Notes & Combos

Aggro Arbok

I understand Red Card is a hot topic. I feel like it adds an extra layer of manipulation and there is a small dopamine hit by sometime cutting your opponents hand in half or simply making them start with one less card to open. If you are in the other camp simply add another Kangas in that spot. I do not feel strongly about this is a spot for you to use as you feel is right. Dial it up to personal preference.

Lets look at the gameplan:

Low monster count but a guaranteed basic to start and a way to dig lead to a suprising consistency to early game.

Use Fetch'd / Kangaskhan to control the early game and ideally score an early KO or break opponent's tempo.

We use a very large pool of items/trainers to make the deck feel flexible albeit sometimes only drawing one basic to start we offset that by running 1 energy attacking Fetch'd/Kanga to start applying pressure until we can develop an Arkbok line on the bench. You must use these items properly or you may miss a kill or way to buy yourself that one more turn you needed to setup ie: Using Sabrina to snipe a bench mon to secure a kill vs Using her to swap a threat out to a mon that they will need to retreat to apply pressure, sometimes allowing you that extra turn you need. Same trainer, vastly different use.

Swap into Arbok to secure points / snipe bench with Sabrina

You are not running EX pokemon meaning your opponent has to slog through a full three points of the traps and pitfalls you create. The trinity of Arbok/Sabrina/X Speed allow you to secure kills out of nowhere if your opponent is lazily thowing mons onto their bench.

Biggest weakness so far are decks that sit on one large HP pool pokemon with none on the bench meaning we have an Awkward matchup vs rogue Venusaur/Melmetal strategies which thankfully are few and far between as the meta decks typically bully those out of existence.

Ekans/Arbok are dark and have +20 on their attacks vs Psychic making the Mewtwo EX matchup very fun. Arbok can two hit a Mewtwo EX with no powerups or swing for 90 when paired with Giovanni while also preventing retreats securing some easy wins against one of the better decks.

Against Charizard EX we are looking to trap a Moltres in the active to secure easy points.

Thats all for now. If there is interest I will update some more matchup specific things.