Baby Mario
2010 UK
National
Seniors
Champion |
#2 Team Magma’s
Camerupt
Unlike the other cards on our countdown,
here’s one that people are trying out
right now.
That’s because Team Magma’s
Camerupt
offers Energy acceleration that has
great synergy with the
Camerupt EX
from PRC. His Burning Draft Ability
means you can recover a Fire or a
Fighting Energy from the discard pile
every turn and attach it to Magma’s
Camerupt.
While underwhelming in
itself (Magma
Camerupt’s
Flame Ball attack is pretty poor), it
can be used to keep fuelling
Camerupt
EX’s impressive Explosive Jet, which
does 50 damage for each Fire Energy you
discard from any of your Pokémon. With
2-3 Magma
Camerupt in
play, plus your regular
attachment and a Muscle Band, you can
OHKO anything short of a Mega every
turn. With no effective damage cap, you
can even take out one of the big guys if
needed too.
Getting the Energy into the discard is
hardly an issue either: the usual
suspects (Ultra Ball, Computer Search,
Juniper) work well, and you also have
the option of discarding Energy with the
Scorched Earth Stadium for extra draw.
It’s a very efficient combo that is
somewhat reminiscent of the old
Magnezone
Prime decks that were so powerful a few
years ago. However,
Camerupt does have a few problems
as a deck, such as the time it takes to
power up Explosive Jet in the first
place and the fact that Water Weakness
isn’t exactly desirable in a format full
of Seismitoad
EX and even the odd Primal
Kyogre deck.
Garbodor LTR
is pretty bad news for
Camerupt
too.
Nevertheless, the deck has the potential
to be competitive and you’ll probably
see some players trying it out at
tournaments. It’s not an absolutely top
tier choice, but once it gets going (if
it gets going), it can devastate pretty
much any deck that doesn’t have a ready
answer for it.
Rating
Modified/Expanded: 3.5
Team Magma deck: 2
|
aroramage |
And now it's time for Team Aqu-wait...Team
Magma's Camerupt? What happened to my Sharpedo? Guess
it's just too theme-specific for general play. Oh well,
Team Magma's Camerupt it is then! And what
an...interesting choice.
Team Magma's Camerupt pretty much
emulates a pack mule with Energy. You can attach
Fighting or Fire Energy onto it once per turn with its
Burning Draft Ability, then use Flame Ball to keep the
party roaring at 3-for-60 and moving one of those
Energies onto one of your Benched Pokemon. Probably the
best part about him is that he doesn't have to target
Team Magma Pokemon - it can honestly be anything you
want!
There are some drawbacks to this,
one being that Flame Ball isn't a particularly powerful
attack, and outside of a Team Magma deck, I see this
being run more in Fire decks rather than Fighting decks
- let's face it, Fighting's already got all the cards
they'll need, we don't NEED to give them a Stage 1 does
the same thing that Landorus does in one attack. And
it's been my experience that Stage 1s don't tend to hang
around for particularly long. At least he's got 110 HP
so he won't immediately die to, say, Seismitoad-EX.
(Though let's face it, he ain't got NOTHING on Primal
Kyogre-EX)
Team Magma's Camerupt does one
niche thing, and in a Team Magma build, that's pretty
good. Outside of it, it's a rather selective slot that's
either already filled or too slow to be useful. Still,
he'll probably be around a little, but I don't expect
him to make a big...splash.
Hehe, get it? Cause he's NOT TEAM
AQUA!!
Rating
Standard: 2.5/5 (good Energy cycler
in Team Magma, not so much anywhere else)
Expanded: 2.5/5 (same here)
Limited: 4.5/5 (getting Energy from
the discard is a very nice thing! Look at Bronzong,
Landorus, Eelektrik - especially in Limited, they're
pretty good!)
Arora Notealus: Geezus!! What is
going on here?! Apparently Camerupt is saving this
female Magma Grunt with the help of the male Magma
Grunt. Like...okay, I'll admit it, this is a cool epic
pic that makes me wanna use Camerupt! Too bad they
didn't come out with M Camerupt-EX...
Next Time: Inside the depths of the
volcano...
|
Otaku |
First, a quick “Happy birthday!” to my brother-in-law,
Kevin!
The second best card from XY: Double Crisis is…
the first Pokémon in the set we are going to look at
(and it may or may not be the last): Team Magma’s
Camerupt (XY: Double Crisis 2/34). Yes,
that’s right, we are saying the number two card in the
set really is the number two card in the set! I’m going
to start by focusing on something I didn’t address for
the previous cards; this mini-set has excellent flavor,
the kind which isn’t necessary but which is greatly
appreciated by players like me. The “flavor” of which I
speak comes not only from every card being part of a
“theme” but from enjoyable art and lore that
fills us in on what it is like both being a part of
Team Aqua and/or Team Magma, including their
rivalry. I especially enjoy that instead of rehashed
Pokédex entries the text describing the Pokémon at the
bottom of the card is from the perspective of an actual
Team Member.
