Black & White
After a bit of a pause, I am back to cover the newer sets, which I consider to be “modern” for various reasons: They are still tournament-legal in the Expanded Format, the set numbering is the same as for the most recent sets, and by the end of the Black & White Series, the sets generally featured “regular” Ultra Rares (Pokémon-EX, Pokémon-GX, Pokémon-V), Full Arts and Secret Rares, as is the case today. The newest Scarlet & Violet Series sets brought a number of changes, so maybe some day we will consider Gens 5 to 8 to be “mid era”.
For most of the sets so far, I have looked at the reverses, trying to guess which kind of cards were printed how many times on the sheet (or sheets). From now on, I am only going to do this for those sets where this question seems particularly interesting. Likewise, as for all post-WotC era sets, I have looked at the commons sheet only in certain cases. Thanks to that, I will mostly only be using data that I have already compiled, which should allow me to concentrate on documenting it rather than compiling even more data.
As a further note, I have compiled a bit more data on older sets, PokeRev did some opening streams of vintage booster boxes and I also found some more videos online, so I plan to update the raw data for individual cards for some sets in the near future. Nothing has changed though as to my estimates of the pull rates. When I do so, I plan to add a changelog to the introduction post.
This being said, it is time to look at Black & White Base Set. This was the first set to feature Full Art cards, though they differ from contemporary Full Arts in that they aren’t textured (the first textured Full Arts appeared in Next Destinies). The set also featured a Secret Rare (Pikachu), obviously printed on a separate sheet due to its holofoil pattern. Finally, the set featured Basic Energy Cards. The pull rates are as follows:
-Two (i.e. both) Full Arts per box.
-As to the Secret Rare, I would guess one in every other box. My sample from Youtube yielded 7 Pikachu from 14 boxes. For Noble Victories, which similarly featured a Secret Rare Meowth, it was 6 from 14 boxes. Now, later sets generally have a secret rare in about one in three boxes, but I figured that for Black & White and Noble Victories, one in two boxes is the best estimate.
-The Basic Energy Cards are printed once each on the commons sheet, which I reconstructed.
Now, for the Full Arts it is necessary to give some thought about how they were printed - namely, what the sheet size was. With the illustration going all the way to the card boundary, you would expect them to be spaced a bit further apart than normal cards, so that there is a bit of margin when cutting them to avoid aesthetically unappealing bits of the neighboring cards appearing on the card border when centering is not perfect. And in fact, there are images of modern Ultra-Rare sheets which are 10x10 - see Rattle’s video, and the Darkness Ablaze Pokémon-V sheet, both posted on this thread by @bk2021.
However, there are images available online showing a 11x11 sheet featuring Full Art Mewtwo EX and Regigigas EX from from next destinies. It is obviously not a finished product, as the set contains six different Full Arts and not only two; also, if you look at closeups (see below), you will notice the cards aren’t textured, and they are missing the card text:
The cards appear extremely closely spaced. While I wasn’t able to find any good images of miscut Full Arts (or uncut sheets other than this proof sheet) from the Black & White Series, I did find the following two examples below, from Furious Fists and Phantom Forces:
The red lines show where the cards should have been cut approximately. There is more spacing here. As a consequence, I have decided I am going to assume the use of 10x10 sheets for the Full Arts of the Black & White and X & Y Series, and regard the 11x11 sheet with Mewtwo and Giratina as a failed experiment. (I will also be assuming the regular Pokémon-EX to be printed on 10x10 sheets, I will possibly include a image or two when I get to covering Next Destinies.
The rarity table for Black & White is shown below. In addition to the number of times cards from specific sheets are inserted in the sequence, and the pack pull rates, I decided to add the box ratios in the table as well:
Notice how the Full Arts are actually more common than the holos, kind of similar to how Pokémon-ex were more common than holos in the first three Ex Series sets.
The raw data for the holos and rares looks as follows (dashed lines indicating where the transition from H11 to H10, etc., would occur):
I see no indication of any artificial rarity differences.
The commons sheet looks as follows:
† Timburr (Pound), Pansage, Woobat, Patrat (Tackle), Snivy (Leaf Blade), Scraggy, Oshawott (Tackle), Water Energy, Timburr (Low Kick), Pidove, Minccino, Panpour, Blitzle (Rear Kick), Energy Search, Oshawott (Razor Shell), Purrloin, Switch, Patrat (Hyper Fang), Joltik (Stun Needle), Potion, Sandile, Tepig (Take Down), Lightning Energy, Zorua, Deerling, Lillipup (Collect), Venipede, Darumaka, Blitzle (Stomp), Woobat, Lillipup (Pickup), Ducklett, Klink, Pidove, Scraggy, Pansear, Joltik (Leech Life), Psychic Energy, Solosis, Blitzle (Rear Kick), Snivy (Tackle), Timburr (Low Kick), Tepig (Tackle), Petilil, Patrat (Tackle), Pansage, Sandile, Oshawott (Tackle), Minccino, Switch, Timburr (Pound), Panpour, Fighting Energy, Purrloin, Snivy (Leaf Blade), Potion, Patrat (Hyper Fang), Darumaka, Klink, Woobat, Lillipup (Collect), Tepig (Take Down), Venipede, Energy Search, Zorua, Oshawott (Razor Shell), Tepig (Tackle), Blitzle (Stomp), Darkness Energy, Lillipup (Pickup), Snivy (Tackle), Timburr (Low Kick), Ducklett, Pidove, Joltik (Leech Life), Deerling, Joltik (Stun Needle), Solosis, Woobat, Timburr (Pound), Oshawott (Tackle), Scraggy, Switch, Metal Energy, Sandile, Petilil, Patrat (Tackle), Potion, Minccino, Pansage, Purrloin, Energy Search, Zorua, Pansear, Patrat (Hyper Fang), Panpour, Snivy (Leaf Blade), Blitzle (Rear Kick), Tepig (Take Down), Grass Energy, Joltik (Stun Needle), Pidove, Oshawott (Razor Shell), Solosis, Switch, Lillipup (Collect), Darumaka, Snivy (Tackle), Deerling, Joltik (Leech Life), Tepig (Tackle), Venipede, Energy Search, Fire Energy, Lillipup (Pickup), Petilil, Blitzle (Stomp), Ducklett, Potion, Klink, Pansear †
Edit 2023/09/07: Added sentence highlighting that the Full Arts are more common than the holos in this set.
Edit 2023/09/09: Corrected mistake in rarity table (previous version had full arts on a 10x11 instead of a 10x10 sheet).