Dark Rush! (Zoroark DEX/Darkrai-EX Deck rate/fix)

Since there's no subforum for anything like this for TCG, I figured I could post here and ask for opinions. I mean, if this sort of thing isn't supposed to be here, I guess it'll just get locked/moved, anyway.

Anywho, I've been waiting a while for Dark Explorers to come out because when I read about the Zoroark Decks popping up in Japan and I thought those were pretty cool looking. So when we got the cards this side of the ocean, I started putting together a deck. It's probably going to look bog-standard, since I creeped some places to get ideas for it, but I dunno. I feel like there could be some improvements to my current formula.

Anyway, my list:

Pokémon: 18
4-4 Zoroark DEX
4-2 Weavile UD
2 Sableye DEX
2 Darkrai-EX DEX

Trainers/Supporters/Stadiums: 28
3 Pokémon Catcher
3 Dark Patch
3 Dark Claw
2 Dual Ball
2 Level Ball
2 Ultra Ball
2 Random Reciever
1 Super Rod
4 Professor Juniper
4 N
2 Bianca

Energy: 14
8 Darkness Energy
4 Special Darkness Energy
2 Rescue Energy

The first thing you probably notice is that this deck doesn't have Junk Arm. It doesn't have any for 2 reasons:
1. Sableye can get Item cards back from the discard if he needs to do more than benchsit for Zoroark.
2. I only own 4 Junk Arm and they're tied up in my Zekeels deck for now.
I'm not saying that I don't want to put Junk Arm in here. I'm just saying I'd rather not have to break apart my Zekeels deck, if I have the option. But I haven't been having problems filling my bench or setting up Zoroarks. I feel like I go through my deck really fast as it is. I have Bianca instead of Cheren or another draw supporter because usually I can get more than 3 cards out of her, but suggestions on that front will also be appreciated. The 1 Super Rod is kinda the odd duck out. I used to only run 1 Darkrai (and 4-3 Weavile, so I still had 18 Pokemon), so I ran a Revive in that slot to take it's place (but usually ended up using Revive on something else just to power up Zoroark's attack) but I got another one today, and I have to say that having more than one Darkrai is helpful, even if he's only a back-up to Zoroark, so I switched out Revive for Super Rod (to help recycle Zoroark).

It's probably obvious, but I have problems against CMT, and that T is bolded for a reason. Tornadus-EX is the biggest thorn in my side when it comes to this deck, oneshotting my main attacker (and Eviolite preventing Darkrai from 2HKOing it if I don't have Dark Claw). I'd like advice on how to handle that match-up. I considered adding in some Enhanced Hammer to take away the DCE, but I dunno.

Any thoughts, opinions, suggestions, or comments would be greatly appriciated. Thank you for taking the time to read this.
 
Well... I'd say that you should at least proxy Junk Arms in your deck to get a feel for how helpful they can be. I like the fact that you haven't included DCE. Smart choice IMO. I'd also personally run 4 Dark Patch and 2 Dark Claw, and I might be tempted to run Collectors in this deck instead of the ball engine. Ball engine is rather nice for the T1 supporter, but your first turn you ideally use Ascension, so collector'ing doesn't really hurt your first turn that much. Provided you can get a draw support for second turn, you should be fine. It should also take up 2 less slots in your list, which can be filled with Junk Arm.

Not sure if I'd keep Sableye... really need to test how handy he is. My intuition tells me I underestimate him, but I don't think too too much of Sableye in many decks.

As for CMTornadus EX... I think the disruption of a Lost Remover or Hammer combined with timely Weavile snipes could really kill the deck. Ideally, say the prizes are 2-4 for them, and you can finally kill the Tornadus EX. You could save your N for this moment, N them to a small hand. Hope to Weavile (This is where Level Ball in the ball engine shines with Junk Arm), and then equalize the prizes while destroying their strategy.

Aside from that, I'd say never play around Tornadus EX (unless it's obviously advantageous). For instance, if you could catcher-kill a Celebi or whack into Tornadus, I'd choose Tornadus. The CMT player will manipulate how many prizes you can take off of EX's and Basics, so if you kill the Celebi early, they can just say "ok, well I'll only play EX's now and force the big KO's" which leaves you in a predicament.
 
