Looking Ahead to February in Umamusume Pretty Derby

January has come and gone, and while your Capricorn Cup training is likely underway, we’re reaching an important period in Umamusume: Pretty Derby’s global release during the month of February: the preparation for the third Scenario, Make a New Track, which will debut sometime in March, as well as a slew of new units and support cards that are worth discussing or keeping an eye on. There’s also two events–the current New Years Event, and a Valentine’s Day Event–coming up alongside the Capricorn Cup and new banners, so let’s take this week to talk about what priorities to have in mind and whether or not you should considering trying your luck on any of the new banners coming up this month (the short answer: probably not).

If you’re new to Umamusume: Pretty Derby, we’ve got a lot of content for you to consider, and the game is starting to approach the “one year” mark in game content (although not in an actual year of Global Release), which means that there are numerous big changes on the horizon and some big updates to the game itself; for now, you should probably try to familiarize yourself with Career Mode, Support Cards, Inheritances, Team Trials, and how PVP works so that you can get off on the right foot to catch up!

The Capricorn Cup: Opens February 9th

Let’s get this part out of the way first: the Capricorn Cup is a Sprint distance race (1200m) run from the Left during Winter in Snow on Soft ground. There’s a somewhat interesting mixture of Green Skills involved in this race, the first of which is that this is a Left-Handed Race for Winter Runners, but the snow on the ground means you will want to look for Wet Conditions and Snowy Days for your weather Greens; Standard Distance is also important here, because 1200 is a multiple of 400, which is helpful as Standard Distance is pretty easy to obtain, while some of the other skills above are a bit spread out among various cards, trainees, and events.

It also seems to be the only Champions Meeting on the Schedule for February, which is likely just due to the fact that the month is so short and the event will very likely open sometime next week (Scheduled around Feb. 9th), meaning that the next event will be arriving at the beginning of March. That’s honestly kind of a relief, as the constant 2 events a month PVP schedule has been a bit brutal for even me to keep up with, so if you’ve been finding yourself a little burnt out by these, take the Capricorn Cup a little easier (or just take it off!) and regroup for MANT and the March schedule.

If you are going to train for Capricorn, just know that while it is a Sprint, the biggest thing you’ll be competing on is Wit and skill activation, meaning that this can be one of the more complicated Champions Meetings to get ready for; next week we’ll start off talking about some prep and last minute considerations for how to get effective trainees, but generally you should be focusing on trying to pick a Front Runner like Bakushin or a Pace Chaser like Oguri Cap and looking to build Speed and Wit to make sure you can burst to a good finish.

New Support Cards and Why You Should Save

February sees a few new support cards and some rerun banners that generally amount to “save your carats”. We do get a few free rolls on the New Years banner that features SSR Matikanefukukitaru, but aside from seeing what free pulls you obtain from it (50 total if you spent the other 50 on Tamamo Cross’ trainee banner), Fuku’s card is okay but not worth pouring all of your carats into. However, I will try to be a little more helpful than “just don’t pull anything”, because while there are very good cards that we’ll see sooner than later, it is worth noting that depending on the state of your current Support Card binder, you may want to consider spending your carats on some of these.

One of the biggest impacts on this decision though is the upcoming release of Make A New Track, or MANT, which is the third scenario in Umamusume that also has a heavy focus on races over other types of events; you can expect to run many races during the career, to the point that it even impacts some scenario events and other issues with racing too often to try and compensate. This also means that certain “staple” cards, like Kitasan Black, actually become a little less relevant or useful because their bonuses do not come from racing, meaning that at least during MANT’s focus as the primary scenario, you may see the card performing less well.

Fuku's SSR card is good, but you can get it on a better banner across from Rice Shower in March.

Cards like Matikanefukukitaru’s Speed SSR card is one such card that’s often discussed as a considerable pick up here; I do think the card is good, and has a very good race bonus… at level 45. That’s right, you need to get at least LB3 of the card to really see the Race Bonus benefit… which is also only 5%. You do get a very respectable starting boost to all stats (25 across the board) at this level, and she also helps reduce energy spent while training, but if you’re desperate to get this card, there is actually another banner coming up in March that is specifically focused on her card and Rice Shower Power, both of which are desirable cards; again, don’t try to fish for Fuku’s card right now unless you know you can get at least 2 copies and then wait to pull again. Otherwise, you probably just want to save.

