aroramage |
Well now we've got the Venusaur-EX
do-over and his Mega Evolution to go over, so let's get
this one knocked out of the way.
Both of Venusaur-EX's attacks are
bulky amounts of expensive, with his leading attack in
Frog Hop being a 3-for-40 strike that has a 50/50 shot
at dealing 40 more damage, thus being a 3-for-80. It's
not bad in terms of damage but not that great either in
terms of attack. Compared to the original XY's Poison
Powder, which effectively was 3-for-60 and did more
damage based on how long that automatic Poisoned status
lasted on your opponent's Active Pokemon, Frog Hop
basically has lower damage in general. Not so great at
the start, but maybe that can change?
You bet it can! Poison Impact is a
4-for-80 hit that makes your opponent's Active fall
Asleep AND Poisons them. Effectively, it's a weaker
version of M Venusaur-EX (XY)'s Crisis Vine, dealing a
little less damage and substituting Paralysis with
Asleep. That being said, it's also a "more balanced"
version of that attack, since it doesn't force your
opponent into either Switching or just letting Poison
take its toll as Venusaur-EX bludgeons it for the KO.
And compared to Jungle Hammer, a 4-for-90 hit that heals
off 30, it's more offensive and ends up pushing forward
with a powerful attack.
So Venusaur-EX could be run in a
deck, but will it? I could understand actually pushing
through with this version in order to use Poison Impact.
Sleep may not be as powerful as Paralysis, but the
Poison is still there, and combined with other
damage-boosts from stuff like Muscle Band...which is
really all Grass types have, Venusaur-EX has potential
to force an opponent into dealing with its crazy
shenanigans.
...either that, or it'll take the
route of the XY version and fade away into obscurity.
Rating
Standard: 2.5/5 (Poison Impact's
great, but with little actual Grass acceleration, it
only goes so far)
Expanded: 3/5 (some of the Grass
support from Virizion-EX may prove to be Venusaur-EX's
saving grace here though)
Limited: 3.5/5 (never mind what you
could do with it and the original M Venusaur-EX)
Arora Notealus:
AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH...what? That's clearly what he's
saying!
Next Time:
AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH...MEGA EVOLUTION
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Otaku |
Is Venusaur-EX
(Generations 1/83) a second change for M
Venusaur-EX or even for Venusaur-EX itself?
I wouldn’t hold your breath. The good news is that
it is a Grass Type so it can tap cards like
Revitalizer and Forest of Giant Plants for
direct support, Vileplume (XY: Ancient Origins
3/98) as an example of indirect support, and Ariados
(XY: Ancient Origins 6/98) as support that is
somewhere in between (it can work with any Type but
specifically singles out performs better with Grass
Types). The Grass Type can hit many Water and some
Fighting Types for Weakness, with older Water Types
being more Type diverse and thus blunting this a bit in
Expanded. Still some notable examples include
Seismitoad-EX, Greninja (all versions),
Greninja BREAK, and Wailord-EX. There
are no Grass Resistant cards unless we go into the scary
wastes of Unlimited. There are not many cards that
penalize the other player for using Grass Types, though
one seems worth a brief mention: Bouffalant (XY:
Primal Clash 119/160) has a “Sap Sipper” Ability
that bumps the damage it does with attacks to Grass
Types by 40, and a decent “Derail” attack that for [CCC]
does 80 while discarding a Special Energy from the
opponent’s Active.
Being a Pokémon-EX
means giving up an extra Prize when KOed, an inability
to take advantage of certain card effects, and being the
target of some detrimental card effects. The only
positive thing guaranteed by it is that it means a card
is either a Basic or a Mega Evolution, so Venusaur-EX
gets to be a Basic instead of a Stage 2. Often a
Pokémon-EX has better attributes and/or effects than it
would otherwise have, but that is not always the case.
What seems like it is has always been the case (but I do
remember when it wasn’t): Being a Basic is the best!
One slot in your deck and one slot on the field equals
one Pokémon. There is no time waiting to Evolve or
dependency on another card for a Basic to hit the field.
