• Follow our Instagram!
  • Curious about what we're currently doing about bots? Check out the latest updates from staff in this thread.

Resource TCG Standard Viability Rankings

zoe

There must be meaning in my roar.
is a Community Leaderis a Top Community Contributoris a Top Smogon Discord Contributoris a Dedicated Tournament Hostis a Site Content Manager Alumnusis a Team Rater Alumnusis a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis a Tiering Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
Discord Leader
Viability Rankings
Updated October 14th 2026​

Welcome to the Smogon TCG Viability Rankings, where we rank the viability of the different decks and archetypes in the current 2026 Standard format metagame. When posting under this thread, the following notes should be kept in mind:

Rules

  • Post intelligently, as one-liners such as "X Deck is Y Rank" will be deleted. Instead, back your opinion with facts based on results and metagame trends.
  • Be civil when debating other users, as not everyone will agree on the viability of every deck. Any flaming will not be tolerated.
  • Try to keep broader metagame discussions to the metagame discussion thread.

Rankings
The decks and archetypes below are not currently ranked within their tiers, and are based on usage from Limitless, and ultimately usage is unfortunately not the same as viability. As we continue to grow and develop our resources further, we look forward to building these rankings as a community.

S Rank
:dragapult: Dragapult

A Rank
:dragapult::dusknoir: Dragapult Dusknoir
:dragapult::blaziken: Dragapult Blaziken
:Slowking: Slowking
:ogerpon::clefairy: Basic Box
:alakazam: Alakazam

B Rank
:zoroark: N’s Zoroark
:dipplin: :thwackey: Festival Lead
:lopunny-mega::dusknoir: Mega Lopunny
:hydrapple: Hydrapple
:crustle: Crustle
:excadrill-mega: Mega Excadrill
:dhelmise::Banette: Hide n' Sneak
:lucario-mega: Mega Lucario
:sharpedo-mega: Mega Sharpedo

C Rank
:ceruledge: Ceruledge
:garchomp: Cynthia’s Garchomp
:typhlosion: Ethan’s Typhlosion
:chandelure: Chandelure
:ursaluna-bloodmoon: Mad Bite
:mewtwo::spidops: Rocket’s Mewtwo
:honchkrow: Rocket’s Honchkrow
 
Last edited by a moderator:
where's Pult Dusknoir whadahell???

also the list is missing some of the newer 30th anniversary stuff like Mew Box + some older decks still seeing play like Marnie's Grimmsnarl or Raging Bolt
 
where's Pult Dusknoir whadahell???
we forgor

Speaking of which though, Pult is the only deck we split up for the initial list here, and that's mostly because a) it's Dragapult, and knowing which variant you're talking about makes a difference, and b) Chicken Pult is a notably different caliber of deck compared to "regular" and PultNoir. There are a few other archetypes with sub-archetypes, like Basic Box (Mew box), Hydrapple (other Meganium decks do exist), Alakazam (control Zam, ZamNoir), Festival Lead (Seaking), etc, but we opted to leave them off for later discussion.
 
we forgor

Speaking of which though, Pult is the only deck we split up for the initial list here, and that's mostly because a) it's Dragapult, and knowing which variant you're talking about makes a difference, and b) Chicken Pult is a notably different caliber of deck compared to "regular" and PultNoir. There are a few other archetypes with sub-archetypes, like Basic Box (Mew box), Hydrapple (other Meganium decks do exist), Alakazam (control Zam, ZamNoir), Festival Lead (Seaking), etc, but we opted to leave them off for later discussion.
Hmmmm, i guess that makes sense fair enough...

my only suggestion featuring some decks i think were out

not saying the placements should be equal but i think its good to include some of the ones not here that do have some presence still in place of something like Ursaluna or Chandelure...

