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Pojo's Pokemon Card of the Day

Sceptile - Non Holo - Sandstorm

Date Reviewed: 11.03.03

Ratings & Reviews below

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst. 3 ... average.
5 is the highest rating.

Heidi Craig	Sceptile Modified 2.5/5 This is a good supporting combo card but the attack is weak. Pokemon Power Energy Trans is very useful in grass decks only. This allows grass energy in play to be moved around. There are several reasons why this Pokemon Power is very effective. If you played grass energy on any Pokemon you really don't intend to use anymore, you can simply move it to the one you want it on. Once your hitter comes into play it can easily have the energy it needs to do the powerful attacks. If your main Pokemon is almost knocked out you can move the energy to another Pokemon use Pokemon Nurse, healing all the damage without losing your energy. It is a great combo card with the other Sceptile. The attack on this card is weak I would try not to relay on this attack unless your in a jam. Unlimited 1/5 Good luck having any energy to move around. The attack is weak for this format so it would be an easy KO for your opponent without doing much damage if any. Draft 1/5 It could go either way, depending on the type of deck you are able to build. For a third stage Pokemon it seems weak in this format. It would limit the types of Pokemon you could use to make the Pokemon Power effective and I'm not a big fan of the powerful attacks to be flip based only. With the right cards it could work in draft decks.
Hedge	Sceptile (Non-holo RS) This card OWNZ. I don’t CARE what ANYBODY says. It pwnz BIG TIME! This card is the core of the scepticenter deck, where it ownz all even more lol. Sceptile, 2 rainbow, 2 grass, zap it back and forth from the three legendary birds (Skyridge versions) and nurse periodically, oh, it’s nearly unbeatable. Often times opponent’s are either leaving because the game is taking so long, or they are crying in frustration after you just nursed 70 off a bird. Plus, with my lucky flips (knock on wood) I will get two heads in a row for ten turns if he is my last fighter (which has happened ~_^) The power is great; the ability to move around energy at will may not seem so spectacular to a newbie, but if you use it in a game you will see it’s power. It used to be venusaur…… but you know what, a lot of old school players are gonna kill me, but I actually say use this instead of venusaur. This is why: Resistance to water. Blastoise is still popular in unlimited if you can believe it. And with this and Zapdos in your deck, you might have a chance against it. But I have to say that you are Stupid with a capital ‘S’ if you play scepticenter in unlimited. The fact that you would even play a stage two in unlimited that is not Blastoise, Meganium, or any evolution save Slowking for that matter, is pretty crazy. However, if you must do a stage two that’s a damage healer, at least do Alakazam…………… Anyway, back to Sceptile. Unlimited: 3/5 – Well, I wrote a lot about unlimited above, so re-read that. ☺ Modified: 4/5 – This card bombs here. This is mainly a stage two dominated format, the rulers being Gardevoir/Gardevoir ex, Omastar, Aggron ex, this and the other Sceptile, Cradily (~_^), and others, which means that it’s slowness won’t bother you as much here because your opponent will be nearly as slow as you are. I love this card here. 2 on 2: 4/5 – Same…….. -_- Draft: 3/5 – Slow, and a stage two….. gg if you get it up. ~ Happy Trails, Coolhedgie
Bullados	Sceptile Attributes: Good HP. 100 is about normal for S2s, so don't squander it. Fire weakness is always bad. There is always a good Big Fire deck out there somewhere. Water resistance is something that'll always be new on me, and it's an extremely good attribute to have. Blastoise, G8r, and now, Swampert, there has always been a good water deck. Three retreat is just plain bad. For the life of me, I can't figure out why he got this retreat. In the game, he is extremely fast for a grass Pokemon. Either way, don't pay this. Switch is to be used here. PokePOWER: "Energy Trans" Lookin for your Venusaur replacement? Here it is. This particular power has always been good, just because there's always been Pokemon Center and Pokemon Nurse. You can abuse these two cards with this POWER. Even after 5 years, it's still good. Attack: "Tail Rap" IMO, this is an upgrade over the original Venusaur. It costs less energy, and does on average the same as Venusaur. Ratings: Unlimited: It's either this or Venusaur. I think this is a little better, just because of the attack. However, evolution decks rarely do well here, and for this card to be effective, there needs to be a ton of energy on the field. ER prone = extremely bad. 1.5/5 Modified: Since LC rotated out, he doesn't have as much competition from Venusaur. He's a support Poke mostly, so he doesn't edge out any other Grass Pokes either. Good combo here: Sceptile, Venusaur (EXP, Harvest), and Exeggutor (doesn't matter). Sceptile and Venusaur as support, Exeggutor to either take out the bench (Grass) or destroy the active (Psychic). Very good support card. 3.75/5 Limited: I actually like this card here. Not because of the POWER, which is good and allows you to play less energy, but because the attack is fairly decent. Not quite a first pick, just something to take if there's nothing else in the pack. 3.5/5 ~Bullados
