How to Counter Regirock
- Thread starter kai88
- Start date
If Wobbuffet is active Greninja and Ariados do not work. The best counter is obviously Trevenant Break as it stops them from using items and their Pokemon all get 4HKOed by Trev or less.
Also remember this is expanded, so you have Accelegor maybe to lock them from attacking as well.
If Regirock just attacked, Wobbuffet won't be Active, will it?
I've not heard of the deck before, but the concept seems sound especially for decks and/or players unfamiliar with it.
Bats are pretty much the best counter. I listen to his podcast and he pretty much flat out says this deck auto losses to bats and Greninja. But an unprepared meta, this does really well.
No. You don't have regirock attacking in those matchups. Think about it. You basically win these by starting with wobbuffet because they cant use they cant use their abilities to win games and can't lysandre regis on the bench. Sure, they can attack regularly, but it takes more time and might not work for an OHKO because of focus sash.
IMHO this deck is tier 4 or below. It has no real autowins and just a few favorable matchups. Good players know the cards and can work around the strategy. It also requires your opponent not to have explosive turns or any tech cards like escape rope or flash energy.
Regirock relies on your opponent dead drawing a little bit in order to buy time for you to get set up. Just go in guns blazing ASAP, kill all their walls, and then they'll have no choice but to send up a premature Regirock.
Jolteon-EX just wins against this it has no counter to it. Also it loses to VileBees.
The comment to which you were responding was specifically made in response to your own comments about having Wobbuffet up front to prevent things like Greninja BREAK decks from using their Abilities. Regirock appears to be the only card that can attack in both builds... so how are you winning without ever attacking? If you try to hide behind Wobbuffet the whole time, going by the builds in the above videos, you're never attacking. Your only hope to win is that your opponent stalls.
I did think about it; if I missed something it would be better to actually tell me. You want to start with Wobbuffet in most matches. Against decks with problematic Abilities it simply becomes even more important than the normal bit of disruption Wobbuffet gives Shaymin-EX. You are correct, a player cannot use Lysandre to get to Regirock on the Bench. Fortunately Wobbuffet up front cannot use Focus Sash. Either its up front and shutting down Abilities but it can't attack, only stall. Whenever you switch gears to attack with Regirock, now Greninja BREAK and company may use their Abilities.
I don't run a Greninja BREAK deck, but especially if it is a list with Octillery that means the Regirock deck can't just wait to go down several Prizes and N to one to prevent Water Shuriken and Giant Water Shuriken Abilities from being used. Regirock has 110 HP; even if one is stuck using Mist Slash (50 damage) instead of Moonlight Slash (60 or 80 damage), a Giant Water Shuriken first means that Regirock is OHKOed regardless of Focus Sash. Wobbuffet can of course survive two hits, but eventually the Regirock decks run out of healing; it can only try to stall by using Puzzle of Time on reclaiming Wobbuffet and spent healing cards for further stall, or else it has to attempt the intended strategy of attacking with Regirock. With luck and good plays the Regirock player can technically win, but all other things being even this Greninja BREAK wins.
The same applies for the other exceptions like Ariados decks, although depending upon exactly what it is it may be easier or harder to accumulate the needed damage for pseudo-OHKO.
The deck is situational. In terms of vepsi or flareon you might understand this a bit better. If I am playing Vespi/Flareon and my opponent is playing Seismitoad, I guarantee you I am only going to be getting out my Vespi's turn one. And against Virizion Genesect I'd primarily get out flareon. This deck is very similar. If I am playing against Greninja I am only getting out Wobbs, and against Manectric I'd get out Regi.
I personally think Omnipoke's/google's list are somewhat bad. I think the deck needs energy denial more than it needs Robo Sub. Robo does really nothing for the deck. It gives no prize, but for the opponent it is a way out of Wobb lock. It's also useless against Toad/Trev, which are already bad enough matchups. The deck runs no Bridgette, Sycamore, and no super scoop ups (maybe even durant). While I haven't tested this deck more than a few times on PTCGO, there is a basic 40-50 set list for this deck and I feel the creators just kind of teched around the point of the deck.
I'll reiterate that I feel this deck is a Tier 4 deck. It can't possibly beat most decks in format especially if they are hitting 80 damage with muscle band constantly. It relies on your opponent to have a poor turn 1/2 and you can't expect that for more than 2, 3 games most at a regionals.
