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Mega Rising celebrates the 1st year anniversary of Pokémon TCG Pocket, the start of a new series and introduce Mega Pokémon for the first time, with a new rule: if these Pokémon are knocked out, you're giving out 3 points, basically losing the game on the spot. JohannTryger and MKCrimson evaluate the cards revealed in the trailer and their expected power level.
Here's the scale we're using:
: Unplayable pack filler (Rhydon)
: Niche tech or good for surprise factor (Shiny Gyarados)
: Solid tech or glue card (Naganadel)
: Very strong, is either a staple card or has potential to win a game on its own (Flareon ex)
: Meta-defining (Darkrai ex, Sabrina, Sylveon ex...)
Mega Blaziken ex
Mega Blaziken ex is quite a straightforward card. It has 210 HP and a single retreat cost. Mega Burning, its only attack, costs 2 energy for a solid 120 damage, on par with Solgaleo ex. Instead of putting 10 damage on itself, however, Mega Blaziken has a different drawback. It needs to discard a energy per attack, which isn't that big of a deal, as a card coming up soon will show. It also gets to Burn the opponent's Active Pokémon. This is important because Burned Pokémon take 20 damage each Pokémon checkup, though they can flip a coin and will recover if they flip heads. The reason this is important is because this means Mega Burning is actually a 140 damage attack for 2 energy, and a 70 D/E ratio is amazing.
As for support, Rare Candy and Lillie are obvious picks. Mega Blaziken can start burning opponents as soon as T4 with Rare Candy. Lillie can heal massive damage off of Mega Blaziken ex. Elemental Switch can also help transfer energy. It can be paired with other Stage 2 Fire Pokémon as well, such as SR Charizard ex. Overall, this is a great card, not broken, yet meta-worthy.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Attacking on turn 2 with a Rare Candy, again, is almost always worth a look. Granted, Magby is required to do so going first, but the babies seem like a natural fit in a deck leaning on Megas in any capacity thanks to the 1-1-3 setup being virtually mandatory to make Megas playable. One-shotting the Legendary Drawing Doggos ex without any help while having 210HP of bulk is absurdly valuable already, and one energy in the bin every turn stops being relevant as soon as the plan is to attack every turn with this anyway. Expect the fighting chicken to see early play at minimum, and bring fire type decks back to prominence by itself on the high end.
MKCrimson's Rating:
Mega Gyarados ex
A more unique card, Mega Gyarados ex boasts the same 210 HP as Mega Blaziken ex despite being a Stage 1 compared to Blaziken’s Stage 2. It does have a severe retreat cost of to balance it. The only attack, Mega Blaster, does the same damage as Mega Burning after factoring Burn damage, without discarding energy. It also discards the top 3 cards of your opponent’s deck, which can cause rage quits. However, it gets a usually prohibitive energy cost of 3 and 1 . The word usually is to factor in the pesonal demon every Water type heavy hitter with high energy costs can summon.
Yes, Misty is what actually lets you play with Mega Gyarados. This combo is more obvious than noodles and cheese, and will be played in the vast majority of Mega Gyarados ex decks.
Irida helps heal damage, letting Mega Gyarados hit for longer. It can also be paired with regular Gyarados ex. The new Magikarp might look decent, but the energy cost is only justifiable by Misty. Overall, this is a decent card, but its reliance on luck just puts it a notch down.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Mega Gyarados ex is the card I admit to having the least confidence in rating so far. On one hand, 210HP is a very large number, especially with Water’s ready access to healing with Irida and Milotic. Additionally, the 3-point drawback is manageable if you can set up your opponent to be forced to knock out two 1-point rampers and then have to deal with a fat water dragon for the rest of the game. On the other hand, Gyarados ex (baby) is also 140 damage a turn forever with the same amount of setup and is worth 2 points as opposed to “lose if KO’d.” The deck disruption is also much more powerful if Mega Gyarados ex can attack asap (see: absurd highroll Misty) as opposed to before your opponent dumps out a hand of Sylveon ex/Poké Balls/legendary draw-me-cards ex and draws into what they need anyway. This is, as you can guess, not terribly easy with a 4-energy attack requirement unless you can get some insane early Manaphy/Misty/Mantyke plays and run to the bank. I’ll lean in favor of “fat water dragon go brrr” for now, but this could easily end up being unplayable when the dust settles.
MKCrimson's Rating:
Mega Altaria ex
This is a little more reasonable. 130 damage for 2 energy (with setup) on a Stage 1 is the kind of rate I expect from the risk being a Mega carries, as we can attack on turn 2 going second. Being in-type with Sylveon ex is also nice to provide a draw engine to fill the bench as quickly as possible. I could easily see this as the fast damage component of a Sylveon ex + Greninja deck, which automatically at least gives this a home in a variant of something broken. Any kind of damage increase effect also puts this in “KO a card-drawing Legendary Beast ex” territory, which also adds to my grade.
