The Ultra Beasts have finally received GX treatment in the TCG and today I am going to go through each of the different GXs with an evaluation of how good the card is and a rating out of 5. Bear in mind we don’t know whether there is going to be any additional support in the future for Ultra Beasts, there is currently no reason for them to have been treated any differently to the current GXs we have in the game but I would be incredibly surprised if the Ultra Beast tag they have been given isn’t somewhat important by the time Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon are released in Japan.
Crimson Invasion
Nihilego-GX 3*
The first of the Ultra Beast GXs, Nihilego-GX is a pretty good start. 180 HP is pretty average nowadays and Psychic Weakness isn’t great unfortunately but these are two of the worst parts of the card on the whole. Nihilego’s Ability, Nihilistic Light, lets you inflict both Poison and Confusion to both players Active Pokemon when played onto the Bench. This may seem relatively insignificant but these “both player” effects often favour the player playing the card more so than the Opponent as you get to choose when the effect is triggered by placing the card onto the Bench. This can combo well with decks that have multiple retreating options in order to receive no downside from the Status effects whilst doing an extra 10 damage at the end of the turn. This can lead to a KO where normally you may not have enough damage overall. This can also combo incredibly well with Darkrai-GX’s Dead End GX attack that takes an automatic KO on the Active Pokemon if they are affected by a Special Condition. This is currently one of the best ways to combo Darkrai-GX’s GX attack and will likely be played in Darkrai archetypes from now on. Unfortunately, Nihilego’s non-GX attack is relatively weak. Lock Up for 3 Psychic energy deals 120 damage and stops the Opponent’s Active Pokemon from retreating next turn. This combos really well with the Ability if you are running multiple Nihilegos but with Guzma and Acerola both in the format now, this effect is overall quite underwhelming. Finally, Symbiont-GX, again for 3 Psychic energy, adds the top 2 cards from your Opponent’s deck to their Prize cards. Again this may seem relatively underwhelming from the offset as this does nothing to progress your own board state overall but comboing this GX attack with a well-timed N can be absolutely devastating as your opponent will receive the punishment of taking many prizes whilst also being pushed back in terms of game state forcing them to take another 2 Prizes. This can sometimes give you enough turns to close out the game yourself as well. However unfortunately due to the heavy cost of the attacks, I think Nihilego is best served in Darkrai based decks for now in order to easily clean up the last two prizes of the game in combination with Dead End GX.
Buzzwole-GX 4*
Buzzwole-GX is incredibly reminiscent of Landorus-EX from Boundaries Crossed which is personally one of my favourite cards ever printed. He boasts a healthy 190HP which is a very good number to have but does unfortunately have a Weakness to Psychic which is pretty detrimental. However, where this card shines is its attacks. Buzzwole’s first attack, Jet Punch, is a complete remaster of Hammerhead from Landorus-EX, dealing 30 damage to the active Pokemon as well as one of your Opponent’s Benched Pokemon. This may not seem like much in an age of EX/GX Pokemon but this can quickly mount up with the support of Choice Band, Strong Energy and Regirock-EX. This can lead to being able to sufficiently 2-Shot EX/GXs whilst also setting up future KOs on the Bench. However, where this really shines is when setting up Devolution style attacks such as Miraculous Shine from Espeon-EX. By being able to apply pressure all across the board, you can easily set up multiple KOs across 2-3 turns by just doing enough damage to KO the lower forms of many Pokemon (including things like Gardevoir, Metagross and Vikavolt). This is easily one of the best devolve packages we have in standard right now and will seriously test evolution decks. Buzzwole’s second attack Knuckle Impact does a huge 160 damage for 3 Fighting energy, and prevents Buzzwole from attacking next turn. This is a massive amount of damage for the energy cost and can easily ramp into 1-shot range again with all of the damage boosters mentioned above. We have also seen that these types of attacks that prevent the user from attacking are relatively detriment free as well with the inclusion of cards like Guzma being heavily played in decks already. Unfortunately, Buzzwole’s GX attack, Absorption GX is relatively antisynergistic on the whole, dealing 40 damage times the number of prizes you have remaining. Whilst this is a huge amount of damage, and will easily be the favoured attack to get a KO at some point in the game in order to Knuckle Impact on the following turn, this is an attack that loses value the longer the game goes on and hence it is unlikely to ever be the first attack of the game doing 240 damage as a base. However, this is no big issue as the Fighting damage support we have in the format means this rarely needs to be doing maximum damage to be able to wipe out the opposing Active Pokemon. Buzzwole is undoubtedly one of my favourite GXs released so far and I can’t wait to build a deck around this guy being able to devolve evolution decks and take crazy KOs on non-evolution decks.
