aroramage |
Genesect-EX makes his return into the TCG, this time
with a new shiny Metal coat! Is he as powerful as his
counterpart from Plasma Blast? And will he be able to
recreate the power of the VirGen deck in the new
Standard format?
Well, probably not. Never mind that
Genesect-EX didn't get anything like G
Booster this time around - that honor
goes to Zygarde-EX at the moment. This
version is just a bit more debatable.
First of all, the Ability it has is now
Drive Change, which once per turn lets
you return a Tool from Genesect-EX back
to your hand. Now last I checked, he
didn't have anything like a Spirit Link
for a M Genesect-EX (not that you could
use that anyway if there was), so I'm
not entirely sure what it would be.
Maybe a Float Stone that you used to get
him out? A Muscle Band you want to get
on someone else? I'm not sure, but I'm
sure there are some minor applications.
As it is, it's just not that relevant.
...at least, to me. Like I said, there
may be some Tool that works well with
that.
As for his attack, he gets Rapid
Blaster, which costs 3 Metal Energy and
does 100 damage. You can also discard
any Metal Energy you'd like from
Genesect-EX while making the attack, and
he'll add on an extra 20 damage for each
one. Including the 3 you use and, say, a
Muscle Band, you can OHKO most Pokemon-EX
in the game outside of Megas. So running
him with something like Bronzong (PHF)
will be pretty much necessary.
So the deck idea in mind is simple
enough: Bronzong are Benched, Genesect-EX
attacks, you use Muscle Band to add more
damage to Rapid Blaster, swap it for a
Float Stone, switch it out for some
other Pokemon, swap out the Stone for
the Band, switch it around again after
fueling it up with Bronzong, and then
Rapid Blaster again. Unfortunately, this
combination takes a bit of time, and if
the other Pokemon you're swapping out
isn't another Genesect-EX or a great
attacker in its own right, it's going to
come out slower more than anything.
He may not be Genesect-EX (PLB)
material, but he's still reasonably good
in his own right.
Rating
Standard: 2.5/5 (Rapid Blaster is the
most appealing thing about Genesect-EX
that I can see, apart from the 180 HP)
Expanded: 2/5 (but he needs good support
to make him work well, and that doesn't
really compare to what VirGen was)
Limited: 4/5 (still, he's got perks, so
he's not all bad)
Arora Notealus: It's really hard to
stand out on your own when you've
already gotten the EX treatment and your
first version was so good. Mewtwo-EX,
Darkrai-EX, and now Genesect-EX have all
been treated like this. At least with
stuff like Dialga-EX, the remake was
better than the original!
Weekend Thought: So what of this week's
cards? What caught your eye? Did
anything catch your eye? We've been
pretty ourselves working away on
different things, so it's no surprise
that we've taken it a little easy with
this one.
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Otaku |
Let’s see if we can
end the week with a bang as we cover Genesect-EX
(XY: Fates Collide 64/124, 120/124)! This
is a Metal Type and I want to make a glorious pun by
saying it is solid but as I mentioned
Monday
and
Tuesday
that might be a bit strong. In terms of exploiting
Weakness they can slam every Fairy Type released so far
and some of the Water Type for double damage, but unless
the latest metagame shifts change things you’ve only got
a scattered handful of high priority targets where that
will be significant bonus. Metal Resistance is
found on almost all XY-era Lightning Types so the saving
grace there is that Resistance is actually well
balanced, just causing you to do 20 less damage; it
matters, but in edge cases. Anti-Metal Type
effects are either nonexistent or easily missed because
I didn’t find any. Beneficial effects keyed in
specifically to the Metal Type are
·
Klinklang
(BW: Plasma Storm 90/135) - Klinklang
[Plasma] has the Ability “Plasma Steel” which protects
your Metal Type Pokémon from damage done by the attacks
of your opponent’s Pokémon-EX.
·
Reverse Valley
- Though one half adds 10 to the damage done by attacks
from Darkness Types, the other side reduces the damage
Metal Types take from attacks by 10.
·
Shield Energy
- The finicky successor to the Special Energy version of
Metal Energy, while attached it reduces the
damage that Metal Pokémon takes by 10. It cannot
even be attached to something that is not a Metal Type
but the protection does stack.