MKCrimson's Rating:
The B1 version of GA Pikachu ex, Mega Altaria ex, has 190 HP, same as Venusaur ex, and a single retreat cost. Its attack, Mega Harmony, does 40 base damage for 2 energy, and 30 extra damage for each benched Pokémon you have. A full year earlier, there was some yellow mouse that did the same thing as a Basic but had no base damage. Mega Altaria ex will likely have a much better time in the meta.
Mystical Slab can help you find the cotton-like bird faster. Giratina ex can be a great partner, and versatile cards like Mew ex can work as well. Overall, this is a decent card, with great potential.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Mega Pinsir ex
Mega Pinsir ex is one of the less promising Megas. It has 170 HP, retreat cost of 2 and the attack Critical Scissors. The latter does 80 damage for and lets you flip a coin. If heads, Critical Scissors becomes a more solid 150 damage attack. Being a Basic allows you to avoid the hassle of evolution.
Erika is almost a must-have, as Mega Pinsir ex is not as bulky as some of the other ones out there. Leaf Cape is also a good choice. Will is the critical reason this deck can work, as it can allow a guaranteed 150 damage. Overall, this can work, but I have lower hopes for this than most others.
JohannTryger's Rating:
I’m not sure a 1 diamond grade does this card justice. This is almost certainly the card you get in a pack and then rage because you lost your 4-diamond pull on this piece of junk. Again, in a world with broken draw engine → Greninja+Cyrus, it is not justifiable to throw “Lose the game if this dies” on the bench to set up for… whatever Critical Scissors is supposed to be. 150 damage (sometimes) for 3 energy wouldn’t be playable on a 2-point card, so no clue how it’s playable here.
MKCrimson's Rating: Triumphant Light Giratina
Mega Absol ex
My general grade of Megas comes down to risk/reward, as unlike in the paper game you just lose the game if your Mega gets KO’d. I feel like the current success of Mega Absol ex Box in paper TCG as well as the disruptive capabilities are going to lead people to massively overrate Mega Absol ex. Getting off a Darkness Claw early can be strong disruption combined with Silver, and 170HP is fine enough, but I feel the need to stress that this is an instant loss if this gets KO’d. 80 damage a turn with chip disruption is not worth the risk of an instant loss in a world with Cyrus+Greninja, especially if your opponent just has their broken draw engine at the ready anyway (see: Sylveon ex, Suicune ex) to offset the loss of a supporter. No thank you.
MKCrimson's Rating:
The irritator of Megas, Mega Absol ex has 170 HP a retreat cost of 1. Its attack, Darkness Claw, does a low 80 damage for 2 Darkness energy. However, its secondary effect is that you can see your opponent's hand and discard a Supporter you find there. Supporters are some of the most powerful cards in Pocket (looking at you, Misty), and getting to discard 1, and obtaining information on what your opponent might be doing next turn allows for some serious rage quits.
Guzzlord ex can be a good partner, with Grindcore allowing energy disruption and Tyrannical Hole to deal the finishing blows later. Darkrai ex is also a decent option, as you can start using Nightmare Aura to chip damage your opponent’s Active once Mega Absol is ready. Dawn can be used in conjunction with Darkrai ex to allow chip damage even earlier. X Speed will be a great item as Mega Absol ex can retreat for free after using one. Overall, this is a promising card, but will be a hated one as well.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Mega Ampharos ex
Let's be honest, this card is underwhelming. Mega Ampharos ex has 210 HP and a retreat cost of 2. Its attack, Lightning Lancer, is cooler when heard than when seen. For , you do 100 damage. Additionally, you can do 20 damage randomly to one of your opponent's benched Pokémon 3 times. While a total of 160 damage isn't the worst, as a Mega, this is much below expectations.
Cyrus is a good partner, as you will be hitting the bench anyway. Pichu and Pachirisu are good for accelerating energy. Lillie helps you to try harder with healing, and Rare Candy helps you turbo faster, which is less effective here due to the larger energy cost. Overall, this is a bad card, and not recommended.
JohannTryger's Rating:
I might be in Magical Christmasland, but I am very interested in (going second) turn 1 Pichu turn 2 Rare Candy to start doing mean things to my opponent with Lightning Lancer. Notably, Red picking up the KO on an Active Suicune ex while shredding the bench is worth a look on its own if you get the dream setup. Baby Pokemon are also going to be more consistently found early thanks to a pair of Supporters we’ll get to later, so the Christmasland scenario might be more common than it seems at first blush. Lightning Lancer also has the significant benefit of setting up our own Cyrus plays quickly. The 1-1-3 point setup is also pretty doable in Lightning thanks to Oricorio. Don’t be surprised if you get got by this thing.
