Eye on Japan: All about Thundurus EX / Deoxys EX

Deoxys EX ends the era of Mewtwo EX.

Hello everyone!


As I made my trip to Japan, I had the privilege to take a close look on the Japanese tournament playing and metagame. I asked from you in my Facebook and Twitter, which  article would you like to have first: an article on the most played deck of the current format in Japan (Thundurus EX/Deoxys EX) or an article about the differences between Japanese and western tournaments. You were very active in the social media (thanks for that!) and it was a close race which Thundurus EX/Deoxys EX ended up winning with a small margin.

As you know, I faced this deck 4 times in the tournament I played in Tokyo and all of them had small differences, so I’m pretty comfortable talking about the deck and how it works. I’ll start by giving the list, I think is the best and then explain the strategy and cards of the deck one-by-one.

I know this is very early as the BW8, which this deck mostly consists of, will be released in May. Anyways, let’s roll!



Pokémon:

3x Thundurus EX(BW8)
4x Deoxys EX(BW8)
2x Kyurem(BW8)
1x Snorlax(Plasma Gale)
1x Lugia EX(Plasma Gale)
=11


Trainer:

4x Professor Juniper
2x Bianca
2x N
3x Colress
2x Skyla
2x Plasma Ball
2x Ultra Ball
3x Colress Machine
4x Pokémon Catcher
4x Hypnotoxic Beam
2x Virbank City Gym
2x Float Stone
3x Switch
1x Scramble Switch
=36




Energy:

4x Prism Energy
3x Blend Energy WFLM
4x Plasma Energy
2x Double Colorless Energy
=13


Strategy

I think this deck is once again very loyal to the very philosophy of Japanese deck building. It’s VERY straightforward, but at the same time it has a few tricks on its sleeve. Not to mention that this deck doesn’t really care about decks like Hammertime, which can Hammerspam them to death if played carelessly. All of these things are very usual within Japanese decks.

Anyways, there are two Pokémon you want to open with, Thundurus EX and Kyurem. Who you like to open with depends pretty much on your opening hand your opponent’s deck. Kyurem is able to hit T1 30 to the active and one benched Pokémon as long as you have Colress Machine in your hand. At the same time Thundurus EX can only hit for 30 and some extra damage, but it is able to load your attackers with its first attack. More often you want to open with Thundurus EX and I would say that it’s the main starter of this deck.

There isn’t any big trick in the early game. Just get the Deoxys EX to the bench as soon as possible and start pounding high damage with your Thundurus EX and Kyurem from T1 onwards. You usually have the 2-3 Deoxys EXs on your bench, so Thundurus is often hitting 50-60 damage while Kyurem can be able to hit whopping 150 damage only with 3 energy.

If this damage isn’t enough, you’re able to add even more damage with Hypnotoxic Beam, which can be combined with Virbank City Gym for an additional 30 between turns. With quick math, you can count that when hitting with Kyurem 120 + 3 Deoxys EXs + Poison and Virbank City Gym, you get the magical number of 180, which is able to OHKO every single EX Pokémon in the format! Not only it’s highly devastating, but it’s also a reality to hit it in T3 or even in T2!

In the late game, you’ll able to wreak havoc with Scramble Switch combined with Snorlax or Lugia EX, which I’ll get later on in this entry. Overall, the deck is all about speed and it’s very consistent. You’re able to finish many games very quickly.



Card Choices

As always, I’ll provide the translations of the cards when analyze. Thanks to Pokebeach.com for providing the analysis!

Thundurus EX

Thundurus-EX - Lightning - HP170
Basic Pokemon (Team Plasma)
[L] Thunder Knuckle: 30 damage. Attach an Energy card from your discard pile to one of your Benched Team Plasma Pokemon.
[L][L][C][C] Thunder Route: 90 damage. If this Pokemon has a Plasma Energy attached to it, discard an Energy card attached to the Defending Pokemon.
When Pokemon-EX has been Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness: Fighting (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 1


Thundurus EX is the main starter of this deck and can be considered as the main attackers of this deck as well. It has decent HP; but most of all it has great first attack that helps you get prizes in the early game while energy accelerating your supporting attackers. You want to get Thundurus EX to the active spot in T1 and start Thunder Knuckling. With Thunder Knuckle, you are able to make even cards like Snorlax able to attack. It’s also worth mentioning that Thunder Knuckle can get ANY energy cards from the discard pile, which is simply huge as there isn’t that many cards in the format that can get special energy cards like DCE back from discard pile. And we all know just how good getting an extra DCE can be.





