The Tall Grass explores a couple of possibilities for Pokemon in the upcoming generation!

Jowy visits the mother of all Pokémon stores and leaves broke.

My next stop will be Akihabara, also known as Electric Town, which is suppose to be the anime capital of the world! There will be a ton of Pokémon stuff there.  Stay tuned!

SALAMENCE

Now, anybody who follows the Pokémon metagame knows that Salamence is, or used to be, one of the biggest powerhouses available. A Dragon-Flying type with a base attack stat of 135 and other stats close to 100, as well as access to a large variety of move options. Salamence at its peak placed itself as the #2 most used Pokémon at over 20% usage rate– that is, about one in four battles you could expect to find Salamence. But recently, as most people know, Salamence was voted into the über tier– that is, banned in standard play. Such a decision initially caused a lot of controversy, but most people were able to accept its new place: with all of those overpowered legendary Pokémon that we’ve all beat the elite four with plenty of times.

But let’s skip back a while to when Salamence was allowed in standard play. Salamence had access to two powerful moves that primarily made it the beast as we know it: Dragon Dance (a move that increases attack and speed simultaneously), and Ourtage (a 120-power Dragon-Type move that lasts 2-3 turns). Your average Salamence would carry these two attacks, in addition to any combination of Earthquake, Dragon Claw, Roost, and the occasional Draco Meteor. So at first sight it may seem that any Pokémon with a really high defense stat would be able to handle this beast. So what makes Salamence such a menace?

In addition to a monstrous attack stat, Salamence also carries a base 110 Special Attack. So when you may expect to be hit with a few powerful physical attacks, you may get the opposite: a 150-power Special move that your Pokémon may not be prepared for. Or you may find one that’s taking advantage of its not-so-shabby defenses, which takes longer to KO than you may have expected, while attacking with power that still cannot be laughed at. With such overall power and versatility, Salamence is not only difficult to predict at first, but powerful enough to KO two or three of your Pokémon before you can properly deal with it. So it’s no question why some believed it should be paired with everybody’s favourite über legendaries.

But Salamence’s fate was recently decided– it will find its new place with all other über legendaries, as had been the fate of the oh-so-powerful dragon Garchomp. Everybody’s reaction to such a change in the metagame will obviously be different– for some it may be an opportunity to test out über-play, and for others it will be a chance to create new strategies that will fit nicely with the new metagame. But for everybody, it should be an opportunity to try something new in the competitive scene.

This guy would totally love to be your BFF.

The name of the deck actually derives from its three main Pokemon: Blastoise, Feraligatr Prime, and Floatzel GL Lv. X. Feraligatr Prime keeps popping up in my reviews like a bad penny, but this is really the best use for him so I won’t abuse him any more, OK? Anyway, the point is to set up all three of these guys as fast as possible using cards like Broken Time Space and Interviewer’s Questions. Then, with Rain Dance, you’ll be firing off 100 damage to whatever the heck you want until Blastoise dies. BUT THAT’S NOT ALL! With this limited time offer, Floatzel GL’s Water Rescue puts everything that is discarded when Blastoise dies right back in your hand, so by the next turn you’re still doing 100s like hamsters run on wheels!

This deck isn’t uncounterable, obviously. It takes a little while to set up, and even then Luxray GL just stomps all over you with an OHKO of Floatzel with Bright Look, and anything that sends you to the Lost Zone upon a KO pretty much ruins your mood. But overall this is a pretty chill deck.

By: HunterX

Pokedex Entry: Its feathers are in seven different colors. It is said that any person who seeing it is promised eternal happiness
Level caught: HeartGold: LV 40
SoulSilver: Lv 70
Moves know when caught: Sacred Fire, Fire Blast, Sunny Day and Extrasensory.
Location: Bell Tower

This Pokemon is mostly a Tank. With its dual type setup of Flying/Fire, it has the power to use both special and physical attacks. Its main attack, Sacred Fire has a base of 100 attack power with 95 accuracy. Its main weaknesses are Rock (x4), Electric (x2) and Water (x2). Overall, for an Uber tier Pokemon, it is fairly balanced.

Suggested Move Set Up:
Sacred Bird
Sacred Fire
Earthquake
Brave Bird
Punishment
Item used: Choice Band
Ev Spread: 4HP/252 ATK/ 252 Speed
Nature: Adamant or Jolly
Reason for this set up:
Sacred fire is an amazing fire type move and it is best used with the sun up. It has a 50% burn so it is extremely hard to switch into, as no one wants to take a burn. Brave Bird is an amazing STAB move because of its high power, athough the recoil might not let you use it to often. Earthquake is a move to use in conjunction with Sacred Fire (it provides coverage for Ho-Oh). Punishment is there for the Calm mind users like Mewtwo, Latios and Latias. You can have Adamant or Jolly nature so pick your poison.

