Rampardos – Ultra Prism Pokemon Review

Vince

To end the week, we’re taking another look at Rampardos from Sun & Moon Ultra Prism. I wasn’t able to chime in, but as of today, Rampardos seem to be made better as time went by mostly because of the cards they support. Before that, I feel like it wouldn’t see as much play. You can read a previous review here.

Tyrantrum does have thing that can deal with both ends of the spectrum. Clean Hit costs F for 60 damage, plus 60 more damage if your opponent’s Active Pokémon is an Evolution Pokémon. For 120 damage against Evolved Pokémon, that’s almost a 2HKO, a solid 2HKO if you have Diancie Prism Star in play, or a OHKO if the defending Pokémon is weak to Fighting. Wild Crash costs FFF, which is costly, but also instantly Knocks Out any of your opponent’s Active Basic Pokémon with ease. And considering there’s Basic EX/GX as well as TAG TEAMs, you can easily get two or even three prizes with this attack. It’s just the matter of fueling the attack cost of Wild Crash.

Well, the card pool seems to help solve the issue. Karate Belt works if you’re behind on prizes, and if it does, then the attack cost is one Fighting energy less. If you’re aren’t convinced that this is helpful, then you should take a look at Thunder Mountain, as it does a similar thing for Lighting types. There’s also Super Boost Energy Prism Star, which provides a Rainbow Energy on a Stage 2 Pokemon, and if you have three of them, then it prodives the equivalent of 4 Rainbow Energies! That’s all I can think of for Standard. Expanded has Counter Energy as it also works if you’re behind on prizes, and it provides 2 units of Rainbow Energy. Combined with Counter Energy/Super Boost Energy and Karate Belt, Rampardos can actually go from zero to attacking with Wild Crash, and Clean Hit is made into a free attack.

Rampardos was previously paired with Talonflame from XY Steam Siege. Being a Stage 2 helps as it can help fulfill the requirements of Super Boost Energy. But since Talonflame is no longer in the format, you’ll have to look elsewhere, or hope that you can put at least three Rampardos in play, or have Meganium LOT to get multiple Stage 2s in play.

Ratings:

• Standard: 3/5
• Expanded: 3.5/5
• Limited: 3/5

aroramage

You’re probably wondering what kind of week this has been, what with all the Fossil Pokemon leading off from Aerodactyl-GX at the end of last week. Well wouldn’t you believe it, there is a competitive Fossil deck out there, and all of these cards are involved in it to some degree!

I’m not gonna talk about Rampardos specifically that much – we actually reviewed him already back in March of last year. The important thing to know is he’s got a move that KOs Basics and another that does more damage to Evolutions. Back in those days, it wasn’t that special to get out Rampardos, but now with the advent of Tag Team-GX – Big Basics worth 3 Prizes – as well as some good tools to work with, Rampardos is surprisingly viable.

Pokemon Research Lab searches out Cranidos and probably an Aerodactyl-GX or either a Tirtouga or Omanyte to evolve all on your next turn. You run Jirachi (TEU) for Stellar Wish to grab Trainers, and possibly Mew for some Bench protection, but for the most part, you’re focusing down on getting Trainer cards like Karate Belt – which reduces Rampardos’s attack costs down by 1 Fighting Energy – and Martial Arts Dojo – to increase the damage from any attacks by 10 or 40. Some variants could run Lance <Prism> to put out 2 Salamence (1 Salamence and 1 Salamence-GX) for free retreat to manipulate the board for Rampardos to take advantage of the opponent entirely. Carracosta locks down Tools, while Omastar locks down Items – set-up and win!

Rampardos is the main attacker, which is great from the perspective of trading out favorably against most match-ups, but there is potential for the deck to suffer from the ill effects of Pokemon Research Lab, meaning the opponent could get a major advantage if they do a lot of damage or KO whatever’s active. Capitalizing on that is crucial, but your opponent will probably try to play around your deck once they know what you’re up to. Rampardos’s biggest strength is KOing the massive Tag Team-GX, but a free Clean Hit is nothing to sneeze at either. Is it a top contender? Maybe, maybe not, but it’s definitely a rogue deck to keep an eye out for.

Rating

Standard: 3/5 (he’s gotten the right tools now, so he’s prominent)

Expanded: 2.5/5 (support continues to expand on his chances)

Limited: 3/5 (still would be hard to bring out in Ultra Prism alone)

Arora Notealus: Actually it’s pretty neat to see Rampardos get some recognition in the metagame. With the noteworthy addition of Karate Belt, it’s easy to get Rampardos’s attacks, especially with Clean Hit being a potential free 120 damage on Evolution Pokemon. On top of that, Martial Arts Dojo from Unbroken Bonds adds in some extra damage, and newer supporting cards just add up to turn Rampardos into a more effective Pokemon in general. In a way, a lot of his faults were addressed, making him quite viable!

