Crushing Hammer
Here’s a welcome return of an old card
under a different name. Energy Removal 2
was the balanced version of the
game-defining Energy and Super Energy
Removal cards from Base Set. The balance
(as is often the case in Pokémon) comes
from making the card work on a coin
flip: if you flip heads, you can discard
an Energy card attached to one of your
opponent’s Pokémon.
So, the question is, how useful is it?
Well, that depends partly on the format,
and partly on whether there are any
better alternatives. Setting your
opponent back a turn on their Energy
attachment is never going to be a bad
thing, but historically Energy Removal 2
only really merited
deckspace as a answer to decks
that relied heavily on their limited
supply of Special Energy: especially
those cards that provided more than one
Energy at a time, such as Double Rainbow
and Scramble Energy. Energy removal
effects have never been that great
against decks that have low attack costs
that are met by running Basic Energy.
Right now, we have
several important Special Energy
in the format. Double Colourless is used
for acceleration by a whole bunch of
Pokémon (Cinccino,
Zoroark,
Beartic);
Rainbow gives decks with multiple types
more versatility; and Rescue is the best
form of recovery we have in the game for
non-Basic Pokémon. Does this mean that
Crushing Hammer should find its way into
your deck though? Well, not so much.
For a start, we already have Lost
Remover to deal with Special Energy, and
a non-flippy
card that sends Energy to the Lost Zone
is preferable to a
flippy one that can discard it.
Secondly, there are a number of commonly
played Pokémon that are barely affected
by removal effects, such as
Yanmega and
Donphan
Primes. Thirdly, Trainer Lock, in the
shape of Vileplume
and Gothitelle
is increasingly common, and renders
Crushing Hammer completely useless.
Lastly, there are those Energy
acceleration decks which either love
having Energy in the discard (Typhlosion),
or have more than enough ways to recover
it (Emboar
decks play multiple Fisherman/Energy
Retrieval). The only major Pokémon I can
think of that could be seriously hurt by
Crushing Hammer would be
Magnezone
Prime, which needs to keep Energy on the
Field to fuel Lost Burn.
Despite the fact that Crushing Hammer
seems mediocre right now, and not really
deserving of deck space, I’m kind of
glad to see it back. Just because now
isn’t the time for it, doesn’t mean it
won’t have a use at some point. Crushing
Hammer is just the sort of card that
could become part of a useful counter
strategy in the future, and most
deckbuilders
would welcome having it back in their
armoury.
Rating
Modified: 2.5 (nothing special now, but
I’m 90% certain it will be put to good
use before it rotates)
Limited: 4.25 (if you pull it, you run
it.
Setting the opponent back a turn could
win the game)
