aroramage |
Welcome back to another Primal
Clash week! This week, it's all Grass-types, so let's
see what kind of shenanigans we can get up to with these
guys! Today's card is Beedrill, who can KO Pokemon
instantly.
...wait, WHAT?!
Yeah, clearly Twineedle's flippy
strike for 50 per heads isn't the highlight of this
card. No, the real appeal is the dangerous Allergic
Shock attack! It's really simple: it "tags" the
Defending Pokemon until the end of your next turn, and
if you inflict any amount of damage on it - any small
amount - by an attack, it gets KO'd. No questions asked,
no save throws, nothing - Beedrill's marked it to get
KO'd right away, and it's going to get KO'd right away!
At least in theory. I don't know of
too many Grass-types that deal spread damage onto the
Bench - I imagine that if the opponent really needs that
Pokemon, they'll switch it out and avoid the risk of it
taking any damage in the Active slot - but if you've got
something like, say, Primal Kyogre-EX or Groudon-EX
(DEX), among other notable cards like Kyurem (LTR), then
nowhere is safe for your opponent's Pokemon!...unless
they've got Mr. Mime, but otherwise NOWHERE TO HIDE!!
I imagine there will be some decks
that work to experiment with Beedrill's Allergic Shock
to sneak in KOs - and that free retreat will probably
help if he survives the following turn! Probably his
biggest drawback is his being a Stage 2, which as we
know well enough by now leads to a bigger need for
resources to run him. A fun casual deck to be sure, but
nothing I'd expect tournament players to be running.
But hey, you never know, that's why
the term "dark horse" is a thing.
Rating
Standard: 2/5 (a chancy strike that
could lead to crazy KOs)
Expanded: 2/5 (about the same here)
Limited: 3.5/5 (he'll probably
survive, and the chances of you flipping both tails is
25%, so you've got a decent chance of hitting and KOing
even monstrosities with 39+EX decks)
Arora Notealus: What, no Beedrill-EX
to go to M Beedrill-EX? I'd love to see this kind of
attack on an EX!...then again, they can already
mercilessly destroy us as it is, they don't really need
an aid to it. Still, maybe some sort of hive-mind thing
like what Vespiquen and Combee have had in the past but
with Beedrills would work. I mean, the Weedle can add
more Weedles onto the Bench!
Next Time: Deep in the jungle, the
great lizard swings through the treetops, a stick
hanging from his mouth...
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Otaku |
Welcome to another Week of Card of the Days here on
Pojo.com. This week we have a simple theme: Grass Week
of XY: Primal Clash. There are 19 different
Grass-Type Pokémon in this set, and we are trying to
separate the wheat from the chaff: every card this week
was selected because it looked like it had potential, or
was at least “interesting”. Of course if this week ends
up being lame, its on me because I was allowed to select
the cards. In general, Grass-Types have a growing level
of direct and indirect support that has some great
entries (like Virizion-EX) but that so far have
resulted in only one strong Grass-Type deck: VirGen (Virizion-EX
plus Genesect-EX). Grass-Weakness has returned
to prominence thanks to Seismitoad-EX, and XY:
Primal Clash has added some more enticing targets
(some Fighting-Types, some Water-Types).
First up is Beedrill (XY: Primal Clash
3/160); as a Stage 2 it is going to have a hard time
actually getting into play; Weedle has to survive
long enough to either Evolve directly into Beedrill
via Rare Candy or Evolve first into
Kakuna and have that survive long enough to finally
Evolve into Beedrill. Further making things
difficult is that aforementioned Seismitoad-EX;
with its Quaking Punch providing easy Item denial, not
only are you at risk for being unable to play Rare
Candy the entire match but Evolutions (as they
require more cards to begin with) are more dependent
upon draw and search which are usually at least in part
supplied by Items in most decks. 120 HP is enough to
sometimes take a hit, sometimes not; this tends to make
it pretty good for cards that are less resource intense
(like Basics) but wanting for something like a Stage 2
(if the Evolving Basic and Stage 1 form would contribute
more, this distinction would be lessened, perhaps
eliminated). Beedrill is Fire Weak; its HP is
high enough that this will sometimes matter, either
saving the Fire-Type attacker an optional discard or
allowing a secondary attacker to score the KO instead of
the (more expensive) primary attack. The lack of
Resistance is the worst there is, but is also the norm
so its more a missed opportunity than anything else.
The lack of a Retreat Cost is the best there is, but
while it is not the norm most decks will still
require a secondary means of getting out of the Active
slot due to things like attack effects that need to be
ditched; coupled with the HP and this lessens the value
of the Retreat Cost.
Beedrill
has two attacks; the first is Allergic Shock and Twin
Needle. The first requires just [G] and does no damage;
instead it places an effect upon the Defending Pokémon
which causes them to be KOed if they take damage from an
attack during your next turn. This is an interesting
attack; if your opponent can’t shake the effect, it sets
up for a 2HKO by any attack that does even 10 points of
damage. As an effect upon the Defending Pokémon, the
good news is that it doesn’t matter what your opponent
does to Beedrill during his or her turn; the
effect will remain. The bad news is that if they can
Bench, bounce,Devolve, Evolve or return their Pokémon to
the deck, the effect is gone. Plus if you whiff and
don’t score even 10 points of damage against your target
the next turn, the effect expires. Twin Needle requires
[GG] and gives you two coin flips good for 50 points of
damage (each) against the opponent’s Active Pokémon.
