I dont know of that has been mentioned in the discussion before, but i like ladder systems in PVP Card games because it gives me some control against what type of decks im going to play. I usually brew my own unoptimized decks and like to hover around in lower ranks and try to bring it as high as possible. From that point i always decide if i de-rank myself with some other weaker brews or switch it up to stronger decks to get more competetive.
Online pvp sucks. Its bot fun to play agaisnt the same 2 decks 90% of the time. It makes most cards useless. Easy fix they need to add a conoetitive mode that only allows 1 EX per deck
this game has zero "serious competitive scene". Pocket punishes any creative deck building leaving you to play one of two copy and paste decks. its a gotcha cash grab
On the Lapras Deck (9:21) i added regular Starmie instead of the Seaking. Although it has less 10 HP, it’s reliable 40 damage and the ability to free retreat (just like it’s ex version) makes it a great addition to the list. thanks for the video Jeff!
I use that deck but swap in 2 dragonite lines, 2 starmie and 1 Lapras ex. It works well if you have 2 misty cards, Lapras ex is great to start with if you go second, staryu is great if you go first. It's very dependent on misty rolling well, though.
The data science background totally makes sense - your visualizations are awesome. Work in finance myself and would love to make something as consumable!
I love setting up a Blaine charged Ninetails pivot to roast that mouse in 1 hit. Blaine decks can compete on speed but can still be outmatched if they don’t just throw pickachu on the fire.
We don't have a pikachu problem, we have a consistency problem. There are a lot of decks that could compete, but if anything goes wrong in the chain of events (missing evolution pieces, missing setup), you just die with no chance of recovery. I play mewtwo and charizard, and honestly I think I will build pikachu because the ammount of lost games because evolution pieces are in the last 3 cards is astounding.
Hey Jeff! Appreciate the keen insights and clean breakdown. So cool after watching you on the scg circuit all the time back in the day. Excellent video!
That Arcanine list is cool! The Aerodactyl tech to clear big bodies is very creative. I was playing around with a similar list using Rapidash instead which felt pretty good.
Great video and nice flex on the grad degree lol. Agree wih your Pika EX nerf idea, and I actually like that a lot. By making it 20 base damage and +20 for each electric benched, it actually increases the damage output at 0/1 benched pokes, is the same at 2 benched, and like you said the cap at 80 damage would help loosen the stranglehold on a lot of otherwise good stage 1 evolution based decks.
I like the 4 marowak sandslash variant more since it gives you a good play going first. The 100 hp and 2 shotting pikachu just also lines up well. It also allows you to go like regular marowak first sandslash second and ex 3rd to maximize point usage.
I honestly wasnt expecting the arbok bird to be a thing. I’ve been running my deck with just arbok and weezing and called it Jessie and James. Been winning ever since. But I’ll try it out with the pidgey line to see how it fairs.
But hitmonlee dont hit for super effective damage because pokemon on the bench dont count their weakness? Thats how it was when i used zebstrika at least. Couldnt one shot staryu so it evolved and hit me for 90
7:00 Welp Jeff I’m switching up my main deck again. I’ve always loved the chunky health swings Erika provides and have always found that eggy provides solid damage. The victreebel controlish element towards the end is choice too. Thinking out loud here, but I wonder if, since you just need a grass energy for victreebel and a single dark for arbok, there may be something there.
I sleeper lightning deck for me is 2x pikachu ex, zapdos ex, zapdos and then 2x eevee + jolteon. It helps me strategize what I wanna put out and use. Sometimes I’ll do the electrode other times I like using snorlax. Just a bulky dude to tank some hits until I set up my bench 👍
I’ve been running Arcanine from the start as I pulled two EX Arcanine back to back and I finished my emblem run with it. Every other video said it was trash but I found it so easy to roll with. I also have 3 Charizard EXs in each rarity and no Charmeleon yet lol
I had pretty good luck with mankey/primeape + Kabuto. However, your win rate is almost entirely determined by getting a turn 2 start, and getting primeape down on turn 4. If you can do those two things you’ve got a pretty decent win percentage
I came up with that same exact Victreebell list (except for the fact that I play 1 Farfetch'd over the regular Exeggutor) and I ended up finishing the event in no time and with 8 consecutive wins. I don't think it's one of the best decks, but it did surprisingly well and I'm happy that other people are playing it as well.
i stayed out with a fighting deck, but there were too many mewtwo decks sweeping me so i switched to a pikachu deck (2 pikachu, 2 pikachu ex, & 1 raichu Lt Surge combo bc i only have 1 raichu rn) and that got me the rest of the wins for the current battling event. i have a dark deck i'm setting up, but i don't have all the pokemon i want for it yet. my fighting deck is lacking an ex mon i want for it too tbh
As i always commented on the Snap videos, thank you for your amazing content/work, Jeff! Nice to see my favorite content creator enjoying pocket just like myself. It has 100% become my comfort game and to be honest im enjoying it more than Snap. Thank you again for everything!
I agree to the pikachu change you said. 1 cards on bench = 40 damage, 2 cards on bench = 60 and max would be 80 damage. Giovanni won’t get it to 100 damage. That would be a healthy change.
@@jprec5174nah that would be like saying marowak ex is too powerful. When they work it's amazing but the chance to hit for 0 keeps them in check. Unlike the consistency of Pikachu just ending games. Without luck beyond hand bricking which is relevant for all decks.
Why would that change much tho? the 90 dmg is not the problem. Pickachu being a basic with 2 energy cost and basically no retreat costs in the deck is the problem.
