Returning Player looking for some Darkrai advice.

[Zero Cool]

Hey all, so I haven't played the Pokemon TCG since I was a small child, but recently some friends have picked it up and suggested I join them, looking at decks I know I want to play Darkrai because Sableye is easily my favorite card I've seen right now, the deck basically does things that I like to do in card games. I just could use some assistance.

Mostly what I want to know is why would you choose the garbodor version of the "straight" darkrai deck and vice-versa? The straight Darkrai deck is what I am putting together currently but I have seen some lists with Garbodor. Is it just a metagame call if Garbodor is going to be powerful enough to include? Also what are some weaknesses of the deck? I know it is supposed to not have a terrific blastoise matchup but why is that? And what can be done to fix it?

Here is the list I have been working on, any advice on this would also be helpful! I'm also not 100% on what is legal in the Standard type format, so if I have any cards that aren't that would probably be good to know as well.

Pokemon:

• 4 Darkrai EX
• 4 Sableye
• 1 Absol
• 1 Mr Mime
• 2 Keldeo EX

Trainers:

• 4 Professor Juniper
• 4 N
• 2 Bicycle
• 3 Crushing Hammer
• 1 Dowsing Machine
• 3 Dark Claw
• 4 Hypnotoxic Laser
• 3 Pokemon Catcher
• 4 Dark Patch
• 2 Random Receiver
• 4 Ultraball
• 2 Virbank City Gym
• 1 Frozen City
• 1 Tool Scrapper

Energy

• 10 Darkness Energy

Edited to coincide with the standards set in the rules! ~Kecleon

 

[zavtac]

Hey zero cool, your decklist right now is a straight darkrai as you say. First of all, garbodor is another variation of this deck (dusknoir is also another popular one). Garbodor shuts down all abilities of other Pokemon if it gas a tool attached. In a garbodor list you need to have quite a few tools so you can use garbodors ability. Garbodor is mostly used as an anti meta deck as most decks these days run around abilities. Eg. Blastoise, virizion, darkrai etc. In answer to your question you can use garbodor in big competitions with lots of teir 1 decks, and straight darkrai anytime. NOTE: Darkrai garbodor isn't always very consistent, while darkrai is. On your question of blastoise, it isn't a good matchup at all and nothing much can be done. All I can suggest is to try take out the blastoise quickly. For your deck though, I suggest only using one keldeo ex. Hope this helped!