Honeymoon In Vegas

Pokémon [16]

3 — Diancie EX — Mega Diancie Collection Box (XY43)
2 — Mega Diancie EX — Mega Diancie Collection Box (XY44)

2 — Malamar EX — Phantom Forces (58/119)

2 — Spiritomb — Legendary Treasures (87/113)
3 — Skarmory — Roaring Skies (69/108)
4 — Xerneas — XY Base Set (96/146)

Trainers [26]

1 — Scramble Switch — Plasma Storm (129/135)
2 — Enhanced Hammer — Dark Explorers (94/108)
2 — Paint Roller — Ancient Origins (79/98)
3 — Ultra Ball — Dark Explorers (102/108)

2 — Ace Trainer — Ancient Origins (69/98)
2 — Professor Juniper — Dark Explorers (98/108)
3 — Steven — Roaring Skies (90/108)
3 — Professor Birch's Observations — Primal Clash (90/108)

2 — Lucky Helmet — Ancient Origins (77/98)

2 — Trick Coin — Phantom Forces (108/119)

4 — Fairy Garden — XY Base Set (117/146)

Energy [18]

2 — Double Colorless Energy

4 — Dark Energy

14 — Fairy Energy

MAIN STRATEGY

Xerneas & Skarmory: These two cards symbolize our transportation to Las Vegas. Because we could fly there if you want—or we could drive there instead, because that can be all kinds of fun. Xerneas is our primary stater for this deck, we want to get Xerneas out by no later than the second turn, to start attaching energies with [Geomancy] to either Malamar or Diancie (depending on your needs). Based on my experience with this deck, Xerneas doesn't come in very handy after that—especially since there are only 12 Fairy energies in this deck, and that doesn't give us much room to stretch the power of [Geomancy] very far.

Xerneas is kind of like renting a Ferrari. It's fast, and fun, and looks real good—but once our time is up—we've gotta take it back right away, because there's no way we can afford another day. We might have to sell our car, and fly back home—and that's about equal to the potential of [Rainbow Spear] in this deck. You'll go broke trying to power up a Xerneas to use this attack—so don't even bother.

Skarmory is our best option between the two when it comes to offensive power. [Blow Through] is only two energy, with a frequent chance its power will be boosted to 60 for us. This should be more than enough to follow through behind powerful attackers like Malamar EX and Mega Diance. But it isn't very strong by itself, and therein lies the importance of planning out your offensive very carefully. Because a moderate attack like [Blow Through] at 60 damage isn't going to carry you very far if that's all you've got to rely on.

In addition to offensive power, Skarmory is also our backup starter for this deck, which runs on a pretty strict clock for a couple of reasons. And for those reasons, [Call for Family] is the main reason why Skarmory is in this deck. It can be essential to keep this deck in pace with the game.

However, if you throw Skarmory out there in your opening turn—it can be crucial that you don't leave him out there. Use [Call for Family] once—fetch yourself a Xerneas, and whichever Pokémon EX that suites your needs, then get him out of there right away so you can begin powering up your bench with [Geomancy].

We've got a very limited number of offensive cards in this deck—and if you can't get the job done between them—then your luck is up. And that's why the technique here involves getting those high rollers out on the prowl as soon as possible (to cut back on the heat that they take). So keep that in mind because it can be the difference between success or fail. You can always throw him back out there later if you need to stall for a turn or two while you get your offensive all geared up.

Malamar EX & Mega Diancie: Diancie represents the newlyweds in Vegas—and Malamar EX represents what should be—the last (and best) part of the honeymoon (the sweet stuff). These two are your high rollers—and my God do they make really great couple. Most decks revolve around the power of Pokémon EX, and that makes Mega Diancie your primary between the two.

In many cases, getting Mega Diancie out and attacking can be all it takes to win the game. [Diamond Force] takes three energy to get going, but against an opponent who's packed their deck with Pokémon EX—it's all downhill from there. [Diamond Force] is going to prevent the damage from your opponent's Pokémon EX, even if Mega Diancie isn't the Active Pokémon anymore. Not to mention, once lady luck is out there working her magic, it can buy you all kinds of time to load up Malamar EX with energies—while further putting your opponent's Active Pokémon to sleep each turn—via {Hyper Hypnosis}.

They're kind of like the perfect slot-machine couple. The lucky one sits there and rakes it in little by little, while other comes back for the extra until the love between them wins it all.

