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Standard This is what I'm looking at

D

Darthkuriboh

Aspiring Trainer
Member
So I got to looking through the Standard 2018 sets and got curious, and really like M Alteria EX and Alteria EX.. now, please understand I've never built a pokemon tcg deck nor ever even played it other than a little bit of pokemon tcg online. So I fully expect this will suck, and I hope you guys can make it better.

4x M Alteria EX
4x Alteria EX
4x Swablu
4x hoot hoot
4x noctowl

4x Alteria's Spirit Link
4x Tierno
3x Potion
3x Professor Sycamore
3x N
3x Ultra Ball

10x Fairy Energy
10x Colorless Energy
 
1. Mega Altaria is not a very good card, let's just get that out there right now. Megas are in a bad place right now and that's especially true of this card because it was very reliant on mega turbo which is now expanded only. It's good enough to play online though.

2. Hoothoot and Noctowl aren't doing anything to support Altaria, dump them. EX cards do not evolve, you do not need Swablus in this deck.


3. Potion and Tierno are junk cards, never ever play them. Trade the potions for 4-4-4 Sycamore/N/Ultra Ball. Remove the Tiernos

4. You can't run 10 DCE, 4 is maximum. Your energy makeup in this deck should be 4 DCE and 8 Fairy. You shouldn't run 20 energy in a deck, that leads to severe hand clog.

So assuming you convert those potions into thicker consistency, that frees up 24 cards in this list

Include 1-2 Special Charge, 1-3 Field Blowers, and 1-3 Rescue Stretchers and 2-3 Guzma. These belong in every deck (special charge in every DCE dependent deck). Choice Bands are normally an every deck card too, but mega decks can't use them consistently.

You should include at least 2 Tapu Lele-GX. They are expensive cards but will be required for almost any deck you want to make for the next 2-3 years. Xerneas with Geomancy is a good one prize option in this deck as a semi-replacement for mega turbo, include 1-3 of them

Fairy Drop and Fairy Garden are key cards for Mega Altaria, run 3-4 of each of them, your strategy is to be mobile on the board, moving injured birdies out of the way then dropping heal on them, 30 from your attack and 50 from a fairy drop is 80 heal which is pretty good.

Those recommendations will take you back to 60 cards and make this deck much better to play.
 
Altaria is playable, it's not horrible, you can win online and in casuals but if you want to go to leagues or whatever you will lose a lot. As I said, megas in general are bad in standard because GX have largely powercrept them and they lost mega turbo. One virtue of it being bad is that the cards are pretty cheap, and since you'll use a lot of the same cards in an Altaria deck that you'd use in a more competitive deck it's not a big deal to invest in a playset if you like Altaria.

Right now, the best standard decks are Garbodor (Golisopod is the best variant but most of the major variants still have their merits) and Gardevoir-GX. Gardevoir is a pretty expensive deck though. Metagross and Solgaleo are both viable decks atm. Volcanion and Ho-oh/Salazzle are both doing pretty well too. It all depends on how you want to play. Altaria is a slow roll deck where you gradually chip away at your opponent with 2HKOs and move things around the board while healing yourself to avoid being counter KO'd.

Golisopod/Garbodor functions pretty similarly to that playstyle except with Acerolas/Guzmas instead of fairy drop+mist ball healing and fairy garden switching, you get off a few nasty first impressions in the early game, keep chaining them with Acerola/Guzma, ability lock with Garbodor--BKT, force your opponent to play down item cards to accelerate their game so they can OHKO your Golisopod then you start counter KOing with Garbodor-GRI. Very annoying deck to play against but not the easiest to play effectively. I'd say the easiest deck to pilot right now is probably Volcanion.
 
Darthkuriboh said:
Excellent. Thank you for the advice. What would you suggest instead of Alteria?
Click to expand...

Lol, one thing, you aren't legally even allowed to run more than 4 dce like Kiet said, you can only play 4 of one type of special energy per deck.
 
Kietharr said:
Altaria is playable, it's not horrible, you can win online and in casuals but if you want to go to leagues or whatever you will lose a lot. As I said, megas in general are bad in standard because GX have largely powercrept them and they lost mega turbo. One virtue of it being bad is that the cards are pretty cheap, and since you'll use a lot of the same cards in an Altaria deck that you'd use in a more competitive deck it's not a big deal to invest in a playset if you like Altaria.

Right now, the best standard decks are Garbodor (Golisopod is the best variant but most of the major variants still have their merits) and Gardevoir-GX. Gardevoir is a pretty expensive deck though. Metagross and Solgaleo are both viable decks atm. Volcanion and Ho-oh/Salazzle are both doing pretty well too. It all depends on how you want to play. Altaria is a slow roll deck where you gradually chip away at your opponent with 2HKOs and move things around the board while healing yourself to avoid being counter KO'd.

