aroramage |
After a very busy weekend working
on...stuff, we're back this week to review some more
BREAKpoint cards! Like this Lapras card!
...yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
So Lapras is...pretty okay. I mean,
120 HP is pretty nice for a non-evolving non-EX Basic.
All that he needs you to do is keep him in play, and he
can run your errands! Pick up your laundry, grab that
mocha cappuccino you wanted, and nab you any Trainer
card you want - all for the low low cost of 1 Water
Energy!...and your attack for the turn. But hey,
details!
And if you're feeling frisky,
Lapras does have a powerful Water Splash attack. For 3
Energy, you can deal 80 damage and flip a coin for
potentially an extra 20. Nothing spectacular, and
nothing to really warrant playing Lapras over some other
card. Errand-Running is an interesting move though, but
since we've got Skyla...
Lapras may not see that much play
all things considered. The attacks are only so good, but
it's nice to see the Pokemon company aiming to push the
boundaries of what their lower end Pokemon can have in
terms of power. Maybe we'll see more of that sort of
thing down the road as the power creep gradually pushes
Pokemon HP and damage higher and higher.
...except for Magikarp. He's fine
as is.
Rating
Standard: 2/5 (couple decent
attacks that are just generally outclassed)
Expanded: 1.5/5 (not much that
Lapras can do about that)
Limited: 3.5/5 (though getting a
Trainer card here would always be nice)
Arora Notealus: Ahhh, Lapras,
you're a pretty cool guy! Don't worry, I'll claim you
from that Silph Co. employee soon enough...
Next Time: OH YEAH I ALMOST FORGOT
THIS GUY WAS IN GENERATIONS TOO
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Otaku |
We begin this week
with the four-one-one on Lapras (XY:
BREAKpoint 28/122). There are four other
options and because they are a somewhat homogenous lot
I’m just going to cover it all at once. The others
are BW: Next Destinies 25/99, BW: Next
Destinies 26/99, BW: Plasma Blast 17/101, and
XY 35/146. The BW versions are only legal
in Expanded.
All Lapras
in question are Water Types. In terms of striking
Weakness this means almost all Fire Types and a chunk of
Fighting Types will take double damage. Not great
right now but not totally without merit. In terms
of slamming into Resistance Water Types only have to
worry about most BW-era Grass Types. Resistance is
not that great and fortunately for Lapras neither
are most cards with explicitly anti-Water Type effects,
nor are they particularly numerous. In terms of
direct support for the Water Types we have some spiffy
cards like Dive Ball that are good but seldom
used because general support like Ultra Ball is
just more important. We also have some potent ones
like Archie’s Ace in the Hole that aren’t as
meaningful for Basic Pokémon. Still have Rough
Seas which might be relevant, though that also works
for Lightning Types. More important are the
indirect support that favors Water Types like Keldeo-EX
or Blastoise (BW: Boundaries Crossed
31/149; BW: Plasma Storm 137/135; BW: Plasma
Blast 16/101) which work with basic Water Energy
and/or have a use in most decks.
All Lapras
are a Basic Pokémon and that is as good as it gets right
now. Game mechanics and card support are net
positives for Basic Pokémon, even though there are both
beneficial and detrimental card effects that apply to
the Stage. BW: Next Destinies 25/99 and BW:
Plasma Blast 17/101 have 100 HP, BW: Next
Destinies 26/99 has 90, XY 35/146 has 110
while today’s XY: BREAKpoint 28/122 tops them all
with 120. I don’t have hard statistics on this by
my general impression is that 90 damage is pretty
commonly hit but at least is not especially fragile;
Seismitoad-EX with Hypnotoxic Laser,
Virbank City Gym and Muscle Band still falls
10 shy of an effective OHKO. Plus it is Level
Ball legal. Just 100 HP is just 10 more but
oddly important because it was one the going rate for
competitive decks and a lot of decks still hit it with
comparative ease. 110 is slightly safer and 120 ups it
another notch. All are going to be OHKOs most of
the time but these edge cases can really matter over the
course of a tournament. All but BW: Next
Destinies 25/99 are Metal Weak which is
comparatively safe in the current metagame, but BW:
Next Destinies 25/99 itself is Lightning Weak which
is dangerous because cards like Yveltal-EX are
still strong enough to make exploiting Lightning
Weakness worthwhile. None are Resistant to we move
onto Retreat Costs: all are [CC] which is low enough you
can pay (and recover from having paid) it but you are
better off if you can avoid it.