Another reason why Malamar EX is such a great counterpart to Diancie—is because it's so strong by itself. Unlike Diancie EX, which really isn't powerful enough to stand alone (especially late in the game). Her HP is really low, and her [Luminous Swirl] attack requires a color heavy three energy to use. And although it can be powerful—it's still far too unpredictable to rely on.

Mega Diancie has some pretty low HP as well—and no Spirit Link either—with her own color heavy three energy attack. These qualities make Diancie & Mega Diancie rather technical cards to use. Like many beautiful things—they're delicate. And so it takes a light touch to handle them. And this explains their low numbers here. They can be powerful, but in order to harness that power, you'll have to build your deck in respects to their lesser qualities if you don't want those qualities to ultimately hold you back (because they're sure to otherwise).

Spiritomb: Spiritomb is like the blacklist at the casino that makes it impossible for you to win at the slot machines. It uses face recognition technology to determine if you're a frequent visitor, and then tracks your location to the exact slot machine (or series of slot machines) that you sit down at and reduces the rate to nothing. The system also analyzes your betting pattern, and if it detects that your betting pattern is too aggressive—it will blacklist you on the spot.

This is an Extended format deck, so among the other options that were available, the narrow open spot lead me to notion that Spiritomb would be a really great choice—since it blocks the power of ACE SPEC cards, which are prominently game winning staples in Extended format decks.

Ironically, there's an ACE SPEC card in this deck, and that's not usually the style that you want to roll with if you're going to be blocking that potential (because it can often hold you back in a tight spot). However, in my experience I've come to realize some potential for running both in the same deck. Where the technique simply involves running a very select number of Spiritomb so that its existence remains light in the deck—where it's easy to get out, and easy to get rid of.

However, in order to utilize this properly, the deck itself has to be one that doesn't rely on the power of [Hexed Mirror] at all. I have some that strongly benefit from it, but that requires you to run higher numbers Spiritomb to make use of—and in a deck like this that would only be many types of get in the way. As it stands, it does still get in the way some—yet based on my experience I think that it's been far more beneficial than it has been a liability.

Scramble Switch, Enhanced Hammer, & Paint Roller: Scramble Switch is the slot machine button—and Enhanced Hammer is like the playtime's over bitch. That's how we paint the town. These cards together make a really aggressive combination. They check some very prominent powers in the game. I have yet to see a single game they don't command respect. There aren't really any special instructions for using them, seeing has how the nature of the cards is basic removal.

However, you can consider a neat trick with Paint Roller, by using it to wipe out your own Stadium card before you re-up your hand with something like Ace Trainer or Professor Juniper. You might get a card from it that you can use right away, further improving the concentration of your next draw.

Every card counts, and there are four copies of Fairy Garden in this deck—yet due to the general offensive strategy, there's not as big a need for it here as with certain other decks. You shouldn't really need to retreat that often here, which makes Fairy Garden a rather expendable card. So consider this tactic if you've got some room to spare—in many cases you'll be able to replace Fairy Garden with another copy right away after the draw.

Ultra Ball: Our coin cup. Goes well with Mega Diancie—but that's about all there is to it.

Card Advantage Supporters: Ace Trainer is our power couple, and Professor Birch's Observations is like the fatty at the buffet. This guy got up to fill his plate three times since we've been here. Next we've got our man Steven—the hotel manager. And lastly we have Professor Juniper—the casino teller. She said that she'll give us 20% of our earnings in chips right now if we don't cash out until the end of the night. I say we take her up on that and let's go take a nap on the couch.

This is a really technical deck, and working that requires a more technical Supporter spread than normal. I've gained a lot of experience with this thankfully, and the more experience I gain, the better I've become at putting together extremely technical combination. The biggest aspect of developing a tactical spread is contouring your Supporter cards around the nature of your surrounding content. You want to choose Supporter cards with effects that compliment the nature of your cards in some way—or that counterbalance some problematic attribute of theirs.

For example, this deck doesn't have a lot of Pokémon in it, and among those it does have, most of them it can't even make use of. The nature of these cards becomes a potential blockade (because we can't make any use them). And that is going to be problematic since they would go back into the deck to dilute the potency of our draw in wheel effects.

Ultra Ball is here to counterbalance this some, yet more proficiently we have Professor Juniper on the high end of this to provide a very strong drawing option—that not only gives us a powerful number of cards—but also enables us to ditch any problematic cards so they're not in the way anymore.