Deoxys EX

Deoxys-EX - Psychic - HP170
Basic Pokemon (Team Plasma)
Ability: Power Connect
All of your Team Plasma Pokemon (excluding Deoxys-EX) do 10 more damage to the Defending Pokemon.
[P][C] Spiral Force: 30+ damage. If this Pokemon has a Plasma Energy attached to it, this attack does 30 more damage for each Energy attached to the Defending Pokemon.
When Pokemon-EX has been Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness: Psychic (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 2


Deoxys EX is this deck’s support. It just sits on the bench and increases the damage output of your other attackers. That is until your opponent is crazy enough to attack with Mewtwo EX or with something that has a huge amount of energy. Even though Deoxys EX doesn’t add to its own damage with its ability, it still OHKOs even a two-energy Mewtwo EX thus making it even better Mewtwo EX counter than Mewtwo EX itself! Not to mention that it causes a real headache for every single attacker that has a hug energy cost. Even though Deoxys EX is a decent attacker, you don't often use it due the fact that it needs 2 energy and one of them is Plasma and another Psychic energy.

I believe that when BW8 is released and Deoxys EX with it, Mewtwo EX will see a huge decrease in play. I played Mewtwo EX in my Hammertime in the tournament in Tokyo and didn’t even want to play it to play, because I noticed that everything was hitting with 1 or 2 energy and no one was weak to Psychic. This will be the end for the tyrannical season of Mewtwo EX.


Kyurem

Kyurem - Water - HP130
Basic Pokemon (Team Plasma)
[W][C] Frost Spear: 30 damage. This attack does 30 damage to one of your opponent’s Benched Pokemon (don’t apply Weakness and Resistance to Benched Pokemon).
[W][W][C] Blizzard Burn: 120 damage. During your next turn, this Pokemon cannot attack.
Weakness: Metal (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 3


Kyurem is the another early game attacker alongside with Thundurus EX. It’s very good, because it can spread the damage in the early turns. This gives an opening for Lugia EX to finish up the game. It’s also good to notice that Kyurem is a non-EX Pokémon, which this deck needs desperately in case of Sigilyph or Terrakion, which destroys Thundurus EXs.

Kyurem doesn’t look on the paper that good. However, when it comes to this deck, you should never look just the numbers behind the attacks, but the whole picture. Frost Spear usually hits for AT least 50 to the active and 30 the bench. Blizzard Burn is able to OHKO even the most fearsome EXs with a single blow when combined with Poison and Virbank City Gym.

Don’t even try to build this deck without Kyurem, because even though it may seem good, it’s at least as good as every other Pokémon in this deck. It’s one of the key ingredient if you want to have a chance against all the decks of the format.


Snorlax

Snorlax – Colorless – 130 HP
Basic Pokemon (Team Plasma)
Ability: Block
If Snorlax is your Active Pokemon, your opponent’s Pokemon can’t retreat.
[C][C][C][C][C] Team Impact: 30x damage. This attack does 30 damage times the number of Team Plasma Pokemon you have in play.
Weakness: Fighting (x2)
Resistance: none
Retreat: 4

Snorlax is in this deck only, because I was able to witness the brute power of Snorlax as it OHKOed my full HP Eviolited Darkrai EX in Tokyo…It’s just crazy how much damage can Snorlax do. Granted, it takes 5 energy, but once you get the 5 energy on it, it takes 2 prizes like nobody’s business. You rarely attach manually the energy to Snorlax or even attach them with Thundurus EX. Your best way of getting the energy on Snorlax is simply use Scramble Switch and gather all the energy on your active Pokémon and move them to Snorlax. This way it will surprise your opponent and you will able to hit at least once with Snorlax (which is often enough, because Snorlax is your late-game finisher).





Lugia EX

Lugia-EX – Colorless – HP180
Basic Pokemon (Team Plasma)
Ability: Overflow
For each of your opponent’s Pokemon that is Knocked Out by damage from Lugia-EX’s attacks, take 1 more Prize card.
[C][C][C][C] Plasma Gale: 120 damage. Discard 1 Plasma Energy attached to this Pokemon or this attack does nothing.
When Pokemon-EX has been Knocked Out, your opponent takes 2 Prize cards.
Weakness: Lightning (x2)
Resistance: Fighting (-20)
Retreat: 2


Lugia EX was a standard tech in every single deck I saw in Tokyo. And why shouldn’t it be, it can finish up the game with only one attack even if you have 3 prizes left! Lugia EX functions the same way as Snorlax. You want it to be a surprise (ok, it’s never a really surprise since it’s a staple tech), because if you play it down to your bench, it’s not only 2 easy prizes for your opponent, but it also useless unless timed correctly.

