By Ellis Longhurst, Contributing Writer
With so many interesting Pokémon to choose from and exciting strategies to explore, building your own deck is one of the most enjoyable and rewarding elements of the Pokémon Trading Card Game. Before you begin, it's important to note that each deck must contain exactly 60 cards—with at least one Basic Pokémon—and cannot contain more than four copies of any card (except basic Energy).
There are a lot of ways to approach deckbuilding. Some decks focus on one type of Pokémon such as Fire type or Psychic type, while others may focus on an individual Pokémon's Ability or particularly powerful attack. Decks can include an even distribution of Pokémon, Trainer cards, and Energy cards, or they can be heavily skewed to include, say, mostly Pokémon and virtually no Energy. With so many options available, the task can feel daunting even for the most intrepid deck builder.
The good news is a variety of methods can result in a winning deck! Let's take a look at two of the most popular approaches to assembling a solid deck and the design principles that underpin them.
How to Build a Pokémon TCG Deck Around One Type
Like the teams of many of the Gym Leaders you'll encounter in the Pokémon video games, a lot of successful Pokémon Trading Card Game decks include Pokémon that are almost all the same type. This approach to deckbuilding has merit because types are often thematic, which means Pokémon of the same type will favor a similar strategy. For example, many Fire-type Pokémon are designed to do loads of damage to the opponent's Pokémon, whereas Metal-type Pokémon tend to have attacks, Abilities, and access to Trainer cards that prevent or reduce the damage they take from opposing attacks.
In addition, Pokémon of the same type usually use the same type of Energy to attack, and they can often be targeted by the effects of the same Trainer cards. This means it's much simpler to design a deck around one type of Pokémon rather than many types.
We'll use the following Lightning-type deck as an example:
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10Lightning Energynrg1 29
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4Speed Lightning Energyswsh2 173
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4Marnieswsh35 56
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4Professor’s Research (Professor Magnolia)swsh35 62
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3Boss’s Orders (Giovanni)swsh2 154
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2Team Yell Gruntswsh1 184
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1Chaotic Swellsm12 187
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4Crushing Hammerswsh1 159
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4Quick Ballswsh1 179
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4Switchswsh1 183
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2Air Balloonswsh1 156
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2Electromagnetic Radarsm10 169
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2Reset Stampsm11 206
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1Cherish Ballsm11 191
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1Tag Switchsm11 209