Hi there. In this Pokemon TCG post I cover the Ninetales ex Battle deck to be released in March 2024. I write this on January 2024 in the Paradox Rift era. This is a follow up of the Zapdos ex Battle deck post.
News Source from Pokebeach with Screenshot and pictures below.
Decklist
This 60 card deck includes 16 Pokemon (10 Basics), 13 Basic Fire Energy and 31 Trainer cards. I provide clickable links.
Pokemon (16)
- x3 Ninetales ex
- x4 Vulpix (OBF)
- x3 Rapidash
- x4 Ponyta
- x2 Paldean Tauros
Trainers (32)
- x3 Professor's Research (Professor Sada)
- x3 Judge
- x3 Youngster
- x3 Zisu
- x2 Jacq
- x2 Rika
- x1 Jubilife Village
- x4 Nest Ball
- x3 Ultra Ball
- x3 Earthen Vessel
- x2 Energy Retrieval
- x1 Super Rod
- x2 Switch
- x1 Pal Pad
Energy (13)
Goal Of Deck
It appears that the deck's goal is to mainly use Ninetales ex to attack the opponent. The Mirrored Flames attack does 80 damage as its base damage. If you have the same amount of cards as your opponent then the attack does 220 damage instead. This is not bad for a two energy cost. Judge shuffles both players hands and each player draws four cards. This helps meet the requirements of the Mirrored Flames attack from Ninetales ex. Zisu lets you draw cards until you have 1 more than your opponent. Play one more card to meet the requirements of the Mirrored Flames attack as well.
Rapidash is there to add 30 extra damage for Fire Pokemon by discarding one Fire energy. Paldean Tauros is there as a backup attacker but I don't think it is very good in this deck. This deck does miss Magma Basin to accelerate Fire Energy. On the flip side Magma Basin cards are not too hard to find and you can find one for 50 cents CAD or maybe less at a local card games store. Picture Link
Pros & Cons Of Deck
Good Cards
Three copies of Earthen Vessel is a very good.. It is new staple card from the Paradox Rift expansion. This card is better than Energy Search as Earthen Vessel can search for two basic Energy Cards. This card can be hard to find and is priced at a least 1 CAD in my area at least. Sometimes this card is more than 1 CAD or hard to find.
Three copies of 3 Professor's Research (Professor Sada) is good here. Maybe a fourth one could be better.
Four copies of Nest Ball and three copies of
Ultra Ball are good here. These ball cards are staples/essentials for any deck.
Three copies of Judge is good here as it supports Ninetales ex and its Mirrored Flames attack. Judge is not as powerful as Iono 185/193 with the hand disruption but Judge is cheaper at mostly 50 cents CAD vs Iono 185/193 at mostly 4 to 6 CAD.
One copy of Super Rod is okay. I think two would be a bit better just in case one is prized or you really need to put back Pokemon from the discard pile back to the deck.
Not So Good Parts Of The Deck
At first I thought that the Pokemon in this deck are not good. Ninetales ex along with Vulpix (OBF) are okay. The other Pokemon being Ponyta, Rapidash and Paldean Tauros are not great.
Youngster is not a great card in general.
Rika is an okay supporter in my opinion. The thing is that there are other more powerful supporters like Professor's Research (Professor Sada) and Iono.
There is no Boss's Orders in this deck. I would add two here.
Jubilife Village is okay in this deck I suppose. If attacking is not a good option I suppose you can use Jubilife Village and end your turn.
No Magma Basin is weird to me. Add 2 or 3 Magma Basins and remove the Youngster cards.
Buy It?
I think this deck is a good buy as a first deck for someone getting into the Pokemon TCG game. Although the attackers are not great you do get a good handful of useful staple Trainer cards like Professor's Research (Professor Sada), Nest Ball, Ultra Ball and Earthen Vessel.
For upgrading the deck definitely get two or three of Magma Basin. The attackers can be upgraded to something like Entei V, Radiant Charizard or Radiant Heatran (cheaper), Armarouge and Armarouge ex or Skeledirge ex (Steel Tera type) with the evolution line.
For someone who wants a more competitive deck to buy out of the box. There is this Origin Forme Palkia VStar League Battle Deck or this recent Miraidon ex League Battle Deck. It would cost 30 or 32 CAD (about 10 CAD more than a Level 2 deck) but the value is better in terms of the abundance of good/playable cards inside.
