Help Zubat Card with no attack quantity?

sakirose

Aspiring Trainer
Member
We are new at Pokemon and my son placed the Zubat as his attacking Pokemon. However, I noticed that the Zubat card has no attack number or amount.

How does this card work as an active attacker if it does no damage or have an attack?
 

snoopy369

Aspiring Trainer
Advanced Member
Member
A lot of cards don't directly do damage with their attack, but instead do something else useful.

For example, one Alolan Vulpix has an attack Beacon which lets you get two Pokémon out of your deck.

If you're talking about the Sun/Moon Zubat, for example, Astonish (for 1 psychic) reads:

Choose a random card from your opponent's hand. Your opponent reveals that card and shuffles it into their deck.
That's not directly damaging the opponent, but it does let you take a card out of your opponent's hand, which is of some use to you. You'll obviously have to eventually put a different Pokémon in eventually in order to do damage, but perhaps that's a useful thing to do while you're waiting to get Crobat out.

And just to be clear; that does count as an "attack", from the game's point of view, even though it doesn't deal any damage. (In fact, many of the attacks in the video game don't do any damage either - they are "buffs" (they make you stronger) or "debuffs" (they make the opponent weaker).)
 

AlphaVoxel

Definitely still in development...
Forum Mod
Member
Yeah. Attacks like that are more or less there to tie things into the video games. It helps bring a bit of variety to the game. Sometimes they will be more beneficial (ex. Drawing cards, searching the deck, etc), while others may be more disruptive (discarding cards from your opponents hand, status conditions, etc.). These still count as attacks, even if they don't do damage.
 

snoopy369

Aspiring Trainer
Advanced Member
Member
And just in case it's not obvious: sometimes attacks are just not very good. If you look at the "Meta", or what's commonly played by most competitive players, only a handful of Pokémon are played in their decks - maybe 100 total Pokémon out of the last six expansions are considered useful enough to be playable in a deck. The far majority are more there for context and environment and fun, but not actually good to use in a deck that you're trying to win with; because lots of people play for reasons other than winning.
 

AlphaVoxel

Definitely still in development...
Forum Mod
Member
Sorry, I'm starting to get a little confused here. What exactly are you trying to say/ask? It kind of seems like you're explaining to me how cards/competitive play works... XD
 

snoopy369

Aspiring Trainer
Advanced Member
Member
@sakirose Yep, that's the Sun/Moon Zubat I linked to. (You can find the specific one by looking at the numbers on the bottom left, even if you don't recognize the symbol which indicates which set it's from; where it says 54/149 that is it's card identifier, 54 meaning the 54th card from the set, out of 149 total advertised cards [plus some 'secret' cards not advertised].) Google "Zubat 54/149" and you'll find the specific one.
 
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