Standard The Haunting (Gengar / Crobat)

[Mr. Wiskers]

Before improvements
Pokémon-21

• 2 Crobat (PHF 33)
• 3 Shaymin-EX (ROS 77)
• 3 Gastly (BKT 58)
• 4 Zubat (PHF 31)
• 3 Haunter (BKT 59)
• 3 Golbat (PHF 32)
• 3 Gengar (BKT 60)

Trainers/Supporters/Stadiums-31

• 3 VS Seeker (PHF 109)
• 4 Ultra Ball (FLF 99)
• 3 Level Ball (AOR 76)
• 2 Sacred Ash (FLF 96)
• 4 Super Scoop Up (FUF 100)

• 3 Dimension Valley (PHF 93)
• 2 Sky Field (ROS 89)

• 4 Professor Sycamore (XY 122)
• 1 Lysandre (FLF 90)
• 1 AZ (PHF 91)
• 2 Professor Birch's Observations (PCL 134)
• 2 Shauna (XY 127)

Energy-8

• 8 Psychic Energy (XY 136)

Strategy:

1) put down as least 2 gastly and 2 zubat (zubat up front) depending on the situation using ultra balls and level balls, but remember to accelerate this process using shaymin via ultra ball. Somewhere in this process put down a skyfield to bait your opponent into putting down their own stadiums, and because most decks do not carry 5 stadiums, it puts you at the advantage.

2) evolve your gastly into haunter before you evolve your upfront zubat (this makes your opponents pokemon confused while removeing the effect from your own), It's ok if some of your pokemon die (not your gastly though), as long as you get as many of their key pokemon to have 30 damage on them as you can.

3) evolve your golbats into crobats and haunters into gengars this should get even more of their pokemon to have 30 damage, then attack with gengar using creepshow to OHKO your opponenets pokemon.

4) in later turns use your sacred ash to keep a steady supply of gengar onto your bench and use the shifting stadiums to get rid of your shaymins and cycle them back in.

Other helpful factors
1) The lack of special energy, pokemon tools, and rare candies hopefully might help against the slime-ball that is toad.

2)stadium control, keeping your stadiums in, and their stadiums out can keep you in control of the game

3)free retreat and attack, all of your pokemon have at most 1 retreat cost, and their attacks cost at most 2 energy (less with dimension valley).

Things that I've seen that might need help...
faster movement) in a few of my battles my deck has gotten clogged with no supporters in the first few rounds, idk what to take out or put in to stop that from happening.

reliance on coin flips) I hate putting my win into the hands of luck, yet idk what other cards could do what professor birch and scoop up do without slowing my deck speed down.

Things I have not seen that might need help...
If anyone spots anything else, it would be greatly appreciated if you would let me know. XD


After improvements
Pokémon-20

• 2 Crobat (PHF 33)
• 2 Shaymin-EX (ROS 77)
• 3 Gastly (BKT 58)
• 4 Zubat (PHF 31)
• 3 Haunter (BKT 59)
• 3 Golbat (PHF 32)
• 3 Gengar (BKT 60)

Trainers/Supporters/Stadiums-32

• 3 VS Seeker (PHF 109)
• 4 Ultra Ball (FLF 99)
• 3 Level Ball (AOR 76)
• 2 Sacred Ash (FLF 96)
• 3 Trainers' Mail (ROS 92)
• 2 Super Scoop Up (FUF 100)

• 3 Dimension Valley (PHF 93)
• 1 Sky Field (ROS 89)

• 4 Professor Sycamore (XY 122)
• 1 Lysandre (FLF 90)
• 2 AZ (PHF 91)
• 2 Professor Birch's Observations (PCL 134)
• 2 Shauna (XY 127)

Energy-8

• 8 Psychic Energy (XY 136)

 

[gumball51321]

You can ditch Bats and Sky Field. You should play Gengar-EX instead. It is much faster, can set your damage up until you can evolve to Gengar, and takes WAY less space. On top of that, it can attack for free.

 

[TuxedoBlack]

Following are a few thoughts for your consideration, IMO:

Level Balls should be maxed-out given the number of Pokémon with () or less HP.

Decks that "explode" (i.e., get a lot or their essential Pokémon in play) on the first turn tend to run "lots" of Acro Bike and/or Trainer's Mail. Acro Bike facilitates getting cards into your discard pile while keeping 1 f the 2 drawn cards. Trainer's Mail allows you to view 4 cards, select a Trainer (non-Trainer's Mail), and potentially play it that same turn. Trainer's Mail works really well with the "Ball" draw engine.

