Eevee – Cosmic Eclipse Pokemon Review

Vince

Hello readers! We’re here with a theme week suggested by me and once again, it’s an Eeveelution week because the Sun & Moon Cosmic Eclipse expansion contained six Eevee related cards, and we’re looking at five of them, starting with Eevee (SM Cosmic Eclipse 167/236). This card actually reminds me of another Eevee card: Eevee (DP Majestic Dawn 62/100). And needless to say, I’ve been given a second chance of using this card that’s similar to an older one, which I somehow lost those copies.

So, why is today’s card special? Well, let me rewind to the Majestic Dawn version. That one has an attack call Call for Family, which costs a single energy and lets you search your deck for as many Eevee as you like and put them into your Bench. With this method, you could bring out three more Eevee in play at the time it was Standard legal, and you could evolve them on your next turn assuming they’re still in play. Problem is, there wasn’t any extremely competitive Eeveelution decks out there despite bringing in Level X versions of Leafeon and Glaceon, or Pokemon Prime versions of Espeon and Umbreon, although you could see how they’re useful in various decks or a dedicated Eeveelution deck. So that leaves something to not forget about (you could easily obtain a playset of four copies from Forest Force or Polar Frost Theme Deck) until rotation hits, which as July 1, 2011. That emergency rotation cut off from DP Majestic Dawn to Platinum Arceus, a whopping seven expansions, ending the DPPt era!

Today’s Eevee is also similar to the older one, but a much improved version of that attack. Follow My Tail also costs a single energy and lets you search your deck for as many Eevee or Eevee-GX as you like and put them into your Bench. With this way, you could bring in seven more of those Eevee related cards in play…well five because that’s your maximum Bench size unless Sky Field is in play. Eevee-GX is also formidable in its own right because it has an ability that lets you evolve into any Eeveelution regardless of being a GX or not and heals all damage from the Pokemon you’re about to evolve. Most likely your Eevee that just used Follow My Tail would get Knocked Out, but your opponent has to deal with at least five more Eevees!

For Standard, this is the Eevee that you most definitely need to use. For Expanded, it has a worthy rival of another Eevee (Sun & Moon 101/149), whose Energy Evolution lets you evolve into an Eeveelution whose type matches with the basic energy you’ve attached. It’s up to the player to see if they wanted an Eevee that can evolve instantly (but can’t swarm other Eevee) or an Eevee that summons many more Eevee in play while thinning the deck by five cards (but having to wait a turn to evolve). Both can be used together, but I rather have four of that same card for consistency. If you pulled any Eeveelutions in Limited, then this is the card to use.

Ratings:

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

Conclusion:

Eevee is a good card to start the week and I’m glad I had a second chance to have that similar card but better. We’ll see if the other Stage 1 non-GX Eeveelutions can pull its weight in competitive battling, especially my partner.

Otaku

Welcome to yet another Eeveelution Week!  SM – Cosmic Eclipse brought us even more Evolutions for Eevee, so we’re going to look at them… but before those, we’ll look at our newest Eevee (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 167/236).  Not to be confused with Eevee (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 166/236) as the only game-relevant differences are in their attacks.  I’ll go ahead and cover it as well, making this an unofficial two-in-one review.

[C] Typing just means no noteworthy Type support and (on the attacking side of things) no Weakness/Resistance to worry about.  60 HP is low enough to be an easy OHKO for most decks but at least it means you can fetch Eevee with Professor Elm’s Lecture or (in Expanded) Level Ball.  [F] Weakness only matters because [F] Type attackers are all but guaranteed a OHKO, as opposed to it being likely, and lack of Resistance just means a missed opportunity to be ever-so-slightly less easy to OHKO.  The Retreat Cost of [C] is good: easy to pay at full price, and relatively easy to reduce into a perfect free Retreat Cost.

Eevee (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 167/236) has two attacks for [C]: “Follow My Tail” and “Tackle”.  The latter just does 10 damage, meaning its pure filler.  The former lets you search your deck for any number of Eevee and Eevee-GX to put onto your Bench.  This really makes me wish we had access to T1 attacks… well, not really, as several attackers would become too good then.  Okay, how about attacks made on Player 1’s first turn (or even both player’s first turns) do no damage?  That would permit supporting attacks like this to shine early game.  Even when facing reality, Follow My Tail is a solid, early game attack… but remember you’re almost guaranteed to be sacrificing that Eevee to field however many your Bench can handle.

Eevee (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 166/236) also has two attacks.  [C] pays for “Lead”, which lets you add a Supporter from your deck to your hand.  This is a decent emergency move, given the first turn rules.  Even with my earlier hypothetical, it wouldn’t be that great, and with Eevee likely being KO’d, this is mostly an emergency measure to jump start a stalled deck, or go for a really big second turn.  It is something, at least, which is more than I can say for “Bite”: [CC] for 20 makes it more filler.

In the Standard Format, Eevee (SM – Cosmic Eclipse 167/236) seems like the go-to option.  Yes, there are a couple of versions of Eevee to technically consider, but even the ones that “do something” don’t do it well enough to compete with Follow My Tail, not that such is a high hurdle to clear.  In Expanded, you’re almost certainly better sticking with Eevee (XY – Furious Fists 80/111) or Eevee (Sun & Moon 101/149, 101a/149; Shiny Vault SV41/SV94).  Both have the Ability “Energy Evolution”, which gives you the option of playing an Eeveelution from your deck directly onto themselves when you attach a basic Energy card of the same time as that Eeveelution.  You can even do so on the first turn of the game!  Though if you’re going all out, with Sky Field, then Follow My Tail could field up to three Eevee and four Eevee-GX from your deck.

Follow My Tail definitely earns its keep in the Limited Format so long as you have other copies of Eevee and some Eeveelutions to go with it.  Excluding decks where where you literally cannot fit them in, of course, namely irreconcilable Energy differences or +39 decks.  Three of the four Eeveelutions in this set have Abilities that won’t matter, but all have at least semi-splashable attacks, needing just one Energy of their own Type (though also with some [C] requirements) to attack competently.  I’ll also remind you that, while you’ll have no Eevee-GX in your deck, the 4 Copy Rule doesn’t apply to Limited Format events… at least, it didn’t the last time I checked, which was (admittedly) several years ago.  Ask a judge if you want to be sure.

Ratings

Standard: 3/5

Expanded: 2/5

Limited: 3/5

The Standard and Limited Format scores probably seem a bit low for how I talked Eevee up, while the Expanded Format score may seem a bit high, but Eevee is a specialist, and does its job better than most Evolving Basics.  If you can spare an attack, you can flood your Bench with Eevee and/or Eevee-GX cards, and hopefully Evolve most (even all) of them the next turn.  There isn’t a better option in Standard, and there is probably still room for a single copy of this in an Expanded deck… after all, its rival is Ability-based, and Abilities on Basics are infamous for getting shut-off.