Otaku |
Soaring into our second Card of the Day is Noctowl
BREAK. As a Colorless Pokémon it won’t be able
to exploit Weakness or have to worry about Resistance.
There are some anti-Colorless attacks but on Pokémon
that just don’t see successful competitive play (even
when a Colorless deck has been on top!). There are
also some pro-Colorless effects specific to the Type:
Altaria (XY: Roaring Skies 74/108; XY:
Black Star Promos XY46) cancels out their Weakness,
Aspertia City Gym grants them +20 HP, and
Winona to search out three of them at a time.
I go back and forth on whether to credit them for their
non-Type specific support; Winona can snag
Shaymin-EX (XY: Roaring Skies 77/108,
106/108) so I guess that is substantial, but then again
not all decks focused on a Colorless Pokémon run
Winona. Usually when I talk about this it is
because common Energy requirements and heavily played
pieces of support make something used frequently off
Type work better on Type. Keldeo-EX is probably
the best example; it is played off Type for its “Rush
In” Ability with its “Sacred Sword” attack still
sometimes being handy, but in a Water deck that
(presumably) furnish it more easily with large amounts
of [W] Energy it can be as or more important as a main
attacker. With all that being said, being a
Colorless Type isn’t bad, but it isn’t especially good.
Its best benefit comes from how they usually have
all Colorless Energy requirements and thus can fit off
Type with relative ease.
As a BREAK Evolution of a Stage 1, Noctowl BREAK
acts like a pseudo-Stage 2; roughly the same amount of
effort to hit the field, but unable to take advantage of
the various bits of Stage 2 support or have to worry
about the anti-Stage 2 cards. Generic Evolution
support or counters will still apply though, as would
any specific BREAK support or counters, but I don’t know
of any such effects. Noctowl BREAK has 130 HP,
which would be the low end for a Stage 2. The good
news is that it just barely gets to that point where I
guesstimate that it’s more likely to survive than be
OHKO’d. The bad news is that you’re investing a
lot to get to that point. Noctowl BREAK has
one attack on it, “Night Scan”, which costs [CCC] and
does 60+ damage. The “+” is your opponent reveals
his or her hand and the attack does 30 more damage for
each Trainer card you find there. Trainer, so
Items, Stadiums, or Supporters all add to the damage.
Weakness, Resistance, Retreat Cost, Abilities, and any
additional attacks will depend on the Noctowl
from which Noctowl BREAK Evolves. We’ll
also need a Hoothoot as well, so now we’ll look
at Hoothoot (BW: Plasma Freeze 91/116),
Hoothoot (XY: BREAKthrough 119/162),
Noctowl (BW: Plasma Freeze 92/116), and
Noctowl (XY: BREAKthrough 120/162). All
are Colorless Pokémon with Lightning Weakness, Fighting
Resistance, Retreat Cost [C], no Ancient Trait, and no
Ability. Which means Noctowl BREAK will
have Lightning Weakness (not the worst), Fighting
Resistance (handy but not huge), and a Retreat Cost of
[C] (good).
Both Hoothoot are 60 HP Basic Pokémon with just
one attack. BW: Plasma Freeze 91/116 can use
“Dual Draw” for [C] to make both players draw two cards.
Not a large enough amount to be useful for a depletion
deck, so giving each player the same amount of draw when
(as an attack) your opponent will be able to use the
freshly drawn cards first is not a good thing in
Expanded or Standard play, though still decent enough to
be worth using when you’re a bit desperate. XY:
BREAKthrough 119/162 can use “Proclaim the Night”
for [CC] and it’s just “Quaking Punch” from
Seismitoad-EX but without the damage.
That isn’t a bad thing as this can be useful at slowing
down your opponent, especially early game. Now for
Noctowl: both are Stage 1 Pokémon with 90 HP and
two attacks. BW: Plasma Freeze 92/116 has
“Powerful Vision” for [CC] and “Fly” for [CCC].
The former does 10 damage times the number of cards in
your opponent’s hand while the latter does 50 and
prevents all effects of attack (including damage)
done to “this Pokémon” during your opponent’s next turn
but is “tails fails”. Keeping up the
pattern, neither of these are great but they aren’t
worthless: Powerful Vision can get a solid hit if your
opponent lets his or her hand swell and Fly is great
when it works, but horrible when it whiffs.