@@jprec5174 Starmie is really good aswell ye. It is not a basic Pokemon tho and Misty is so unreliable. I played 1 Starmie player so far in 100 games lol. Everybody is on pikachu and mewtu.
@@StarBuZZpro 90 to 80 is definitely a meaningful change. Tamping down on the number of things that Pika or Pika+Giovanni can just run over (which represents a lot of stage-1 final evolutions and Kangiskhan) is a conservative but significant change. Which I think is a great.
My favorite “no meta” decks are Melmetal (Bisharp, Mawile , Farfetchd) and Dragon-Moth (Dragonite & Frosmoth, with Misty to get Frosmoth up and running w/o taking energy turns from Dragonite)
Just started 3 days ago. Got Marowak EX off an early Wonder Pick and been enjoying dumpstering even Mewtwo, I will have to try the Sandslash variant. I pulled rainbow rare Moltres and Charizard, but I definitely think that variant is too inconsistent.
I think Pikachu will always be a viable strategy for the live time of the game. It can be frustrating now to deal with Pikachu but as more cards and expansions come out, we can expect natural a swears to appear. I don't know if it needs a nerf just now.
Came back to the video after trying out the Victreebel deck as I was excited to see I had all the cards for it; I gotta say it really is super satisfying keeping Pikachu trapped
i love my pika ex deck fs but a counter (or a few) would be a healthy welcomed addition when new cards come out c: but all i want is more metal cards to mess with.
I've been playing a lot of Raichu Magneton Surge after I saw a Japanese player post the list, and I can confirm it's insane. Maybe the highest win rate deck I've played (and I've tried everything), and it also feels like you get to make lots of fun decisions with a very rewarding payoff. LOVE the deck
Nice meta report!! Two things i like to say tho: in 3:01 you said raichu has the upper against most common pika list (implying it to be zebra) and this is just untrue. The zebra iteration was made exactly to have the upper hand against the raichu tech. About the pika dominance it seemed hopeless for most of the last month, but in this weekend besides arcanine entering the fray with a top2 and a top8 (with almost no entry rates), m2 newer iteractions(6 basics with either kangs or bb m2) have consistenly beaten pika lists (at least on the hands of upper cut players), so we may be close to reach the inflexion point where pika is not clearly the only reliable way to topcut. But this will take some time to tricle down imo since both arcanine and 6 basics m2 are among the hardest lists to pilot imo.
awesome video as always. the game and the decks in general are kinda nice, sadly some highroll mewtwo players here and there ruin a bit the fun of making a strat by having like no counterplay to it but hopefully the gardevoir power will become less problematic once we have harder hitting base pokemon to play that threat mewtwo a bit more than 20/60 dmg max before the 150 dmg spam starts
What I saw in the last week of playing the game doesn't mesh with what you've said. Almost half of my opponents were Mewtwo/Guardivoir. Of the rest they were fairly evenly split between Koga Dark, Articuno 18T, and PicachuEX/ZapdosEX. The deck I usually played is the last as I have the cards for it. A rising deck is MoltresEX/ArcanineEX (noted in the video). Articuno 18T is likely to die out as it's so much a gimmick deck. I actually had a match where the other person quit on TURN 1 because Misty predictably failed. StarmieEX may be taking its place, or at least supplementing it. What it looks like to me is that people are mostly looking for ways to get more energy as early as possible. This is compounded that there's only a couple of cards that remove energy, and nobody uses them. This may change if Energy Removal and Item Finder get introduced. Until then, Mewtwo will reign supreme.
The data I am reviewing in this report is from tournament matches. You are correct that the experience in the event queue is very different. The fact that you are not punished for losing like you are in a tournament means most people aren't playing the best decks and things like Misty cheese are very popular. People that want to win are playing Pikachu, but that pack is also the worst of the 3 packs so the fewest average players are opening it - so the deck isn't very popular in the more casual setting.
nice video! Personally, i am strongly against adjustments to current cards, despite this being an online game. I think many people would be angry to spend pack points on a pikachu just to have the card changed randomly one day. Not to mention increased confusion. I think pokemon just needs to release fighting support trainer card and that can help the issue organically
I've been running a Nido King/Queen deck and just vibing lol. It's definitely not the best deck out there since it has no extra energy gen options and needs time to ramp, but I find it fun! It loses against Pikachu a lot just because of how quickly that deck gets to full power. It fairs pretty decently against Mewtwo but if they get get a lucky Turn 3 Gardevoir you're screwed. Against other decks it's usually RNG. How good are their dice rolls on Moltres EX / Misty, etc etc. The nice thing is that because Mewtwo is so popular not a lot of people are playing Fighting decks, so it's rare to be hard countered lol.
I’d like to see an adjustment to pika, I think that if it goes 2nd with even a reasonable draw it is near unbeatable. I think that reducing its max damage to 80 would help
That Mewtwo-Gardevoir is unstoppable. I've lost with PikEx quite a bit. I only lost twice with MewGard when I only had 1 Gard, and I was trying to put the finishing touches.
@HooglandiaPocket I had a good stretch with PikEx. Then I had a good 10 games straight where I couldn't get Pika out in time at all. I just felt like it was inconsistent. Zapdos is too reliant on coin flips. Just to show how badly coin flips go my way, I had 16 out of 20 going firsts. Zapdos is not for me.