Golisopod/Garbodor functions pretty similarly to that playstyle except with Acerolas/Guzmas instead of fairy drop+mist ball healing and fairy garden switching, you get off a few nasty first impressions in the early game, keep chaining them with Acerola/Guzma, ability lock with Garbodor--BKT, force your opponent to play down item cards to accelerate their game so they can OHKO your Golisopod then you start counter KOing with Garbodor-GRI. Very annoying deck to play against but not the easiest to play effectively. I'd say the easiest deck to pilot right now is probably Volcanion.
Click to expand...


yeah I'd be a pretty new player so I'd need something that can be competitive but is also easier to learn. I've been playing ptcgo and it's helping me learn the game a bit but of course i have to buy cards to get them in game.
 
Actually, this might have more potential than you might think. This is like Drampa but evolved form. And it even heals your benched Pokemon. On top of that, it can 2HKO literally anything.
 
Yeah, it's a playable deck, but not a good one. Megas are structurally weak right now having lost one of their best support cards in mega turbo and losing their HP advantage, now most stage 1/2 GX cards have as much or more HP than megas and put out damage more efficiently and don't need spirit links.

Drampa attacks for base 150, Altaria is 130. 180 with band verses 160, that's a massive difference in terms of how many 2HKOs you convert to OHKOs. Drampa is way lower investment and much more consistent.
 
Kietharr said:
Yeah, it's a playable deck, but not a good one. Megas are structurally weak right now having lost one of their best support cards in mega turbo and losing their HP advantage, now most stage 1/2 GX cards have as much or more HP than megas and put out damage more efficiently and don't need spirit links.

Drampa attacks for base 150, Altaria is 130. 180 with band verses 160, that's a massive difference in terms of how many 2HKOs you convert to OHKOs. Drampa is way lower investment and much more consistent.
Click to expand...


can you show me what a drampa deck looks like? If I'm going to play I want to play something that can actually win, and I just don't have the skill yet to build my own
 
DragonFang101 said:
Actually, this might have more potential than you might think. This is like Drampa but evolved form. And it even heals your benched Pokemon. On top of that, it can 2HKO literally anything.
Click to expand...


if you were going to build this for competitive standard, what would it look like?
 
Darthkuriboh said:
if you were going to build this for competitive standard, what would it look like?
Click to expand...
I'll make a specific deck list when I have the time, but I think this would work with Shining Celebi to use Altaria EX's attacks. But one thing to consider is that Mega Pokemon have really lowered in power with GXs in the metagame right now. But, I think that with enough luck, this would make a decent stall deck because it can constantly heal itself. I leave the rest to you.
 
Highly recommend a drampa deck. He's pretty cheap, and if you get a garb line it'll serve you well for while. (He's cheap too)
There's a fistful of garb variants, so so you can probably work him into a variety of decks, or sub the drampa out for almost anyone.

It's the tapu leles....those are a hard pill to swallow. Pricey, but useful in EVERY deck.
Get your 4/4/4/4 sycamore/n/ultraball/guzma and a few Brigette, acerola, field blower, rescue stretchers and you'll be set for trainers for most decks (bar stadiums and techs)

Welcome to tcg :D
 
Darthkuriboh said:
I was just looking at Tapu Koko GX and now I'm thinking I want to build around that.. it's NASTY
Click to expand...

Koko is a deck that is deceptively weak due to the fact that 180 is the current 'magic number' and it only has 170hp, with easy tool/stadium removal you can knock fighting fury belt and paradise off easily so it's hard to prevent losing your koko every turn to something like Drampa or Garde, and once Koko's gone it's a pain to set them back up.

Raikou SHL helps though. As far as general deck building tips go

Basically every deck will run these:
4 Ultra Ball
4 Sycamore
4 N
2-4 Guzma
2-3 Tapu Lele-GX
8-12 energy cards (some decks run only 4 double colorless, but not many of them are still in standard)

Most decks want these:
1-2 Rescue Stretcher
2-4 Choice Band
1-3 Float Stone

Many decks will run these common techs:
Brigette - Any deck that runs evolutions
Rare Candy - important in most stage 2 decks
Skyla - Decks dependent on rare candy work well with Skyla
Special Charge - Decks that depend on double colorless energies generally want these

Between these staples, that's about half of your list. From there on out, pick a pokemon and build around it, don't build around a color and don't include superfluous pokemon, everything should have a direct relation to helping your main attacker win games. A healthy split between pokemon/trainers/energy in a standard deck is usually about 18/30/12 these days. Those aren't hard numbers, but it gives you a little guide so when you step back and look at your list, you can immediately know something is wrong if you're not in the ballpark.
 
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