Ribbon Badge – Evolving Skies
Date Reviewed: September 26, 2021
Ratings Summary:
Standard: 3.00
Expanded: 3.00
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is horrible. 3 is average. 5 is great.
Reviews Below:
Otaku
Ribbon Badge (SW – Evolving Skies 155/203) kicks of this week. Gee, I wonder what card we might be reviewing later this week? Ribbon Badge is a Trainer-Item, specifically a Tool. This means there’s no real cost to play except having a Pokémon with an open Tool slot to which you can attach it. Ribbon Badge’s effect narrows this down further; while you can attach it to anything, the effect states it only does anything for Pokémon V with “Sylveon” in their names. Currently, we only have one Sylveon V and Sylveon VMAX that qualifies, but it is possible we’ll receive different versions of these cards, or some bizarre variant. After all, when Pokémon-GX (the immediate predecessors of Pokémon V) first came out, who would have predicted TAG TEAM Pokémon like Gardevoir & Sylveon-GX?
As for what Ribbon Badge does for Sylveon V/Sylveon VMAX, should the equipped Pokémon be KO’d by damage from the attack of an opponent’s Pokémon, your opponent will take one fewer Prize cards. So your opponent will only get one Prize for KOing Sylveon V and two Prizes for KOing Sylveon VMAX; not bad, so long as it actually happens. My main concern is that this is the kind of Tool that doesn’t actually do anything until your opponent triggers it. Which means they can try to avoid triggering it, say by using Boss’s Orders to force something else into the Active position, or by discarding Ribbon Badge before KOing Sylveon V/VMAX via Tool Scrapper.
From what I can tell, Ribbon Badge is still a great play for Sylveon VMAX decks. Possibly for decks running just Sylveon V, should they exist. The same goes for any such decks that might show up in Expanded. Note that I have no knowledge of such decks, I’m just allowing for the possibility they could one day exist, or already do and I just don’t know about them. Still, while the effect is great, it only applies to two Pokémon and is very vulnerable to disruption (Tools being discarded or negated). So this card scores on the happy side of average, as opposed to how sick it would be if it had a broader application.
Ratings
- Standard: 3/5
- Expanded: 3/5
Vince
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