So, another week, and another set of SV cards, most of
which, let's face, you couldn't care less about, and are
just checking back for to see if we've done either of
the 2 cards you actually care about from the set.
Anyway, Yanmega, and the basics of the card first, and
it has 100 HP, which for a fully evolved Stage 1 is
quite good actually, so should survive a hit or 2 if you
are lucky. +20 Lightning Weakness is different for a
Grass Pokémon, but ultimately is still quite bad since
Luxray GL Lv.X (RR) is running about as if it owns the
place, either in it's own deck, or as a tech. -20
Fighting Weakness is helpful against Machamp (SF), which
is still about in some form or another. No Retreat Cost
is perfect as well, no other question or doubt about it.
Abilities now, and it's Poké-Power first, Speed Boost,
which, once per turn, allows you search your Discard
Pile for a Grass Energy and attach it to Yanmega if
Yanmega is your active Pokémon, so it's nice, inbuilt
Energy Acceleration. It may only be one per turn, but
it's better than nothing. It's actually quite useful,
and better than most of these inbuilt Energy
Acceleration abilities. There are plenty of ways of
discard energies (Blissey (PL), Lunatone (GE),
Felicity's Drawing (GE), Volkner's Philosophy (RR), and
more besides), so getting them into the discard pile is
not a massive problem.
Attacks, and we start off with Wind Return, which costs
CC and does 20 damage, which, let's face it, isn't very
good. However, you may return all Grass energies
attached to Yanmega to your hand to deal 20 more damage
for each Energy returned in this way. It's not bad, but
it's just getting energies back onto him to deal the
damage again. Speed Boost will help, but you need other
Energy Accelerators to help in reality. I'll get onto
them in the combos section.
Speed Dive is a rather vanilla attack, GGCC for 70 is
actually not even very good for a vanilla attack. For
that cost, I'd look for at least 80-90 to even make it
acceptable, so just stay away from Speed Dive really.
Combos, and it's really all about Energy Accelerators
here, and a choice of 2. First we have Leafeon Lv.X
(MD), who, in combination of Speed Boost, normal
attachment and having 2 Lv.X's in play, can attach up to
4 energies per turn to Yanmega and deal 100 damage per
turn, which isn't bad, but it does mean you won't be
able to power anything else up in the process. Actually,
not so bad then in reality, since you'll be able to
attach to which ever Yanmega you next put active after
the first one gets KOed. Also, it's a little on the slow
side, which doesn't help.
The other main Energy Accelerator is one you know but
never use for this purpose, Shaymin Lv.X (Land Form).
It's attack, Seed Flare, does 40 for GCC, but then
allows you to attach as many Grass Energies from your
hand as you like to your Pokémon in anyway you like, and
deal 20 more damage for each Energy Attached in this
way. So you do 40+ one turn, and 20+ the next, which
equals very high damage output, and 140 HP Yanmega's
thanks to Thankfulness. However, should Shaymin Lv.X get
KO'ed, or you powered up Yanmega get KO'ed, you are in a
sorry position, where you have to hope you can get the
energies back again quick enough to deal serious damage,
or else just get swept away by whatever their main
attacker is.
So, things aren't looking too rosy for Yanmega at the
moment, and they don't get much better in the counters
section. The big one is Luxray GL Lv.X, who can pick a
Pokémon off the bench, be it Yanmega, Claydol (GE),
Shaymin Lv.X (PL) or whatever, and attack it for high
damage or a KO, and then sweep through your Yanmega's
with ease with a little help from Lucario GL (RR) or
Crobat G (PL) and basically, just wreck Yanmega's day.
Not good. Other Lightning types do a similar thing, but
only to Yanmega's, since they don't have a built in Gust
of Wind Poké-Power. Cards that discard your opponents
hand, like Weavile (SW), are also helpful at dealing
with Yanmega, since they can discard alot of Grass
Energies after Wind Return has been used once though
they will fuel Speed Boost, which might not help that
much.
Ratings:
Modified: It's a nice idea. Speed Boost is nice Energy
Acceleration, even with the Active part hurting a
little, but outside of that, it's useless. Wind Return
seems promising, especially with Shaymin Lv.X (PL), but
it's too easily stopped to really be any good, and Speed
Dive is just dreadful. I think there is potential in
this card, but we'll have to wait a few sets before we
get it out of Yanmega, at which point, it'll probably be
overshadowed by something even better. we will have to
wait and see. 2/5
Limited: Speed Boost is brilliant, since all Energy
Acceleration is welcome here, and all you need to do is
wait for a Pokémon with Grass Energies attached to get
KOed, beautiful. Wind Return is not welcome though,
since it gets rid of all your hard work of getting the
energies into play in the first place. Speed Dive is
nice here though as a finishing move, dealing 70 when
you need it thanks to Speed Boost getting the energies
back when your opponent KOed something, then retreating
it for free straight away afterwards. Not bad really,
but getting into play might be the tricky part. 2.75/5
Meganium45
100 HP Stage 1 with Lightning Weakness, fighting
resistance and free retreat. Not great, but not tragic.