·
Steel Shelter
- This Stadium makes both players’ Metal Type Pokémon
immune to Special Conditions, and removes any Special
Conditions already present when it hits the field.
No Type specific
Supporter or Pokémon Tool or similar tricks found in
some of the other Types, but still some solid options
here. The real strength of the Metal Type are from
effects not restricted to them but which naturally favor
them. They have several solid, if not keen, attack
options or forms of Energy acceleration
·
Aegislash-EX
- Stall and attack
·
Bronzong
(XY: Phantom Forces 61/119; XY: Black Star
Promos XY21) - Energy acceleration from the discard
pile
·
Cobalion
(BW: Noble Victories 84/101, 100/101) - Solid
attack or Stall and attack, regular Pokémon
·
Cobalion-EX
- Discard Special Energy or pierce through protective
effects while attacking
·
Dialga-EX
(XY: Phantom Forces 62/119, 122/119) - Stall
while attacking or potential OHKO attack
·
Heatran
- Solid attack, potential OHKO attack, regular Pokémon
·
Klinklang
(Black & White 76/114) - Energy acceleration via
its “Shift Gear” Ability transferring Energy
·
Registeel
- Discard Special Energy via attack, regular Pokémon
·
Registeel-EX
- Spread attack, attack while reducing damage taken
I left out a few
that were more specialized and/or hadn’t seen as much
play (either now or ever). With all of this it
seems odd that the Metal Type doesn’t have a greater
presence. I indulged in the extreme detail because
most of these will get at least a passing reference
later in the review. So getting back Genesect-EX,
it is of course a Pokémon-EX. It has been almost a
month since we reviewed the fundamentals of being a
Pokémon-EX so as a reminder the only guarantees are
giving up an extra Prize when KO’d though the cardpool
already contains effects meant to counter Pokémon-EX,
plus supporting effects that exclude them. I think
it so far has always come with at least a small HP boost
(Jirachi-EX is all of 20 HP bigger than the
various regular Jirachi), but the notion that it
always means an awesome Ability, Ancient Trait, or
attack is mistaken; we’ve seen some real stinkers that
may hit hard or have a cool effect, but the cost just
has not been worth it. So with that in mind we’ll
look at the 180 HP; this is good but just the higher of
the two typical scores for Basic Pokémon-EX. It is
enough you ought to survive a hit most of the time, but
OHKOs aren’t going to be rare, just less common.
Fire Weakness is
typical of Metal Types and not as bad as it might seem.
It isn’t good, but the Fire Type isn’t riding too high
as an established top deck and any of the new decks
XY: Fates Collide inspired that were Fire seemed to
have already burned out. Flareon (BW: Plasma
Freeze 12/116) is still performing reasonably well
in Expanded and you might catch someone still running an
Entei (XY: Ancient Origins 15/98) deck,
but these actually are built to OHKO non-Weak 180 HP
Pokémon so Weakness doesn’t dramatically shift the
matchup. There is an outside chance (but still a
chance) that someone will surprise you by working in a
Flareon (XY: Ancient Origins 13/98) so
that some other Stage 1 will be able to hit you twice as
hard but take all of this and weigh it against the
threat of being Fighting or Darkness Weak and it puts it
into perspective. Genesect-EX does enjoy Psychic
Resistance, which can come in handy and a little more
often than some other forms thanks to the popularity of
Night March. Sometimes your opponent just won’t
quite manage the OHKO, but there is also when they could
have but don’t because they forgot about Resistance.
Then again Psychic Types often focus on more than
damage; Trevenant BREAK won’t care about
Resistance if it already was going to use its “Silent
Fear” attack. The Retreat Cost of [CC] is
functionally average; low enough you can pay it if you
must but high enough you’re better off reducing or
bypassing it entirely.
Genesect-EX
has the Ability “Drive Change”; once per turn you can
bounce a Pokémon Tool attached to itself to your hand.