I use 4-3 Weavile and no Sableye personally, but it doesn't matter that much. I guess it helps to have more Dark guys.

Dark Claw and sp Dark I haven't found too helpful, and since the Energy line of this deck is so awkward I gave up on sp dark entirely just to be able to fit in plenty of Rescue, basic Dark, and DCE. But I guess it's nice to one-shot Terrakion and stuff.

Not a big fan of Level Ball in this deck when you only have 2 Dual Ball. I can see why you have it I guess, and the only Basic it can't find is Darkrai, so w/e.
 
Thank you both for taking the time to respond to this.
Well... I'd say that you should at least proxy Junk Arms in your deck to get a feel for how helpful they can be. I like the fact that you haven't included DCE. Smart choice IMO. I'd also personally run 4 Dark Patch and 2 Dark Claw, and I might be tempted to run Collectors in this deck instead of the ball engine. Ball engine is rather nice for the T1 supporter, but your first turn you ideally use Ascension, so collector'ing doesn't really hurt your first turn that much. Provided you can get a draw support for second turn, you should be fine. It should also take up 2 less slots in your list, which can be filled with Junk Arm.

Not sure if I'd keep Sableye... really need to test how handy he is. My intuition tells me I underestimate him, but I don't think too too much of Sableye in many decks.

As for CMTornadus EX... I think the disruption of a Lost Remover or Hammer combined with timely Weavile snipes could really kill the deck. Ideally, say the prizes are 2-4 for them, and you can finally kill the Tornadus EX. You could save your N for this moment, N them to a small hand. Hope to Weavile (This is where Level Ball in the ball engine shines with Junk Arm), and then equalize the prizes while destroying their strategy.

Aside from that, I'd say never play around Tornadus EX (unless it's obviously advantageous). For instance, if you could catcher-kill a Celebi or whack into Tornadus, I'd choose Tornadus. The CMT player will manipulate how many prizes you can take off of EX's and Basics, so if you kill the Celebi early, they can just say "ok, well I'll only play EX's now and force the big KO's" which leaves you in a predicament.
I think I will try Junk Arm in the deck, just to see how it goes. Who knows? It might work out a lot better. What would you take out for them? I'm thinking about the two Sableye, one Catcher, and one Dark Claw, but I'm not an expert deck builder or anything.

The reason there's no Collector in the list is because there's Random Receiver. If I really need to refresh my hand, I'd rather not hit an unused Collector. If I tried out Collector, I'd probably need to replace RR with Pokegear so I could play around any Collectors in the way, but it's much less consistent. (I know how bad it is to whiff on the Pokegear.)

I'm trying to figure out where I could fit Enhanced Hammer on that list... any pointers?

I use 4-3 Weavile and no Sableye personally, but it doesn't matter that much. I guess it helps to have more Dark guys.

Dark Claw and sp Dark I haven't found too helpful, and since the Energy line of this deck is so awkward I gave up on sp dark entirely just to be able to fit in plenty of Rescue, basic Dark, and DCE. But I guess it's nice to one-shot Terrakion and stuff.

Not a big fan of Level Ball in this deck when you only have 2 Dual Ball. I can see why you have it I guess, and the only Basic it can't find is Darkrai, so w/e.
I can see the value of more Rescue, but the only Pokemon in my deck that can use DCE is Zoroark (unless I want to scratch with Zorua), and I'm afraid that including them at the expense of Special Darkness might make that T1 Ascension harder to pull off (I've been doing pretty well with pulling it off so far).

I have been thinking of going more Dual Ball, but I think that having different kinds of ball helps give me more options. Level Ball can search for anything except Darkrai and Zoroark (including Weavile if I want to snatch cards from their hand), Dual Ball can get anything except Zoroark and Weavile (and odds are that I'll hit one on each of those), and Ultra Ball can grab anything if I'm willing to toss some cards to get there. Part of me wishes that Zoroark had 10 less HP so it could be grabbed with Level Ball, but my deck doesn't need to be oneshotted by Darkrai-EX as well. But yeah, in short, I've been considering more Dual Ball, but I think I like all of my options better.
 
