Expanded Modern Mega Rayquaza

[MrOptimistic]

I've always wanted to play a Mega Ray deck since I saw it at my local a a while back when it was in standard, and I know it's not going to be as fast or consistent as most decks out there but it is played expanded which leaves room for some error. I'd like some help making this deck as I plan to make it and play it at my local.
(i use ptcgo to showcase decklists as it's easier to see what is what)

Spoiler: Decklist

Dragonite is played late game, so that you can get either important Pokemon back, mainly for shaymin or basic rayquaza.
Rayquaza (Guardians Rising) is played to counter stuff like Hoopa and Ninetales that negate EX/GX attacks, and i'm considering bumping to 2.
3-3 line of Rayquaza is fairly standard I guess, 4 of either seems too much as I run 2 hoopa and 4 ultra ball.
I run 1 Shaymin insteaad of 2 because of the decent draw power already, he is just there to add bench space, and the extra draw power is lovely.
2-2 line of Zoroark GX is pretty standard and the most consistent draw power I think.
The 1 Jolteon is for mirror matches and anything really weak to it, used to be the standard and I like him in this deck.
2 Hoopa are for filling up the bench only when needed.
Mewtwo hits for weakness on fighting decks now that lucario is out again, plus a reliable attacker.
Playing Puzzles for recycling the better cards, like super rod early if needed, might drop all 4 at some point.

Possible changes I can see are:
-4 Puzzle of Time
-1 Lighting Energy
-1 Mega Turbo

+1 Rayquaza (Guardians Rising)
+1 Special Charge
+2 Skyla ???

Any help will be amazing everyone Many thanks.

 

[Kietharr]

Road Block Sudowoodo is key for any sky field deck to give you the bench advantage, that will help you much more against other Sky Field decks than Jolteon will. Jolteon is not nearly as value as it used to be because basic only decks are way less common than they used to be, and it doesn't block evolution attackers so I fail to see how it would help you in the mirror other than the weakness factor. Unlike the Yveltal days, lightning is not a very common weakness on good cards right now, I think running with water energy and Manaphy or metal energy and Magearna are probably both better than lightning energy and Jolteon these days. Unless you have a very odd local meta nobody runs megaray these days because of how horribly vulnerable it is to cards like Sudowoodo, and you double down on that vulnerability with your secondary attacker also having bench scaling damage. If that card comes down you really need to be able to immediately Lysandre/Guzma and KO it or you will probably lose the game. Your N investment is really high for an expanded deck and not having 2 Colress in a sky field deck is a mistake. I don't feel Ranger is very necessary here either, what effects do you need to block? Jirachi promo and Glaceon aren't very common anymore and those are the two big ones that the card was originally used to counter.

On the whole it's really hard for this deck to succeed because of Road Block Sudowoodo, which is very commonly used due to the popularity of Zoroark-GX, which also scales on bench damage and is much more effective at playing a 2HKO game and/or has room for a secondary attacker that can help compensate for a limited bench. If you're forced into a 2HKO game by a Sudowoodo with megaray you're probably going to lose. You can't even really hex around it since hex will disable dragonite and even eggs if you ran them for faster bench building. You should run it yourself and hope to get it down before they can.

I advise against adding Skyla, you can't afford to play that slow in a deck like this, you need to be getting lots of cards every turn and moving through the deck rapidly. Another card to consider is Magearna ULP, which lets you recycle spirit links to more efficiently chain megas.

 

[AFEX]

1-2 Tapu Lele could definitely help this deck.

 

[gumball51321]

Needs way more Shaymin. Drop Sycamore altogether, go down to 1-2 N, play 2-3 Colress, keep Puzzles, those are one of the foundations of the deck. Drop baby Rayquaza, it does literally nothing but slow you down. PBetter yet, I can give you a decklist to base yours off of. You're certainly on the right track though.

Pokemon:19

• 3 Rayquaza-EX
• 3 M Rayquaza-EX
• 2 Zorua
• 2 Zoroark-GX
• 2 Exeggcute PLF(Propagation)
• 2 Hoopa-EX
• 3 Shaymin-EX
• 1 Tapu Lele-GX
• 1 Oricorio(Supernatural Dance)

Trainers:34

• 2 Colress
• 1 N
• 1 Ghetsis
• 2 Hex Maniac
• 1 Guzma
• 1 Mallow

• 4 Sky Field
• 3 Rayquaza Spirit Link
• 1 Float Stone
• 1 Comp. Search(This is on the TCGO ladder, you can pick it up before the end of the month)

• 4 Ultra Ball
• 4 VS Seeker
• 4 Puzzle of Time
• 3 Mega Turbo
• 1 Battle Compressor
• 1 Rescue Stretcher

Energy:7

• 4 DCE
• 3 Dark

Mega Rayquaza is built to be fast, consistent, and STRONG. This list optimizes speed, and high Shaymin counts mean consistency. Between sheer draw power, 4 VS Seeker, and 4 Puzzles, you don't need many supporters, you have Stretcher and Puzzles, so Dargonite is eh. You want to play Oricorio over Karen for Night March because you can bench Oricorio and Zoroarklets them draw and discard their Night Marchers all over again, and Joltik slaps you for weakness anyway. 2 Hex destroys everythinjg if you go first. And any turn you hit for 240 and lock your opponents' Abilities is a turn you get ahead in the game. Plus, Sudowoodo is rampent and Hex lets you bypass Roadblock more frequently.

 

[Jason Yanes]

I'd also say Megearna and Manaphy variants are better, but if you wanna make one with Zoroark GX I recommend running in Darkrai EX instead of float stone, actually has the same ability as Manaphy EX just gives every pokemon with a dark energy free retreat cost, in some ways she's even better cause she has higher HP and damage output, I'm surprised I don't see as many if not more variants with her. It always helps in those awkward situations where your forced to start with Hoopa EX as your active. It's even easier to cheat in energy by discarding through Zoroarks Ability or Ultra ball and then use Mega Turbo. Personally I would run more energy to make it consistent, so I'd take out Mallow, Guzma, maybe Oricirio (ok ability but basicly professors letter, i wouldn't run it if I'm trying to dump my cards).