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Name:
Gardevoir
Set:
EX Emerald
Card#:
4/106
Type:
Psychic
Stage:
2 Evolves from Kirlia
HP:
100
Weakness:
Psychic
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
CC
Poké-Power:
Heal Dance
Once during
your turn (before your attack), you may remove 2 damage counters
from 1 of your Pokémon. You can’t use more than 1 Heal Dance
Poké-Power each turn. This power can’t be used if Gardevoir is
affected by a Special Condition.
Attack#1:
(PC) Psypunch [30]
Attack#2:
(PCCC) Mind Shock [60]
This
attack’s damage isn’t affected by Weakness and Resistance
Name:
Kirlia
Set:
EX Emerald
Card#:
33/106
Type:
Psychic
Stage:
Stage 1(Evolves from Ralts)
HP:
70
Weakness:
Psychic
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
C
Attack#1:
Attack#1: (PC) Psypunch [30]
Attack#2:
(CCC) Mind Shock [40]
This
attack’s damage isn’t affected by Weakness and Resistance
Name:
Ralts
Set:
EX Emerald
Card#:
61/106
Type:
Psychic
Stage:
Basic
HP:
50
Weakness:
Psychic
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
C
Attack:
(P) Hypnotic Ray [10]
The
Defending Pokémon is now Asleep.
Attributes:
Gardevoir is a Stage 2 Pokémon. As such, it will need
good stats and abilities to offset the relative difficulty of
playing it. Let us take a moment to first look at the lower
Stages it comes from: the Kirlia in this set is basically
a miniature version of Gardevoir with comparable stats
and slightly weakened attacks. It just lacks the Poké-Power.
The Ralts appears solid and uses the seeming “default”
pattern for Basic Pokémon, having the expected 50 HP and Retreat
Cost of just one Energy. It does only have one attack, but it
only requires a single Psychic Energy and is capable of hitting
for decent damage and automatically inflicts Sleep, a decent
stalling technique.
Gardevoir
is
a Psychic Pokémon. This is a decent type to be: Resistance
exists, but it isn’t too common in Modified. Weakness exists in
a reasonable about of Pokémon, at least that see play.
Gardevoir
clocks in at 100 HP. This is the bottom rung of HP for Stage 2
Pokémon: any less tends to be a serious handicap: it takes
exploiting Weakness, a lot of effort, or a little luck to OHKO
something with this much HP. It is the third best for a
non-Pokémon-ex.
Psychic
Weakness is to be expected: this is a pure Psychic Pokémon in
the video games, and even though Psychic Pokémon are Resistant
to each other, TPC decided to make them Weak to each other
instead. There are a handful of solid Psychic Pokémon that show
up in decks, and pretty much all of them can OHKO Gardevoir,
so watch out or consider running something like Ancient Tomb
(which causes Weakness to be ignored for Pokémon without owner’s
in their name who are not Pokémon ex).
No Resistance
is the worst Resistance. I think it’s time that Psychic Pokémon
were allowed the Fighting Resistance they have in the video
games. Most Fighting Pokémon have ways around Resistance
anyway, so it would mostly be a gesture to incorporate
Resistance as fully as it is in said video games.
Gardevoir
has
a retreat cost of two, which is average in the sense that it is
neither large enough to be a serious concern nor low enough to
be trivial. If you must pay for it, you can, but you’re better
off avoiding having to manually retreat if possible.
Abilities:
This Gardevoir has a Poké-Power, and it is one we have
seen before. Healing Dance first appeared on Hidden Legends
Bellossom. The Poké-Power can only be used once per turn,
regardless of how many copies of it you have in play (yes, even
on other Pokémon). Why? Because the power is a free Potion,
allowing you to remove two damage counters a turn. This doesn’t
sound like much, but it can often give you one extra turn of use
from a Pokémon under attack, and thus deny our opponent access
to a prize for a turn as well.
Psypunch is
the first attack on this card. It is a nice, quick attack that
requires only two Energy and yields 30 damage (since once Energy
requirement is Colorless, that is 5 extra points of damage).
