Lightning-Type Treasure Trove — Pikachu & Zekrom-GX in Expanded
Forget Rayquaza-GX, Expanded has a new Max Elixir target in town. Pikachu and Zekrom-GX has seem its fair share of success in Standard already, so there’s little reason to believe that wouldn’t translate over to Expanded where it gains a variety of new tools to work with. Here are the new tricks:
- Shaymin-EX
- Battle Compressor
- Colress
- Fighting Fury Belt
- Max Elixir
- N
- Parallel City
- Professor Sycamore
- Scramble Switch
- Silent Lab
- Trainers' Mail
- VS Seeker
- Flash Energy
That’s a lot. Many of these cards are extremely influential in the deck, like Scramble Switch and Flash Energy, specifically.
In Expanded, this deck has the potential to draw through most of its deck on the first turn. The newcomers to the deck assist it with that, particularly Trainers’ Mail. Your late game is also significantly improved with the likes of Scramble Switch and better Supporter cards to keep the heat coming and in avoiding Knock Outs. A pair of Stadium cards, Parallel City and Silent Lab, both have uses in the deck that allow you to counter counters to the deck. Here’s my list:
This list is nice and simple with proper techs as needed. It’s quite fast and can get the first or second turn Full Blitz often, just as it can in Standard, but even more consistently.
Explanations
Four Pikachu & Zekrom-GX
Your main attacker. Having four ensures that you get one on your Bench quickly to Max Elixir to. When you’re only playing three, you might land one in your Prizes, have difficulty finding both, and be unable to effectively use Max Elixir. You’re never going to use all four in a game, but having four is great insurance to get a strong start each game.
This concludes the public portion of this article.
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