aroramage |
Man, this week is just filled with interesting cards.
Victreebel with his less than stellar Hypnotoxic
Ability, Magmortar with his tag-partner Electivire, and
now we're looking at another Gen I OG Pokemon with
Poliwrath! Why's he interesting? Good question! Let's
find out!
Our latest line-up in the Stage 2 arena begins with a
3-for-60 Steamroll that's all Colorless. It's like he's
trying to be Seismitoad-EX or something, am I right?
...anyway, Steamroll is another one of those sniping
moves that does 30 to a Benched Pokemon, so naturally
the best counter is Mr. Mime. Still, 60's not a bad
number to be hitting, but having to use up 3 Energy for
it is a bit expensive.
Submission adds another energy (and that's a total of 2
Water Energies out of 4 needed) to deal a much more
powerful 130 damage, but it does deal damage back to
Poliwrath. How much you ask? 30 damage. You know,
Poliwrath, our opponents are having an easy enough time
OHKO-ing you without you helping them along. Still, with
a little Muscle Band and Hypnotoxic Laser, that 130 is
likely to help KO an EX, so it's not terrible. Just
expensive.
Now why is a mediocre-at-best kind of card like
Poliwrath interesting? Well similar to Magmortar from
yesterday, Poliwrath has a partner that came out in this
set: fellow Poli-lution (see what I did there?) Politoed!
Politoed doesn't have much with his 3-for-70 vanilla
Hyper Voice, but he has the most curious Ability in
King's Song; with just one in play, you can ignore the
Colorless Energy in the cost of all Poliwag, Poliwhirl,
and Poliwrath's attacks. This changes Poliwrath from a
mediocre Stage 2 into an excitingly cheap powerhouse!
All you need equip are 2 Water Energies, and Poliwrath
doesn't even have to worry about not having Energy to
attack! Steamroll becomes free - as in 0-for-60+30-Bench
- and Submission does 130 for 2!! That's amazing!
But that kind of functionality comes at a price: you
have to run Politoed AND Poliwrath to make the combo
work, and while having the same evolution line helps in
part, it does mean your deck will have to focus on these
two. Needless to say this is a fun casual deck to try
out, but is this going to top competitively? I doubt it.
Rating
Standard: 2/5 (he's resource-heavy no matter which way
you go about playing him, but Politoed makes him
cheaper)
Expanded: 1.5/5 (a double Stage-2 deck against Big
Basics? I don't think so.)
Limited: 2.5/5 (he's slow to begin with, and if you
don't get that Politoed out, he's gonna need a lot of
Energies)
Arora Notealus: Apparently he can keep swimming in the
Pacific Ocean without resting cause of his muscles...but
I don't recall the Pokemon world HAVING a Pacific Ocean.
Who're the real aliens now, Poke-conspiracy theorists?
Next Time: In my dreams, I see you...WHAT ARE YOU DOING
IN MY HEAD?!
(also props if you caught the joke from yesterday's Next
Time! it's terrible, I know)
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Otaku |
I’m
very late to the party, so lets just dive in!
Poliwrath (XY:
Furious Fists 17/111) is a Water-Type; this is
relevant solely because you’ll enjoy hitting cards like
Landorus-EX for double damage, and occasionally
run into Resistance on cards like Virizion-EX
(though Water Resistance is absent on XY series cards).
While there is some Water-Type support, I can’t see how
you’ll work it in with this Stage 2 line (especially
after we see what the card lends itself to). Of course,
as it is a Water/Fighting-Type in the video games and
this set is focused on Fighting-Types, it might have
benefited more from being that Type. Being a Stage 2 is
still a serious drawback, but this card line almost
makes it work, but we’ll address that when I cover the
lower Stages, related cards and combos.
140 HP
is “okay” for a Stage 2; you’re investing time and at
least three cards getting Poliwrath into play and
140 HP is in that kind of gray area where a OHKO is not
the most probable outcome (in general, it is in specific
match-ups), but it is definitely possible for many
decks. Against Grass-Type attackers the HP is only half
as good thanks to Weakness; a Virizion-EX with a
Muscle Band scores a clean OHKO and Genesect-EX
is in “overkill” territory even without G Booster.
The video game Type combination has Weakness to Fairy-,
Flying-, Grass-, Electric- and Psychic-Type attacks. Of
those, the Fairy-Type is probably safer to have (at
least for now), plus the TCG Grass-Type includes
video-game Bug-Types, and Poliwrath in the video games
have Resistance (x˝) to Bug-Type attacks. Speaking of
Resistance, its absence is more a missed opportunity
than a real detriment (so few cards have it, and it only
occasionally makes a difference), but for the record
(and skipping anything that causes an issue due to video
game/TCG differences), Poliwrath could have
enjoyed Darkness, Fire, Metal or Water Resistance
without clashing. Finishing off the bottom of the card,
the Retreat Cost of three is chunky and you don’t want
to have to pay it; make sure you pack an alternative
(including “tanking”, if it proves viable). Slight
upside; you can use Heavy Ball to search it out
in Expanded.
