Check Out Some of the Top Cards from Mega Evolution—Delta Reign
By Google News Technology ·
Greetings, Trainers, and join me in acknowledging the debut of the newest Pokémon TCG expansion, Mega Evolution—Delta Reign! This set marks the first release in the freshly begun 2027 Championship Series season and will become tournament-legal in time for this year’s Latin America International Championships. Let’s take a look at some of the cards that may shake up the metagame in Brazil next month.
Giratina ’s attack, Chaos Crawler, does a respectable 120 damage, but its true benefit is its effect: “During your opponent’s next turn, prevent all damage from attacks done to this Pokémon.” In other words, given that most decks in the Standard format focus only on attacking Active Pokémon, you’re putting your opponent in a position where they have to find Boss’s Orders or skip attacking for the turn.
Giratina is the perfect addition to the existing Slowking archetype. This deck has seen moderate success at Pokémon Regional Championships, perhaps now finally finding the missing key to International Championships success. In short, Slowking leverages its Seek Inspiration attack to copy the attack of any Pokémon without a Rule Box.
At present, it most effectively uses Kyurem and its Trifrost attack to Knock Out multiple lower-HP Pokémon at once or Metagross and its Metallic Hammer attack to Knock Out one high-HP Pokémon. Giratina offers an alternative: some damage in exchange for temporary protection on Slowking.
There are two scenarios where Giratina will shine. First, there exist some matchups where the main attackers have less than 120 HP, like in Festival Lead decks. If the opponent has Shaymin in play, Kyurem is effectively useless, and Metagross’s damage output is wasted. However, copying Chaos Crawler forces the opponent to find Boss’s Orders, perhaps making their turn more difficult.
Second, and perhaps more importantly, there are times when the threat is stronger than the execution. Although Trifrost is powerful, it leaves the Active Slowking with zero Energy, vulnerable to counterplay from an opponent’s Unfair Stamp , Special Red Card , or other disruptive effects.
Chaos Crawler can let you take a turn off, potentially letting you progress the board state while keeping Slowking safe to unleash a more timely attack on the following turn.
Second on this list, but first in my heart, is Legendary Pyroduct . This is one of three new dual Stadium cards that require both halves to be put into play at the same time, reminiscent of Pokémon LEGEND from the HeartGold & SoulSilver expansions released in 2010. Like Pokémon LEGEND, both Stadium halves share the same name, meaning you can only play up to four total copies, not four copies of each half.
In practice, this means two copies of each half and therefore two chances to take advantage of each of these Stadium’s powerful effects.
Though Legendary Pyroduct does not shut off all Abilities, it does remove the most troublesome ones in the Standard format, all of which are present on Evolution Pokémon. Here is a short list of meddling Pokémon that can’t take the heat: Drakloak , Dudunsparce , Alakazam , Dusknoir , Thwackey , Crustle , N’s Zoroark ex , and…I could continue, but you get the point!
All that to say, if you can put and keep Legendary Pyroduct in play against an unprepared opponent, you’re that much closer to victory.
However, the important part is “if you can put and keep Legendary Pyroduct in play.” It can be difficult to find one specific Stadium card upon command, let…
Originally published by Google News Technology
