An Early Look at the Temporal Forces Metagame!

Hello PokeBeach readers, I’m back again! Standard format rotation is almost upon us, and all eyes are currently upon Japan as they play the first major tournament of the new format at the Champion’s League in Fukuoka. The early Champions Leagues in Japan are often impactful on the metagame that the rest of the world enters into, and we have a bit of time to reflect on the results. The Standard rotation always provides a significant shake-up to the metagame, and this one is no exception — several potent cards are leaving the format and I am excited to see where the decks land heading into the European International Championships in April!

Cards Leaving the Format

Several important cards are leaving the format once rotation hits the rest of the world in April, and I’ll go over the four most important ones here.

Battle VIP Pass is currently a core feature of almost every single deck in the format, and it heavily swings the game in the favor of whoever has it in their opening hand. So many decks rely on Battle VIP Pass in the current format that many decks are even opting to go second, mainly so they can play Arven or Peony to increase their odds of finding it. The removal of Battle VIP Pass will make almost every deck significantly less consistent, but some decks will survive thanks to Buddy-Buddy Poffin, a new card releasing in the Temporal Forces expansion, becoming legal on the day of our rotation, This differs from Battle VIP Pass in that you can play it past your first turn, and significantly boosts decks that play Evolution Pokemon since they now have easy access to Basics on the first turn and beyond. It also helps any Lost Zone deck, as Buddy-Buddy Poffin can grab two Comfey which significantly helps those decks after the rotation of Battle VIP Pass.

Buddy-Buddy Poffin significantly improves the viability of Ditto, as you can find it with Buddy-Buddy Poffin, move it Active and use its Transformative Start Ability to swap it with a different Pokemon like Cramorant or Giratina V.

Path to the Peak is another huge card that will be rotating out in April. Path to the Peak has been a staple for the entire time it’s been in the format, as many of the top decks rely on their Abilities to function. Without Path to the Peak in the format, many decks will have three or four spaces freed up as they no longer need to include counter Stadium cards. Many of the decks in the current format mostly play their Stadiums to bump an opposing Path to the Peak, so once it’s gone then those spots can now be used for other cards. The main deck that benefits from the rotation of Path is Charizard ex; the way many decks attempt to beat Charizard ex currently is through spamming Path to the Peak, as it shuts off both their Infernal Reign and Quick Search Abilities. Charizard ex is one of the biggest benefactors from the rotation as well, mostly because the next card is rotating…

While Gardevoir isn’t the only card from the Gardevoir ex deck to rotate, it effectively removes the deck in its current form. Without access to Gardevoir, the deck can no longer easily take Knock Outs with a single-Prize Psokemon, making Prize mapping considerably more difficult. This is a huge boost for Charizard ex decks, as Gardevoir ex is currently one of its worst matchups. Post-rotation builds of Gardevoir ex haven’t managed to achieve many results at City Leagues or the Fukuoka Champion’s League.

This rotation completely removes the Mew VMAX deck. Mew VMAX has been a fixture of the Standard format for the entire time it has been legal, using Genesect V‘s Fusion Strike System Ability to draw extra cards and constantly put pressure on your opponent.

This rotation makes a lot of the two-Prize attacker decks significantly stronger, as Mew VMAX previously kept those decks down thanks to the efficiency of Genesect V’s Techno Blast attack. Mew VMAX rotating out also effectively removes Spiritomb and Drapion V from the format, freeing up Pokemon like Rotom V and Lumineon V from being hit in the crossfire.

Additions from Temporal Forces

While Temporal Forces doesn’t add a big new deck on its own, there are a ton of upgrades to existing decks. The most notable new change from this expansion is the re-introduction of ACE SPECs. These are significantly more powerful than normal cards, but you can only include one ACE SPEC in your deck. This means that you can include either a Master Ball or a Hero Cape in your deck, but not both. By far the most powerful ACE SPEC in my opinion is Prime Catcher.

Following Japan’s Lead

Many more cards are rotating out than these, these four are simply the most impactful right now, but we aren’t going into this new format completely blind! There have been several City Leagues (effectively League Cups) in Japan in addition to the Champion’s League that happened last weekend. If you want to look at a database of all of the City League results, Limitless has added a section to their website that has a bunch of the City Leagues on there with decklists for most of the Top 16! Throughout the City Leagues, certain decks have risen to the top, so let’s get stuck in!

This concludes the public portion of this article.

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