Ralphy	Ralphy- Decent card, a little weird though. This card is more or less Venusaur with a different name. Venusaur stopped working as a deck years ago. Unlimited- I could see running a Scepcenter deck instead of a Venucenter deck. Even though Sceptile's attack will average 10 less damage, your getting it for possibly two less energy cards. 50 x 2 for a grass and two colorless. Toss in a Meganium and you have a deck that could work, or it could get ripped to pieces by Lass, ER, Slowking, and even Fossil Magmar could take this deck on. Resistance tp Blastoise and the likes is nice though. In short, I would rather play Sceptile than Venussuar, but I wouldn't want to play Venusuar in Unlimited to begin with. 3/5 here. Modified- There are positives and negatives in Modified. To start off with there are no Pokemon Centers or Meganium's with Wild Growth Pokemon Powers so this deck lot's it's best, and most powerful combos. Also, Fire always has a strong showing in Modified and most of the Big Fire Pokes can take Sceptile out in one shot very easily. Resistance to water saves you from things like 'Gatr, Poliwrath, 'Tops Ex, and Wailords. Those are some powerful decks, and this card shuts them down almost completely. Most if not all of the card mentioned above are weak to Sceptile and Sceptile resists them. Those two things combined can be though to stop. I'm going to give a 3.25/5 in Modified. Limited- Being a Stage two in bad, but not as bad as it used to be because in drafts with the newer sets, there is a good chance that half of the decks are going to contain them. It's not like in Base when the best cards were basics and you were a fool to draft a Stage 2. Now the best cards are Stage 2's. Anyway, having any resistance is nice, and the attack is reasonably draft friendly. The power is also nice to reuse energy. Retreat your active before it gets KO'ed and then put the energy left on that Pokemon on to another one. Nice energy economy. 3.5/5
Patriarch	Now, today we're reviewing the new Venusaur: Sceptile from Ruby/Sapphire! Can energy trans fight back in the new modified? Read on, meh friends, read on... Unlimited (2/5): Stage 2's, while still playable, are a load of worries getting out. In this arena, the attack and power don't necessarily put you into a winning position, either. Modified (4/5): Unlike open, E-on is a completely different case. The ability to juggle around your energy will be a useful weapon late-game, and combined with the holographic Sceptile, you can put yourself into a VERY good situation! The attack, Tail Wrap, may prove as an economy punch by dealing an average of 50 for 3 (or for weakness, 100 for 3! Good against Gardevoir ex, mind you). Just watch out for big fire: one tiny hit from a Blaziken will put you out, most likely for good. Limited (4.5/5): If this guy gets out, he'll be a BEAST! The factors that made him decent in unlimited, and good in modified, make him GREAT in drafting. The bottom stats, resistence to water and retreat of 2, are also a nice way to round a big, fat card out. Before I say peace out, I want to say something. A while's back, I ran into a cool site called www.marriland.com, and it has a plethora of information on the TCG! So go there, and become a forum frequenter...you know you want to ;P ~Patriarch
pERfeCt0nE	Dusclops If a pokemon runs through the rooms with scissors in his hand, causing an accident, his spirit becomes a duclops... @_@ Unlimited- Sneasel is his lord and master. Only 1 heads out of the 6 is needed to kill this poor guy! rating--- 1 Modified- I don't think that random curse is strong enough to allow it to be of any trouble to Gardevoir decks or most others for that matter! Judgement is too flippy to use in this format either... or any format really =/. rating--- 2 Draft- Being a stage 1 who evolves from a choice of 2 commons, is really easy to use. I remember I drafted 2 of each duskull and a dusclops. Although I only put 3 duskulls in, its the fact of the matter, that duskulls are easy to get. Judgement is a last resort, or a way around absorbing or stalling moves. Basically use random curse though =). rating--- 3.875 2 vs. 2- Well this guy is definitely a good finisher here. I've seen this used with slaking/memory berry once in a casual match. The guy first used his Mem. berry for slack off, and then starting using Judgement on hitters. Once he was out of the picture, slaking took a share of prizes, and eventually he used critical move/random curse alternately every chance possible to KO a hitter and move the excess damage to set up slaking to OHKO the next one. There are good decks for him to fit into, but being psychic- you may want to stick with Gardevoir if anything =/. rating--- 2.75 Multiplayer- Since Judgement will scare your opponents into trying to kill him first. Build your decks to take advantage of that. Perhaps using Dusclops/Wynaut/Wobuffet and your ally using Salamence (DRAGON- HOLO) would work well. Use wynaut to support you OR you allys evolution. With Salamence's free gust of wind-like poke-power, Judgement can be set-up very well. Try your combinations and read spoilers. rating--- 3
