 100 HP, which is small for a Stage 2. It has a bad (but not the worst)
Lightning Weakness at plus 30. This means it can be smacked around by
things like a normally Bench-sitting Magneton in Hurricane decks.
Realistically, though, it has to worry about Electivire the most.
This is due both to the actual prowess of Electivire as well as the
residual popularity of Electabuzz: it and Scyther were
featured early on in the Pokémon cartoon and it was considered “rare” in Red
and wasn’t in Blue or Yellow at all. On top of that, players from the early
days of the TCG remember that Base Set Electabuzz was a force to be
reckoned with. Ludicolo’s HP and Weakness aren’t so bad that it
becomes an easy OHKO, but it certainly doesn’t help. Sadly, there is no
Resistance balancing this out, and as usual I find that annoying: Resistance
is a part of Pokémon, and especially under the new rules no more difficult
to understand than Weakness. Last for attributes, let us look at the
Retreat Cost: two Energy is low enough you can Retreat but high enough you
won’t want to, so in the end it is “average”.
Abilities:
Ludicolo has a Poké-Body and a single attack. The Poké-Body helps to
offset its lower HP score a little: between turns you can remove a damage
counter from Ludicolo at any time. This will frustrate widespread
but low damage themed decks, but won’t help against big damage decks. Even
against moderate damage decks, it might not be enough: 100 damage is pretty
easy to do when it comes down to other top Evolutions. Still, let me point
out a bright side: you choose exactly when to use Rain Dish between turns:
if you wanted to let Poison KO your Ludicolo, hey, you can. That may
seem lame, but if we ever get any of the classic “remove damage counters
between turns”
Berry
Pokémon Tools back, it gives a very realistic reason why the control
matters: choose whether or not to keep damage to trigger the
Berry
when it is most desirable. No threats on the horizon? Drop the damage and
save the
Berry.
Yes, all this assumes you are only damaged to the exact minimum trigger
point and one damage counter matters, but it is something.
The Nature Power
attack is hurt by the prevalence of Windstorm: people have once again
cut back on Stadiums. I have always advocated Stadium use, and any deck
wanting to use Pokémon Tools would be smart to include some annoying or
otherwise useful Stadiums as “bait” for Windstorm (just don’t be
silly and lay both Stadium and Tool out at once). Still, you can always add
a few good Stadiums to your deck to act as “double” Plus Powers due
to the attacks effect and 80 for three Energy is then pretty solid. If the
opponent actually runs Stadiums, Confusion can be very handy against many
big, hard to KO Pokémon.
So both abilities
are pretty solid, but nothing special, and given the attributes, this is a
problem.
Uses and
Combinations:
This could be run with a single copy of Ludicolo δ, as that would
give you an edge against any remaining Pokémon-ex decks or Fire Weak decks.
Scott makes it easy to get several Stadiums to your hand quickly
while simultaneously thinning your deck. There are several Stadium cards
that can disrupt common deck themes at the moment like Battle Frontier
and Crystal Beach, plus Glacia’s Stadium is a must given your
Weakness.
Lake Boundary
could be good when you are the other decks Weakness, and I just love using
Speed Stadium, though I tend to flip mostly heads.
Ratings
Unlimited:
1/5 – My review for Modified has a distinctly negative tone, and there is
nothing here that suggests Unlimited would be anything but a worse place to
use this card.
Modified:
2/5 – You could probably make an “okay” deck with it, but it would be
because you love Ludicolo.
Limited:
3.5/5 – The healing effect has a chance to kick in often here, though there
are no Stadiums to benefit the attack.
Summary
This Ludicolo
isn’t especially bad, it just isn’t especially good either, lacking anything
potent enough to warrant it being a deck focus, and lacking anything to make
it a worthwhile support Pokémon.
-Otaku
