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Pojo's Pokémon Card of the Day

 

Beartic #31

Emerging Powers

Date Reviewed: August 22, 2011

Ratings & Reviews Summary

Modified: 2.75
Limited: 4.00

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

Back to the main COTD Page

Combos With:

Baby Mario
2010 UK National
Seniors
Champion

Beartic #31/98 (Emerging Powers)

Hello and welcome to more CotD here on Pojo. I’m back to reviews now after the World Championships. Didn’t do so well in the tournament, but I had a brilliant time and got some awesome stuff . . . so yeah, it was great . . . bring on the new season!

We kick off the week with one of the two Beartic from the new set. The good one was reviewed previously, so don’t expect too much from the card which I suspect will end up being called ‘Badtic’ (if it ever needs to be referred to at all).

Actually, the card isn’t a total disaster. 130 HP is still excellent for a Stage 1, and Metal Weakness is brilliant now that Reshiram has pretty much chased all Metal Pokémon from the metagame. Being a Water type is pretty good right now as you are hitting both Fire decks and Donphan Prime for Weakness. Hey, you even get a more than decent attack for only one Water Energy! Icy Wind does 30 damage and inflicts auto Sleep: that’s a great value, very worthwhile attack to be doing while you build up the Energy for something better . . .

. . . and that’s where the card falls down: the big hit just isn’t there. Instead, we get the (ironically named?) Superpower which has a base damage of just 60 for a [W][W][C] cost (so you can’t even speed things up with Double Colourless). You also get a coin flip – heads will increase the damage to 80, but tails will have Beartic doing 20 damage to itself. Ugh . . . even if you do flip heads, the attack is only just acceptable, and flipping tails just leaves you with poor damage output and a weakened Beartic – no thanks.

If this card had better damage output, even at a higher cost, it might have been playable. As it is, it is just going to have to watch from its place in the binder while the other Beartic gets all the love at the tournament tables.

Rating

Modified: 2 (not bad, just not good enough)

Limited: 4.25 (Fantastic in this format. Don’t even bother with Superpower – just tank and use Icy Wind)

Mad Mattezhion
 Professor Bathurst League Australia

Beartic 31/98 (Emerging Powers)
 
Hey Pojo readers, welcome to a new week of Emerging Powers! It seems to be a recurring theme of the English B&W releases that there are several doubles in each set, so today we bring you the second Beartic card of the set, followed by 2 more sets of doubles this week.
 
I made a couple of gaffes in my review last Friday, saying that both Beartic cards had the same stats and I think I also called the other Beartic #31 when it is actually number #30. As it turns out, the two Beartic cards differ quite a lot.
 
Most of the excitement has been centred on the other Beartic, but this card could also be useful as a one-of companion card (much like the 'other' versions of Feraligatr, Samurott and Emboar). Beartics is a Stage 1 Water type with 130 HP, Metal weakness, a retreat cost of 2 and two attacks.
 
This Beartic has all of the survivability the makes its cousin so valuable along with greater speed due to the cheaper costs to attack and retreat. Better still, the changes don't seem to have drastically affected Beartic's attack power (which is the usual tradeoff) so it may actually be easier to begin your offensive with this Beartic and switch to the other version when it is powered up.
 
The first attack is Icy Wind, which as usual (for the TCG at least) deals damage and causes Sleep. This versions costs [w] and deals 30 damage as well as auto-Sleep (rather than requiring a coin flip) so it is ahead of the energy curve as far as effects go. Unfortunately, Sleep is one of the weakest Special Conditions so you still only have a 50% chance of disabling your opponent (without considering any countermeasures they may have in place). So, this attack is only useful once or twice to stall the opponent while you build something better.
 
Superpower is a little more punchy. For [w][w][c] you deal 60 damage, with the option to deal an extra 20 damage to both yourself and your opponent. The main use for this attack is to take out evolving Basics and Water-weak Poke'mon for one less energy than the other Beartic requires, and with Defender you can negate the self damage and make Beartic even more durable.
 
Unfortunately, Beartic can't use Double Colourless Energy and needs multiple [w] energies, so it can't be used as a Donphan counter in off type decks the same way as you would use the other version. In Rain Dance variants however, the cheaper attack cost may well prove a life saver (on many occasions I've only had 3 energy to work with when I have desperately needed 4 to attack and save myself).
 
