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Standard Yveltal EX / Seismitoad EX / Garbodor

boltkenji

boltkenji

Aspiring Trainer
Member
I am a veteran to Darkrai decks, as I have been playing it as my main deck since it was introduced into the format. When Yveltal was released, naturally I started playing variants with it as well. Overall, the Garbodor variants have worked the best for me, but in the past I have experimented with things like Manectric/Yveltal, but with little success in a Fighting-Focused meta.

Pokemon: 13
  • 3 Yveltal EX
  • 2-2 Raichu
  • 2 Yveltal
  • 2 Darkrai EX
  • 2 Seismitoad EX
  • 1 Malamar EX
  • 1 Jirachi EX
Trainer/Supporter Stadium: 35
  • 3 Professor Juniper
  • 3 N
  • 2 Colress
  • 2 Lysander
  • 2 Pokemon Fan Club
  • 1 Lysander's Trump Card
  • 4 Hypnotoxic Laser
  • 3 Muscle Band
  • 3 VS Seeker
  • 3 Virbank City Gym
  • 2 Head Ringer
  • 2 Ultra Ball
  • 1 Switch
  • 1 Professor's Letter
  • 1 Dowsing Machine
Energy: 12
  • 4 Double Colorless Energy
  • 8 Darkness Energy
Strategy:

Start with Seismitoad and Quaking Punch your opponent to slow them down while you set up your Yveltal EX's to deal damage to their field. The two regular Yveltal help get energy out of the discard and onto my attackers. Garbodor is there to lock down any abilities that the opponent could use such as Safeguard, Intimidating Mane, Red Signal, and Fairy Transfer. Head Ringer is particularly nice in Yveltal decks because not only does it provide disruption, but it also causes your opponent to attach more energy to attack, which is something that Yveltal EX loves. I personally like to attach it Ex Pokemon that can Mega Evolve, like Manectric, so the opponent cannot use a Spirit Link on it.

Things I am considering:

Energy Switch, Crushing and Enhanced Hammer (This would take the place of Hypnotoxic Laser in the list), Skyla, Shadow Circle, Xerosic, Ghetsis


Update-5/17

- 2-2 Garbodor
- 1 Escape Rope
- 1 Lysander
- 1 Computer Search
- 1 Professor's Letter
- 3 Float Stone

+2-2 Raichu
+ 1 VS Seeker
+ 1 Virbank City Gym
+ 1 Dowsing Machine
+ 1 Lysander's Trump Card
+ 1 Darkrai
+ 1 Keldeo
+ 1 Ultra Ball

Update-5/20


-1 Professor Juniper
-1 N
-2 Ultra Ball
-1 Keldeo EX

+1 Malamar EX
+1 Lysander
+2 Pokemon Fan Club
+1 Professor's Letter
 
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I think the Shadow Circle stadium would be overall more helpful than Virbank. I'm looking to make a new Darkness deck and this one is close to what I'm aiming for. The deck is really well made though, I love it.

Also, how do you use the Garbodor in this deck? Do abilities work from your hand now? I haven't played in a while.
 
It's really kind of a toss up for me. I like having Virbank in this deck because of the kill potential, but Shadow Circle helps with the Manectric matchup. Of course, in order for Shadow Circle to be the most effective, the opponent can't play any counter stadiums, as they would get a free two prizes everytime it comes into their turn. Manectric is a problem for Yveltal, but not so much for Seismitoad. In theory, I can Quaking Punch and prevent the Spirit Link from coming out, and just clean up with Yveltal if necessary. Manectric is a matchup that I have thought a lot about, but I haven't had much of an opportunity to play against it.

Regardless, I'm thinking about dropping the Garb altogether and replacing it with a 2-2 line of Raichu. In the past, Garb has kind of underperformed in my opinion. I just don't feel that it was as good as it once was. Sure, it does help in certain matchups, but I feel like this deck can perform well without Garb if it focuses on consistency cards and playing well against certain matchups. Raichu on the other hand, will help immensely in the mirror and make it so that I out trade my opponent in prizes.

And to answer your question, Garbodor is there as a bench sitter to prevent your opponent from using any abilities as long as there is a tool attached to it. It is not meant to be attacked with. In most cases, in order for a pokemon to use an ability, it has to be out on the field, unless the card says otherwise (such as Ho-oh EX). And I currently do not know of a card that lets you use an ability from your hand.
 
Thanks for the information, looks like I've got a lot to learn about this game. How well do you think this deck would run with a Mew EX rather than Jirachi EX? It doesn't seem like Jirachi is all that useful, but Mew can do a lot in terms of bringing energy to Yveltal and can attack when needed to.
 
I personally would not replace Jirachi. It's a nice card to have when you open with a hand without a Supporter. As long as you have an Ultra Ball, you can search it out anytime. It also gives you more options for draw support. Instead of relying on randomly running into Supporters, Jirachi provides a way to search it out.

To be honest though, I don't think that Mew has much to offer for Yveltal. In order for Mew EX to use Replace, it needs a Psychic energy. When you run Dark Energy and Double Colorless, adding Psychic for Mew EX to attack would hurt your consistency a bit too much in my opinion. I could see it being useful against Manectric, as Mew and Yveltal do not share the same weakness. But because Mew has such low HP for an EX, giving it an offensive role is like giving two free prizes to your opponent. If you want to move energy around the field, I would stick with Energy Switch.
 
