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Pojo's Pokemon Card of the Day

 

Feraligatr #20/123

HeartGold & SoulSilver

Date Reviewed: 04.06.10

Ratings & Reviews Summary

Modified: 3.00
Limited: 4.50

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

kentucky
fried
torchic

Today we're going to be reviewing one of the Johto starters from the HeartGold&SoulSilver set, Feraligatr. Not the Prime mind you, but let's see if this one can make a dent in the organized play.

To start off, Feraligatr has 130 HP, the average amount for a Stage Two Pokemon, ensuring that Feraligatr can survive a hit or two. His weakness is a whopping x2 to Grass, although the most common Grass decks I can think of are Leaftile, Tangrowth, or Scizor. Most of these decks are quite rare right now, so you generally don't have to worry about being one-shotted to often. At least it's not a x2 to Lightning after all. No resistance is to be expected, as Water Pokemon usually don't have any unless they have multiple types in the video games which Feraligatr does not. Finally, our card has a retreat cost of two, which can easily be remedied with a Flygon, or an evolved Mysterious Treasures Mantine.

Feraligatr's first attack is Spinning Tail, a name that should sound very familiar to anyone who's seen the Stormfront Tyranitar. It does the same effect, 20 damage to each of your opponent's Pokemon, but instead of costing five Darkness Energies, it costs one Water and two Colorless, meaning you can charge it up quickly with a Feraligatr Prime or a Double Colorless Energy. Nidoqueen cancels out the damage over the course of a round, but besdies that this is a nice attack, and one that goes very well with Feraligatr Prime's attack.

Feraligatr's second attack is Surf, which does a simple 80 damage for two Water and two Colorless Energy. Once again, this a good card to use Double Colorless energy with, and Surf can be a good finishing attack after a couple of round of Spinning Tail. An effect would've been nice, but with all of the energy acceleration this Pokemon can get, Surf is fine the way it is.

Overalll, Feraligatr makes a nice counterpart to its Prime form, giving you more options when evolving your Totodile or Croconaw. You might not see it run too much yet, but after rotation, decks based around the Johto starters are likely to gain popularity. The main downside is the energy intensive attacks, but there are plenty of ways around that.

Modified 3/5
This card is good, but just not good enough in this format. Feraligatr Prime lacks a good Pokemon to support, but come future sets, the Feraligatr line might see a lot more play. When that happens, you can expect to see Feraligatr teched in as a backup attacker.

Limited 4.5/5
If you pull the Feraligatr line, use it. Spinning Tail is excellent with the limited healing in HGSS, and Surf can wipe out a huge part of the set in one hit. Even if you don't pull DCE or Feraligatr Prime, the lack of sniping in the set means you can charge your Feraligatr on the bench, generally worry free. Just watch out for Meganiums.

~kentuckyfriedtorchic

Otaku

Today we look at the other Feraligatr from HeartGold & SoulSilver.  Like most Feraligatr, this is a Stage 2 Water Pokémon, allowing it to tap the more prominent Prime version for support.  It has a solid 130 HP that will allow it to take a big hit and survive from all but Grass Pokémon (to which it suffers x2 Weakness), and multiple lesser blows.  The lack of Resistance is frustrating as always, but at least it has a relatively average (in terms of performance) two Energy Retreat Cost: you’ll rarely want to discard that to retreat, but you can in a pinch.

 

This card has two attacks, both of which need Water Energy.  The first is Spinning Tail, and attack I’ve always liked but found frustrating to execute when I first saw it.  Pokémon tends to be a fast game and while 20 damage to all of your opponent’s Pokémon is good, it isn’t “great”.  At least the cost of (WCC) is easy enough to meet: either a Double Colorless Energy or Feraligatr Prime will make it fairly painless.  If you can get this up and running your second turn, it could get off two or three Spinning Tail… enough to seriously hurt your opponent in the long run.  The catch is you’ll need an opponent who already benched several Pokémon for that to work.  If they didn’t, it may be hard to finish what you’ve started and while it’s a strong position, it the short run your opponent might trash enough of your own Pokémon that you can’t follow through.  The second attack is pretty vanilla: for (WWCC) you’ll hit for 80.  This is adequate damage for the Energy required and Stage of the Pokémon: not especially good when slugging it out against another heavy, but capable of OHKOing a lot of Stage 1 and lower Pokémon, or finishing off an injured larger Pokémon.

 

I can really see this being run alongside Feraligatr Prime if you find you can set up one-of-each quickly and reliably.  If you can have them both out by your second turn, you can soften up an opponent for Feraligatr Prime to finish off.  I’d very much like to test this in my proposed Blissey Prime/Feraligatr Prime deck, since that might extend its life long enough for Spinning Tail to score multiple KOs, but it’s a bit of a stretch.

 

When playing this in Limited, it can really shine: it may set up a hair slow but so does everything else.  Players are more apt to have a bench full of smaller Pokémon as well, and combined with only four Prizes to start, you might find yourself winning by taking all your Prizes in one turn.

 

Ratings

 

Modified: 3.25/5

 

Limited: 4/5


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