This past week I have exclusively been testing the "Monke bonk" Promo Mankey + Kabutops deck. I found two main issues for this deck's viability 1. Going second:This deck BEGS to go second. Going first literally destroys this decks viability. In a mirror match of the exact same deck with a friend, the person who went on turn 2 was ALWAYS the winner. We tested 15 or so games and not once did the person going first win. An optimal opening for this deck is Turn 2 Promo Mankey -> Turn 4 Primeape. Its not Impossible to win turn 1, it just becomes an instant uphill battle 2. RED CARD: as the week progressed, more and more people were red carding my hand. I think more people realized they have nothing to lose by red carding on turn 3. Either You dont get primape or you draw him next hand, And they get 1 extra turn to set up before turn 4. That's just my anti-meta analysis for the week ive played this deck. I'm going to keep experimenting becuase this is soooooo close to being the pikacuu killer.
I’ve been running this deck quite a bit as well, this deck needs to go turn two, still can win fights turn one but certainly makes it more difficult! And I’ve noticed this with the red cards but more often than not the opponent does me a favour with them 🤣 deffo needing some more fighting types to counter the amount of pika decks. I have the top 5 meta decks but find myself using more rogue decks as they are more fun tbh
@chazclark86 I'm the exact same way, after a losing streak I'll pop out my Mewtwo deck and go on a long win streak, get bored, then theory craft some new fringe deck because it's more fun to throw cards at a competitive wall and see what works
@ yep 100% this. I’ll generally go to the pika deck for a bit then get bored and go to Mewtwo or back to fringe decks, could be doing with more AI battles, hoping with the next big expansion we get more of those. Apparently coming in January?
I think it’s a little early for a nerf on anything. New sets on the horizon could really change up the meta in big ways. Pikachu is dominant but not unbeatable, but with such a small card pool for the meta to pull from I think waiting to see what happens once we have more options is the right play. There’s always going to be a best deck and best card, if after a set or two comes out and pikachu is still obviously the best thing going on, maybe we look at a nerf then.
The number of "Red Card"s in these top tournament deck lists seems pretty high to me. Do you think that's because red card is sufficiently disruptive in matchups like Mewto Ex where the opponent is trying to assemble Stage II pokemon like Gardevoir? Or do you think top performers will begin cutting red card as they gain more experience with how often it isn't impactful many matchups?
I think a single red card has some value for forcing your opponent to play in a specific way. Overall, I think the card is still pretty mediocre, though. Especially against decks like Pika that rely on basics only.
I'd like Pika to do 20 per electric pokemon you are controlling so it does always at least 20 because it would count itself and cap out at 80. I also want starmie to have a one energy cost retreat and gardevoir have a once per turn and not a once per gardevoir so you can't channel 2 psychic energy per turn, one free is already really good.
Thanks for the video! I am a bit puzzled by the amount of decklists with 4 basics that you feature just after hammering the point in that 5-6 should be the sweet spot and 4 is being greedy. But Probably i am not seeing how that rule is different for the sandslash, the machamp and the victreebell decklists. I am not good at deckbuilding, but i didnt expect that.
Primape + Kabutops has been the most consistent variant for me. It has a very consistent turn 1 with the guaranteed Mankey. Only feel bad is if you can’t get the Primape evo within the first couple of turns. Kabutops is a good bulky body that is easy to set up and is resilient.
Playing the same deck. Especially the low energy cost of Kabutops makes it a great deck for quick pressure. And it's basically without chance! I hate it if my whole deck just relies on coin flips and Primeape + Kabutops feels just great, just not drawing Primeape can be a big issue. Together with Sabrina it's really fun to break other decks while they still try to build up.
@ do you run two kabutops? I run two fossil and kabuto, but just one kabutops. (Primarily because of not owning a second, but I’ve not really been hurting for it so far.) It’s given me extra space for Trainer cards. Lowering pokeball to one has helped with dead draws, and upping Giovanni to two has helped me take out small super effective bodies in one hit more regularly. I can body PikaEX most the time - Zapdos being the biggest issue in that deck, but very doable if they get bad flips or can’t get it setup. Otherwise MewtwoEX is worst matchup, but I honestly have a shot as long as Primeape is out on my second turn. I agree with Sabrina at 2. Even if they use Sabrina on you to just disrupt and not attack, having a fossil on the bench just guarantees you a free switch back into primeape, which I feel like people forget often.
@@Brandease Just did the last thing...removed the fossil, brought my Primeape into active position and forced the opponent with Sabrina to make a Pokemon with less than 100hp active. I have one Pokeball as well (might even get rid of that, I rarely do anything useful with the second Mankey as it's hard to get it damaged (and not dead) mid to late game. Two Kabutops in my case, I want to make I likely to have at least one if Primeape dies. And why not have two? They might need three rounds to develop, but cost only one energy. I currently do not have any Giovanni.
@@frool76 I’ll contemplate the second Kabutops (I’m just stingy spending my pack points on one). So far most my wins has been sweeping with Primeape, so I don’t typically rely too much on fossil line aside from chip damage or switch-and-bait. I do think having the one pokeball at the very least may help with deck thinning if you draw it early on and still need to draw into other key pieces. But I agree that a second mankey/primeape isn’t as useful in most cases. I would suggest Giovanni only if you notice a trend of coming up 10hp short of KO, which happened to me quite frequently. If anything, you may be able to scare your opponent into switching by using Giovanni on the first of a potential two hit KO. Your opponent may suspect another Giovanni or an evolution with their powered up attack and prematurely swap.
I definitely agree with adjusting/nerfing Pikachu EX because it is much more scarier than Articuno/Starmie EX with Misty, at least with Misty there's a 50% it can fail, same goes with Moltres actually, while with Pikachu, as long as you have 3 electric bench pokemon you can consistently deal 90 damage for just 2 energies and with 1 retreat cost, you can swap it with another pokemon you built if it's health becomes low enough.
