Pokemon Card Game Legal Sets

The rotation of the 2022 standard format will officially come into effect on September 10, 2021. In the future, the legality of the card will be linked to the regulatory sign rather than the release of extensions. Starting with the Sword & Shield series, cards have a letter at the bottom of the card (the rule character) indicating whether or not a card is legal for the tournament. Note that not all cards in the same expansion have the same rule. With one exception in the standard format, you can only have four copies of a card with the same name in your deck. This means that a deck can only hold four copies of a card called « Bruno », a supporter card, and up to four copies of « Switch », an object card. For this reason, a set of four of the same card is commonly referred to as the deck of that card – this is the maximum number of copies of that card that can be contained in a deck. It is extremely rare for a standard-sized card to be banned, and there are currently no cards that are banned in the standard format. The most recent bans from the standard format were those of Mismagius UNB 78 and Bellelba & Brycen-Man CEC 186, which have since been removed from the standard format. These cards have been banned from 1 September 2020. Before it was banned, the last banned card in the standard format was Lysander`s trump card, which was banned on July 15, 2015. The Lysandres master card set was printed, Phantom Forces, which was shot from the standard format on September 2, 2016. The trump card of Mismagius and Lysander remains forbidden in the expanded format.

Older versions of cards that do not have a rule character can still be used if the card is currently legal. For example, the card counter in the Sun & Moon expansion can still be used because the card counter in the Sword & Shield expansion has a rule character « D ». Make sure you use the Play! ©For my Tournament Rules Manual for more details on acceptable reprints. In recent years, the rotation of the Pokémon TCG standard format has taken place in August or September. However, the next rotation will not take place until early 2023. This means that cards with the character of the « D » rule can be used in the 2022 Pokémon TCG World Championships. The last expansion that will be legal for this event is the Pokémon TCG: Pokémon GO. Standard is one of the two main formats for Pokémon TCG and is the most commonly played. In Standard, only cards from recent years are legal to ensure the long-term balance of the game. Unlike Magic: The Gathering, which uses the release of its fall set as the cut-off point for « rotation, » Pokémon has a much more flexible schedule and uses « regulation marks » to decide what`s legal and what`s not. In Pokémon TCG, new sets will become tournament legal on the second Friday after the set is released. It`s the second Friday after the official commercial release, not the second Friday after the first preview events, called previews.

While new cards like these aren`t immediately eligible for tournament law, local Pokémon leagues often allow cards from these sets to be played immediately after pre-release, especially during open play. Cards with alternate card backs, including World Cup cards, are also not legal for tournaments. World Cup cards can also be identified by their silver card edges and a silver color signature on the map illustration, as in the image of Mewtwo LV. X of the Stallgon World Championship game, played by David Cohen, finalist in the senior division at the 2009 World Championships. Sometimes older maps with the same name as a map printed in a standard-legal set receive an errata that modifies their official text. Quick Ball MD 86 below has a completely different effect on the card than Quick Ball SSH 179 – the version of Quick Ball included in our Sword & Shield set, which is a current standard legal set. However, Quick Ball MD 86 has an official errata that adapts its text to that of Sword & Shield`s Quick Ball, making Majestic Dawn`s fastball legal even to play in standard format. These changes to the map text are supposed to be known to all participants in a tournament, so it`s a good idea to refresh the card errata before participating in a major tournament.

You can see a list of official errata on Pokemon.com. The Pokémon Company International is also publishing an article with official rule changes, new card bans, and new errata on Thursday before the pre-release events of a new set begin. Currently, all cards with rule characters D or E, F are legal as standard, meaning everything from the base of Sword & Shield to the latest release of Astral Radiance can be played in organized events and tournaments. With the next rotation, all D cards will step out of the norm and will no longer be legal – everything from the basic Sword & Shield setup to most cards removed in Shining Fates.