I didn't put it here cuz i wasn't sure if it was worth it, but i think having both Alakazams is worth it considering much like pult their playstyles are VERY different from each other

While Lucario maybe should be an unified placement cuz lwk the only difference is the inclusion of hariyama for the gust or having dudunsparce for the draw engine

1792980775317.png


Actually i forgot some decks too oops!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
With the way the meta has developed many more people know how to play around Slowking than in the beginning of the format and a deck that is so easily teched against with a 1 card inclusion of Shaymin I would never consider A tier. Slowking at best is a B tier deck

Zoroark and Mega Sharpedo however I believe are much better and solid decks currently and are much more worthy of an A tier ranking. I think both decks get too much flack for "losing to grass decks" when thats simply not true. Their worst matchups are really festival lead which is not a popular or good enough deck to warrant them not seeing high levels of play. If anything Zoroark itself should be A simply for the fact it is one of the few decks that can boast it has a positive matchup into all 3 dragapult variants.

:Slowking: from A -> B
:Zoroark: from B -> A
 
Last edited:
With the way the meta has developed many more people know how to play around Slowking than in the beginning of the format and a deck that is so easily teched against with a 1 card inclusion of Shaymin I would never consider A tier. Slowking at best is a B tier deck

Zoroark and Mega Sharpedo however I believe are much better and solid decks currently and are much more worthy of an A tier ranking. I think both decks get too much flack for "losing to grass decks" when thats simply not true. Their worst matchups are really festival lead which is not a popular or good enough deck to warrant them not seeing high levels of play. If anything Zoroark itself should be A simply for the fact it is one of the few decks that can boast it has a positive matchup into all 3 dragapult variants.
Even though the one card tech of shaymin can delay slowking's setup, it's still has a very high power level. Also slowking only has to deal with shaymin if people actually tech shaymin into decks that already do not play it. In decks like dragpult and zororark shaymin is not really needed or too costly to play in the decks and also make the decks less consistent and overall worse into the other parts of the meta.

Dragapult can still be fine as long as they can get budew and some sort of hand disruption after getting trifrosted and also start to establish fezandipiti as an attacker still be fine and setup normallyish. For a deck like zoroark, having shaymin take up a bench space is too much of a resource when bench spaces are needed for more important pokemon.

I truly do not think that zoroark is worth being in A tier. Having a good dragapult matchup is simply not enough in this format. Even though you have a favored dragapult matchup, maybe 60/40 or 55/45 its still very losable and there's a lot of decks you can lose to if your deck is not teched correctly such as alakazam or any sort of grass deck.

Edit: oh wait ur that guy from twitter lol
Sharpedo is a bit too one dimensional and can succumb to being overshadowed other decks that are faster and better at doing similar things such basic box imo.
 
Last edited:
Even though the one card tech of shaymin can delay slowking's setup, it's still has a very high power level. Also slowking only has to deal with shaymin if people actually tech shaymin into decks that already do not play it. In decks like dragpult and zororark shaymin is not really needed or too costly to play in the decks and also make the decks less consistent and overall worse into the other parts of the meta.

Dragapult can still be fine as long as they can get budew and some sort of hand disruption after getting trifrosted and also start to establish fezandipiti as an attacker still be fine and setup normallyish. For a deck like zoroark, having shaymin take up a bench space is too much of a resource when bench spaces are needed for more important pokemon.

I truly do not think that zoroark is worth being in A tier. Having a good dragapult matchup is simply not enough in this format. Even though you have a favored dragapult matchup, maybe 60/40 or 55/45 its still very losable and there's a lot of decks you can lose to if your deck is not teched correctly such as alakazam or any sort of grass deck.

Edit: oh wait ur that guy from twitter lol
Sharpedo is a bit too one dimensional and can succumb to being overshadowed other decks that are faster and better at doing similar things such basic box imo.
Dragapult does not need to run shaymin to beat Slowking because they can delay enough turns after an initial trifrost by hitting a hammer heads to get rid of a boomerang, using stamp and itchy pollen and eventually take over the game that way. slowking overall has a worse dragapult matchup than zoroark in my opinion, which i think, with pult being as much of the meta as it is right now, makes zoroark a deck i would consider playing before slowking to a large event. Both decks do have inconsistencies but Zoroark at least does not get the boot from a shaymin tech. Slowking has a high power level but is too reliant on Mega Kangaskhan to draw and pulling off multiple 3 to 4 card combos most turns to do its attacks. In many matchups Mega Kang is actually a liability due to being shut down by watchtower or being worth 3 prizes, meaning most decks can 3->2->1 you to win very easily.

