Is Sharpedo-EX Going to be Used in the Meta?

bbninjas

bbninjas

Ready or Not!
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The reveal of XY5 gave us a new Dark type EX - Sharpedo-EX.

Sharpedo EX - Darkness - HP170
Basic Pokemon

[D][C] Prowl After: Switch your opponent’s Active Pokemon with 1 of his or her Benched Pokemon. This attack does 30 damage to the new Active Pokemon.
[D][D][C] Jaggy Fang: 100 damage. Discard 1 Energy attached to this Pokemon. Then discard 1 Energy attached to your opponent’s Active Pokemon.

When a Pokemon-EX has been Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.

Weakness: Lightning (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 1

You've got a Mini-Lysandre and an Energy discarder.

Here is my discussion: Do you think Sharpedo-EX is going to see use in the meta? Would it be a worthwhile addition to Yveltal/Darkrai decks?
 
I'm not backing my own words this time, because when I first saw Yveltal-EX last year, I said "Oh, that looks like it'll be a nice one-of in Darkrai decks." Clearly i was wrong. That in mind, I don't think Sharpedo-EX has the same staying power as Yveltal. With Dark Patch gone, Jaggy Fang is going to take a while to power up, though perhaps it could have a nice role in Expanded due to that. Still, Enhanced Hammer can do the job more efficiently. Even Prowl After isn't that useful. Darkrai-EX's Night Spear can effectively do the same thing (30 damage on a benched Pokemon, though it doesn't drag it active), it also provides the invaluable service of free retreat, and while it has that same hefty attack cost, it can become a surprise attacker in Energy Switch heavy builds. Sharpedo's attacks are nice but expensive. Unlike Darkrai, it doesn't seem to have the all-around utility to make it worthwhile in my book, but we'll see once the set is released stateside.
 
I don't think Sharpedo-EX is going to be as big an impact as Yveltal-EX, but I do think that it does have it's good merits.

Jaggy Fang can get rid of continuous streams of Energy really quickly, but the problem I see against it that a lot of the newer decks all have some form of Energy acceleration/consistency.

Alpha Growthers, Blacksmith, Blastoise/Emboar, Landorus, Eelektross Engine, Aromatisse with Alpha Growth/Excadrill, Sceptile, Yveltal, you name it.

Still, I don't want to be too think skulled on cards that haven't released yet. There have been way too many cards that I either over-hype or neglect, and it's something that I still find myself doing today.
 
The first attack is real nice but the second can be a problem since it discards from both Pokémon. If the second attack would not discard from Sharpedo Ex too it would be real nice combined with Yveltal and Crawdaunt.
 
I can see Hammertime coming back in Expanded with this, hammers and Krookodile (Black Eyes).
It's a really fun deck ^.^ However it's nothing more than that...
 
You could combo this with Hydreigon PHF to take the sting out of discarding your own energy. Other than that, I see this as a pretty average card. It's usually better to KO the opposing Pokemon than discard an energy.
 
According to the translation it discards Special. I would see it not too bad against fairy decks that keep their energy, or to discard double colourless.
 
I'd rather be using Enhanced Hammer against Yveltal rather than Sharpedo IMHO...
 
Sharpedo EX discards any Energy.

Jaggy Fang: 100 damage. Discard 1 Energy attached to this Pokemon. Then discard 1 Energy attached to your opponent’s Active Pokemon.

That said, as an attacker, I think this card is very weak. Prowl After's effect isn't useful enough for how much Energy it costs. Lysandre and Night Spear are much better alternatives. Jaggy Fang is by no means bad, but Yveltal can get OHKOs with 3 Energy fairly easily, so I'd rather just use that. It even has the same weakness as Yveltal, but no Fighting resistance! How awful is that? That's really the nail in the coffin for me.

How, I think it might be alright in Energy discarding decks. With how many Energy a lot of the stuff in this set uses, being able to discard that many each turn might be a legitimate strategy. If you can spam Crushing Hammers, Crawdaunts, and Jaggy Fangs, you can deny a lot of decks of getting anything into play. Might have to test that one out at some point.
 
^

Yeah, terrible weakness and no resistance. The only reason it has L weakness is because of it's water typing, but shouldn't it have grass weakness instead?

Had the discard been optional or had the discard been from any of an opponents Pokemon (even on a coin flip), it could have been something. Discarding from the active just isn't that good on an attack that already 2HKOs everything.
 
This could potentially be disruptive to Night March - Double Colorless for days - but even then, Night March isn't exactly a 'meta' deck and this card's a pretty weak EX compared to the other ones we've gotten.
 
pokedan24 said:
You could combo this with Hydreigon PHF to take the sting out of discarding your own energy. Other than that, I see this as a pretty average card. It's usually better to KO the opposing Pokemon than discard an energy.
Click to expand...

I will probably do this with an online deck, as it will be pretty fun. But it's hard to see it being competitive.
 
My friend asking me if I had seen the scan for Sharpedo EX telling me how good it was. And then when he told me what it actually did, it was very underwhelming. I don't see it. Maybe it could be an option in Hydreigon builds (to make use of Prowl After more than anything) and you can manipulate your previous Energy attachments to power it up, but getting a heavy retreater out of the Active spot isn't a miraculous feat, and I feel like players would rather include Malamar, if anything, before they would include Sharpedo.
 
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