Next, Steven is the axis of this tactical spread. We only have one Dark-type Pokémon in this deck that needs its type energy to support it. So based on the dynamics of Special Energy (and how they work with the flow of the cards)—four energy should be enough to support that. However, as with Special Energy, it's not exactly absolute—and that's what makes Steven such a great card for this deck. It not only holds the amazing potential to reserve a specific energy for us, it can also reserve the exact style of Supporter we need to use next.

Steven is a great card when it comes to adaptability, but I've come to learn that this card can also work against us in a technical decks such as this one (where the needs are more specific and less general). In a deck like this, four copies won't help you as much as they seem to hurt you—and that's why the numbers have been slightly dialed down here. It helps to reserve his best potential for us, without him often overstaying his welcome.

On the flip side, Professor Birch's Observations has been dialed up slightly, because his potential is more general—and those elevated numbers aim to create a heatsink—that cools down the flow of the cards by providing a little extra circulation. A lot isn't needed, that could actually hold us back by taking up unnecessary spots that are better held by more tactical cards (such as Item cards).

Just a little extra (or little less) can make a world of difference, and this is the principal I use when determining the perfect numbers for any given card (especially Supporter cards). I take my collective experience and estimate what should be the perfect amount, then go little by little up or down, paying close attention to the variance between those numbers to determine the perfect measure.

There are quite a few ways to toss cards in this deck, and that give Professor Birch's Observations a little extra potential here—yet the foundation of the deck as a whole suggests we'll need a little extra if we want to tap into that. The ideal scenario isn't always going to be present, and so the slightly elevated numbers provide some cushion for the pushin'.

On the far end of town, Ace Trainer makes a tactical pair with Professor Juniper—proving the especially powerful effect of a double-advantage. It can only be used when your opponent has fewer prize cards than you, but it will strongly re-up your hand while cutting your opponent's down to size. In many ways, Ace Trainer is even better than N—yet I find it to be such a technical card, that it moreso runs along the same lines as Teammates.

If you can make use out of more than three copies, that's beyond me.

The card's condition is actually pretty hard to fulfill without setting yourself on the losing end of the game's momentum. It tends to be that once the prize cards start picking up, they finish picking up fast. You don't want to set yourself on the losing end of that momentum for the simple advantage of cards in your hand. What your opponent will have secured in the process is board advantage—and when that's strongly against you all the cards in the world are useless.

Two is a comfortable number for Ace Trainer. You don't want to try using it all the time. It makes a really great game winning card—for cutting off your opponent's momentum, and taking the cards out of their hand that they desperately needed to keep pace with you in a close game. Making good use of this card involves a very narrow window of opportunity, so you'll generally want to keep the numbers low (so that it doesn't disrupt the flow of the cards)—and also run it alongside a card like Steven—that can put Ace Trainer by your side right when you need it.

Lucky Helmet & Trick Coin: Our lucky underwear—and what could be the coin that wins it all for us. This right here is actually a Pokémon Tool split that I'd never think possible. The numbers are so narrow, and Pokémon Tool cards generally require a lot of depth and concentration to make perfect use of. Surprisingly, it actually works pretty well. At two copies each, they seem to float around with the same consistency as Enhanced Hammer—which does very well at two copies—and just as useful.

Lucky Helmet fits our starters perfectly, and works extra wonders when we have to throw out a decoy Pokémon to stall for time. Lucky Helmet can net us a lot of important cards, which includes some of the powerful removal cards we've got—or getting us to our ACE SPEC card—as well as netting us a few extra cards to throw away to Ultra Ball. Lucky Helmet provides us with some straight draw power—the potential of which is an amazing compliment to otherwise immensely complex Supporter suite that this deck utilizes.

Trick Coin also does really well here despite the spare numbers. Its place follows a principal that I often use when developing my deck structures. The principal revolves around certain complimentary cards in the deck—and involves including a number of copies no greater than the number of copies of the primary card itself. This technique works really well to provide exactly what we need—yet within strict proportion—which opens up potential for diversity elsewhere.

Getting Malamar EX onto the bench is pretty much a have-to-do each game—but we're only looking to get one good copy out on the board, so two copies of Trick Coin actually does well to deliver the goods—and often even leave us with a little extra to play with. I was surprised. I'm not normally comfortable with a split between any less than 3/2. And I would have done that here with Lucky Helmet at the higher end of the split. But there wasn't any room for that—so I was forced to play it out as it is—and in the end it turned out to be a sweet bit of serendipity.