Mewtwo ex decks are dominating the Pokémon TCG Pocket meta — and it’s driving me nuts

I do not have a Mewtwo ex card. I am reminded of this every time I open Pokémon TCG Pocket to battle a stranger. Released on Oct. 30, Pokémon TCG Pocket already has a pretty solid metagame — and surprise, it includes a powerful, shiny Mewtwo ex card. Ex cards, in general, are essential to winning matches in Pokémon TCG Pocket; Charizard ex is another super powerful and popular card.

Ex cards are essentially just more rare and powerful versions of several Pokémon’s standard cards. So if we’re comparing the regular Mewtwo card with its ex version, the difference is in HP, moves, and power: 120 HP to 150 HP, respectively. Similarly, Mewtwo simply has the 120-damage dealing move, Power Blast, but Mewtwo ex can use Psychic Sphere for 50 damage and Psydrive for 150 damage. To balance that extra power, ex cards are more high risk, since they count for two knockout points when they’re defeated.

I have yet beat a Mewtwo ex player. My hatred of the Mewtwo ex is twofold: 1) I’m not good enough to beat it, and 2) I don’t have a Mewtwo ex card of my own. What makes the Mewtwo ex deck so powerful is what you play alongside it; the Mewtwo ex deck is a slow-building one, requiring some luck to build a Ralts up to a Gardevoir to boost the amount of energy passed out each round. Gardevoir’s ability is that it takes one energy and adds it to the Pokémon in the active slot, on top of the regularly generated energy. While they’re building up to that, Mewtwo ex players can deal out damage using only two energy with Psychic Sphere. Once you’re up to four energy, you can blast your opponents away with Psydrive, which does a whopping 150 damage. This move eats up two energy per usage, which is why the Gardevoir is essential — you can just keep continuing to use it without any energy issues.

Once you get the deck set up, it’s really hard to beat. The only way I can see beating this deck is just by mucking up the process and eliminating cards early, but I haven’t nailed that approach just yet. The Charizard deck works similarly, requiring Moltres ex to quickly boost energy to its powerful 200-damage dealing move, Crimson Storm. In fact, most decks built around ex cards are pretty damn powerful. With the Pikachu ex card, it uses two, actually, adding Zapdos ex for powerful damage-dealing. The Pikachu ex card can do heavy damage if you have a full bench, but the Zapdos is a nice backup if Pikachu gets eliminated early.

Am I a hater simply because I can’t run this powerful Mewtwo ex (I’d settle for the Pikachu ex card, too!) setup myself? Maybe. If I get a Mewtwo ex card, will I upset other players like me on the daily? Probably! That’s really the thing with deck building games — the feeling of hating a card simply because I want it so badly. But in the meantime, my lack of Mewtwo ex has caused me to get creative with my builds. Because I can’t control what cards I pick, I’ve got to just use what I’ve got — and it’s making me a better, more well-rounded player.