Card of the Day – Infernape 4 LV.X (Rising Rivals RR 108)

What’s up Prof-It fans, welcome to another video- Wait, never mind, I just finished watching like three Prof-It episodes, so it’s stuck in my head. Let’s start over.

Welcome to the latest Card of the Day. For this review, I’ll be taking a look at Infernape 4 LV.X, from Platinum: Rising Rivals. Like every other day, we’ll start of with its stats. Infernape is a Level Up Pokémon who boasts an average 110 HP.

Since Infernape is a Fire type, it can hit Scizor, Steelix and most importantly Dialga G LV.X for twice as much damage. It has a x2 Water Weakness, which means Gyarados will easily 1HKO it, even if there are only two Magikarp in their discard pile. The no Resistance is expected from most cards, unfortunately. The free Retreat Cost is very much appreciated.

In order to look at any Level Up Pokémon’s attacks, we must first take into consideration its previous form as well, which has two attacks, “Split Bomb” and “High Jump Kick,” which are both unimpressive. “Split Bomb,” for RC does 20 damage to two of your opponent’s Pokémon. “High Jump Kick” does a vanilla 50 damage for the high cost of RCC (even with DCE or TGI Energy Gain).

Thankfully, Infernape 4 LV.X comes with a much better attack in the form of “Fire Spin”, which is a classic attack that dates all the way back to Base Set Charizard. While the cost and damage all vary, the base of each is the same: A high priced, high damage output attack that forces you to discard R Energy. This particular one costs RRC, does 100 damage and requires two R Energy to be discarded.

pokebeach.comOverall, its attacks are barely average. Is there any good Poké-Something to make playing this card worthwhile? Well, its Poké-Power is certainly interesting. “Intimidating Roar”, when it’s used, forces your opponent to switch their active Pokémon with one on their bench.

So, is Infernape 4 LV.X worth playing? I think so. First of all, it will help against Kingdra decks as it will really lower Kingdra Prime’s attack power. In addition, it could be a very useful tool against Gyarados as you can keep KOing a bench Pokémon as many times as you need. Also, its attack is great for 1HKOing a pesky Dialga G. I definitely think that SP players should really consider this card as a great tech for quite a few match ups.

The other question that may be on your minds, should it be tried in non-SP decks? I think it could be, but it would really depend on what deck and the type of list you have.

My Recommendation: It is an older card, so it isn’t on the same level as a lot of later Pokémon, but I do believe that Infernape 4 LV.X could have a second life in this format. Your best bet IMO is in SP decks.

My Rating 3.5/5

Reader Interactions

9 replies

  1. Colin Peterik

    You do not need to discard 2 fire. BIG difference.
    This card is SO good right now with Gyarados being so popular. It’s a Mewtwo X and Umbreon counter, and it destroys the tanks Dialga and Steelix. It’s hard to find a good home for it… But I love this card in Mew. It doesn’t deserve any lees than 4/5 IMHO

      • venny kid  → venny

        Ugg. Computer messed up. Anyway…
        Can you “discard” the “energy” provided E-Gain as 1 of the two energies?

        • Eric Lari  → venny

          no but it says 2 energy so you can have 2 Fire energy and 1 DCE on it and simply discard the DCE if I’m reading it correctly.

        • Jona Jeffords  → Eric

          You are correct; discard 2 energy could be a single DCE which would leave you set to do Fire Spin again the next turn (provided you survive).

          I added this guy into my SP-based deck for the last City Championship I went to and it definitely gave my deck more options and made it more competitive (I still lost more games than I won, but that is a different story).

  2. Ryan

    It has great artwork too, the only problem is Gdos :( . otherwise, It is a disruptive card and can hit with o.k power.

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