aroramage |
Man, Stunfisk is one weird Pokemon.
He's a fish, but he's also Electric/Ground, but he's
also derpy-looking, but he's also in a weird spot in the
games - let's face it, everything about him is weird!!
JUST LOOK AT THAT FACE!! IS IT A
FACE?! I DON'T KNOW?!?!
What I DO know is that he's got a
couple of attacks that are...well, interesting. At least
one of them is, Thunder Blast is just some Flamethrower
knock-off that discards an Energy to use at 3-for-80.
It's alright, I suppose, but I'm more interested in
Revenge!
...what? No, I don't have anything
against my fellow writers! I just mean the attack called
Revenge!
At first glance, it's a 2-for-20
hit that's pitiful at best, but some folks may recall
Revenge on another Pokemon - Druddigon from Flashfire!
In fact, Stunfisk seems to share a few qualities with
this Druddigon, and Revenge is one of them! There is one
minor tweak though, and that would be the cost of
Revenge; while on Druddigon it can be two Energy of any
Type, on Stunfisk it's only good if you're running
Electric Energy on one of those in some form. The
trade-off for this tweak is that Stunfisk can actually
do a little extra damage, adding on 80 damage instead of
just Druddigon's 70 damage.
So does that mean Stunfisk will see
play? Maybe. The big appeal to Druddigon was the
metagame being dominated by Dragons - or at least,
having Rayquaza-EX be a prevalent part of the game. In
fact, for the duration of about 4 months, Druddigon
could be teched into decks as a means of dealing with
Rayquaza-EX until it got rotated out in August 2014. Now
though?
Well, Rayquaza-EX technically is a
major threat again, but he got an upgrade called M
Rayquaza-EX.
And that's Stunfisk's main problem
right now. While dealing 100 damage is a fair hit for a
Basic non-EX, it's still a far cry from dealing with
some of the most dangerous stuff out there. Sure, it
could OHKO a Pokemon-EX Basic that's weak to Electric,
but Stunfisk may not be as highly teched as Druddigon
was.
...at least, not right now.
Rating
Standard: 2/5 (he's a bit more
niche than Druddigon was, and while he does more damage,
he's also outclassed by the overall higher HP scores of
his new targets)
Expanded: 2.5/5 (here though, he's
probably fair game to use)
Limited: 3.5/5 (and I would never
fault anyone for running him here)
Arora Notealus: WHAT ARE YOU,
STUNFISK?! WHAT ARE YOUUUUUUU?!?!
Next Time: And now for something
completely different.
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Otaku |
Stunfisk
(XY: BREAKpoint 56/162) continues or trend of
Lightning-Types for this week, so the same applies:
useful for exploiting Weakness against some high profile
targets, a little Resistance to worry about but only in
Expanded, a single card with an effect that references
Lightning-Types in a negative manner and only a few that
explicitly affect Lightning-Types in a positive manner,
though there are a few more that benefit them indirectly
such as by accelerating [L] Energy. Being a Basic
is the best right now and has been for a while, 110 HP
is 20 less than the max printed on Basics (sans
Pokémon-EX) and enough to sometimes survive a regular
hit, Fighting Weakness is dangerous, Metal Resistance
isn’t a huge benefit is better than nothing especially
on top of said 110 HP and a Retreat Cost of [CCC] is
definitely too much to pay unless you are desperate, so
pack some alternatives to paying it (and maybe if enough
other cards can use it as well, you can take advantage
of being Heavy Ball and/or Heavy Boots
compatible).
Stunfisk
does not have an Ancient Trait, nor does it have an
Ability: just two attacks. The first (Revenge) is
not new; in fact it has enough of a history (and
present!) that we’ll need to go into detail for it.
First though we can focus on the attack requiring [LC]
to hit for 20 damage, which is bad. However the
effect text contains a clause stating that if one of
your Pokémon were KO’d by damage from the attack of one
of your opponent’s Pokémon on his or her last turn,
Revenge hits for an additional 80 damage, or 100 damage
total. 20 for two is poor but at least it could
possibly finish something off, while 100 for two is a
great deal. The condition for triggering the extra
damage is just picky enough you will run into decks that
scarcely will qualify: besides decks that just aren’t
trying to damage your Pokémon (such as certain mill
decks), decks place damage counters, decks that do
damage but not through attacking and even decks that
still do damage but don’t do it with an attack or during
the correct turn. Some of these are quite obscure,
even found only in Unlimited but mill, damage counter
placement (especially via Poison) are at best uncommon.
