Black Bolt: chase cards, pull rates and most valuable cards

Black Bolt is a Pokémon Trading Card Game expansion in the Scarlet & Violet Series, released on July 18, 2025, as one half of a split expansion with White Flare. Between them, the two sets feature all 156 Pokémon first discovered in the Unova region. Black Bolt features the Legendary Pokémon Zekrom, with Zekrom ex and the Mythical Meloetta ex among its six Pokémon ex, and the first partner Snivy evolving all the way to Serperior ex. Its main set has 86 cards, and 86 more are numbered above it (087/086 to 172/086), for 172 cards in all, one fewer than White Flare. This page shows the cards collectors chase, ranks them by sold prices as of October 28, 2026, and sets out what the published pack counts found. It is a reference, not buying advice.

Set facts

The chase cards

The grid shows both Black White Rares, all seven Special Illustration Rares and the three Illustration Rares with the highest ungraded prices, with prices as of October 28, 2026. Zekrom ex, the set's headline card, appears four times: as the Double Rare (034), the Ultra Rare full art (158), the Special Illustration Rare (166) and the Black White Rare (172). Victini is the one Black White Rare that is not a Pokémon ex, and it has a different number in each half of the split expansion: 171 in Black Bolt and 172 in White Flare. The regular Victini in the main set (012) is a Rare and sells for under a dollar ungraded.

• Victini#171/086 · Black White RareUngraded $558.59 · PSA 10 $1,275.00
• Zekrom ex#172/086 · Black White RareUngraded $524.75 · PSA 10 $1,175.00
• Zekrom ex#166/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $215.00 · PSA 10 $382.00
• Kyurem ex#165/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $64.00 · PSA 10 $136.92
• N's Plan#170/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $54.31 · PSA 10 $105.00
• Genesect ex#169/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $37.92 · PSA 10 $91.35
• Serperior ex#164/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $37.23 · PSA 10 $89.19
• Meloetta ex#167/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $33.00 · PSA 10 $77.72
• Excadrill ex#168/086 · Special Illustration RareUngraded $19.95 · PSA 10 $69.50
• Seismitoad#105/086 · Illustration RareUngraded $183.25 · PSA 10 $1,599.00
• Haxorus#147/086 · Illustration RareUngraded $54.76 · PSA 10 $288.00
• Volcarona#100/086 · Illustration RareUngraded $47.74 · PSA 10 $1,150.05

The rarity tiers above the main set

The main set (001–086) holds 39 Common, 31 Uncommon and 10 Rare cards plus six Double Rares. The 86 cards above it fall into four tiers.

On top of the numbered cards, each of the 80 Common, Uncommon and Rare cards also exists as a reverse holo with a Poké Ball foil pattern, and the 72 Pokémon among them also with a Master Ball foil pattern. These parallels are separate printings with their own prices and are not ranked below; the Master Ball Victini #012, for example, was at $38.79 ungraded.

Most valuable cards

Ranked by ungraded price, the value of a raw copy as pulled from a pack, with the PSA 10 value and how often PSA 10 copies sell. Prices come from recent sold listings and change daily. All values as of October 28, 2026.

• Two cards above $500 raw. The Black White Rares Victini #171 ($558.59) and Zekrom ex #172 ($524.75) were far ahead of every other card; the next, Zekrom ex #166, was at $215.00. In PSA 10, Victini was listed at $1,275.00 against $1,175.00 for Zekrom ex #172.
• Seismitoad is the outlier. Seismitoad #105, an Illustration Rare, sold for $183.25 raw, more than any Special Illustration Rare except Zekrom ex #166, and at $1,599.00 it had the highest PSA 10 value in the set, above both Black White Rares.
• Illustration Rares climb steeply in PSA 10. Volcarona #100 sold for $47.74 raw but $1,150.05 in PSA 10; Dwebble #129, Amoonguss #96, Lilligant #92 and Krookodile #137 were all above $500 in PSA 10. Several of those graded prices rest on one sale a week or a month, so a single sale moves them.
• Special Illustration Rares. After Zekrom ex #166, Kyurem ex #165 ($64.00) and N's Plan #170 ($54.31) led the tier. Serperior ex #164 ($37.23), Meloetta ex #167 ($33.00) and Excadrill ex #168 ($19.95) fall below the top 14, and their PSA 10 values stayed under $100.
• What is left out. Sealed products, Poké Ball and Master Ball pattern parallels, and stamped or promo versions are not ranked. A stamped Zekrom ex #034 and a stamped Victini #012 are listed separately from the regular cards, so check which version a listing shows.
• Graded vs raw. Whether a PSA 10 price is worth chasing depends on the odds of getting one and on the fees; Is it worth grading? works through the method and PSA 9 vs PSA 10 covers what separates the two grades.

