The Best Cards In The Pokémon Paldean Fates TCG Expansion

Palafin Paldean Fates artwork

Pokémon’s latest trading card game set, Paldean Fates, is officially out in most of the English-speaking world, and while some of us haven’t been able to get our hands on it just yet, we have been scouring the internet and looking at the wonderful cards on offer.

Paldean Fates is a special set, meaning there are no standalone boosters for sale, but there are booster bundles, elite trainer boxes, and some promo packs with which to obtain cards. It brings the return of shiny Pokémon, and while many of the cards are functionally reprints, some of them are very interesting and most importantly, very fun to look at.

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We’ve gone through the whole set and picked out the best cards in the Pokémon Paldean Fates TCG expansion. We’re going entirely by vibe here — it doesn’t matter how good they are competitively, the only thing that matters is how they make us feel.

Nemona – PAF 229/091

Nemona actually has three cards in the Paldean Fates expansion, one standard card, one ultra rare (that’s this one) and one special illustration rare. It makes sense, given she’s the best character in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, and the ultra rare has an absolutely wonderful piece of art from Sanosuke Sakuma. The special illustration rare is nice too, but card number 229 takes the cake.

Clive – PAF 227/091

Like Nemona, Clive has three cards in Paldean Fates, being one of the cards in the set that isn’t a rehash of an existing card. Clive is a hilarious character, being Director Clavell in a very “fellow kids”-style getup, and this card captures this essence brilliantly.

Paldean Clodsire ex – PAF 219/091

Clodsire is a perfect creature, and this card was one of the best in the Paldea Evolved set. Now, it’s shiny, and it looks absolutely incredible, with a relatively plain white background and some fun sparkles denoting its shiny status. Truly no notes, it’s perfect.

Pidgeotto – PAF 197/091

Kouki Saitou is one of the best artists under The Pokémon Company’s banner, and this Pidgeotto is very much illustrative of his work. It’s a very dynamic pose with really solid linework and coloring, with just a dash of the cool factor that you’d normally see in a full art card. That it’s a standard card makes it even better, in all honesty, since it’ll be easier to get your hands on it and much more common in play.

Wugtrio – PAF 224/091

Gosh, what a wonderful card. Wugtrio is already an incredible Pokémon, but this card, with its shiny form front and center, surrounded by non-shinies, chilling at the bottom of the ocean, it’s honestly just a vibe. The artwork is lovely, with some gorgeous stippling and bold use of color, it’s all just fantastic.

Palafin – PAF 225/091

This was one of the earlier cards revealed for the set, and it’s easy to see why, it’s absolutely incredible. Palafin is usually portrayed as a superhero, but here we see it at its most villainous, its jet black shiny form looking very menacing in the shadows of the ocean. Artist akagi really knocked it out of the park here.

Mew ex – PAF 232/091

USGMEN is well-known in the Pokémon community for their adorable illustrations of just about every Pokémon in Ditto form. Their art style is iconic and distinctive, and they’ve finally been able to create art for a TCG card. The result is probably the best Mew card the series has seen to date, and easily one of the best cards in the Paldean Fates set. It helps, too, that it has a very good ability and an even better move, but none of that matters here — it’s worth it for the adorable Poliwag, Ditto, and Ratatta alone.

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