Okay,
confession time-I wasted my time this weekend (got new game
and was breaking it in, plus had homework and the normal
stuff). Long story short, this should be shorter than
normal. Most of the feedback I have gotten has indicated I
should try to tighten my reviews anyway, so here goes…
Name:
Shedinja
Set/Card#:
Dragon, #11/97
Type:
Grass
Stage:
1 (evolves from Nincada)
HP:
30
Weakness:
None
Resistance:
Resistance
Retreat:
C
Poké-Body:
Wonder Guard
Prevent all
effects of attacks, including damage, done to Shedinja by your
opponent’s Evolved Pokémon and Pokémon-ex.
Attack:
(C) Damage Curse
Put 1
damage counter, plus 1 more damage counter for each damage
counter on Shedinja, on the Defending Pokémon.
Name:
Ninjask
Set/Card#:
Dragon, #18/97
Type:
Grass
Stage:
1 (evolves from Nincada)
HP:
70
Weakness:
Fire
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
None
Poké-Power:
Loose Shell
Once during
your turn, when you play Ninjask from your hand to evolve 1 of
your Pokémon, you may search your deck for Shedinja and put it
onto your Bench. Treat the new Benched Pokémon as a Basic
Pokémon. Shuffle your deck afterward.
Attack:
(CC) Quick Touch [30]
You may
switch Ninjask with 1 of your Benched Pokémon. If you do,
you may move any number of (G) Energy cards attached to
Ninjask to the new Active Pokémon.
Name:
Nincada
Set/Card#:
Dragon, #67/97
Type:
Grass
Stage:
Basic
HP:
50
Weakness:
Fire
Resistance:
None
Retreat:
(C)
Attack#1:
(C) Bite [10]
Attack#2:
(GC) Double Scratch [20x]
Flip 2
coins. This attack does 20 damage times the number of
heads.
Attributes:
There is only one Shedinja. However, it evolves from the same
Basic as another Pokémon. Fortunately that other Pokémon,
Ninjask, possesses a Poké-Power that lets you search your deck
for a Shedinja and put it into play as a Basic Pokémon when
you evolve a Pokémon into Shedinja. There is another version
of Ninjask, but you want the one with the Poké-Power that I
listed above. There are three Nincada-again listed above is
my choice-decent attacks and solid HP. The others either were
low on HP or had less useful attacks in my opinion. Back to
Shedinja-as stated, it’s a Stage 1, so it has to be better
than a normal basic to compete. Its HP is less than
inspiring-30, the lowest you’ll see on any real Pokémon.
That’s one strike against it. Its weakness, unlike the others
in its family, is none. This is as good as it gets… to bad
Resistance is also non-existent-they kinda balance out. Last
for attributes is retreat: just one. Second best retreat in
the game. Easy to pay, though it can still come back to haunt
you at times.
Abilities:
Here’s the meat of this card-it’s Poké-Body. Wonder Guard
makes this card nearly impossible to hurt… or rather it would
if most people didn’t run Sandstorm Wobbuffet in their decks.
Still, it’s a very strong ability. Damage Curse would be fine
on a Pokémon with more HP, but here it’s too weak.
Uses/Combinations:
I have heard of two decks to use Shedinja somewhat
effectively. First one is complicated-run it with Victreebel
for a chance at luring up a non-basic or Pokémon-ex, have an
Expedition Gengar ready and attack with it’s attack which does
40 then benches Gengar, and finally bring up Shedinja to
block. Retreat Shedinja next turn if needed, or start pecking
away with Shedinja. Repeat until victory or one of the needed
Pokémon is gone. I would add Mirage Stadium to the combo,
since Low Pressure’s 10 HP won’t do much for Shedinja-while
possibly halving the number of Basics that can OHKO it, its
usually going to be tackled by Ffet, who will still OHKO it.
With Mirage, if you lure up something with a high retreat
cost, they will have to deal with flip and payment, and even
cheap retreaters will have trouble. An idea I think has more
merit is losing the Victreebel and adding High Pressure System
plus Expedition Magby and/or some of the Fossils. This gives
you options against basics.
Ratings
Unlimited:
1/5-No. Yeah, my Mulligan Mewtwo ex deck hates it, but that’s
about it… and in this format, that deck has Goop Gas to handle
problem Pokémon Powers.
Modified:
3/5-Might be good for fleshing out Gengar Porter decks. Other
than that, it seems like it could have something, but I am not
seeing it.
Limited:
3/5-This was a tough call-on one hand, most of us rush to
evolve in this format… but then again, it’s hard to do so
here. Then again, you probably won’t run a lot of them here,
so one could be a nice, nasty surprise.
2-on-2/TMP:
2/5-It is much harder to avoid active basics here.
Summary
One of those
cards with an interesting and strong effect that TPC
“over-compensated” for by making the rest of the card pretty
poor. Still, it’s worth some experimentation time.
-Otaku (nintendotaku@hotmail.com)