Being a Fire-Type could be handy, but only if Team
Magma’s Camerupt ends up being an attacker and in
the interest of brevity (a rarity for me) I’ll just
point out that no, you should not be attacking with this
card so the Typing does little for it. It is a Stage 1
making it take twice the time and space to get into play
as a Basic but still being within reason to run in a
competitive deck. It has a decent 110 HP; this is
enough to be more likely to survive a hit than not and
(again) as this is a Bench-sitter, that will do. Water
Weakness is bad right now because it allows
Seismitoad-EX to actually score good damage with
Quaking Punch (keeping in mind Quaking Punch only
requires [CC]); if Seismitoad-EX can equip a
Muscle Band it just needs another damage counter for
an effective OHKO… like it would gain from a
Hypnotoxic Laser. Most of the time though, this
isn’t a big deal because - say it with me now -
“Bench-sitter”. No Resistance is even less of a missed
opportunity than normal for that same reason, though the
Retreat Cost still matters as you might need to get
Team Magma’s Camerupt to the Bench: [CCC] is usually
going to be difficult to pay and as such means you’ll
probably need more than just a clutch Switch to
get by, though it does make Heavy Ball an option
for Expanded.
So what does Team Magma’s Camerupt do? Just to
get it out of the way, the attack - Flame Ball - does 60
for [RCC] and requires you move a basic Energy from
Team Magma’s Camerupt to one of your Benched Pokémon
(if both are present). While it hits for at least 30
points less than I’d like, at least moving Energy off of
it is going to be a benefit since you don’t want to be
attacking with it. So… why run it at all? The Ability,
Burning Draft, allows you to attach a Basic Fighting
Energy or Fire Energy from your discard pile
to Team Magma’s Camerupt, once per turn. The
Ability does stack so two copies could each attach an
Energy to themselves (one Energy each) per turn. On its
own, this doesn’t mean much; sure a Double Magma
Energy or better still a Double Colorless Energy
could allow you to go from no Energy to attacking in one
turn, but we established we don’t want to attack with
this card. Team Magma’s Numel doesn’t help any
either, not that most expected it would; you need to use
it to get to Team Magma’s Camerupt and it also
has nice art and lore, but it is simply a Basic
Fire-Type with 70 HP, Water Weakness, no Resistance, a
Retreat Cost of [CC]. no Ability, no Ancient Trait and a
single attack for [RC] - Ember - which does 30 with a
mandatory Energy discard from Team Magma’s Numel
itself. Also if you aren’t used to the old
“Team-affiliation-in-name” mechanic, yes you must Evolve
from Team Magma’s Numel into Team Magma’s
Camerupt - no Evolving from the plain Numel
into the Team Magma’s Camerupt (or vice versa).
The Team Magma support is… not why you should
consider using this card. Don’t get me wrong, there is
an obvious combo between this and Team Magma’s
Claydol, which has an Ability to (once per turn)
move a basic Energy card from one of your Pokémon to one
of your Team Magma Pokémon (again, multiple
copies can each be used once per turn). This allows any
Team Magma Pokémon Energy acceleration, with
Team Magma’s Aggron, Team Magma’s Groudon and
Team Magma’s Zangoose all potential dance
partners… just like their counterparts from the original
EX: Team Magma Vs Team Aqua expansion. What you
might want to look at are other combos that can make use
of Energy on your own Benched Pokémon. The one of which
I am aware that seems most likely to succeed (though it
is still just a chance) is the combo with Camerupt-EX
(last reviewed
here).
While it takes some effort as you’ll need at least two
and want at least three Team Magma’s Camerupt on
your Bench (four being the idea) and still need
something else (probably Double Colorless Energy
plus a Blacksmith) in order to get Camerupt-EX
itself powered up, when you do you get a nice, beefy
Fire-Type attacker that can OHKO almost anything.
Ratings
Standard:
3/5 - Useful for the probably not-great Team Magma
deck and useful for a possible worthwhile Camerupt-EX
deck… that seems worth a “good-average” rating. Even if
Camerupt-EX could somehow dominate the format (no
idea how that could happen) Team Magma’s Camerupt
is only worthwhile with something else that can
specifically make use of its Energy, so its own score
wouldn’t be much higher.
Expanded:
3.15/5 - As above, but Heavy Ball can snag
Camerupt-EX and this card, leaving either
Level Ball or Team Magma’s Great Ball to get
Team Magma’s Numel. Unless you also run
Fighting Energy, I’d go with Level Ball.
Limited:
3.5/5 - Only a slight bump because this card is very
combo dependent; here you’re running it because either
you also got Team Magma’s Claydol or else you’re
going to actually have to attack with Team Magma’s
Camerupt itself… but again here that can actually
work.
Summary:
While mostly “average”, in a set of mostly fun,
nostalgic cards, Team Magma’s Camerupt can stand
tall. This one might be worth snagging for experimental
deck building, not just for collecting or casual Team
Magma decks.
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