aroramage |
Ahhh yes, the original fatty
mctubby tubs - Snorlax! Ahh, I've always had a soft spot
for this gluttonous...um...bear? He seems like a bear.
And naturally the game has taken
advantage of his ridiculous amount of bulk! Ever since
the early days, Snorlax has always had at least 3 Energy
in his Retreat Cost, all to represent his effective
"weight" as "really really heavy." Aside from that,
they'll also usually implement his bulk in ways such as
high HP scores and effects that keep the opponent's
Active Pokemon from retreating, and if they're not
working around those effects, they're revolving around
putting Snorlax to sleep!
Another notable feature that gets
attributed to Snorlax cards are the ABSURDLY HIGH ENERGY
COSTS FOR HIS ATTACKS!!
Most of Snorlax cards will have a
big attack around 3-4 Energy, though there are a few
that do have weaker 1-2 Energy attacks (and even one
from Dragon Frontiers with NO attacks or Energy
requirements! Look it up!). That being said, this one
isn't much of an exception, but let's not focus on that
- let's focus on his Ability first! Plump Body acts a
lot like Thick Fat does in the video games, in that it
reduces damage that Snorlax is taking.
Granted, it's much more versatile
as Plump Body than as Thick Fat, but details.
This is great! This could make
Snorlax a bulky offensive threat, since he's soaking up
at least 30 damage on attacks! Okay, so some of those
attacks will still OHKO his 120 HP BULK for a basic
non-EX, but still! Against those smaller forces, he's
going to be tough to beat! And what attack does he get
to use to deliver the beatdown against those other
worthy foes?
Knock Away, a 4-for-50 and a coin
flip for 30 more.
...PASS
Rating
Standard: 1.5/5 (he's not much of
an attacker with that attack, even when he is bulky and
has a damage-reducing Ability)
Expanded: 1/5 (let's face it, he
can't do that much)
Limited: 3.5/5 (...well, except for
here, where his bulk and damage-reduction will make it
worth it to build up to his 4-Energy coin flip 80 at
most damage maneuever)
Arora Notealus: Maybe there will be
some Snorlax-EX love one of these days, right? Right? I
can dream, can't I? Then again...he might just end up
like Wailord-EX.
Next Time: SPEAKING OF WATER-TYPES,
WHO WANTS AN OCTOPUS
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Otaku |
I’m going to be upfront with you: today we are looking
at Snorlax (XY: BREAKthrough 118/162)
primarily because it is my favorite Pokémon. If I
could work it into the schedule at all, I knew I would.
It was helped by a few other things, but in the end I
was able to squeeze it into this week. I haven’t
had time to test it, but I’ll tell you now I’ve not
heard of anyone using this card in a competitive venue.
Actually since I’ve always been lazy and like it when
tournament results are spoonfed to me a la
The Charizard Lounge
unless I get lucky while on the message board or PTCGO,
I don’t often know about the “fun” decks that could be
using it either. The same thing has been true of
other cards that surprised me, so there is still hope
that this card could be good… so let us take it apart
and see how it works (or doesn’t).
Snorlax
is a Colorless-Type, which means it can’t hit anything
for Weakness but doesn’t have to deal with Resistance.
There are two cards with attacks designed to be
anti-Colorless - Exeggcutor (XY: Roaring Skies
2/108) and Haxorus (BW: Dragon Vault
16/20) - and they are most underwhelming. Slightly
more Colorless-Type support exists and while not
brilliant it offers some nice options: Altaria (XY:
Roaring Skies 74/108; XY: Black Star Promos
XY46) which cancels out Weakness on your
Colorless-Types, Aspertia City Gym to grant +20
HP to Colorless-Types and Winona to search your
deck for up to three Colorless-Type Pokémon. Being
a Basic is the best as there are no extra cards or turns
of waiting required, some Basic Pokémon support exists
and some card effects just work better for Basics.
You don’t even have a legal deck (or opening hand you
can keep) without at least one Basic Pokémon, though
there are some anti-Basic Pokémon effects to deal with
Pyroar (XY: Flashfire 20/106) which shows
up in some capacity sooner or later every time I write
it off.
