Eelektrik (Dark Explorers)
Hello and welcome
to a new week on
Pojo’s CotD.
I hope all US readers enjoyed their 4th
July Holiday and aren’t suffering too
much from the
heatwave.
We kick things off
with a look at Eelektrik from the Dark
Explorers set. The last time the Eel
appeared on a card (Noble Victories), it
came complete with an amazing Ability
which laid the foundation for a new and
dominant archetype (Zekrom/Eelektrik).
Surely Lightning isn’t going to strike
twice? (Please excuse the pun).
Well, there’s no
Ability this time around, so what we are
left with is a 90 HP evolving Stage 1
with an inconvenient Retreat cost of two
and a Weakness which leaves him
vulnerable to
Terrakion and other Fighting
Pokémon. Eelektrik NVI had the same
stats of course, but was completely
redeemed by Dynamotor. This card will
have to rely on its attacks to make an
impression.
And, unfortunately,
they are pretty generic and weak.
Headbutt
will do 20 damage
for a single Energy of any Colour: not
terrible value, but not much of an
impact either. Shock Bolt does ramp the
damage output up to 80, but at a cost of
[L][L][C]
and the discard of all attached
Lightning Energy. The upshot of this is
that Eelektrik falls into the category
of ‘Stage 1s you only play in order to
evolve’, which in turn means that you
will
always choose the NVI Eelektrik
because it offers you everything that
this card does, plus the huge bonus of
Energy acceleration.
Outclassed to a
ridiculous extent by its predecessor,
you can safely put this wherever you
store your unplayable cards and forget
about it.
Rating
Modified: 1.25
(might as well not exist)
Limited: 1.75
(still wouldn’t play it unless I needed
a Lightning attacker for filler
purposes)
