Scizor/Cherrim

[ryanvergel]

Pokemon[16]
4 Scyther SF
4 Scizor SF
3 Cherubi (SF/DP- both are good)
3 Cherrim SF
1 Unown Q
1 Chatot MD

Trainers[32]
4 Bebe's Search
4 Roseanne's Research
4 Poké Ball
4 Poké Blower +
4 Professor Rowan
3 Cynthia's Feelings
3 Warp Point
2 Team Galactic's Wager
2 Night Maintenance
1 Marley's Request
1 Luxury Ball


Energy[12]
12 :grass:

--
Scizor: This is the main attacker of the deck. Scizor works by playing a deck with no poke-powers, and getting and maintaining a consistent Pound Down attack, followed through with the occasional Accelerate attack.
Cherrim: Scizor's attacks get a significant boost with Cherrim in play. Cherrim increases Scizor's attacks by 10 damage for each Cherrim in play, meaning with 3 Cherrim in play Scizor's Pound Down attack does 100 damage. Scizor's Accelerate does 60 damage.
Chatot: This free retreating basic helps to maintain consistecy, while providing a pokemon who can be sacrificed to set up or during a Warp Point. His attack is free and can refresh your hand to help during a drought or low hand count.
Unown Q: This is also a free retreating basic who serves to reduce one of your opponent's retreat by 1. Attach him to a Cherrim or Scizor to grant the pokemon free retreat.

The main strategy of the deck is to get out Scizor by turn two every game, and have 2 grass energy attached to do Pound Down. The secondary objective is to boost the damage of Scizor by using Cherrim's poke-body.

Trainers
Bebe's Search: This card fetches any pokemon in the deck, giving a consistent turn two Scizor, and to get out other pokemon late game.
Roseanne's Research: Gets two basic pokemon, including Unown Q, and gets basic energy also.
Poké Ball: A non-supporter card to get any pokemon.
Poké Blower +: Disruption card to knock out key benched pokemon such as Claydol, or a main attacker being built up.
Professor Rowan: Keeps 1 card in hand, which is very important in this deck, being able to keep a Luxury Ball, a Cynthia's Feelings, a Poke Blower+, Night Maintenance, etc.
Cynthia's Feelings: Refreshes the hand to 8 new cards whenever they knock out a pokemon.
Warp Point: Disruption and switching.
Team Galactic's Wager: Disruption and hand refreshing.
Night Maintenance: Maintain a swarm, and to recover energy and lost tech pokemon late-game.
Marley's Request: Useful for getting a key discarded Poke Blower, or Luxury Ball.
Luxury Ball: Gets any pokemon. Only one because once one is used, all others are useless.

--
You get a consistent Scizor up every game, while taking easy prizes through Poke Blower, warp point, and pure speed.

 

[Rambo1000]

I'd drop a rowan, the 4 pokeball, and either the lone marleys or a warp for 4 pluspower and 2 master ball.

edit: just noticed 12 energy is a little low. I find myself missing energy drops even with the 14 in my list.

 

[Vegeta ss4]

Pokemon line and energy line...EXACTLY how I would play it.

Trainers-I dont like Bebe's or Roseannes in here.

The only supporter I play is Maxed TGW and 2 Cynthias

I like..
4 Great Ball
4 Pokeball
4 Quick Ball
4 Drawer+
4 Pokedex
4 TGW
3 Plus Power
2 Cynthia's
2 Night Mant
1 Luxury Ball

 

[patthemanvan]

I'd drop a rowan, the 4 pokeball, and either the lone marleys or a warp for 4 pluspower and 2 master ball.

edit: just noticed 12 energy is a little low. I find myself missing energy drops even with the 14 in my list.

i didnt think master ball was still in format

 

[Rambo1000]

honestly it might not be! I just hate the fact that you have to flip for pokeball!

the energy count, if nothing else, should be revised....maybe I'm just really unlucky, but missing 1 drop could be the difference between a win and a loss, I've seen it tooooo many times.

 

[EHLERZ5]

Unown Q..... when you use it as a tool.... does he still count as a poke with a POWER while he's in play? Just checking because I like Ryan's build.....

 

[kristi]

Who ever said drop the Rowan has obviously not played this deck before. Keeping your hand refreshed at all times is crucial to keep up with ppl that are playing claydol. Nice build Ryan, but I would play something a little more like this:

Pokemon[15]
4 Scyther SF
4 Scizor SF
3 Cherubi (SF/DP- both are good)
3 Cherrim SF
1 Chatot MD

Trainers[32]
3 Bebe's Search
4 Great Ball
4 Quick Ball
4 Poké Drawer+
4 Professor Rowan
4 Cynthia's Feelings
3 Warp Point
1 TSD
1 Night Maintenance
1 Marley's Request
1 Luxury Ball


Energy[15]
15 Grass

This list is only slightly different, going after more consistancy over other stuff. Stuff like Poke` Blower is replaced by Poke Drawer and Pokeball by Quick Ball. It also has somewhat of a ball engine. I recomend trying it.

