Neo Discovery Review - Darkness

While none of the Darkness-types in Neo Discovery are on par with Sneasel, that would be a pretty high bar to shoot for. That's really one of the biggest issues with most Darkness-types. Since you can only play four copies of Darkness Energy, you really only want to commit to one Darkness-type per deck.

Don't underestimate the new options, though. Darkness-types are always good at laying down a serious beatdown on an unprepared opponent.

Umbreon (lv 33) doesn't have much going for it when compared to other similar options. Like with the Espeon cards, it seems like they wanted to have a matching set with the Jungle Eeveelutions, even if it meant producing subpar versions of the cards.

Pursuit has a cute gimmick, but doing a situational extra 10 damage on a delay is a very minor effect. You also need two separate Special Energy Cards in hand if you want to use Pursuit on turn 2.

Grade: 4/10

Umbreon (lv 40) doesn't look like anything special, but it's surprisingly powerful in practice. Feint Attack can pick off a Baby and ignores all defensive effects (most notably Metal Energy), while Bite does solid damage when powered up by a Darkness Energy or two.

80 HP is also high for a Stage 1. Each individual quality of the card is only above average, but it adds up to an impressive package.

Grade: 8/10

This Houndour is a marked improvement over the Fire-type Houndour, since it synergizes much better with Houndoom. Plunder can rip off a Focus Band or Gold Berry, which can make it surprisingly hard to block this guy.

It's also worth noting that Bite will actually do 20 damage on the first turn if you attach a Darkness energy, which you should. As a result, this card is much more powerful than it looks.

Grade: 7/10

Houndoom is fine, but this is not the preferred Houndoom for competitive play. A significantly better Houndoom was released in the very next set. But since they're legal in all the same formats, I have to take points off of this version's score.

It's not impossible to make this card work, and it's probably the best Houndoom to pair with the Fire-type Houndour, but you'll want the Neo Revelation Houndoom 9 times out of 10.

Grade: 4/10

Tyranitar is an insane card. Trample has a chance to devastate EVERY 'mon in play, on both sides of the field. It is expensive, though, and you'll have to build your entire deck around Tyranitar.

It pairs nicely with Jungle Mr. Mime, which is immune to the damage, and should generally be played in a slow, bulky deck that can outlast your opponent in a war of attrition. It's a very real deck, despite the downsides.

Grade: 8/10

If there had been a basic Darkness Energy, then these cards might have gotten even higher scores. The biggest issue the Darkness-type faces is that it's just an extremely competitive type. It's not like the other types, where you can afford to play two or three evolutionary lines easily.

As a result, every Darkness deck ends up being compared to every other Darkness deck, instead of supplementing and supporting each other. At least that feels appropriate to the cutthroat personality of the type, though.