Without Lucario (or Crobat help) the great Luxray cannot
take the bug down in one hit.
The power to be able to scoop an energy out of your
discard pile and attach it to Yanmega, while Yanmega is
active is significant. What a good power.
Combine that with a 2 energy attack that does 20 plus 20
more for every Grass Energy you return to your
hand…could essentially make this a 60 for 2 attack,
every turn, assuming you can keep grass energy in your
discard (and we can).
The 4 energy attack for 70 is OK at best, the first
attack is worth the price of admission.
The first attack does not get “Sceptile bonused” for
doubling the energy, except to only require one energy
to fire off the first attack, and 2 energy to fire off
the second attack.
I can’t see this being the cornerstone of a deck, but
would love to see it as a late game finisher in a
Tangrowth or Torterra deck, especially on a warp point,
or turn start to sweep in, grab an energy, and then sit
back on the bench and wait to finish off something huge.
There is NO maximum number of energy for this bug, so
with 4 energy returned, it does 100 damage. Not too
shabby, especially for one shot once in the game. I
think it is worthy of a 1-1 or 2-2 line in any big grass
deck for the free retreat and power.
Ratings…
Modified – 3/5 Good card
Limited – 4.5 / 5 …Free retreat, easy basic, stage 1,
energy acceleration, tough to counter…what more do you
want? Did I mention Splashable???
There you go!
Vince
Baby Mario Top 4 UK Nats
Yanmega Lv 53
I have heard rumours of this card being played at Battle
Roads, so I was very interested to see it up for review
this week.
What you have here is a 100 HP Stage 1 (not bad), with
Lightning Weakness (uh-oh), and a Resistance to Machamp
(and the handful of other Fighting Pokémon that are
played, of course). You also get free Retreat, which is
always great.
When you add to this the fact that Yanmega comes with
built-in Energy acceleration in the form of its
PokePower, Speed Boost, then you can begin to see why
people have been giving this card a second look.
The main attraction attack-wise, is Wind Return. (Speed
Dive is a very expensive vanilla attack doing 70 for [G][G][C][C]).
Wind Return does 20 damage for [C][C], and you can then
choose to return all Grass Energy attached to Yanmega to
your hand and do 20 more damage for each CARD you
returned. I put CARD in capitals because it is important
to remember that Sceptile GE’s Wild Growth Power won’t
work to increase the damage here.
So, in theory, you can keep discarding Grass Energy (Lunatone,
Blissey PL, Felicity’s Drawing all work well here), get
an extra attachment per turn with Speed Boost, and then
hit for 60 + damage. Hmmm . . . I think that is going to
be slightly below par, especially compared to other fast
attackers like Kingdra, Beedrill, and Gyarados. I also
think that, perhaps after an initial big hit, you will
struggle to do any more than 60 per turn. While not
terrible, there are better options out there.
Maybe there is some amazing combo I am missing (I can
see both Shaymin LV Xs and Leafeon LV X working with
Yanmega), but until I come across it, I can’t see this
card as anything other than very mediocre.
Rating
Modified: 2.25 (Not sure what the fuss is about)
Limited: 3 (60-70 damage per turn is more than decent
here, but how to discard?)
Steel_Winger
Welcome back to the Pokemon COTD!
Today's card is the new Yanmega from Supreme Victors.
Let's see... 100 HP on a Stage 1 is good. A +20 Weakness
to Lightning equals trouble in the form of Luxray GL
(LV. X). A -20 Resistance to Fighting is somewhat
irrelevent, seeing as Machamp isn't around much anymore
and Rampardos hasn't made a big showing. But still, it's
better than no Resistance at all. Retreat Cost: 0.
Everyone's favorite number in the bottom-right corner.
Yanmega has a Poke-Power: Speed Boost. It allows you to
attach a Grass energy from your discard pile to Yanmega
if it's Active. Energy acceleration on a Pokemon is
excellent, but this is most useful mid-late game. If you
want to get the most of it early game, use Volkner's
Philosophy or Felicity's Drawing.
Now for the two attacks. The first, Wind Return, does 20
damage for 2 energies of choice. You also have the
option of returning all Grass energies attached to it to
you hand and dealing an extra 20 damage for each one.
Using just 2 Grass energies, you could do 60 damage for
a good cost! But how would you be able to attach the
energies back to it in time to attack again, especially
if you don't have any in the discard pile for Speed
Boost? You would need another energy accellerator to do
so, such as Shaymin (Land Forme) LV. X and Leafeon LV.
X.
Yanmega's second attack, Speed Dive, does 70 damage for
4 energies, 2 which must be grass. That's an
underpowered attack for so much energy and no extra
effect. Well, you could use this if you're not keen on
returning energies to your hand at that point in time,
but you'll usually have a way for Yanmega to get the
energy back on it quickly by the time you get Speed Dive
charged up.
