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Pojo's Pokemon Card of the Day

Baby Mario 2010 UK National Seniors Champion	Reuniclus #57 (Black and White) One of the weirdest Pokémon ever to see the light of day, Reuniclus will instantly remind old school players of the very first card (by set number) from the very first set in the Pokémon TCG. That’s right, Reuniclus comes with Case Set Alakazam’s Damage Swap Power (now called an ‘Ability’, of course). And Reuniclus seriously needs that Ability to be a good one because it has virtually nothing else going for it. The 90 HP is pitiful, the Weakness isn’t great, and the Retreat cost of two is a bit much. Worst of all is the attack: three Psychic Energy for 30 damage plus 10 times the Energy on the Defending Pokémon? You are joking me if you ever say you are planning to attack with that. So it all comes down to the ability then. Damage Swap allows you to move a damage counter from one of your Pokémon to another as many times as you like during your turn. Obviously the point is to keep important Pokémon (usually a main attacker) from getting KO’d by moving damage counters on to something else. This can then be combined with Seeker, Super Scoop Up, or Unown RETURN to pick up the newly damaged Pokémon rather than give up a Prize. Note that you can’t just go ahead and put as many counter as you like on a Pokémon before scooping it up: once the number of damage counters reach the level of the HP, it gets KO’d. Clearly, Reuniclus is made for decks that like to tank their main attacker. Unfortunately both of the major tanking types (Grass with its healing and Metal with its Special Energy) are Weak to Fire . . . a type that is about to infest the metagame with Pokémon that do so much damage (notably Reshiram) that nothing with Weakness can avoid the OHKO with any amount of healing or counter moving. It may be that the best partner for Reuniclus at the moment will be Gengar Prime: a Pokémon that is difficult to one-shot without PlusPowers or Tyranitar Prime. With Reuniclus in play, Gengar Prime might be able to survive long enough to stay ahead in the race to Lost Zone six Pokémon before the opponent can take six Prizes. Reuniclus is the kind of Pokémon that will always appeal to deckbuilders as its Ability is one that could be extremely useful in the right deck and in a metagame which favours it. Right now, I think its use will be limited. Apart from Gengar, I can see maybe Machamp Prime (spread damage around for Champ Buster) and Donphan Prime being able to get something out of it. Time will tell if it will have any wider use. Rating Modified (HGSS-on): 3 (a possible tech for Pokémon that like to tank and can avoid OHKOs) Limited: 1.25 (Ability is not worth the effort of evolving a Stage 2 and even in Limited the attack sucks)
Otaku	Name : Reuniclus Set/#/Rarity : Black & White 57/114, Holo-Rare Stage : 2 (Evolves from Duosion) Type : Psychic Hit Points : 90 Weakness : Psychic x2 Resistance : None Retreat Cost : CC Ability : Damage Swap As often as you like during your turn (before your attack), you may move 1 damage counter from 1 of your Pokémon to another of your Pokémon. Attack : (PPP) Psywave [30+] Does 10 more damage for each Energy attached to the Defending Pokémon. ------------------------------------------------------------ Name : Duosion Set/#/Rarity : Black & White 56/114, Uncommon Stage : 1 (Evolves from Solosis) Type : Psychic Hit Points : 60 Weakness : Psychic x2 Resistance : None Retreat Cost : C Attack#1 : (C) Recover Discard an Energy attached to this Pokémon and heal all damage from this Pokémon. Attack#2 : (PC) Rollout [30] ------------------------------------------------------------ Name : Solosis Set/#/Rarity : Black & White 55/114, Common Stage : Basic Type : Psychic Hit Points : 30 Weakness : Psychic x2 Resistance : None Retreat Cost : C Attack#1 : (P) Cell Structure Search your deck for Solosis and put it onto your Bench. Shuffle your deck afterward. Attack#2 : (PC) Rollout [20] ------------------------------------------------------------   Today we look at the Black & White answer to Alakazam, Reuniclus. Let’s break the card down. First, it is a Stage 2 Psychic Pokémon. Being a Psychic usually isn’t a bad thing, and they do have some specific support available to them. We see a big problem right away: 90 HP on a Stage 2 Pokémon. Certainly not a record low for the game, but the only other Modified Legal Pokémon I could find that was that small was Jumpluff from HeartGold/SoulSilver! In a format where HP scores seem to be remaining steady or even climbing slowly, this is a pretty big drawback, and likely meant to offset what the designers considered to be something great on the card. Moving on, we see the expected Psychic Weakness, which always bothered me given that in the video games, Psychic-Type Pokémon are Resistance to their own type, not weak to it. Lack of Resistance is annoying but so common it doesn’t really hurt it. The two Energy needed to retreat isn’t bad for a Stage 2, but given how small it is they probably could have let it get by with just one.  