pokebeach.comHello 6 Prizes. It’s been a while since I’ve had the ambition to sit down and hammer out an article, but with all the new cards and possibilities crawling from the floorboards, I figure it’s time to start writing again. Today we have a Pokémon that hasn’t been too hyped, but may have the potential to be a deadly weapon. Granted I only ran into this Pokémon at the Noble Victories pre-release, I saw some hidden power in this card.
Bisharp is a Stage 1 Dark Type Pokémon with 90HP. With even less than 100HP, he is not the sturdiest Pokémon by any means. Weakness only makes it worse by adding Donphan to the list of Pokémon that can 1HKO it, along with any other Fighting type Pokémon that can do at least 50 damage.
While the weakness is disappointing, being Dark type has its advantages. There are always the Special Dark energies, along with the potential to add Dark type tech Pokémon such as Zoroark. That, and for those of you who know about the “Dark Rush” set that is on its way, you’ll remember the new Item “Dark Patch”. The card allows a player to attach a Basic Dark energy from their discard. Combine it with Junk Arm, and Dark goes on the list of types with usable energy acceleration.
Now onto why I think this card really shines. His first attack “Finishing Blow” costs one Dark energy and does a base of 20. The effect is what makes the attack. If the Pokémon already has damage on it, the attack does 50 more damage. The attack then does 70 damage for one energy. Add a Special Dark into the mix, and account for the minimum of 1 damage counter already there and the defending Pokémon is sitting on 90 damage when the turn ends.
“But Travis, how does the Defending Pokémon already have a damage counter on it?” Please hold all questions until the end of the article.
Bisharp’s second move “Night Slash” doesn’t come across as dangerous. It costs a Dark and a Colorless, and only does thirty, but again, the effect is key. The effect allows you to switch Bisharp with a benched Pokémon. Maybe a combo with Gothitelle or Druddigon with a Rocky Helmet could be used with this attack. This could be used as a backup plan to build damage, or stall the opponent with a lock. The possibilities go on.
Bisharp would obviously need a couple of partners to bring him to his full potential. For one thing, Bisharp needs someone to place damage on the other side, preferably without attacking. The two Pokémon that come to mind are Kingdra Prime and Chandelure NV. Both use abilities to place damage on the other side of the field. Chandelure would take a bit more work to use, as it has to be active, but maybe a Dodrio tech could improve his usefulness. Only time and testing will tell.
The problem with Bench-sitters is that Catcher is being used so much. It’s dangerous to have important Pokémon just chilling on the bench. This is why I believe if this deck were to work it would need thick lines of the snipers, or trainer locking Pokémon such as Vileplume or Gothitelle.
This card has the potential to become lethal, especially with Dark types getting a whole set of support in the future. Overall I’d give this card a 6/10 for playability, but an 8/10 for potential. Am I just buying this card a first class ticket for the hype train, or can it actually stand out? Let’s see what you all think.
It is a great card but with 90hp and it is a stage 1. The attack is only spectacular if the defending pokemon has damage. It is great with lock decks but only if you can have a sniper backing you up. Another problem is yes it may have the ability to use special darks which make him just that much better but they are special…..either a typhlosion to discard it or a lost remover to lost zone it. Great article and card but I think you are just hyping something that everyone wishes would work especially with Tyranitar prime.
I don’t really know why, but I am really jazzed about this card :)
I think you forgot TTar Prime, cause it’s a card that everyone would like to see at competitive. Btw, Nice CoTD.
I think that Mandibuzz would be better than TTar because of Darkness Howl.
All I could see of it would be a 1-1 tech in Ttar.
People would run mandibuzz over this in a ttar deck: different weakness, plus can attack ANY pokemon, just just the defending pokemon. I don’t see why this is better than mandibuzz.
This card cannot one-shot anything.
This card gets one-shot by everything.
This card is terrible.
This card has the soul of a Lion, a Tiger, and an MMA Fighter.
This card is kept on Chuck Norris at all times.
This card is the greatest card in the entire universe.
LOL. That comment reminds me of Sea Blaster.
It’s Mandibuzz, except it can’t snipe or deal huge dmg to Stage 2s, and it shares its weakness with Tyranitar, so it basically adds nothing. Pump your resources into Tyranitar instead. I will never understand the hype for this one.
This Card Is Amazing For Cleaning Your Car Or For Putting In The Wheels Of Your Bike.
I think you’d go all out and use Joltik or Audino BW to do that.
I’m Audino5000.
LOL thanks for the idea.
How do you clean a car with a card? I just can’t imagine it lol.
grease, or you could scoop up dust or something.
If you use Chandelure NV, you can use Night Slash to switch to him.
that’s not the point. the point is to get chandelure to place the damage counters AND THEN switch to bisharp, not the other way around -.-
metagross ul and dodrio ud
Why use that with Darkrai Ex having the ability to give pokemon with DE attached a free retreat
I am going to give this +1 because I think most of what you said is true. But the only + this has over Mandibuzz is 10 more damage and it can use special darks (Mandibuzz can only to hit the active) and he has base damage.
Yea, I don’t know, I can just see a Dark type doing 1 for 70 being pretty good. It was just a little idea I was wrapping together.
tgrue, but a dark type sniping for 50 is equally good. A T-Tar Spread tech is what this is.
So glad this site has so much support. Makes me fuzzy inside. The card is not sparkling good no. The hook that caught me was the 70 damage for 1 energy.
I know this card is no Yanmega.
I know it’s one shotted.
I know it’s no bdif card.
I know tyranitar, AND Mandibuzz exist.
I know special darks can be removed by lost remover.
I mentioned most of that in the article, the rest is common sense. Honestly I think there’s just a bunch of people waiting by their computer to complain about cotd’s on this site. If it was a bdif card, there would be no point in writing about it. Who wants to read an article on yanmega or donphan? NOW I remember why I quit writing on this site.
It doesn’t have real negative effects in the strictest sense, but instead it has a very annoying requirement to do that 70. Don’t get me wrong with my criticism by the way – this article explained well what Bisharp does best, and the rating for playability wasn’t really too high (I would’ve given it a 5 or so in a vacuum). But I do think there’s pretty much no reason to play this card, and I’ve seen people hyping Bisharp like there’s no tomorrow when there’s really no reason to.
Not all CotD’s have to be BCIFs. As long as they don’t claim to be when they’re not, you won’t see any negativity about the article from me. But this card has no reason to be played at the moment.
You’re right. I have high hopes for this card after Dark Rush though.
I don’t see Dark Rush making this guy good enough when there’s going to be so many other Dark Pokemon to use in his stead. His low Energy requirement isn’t even that much of a boost factor because of Dark Patch.
I think it would be an interesting partner with Kindgra and Mandibuzz.
this card might see alot of play BEFORE all the new EX cards come out, however I predict by the time dark rush comes out tyranitr prime will be rotated out. I think the format will be CL and on.
Why would they reduce the amount of sets to such a low number, especially with Call of Legends having nearly nothing of competitive value? I think it’s more likely they won’t rotate at all.
I hope they don’t rotate because I don’t want to have to flip for dual ball after my last br.
(I had 2 dual ball in my hand, I flip all tails and as a result get zekrom donked.
I can’t see fitting it into any Ttar builds, right now.. I agree the article for the most part but down 1-2 points on the hype scale. People should try it.
Cool card, but I think Mandibuzz (B&W) outclasses it with it’s sniping ability
in TTar
in ttar
T-Tar/Mandibuzz/(Yanmega)/Absol/Bisharp? I think so!