What will make or break this card is your fondness for Double Colourless Energy; if you are playing an off type deck that depdens on the acceleration that DCE then you will only use the other Beartic to guard against Donphan and Fire types; but if you want to run Rain Dance and think that Basic energy are a lot easier to manage (because they are easier to retrieve and reuse after burning them to draw cards with Engineer's Adjustments) then you may well run a copy of this Beartic to cover contingencies. This card isn't all that exciting but it is solid so I'd suggest playtesting a copy for anyone who wants to see what Beartic/Feraligatr can do.
 
Modified: 3.5 (this card is an optional extra for anyone who wants to turn Beartic into an archetype, covering those situations where energy is scarce and time is short)
 
Limited: 4 (double entries give you a better chance of drafting several Cubchoo cards to make this a worthy pick, and combining that large HP with a cheap stalling will make Beartic a massive tank, especially when combined with Max Potion. Just watch out for your weakness as Metal types are far more common than usual in this set)
 
Combos with: Beartic 30/98, Feraligatr Prime, Defender


Otaku

Welcome readers! We begin this week looking at Beartic (31/98), the other Beartic in BW: Emerging Powers.

Stats

Like its set-mate, Beartic is a Stage 1 Water-Type Pokémon. This format is great for Stage 1 Pokémon, though it is easy to think that with the big basic Pokémon we keep seeing that it wouldn’t be: fortunately the best require enough of a set-up that Stage 1 Pokémon are still quite strong, while running a Stage 2 is finally back to being the burden it was meant to be (and some would argue too challenging this format). Being a Water-Type Pokémon does allow Beartic to tap a few cards of Water-Type support, which is actually good considering this format has few cards that support the Pokémon-Type (as opposed to Energy-Type). Perhaps more important is the low occurrence of Water Resistance (with even few of those Pokémon seeing play) and the very high usage of Water Weak Fire- and Fighting-Type Pokémon. In the video games, it is a pure Ice-Type Pokémon. Given that polar bears (the probable inspiration for Beartic) are pretty handy in and around Water, the fact that it wasn’t an Ice/Water hybrid surprised me.

This Beartic also has 130 HP, which seems to be pretty good for a Stage 1 Pokémon now. Good but not great – something known for having a large HP score like Blissey or Wailord still clocks in another 20 or 30 points higher, but at 130 HP Beartic already has more HP than the smaller Stage 2 Pokémon, and actually ties what appears to be the new “low-average” of the Black & White era (as demonstrated by all English versions of Serperior). Functionally an uninjured Beartic should survive all but the biggest, most destructive attacks unless an effect is boosting damage (which would include Weakness)

Yet again this Beartic is like its counterpart, possessing the somewhat rare Metal-Type Weakness, which is probably the second or third best Weakness to have: none would obviously be the best and both Grass- and Metal-Type Pokémon seem to be struggling to field a tournament winning deck in this format. Given its video game type, it might have gotten stuck with Fire or Fighting (to represent video game Fighting and Rock) Weakness instead! The lack of Resistance is disappointing and could have made the card pretty interesting: Ice-Types are only Resistant to Water attacks, so we could have had a Water Resistant Water-Type for the TCG. The Retreat Cost clocks in at two; that’s fairly typical of a Stage 1 Pokémon, especially a larger one. Functionally it’s about average: you definitely won’t want to pay it, but if you have to you usually can; Double Colorless Energy would even let you do it for a single Energy, though that usually is a waste. With Pokémon Catcher (BW: Emerging Powers 95/98) becoming a staple as soon as it is legal, expect the Retreat Cost to matter a bit more than it recently has.