Overall it just kind of comes down to what is better against Dragapult however as the deck (and its variants) are always the most played deck to any event. I think having a good Dragapult matchup can carry you further in a tournament than beating everything that isnt dragapult simply because it is going to be your most common matchup. Alloutblitzle (James kowalski) was proof of that at NAIC running a deck that simply took a very favored Dragapult matchup. For this reason alone I think Zoroark is a much more deserving deck of A than Slowking tbh.

Edit: the recent addition of N's Purrloin into lists also gives zoroark some very good comeback potential and a very favored mu into alakazam and Hide N Sneak which have seen increased play recently.

Also yes hi lol
 
Last edited:
Short post but surprised to see no Starmie/Froslass or Pure Toucannon (no Zam) in C tier, i think both of those decks are more effective and have better results than a lot what's in that tier. Starmie/Froslass gets set up very quickly and can swing at low energy costs and can run Wally. Toucannon is basically just a lower ceiling Zam that doesn't get as badly screwed by hate
 
With the way the meta has developed many more people know how to play around Slowking than in the beginning of the format and a deck that is so easily teched against with a 1 card inclusion of Shaymin I would never consider A tier. Slowking at best is a B tier deck

Zoroark and Mega Sharpedo however I believe are much better and solid decks currently and are much more worthy of an A tier ranking. I think both decks get too much flack for "losing to grass decks" when thats simply not true. Their worst matchups are really festival lead which is not a popular or good enough deck to warrant them not seeing high levels of play. If anything Zoroark itself should be A simply for the fact it is one of the few decks that can boast it has a positive matchup into all 3 dragapult variants.

:Slowking: from A -> B
:Zoroark: from B -> A
Zoroark in no shape or form should be in A tier. It’s becoming worse and worse of a meta call. People are becoming more comfortable moving off of Pult for major tournaments (as seen by the total of all Pult Variants dropping from 35% to 27%), and Zoroark has a terrible matchup spread into many of the other successful decks. Unless someone cracks the formula again, Zoroark needs a god tier run even to make top cut.
 
Zoroark in no shape or form should be in A tier. It’s becoming worse and worse of a meta call. People are becoming more comfortable moving off of Pult for major tournaments (as seen by the total of all Pult Variants dropping from 35% to 27%), and Zoroark has a terrible matchup spread into many of the other successful decks. Unless someone cracks the formula again, Zoroark needs a god tier run even to make top cut.
I mean even in Puebla this weekend there were 3 in top 16 and 1 in 17th. The deck does have a few top cuts from what i remember in this format? I know Marco Cifuentes got a top 4 in recife and there was 1 in an assym cut somewhere (i can't remember) but its matchup spread is not as dire as people think imo. Like i mentioned your worst matchup is Festival Lead and everything else seems at least winnable although probably slightly unfavorable into certain other B tier decks (Hydrapple, Lucario, Excadrill) Its about even to favored into all other A tier decks or higher so i see no reason it should not reside there with them.
 
I believe straight Dragapult should stand-alone in S tier, the build gives you both lots of coverage into most of the non-Pult meta as well as the best matchup against other Pult variants. Pultnoir should be at B tier, the extra firepower it gives just isn't good enough of a tradeoff for the inconsistency of the deck and hammers do better to address those matchups, plus it also struggles into other Pult variants.

Slowking is debatably B tier, there are a lot of ways to play against it and it does have issues with closing out the late game.
Overall I think some of the decks in B and C tier should not be on the tier list at all or in a lower D tier or something; things like Mad Bite, Honchkrow, Ceruledge, etc.
 
I mean even in Puebla this weekend there were 3 in top 16 and 1 in 17th. The deck does have a few top cuts from what i remember in this format? I know Marco Cifuentes got a top 4 in recife and there was 1 in an assym cut somewhere (i can't remember) but its matchup spread is not as dire as people think imo. Like i mentioned your worst matchup is Festival Lead and everything else seems at least winnable although probably slightly unfavorable into certain other B tier decks (Hydrapple, Lucario, Excadrill) Its about even to favored into all other A tier decks or higher so i see no reason it should not reside there with them.
It's hard to say, I believe it only has 1 top 8 in every post-rotation major. I think against good Pult players there are ways to combat their deck, even the most staunch Zoro players like Liam have switched off the deck because it does badly into other matchups and good Pult players can beat the deck as well. Then again, because a lot of the best Zoro players have switched off the deck it's also possible that the people playing the deck aren't getting the most out of it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: P9
First off this is kinda cool, glad to see smogon is expanding outwards even if it's gradual. Anyways I have a couple of personal opinions regarding placements.

