Body of Protection from attacks by basics by 20. Pretty
cool, since there are a lot of SP decks out there, and
just not a lot of grass decks not named Beedrill at this
point (Thanks Steve). A swampert deck gets to simply cry
against a Beedrill deck, so let’s take that loss and
move on (until there is a good matching Magcargo to go
with Swampy, oh the days of yore, with a fire type
magcargo that used fighting energy)…
The attacks are interesting, and overpriced. 3 for 30
with a choice of bench to gust. OK. Better as a 2 energy
attack, especially on a stage 2.
4 (yes 4) for 60 plus 10 more for each fighting energy,
so really up to about 90. 4 for 90, I’ll take.
Possible partners for this guy…Machamp (cheap fighting
attacks, allows you to gear Swampy up as a backup
hitter), Rampardos, ditto, Infernape or Blaziken SP…just
to protect from Beedrills, or Gyarados, the master of
the 0 energy attack. All of the above appear to work
better WITHOUT Swampert though….
Better Water Pokemon out there? Yep. Will there be after
this set? Yep.
What does that mean? Not going to play it, or focus on
protecting against it.
Can you foresee a “Swampert Tank” deck that might have
real success against and SP deck? Yep, even a blind
squirrel finds some acorns once in a while.
The best part of Swampert is T. Mitchell Art….inside fun
for anyone who was at Regionals in 2009 in St. Louis,
the artwork won the contest, as well as our hearts.
Ratings….
Modified….2/5 Not a happy pokemon here. Too many better
options.
Limited – 3/5..A little better. If you can actually get
it up…quite a beast.
See you this weekend in Eureka – B&B Games on Saturday
and on Sunday at Ogres!!!
Baby Mario Top 4 UK Nats
Swampert Lv 60
I heard people liek Mudkipz, but is there any love out
there for Swampert?
Well, it has decent stats: 130 HP for a start, and
Weakness to Grass, rather than Lightning (= Luxray GL LV
X) makes a nice change for a Water Pokémon. Retreat cost
of two is acceptable as long as you can fit in a couple
of Warp Points or Switches.
Root Protector is a very nice PokeBody too, reducing the
damage Swampert takes from unevolved Pokémon by 20.
Obviously this is meant to give it some way of holding
off SP Basics and seeing as SP Basics are very popular,
this will come in handy.
But . . . those attacks . . . oh dear!
Drag Off for 30 damage and a forced switch? Doesn’t seem
too bad until you realise it costs THREE Energy. I doubt
that 30 for three has been acceptable since Base Set.
Push Over isn’t much better, doing a straight 60 for [W][C][C][C],
with an additional 10 damage for each Fighting Energy
attached. Yep, you could do 90 for 4 Energy and no
effect . . . just not good enough in this Format on a
Stage 2.
You could combo this Swampert with its GE counterpart
and use the latter’s Wash Out Power for a bit of pseudo
Energy acceleration, but with those attacks, it just
isn’t worth the effort. When a Pokémon has attacks that
are both underpowered AND over-costed, you know it
doesn’t belong anywhere but the binder.
Rating
Modified: 1.25 (horrible card is horrible)
Limited: 4 (evolved Pokémon are more rare here, so this
can really tank and win you games)
Steel_Winger
Welcome back to the Pokemon COTD!
We start off the week with a card that hasn't really
gotten any hype, and that is Swampert from Supreme
Victors. Let's look at it: 130 HP is great on a Stage 2,
right up there with Kingdra and Machamp. It's
Water-type, so if you do play it, you could give
Blaziken FB and Infernape 4 a bit of trouble. A +30
Weakness to Grass means trouble in the form of Speedrill
and Yanmega decks. There's no Resistance, but that's
expected more often than not. A Retreat Cost of 2 isn't
bad, but not good either, but it's better than some
other Pokemon, like Venusaur.
Swampert's Poke-Body, Root Protector reduces damage done
to it by Basic Pokemon by 20 after Weakness and
Resistance is applied. The main Basic Pokemon you'll see
in competitive play are Mewtwo LV. X and the SP Pokemon,
so it's not a bad Body.
