Prinplup
(Dark Explorers)
Hello, and welcome
to a new week of
Pojo’s CotD,
where we will carry on rounding up some
of the cards from the Dark Explorers
set.
We kick off the
week with Prinplup.
Yes, he’s an evolving Stage 1, but he’s
still worth a look because
Empoleon is
a decently playable card right
now, and if
Japan is anything to go by, he could
well be the focus of a top tier deck
next season when we move to BLW-on.
Because it is the Stage 1, we all know
that Prinplup’s
main job is to evolve into
Empoleon on
those occasions where Rare Candy isn’t
an option. That doesn’t mean it can’t be
useful in its own right though –
remember how good
Prinplup DP was as an early game
spread/snipe Pokémon in decks that ran
the MD Empoleon?
This version
doesn’t look too promising though. 80 HP
and Lightning Weakness are not exactly a
surprise of this Water-Type Pokémon, but
they don’t do anything to endear the
card to players. Even the Retreat cost
of two seems a little harsh. No
Abilities here either, so I guess it all
comes down to the attacks.
The first, Razor
Wing, has the minimum cost of one Energy
of any Colour (we haven’t had no Energy
attacks since the Baby Pokémon), and
does 20 points of vanilla damage. It
isn’t bad value, but then it isn’t
likely to impact the game much either.
Consider it a bit of a filler attack to
use only when you really have nothing
better to do.
Prinplup’s second option, Fury
Attack, is something we’ve seen before
in different versions. This one is quite
pricey at [W][C][C],
and that is part of the problem. See
Empoleon
itself only needs one Water Energy to
attack, so stacking three on
Prinplup
will just be a waste when it evolves.
That’s not the only issue though: Fury
Attack is a coin flip thing, where you
get three flips and
30 damage for each heads. Even
with great luck, the 90-for-three is
nothing special, and anything below that
is pretty poor.
So, this is no
Prinplup DP,
that’s for sure. Instead of being a
useful source of alternative attacks,
Prinplup DEX
is just your everyday generic filler
Stage 1. Barring the release of a better
version, he’s going to get some play in
competitive
Empoleon decks, but he doesn’t
really deserve it.
Rating
Modified: 1.5 (He
evolves into something good!
. . . and that’s about all he
does)
Limited: 2.25
(cheap first attack, but even here he’s
a bit meh)
