When Pokemon TCG Pocket first launched, Meta quickly became dominated by a very small handful of decks. One of them, centered around Misty and water-type Pokemon, became hated early on as it could overwhelm the enemy based entirely on how well the coin flip did.
Now you’ll think that three expansions later, and that other cards have swooped down to replace or counter a foggy deck. But instead, the latest expansion of Pokemon TCG Pocket has added a new card that will enhance Misty Decks more than ever before. Many players are surpassing that.
In context, this doesn’t mean that a fog deck is not necessarily the most powerful in the game. That means Misty’s luck-based nature makes them feel like they’re losing. Misty is a supporter card and has the unique feature that allows users to choose water-type Pokemon and flip the coin until they land on their tail. Then, for all the heads they turn over, attach water-type energy to that Pokemon. This can cause players to attach zero water type energy and effectively waste deck spots and supporter cards playing. Alternatively, if you have luck for the day, you can add 1, 2, 3, 5, 10 energy, etc. A well-covered Misty can win a player in turn 1 in certain circumstances before the opponent has even the opportunity to move. Or, in a more common scenario, you get enough bonus energy to offer a very powerful card online before your opponent builds meaningful defenses.
It’s all okay and dandy, but what’s gotten even worse is the many cards in the subsequent expansions that made it even stronger. Mythical Island has added Vaporean. This gives players the ability to move all bonus energy freely between water types. Smackdown of space-time brought manaphy More water energy On the board. Both expansions saw new powerful water-type Pokemon that could harness that energy, such as Palkia Ex and Gyarados Ex. As a result, the water deck was consistently on top of the meta due to multiple expansions.
And now, with the light of victory, Another Cards that make your fog deck even more hellish: Irida. Irida, like Misty, is a supporter card, but its effect is that it can heal 40 damage from each Pokemon with water-type energy. Until now, grass-shaped decks have been experts in healing. But in Illida, as long as the water decks gather enough energy and spread out, they can make a huge comeback…and among Misty, Manafie and Bapoleon, it’s very likely that they will.
Because of its value, some Pokemon TCG experts have provided Irida with a rather logical explanation. With TCG Pocket, the deck is limited to 20 cards, so if you want to add something like Irida, you’ll need to take out something else. Water decks simply swim with good cards – at certain points, players should weigh whether it is actually worth removing the fog for cards like Illida. Some players speculate that developer Dena added Illida to force her to make tough choices about which supporters to include due to the fog. But that doesn’t mean that many clever deck builders haven’t found a way to include both.
As the players above point out, Pokemon TCG Pocket is preparing for regular scheduled events. Here, rewards are dolled out to proceed to Win Streaks in the game’s online competitive mode. The best rewards that are Gold Profile Badge are given to win five times in a row. This is surprisingly difficult. Also, if many decks you are facing have correctly flipped the coins over, it will wipe you out within the first few turns, and have a backup like Irida that can be saved even if the flip is bad.
Hope to see plenty of water decks during this event and for a long time to come. In fact, at this point it may still be worth playing yourself.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter at Passthecontroller. You can find her posts at Bluesky @Duckvalentine.bsky.social. Do you have any tips for the story? Send to [email protected].
