Standard Newbie here - need advice

[Leofot]

Hello everyone,
I'm a new deck builder here and I'm a bit overwhelmed by a lot of stuff. However, the reason why I'm here is I'm looking for advice after reading some other posts about deck building and mentioning builds that were assumed to be common knowledge that I have no idea about. But I was planning on trying to build a deck based around poison/bugs or a ghost type deck around a few of my favorite pokemon such as palossand. However, I get the feeling a lot of my favorite pokemon will be far underpowered than most and cause me to most definitely lose.
Where should I begin? Or any suggestions?

Thanks,
Leo

 

[Charmaster:)]

Welcome to Pokebeach, Leofot! Rather than suggesting a deck for standard, I would actually suggest building around the Fighting type Palossand from Silver Tempest in the Gym Leader Challenge format. There's already a deck that uses a Hitmonchan, Hitmonlee, and Hitmontop that have a powerful, sequence-based chain of attacks that hits your opponent's bench hard, so a Palossand that does 30 damage to each of your opponent's Pokemon wouldn't be out of place.
https://gymleaderchallenge.com/
https://gymleaderchallenge.com/fighting
The Gym Leader Challenge format restricts players to one copy of any card with the same name (except for basic Energy), excludes Pokémon with a Rulebox (such as V's or Radiant Pokémon), and requires lists to include Pokémon of only one type. Rather than creating an inconsistent format, however, Gym Leader Challenge games prove to be fun and skillful, and the custom rules have created a rich format where a wide variety of Pokémon are playable for each type. I've never played at a Gym Leader Challenge tournament, but I have played with a friend. There's a Discord linked on the blog where you could play webcam games. (Ironically, I haven't touched Discord in over a year, because I found it too addicting, but if you already have Discord, it could work rather well.) Even if you can't find any events nearby, you could still play over the aforementioned webcam or with friends or family. The people there would also be able to help with any deck list questions you have.
https://gymleaderchallenge.com/grass
As for Bug types, many bug type Pokémon are used in Grass type Gym Leader Challenge decks.
If you're planning on going to leagues in your area, the new Spidops ex and Banette ex cards look like decent rogue decks. Justinbasil predicts that Banette ex will be the better of the two, and includes lists for both decks. ZapdosTCG predicts they'll both be tier 3 decks.
https://www.justinbasil.com/new-decks/sv1#spidopsex
https://www.justinbasil.com/new-decks/sv1#banetteex
https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url...ved=0CAMQjB1qFwoTCNi3nuS1kf4CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE
Hopefully something here looks interesting and fits the bill. I might be able to find more Gym Leader Challenge examples if you're interested in building a couple of decks for casual play with friends. In that case, it would be helpful to know what a few more of your specific favorite Pokémon are. Let me know if you have any more questions.

 

[Serperior]

Hi Leo! I don't need to echo a lot off Charmaster's thoughts but they raise a great point in mentioning Gym Leader Challenge (GLC). It's a format that's gained popularity to the point where they hold Side Events at officially sanctioned tournaments which is pretty sick.

If you're looking for builds that are more common knowledge and up-to-date with current sets, I highly recommend tuning into any of the official Pokémon streams on Twitch and YouTube. The casters do a good job of describing the strategy of each deck all the while explaining move-for-move decisions that will help you get comfortable with what you're supposed to do with the most powerful decks in the format. I also recommend channels like Tricky Gym where Andrew provides high quality content with a great depth and detail when getting into the cards he plays.

There are so many resources out there that it certainly is overwhelming, but once you get organized, jumping in will never feel easier. Hope this helps!