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Given these GXs, EXs, and M EXs... best deck for an 8yo?

L

lee1337

Aspiring Trainer
Member
Hi! My 8yo son has been getting into Pokemon TCG over the last 2 months. He's doing pretty well - played in his first tournament yesterday and got 2nd place. Not bad, considering his deck's really heavy on ~ 25 mostly fire Pokémon including 4 Volcanions, a Volcanion EX, 2 Houdoum EXs, 1 Charizard EX, 1 M Charizard EX, 1 M Houdoum EX. He has the usual suspects in there too (Ns, Lysandres, VS Seekers, etc). We were planning to build him a Volcanion Deck, but haven't found any Shaymins yet.

Before we get too invested in sticking to the Volcanion deck, I was wondering if anyone might want to take a look at his GX, EX and Mega EX cards below and offer some thoughts on alternative decks to strive for?

GXs
  • Espeon GX (Sun & Moon)
  • Decidueye GX (Sun & Moon)

MEGA EXs
  • M Pidgeot EX (Evolutions)
  • M Beedril EX (Promo)
  • M Scizor EX (Breakpoint)
  • M Diancie EX (Promo)
  • M Slobro EX (Evolutions)
  • M Charizard EX (Evolutions)
  • M Gengar EX (Phantom Forces)
  • M Mewtwo EX (Breakthrough)
  • M Houdoum EX (Breakthrough)
  • M Tyranitar EX (Ancient Origins)

BASIC EXs
  • Diancie EX (Fates Collide)
  • BlastoiseEX (Evolutions)
  • Glalie EX (Breakthrough)
  • Xerneas EX (Promo)
  • Genesect EX (Fates Collide)
  • Beedril EX (Promo)
  • Charizard EX (Flashfire) - not usable in "standard"
  • Charizard EX (Promo)
  • Slowbro EX (Evolutions)
  • Houdom EX (Breakthrough)
  • Houdom EX (Breakthrough)
  • Volcanion EX (Promo)
  • Gengar EX (Phantom Forces)
  • Pidgeot EX (Evolutions)
  • Mewtwo EX (Breakthrough)

BREAKS
  • Nidoking (Evolutions)
  • Nidoking (Evolutions)
  • Luxray (Breakpoint)
  • Ninetales (Evolutions)
  • Florges (Breakthrough)
  • Machamp (Evolutions)
  • Yveltal (Steam Siege)
  • Delphox (Fates Collide)
  • Golduck (Breakpoint)
  • Starmie (Evolutions)
  • Marowak (Breakthrough)

He's got a metric -ton of other Pokemon cards - mostly from Steam Siege and Evolutions. He's got all the trainer / supporter sets covered I think.

FWIW he went to the Sun and Moon prerelease today and was thrilled to picked up an Espeon GX, so something with that would be great.

TIA for any thoughts while I level up my Pokéknowledge!
 
If you're looking for something that is already tried and tested and proven in the Metagame, then the key cards you have here are MScizor, MMewtwo (assuming it's the Psychic Infinity one and not the one with Fighting costs), and Volcanion. You can usually find skeleton list for the established decks here on Pokébeach but that area of the forums seems to have vanished in the site re-design o_O Google will give you what you need for those three deck archetypes.

As Sun & Moon has not dropped yet it's difficult to predict exactly how useful the SM cards will be, but those are quite the pair. A lot of people are predicting if there is only one brand new archetype to arise from SM, it will most likely be a Decidueye deck. Meanwhile Espeon is sure to have it's uses. Maybe not on it's own, but somewhere in some future deck. No real telling yet as to what.

As for the rest of the cards, not much there to shout about. Not from a "competitive" standpoint anyway. There is a pretty established metagame currently and none of those cards really fit it. However, that is not to say you can't make some fun rogue decks there. I've been having good fun with a Glalie-EX deck of late (hmu if you want the actual list for that). Beedrill/Yanmega is a thing. As is one Beedrill dropped into a Sceptile deck (which would actually be fantastic if Volcanion wasn't so strong right now). Genesect can be amazing in Expanded format where it can be paired with the energy accelerating Bronzong. There are a few fringe Yveltal Break decks too that might be worth looking into. MPidgeot is not a bad card to build around either with lots of approaches.

He's only 8, don't worry too much about being ridigly competitive :p Have some fun with it and build something new and exciting. If competitive and tourneys is more of his thing, then one of Volcanion, Mewtwo, Scizor & Decidueye are the way to go. Or just check out some of the other established decks right now and start from scratch.
 
Depends on the tournament IMO. In standard, I think Volcanion is a great deck for an 8 year old. I don't have anything to add to what Yog said.

However, if the tournament is expanded format, those decks don't hang with the format as well. Obviously that depends on who your child plays and what decks they run. That said, Night March is a proven concept deck that is pretty easy to run, has a ton of variance depending on which style you choose to run with it (I found that my daughter didn't do as well with it when it was stacking Puzzle of Time, so I changed it to use more Special Charge + Revive cards), and it can absolutely decimate your opponent.

There are so many deck lists for that particular deck that you shouldn't have trouble finding one that fits your son's tastes. The deck lists don't fit very well into the Steam Siege / Evolutions sets that he owns though, so you would end up having to get a lot of cards piece meal.

If you are dead set on using the cards listed, I think Yog's answer is outstanding.
 
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