Gift Guide

For the youngest new players, a Battle Deck deck is an easy way to get familiar with the basics of the game. Battle Decks are built to be simple and to help players learn the game’s rules without worrying about complex attacks, abilities, or Trainer cards. Although Battle Decks are generally not especially competitive against other decks that aren’t also Battle Decks, a Battle Deck offers a solid start for a young new player.

Each Battle Deck comes with:

• A full 60-card deck, ready to play against another player with their own deck

• A paper deckbox and a coin featuring the star Pokémon of the Battle Deck

• A set of paper damage counters to help keep track of the damage Pokémon take during their battles

• A paper playmat with helpful tips and reminders for the rules

• A quick start rules booklet to help get a new player up to speed on how to play the game

• A code card for the Pokémon Trading Card Game Live—an online Pokémon TCG client for Windows, Mac, Android, and iPadOS devices—that will redeem the deck and coin in the digital game

Once your young new player gets comfortable with their Battle Deck, they can begin upgrading it with better cards, cutting the less useful cards and substituting more powerful cards in their place. With help, they can use the guide to upgrading a starter deck on this site to improve their new deck’s chances in more competitive play.

Battle Decks sell for $10-15.

This product was designed to be an easy way for families to learn and play the Pokémon Trading Card Game together. The Pokémon Battle Academy contains three decks—featuring Cinderace, Pikachu, and Eevee—and like a theme deck, helps a new player learn the basics of the game. In many ways, the decks found inside of the Pokémon Battle Academy are slightly more powerful theme decks. Like a theme deck, however, the decks in the Pokémon Battle Academy are constructed to be simple, easy introductions to the rules of the game and are not especially competitive decks.

In addition to the three decks, the Battle Academy box set includes:

• 1 instruction sheet to help you set up to play

• 2 tutorial guides to lead you through the decks

• 1 two-player game board

• 3 deck boxes to keep the cards organized

• 1 rulebook

• 1 large metallic coin featuring Cinderace, Pikachu, and Eevee

• 1 set of damage counters

• A code card for the new Pokémon TCG Live

If you are the parent of a young child who would enjoy playing the Pokémon Trading Card Game with you and with other members of your family, Pokémon Battle Academy is a great buy for family game night!

Pokémon Battle Academy sells for about $20.

These decks are excellent jumpstarts for entering the competitive scene. Although as they come, these decks aren’t at full power, these decks are slightly simplified versions of real competitive decks and offer a great way to get hold of many of the cards in the competitive decks they represent. The League Battle decks themselves are built to be reasonably competitive and with a few small upgrades are often competitive even in a tournament setting!

Each League Battle deck comes with:

• A full 60-card deck featuring the Pokémon in the front window of the product’s packaging.

• A paper deck box with artwork featuring the main Pokémon in the League Battle deck.

• Poisoned and Burned condition markers

• A “coin flip” die and 6 damage counter dice

• A getting started guide and Pokémon TCG rulebook

• A code card for the Pokémon Trading Card Game Live—an online Pokémon TCG client for Windows, Mac, Android, and iPadOS devices—that will redeem the League Battle deck in the digital game

League Battle decks sell for about $25.

Elite Trainer Boxes contain 9 booster packs*† and a host of other helpful inclusions to jump-start a new player’s inventory. In addition to the booster packs, Elite Trainer Boxes also come with:

• A large “coin flip” die and six small damage counter dice to help players keep track of their Pokémon’s health through the course of a game

• Poison and Burn special condition markers to help a player keep track of these specific special conditions

• A pack of energy cards with roughly 4-5 basic energy cards of each type.

• 65 deck sleeves featuring artwork of a Pokémon highlighted in that box’s set. Note: these deck sleeves are of abysmally poor quality and are better used for storing cards in a collection binder than for playing the game.

• A set of card dividers to help keep a player’s cards organized in the Elite Trainer Box itself

• A Player’s Guide and a Pokémon Trading Card Game Rule Book to help a new player brush up on how to play the game.

What an Elite Trainer Box does not contain, however, is a functioning deck. Because Elite Trainer Boxes contain booster packs that themselves contain random cards, it is extremely unlikely—even bordering on impossible—for someone to craft a coherent deck from its contents.

Elite Trainer Boxes range in price from $40-50. See the list of ideal sets from the section on Booster Packs, Blister Packs, and Booster Boxes to figure out which Elite Trainer Box to get for your Pokémon fan!

