I was waiting for someone to make a thread about this after reading about it but since no one has yet done it i decided to be the one starting the discussion.
I know these special holiday sets tend to divide people’s opinions but i’m quite optimistically looking forward to this set. Like pokebeach article says it feels very likely that this will be a dragon themed set because of the resent japanese paradise dragona set name trademarked and the year of dragon we are living in, feels like a no-brainer at this point. We’ve already had a fair share of dragon themed sets but i’m very open to one more, especially with all the new interesting artist additions we’ve gotten. I also have to add that i’m excited to hear about this product:
A new “Illustration Rare Collection” with four booster packs, three promo cards, and a code card.
Could this finally be the product that brings us international versions of bulbasaur and squirtle to accompany the obsidian flames etb release of charmander promo? Looking forward to news and card reveals of the set in addition to the final release on August 2nd!
I thought about creating the thread, but there is so little info. Back when 151 leaked, we had the name at least. Without anything besides the set number and some vague product descriptions, it could be anything.
Based on timing, i would assume it’s related to the Stellar Miracle trademarked set name, but there is also a Dragon trademarked name that it could be based on.
This set is currently in speculation mode but I have a thought of a few things to note. The main vibe I get is Champion’s Path 2.0,
EN holiday sets are known to catch up to JP set, deck and promo deck card releases that they didn’t insert in the quarterly main sets, look at Champion’s Path, Shining Fates, Pokémon GO, Crown Zenith, 151
If SV 6.5 is supposedly tournament legal for Worlds and is releasing on August 2, then the cards in it should be based on leftovers from JP sets releasing before Worlds, not after.
JP main expansion SV7 Stellar Miracle has an expected release date of July 19. If the recently trademarked JP set [SV7a] Paradise Dragona is slated to release after this, it is more likely to be in September than August because of Worlds.
Points #2 and #3 should indicate that cards in Paradise Dragona will not feature in the August EN holiday set
SV3 Ruler of the Black Flame wasn’t tournament legal for Worlds 2023 despite its July 28 release (Obsidian Flames - August 14). One can assume the same will occur to SV7 Stellar Miracle this year
Because it’s a holiday set, certain deviations from the main expansion formula can be made. For example, Champion’s Path includes the FA shiny Charizard V from S4a Shiny Star V released several months later. It is technically a reprint variant of the Charizard V from Darkness Ablaze. Both the ETB FA Charizard V and rainbow Charizard VMAX were Legendary Heartbeat sealed battle prizes, also reprint variants
Thanks to TPCi’s proclivity for jumbling JP releases, we might get a preview of some cards from this year’s high class pack set as they are basically reprints of existing cards
As for the Illustration Rare Collection box, the Art Rares that currently don’t have a EN release are the Squirtle, Bulbasaur and Detective Pikachu promo
yeah this happens almost every year. jp has some cards that the west doesn’t have legal yet, so they have to go back to the previous format and play without certain cards.
it’s possible this 6.5 set will contain stellar miracle and they’re trying to rush these out to have the new stellar type legal for worlds. VGC also is introducing a new format for this year’s worlds and last year had a brand new format for worlds as well.
gotta keep in mind that for the west, a set must be out for two weeks before it is tournament legal whereas for TPC ran tournaments, the cards are legal on release day.
If that is the case, shouldn’t the EN SV7 set be the one to release early? It’s expected to introduce the Stellar mechanic from Stellar Miracle after all. The timing of this holiday set is rather strange because cards from [SV6a] Night Wanderer, the set before, also need to be somewhere for EN players.
I’m also starting to wonder if [SV6a] Night Wanderer will be fully incorporated into SV6.5 instead. It is going to be a June release subset expansion like Eevee Heroes (late May), Pokémon GO and Pokémon 151. Sounds logical if SV7 is devoted to only Stellar Miracle and its accompanying Sylveon/Ceruledge ex decks (August 30) to release in late August/early September.
How many times has English released functionally new cards ahead of Japan?
I can only think of Celebrations, but Japan did release their version 2 weeks later. I can’t remember if there were any new cards released in TTAS that were also included in Cosmic Eclipse.
The weird timing of this set suggests that they don’t want to have SV6a + SV7 entirely legal for Worlds, otherwise why not release the special set later like how 151 was after Obsidian Flames, though in that case OBF wasn’t legal anyway.
But if it does feature cards from Paradise Dragona, then you would have an entire set being revealed before Japan which I think would be unprecedented and also unlikely considering there is no good reason to disrupt the schedule in this manner.
I suppose another option would be theming the special set as a DLC set, where Pecharunt (assuming it’s from Night Wanderer) and Terapagos (Stellar Miracle) are the highlight and basically any playable card from the 2 sets is released but anything considered bulk filler is left out for SV7, which will be combined with Paradise Dragona that can then be billed as a Rayquaza or whatever set, assuming other non-Gen 9 Dragon Pokemon are in that set.
This would also assume that Paradise Dragona is more special than normal expansion set with more than 60-70 normal set cards and that SV8 is a double set otherwise they just ‘lack’ cards to make up these sets (English SV7 and SV8).
The reason can suggest the opposite though, that Pokémon 151 wasn’t tournament legal at the time and Night Wanderer is, which may lead to SV6.5 being pushed up to August 2. Even the set code lines up properly this way, SV6.5 for SV6a, SV7 for SV7, etc.
For Paradise Dragona, it may feel like a special themed set but so were SM11a Remix Bout (Cosmic Eclipse), SM11b Dream League (Cosmic Eclipse), S3a Legendary Heartbeat (Vivid Voltage) and S11a Incandescent Arcana (Silver Tempest). The September sealed battle subset expansions are often lumped into the final EN main set of the year
i agree with what you’re saying. i’m just trying to make sense of it.
what i will say is this .5 set all but ensures that the TPCI version of the EoY set will be pushed back to 2025 once again which will likely screw over SV09’s potential of releasing close to SV9
I find it hard to believe that the new set would be like champion’s path but that would be a big disappointment. Every special set after champion’s path has had some theme or other bigger catch going on, releasing a special set around one big chase card and otherwise filled with crap would feel so stupid when all the stores still had, at least some time ago, stock left of champion’s path
I could be wrong after all since no cards or additional info has been revealed. It’s just that Night Wanderer doesn’t scream mid-year special set like Eevee Heroes or Pokémon 151, and Paradise Dragona was trademarked late. There are no Charizard cards yet either
This would be somewhat disappointing if it ends up being true, not judging the set before cards are released but the starting point isn’t the best at this point. I did warm up for ogerpon cards very quickly tho but not sure if lightning strikes twice
