Pokemon Home

Pokedex

Price Guide Set List

Message Board

Pokemon GO Tips

Pokemon News

Featured Articles

Trading Card Game
- Price Guide
- Price Guide
- Card of the Day
- Professional Grading
- Killer Deck Reports
- Deck Garage
- William Hung
- Jason Klaczynski
- Jeremy's Deck Garage
- Johnny Blaze's Banter
- TCG Strategies
- Rulings Help
- Apprentice & Patch
- Apprentice League
- Spoilers & Translations
- Official Rules
- Featured Event Reports
- Top of the World
- An X-Act Science
- Error Cards
- Printable Checklist
- Places to Play

Nintendo Tips
- Red/Blue
- Yellow
- Gold & Silver
- Crystal
- Ruby & Sapphire
- Fire Red & Leaf Green
- Emerald
- SNAP
- Pinball
- TCG cart
- Stadium
- PuPuzzle League
- Pinball: Ruby/Sapphire
- Pokemon Coliseum
- Pokemon Box
- Pokemon Channel

GameBoy Help
- ClownMasters Fixes
- Groudon's Den
- Pokemon of the Week

E-Card Reader FAQ's
- Expedition
- Aquapolis
- Skyridge
- Construction Action Function
- EON Ticket Manual

Deck Garage
- Pokemaster's Pit Stop
- Kyle's Garage
- Ghostly Gengar

Cartoon/Anime
- Episode Listing
- Character Bios
- Movies & Videos
- What's a Pokemon?
- Video List
- DVD List

