What is better then the best card in the format? The best ability!
It is time to reach for the sun with this week’s featured card. It is burning bright but it isn’t a fire type. It is so hot that you won’t believe how great this card can be. That is all because this card can do the best thing in the game. Imagine being able to get away with anything no matter the situation. Just go ahead and run away! You have a problem? Just blow it up! This card can do it! You will have no worries when you play this card and roar loudly about it. Your opponent will be shivering with fear as you heat thing up with this metal beast. That is because this week we are talking about Solgaleo GX! The Pokemon with the best ability in the game!
Solgaleo GX is a Stage 2 Metal Pokemon with 250 HP! It has a weakness to Fire types but resistance to Psychic types. This card has a three energy retreat cost. If you want to attack with Solgaleo GX then you can use Sunsteel Strike that cost two Metal energy and a colorless. When you use this attack then Solgaleo GX will do 230 damage at the cost of discarding all energy attached to it. As a GX Attack, Solgaleo GX can use Sol Burst GX to grab any five energy cards from your deck and attach them to any of your Pokemon. But the best part about Solgaleo GX is that it has the ability Ultra Road! This ability allows you to swap out your active Pokemon with one on your bench!
The Pros
What makes Solgaleo GX so great? It is the fact that you have the best card in the game as an ability! Ultra Road allows you to swap out your active Pokemon with any Pokemon on your bench whenever you want once per turn! That is an amazing ability because you never have to worry about somebody using Lysandre to stall the game. What if you need to change your main attacker? Simply use Solgaleo GX’s Ultra Road to put in the new attacker! It is that easy! You don’t have to use a Tool to get your Pokemon out of the active. Simply just use Solgaleo GX to move your Pokemon however you want. Do you want to double retreat? Play two Solgaleo GX so you can use Ultra Road twice! Only play one Solgaleo GX? Put Solgaleo GX in the active by using Ultra Road. Attach a Float Stone to Solgaleo GX and retreat! Then use Switch to put in a new Pokemon! That is the sound of you retreat three times!
I suppose you do have an okay GX Attack that allows you to pull energy from your deck and attach them however you want. Sol Burst GX is pretty cool because it gives you access to energy acceleration for a single Metal Energy. Depending on your Pokemon, you can at least get two Pokemon set up with a single Sol Burst GX. That is pretty okay.
There is also Solgaleo GX’s Sunsteel Strike that does 230 damage. That is a huge number that can knock out almost anything in the game. Especially since it works well with Sol Burst GX because you can attach two of the energy from it to fuel up Solgaleo GX’s Sunsteal Strike. So there is that.
But we all know that the really good stuff is Solgaleo GX’s Ultra Road ability which is basically…SWITCH AS AN ABILITY!!!!!
The Cons
The main bad thing about Solgaleo GX is that you can only use Ultra Road once per turn. So if you use Ultra Road to put the wrong Pokemon into the active then there is no way out. That is unless you play another Solgaleo GX or Switch or Float Stone. So make that Ultra Road count!
Also, I guess with the popularity of Volcanion EX could make it too hot for a Steel type like Solgaleo GX to stay around. Those Fire Volcanion EX deck can blast through any Solgaleo GX like a hot knife through butter.
Ability lock could be a bad thing too because that means you can’t use Ultra Road to retreat. So make sure you try to avoid that happening.
Lastly, Solgaleo GX is a Stage 2 so you need to find a way to get this card out quickly if you want to use Ultra Road aka THE BEST ABILITY IN THE GAME.
How To Play It
You will need to get Solgaleo GX out as soon as possible. That means getting this big lion out has to be a priority for your deck. The best way to do this is by having your Cosmog go right into Solgaleo GX by using Rare Candy. It may sound like a daunting task to have both Rare Candy and Solgaleo GX in your hand to do this but it is possible. Just make sure you have a Cosmog on your bench at the end of your first turn. You will need to play at least three Rare Candy and a full count of Ultra Ball but it can be done. If not, then at least make sure to have a few Cosmoem so you can evolve up into Solgaleo GX the slow way. If you are playing a few Level Ball then you can guarantee to get Cosmog and Cosmoem out for free.
