Lugia VSTAR in the Post Rotation Format!
Hello everyone! After a stint out of the format during Paradox Rift, Lugia VSTAR has established itself as a top tier deck during the Temporal Forces metagame. It won the Champion’s League in Fukuoka and has done well in several online tournaments, mostly thanks to the new inclusion of Cinccino. Cinccino’s Special Roll attack does 70 damage for each Special Energy attached to it, which adds up very quickly with Archeops‘s Primal Turbo. With five Energy attached, Special Roll is hitting for a massive 350 damage! If one of these is a Double Turbo Energy then you are still hitting for 330 damage, enough to take a one-hit Knock Out on a Charizard ex! The best part of Cinccino is that it has no drawbacks associated with Special Roll, it can just keep hitting for massive amounts of damage turn after turn. This is critical when playing against decks that try to aggressively KO your Archeops, as you can force them to keep taking Knock Outs on multiple Cinccino, effectively protecting your Archeops on the Bench! This gives your deck a very similar play pattern to the Gardevoir ex deck, where you hit for massive damage with a single-Prize Pokemon that your opponent must KO every turn.
The biggest problem that Lugia VSTAR decks have had to overcome recently is their consistency. Getting two Archeops in your discard pile on the second turn to use Summoning Star is very difficult in this format, especially thanks to the rotation of Professor Burnet. While most lists are now including Jacq, this Supporter is still much worse than Professor Burnet was, as you need to also have an Ultra Ball to discard the Archeops. In most Lugia VSTAR decks, the only ways to discard your Archeops are Ultra Ball, Professor's Research, and Lugia V‘s Read the Wind attack. Because of how difficult it is to find these outlets while you have the Archeops in your hand, there are a realistic number of games where you will be unable to use Summoning Star for two Archeops on the second turn. While using it for one Archeops is a possibility, that usually leads to your opponent chasing down the Archeops and quickly Knocking it Out. Because of how bad only getting one Archeops down is, I typically lean towards using Read the Wind instead of pulling the trigger on Summoning Star. Because you can create split targets with your Cinccino, since they are attacking for huge amounts of damage, getting the full two Archeops with your Summoning Star is very important, even to the point where it’s worth delaying your attacks by a whole turn!
Lugia VSTAR is still quite inconsistent even if you play a high number of consistency cards in your list. Ever since the D block rotated out of Standard, the options for searching out Pokemon have been very lackluster. In the E block format, most Lugia players moved to Capturing Aroma instead for any way to find Evolution Pokemon. While we have Nest Ball and Buddy-Buddy Poffin to search out Basic Pokemon, these don’t do much if you’re struggling to find your Archeops on turn 2. Most players have embraced Great Ball in Lugia VSTAR decks, mostly for its ability to find Archeops and Lumineon V, letting you use Luminous Sign for usually either Jacq or Professor’s Research. The deck list that Daisuke Kubo used to win the Fukuoka Champion’s League has become the shell for most Lugia VSTAR lists in the Temporal Forces format, and I took great inspiration from theirs when making my list!
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