Pokémon TCG Pocket Weakens Pikachu ex, Boosts Mewtwo ex, And Adds Celebi ex as a Brand New Threat

Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket has received its first major card drop since launch with the Mythical Island Themed Booster, and the long-established meta has already been shaken up to push Mewtwo ex up, Pikachu ex down, and the new Celebi ex potentially above them both.

The Genetic Apex meta saw four decks stand above the rest. Pikachu ex was perhaps the best, followed or rivalled by Mewtwo ex. Charizard ex followed in third place, and Starmie ex in fourth. Of these, Mewtwo ex and Starmie ex have received a slight boost, while Pikachu ex seems to be the target of a meta shift as many new cards are poised to take it down.

Mythical Island is built around Mew, the mythical relative and predecessor of Mewtwo. It therefore includes many Psychic type cards, but it’s not the headliners like Mew ex itself that provide a bump but instead a new Item called Mythical Slab.

“Look at the top card of your deck. If that card is a Psychic Pokémon, put it into your hand,” reads the effect. “If it is not a Psychic Pokémon, put it on the bottom of your deck.”

Card draw effects are incredibly important in card games as they essentially reduce the random chance element and allow players to pull exactly which cards they need to execute winning combos. It’s the reason why every deck in the game runs Poké Ball and Professor Oak; they let players draw cards.

Mythical Slab is another card draw exclusive to Psychic types, so including it in a Mewtwo ex deck is practically an instant bump. It lets players dig through their deck quicker and pull the likes of Ralts, Kirlia, and Gardevoir to execute the deck’s best play, removing some of the random chance that’s perhaps the Mewtwo ex deck’s greatest flaw.

As for Starmie ex, a new Vaporeon variant threatens to make the infamous Misty card even more powerful. It allows the transfer of Water Energy between Pokémon, essentially meaning Misty coin flips of three or more are no longer wasted and can boost myriad Pokémon at once.

Charizard ex, being a Fire type deck that’s weak to Water, could see some reduced play as a result of this boost, but is otherwise largely unaffected by the Mythical Island expansion.

It’s Pikachu ex which seems to take the most hits, with several of the new cards seemingly designed with taking Pikachu ex down in mind. Pidgeot ex, for example, despite being weak to Electric Pokémon like Pikachu, has an ability that works directly against Pikachu ex’s.

A three Colorless Energy attack does 80 damage plus 20 more for each of its opponent’s Benched Pokémon. Unlike other meta leaders Pikachu ex relies on having a full Bench, as its attack does 30 damage times the number of Pokémon there.

Stacking the Bench against Pidgeot ex will only lead to disaster though, with Scattering Cyclone doing 140 damage in that instance, enough to take down Pikachu ex in one hit.

Another Colorless card can also take down Pikachu ex in one turn too. A new Tauros card is fairly simple, being a basic Pokémon with 100 HP and a single attack called Fighting Tackle. It does 40 damage for three Colorless Energy, unless its opponent is an ex Pokémon, in which case it does 120 damage.

This won’t take down Mewtwo ex in one hit, nor Charizard ex, nor Starmie ex, but is just enough to take down Pikachu ex in one hit. These Colorless cards likely won’t fit into the aforementioned meta decks but they will fit into the also popular anti-meta category, in which players build decks with the sole purpose of taking down the likes of Pikachu ex and Mewtwo ex.

Finally, what’s emerged as a potential new threat to the meta is Celebi ex. It can be combined with a new Serperior card that doubles the value of all Grass Energy, allowing Celebi ex to do up to 100 damage with just one energy, up to 200 with two, up to 300 with three, and so on.

Mythical Island just arrived yesterday, December 17, and the meta will no doubt continue to chop and change as time goes on and players discover new combos.

The main game arrived around six weeks earlier on October 30 and is a certified hit for Creatures Inc. and The Pokémon Company, having earned an estimated $200 million in its first month across more than 60 million downloads.

This huge amount of money comes as Pokémon TCG Pocket follows the standard mobile and free to play game model, flooding players with rewards in the first few days before soon drying up, with spending real world money the only real way to re-experience that early thrill outside of the occasional set drop like this.

Completing Genetic Apex, the first set of cards which totals 226 officially but also contains 60 rare alternate art cards, will take players not spending money around two years according to one estimate, while those looking to make it rain can wrap up the collection after dropping around $1,500.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.