Once you have Solgaleo GX out then you have a Switch on your board that is ready to use at anytime of the game. Though, there are a few other things that Solgaleo GX is useful for.
Solgaleo GX is a priority when you are playing it in your deck because once it is up then you can use Ultra Road to put Solgaleo GX into the active and use Sol Burst GX. This attack allows you to take out up to five energy from your deck and attach them to your Pokemon however you want. You can put four Double Colorless energy on one Pokemon or spread the energy around. Maybe set up a few of your benched Pokemon and your active Solgaleo GX. Maybe you can set up two Solgaleo GX. Your possibilities are almost endless when you have five energy that can be attached to any Pokemon on your board.
One additional benefit to using Sol Burst GX to grab five energy from your deck is the thinning effect. Your deck will have five less cards in it which means you will have a higher chance to get cards that you may need. That is pretty awesome if you are wanting to top deck a Lysandre to pull one of your opponent’s benched Pokemon into the active.
You may be asking about who do you attach all this energy to from Sol Burst GX? There are a few likely targets. The first one can be Solgaleo GX.
Why Solgaleo GX? So you can use Sunsteel Strike to get rid of one of your opponent’s Pokemon. Sunsteel Strike does 230 damage so not many Pokemon can live after getting hit by that. Your opponent will have a Pokemon that has gotten set up or getting set up. Imagine simply getting rid of that problem with a simple attack. Just attach two Metal energy on to Solgaleo GX by using Sol Burst GX. After that, you can just blow it up by using Sunsteel Strike to get rid of the problem.
Is 230 damage not enough to take something out? Then go ahead and use that Professor Kukui to do 250 damage. That is enough to knock out your opponent’s Solgaleo GX or Decidueye GX. You will find out that Solgaleo GX is just a huge delete button for all of your worries.
So who else can you attach energy to from Sol Burst GX? The most popular seems to be Lurantis GX which only needs three energy and can hit for 120 with Solar Blade. Though you may only need to attach just one Grass energy to best help out Solgaleo GX thanks to Flower Supply.
Let say you did a huge Sunsteel Strike to knock something out but have no more energy except for the one Grass energy on Lurantis GX. You can simply just use Flower Supply to pull two energy from the discard on to Solgaleo GX. That way you can have another Sunsteel Strike ready to go next turn. Also, Lurantis GX has a great second attack with Solar Blade doing 120. You can two-hit-KO almost anything and hear Lurantis GX at the same time.
Solgaleo GX has been seen in a few other decks like M Mewtwo EX and Primarina GX due to it’s Sol Burst GX attack. You can flood the bench with energy that M Mewtwo EX and Primarina GX can both use. Solgaleo GX has a strong set up attack that can help any energy get a jump start.
Do you want to hear a cool trick? If you attach a Rainbow Energy by using Sol Burst GX then that Pokemon won’t take damage from the attachment. That is because Rainbow Energy only does damage when it is being attached from the hand. You got to love those loopholes!
Do you want to hear another cool trick? Play Solgaleo GX with Magearna EX. You can attach three energy to Magearna EX to use Soul Blaster to hit 120. You can then use Ultra Road to swap in another Pokemon who has a Float Stone attached. This will allow you to retreat into Magearna EX to fire off another Soul Blaster for 120 damage. Do you want to sweeten the pot? You will most likely be playing Metal energy which means that Magearna EX will be providing protection to all your Pokemon holding a Metal energy thanks to it’s Mystic Heart ability.
You can have a strong card in the form of Solgaleo GX. It can be splashed into anything that is willing to play a few Metal energy. It is a strong Pokemon that has an awesome ability in the form of a built-in Switch. It can set up the board quickly then be used to eliminate anything on the field. Solgaleo GX is so strong that no bag can contain it. So go ahead and give this card a ride on the ultra road!