Snorlax
has 120 HP, just 10 shy of the maximum currently printed
on any non-Pokémon-EX Basic with what I guesstimate to
be decent odds of surviving a hit from your opponent’s
attackers, at least before other factors. One of
those other factors is Weakness: Fighting-Types will
find the OHKO fairly easy. No Resistance which is
to be expected (still more common than having
Resistance) but as we’ll see in just a moment, is either
a huge missed opportunity for the card or potentially
justified for more than the usual reason of just not
being all that appropriate to the card’s Typing: as a
video game Normal-Type a Snorlax is Resistant to nothing
though it is immune to Ghost-Type attacks… which is
awkward as the TCG doesn’t do Immunity and the
Ghost-Type is combined with Psychic-Types and
Poison-Types. Snorlax has a Retreat Cost of four
which is expected on a Snorlax the lowest it has
ever been printed with is [CCC] and its in the video
games it is known for its weight and low Speed stat.
You’re going to need to pack something to deal with
this, either lowering the cost or bypassing your need to
pay it (which includes effects to enable tanking).
Speaking of tanking, what I’ve danced around so far has
been the card’s Ability “Plump Body”. This is
pretty sweet as it reduces the damage done to Snorlax
(meaning itself) from attacks by 30 after
applying Weakness and Resistance. It doesn’t
specify “while Active” or “on the Bench” so it works in
either position and it also just doesn’t specify a
player so it works against not only the opponent’s
attacks but those by your own Pokémon! This is
quite impressive when paired with that 120 HP: if it
isn’t hitting for Weakness or finding a way to ignore
the Ability, your opponent needs to score at least an
effective 150 damage for a OHKO, 180 for a 2HKO, 270 for
a 3HKO, etc. That means if your opponent fails to
score the OHKO Snorlax soaks as much damage as a
typical Basic Pokémon-EX and if your opponent needs
three attacks the damage surpasses what is required to
KO even Wailord-EX! Even against Weakness
it might matter: as damage is done in increments of 10
your opponent needs to score 80 instead of 60, which
means a Lucario-EX or Landorus-EX sporting
a Strong Energy and Muscle Band will still
miss the OHKO by 10 damage with their single Energy
attacks.
Plump Body coupled with 120 HP is so impressive that
Snorlax will have to have a pretty poor attack to
not have a bright future in at least Standard.
Something like needing [CCCC] to do 80 damage and…
Snorlax needs [CCCC] to use “Knock Away” to hit for
80 damage on “heads”; on “tails” it only hits for 50
damage! This is one of the many reasons “headdesk”
needs to join “facepalm” in English dictionaries.
In a better balanced format, this would be a good way to
keep Snorlax from getting out of control but in
the current metagame, it means Snorlax in a deck
with abundant Energy acceleration, just maybe it
is worth actually attacking with Knock Away. So
what can we do with this card? Well first let us
run through the other Expanded and Standard legal
options for Snorlax: BW: Boundaries Crossed
109/149, BW: Plasma Storm 101/135, XY: Kalos
Starter Set 26/39 and XY: Flashfire 80/106.
All are Colorless, Basic Pokémon with Fighting Weakness,
no Resistance, a Retreat Cost of [CCCC], no Ancient
Trait, at least 100 HP and at least one attack.
BW: Boundaries Crossed
109/149 is one of the 100 HP versions and sports two
attacks, probably because it lacks an Ability. For
[CCC] it can use “Double Lariat” to flip two coins good
for 40 damage per “heads” or for [CCCC] it can use “Roll
Out” to hit for 60. These attacks are horribly
overpriced and were when this card was new.
Probably why it didn’t even get a filler review. BW:
Plasma Storm 101/135 is a Team Plasma Pokémon with
130 HP, the Ability “Block” that prevents the opponent’s
Active Pokémon from retreating and at a cost of [CCCCC]
can use “Team Pact” to hit for 30 damage times the
number of Team Plasma Pokémon you have in play.
This card really psyched some of us out (like me): it
seemed like it might seem pretty good given the Team
Plasma support we had or knew was coming and it was,
just not how we expected it. While it was used as
a solid attacker in Team Plasma decks, it was usually
just a back-up. Instead its Ability proved quite
useful with decks relying on manually retreating (often
Keldeo-EX) pretty heavily; there was even a deck
built around not attacking with Snorlax [Plasma]
but instead spamming cards like Crushing Hammer
and Hypnotoxic Laser to slowly beat your
opponent’s stranded, struggling to attack Active.