I think rather than adjusting Pikachu ex, in an ideal world they'd introduce something that created a new deck that would turn it into more of a rock paper scissors format. I think if there was a deck that lined up really well against Pikachu ex but had a poor matchup against Charizard, that would bring more of a healthy balance
pikachu ex is just too simple to set up. He is a menace on turn one, mewtwo needs the gardevior synergy so you have essentially 3-4 turns to prep for the nukes and charizard is similar to mewtwo except you need to evolve charmander and get lucky rolls on your moltres while you evolve charizard, i've seen battles where even setting up moltres is an uphill battle for charizard decks.
Pikachu still wins a good bit, but my three decks so far use fighting type. two of those hve dark for coverage against mewtwo but pikachu is still the toughest deck to face imo
Any thoughts on the PvP Event they got going now with those trophies ? I wonder how they pair ppl or mmr ppl if the trophies are supposed to be some sort of a ranking system. I'd say 45 wins and top trophy isn't that great. Imagine if we could see a Win rate or Loss rate of the whole account. How many loss before 45 wins and how heavy RNG this game can be at times with flips and how destructive the 3 meta decks really are towards any balancing in the ranking and game in general. what's the future for this game and how long can they keep milking decks and keep people interested ? Why are we even fighting in this PvP event when it's lasting for a very long time just got get 45 wins and then what ? I guess some people got the 45 win top trophy badge the first day. and for someone who's gathered all the cards in the game so far, what's the drive to keep playing when there's literally no rewards, ranking or any longevity to PvE either.
@@HooglandiaPocket Much appreciated, I'll have a look at it now :D the aftermath: Thanks for making that video, appreciate your take on this and I agree with you. I myself personally don't think this game has a place as a ranked PvP game, it's too imbalanced, too much RNG which is good for what it is now and it's just not well designed for a ranked MMR system. On the other hand I would like to see more PvE content and a league system and battles vs gym leaders and trainers much like the good old Gym Leader Castle in Pokémon Stadium. With challenges and rewards.
As soon as the new expansion releases, there will be a whole new meta. It's the same with any card game. There's not many cards, so everyone gravitates to the same decks.
I’m with you on that. Pikachu feels so overtuned. It’s so over the top on terms of energy efficiency and ease of use. This little guy is a 2 energy normal Pokemon that deals 90 or 100 with Giovani, and also has a lot of HP, like WTF. It’s Starmie (also very op) on roids.
Honestly I love how pocket doesn't have a ladder but has a serious competitive scene. It's truly the best of both worlds, for all players.
Yeeeeep!
I dont know of that has been mentioned in the discussion before, but i like ladder systems in PVP Card games because it gives me some control against what type of decks im going to play. I usually brew my own unoptimized decks and like to hover around in lower ranks and try to bring it as high as possible. From that point i always decide if i de-rank myself with some other weaker brews or switch it up to stronger decks to get more competetive.
Except for free to play players who can’t even play a “beginner” level random match because it is literally 90% mewtwo and pikachu decks
Online pvp sucks. Its bot fun to play agaisnt the same 2 decks 90% of the time. It makes most cards useless. Easy fix they need to add a conoetitive mode that only allows 1 EX per deck
this game has zero "serious competitive scene". Pocket punishes any creative deck building leaving you to play one of two copy and paste decks. its a gotcha cash grab
Dude the graphics you made for this video is great. All the small details and commentary value was great. Good stuff!!!
The editor has been doing a great job on this Pocket channel!
Apreciate the work you put into these meta reports
On the Lapras Deck (9:21) i added regular Starmie instead of the Seaking. Although it has less 10 HP, it’s reliable 40 damage and the ability to free retreat (just like it’s ex version) makes it a great addition to the list.
thanks for the video Jeff!
I use that deck but swap in 2 dragonite lines, 2 starmie and 1 Lapras ex. It works well if you have 2 misty cards, Lapras ex is great to start with if you go second, staryu is great if you go first. It's very dependent on misty rolling well, though.
The data science background totally makes sense - your visualizations are awesome. Work in finance myself and would love to make something as consumable!
This is exactly the content I was looking for - been a fan of yours during the MTG days!
Glad to see you making content for this game. Your Snap decks were always my favorite. Hope all is well!
The strength in Pikachu's kit is consistency, you just have to find a single basic, instead charizard and Mewtwo rely on stage 2 Pokémon.
Jeff is looking 10 years younger with the new look, amazing actually
I love setting up a Blaine charged Ninetails pivot to roast that mouse in 1 hit. Blaine decks can compete on speed but can still be outmatched if they don’t just throw pickachu on the fire.
Match up data from events this week shows Blaine has an overall awful matchup against Pikachu decks unfortunately.
Ya seems like you just need a lot more to go right than the pika player does.
My Blaine deck has indeed been getting roasted (pun intended) since the rise of that damn electric rat!
We don't have a pikachu problem, we have a consistency problem. There are a lot of decks that could compete, but if anything goes wrong in the chain of events (missing evolution pieces, missing setup), you just die with no chance of recovery. I play mewtwo and charizard, and honestly I think I will build pikachu because the ammount of lost games because evolution pieces are in the last 3 cards is astounding.
This is a lot of words to describe why Pikachu is significantly better than the other options. I agree it's because of consistency.
Hey Jeff! Appreciate the keen insights and clean breakdown. So cool after watching you on the scg circuit all the time back in the day. Excellent video!
That Arcanine list is cool! The Aerodactyl tech to clear big bodies is very creative. I was playing around with a similar list using Rapidash instead which felt pretty good.
Incredible video as always. Love the information you gather and show in well thought-out way.
