Introduction:
With Steam Siege being close to release, I would like to discuss one of my favorite decks that is coming out of the new set, Volcanion. To summarize the deck very briefly, Baby Volcanion has the ability to recover 2 Fire Energy from your discard and attach them to two different Pokemon, and deal 20 damage, all for 1 Fire Energy. Volcanion-EX has the ability to discard a Fire Energy to boost Basic Fire type Pokemon's damage by 30, and an attack that deals 130, but you can't attack the next turn with that Pokemon. While this seems like a fine combo by itself, the deck has some issues. Mainly, specific damage numbers, getting around problem cards, effectively using Baby Volcanion to accelerate Energy, generating a strong Pokemon that isn't Volcanion-EX, and retreating.
Important Damage Numbers:
100- Garbodor: OHKO with 3 Energies on either Pokemon, which isn't bad, but isn't good.
110- Shaymin/Carbink BREAK: OHKO with Volcanion-EX or Baby Volcanion with Fighting Fury or 1 Steam Up or 3 Steam Ups (In case you want to use the energy acceleration attack).
130- Non-Ex Basics: OHKO with Volcanion-EX or Baby Volcanion with 1 Steam Up.
170/180/190- Standard EX HP/Fighting Fury on Non-EX Basics: OHKO with Volcanion-EX with Fighting Fury and 1 Steam Up (For 170) or 2 Steam Ups or Baby Volcanion with 3 Steam Ups.
210/220/240- Megas/Fighting Fury on Standard EXs: OHKO with Volcanion-EX and Fighting Fury and at least 3 Steam Ups or 4 Steam Ups with the Baby Volcanion.
Problem Cards:
Megas: Nearly impossible to OHKO anything, which is especially an issue in the Mega Ray matchup.
Garbodor: Shuts down almost all ability to OHKO anything, luckily our deck can be fast, but this card is still a pain. If any good anti-tool card comes out, this will no longer be a problem.
Carbink BREAK: Only a problem if you rely on Volcanion-EX to be your attacker, but over all, not too much of a problem.
Jolteon-EX: Luckily Pokemon Ranger is coming out so this probably won't have a huge effect, but can still be annoying.
Effective Energy Acceleration:
Because you must split your energy between two different Pokemon when using Baby Volcanion, you need to find a way to channel this onto one Pokemon to get OHKOs. Your options are either accelerate Energy faster, or be able to move around energy, and without an efficient way to move Energy, the best way is just to accelerate faster using Max Elixir. This isn't an amazing fix, but it is a fix.
Generating a strong attacker:
As you can see so far, this deck relies on Volcanion-EX to generate OHKOs, this is a huge weakness because if just one is knocked out and/or prized, your deck can collapse. This is why I want to discuss some potential replacements for main attackers:
Entei (Ancient Trait): This was my initial go-to but after some more testing, I am wondering if it is the best option. Entei allows you to generate a 210 tank really cheap, and this Pokemon just sucks up low damage attacks. With a build involving Entei you will run more tools than standard builds, for example 4 Fighting Fury 3 Float Stone, allowing consistent attachments and without good tool removal, they will stay in play. The big issue with this card is that it sets up an efficient wall for lower damage attacks, and currently, a wall against weak attacks is not what this deck needs, and without any significant boost that allows you to OHKO Pokemon easier, this card doesn't seem that good to me.
Entei: While decent for setting up your Discard/Energy with its first attack, we don't need another card to set up. The second attack I originally discounted because nothing seemed amazing about it, however I have recently found this attack to be amazing. This card slays the Mega Ray matchup by giving you a powerful Non-EX attacker, with a very cheap cost. If your opponent has a Full Bench with Sky Field, Combat Blaze will do 180 +Fighting Fury Belt and 1 Steam Up and that is a OHKO on a Mega Ray, If your opponent only has 5 Benched Pokemon, Combat Blaze will be able to do 120 +Fighting Fury Belt and 3 Steam Ups, and that is a OHKO. With a format so dependent on cards like Shaymin, Garbodor, and Max Elixir, it is common to see a bench of at least 3 Pokemon, making this card is a near staple.