MKCrimson's Rating:
Jirachi
Jirachi is a frail, yet decent card. With 50 HP and a retreat cost of 1, you can pivot, but Cyrus will likely end the Wish Pokémon. Its attack, Star Drop, is a good 30 damage snipe onto any of your opponent's Pokémon for a single Psychic energy. A good tech card in Psychic decks, it can fit into Mega Altaria ex decks, serving as an easy way to counter Mega Gyarados ex by removing Magikarps, and also good for chip damage early on. Overall, a solid card worth considering.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Jirachi is a curious card that has the small weakness of dying to everything while not really providing enough aggression to counteract its frailty. Psychic seems to get a lot of semi-aggressive one-point Basics that sit there and die to bigger stuff, so I guess that tracks?
MKCrimson's Rating:
Hydreigon
A Stage 2 that attacks turn 2 with a Rare Candy regardless of who goes first? A one-point Stage 2 that attacks turn 2 for 130 damage? Sign me up! For bonus points, Sabrina can bring in Giratina ex if poorly defended to have Hydreigon delete it from existence. Absolutely nutty aggressive card.
MKCrimson's Rating:
The pseudo-legendary of Unova, Hydreigon has a good 150 HP and a retreat cost of 2 as a Stage 2. It has a brilliant ability, Road in Unison, allowing you to attach 2 Darkness energy to it while doing 30 damage to itself. This combos with its attack Hyper Ray, which does 130 damage for 3 Darkness energy and discards all energy attached afterwards. This effectively means Hyper Ray discards 1 energy and does 30 damage to itself while dealing sizeable chunks of damage. This can pair well with Absol ex, Guzzlord ex, etc. Guzzlord ex and Lusamine look promising. Overall, this is a nice card, not broken, yet a great ability.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Aegislash
Aegislash has what would be a broken ability but applied on the incorrect Pokémon. It has the ability Cursed Metal, which allows your Psychic and Steel type Pokémon to do 30 more damage. This can be compared with Lucario’s Fighting Coach ability, which grants a 20 damage boost to Fighting types. It has far more utility, and a bigger damage boost as well, and is only held back by it being a Stage 2. Slicing Blade, its attack, does effectively 100 damage for . This is a perfect example of balancing a card while keeping it great. Overall, a perfect tool for Steel and Psychic types to get damage boosts.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Cursed Metal is comparable to Lucario’s Fighting Coach ability, with the upside of more damage amp (and affecting more types) and the downside of being attached to a Stage 2 in a world where your supporting Stage 2 is Greninja. As Aegislash can’t set up Cyrus plays in the same way a Water Shuriken does, I feel like it’s a strong supportive Stage 2 fighting uphill against the opportunity cost of including a broken one.
MKCrimson's Rating: ; if Greninja gets deleted from the game
Jellicent & Marlon
Unless Carracosta ends up being incredibly overpowered, Marlon’s playability is bound to Jellicent. The theory is if Jellicent is sufficiently beefy, you can stack potentially broken amounts of healing to allow Bouncy Body to trigger multiple times. This allows it to fit into, say, Mega Gyarados ex decks as a 1-point wall to juice up your 4-energy attacker quickly. I feel contractually obligated to also mention that in theory, this could be a generic Stage 1 Wall in any deck; there’s no type limit as to what can receive the energy, which increases the potential payoffs substantially.
70 is an obscene amount of healing in one card, meaning if Jellicent is playable then Marlon assuredly is going to be a very strong play. I feel confident in saying that if Jellicent has at least 110HP and thus lives a Suicune ex + Water Shuriken without help (asssuming you don’t load your own bench with anything besides your direct ramp target), I’m happy to give the pair a shot. I’ll assume that it does, as Jellicent’s Secluded Springs counterpart has 110HP as well.
MKCrimson's Rating:
Marlon is a Supporter we cannot truly measure up. It heals 70 damage from a Carracosta or Jellicent. While we do not know about Carracosta, we know that Jellicent has the ability Bouncy Body, which accelerates a energy to one of your Benched Pokémon, if Jellicent is in the Active Spot and is damaged by an attack from one of your opponent's Pokémon. While we lack Jellicent’s HP, we can make an estimated guess that Marlon will see relatively little play, as other such cards before him have not fared well. Overall, it will not be surprising if this is only used in fringe decks.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Magikarp
All the Magikarps we have so far are deckbuilding taxes paid to include Gyarados ex (and soon Mega Gyarados ex) and are bad as a rule. This one has the theoretical upside of drawing and playing said ex (good!) and the not-so-theoretical double downside of being a brick if it’s the only Basic you start with (bad) and being a complete sitting duck in the active slot unless you get lucky with Misty (gross). I’m sure there’s a world where you play this anyway but I’m likely leaning towards MI Karp just so I can get out of dodge if I have to lead with it.