Anime Appearances
Episode 1: Pokemon, I Choose You
Episode 2: The Pokemon Emergency
Episode 229: For Ho-Oh the Bell Tolls
Episode 275: Gotta Catch Ya Later
Jirachi-Wish Maker
Lucario and the Mystery of Mew
Episode 454: Battling the Enemy
Episode 474: Dawn of a New Era!
Giratina and the Sky Warrior
Arceus and the Jewel of Life

Random Trivia bits
Ho-Oh is one of the 8 Pokemon that have non alphabetical characters in their names. The others are Porygon-Z, Porygon2, Nidoran( Male and Female), Farfetch’d, Mr. Mime, and Mime.Jr

Ho-Oh’s name is a palindrome, much like the English names for Eevee and Girafarig

Ho-Oh’s Pokémon Pearl/Diamond/Platinum Sprite is shown as a slight orange. This was corrected in Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver.

Firstly, the stats are overall pretty lame for this card, seeing as it’s a prime. I would have expected more than 110 HP on a Lanturn seeing how bulky it is ingame, but the cards haven’t always been known for faithful reproductions (See Kingdra Prime’s weakness). Also, its retreat cost is two, and it has a weakness to Fighting, which is compounded by the fact that most fighting types resist Electric types. But that is all glossed over by its simply beautiful Poke-Power. Not only does letting it change types laugh in the face of resistances (especially at ground types), but it also lets it combine with Feraligatr for a truly powerful card.

I already reviewed Gatr Prime, so I refuse to link you lazy bums,  but if you combine the type swap with Rain Dance (assuming you have lots of energies in your hand), you should be able to pull off a devastatingly Powerful Spark. (I made a pun, sue me.) This sweep can basically not be stopped except by a fully powered benched Pokemon because again, his glorious PokePower prevents a resistance.

Here’s my rundown of the card:

Art: 9.5. I love the artwork for the Primes if I haven’t already said so, and this is no exception. The lightning is a little misplaced for an Angler fish, but still, it’s just so incredibly BA.

Playability: 7. The card in itself is very easy to set up. The only real problem is that you need to have a Feraligatr Prime on your bench, but it shouldn’t be that hard to get out with all those newfangled Spiritombs and such.

Usefulness: 9. This card can easily sweep if given a setup. Almost nothing without bench value will ever be given a 10 because they simply die too easily, but this comes close. The only thing stopping it from reaching the perfect mark is that Feraligatr has better things to do than pal around with this guy.

Overall: 10. This is probably one of the best cards in the set. The artwork is great, it’s good at attacking, it doesn’t take too long to set up, it’s LANTURN for Pete’s sakes. Did I mention it has a great PokePower?

This card seems a little hard to run in a deck judging by the fact that it has a 2x weakness to water, a retreat cost of two, and worst of all, discards at least two cards whenever it attacks. And as of now, it is hard to run. The only things that slightly make this work are Porygon-Z Lv. X if you use Hard Crush or Heatran Lv. X if you use Mantle Bazooka. However, I can feel the anticipation in this card for when the next set, Lost Link, rolls around in August.

Combining this Pokémon with the Research Documents (Trainer card) lets you choose exactly what it will discard. Then, with cards such as Mew Prime and Lucario, you can deal massive amounts of damage. (Link to entire set here: http://pokebeach.com/tcg/lost-link)

Here’s how I would rate this card:

Art: 7. I have to admit, I’m not feeling the art for this card. It doesn’t look like much detail was bothered to be put into it, and it makes a Pokémon I always thought was really BA look stupid.

Playability: 7. It’s only stage two, but you still need a backup, be it PoryZ, Heatran, or Research Documents to use him properly. Overall, not that easy to use.

Usefulness: 7. Even if you can use this guy, he sorta just sets up and then dies. It’d be better if he had a drawing attack or at least did some decent damage without giving himself whiplash.

Overall: 7. Just a meh card. The artwork isn’t great, it’s not rare or collectible, and it isn’t a great card to use in decks. It’s not horrible in any category either. It’s the card you have to check back halfway through my review to remember what I was talking about, and even if you did want to use it, it’s worthless until safely after the World Championships.

Tune in next week for my review of a mystery card from Unleashed! Speculation welcome!

There are some Pokemon that just don’t make sense. Each day we see more and more backwards-legged dog-people and giant gas-spewing air mines. Usually, there’s some explanation for why these things make absolutely no sense. Usually this explanation is “We said so; shut up.” But, occasionally, there are some that make such a little amount of sense that not even “we said so” would work.

Here’s five of them.