The Trainer’s Toolkit is one of the very best products for a new player to upgrade their first decks and for more seasoned players to ensure they have all of the cards they need in their deck building arsenal. The Trainer’s Toolkit comes with the following supplemental materials:

• 65 deck sleeves

• A deck builder’s guide and a Pokémon Trading Card Game rule book

• 1 “coin flip” die and 6 damage counter dice

• Poison and Burn special condition markers to help a player keep track of these specific special conditions

• 12 of each basic energy card

• 4 Pokémon TCG booster packs

• A code card for the Pokémon Trading Card Game Live—an online Pokémon TCG client for Windows, Mac, Android, and iPadOS devices—that will redeem the cards from the toolkit in the digital game

Inside the Trainer’s Toolkit is a whole host of cards useful for upgrading a player’s existing deck or crafting a brand new one. Below is a full list of all of the cards included inside the Trainer’s Toolkit.

Booster Packs and Single-Pack and Three-Pack Blister packs are amongst the safest items to give to a player, collector, or “unknown” Pokémon TCG fan. As a general rule, the most recent sets will be the most sought after by players, but collectors tend to appreciate different sets than players do. Booster Boxes, also known as Booster Displays, generally contain the most packs per dollar you spent and contain 36 booster packs compared with 1 or 3 packs from the individually sleeved booster packs, single-pack blisters and three-pack blisters. If you’re looking at getting one of these three items for your Pokémon TCG loving-friend, here are few great sets to consider:

Like deck sleeves, a deck box could be an item for which seasoned players will have a strong preference. However, new and aspiring players will often not have a deck box at all. It’s not uncommon, for example, to see a new young player at Pokémon League with their freshly-crafted deck in a plastic sandwich bag. This is very less than ideal! A deck box does more than merely keep the cards together—it also helps provide another basic level of protection. Some nicer deck boxes also offer space for gameplay trinkets—like the dice, Poisoned and Burned counters, and the GX Marker that are necessary to play.

Deck boxes and other deck storage can vary in price rather a lot. Some of the simplest plastic deck boxes can run between $3-5. The nicer ones can often exceed $20.

For the simpler end of deck boxes, these options are good picks:

• Ultra Pro Deck Box

• Ultimate Guard Deck Case

• Ultimate Guard Boulder

For something a bit more feature rich, these options are great buys:

• Ultra Pro Satin Tower

• Ultra Pro M2.1 Deck Box

• Ultimate Guard Sidewinder 80+ XenoSkin

• Ultimate Guard Flip'n'Tray 80+ XenoSkin

• GameGenic Watchtower

And for deck boxes with space for more than one deck:

• Ultimate Guard Twin Flip'n'Tray™ 200+ XenoSkin

• GameGenic Stronghold

• Dex Protection ProLine Deckbox Large

As a general rule, collectors tend to prefer over-sized clear sleeves called penny sleeves to add a little extra layer of protection for their collection. Penny sleeves are an excellent extra barrier between the card and larger protective exteriors like a Card Saver or toploader.

Players, in contrast to collectors, tend to prefer smaller, snug-fitting clear sleeves often referred to as perfect fit sleeves. These sleeves are barely larger than the cards they cover and are designed to be small enough to fit inside a larger outer sleeve—often, but not always—a deck sleeve.

Penny sleeves tend to be rather inexpensive—$2-3 for a pack of a hundred. An ideal brand for penny sleeves is Ultra Pro.

Perfect fits also tend to be rather inexpensive at $3-5 per pack of a hundred. Ideal brands for perfect fits are KMC and Dragon Shield.

For a collector, a tin may be a great option to consider when looking at what gift to give. For younger collectors especially, consider a Pokémon tin featuring one of their favorite Pokémon.

For more seasoned collectors especially, the tin itself may be less important than the booster packs included inside. As a general rule, Pokémon tins featuring booster packs from the year’s mini sets tend to be the most sought-after, but are also often the hardest to find-especially at a price close to their manufacturer’s suggested retail price, or MSRP. These special tins often have the name and logo of their special set printed on the back side of the tin to make it easier to locate them.

Tins with the following sets included inside are the ones to keep an eye out for:

• Crown Zenith

• 151

Tins vary in price from about $10 for the mini tins to about $30 for the tins featuring a Pokémon card in the window on the tin. Tins from special sets listed above are likely to cost more than those not from the special sets, but always verify the contents of the tin if the store you’re purchasing from is asking for a premium.

Like tins, Pokémon premium collection boxes can be a great purchase for a collector if you can find one featuring their favorite Pokémon. These collections can also be fantastic purchases for collectors when they contain booster packs featuring one of the year’s highly sought-after mini sets. Like the tins that feature packs from these mini sets, it may be difficult to find these collections at all—and finding them close to MSRP can be even harder. Special collections featuring one of the special sets listed below will list the name of the set in the products contents on the back of the packaging:

• Hidden Fates

• Champion’s Path

• Shining Fates

• Celebrations

• Crown Zenith

• 151

These special Pokémon collections often vary in price from $30 for older collections to $50 for collections featuring multiple Pokémon. An average recently released collection usually costs about $40.