Effects

Beartic has two attacks, just like its sibling we reviewed last week. This version has Icy Wind and Superpower. Icy Wind requires just (W) to use and hits for 30 points of damage and automatic Sleep. Honestly, this is a decent opening move. It won’t lead to a OHKO unless you hit Weakness, play a damage boosting card, etc. but it’s a solid hit for the Energy and while you can’t count on Sleep sticking around, it can be annoying if you’re lucky and your opponent isn’t. Superpower is a bit of a disappointment. It requires (WWC) and all it does is 60 points of damage. For the “big” attack on a Stage 1 that can’t Evolve anymore, that’s weak. It does have an additional effect: you can choose to do 20 points of damage to Beartic in order to do another 20 points of damage with Superpower, for 80 points before other effects. 80 points of damage is enough to matter most of the time, but quite frankly that’s what I’d expect just for the Energy alone. This is the “big” attack, the attack that really needs to carry the card, and I don’t think it does.

Together you get a solid but unspectacular combo since (before other card effects or plays) you’d have roughly a 50% chance of your opponent’s Pokémon Sleeping through its attack, which means you’re “damage ahead” and so the kickback of Superpower isn’t so bad. Still for a two turn average, even with the boost you’re only hitting for 110, which doesn’t cut it right now. Lack of Double Colorless Energy compliance also hurts, even if you open with Cubchoo and attach an Energy to it, second turn you need outside help to use Superpower.

Usage

As of now (or rather BW: Emerging Powers becoming tournament legal) there are two options for Cubchoo to run (28/98 and 29/98). Both are 70 HP Basic Water Pokémon with Metal Weakness, no Resistance, and chunky (for Basic Pokémon) two Energy Retreat Costs. 29/98 can do 30 for (WW) and that is not especially helpful; I recommend 28/98 because for (W) it can do 10 and potentially put the Defending Pokémon to Sleep or for (CC) it can put itself to Sleep and heal up to 60 points of damage. Since its job is too Evolve and it’s only attacking first turn or in a worst case scenario, the latter seems better.

So is there a good Modified use for this card? Not really. Water has been struggling lately to find really strong attackers, but most Water decks I can think of are going to just run the other Beartic. It might have a larger Retreat Cost and need more Energy to attack, but it is a great example of getting what you paid for: better damage for both attacks and they come with beneficial effects. In Energy acceleration decks its no contest: the extra Energy required will often be negligible and the times when it isn’t won’t outweigh the times when it is. The other Beartic also makes solid use of Double Colorless Energy so even if you wanted to run a Water deck without the usual suspects or add Water to a non-Water deck, again the other Beartic will outperform this one. The only thing this version has going for it is if it has to, it can attack by meeting a single (W) Energy requirement. I’ll still toss out a basic combo in case you really like this card: Defender. A single Defender will allow you to use Superpower without a drawback and on a 130 HP Stage 1, the normal benefits Defender are magnified.

In Unlimited the good news is it can hypothetically OHKO traditional Baby Pokémon, and using the effect of Superpower would even allow you to OHKO several popular Basic attackers or Stage 1 Bench-Sitters. Still even ignoring the currently vicious donk and first turn control decks, you’re just better off with another candidate. In Limited play, this Beartic is almost as good as the other version. Regular readers (or players in Limited events) know the drill: since you’re building decks with the cards provided, a lot of Pokémon just aren’t worth using, either because they need a serious amount of support or simply because you don’t have access to the entire Evolutionary line. This results in lower average HP and attack damage scores. Superpower has a better chance of taking out Defending Pokémon without resorting to the self-damage clause. 130 HP is both unusual to see and likely to last even longer. Special Conditions are harder to shake and thus more effective. This set has some good Metal-Type Pokémon for Limited play so you’ll actually need to pay more attention to the Weakness than in Constructed formats. Have two possible Cubchoo also helps both for adding more variety to your deck and just making it easier to get a good line to run. If you can afford to make at least 40% of your Energy Water Energy (and you’re running about 20 Energy cards) then this is great card. You have to have at least some Water Energy to run it but especially if you want to just rely on the first attack you could get by with fewer Water Energy cards.

Ratings

Unlimited: 1/5 – Outclassed by so much, including the other Beartic.

Modified: 2.25/5 - Outclassed by the other Beartic amongst a few other cards, but technically solid.

Limited: 3.5/5 – If you’re running Water and you have the line, you should probably be running Beartic.

Summary

The “other” Beartic joins the pile of “other” cards that are easily outdone by their set-mates. It isn’t a hopeless card but even together the attacks are too weak to make it worth the effort of running.


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