Baby Mario
2010 UK
National
Seniors
Champion |
Aromatisse
(XY)
Pokémon launched their new Fairy Type on the TCG with a
ton of support: Slurpuff,
Fairy Garden . . . even their own Energy (which is more
than Dragons got). The best of the lot though is easily
Aromatisse – a card that
should (with hindsight) have made our top 10 countdown.
Why is Aromatisse so good?
After all, it’s just a 90 HP Stage 1 with a mediocre
attack (three Energy for 60 with no
effect). The answer lies in its Fairy Transfer
Ability, which is one of those Energy Trans Abilities
for a specific Type which we have seen so often in the
game, going right back to Base Set
Venusaur. Newer players will be familiar with it
via Meganium Prime or
Hydreigon DRX. It’s a great
Ability to have, as it allows you to conserve Energy
while being very flexible with your attackers. Of course
being able to use Max Potion and completely heal your
Pokémon without having to discard is one of the main
attractions of this kind of Ability at the moment.
Unlike the Pokémon I have just mentioned, however,
Aromatisse is
not a Stage
2. This is a very big deal as it takes up much less deck
space and can be used in decks that don’t run Rare
Candy. The other huge factor in making
Aromatisse playable is the
re-printing of Rainbow Energy in the XY set. This means
that, when played alongside
Prism, you have
eight Energy cards you can move around with Fairy
Transfer in addition to Fairy Energy, and the upshot is
that you are not tied down to using just (mostly
mediocre) Fairy Type attackers with
Aromatisse. In fact you can build a deck that
functions the same way as the
Klinklang deck that won US Nationals back in
2012, with a whole range of tech Basics like
Yveltal,
Cobalion, and
Terrakion to hit your
opponent for Weakness.
Without Rainbow Energy, we would probably have been
waiting on a truly good Fairy Pokémon to make
Aromatisse good. With
Rainbow Energy, we have the basis for a new competitive
archetype.
Rating
Modified: 4 (Stage 2 Ability on a Stage 1 . . . yeah, it
will get played)
Limited: 3 (you need to get some very lucky pulls to
make the best of it)
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HEZ
Intro to
Unlimited 150 |
Aromatisse.
Standard.
This sort of Ability has traditionally only been found
on Stage 2s, from Venusaur in Base Set to Hydreigon in
Dragons Exalted and it’s always been a good one! To get
it on a Stage 1 show you they’re really trying to push
the new Fairy type. The rest of the card isn’t anything
impressive, it has decent HP and deals ok damage and has
the usual 2 Retreat for a bench-sitting utility ‘mon.
You can use the Ability to move Energy where you need
it, when you need it and it can also combo with Max
Potion to heal a Pokémon to full HP whilst avoiding
discarding any Energy. Both Xerneas cards are good, but
I think it will take just one more high quality Fairy
and with such amazing utility it can be a top tier deck.
Unlimited 150.
If there’s a lack of Fairy types in Standard then
the problem is only worse in U150 where you only get 1
of each of those Fairies… and Xerneas EX is banned.
Still, this effect on a Stage 1 is far too powerful to
pass up. A Fairy deck built with the current card pool
would need to splash another Type or at least make heavy
use of Colorless Pokémon. Luckily, Wigglytuff got two
good cards in XY and has plenty of interesting older
Colorless versions like the Great Encounters one that
can easily make use of Fairy Energy making Wigglytuff
the main Pokémon of the deck.
Another Bulky Colorless Pokémon that springs to mind is
Blissey. The Mysterious Treasures one appreciates having
Energy piled onto it by Aromatisse and Blissey ex’s Poké-Power
heals any number of your Pokémon then discards all their
Energy. Aromatisse can help get around this drawback by
moving Energy off a Pokémon before healing it!
If there’s already so much potential for a Fairy deck in
U150 then after a couple more XY sets it should become a
real contender if cards like Aromatisse are anything to
go off.
Ratings.
Standard: 3.5: (likely to rise with more sets)
Unlimited 150: 4
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