 

[Vegeta ss4]

^Why Marley's? and Unown Q is a MUST in this deck.

Rowan is good too...
Pokeball is amazing IMO, 50% chance you will get WHATEVER pokemon you want.

I wanna try 2 Energy Switch in here to.

 

[TeamOG]

so is this a late game deck over speed?

 

[mrdraz07]

12 energy is too few to get 2 by turn 2 reliably IMO.

 

[Brady1]

I love how pokeball was bashed when it came up but 30something (right?) sets later, its considered good. Quick ball>>>pokeball here. 4-4 cherrim and 4 plus power is nearly a must for this deck to be taken seriously.

 

[Rambo1000]

4-4 scizor
3-3 cherrim
2 unown q

4 bebe's
4 roseanne
4 pokeblower +
3 quick ball/poke ball
3 rowan
3 cynthias
2 warp
2 night maintenence
1 luxury ball
2 wager
2 dawn stadium

14 grass

dawn stadium for longevity and dusknoir counter. vs kingdra, they hit you for 60, then the most they can do is 20 to that scizor. dawn stadium buys that scizor yet another turn and can allow you to grab a prize with the agility attack.

 

[edwarpy]

So, pretty much this deck this deck, then?

 

[ryanvergel]

What? Scizor/Cherrim is just a very, very, very obvious combo.

I've found with 12 grass and 4 roseanne's I very seldomly miss the t1 energy drop. 50% of the time I go second and have *16* energy in hand (4 roseanne outs, and 12 grass energy outs).

http://www.pojo.com/Features/X-Act/2005/Odds in Pokemon 4.htm

If I go first I have a 20% of whiffing the t1 energy drop. If I go second, I have a 10% chance of whiffing the t1 energy drop. Averaged out, I have a 15% chance of whiffing the t1 energy drop with this build. (I actually think it's higher now since you draw a card t1, whereas before [when I believe this article was written], you did not draw a card t1. So the chances are probably closer to 17%/7% (or ~12% averaged) of whiffing a t1 energy drop. That's about 1/9 games. That's probably once a tournament, or once during swiss at nationals. On average of course. I guess you could add an energy or two, but those people trying to play 15, that's really a lot of energy for this deck, when you play 2 NM and only need 2 energy to attack. That makes it 12/6 or 9% average, only barely down from the 12% average of playing 3 energy less! Adding 2 energy (according to the graph at hand, not my speculation of a possible 7+1 first turn discrepancy) would make it 14%/7%, averaged to 11% chance of whiffing. So you add 2 energy for a 4% increase of not whiffing. I'm not sure if that's technically worth it to me.

I really don't like Dawn Stadium. It's obviously the only gym one would use if Dusknoir was prevalent in their area, but otherwise it really isn't worth the spots in the deck. This is a generic version not teched to any particular metagame, such as Dusknoir.


The deck also loses without Poke Blower+, to all of you saying to play poke drawer instead. Vs any good player, Scizor will usually inevitably rely on knocking out a key benched pokemon, like Claydol, Torterra, Sceptile, whatever. I have been thinking of going to 4 cynthia's, and it probably should. 8 cards is ridiculous and probably necessary if the deck hopes to get 2 Poke Blower+ in hand.

Vegeta: I love energy switch. Why Marley's? I wanted to try out the gimmick, since I played both Poke Blower+ and Luxury Ball, I could at least probably use it effectively.

Kristi: I've thought about even dropping the 2 NM and a poke ball for 3 TSD. I mean, why have 4 poke ball over 3 pokeball/+1 TSD. After they knock out 1 Scizor, TSD becomes a triple pokeball for my main attacker, NAWMEAN? I like them odds. 87.5% chance of getting either a scizor/scyther of my choice is pretty good odds. I'd probably just leave at least 1 NM though. It's definitely a strategy I'm thinking about though. Possibly even 4 TSD. Why not? Once you get the first Scizor out, you can easily replenish them through TSDs.
Jeremy: As far as kingdra doing 40/60 to you repeatedly, are you just neglecting Accelerate completely LOLOLOL. Scizor does 90-100 to you, leaving you with 30-40 HP left. How convenient.

 

[ryanvergel]

I'm also looking at some cool tech pokemon (fire/grass with no powers) for the deck.

 

[Jason]

houndoom la? Or rapidash sf?