I have 4 Collectors in my deck. I use 3 Poke Gear 3.0 and 3 Junk Arms. 4 PONTs and 4 Junipers with 2N. I have 4-2 Weavile. 4-4 Zoroark and 2 Darkrai EX. 6 Basics 3 sp Dark, 3 Rescue. I didn't want to use a ball engine because it seems the deck is limited with space and collectors are a bit more reliable. (I hate coin flips) 4 patches, 3 claws. Anyway, it's a great deck and I really only have trouble with some fighting. I'm thinking a Tornadus EX but I'm not sure.
 
I have 4 Collectors in my deck. I use 3 Poke Gear 3.0 and 3 Junk Arms. 4 PONTs and 4 Junipers with 2N. I have 4-2 Weavile. 4-4 Zoroark and 2 Darkrai EX. 6 Basics 3 sp Dark, 3 Rescue. I didn't want to use a ball engine because it seems the deck is limited with space and collectors are a bit more reliable. (I hate coin flips) 4 patches, 3 claws. Anyway, it's a great deck and I really only have trouble with some fighting. I'm thinking a Tornadus EX but I'm not sure.
Both Collector and Ball have their pros and cons, but that's a different potential topic of it's own. As for myself, I was considering PONT over N, but I think I like the potential disruption of N over the late-game refreshing from Oak. But, again, I think it's mostly preference.

I'd advise against adding a Tornadus-EX, though (or any non-Dark Pokémon, for that matter) because it can limit Zoroark's damage output. After all, there's only a handful of ways you can get a Pokemon off your bench.
 
I think people underestimate Pokegear for some reason. We've been playing with it for so long now, and suddenly now that RR is out, people are saying how Pokegear is inconsistent. Usually, you'll have A supporter in your top 7 cards, it's rare not to unless you've been discarding them or something. As for what I'd take out for Junk Arm, well I'd recommend running Collector for the deck with Pokegear, so that frees up space. I would say dropping Sableye for Junk Arm makes sense, but maybe keep 1 and see how you like it.
 
Yeah, after further consideration I decided not to add any non-dark types. I'm down to last three cards I need for my deck: Pokemon Catcher x3. I've been using Reversal but, I don't like the coin flips.
 
I think people underestimate Pokegear for some reason. We've been playing with it for so long now, and suddenly now that RR is out, people are saying how Pokegear is inconsistent. Usually, you'll have A supporter in your top 7 cards, it's rare not to unless you've been discarding them or something. As for what I'd take out for Junk Arm, well I'd recommend running Collector for the deck with Pokegear, so that frees up space. I would say dropping Sableye for Junk Arm makes sense, but maybe keep 1 and see how you like it.
There's a reason people run Random Receiver: it can't possibly whiff. Yes, the chance of whiffing with Pokegear is relatively small, but it's there. Why would you go to a clunkier engine? Collector isn't all that great, and makes the t1 Ascension harder (you can't PONT then Collector for Zorua, for example), and midgame you will often want to fish for energy/tools/Zoroark so there's no time to Collector for more Pokemon.
 
Ive been planning a deck like this. Im personally thinking of running hyreigon. With a dark claw it can ko celebis on the bench recking cmts. in two turns take down eels and zekroms with out evolite. its slow but can make your oppenents restart late game and even get a view late game donks and early game if you can get it out fast.
 
Ive been planning a deck like this. Im personally thinking of running hyreigon. With a dark claw it can ko celebis on the bench recking cmts. in two turns take down eels and zekroms with out evolite. its slow but can make your oppenents restart late game and even get a view late game donks and early game if you can get it out fast.
Dark Claw, like PlusPower, doesn't change the damage you inflict on the bench. So Hydreigon's attack still only does 40 to the bench. A friend of mine talked about how Hydreigon could be useful in a deck like this, but it takes up a lot of room, and isn't that fast. The reason Zoroark can hang with Zekeels and CMT is because if can start hiting so hard on turn 2 (at least, that's what I think makes it so viable).
 
