LC Challenge report: Tyrunt Control (or how a little Dinosaur broke the LC Challenge)
Just to be clear, I always thought that Tyrunt was a really oppressive card but it was with this only common challenge that I understood that it is just broken in this format.
I get some uncommon and rare cards from the starter deck but I ended up building a full common list just for the challenge.
The list:
The picks. All explained:
* Tyrunt: The star of the deck. This guy is OP. I always thought that 2 energies for an energy removal with 20 damage was almost broken but I also thought that a 60 HP Pkmn with water weakness could be easily knocked out by any Water attacker (which is true!). In the end, the energy removal with 20 damage that early in the game is just that oppressive that there is no Pokemon that could 1 hit KO him with a single energy attack. The only escape: Rain Dance from greninja but there is only 1 trainer in all the game that use it if I'm not wrong and with this build she shouldn't be capable of assembling her Stage 2 ninja frog.
* Dunsparce: I never used Glare in the standard format but now I understand how powerful is this attack and this pokemon. The transition from Bill to the same attack that Jungle's Likitung for twice as much damage is just seamless. I always used 2 Dunsparce in the base game but just used it as a support for the draw power. It could stall, draw a lot of cards and even KO something weakened. A beast in LC.
* Zigzagoon: I always thought this was an amazing support pokemon. No retreat cost and team assembly for C? Wonderful! I never resolved a single Pin Missile in the base game because I used Zigzagoon just as a support and I thought it was 2 or maybe 3 coins, but no! It's 4 coins for CCC! It's Kangaskhan's Comet Punch for one less energy! In this deck is the same support as always but it is also our "finisher" that could beat everything after the oppressive energy denial.
* Duskull: Hypnosis sleeps ALWAYS. Another case of "read the card explains the card". Between Hypnosis to stall, Dark Revival to revenge kill or do a spread of damage after a KO or an opponent's Prof. Oak Duskull could even do a killing spree chaining between Dark Revivals (and we could block the opponent bench with good targets for our Gust of Wind). What else we can ask? I dunno but the guy has no retreat cost too just to let us pivot even more between our menaces, supports or denial tools.
* Murkrow: There's a reason why Psyduck was used in Base-Fossil era as an opener. Trainer denial could brick a lot of decks and if you add damage to the formula it is even more oppressive. The stall is not as strong without Lass to support us but the value that we could get from opening with it and blocking some trainers at the start of the game could give us the game easily after building our first Tyrunt. Also, another pokemon without retreat cost to continue pivoting.
All trainers are pretty obvious except for:
* Gambler: The new Gambler does the best impression of Professor Oak a control/stall deck could dream of. Not only we shuffle our hand instead of discarding it to not lose to mill but we can always pitch it with 3 or less cards in our hand just to "refresh" the hand. It is an amazing draw also when we are in topdeck mode because it is just a "draw 3 cards".
* 4 Switchs?: Yeah. Normally I use 2 switch + 1 full heal in most decks or a 3 / 2 split in decks that are really reliable in a single pokemon with an expensive retreat cost, but THERE'S NO FULL HEAL in the format. So I just used 4 "full heals" in the form of pivot pokemon without retreat cost (9: Zigzagoon, Duskull, Murkrow) since Tyrunt has a retreat cost of 2.
After all this I could say that maybe Tyrunt need a little nerf because it is the only pokemon that could do a energy denial attack for 2 energies in all the format and I don't think many decks could escape that level of oppression. This could maybe even beat Cataclyptic's Hellfire Deck that proved to be problematic prior to 1.2 (with the help of Lass and the rest of uncommon and rares).
All things say. It was an amazing challenge, I had such a blast doing it! I don't know if I'm doing a v1.2 standard run soon but if I do so I'll try the Pokemon introduced in 1.1 & 1.2 because I didn't tested any yet.
Thanks again for the game! It is really cool and I really appreciate the experience of playing it, it let me feel like when I was a kid and played the original pokemon tcg for gbc for the first time =)