Baby Mario
Top 4 UK Nats |
Garchomp
Ever since it’s first appearance in Diamond and Pearl,
Garchomp has proved to be a bit of a fan-favourite
Pokémon. In the TCG, it has enjoyed some popularity,
especially after the release of the powerful LV X. The
problem that it faced was that the Stage 2 forms were
always a bit lacking. Garchomp MT only had one attack,
and that cost three Energy. True, it could do 110 damage
with its PokeBody, but once Dialga G LV X was released,
and Power Spray killed any hopes of powering it up with
Togekiss, it became totally uncompetitive.. The POP 9
Garchomp had one very risky and one heavily costed
attack, and so far that has seen little to no
competitive play.
So, could Garchomp SV mean the return of the Garchomp
deck? Well, it certainly has quite a lot going for it,
including some quite impressive stats: 130 HP and free
retreat stand out here. The Colourless weakness is not
so bad, though Ditto and Ninetales MT will cause
problems if played with Lake Boundary or Lucario GL. A
match up with Flygon could get interesting too. The fact
that it requires only Colourless Energy makes it very
flexible when it comes to pairing other Pokémon with it.
Garchomp’s Dragon Intimidation PokeBody has a rather
nice effect. If an active Garchomp is damaged, you get
to return an Energy card attached to the defending
Pokémon and return it to the opponent’s hand. This
effectively sets them back a turn on their Energy drop
and can compensate for the fact that Garchomp itself is
not the fastest attacker in the game (VERY unlike the
video games). The Body has some synergy with Garchomp’s
first attack, Guard Claw. This does a semi-decent 40 for
[C][C] and reduces any damage Garchomp takes by 20 on
the opponent’s next turn. This means that your opponent
is faced with the option of losing an Energy in order to
deal less damage. This, combined with its high HP gives
Garchomp a degree of survivability.
The main attraction of the card is its second attack,
Speed Impact. For [C][C][C] it does an impressive 120
damage, reduced by 20 for every Energy attached to the
defending Pokémon. Obviously, this is designed to work
together with Garchomp’s PokeBody. At the moment, the
dominant decks tend to use either Pokémon with very
little Energy attached (Beedrill, Kingdra, Gyarados), or
use Energy Gain in place of an Energy attachment (SP
decks). This means that Garchomp will often be hitting
for a very good 100 or a reasonable 80 damage.
Garchomp SV is certainly the best Garchomp we have at
the moment. It has some useful and powerful attacks.
Unfortunately the option is there for people to play
around its big attack by simply attaching more Energy.
Although this will slow them down somewhat, Garchomp
itself is not quite quick enough to always take
advantage. If Super Energy Removal was still in the
format, then it would be a great rogue deck. As it
stands, I think Garchomp is a very borderline card. It
will take a very good list and a skilful player to make
it into a contender, but the potential is there.
Rating
Modified: 3.25 (an interesting card which is worth
testing)
Limited: 3.75 (if you pull the whole line, big
Colourless attacks are great)
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