Type O negative said:
But there are still Kingdra decks around, and winning too.
We be talkin' 'bout America here, Type O.
Blaziken is still the single best deck in the format, and I'm sure it's hard to argue against that. But is it the most played? No. There are so many other decks being played, like Walrein/Milotic, Machamp, Gardy, Swampert, Crobat, Exploud, Metagross, SceptiMuk, and even more rogue decks. Walrein/Milotic was something I'm sure most people overlooked until our very own Pooka nabbed second place at Nats with it. I'm still trying to figure out how the deck beats anything besides Blaziken and Gardy.
But see, that's how he got up there. Pooka was smart and figured that Blaze and Gardy were going to be the top two decks played. So what did he do? He countered 'em, and he got second place. Jacy from NC won with a Gardy deck, so Pooka might have gotten a crappy draw. Maybe Jacy was the better player in that matchup, or found a weakness in Pooka's deck or something. *shrugs* Second is still awesome though!
HL just got released, and...well...it really didn't do much for Kingdra or Ampharos. Both decks can't dish out enough damage in one sitting to survive, and 150 HP isn't really as big as it sounds. Amphy dies to Machamp, no question, and Kingdra dies to a whole bunch of stuff. Ninetales ex isn't the card to bring Kingdra back, and when Nurse is rotated out like it soon shall be, the deck is through. Kingdra doesn't really have much hope for the future.
On the other hand, Ampharos ex is going to make a strong showing in RSon, because Blastoise ex will be a powerhouse, and Ampharos is just the deck to counter it.
HL was released not too long ago, so people are still messing around with decks, but we've still got a few weeks left before the Stadium Challenges, and about two months until Worlds, so we'll have to start playtesting like crazy in order to smooth out the edges of our Crobat, our Metagross, our Exploud, and our Machamp. They're all new, and all have potential, but we need more time, which is exactly what we have.
I still think that an archetype will win Worlds. A lot of people I know that were 1st place material purposely played rogue because they wanted to test it out. Exploud is one particularly deserving deck, GymLeaderPhil placed 16th in 15+ with it. For those of your thinking it's easy to place 16th, it really isn't. Not in Nationals, kiddies.
But those people will probably go back to Blaziken. They won't play the rogue decks because the rogue decks don't keep up with Blaziken all of the time. Blaziken and Swampert are the only two decks that can go 50-50 with Blaziken all the time. There will be a lot of Gardevoir, but I think Blaziken will make another strong showing and come out on top. A few red face paint decks might wiggle their way in to top sixteen or top eight, but I see either Blaziken or Swampert winning the entire thing. Good luck to all though, no matter what you play.
Amphy and Kingdra really can't keep up anymore. Kingdra t3 is a little slow for a monster that can't do that much damage, and Amphy does 40-70 a turn? That's not enough to keep those decks alive, folks. Right now, Amphy and Kingdra are roguer than rogue. They had their 15 minutes of fame, and now it's over. Deservedly so: they couldn't keep up, so they got left in the dust.
You want to use an ex protector in your Kingdra deck? Just play Wobbuffet. =/
