Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

2010-12-09 TM Solrock 009

Fighting Pokemon

  • Great Card

    Votes: 9 28.1%
  • Good Card

    Votes: 14 43.8%
  • League and Fun Card

    Votes: 7 21.9%
  • Collectible Card

    Votes: 2 6.3%

  • Total voters
    32
  • Poll closed .
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MrMeches

New Member
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[gal=51043]
2010-12-09 TM Solrock 009
[/gal]​
 
Love this card, especially at the prerelease, good when paired with Lunatone obviously. Possibly a Steelix counter/ slow down tech?

Subpar HP, ok retreat and meh attack are what kill this card, more of a tech I guess. 5/10 :)
 
This card with the Lunatone from SV is a pretty cool combo. Alone this card is pretty useless though. Its still a great tech, but the fact that Dialga G X stops it and that its pretty bad by itself makes it average as far as cards go. It can only shine on the bench and no where else.

7/10
 
It makes it so you can play spread again in this current format. Its AMAZING with the SV Lunatone. Against Dialga it does suck that its useless but you cant beat every deck.

8/10
 
Today's CotD is Solrock from TM, a fairly interesting addition for spread decks out there. Statwise, 70 HP is nice for a Basic, x2 Weakness to :grass: is eh, no Resistance is common, and :colorless: to Retreat is cheap. Heal Block is an interesting Poke-Body, blocking off removing damage counters off any Pokemon as long as Lunatone is also on the bench; this is a great benefit for spread decks, though the fact the combo eats up 2 bench slots makes it a little hard to use, since bench space is at a premium in most decks. Sun Flash deals a basic 20 for :fighting: and has the "Sand Attack" effect, giving the Defending Pokemon a 50/50 chance of failing to attack next turn.

Modified - 6/10 (It's interesting, but spread decks aren't really that good even with Lunasol, and the fact it needs 2 bench spots sucks. Still, it's a powerful effect if you can use it...)
Limited - 7/10 (Decent enough Basic, and if you happen to get Lunatone out as well, even better)
Unlimited - 1/10 (No use here, spread decks aren't really existent are they?)
 
This card solely exists as a Garchomp LvX counter. But, at the same time he's easilly sniped or bright looked and OHKO, unless you have Lunatone from SV. His attack is good for a basic bench sitter, allowing the chance to tank by making an opponent flip in order for them to pull off their attack which is much better than paralyse/confusion as your opponent can't heal their way out of it and attack anyway. One combo that could work is using Lunatone from both TM and SV and Gengar LvX. First you would use Lunatone from TM to do 60 to active and 10 to all bench at the cost of KO to yourself and then using compound pain every turn to do 30 damage, to all opponents pokemon in play. This sounds like a cool combo, but it's very hard to pull off and I doubt it would work most of the time even when properly setup. This is just a fun card I'm afraid, high risk; low reward.
 
Well, since I still need to write a review for another website (guess who? XD), I'll do a brief one here before it gets locked as "practice". Don't you all feel special? >.> On to Solrock!

In short, being a Basic Pokemon is good, being a Fighting Type is useful for nailing Weakness, 70 HP is good (but not great) since it is a Basic Pokemon that cannot further evolve. Grass Weakness is unlikely to be hit a lot in the current format, no Resistance is the worst a Pokemon can have (but annoyingly common) and a single Energy Retreat Cost is fairly good.

I'll cover the attack first because simply put, I have a lot more to say about the Body and so it makes more sense to close the review with it. Sun Flash is a solid attack slightly hurt by it requiring a Fighting Energy. It only requires one, though, so it wouldn't be impossible to mix it in with another type, especially as this is a fallback in case you absolutely have to attack with it. You hit for 20, and the Defending Pokemon has to flip to attack next turn. Based on the wording, the effect probably rests on the Defending Pokemon, so while your opponent can't ditch the effect by forcing you to change out Active Pokemon, s/he does only need to change out or Evolve their own to shake it. Still a solid attack for something not meant to attack.

The Poke-Body is what would make you want to play this card, and it is "okay". As long as you have a Lunatone in play alongside your Solrock, damage counters can't be removed from either players' Pokemon, though it states that damage counter moving effects (e.g. it isn't leaving play, just changing Pokemon) are allowed. This is a good idea in theory, but it hits a few snags. The most prominent is it feels like they forgot it requires Lunatone in play. There is a useful Lunatone that provides protection from Level X Pokemon for Lunatone and Solrock in play, as long as both are in play. However, it still means you're dedicating as many slots to this as you would a Stage 1 line and you eat up two Bench slots! The icing on the cake is that if you want to use either cards decent (but not great) attacks, you'd have to run Fighting and Psychic Energy (the Lunatone needs the latter), or run the newer, less desirable Lunatone.

So, taking that into account, it doesn't do much. It'd be different if healing decks were everywhere, but healing in and of itself has never been a viable winning strategy. Its always a supporting effect and even with the potent healing we have, it isn't a common one. Factor in that it won't stop the much rarer but often supplemental damage swapping trick, and you just feel gypped.

The other place you'd think to use this would be damage spread decks, but like healing decks they just aren't all that popular, and it might be overkill to worry about countering healing by even running one each of Solrock and Lunatone right now.

Given what is going into using the effect, I really believe they should have had it do something that basically shut off damage counter placement and manipulation entirely, only allowing damage counters to be placed as a direct result of doing damage. So you'd stop damage counter placing, moving, and removing effects, as well as neutralizing the damaging aspects of Burn, Confusion, and Poison. Separately those are all minor things but together they might matter enough that a few more decks would consider this as a counter.

Solid pick in Limited play, unless you just cannot run at least five Fighting Energy. Otherwise, exploiting Fighting Weakness is more effective here. Attack blocking effects that rest on the Defending Pokemon are a lot more effective here. Basics are more effective here (well, that aren't SP). 70 HP lasts longer. Finally, there are a few Pokemon in the set that can heal, and while they won't be in every deck, the decks that run them are probably counting on that healing, and it will really mess up their strategy.

Ratings

Modified: 5.5/10

Limited: 6.5/10

Close, but not quite good enough. Keep it in mind, though: after the next set rotation, or even if we just get a potent "healer" in a future set, could make this vital to several decks.
 
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