Lysandre’s Trump Card Banned in Japan

The official Japanese TCG website has announced that Lysandre’s Trump Card will be banned from tournament play starting June 20th, the day Bandit Ring is released in Japan. They state the reason is to “promote a better competitive environment.” The ban applies to all of Japan’s tournaments.

Lysandre’s Trump Card allows you to dump all cards from your discard pile back into your deck, meaning players do not have to worry about managing their resources as much. With the card no longer tournament-legal, games will be more skill-based because players will have to think carefully about what cards they use knowing that they might not be able to play them again.

While Tropical Beach has also been banned from Japan’s tournaments, it should be noted that the reason more related to the rare availability of the card than to its relative usefulness. For Lysandre’s Trump Card, this is the first time in recent memory that a card has been banned because of its own merit. Thus, there is a possibility this ban could come overseas as well. But since there isn’t precedence for this exact type of situation, no one can really predict an outcome for sure. We’ll just have to see!