Also, if you need extra speed, a Double Rainbow Energy
would allow you to open with Psypunch for 20 (provided you used
Rare Candy to Evolve that first turn). This kind of
attack usually doesn’t “make” a card, but you notice if it isn’t
there.
Next is Mind
Shock, an attack with some history. First seen on Dark
Alakazam and Dark Kadabra, back then it wasn’t so
good. Mainly because Psychic Weakness was as common as or more
common than Psychic Resistance, this attack’s ability to ignore
both meant a net loss. Also, it was originally a fairly
“pricey” bonus, doing 5 less damage than paid for even on a
Stage 2 Pokémon! Fortunately this version seems to get it
right. It has good base damage; you pay for 45 points of damage
and do a full 60. Even without the chance of hitting Weakness,
that is at least half of any non-Pokémon-ex’s HP. Also, the
format has changed enough where Weakness and Resistance to
Psychic Pokémon are seen much less than the in the time of the
Base Set through Team Rocket.
All in all, we
have some very solid abilities here, though not enough to be the
main focus of a deck.
Uses and
Combinations:
Fortunately, there is already another Gardevoir, from EX
Ruby and Sapphire, is the main focus of its deck. It
also happens to have a Poké-Power, Psyshadow, that allows it to
break the “once per turn Energy attachment” rule by attaching a
Psychic Energy card (to one of your Pokémon) from the deck. For
those familiar with the game, that is usually the hallmark of a
great or even “broken” card, and Gardevoir/Gardevoir
ex used to be quite the popular deck about a year ago. This
card fits quite well into the deck because of the one drawback
of Psyshadow… it places two damage counters on the Pokémon that
receives the Psychic Energy. Back then, Sandstorm Wobbuffet
was a common site in the deck: you’d slap Energy onto Wynaut,
use its Poké-Power to Evolve into Wobbuffet, which also
removed all damage counters. So not only did you have a counter
to all the Pokémon-ex being played back then, but it served as a
repository of Energy, which feed Gardevoir ex’s Psystorm
attack which did more damage if there was more Energy in play.
Wobbuffet
is no longer a good counter. It isn’t bad, but for a while it
was in virtually every serious deck. This is where the new
Gardevoir comes in. You don’t need to rely on the Wynaut/Wobbuffet
combination for “safely” powering up, or include a bunch of
Potion or the like. For that matter, you no longer need to
rush and deplete your deck of Energy (a common problem Jaeger’s
version of the deck had, and probably the only thing that let me
beat him). By using Healing Dance after Psyshadow, you get a
“free” extra attachment from the deck. Since damage is not
building up so quickly, you don’t have to “rush” so much with
building up back-up hitters. And if you have plenty of Energy,
Healing Dance is still useful, buying you an extra turn or two,
especially if the active is Gardevoir ex or another big
hitter. Also, EX Emerald Gardevoir has better attacks
than its Ruby and Sapphire cousin.
Ratings
Unlimited:
2/5-It would be hard to run (and I only see using it as
mentioned above with other Gardevoir), but it would also
be hard for decks in this format to handle, since energy
removing effects… would not buy much time.
Modified:
3.75/5-Gardeovir decks can work without this version, but
I believe it is a big help, and with Boost Energy back in
play, the two ensure fast, painless starts.
Limited:
4.75/5-A top pick, assuming you can pull a suitable supporting
line (at least a 1/2/2). It can bench sit and heal whatever is
attacking, or be the attacker itself. The attacks of this (and
its lower Stages in this set) are rather good for Limited
events. There is even Double Rainbow Energy in this set
to be exploited. The only real downside is a decent amount of
Psychic Weakness and no Resistance… which, given the nature of
the second attack, is somewhat depressing.
Summary
A good idea
that will hopefully re-invigorate a fallen deck type.
If Gardevoir works, the format becomes a hair closer to
being balanced, or at least having a wider variety of
over-powered decks.