Charizard-EX (Combustion Blast): I thought that this card was going to be really good, but it simply is not. It has a high energy cost attack that can only be eased with DCE (Doesn't fit in this deck at all), that slightly makes the numbers better against Megas and EXs, and has the same issue of Volcanion-EX in that it can't be a consistent attacker.
Flareon-EX: My current favorite card for this deck. Not only does this card have some of the most favorable math behind it, it has an amazing ability that abuses Baby Volcanion's energy acceleration. A common occurrence with this deck is that you accelerate a ton of Energy, yet have no where to place it, this card fixes that. If you have multiple copies of this card in play, you have absolute control over the precise amount of damage you are dealing. I do have to admit that this card does have a weakness, in that it requires a high energy investment and it isn't the best against Megas, however can still effectively deal with them (5 energy + Fighting Fury + 2 Steam Ups KOs most Megas). However with you being able to attach a ton of energy every turn, (1 from Volcanion on attack, 1 from using previous Energy and moving it, 1 from attaching from hand, 1+ from Max Elixirs), this card is undoubtedly fast.
Retreating:
While I didn't think this was going to initially be a problem, it has became one of the biggest ones. With a deck that wants to flicker between Acceleration and Power, you must be able to make the switch as quickly as possible to get the strongest effect. There is a couple options to remedy this:
Zoroark with a Float Stone: With our deck already having a rough time with Garbodor, I don't want to rely on a support Pokemon that also has a rough time with Garbodor.
Float Stone: The easiest way is to just use a Float Stone, and while this isn't as good as being able to switch Pokemon freely like Zoroark, it is a good option. The only issue that I have with this option is it takes up the space that a Fighting Fury belt could have, which is key to hitting some numbers.
Switch/Escape Rope: A really good way to increase Pokemon rotation freely, and with Seismitoad-EX being rotated out, we can now actively use cards like Switch/Escape Rope.
Conclusion:
Hopefully, you enjoyed my thoughts on the problems and their solutions with Volcanion. This was my first massive post so tell me what you thought. If I missed anything, or you want to talk about a certain point, please comment!
With Steam Siege being close to release, I would like to discuss one of my favorite decks that is coming out of the new set, Volcanion. To summarize the deck very briefly, Baby Volcanion has the ability to recover 2 Fire Energy from your discard and attach them to two different Pokemon, and deal 20 damage, all for 1 Fire Energy. Volcanion-EX has the ability to discard a Fire Energy to boost Basic Fire type Pokemon's damage by 30, and an attack that deals 130, but you can't attack the next turn with that Pokemon. While this seems like a fine combo by itself, the deck has some issues. Mainly, specific damage numbers, getting around problem cards, effectively using Baby Volcanion to accelerate Energy, generating a strong Pokemon that isn't Volcanion-EX, and retreating.
Important Damage Numbers:
100- Garbodor: OHKO with 3 Energies on either Pokemon, which isn't bad, but isn't good.
110- Shaymin/Carbink BREAK: OHKO with Volcanion-EX or Baby Volcanion with Fighting Fury or 1 Steam Up or 3 Steam Ups (In case you want to use the energy acceleration attack).
130- Non-Ex Basics: OHKO with Volcanion-EX or Baby Volcanion with 1 Steam Up.
170/180/190- Standard EX HP/Fighting Fury on Non-EX Basics: OHKO with Volcanion-EX with Fighting Fury and 1 Steam Up (For 170) or 2 Steam Ups or Baby Volcanion with 3 Steam Ups.
210/220/240- Megas/Fighting Fury on Standard EXs: OHKO with Volcanion-EX and Fighting Fury and at least 3 Steam Ups or 4 Steam Ups with the Baby Volcanion.
Problem Cards:
Megas: Nearly impossible to OHKO anything, which is especially an issue in the Mega Ray matchup.
Garbodor: Shuts down almost all ability to OHKO anything, luckily our deck can be fast, but this card is still a pain. If any good anti-tool card comes out, this will no longer be a problem.
Carbink BREAK: Only a problem if you rely on Volcanion-EX to be your attacker, but over all, not too much of a problem.