#5: Voltorb

Voltorb is one of those weird Pokemon from the good ol’ days. If you are one the zero people who looked at a Poke Ball and thought ‘I want that thing to be ALIVE’ then Voltorb is your dream. Your dream that steals electricity, zaps people on touch, rolls to move, and explodes whenever it moves on uneven ground.

If you couldn’t tell from that picture, Voltorb isn’t completely round. If it goes forward at all, it rolls on its uneven self and explodes. Of course, it can just roll on its side. Sure. But how far can it go without hitting anything even slightly uneven?

#4. Delibird

Delibird is the ‘Awesome Best Friend’ Pokemon. It carries around food with it all day and gives it away (using the ‘attack’ Present, of course) to any travelers it sees! How nice is that? Even if it’s attacked, it gives them food! And like most birds, at the end of the day it shares this food with its chicks! It’s such a giver!

Hey, anybody notice that Present usually results in an explosion?

Yeah, that’s right. This benevolent birdy gives bombs to everything it sees! People walk up to it, expecting a present, and boom! People die. And nobody ever knows, because they either blow up or get food, giving them the idea that Delibird is a pretty cool guy!

“But Shiny,” you may be shouting, “just because it’s evil doesn’t mean it shouldn’t exist, unless you mean morally which makes this an opinionated article which means it sucks.” But, dear reader, consider this!

It gives the same presents to its kids.

As stated before, Delibird carries food around all day so it can give it to its chicks. As also stated before, this food is the attack ‘Present’. So, not only does Delibird carry around food that explodes, but it carries these bombs to feed it to its kids. A species won’t last long if the adults are blowing up their children eighty percent of the time.

#3. Beedrill

Beedrill is basically a giant bee. Its arms and legs are far too thin to support its weight, but, hey, it’s got wings, so it can fly around, right?

Sure, it can fly, but that doesn’t explain the arms.

You see, Beedrill has giant drill things for hands. These drill things are so giant that the impossibly thin arms could in absolutely no way wield them properly. Hunting for Beedrill would just delve down to wildly flailing around its arm-drills until it hits something.

Too bad they hunt in swarms. If Beedrill were to perform the only method of attacking it has, it’d just end up hitting the rest of its swarm. While a bunch of gigantic bees killing each other so they could kill you would indeed be freaky, the swarm will just end up accidentally lowering its numbers to a handful of imprecise fragile bees swinging their arms around, which should be an easy fight for anything not on this list.

#2. Parasect

Parasect is another one of those first generation weirdos. It’s basically just a Paras with a giant mushroom and claws. Studying of the Pokedex entries notes that the giant mushroom has actually taken complete control of Paras’s body and mind. It also stunted its growth, but mostly the control part.

Also, the eyes are kinda scary,

Of course, this is just Parasect’s natural life cycle. It lives a nice life then a mushroom takes it over. Oh well, right? Well, look at its ability. Or moves. You’ll see the word ‘spore’ show up a lot. Now, what is a spore?

Not sure what this is, but the answer is "baby mushrooms".

Now, Parasect fights by throwing baby mushrooms at its enemies. These mushrooms happen to take over their host’s body, effectively making them a zombie slave creature for life. Even those who attack first have a chance of getting spored. With enough organization, the entire world would quickly fall to the monster that is Parasect. And with the amount of organized crime in Pokemon, this should have happened long ago.

#1s: Everything that has a weather-related ability ever

Golduck and Psyduck, being ducks, live in water. And, being living creatures, they require water to live. Now, as anyone who passed middle school Science would know, water is recycled and comes back to us through the rain. Well, it’s too bad Golduck’s and Psyduck’s abilities remove all weather, isn’t it? Cloud Nine effectively removes the rain, which would eventually destroy the ducks’ habitat.

One-upping that Castform isn't so funny now, is it Golduck?

But Golduck and Psyduck don’t have it the worst. Consider Groudon and Kyogre. Their abilities create extreme sunlight and extreme rain. And, as Teams Aqua, Magma, and the third generation games teach, these weather effects go worldwide. If Groudon’s out, the world is in an eternal drought- no water, everything dies. Except whatever doesn’t need water, which is a handful in Pokemon. If Kyogre’s out, the world is flooded, so only the fish survive.

Oh, right, there are three.

Rayquaza is the same as Kyogre and Groudon. It creates weather all over the world. However, its weather is just overdraft clouds. No sun, no rain, nothing. The water goes away since the rain doesn’t keep recycling, so it just evaporates. The plants go away because there is no sun for photosynthesis. The animals die because there is no water to drink, and the waterless animals starve themselves to extinction. Everything dies. Except Rayquaza.

But, hey, as long as Rayquaza’s happy, right?

Yay!