This one did get
a review,
though it was written well before we knew how to really
use the card. These two are only legal for
Expanded play.
XY: Kalos Starter Set
26/39 is back to being vanilla but at least it has 120
HP like today’s Snorlax. It has no Ability,
just two attacks: “Rock Smash” for [CCC] to hit for 10
(plus 30 if you get “heads” on a required coin flip) and
“Strength” for [CCCC] to hit for 70. These are
badly overpriced and this time there isn’t an Ability to
even remotely justify it; while not a mainstream release
a “starter set” doesn’t have to under power cards.
Ideally it would simply contain cards that were simple
but sound. Unsurprisingly this also received no
review. The final alternative to today’s card is
XY: Flashfire 80/106: back up to 130 HP and this
time we’ve got an Ability in addition to an attack that
requires [CCCC]. The Ability is “Snore and Snooze”
and it… forces you to flip two “heads” instead of one
should this Snorlax be Asleep in order for it to
wake up. Ouch. “Sleepy Press” is the attack and
it hits for 120 damage, heals 20 damage from itself and…
puts itself to Sleep. This one also didn’t get a
review probably because it is not a good card, but it
isn’t hopeless: even with the Ability functioning, 120
for four and 20 points of healing on a 130 HP Basic is
decent, nearly adequate. With a means of dealing
with Sleep, such as Keldeo-EX and a Float
Stone, one could use Silver Bangle or
Muscle Band alongside Hypnotoxic Laser and
Virbank City Gym to hit the “magic” numbers to OHKO
most Basic Pokémon-EX… but for that much effort one is
better off focusing on something else.
So no, I don’t think any of these are going to play well
with today’s Snorlax. Are there any other
cards to consider? Yes. Lucky Helmet won’t
keep Snorlax alive longer but it does mean you’ll
usually get to draw some cards off of it. Rocky
Helmet or Rock Guard or possibly something we
might be getting next set can allow a Snorlax to
get some damage counters on the opponent’s Active even
while not attacking. Assault Vest, Eviolite,
Giant Cape, Hard Charm and (again)
something we ought to be getting next set can help soak
more damage. The reason I am focusing on such a
thing is that I don’t think much of Snorlax on
offense, but if you have a deck that needs to stall it
seems to have at least a little potential. It
might also have some merit as of all things, a counter
to Seismitoad-EX. Why? Quaking Punch
does not hit hard so unless it is backed by cards
to deny Snorlax its Ability, your opponent is
going to lose a lot of time taking it out. Time
you can use to possibly build up something in play to
actually fight back… and in some decks that something
might even be Snorlax itself given the barely
there damage output Seismitoad-EX can manage
against Plump Body.
So give it a try in Standard or Expanded if you have
nothing better, like Snorlax or simply wish to be
thorough. In Limited, Plump Body means almost
every deck can use it, possibly every deck. It is
just a bit too slow to risk using it on its own in a +39
deck as by the time Snorlax starts swinging your
opponent should have a decent set-up. On the other
hand, it should have the endurance that maybe - just
maybe - it could turn a different +39 deck into a +38
deck. If you’re not familiar with typical Limited
play, usually (but not always) it involves building a 40
card deck at the event from the contents of six booster
packs provided at said event. You don’t get to
trade or use anything other than the contents of said
booster packs to build your deck except for Basic
Energy cards (usually provided as needed alongside the
packs). So when you run a +39 deck you select a
single Basic Pokémon to run ensuring you open
with it because you have to mulligan until it is in your
opening hand. Even with the lack of draw and/or
search power in most Limited decks, Snorlax ought
to have enough staying power most of the time that the
50% of games you would expect to open with it, it can
survive long enough to get your other Basic Pokémon into
play (maybe even powered up) or just handle things
itself. Knock Away goes from bad to acceptable
here while Plump Body goes from great to amazing.
Mostly though Snorlax scores high here because it
will be run in everything other than+39 decks.
Ratings
Standard:
2.15/5
Expanded:
2/5
Limited:
4.75/5
Summary:
Snorlax is so close to being an obviously good
card, held back by its overpriced, low damage attack.
It still may have a shot because the rest is just that
good and you might even find a use for it while not
attacking at all… but we looked at it just because
Snorlax is my favorite Pokémon and there was an opening
in the schedule.
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