It is the only Stage that can serve as your opening
Pokémon. Many card effects simply work better for
Basics due to these facts and while there are some
anti-Basic effects out there, the Stage also has a few
pieces of support. Venusaur-EX does bring the HP
as 180 is better than it would have enjoyed as a Stage
2. It isn’t more than is typically seen on Basic
Pokémon-EX, but at least it is the higher of the two
common scores and enough to often take a hit.
Nothing is safe from OHKOs though. Fire Weakness
is mostly a risk in Standard due to players still using
Entei (XY: Ancient Origins 15/98) decks
and Flareon-EX starting to pop up as well,
sometimes as a supporting attacker and sometimes as the
main. In Expanded there are a few other risks, but
mostly it just means Flareon (XY: Plasma
Freeze 12/116) scores the OHKO a little easier.
No Resistance so moving onto the Retreat Cost, it is a
massive [CCCC]: make sure to include cards to get it out
of the Active slot, to allow it to tank in the Active
slot, or both.
So what can this
Venusaur-EX do? For [GCC] it can use “Frog
Hop” for 40 damage and on a successful coin flip you get
an extra 40 damage. 80-for-three is decent, but a bit
low. 40-for-three is bad without an effect, but an
effect that just gives you a 50% chance of decent damage
is not what I mean. This is a very disappointing
attack, so onto the next. “Poison Impact” requires
[GGCC] and only does 80 damage, but it does afflict the
opponent’s Active with both Poison and Sleep. 80 damage
is quite low for four Energy and two Special Conditions
are not enough of a bonus to offset this. Poison
means an effective 90 damage most of the time and Sleep
can help protect you on the next turn but they
also have ways of being inflicted outside of attacks:
Ariados as mentioned earlier can Poison from the
Bench while Hypno (XY: BREAKpoint 51/122)
can put both Active Pokémon to Sleep in either format
while Hypnotoxic Laser can easily do the job in
Expanded (assuming you get the flip). This is not
a card worth running for its own sake, but then again we
all know it was meant as a lead-in for M Venusaur-EX.
So as a precursor
to M Venusaur-EX it competes directly with the
old Venusaur-EX (XY 1/146, 141/146; XY:
Black Star Promos XY28), which we looked at
here. It
is almost identical to today’s version, at least for the
bits relevant to the TCG. The only differences are
the attacks but not by much as they have the same Energy
costs while doing similar amounts of damage. The
[GCC] attack is “Poison Powder” and it does 60 damage
with guaranteed Poison while for [GGCC] it can use
“Jungle Hammer” to do 90 damage to the opponent’s Active
while healing 30 damage from itself. The damage
output is still poor and the effects are still
underwhelming. I think I prefer the reliable
damage of Poison Powder but again, supplying Poison
isn’t that hard right now. Jungle Hammer does more
damage than Poison Impact but not enough and healing as
part of an attack often does not help much. I
might favor the Sleep to just trying to avoid damage.
So while not by much, I think I prefer the older to
today’s. Unless M Venusaur-EX does
something that somehow combos with today’s Venusaur-EX,
you’re going to want to go with Venusaur-EX (XY
1/146, 141/146; XY: Black Star Promos XY28).
As I am going to
save that for tomorrow when we review M Venusaur-EX
(Generations 2/83), I am just going to tell you
that no, neither M Venusaur-EX does anything that
makes this Venusaur-EX better. You
shouldn’t bother with it in Expanded or Standard. Generations
has this odd release method so I don’t know if there
will be a chance to really use it in Limited play, but
if it happens then finally Venusaur-EX has a
place where it’s good. You might even risk running
it without any other Basics (ensuring you open with it)
as in the 40 card, four Prize Limited format it might be
able to take four KOs without being overwhelmed, but I
don’t know if I would risk it myself. Fortunately
the Energy costs are half Colorless which means mixing
it with multiple Types isn’t too bad.
Ratings
Standard:
1.25/5
Expanded:
1.25/5
Limited:
4.25/5
Summary:
Venusaur-EX is only really worth it in Limited
play and I’m not sure Generations even really
does that. Another reminder that this set was
really targeting nostalgic collectors more than players,
I suppose.
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