Cobalion vs Beartic

Whoever mentioned that you can only run four Special Metals...I have an idea. Steelix Prime. We could probably pair these two together, simply because Cobalion can eat up the Energy, faint, and Steelix could pick it back up and tank. Yes. The Weakness is a terrible issue. But this way we can use Cobalion, which is faster than Beartic, make use of Eviolite, while locking our opponent with Iron Break, and find a way to recycle those Metal Energy.

To work around our really bad Weakness, we could tech in...Beartic itself. All he needs is a Water Energy, and we could tech in DCE as well. Rainbow Energy completely eliminates the need for Water Energy, if you decide to put a damage counter on it.

I'm thinking:

4x Cobalion
2-2 Steelix Prime
3-3 Beartic

and whatever else you want. We're obviously gonna need 3x Pokemon Collector and such, but I think this looks kinda decent with what we have to work with.

Thoughts.
 
EspeonROX said:
Whoever mentioned that you can only run four Special Metals...I have an idea. Steelix Prime. We could probably pair these two together, simply because Cobalion can eat up the Energy, faint, and Steelix could pick it back up and tank. Yes. The Weakness is a terrible issue. But this way we can use Cobalion, which is faster than Beartic, make use of Eviolite, while locking our opponent with Iron Break, and find a way to recycle those Metal Energy.

To work around our really bad Weakness, we could tech in...Beartic itself. All he needs is a Water Energy, and we could tech in DCE as well. Rainbow Energy completely eliminates the need for Water Energy, if you decide to put a damage counter on it.

I'm thinking:

4x Cobalion
2-2 Steelix Prime
3-3 Beartic

and whatever else you want. We're obviously gonna need 3x Pokemon Collector and such, but I think this looks kinda decent with what we have to work with.

Thoughts.
Click to expand...

I'm thinking basic Water and Energy Exchangers over Rainbow. The energy exchangers help with the DCE and sp. Metals if needed.
The 10 from Rainbow puts Beartic into KO range with Reshiram allowing them an easy revenge kill.

The thought of Coballion+Steelix is nice though. You probably need to play Vileplume in there to prevent Switches though (Which will inevitably be in most decks to avoid stuff getting Catcher'd and stuck) so I don't know how clunky a Steelix and Vileplume is going to be.
It could work though.

I think Beartic is better as someone said earlier, damage output isn't that big of a deal since you are locking them in the active anyway. I do think Coballion has potential. If only there was something to rid it of it's weakness.
Beartic jsut has better survivability even if it would be slightly tougher to have a back up ready to go.
 
I'm not to sure, they both have their own strengths and weaknesses.

Cobalion does more damage, is a basic and can therefore use eviolite and can abuse special metal, but it also has less HP (it can therefore be OHKOed by zekrom), and has a bad weakness against fire.

Beartic has more HP (and survives zekrom unless it uses plus power), has a good weakness and can use double colorless, but is a stage 2 so it takes longer to set up in that matter.

i would say that Beartic is better but if Beartic would face another Beartic or a Cobalion it would have some problems since it has {C}{C}{C} retreat cost, when Cobalion only has two.

Beartic and Cobalion's biggest problem would probably be Yanmega prime, since it has seen a lot of hype and has zero retreat cost, so it just has to retreat, send out another pokemon that you probably have been setting up and KO it, or just send up cleffa and go for Eeeeeek and next turn bring up Yanmega to attack again.

But i would personally go for Beartic since it has a better weakness.
 
This is actually not a bad idea, I may need to make a list. The problem is it's weak to fire, and since it's gonna take some setting up you may not have time to get anything that can combat fire out.
 
Beartic > Cobalion. Why? It's not ohkod by Reshiram, and that is the ONLY reason. Both are overrated imo though, because once a pokemon's KOd you can bring up another and KO it back, or you can simply retreat, which is extremely easy in our format with all the Emboar, and Gatr roaming around. You also can Catcher to get out of the lock. It would be broken if they did no damage, and you couldn't attack or retreat.
 
Im hearing a lot about how Feraligatr can help Beartic attach. Here's my point.

Are you really gonna run Feraligatr with Catcher and ZPS in play?

Exactly. So please DO NOT CONSIDER THAT OPTION.

However, Cobalion lacks other Steel support pokemon to help it tank/setup or even as a side attacker. The best steel supporting Pokemon right now is Kinklang, and even I'm not sure how it' supposed to be good....
 
Well for starters with both Beartic and Catcher in the format fire will fall in play. look at it know 16 of the top decks at nationals had yanmega in it. I think all the winning decks had yanmega in it. It goes to show you that Emboar can do well against stage ones. Add in catcher then you will be really lucky to get him out. So may answers is Colbalion. The reason why he is a basic he has good hp he can use both special metal and evloite. To say that he doesn't have supporting steel pokemon. You can always run Skarmory. And for another attack you can go the power route with Scizor or the tank route wilth Steelix
 
I like the idea of using both Cobalion and Beartic. But like people have said, they won't do well against the rest of the format where it all seems to be about OHKOs. Zekrom, Reshiram, and Magnezone can all OHKO Cobalion, and with a pluspower Beartic too.

blaZofgold said:
Im hearing a lot about how Feraligatr can help Beartic attach. Here's my point.