A savvy opponent has a serious chance of playing around
this effect.
Though the damage done and the Energy costs were
different, Revenge has a substantial history in this
game. If we focus on the effect and not the name,
it includes even more cards, but I don’t have the time
to do that thorough of a search. I did manage to
find Machamp (Diamond & Pearl 31/130)
though, possibly the first card to sport this kind of
attack under the name “Revenge” and it is over eight
years old! Focusing on more recent cards, of note
are Terrakion (BW: Noble Victories 73/101,
99/101; BW: Boundaries Crossed 151/149; BW:
Legendary Treasures 84/113), which has
Revenge-by-another-name (Retaliate). There was a
time when it was a major force in competitive play, and
we have reviewed it
three
different
times.
Another recent example is Bouffalant (BW:
Legendary Treasures 107/113), though it never got a
review and never made a big splash. The most
recent example is Druddigon (XY: Flashfire
70/106), which also was our
fourth place pick
for the Top 10 cards of its set. It did make a big
splash in competitive play (pun intended) as at the time
we desperately needed something that could exploit the
Dragon-Type Weakness on potent BW-era Dragon-Types, but
now it sees just a little successful competitive play.
All three are Basics. Terrakion and Druddigon
were at their best when they were able to exploit
Weakness at critical moments in the format, which is the
big difference between them and Bouffalant. Terrakion
has the full 130 HP and was on top when that was more
likely to survive an attack than be KOed, but also has
the somewhat awkward [FC] to its attack cost, while
Druddigon has a little less going for it except
its Revenge attack costs [CC], so powering it up in one
turn is as easy as a Double Colorless Energy.
So what does all that mean? Well Stunfisk
has the clunkier cost of Terrakion but also the
Type-matching of Terrakion (Druddigon was
a Dragon-Type, which is so specialized it doesn’t really
compare). Stunfisk also hits harder than
any of the past examples when its condition is met.
The increase is not enough to take out a lot of extra
targets in one hit, but sometimes it will. More
useful is that with a Muscle Band or Silver
Bangle, it threatens even Mega Evolutions (Lightning
Weak ones with a OHKO, everything else with a 2HKO).
So what about after that? Enter the second attack,
“Thunder Blast”, which costs [LLC], states you must
discard an Energy from “this Pokémon”, and does… 80
damage. Three Energy and a discard only doing 80
is poor, but not useless. If your opponent doesn’t
OHKO Stunfisk or tries to “dodge” the effect of
Revenge, you are one more Energy away from a solid blow.
I’d be happier if it did more damage, but it is more
useful than it might first appear once you factor in the
rest of the card. The biggest concerns are the
Energy costs: [CC] and [LCC] for the attacks would have
been impressive, giving Stunfisk the best of all
its predecessors, but at least with [LC] and [LLC] it is
still staggered in a useful manner.
So what about the other Stunfisk? There are
four other versions available, all Basic Pokémon with no
Ancient Traits, no Abilities but two attacks. All
are also Expanded onlys: BW: Noble Victories
42/101, BW: Noble Victories 68/101, BW:
Dragons Exalted 70/124 (also available as BW:
Legendary Treasures 83/113) and BW: Legendary
Treasures RC12/RC25. Stunfisk is a
dual-Type Pokémon in the video games: Ground/Electric.
In the TCG this means it is either a Fighting-Type or a
Lightning-Type, and BW: Noble Victories 42/101 is
the only other example of a Lightning-Type and it even
managed to get a
review.
