Draw Energy – Cosmic Eclipse Pokemon Review

Vince

Most special energies that provide one colorless might not be as useful at first glance due to only fulfilling part of the attack cost that needs at least one colorless energy. However, they also tend to provide effects that seems promising that it’ll be worth a deck slot. Special energy from format’s past such as Call Energy, Plasma Energy, or even Rescue Energy were meta defining cards in its time. Does Draw Energy comes close to that?

Not quite, though the effect Draw Energy provides is something we haven’t had for a long while, or if there is any (I don’t recall if there was a much older Special Energy card that draws cards). It provides a colorless energy, but also when you attach that energy to a Pokémon, you get to draw a card. We got another form of draw power, albeit minimal, and that might be enough to make it worthwhile. Effects that search for cards and put them on the top of your deck have even more value; Draw Energy plus Magcargo’s Smooth Over means you got exactly what you need, and you still haven’t used a Supporter for your turn yet! Alternatively, if you have Porygon-Z with the Crazy Code Ability in play, you could potentially attach 4 Draw Energies and draw 4 more cards! As for Expanded, if you have both Crazy Code Porygon-Z and couple copies of Energy Reset from XY Fates Collide, not only you put those four Draw Energies back into your hand, but you’ll also reattach them to any Pokemon, and draw four more cards in the process! That pretty much mandates you to use that Pokémon, which may make it inconsistent for certain decks if they don’t have room for a Stage 2, but it does leave room for you to freely use niche Supporters that doesn’t draw cards.

Part of me wished that Draw Energy drew more cards, but this is good enough. Necrozma from Unified Minds would like that kind of energy to get the damage boost of Special Laser. I’ll be thanking the designers for making this kind of effect.

Ratings:

• Standard: 3.5/5
• Expanded: 3.5/5
• Limited: 5/5
• Theme: 5/5

Otaku

Draw Energy (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 209/236, 271/236) is the most recent Special Energy released.  It provides [C] while attached to a Pokémon, and when attached (from hand) to any of your Pokémon, you get to draw a card.  Draw Energy doesn’t care about the Pokémon’s Type, Stage, etc. and the draw is mandatory.  A single card’s worth of draw power isn’t much, especially from what is normally a once-per-turn option.  While there are counters to Energy, it is much less common for their effects to be negated or their play blocked than Items or Abilities, and you’re able to draw without burning your Supporter for the turn.

Even if it is only good for one card, that can matter in certain decks. I thought Draw Energy might be used in conjunction with something like the “Crazy Code” Ability from Porygon-Z (SM – Unbroken Bonds 157/214) or the “Energy Loop” attack of Golduck (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 41/236).  Not together, mind you; the former lets you attach as many Special Energy from your hand to your Pokémon as you want during your turn, while the latter bounces an Energy from itself while attacking.  Either can make that little bit of extra draw power more relevant.  Neither of these have been proven, and actually quite doubtful.  The reason we’re reviewing this is because Adrian Velasco piloted to 16th-place at the Kuala Lumpur Regional Championship ran in it his Lucario & Melmetal-GX deck.  Unfortunately…. I don’t actually know why.

I’m just guessing that this stall/control deck could use the extra non-Supporter draw and since its main attacker has [C] Energy requirements, it was more of a “Why not?” situation.  I’d be more convinced if this was Expanded.  Why?  Acerola and other bounce effects; as long as you have a [C] Energy requirement, it could be a nice little combo.  At least in the Limited Format, this is a must-run.  Odds are good that a little more draw power won’t hurt you, even if you have no [C] Energy requirements to meet!  Do remember that, in this case, drawing one card is about effectively shrinking your deck.  It performs similarly well in both the Towering Heights and the Unseen Depths Theme Decks.

Ratings

• Standard: 2/5
• Expanded: 2/5
• Limited: 4/5
• Theme: 4/5

Draw Energy does a simple thing, and not well enough that most decks should bother with it.  Still, if your deck has plenty of [C] Energy requirements, it is probably worth testing out.

aroramage

Honestly it’s good to see Lucario & Melmetal-GX making the rounds at tournaments. Even though it’s not played as often as ADP or Mewtwo & Mew-GX, they do still end up making a showing. In fact, one of their most recent showings was up in 16th Place at Kuala Lumpur! And while the biggest decks of the game gave it a rough time, it still managed to muscle its way past a lot of other top decks – including its biggest competitor, Reshiram & Charizard-GX. So how did they do it? Maybe today’s card will help answer that.

Draw Energy is pretty basic, for a Special Energy. You attach it to one of your Pokemon, and it provides 1 Colorless Energy. Not very exciting, but the real potential is in the other effect: when you attach it to one of your Pokemon, you get to draw a card! Pretty simple, and pretty straightforward.

So how did this help Lucario & Melmetal-GX achieve a top spot in a recent tournament? Well, considering the deck was primarily centered around the titular duo, it didn’t have a whole lot of room for other cards, but what those cards were ultimately mattered. Power Plant is an essential in the deck, since it shuts down the abilities of other EX/GX – a trait that Lucario & Melmetal-GX lacks. In addition to that, the deck ran Latios-GX, a card with an Ability that would prevent itself from attacking if you have 4 or less Pokemon, a condition that could be avoided simply by having Power Plant in play! This helped the deck set-up for Tag Purge when needed to keep the deck alive against the most powerful Tag Team decks out there.

There were also plenty of unique one-off cards in the deck, ranging from Koga to Channeler to Weakness Guard Energy to Beast Energy <Prism> (since the deck ran the smaller Dusk Mane Necrozma as well as Pheromosa to improve type match-ups and lock up the endgame). With Guzma & Hala around, the deck can get whatever Special Energy is needed for the time, and Draw Energy could be selected for its extra synergy and draw power for the deck! After that, it’s just a matter of stalling out with Lucario & Melmetal-GX’s Full Metal Wall GX effect as well as Metal Frying Pan lowering the damage significantly while dealing tons of damage before the endgame!

So while Draw Energy isn’t necessarily the highlight of the deck, it does end up filling up a space in the deck that helps out with a lot of smaller details. It’s no Rainbow Energy, but it’s incredibly valuable in the line-up!

Rating

Standard: 3/5 (a very solid option for when you need that extra draw)

Expanded: 3/5 (not to mention you still get the 1 Energy)

Limited: 5/5 (hey, Energy is Energy and draw is draw)

Arora Notealus: There’s a surprisingly large number of good utility Special Energies in the game at the moment. They may not see play in every deck, and even then they might not be the most important card in the deck, but they always fulfill some small function that makes the deck work. Beast Energy <Prism> helps out Ultra Beasts, Weakness Guard Energy gives decks that are weak to the meta a fighting chance, even stuff like Triple Acceleration Energy and Super Boost Energy <Prism> are extremely useful for the few decks that can run them! It’s something that makes each Energy…well, Special, and hopefully we can keep a few of these Energy going forward, if not get even more useful Special Energies!

Weekend Thought: Kind of an odd set of cards this week, wasn’t it? Do you think you’d put these cards into your deck? Think they’d do well in your strategy? What other cards could work in your deck that you haven’t tried out before? What hidden synergies have remained untapped by your strategy? Or do you already have the optimal build for your deck and can draw the most out of it whenever you play?