Pull rates

The Pokémon Company does not publish pull rates. The largest published opening with a stated sample is TCGplayer's, published on July 21, 2025: the eBay Authentication Center in Kentucky opened more than 350 booster packs of Black Bolt and more than 350 of White Flare. Because each half is small, TCGplayer combined them into one sample of over 700 packs, on the assumption that the two sets share the same rates; it found no notable differences between them. The figures are per pack, with 95% confidence ranges, and they are estimates, not guarantees. The same table appears on the White Flare page.

1. Poké Ball pattern foil: 30.56% ± 3.36% of packs, about 1 in 3 packs.
2. Double Rare: 21.11% ± 2.98% of packs, about 1 in 5 packs.
3. Illustration Rare: 16.39% ± 2.70% of packs, about 1 in 6 packs.
4. Ultra Rare: 5.83% ± 1.71% of packs, about 1 in 17 packs.
5. Master Ball pattern foil: 5.14% ± 1.61% of packs, about 1 in 19 packs.
6. Special Illustration Rare: 1.25% ± 0.81% of packs, about 1 in 80 packs.

What the counts say, and their limits

• No Black White Rare rate. TCGplayer found no Black White Rare in more than 700 packs, so it gives no rate for them, only that it is likely very low. The other count found with a stated sample, a Reddit user's tally of 1,000 English packs of both sets reported by Card Codex on July 7, 2025, saw only a couple of Black White Rares. Neither is enough to put a number on Victini #171 or Zekrom ex #172.
• Illustration Rares come often, a specific one rarely. At about 1 in 6 packs, TCGplayer found Illustration Rares roughly twice as easy to pull as in the Scarlet & Violet base set (about 1 in 13) or Destined Rivals (about 1 in 12). With 69 of them in Black Bolt, a specific one such as Seismitoad #105 still works out at about 1 in 848 packs.
• Where the hits sit. Double Rares and Ultra Rares turned up in the Rare slot, Poké Ball and Master Ball pattern foils in the first Reverse Holo slot, and Illustration Rares and Special Illustration Rares in the second. Counting all of them, TCGplayer put the chance of a hit in a pack at roughly 50%, the best it had seen in a modern set.
• The two counts agree where they overlap. Card Codex's report gives an Illustration Rare about every 6 packs and a Special Illustration Rare about once in 77 packs, close to TCGplayer's 1 in 6 and 1 in 80.
• Small samples, wide ranges. For a specific Ultra Rare the margin (± 0.44%) is larger than the rate itself (0.36%), and the per-card odds assume every card of a rarity is equally common; TCGplayer says the counts it found for each card fit within that assumption. For a larger study of a later set, see Mega Evolution.

Checklist before you rely on a number here

• ☐ The price has a date: everything above is as of October 28, 2026, and prices move daily.
• ☐ You are comparing like with like: ungraded with ungraded, PSA 10 with PSA 10, and the right card number (Zekrom ex exists as 034, 158, 166 and 172; Victini is 012 and 171 in Black Bolt and 172 in White Flare).
• ☐ The card is the regular set version, not a Poké Ball or Master Ball pattern parallel or a stamped or promo printing.
• ☐ The PSA 10 price rests on regular sales (check the volume column; several Illustration Rares sell about once a week or less).
• ☐ Pull rates come from Black Bolt and White Flare counted together, a little over 700 packs; a single product can land well above or below them, and there is no rate for Black White Rares.
• ☐ Before grading, check the card against the modern pre-grading checklist.