We’ve seen similar and even better effects before, but
on stuff like Masquerain (BW: Plasma Blast
2/101) which is a Stage 1. Even if you’re not
running a Tool-centric deck like Tool Drop, many decks
have two or three different Pokémon Tools in them right
now because we’ve got so many great options. Once
more with the bullet points
·
Assault Vest
- Soak 40 damage if the attacker uses Special Energy
cards
·
Exp. Share
- Energy acceleration via salvaging basic Energy cards
·
Fighting Fury Belt
- +10 damage and +40 HP
·
Float Stone
- Zero out Retreat Cost
·
G Booster - Probable OHKO attack that pierces defenses
·
G Scope - Attack that hits a Benched target for 100
·
Hard Charm
- Soak 20 damage
·
Head Ringer
- Special, see below
·
Jamming Net
- Special, see below
·
Life Dew
- Give up one less Prize when KO’d
·
Muscle Band
- +20 damage
·
Rock Guard
- 6 damage counter placement
You won’t be
bouncing your own Head Ringer or Jamming Net
since Pokémon Tool F cards are attached to your
opponent’s Pokémon, but if an opponent attaches one to
your Genesect-EX you can use Drive Change to send
it to the owner’s discard pile as that is what happens
when a Pokémon Tool F card leaves the field for any
reason. Some of these are quite unlikely, but more
niche cards might get a shot because you can run one,
attach it when you need it, and if Genesect-EX
survives past that point you can then bounce it back to
hand and put in something more useful. Just
letting you deal with Pokémon Tool F cards is useful, so
being able to also tailor your assault seems fairly good
to me.
Genesect-EX
has one attack called “Rapid Blaster”. The printed
Energy requirement is [MMM] but the effect means often
enough you’ll want more than that attached to this
Pokémon; the attack does base damage of 100 but the
effect lets you discard as many [M] Energy from this
Pokémon as you like, then does 20 more damage for each
[M] Energy discarded. 100 damage is good enough to 2HKO
most things in the game (OHKO for smaller targets).
A single discard doesn’t change things much but two and
other buffs just barely brings the typical Basic
Pokémon-EX beatstick into OHKO range, and discarding
three means you just need a Fighting Fury Belt or
Muscle Band to do the deed. Four [M] Energy
means you don’t need the Tools while five means you do
but now to take out Mega Evolutions; you have to hit 8
to OHKO anything without protection (and without you
needing additional ways to boost damage)... unles it’s
like Wailord-EX with a Fighting Fury Belt
you can’t ditch, in which case you still need more.
So this isn’t too likely to be a OHKO anything card,
even with this Ability/attack combo, but a 2HKO attacker
that can adapt a bit better than most which can be a
reasonable OHKO attacker with the proper set up.
Before we get to
that, what about the other Genesect-EX?
Released as BW: Plasma Blast 11/101 and 97/101,
it is a Grass Type Basic Pokémon-EX with 170 HP, Fire
Weakness, no Resistance, Retreat Cost [C], the Ability
“Red Signal”, and the attack “Megalo Cannon”. It
is also a Team Plasma Pokémon, so we can just refer to
it as Genesect-EX [Plasma]. Red Signal acts
like a Lysandre except instead of your Supporter
for the turn you need to attach a Plasma Energy
card from hand to Genesect-EX [Plasma].
Megalo Cannon needs [GGC] and does 100 damage to the
opponent’s Active plus 20 more to one of his or her
Benched Pokémon (your choice). This is still a
good card and once it was great. We reviewed it as
the third best
card
of BW: Plasma Blast and again as
the seventh best
card of 2013. In hindsight I am pretty sure my review (missed one of
them) makes me look like an idiot, but I can’t pin down
anything specific; the whole thing is kind of a mess and
reminds me of even older CotDs. Fortunately as was
often the case Baby Mario got it right. There are
also two Ace Spec Pokémon Tools that work only for
Genesect-EX (either of them, since the printed names
are the same for the cards): G Booster and G
Scope. Both allow the equipped Genesect-EX
to use an attack named after the Pokémon Tool in
question, and both have a cost of [GGC]. G Booster
also requires a two Energy discard but it does 200
damage while ignoring effects on the Defending Pokémon.