Great video and nice flex on the grad degree lol. Agree wih your Pika EX nerf idea, and I actually like that a lot. By making it 20 base damage and +20 for each electric benched, it actually increases the damage output at 0/1 benched pokes, is the same at 2 benched, and like you said the cap at 80 damage would help loosen the stranglehold on a lot of otherwise good stage 1 evolution based decks.
Thank you for the hard work on the meta breakdown
I like the 4 marowak sandslash variant more since it gives you a good play going first. The 100 hp and 2 shotting pikachu just also lines up well. It also allows you to go like regular marowak first sandslash second and ex 3rd to maximize point usage.
I honestly wasnt expecting the arbok bird to be a thing. I’ve been running my deck with just arbok and weezing and called it Jessie and James. Been winning ever since. But I’ll try it out with the pidgey line to see how it fairs.
Hitmonlee is so powerful into pikachu decks, allows you to take points early and reduce pikachus output. Surprised it hasn’t seen more use
I run this with marowak primape and it does really well. Especially if you leverage your Sabrina's or predict the switch outs.
Because Mewtwo is running around at a high clip. That and it doesn’t have a great matchup against either Water EX decks
But hitmonlee dont hit for super effective damage because pokemon on the bench dont count their weakness? Thats how it was when i used zebstrika at least. Couldnt one shot staryu so it evolved and hit me for 90
If the pika deck runs potion, its just a waist of a turn to use hitmonlee
YES JEFF!
I cant believe i lived long enough to see you swap the mop for the skin dome!
What a time to be a TCG player.
7:00 Welp Jeff I’m switching up my main deck again. I’ve always loved the chunky health swings Erika provides and have always found that eggy provides solid damage. The victreebel controlish element towards the end is choice too. Thinking out loud here, but I wonder if, since you just need a grass energy for victreebel and a single dark for arbok, there may be something there.
I sleeper lightning deck for me is 2x pikachu ex, zapdos ex, zapdos and then 2x eevee + jolteon. It helps me strategize what I wanna put out and use. Sometimes I’ll do the electrode other times I like using snorlax. Just a bulky dude to tank some hits until I set up my bench 👍
commenting to help others see this awesome channel!
I’ve been running Arcanine from the start as I pulled two EX Arcanine back to back and I finished my emblem run with it. Every other video said it was trash but I found it so easy to roll with. I also have 3 Charizard EXs in each rarity and no Charmeleon yet lol
I had pretty good luck with mankey/primeape + Kabuto. However, your win rate is almost entirely determined by getting a turn 2 start, and getting primeape down on turn 4. If you can do those two things you’ve got a pretty decent win percentage
Absolutely👏perfect❤meta breakdown😊
Now I got some juicy new decks to toy around with! 🎉
I came up with that same exact Victreebell list (except for the fact that I play 1 Farfetch'd over the regular Exeggutor) and I ended up finishing the event in no time and with 8 consecutive wins. I don't think it's one of the best decks, but it did surprisingly well and I'm happy that other people are playing it as well.
It's so good. Feels incredible into Pikachu
i stayed out with a fighting deck, but there were too many mewtwo decks sweeping me so i switched to a pikachu deck (2 pikachu, 2 pikachu ex, & 1 raichu Lt Surge combo bc i only have 1 raichu rn) and that got me the rest of the wins for the current battling event. i have a dark deck i'm setting up, but i don't have all the pokemon i want for it yet. my fighting deck is lacking an ex mon i want for it too tbh
As i always commented on the Snap videos, thank you for your amazing content/work, Jeff! Nice to see my favorite content creator enjoying pocket just like myself. It has 100% become my comfort game and to be honest im enjoying it more than Snap. Thank you again for everything!
I agree to the pikachu change you said. 1 cards on bench = 40 damage, 2 cards on bench = 60 and max would be 80 damage. Giovanni won’t get it to 100 damage. That would be a healthy change.
That was exactly my armchair developer take too. Three people on the internet; we can't be wrong!
@@jprec5174nah that would be like saying marowak ex is too powerful. When they work it's amazing but the chance to hit for 0 keeps them in check. Unlike the consistency of Pikachu just ending games. Without luck beyond hand bricking which is relevant for all decks.
Why would that change much tho? the 90 dmg is not the problem. Pickachu being a basic with 2 energy cost and basically no retreat costs in the deck is the problem.
@@jprec5174 Starmie is really good aswell ye. It is not a basic Pokemon tho and Misty is so unreliable. I played 1 Starmie player so far in 100 games lol. Everybody is on pikachu and mewtu.
@@StarBuZZpro 90 to 80 is definitely a meaningful change. Tamping down on the number of things that Pika or Pika+Giovanni can just run over (which represents a lot of stage-1 final evolutions and Kangiskhan) is a conservative but significant change. Which I think is a great.
Thanks for the report! Love the data-driven analysis as usual
My favorite “no meta” decks are Melmetal (Bisharp, Mawile , Farfetchd) and Dragon-Moth (Dragonite & Frosmoth, with Misty to get Frosmoth up and running w/o taking energy turns from Dragonite)
Just started 3 days ago. Got Marowak EX off an early Wonder Pick and been enjoying dumpstering even Mewtwo, I will have to try the Sandslash variant. I pulled rainbow rare Moltres and Charizard, but I definitely think that variant is too inconsistent.
was the machamp deck at 5:56 really running two red card over poke ball??
I think Pikachu will always be a viable strategy for the live time of the game. It can be frustrating now to deal with Pikachu but as more cards and expansions come out, we can expect natural a swears to appear. I don't know if it needs a nerf just now.