Guzzlord-GX 2*
Guzzlord-GX is definitely one of the funniest GXs we’ve seen so far and I think is only just slightly under the level of playability right now. 210 HP is a huge amount for a Basic Pokemon and means that Guzzlord can definitely tank 1 or 2 hits before giving up prizes. This is incredibly useful as 2 of its attacks cost a whopping 5 energy in order to use them. However, Guzzlord’s first attack, Eat Sloppily, can help with energy acceleration, discarding the top 5 cards of the deck and attaching any energy you find there to Guzzlord. This is brilliant in a pre-release style event but unfortunately most decks run more than just energy and hence the likelihood of discarding important trainer cards instead of energy is much more likely. If you are able to get 5 Energy onto Guzzlord however, his Tyrannical Hole attack does 180 damage with no further drawbacks which is a huge amount of damage that can easily take KOs on many GXs especially when paired with a Choice Band. Finally, Glutton GX only does 100 damage but lets you take 2 extra prizes if any Pokemon is KO’d by the attack. Of course the dream here is to take 4 prizes on an EX/GX knockout but even just taking a non-EX/GX knockout can be game swinging. Unfortunately, the 5 energy requirement for Guzzlord is a huge ask and hence the only way I see this ever seeing play is in a Turbo Dark style deck that runs Max Elixir and EXP. Share and just has Guzzlord setting up on the bench whilst Yveltal and Darkrai-EX take early game prizes. However as much as it would please me to say Glutton-GX for game at some point in its career I don’t think it is too likely Guzzlord will make much of an impact on the format on the whole.
Kartana-GX 3*
Kartana-GX boasts an incredibly ability, Cut Down, letting you discard a Special energy from your opponent’s board when played onto the bench. This can be from the Active or Bench making it super versatile and is a searchable disruption card with Ultra Ball which is an added bonus. Energy disruption effects have always been incredibly strong and being able to search this effect out whilst not using your Supporter card for the turn is huge. Kartana’s non-GX attack Gale Cut may only deal 70 damage for 3 Energy but gives you the option to shuffle Kartana and all cards attached back into the deck. This is like a strafe style attack but with added safety as you don’t have to worry about Guzma bringing Kartana back up. However, this does mean you have to fully set up another Kartana-GX each turn in order to loop this attack like Strafe style decks do. Finally, Kartana’s GX attack, Blade GX, simply states take a prize. This is a super simple effect but since it only costs 1 Energy, can completely take the opponent by surprise, especially if they have decided to feed you a non-EX/GX in order to try and skew the prize trade. I think the strongest part of the card is undoubtedly the ability since the 170 HP and Fire weakness are relatively standard/underwhelming overall. However, having the option for searchable, non-supporter based energy denial is really strong and will indeed justify its place in not only heavy disruption decks but also maybe even current archetypes as well in order to provide an edge in a format that is currently full of Double Colourless Energy based attackers.
UB Premium Collection
Pheromosa-GX 2*
Pheromosa-GX unfortunately doesn’t have the most competitive stats in the game, only having 170HP and being weak to Fire. These are both relatively poor at the moment with Volcano being very popular and most decks being able to hit around 180 with relative ease. On the plus side, Pheromosa is a pretty cheap attacker overall. For 1 Grass energy, Pheromosa can use Fast Raid, the attack from Latios-EX. This means that Pheromosa can actually win the game before the Opponent draws a card which is pretty incredible. However, there aren’t too many Pokemon with Grass weakness at the moment (other than Froakie) meaning that until Grass is a relevant type on lower evolutions, Fast Raid may not be taking too many quick games from the Opponent. Having the ability to attack early is still quite strong though and may mean you are able to push for a KO a turn earlier than usual. Pheromosa’s second attack Cruel Spike deals 60 damage for 2 Grass energy and confuses the Opponent’s active Pokemon. Confusion can be annoying to deal with but the attack does slightly too little damage for the cost to justify using in my opinion. Finally, Beauty GX does 50 damage times the number of Prizes the opponent has taken again for just 2 Grass energy. This is the best attack in my opinion on the card and can easily finish the game up for relatively little cost. This could be why the card sees play but unfortunately one of the only decks that currently runs Grass energy is Vikabulu which definitely has the ability to 1-Shot anyway so Pheromosa-GX seems to fall slightly short of the competitive mark overall.