Now, let's see about its attacks. Drag Off, for 1 Water
energy and two other energies of choice, does 30 damage
to the active. NOT a good cost/power ratio for a Stage
2, I'll say that right now. But before doing the damage,
you can bring up an opponent's Benched Pokemon to
replace their active, kinda like Froslass GL's Sleep
Inducer or Blaziken FB's Luring Flame. But for 3 energy,
it'll take a bit of a while to get it powered up though;
perhaps it'll have time to do so due to Root Protector.
The second attack, Push Over (man, these attacks make
Swampert sound like a bully), does 60 damage for 4
energies, one which must be Water. Again, BAD cost/power
ratio. However, it also does an extra 10 damage for
every Fighting energy attached to Swampert. So you could
possibly do a required maximum of 90 with 3 Fighting
energies attached, and if you feel like attaching more,
it racks up.
What goes well with Swampert? Before evolving, Marshtomp,
with a flip, can switch itself with your Active Pokemon
and take all energy attached to the previous Active
Pokemon with it. It's not bad to power up those
ridiculous energy costs of Swampert's. You could also
use Swampert from GE. It's Wash Out Poke-Power allows
you to move a Water of Fighting energy from one on your
bench to your Active. If you can keep rotating Swamperts
effectively, you won't have to worry much about powering
them up. Sandslash's (SV) Power, Dig Down, gives an
opportunity to get more Fighting energy into your hand
to power up Swampert's Drag Off attack.
Still, it's highly unlikely that Swampert will
be competitive. Maybe you'll be the person to prove me
wrong. If you are, let me know!
Ratings:
Modified: 2/5 The Body is good against SP Pokemon but
not much else, and there are plenty of Pokemon that have
more power in their attacks for the same or even less
cost.
Limited: 2.5/5 It might not be too bad here, but it's
hard to pull the entire line. Beware of Ninjask,
Masquerain, and Cherrim.
This is Steel_Winger, until next time!
Guy
Swampert:
Hello everybody! Before
I get to my first review I believe I should introduce
myself. My name is Guy, and I have played the pokemon
trading card game, and the pokemon video games, since
1998 when they were released in the United States. I got
out of both the trading card game and video games around
2005, but I'm back into both of them now. For the
trading card game this will be my first full season in
League play since that time, and I am looking forward to
it. As someone getting back into the game I hope that my
perspective of one who is learning and discovering the
game again can be beneficial to new players, and I hope
that my long time experience with the game can be
beneficial to all players! So here we go!
Today's card is Swampert
lv. 60 from Supreme Victors. This card is fitting for my
first review, as it was in the starter deck I bought
when getting back in the game. My deck has changed since
then, but I have played with this card before, so I can
speak about it with some first hand experience.
130 hp is nice, but for
a stage 2 can we really expect much less? The poke-power
"Root Protector" is mildly helpful. At it's best it
allows Swampert to survive one more turn, which could be
crucial, but most likely Swampert would be knocked out
in 2 turns anyway. The first attack, "Drag Off" is
costly for only 30 damage, but the ability to switch the
opponents pokemon before doing damage can be helpful.
Situationally, this is best used when the oponent has a
main attacker who has recieved a lot of damage and is
being reloaded or hiding on the bench. Simply use Drag
Off and try to get the KO. "Push Over" allows you to do
60 damage while adding ten damage for every fighting
energy attached to Swampert. For 4 energy, I want my
pokemon doing more than 60 damage, and it could do that
damage if there were a good reason for throwing fighting
energy into water deck, like a good fighting pokemon to
combo with Swampert. The weakness to grass is +30, at
least it isn't 2x, optimistically speaking. 2 ** retreat
cost is to be expected from an average stage 2 card.
A good fighting pokemon would
most likely be Swampert's best combo and utilize
Swampert to its best potential. If you want to run a
Swampert deck, then for discovery's sake, it is up to
you to figure out if Swampert has a good fighting
partner out there. Especially if that partner is a basic
or stage 1 that could deal heavy damage (or maybe even a
colorless pokemon??). Otherwise, this card is average at
best. If you're running a water themed deck and have a
main water attacker pokemon, I do not see why Swampert
would be added to that deck, and this is Swamert's
problem: it doesn't combo well. It could be great
against some fire decks out there, but when I played Swampert
I found my deck to be lacking in the "good attacker"
department.
Modified: 2/5 Really
needs a good combo to be above average, and honestly
needs better attacks to gain that status as well
Limited: 3.5/5 Could be
great if you could get it out in a limited battle, but
can you get it out is the question!
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