Are you really gonna run Feraligatr with Catcher and ZPS in play?

Exactly. So please DO NOT CONSIDER THAT OPTION.

However, Cobalion lacks other Steel support pokemon to help it tank/setup or even as a side attacker. The best steel supporting Pokemon right now is Kinklang, and even I'm not sure how it' supposed to be good....
Click to expand...

Feraligatr is weak to grass.

But I get what you're saying, it's too much set up for a [W][C][C] attack.
 
I doubt any of them will see play. Just tech in 3-4 Switch and your good to go. There are too many ways to get out of this. Yanmega retreats and just hits again, or Catchers and snipes you. And a simple Zoroark tech laughs in the face of both of these guys. I think that the most these cards are going to be used for is a hopeful stalling, which won't work most of the time unless you are lucky to get a Vileplume out.

But for which one is better, Beartic wins out. Late game you are never going to power up a Cobalion with Catcher romping around. If they manage to kill the first Cobalion before Cobalion 2 is powered up, it game over. As where Beartic can get powered up within 2 turns, is has many more techs that can be utilized. Even though people say Feraligatr isn't usable, just set up 2 Totodile, because they can't kill both.
 
Cobalion and Beartic burn through your resources to get around them. If you have switches (which many people will due to catcher) they will use them up quickly, leaving them exposed to later game catchers or something. Also, if they use energy to retreat, they will quickly burn through their energy and have late-game droughts. I think Beartic and Cobalion will work really well together. However, I don't get what Steelix Prime adds, he can only attach 1 energy to himself and requires an attack to do so.
 
In my opinion Cobalion is the better of the two, mainly due to him being a basic, and the massive support he gets for being one. I personally think that Cobalion's biggest point isn't the weakness, but the damage output that hurts him. If I were facing a Cobalion deck, and I knew he'd lock me stuck, I'd either:

a) send something active which can wreck cobalion in one go (aka OHKO)
b) send something active with 80 or less HP, sacrifice a prize (and maybe even inflict a little damage in the process), and then take steps to achieve step a). Because it takes at least 3 turns to power up any Cobalion (in any given way, with the only exception being if you found a Cobalion/Emboar rogue or something), I am also given 3 turns to build up my bulk, so I usually should have something to KO the Cobalion in question, which isn't easily recovered.

Of course the other downside is it's weakness, but Sp Metal and Eviolite are the best boosts you're going to get against anything, and in perfect case scenario's you'd be reducing 60 damage, so unless you find an water type tech (not neccesairly Beartic) fire matches are an auto-loss, and you'll need to accept that.

But moving on to the good new though; Cobalion has some really big plusses in my opinion:

Being a basic means you can easily swarm your main attacker with no other means than collector and revive. As mentioned before, Eviolite is a good bonus as well. Not to mention this guy will maximal take up 4 spaces in your deck, leaving a TON of room for techs, or even otherwise, more room for an extra few copies of a main attacker (line) in the deck.

Bringing us to our next (already mentioned) bonus; Cobalion can (ab)use sp metal energy due to it's typing, meaning it has tanking options. add in the 120 HP, and we have a contender.

Having damage outputs varying between 20 and limitless amounts (depending on the amount of energy attached to your target), Cobalion provides multiple strategies; if the opponent decides to stall out by avoiding to attack, you can just press through by going on the offensive side yourself. Oh, did I already mention that while jamming their attacks you already go offensive? Jup, that's right; you're using two strategies at the same time. Just be sure that it doesn't backfire on you in the end, and time your choice of focus correctly.

Being so versitale, it can combo with nearly anything, meaning that after it goes down, the deck can flip from strategy entirely, depending on the techs and/or other attackers. Cobalion pairing with Jumpluff and/or Cinccinno will revert to a much more aggressive strategy, while pairings with Vileplume/Carracosta may become more defensive. On the other hand, if you've stalled long enough, why not finish the game up with a Durant invasion, milling at the opponent's already weakened deck (if they sacrificed prizes to counter you this will obviously not work, but if the oppoenent had trouble dodging to ''no attack'' penalty before working your Cobalion's out of the way the chances are pretty big they have little to no recovery left, meaning you could mill for the win anyways).

What it all comes down to, is that in my opinion Cobalion being a basic, plus his typing, outweighs Beartic's pro's simply by the flexibillity it offers. For as far as Ive seen Cobalion has only be discussed as a main attacker here, while it is surely a nice tech for decks that can handle the retreat as well.
 
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