MKCrimson's Rating:
Flame Patch
The only revealed Item, Flame Patch is a boon for Fire types. It allows you to attach a energy from your discard pile to your Active Pokémon if it is Fire type. Fire is a type known for discarding energy, which allows this more utility. This can help out Mega Blaziken ex as well. Flareon ex, GA Charizard ex, etc. are all rejoicing as a great support has been bestowed. This is overall a brilliant card, and is only held back by the Fire type restriction.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Funnily enough, this seems less designed for Mega Rising’s marquee Fire Mega ex and moreso meant to give needed support to two other forgotten Starters; namely, Infernape ex and Charizard ex (GA). The former is the most relevant, as it can set up either another attack from itself or thanks to its free retreat pivot into anything else and ramp up to 3 energy with two Flame Patches. That said, this is definitely the kind of card that would have been absurd in early builds of Moltres ex + Charizard ex (GA), if possibly a bit late in a metagame that isn’t well suited to building a Greninja+Cyrus target on the bench. This could also be used to set up a surprise Entei ex with the additional energy required to bring Blazing Beatdown to 120 damage. Really, any deck that can get energy into the bin by any means will probably find room for 2 of these. Energy cheating good.
MKCrimson's Rating:
Sitrus Berry
The main weakness that sticks out from the Sitrus Berry is that it’s telegraphed, so an opponent that’s able to manipulate how much damage they deal can either one-shot whatever this is attached to (rendering the heal irrelevant) or otherwise set up an opportunity where this never goes off by not reducing said berry-holder to half or less unless it would KO. That said, the second scenario potentially buys an extra turn in the same way a Giant/Leaf Cape might. If the opponent is forced into a situation where they have to pop the Sitrus Berry to win a points race, it then frees up space for a Cape to further extend its recipient’s survivability, effectively being a Potion that healed for an extra 10HP. In a sufficiently bulky meta – such as one where it’s a slugging match between two Megas – Sitrus Berry could be an important part of outlasting the opponent in the endgame. I’m just concerned about how often it could just Do Nothing, but I’ll do my best to be an optimist!
MKCrimson's Rating:
The only revealed Tool, Sitrus Berry has a decent effect. If the Pokémon you attach it to has half HP or less at the end of each turn, it heals 30 damage, but discards itself. This is obviously a better Potion but restricted. This card can help heal high HP Pokémon, and will be used in many decks. It is a good card overall, but is eclipsed by Supporters.
JohannTryger's Rating:
May
May is the best Supporter revealed and it is not close. It gets you 2 random Pokémon from your deck, but you have to shuffle that many Pokémon from your hand to deck. This allows you to trade away unwanted Pokémon for the required ones. Also, due to how it's worded, you can put back the Pokémon you got if you aren't happy with them. Ash’s Hoenn companion has received a meta-warping card, and every single Pokémon-heavy deck, including some Pokémon mentioned above such as Mega Blaziken ex, Mega Ampharos ex, Hydreigon, Aegislash, etc. will be more than happy with this draw powerhouse.
JohannTryger's Rating:
This is less card-drawing and more card-filtering, but as worded it still reads as incredibly powerful. As the draws are simultaneous, you effectively pick the worst two Pokémon in your hand after playing May to send back, which massively increases your consistency in any deck with multiple moving parts. Combine this with the current state of card draw and you are playing 2 copies mandatory in any deck that plays 2+ evolution lines (i.e. every single one).
MKCrimson's Rating:
Lisia
Pocket’s knockoff version of Buddy-Buddy Poffin from PTCG, Lisia gets you 2 random Basic Pokémon with 50 HP or less. Being honest, few Basic Pokémon with 50 HP or less have ever worked, and there are little to no signs of change, with Basic Mega Pokémon going in the opposite direction. While it can work, few decks will be interested in using it, though those decks will be quite glad about this card. Overall, a niche card that will be used in only a handful of decks.
JohannTryger's Rating:
Somehow, this reads to me as more broken than May in decks that want it and I feel like Lisia is being glossed over. Any deck that runs babies will run two copies of Lisia, as you can virtually guarantee your optimal start if you open with a Baby or Lisia in hand. Drawing babies from Lisia means your Poké Balls are drawing the other basic lines you need. Lisia finds Swablu guaranteed for Mega Altaria ex or Magikarp for any Gyarados decks. Drawing 2 basics guarantees extra damage from any Pokémon that cares about your bench being filled; I wonder if there’s some broken ex Pokémon running around that wants your bench filled, draws cards, and would heavily appreciate if its draws were more likely to be gas? Am I taking crazy pills? Is Lisia not just busted in any deck that you can curate specific draws for?