Top 4 Decks to Test Against to Prepare for BRs

Hypno68

Hypno68

Hypnotized!
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So... Battle Roads is around the corner. Emerging Powers will be part of the legal pool.

Let's say a player decides what deck(s) they want to play and they want to do tons of play testing.

What are the 4 most important decks to test against?

My current top 4 are:

Reshiphlosion - Mostly because of it's popularity/success at World's (no need for ReshiBoar since playing against Reshiphlosion is very similar)
MegaZone - Again, due to its popularity
Bearplume - A player should test against some type of trainer lock deck, be it based on Gothitelle or Vileplume... I'm saying Bearplume because it should be popular
Donphan/Zoroark/Yanmega/Ciccino - Some sort of "Stage 1 rush" deck or perhaps Donphan and Dragons fills my 4th spot.

Testing against different players running decent builds of the above 4 decks should be great preparation.

What do you think?
 
I think that Bearplume should be tested against, but I don't know really if it'll be super popular. Donphan Dragons AND Stage 1 Rush should be tested against. Reshiplosion or Reshiboar should be tested against and then some kind of Yanmega deck. Really I think it needs to be top 5.
Reshiphlosion/boar
Yanmega Variant
Stage 1 Rush
Donphan Dragons
Bearplume or other trainer lock
 
Thanks for making this. I really should have thought of something like this, but I never did. XD

Your list looks pretty good, but there are some changes.

MagneBoar – I expect to see a lot of this, mostly because it won Masters at Worlds. Because of this, people will be trying it.
BearPlume – Honestly, this is not the deck to beat. It's not going to be that great. It it really gives you problems, just tech in a Dodrio, and that's that.
MegaZone – I honestly think it lost a lot of it's popularity due to Worlds. Sure, it'll be there, but I don't expect to see too much.

There is still one major thing you're overlooking. Battle Roads is the most casual of the tournaments, and the rotation (usually) just happened, (but this season is an exception). Therefore, it's usually a free-for-all of everybody's new ideas for the season. Therefore, I'd stop worrying about the meta and really prepare for the unexpected. Plus, with Emerging Powers coming out, we really don't know how the cards in will affect the format. Catcher could totally destroy Magnezone decks and we wouldn't even know it. Ability Gothitelle could dominate the format and we'd all start running low Trainer lines, and we'd have no idea.
 
Funny as it sounds, special condition decks are actually starting to pose a threat. I won my Emerging Powers prerelease with one, and with things like Victreebel and Leafeon around, alongside Crobat Prime, conditions are becoming more and more of a threat as rogue, but they still have yet to become meta.

Your list looks good, but I consider Zekrom Donk as a large threat. People will run a Throh or a Donphan to stop it, since it poses a great threat.

@Dec
After my prerelease, I've concluded several things:
-Rogue can win if played right
-Catcher has a lot of potential against most Pokemon (since you can bring up anything unprepared and, if only temporarily, lose the threat of the main offender, which might be enough to win you the game)
-Bianca is underlooked. She's a slightly worse Uxie, and quite honestly I can say that she's magic after running 3 of them
-Gothitelle is good, but a pain to set up without the right trainers, and maybe not worth it just to do Spiritomb's effect. But I still grabbed one while I could anyway. :p
 
Lol testing for Battle Roads?

Yanmega Variants
Dragon Variants
Donphan Variants.
Trainer lock.

These things will probably see the most play, all the same stuff people played at Worlds, because Emerging Power will introduce nothing new to the Meta except Max Potion and Catcher.
 
According to the metagames listed on this page, SEL variants are nothing to overlook. SEL handles Reshiram and Donphan, and with various techs for the rest of the field, it is easily a great deck.
 
Tyraniking said:
According to the metagames listed on this page, SEL variants are nothing to overlook. SEL handles Reshiram and Donphan, and with various techs for the rest of the field, it is easily a great deck.
Click to expand...

That might as well be including google's deck (which I actually think could be played around, a lot of people are willing to try out the deck). It'll be interesting to see what changes people make to it, if any.

dmaster out.
 
It is, but with less techs. There are a couple other things that weren't in google's list you can tech in here, it just depends what your metagame is.
 
Do you really need to test for BRs? BRs is going to BR my testing for Fall Regionals and Cities.

If you are though, you have the right idea about what to test against.
 
Honestly, I think Zekrom will be huge. With catcher, it's insanely fast and can ruin you before you even set up.
 
Tech for the metagame before EP and make sure you know at least what to do when you're up against some of the EP cards to make sure. Above all, make sure your deck is consistent and that it can set-up within a couple turns.
 
Obviously test all the big decks (Stage 1, Yanmega varients, Reshiphlosion, Magneboar, Mewbox, ZPS, and DD) and even hyped decks like Beartic. Like everyone already, said Battle Roads is pretty casual so expect the unexpected. People might have too much confidence in rouges just because a rouge took 2nd in Worlds. Another thing is test against the meta you KNOW will be there based on what people there run. That mostly applies to small leagues though.
 
Local metagame obviously varies, but I'm sure only a handful would play Bear for BRs. If you know there might be players that go for it, just put it into consideration anyway. Mewbox is definitely a greater threat than Bearplume.
 
If a person only tests against four decks it's incredibly unlikely they'll win anything bigger than Battle Roads. (Because they don't know the deck there playing against, NOT because there a bad player).
 
Zyflair said:
Local metagame obviously varies, but I'm sure only a handful would play Bear for BRs. If you know there might be players that go for it, just put it into consideration anyway. Mewbox is definitely a greater threat than Bearplume.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure we'll see plenty of BearPlume during the BR season and then when people realize its a bad deck, its just gonna fade away. I mean the main attacker (Beartic) is water, 2 of the top decks are mainly fire (Tyram and Magneboar+Reshiram), so right there allows you to hit for weakness. Only issue Bearplume needs to work out is how it will take care of the rest of the meta such as Yanmega. Magnezone isn't really an issue do to it having such a beefy retreat and only 1 attack.
 
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