G Scope just does 100 even if it can also hit Benched
Pokémon. I was hoping G Scope might be made
better by Drive Change but I was being pretty
unrealistic. Now if Shaymin-EX (XY:
Roaring Skies 77/108, 10/108) had 10 less HP it
might have been different. Out of these, G
Booster may matter to Genesect-EX, but I
don’t think Genesect-EX [Plasma] occupies a
similar enough place for the two to compete or
compliment each other.
For Standard play
the plan is to fill your bench with the above mentioned
Bronzong so that you can afford to constantly use
Rapid Blaster for big hits (at least if necessary).
Then select a good assortment of Pokémon Tools that will
let you tailor things to the situation. Probably
Assault Vest, Fighting Fury Belt, Float
Stone, and Muscle Band but maybe a Hard
Charm in addition to or instead of Assault Vest.
I think most attackers still use enough Special Energy
that Assault Vest is the way to go to deny some
key OHKOs and even 2HKOs. Fighting Fury Belt
will usually be better than both but I’ve seen just
enough exceptions that with Drive Change the variety
might once again be justified. Float Stone can
fake being a Switch often thanks to Drive Change while
Muscle Band is self-explanatory. However
this is my guess work and I’m seeing others that do
things much differently. What I can tell you is
that in the European National Championships, you’ll see
Bronzong/Genesect-EX decks pop up in the top eight and
even win one (Gawein W. in the Netherlands).
In Expanded I could
see Genesect-EX could try and do the same thing.
Not sure why it would be that much better or worse save
the larger card pool and general increased competition.
However if you want something a little kooky, how about
a klunky combo that is amazing when you get it all
working. Combine Bronzong, Klinklang,
and Klinklang [Plasma] which actually is nothing
new. You just won’t have room for a Bench full of
Bronzong like in a normal build but you gain both
protection from Pokémon-EX and the capacity to move
Energy around. Now include the Pokémon Tools I
mentioned for Standard, with possibly one addition: G
Booster. This deck is already so packed that
there isn’t as much room for a diverse array of
attackers. So either include some Rainbow
Energy or two Smeargle (XY: BREAKthrough
123/162) and a few basic Grass Energy cards.
Now by varying the Pokémon Tool, Genesect-EX can
handle several roles; stall against some decks with
Assault Vest, punch through protective effects with
G Booster, and deliver solid attacks with
everything else. Bronzong can let you use G
Booster turn after turn. Since you don’t need
everything all at once you might also want a Keldeo-EX
both to handle any oddball Fire decks and to combo with
Float Stone as usual (that means one less
Bronzong though). You also have the option of
just using a massive Rapid Blaster for a final big push.
In Limited, this is
a good card and if the contents listing for Evolution
packs didn’t show all three packing Fire Types I would
suggest you just run Genesect-EX solo. It
will take three turns before you can attack but from
there you can do 100 each turn with ease, likely taking
four Prizes. Even if a few of your targets are
bigger, any turn you don’t discard means another Energy
in reserve to discard for Rapid Blaster; so if you
attach one Metal Energy per turn as planned and
your opponent can’t mess it up for you, then by turn
seven you’ll be able to attack for the fourth time and
discard all your Energy to do 240 damage. Since
there is so much Fire, do not try this.
Build your deck around it since it isn’t something you
can splash in; it will need a mono or near mono Energy
Type deck.
Ratings
Standard:
3.7/5
Expanded:
3.6/5
Limited:
4.5/5
Summary:
When I first saw the new Genesect-EX I think I
was impressed. Then not impressed. Then kind
of impressed. The attack can hit some important
numbers, just not in a super easy fashion. The
deck will be Ability reliant, which can be a problem
since more than one deck right now shuts them down (and
in different ways!). The biggest problem for this
card is that it is way too easy to fixate on Genesect-EX
[Plasma] and how this is not the same card
despite some legitimate similarities in how you would
use them.
Genesect-EX
ranked 12th on my own personal Top 15 for XY: Fates
Collide, which gave it four voting points and
allowed it to take 21th place on the Pojo’s list.
It even only managed that through me putting my thumb on
the scale as it tied with a card that ranked lower but
showed up on two lists (one being my own). That
means this almost missed even the fringe of the Top 10
lists, which I think may have been an oversight on our
collective part.
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