Could Giratina VSTAR Come Back for the World Championships?
Hello PokeBeach readers! Isaiah here, and I am happy to be writing another article for you all! Last time, I discussed Iron Thorns ex and how it was about to go from a forgotten quantity to one of the most successful cards at the North America International Championships. In that article, I discussed Quad Iron Thorns ex and Iron Hands ex / Iron Crown ex both of which saw high success at NAIC with high counts of Iron Thorns ex. The card also saw some success at lower counts, like as a one-of in Andrew Hedrick’s Lost Zone deck, which he used to win the event, as well as in Ian Robb’s 19th-place Miraidon ex list.
As we head into the World Championships, I think Iron Thorns ex is in a position to continue to succeed, but my testing has led me to question if it will be as good as it was at NAIC. As I started testing for Worlds, the first thing I did was test a few of the decks I expected to be good, such as Charizard ex, Regidrago VSTAR, and others, to see if they really were going to live up to the hype. Once I found that the hype was mostly based in truth, I started examining off-meta strategies. Decks like Banette ex or Gholdengo ex got revisited because I thought their success earlier in the season could be seen again, but they ultimately fell short of what I wanted. I even tried some really weird stuff, like Greninja ex, Toedscruel ex, and even Klawf, hoping to find an overlooked gem in the format, but I was struggling. It was during this stage that I tried both Quad Iron Thorns ex and Iron Hands ex / Iron Crown ex, which is part of what inspired me to write my previous article. Quad Iron Thorns ex in particular actually did impress me a lot, and I think the deck could be a solid play for the World Championships if you feel like you have a good shot at dodging Gardevoir ex all weekend. (A bonus to this strategy is that, if you fail, you get to spend more time exploring Hawaii!) However, I wanted something that felt a bit safer.
One deck that seemed to merit a second look was Giratina VSTAR. Just before rotation, Giratina VSTAR was considered by many to be the best deck in the Standard format by far, and, even though rotation hurt it a lot with the loss of Path to the Peak, the deck was still able to finish second place at the Europe International Championships in the hands of Isaiah Bradner. At NAIC, I ran into a Giratina VSTAR player, and while I was able to beat them, I am not so sure that I should have. I got a little lucky off of some Roxanne, and I was given a window to win a game that I was probably going to lose when my opponent attacked with Bloodmoon Ursaluna ex, which I could not Knock Out, while being out of Switch and having Temple of Sinnoh in play, shutting off Jet Energy. This gave me time to take a two-hit Knock Out and win the game.
After such a close call, and seeing a few notable Giratina VSTAR players, including Alberto Conti, who is arguably the best Giratina VSTAR player in the world right now, see some success at NAIC, I started thinking about the deck again. As I kept thinking about its matchups, I started to like the deck more and more. Sure, it has some rocky matchups, but a historically great Charizard ex matchup was enough for me to start testing the deck, and I liked it a lot! After researching lists and considering the changes that I think are necessary for Worlds, I settled on a deck list that I feel is pretty solid. Before I get into that, though, we need to take a deeper dive into why I think Giratina VSTAR has a chance right now.
Why Can Giratina VSTAR Come Back?
As I said already, I think that Giratina VSTAR has the potential to come back for the World Championships thanks to its historically excellent Charizard ex matchup. In its prime, Giratina VSTAR could use Path to the Peak to completely shut down Charizard ex decks. With Path to the Peak gone, you are forced to be a bit more aggressive. With Lost Impact to take an easy Knock Out on a Pidgeot ex and Star Requiem to Knock Out a Charizard ex, most of the Charizard ex matchup is simply figuring out how to take the other two Prize cards.
In the past, a decent strategy was to use Spit Innocently to deal some damage to a Charizard ex and finish it off with Lost Impact, but if the opponent removed that Charizard ex from the board, that strategy could fall apart. You could also try to steal a couple Prizes with Sableye, but Jirachi made that much harder. Similarly, Manaphy blocks you from using Radiant Greninja. Finally, you could opt to be more aggressive with Cramorant against their evolving Basic Pokémon, but activating Defiance Band and Counter Catcher before you get a Giratina VSTAR in play is effectively signing your own death warrant. As a result of being stuck with no good options, you would often end up just having to hope Roxanne plus Path to the Peak bought you a little time, and it usually did, but that’s not an option anymore.
Fortunately, the rotation of Path to the Peak also marked the release of a new card in Temporal Forces, Iron Leaves ex . Now, Giratina VSTAR has a way more concrete game plan: using Giratina VSTAR for the first four Prize cards, and then closing the game with Iron Leaves ex. Not just that, but you can also use Iron Leaves ex for your third and fourth Prize cards, forcing the opponent to decide between removing Iron Leaves ex and allowing you to use Star Requiem, effectively checkmating them with a lose-lose decision.
This concludes the public portion of this article.
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