Otaku	Name: Sceptile Type: Grass Stage: 2 (evolves from Grovyle) HP: 100 Weakness: Fire Resistance: Water Retreat: CCC Poké-POWER: Energy Trans As often as you like during your turn (before you attack), move a (G) Energy card attached to 1 of your Pokémon to another of your Pokémon. This power can’t be used if Sceptile is affected by a Special Condition Attack#1: (GCC) Tail Rap [50x] Flip 2 coins. This attack does 50 damage times the number of heads. Name: Grovyle Type: Grass Stage: 1 (evolves from Treecko) HP: 70 Weakness: Fire Resistance: Water Retreat: C Attack#1: (CC) Poison Breath The Defending Pokémon is now Poisoned. Attack#2: (GCC) Swift [30] This attack’s damage isn’t affected by Weakness, Resistance, Poké-Body, Poké-Power, or any other affects on the Defending Pokémon. Name: Grovyle Type: Grass Stage: 1 (evolves from Treecko) HP: 80 Weakness: Fire Resistance: Water Retreat: C Poké-BODY: Natural Cure When you attach a (G) Energy card from your hand to Grovyle, remove all Special Conditions from Grovyle. Attack#1: (CC) Slash 20 Name: Treecko Type: Grass Stage: Basic HP: 40 Weakness: Fire Resistance: Water Retreat: C Attack#1: (G) Poison Breath Flip a coin. If heads, the Defending Pokémon is now Poisoned. Name: Treecko Type: Grass Stage: Basic HP: 40 Weakness: Fire Resistance: Water Retreat: C Attack#1: (C) Tail Slap [10] Attack#2: (GC) Razor Leaf [20] Name: Sceptile Type: Grass Stage: 2 (evolves from Grovyle) HP: 120 Weakness: Fire Resistance: Water Retreat: CCC Attack#1: (C) Lizard Poison [20] If 1 Energy is attached to Sceptile, the Defending Pokémon is now Asleep. If 2 Energy is attached to Sceptile, the Defending Pokémon is now Poisoned. If 3 Energy is attached to Sceptile, the Defending Pokémon is now Asleep and Poisoned. If 4 or more energy is attached to Sceptile, the Defending Pokémon is now Asleep, Burned, and Poisoned. Attack#2: (GGCCC) Solar Beam [70] Hmmm… Otaku takes a Base Set Venusaur, activates De-Fusion. Otaku now has one of each Sceptile. Who knew TPC played Yu-Gi-Oh? ;) We are looking at the top Sceptile on my list, but all the rest go with it and will be important later on. Attributes: For those of you not used to my review style, I cover the less dynamic elements of a card first (basically everything but attacks, Poké-Body, Poké-Power, and Pokémon Powers) in this section. To start off, let’s look at its name: being a Sceptile means that it only has one current form of direct competition: the Holo-Rare EX Ruby/Sapphire Sceptile. We’ll look at how they compare in each category, then decide if this was a good or a bad thing. This is a Grass Pokémon (like the other Sceptile), which is more or less a “neutral” trait-there are many Grass weak Pokémon, but so far only Metal Pokémon have any resistance to them. That being said, going against a Metal Pokémon with real Metal Energy attached is nasty. The HP for this card is 100: more or less expected for a Stage 2 anymore. Without being a dual-weakness Pokémon ex, you could only have another 20. The other Sceptile wins out here, having that 120 HP. Next up we come to Weakness: Fire. This is a very common weakness for Grass-Types, and it is more or less expected. No weakness is the only good weakness, and Fire is fairly common in Modified right now, so be wary of it. Next up is Resistance, and we actually have one again! Sceptile is Water Resistant, which is a more recent resistance, and is, like all resistances, useful. Last, we come to retreat: three energy. This is a bit much. First, most recent 100HP Pokémon have a retreat of 2, one less than this. Second, 2 is the highest Retreat cost you can have before retreating becomes too difficult to budget. So let us hope that this is balancing out some other part of the card… The other Sceptile has the same bottom stats, so they are of course equal there. Before moving on, since Sceptile is a Stage 2, let me a) remind you that we will need to see some “bonuses” to help it compete with basics and Stage 1 Pokémon and b) examine what we should evolve it from. =P I would go with the “Natural Cure” Grovyle, since Special Conditions can be nasty, but primarily for the 10 more HP. The 70 HP version can Poison, but it is over-priced for a basic, so on an Evolution card, it’s even worse. Swift could be useful, but that lack of applying Weakness can haunt you early game (where you