Running 5 Stadiums seem excessive and a few of those slots can be used more effectively. "Winning the Stadium war" is not about having "more" Stadiums you can put into play in order to disrupt or counter your opponent as much as your having your Stadium in play at the right time. Consider that opponents can "lock" their Stadiums by using either Giratina EX's Chaos Wheel or Ninetales. Lastly, if an opponent plays a timely Parallell City limiting your bench to just 3 Pokémon, you may not be able to effectively recover from that potential undesirable position quickly.​

Following are some suggested deck changes for your consideration:

-1 Shaymin EX - 2 should be sufficient with improved card-draw engine
-1 Ultra Ball
-2 Sky Field
-2 Super Scoop Up - IF you don't get heads at critical times, your odds of winning the game are diminished significantly; plus, you only have 50% of favorable outcomes (I so dislike flipping)​

+1 Level Ball
+1 VS Seeker - should be maxed-out to provide highest possible utilization
+1 AZ or Lysandre - critical to have access to 1 should 1 be prized
+3 Trainer's Mail​

I hope you find these comments helpful.

 

[Mr. Wiskers]

I'll test out 3 trainers mail and adding another AZ in exchange for 2 scoop ups a shaymin and 1 skyfield, But I would like to keep skyfield in my deck because it lets me get rid of my shaymin and golbat when scoop up and AZ are not available, then get them back later with sacred ash.

and I like ultra ball over level ball because it lets me reduce my hand then look for a shaymin, so I can draw more cards.

after testing it on tcgone, the trainers mail, worked well, though not having a second skyfield reduced my shaymin destroying ability and clogged up my bench when I needed to have more bats down.
But over all the changes were positive.
thx tuxedo black

 

[thecowisred]

I have been building a deck just like this...I found that having 2 lines of stage 2's to be very difficult to manage. I dropped the bats, scoop up's and AZ's from my deck, put in 3 Gengar EX and left me over 10 spaces for cards to help set up my Gengar's faster and more consistently. Gengar EX attacks for free with Dimension Valley. The one problem I have is getting enough Gengar's rotating. I find I am stuck with a haunter and Gastley sitting on my bench after one or 2 Gengar's get KO'd depending on late in the game it is, and it is difficult to draw into them after most of my resources are used up. This deck seems to really slow down late game.

 

[TuxedoBlack]

I have been building a deck just like this...I found that having 2 lines of stage 2's to be very difficult to manage. I dropped the bats, scoop up's and AZ's from my deck, put in 3 Gengar EX and left me over 10 spaces for cards to help set up my Gengar's faster and more consistently. Gengar EX attacks for free with Dimension Valley. The one problem I have is getting enough Gengar's rotating. I find I am stuck with a haunter and Gastley sitting on my bench after one or 2 Gengar's get KO'd depending on late in the game it is, and it is difficult to draw into them after most of my resources are used up. This deck seems to really slow down late game.

Near auto-loss to most Dark decks due to your main Psychic Pokémon have Dark Weakness?

 

[thecowisred]

Yes, that is definitely a big downfall of this deck as well...however, it is difficult to find a good pairing Pokémon (that I can think of) to put in the deck other than Noivern or bats that can do consistent 30 damage quickly all over the board. I have tested Noivern a bit on PTCGO and it is a bit slow to set up as well due to the energy requirements for the attack and the fact you are depending on 2 evolutions for the set up. You have to hit a double dragon on T1 or T2 plus a basic, plus evolve Noivern, plus start evolving into Gengar, plus get an energy on Gengar and hope you have a dimension valley in your hand or still in play... you are minimum 3 rounds to get set up if the stars align!

Any ideas, or a Poke that can do some spread damage to reach that magic 30 HP damage quickly aside from Noivern or bats?

 

[Mr. Wiskers]

When evolving both lines of stage 2's most of the time haunters ability to confuse while evolving and a steadily evolving bat up front to remove the confusion from my own Pokémon, has saved me more than once by either forcing them to retreat and waste energy or making them attack and get another 30 damage onto them.

The dark weakness problem is not all that bad (though it can sometimes be a problem against zourok deck) because when fighting baby yveltal they still need to get 2 hit's in and against a big yveltal even though they might KO one gengar, the prize trade off works out, because 1 big yveltal takes at least 2 turns to power up VS my gengar which takes only 1 energy due to dimension valley.

As far as I've seen I still do not know of any other 30 damage mass dealers that can fit the criteria other than bats, (as much as I like noivern it just does not par up)

 

[TuxedoBlack]

Any ideas, or a Poke that can do some spread damage to reach that magic 30 HP damage quickly aside from Noivern or bats?

Manectric EX with Wide Lens can help. As a starter, it's very helpful in setting up your opponent's field. In addition, Manectric EX can provide some protection against Yveltal and Yveltal EX decks.

 

[Mr. Wiskers]

I understand the manectric, and I think I'll try it out, but why wide lens?

Also I'm not quite sure what would be taken out...

 

[TuxedoBlack]

I understand the manectric, and I think I'll try it out, but why wide lens?

... 1) Protects it from opponent's Head Ringer and 2) hits opponent's benched Pokemon for extra damage if they are Weak to Lightning Pokemon attacks. Nice combo with Bats.