Lmao I haven’t seen your videos since I quit marvel snap last year. I’m shocked and not shocked to see you here at the same time.
Great video. And great decision shaving the head! Looks so much better Jeff!
You have become one of my favorite streamers. Great video.
Came back to the video after trying out the Victreebel deck as I was excited to see I had all the cards for it; I gotta say it really is super satisfying keeping Pikachu trapped
i love my pika ex deck fs but a counter (or a few) would be a healthy welcomed addition when new cards come out c:
but all i want is more metal cards to mess with.
Does the Arcanine EX deck need the Aerodactyl package to be optimal? What card can substitute for them?
I've been playing a lot of Raichu Magneton Surge after I saw a Japanese player post the list, and I can confirm it's insane. Maybe the highest win rate deck I've played (and I've tried everything), and it also feels like you get to make lots of fun decisions with a very rewarding payoff. LOVE the deck
Nice meta report!!
Two things i like to say tho: in 3:01 you said raichu has the upper against most common pika list (implying it to be zebra) and this is just untrue. The zebra iteration was made exactly to have the upper hand against the raichu tech.
About the pika dominance it seemed hopeless for most of the last month, but in this weekend besides arcanine entering the fray with a top2 and a top8 (with almost no entry rates), m2 newer iteractions(6 basics with either kangs or bb m2) have consistenly beaten pika lists (at least on the hands of upper cut players), so we may be close to reach the inflexion point where pika is not clearly the only reliable way to topcut. But this will take some time to tricle down imo since both arcanine and 6 basics m2 are among the hardest lists to pilot imo.
Time will tell. Generally speaking, when decks have widespread adoption, their performance falls.
thanks for doing this type of content for Pocket
awesome video as always. the game and the decks in general are kinda nice, sadly some highroll mewtwo players here and there ruin a bit the fun of making a strat by having like no counterplay to it but hopefully the gardevoir power will become less problematic once we have harder hitting base pokemon to play that threat mewtwo a bit more than 20/60 dmg max before the 150 dmg spam starts
Lookin lean and mean dude, giving this old millennial some hope for myself lol
Top tier content as always
I think, once more Pokemon Tools become available, Primeape decks might make a comeback.
Something to give the Mankey more hp or a Focus Sash effect
You got a new sub,
Great breakdown!
yo those frames are nice af ik they save you from constantly having to readjust them with your headphones on
Commenting for the engagement gods. Great video Jeff!
What I saw in the last week of playing the game doesn't mesh with what you've said. Almost half of my opponents were Mewtwo/Guardivoir. Of the rest they were fairly evenly split between Koga Dark, Articuno 18T, and PicachuEX/ZapdosEX. The deck I usually played is the last as I have the cards for it. A rising deck is MoltresEX/ArcanineEX (noted in the video).
Articuno 18T is likely to die out as it's so much a gimmick deck. I actually had a match where the other person quit on TURN 1 because Misty predictably failed. StarmieEX may be taking its place, or at least supplementing it.
What it looks like to me is that people are mostly looking for ways to get more energy as early as possible. This is compounded that there's only a couple of cards that remove energy, and nobody uses them. This may change if Energy Removal and Item Finder get introduced. Until then, Mewtwo will reign supreme.
The data I am reviewing in this report is from tournament matches. You are correct that the experience in the event queue is very different. The fact that you are not punished for losing like you are in a tournament means most people aren't playing the best decks and things like Misty cheese are very popular.
People that want to win are playing Pikachu, but that pack is also the worst of the 3 packs so the fewest average players are opening it - so the deck isn't very popular in the more casual setting.
Everyone, every single content creator, has s**t on arcanine since launch and now it’s the best fire deck. That is hysterical.
I was running a blastoise EX & opponents arcanine ex killed me & him resulting in my only Tie to date 😂
nice video!
Personally, i am strongly against adjustments to current cards, despite this being an online game. I think many people would be angry to spend pack points on a pikachu just to have the card changed randomly one day. Not to mention increased confusion. I think pokemon just needs to release fighting support trainer card and that can help the issue organically
I've been running a Nido King/Queen deck and just vibing lol.
It's definitely not the best deck out there since it has no extra energy gen options and needs time to ramp, but I find it fun!
It loses against Pikachu a lot just because of how quickly that deck gets to full power. It fairs pretty decently against Mewtwo but if they get get a lucky Turn 3 Gardevoir you're screwed.
Against other decks it's usually RNG. How good are their dice rolls on Moltres EX / Misty, etc etc.
The nice thing is that because Mewtwo is so popular not a lot of people are playing Fighting decks, so it's rare to be hard countered lol.
I’d like to see an adjustment to pika, I think that if it goes 2nd with even a reasonable draw it is near unbeatable. I think that reducing its max damage to 80 would help
The teacher!🙏
That Mewtwo-Gardevoir is unstoppable. I've lost with PikEx quite a bit. I only lost twice with MewGard when I only had 1 Gard, and I was trying to put the finishing touches.
Mewtwo Gard is far more linear and easier to play.
@HooglandiaPocket I had a good stretch with PikEx. Then I had a good 10 games straight where I couldn't get Pika out in time at all. I just felt like it was inconsistent. Zapdos is too reliant on coin flips. Just to show how badly coin flips go my way, I had 16 out of 20 going firsts. Zapdos is not for me.
Great vid, and another reminder of how desperately I want more than 15 deck slots
I'd honestly use 50 at this point.
Could you explain why play Arcanine over Centiscorch? Is one mana difference on attack so significant?
Yes, it is significant. That is an entire turn extra to get setup.
