Mucha Hawlucha! We begin the week with
Hawlucha-EX (XY: Furious Fists
64/111), whose “regular” counterpart and
set-mate Hawlucha was reviewed
just that week: I’ll be referencing
Hawlucha at points so click
here
if you need to go back and read it. As
a Fighting-Type, Hawlucha-EX
enjoys access to the new Fighting-Type
support XY: Furious Fists brought
us, and while it has to deal with
Resistance, that is far outweighed by
Colorless-, Darkness- and
Lightning-Types being mostly Fighting
Weak. It also enjoys being a
Basic-Type, though it does have the
drawback of being a Pokémon-EX: though
that status can justify higher than
normal HP and better than normal attacks
and/or Abilities, it isn’t guaranteed.
What is guaranteed is that Hawlucha-EX
gives up an extra Prize when KOed, can’t
use certain pieces of support (as they
exclude Pokémon-EX) and is the target of
certain Pokémon-EX specific counters.
Hawlucha-EX
has 130 HP; for a non-Pokémon-EX this is
great (the most such Basic Pokémon have
had), but it is about 40 below the going
rate for competitive Pokémon-EX. It
isn’t a guaranteed OHKO for your
opponent or even an especially easy one,
but its fairly probable that once your
opponent gets their set-up going, that
Hawlucha-EX won’t last long. The
fact that Hawlucha-EX is just
that - a Pokémon-EX - means not only
giving up two Prizes when (similarly
sized) competitive Pokémon would just
give up one, but that your opponent’s
can tap things like Silver Bangle.
I do realize that the “regular”
Hawlucha from this set only has 70
HP and thus its Pokémon-EX counterpart
is sporting just 10 less than twice that
while other Pokémon-EX are getting a
much smaller bump, but the effectiveness
of the HP score doesn’t care about that.
Even if it is “fitting” that doesn’t
mean it is competitive. To give you an
idea, a Lugia-EX needs to make up
just a 10 point damage difference for a
Plasma Gale OHKO that Overflow turns
into a three Prize turn. A very
cherry-picked but still illuminating
scenario, a Hawlucha (regular)
with just one Strong Energy, a
Silver Bangle and a Fighting
Stadium OHKOs Hawlucha-EX!
Hawlucha-EX
is just large enough for its Weakness to
prove relevant; contrast that with
Friday’s Hawlucha, who was often
in OHKO range without such boosting. It
is still useful that its Lightning-Type
Weakness isn’t the same as nearly any
other Fighting-Type,and most
Lightning-Types are going to be Fighting
Weak). With little(r) Hawlucha,
its Weakness often often didn’t matter
since it was so small (and no sense
double penalizing the card for such a
thing). Not so with Hawlucha-EX;
Raichu (XY 43/146) still
can do the deed with less than a full
Bench and a Silver Bangle for a
Circle Circuit KO (what it would need
sans Weakness), Thundurus-EX goes
from having no chance of a OHKO with
Raiden Knuckle to having decent odds (at
least in decks running multiple buffs)
and in Expanded Zekrom (latest
printing BW: Legendary Treasures
51/113) can use an unaugmented Bolt
Strike or to Outrage with at least five
damage counters on it (or just two if it
has a Silver Bangle attached),
instead of having to boost Bolt Strike
or be nearly KOed from damage counters
when it goes to use Outrage. Hawlucha
was more fragile, of course, but it also
wasn’t a Pokémon-EX.
Hawlucha-EX
does enjoy the same Fighting Resistance
as Hawlucha, and again its a nice
bonus, but it only does so much good.
Generally speaking, more HP allows
something to take more hits, and the
more hits something can take the more
damage Resistance can ultimately soak,
but that 130 HP falls into a weird
place. The good news is that it isn’t
pointless; things like a Landorus-EX
with a Strong Energy and
Muscle Band will miss the 2HKO
against an active Hawlucha-EX,
but the bad news is that as a
Pokémon-EX, Fighting-Type Pokémon have
the option of running Fighting
Stadium to add 20 points of damage
when attacking Pokémon-EX, nullifying
Resistance. In fact, the
anti-Pokémon-EX and/or anti-Resistance
measures in Fighting-Types magnify each
other, to the detriment of Hawlucha-EX.
It is the goal of many competitive
Fighting-Type decks to open with a Basic
attacker that can attack for [F], a
Strong Energy and Pokémon Tool on
that attacker, and a useful Stadium in
play. Sometimes the Stadium is
Fighting Stadium (that only grants
its +20 to Fighting-Types attacking
Pokémon-EX), sometimes its Virbank
City Gym (which mean a Hypnotoxic
Laser is required to further the
combo), sometimes the Basic isn’t a
Pokémon-EX so that opening Tool can be a
Silver Bangle instead of a
Muscle Band and while the full combo
of this opening is probably less likely
to happen than it is to happen (at least
for most decks), it still happens often
enough to be a concern (plus we are just
talking early game - mid-game or late
game you face attackers that are fully
powered and scoring a OHKO). What this
means is as you look at common attackers
for these decks… they usually just whiff
on a OHKO of Hawlucha and just
manage a 2HKO of Hawlucha-EX when
they get their intended opening set-up.
A bit of a nitpick as it shouldn’t
matter all that often? Perhaps, but
since I was covering the usefulness of
Resistance (which is already niché), it
seems appropriate to point out how when
you need it most, being a Pokémon-EX
with 130 HP ends up being only
marginally better than being a
non-Pokémon-EX with the same Resistance
and 70 HP.
Hawlucha-EX
has a single Energy Retreat Cost - this
is very good (perhaps great) as it is
fairly easy to pay and won’t usually set
you back an overly significant amount.