Lucario from B -> C: Lucario is, in a word, fraudulent. Having bad matchups into a flurry of decks like Alakazam, Festival Lead, and basically any Psychic deck, there's not much reason to play Lucario in my opinion. Basic Box's matchup isn't particularly great, either, as while you can Hariyama spam to get a favourable prize trade, you can't fuel up Hariyama without having to Aura Jab first. Your Dragapult matchup isn't even that good: Mind Bend is incredibly powerful into Lucario alongside Risky Ruins, and the 200 + 120 + 20 math is just so easy for the Dragapult player to obtain that I can't really see it doing well most of the time. While Lucario has good draw and support from the Lunaroc engine and Hariyama, its matchup spread is too voltaile for me to have it in B tier. What seals Lucario's fate, however, is the uprising of Hide 'n' Sneak after it Top 4d Louisville and made finals at Nice, which is basically the closest any two decks have in this format to a 100/0 matchup.

Excadrill from B -> C: Excadrill is also not that great of a deck. Ever since Worlds, Drill has made barely any movements in the metagame. While Drill was hyped up as a real threat going into Worlds and was talked about as being "favoured into Pult," the issue with Drill is that it simply doesn't draw cards. Regardless of whether the Drill player is on Trolley or Cape, both have serious issues regarding finding the pieces for everything to operate. While Drill is able to set up Metangs well thanks to Genesect, once you take a knockout serious issues start to pop up for Drill. Once your opponent hits into Drill, you can't really just spam Jumbo Ice Creams because your hand will usually be very poor. Needing huge amounts of Energy in your deck and needing Metal Makers to hit is also not reliable mid and lategame: too often have my opponents whiffed an attack using Metagross or their second Drill because they weren't able to find their Energy Recycler and couldn't Knock Out my active Pokemon. Drill is great on paper, having access to a strong single prizer that hits for 300 and nukes Crustle, strong healing options to counter Pult or something like Hide 'n' Sneak, and being able to do 330 damage to one-shot Pult, but in practice Drill feels pretty bad to play.

Like Lucario, Drill also has serious matchup issues. Alakazam destroys Excadrill, Slowking destroys Excadrill (assuming no Shaymin), Blaziken destroys Excadrill... I do think Pult is somewhat unfavoured into Drill, but Unfair Stamp / Judge are super powerful into Drill. Moltres is also a pretty common card for Pult, and with that you can smack into Genesect for a free two prizes or hit into Drill. Overall, Drill is for sure on fraud watch at the moment. I do think Drill's potential hasn't been unlocked yet, but considering the current metagame and lack of good players who are willing to play Drill, I'm not sure if Excadrill's optimal list will ever be unlocked.

Ursaluna from C -> Untiered: This deck is really bad, kind of like Hide 'n' Sneak if it needed triple the setup to get going. Having to play Mega Greninja is miserable, and needing three Fighting Energy in hand to play Ursaluna feels super mid. Don't really think it has good matchups into most of the meta decks, and it doesn't have any strong Day 2 finishes.

Ceruledge from C -> Untiered: Too highrolly and doesn't really beat anything notable aside from Fire-weak decks. Also doesn't have any notable finishes.

Mewtwo from C -> D: I like Mewtwo (even got my mid-year mat with it), but this meta is not favourable for it. Mewtwo doesn't even reliably beat Dragapult because disruption, Hammers, and Bossing up the Clefairy is a death sentence for it. Other matchups, like Basic Box, Slowking, Hide 'n' Sneak, and Festival Lead are also very bad for it due to Mewtwo's lack of a strong damage output. If not for Juho's finishes and the Top 64s Mewtwo has gotten at Puebla and Recife, I would even recommend putting it into Untiered.