With 90 HP, Fighting Weakness, no Resistance, and a
Retreat Cost of [CC], it lacks a lot of the benefits of
today’s card, though it does gain being Level Ball
legal (should that matter). It won’t though
because of the attacks; while I said I wanted [CC] and
[LCC] for costs it was with the attacks of today’s
version, but this one instead just has “Mud Shot” for a
vanilla 20 and “Thunder” for 60 with a coin flip where
“tails” means 30 damage to itself (“heads” just does the
base 60). No thanks. The remaining three are
all Fighting-Types with Water Weakness and Lightning
Resistance. BW: Noble Victories 68/101 was
reviewed
here
and it too has only 90 HP, but this time with a Retreat
Cost of [C] (the lowest of any Stunfisk).
Its claim to fame is that while it is a Fighting-Type,
its attacks cost [LC] and [LLC], like today’s
Stunfisk. The first is attack “Trickle” which
gives you two coin flips good for 30 damage per “heads”.
The second is “Thundershock”, a familiar attack that
does 50 damage with a coin flip to inflict Paralysis.
Another one to skip.
Dragons Exalted
70/124 actually saw some competitive play, acting as a
smaller version of Landorus-EX. You can see
the old review
here.
It has 100 HP and Retreat Cost of [CCC], with its first
attack requiring [F] and second requiring [FC].
The former is “Muddy Water”, which does 20 to the
opponent’s Active and 20 to one of the opponent’s
Benched Pokémon (your choice). The second attack
is “Rumble” and does 40 damage, while also preventing
the Defending Pokémon from retreating the next turn.
I don’t think anyone uses it now but it at least would
have a small prayer of it, taking advantage of all the
damage boosts provided to Fighting-Types on top of its
useful effects. If you have a good way to supply
both [F] and [L] Energy in the same deck, this one
actually could be used alongside today’s. Finally
there is BW: Legendary Treasures RC12/RC25, which
has hilarious art, 90 HP, Retreat Cost [CCC] a [F]
Energy attack (Attract) and a [FFC] attack (Mud-Slap).
Attract forces the Defending Pokémon to flip a coin if
it wants to attack Stunfisk the next turn, but I
think benching/bouncing/etc. either Pokémon resets the
effect, while Mud-Slap just does 70 damage. Sadly,
not a Stunfisk you ought to be running.
So the other Stunfisk are pretty much a bust.
Has anyone been using this card? Yes. I
expected it in Magnezone (XY: BREAKthrough
54/162) decks but I’ve no proof that they are using it:
it isn’t really a main attacker so I didn’t expect it to
show up in general descriptions for any deck that might
use it. Fortunately someone must have really felt
like being detailed, so over on
The Charizard Lounge
the list of Masters Top Eight finishers (note the charts
that total said finishes only cover the Top Four) did
include single Top 8 finish with Stunfisk so…
good enough for me to justify reviewing it.
Interestingly, Justin Bokhari ran a Yveltal EX
deck that included strategic back-up attackers in the
form of Regirock (XY: Ancient Origins
40/98) and today’s Stunfisk, plus Smeargle
(XY: BREAKthrough 123/162) to help with the three
different Energy-Types. At first I was surprised,
but it occurred to me this allows the deck to strike
three different kinds of Weakness (Darkness, Fighting
and Lightning) with one attacker that hits harder based
on the Energy attached to both Active Pokémon (Yveltal-EX)
or hits for a solid 90 while moving an Energy from
itself to something on the Bench, another that clobbers
Pokémon-EX harder (Regirock) and finally the last
one (Stunfisk) with its Revenge attack for a
surprise hit after something of yours is KO’d (in the
appropriate manner).
So for Standard and perhaps Expanded, Stunfisk
has some reason to be considered. For Limited it’s
a great pull; don’t try a +39 deck with it but if you
can make room for a handful of Lightning Energy
cards, enjoy a Revenge attack, maybe followed by a few
KOs from Thunder Blast.
Ratings
Standard:
3.25/5
Expanded:
3.15/5
Limited:
4.65/5
Summary:
Stunfisk shows some power creep for the
Revenge-style attackers, but that isn’t enough to make
it the new backup hitter for most decks. It is
enough for it to find a place in certain decks, and that
is good enough. This made it good enough to
include as my 13th place pick for the Top 15 of XY:
BREAKthrough, and had our Top 10 list been a Top 15,
it would have just missed out since it only managed a
16th place finish.
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