Featured Articles

Pojo's Toy Box

Books & Videos

Downloads

Advertise With Us
- Sponsors
- Links

Chat

About Us
Contact Us

Pojo's Pokémon Card of the Day

aroramage	Here we've got the other major component of the Mega Absol-EX Collection, the Mega Absol-EX himself! He's a little weaker compared to some of the other Megas, having only 210 HP compared to what most would have in the 220-240 range, but it's still a larger amount compared to most other Pokemon! Just, uh, somewhat easier to hit.  Which your opponent will want to aim to do as fast as possible, cause M Absol-EX has a nasty little attack that's sure to do its own share of dirty work! At only 2 Darkness Energy, Disaster Wing deals a pretty powerful 80 damage to an opponent's Pokemon - that's a lot for just that much, though not the worst we've seen come from 2 Energy. Then again, that's also not accounting for the effect of Disaster Wing, and yes, it does add on more damage! Not only that, it's doing it at the expense of your opponent's next card! M Absol-EX will mill off the top card of your opponent's deck, and if it just so happens to be a Trainer card - something that most decks tend to run in spades - the attack does another 80 damage! That's 160 damage for only 2 Energy!! Impressed much?  There is one catch to this though, and it's a big one: Absol-EX doesn't have a Spirit Link card tied to him at all, meaning your opponent gets one free turn to save themselves from M Absol-EX. This could involve KOing the Mega before he can attack, like with a forced switch via Lysandre and a Fighting-type to deal heavy damage, or it could involve using something like Regice to do a decent chunk while also preventing you from using M Absol-EX to attack at all! Sure, you'll still get the discard, but that Regice ain't moving for anything!  The speed drop does hurt M Absol-EX a lot, but compared to just running his base form, he's definitely worth running. By now, you've probably even encountered some people running builds with him out front! And if you're not careful, he might even bring disaster upon you.  Rating  Standard: 3/5 (a pretty decent attack, all things considered, does make him playable at least)  Expanded: 3/5 (and the extra Dark support always helps! but that Spirit Link card...oof.)  Limited: N/A (but he is still a promo)  Arora Notealus: Man, if only you had a Spirit Link, M Absol-EX, then maybe more people would play you. And maybe if your counterpart wasn't "meh" in terms of EXs, he might be worth running to. Or maybe you just need to be used in a deck destruction form, that could probably end a game quick, right? Hmmm, I wonder if Expanded could make that work...  Next Time: The king of monsters needed to start somewhere!
Otaku	Admittedly feeling more like the conclusion of yesterday’s CotD - Absol-EX (XY: Black Star Promos XY62) - today we finally give a full look at M Absol-EX (XY: Black Star Promos XY63).  Even if you can’t read the name on the card, a glance tells you it is a Darkness-Type.  The good news is that this type is home to one of the best overall attackers in the game right now - Yveltal-EX - and Item Based Energy acceleration - Dark Patch - and some solid supporting cards like Darkrai-EX and Shadow Circle but they don’t have their own Supporter and the Darkness-Type Special Energy is Dangerous Energy which actually isn’t all that dangerous.  You can hit a subsection of the Psychic-Type for Weakness which is better than nothing and so far all Fairy-Types are Darkness Resistant.  There are even some anti-Darkness-Type cards but they are overall poor cards and not a real concern.  All this leaves us with a Type that is still good, but no longer great like it once was; when it comes to Standard play you lose some of the “good” I mentioned, so it is a pretty average type there, maybe even a little underpowered (one strong attacker with a decent Stadium it doesn’t always use does not make for a strong Type).  Being a Mega Evolution means being a Pokémon-EX; M Absol-EX gives up two Prizes when KOed, can’t use certain beneficial supporting effects and is the target of certain detrimental effects.  While not guaranteed, typically being a Pokémon-EX means better attributes and effects, with Mega Evolutions doubling down with an even bigger boost to attributes and effects.  Being a Mega Evolution also means ending your turn when you Mega Evolve one of your in play Pokémon; M Absol-EX lacks a means of bypassing this as it has no Spirit Link and there is no Darkness-Type equivalent of Archie’s Ace in the Hole or Maxie’s Hidden Ball Trick.  I can’t think of a current, successful Mega Evolution which lacks such an option.  You do gain access to benefits like Mega Turbo but your opponent’s can frustrate you with cards like Faded Town.  The net result is a poor one.  Still the benefits do materialize to some degree; 210 HP is 40 higher than its lower Stage and while one the lower end of Mega Evolutions, it isn’t the lowest.  210 is enough that scoring KOs that are rapid, reliable and repeated against it is a tall order, though anyone is probable in a competitive deck.  What does concern me is the Fighting Weakness; it is a Type known for hitting hard, hitting fast and stacking smaller damage bonuses.  I don’t know if it is the worst Weakness to have right now, but it has to be up there.  Psychic Resistance on the other hand isn’t a big deal, but it is a nice bonus to have and far better than the typical lack of Resistance.  