Sunday, August 7, 2011

Pokemon Deck Review – Gamingfieldstudios - Donphan Yanmega Zoroark


4 - 3 Yanmega Prime TM
2-2 Donphan Prime HS
3 -3 Zoroark BLW
1 Cleffa HS/CL
1 Tyrogue HS/CL
1 Manaphy UL
1 Reshiram BLW
Pokemon - 21

4 Pokemon Collector
4 Judge
3 Professor Oak's New Theory
2 Professor Juniper
4 Pokemon Communication
3 Pokemon Reversal
4 Junk Arm
3 PlusPower
1 Switch
Trainers/Supporters - 27

8 Fighting
3 DCE
Energy – 11

Overall Strategy
I think people are getting pretty familiar with this deck.  Yanmega is the primary attacker since it snipes and hits hard for no energy as long as your hand size is identical to your opponent.  It’s weak to lightning which is easily taken care of by donphan prime which can start attacking for only one fighting energy.  The zoroark is a great all around tech since it can copy the defending pokemon attacks for only a DCE.  Reshiram is to decrease the base damage of kingdra’s dragon steam attack which is the most popular water pokemon in the format right now (a danger to donphan).  Manapy and cleffa are for setting up and tyrogue is for getting the donk.

Pokemon analysis
While yanma is a great starter too with free retreat and enough HP to avoid a donk, I still prefer a line of 4-4 or running rescue energy to reuse a yanmega.  I like to choose either cleffa or manaphy instead of going with both.  With so many tyrogue, I think manaphy is the safest choice.  I’m used to seeing higher lines of donphan (3-3) and lower lines of zoroark (2-2) for consistency.   If part of the donphan line is prized, it could really hurt your game if you’re only running a 2-2 line.   I would run the donphan with the pokebody rather than the ‘flail’ donphan so that if you have an energy attached, you don’t damage the benched donphan with earthquake, making it easier for it to be KO’d when it’s a donphan.

Energy Analysis
I like the 3 DCE since both reshiram and zoroark can utilize it, and would keep it at that number even if you decide to reduce the zoroark line to 2-2.  Your fighting energy line is pretty high for just running 2 donphan, but if you increase donphan to 3, it’s perfect.  11 energy might be a little low overall, so I would add in a couple of rescue or grass depending on your play style.  I personally like the back up of being able to rely on grass energy to snipe with yanmega.  You might also want to consider running special dark to increase the power of zoroark (max of 2).

Trainer/Supporter Analysis
I like the 4 pokemon collector, but in case you need to find room for another card, you should be able to reduce the number to 3 without problems.  Since yanmega relies on identical hand sizes, I would run both judge and copycat – a combination of 7 or 8.  To make room for 3 or 4 copycat, I would drop 1 juniper and the professor oaks new theory.  Since you run donphan, who has a really heavy retreat cost, I would increase your line of switches to 2.  It would also help your sleeping babies get out of the way.  The 3 pluspower is perfect, especially if you don’t decide to run special dark.  If you still need a little room in the deck, I would drop the communication down to 3 since you can easily reutilize them with junk arm.  The only other suggestions I have would be to add in one flower shop lady, just in case you need a little recovery late in the game.

Overall
This deck is extremely well built already and very similar to the video deck review I did of pgmcsskater’s donphan zoroark yanmega deck if you’d like to check that one out.  One of your biggest worries is going to be the mirror match, so If you going to worlds, make sure you get lots of practice against the mirror in!

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