Xurkitree-GX 3*
Xurkitree-GX is very reminiscent of Aegislash-EX from Phantom Forces, which was a very popular card when in Rotation. Xurkitree has the Flash Head ability, preventing it from being damaged by Pokemon with any Special energy attached to them. This is actually a really useful Ability to have in the current format as Special Energy (such as Double Colourless and Rainbow Energy) is very popular in top tier archetypes such as Gardevoir and Garbodor variants. This is an additional level of annoyance for these decks to deal with and will certainly prove to be annoying in situations, giving Xurkitree an extra turn to attack. For 2 Lightning and a Colourless Energy, Rumble Wire deals 100 damage and discards the top card from the Opponent’s deck. This isn’t the most cost efficient attack but the Discard mechanic can be annoying in a format without too much recovery. VS seeker has gone and now resources are all the more valuable and therefore this effect may be more premium than before. Finally, Lightning GX forces your opponent to reveal their hand and gives you the option to add one of the cards there to their Prize Cards. This may not be too influential if they have a large hand size or access to multiple Supporter outs but when the opponent has just been N’d to a low hand size, this can lock them out of the game for enough turns for you to finish the game yourself. This also gives good knowledge of what resources they have left as this leaves only the deck as private knowledge. An incredibly strong but difficult to pull off combination is using the Shining Legends Marshadow to shuffle both players' hands down to 4 cards, followed by a Delinquent and then Lightning GX to leave the opponent with a 0 card hand potentially from turn 1. This is a difficult combination to pull off but can be devastating and forces the opponent into a top deck mode in order to continue playing the game if done early enough.
Celesteela-GX 2*
Celesteela-GX looked to be the GX that would counter Gardevoir-GX from its tight grip over the Standard format right now but unfortunately it doesn’t quite have enough power on its own seemingly to be able to change too much about the format. 200HP is a great start and a weakness that isn’t fire is also a bonus for a Metal type. Rocket Fall is Celesteela’s first attack for a Metal and Double colourless Energy. This deals 30 damage plus 30 more for each energy in the Opponents Active’s retreat cost. Unfortunately, Gardevoir only has a 2 retreat Cost meaning a Choice Band is required for a 1-Shot knockout. This may on the surface seem fine but overall but the 3 Energy commitment that Celesteela requires to get this KO can easily be abused by Gardevoir players buy responding with either 4 energy of their own or 3 Energy and a Choice Band. This is not an overly huge task for Gardevoir to establish and therefore means the card isn’t even a particularly good Gardevoir-GX counter. Moon Press does 130 damage for 4 Energy which does indeed get a KO without a Choice Band on a Gardevoir but again is easily responded with the extra attachment required. However, it is worth noting that with Choice Band and Kukui you are hitting 180 damage which is a relatively important number to be able to hit for KOing some key EX/GXs within the format. Finally, Celesteela’s GX attack, Blaster GX deals 180 damage and lets you turn over all of your face down prize cards for the rest of the game for 4 energy also. This is great if combined with a KO as you are able to pick exactly which Prizes you take for this knockout. However, the 4 Energy requirement means that a lot of set up has to go into the GX attack in order to get the maximum benefit of taking a look at all 6 prize cards. I think despite the inefficient attack costs on Celesteela-GX, the card may see some fringe play in Metal decks in the future in order to have multiple Weaknesses to avoid being run through by Fire decks as well as having a huge 200HP to deal with too. However unfortunately this isn’t the Gardevoir-GX counter many players wanted it to be when the card was announced.
Thank you for reading my analysis on the Ultra Beasts coming out, make sure you check out Omnipoke for all the latest Crimson Invasion decks ready for the London International Championships! - Jack