Ah right, I forgot about the Psychic energy requirement. It's a shame, it could sort of work otherwise. One last question, why not just add another Darkrai EX instead of having float stones? The only drawback to his ability is that it requires a Darkness energy to be on the Pokemon but I don't see that being an issue most of the time.
 
Looking at the decklist, Shadow Circle does nothing in Pokemon TCG now,
Think about it, Manectic decks are running 4 copies of Rough Seas. Thats the answer to shadow circle.
Also, You need to play Darkrai.
Garb isn't as needed, I don't know what matchups it helps with besides V/G and Pyroar.

I mean Two Darkrai, sorry I should've included that.
Darkrai is still an amazing attacker, and if you don't set up garb, you need two for consistency.
 
Garbodor will shut off your abilities as well. So the guys on your side of the field will not have free retreat. Float Stone is the primary tool that will be attached to Garbodor. And giving it free retreat will prevent the opponent from trying to Lysander it out to stall. After I have a tool on Garb, I like to attach a Float Stone to either a Seismitoad or a small Yveltal so I can use it as a pivot more easily. That way, if I was attacking with Seismitoad, I could easily attach a Float Stone to it so I wouldn't have to drop energy to retreat. In this way, I could attack with Seismitoad later without having to worry about not having enough energy on it.

I would probably add another Darkrai if I was not using Garbodor. In this deck, free retreat is too good to pass up. That's why I run a heavy amount of switching cards. Between the Float Stone, Switch, and Escape Rope, I am almost guaranteed to have an easy way out if I need it.
 
Awesome, thanks for answering my questions! I'm going to use this information and hopefully make a good Darkness deck!
 
No problem. Good luck with your list.
lrodjrod said:
Looking at the decklist, Shadow Circle does nothing in Pokemon TCG now,
Think about it, Manectic decks are running 4 copies of Rough Seas. Thats the answer to shadow circle.
Also, You need to play Darkrai.
Garb isn't as needed, I don't know what matchups it helps with besides V/G and Pyroar.

I mean Two Darkrai, sorry I should've included that.
Darkrai is still an amazing attacker, and if you don't set up garb, you need two for consistency.
Click to expand...

You're right about Rough Seas, that's why I was so against Shadow Circle to begin with. Honestly I would rather have the Virbank. And I was on the fence about Garbodor too, but I still think that space could be better filled with Raichu.
 
After playing around a bit, here's my new list. I didn't get a chance to test it yet:

3 Yveltal EX
2-2 Raichu
2 Yveltal
2 Darkrai EX
2 Seismitoad EX
1 Keldeo EX
1 Jirachi EX

4 Professor Juniper
4 N
2 Colress
1 Lysander
1 Lysander's Trump Card
4 Hypnotoxic Laser
4 Ultra Ball
3 Muscle Band
3 VS Seeker
3 Virbank City Gym
2 Head Ringer
1 Switch
1 Dowsing Machine

4 DCE
8 Darkness
 
No problemo, mate!

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I personally would not run Keldeo EX. You have the free retreat already with Darkrai, and you aren't running water or rainbow energy so you can't get extra damage on Keldeo. I would run Malamar EX instead. The ability of putting your opponent to sleep when you attach energy works great with hypnotoxic to just keep putting your opponent to sleep plus the insane damage of his attack when you get him charged (flip for each energy attached to Malamar, deals 60x number of heads. Costs 1 dark, 1 colorless) makes him so powerful. Thus I would add 2 Malamar EX and remove Keldeo EX and Switch (again I don't think it is that necessary with Darkrai).

I would also add a second Lysandre and a 4th VS Seeker while removing 1 N and 1 Juniper (you don't really need 4 with so many VS seekers). Another thing would be to remove 1-2 ultra balls and replace them with Pokemon Fan Clubs. You only have 1 non-basic (Raichu) and with the popularity of Seismitoad the fact that PFC is a supporter is in a lot of cases beneficial. Plus you can take out 2 pokemon which will give you more options in a game. Personally I would remove 2 ultra balls and thus run 2 PFC.

In total this is what I would do:
+ 2 Malamar EX
+ 1 Lysandre
+ 1 VS Seeker
+ 2 Pokemon Fan Club

- 1 Keldeo EX
- 1 Switch
- 1 N
- 1 Professor Juniper
- 2 Ultra Ball
 
Thanks for commenting. The Malamar is an interesting choice, but I don't think that I should commit that much energy to it. By attaching to Malamar, I am also missing critical energy attachments on Yveltal. Nevertheless, I might test with one though, just to see how it works. I like the Pokemon Fan Club too, as it will help me to set up my field sooner. And for this list, I opted for consistency, hence the high VS Seeker count. Even with the Seeker, I don't think it would be a good idea to cut back on Juniper and N. Keldeo was there to that I could make sure that I had an out against Hypnotoxic Laser during item lock. That's why I included a Switch as well.

Edit
After a lot of consideration, here is what I decided to do:

-1 Professor Juniper
-1 N
-2 Ultra Ball
-1 Keldeo EX

+1 Malamar EX
+1 Lysander
+2 Pokemon Fan Club
+1 Professor's Letter
 
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