Pokémon TCG Pocket: Blastoise EX Deck Guide

To no one’s surprise the original Starting Pokémon trio all come together to make some powerful decks in Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket in their EX forms. So, where does everybody’s favorite blue turtle Blastoise stand?

Unfortunately, Charizard EX is the best of them, followed by Venusaur EX, and Blastoise EX solidly in third place when it comes to the Starter evolutions. Still, if you pulled Blastoise EX or you’re a big fan of Squirtle, we’ve put together a competitive deck that, with a little bit of luck, can stand up against the best decks in the meta.

We've covered the best cards for the deck, some budget options, and the deck's strengths and weaknesses so you can plan ahead as best as possible.

Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket - Best Blastoise EX Deck

When if Blastoise EX is the worst of the starter trio EX decks, it's still a solid pick. A C Tier deck is still okay!

If you want to build the best deck possible for Blastoise EX, then these are the best 20 cards to grab. This deck relies heavily on Misty, with a little help from Articuno EX, and uses Water energy. Pikachu booster packs will get you most of the way but you'll want Mewtwo boosters for the Articuno.

• 2x Squirtle

• 2x Wartortle

• 2x Blastoise EX

• 2x Articuno EX

• 2x Misty

• 2x Professor’s Research

• 2x Sabrina

• 2x Poké Ball

• 2x Potion

• 2x X Speed

The aim is to build up either Blastoise EX or Articuno EX with the help of Misty, which requires you to flip heads to place Water energy onto either card. If Blastoise EX has 5 Water energy on him, Hydro Bazooka will do a total of 160 damage. This will one shot pretty much every Pokémon you’ll go up against, including Charizard EX due to its water weakness.

Articuno EX can win on its own if you hit one or two extra Water energy with Misty. Furthermore, it can give you time to power-up your Blastoise while whittling down your opponent’s bench with Blizzard, which does 10 damage to your opponent’s benched Pokémon on top of 80 damage to their active Pokémon.

This list is highly Water energy dependent so good flips with Misty is necessary to make it work. Because Articuno EX also uses a lot of energy, many players have opted to switch Articuno EX out for a low-energy dependent card like Kangaskhan; however, we’ve found Articuno EX’s backup win condition necessary for consistency here.

Blastoise EX Best And Worst Matchups

Obviously, Blastoise EX has one of the best matchups against Charizard EX. Both have similar game plans by cheating out energy early for high-powered attacks; however, Articuno EX puts far more pressure on them than Moltres EX.

Mewtwo EX can sometimes struggle against Blastoise EX too, as it needs time to set up for the win. Blastoise can act quickly, however.

On the other hand, Pikachu EX absolutely wrecks Blastoise EX without a very good result from the Misty Trainer card. If you do not get that extra energy, Pikachu EX and Zapdos EX will tear through this deck before you can even sniff at 5 energy for Blastoise.

Blastoise EX Budget Options

Fortunately, there’s quite a lot of budget options for this list if you do not have two Articuno EX or lack a second Blastoise EX.

First and foremost, the recently released Lapras EX from the Lapras EX Drop Event is a great choice to stall for time as its Bubble Drain attack heals itself. In fact, many players might choose Lapras EX over Articuno EX for this fact alone.

Regular Blastoise isn’t so strong but in a pinch, it can replace a missing Blastoise EX as you already have the Squirtle line in the deck. Otherwise, look at other options like Snom and Frostmoth that can put your opponent’s active Pokémon to sleep.

With that, you should be able to hose down your opponents and pick up some much-needed experience to open more Pokémon TCG Pocket packs.

Good luck with your Blastoise EX deck in Pokémon TCG! Have a look at our Tier List if you're struggling, and let us know if you think Blastoise is better than we do!