Rebel Clash in 2026: All Three Galar Starter VMEXs and the Supporter That Defined an Era
By Dexhaul Team · September 4, 2026
No other Sword and Shield expansion put all three Galar starter VMEXs into a single booster set.
Rebel Clash (SWSH2) arrived on May 1, 2020 as the second main Sword and Shield expansion, two months after its Japanese release as Rebellion Crash. The English set consolidated its Japanese equivalent with the VMAX Rising subset into a single 209-card release.
The set runs 192 numbered cards plus 17 secret rares. Its secret rare pool is one of the most stacked in the SWSH era: seven Rainbow Rare VMEXs, four Rainbow Rare Supporter portraits, and a cluster of gold secret rare Items that overlap with cards played in competitive decks for the next two years.
How SWSH2 Fits Into the Era
SWSH1 (Sword and Shield base set) opened the era in February 2020 with the cover legendaries: Zacian V and Zamazenta V.
Rebel Clash shifted that focus immediately. Where the base set established the V and VMAX mechanics and foregrounded the legendary wolves, SWSH2 handed the spotlight to the Galar starter line.
Rillaboom, Cinderace, and Inteleon all received their full VMAX treatment here. No other main Sword and Shield expansion repeated that three-starter pairing in a single booster product.
Crown Zenith (SWSH12.5), released in January 2023, closed the era as its final English expansion. Collectors picking up SWSH sealed product today work primarily through Crown Zenith, which remains the most accessible current entry into the era.
The Galar Starter VMAX Trio
Rillaboom VMAX, Cinderace VMAX, and Inteleon VMAX all debut in Rebel Clash.
Each starter VMAX appears twice in the set: once in the standard card pool and again as a Rainbow Rare in the secret rares. Rillaboom VMAX is numbered 193/192, Cinderace VMAX is 194/192, and Inteleon VMAX is 195/192.
All three receive identical rarity treatment. There is no "premium" starter among the Rainbow Rares in this set.
The significance for collectors is structural. Later expansions in the SWSH era introduced individual starter VMAX variants (Inteleon VMAX appeared in multiple products through promos and alternate sets), but Rebel Clash is the only booster expansion where all three Galar starters can theoretically surface from the same box. A collector building a complete Galar starter VMAX binder traces all three Rainbow Rares back to a single set.
Toxtricity VMAX (Lightning, #196/192), Dragapult VMAX (Psychic, #197/192), Malamar VMAX (Darkness, #198/192), and Copperajah VMAX (Metal, #199/192) round out the VMAX rainbow rare pool. All seven VMEXs share the same secret rare numbering pattern used across the SWSH era.
Boss's Orders: The Supporter That Ran Through the Era
Boss's Orders may be the single most historically significant card in the set.
The Supporter at #154/192 lets the player bring one of the opponent's Benched Pokemon to the Active position for that turn. The mechanic is not unique to SWSH2: Guzma from the Sun and Moon era did the same thing.
What changed is timing. Boss's Orders arrived precisely as the competitive format transitioned to Sword and Shield rules, stepping directly into the gap Guzma left behind and filling it for the next two-plus years of tournament play.
Tournament records archived at Limitless TCG reflect how consistently Boss's Orders appeared across SWSH-era top-cut lists. Deck archetypes from ADP-Zacian in 2020 through Palkia VSTAR in 2022 ran the card in counts of three or four copies. It is the rare Supporter that required no adaptation for different strategies because forcing a Bench target to the Active position is universally useful regardless of what the deck is trying to do.
The Rainbow Rare version (#200/192) features a Giovanni portrait drawn in a style consistent with the game's late Kanto character depictions. It remains the original printing of one of the most-played Supporters in SWSH history. Later sets included alternate art versions, but SWSH2 is where the card first appeared.
Dragapult VMAX and the Gold Secret Rares
Dragapult VMAX is the collector favorite that isn't a starter.
The Psychic-type pseudo-legendary's VMAX form depicts it launching Dreepy from cavities in its wings, a reference to its Pokédex entry in Sword and Shield. The rainbow rare version at #197/192 translates that visual into the gold-pink shimmer of the SWSH rainbow treatment. Among the non-starter VMEXs in the set, Dragapult VMAX consistently holds the most collector interest six years after release.
The gold secret rare tier covers six cards: Frosmoth (#204), Galarian Perrserker (#205), Big Charm (#206), Scoop Up Net (#207), Tool Scrapper (#208), and Twin Energy (#209). Scoop Up Net found consistent tournament play in combination with Inkay-Malamar decks and other setup strategies across the SWSH era, giving its gold version appeal among both competitive players and collectors. Twin Energy served colorless attackers throughout the era and appears similarly across archived decklist databases.
Approaching SWSH2 as a Collector in 2026
Rebel Clash sealed product is out of print.
Standard booster packs and booster boxes move through secondary market channels. The set's profile as a mid-era release without a single dominant chase card like Darkness Ablaze's Charizard VMAX means secondary pricing is spread across multiple targets: Boss's Orders rainbow, Dragapult VMAX rainbow, and the Galar starter rainbow trio each attract different segments of the collector market.
Collectors whose primary interest is SWSH-era sealed product find Crown Zenith as the most accessible current option. Its booster packs include access to the Galarian Gallery subset, and the set's Zacian and Zamazenta packaging artwork directly calls back to the cover legendaries introduced in SWSH1. Crown Zenith ETB is the mid-commitment sealed format, while individual booster packs work for collectors who want single-pack pulls without the box commitment.
The 30th Celebration set, launching September 16, 2026, also brings a Galar connection. The all-foil booster format includes Futuristic Rare cards for several Galar-region Pokémon alongside the Kanto-focused headline chase cards. Collectors who built their TCG interest during the Sword and Shield era have a new product to watch when those packs ship.
DexHaul is an independent, unofficial Pokémon search engine. You can browse Rebel Clash singles and Crown Zenith sealed products from independent merchants at DexHaul, where listings from thousands of shops surface alongside current in-stock Crown Zenith and 30th Celebration pre-orders.