Typhlosion from C -> D: Typhlosion's main appeal is being a Fire-type and being able to incinerate Crustle, Drill, and Hydrapple, but the deck hasn't been converting well recently (unless your name is Yasmin Kiss). Crustle hasn't been getting as much play and Drill has been on fraud watch for a while as well. Your Pult MU is honestly not that bad but it's still pretty bad, and as a general one-prizer beatstick I do think it's worse than Festival Lead, Toucannon, and Alakazam.

Toucannon to C: Toucannon is unironically not that bad. I was expecting it to be a random bad deck, but it's surprisingly powerful thanks to its low maintenance and good damage output. Being able to play four Mists also makes it super cracked into Alakazam, and there's a lot of draw power to spare thanks to Toucannon's Ability. Legacy is also very good into some more random decks like Hide 'n' Sneak. Of course, you don't beat Dragapult or Festival Lead, but it's definitely somewhat decent.
 
First off this is kinda cool, glad to see smogon is expanding outwards even if it's gradual. Anyways I have a couple of personal opinions regarding placements.

Lucario from B -> C: Lucario is, in a word, fraudulent. Having bad matchups into a flurry of decks like Alakazam, Festival Lead, and basically any Psychic deck, there's not much reason to play Lucario in my opinion. Basic Box's matchup isn't particularly great, either, as while you can Hariyama spam to get a favourable prize trade, you can't fuel up Hariyama without having to Aura Jab first. Your Dragapult matchup isn't even that good: Mind Bend is incredibly powerful into Lucario alongside Risky Ruins, and the 200 + 120 + 20 math is just so easy for the Dragapult player to obtain that I can't really see it doing well most of the time. While Lucario has good draw and support from the Lunaroc engine and Hariyama, its matchup spread is too voltaile for me to have it in B tier. What seals Lucario's fate, however, is the uprising of Hide 'n' Sneak after it Top 4d Louisville and made finals at Nice, which is basically the closest any two decks have in this format to a 100/0 matchup.

Excadrill from B -> C: Excadrill is also not that great of a deck. Ever since Worlds, Drill has made barely any movements in the metagame. While Drill was hyped up as a real threat going into Worlds and was talked about as being "favoured into Pult," the issue with Drill is that it simply doesn't draw cards. Regardless of whether the Drill player is on Trolley or Cape, both have serious issues regarding finding the pieces for everything to operate. While Drill is able to set up Metangs well thanks to Genesect, once you take a knockout serious issues start to pop up for Drill. Once your opponent hits into Drill, you can't really just spam Jumbo Ice Creams because your hand will usually be very poor. Needing huge amounts of Energy in your deck and needing Metal Makers to hit is also not reliable mid and lategame: too often have my opponents whiffed an attack using Metagross or their second Drill because they weren't able to find their Energy Recycler and couldn't Knock Out my active Pokemon. Drill is great on paper, having access to a strong single prizer that hits for 300 and nukes Crustle, strong healing options to counter Pult or something like Hide 'n' Sneak, and being able to do 330 damage to one-shot Pult, but in practice Drill feels pretty bad to play.

Like Lucario, Drill also has serious matchup issues. Alakazam destroys Excadrill, Slowking destroys Excadrill (assuming no Shaymin), Blaziken destroys Excadrill... I do think Pult is somewhat unfavoured into Drill, but Unfair Stamp / Judge are super powerful into Drill. Moltres is also a pretty common card for Pult, and with that you can smack into Genesect for a free two prizes or hit into Drill. Overall, Drill is for sure on fraud watch at the moment. I do think Drill's potential hasn't been unlocked yet, but considering the current metagame and lack of good players who are willing to play Drill, I'm not sure if Excadrill's optimal list will ever be unlocked.

Ursaluna from C -> Untiered: This deck is really bad, kind of like Hide 'n' Sneak if it needed triple the setup to get going. Having to play Mega Greninja is miserable, and needing three Fighting Energy in hand to play Ursaluna feels super mid. Don't really think it has good matchups into most of the meta decks, and it doesn't have any strong Day 2 finishes.

Ceruledge from C -> Untiered: Too highrolly and doesn't really beat anything notable aside from Fire-weak decks. Also doesn't have any notable finishes.

