Hi there. In this Pokemon TCG post I cover Cynthia Pokemon card reveals from Japan's Heat Wave Arena set. The cards from Hot Wind Arena and the upcoming Team Rocket set are speculated to be released in the English international Destined Rivals set in May 2025.
Cynthia's Power Weight Tool card provides a big HP boost to any Cynthia's Pokemon that this card is attached to. This HP boost is plus 70 HP to any Cynthia's Pokemon.
Compared this to Bravery Charm which provides +50 HP to any Basic Pokemon. The Cynthia tool card is very powerful.
Cynthia's Roselia is a 70 HP Grass Basic Pokemon with one retreat cost and Fire weakness. The attack is good as it requires one Colourless Energy to do 20 damage. No need for a Grass Energy for its attack. This Roselia is okay in the early game.
Cynthia's Roserade is the Stage 1 Evolution of Cynthia's Roselia. Its attack is not great as it is costly. The ability is something that you cannot ignore. The Glory Cheer ability from Cynthia's Roselia allows your Cynthia's Pokemon's attack do 30 more damage. As it does not say This ability does not stack., you can have multiple copies of Cynthia's Roserade in play. Two of them would result in a +60 damage boost for Cynthia's Pokemon.
There is an illustration art version of Cynthia's Roserade. I do predict this card being sought after. There are Cynthia waifu lovers out there.
This Gible is pretty good in the early game. As there are a handful of Pokemon with Fighting Resistance, the Rock Hurl attack for one Fighting Energy does 20 damage while ignoring Resistance from the opponent's Active Pokemon.
This Cynthia's Gabite is the Stage 1 evolution of Cynthia's Gible. There may be a trend where Stage 1 middle Evolutions have good abilities. This one is of them along with Ethan's Cyndaquil. The Champion's Call ability can be used once during your turn. You may search your deck for one Cynthia's Pokemon, reveal it and put it into your hand. (Then shuffle deck.) This ability is a free Cynthia Pokemon search which is too good to ignore.
The Dragon Slice attack is okay. It does 40 damage for one Fighting Energy.
Garchomp ex from Paradox Rift was almost playable but the attack did 160 instead of 170 with Fighting Energy acceleration. It was not good.
Cynthia's Garchomp ex from Heat Wave Arena in Japan and in Destined Rivals in English worldwide looks like a really good attacker.
It has 330 HP, free retreat cost and Grass weakness. Combine this Cynthia's Garchomp ex with Cynthia's Power Weight for an additional 70HP. This goes from 330 HP to a staggering 400 HP. The power creep is real.
The first attack of Corkscrew Dive requires one Fighting Energy to do 100 damage. You may draw cards until 6 cards in hand. Do some damage plus draw cards is not too bad.
Dragon Blaster is the second attack. For two Fighting Energy you deal 260 damage with the drawback of discarding all Energy from this Pokemon. Combine this attack with one Cynthia's Roserade to do 290. Two Cynthia's Roserade in play would make this attack do 320.
Fighting Pokemon don't have much energy acceleration. You would have to use Crispin and have a second Basic Energy type to attach an Energy from Crispin and have a second seperate Fighting Energy from hand to attach two Energy for the turn.
Cynthia's Spiritomb is kind of interesting. It can be a super dangerous attacker for a non-Pokemon ex Basic attacker. This Dark type Spiritomb has 70 HP
, one retreat cost and Grass weakness.
The Raging Curse attack requires one of any Energy (it is one Colourless Energy cost). Its damage does 10 times the number of damage counters on your Benched Cynthia's Pokemon. You can use the zero retreat cost to retreat a damaged Cynthia's Garchomp ex then bring in this Cynthia's Spiritomb to deal damage equal to the damage your Benched Cynthia's Pokemon have taken. In theory this Spiritomb can deal high damage numbers like 100, 200 or more.
From the first set of reveals for the Cynthia archetype it looks like a Cynthia deck could debut as a Tier 1 deck. The Roserade adds more attacking power, the Cynthia's Gabite has a good search ability and the Garchomp does not require too much Energy to start attacking.
In a Cynthia themed deck I don't think you need much Rare Candy to evolve from the Gible to the Garchomp ex. Technical: Machine Evolution could be the evolution strategy of choice as Gabite is really good. There is also Budew in the format that can item lock your Rare Candies.
The Cynthia's Garchomp ex may not have one hit knockout power against other Stage 2 Pokemon like Charizard ex with 330 HP, Mamoswine ex with 340 HP. 260 damage without Roserade is good but not super high. Grass weakness is bad as Teal Mask Ogerpon ex is very good as a draw engine and as an attacker.
I think there may be Cynthia's Togekiss or something to add to this set. Let's wait and see.
Thank you for reading.
