Posted in: Card Games, Games, Pokémon TCG, Tabletop | Tagged: chilling reign, pokemon, pokemon cards, Pokemon TCG, Pokemon Trading Card Game

The Cards Of Pokémon TCG: Chilling Reign Part 22

Sword & Shield – Chilling Reign is the latest expansion from Pokémon TCG. It focuses on the Legendary Pokémon Galarian Articuno, Galarian Zapdos, Galarian Moltres, Shadow Rider Calyrex, and Ice Rider Calyrex. It continues the Rapid Strike and Single Strike mechanic introduced in Battle Styles. Chilling Reign is known for its inclusion of a large number of Alternate Arts both in the Full Art portion of the set and the Secret Rare portion. These Alternate Arts were popular during the tail end of the Sun & Moon era with fan-favorite sets such as Unified Minds, Cosmic Eclipse, and so on, but Chilling Reign, Battle Styles, and the upcoming Evolving Skies set have made this style of card more popular than ever. With this series, we will spotlight all of the exciting pulls from Chilling Reign, which you can see as they release by following the set's Bleeding Cool tag. This time, we continue with a closer look at the set's Secret Rare cards.

Note that because Rainbow Rares use essentially the same artwork with a different color palette that we already covered in our earlier pieces, these installments will focus more on value and collectibility rather than the artwork focus that this series normally uses.

• Melony, Peonia, Peony, Siebold: I feel like this is the perfect example of what cards should get Rainbow Rares and which shouldn't. The amount of white space on the Melony and Siebold cards allows the Rainbow sections to work and stand out, while Peony looks like an amorphous blob of color. Personally, I love Rainbow Rares and hope that the Pokémon TCG continues them, but begin to be a bit more selective about which cards get this treatment. The value of these cards as of this writing proves the "Waifu Tax" situation once again. The phrase refers to the current trend of cards featuring female trainers ballooning in price, which essentially becomes a tax that completionists have to pay in order to collect the whole set. Thankfully, we haven't seen a card balloon in value because of this to a ridiculous extent since Sword & Shield base set's Marnie. Still, the Melony and Peonia are two of the highest-valued Rainbows in the set, while Peony is half the price of theirs and Siebold is the lowest-valued trainer in the set.

Next time, the spotlight on Pokémon TCG: Sword & Shield – Chilling Reign continues with the set's incredible Secret Rares.

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