Yanmega.... how to counter?

Empoleafeon

Aspiring Trainer
Member
after yanmega variants won nats in all divisions and swarmed the topc ut, its important to know how to counter them. is there any way?
 
Zekrom/Reshiram are pretty decent against it too, 40 snipe isn't really enough for it to keep up, and running Kingdra doesn't help against Emboar variants. I suppose you could tech Zekrom into a deck(if you're already running DCE, Rainbow, or Lightning already), but it would only snag you a few prizes.
 
I have Zekrom in my MegaJudge list for Umreon, between Magnezone w/ Kingdra 1 shotting him for 1 energy and Zekrom 1 shotting them easily Yanmega is no problem. Although, one of the reasons Yanmega is so good is because it's hard to tech against him in a non-electric deck. If you're running PlusPower Cinccino can deal with them decently, but you're probably best just using someone who hits for at least 110
 
Any Magnezone deck that has PlusPowers can OHKO Yanmega as well. You could use Kingdra or that. If you're running a Magnezone deck PlusPowers could be helpful against Donphan as well. Instead of burning 4 energies you would only need to use 3 with a PlusPower.
 
Pretty much anything that's very fast setup and does nice dmg (100 or above), like reshiram variants for example. Ofc being hard to be disturbed by judges is good thing aswell.
 
uhh...being smart enough to keep your hand drastically different in numbers than your opponent works great. if they have a judge or copycat then there's nothing you can do but they only have so many of those. I just focused on manipulating my hand to be different in number than my opponent as much or more than they focused on keeping it the same as mine and I won against yanmega every time except for one battle with pooka at nats (who only beat me because he flipped freaking 6 out of 6 heads on reversals [4 then 2 junk arm for 2 more] which is ridiculous...no way you can win against his luck)
 
It's extremely easy to manipulate your hand with junk arms and communications, so you don't have to copycat every turn. If it was easy as you say it is, then yanmega would not be doing well at all. Also, if you aren't playing all of your cards or if you're burning all of your cards then you won't have a good late game and you won't be able to keep up because yanmega is a stage one that attacks for 0 energy and has no retreat.
 
dunno....maybe it just seemed a lot easier because I ran reshiboar with high hp's, good draw power to bring my hand higher and high trainer count to bring my hand lower....other than a super lucky pooka, I was undefeated against yanmega prime decks....so maybe that's the counter right there: reshiboar.
 
Anything that 1-shots Yanmega is a counter to be honest. It's just how can you keep up with a stage 1 that attacks for 0 energy at least Eight times in the game (provided with 4 copycat and judge)
 
well, the idea is that they'll somehow either one or two shot you if they only have 8 guaranteed times to go 0 energy cost and more if their opponent doesn't know what they're doing or they get a lucky break on just the right trainers/supporters to manipulate their hand enough to go crazy high or low depending on which direction their opponent went.

yanmega prime can only hit for 70 or snipe for 40 after all that too. all it has is speed. so all you need to do is be a tank and wear it down. I'll admit yanmega is the fastest and hits second hardest with that speed (first would be ZPS but that has a wicked recoil) but if you get heavy hp pokemon set up you're golden. throw zekrom or reshiram out and outrage...or if they snipe around your zekrom/reshiram then that'll just give you more time to build up your attacks for the OHKO. yanmega only has 110 hp...they'll need a defender to survive bolt strike/blue flare but then just slap on a pluspower.

I think yanmega did great because it caught everybody by surprise...there was only a week or so preparation and during that time there was still speculation of whether or not it would really do well at nats. it's the same reason why I took battle roads a couple times...I used reshiram and zekrom decks and people did know how to get around the high hp basic with the crazy outrage ability. but a month after release, it's not nearly as hard for people anymore.
 
well have a draw engine so that you are not disrupted by judges...and have an attacker who has more than 70 hp and can do atleast 110...and that would be game imo...
 
Well Yanmega is a weak card when it's all alone. Another advice would be just to kill off it's support. This holds true especially vs MegaZone and KingMega. As for Stage 1 Toolbox, that's a harder one to deal with.
 
If you are playing a deck with DCE Zekrom could be of great assistance, considering if they do anything to it, you will be able to one shot them. I've also found that you can sometimes make someone playing Yanmega to Copycat themselves into awful hands. At Nats I played a Kingdra Yanmega, cut my hand size down to about 2, they had to Copycat to get the kill, and after I killed their Yanmega next turn, they couldn't get anything out. Most the time, a good Yanmega list can set up off a 3-4 card hand though, so I would say the best counter is a Zekrom tech or 2.
 
Idk about zekrom techs because a good yanmega player most likely will not attack the zekrom, so it will be doing 40 damage at a time while you're bench gets torn up.
 
or don't lay down a bench until they get their own bench set up. forces them to wait or attack to be counter-KO'd
 
Everyone on Pokebeach is extremely stubborn lol. If you're playing without a bench, there is no way that you will be able to match their setup.
 
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