could be racking up Grass Weak OHKOs). Still, if Metl Pokémon are common, it might be a good back up. Both have Fire Weakness, Water Resistance, and nice retreats of only 1. As for the Treecko, I would go with the Treecko that has two attacks: Razor Leaf is slightly over-priced, but not as badly as Poison Breath. Given that is has mere 40 HP, and the fact that the Sceptile we are looking at is not too energy dependent, I think your best bet would be to wait until turn 2 or later, then drop a Treecko and Rare Candy to Sceptile. Abilities: One of the “classic” Pokémon Powers is revived as a Poké-Power (which is sub-division of Pokémon Powers). Energy Trans can be mighty useful, and makes possible some sick combos, which I will detail later. The attack, Tail Rap, is flippy but hard hitting. Also, note that GCC for 50 is discounted (GCC yields 35 damage, but the attack averages 50). All in all, this compares well with its Holo-Rare brethren: not as great an attacker, but it has some tricks to it… Uses/Combinations: There are two good uses for this Pokémon: TecHing it into a deck with the other Sceptile, or using it as a main focus in a deck (in which case TecH the Holo-Rare Sceptile with it ;) ). Energy Trans made Venusaur almost viable in Unlimited, and it still has a mess of tricks for Modified. First off, it allows you to get away with less energy-if something is about to die, rip away its energy and put it on what will become your new attacker. Second is moving the energy from one Pokémon to another, and healing the “naked” one with Pokémon Nurse, then returning the energy you took so it can go back to attacking. Third is manipulating energy counts (sometimes it matters, like for Holo-Rare Sceptile’s Lizard Poison or Aquapolis Muk). Let’s not forget the joy of the off-color Fire Cleaner. What do I mean? You have your seemingly normal mono-Grass deck. Then when the time is right, plunk down a Numel, Rare Candy to Camerupt, and load up enough energy to keep it going until you draw your last prize. notices people snickering What, think it won’t work? You just need to keep the few fire cards in hand… ooooh, you wanna know how it will work with Camerupt needing two Fire Energy, but Energy Trans only affecting Grass? Unless Nintendo changes it, Energy Trans can affect Grass Energy, no matter what is providing it. Q. If Mewtwo "Energy Absorbs" a Rainbow Energy and then Venusaur "Energy Trans" it, does the receiving Pokémon take damage? A. Nope, it only does the damage when you play the card from your hand. (June 22, 2000 WotC Chat, Q72) * If a card gives off Energy of any type then that card COUNTS as an Energy card of that type. This means a Buzzap'd Electrode that was chosen to give 2 Grass Energy COUNTS as a Grass Energy Card and can be Energy Transferred by Venusaur's Pokémon Power. As a further example, Energy attached to Ditto COUNTS as all basic Energy types at once. So any Energy type attached to Ditto could ALSO be Energy Transferred by Venusaur's Pokémon Power. (Mar 30, 2000 WotC Chat) So you should be able to Energy Trans a Crystal (provided there is a Grass energy attached when your try it), Multi, or Rainbow Energy to your new Camerupt, as well as a heaping helping of Grass Energy. Just remember that if you use Crystal or Multi Energy for one of the Fire, a real Fire Energy will still be needed. I included the Mewtwo ruling to remind/prove to you that rainbow’s damage placement only triggers when it comes from the hand. Ratings Unlimited: 3/5-I think it might make a fun rogue deck. Sceptile Center? You can have fun keeping energy spread out (and thus harder to remove) until you are ready for a big attacker (and No Removal or Chaos Gym can help protect the energy too). Energy Trans Sceptile itself can use a DCE for a surprise attack: slap a Grass on a Cleffa, Eeeeeeek, then drop a Treecko, Rare Candy to Sceptile (really? ;) ), then Trans the Grass back to Sceptile, drop a DCE, and see if you can OHKO that Sneasel. While it might be fun, it probably won’t win a lot. Modified: 3.75/5-Sceptile is mainly waiting on two things: the right deck and people to start diversifying. If you fail to steam roll it early on, prepare for a loooooong fight. Hmmmm… Fluff Jumpluf with this and Pokémon Nurse could be more efficient and nearly immortal… 2-on-2: 4/5-use almost he same energy for two Pokémon. :-P Whatver guy you want attacking loads up while the other just chills and maybe gets attended to by a Nurse. ;) Limited: 3.5/5-it’s a nice sized Pokémon that can be splashed with a little care (it just need one Grass to attack, as does my preferred Treecko/Grovyle), though its Poké-Power becomes next to useless then. In a real grass deck, it will let you make use of little energy. It’s the Grovyles that make it nice though: they are fairly sturdy for Limited play (Swift gets around some annoying effects, while the other is nearly immune to Special Conditions). -Otaku

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