Steamroll requires [CCC] to use and does 60 to the
opponent’s Active Pokémon and 30 to one of his or
Benched Pokémon (your choice which). 90 for three is
good, especially three of any Type, but the split makes
it less effective. Submission requires [WWCC] and
delivers 130 points of damage, which even for four
Energy is a solid return, but the catch is the attack
also does 30 to Poliwrath itself; if you have a
fully healthy Poliwrath, one use of Submission
reduces it to “probable” OHKO level and a Poliwrath
that has been subjected to an attack may not have enough
to survive using Submission after that. Somes the
damage won’t matter as after using Submission,
Poliwrath ends up with enough HP to survive but was
already going to be within KO range for the opponent’s
next attack. Still a solid attack, as while it requires
serious investment, for a Silver Bangle and
Hypnotoxic Laser you reach OHKO range of 170 HP
Pokémon (excluding the Water Resistant like Virizion-EX):
Virbank City Gym would mean even take out 180 HP
HP examples (plus 160 HP non-Pokémon-EX).
Poliwrath has to
Evolve from something; Poliwag (XY: Furious
Fists 15/111) and Poliwhirl (XY: Furious
Fists 16/111) are the only options for your Basic
and Stage 1 forms, though you could try something crazy
like using Cradily (BW: Plasma Blast
4/101) and its infamous Lifesplosion attack to skip both
lower Stages or as expected, Rare Candy to bypass
Poliwhirl. Poliwag is a 60 HP Basic
Water-Type Pokémon with Grass Weakness, no Resistance
and a single Energy Retreat Cost. For [W] it can use
Rain Splash to do 10 damage (overpriced) and for [CCC]
its Spiral Current does 20 to the opponent’s Defending
Pokémon while Confusing it and preventing it from
retreating… pricey but if you could afford to use it
that actually is useful; not just for surviving, but it
can be tactically beneficial elsewhere. Poliwhirl
is a Stage 1 Water-Type with 80 HP, that same Grass
Weakness and lack of Resistance and a Retreat Cost of
[C], plus two attacks. It also has Rain Splash for [W]
and now it does 20, and for [CCC] you can use Finishing
Blow. Finishing Blow does 50 points of damage, plus
another 50 if the Defending Pokémon has any damage
counters already on it. This is only a decent deal if
the Defending Pokémon has some damage on it, and it
probably won’t keep Poliwhirl alive for an extra
turn, but it is a nice option to have. If only it
didn’t cost as much to use (...you know where this is
going).
Let me
finally address Politoed (XY: Furious Fists
18/111). This Evolution line Branches, and Poliwhirl
can Evolve into either Poliwrath or Politoed,
and as I am about to explain, you’re going to want both.
Politoed is a Stage 2 Water-Type Pokémon with a
worse 130 HP, better single Energy Retreat Cost (unless
you wanted to focus on Heavy Ball and Expanded),
an Ability and one attack. The attack just does 70 for
[WCC] mediocre at best, but the Ability may live up to
its name: King’s Song allows you to ignore all [C]
Energy requirements in the attacks of your Poliwag,
Poliwhirl and Poliwrath. Steamroll
becomes a free attack while Submission would only
require [WW]. Poliwag becomes a worthwhile
irritant using Spiral Current for no Energy and
Poliwhirl becomes a decent finisher. It isn’t quite
what I’ve been hoping to see in Evolution lines, but its
quite close… and there’s more.
Celebi-EX is
risky given that it is a mere 110 HP Pokémon-EX, but its
Time Recall Ability will allow Poliwrath to use
attacks from its previous Stages. Note that the attack
is considered to be on Poliwrath, so King’s Song
kicks in and cancels out [C] Energy requirements in the
attacks: Politoed itself would also gain access to said
attacks, but because Politoed does not reduce the
cost of its own attacks, they have their usual Energy
cost. This combo gives you a Stage 2 with 140 HP and
six attacks, three of which require no Energy! Steam
Roll plus Finishing Blow need just a small boost on the
first use to begin 2HKOing Pokémon-EX for no Energy
(assuming an uninterrupted cycle of Steamroll Active and
Bench hits). As long as Poliwrath can survive,
Max Potion can instantly clear away all damage
taken between attacks… at least until you run out of
them.
So why
isn’t this the new top deck? Without Abilities, it
grinds to a halt. It relies on a split Stage 2 line.
It relies on a 110 HP Pokémon-EX for its full
versatility, and actually fitting in all the Items you
want to run can leave you out of space quickly… and
VirGen decks shred it. For Standard or Expanded, it
should be a fun deck, and in Limited its a great Stage 2
line to pull (even the lower Stages) as their
overpriced, Colorless-only requiring attacks aren’t so
overpriced here (and if you can include some Water
Energy in your deck, even better).
Ratings
Standard: 3.25/5
- Reflecting the power of the deck levied against the
difficulty in setting it up and keeping it going, it
clears that three-out-of-five hump but not by much.
Expanded: 3.25/5
- I don’t think the expanded card pool will really hurt
or help this card; the deck doesn’t really gain a whole
lot, and most decks seem unlikely to cause more of a
problem for it here than their Standard counterparts.
Limited: 3.75/5
- The whole Evolution line performs better here, though
of course pulling them and then drawing into them in a
timely manner lowers their effectiveness. Plus you
wouldn’t bother with this if you were building a deck
around a sole big Basic Pokémon, of course.
Summary: Poliwrath
and its line demonstrate how a Stage 2 can be enhanced
by making sure its lower Stages (and in this case,
alternate Stage 2) all work together, enhancing each
other. It isn’t quite what I think the format needs,
but its a lot closer than what we usually see.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t make it the new top deck;
when it sets up and gets going its impressive, but its
easy for many decks to disrupt, either by shutting down
Abilities or simply hitting hard enough and fast enough
that the set-up doesn’t matter.
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