Lugia EX is probably one of the most hyped cards of the next set, but I believe that this will be the first deck that can really harness the devastating power of Lugia EX. Lugia EX very difficult to get into play properly and for example against Hammertime, it’s impossible. Lugia EX is a card that needs a lot of skill to play correctly and I think this deck can do very well without this even though it can be considered as a staple in Japan.  




Professor Juniper, Bianca and N

Nothing surprising here. Maybe the only interesting thing I noticed was the surprisingly low amount of Ns the deck played. This is probably due Colress, which surpasses N when it comes to the raw draw force. So far, N has been the only shuffle&draw for us for a long time, but now Colress challenges N, which has led to the decrease of Ns in decks. If we take a look back to the season of 2005-2006, only some decks played 4 Rocket’s Admins. We will probably see a decrease of N amounts in west as well.


Colress

Colress – Trainer
Supporter (Team Plasma)
Shuffle your hand into your deck. Then, draw an amount of cards up to the number of Pokemon on both your and your opponent’s Bench.
You may play only 1 Supporter card during your turn (before your attack).


To be honest, I don’t know what to think about Colress. First it seemed broken, then it seemed horrible and now I’m somewhere in between with it. All I will so for now is that it fits perfectly in THIS deck, because this deck wants to have a bench full of Deoxys EXs as soon as possible. The decks’ strategy really supports Colress and that’s why I believe it was so popular in this deck. I tried to keep my bench at minimum with Hammertime against these decks (2 Pokémon benched) and still they draw 7 cards. Most decks are forced to play even more Basics on the bench, so Colress is very efficient in this deck. In general, I think Colress is a mediocre card, but in this deck it’s great.


Skyla


Skyla is a good card, but in this deck it has a big role at two points of the game.

The first turn: Search for Plasma Ball, Hypnotoxic Beam or for a Virbank City Gym and donk the opponent.

The last turn: Search for the Scramble Switch and end the game in a cool fashion with Snorlax/Lugia EX.

I was especially afraid for the first turn situation in two of the games as they played Skyla in the first turn, but thankfully I wasn’t donked. However, I’m sure that if someone still plays stage2 decks and weak Basic decks when this deck comes out, a lot of donks will happen thanks to Skyla.


Plasma Ball - Ultra Ball

Plasma Ball – Trainer
Item (Team Plasma)
Search your deck for a Team Plasma Pokemon card, reveal it, and add it to your hand. Shuffle your deck afterwards.
You can use any number of Item cards during your turn.



Well, it’s kind of obvious that both of the cards are very good in this deck, but the question is why to run Ultra Balls and not only Plasma Balls as you wouldn’t need to discard from Plasma Balls? Well, obviously the answer is that you WANT to discard cards (energy) in the early turns of the game to get the most out of Thundurus EX’s first attack. You have to find the balance between Plasma Balls and Ultra Balls, but from what I saw, most players were settled with 2-2 split. It gives you Ultra Ball access with Skyla and it gives you Plasma Ball access when you can’t afford discarding any cards.


Colress Machine

Colress Machine – Trainer
Item (Team Plasma)
Search your deck for a Plasma Energy and attach it to one of your Team Plasma Pokemon. Shuffle your deck afterwards.
You can use any number of Item cards during your turn.


Colress Machine is the Energy Gain of Plasma Pokémon. The difference is that Colress Machine searches for energy. Plasma Energy. Plasma Energy is very important to Plasma Pokémon, because some Plasma Pokémon need them to do the necessary damage. Good examples of this would be Deoxys EX, which hits only for 30 if you don’t have a Plasma Energy on it. The same goes with Lugia EX, except Lugia EX can’t even attack without Plasma Energy!

Colress Machine is a must for this deck also, because you want to get your Kyurem attacking as fast as possible and with Colress Machine, you can enable Kyurem hitting in T1. 2-3 Colress Machines will become a staple for every single Plasma deck that will ever be played.


Pokémon Catcher

Well, it’s a straightforward deck, so 4 Catchers is a must. This deck can destroy any slow decks’ set-up with correctly played Catchers.