Weekend Thought: Did you enjoy digging through the ancient past for potential new strategies? Did these cards revitalize the Fossil Pokemon, or are they still extinct? Would you want to play these Fossil Pokemon with the Unidentified Fossil? Or would you prefer the old ways of Mysterious Fossil? Or that weird period inbetween where they had the Fossils with Poke-Bodies or the Fossils that dug under the bottom seven cards of your deck?

Otaku

Rampardos (SM – Ultra Prism 65/156) closes out our Fossil Week. I debated using it as our Throwback, even though it’s not particularly old, but I wanted to cover something that used the original Fossil mechanic (or bypassed it, as was the case).  This is our second review of this card, but I missed out on the first go-round so let’s dig in! 

Rampardos is a [F] Type, giving you the option of backing it with Diancie {*}, and making it valuable for smacking a good bit of Weakness. Being a Stage 2 is a pain, though Cranidos can be put into play directly through Pokémon Research Lab. No bonus option for Expanded, though; Rampardos sat out the XY-era, the BW-era, and even the HS-era! 150 HP isn’t beefy, but it is a little more likely to survive a hit than to be OHKO’d. [G] Weakness isn’t too bad, based on recent tournament results, but we’ll see how long that lasts. No Resistance isn’t changing, but it also doesn’t matter. The Retreat Cost of [CC] isn’t bad, but it isn’t good, either.

Rampardos has two attacks, “Clean Hit” and “Wild Crash”, both requiring pure [F] Energy. Clean Hit only needs one Energy, though, so it wouldn’t be too bad run in a multi-Type deck. You could even use Karate Belt to attack for free, at least if you’re behind in Prizes. It does 60 damage, which is a good return for one Energy, but not enough to hit key OHKOs or 2HKOs unless you had a lot of damage buffs to go with it. Even in the Standard Format, you have Diancie {*} and Martial Arts Dojo, but they still don’t add a lot.  Fortunately, Clean Hit has an effect, doing an additional 60 when used against an Evolution Pokémon. 120 for one is a good deal and 2HKO range against many targets.

Wild Crash requires three Energy, and as they all need to be [F] that is pretty chunky. Karate Belt can drop this to just [FF], but that is still quite a bit. Super Boost Energy {*} might be your best bet, assuming you have enough Stage 2 Pokémon in play to trigger its secondary effect. Wild Crash does no damage, but its effect states any Basic Pokémon hit by Wild Crash is Knocked Out: no damage required! Of course, a Pokémon protected from attack effects is entirely immune to it, as are any Evolution Pokémon. Basic Pokémon are more likely to be the fast ones in terms of setup, so the chunky Energy cost takes what might have been a broken attack, and makes it so-so.

Rampardos has already seen some success in tournaments over the past few months. Even though it isn’t a Top 16 but finishing 26th out of 726, such as at the Regional Championships held in Cologne, Germany, is still impressive. It has its own “Fossil” deck, supplemented by cards like Areodactyl-GX and/or Carracosta (SM – Unified Minds 45/236). The specific deck I’m citing surprised me by running Salamence-GX and Salamence (SM – Celestial Storm 106/168; SM – Black Star Promos SM140), put into play through Lance {*}! Out of what I’ve mentioned in this review, the only Diancie {*} was skipped, though a lot of cards were just singles or doubles, like Karate Belt and Martial Arts Dojo.

If I didn’t know this deck had chops, I wouldn’t have believed it. I believe that it is because so many strong, competitive decks focus on Basics, [F] Weak Pokémon, or both… and those Basics are often TAG TEAM Pokémon. A [F] Weak Evolution takes 240 from Clean Hit, and even if you give up two Prizes in the process, Wild Crash can bag a TAG TEAM and take three Prizes. I don’t think it will be dominating Standard anytime soon but it should be a competitive (though not top tier) option.

I have no idea what Expanded is like right now, but if it hasn’t changed too much then this should still have a chance. Why? A nice mix of low HP targets, high HP Basic or [F] Weak targets, and more tricks (Counter Energy, Strong Energy, etc.) The anti-Item effects and related control effects are why I don’t expect much of a Rampardos presence, but I think it might be plausible. As for the Limited Format, if you get the cards you need to field it and can run mostly (or just) Fighting Energy, go for it! Its attacks are great here!

Ratings

Standard: 3.2/5

Expanded: 3/5

Limited: 3.5/5

Rampardos has potent and solid stats, other than being a Stage 2. It just exists in a metagame where – instead of being a great deck – it is just a decent deck. Which is still impressive, given the decks that are on top.