After that, the next banner we’re getting later this week on Feb. 5th is a banner with Tamamo Cross SR Guts, which is never worth chasing an SR, and Anshinzawa (the lady in red who you have maybe seen rarely) SSR, which is… a bad card. It is maybe one of the worst cards in the game, actually, which I feel is worth noting because Pal cards are not that common, so the urge to get it might seem high, but you really, really do not want to spend your carats on this card specifically. It does very little of use and unlike other pals like Tazuna or Riko, you’ll not get any longevity out of it. WHY is it bad? Because her entire gimmick is that you are gambling on getting good skills or self-debuffs, and the “good” skills are not worth the downside.

do. not. pull. for. this. card.

Speaking of pal cards, there’s a somewhat mean banner following that one which is focused on Tazuna and Riko. You might be surprised, but this banner is also bad. Why? Because if you did not have these cards already, they are nearing the end of their usefulness when this banner arrives; Riko and Tazuna are not helpful in MANT, Riko especially, as all of her boosts and bonuses are specific to Unity Cup, which you won’t be running anymore after MANT comes out (even if it is maybe more fun). Tazuna is maybe okay, but you really don’t need her and she doesn’t offer anything exceptionally useful, so sadly if you did not obtain Tazuna or Riko in good enough quantities before, don’t get them now.

Has Groundwork, which is a potential reason to pull. Also cute art. Less of a reason, but nice.

The Valentine’s event is scheduled to start around February 18th (so actually kind of on schedule!) and will have SSR Sakura Bakushin O and another Nishino Flower, and although both cards are very cute, they aren’t exceptionally valuable. However, Sakura Baksuhin O provides Groundwork, so if you still lack a consistent way to obtain or train this skill onto your aces (or parents), it is a card you could consider trying to obtain at least one copy of, but there aren’t a lot of exceptional benefits to the card aside from the fact that you get Groundwork, which you could likely get just as easily from parents or borrowed trainee Umas.

Finally, February closes out with another fairly weak banner: SSR Power Agnes Digital, and SR Ines Fujin. Poor Ines Fujin; she really hasn’t had any chance to shine in Global and her cards are just not that good, and this one is still in line with that issue. Digitan’s problem is that her card is almost entirely focused on Dirt related racing, meaning that it is an exceptionally bad waste of your carats to invest in a card that focuses on the least run type of race in the game. It is a very cute card, though, but that’s never a reason to chase a support card unfortunately! The biggest lesson for February cards is that you are going to want to skip and save till March, but doing so should put you in a good position to probably have around 30k Carats saved up for far better banners for when MANT is underway.

New Trainees: Valentines Be Yours (Maybe)

February also sees the release of a few new trainees, along with a rerun of Smart Falcon. The current New Years banner for New Years T.M. Opera O and Haru Urara is also underway for a little while longer, and T.M. Opera O is quite good, but she probably isn’t worth your carats if you care about meta or other performance related things. With trainees, the main truth is just to pull for who you like, but always save up 30k Carats before you do so; ideally, you pull them before you spend all your carats, but if you don’t, you get them guaranteed (and hopefully got some other good things in the process. Or 3 copies of Curren Chan).

Before getting into some of the new Trainees, because the game is approaching the “in-game” first year release celebration, we will be receiving some access to various new selector tickets as part of that celebration. This is important because these tickets work like the previous round of tickets from launch, which will allow you to pick any trainee from a general pool of available units from the “first year”. The reason this matters is that Christmas Oguri is included in this pool, so if you didn’t get her or weren’t able to pull for her, you can use the ticket to get her; after that, you can just focus on whoever you like that you don’t have!