Hypnotoxic Beam - Virbank City Gym

Poison Hypnotic Beam – Trainer
Item (Team Plasma)
The Defending Pokemon is now Poisoned. Flip a coin. If heads, the Defending Pokemon is also Asleep.
You can use any number of Item cards during your turn.

Virbank City Gym – Trainer
Stadium
If a Pokemon is Poisoned, place two more damage counters on it between turns.
This card stays in play when you play it. Discard this card if another Stadium card comes into play. If another card with the same name is in play, you can’t play this card.


As this combo will be analyzed to death once Plasma Gale will be released, I won’t get too in-depth with this. As you may know, most Japanese decks play 4-2 split of these cards. I was scared of it as I didn’t run a Keldeo EX or Stadiums, but I noticed that it wasn’t that good against Darkrai EX as Darkrai EX gets to retreat for free. Granted, it adds 30 damage to the deck’s attack, so it’s naturally VERY important for this deck, but I don’t believe these cards will become a staple for every deck. They are good, but some decks (especially stage2 decks) can’t really afford playing them.








Float Stone and Switch

Float Stone - Trainer
Item
Pokemon Tool: Each Pokemon can have only 1 Pokemon Tool attached to it at any time.
The Pokemon this card is attached to has no retreat cost.
You can use any number of Item cards during your turn.


Deoxys EX sits on the bench and has a retreat of 2, sounds legit? No it doesn’t. That’s why you need enough Float Stones and Switches to retreat your Deoxys EX from the active spot EVERY TIME it gets Catchered. You really can’t afford to get stuck with Deoxys EX to the active spot as its 2 free prizes for most of your opponent’s Pokémon. Not to mention that Float Stone is a MUST if you decide to play Snorlax as I did.


Scramble Switch

Scramble Switch – Trainer
Item
Switch your Active Pokemon with one of your Benched Pokemon. Then, you may move any number of Energy attached to that Pokemon to the new Active Pokemon.
ACE SPEC: You can’t have more than 1 ACE SPEC card in your deck.
You can use any number of Item cards during your turn.


Scramble Switch is the last-turn card of this deck. Sometimes uou may be forced to use it before the last turn, if you’re forced to use a Juniper and you have Scramble Switch in your hand. However, you want to save Scramble Switch for the last turn, because it’s your only real way to energy accelerate your finisher attackers – Lugia EX and Snorlax. Scramble Switch was the only ACE Spec I saw Japanese players’ playing in their Plasma decks, so I believe it will become a real staple in the west as well. And why wouldn’t it – when timed correctly, it’s the most broken ACE Spec of the format!

Energy

The energy lines of this deck are very challenging, because you want to play 4 of anything, but can’t find space for it. The energy lines in this list are completely copied from what I saw in Japan. The 7 “Lighting” energy was always enough for Thundurus EX even though I ran Hammertime. That was probably the thing that really surprised me as in theory it seems a very low amount, but trust me with this.

The deck doesn’t necessarily need DCES, but the reason why I ran them is because a) I run Snorlax b) It gives you more options to retreat with Deoxys EX than just Switch, Scramble Switch and Float Stone. DCE is by far the best energy in the format and as long as you can take the advantage of it, it’s worth playing.



Conclusion

So, what can I say. The deck is going to be a tier1 contender, but one thing that really annoys me is the price of the deck in the west if Thundurus EX or Deoxys EX won’t be released as Promos. If that doesn’t happen before Worlds, it’s going to be the most expensive deck of the format BY FAR. If the box ratios don’t change I guess the deck will end up costing about 500 dollars. It’s one of the main reasons why I HOPE the deck doesn’t become the dominating BDIF. However, no matter what I hope, the deck is highly competitive and – in my opinion – has enough firepower and versatility to win even the World Championships.

In all its straightforwardness, the deck is a good play no matter what age group you play in. It’s enough for a Junior player, but at the same time it can be made into a competitive Master deck. All the Juniors I saw in Japan were playing the deck, and I will be surprised if this deck doesn’t win Worlds in the Juniors age category – it’s so destructive in all its simplicity.

Anyways, I hope this answered all the questions you had about the deck. You asked for the strategy, but in the end, the deck doesn’t have a real strategy. It adopts against its opponent’s and since it’s such a straightforward deck, it’s not rocket science. However, if you have any questions about the strategy, possible techs or the decklist itself, feel free to let ask anything. I’m always ready to discuss about the deck!

As always, feel free to comment on anything!

Thanks for reading!