A Progression Series (also known as Evolution Series) is a fun format for Pokémon TCG where a group of players open a predefined number of boosters, one set at a time and accumulate a card pool from which they will build decks and play against each other.
Only imagination is limit on how to choose which sets you include. The “easiest” way is to choose a series and open each set in it. We started ours with Scarlet & Violet and will play through each set published.
In the beginning, the decks will be bad and inconsistent and that’s part of the fun. Over time, your decks improve but you still need to adapt to new situations based on what cards you pull.
Once for each set:
- Open 18 boosters
- Add cards from those boosters to your available card pool.
- Build a 60-card deck from available cards.
- Play against everyone and count score.
- After a set finishes, you can distribute Compensation Packs from the set based on rankings.
Compensation Packs
We decided to award players extra packs after each set, based on how they performed. This helps players who may have gotten a short straw with the initial sets to improve their decks.
In our group, we decided to give these packs as follows
- 1st place: 1 pack
- 2nd place: 2 packs
- 3th place: 4 packs
- 4th place: 6 packs
- 5th place: 8 packs
And if players ended up with a tied score, they’d receive packs based on the average of packs for the positions, rounded up. For example, if two players tied for 2nd place, they’d get (2 + 4) / 2 = 3 packs.
Some groups decide to give the winner something good while the ones performing less well get a lesser prize. Personally, I find this bit problematic in such format because if a player gets far ahead in their card pool, it can be hard to catch up which makes future sets less interesting to play.
Tools and resources
You can play this with physical cards if you got the cash and find enough booster boxes for players. A more budget friendly alternative is to use tools like PokemonCard.io’s Pack Simulator and then play in either Pokémon TCG Live (for newer sets), Untap.in or Tabletop Simulator.
To keep track of your card pool, you can copy-paste the picks from Pack Simulator or print the final page as PDF for safe keeping. I have also built a bookmarklet that will export the cards to clipboard so you can then store them somewhere.
Make it your own
There are no hard and fast rules when designing your own Progression Series. Pick any sets you want and make up your own rules. I hope these will give you a starting point but don’t feel like you need to follow any of them.