Light in the Dark — the Darkness Ablaze Guide

With the English set list live here on PokeBeach, I now have the means to do my usual set review! This article will be a primer of all the best cards—contrasting their value in both formats. As did the last time, I will be dedicating a paragraph or so to my thoughts on the card itself, then asking “Will it be in meta decks?“, then concluding the section for each card.  I hope you enjoy, this set looks good!

Grass

Like with nearly every format in the Pokemon TCG, Decidueye is set to inherit the role of Hoopa, Suicune, and the like of the past. Currently in Standard there isn’t a good way to get around damage blocking from both Pokemon V and Pokemon-GX. Split Arrow is just the kind of attack that a card like this can abuse to keep potential threats from coming up as well, spread damage to the Bench can stop a Basic Pokemon from evolving into a non-GX/V Pokemon that can one-shot Decidueye and its 140 HP. For anyone wondering, I had to check myself, Pokemon VMAX are still Pokemon V, so Decidueye works against them too!

Will Decidueye be in meta decks?

In Standard there is a very good chance that a new stall deck could arise with Decidueye at the forefront, or it could see play as an attacking deck just on its own. Stuff like Baby Blacephalon will be a huge problem at first, but you could play something janky like Alolan Persian-GX alongside it to prevent that. Expanded won’t be welcoming, there are also still Pokemon-EX to deal with, which the Ability doesn’t do.

Golisopod always seems to get high-value cards, this one is no different with an attack that punishes decks that play down a lot of Pokemon V and Pokemon-GX. For a Twin Energy, you can deal up to 370 damage as a single Prize Pokemon, that’s insane (but also unlikely.) In any case, this is just a powerful card in the current Standard with most decks playing multiple Pokemon that add to its damage output.

Will Golisopod be in meta decks?

In Standard, almost certainly, this card strikes me as very playable and potentially powerful. It’s difficult to play around because most decks are compiled of all Pokemon V and Pokemon-GX, there are few non-GX/V Pokemon in the metagame right now, aside from Spiritomb and Blacephalon. Expanded probably won’t work amazingly well for Golisopod, the format favors Basic Pokemon, and Pokemon-EX don’t add to its output.

Fire

This concludes the public portion of this article.

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