None of these have
Ancient Traits or Abilities but at least all of them
have two attacks. BW: Next Destinies 25/99 has
“Call for Family” at a cost of [W] to search your deck
for and Bench two Basic Pokémon; a decent setup attack.
Speaking of “setup”, for [CC] it can use “Reckless
Charge” to do 40 damage to the opponent’s Active and 20
to itself; poor but functional enough to either setup
for a KO by your real attacker or finish something off
that barely survived. This version was reviewed
here
by some of the other members of the CotD crew who were
just a bit harsh, but only a bit. Set-mate BW:
Next Destinies 26/99 can use “Water Arrow” for [WC]
to hit any one of your opponent’s Pokémon for 20 damage
(don’t apply Weakness or Resistance for Benched targets)
while for [WWC] it can use “Surf” for 60. Or not
as hitting the Bench for so little is just not worth it
now and as its CotD
review
points out neither was it back when the card was new. BW:
Plasma Blast 17/101 could heal 30 damage from itself
for [WC] with its “Cleanse Away” attack or use its own
version of Surf that costs [WCCC] to do 70 damage.
You can read what baby_mario said about it
here but the
short version is “pure filler” and that was when it had
less competition.
XY
35/146 can use “Seafaring” for [W] which allows you to
flip three coins. For each “heads” you can attach
a [W] Energy from your discard pile to one of your
Benched Pokémon. This is actually a solid attack.
There are eight possible outcomes: one is triple
“heads”, three are double “heads”, three are a single
“heads”, and one is zero “heads”. Now assuming you
need something up front to take a hit (whether or not it
survives) and have three basic Water Energy in
the discard pile when you use Seafaring, this means you
can attach an Energy to Lapras and only one in
eight outcomes have you not at least breaking even in
terms of Energy with half of them having you come out
ahead. The second attack is “Hydro Pump” for [CC],
which does 10 damage plus 20 more for each [W] Energy
attached to Lapras. This is also a solid
attack; if for some reason you are using Lapras
off Type the attack can still at least work, even if 20
is not much. Assuming you are on top like you
ought to be, [WW] buys 50 damage and you have the option
of loading up to hit harder. I wouldn’t unless the
KO is important as so many other attackers will punish
something this small for having so much Energy attached,
but options are usually a good thing to have.
Fourth one of these I was not around to
review and so far
this has been the best one. It might be a bit
better now as Standard seems more friendly to its
tactics.
So what about
today’s card, XY: BREAKpoint 28/122? For
[W] it can use “Errand Running” to search your deck for
a Trainer and add it to hand. This is a decent
attack until N usage picks up again. I
think it will though exactly how much is uncertain. N
has been reprinted in Japan and so like Skyla it
should be coming back to Standard. Having one of
the main draw cards also shuffle the opponent’s hand
makes it potentially pointless to add something to it
for the next turn. For [WWC] this Lapras
can also use “Water Splash” to do 80 damage and flip a
coin: “heads” means an extra 20 damage while “tails”
just means the attack does the base 80. A little
below average, but likely adequate. Looking at all
three, this is probably the second best version, with
XY 35/146 being the best. While likely a
fool’s errand, I have been wondering if I ought to be
toying around with some Standard Format Water decks that
use Lapras, Battle Compressor and
Seafaring (also debating Trick Coin) as an
opener. An opener for what I am uncertain, either
something that can use basic Water Energy and
doesn’t have better Energy acceleration available to it
like perhaps Articuno (XY: Roaring Skies
17/108) or to supplement additional Energy acceleration.
In the case of the latter it would either be the stuff
that is not easily reused like (Max Elixir,
Mega Turbo, etc.) or as an emergency backup which
would even be something for Expanded. Gives Deluge
decks an option when you can’t quite pull off
Archie’s Ace in the Hole and your hand won’t empty
out, or when either Abilities or Items are offline.
If it isn’t obvious, the only reason you don’t run this
in Limited is because you pulled a something like a
Basic Pokémon-EX which are you running as your only
Basic Pokémon: Trainer Search, solid attack and 120 HP
are wonderful here.
Ratings
Standard:
2/5
Expanded:
1.8/5
Limited:
4.25/5
Summary:
Enjoy this Lapras in Limited. It isn’t all
bad in Standard or Expanded; if you already are running
a decent amount of basic Water Energy it will
just be a subpar opening Pokémon. In a more
forgiving format it may even score a bit higher but the
format is not that forgiving and soon will be
even less agreeable.
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