 

[ryanvergel]

I kind of think Torkoal is cute, for a Toxicroak-like approach last year. If you have 3 cherrim in play, for RC (possibly play a few multi in the deck, or one tech fire) you do 30+30=60 damage and 50% burn/paralyze. Very similar to last year's Scizor'Toxicroak deck, where Toxicroak could cripple their main attackers. Half the time they are paralyzed/burned, and more importantly, vs decks like Torterra, you're doing 30+30 with weakness alone, and +30 for cherrims, means 90 for 2 energy and a chance to cripple them- coming from a basic.

 

[butlerforhire]

I've been trying to come up with some techs for Scizor/Cherrim as well, mainly to help the match-up against Torterra. I was thinking that Unown E might help prevent the OHKO from the lv. X/Frenzy Plant as long as it was undamaged to begin with and the opponent isn't playing Buck's/PlusPower, and most Torterra lists won't simply because they lack the room. I know Forest Murmurs can get around Unown E (bring in a Scizor without it) and so can Vigorous Dash (by setting up a benched, E'd Scizor for a future OHKO), but they aren't going to be behind in prizes forever to use Murmur and the lv. X also isn't always going to be in the picture especially if you've been putting the pressure on with T2 Pound Down and Blower. It would also give you the extra turn against something like Kingdra after they Dragon Pumped you for 60, although I think that most smart Kingdra players would just hit you for 40 instead the first time and then do 60 next turn for the KO. Unown E would prevent that kind of evasive trick though since you'd still be alive with 10 HP. (It's not relevant now obviously since it hasn't been released here, but when we do get Shaymin lv. X, I'd say the +40 HP boost it can give would help the Torterra match a lot.)

 

[tc19930815]

Quick Ball>Poke Ball

 

[Brady1]

1-1 NM/TSD has been more then enough for my list. I don't find scizor dieing at all, espically when you go for the quick 90+ t4 build rather then what I think of this version (more late game based). As for techs, Camerupt, Flareon, Houndoom, Magmortar (MT), Torkoal, Breeloom, Carnivine, Exeggutor (MT), Leafeon, Masquerain, Mothim (both), Parasect, Roserade (SW), Tanglegrowth, Tropius, Venomoth, Vespiqueen, Wormadam, and Yanmega meet the criteria given.

Camerupt: Decently big stage 1 and can hit for scizor-like numbers with some luck. 6.5/10
Flareon: 3 energy for 70 is not worth it. 3/10
Houndoom: Probably won't ever get the body to activate but can still hit for some high damage. 7/10
Magmortar: Big hp and disruptive. The second attack will probably never be used. 5/10
Torkoal: Great body but risky attack. 7/10
Breeloom: Big hp and can heal. Can score OHKOs sometimes. 7.5/10
Carnivine: Risky card but has a good payout. Can be used to t2 some pokes. 6/10
Exeggutor: Offers recovery if no energy on the field, as well as possible OHKO if enough time is spent on him. 8/10
Leafeon: Very slow without the level X. All I could see here is doing 30+ and then accelerating for a prize. 4/10
Masquerian: Nice tech against kingdra/other water pokemon. First attack can hit for 60+ against some pokemon. Depending on metagame: 7.5/10 for water heavy, 3.5/10 otherwise.
Mothim: SW can set-up for an accelerate against some pokemon, and can return a favor big time against spreaders. MD can remove resistance (...er, not helpful) and can hit for 40+ and run to a damaged scizor (hit and run of some sort). 6/10 for SW, 4/10 for MD
Parasect: Always a pokemon I like, can be a powerful one-time hitter and can possible buy a turn/game. 8.5/10
Roserade: DP just sucks...lol. SW is actually a pretty decent disruptor and can hit for siczor-like numbers. 6.5/10
Tanglegrowth: Unless your scizor list can buy alot of time, too slow to have any impact. 1.5/10
Tropius: Good as a sacrifical lamb in order to heal your bench from spreading/snipers. 9/10
Venomoth: Quick t2 hitter and has a very diruptive body. 8/10
Vespiqueen: Big hp and comeback power. 8.5/10
Wormadam: I can see this guy working later in the game, as the basic has a power. However, 120 hp is too hard to ignore and can swing for confusion late game (always big). 7.5/10
Yanmega: Disruption/spreading (good for later game constant acceleration) and can swing for damage. 7/10

Overall, I wouldn't play a back-up hitter, espically a fire one (I wouldn't play a tech in general). Torkcoal, Eggs, and Tropius seem like the best support techs this format has to offer. For disruption, I would go with Roserade or Parasect (Parasect is just amazing in my eyes, espically if you can drop an energy on him before he evos as well).