It is time to get wet and wild with a new card!
The forecast for the Pokemon TCG looks to be pretty stormy as a new wave of cards will be entering the game. Guardians Rising will bring plenty of new rising threats and one of those is in the form of Water Pokemon. These types of Pokemon have a few new tricks that will be coming above the surface that will give them quite a boost. It could even patch up some much needed things in the game to make Water Pokemon quite strong adversaries. That is why we will be looking at a card that has a nice and bubbly beat. It can make a sea of fans roar as it enters the battlefield. Though maybe that battlefield will become a stage when this week’s featured card gets ready to preform. This week on TCG Jump we will be featuring Primarina GX!
Primarina GX is a Stage 2 GX Pokemon that is a Water type Pokemon. It has 250 HP, was first release in Sun & Moon, and has three attacks. The first attack cost two energy and is called Bubble Beat. This attack does a base 10 damage plus 20 more damage for each Water energy attached to your Pokemon. Primarina GX’s second attack is called Roaring Seas which cost three Water energy and one more to do 120 damage. This attack also has the additional effect of discarding an energy from your opponent’s active Pokemon. Primarina GX’s last attack is called Grand Echo GX which heals all damage from your Pokemon for two energy. This card has a weakness to Grass type Pokemon and needs two energy to retreat.
The Pros
A Stage 2 Pokemon? This is surely a surprise but there is a reason why we are featuring it and that is Guardians Rising. Primarina GX has plenty of potential thanks to a few cards that will be release in this set. We will be talking about these cards later on but lets focus on the main draw of Primarina GX which is Bubble Beat.
The Bubble Beat attack may sound familiar and that is because it is the same as Dark Pulse but with Water energy. Well, not exactly because the base damage is 10 but it will still hurt when you flood the field with Water energy. There are and will be so many ways to flood the field with Water energy. It won’t be too hard to get five Water energy on the field if you play your cards right. The best part is that Bubble Beat takes two energy to use which means it is easy to use. You can use a Double Colorless Energy but if you want more bang for your beat then take the time to put two Water energy on Primarina GX as you evolve it up.
Another pro that Primarina GX has is that bulky HP. This card has 250 HP which makes it one of the Pokemon with the highest HP in the game. Solgaleo GX can’t knock it out with it’s Sunsteel Strike and Darkrai EX will need a lot of energy on the field to take a clean knockout. Three Feather Arrow and a Leaf Blade from Decidueye GX will not be enough to bring down Primarina GX. That is the kind of bulk that Primarina GX has.
The best part is that you can maintain that HP by using Rough Seas. You can heal 30 damage a turn to force your opponent to play to hit funny numbers in order to take down a Primarina GX. That will surely annoy your opponent.
The Cons
Let get the biggest con out of the way first which is that fact that Primarina GX is a Stage 2. Your opponent has at least one or two turns to get rid of any Popplio that can evolve into the bulky Primarina GX. They could even put some splash damage to help weaken it to make Primarina GX easier to knock out later. It isn’t pretty when that happens and forces you to evolve your Popplio into Primarina GX as quick as you can.
The other con for Primarina GX is that weakness to Grass. Currently Decidueye GX is popular and it can hit Primarina GX for a lot of damage. You can live it’s Leaf Blade attack but it will not be fun as your 250 HP Primarina GX now has only 70 HP left. You will need to have a lot of Water energy on the field in order to take a strong knockout on Decidueye GX.
Lastly, Primarina GX has two pretty useless attacks outside of Bubble Beat. You could use Roaring Seas but most of the time you will be hitting harder with Bubble Beat and discarding an energy may not be worth the four energy cost. Grand Echo EX isn’t bad as a late game attack. It could prevent your opponent from using Lysandre to pull up a previously damage Pokemon to take a knockout but there are just better GX attacks that could be used to promote your board state.
How to Use It
Lets talk about how to get Primarina GX out on the field. You will want to use four Rare Candy to do this. That way you can quickly get your Popplio into Primarina GX in two turns. If you are going to play a Stage 2 deck then make getting your Stage 2 out a priority.
These Stage 2 GX Pokemon are pretty impressive and Primarina GX is no exception. That is why you want to play four Rare Candy to skip that middle evolution and go straight into the star of the show. If you go this way then you do not need to worry about Popplio getting easily KO. A smart opponent will see the Popplio and know what is going on. They will try to knock it out as fast as possible so make them rush and punish them if they do not. If they do not then you will have a massive 250 HP Pokemon on the field.
Now that we have a way to get Primarina GX out, lets talk about how to get the Water energy out. In the current meta, we have a few ways to flood the field with Water energy. There is the fast way and the fast way.
The first way that I will mention is using four Max Elixir and plenty of Water energy. You will use Max Elixir to pull Water energy onto the field and to a benched Basic Pokemon. There could be a few Water type Pokemon that wouldn’t mind holding some Water energy like Lapras GX. It has a respectable amount of HP for a Basic GX Pokemon and can hit hard with it’s own attacks.
Lapras GX is a strong backup attack for Primarina GX that wouldn’t mind holding three Water energy. It also has the useful Collect attack which allows you to draw three cards in case you ever end up starting with it. This could help you draw into any Rare Candy or Dive Ball to get Primarina GX out during your next turn.
The second way to get Water energy on the field is by using Solgaleo GX’s Sol Burst GX. This is the nuclear option that gets you plenty of energy out, thins out your deck and just straight out allows you to blow things up.
The focus with this strategy is to get Solgaleo GX out as fast as possible. You will rush to get one set up with a Rainbow Energy and use Ultra Road to get Solgaleo GX into the active to use Sol Burst GX. The floodgates will open up and allow you to put tons of Water and Rainbow Energy on the field. You can put two Water energy on to Popplio so it can evolve into Primarina GX next turn to use a potential seven energy fueled Bubble Beat. That is 150 damage thanks to a simple set up attack. Lapras GX can also be played in this list as a secondary attack or simply to hold Water energy. Either way, Solgaleo GX will be here to act as a way to flood the bench with Water energy, free retreat thanks to Ultra Road or blow things up by using Sunsteel Strike. If you are going to use four Rare Candy then might as well use them on another powerful Stage 2 GX Pokemon.
If we look into the future where Guardians Rising has flooded the game then we can use the new Item card, Aqua Patch. This item allows you to take Water energy from your discard and attack it to your Benched Pokemon. This will give Primarina GX even more water power to attack with Bubble Beat. There will be no worries about discard Water energy or having a Pokemon getting knocked out with Aqua Patch there to help you recover your energy.
By now you may be asking, what do you do when you do face a Grass deck? There are a few options. The first one is to play Weakness Policy. This Tool allows you to remove Primarina GX’s Grass weakness. This will allow you to potentially two hit KO some Grass Pokemon with Bubble Beat. Maybe you can use Lapras GX’s Ice Beam GX to freeze your opponent and then take the knockout during your next turn by using Primarina GX. It is an option but the game goes more in your favor once you can remove that pesky Grass weakness.
Primarina GX is primed to rise as the tide comes. The metagame may become it’s new stage to preform on thanks to new ways for Water type Pokemon to flood the scene. It may have a rough match up against Grass type Pokemon but it can put on a show. If you are interested in a great show then give Primarina GX a try!
