Hey there, Cut or Tap readers! It has been a while, as my laptop 6-0’ed me back in the summer, but I am finally back with another article!

A bit of an anecdote here, but I believe the last time I shared any content was in a brief statement on Olympia, in one of Phinn’s last articles. Collaborating with another player on an article is such a fun and interesting thing, as mixing collective minds together in this game brings such different mindsets and preferences. I would recommend to anybody writing articles to try and collaborate on one, as the Lesages often do on here, or in two different ones, as Travis Nunlist and Aaron Tarbell recently have. And with that being said, I’ll jump into what you all are here for: some spicy Altavilla lists!

Dark Dragons in Expanded?!?

Now usually I would go over my last tournament and then share a couple decks for a tournament coming up, but this time around I’d like to bring up one of my San Jose plays early, to keep it out of the paywall for everybody. Please give the idea a chance, as it has been well thought-out to cover the meta. And without further adieu, I bring you:

At first glance, I would confidently say that this deck gets slaughtered by the plethora of Gallade, Groudon-EX, and Jolteon-EX that riddle the Expanded format. I feel that this deck has an answer to Groudon and to Gallade, but it more than likely falls short when it goes second versus any variant of the Plumebox archetype. That might just be okay though, as the rest of the Expanded format is naturally well-equipped to deal with such a deck, and the resurgence in Trevenant will probably boot the brainchild of Sam Hough directly out of the format.

Two Darkrai BKP is a weird number that I just can’t see being that great, but I feel with the wide use of Jirachi and Shaymin, plus every non-EX deck being a near auto-win for you, that Salamence is way too good to pass up 2 copies. The card is actually nuts.

One ‘Tina is awfully uncomfortable as well, but he’s very niche in Expanded and you normally only need one anyways. In games where you need two, it’s usually because one is close to getting KO’ed, and Olympia can alleviate this issue half of the time anyways.

Mewtwo-EX only takes one Energy and one Elixir, so I heavily doubt he’ll whiff when you need him. KOing Gallade is so important for this deck to succeed versus Yveltal/Maxie, so Mewtwo needs that slot. I was debating Mew EX as well, but Mewtwo is just better in so many matchups.

For those who don’t feel like ascending the paywall through purchasing a subscription to Cut or Tap, I bid you farewell and I urge you to try this deck on for size. It’s actually busted in practice and it can steal games it probably has no business winning, through the sheer force of hitting ridiculous numbers from probably the first turn of the game.