Yanmega, while not having much time in the spotlight
yet, could be just waiting in the wings for someone to
take it to the top. It certainly has potential.
Ratings:
Modified: 3/5 Good HP, an great attack, and a helpful
Power give Yanmega a chance to be a contender. LuxNape
decks are your worst enemy though if you want to run
this.
Limited: 3/5 It can also do well here with the right
support. Try using Electivire FB to get energies into
the discard pile to power up Yanmega's Speed Boost.
This is Steel_Winger, until next time!
Guy
Yanmega:
Today we examine Yanmega from the Supreme Victors
series. Yanmega is a stage 1 with 100 hp, which is not
bad, but a 100 hp stage 1 with free retreat cost, now
that's great! Lets look at the Poke-power and attacks to
see if it is truely a good card or not.
Yanmega's pokepower is Speed Boost. This allows you to
attach a grass energy from your discard pile to Yanmega
before you attack, if Yanmega is your active pokemon.
This power seems good, but it has a few catches: 1. You
can only attach the energy to Yanmega. 2. Yanmega has to
be your active pokemon to use the power. This card would
essentially be great if the power did not have to be so
conditional!
The first attack, Wind Return, is very interesting.
It does 20+ damage for ** energy. It also allows you to
return all grass energy attached to Yanmega to your
hand. If you do this, Wind Return does 20 + 20 for each
energy returned. This would seem like a logical
combination with Speed Boost, but the energy go to your
hand, not the discard pile (which hinders the
power/attack combo). The attack and power could still be
combo'd well, but lets talk situationally. Your turn, IF
Yanmega has survived (since it needs to be active to use
it's power...unless you retreat it after using the
power), you attach a grass energy for your turn, and IF
you have a grass energy in the discard pile (which would
most likely indicate that the game is in a later stage)
you use it's power to attach that discard pile grass
energy, and Wind Return can do 60 damage. How long until
Yanmega has no grass energy to take from the discard
pile and his power is useless? So it can be good for a
while, but its main use could be to clean out your
discard pile if you want to speed boost with wind return
to get grass energy in your hand, and then attach them
to someone else who can do more damage, or back to
Yanmega.
Yanmega's next attack is Speed Dive which does 70 damage
for 2 grass and 2 ** energy. This is only average at
best.
Free retreat is great, resistance to fighting helps
against Machamp or Gallade, and +20 weakness to electric
is not the worst thing to every happen.
Yanmega is very intriguing, and it may be best used to
clean the discard pile of energies. His best attack is
wind return, as one can combo it with Speed boost to do
60 damage for 2 energy. The fact that the energy goes
back to the hand makes it very playable with a certain
lv.X grass pokemon out there, so go out and test it and
see what happens. I say Yanmega has potential!
Modified: 3/5 I may rate it high, but it has some
combo's, tricky combos, but combos none the less out
there.
Limited: 4/5
Codex_of_
Wisdom
So my first COTD for Pojo shall be Yanmega LV.. 53.
Cool.
First, very fast: Hi all, my name is Cody, handle
Codex_of_Wisdom. I started Pokemon back in ’98 or so as
a second grader and played until shortly after the Neo /
Johto stuff came out, at which point I quit. But with
graduation came extreme boredom and loneliness, so I
rejoined the fandom stronger than ever and am now
nearing Platinum completion and preparing for my first
Autumn Roads.
Enough about me, on to Yanmega.
Stage 1 with 100 HP, not too bad, especially with only
+20 electric weakness and a fair fighting weakness
(though is that really relevant right now?)
No retreat is nice (yay wings).
But now what really matters: the abilities.
Reading this card immediately sent gears turning in my
head. The Power lets you, once per turn, put a grass
energy from your discard onto Yanmega. Pretty nice,
though grass energies aren’t the type to be sacrificed
often.
Then its first attack compounds nicely with this power:
double colorless for 20 damage (bleh) but return all
grass energy to your hand to do an extra 20 for each
(therefore if you use grass to power, it does 60). Now
you may be saying “that stinks” but here’s the beauty I
see in it: you can now put those energy on any other
Pokemon you have. With 0 retreat cost, you can also
switch to that pkmn easily too! Use the Power to take
energy from the discard pile, use the attack to return
them to your hand, and then put them wherever you wish.
The second attack, however, is fairly mediocre and
bland: double grass and double colorless for 70 and no
effect is OK, but not outstanding, especially for a
Stage 1.
Overall:
Modified – 4/5 Low weakness, great combo opportunities,
no retreat. This is definitely going in MY deck! The
only problem I see is Speed Dive
Limited – 4.5/5 Good for getting back your precious
energies and spreading them out.
I hope everyone liked my first review. With luck I’ll be
doing this for a while!
