Why Jumpluff could be the best new Modified deck around.
Well, Modified is set as is for the remainder of the time we have with Wizards, until or unless TPC/Nintendo whoever changes things up. And Skyridge has brought several new contenders to the tables. Some are obvious; Scizor, Feraligator (Genesis), Feraligator (Expedition), Kingdra (although Scizor REALLY hurts him badly), Beedrill (finally a truly playable one!), and I’ve even see a little more of Revelation Crobat popping back up around the leagues. One of my new favorites is the Skyridge Piloswine. Seriously, he averages 70 while only taking 20, which can easily be remedied with a Berry, Gold Berry, Potion or lots of other things. I am currently testing him with the Skyridge Poliwhirl, and it’s worked out pretty well so far. That brings me to Poliwrath himself; a deck build around his power and his attack could really work, especially with his high 110 hp.
But truly, all these decks have a pretty darn hard time against the popular Scizor/Furret deck. It really is extremely powerful. Insane Choa loves his Furrets, and even uses them to get multiple darks/steels on Dark Scizor. And it does work, but the Aquapolis Scizor is a force. If you want to stand a good chance in Modified right now, you really do need to be able to handle him. So off I set to find a deck that could beat Sizor regularly and do well against other decks as well. After a bit of thinking, testing and frustration, I noticed dontknow09’s deck at a local tournament. Jumpluff. With a Rainbow and Focus Band, the stupid thing was darn near invincible. That got me to thinking; now that Sizor lost his grass resistance (why I’ll never know) meant that he could be hurt normally by grass types. But with the four metals I have seen dumped on him by turn 4, Cotton Punch obviously wasn’t going to make the cut. So I needed something with more power. So far, the only grass type I saw that could go toe-to-toe with Sizor and come out on top was Meganium/Exeggutor. So I needed one of the following things: something to bypass the Metal effect, something to remove the metals, something to negate the metal effect (turn it off), or maybe even something to turn off Furrets power. Thats where Muk came in. It sounded good; Muk would stop Furret, Sizor’s no poison power, and could then hit Sizor AND poison him! But people keeped Billing, Elming and Copycatting and got the metals out anyway, so all Muk could do was hit and hope to poison, and did no damage cuz the metals were on, then get the tar beat out of him (or sludge, rather >_<), so the Muk idea was trashed. But I still wanted to play Jumpluff. And I keeped getting trashed by dontknow09’s Jumpluffs. Then.....
Skyridge was relesed! And with it came the answers to ALL my prayers; Ledian! Swift for 50 with only GGC cost? It can hurt anything Steel, and bad. Steelix now has to fear grass! Swift bypasses the Metal effect, so two shots with a swift and Sizor is down for the count. And there are good reasons as to why it works: Swift is automatic 50, while heavy metal relies of flips. A fully pumped Sizor (with four metals) needs two heads for a KO. If Ledian gets in the first shot, it can come out the victor, especially if you have a focus band on it. Also, Jumpluff can soften up Scizor before he has alot of metal on him. It may only work sometimes, but a single heads means thirty, which is just under Gold Berry’s help, the swift next turn for a KO. Another reason is that Ledian can retreat for free, while Scizor has a 2 retreat cost. They may have switch, but a ledian/jumpluff deck can abuse Double Gust, which can mean all the difference. All in all, this deck can come out on top alot.
Sizor is awesome, no doubt about it, but this is Pokemon, and one of the best things about this game is that EVERYTHING has a counter. I even expect Dark Venusaur to be a real force. Think about it; he can use dark energies and with Rocket’s Hideout, he has 90 HP. But suppose he did become popular. Full Heal and Miricle Berry would be perfict counters, two cards VERY often overlooked. Sizor has his weaknesses, aside from fire. Entei/Cargo is still a great way to go, but even a properly built Jumpluff deck shouldn’t fear them too much. 1 heads with Cotton Punch, then retreat for free for a Swift KO on both Magcargo and Entei.
Below is a link to my home Leauge’s website. On the last Modifed tournament I played Jumpluff, so you can see the deck list to see what I’m talking about. Although the second place Feraligator wasn’t much of a match for Jumpluff, you can see it is a very well-built deck that is competitive. In that same tournament, I went undefeated beating 2 other Jumpluff deck not playing Ledian, a Entei/Cargo deck, a solid Kingdra deck and a very nice rouge Dark Blastoise. Jumpluff came out undefeated. So it DOES work. Try it out. Just today I went 6 out of 8 games victorious aganst a few different Scizor deck, and my loses I blame on the fact that ALL the Jumpluffs were prizes in BOTH game. That may be this deck’s one fatal flaw; the darn Jumpluff cards seem to stick TOGETHER >_<.
One last thing. Pokemon is almost done with wizards. This may be a bad thing, but may I remind you; Town Volunteer’s original text in Japan let you get ANY energy out of the discard. But when Wizard’s got a hold of it, somehow that dirty little word got in their; "BASIC" >_< so don’t give up guys. They have been doing it oven in Japan for years now, and it’s more popular over their than here. This could mean the return of mall tours and such. Don’t leave the Church before the new pastor gets to preach his first sermon.
Secondly, I am starting a petition for Wizards last act as runner of Pokemon TCG in America to make a promo Genesis Cleffa in the best series. =D LOL, just joking, although one can dream, no?
Cheers!
The Pokemaster1110
Brian Stevenson
Email@ pokemaster1110@hotmail.com
League Website@ http://wylie1.com/heropoke/windeck.html
