Balance Feedback: Lucky Ice Cream, Pom-Pom Oricorio and Plubio

Jicda · August 20

I would like to suggest balance changes for three cards that I believe create unhealthy or overly binary interactions in the current game: Lucky Ice Cream, Pom-Pom Oricorio, and Plubio.

My concern is not simply that these cards are "too strong." The bigger issue is that each one can undermine an important limitation or rule that normally creates counterplay in Pokémon TCG Pocket.

1. Lucky Ice Cream

The problem

Lucky Ice Cream is, in my opinion, significantly better than Potion in almost every situation.

Potion provides a guaranteed 20 HP heal and is discarded after use.

Lucky Ice Cream can potentially heal 40 HP, and if the coin flip succeeds, the card is returned to your hand. This means that a successful flip effectively gives you both a stronger heal and the possibility of using the same card again.

This creates situations where Lucky Ice Cream can repeatedly generate healing value while also making Potion difficult to justify in deck construction.

The most frustrating part is that the player can sometimes heal a Pokémon for a very large amount over multiple uses while still retaining the healing card. I have experienced this many times both when using the card and when playing against it.

Suggested change

I would change Lucky Ice Cream to:

Heal 10 damage from your Pokémon. Flip a coin. If heads, heal 30 more damage. Then discard Lucky Ice Cream.

This would result in:

Tails: 10 HP healed
Heads: 40 HP healed
The card is always discarded

The goal is not to make Lucky Ice Cream bad. The goal is to make its power come from the coin flip rather than from potentially generating an unlimited amount of healing from a single card.

This also gives Potion a meaningful purpose:

Potion: reliable 20 HP heal
Lucky Ice Cream: unreliable 10/40 HP heal

That creates an actual choice between consistency and potential value.

2. Pom-Pom Oricorio

The problem

The current ability of Pom-Pom Oricorio effectively prevents Pokémon ex from damaging it.

This creates an extremely binary matchup.

If a player is running a deck that relies almost entirely on Pokémon ex, Oricorio can become a hard wall rather than simply a defensive Pokémon.

The problem is especially significant in Pokémon TCG Pocket because decks are only 20 cards. There is much less room to include specialized answers for a single card.

I don't think the solution should be to remove Oricorio's anti-ex identity. Having a Pokémon that is particularly effective against ex Pokémon is interesting and creates strategic diversity.

The problem is that complete immunity removes too much counterplay.

Suggested change

I would change the ability so that it only works while Oricorio is in the Active Spot:

While this Pokémon is in the Active Spot, attacks from your opponent's Pokémon ex can do a maximum of 30 damage to it.

This would preserve the card's role as an anti-ex Pokémon while preventing it from being an effectively invulnerable wall.

For example:

20 damage → 20 damage
60 damage → 30 damage
100 damage → 30 damage
150 damage → 30 damage

The Pokémon ex player can still defeat Oricorio, but it takes multiple attacks.

I prefer this over simply reducing damage by a fixed amount because it produces a much more predictable interaction and avoids strange damage breakpoints.

Most importantly, restricting the effect to the Active Spot creates counterplay. Oricorio would have to actually take the risk of being Active rather than providing a permanent defensive effect from the Bench.

3. Plubio

The problem

This is the change I consider the most important of the three.

The turn order in Pokémon TCG Pocket gives each player a different advantage:

Player going first:

Can evolve first.
Cannot generate Energy on the first turn.

Player going second:

Generates Energy first.
Normally cannot evolve on the first turn.

These advantages are part of what balances going first versus going second.

Plubio can completely bypass this tradeoff.

A player going second can generate Energy and then use Plubio to evolve during the same first turn.

This is particularly problematic with cards such as Mega Sharpedo ex, because it allows the second player to combine both of the advantages that are normally distributed between the two players.

The result is not simply "a strong card."

It effectively breaks one of the fundamental constraints of the turn system.

Suggested change

My preferred solution is very simple:

Plubio cannot be played during your first turn.

That's it.

I think this is better than adding complicated conditions or simply increasing the cost of the card.

After the first turn, Plubio can continue doing exactly what it was designed to do: accelerate evolution and help players establish their board.

But it would no longer allow the player going second to simultaneously obtain:

The first Energy advantage, and
The first evolution advantage.

This preserves the intended tradeoff between going first and going second.

Summary

I don't think these cards necessarily need to be removed or fundamentally redesigned.

My suggested changes are:

Card	Suggested change
Lucky Ice Cream	Heal 10 HP. Flip a coin. If heads, heal 30 additional HP. Always discard it.
Pom-Pom Oricorio	While Active, attacks from Pokémon ex can deal a maximum of 30 damage to it.
Plubio	Cannot be played during your first turn.

The common theme is that these changes preserve the identity of the cards while restoring counterplay.

Lucky Ice Cream remains the high-roll healing option, but no longer generates potentially unlimited value.

Pom-Pom Oricorio remains an anti-ex Pokémon, but it is no longer a hard immunity that can completely invalidate ex-only decks.

Plubio remains an evolution acceleration card, but it can no longer break the fundamental first-turn tradeoff between Energy and evolution.

I believe these kinds of changes would improve the game without simply making the affected cards unplayable.

Dragonfly102024 · August 20

I don't know if you factored this into your analysis, but just as a reminder, the Potion item can heal benched AND active Pokemon whereas the Lucky Ice Pop (not ice cream) item ONLY heals active pokemon.