Medicham V receives Pokémon TCG Extra Regulation card ban in Japan, effective February 20th

In a brief update posted on the Pokémon Trading Card Game's official Japanese homepage, it has been announced that Medicham V, released in Japan in 2021 in the Blue Sky Stream expansion, and overseas in Sword & Shield—Evolving Skies), will no longer be able to be used in Extra Regulation decks from February 20th.

The Expanded format, known as the Extra Regulation format (エクストラレギュレーション) in Japan, is one of two formats used for officially-sanctioned Play! Pokémon events, originally added in the 2014-2015 season. It allows a greater number of expansions than the Standard format, but is not as unpredictable in card combinations as the Unlimited format. Medicham V rotated out of the Standard format with the start of the 2024-2025 season on April 5th, 2025.

Typically, cards are banned from this format in response to strategies that may unbalance play. In the past, this has included strategies involving hand disruption, such as those that could dwindle an opponent's hand up to no cards on their first turn; or which had the potential to stifle creativity by acting as a hard counter for a wide variety of deck archetypes. While no official explanation has been given at this stage for why this card has been banned, Japanese fans have identified at least one combination that would allow for reliable use of Yoga Loop in the early game, which could allow players to get an important early turn advantage. A sample decklist showing one implementation of this deck combo is included below.

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