Ive been planning a deck like this. Im personally thinking of running hyreigon. With a dark claw it can ko celebis on the bench recking cmts. in two turns take down eels and zekroms with out evolite. its slow but can make your oppenents restart late game and even get a view late game donks and early game if you can get it out fast.
Good thought, but Dark Claw only affects damage done to the Active Pokémon:

"If this card is attached to a [D] Pokémon, each of the attacks of that Pokémon does 20 more damage to the Active Pokémon (before applying Weakness and Resistance)."

The only effect in game right now I can think of that increases damage dealt to benched Pokémon through attacks is the strange Mew Prime/Swanna BLW combination, and that's too clunky to be used in any serious deck. Hydreigon is still useful in a number of matchups --- Tynamo, for example, has 40 HP. But you're unlikely to have it up in time to take out evolving basics unless you get a near-perfect draw... which is why it doesn't get run very often, or at least the reason I don't run it.

edit: ...and Purimpopoie beat me to it :)
 
Hydreigon is too slow for this to work, sorry. He also just kind of clashes with the style of the deck - nothing else in your deck spreads damage, so you will just end up sniping something, getting KO'd, and then Zoroark will probably OHKO the things regardless of whether you hit them with Berserker Blade.
 
another idea i got is absol prime and manibuzz. absol can weak basics like celebi prime and send in manibuzz for the snipe
I have actually heard of people running Absol (I'd assume over a Sneasel, so like 3-3 Sneasel, 1 Absol Prime). I don't want to run it because 1. I don't like the idea of an attack that you can only use if you banish a card from your hand and 2. I don't have an Absol Prime.

I have also heard of people trying Mandibuzz, but you can only really snipe benched Babies and Tynamo, so I feel like it's a waste of resources (compared to just getting Zoroark up.)

And sorry if I seem to be missing something. I've felt Absol-utely miserable today. I haven't been this sick in years.
 
There's a reason people run Random Receiver: it can't possibly whiff. Yes, the chance of whiffing with Pokegear is relatively small, but it's there. Why would you go to a clunkier engine? Collector isn't all that great, and makes the t1 Ascension harder (you can't PONT then Collector for Zorua, for example), and midgame you will often want to fish for energy/tools/Zoroark so there's no time to Collector for more Pokemon.
Yeah, I'm not recommending pokegear for this deck. I do think it runs better with balls and RR. That was just sort of an aside ^_^;
 
another idea i got is absol prime and manibuzz. absol can weak basics like celebi prime and send in manibuzz for the snipe
The problem with Mandibuzz is that it's really weak especially vs their active, and another Stage 1 that only kills things that are easily replaced.
 
Is there any way we could turn this into a more generic Zoroark/Darkrai-EX Deck thread, since we've been heading that direction, anyway?
 
To Purimpopoie:
I am wondering why you run Bianca when you are talking about PONT > N. Then i think PONT>Bianca is the way to go. You can put Bianca back after the rotation to BLW - on (unless it will become CL - on, then we keep smeargle and PONT :D). Also maybe 1 dual ball> 1 ultra bll is the way to go since you will get more basics out for Brutal Bash and with your Draw Support, I think you will draw into your evolutions quite easliy.
 
To Purimpopoie:
I am wondering why you run Bianca when you are talking about PONT > N. Then i think PONT>Bianca is the way to go. You can put Bianca back after the rotation to BLW - on (unless it will become CL - on, then we keep smeargle and PONT :D). Also maybe 1 dual ball> 1 ultra bll is the way to go since you will get more basics out for Brutal Bash and with your Draw Support, I think you will draw into your evolutions quite easliy.
When building the deck, I was probably thinking that there are some times I'd rather keep my what's in my hand, so I'd use Bianca to keep those cards. However, even I can see that that's faulty reasoning... Ultra Ball has more synergy with Dark Patch, but you make a good point about not discarding resources... I think the guarantee with the ability to toss Dark Energy for Dark Patch makes Ultra Ball a little more valuable. I guess.

Feh, I guess I'll try it out at League tonight (since that's basically the only place I can play-test, anyway). We'll see how I like it.
 

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 1, Guests: 0)

Top