This is why I look at such traits in
isolation, in conjunction with the rest
of the card and then with the format. A
single Energy Retreat Cost is only
surpassed by a free Retreat Cost, but
that free Retreat Cost enables some
great tricks that are much harder even
when you have to pay but a single
Energy. Among Fighting-Type Pokémon-EX
it is the lowest, but that still isn’t
good enough for a pivot Pokémon, unless
of course its something like Keldeo-EX…
which requires a combo but brings an
awesome Ability and great HP score to
the job. This point is worth
emphasizing because little(r)
Hawlucha was useful to decks for
doing a wide variety of things, and this
wasn’t one of the lesser points.
So we’ve covered the cards “Attributes”,
what about its “Effects”? Hawlucha-EX
has one Ability and one attack. The
Ability is familiar: when Hawlucha-EX
is damaged by an attack from an
opponent’s Pokémon, Counterattack places
two damage counters on said attacking
Pokémon. We’ve seen it before with
different names, text and damage output
as Abilities (and mechanics that were
the precursors to Abilities) date back
to Machamp (Base Set
8/102) and its “Strikes Back” Pokémon
Power. Even though such a mechanic has
been with the game a while, it hasn’t
actually had much success; more recent
examples like Qwilfish (XY:
Flashshire 21/106) have had some
success, but due to several aspects
overlapping in the card that are not
replicated here: not being a
Pokémon-EX (since it was usually a
sacrifice play) and being able to attack
with a Double Colorless Energy
alone, Poisoning the Defending Pokémon,
and generally being a decent counter to
Landorus-EX and Pyroar (XY:
Flashfire 20/106). Its almost like
Qwilfish and Pyroar were
right next to each other to signal that
the former just needed a Muscle Band
to take down Litleo with a single
attack and that Poison plus the Ability
could still get through Intimidating
Mane. Hawlucha-EX seems unlikely
to find a similar place in the format,
and instead seems more like Lucario
(BW: Next Destinies 64/99; BW:
Legendary Treasures 80/113); being a
Stage 1 with 100 HP it is neither an
affordable sacrifice nor a durable wall,
Lucario also has seen no
successful competitive play (at least of
which I am aware). On such a small
frame, Counterattack needs to hit much
harder, or else scale with the damage
being taken (such as two damage counters
per 10 damage done to Hawlucha-EX).
Moonsault Stomp is an awesome name and
the Energy cost looks almost promising,
especially when you can use a Double
Colorless Energy to cover two of the
three requirements, but it is a bit
pricey compared to the other successful
Fighting-Type Pokémon-EX. Sure
Landorus-EX and Lucario-EX
actually have even more expensive
attacks, but those are just their “big”
attacks; they also have less expensive
attacks for [F] that they can open with
and fall back on or even buff to the
point where the little attack is the
“main” attack! The base damage is only
60 (30 below what would be needed for an
unaided 2HKO against most Pokémon-EX).
The effect adds another 40 points of
damage (so a total of 100) when a
Stadium is in play, but even before
considering the rest of the card, you
basically needed to hit that hard for
that much Energy regardless. Though at
least the condition will be fairly easy
to meet most matches, it still is being
double billed for what you’ve already
covered (Energy cost plus trigger). A
low Energy cost or better damage output
seems in order.
Now when you put it all together, you
see the lack of synergy. A Bench-sitter
with a fantastic Ability can handle
having 130 HP. Something beefy meant to
soak hits in the Active slot would enjoy
the two damage counters Counterattack
grants, especially if the attack helped
heal it or reduce the damage taken to a
more manageable amount (note that
healing wouldn’t likely help Hawlucha-EX
due to its size). A Pokémon-EX with
amazing damage output can be justified
for being as small as the above
reference Zekrom, but Hawlucha-EX
is none of these. Skip it in all
formats save perhaps Limited, but do
not attempt a deck built around just
it (and no other Basic Pokémon) like you
would a Lucario-EX in Limited;
instead include it to augment what you
have and even then, only if you get one
of the many Stadiums in the set to go
along with it because for two Prizes in
a four Prize format, the rest still
isn’t worth it without triggering the
effect of the attack.
If you love Hawlucha-EX and
really want to base a deck around it,
either attempt to spam Machamp (XY:
Furious Fists 46/111) and accept
that most other Fighting-Type Pokémon-EX
would still be better, or find a way to
boost its HP. For that latter, all I
can think of is Team Plasma Badge
and Umbreon (BW: Plasma Freeze
64/116) and again, there are better
choices for this tactic. If you just
want to run it, toss it into a
Landorus-EX and Lucario-EX
focused Fighting-Type deck with the
usual support and no Garbodor (BW:
Dragons Exalted
54/124; BW: Plasma Freeze
119/116; BW: Legendary Treasures
68/113); it will make the deck
ultimately a little worse but a single
copy or two won’t be a major detriment.
Ratings
Standard:
1.5/5 - It does stuff, but really
poorly. It could however plausible be
worse as not everything is as bad as
we’ve seen before.
Expanded:
1.25/5 - As for Limited, but I suspect
the Weakness will come into a little
more often, enough to justify docking it
a quarter point.
Limited:
3/5 - Sadly a bit misleading; if you
can’t run sufficient Fighting Energy and
get at least one Stadium, skip it as it
is too fragile for what it does, even
here. Do not attempt a +39 build
with it.
Summary:
Attributes that demand the card be a
Bench-sitter or glass cannon with an
Ability that wants to be on a tank and
an attack that is slightly nerfed, as if
the Attributes, Ability or combination
of the two were supposed to have already
proven magnificent and well worth
playing. Hawlucha-EX isn’t
greater than the sum of its parts, and I
just went into detail about why those
parts vary from adequate to substandard
to just plain bad.