Well, the stats are disappointing, so let’s check the Ability I alluded to earlier, Damage Swap. Yeah, just like Base Set Alakazam but with modern wording. If you can keep Reuniclus safe on your Bench with a veritable tank up front and some HP “donors” on the Bench, you can keep that tank going for quite some time. This really is a remarkable Ability. The attack is less impressive. Psywave hits for base 30 points of damage, but gets an extra 10 points of damage for each Energy attached to the Defending Pokémon. It doesn’t specify Energy card, so hitting something with a Double Colorless Energy attached would do +20. Even adjusting for the more moderate damage of this set, they are charging too much for the attack: you’re investing enough Energy to expect 40 to 50 points of damage on an Evolvable Basic Pokémon. On a Stage 2, I’d expect at least 60 but would still complain it was steep. To get that much damage, you have to hit something with at least three Energy attached, and need to face some very Energy intensive Pokémon if you want to come out ahead.  Well, what does Reuniclus Evolve from? Does that save it? Nope. Duosion can flush away all damage on itself by discarding an Energy, but that is an attack so it will almost certainly be KO’d on your opponent’s next turn, plus it can only hit for 30 damage! Solosis is actually worse as a Basic that clocks in at the minimal HP score of 30 (no plain Pokémon has had less) and in order for its attacks to be fairly priced all Psychic Energy requirements need to be Colorless. Of course, even if that were true it’d need even more to compensate its horrible HP. With all this taken into consideration, clearly TPC is betting the farm on Damage Swap.  So how should use you this card? I am not certain what Pokémon to use, but for Trainers I’d say Bench Shield, Seeker and Super Scoop-Up. With Reuniclus hiding on the Bench and protected by Bench Shield, the other two will become supreme healing cards for whatever it is you want to protect. I know Manectric from Platinum has a Poké-Body that can protect Pokémon on the Bench, but I have some concerns with it. First, Poké-Bodies can be blocked. So can Trainers, but it is still worth mentioning. More importantly, it’s a Stage 1 with only 90 HP and its Poké-Body doesn’t protect itself (or other Manectric) so you’d really have to run Bench Shield anyway. So that’s at least two extra slots in your deck and a spot on your Bench for incomplete protection. You should probably include some larger Pokémon appropriate to the rest of the deck, and then use this to back up something that is really hard to KO or bad about inflicting self-damage. Honestly, though, it sounds too risky in this format, when it is so easy to load the Bench with damage counters, many times without relying on attacks. Once the rotation happens, you’ll lose Bench Shield (and Manectric, should you choose it), but we also loose the premier sniping Pokémon I am worried about right now. Still, given how many times Damage Swap has failed to sustain a deck in the past, I am thinking Reuniclus would be most useful as a Bench sitter splashed into a deck. I don’t feel I can really call it TecH since it is a minimum of three card slots (since even if you use Rare Candy, you used Rare Candy) plus I’d want at least a 2/2/2 line of it, even if the middle two are just Rare Candy. If you can figure out how to work this into a Typhlosion Prime deck, you can control the damage counter placement from its Afterburner Poké-Power. The thing is I’d want set-mate Ninetales for the obvious combo provided through Roast Reveal: discard a Fire Energy from hand, draw three cards, and use Afterburner to attach it to one of your Pokémon. A single damage counter isn’t that bad, and by the time Reuniclus is needed to damage swap… you’ll be lucky to have a Bench opening left. I’d prefer to have at least two each of Typhlosion, two each of Ninetales, and then two of my main attacker (we’ll say Reshiram for the sake of argument). What about other decks? We tend to hit the same problem.  I’d even avoid this in Limited. That’s right, avoid it! Not only is it poor, but so are its lower Stages. Even if this format, 90 HP is bad for a Stage 2. While you should be hiding this on your Bench, what do you do when you open with Solosis? When you can’t build anything because you’re constantly attaching and discarding energy on your Active Duosion to keep it from being KO’d, and you know eventually your opponent will just build up something that can OHKO Duosion. Damage Swap is clearly tempting as a Bench sitter, but there is too much of a risk of its lower Stages being stuck Active. On the bright side, since the Ability is so useful I suppose you could ignore the attack completely and thus run it in any Energy deck if you decide to disregard my advice. I mean, this set has PlusPower in it!  Ratings Modified (Current): 3/5  Modified (HGSS-On): 3.25/5  Limited: 1.75/5  Combos with: Seeker, Super Scoop Up  Summary  Damage Swap is a great power and I expect at least a few decks to find a good use for Reuniclus, especially next format when things should be a little slower. That being said, stall strategies often don’t work out too well due to time limits in Organized Play, and the Ability is the only thing that isn’t deadweight on this card. You have to worry about protecting it, providing Pokémon to shunt the damage to, and then cards to bounce those Pokémon to hand for healing (or actual healing)… and by that time you don’t have enough room left for a good attacker and the support needed to set it up!   Please check out my auctions on eBay as I sell off most of my assorted collections! It’s a slow process so visit me through the week as I get items ready for sale. Just remember that Pojo.com is in no way responsible for any of these sales and are merely kind enough to let me link to them in my reviews.
