Recently I've been testing a lot of Greninja Break and trying my best to make it work. In a twitch stream I was watching two Greninja lists mad it to top 8 in a league cup and faced off against each other. While the both may have been the same archetype the amounts of certain cards and more importantly the Stage 1 partner where very different from one another. The first list played a 1-1 line of Starmie while the other played a 1-1 line of Octillery. Both played Brooklet Hill as well.
-Starmie: Through all of the testing I've done so far the majority of my lists have had either a 2-2 or 1-1 line of Starmie. From my experience it can work wonders in the late game while being lackluster in the beginning of the game. The main issue I have with Starmie however isn't it's early game play-ability it's how much of a pain it is to reset mid game. Staryu with only 40 HP can be killed by almost anything you'll find in meta decks which at times can make it a literal free prize card for you opponent. While there are other Staryus the versatility of a basic free retreater that can help to pivot switches after knockouts and overall just save energy in a deck that needs it for more than it's attack cost can be huge for as simple as it sounds. When Starmie dies and the same thing goes for Octillery aswell, it is extremely easy to get back with cards like Rescue Stretcher and Brooklet Hill.
-Octillery: At first glance this one was very new to me. On paper I think the concept is there, it's good in the early game and can help push and grind through the late game. Now this might just be my testing but I have found the card to very bad in the deck despite the success other lists have found with it. The problem I have with it is that it actually hurts the deck a crucial times more than it does help in the said crucial time. For instance if my hand is bricked and full Octillery literally sits there, to simply put it, if you're already bricking it will brick you harder. I think in other decks like Gardevoir and Ninetales a card like Octillery has more potential because these decks accelerate energy from the hand like in Gardevoir's case or can at times play very conservatively like Ninetales. This is of course just my opinion from my lack of experience with the card, for the majority of my testing (and I mean the majority) I used almost exclusively Starmie as my engine after getting rid of Talonflame so this whole paragraph has a lot of biased behind it but I guess the same thing could be said about the Starime paragraph aswell.
these are all just my opinions and experiences, between the two let me know which one you think i better or even one I didnt mention.
-Starmie: Through all of the testing I've done so far the majority of my lists have had either a 2-2 or 1-1 line of Starmie. From my experience it can work wonders in the late game while being lackluster in the beginning of the game. The main issue I have with Starmie however isn't it's early game play-ability it's how much of a pain it is to reset mid game. Staryu with only 40 HP can be killed by almost anything you'll find in meta decks which at times can make it a literal free prize card for you opponent. While there are other Staryus the versatility of a basic free retreater that can help to pivot switches after knockouts and overall just save energy in a deck that needs it for more than it's attack cost can be huge for as simple as it sounds. When Starmie dies and the same thing goes for Octillery aswell, it is extremely easy to get back with cards like Rescue Stretcher and Brooklet Hill.
-Octillery: At first glance this one was very new to me. On paper I think the concept is there, it's good in the early game and can help push and grind through the late game. Now this might just be my testing but I have found the card to very bad in the deck despite the success other lists have found with it. The problem I have with it is that it actually hurts the deck a crucial times more than it does help in the said crucial time. For instance if my hand is bricked and full Octillery literally sits there, to simply put it, if you're already bricking it will brick you harder. I think in other decks like Gardevoir and Ninetales a card like Octillery has more potential because these decks accelerate energy from the hand like in Gardevoir's case or can at times play very conservatively like Ninetales. This is of course just my opinion from my lack of experience with the card, for the majority of my testing (and I mean the majority) I used almost exclusively Starmie as my engine after getting rid of Talonflame so this whole paragraph has a lot of biased behind it but I guess the same thing could be said about the Starime paragraph aswell.
these are all just my opinions and experiences, between the two let me know which one you think i better or even one I didnt mention.