The Retreat Cost of two is also a pretty common sight and is low enough you’ll often be able to pay (and recover from paying) the Energy but still high enough that it behooves you to find a work around… like Darkrai-EX.  M Absol-EX has the typical lone attack of Mega Evolutions, this one named “Disaster Wing”.  It requires [DD], which isn’t too bad for manual Energy attachments can can be done in a single turn your manual Energy attachment and a Dark Patch, provided M Absol-EX is on your Bench and you’ve got a means of then making it your Active Pokémon.  It hits for 80 damage while discarding the top card of your opponent’s deck, which is just “okay”, but the rest of the effect states that if the discarded card is a Trainer (usually at least half and often two-thirds of competitive decks) Disaster Wing will do an additional 80 damage (so 160 total).  Two for 80 and a discard is solid, two for 160 and a discard is great!  Before we move onto how we might capitalize upon what M Absol-EX can do, let’s run through Absol-EX (XY: Black Star Promos XY62) is like; it has a lot in common with its Mega Evolution with the differences being that it is not a Mega Evolution (…yes, obvious) and thus only a Basic Pokémon-EX, with 170 HP and two of its own attacks.  For [D] it can use “Dark Fang” to hit for 20 damage and flip a coin; if you get “heads” you discard a random card from your opponent’s hand (either result still means 20 damage).  [DDC] pays for “Dark Edge”, which hits for 100 damage plus places an effect on the Defending Pokémon are reduced by 20 before Weakness and Resistance.  Dark Fang can act as an opening attack until you get to Dark Edge, but neither attack is good enough to carry the card, especially in light of the competition (like Yveltal-EX) that you could be running instead.  Absol-EX isn’t a deal breaker; it is simply underwhelming.  The lack of Spirit Link is however the deal breaker; with one M Absol-EX would be a solid attacker in a Darkness-Type deck.  You could use Trick Shovel, Dark Patch and Muscle Band to quickly field M Absol-EX and hit for at least 100 damage (well, 80 against Resistance) with good odds of scoring the needed 180 to OHKO almost all Basic Pokémon-EX.  As Dark Patch indicates Expanded, you might even tack on Hypnotoxic Laser and Virbank City Gym to go for three damage counters plus 160/180/360 (Resistance/neutral/Weakness); you won’t most Mega Evolutions but you’ll leave them so small that they should be easy to finish off… maybe even with Absol (XY: Roaring Skies 40/108), with its “Cursed Eyes” Ability (and the damage from another attack).  Of course if they can’t shake Poison or get rid of Virbank City Gym almost everything will go down from the additional Poison damage.  So if there was a way to avoid losing a turn, it might have a real shot but having an otherwise fast attacking deck grind to a halt for a turn per copy of its large, fast attacker you want to put into play just won’t cut it for Standard or Expanded and this isn’t a legal option for Limited. Ratings  Standard: 2/5  Expanded: 2/5  Limited: N/A  Summary: A flashback to the flavor our reviews of Mega Evolutions had before Spirit Link cards were popular, M Absol-EX has a nice, fast attack that can hit quite hard though with some reliability issues due to how it works, but even on a “whiff” it still sets up the typical Basic Pokémon-EX for a 2HKO.  Unfortunately having to give up a turn to Mega Evolve is the opposite of “fast” and so without a way around that drawback, it just doesn’t work.
Emma Starr	Today, we shift our eyes to the disaster-seeing Mega Pokemon himself, Mega Absol EX! He has 210 HP, which is a bit lower than some Megas, but is still not too worrisome, except for the fact that he’s cursed with having a Fighting Weakness, and we all know how quickly Fighting decks can boost their damage output. It also doesn’t help that Mega Absol has no Spirit Link card, so Absol EX will haveto spend at least a turn waiting on the bench (hopefully), and having to forgo a turn of damage. Are these risks worth it? Well, his only attack will decide this!             Disaster Wing does a very mediocre 2-for-80…that is, unless the top card of your opponent’s deck is a Trainer Card! Regardless, you get to discard the top card of your opponent’s deck, and if it IS a Trainer card, the damage gets boosted to 160 damage! What’s nice these days is that almost every deck consists of having at least 1/3 of their deck as Trainer cards, so the chance of this bonus being tacked on may be higher than you think. The chance, of course, can be even greater in decks such as Night March or Vespiquen, which seem to be quite popular these days. However, in the end, you’re still relying on luck, and in this kind, not even Trick Coin can help you. Although this may be pretty effective against a lot of popular decks, if you run into something like…an Item-light Vileplume deck (Which I’ve personally found to be pretty ineffective at times, but I’m sure someone can make a great deck in this way…), Mega Absol EX is going to be relying on that mediocre 80 damage more often than you’d like. There is a saving grace with Muscle Band, though – attach it to Mega Absol EX, and he’ll be 2HKOing anyone who isn’t a Mega. But of course, there are so many EXs that can do this or better, but he can be quite a nice counter to many popular decks of today.               Standard: 3/5 (160 damage is nothing to scoff at, but other Megas can do this more reliably…and with Spirit Links, such as Ampharos, Tyranitar…)             Expanded: 3/5 (Lots of old Darkness support, such as Darkrai EX, Dark Patch, and Dark Claw are always nice.)             Limited: .epoN