XY: BREAKthrough
120/162 also has one [CC] attack (High Flight) and one
[CCC] attack (Speed Dive). The former has both
players reveal their hand and does 20 damage per Item
card in each while the latter does a vanilla 70 for
three. We looked at Noctowl (XY:
BREAKthrough 120/162)
earlier this year.
My advice for using it hasn’t changed but the prognosis
has: if you lock down Items with Vileplume (XY:
Ancient Origins 3/98) not only can you tap any Items
left in your own hand for extra damage, but your
opponent’s hand will likely keep filling with more and
more Items as well. High Flight just needs four
Items between the two of you to out perform Speed Dive.
You’ll need a lot more than that to rival an attacker
like Vespiquen (XY: Ancient Origins
10/98), but it is possible you could reach that level.
Speed Dive is decent as a filler attack; toss on a
Muscle Band and Noctowl can 2HKO the typical
big Basic Pokémon-EX, plus all Stage 2 Pokémon, nearly
all Stage 1, all regular Basic Pokémon, etc. excluding
those with some sort of HP buff or other protection.
The big concern is that your opponent will most likely
manage to use N or Professor Sycamore to
flush away his or her hand, replacing it with another
that probably won’t have as many Item cards in it.
You’ll see it coming though since you’re seeing your
opponent’s hand turn after turn, though your opponent
will have the same insight into your own immediate
plans.
This is where Noctowl BREAK comes in as it plumps
up the HP of our feathery attacker while giving it an
attack that is a better form of High Flight. Yes
you need another Energy to make it work, but now you
don’t worry about your own hand at all. That is
good; though you have more control over your own hand
than your opponent, their N shuffles away your
build up of Items as well as your opponent’s plus the
best draw power is N or Professor Sycamore
or Shaymin-EX and none of those plays well with
keeping a plump hand. You stop giving your
opponent a head’s up about your plans, you get base
damage of 60 (just 10 less than Speed Dive) and now if
your opponent has even one single Trainer card (Item,
Stadium or Supporter) you do 90. Okay, 90 isn’t
great but that whole 2HKO thing mentioned with a
Muscle Band backed Speed Dive applies. Two
Trainers means 120 and now we have a solid 2HKO attack
for everything but Wailord-EX and protected
Pokémon. Three more means 150 damage, but against
most decks that won’t be a big deal. Four Trainers
in hand will take a little time and/or luck, but if your
opponent can’t avoid it, that is 180 damage, taking out
a lot of the metagame in one shot.
The reason you’ll only be doing this for fun is because
Noctowl BREAK is an inferior choice to
Vespiquen. Probably some other Vileplume
dance partners as well. There is a sliver of hope
though; once Karen releases there might be a
small niche for a deck built around Noctowl and
Vileplume. If you are unaware Karen
released a little bit ago in Japan and is a Supporter
that shuffles all Pokémon from both player’s discard
piles into their (respective) decks. This hits
decks built around filling your discard pile with
Pokémon harder than Lysandre’s Trump Card; it
also returned the Trainers you needed to thin your deck
and refill your discard pile. Noctowl BREAK is
not legal for Limited play but if it was, it would be
alright. You’d likely never reach high damage
counters with Night Scan, or rather wouldn’t be able to
hold it for long, but this would force your opponent to
burn Trainers he or she would rather save in a format
where they are scarce, you would see the opponent’s hand
turn after turn, and 60-for-three damage on a 130 HP
pseudo-Stage 2 that can use any Energy Type is itself
good in Limited.
Ratings
Standard:
2.25/5
Expanded:
2.25/5
Limited:
N/A
Summary:
Noctowl BREAK isn’t going to be breaking into
tournament top cuts anytime soon, but indeed it may have
a chance in the future. For now enjoy it as a kind
of fun deck, though the speed at which Vileplume
locks down Items means I wouldn’t consider most decks
using it to be casual or fun. The Noctowl BREAK
Evolution line does it right, with a Hoothoot
that can be risked to shut down Items on the first turn
you attack, instead of having a big, beefy Basic like
Seismitoad-EX open or speed Vileplume into
play before your opponent even gets a turn via Forest
of Giant Plants.
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