Mewtwo from C -> D: I like Mewtwo (even got my mid-year mat with it), but this meta is not favourable for it. Mewtwo doesn't even reliably beat Dragapult because disruption, Hammers, and Bossing up the Clefairy is a death sentence for it. Other matchups, like Basic Box, Slowking, Hide 'n' Sneak, and Festival Lead are also very bad for it due to Mewtwo's lack of a strong damage output. If not for Juho's finishes and the Top 64s Mewtwo has gotten at Puebla and Recife, I would even recommend putting it into Untiered.

Typhlosion from C -> D: Typhlosion's main appeal is being a Fire-type and being able to incinerate Crustle, Drill, and Hydrapple, but the deck hasn't been converting well recently (unless your name is Yasmin Kiss). Crustle hasn't been getting as much play and Drill has been on fraud watch for a while as well. Your Pult MU is honestly not that bad but it's still pretty bad, and as a general one-prizer beatstick I do think it's worse than Festival Lead, Toucannon, and Alakazam.

Toucannon to C: Toucannon is unironically not that bad. I was expecting it to be a random bad deck, but it's surprisingly powerful thanks to its low maintenance and good damage output. Being able to play four Mists also makes it super cracked into Alakazam, and there's a lot of draw power to spare thanks to Toucannon's Ability. Legacy is also very good into some more random decks like Hide 'n' Sneak. Of course, you don't beat Dragapult or Festival Lead, but it's definitely somewhat decent.
lol thank you for writing more substantive analysis on all of the fringe low-tier decks, I was just a bit lazy and I think all of them are around C-D tier anyways, but I agree with your assessments
 
  • Like
Reactions: P9
Short post but surprised to see no Starmie/Froslass or Pure Toucannon (no Zam) in C tier, i think both of those decks are more effective and have better results than a lot what's in that tier. Starmie/Froslass gets set up very quickly and can swing at low energy costs and can run Wally. Toucannon is basically just a lower ceiling Zam that doesn't get as badly screwed by hate
I don't play Starmie myself but from when I hit it on ladder/in person the deck just doesn't feel super powerful overall. Being able to Turn 2 Jetting Blow is for sure strong, but that's kinda all the deck can do. Nebula Beam hitting 210 requires Ignition as well which is okay i guess. Itchy Pollen spam is pretty real into Starmie and the deck usually just bricks super hard when I play against it. Against stuff like Alakazam or Festival Lead, the damage output is usually too much for Starmie to handle, plus Shaymin removes the most dangerous part of Jetting Blow. I know Starmie/Froslass got top 32 at Baltimore, but the list in my opinion is super weird (1- of Petrel? Mega Signal? Xerosic? Three Switch??), and the deck hasn't done anything since then. Wally spam is okay but I would rather play Lopunny/Dudunsparce to deny prizes.
 
1793200850726.png


This is personally what I would consider the tier list to be, considering what type of deck is most likely to top cut at a major tournament. Tiers are semi-ordered. I'll give some thoughts about some of the decks here, and can add a description on other decks if so desired.

Dragapult- This deck has just consistently shown that it has lines into even its most unfavored matchups. With the consistentcy of having on-board draw as part of its evolution line, as well has utilizing Munkidori the most effectively, Dragapult has the most potential to win the game in a single turn. The ability to set up for multi prize knockouts in order to avoid the popular disruption cards in the format (Unfair Stamp and red card) give this deck a huge advantage over other decks.

Pult Blaziken- The pult archetype that has the widest matchup spread, the Blaziken line makes a lot of difficult matchups for Dragapult either trivial or easier, though has a harder time into the mirror due to bench lock issues and ultimately losing the item lock war due to only playing a single budew typically. Watching Austin Charles' Louisville run (and general success with the archetype) shows the potential of the deck, but the match against Riley ultimately shows the weaknesses into the mirror.

Basic Box- Slop box has a very good Dragapult matchup, and is able to adapt itself to fit whatever the metagame calls for, whether it be Iron Crown inclusion to give answers to FLead or Alakazam, or Passimian for the mirror and a semi decent chance vs Crustle. James Kowalski and Dylan Kasturi, as well as many others, have shown that this archetype is the second best archetype outside of Dragapult, and utilizes the strongest individual card in the format, Mega Kangaskhan ex.

