Hi there. In this Pokemon TCG post I cover the Ponyta and Rapidash cards from Hot Wind Arena as well as the Mega Pokemon ex reveals from Pokemon day on February 27, 2025. These Mega Pokemon are Mega Lucario ex and Mega Gardevoir ex.
Ponyta
Ponyta is a 70 HP Basic Fire Pokemon with one retreat cost and Water weakness. The attack costs one Colourless Energy. Flip two coins for the attack. For each Heads the attack does 10 damage each.
Rapidash
Rapidash is the evolved form of Ponyta. This one has 110 HP, one retreat cost and Water weakness. The attack of Fire Mane is a generic looking attack that costs one Fire Energy and one Colourless Energy to do 60 damage.
The ability on Rapdiash is called Hurried Gait. Once during your turn you draw one card. Pretty simple. There is a card from Pokemon 151 with a similar ability. It is Dodrio.
Dodrio allows you once during your turn to draw 1 card. The drawback is taking 10 damage. The attack on Dodrio is nice though as the power of the attack increases as there is more damage on it. In the modern competitive metagame, Dodrio is not used much. The popularity and threat of Dragapult ex is too high.
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Back to Rapidash. I think the draw ability is not good right now as we have Dudunsparce when the Journey Together set and post rotation occurs. Maybe in a year Rapdiash may be the go to card for drawing cards.
Rapidash has an illustraton rare version card. Here it is.
Mega Lucario ex
It was rumoured about Mega Pokemon coming back in the TCG after a long time. Here it is. (I was not around playing the Pokemon TCG 10 years ago.)
It appears that you can evolve from Riolu which is a single prize Basic Pokemon right into Mega Lucario ex. You don't need to evolve from Lucario into Mega Lucario ex. The downside is that if your Mega Evolution Pokemon ex card is knocked out then your opponent takes 3 Prize Cards out of 6. (Yellow box bottom right) The Mega Pokemon have a lot of HP but they give more Prize Cards when they are Knocked Out. When these release you have to be very mindful of prize mapping and Prize trades. One strategy would be to go for a 2-2-3 prize map where you make your opponent knock out two Pokemon ex attackers then have the Mega Evolution as the ace Pokemon.
The first attack of Mega Lucario ex is Aura Jab for 1 Fighting Energy. It does 130 damage with Fighting acceleration of 3 Fighting Energy cards from discard pile to your Benched Pokemon in any way you like. This is very similar to Garchomp ex from Paradox Rift. Garchomp ex is a Stage 2 Pokemon while Mega Lucario ex is a Stage 1 Pokemon.
Mega Brave is the second attack. For 2 Fighting Energy Mega Lucario ex does 270 damage. The drawback is that you cannot use Mega Brave (unless you switch it to the Bench and come back to the Active Spot.)
Mega Gardevoir ex
I guess Gardevoir is popular. Here is another Gardevoir ex card. This one is Mega Gardevoir ex. It is the evolved form of Kirlia. This Mega Pokemon has 360 HP, two retreat cost and Dark weakness.
The first attack of Overflowing Wishes requires one Psychic Energy. It does zero damage but it accelerates 1 Psychic Energy from your deck to each of your Benched Pokemon. (Then shuffle your deck.)
Mega Gardevoir ex's second attack is Mega Symphonia. It does 50 damage for each Psychic Energy attached to all of your Pokemon. Having 7 Psychic Energy in play deals 350 damage which is big. Eight Psychic Energy would deal 400 damage.
Premium Power Pro
Premium Power Pro is an attack boosting Item card for Fighting Pokemon. This Item card is quite powerful as Fighting Pokemon deal 30 more damage to the opponent's Active Pokemon.
In the Prismatic Evolution format we do have Kieran and Black Belt's Training for adding more damage to the opponent's Active Pokemon ex (or V if Kieran is used). Dealing 30 more damage for Fighting Pokemon to any opponent's Pokemon on an Item card is kind of busted. Maybe because this card is compensation for bad Fighting Pokemon support for the last year or two. (Koraidon ex was unsuccessful in the competitive metagame.)
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Closing Notes
The Rapidash art card is okay. It is not awful but it is not too crazy for me. The art style is not for me. Some other people will find that Rapidash card to be elegant and pretty.
Mega Lucario ex looks like a very good attacker that will bring Fighting types to the spotlight. For a big part of the Scarlet & Violet era Fighting Pokemon were not really popular. The one exception is Klawf with Terapagos ex.
Premium Power Pro is a broken item card that adds more damage for Fighting Pokemon.
Mega Gardevoir ex can deal big damage if there is a lot of Psychic Energy in play.
I have mixed thoughts on these Mega Pokemon ex. They are powerful but at the same time they are vulnerable. In the Scarlet & Violet format we have Gholdengo ex, Roaring Moon ex and Raging Bolt ex available that can in theory deal one hit knockouts. Gholdengo ex is popular right now in the Prismatic Evolutions format while Raging Bolt takes a break and Roaring Moon ex decks are not seen too much.
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If Mega Evolution Pokemon are popular then you can see an increase in one hit knockout decks as a counter to knockout the Mega Pokemon for 3 Prizes. The one hit knockout Pokemon like Raging Bolt ex, Roaring Moon ex and Gholdengo will be around until they are out of rotation.
A card that is underrated right now is Salvatore. With Salvatore you can quickly bypass the one turn wait for a Basic Pokemon to evolve into a non-ability Stage 1 Pokemon.
In theory you can use Salvatore with a Riolu and go right into Mega Lucario ex. For the Mega Gardevoir ex you can go from manually evolve from Ralts to Kirlia then use Salvatore into Mega Gardevoir ex. The ACE SPEC stadium card Great Tree can be good to go from Ralts to Kirlia to Mega Gardevoir ex.
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