I’ve been using diglet and dugtrio in my rock deck helps counter pikachu ex decks
This past week I have exclusively been testing the "Monke bonk" Promo Mankey + Kabutops deck.
I found two main issues for this deck's viability
1. Going second:This deck BEGS to go second. Going first literally destroys this decks viability. In a mirror match of the exact same deck with a friend, the person who went on turn 2 was ALWAYS the winner. We tested 15 or so games and not once did the person going first win. An optimal opening for this deck is Turn 2 Promo Mankey -> Turn 4 Primeape. Its not Impossible to win turn 1, it just becomes an instant uphill battle
2. RED CARD: as the week progressed, more and more people were red carding my hand. I think more people realized they have nothing to lose by red carding on turn 3. Either You dont get primape or you draw him next hand, And they get 1 extra turn to set up before turn 4.
That's just my anti-meta analysis for the week ive played this deck. I'm going to keep experimenting becuase this is soooooo close to being the pikacuu killer.
I’ve been running this deck quite a bit as well, this deck needs to go turn two, still can win fights turn one but certainly makes it more difficult! And I’ve noticed this with the red cards but more often than not the opponent does me a favour with them 🤣 deffo needing some more fighting types to counter the amount of pika decks. I have the top 5 meta decks but find myself using more rogue decks as they are more fun tbh
@chazclark86 I'm the exact same way, after a losing streak I'll pop out my Mewtwo deck and go on a long win streak, get bored, then theory craft some new fringe deck because it's more fun to throw cards at a competitive wall and see what works
@ yep 100% this. I’ll generally go to the pika deck for a bit then get bored and go to Mewtwo or back to fringe decks, could be doing with more AI battles, hoping with the next big expansion we get more of those. Apparently coming in January?
Do we know if they'll do actual direct changes to the cards or just release the next set and let the meta balance itself out? Great video.
There is no official communication on their plans to balance or ban problematic cards. Wording in the client leaves them room to do either.
Volt vs raichu - what is the big difference ? You are trying to lead off with ex pika up front while leveling up zap regardless, correct?
Where do people compete in the tournaments?
limitlesstcg.com
I think it’s a little early for a nerf on anything. New sets on the horizon could really change up the meta in big ways. Pikachu is dominant but not unbeatable, but with such a small card pool for the meta to pull from I think waiting to see what happens once we have more options is the right play. There’s always going to be a best deck and best card, if after a set or two comes out and pikachu is still obviously the best thing going on, maybe we look at a nerf then.
Thanks for this, some ideas are floating around
The number of "Red Card"s in these top tournament deck lists seems pretty high to me. Do you think that's because red card is sufficiently disruptive in matchups like Mewto Ex where the opponent is trying to assemble Stage II pokemon like Gardevoir? Or do you think top performers will begin cutting red card as they gain more experience with how often it isn't impactful many matchups?
I think a single red card has some value for forcing your opponent to play in a specific way.
Overall, I think the card is still pretty mediocre, though. Especially against decks like Pika that rely on basics only.
Mmm, sweet sweet data analytics. Delicious! Jeff, what do you use to crunch your numbers? Excel, Google Sheets, PowerBI, something else?
Just working in Google sheets these days.
Having a lot success with Alakazam deck, pretty underrated.
I'm down for Pokeball only grabbing non EX basic Pokemon. At least then, you can play the card draw mini game to have a chance against these ex decks
What do you think about having a cost increase to Pikachu's attack? Bringing it from to 2 to 3.
That is a major change and likely kills the card.
So where are the best places to go for pocket tournaments
The data I work off of here is from limitlesstcg.com
That pika is crazzy but i'm very hapyy to see that 30% in others.
The meta will shift to fighting or a Dark/Fighting build thats is both good vs mewtwo and pika
None of the existing fighting decks have promising stats against Pika and they are worse against the field unfortunately
We need a rare candy / pokemon breeder effect, either in a supporter or pokemon.
Very nice video. Im only missing to show winning decks from tournaments.
What a fantastic video, thanks Jeff!
I've been having an easy time with pikachu playing venosaur eggecute but it beats up like every other deck lol I agree needs some tweaking
Did the Machamp EX cut 2 Poké Balls because it’s only running 4 Basics?
I'd like Pika to do 20 per electric pokemon you are controlling so it does always at least 20 because it would count itself and cap out at 80. I also want starmie to have a one energy cost retreat and gardevoir have a once per turn and not a once per gardevoir so you can't channel 2 psychic energy per turn, one free is already really good.
I subscribed a long time ago for marvel snap, now i return for pokemon 🎉
Thanks for the video! I am a bit puzzled by the amount of decklists with 4 basics that you feature just after hammering the point in that 5-6 should be the sweet spot and 4 is being greedy. But Probably i am not seeing how that rule is different for the sandslash, the machamp and the victreebell decklists. I am not good at deckbuilding, but i didnt expect that.
I did not build the decks in this video. As mentioned multiple times throughout the video, These are decklists from events played this past week.
Primape + Kabutops has been the most consistent variant for me. It has a very consistent turn 1 with the guaranteed Mankey. Only feel bad is if you can’t get the Primape evo within the first couple of turns. Kabutops is a good bulky body that is easy to set up and is resilient.
Playing the same deck. Especially the low energy cost of Kabutops makes it a great deck for quick pressure. And it's basically without chance! I hate it if my whole deck just relies on coin flips and Primeape + Kabutops feels just great, just not drawing Primeape can be a big issue. Together with Sabrina it's really fun to break other decks while they still try to build up.
