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Expanded Standard to Expanded Metal Rayquaza

Gible06

Gible06

Aspiring Trainer
Member
Pokemon: 24
  • 3 Rayquaza EX (colorless)
  • 3 M Rayquaza EX (colorless)
  • 3 Shaymin EX
  • 2 Aegislash EX
  • 1 Hoopa EX (unbound)
  • 3 Bronzor (phantom forces)
  • 3 Bronzong (phantom forces)
  • 1 Heatran (phantom forces)
  • 2 Zorua
  • 2 Zoroark
  • 1 Jirachi (promo XY 67)
17 Trainers/Supporters/Stadiums:
  • 4 Professor Sycamore
  • 2 Professor Birch's Observations
  • 2 Lysandre
  • 1 AZ
  • 4 Ultra Ball
  • 3 VS Seeker
  • 4 Sky Field
  • 3 Rayquaza Spirit Link
  • 2 Float Stone
  • 1 Battle Compressor
Energy:
  • 6 Metal Energy
  • 4 Double Colorless Energy
Strategy:

This is a pretty straight forward deck. Use mega Rayquaza to attack for 240 with sky field. Shaymin and Hoopa and bronzong for set up. Zoroark for stand in and I find mind jack useful for attacking occasionally.

I want to change this to a expanded deck for regionals. Any help is appreciated!

I would also like to add a Maxie and gallade any help in making room very appreciated!
 
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The first thing I would suggest is replacing the Zoroark for Keldeo as it is a basic and takes up less space in the deck (3extra spaces). I would then suggest replacing the Heatran and Jirachi promo for the (LTR) Cobalion and add Cobalion EX. I would then suggest dropping 2 professor birches for 2 colress for the additional draw support.
With the 3 spaces left I would add 1 metal energy, 1 super rod and 1 Xerosic (Garbodor can hurt)
I hope this gave you a couple of ideas.
 
-2 Professor Birch
+2 N

N is basically the go-to draw next to a Professor Juniper or Sycamore for Expanded decks. You may also like to add a Colress due to its insane potential. Another option would be adding a couple of Exeggecute w/ the Propagation Ability to have a continuous flow of M-Rayquaza power, although with the amount of Pokemon you have already, you may not need/have the space for these.
 
Thanks for the help. I don't see much use for the exeggecute as my bench gets to full already for having so many pokemon with bronzong, keldeo, extra rayquazas, shaymin, hoopa.
 
At my league someone ran a Maxie's hidden ball trick and a gallade in his deck I was really interested in it what the list was. Any help on get a gallade and Maxie in it would be very helpful. I won't run it at regionals but very interested in this tech.
 
@Gible06

I have not tested that much the Expanded Format, but it seems to me that the Bronzong tech will be a bit slow.
It does great job in Standard, but I have some doubts for the Expanded...
Perhaps you could find your missing slots for Gallade/Maxie here.

-3 Bronzor
-3 Bronzong

+2 Gallade
+2 Maxie's Hidden Ball Trick
+2 Others

If you play Gallade, you should consider playing a bunch of cards which highly benefits from his Premonition too : Acro Bike, Trainer's Mail and a few Supporters for maintenance (a 4th VS Seeker will then be great).

You could think about :
- Professor Juniper/Sycamore : already in your list
- N : just great
- Colress : with Skyfield in play, the best :)
- AZ : at least 1 copy
- Lysandre : at least 1 copy too
- Ghetis : why not ?
- Judge : better in Standard in my opinion
- Xerosic : Always nice
- Hex Maniac : I don't know the metagame enough to have a clear opinion about this one

Do not hesitate to play 1 copy of them, Battle Compressor + VS Seeker are here to help you to have the right Supporter in hand for each situation.

An other option, since you wouldn't have Bronzong's acceleration anymore, would be Mega Turbo.
This card could give M-Rayquaza EX it's third energy to attack the turn it comes into play. It is also a lot more aggressive than Bronzong, wich seems to be a good option in Expanded.

Hope that helps ;)
 
what are metal ray's matchups in Expanded? Has anyone done testing?
 
I played MetalRay in week 2 of Winter Regionals, by then the Hexray variant had just made a breakthrough. Unfortunately due to its inability to pull of any attacks on the first turn (even if you ran few mturbo it won't be consistent) meant that going 2nd put the deck naturally behind, which I ended having to deal with and got too many ties early on. Going first the deck was just as good as anything you can get with very good coverage.

I know that's few sets away but not much has improved in fact probably gone worst, being able to stream use Hex and put pressure T1 is too important and therefore makes this variant inferior to HexRay and very risky since all the matchups are not as good compared to HexRay variant.

Main MU differences from HexRay:
Greninja: Lack aggressive enough, and can't consistently hex, koing 2 Bronzong is the same a koing 1 Shaymin except taking out bronzong takes out the strategy of the deck.
Trevenant: Unless you can get Keldeo Float stone quick enough, Bronzong is easy Lysandre target. And under item lock and silent fear they won't last.
*These matchups are super tight already, I would think it goes unfavourable

-Vespiquen/Flareon: Not aggressive enough, and not being able to hex consistently they are able to advance their board much easier.
-Dark/Maxies: Still a good matchup, although getting out MegaRay or bronzong under Archeops is a bit harder, but once you do you tend to win.
-Archtoise: Lack of T1 Aggression and ease to Hex. Still an okay matchup.
-MManectric: Lack of T1 attacking means going 2nd is really bad as it can buy them the turn to set up a MManectric and turbo bolt set up another, wobbuffet is mostly bad too. Altaria can help but its not a safe out depending if they run Garbs. ( I went 1-0-1 Against MManectric in the tournament and even when I timed a Xerosic on their Garbardor before attacking they could have easily played another tool, Lysandring a Garb was the best way).
*These go from favourable to potentially almost 50/50

Vileplume variants: Most current vileplume variants autolose to Aegislash if you can get it out.
Toadtina / Bats: Cobalion EX helps alot, its not as straightforward due to timed hammer and head-ringer so can be very dependant in if you can AZ, Xerosic and even Bronzong to reattach energy on Keldeo or Cobalion EX.

Bad matchups:
Nightmarch (Metal variant improves it a bit back then, although now i would falter to say that since they're are more focussed in using Hex so overrides Altaria)
HexRay
Wobbuffet starts
Sableye/Garbs

I know I've talked alot about Hex maniac, this is the difference between MetalRay and HexRay. The lesser ability to relay Hex when you want is a big deal. And although arguable for many decks, there's more opportunities for a deck to time a critical Hex against this deck.

Hope that gives you an idea, I'm not trying devalue your deck choice (heck I played this and I was aware of the disadvantages and still played it) but MetalRay is probably not an optimal choice. If you predict alot of Vileplume and Toad (provided you can manage your Coba/Keldeo EX or get Aegislash) and less of the bad matchups including Trev and Greninja then by all means you can make the call.
 
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