Well, it didn't take long for TPCi (The Pokemon Company International) to confirm the leak for Pokemon Pocket’s next expansion set coming July 30th.
Confirmed Cards:
Thanks to the official English trailer for the upcoming set, actually titled ‘Wisdom of Sea and Sky’, all the cards found in the previous leak have been confirmed.
There are some differences from the community's attempted translations, though, as we'll get to.
The Legendary Birds:
With the official trailer, Ho-Oh ex and Lugia ex have been confirmed to be coming to Pokemon Pocket.
Unfortunately for these bird Pokemon, the online community was pretty spot-on with their translation attempts.
Ho-Oh ex will still be suffering from its 3 energy activation to accelerate its other Basic-Stage allies.
Lugia ex, on the other hand, will definitely be one of the harder Pokemon to use just by how fast decks can activate their win condition Pokemon (e.g. Giratina ex).
Not Many Changes:
As for the rest of the Pokemon that were shown in the leak, their translated abilities were more or less accurate.
The Johto starters are more or less confirmed with their capabilities intact; 60 HP, a single energy for either a 20 damage attack or a retreat.
There’s still no confirmation on the rest of their evolutionary line, though.
Different From First Impressions:
Umbreon ex and Espeon ex:
The Eeveelutions of Umbreon ex and Espeon ex have kept their abilities pretty much intact, minus a couple of edits to the wording.
Espeon ex’s actual healing value from the leak, and subsequent translation attempt, was off a bit due to how blurry the original leaked video was. Instead of 20 health, Espeon ex actually heals for 30 health.
Now, while 30 health is a lot of healing done, it’s still shackled to Espeon ex itself being in the active zone.
Both Espeon ex and Umbreon ex are worth two prize points respectively. As Stage-1 Pokemon, they have a slightly lower than average health that makes them susceptible to being OHKO’d (One-hit KnockOut) by some staple Pokemon like Shining Revelry’s Charizard ex.
With both needing two of their respective energy to attack, it makes them harder to use when you’re generating more than a single type of energy in the deck.
Hopefully, some creative deck builders will be able to crack the code to making a game plan for these particular Eeveelutions.
Baby Pokemon:
Pichu and Cleffa are pretty much confirmed as Pokemon Pocket’s foray into adding Baby Pokemon.
Pichu’s official wording makes it a whole lot better than its initial impressions from the leak.
Starting with this little Pokemon in the active zone means that any Pokemon that needs that odd Lightning energy can finally be easier to accelerate.
What makes Pichu even better is that it doesn’t need energy to start doing this, so you’re essentially putting at least 2 Lighting energy on your win condition.
This implication could lead to Magnezone decks actually eschewing the use of Volt Charge Magneton for a Pichu and Rare Candy combo.
There wasn’t much difference between Cleffa’s official wording and the translation attempt. For what it's worth, it’s still a solid consistency tool.
Cleffa might even find a home in Fossil decks as it can immediately, albeit randomly, bring out a Fossil Pokemon.
The main takeaway for these little ones is the fact that they’re easily integrated into most decks because of their lack of energy requirement.
Water Deck Focused:
The Gyarados shown in the leak and the translation efforts were pretty much accurate to the official translation.
The only minor caveat to its main attack is that it requires the discarding of Water-type Pokemon.
It’s not a deal-breaker if you want to make use of this version of Gyarados. It just makes this Pokemon less friendly to anything outside of Water decks.
Actually Different:
This is where the translation efforts of the online community were inaccurate, but that doesn’t diminish the effort placed or the appreciation the wider audience has had for the attempt.
Lyra (originally translated as Cetra) is actually a reverse Cyrus. The ability to hotswap one of your bulkier Pokemon to protect their health can be invaluable depending on the match-up.
Silver (originally translated as Argento) turns out to be a surprising denial tool.
Due to Sylveon ex warping the meta with its presence, cards like Mars and Red Card have seen more use just to counter all the draw power some decks have been able to enjoy.
Silver seems like a weaker and more specific version of current denial tools, but without the opponent being able to replace what was just lost.
It may be up to personal preference if players will give Silver a try or just stick to what is already working.
Out of the Trainer cards shown in the leak, Elemental Switch got the most accurate translation.
The only slight difference from translation efforts is that Elemental Switch could also be used to move around Water energy from a benched Pokemon to a Pokemon in the active zone.
Rescue Scarf (originally translated as Energy Shoe) was the Trainer card that got the worst hit when it came to translation inaccuracy.
Instead of healing a Pokemon, Rescue Scarf brings whatever Pokemon it's attached to back to hand.
It more than likely doesn’t save the prize point, but bringing back a Pokemon within Pocket's limited space could prove to be a useful tech option.
The Ultra Beasts may find this item to be a welcoming addition.
Once an Ultra Beast with Rescue Scarf is knocked out and subsequently returned to hand (e.g. Buzzwole ex), it can be brought back into the frontline from the bench with Celesteela, and then promptly primed with Lusamine.