I’ve been falling behind in my CotDs
again, so let us see if skipping my
normal template is helps me be more
concise?
Today we look at
Sigilyph (BW: Plasma Blast
41/101), which actually snuck into my
own Top 12 Promising Picks of Plasma
Blast list in the number 11 slot.
Sigilyph is a lot like its older
sibling (BW: Dragons Exalted
52/124; BW: Plasma Freeze
118/116) both are 90 HP, Psychic-Type
Basic Pokémon with Psychic Weakness, no
Resistance, and single Energy Retreat
costs.
Being a Basic Pokémon is still the best
right now as the imbalance between the
Stages remains (ideally I believe they
should ultimately even out).
Basic Pokémon are still the
fastest and the most space efficient,
allowing them to work better with the
common resources shared by the other
Stages, and the speed of the game means
that being slower than a Basic Pokémon
is a serious detriment… and the rotation
unfortunately didn’t cut all of their
specific Stage support that they didn’t
need.
The Psychic-Type has some support but
like most Types, said support hasn’t
proven worth using.
Psychic Weakness is seen; most
Psychic-Type Pokémon and a good deal of
Fighting-Types are Psychic Weak, and a
few of those do see serious play (and
note that
Sigilyph is not Psychic Weak
itself).
Psychic Resistance may be more
common than Psychic Weakness, as most
Darkness-Type and Metal-Type Pokémon
possess it, but Resistance as a whole
isn’t a strong mechanic so in the end,
it is probably a wash.
The HP is unlikely to survive a shot
from a fully set-up deck; even without
other effects to boost damage, 90 is a
number regularly hit.
At least it is enough that it
shouldn’t be an overly easy kill for
weaker set-up attacks or incidental
damage unless those are boosted.
Being at 90 does allow
Level Ball to fetch it from your
deck, and is a score that tends to be
something of a “bittersweet spot” for
Weakness; not a lot of Lightning-Type
attackers will hit high enough to OHKO
it without having been at least close to
doing so before Weakness anyway.
We also get Fighting Resistance;
just enough to annoy a Fighting-Type
attacker with the HP.
Finish it off with that good
Retreat Cost (only “free” is better),
and the bottom stats don’t disappoint.
The Ability is what really catches one’s
eye for this card; Toolkit allows
Sigilyph to have up to four Pokémon
Tools attached at once; this enables
many combos and you’ll recall that we
had two excellent Pokémon Tools place
highly in our Top 12 list (Silver
Bangle and
Silver Mirror).
The attack is underpowered, but
only just and likely to compensate for
the Ability: Cutting Wind does 70 for
(PCC), which isn’t too hard to pay with
some acceleration, and is fairly
splashable.
So how should one use this card?
Honestly, I don’t know.
I can give you some ideas,
though.
Obviously you’ll want to run a
decent amount of Pokémon Tools with it;
as none provide draw power or especially
good search power which means you’ll
need to make room for them without
cutting out the usual set-up Trainers.
We haven’t gotten it yet, but
Elesa is a Supporter Japan already
has, and she adds three Pokémon Tools
from your deck to your hand, meaning you
would just need a good source for
recycling Pokémon Tools.
We have some Pokémon with Pokémon Tool
focused effects but honestly?
I don’t find them to be very good
save perhaps one and it almost surprises
me what it is:
Trubbish (BW: Plasma Storm
65/135) does 20 points of damage for
each Pokémon Tool attached to a Pokémon
in play (both players) at a cost of (PC)
with its Tool Drop attack.
With the right set-up (namely
today’s
Sigilyph backing it), this could
lead to a “glass cannon” effect, where
you Tool Drop for a KO knowing that
Trubbish is going to be OHKOed right
back the next turn.
Other than that, might include this
alongside the Safeguard version in a
deck built around anti-Pokémon-EX Basic
Pokémon; with the right Pokémon Tools
such a deck could adapt to much of the
metagame, and if you wanted you could
push for the surprise win by doing
something crazy like attaching four
Silver Bangle to this at once (which
would allow it to hit for 190 points of
damage before Weakness and Resistance).
The key is to utilize this card
for unusual situations; you wouldn’t
want to rely on the above crazy play
except to win the game.
Obviously, there are some hurdles for
this card to overcome.
First,
Tool Scrapper is likely to become a
deck mainstay and
Chatot (BW: Plasma Blast
77/101) exists just to make sure that
you always need a
Silver Mirror as one of your Pokémon
Tools (barring specific combos).
Second,
Garbodor (BW: Dragons Exalted
54/124; BW: Plasma Freeze
119/116) shuts off Toolkit, forcing you
to discard down to one Pokémon Tool (if
you had more than one attached).
The third and final concern is… there is
Pokémon Tool support, but unless
something changes its bad.
This is a problem because it may
just signify the-powers-that-be aren’t
sure what support needs to do, that they
think what exists actually is good
enough, or even if they recognize the
need it probably has low priority (as
they already tried before).
Elesa is a Supporter already out in
Japan,
and it allows you to add three Pokémon
Tools from your deck to your hand.
This is good and would be a
likely deck-mate for
Sigilyph but there is a huge need
for a way to get Pokémon Tools out of
the discard efficiently… but that might
break some Ace Spec cards like
Life Dew.
Ratings
Unlimited:
Might make for a fun deck, but it won’t
protect you from First Turn Win decks or
lock decks, nor do I believe it can
actually create any.
Still, this format has so many
amazing Pokémon Tools it might still be
slightly competitive fun.
2/5
Modified:
This seems to be a good, interesting
card though not something I expect to
win many (if any) events.
I’ve said it before; we’ve got
another good card in a format of great
cards.
3/5
Limited:
Ignoring the Ability for a second, it’s
a good, solid card; as long as you can
run some
Psychic Energy so it can attack, its
just a nice, big (by Limited standards)
Basic Pokémon.
Then if you do get multiple
Pokémon Tools (there are two in this set
it could use) it could be a major force.
Just don’t expect to run it like
you would a good Pokémon-EX (on its own,
with just Energy and what few Trainers
you pulled).
Summary
Toolkit is a potent Ability, but whether
or not we’ll have enough “ammo” for a
card like
Sigilyph to use reliably is another
question.
Don’t count on it, but don’t
count it out either.
Unless you’re running something
like
Sableye (BW: Dark Explorers
62/108), you at most can run four copies
of
Tool Scrapper… and while that would
indeed counter
Sigilyph well, you’ve got to realize
what you’re facing and your opponent has
to fail to draw out said
Tool Scrapper.