@Elbow I don't know what you think I'm saying, but you made a comment contrary to the claims of the video, which oversells these decks, and common sense; several decks with a natural advantage over Regirock/Wobbuffet may be slowed by losing their Abilities while Wobbuffet is up front, but to attack the list being reference (if yours is different, share it if you want it to be part of the conversation) must have Regirock up front. Regirock can be built on the Bench, but it cannot attack from there. So while it is possible your opponent's setup will be so stunted by Wobbuffet that when you switch to Regirock, you'll take out your opponent's only offensive option and thus won't have to worry, more than likely Regirock/Wobbuffet will slowly setup as usual, allowing even relatively slow setup decks like Greninja BREAK enough time to field multiple options.
Now, if you only Bench Wobbuffet against Greninja BREAK decks, you are desperately stalling. If they don't deck out before time is called, they just need to take a single Prize to win because Wobbuffet on its own cannot take Prizes with the deck list we have been using. That still assumes you can keep a flow of replacement Wobbuffet going; the deck packs healing, but not so much it won't most likely run out. Again, focusing on the list presented; if your list is different, you didn't bother explaining until well after the point in question.
If you still cannot accept this... fine. I'm not going to belabor the point further.
Now, if you only Bench Wobbuffet against Greninja BREAK decks, you are desperately stalling. If they don't deck out before time is called, they just need to take a single Prize to win because Wobbuffet on its own cannot take Prizes with the deck list we have been using. That still assumes you can keep a flow of replacement Wobbuffet going; the deck packs healing, but not so much it won't most likely run out. Again, focusing on the list presented; if your list is different, you didn't bother explaining until well after the point in question.
If you still cannot accept this... fine. I'm not going to belabor the point further.
Interestingly enough, I just played 3 or 4 games against someone running this deck and I (running Trevenant-Wobbuffet) won all the games without much difficulty...
If this deck were to become popular enough to warrant countering, wouldn't Jirachi with w/Stardust be an option? It can mess with other decks as well, and in this matchup it does 10 damage while being protected from retaliation for a turn. Those videos emphasized playing multiple Strong Energy on a Regirock which makes me think that unless you telegraph the play, not only will they be stuck healing just 10 damage to keep the Focus Sash trick working, they'll need Lysandre or Escape Rope to get rid of Jirachi so they can go for a KO. The deck is literally built around the Focus Sash/Scramble Switch combo; it cannot afford to waste too many resources or attacks.
Not saying it is a silver bullet answer though; Jirachi isn't as useful as it once was, but some decks still have it for dealing with other situations. Adding Jirachi back in if Regirock/Wobbufet gets serious doesn't seem like a huge strain for the decks that would otherwise struggle countering Regirock/Wobbuffet, like Night March.
Not saying it is a silver bullet answer though; Jirachi isn't as useful as it once was, but some decks still have it for dealing with other situations. Adding Jirachi back in if Regirock/Wobbufet gets serious doesn't seem like a huge strain for the decks that would otherwise struggle countering Regirock/Wobbuffet, like Night March.
In case this just answers the question on how to beat this deck, play a startling megaphone upon entry of regirock to the active. Correct me if I'm wrong, but since that doesn't specifically target regirock the sash would still be removed and the ancient trait wouldn't save it.
According to this ruling over at PokéGym, all effects like this are considered to go through the Pokémon. If you are not familiar with that website, it is run by Team Compendium, who have been maintaining the Pokémon Rulings Compendium since the early days of the game, and while they don't have the final say for rulings, are basically two steps removed. That is the primary source of rulings are The Pokémon Company in Japan, then TPCi, and Team Compendium is recognized for their work with TPCi (though they can still be overruled by TPC or TPCi).
So Startling Megaphone won't work on Pokémon Tools attached to anything with Ω Barrier.
To be frank, I'm familiar with pokegym for their decklist tool only.
And I've never used their decklist tool, used to be fairly Active on their forums, but now use them mostly for rulings.
Here we go. If that is still not good enough, feel free to double check directly with TPCi.
Very cool deck! I would love to play this at Spring Regionals but I except to see Jolteon EX and Trevenant. Also, it really sucks that the deck basically has to have 3 Tropical Beaches. A cheap deck for rogue deck players turned into a really expensive deck.