Stage 1 Water Pokémon from Fossil
Water being one of my favorite types (no, I do NOT run a
raindance! I
don't even HAVE a Blastoise!!) I have made some tough decisions regarding
which Pokémon to use. Now that Fossil is out, Lapras is almost a
"given" in
all of my water decks. But all of my water decks include at least one
Pokémon family with evolutions, usually two of them, and most of those
evolutions just go to stage 1, so it's hard to choose between them.
Seadra,
Kingler, Cloyster, Tentacruel, Seaking, Wartortle, Dewgong, Omanyte,
Poliwhirl, Gyarados, Starmie, Golduck or Vaporeon. Of course, I don't HAVE
all of those cards, but most of them aren't hard to get!
I'm not going to add to the Dewgong-Gyardos debate, I'm not
going to
bother with hate mail from all of those people who think "Why use Wartortle?
Just use Squirtle and Breeder!" and heck, I'm not even going to exclaim
over
Seaking or bash Cloyster. Basically I'm just going to compare the Stage 1
water Pokémon from the Fossil expansion!
Well, okay, I AM going to bash Cloyster. *bashes
cloyster* There, it's
bashed.
Seadra:
It has 60 HP, a Water + Colorless
version of Water Gun (20 with just
that) that can do 40 damage with 1 colorless and 3 water. Pretty nice.
The
other attack, for 1 water and 2 colorless, is Agility. Agility is a
splendid
attack, one of the reasons I love Rapidash so much! If you don't know what
Agility does, look at Base Raichu, Fearow, Rapidash, or Seadra! They're
all
basically the same. It has a One Colorless retreat cost, the typical water
weakness to Lightning, and is, duh, a stage 1 Pokémon.
Extra Comments: Imagine attaching one Water to Horsea,
using
Smokescreen, they flip tails when trying to attack so it doesn't work, your
turn, attaching a DCE to Horsea, evolving it into Seadra, and using Agility!
Seadra has a nice retreat cost, the average HP for a stage 1, and is overall
Pretty Darn Good.
Kingler:
Like Seadra, Kingler has 60 HP.
For 1 water energy, Kingler can use
Flail; if Kingler is near death it can do 50 damage. This is like that
crummy attack Magikarp has. The downside is, if there's no damage on
Kingler, Flail does diddly squat. Many would say that Kingler's second
attack, Crabhammer, makes up for Flail's shortcomings. For 2 Water and 1
Colorless, Crabhammer does a solid 40 damage. Unfortunately, Kingler has a
whopping 3-colorless retreat cost! It's also weak to lightning.
Extra Comments: 40 damage is great! Flail isn't
so great. It's not DCE
compatible, but is still a pretty good card. Same HP as Seadra doesn't
give
Kingler an "obvious" advantage though.
Omanyte:
Omanyte is one of the three
Mysterious Fossil evolutions. If I was
using the point system, it'd LOSE three points for that! ;) Omanyte
has 40
HP, which makes it equivalent to essentially a "basic" Pokémon.
It's the
only water Stage 1 from the fossil expansion which has a Pokémon Power
though, and it's pretty nice. Clairvoyance makes your opponent play with
his/her hand face up. Really nice for a status-change deck! Its
attack is
another Water Gun; for 1 water energy, it does 10, for 2, does 20, for 3 does
30. Pretty basic Water Gun attack there. It's got a retreat cost of
1...
which I guess is decent for a stage 1, and unlike all of its buddies, it's
weak to Grass.
Extra Comments: Omanyte works in several decent
status-effect decks.
Think of it as an "Always knowing when to Lass'em" sort of deck.
The Grass
weakness can help even-out the "usual" lightning weakness of most
water
Pokémon!
Golduck:
This is one of the most popular Stage
1 Water Pokémon from the Fossil
expansion. It's got the highest HP; 70, and is one of those pesky
Mixed-Type
Pokémon, much like Exeggcute. For a Psychic energy, Golduck does a pretty
good impression of Abra... Psyshock! 10 damage and flip for paralysis!
Its
Golduck's other attack, though, that makes it so loved. 2 water and 1
colorless, 20 damage, Hyperbeam! As in, you get to throw away one of your
opponent's energy cards! Golduck's weak to Lightning (gee this is getting
familiar) and has a 1 retreat cost!
Extra Comments: Golduck is a very good card, even if
you aren't using an
Energy Denial deck. I might be a bit biased toward Golduck, since one of
my
favorite decks is Denial, but my Dratini would bite off all my fingers while
I'm asleep if I say it's "the best" ;)
Tentacruel:
I don't know why people hate
Tentacruel so much! It's got 60 HP,
just like Seadra, and Kingler, but has NO RETREAT COST. It evolves from
the
30-HP-wonder, Tentacool (used briefly in Damage Swap decks) and provides an
element of Status Effect to the water scene. Usually Water Pokémon have
paralysis as their status effect, but for 1 water, Tentacruel can confuse
with Supersonic. For 2 water, it can use Jellyfish Sting. It only
does 10
damage. No, wait, essentially it does 20 damage since Jellyfish Sting
makes
the opponent AUTOMATICALLY POISONED. No, wait again! If they
don't use a
Healing trainer, a Switch, or Scoop, it does 30 by the time it's your turn
again! Perhaps this is another way to get around Mr. Mime; confuse it,
then
poison it. The good thing about Tentacruel is that its status effects
don't
cancel each other out. Once again, Tentacruel is weak to Lightning.
I only
mention the weakness because Omanyte's is different!
Extra Comments: I once used a water-grass deck which
had Seaking in it.
But then I decided to try out Tentacruel and where in the Seaking version, I
lost a lot, I won a lot more with Tentacruel. Although Seaking's waterfall
does a solid 30 for 2 energy, Tentacruel can also do 30 by the time the turn
gets back to you.
So which one is best? I'll leave that mostly up to you.
Each one has
its own uses. Tentacruel for status effect, Golduck for denial, Seadra for
a
sort of semi-stall, and Kingler in "bash 'em up" decks. Omanyte
fits in
nicely for Disruption decks, and it is the only of the group which evolves
again. (Okay, so Seadra evolves again in the Neo set. But I'm not
talking
about the Neo expansion!)
Personally, I think Tentacruel and Golduck are the best.
But that's just
my opinion. If I focused on Disruption decks, I'd say Omanyte is my
favorite, regardless of the low HP, which *ALMOST* makes Cloyster look good!
Make your own decisions about the cards, I'm not telling you what to use!
Rainy, the
Furry Blue Mock-Dragon
and OhDrat, the Bratty Blue Poké-Dragon
(( don't bother to contact me at:
RainStr0m@aol.com ))