One of the most important metrics for any new expansion set is the pull rate – the ratio of packs that have rare cards to those that don’t. Sets that have a good pull rate tend to be more popular than those with a low pull rate. We were interested to find out the Brilliant Stars pull rate. We opened two booster boxes and logged our results
What is a Brilliant Stars Booster Box?
Brilliant Stars is the 9th main expansion set in the Pokémon Sword and Shield series.
The set was released on 25th February 2022 with a presale price of around £125 ($140). At the time of release most stores had stock available. This could be due to less demand for this set or because stock was not allocated and stockists received the full quota ordered.
New booster boxes are sealed a with clear film covering which has the Pokémon logo imprinted in white.
Each booster box contains 36 sealed booster packs. The booster packs for this set have four different artworks – Arceus, Charizard, Shaymin and Whimsicott.
How good is the Brilliant Stars pull rate?
The term ‘pull rate’ refers to the numbers of holo, half art, and full art (including ultra and secret rare as well as Trainer Gallery cards) that are found in booster boxes. The higher the numbers of these cards, the better the pull rate. In the set, the Trainer Gallery cards take the place of a reverse holo, meaning that a pack can have more than one art card.
In addition to logging the overall Brilliant Stars pull rate we also logged the pull rate for each pack art design.
Results by Pack Art
Our two booster boxes contained:
18 packs with Arceus, 18 packs with Charizard art, 17 with Shaymin and 19 packs featuring Whimsicott.
Arceus Artwork
Our 18 packs featuring Arceus included 9 that had no holo or art cards.
From the other 9 packs we pulled:
008/172 Torterra (Holo Rare)
062/172 Dusknoir (Holo Rare)
079/172 Lucario (Holo Rare)
057/172 Granbull V (Half Art)
064/172 Whimsicott V (Half Art)
095/172 Morpeko V (Half Art)
TG10/TG30 Houndoom (Trainer Gallery)
TG11/TG30 Eevee (Trainer Gallery)
TG29/TG30 Single Strike Urshifu VMAX (Trainer Gallery)
169/172 Cynthia’s Ambition (Ultra Rare)
This represents a pull rate of 55%
Charizard Artwork
Out of our 18 packs featuring Charizard 8 packs had no holo rare or art cards.
From the remaining 10 packs we pulled:
021/172 Galarian Moltres (Holo Rare)
026/172 Infernape (Holo Rare)
121/172 Bibarel (Holo Rare)
132/172 Boss’s Orders (Holo Rare)
048/172 Raikou V (Half Art)
068/172 Mimikyu V (Half Art)
170/172 Kindler (Ultra Rare)
TG04/TG30 Jolteon (Trainer Gallery)
TG05/TG30 Zekrom (Trainer Gallery)
2 x TG23/TG30 Umbreon VMAX (Trainer Gallery)
This represents a pull rate of 61%
Shaymin Artwork
Out of our 17 packs, 11 packs contained no holo rare or art cards.
From the other 6 packs we pulled:
026/172 Infernape (Holo Rare)
062/172 Dusknoir (Holo Rare)
027/172 Simisear V (Half Art)
122/172 Arceus V (Half Art)
153/172 Charizard V (Ultra Rare)
156/172 Lumineon V (Ultra Rare)
This represents a pull rate of 35%
Whimsicott Artwork
Our 19 packs featuring Whimsicott included 10 that had no holo rare or art cards.
From the other 9 packs we pulled:
021/172 Galarian Moltres (Holo Rare)
037/172 Empoleon (Holo Rare)
079/172 Lucario (Holo Rare)
081/172 Torterra (Holo Rare)
132/172 Boss’s Orders (Holo Rare)
017/172 Charizard V (Half Art)
088/172 Honchcrow V (Half Art)
106/172 Flygon V (Half Art)
029/172 Kingler VMAX (Full Art)
TG08/TG30 Alcremie (Trainer Gallery)
This represents a pull rate of 53%
Conclusion
From our 72 booster packs we pulled 14 holo rare cards, 10 half art V cards, 1 full art VMAX card, 4 full art ultra rare cards and 8 Trainer Gallery full art cards. This represents a Brilliant Stars pull rate of 51%.
If the holo rare cards are removed from the calculation the pull rate falls to 32%
The results analysed by pack art showed that packs with Charizard artwork had the better pull rate.
However, it should be remembered that the results posted here were taken from two booster boxes. If the sample were larger with more booster boxes being analysed, the result could be different.
