Ah, Serperior 6. How excited I was when you were first announced! My starter from White, in a Tank-style TCG form! I thought it was smooth sailing for a HGSS-on format!
…Until the rest of the set was announced.
Serperior 6, or Ability Serperior, is a Grass-type with 130 HP. Grass typing does it no favors, and a Fire weakness seals a grim fate against Reshiram and Emboar. A Water resistance is not necessarily a bad thing, allowing you to better wall Samurott 32 and Blastoise.
Serperior’s Ability, “Royal Heal”, lets you heal each of your Pokemon for 10 damage at any time between turns, similar to Nidoqueen RR. However, Serperior’s Ability is stackable. Feel free to remove 40 damage before your opponent’s turn.
“Leaf Tornado”, for a Grass and a Colorless, does 60 damage and allows you to reposition Grass energy among your Pokemon. It’s a very mediocre attack and shouldn’t be used. You’re better off using Meganium Prime.
The biggest problems with Serperior are its position as a Stage-2 Pokemon, requiring a large commitment of cards to put in a deck, and its mediocre attack. If Leaf Tornado did 80 damage, Serperior and I might be able to sit down and talk about career possibilities. But as it stands, Serperior is nothing more than a great benchwarmer.
The other problem that limits Serperior is not having a deck to fit into. My two favorite tank decks are Steelix and Wailord. Both of them can tank large amounts of damage and insignificant heals like Serperior’s will only add to your opponent’s frustration.
However, both Wailord and Steelix can be frequently one-shot in the current format. Donphan might be played more tanky with Serperior, but it’s really not efficient compared to Machamp Prime. So there’s not a big point putting Serperior into decks that don’t get an opportunity to use its ability, or there’s better cards that work with its partners.
Because Leaf Tornado is such a poor attack, you won’t be able to use Serperior on his own. having “only” 130 HP is also a problem, considering his ability will make no difference against Reshiram or Zekrom. It does help against Donphan, but if Donphan attacks first you won’t be able to KO it before it KOs you.
I’m honestly conflicted as how to rate Serperior. Because it doesn’t fit particularly well in any deck, and it can’t fend for itself, I’ll give an unfortunate 2/5. I wish it was better, though.
