Hey readers! Sorry about the wait on this piece. I’m back with four new and unique options for Worlds. Over the last two weeks I have been testing a jungle of decks, tweaking the previous lists and recreating past archetypes to deal with a new meta.

Decidueye Vileplume has proven to be an extremely strong option in this format, seeing as it is one of the only decks that can consistently beat Gardevoir. Irritating Pollen continues to be one of the most overpowered abilities out there, and Feather Arrow is the perfect partner.

Volcanion gained a huge boost with the release of Kiawe and Guzma. These two supporters take the deck from consistent and powerful to aggressive and extremely hard hitting. Turtonator does a great job of countering the most feared card in our meta; Gardevoir GX.

Mega Rayquaza is an archetype that fell out of favor for a while because of the way the meta had evolved. However in the new worlds format there are more big two-prize Pokemon for Ray to oneshot, and less Parallel City or Zoroark out there to counter the sky Field engine.

Finally Garbodor still reigns as one of –if not the– best deck(s) in the format. A new version of this deck focusses on several different attackers rather than just Espeon GX, or Just Drampa. This list takes advantage of the new Po Town, and creatively manipulates damage while providing a strong item lock. And while we will not be receiving the Tapu Lele Promo, this deck still pushes a hard lock.

I will begin with Decidueye Vileplume because frankly it is the list I am least proud of. This is basically John Ketler’s list with some minor changes and a thin Ninetales line. I figure it’s best to save the craziest lists for the end. While this is not a ground breaking list, it is a strong one. Ninetales is very powerful in the deck, and we now have a way to fit Tales and Vileplume instead of one or the other. Here’s what I have been working with.

Ninetales

The idea here is that the two Vulpix take the place of the Level Ball that was cut, and the Ninetales takes the spot of Lugia. I never liked that Lugia much because I felt Lele replaced it well, but the Ninetales is another option as an attacker while Vulpix is the perfect Pokemon set up attacker. Ninetales can help the otherwise tough Volcanion matchup, and works wonders against Garbodor decks. Oftentimes I will Feather arrow a Trubbish and then use Ice Blade to do the remaining 50 to take a knock out.

Most of the reason why I like Vulpix is because I can get turn one Vileplume and still set up Decidueye by using a couple Beacons. There are many other reasons, including being able to get myself out of a supporter drought by using Beacon for free to get a Lele.  It also offers another GX attack option for any games where Hollow Hunt is less needed. The threat of being able to Ice Path GX is enough as is frankly, even if you never plan to actually use the attack. Your opponent will have to divert their damage from Ninetales creating suboptimal plays.

Acerola

I find use for this card frequently. Sometimes it will be important to move something from the active, but without being forced to bring up one of my opponent’s benched Pokemon (effect of Guzma). The healing effect works well in decks like these where it is important to maintain attackers for a couple turns. Any time where I have to attack with Decidueye is painful because I know it will be knocked out, and I will have one less Feather arrow for the rest of the game. With Acerola you can hit for 90 and then preserve the Decidueye. On top of that, you can Feather arrow an extra time after playing the Decidueye back down, which means you can actually Feather Arrow four times with three Decidueye in one turn!

Another nice aspect is that it can pick up a Vileplume to get you out of item lock for a turn. Once you have played all of your items you can play the Plume back down and keep your opponent locked.

2 Guzma/0 Lysandre

One of the biggest issues Vileplume has is the big three retreat. People will stall it in the active if they can. With two Guzma you can prevent Vileplume from being stuck in the active. Lysandre is nice but having the insurance of not being stuck with the plume active is better.

1 Level Ball

Only one Level ball is a compromise to help fit in the Vulpixes. The idea is that Vulpix can search out any two Pokemon instead of Level Ball searching out only one 90 HP or less Pokemon. Of course this is not perfect logic because you can play that Pokemon down right when you Level Ball, and because N can nullify Beacon. Level Ball helps you to get the turn one Vileplume, but Beacon helps you set up under the turn one Irritating Polen.

1 Field Blower

Basically you only ever need to use Field Blower because once you get rid of the tool on Garbotoxin, Irritating Pollen will prevent your opponent from playing down another tool for the rest of the game. This is not always the case, but cuts had to be made and this philosophy works out a lot of the time. if they ever do have the chance to put another tool down by using Hex, or knocking out the Vileplume, you can just go for the knock out on Garbodor with a couple a Feather Arrow (before Garbotoxin is back) and a Razor Leaf. It is not perfect by any means, but it works…usually.

3 Grass Energy

Three or Four is the norm. I found the fourth Grass to clunk up my hand a lot of the time. Frankly I only really need one Grass energy per game. I rarely Razor Leaf with two separate Decidueyes. This list has the Ninetales as another option to attack; DCE is energy we really care about.

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This is probably my top pick at the moment. If the meta was less of a factor I would hands down play this deck for Worlds, but because I think other people will play Deci/Plume, I am more in favor of Rayquaza or Garbodor currently. If you feel comfortable with mirror and know how to pilot Decidueye well, then this is probably your best bet.

Next up is Turtonator Volcanion. Loving this deck at the moment because of its huge aggression with Turtonator, and big damage output starting on turn two. This is the list featured in the last episode of gameplay analysis but with a couple tweaks.

Turtonator Volcanion

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