Smart Falcon is a decent consideration on a rerun due to her useful skills and parentage possibilities, even though she’s a Dirt racer; she can do very well if you get her Turf sparks up (she can even be a top contender in Capricon Cup), but I would consider passing on her rerun if you didn’t get her already. She’s good, but she’s not meta defining, and you’ll likely want to consider some other trainees unless Smart Falcon’s idol gimmick is what you want the most out of her. The same goes for Feb 11th’s debut of Sakura Chiyono O, sort of. The second of the O line (Sakura Bakushin O being the first), Chiyono is actually a very good Medium runner with very solid innate skills and a good unique skill. The issue is she is a very good Medium runner in a game dominated by “Very Good Medium Runners”, so although she’s a great unit, she may not offer you anything you don’t already have access to, but she IS extremely cute, so her Oshi Power is quite high. I’ll probably be trying to obtain her myself, because I love the O line of Umas, but I’m not entirely all in on the idea yet.

The face of Front Runners for a while.

The Valentine’s event brings 2 new themed units to the game, Valentine’s Mihono Bourbon and Valentine’s Eishin Flash. Of them, Mihono Bourbon is the first “if you want a very strong trainee that shakes up a meta” of the month, and if you lack strong Front Runners, I highly suggest considering her for your roster. Bourbon has everything you want in a Front Runner, including Groundwork as an innate skill, along with Final Push, Early Lead, Straightaway Acceleration, and a distance rating of C/B/A/B, meaning she can compete in almost any distance with very little investment. Although Seiun Sky and Summer Maruzensky are very good Front Runners, Bourbon is an exceptional Front Runner target, so if you like running that position, consider picking her up. In comparison, Eishin Flash is… fine, and mostly run as a Debuffer, but otherwise you’ll only want to pursue Bourbon here.

There's moody trainees, and then there's 'debilitating recurring injury' trainees. Meet Mejiro Ardan.

Finally, we have the somewhat odd Mejiro Ardan as the last February trainee. Ardan has a somewhat tragic IRL career due to leg injuries, and the trainee mimics that with an innate career debuff called “Glass Leg” which triggers if you race too much (although MANT disables this because otherwise she’s useless). Mejiro Ardan is not a bad trainee, but a difficult one, and she doesn’t dominate the meta like anyone else; her tricky nature to train and her status as otherwise just being “pretty okay” means that while she’s very pretty, she is probably not worth your carats unless you find her absolutely your type of trainee. Otherwise, consider saving and waiting for some upcoming units that may make for better long lasting and roster changing options in March.

So If I’m Not Rolling, Then What?

If you’re taking the advice to save your carats, I do understand that it does sort of make the game seem a little less exciting to simply log on, train, and log off, especially since MANT is coming up and you are unlikely to produce a truly stellar trainee between now and then. Of course, the search for great parents with amazing sparks is really the bread and butter of “everyday” Umamusume, and you can still do that by running your trainee through the original URA finale career if you want (it is shorter and by now a little easier for most people than Unity), as Parents don’t require stats beyond specific thresholds for sparks.

Otherwise, you should spend your time running the New Years and Valentines Events when they come up, even if just to hit 400k event points to ensure that you have MLB copies of the event SSRs. Event SSRs are sometimes hit or miss, but they can be very helpful in a pinch when you are lacking certain other types of cards to have, and they are free, meaning that you really can’t complain that badly about them. Meisho Doto’s Stamina card from the New Years event has a great selection of Green Skills for example, and Tosen Jorden’s speed card has some solid stat boosting for Speed training as a secondary card to something like Kitasan Black. Remember that you can use the boost feature to get extra points from your career runs, and generally can get to 400k by doing 1 boosted career a day, and within less than 5 days if you do 3 or 4 runs and restore your stamina during the process to get the maximum out of your event boosting; although it does still take some work (we still don’t have auto!), you’ll find that it is far less work to get a full SSR card from the events than it did when we first got the game back in June. If you have any questions, please leave us comments down below, drop by the Goonhammer Discord if you’re a Patron, or even email me at marcy@goonhammer.com! Until then, see you out on the track!

Have any questions or feedback? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com. Want articles like this linked in your inbox every Monday morning? Sign up for our newsletter. And don't forget that you can support us on Patreon for backer rewards like early video content, Administratum access, an ad-free experience on our website and more.

Tags: umamusume | Uma Musume Pretty Derby