So recently I've been looking through Shining Legends since we're getting it fairly soon. I know this is going to sound dumb but personally I think it'll be a better set than Crimson Invasion. A lot of the "Shinging Legaendaries" are actually pretty good for what they are, Zoroark GX may be the perfect consistency piece for some decks and Lightning gets good support since Elektross (that might be a bit extreme) and even gets its own "Baby Volcanion" which is something I wish every type had tbh.
While looking through the set I noticed a card I disregarded when I first saw it.
Incineroar – Fire – HP170
Stage 2 – Evolves from Torracat
[R][C] God Damn Punch: 50+ damage. If any of your Benched Pokemon have damage counters on them, this attack does 80 more damage.
[R][R][C] Flare Drive: 180 damage. Discard all [R] Energy attached to this Pokemon.
Weakness: Water (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 2
Now at first glance this is no better than horrible base set one right? But I started looking into it a bit more when I saw its HP. 170 for a stage 2 one prizer. It probably dosent sound like much but compared to other stage 2s it's bulkier than normal. Greninja, a stage 2, 1 prize attacker has 130 HP and only after evolving again does it reach 170. Along with its bulkiness its first attack (which most definitely get its name changed) can hit for 130 with easy set up. The second attack hits for 180 which can be really good but the fact that it all gets discarded makes it more of a clutch game ender or a last ditch effort when you're on los HP.
So I've explained why the card itself is good (to me atleast) but now for the real question, "Why would you ever make a deck around this?!?".
Now, if this card came out in late XY where we had decks that were packed to the gills with Shaymins and low costing EXs I would never see this card being good. But take a look at how decks are being build right now, decks that are topping tournaments, they're actually using stage 2s! *gasp*. But in all seriousness, most decks right now seem to be built around getting a Brigette off turn one and consistently finding candy and other cards to get build your board up. Incineroar being able the I hit 120 for 2 energy isn't the fastest thing in the format but it's far from the slowest. If Bremen showed us anything it's that Golisopod shouldn't be underestimated, from the matches I saw a lot of people brought metagross in fear of Garde and while it most likely made that matchup easier than others many of the lists weren't prepared for Golisopod and its deadlier partner Garbotoxin. The meta's current state (which is always changing) a non-ability dependent fire deck could be what the meta needs.
This card isn't out yet of course so I guess only time will tell if it will either see play or just collect dust in a trade binder. These are just my opinions but I'm really hoping for some of yours. Let me know what you think, does this actually have some potential to it or is it just like a slightly above average theme deck Pokemon , let me know
While looking through the set I noticed a card I disregarded when I first saw it.
Incineroar – Fire – HP170
Stage 2 – Evolves from Torracat
[R][C] God Damn Punch: 50+ damage. If any of your Benched Pokemon have damage counters on them, this attack does 80 more damage.
[R][R][C] Flare Drive: 180 damage. Discard all [R] Energy attached to this Pokemon.
Weakness: Water (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 2
Now at first glance this is no better than horrible base set one right? But I started looking into it a bit more when I saw its HP. 170 for a stage 2 one prizer. It probably dosent sound like much but compared to other stage 2s it's bulkier than normal. Greninja, a stage 2, 1 prize attacker has 130 HP and only after evolving again does it reach 170. Along with its bulkiness its first attack (which most definitely get its name changed) can hit for 130 with easy set up. The second attack hits for 180 which can be really good but the fact that it all gets discarded makes it more of a clutch game ender or a last ditch effort when you're on los HP.
So I've explained why the card itself is good (to me atleast) but now for the real question, "Why would you ever make a deck around this?!?".
Now, if this card came out in late XY where we had decks that were packed to the gills with Shaymins and low costing EXs I would never see this card being good. But take a look at how decks are being build right now, decks that are topping tournaments, they're actually using stage 2s! *gasp*. But in all seriousness, most decks right now seem to be built around getting a Brigette off turn one and consistently finding candy and other cards to get build your board up. Incineroar being able the I hit 120 for 2 energy isn't the fastest thing in the format but it's far from the slowest. If Bremen showed us anything it's that Golisopod shouldn't be underestimated, from the matches I saw a lot of people brought metagross in fear of Garde and while it most likely made that matchup easier than others many of the lists weren't prepared for Golisopod and its deadlier partner Garbotoxin. The meta's current state (which is always changing) a non-ability dependent fire deck could be what the meta needs.
This card isn't out yet of course so I guess only time will tell if it will either see play or just collect dust in a trade binder. These are just my opinions but I'm really hoping for some of yours. Let me know what you think, does this actually have some potential to it or is it just like a slightly above average theme deck Pokemon , let me know