Jolteon-EX: Luckily Pokemon Ranger is coming out so this probably won't have a huge effect, but can still be annoying.
Effective Energy Acceleration:
Because you must split your energy between two different Pokemon when using Baby Volcanion, you need to find a way to channel this onto one Pokemon to get OHKOs. Your options are either accelerate Energy faster, or be able to move around energy, and without an efficient way to move Energy, the best way is just to accelerate faster using Max Elixir. This isn't an amazing fix, but it is a fix.
Generating a strong attacker:
As you can see so far, this deck relies on Volcanion-EX to generate OHKOs, this is a huge weakness because if just one is knocked out and/or prized, your deck can collapse. This is why I want to discuss some potential replacements for main attackers:
Entei (Ancient Trait): This was my initial go-to but after some more testing, I am wondering if it is the best option. Entei allows you to generate a 210 tank really cheap, and this Pokemon just sucks up low damage attacks. With a build involving Entei you will run more tools than standard builds, for example 4 Fighting Fury 3 Float Stone, allowing consistent attachments and without good tool removal, they will stay in play. The big issue with this card is that it sets up an efficient wall for lower damage attacks, and currently, a wall against weak attacks is not what this deck needs, and without any significant boost that allows you to OHKO Pokemon easier, this card doesn't seem that good to me.
Entei: While decent for setting up your Discard/Energy with its first attack, we don't need another card to set up. The second attack I originally discounted because nothing seemed amazing about it, however I have recently found this attack to be amazing. This card slays the Mega Ray matchup by giving you a powerful Non-EX attacker, with a very cheap cost. If your opponent has a Full Bench with Sky Field, Combat Blaze will do 180 +Fighting Fury Belt and 1 Steam Up and that is a OHKO on a Mega Ray, If your opponent only has 5 Benched Pokemon, Combat Blaze will be able to do 120 +Fighting Fury Belt and 3 Steam Ups, and that is a OHKO. With a format so dependent on cards like Shaymin, Garbodor, and Max Elixir, it is common to see a bench of at least 3 Pokemon, making this card is a near staple.
Charizard-EX (Combustion Blast): I thought that this card was going to be really good, but it simply is not. It has a high energy cost attack that can only be eased with DCE (Doesn't fit in this deck at all), that slightly makes the numbers better against Megas and EXs, and has the same issue of Volcanion-EX in that it can't be a consistent attacker.
Flareon-EX: My current favorite card for this deck. Not only does this card have some of the most favorable math behind it, it has an amazing ability that abuses Baby Volcanion's energy acceleration. A common occurrence with this deck is that you accelerate a ton of Energy, yet have no where to place it, this card fixes that. If you have multiple copies of this card in play, you have absolute control over the precise amount of damage you are dealing. I do have to admit that this card does have a weakness, in that it requires a high energy investment and it isn't the best against Megas, however can still effectively deal with them (5 energy + Fighting Fury + 2 Steam Ups KOs most Megas). However with you being able to attach a ton of energy every turn, (1 from Volcanion on attack, 1 from using previous Energy and moving it, 1 from attaching from hand, 1+ from Max Elixirs), this card is undoubtedly fast.
Retreating:
While I didn't think this was going to initially be a problem, it has became one of the biggest ones. With a deck that wants to flicker between Acceleration and Power, you must be able to make the switch as quickly as possible to get the strongest effect. There is a couple options to remedy this:
Zoroark with a Float Stone: With our deck already having a rough time with Garbodor, I don't want to rely on a support Pokemon that also has a rough time with Garbodor.
Float Stone: The easiest way is to just use a Float Stone, and while this isn't as good as being able to switch Pokemon freely like Zoroark, it is a good option. The only issue that I have with this option is it takes up the space that a Fighting Fury belt could have, which is key to hitting some numbers.
Switch/Escape Rope: A really good way to increase Pokemon rotation freely, and with Seismitoad-EX being rotated out, we can now actively use cards like Switch/Escape Rope.
Conclusion:
Hopefully, you enjoyed my thoughts on the problems and their solutions with Volcanion. This was my first massive post so tell me what you thought. If I missed anything, or you want to talk about a certain point, please comment!