@ do you run two kabutops? I run two fossil and kabuto, but just one kabutops. (Primarily because of not owning a second, but I’ve not really been hurting for it so far.) It’s given me extra space for Trainer cards. Lowering pokeball to one has helped with dead draws, and upping Giovanni to two has helped me take out small super effective bodies in one hit more regularly. I can body PikaEX most the time - Zapdos being the biggest issue in that deck, but very doable if they get bad flips or can’t get it setup. Otherwise MewtwoEX is worst matchup, but I honestly have a shot as long as Primeape is out on my second turn. I agree with Sabrina at 2. Even if they use Sabrina on you to just disrupt and not attack, having a fossil on the bench just guarantees you a free switch back into primeape, which I feel like people forget often.
@@Brandease Just did the last thing...removed the fossil, brought my Primeape into active position and forced the opponent with Sabrina to make a Pokemon with less than 100hp active.
I have one Pokeball as well (might even get rid of that, I rarely do anything useful with the second Mankey as it's hard to get it damaged (and not dead) mid to late game. Two Kabutops in my case, I want to make I likely to have at least one if Primeape dies. And why not have two? They might need three rounds to develop, but cost only one energy. I currently do not have any Giovanni.
@@frool76 I’ll contemplate the second Kabutops (I’m just stingy spending my pack points on one). So far most my wins has been sweeping with Primeape, so I don’t typically rely too much on fossil line aside from chip damage or switch-and-bait. I do think having the one pokeball at the very least may help with deck thinning if you draw it early on and still need to draw into other key pieces. But I agree that a second mankey/primeape isn’t as useful in most cases. I would suggest Giovanni only if you notice a trend of coming up 10hp short of KO, which happened to me quite frequently. If anything, you may be able to scare your opponent into switching by using Giovanni on the first of a potential two hit KO. Your opponent may suspect another Giovanni or an evolution with their powered up attack and prematurely swap.
I definitely agree with adjusting/nerfing Pikachu EX because it is much more scarier than Articuno/Starmie EX with Misty, at least with Misty there's a 50% it can fail, same goes with Moltres actually, while with Pikachu, as long as you have 3 electric bench pokemon you can consistently deal 90 damage for just 2 energies and with 1 retreat cost, you can swap it with another pokemon you built if it's health becomes low enough.
No articuno / starmie ex? That’s interesting, it is for sure in the top 3 decks I go against in PvP together with mewtwo and pikachu ex
That deck mostly lives or dies by misty flips. It's fine in the queues where losses don't matter, but doesn't make consistent play in tournaments.
I think rather than adjusting Pikachu ex, in an ideal world they'd introduce something that created a new deck that would turn it into more of a rock paper scissors format. I think if there was a deck that lined up really well against Pikachu ex but had a poor matchup against Charizard, that would bring more of a healthy balance
My favourite non meta deck is venusaur x butterfree x Erika it’s very hard to get rid of venusaur once your set up
pikachu ex is just too simple to set up. He is a menace on turn one, mewtwo needs the gardevior synergy so you have essentially 3-4 turns to prep for the nukes and charizard is similar to mewtwo except you need to evolve charmander and get lucky rolls on your moltres while you evolve charizard, i've seen battles where even setting up moltres is an uphill battle for charizard decks.
I would love new poke balls/rare candies to make stage 2 decks more consistent
Is the Arcanine EX deck better than the Charizard EX deck?
Charizard is definitely mediocre. Remains to be seen if Arcanine can be good.
Where can I find these tournaments? I want to batle!
Limitlesstcg.com
Arbok muk weezing is a fun deck as well
Pikachu still wins a good bit, but my three decks so far use fighting type. two of those hve dark for coverage against mewtwo but pikachu is still the toughest deck to face imo
How do i get into these tournaments?
Limitlesstcg.com
Any thoughts on the PvP Event they got going now with those trophies ? I wonder how they pair ppl or mmr ppl if the trophies are supposed to be some sort of a ranking system. I'd say 45 wins and top trophy isn't that great. Imagine if we could see a Win rate or Loss rate of the whole account. How many loss before 45 wins and how heavy RNG this game can be at times with flips and how destructive the 3 meta decks really are towards any balancing in the ranking and game in general. what's the future for this game and how long can they keep milking decks and keep people interested ? Why are we even fighting in this PvP event when it's lasting for a very long time just got get 45 wins and then what ? I guess some people got the 45 win top trophy badge the first day. and for someone who's gathered all the cards in the game so far, what's the drive to keep playing when there's literally no rewards, ranking or any longevity to PvE either.
I discussed this event and my thoughts on things like ranked at length over here ua-cam.com/video/rjMg8daLn84/v-deo.html
@@HooglandiaPocket Much appreciated, I'll have a look at it now :D
the aftermath:
Thanks for making that video, appreciate your take on this and I agree with you. I myself personally don't think this game has a place as a ranked PvP game, it's too imbalanced, too much RNG which is good for what it is now and it's just not well designed for a ranked MMR system. On the other hand I would like to see more PvE content and a league system and battles vs gym leaders and trainers much like the good old Gym Leader Castle in Pokémon Stadium. With challenges and rewards.
They need to buff charmander and made its attack doesnt discard energy. So charizard deck will be nice to play
As soon as the new expansion releases, there will be a whole new meta. It's the same with any card game. There's not many cards, so everyone gravitates to the same decks.
Glad to see Arcanine EX getting some respect lol
Exeggutor Ex + Butterfree is a crazy underrated deck
I’m with you on that. Pikachu feels so overtuned. It’s so over the top on terms of energy efficiency and ease of use. This little guy is a 2 energy normal Pokemon that deals 90 or 100 with Giovani, and also has a lot of HP, like WTF. It’s Starmie (also very op) on roids.