Its Artisan form Pokédex entry from Pokémon Scarlet reads, "It sprinkles some of its powdery body onto food and drains the life-force from those who so much as lick it."
I'm going to take that as a yes.
It's not an act.
I was and am disappointed.
It's fine that they power stuff down, but it does hurt the game if the star deck introduced in a set can't compete with any of the previous decks that already exist in the format (see: Coalossal VMAX). That creates and perpetuates a stale...