Expanded is in a strange place right now because the format has turned very denial/control oriented. So much so, that cards like Seismitoad and Lusamine actually have a legitimate place in decks. Lost Thunder takes the control/denial paradigm to a new level by adding cards such as Girafarig, Faba, and Morty. Faba in particular changes a lot because several decks were relying exclusively on Double Colorless for all of their attackers. These control decks can now get rid of all their opponents energy by using Faba repeatedly through VS Seeker, Dowsing Machine, and/or Oranguru. Disgusting.
With that kept in mind, I tried to orient all of the decks in this article around being able to deal with the control threats. The Zoroark decks abuse the new combinations while trying to avoid their opponent doing the same, while the Eels and Cofagrigus lists work to avoid the weaknesses that the control decks capitalize on. I’ll start with Eels so the non-subscriber readers have some content to check out.
Raikou Eels
| Pokémon – 14 | Trainers – 37 | Energy – 9 | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4 | Tynamo | 2 | Professor Sycamore | 4 | VS Seeker | 9 | Electric | ||
| 4 | Eelektrik | 2 | Colress | 4 | Acro Bike | ||||
| 3 | Raikou | 1 | Brigette | 4 | Ultra Ball | ||||
| 1 | Pikachu EX | 1 | N | 3 | Level Ball | ||||
| 1 | Xurkitree GX | 1 | Faba | 2 | Field Blower | ||||
| 1 | Tapu Lele GX | 1 | Guzma | 2 | Rescue Stretcher | ||||
| 2 | Battle Compressor | ||||||||
| 3 | Sky Arrow Bridge | 2 | Fighting Fury Belt | ||||||
| 1 | Electropower | ||||||||
| 1 | Dowsing Machine | ||||||||
| 1 | Nest Ball | ||||||||
One of the best parts about Eels in this format is Xurkitree. Send that thing up against decks that only attack with DCEs and you just use Rumbling Wires until you win. Another nice aspect is the fact that you have basic energy acceleration in a format full of denial stuff. All those Plumeria, Faba, and whatever else will not hurt you much because you continually recover the energy. Electropower was a card that boosted the deck’s utility a little further as well.
List Details
Pikachu EX
The idea here is to have a big attacker to close out games, or other times when you can get ahead in a prize race, you can use it multiple times to keep pulling off big KOs. I figure Malamar always plays one Necrozma GX in Standard, so Pikachu is the Expanded Eels equivalent.
Sky Arrow
It became clear through testing that counter stadiums are needed. Parallel is very annoying and so is Silent Lab. Sky Arrow was the stadium I chose because it adds some speed and mobility, but Rough Seas or Tropical Beach are also solid options. More Field Blower could also be an answer to stadiums, but you cannot use it against Trevenant and Toad. Now that I type it, I do want to try out Tropical Beaches…
One Electropower
Two would be nice and I could see a list with four, but I just have the one as an option for certain games. If you want to cut Pikachu and maybe Xurkitree, you could fit in more Electropower and try to take OHKOs with Raikou instead. I prefer to build it this way because I am less hurt by item lock.
Cofagrigus Giratina
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