Hydrapple- Hydrapple has seen a lot of success recently, coming second at Baltimore and top cutting Louisville. The Teal Mask Meganium archetype has been theorized to be strong since the beginning of the format, and has even seen different secondary attackers like Arboliva be successful. Hydrapple becomes a lot weaker when decks begin utilizing Moltres to knock out Teal Masks, but with Meowth, they're able to keep Briar lines possible if the opponent goes for a 2-2-2 prize map. Also, Hydrapple has a very strong matchup into all Big Basic lines due to its explosive damage numbers.

Loppuny Dusknoir Bronzong- A rogue deck that has seen several high placement finishes and top cuts recently, this deck was thought to be a meme, even after winning the Full Grip Invitational Tournament. Though an explosiveness in popularity, innovative deck building, and better lines of play give this deck a real chance against all non-dark evolution decks that don't have alternative basic attackers. However, the drawback is that strong Dragapult players now know the lines to beat this deck, which makes this archetype more risky to play. It still does well into players that don't know how to beat it though, which gives it strong day 2 potential. Dusknoir is also a very disrespected card due to unfavorable prize trading, and Lopunny is a very strong partner for it being an efficient one energy attacker.

Absol Audino- Mega Audino was theorized to be a terrible card early on, but we saw this deck be incredibly successful at Nice with a top cut finish, mainly because your setup is completely on board making it budew proof if you're able to get going. The severe downside to this archetype is that it's incredibly dependent on Precious Trolley to get going, which ultimately makes it worse if forced to go first. I think the formula needs to be fiddled with a bit more, because Absol is an incredibly strong card in the right circumstances, with Claw of Darkness paired with Disruption being completely able to lock your opponent out of the game (minus a timely top deck).

Mega Excadrill- there was so much hype around this card when it was first released due to its explosiveness, and 90 damage mill two is an incredibly strong resource in the early game. However, its inconsistency, has left it with some absolutely dismal conversion rates (10% conversion rate in Louisville), and players just learning how to play around it, either with Mind bend or Moltres
 
Last edited:
This tier list is pretty odd. Half of C tier shouldn't be here at all. CynthChomp, Baby BM, Chandelure, and Typhlosion have seen no real play at all in this format. Lucario is a c-tier deck due to its overall bad matchup spread and lack of meaningful winning matchups. Pultnoir is pretty solidly top of A but not S imo. Having an unfavored Pult mirror is pretty bad and the rest of the mu spread changes don't make up for it. It has very slight improvements to its King and straight Zam mus and it wins Crustle but its matchups agains the rest of the 3% decks are generally worse. Also, Alakazam should definitely be split into Straight (or Dudun) Zam and ZamNoir. The two decks are wildly different and have very different gameplans, matchup spreads, and counterplay. If this split is made, Alakazam should be A tier and ZamNoir should be B tier. ZamNoir loses the motley low-tier good matchups that straight Zam has and doesn't really make up for it.
 
we are going to update these Pretty Soon (tm) with the feedback we've received so far, along with some tentative DLR decks. the initial rankings were in no small part "let's just try to have it complete" and it's pretty clear we made a few errors (particularly me just shoving PultNoir in S after we forgot it lol, I'll just fix that right now)
 
1793770061699.png

Current take on the meta pre-Delta Reign. Not ordered within tiers but I do think almost all decks here can at least comfortably win some matchups (that or I forgot some). Not sure how much Delta Reign actually changes things, we likely won’t escape the Dragapult meta until rotation, but I am eager to see how cards like Mega Rayquaza shakes things up.
 
I haven't used Smogon in a bit, mostly because of all my irl's playing the TCG so it's cool to see a part of the forums for it !!
But I do want to nom N's Zoroark ex to A tier. It's a very solid tech that's able to tech itself out for multiple mus, is one of the few decks that has a good pult matchup, is also pretty good into basic box and CAN beat decks like zam. With the new custom vest, it's able to beat things like drill or Lucario better along with reshiram.
The draw is also debatably the best in the game- being able to discard fodder cards and get more into your hand is amazing and makes it more consistent, especially in the late-game when you're stamped or special redded.
Also to RainGal6 Beedrill in C is something I do kinda agree with, I think it's a solid deck, it's just worse than hydrapple. Beedrill is kind of a subject for another post tho
 
Back
Top