virusyosh	Happy Tuesday, Pojo viewers! I hope that all of you are having good weeks thus far. Today's Card of the Day is yet another new Pokemon from the new Black and White expansion that may see some play. Today's Card of the Day is Reuniclus. Reuniclus is a Stage 2 Psychic Pokemon. Gengar is the most common Psychic played right now in its own deck, while Uxie, Mesprit, and Azelf are very commonly seen supporters. Reuniclus has an abysmal 90 HP for a Stage 2, meaning that it probably won't be able to take many hits, even if they aren't hitting for Weakness. Psychic Weakness especially hurts against Gengar, as Poltergeist can OHKO with little investment. Like many other cards, Reuniclus has no Resistance, and a Retreat Cost of 2 isn't terrible, but it isn't great either. Aside from Reuniclus's lackluster top and bottom stats, it has an Ability and a single attack. The Ability, Damage Swap, is identical to that of Base Set Alakazam, in that it allows you to move damage counters around as often as you like during your turn between your Pokemon. This can be pretty useful if you have adequate bench sitters with high HP and a reliable way to heal them, or if you just want to move damage off of your Active Pokemon. However, will all of the snipe available in today's metagame (Gengar, Garchomp, even some rare things like Abomasnow), you should make sure to be able to heal the damage with a Seeker/Super Scoop Up/even Blissey Prime. There has been talk of an infinite combo involving Reuniclus, Mismagius GL, and Unown Q, where you can keep loading damage onto Unown Q, return it to your hand with Magical Return, only to play it down again and continue the process until all of the damage on your side of the field is gone. However, given that this combo requires a Lv. X and a Stage 2, both with low HP, chances are that your opponent will be able to deal significant damage to you before this gets set up anyway. Reuniclus's attack, Psywave, starts off at 30 damage and does 10 more for each Energy attached to the Defending Pokemon for the terrible cost of [PPP]. Not really worth using on its own, especially because it has a very expensive cost AND is dependent on the opponent. Modified: 2.5/5 Although hyped, I don't find Reuniclus all that impressive, at least right now. 90 HP is terrible for a Stage 2, and having a Psychic Weakness also hurts. While Damage Swap can be useful, the presence of SP really limits Reuniclus's usability, as a Flash Bite + Dragon Rush will OHKO. Once the HGSS-on rotation is in effect, Reuniclus could definitely see more play, perhaps with Blissey Prime or other similar mass-healing cards. Limited: 3/5 Damage Swap can be great here, especially if you draft another big hitter with a lot of HP. Reuniclus's low HP once again lets it down here, and Psywave is very expensive for little potential reward. Even still, if you draft the whole Reuniclus line, it may still end up being useful. Combos With: Mismagius GL Lv. X and Unown Q, Blissey Prime
Mad Mattezhion  Professor Bathurst League Australia	Reuniclus BW   Hello, this is one of my late reviews. Since the total built up to over 80 missed reviews, I figured that I'd just make a fresh start and only catch up on Black & White cards I missed rather than annoy Bill with constant requests to backdate reviews.   So, what does Reuniclus offer to players? Reuinclus is a Psychic type Stage 2 with 90 HP, Psychic weakness, a retreat cost of 2, an Ability and an attack.   To cut a long story short, Reuniclus has terrible HP and an easily exploited weakness (not so bad in the new format coming though) with no redeeming features amoung the rest of the stats. The retreat is terrible because Reuniclus isn't going to survive in the Active slot long enough for you to attach the necessary energy for manual retreating and the lack of resistance, while expected, is not pleasing. Never have Reuniclus Active if you can help it, but even on the bench Reuniclus is easily sniped by Blastoise UL and Garchomp C. Fortunately Abilities aren't affected by the same things that Poke-powers and Poke-bodies are, or you could add Gengar SF and Entei & Raikou Legend to the list of dangerous snipers.   