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Pojo's Pokémon Card of the Day

 

 Leafeon

- Furious Fists

Date Reviewed:
Oct. 30, 2014

Ratings & Reviews Summary

Standard: 1.75
Expanded: 1.88
Limited: 3.13

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


aroramage

After looking at another Hitmon, we now return to another -eon! I guess that makes this some kind of Hitmoneon week! Maybe something for a Fighting-type Eeveelution in the future, who knows. Welcome back guys, today we're taking a look at Leafeon!
 
Similar to our friend Glaceon from earlier in the week, Leafeon has a cheap 1-for-30 attack and a 3-Energy attack that has a coin flip, but maybe Leafeon's a little better or a little worse depending on what you look into. Her first attack is Soothing Scent, which deals 30 damage and puts the target to sleep. That's not too bad, all things considered, and you can still stack on either Poison or Burn to add some more damage. The best part about this attack is that it just works - there's no coin flip to add the Sleep status on! Sure, you could Poison and Sleep with HTL, but the Sleep part is always a coin flip, so it's nice to have in case that doesn't pan out.
 
Magical Leaf, Leafeon's second attack, is similar to Glaceon's Ice Edge, but instead of dealing 60 with a chance to hit 90, this attack deals 50 with a chance to hit 80. Seems a little short, doesn't it? On top of that though, you get to heal off 30 damage, so it's a nice trade-off at the very least. Granted, you're only getting that half the time, and Leafeon doesn't have that many hit points to begin with.
 
So could Leafeon be what Glaceon wasn't? She does have the same potential as Glaceon, with a strong cheap attack that can help out quite a bit, but her second attack doesn't really hit the mark as well as Glaceon's. On top of that, she suffers the same low HP her sister has, and that's detrimental in an environment where 90 is an easy number to reach. As optimistic as I'd like to be with Leafeon, she ends up in the same region as Glaceon: good, but just not good enough.
 
Rating
 
Standard: 2/5 (not bad, just not great)
 
Expanded: 2/5 (not really different here)
 
Limited: 3/5 (whereas Glaceon's spread damage is good here, Leafeon's healing and status-infliction are both nice, so a little higher score)
 
Arora Notealus: You know when Leafeon's performing photosynthesis, she's making fresh clean air. Course, anyone who knows what a plant does could say the same thing! Welcome to the circle of life.
 
Next Time: A new challenger spins into action!


Otaku

As a reminder, EX: Phantom Forces isn’t going to be tournament legal until November 26th (if I did the math right) and the official release date is November 5th.  As such, I have very little information on how this set is going to affect the metagame; I will indulge in some speculation, but overall the review is considering competitive Organized Play as it is now… or at least as I understand it to the best of my abilities. 

Leafeon (XY: Furious Fists 7/111) is a Grass-Type, which is somewhat useful; you’ve got direct support like Floette (XY: Flashfire 64/106) and Herbal Energy as well as indirect like Virizion-EX and you don’t have to worry about Resistance.  It isn’t too bad at hitting Weakness either; Keldeo-EX, Seismitoad-EX, Suicune (BW: Plasma Blast 20/101) and Terrakion (latest printing BW: Legendary Treasures 94/113), perhaps even the odd Tyrantrum (XY: Furious Fists 62/111).  Perhaps most important of all… it isn’t the easiest thing to splash into a deck; there isn’t a Grass-Type equivalent of Mewtwo-EX for example. 

Leafeon is a Stage 1 Pokémon, which is a bit of a drag in the literal sense as it takes an extra turn to set-up and an extra card to get into play over a Basic Pokémon.  There is an option open to Leafeon to help speed things up, but its still two cards to get one Leafeon into play.  It has 90 HP which means it is a probable OHKO, at least once the opposing deck really gets going.  Fire-Type decks will have it even easier given that the card’s Fire Weakness will double the damage done and there is no Resistance to provide a very mild bonus (in no way proportional to how potent Weakness is), but that lacking Resistance is the norm.  Leafeon has a Retreat Cost of [C], which is very good as you’ll often be able to meet the cost and recover from paying it. 

Leafeon has two attacks.  For [G] it can use Soothing Scent to hit for 30 points of damage plus inflicting Sleep on the Defending Pokémon.  This isn’t bad though it isn’t overly good.  For [GCC] it can use Magical Leaf to hit for 50, with a coin toss to hit for an additional 30 while healing 30 from Leafeon.  For the Energy going into the attack, there shouldn’t be a coin flip and I would still call it underpowered as the going rate tends to be 90 for three Energy and healing is pretty much a waste on a 90 HP Pokémon. 

Leafeon has to Evolve from an Eevee and XY: Furious Fists 80/111 was so promising we reviewed it separately here.  There’s also a quick overview of all the other Eeveelutions for reference as well.  This Eevee has an Ability that triggers when you attach a Basic Energy to itself from hand; you can search your deck for a card that Evolves from Eevee which is the same Type as the Basic Energy just attached and then you Evolve Eevee into that card.  You can even do this on the first turn Eevee is in play, even the very first turn of the game. 

The big thing to understand is that there is a better Leafeon to play than this card; BW: Plasma Freeze 11/116 a.k.a. Leafeon [Plasma].  You can read the reviews for it here.  Besides the ups and downs of being a Team Plasma Pokémon (mostly ups as the Team Plasma counters aren’t as popular now that they aren’t a dominant force in the format), the other differences are 10 more HP (so 100), Water Resistance and a Retreat Cost of two (which is noticeably worse as this is a smaller Pokémon).  For [C] this version can use Energy Crush to hit for 20 points of damage per Energy attached to all of your opponent’s Pokémon, which is fantastic.  Its second attack, Leaf Blade,  requires [GCC] just like Magical Leaf but it does 60 with an extra 20 on a coin flip… and as healing is so rarely going to be useful that doing 10 more damage before the coin toss might still make it a better attack: with a Silver Bangle Magical Leaf will OHKO a Seismitoad-EX (assuming you can get the Tool attached in the first place). Mostly though stick to Energy Crush.

Ratings 

Standard: 1.5/5 - The big attack really lets Leafeon down, squandering the opportunities provided to it through being an Eeveelution. 

Expanded: 1.75/5 - Technically it is a bit better here; Level Ball is available and there at least might be more Grass Weakness to exploit.  You can use Level Ball on it but mostly you’ll want it for Eevee. 

Limited: 3.25/5 - As is often the case, Limited makes poor card much better.  Eevee from this set makes it easy to search out and speed into play, and while you’ll need some Grass Energy (that is the Basic Energy card) to Evolve, it should be worth it unless you are able to build a deck around one of the good Pokémon-EX.  The HP isn’t much better here, but the damage output is effectively better and both the Sleep and healing effects can also prove more useful. 

Summary: Leafeon is clearly inferior to Leafeon [Plasma]; when we lose access to that version, it might become the preferred choice, but hopefully we’ll see something better released before that point in the next inevitable batch of Eeveelutions.


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