The new Ho-Oh EX Card from the "Pokemon" Trading Card Game (TCG) "Rage of the Broken Sky" has been revealed with its English translation and some players explained their thoughts about its playability.
The official Japanese Pokemon company wrote on Twitter the ability and attack along with the photo of the new Ho-Oh EX card from the "Pokemon" TCG "Rage of the Broken Sky" card expansion. Ho-Oh EX's type is colorless and it has 180HP, which is different from the 160HP fire type Ho-Oh EX card from the "Dragons Exalted" set.
The card posted on the social media platform was in Japanese and Bangiras and Jake C. provided the English translation of the card. According to Pokebeach, Ho-Oh EX's ability is called Cleansing Flame, which allows Ho-Oh to heal itself 50HP before attacking once during its player's turn. However, the ability can only be used if Ho-Oh EX has any basic fire [R] energy card attached to it.
Ho-Oh EX's attack is called Elemental Feather. With a grass [G], water [W], and lightning [L] energy attached to Ho-Oh EX, it can deal a massive 130 damage to the defending Pokemon, in addition to a bonus 30 damage to one of the opponent's benched Pokemon. Weakness and resistance will not apply to the benched Pokemon.
In contrary to other colorless flying type Pokemon in the trading card game, Ho-Oh EX from the "Rage of the Broken Sky" has a water weakness, which can divert a colorless deck's weakness to lightning types. It also gives benefits to its player with its fighting resistance; however, it has two energy retreat cost.
"Pokemon" TCG players expressed mixed reactions on the release of the new Ho-Oh EX in the metagame. One netizen tweeted that new mechanics in the upcoming expansion may help boost the card's playability in the current meta.
A forum member Crimzonlogic said that Ho-Oh EX was another gorgeous card of the Pokemon she loved, expressing her interest to collect the cards from the set and the possibility of a Ho-Oh EX full art card.
Another netizen said that while he loved the card, the decks Ho-Oh EX would be used in would probably be hard to make with the four energy types it needed in one deck. He added that a dragon type deck could include Ho-Oh EX. While the double dragon energy card sounds interesting, it cannot be attached to a non-dragon type Pokemon card.
Along with Ho-Oh EX, "Rage of the Broken Sky" will contain 79 other cards, excluding secret rares. According to Pokecollector, some of the notable cards include Gyarados EX, Mega Gyarados EX, Manaphy EX, Greninja BREAK, Zebstrika, Aegislash, Raticate BREAK, Max Elixir, Burst Balloon, Fighting Spirit Belt, and Splash Energy (Special Water Energy Card).
With the beautiful art of Ho-Oh EX, as remarked by most TCG players online, a secret rare Ho-Oh EX card is not far from happening.
"Rage of the Broken Sky" stands as Japans "XY9" set. The upcoming set will be released in Japan on Dec. 11 while its release in the United States, reportedly, in February 2016. Meanwhile, the release date of the three "Battle Strengthening Sets" is on Dec. 26.