The attack is Psywave, and at the cost of [p][p][p] you know it isn't any good no matter what the effect is because investing that much energy on a 90 HP Poke'mon is sheer lunacy. I doubt anyone is going to try in any case because the effect is a measly 30 damage plus 10 more damage for each energy attached to the Defending Poke'mon, which means you will never deal more than 70 damage per hit and usually you won't deal more than 50. Psywave is a pitiful attack that noone should ever use.   To be worth the investment and risk Psywave had to be a truly broken attack (which it is most certainly not) so it all comes down to the Ability to keep Reuniclus out of the binder.   Damage Swap is just like Rain Dance in a way, because it is a clone of the old Poke'mon Power the first ever Alakazam used. The effect is to move any damage counters on your Poke'mon around in any way you like, which can be quite useful. The most obvious use is to move damage counters from your damaged attacker to a benched sacrifice which can then be returned to the hand with Super Scoop Up/Seeker or healed with an Ability/attack.   Another use is to power up attacks that do extra damage based on how many damage counters are on your Poke'mon (whether it be damage counters on the attacking Poke'mon like Zekrom's Outrage or damage counters on your benched Poke'mon like Machamp Prime's Champion Buster) but bear in mind that you will leave yourself vulenerable to a return KO during your opponent's turn if they manage build a replacment attacker.   An overlooked use would be to intentionally KO one of your own Poke'mon to clear some space on your bench and qualify for using cards like Twins and Black Belt. Sadly you can't move extra damage counters onto a Poke'mon that is already being Knocked Out by Damage Swap because you have to move the counters one at a time, but it is still a possible play if you run Reuniclus.   The problem is that Damage Swap only helps if your main attacker can avoid being wiped out by a single attack which rules out most of the cards that are currently popular if you are facing any kind of beatdown deck (which between Reshiram, Zekrom and Machamp Prime, is most of them). Worse yet, while Reuniclus combos well with Serpeior BW and Nidoqueen RR, you probably won't have the space to run two Stage 2 techs in your deck. Healing is better than simply moving counters so Reuniclus will probably get edged out in most builds.   If Damage Swap allowed you to move damage counters between turns instead of during your turn then it would work a lot better. You could get more healing from Maternal Comfort/Royal Heal (you could move the damage counters immediately after getting hit for maximum efficiency in healing) and power up Rage style attacks without having to worry about a revenge KO (you would move the damage counters back away from your Active immediately after your attack) as well as get around Poison and Burn more easily. Sadly, that isn't the way it worked out so Damage Swap is a luxury instead of a staple in decks that do fun things with damage counters (tanking decks, anything that likes Rage style attacks, et cetera).   Seeing as the Ability is situationally useful but generally outpaced by other options and the rest of the card is terrible, Reuniclus gets the gong and will remain as an obscure tech that is usually no more than binder fodder. At least it is marginally better than Alakazam E4 Lv X (Alakazam came with a Damage Swap Poke-power that only affected SP Poke'mon, which between Poketurn and Garchomp C is completely redundant).   Modified: 2 (there is some potential, but far too often you won't have the room for this card and Damage Swap isn't always helpful anyway)   Limited: 1.5 (Damage Swap may be far more useful here if you pulled a lot of Super Scoop Up cards, but generally you will do better with self healing attacks and the newly revamped Potion. Not to mention the stats are still terrible, as is Psywave. Why on Earth did they need to add insult to injury by coupling those stats with such an overpriced attack?)   Combos with: Serperior BW, Super Scoop Up, Machamp Prime, any similar cards