On July 17th, the Pokémon TCG‘s Pitch Black expansion will officially release. Over in Japan, though, players have been experimenting with cards from the set since May. The card Mega Excadrill ex has garnered a lot of attention for its ability to deal with the current master of the Standard meta Dragapult ex. Let’s dig into what makes Excadrill so exciting.
Is Mega Excadrill ex one of the best Pokémon cards in Pitch Black? Well, it’s a 340 hp metal type stage 1 (it evolves from Drillbur). For two metal energy, it can use the underwhelming mill attack ‘Undermine’ which deals 90 damage and sends the top two cards of the opponent’s deck into the discard pile. Its main offensive option is its ‘Maximum Drilling’ attack, which deals 200 damage for 3 metal energy, that rises to 330 damage if an additional two energy cards of any type are attached to Excadrill.
330 damage is enough to knock out many meta mainstays, including: Dragpult ex, Mega Kangaskhan ex, and N’s Zoroark ex. Given that you need 5 energy cards attached to Excadrill to pull it off, though, it might seem unlikely that you’ll be able to reliably get Maximum Drilling going, right?
Well, fortunately, Excadrill has a best friend in the form of Metang from Temporal Forces. Metang’s Metal Maker ability is a great acceleration tool for metal energies, as it reveals the top four cards of its controller’s deck and attaches any number of metal energy cards shown this way to any of their Pokémon. If you’re able to get multiple Metangs in play, then you can ramp up and get drilling surprisingly quickly and then dig to victory.
Will you be trying out Mega Excadrill ex when Pitch Black releases? Do you think it can dethrone Dragapult, or do you have another deck in mind? Let us know in the Wargamer Discord.
Source: Wargamer