This means a mean, median and mode damage of 50,
occurring as half of the possible results. One in four
possible results is the maximum damage of 100; the final
result (also one-in-four) is the minimum of doing no
damage at all. Ignoring the rest of the card, this is
still a mediocre attack at best for the
investment; for two [CC] attacks tend to hit for a
reliable 30 with a decent chance (be it from a flip or
not-too-difficult condition to meet) 60. For two
specific Energy requirements (more difficult to provide
than [CC]) like the attack cost of [GG] more is expected
and usually required to perform well. Now consider the
rest of the card; a Stage 2 that is likely going to be
lucky to qualify as a “glass cannon”, which has an
attack that places a condition on the Defending Pokémon
to score an auto-KO but only if it takes damage the next
turn.
It is hard to tell whether they didn’t really think the
card through, or if the designers just grossly
overestimated what this card could do. This is a format
where 2HKOs are pretty common and the exceptions (at
least for now) aren’t that numerous. Even thinking
ahead (both to hypothetical new cards and eventual
rotations), it would require some serious changes to the
metagame that just aren’t happening unless I suppose we
eventually go to XY: Plasma Clash-On for Standard
and this is the strongest set until that time: no
cards following in the footsteps of Mewtwo-EX and
Yveltal-EX or even most of the competitive card
pool as just about everything worth playing is good at
scoring 2HKOs. If this had received the Ω Barrage
Ancient Trait and been worded so that Allergy Shock
kicked in right away, then I could have seen it working.
If Allergy Shock was an Ability, even a “coming into
play” or other heavily restricted one, I again could
have seen this becoming a serious deck (but even then,
unlikely to be the top deck). Still, Allergy Shock
seemed more interesting than what the other Grass-Types
that didn’t make it into this week offered.
For the sake of completeness, I’ll go over its Evolution
options without feigning that they will make a
difference. For Weedle, there is BW: Plasma
Freeze 1/116, XY: Kalos Starter Set 1/39,
McDonald’s 2014 Collection 1/12, XY 3/146 and
XY: Primal Clash 1/160 with the middle two being
alternate art versions of each other, leaving us three
actual options. All are Basic Grass-Type Pokémon with
Fire Weakness, no Resistance, a Retreat Cost of [C], no
Abilities, no Ancient Traits and just one attack. XY:
Kalos Starter Set 1/39 (again, same as McDonald’s
2014 Collection 1/12) has 40 HP but for [G] it can
hit for 10 with a coin flip for Paralysis, potentially
buying you time to Evolve. For the same price, BW:
Plasma Freeze 1/116 just does three flips for 10
damage each while XY 3/146 does 10 (+20 if the
Defending Pokémon is a Grass-Type) while XY: Primal
Clash 1/160 lets you search your deck for another
Weedle and Benches it… and all three of these versions
have 50 HP. For Kakuna it is a little simpler:
just BW: Plasma Freeze 2/116, XY 4/146 and
XY: Primal Clash 2/160, all Stage 1 Grass-Type
Pokémon with Fire Weakness, no Resistance, no Abilities,
no Ancient Traits and just one attack that costs [G] to
use. BW: Plasma Freeze 2/116 has 80 HP, a
Retreat Cost of [CC] and its attack gives you a coin
flip to prevent all effects of attacks (including
damage!) done to itself until the end of your opponent’s
turn. XY 4/146 has just 70 HP but still a
Retreat Cost of [CC], with its attack blocking damage
done by the opponent’s attack but only if it does 60 or
less damage - it doesn’t say, but I am assuming after
factoring in Weakness and Resistance. XY: Primal
Clash 2/160 has 80 HP with a Retreat Cost of [CCC]
and just hits for 20 damage. Normally I would say use
XY: Primal Clash 1/160 and BW: Plasma Freeze
2/116 for your best survivability potential, but you may
have to go with XY 3 and XY: Primal Clash
2/160 so that if you have to, they can attack to trigger
Allergic Shock.
One of the reasons I don’t recommend this Beedrill
is the other Beedrill options: BW: Plasma
Freeze 2/116 and XY 4/146 have the same
Typing, Stage, HP, Weakness, lack of Resistance, lack of
Abilities and lack of Ancient Traits as XY: Primal
Clash 2/160. BW: Plasma Freeze 2/116 also
has the same perfect free Retreat Cost; its first attack
requires [G] and does 20 damage, but if there are no
damage counters already present on Beedrill then
it hits for 40 more points of damage while also
Confusing and Poisoning the opponent’s Active Pokémon.
It also can do 60 for [CCC] (no additional effects) but
that’s mostly a fall back move; the first attack never
got it serious play, but does already for a “fun” deck
(the kind that can sometimes take down a “real” deck). XY
4/146 has a Retreat Cost of [C] and its attacks have the
same [G] and [GG] attack costs (respectively) as today’s
version, but they work a bit better; the first does 20
damage and inflicts Poison while the third provides
three coin flips good for 40 damage per “heads” and if
all three coins are “heads” then the attack prevents all
effects of attacks (including damage - again!). While
not revolutionary, these attacks are more reliable in
the damage they do inflict and the periodic
nigh-invulnerability almost tempts you into running this
version. In the end, none are overly good but today’s
seems to be the least among them.
Ratings
Standard:
1.5/5
Expanded:
1.5/5
Limited:
4/5
Summary:
Beedrill isn’t good, but at least it was somewhat
interesting. It might be the weakest of the Grass-Types
we look at this week, but hopefully it was better than
the ones we’ll have to skip. Mess with it for fun, but
even then be prepared with official rulings for how the
attack works.
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