Standard Deck Tech: Hisuian Goodra VStar - Tanker Deck

Hello everybody. I'm Rodrigo, and I'm here to bring you more ideas and deck possibilities for the Standard format in Pokémon TCG.

In this article, with the hype of the Lost Origin expansion, we will start with another deck with casual potential for being a resistant Pokémon and that will yield good matches, making some opponents pull their hair in anger: Hisuian Goodra.

With no weaknesses in the dragon-type archetype, Hisuian Goodra (as well as Giratina) has these benefits that give him the advantage to not take double damage from weakness, such as the Blissey-V that has the fighting type, which is the reference of tanker deck currently.

And with new Lost Zone mechanics, Hisuian Goodra has his own set-up mechanics that we will break down and explain how to play with this type of deck.

Deck Analysis

The deck consists of energizing Hisuian Goodra as much as possible because of the different energy requirements it asks for: metal and water, for that, only the card Mirage Gate LOR 163 can fulfill this role, as long as you have 7 Lost Zone cards to pay this tribute. Considering this, we see the importance of Comfey LOR 79 with its Flower Selecting ability, that if it is your active Pokémon, you look at the top two cards of your deck: one goes to your hand and the other goes to the Lost Zone.

Following this script from starting with Comfey to putting the seven cards in the Lost Zone, use the Mirage Gate to power up two different basic energies from the deck for Hisuian Goodra plus the energy of the turn to ensure his attack readiness.

And for the best play on the first turn on your turn, try to use the Battle VIP Pass FST 225 to put into play at least all the Comfey LOR 79 possible to speed up the process of using its ability.

There is also the Trainer Supporter Colress's Experiment LOR 155, which can help with the setup set-up to use Mirage Gate LOR 163 as quickly as possible.

And finally, when you have as many cards as possible in the Lost Zone, reaching 10 cards, you can resort to the card Fantina LOR 157 which has the tribute cost of having at least that amount mentioned in the Lost Zone (from ten cards) to perform the effect: Your Pokémon V takes 120 less damage on your opponent's turn from attacks from their Pokémon, making Hisuian Goodra last a long time in play).

Important Pokémon

As a secondary attacker, we have Cramorant LOR 50 which serves as a resource of a prize card to deal against Miltank ASR 126 which is an anti-Pokémon V card on the Blissey V CRE 119 deck, which would be one of our worst matchups.

For resource searching, we have Radiant Greninja ASR 46, which with its Concealed Cards ability, you discard an energy card from your hand to draw two cards.

Trainer Cards

- Colress's Experiment LOR 155 is precisely for the deck's focus, the heart of the gear of the send function to the Lost Zone, which will be very frequent in decks that will have this approach.

- Fantina LOR 157 is for the damage reduction of your Hisuian Goodra-V.

- Boss's Orders BRS 132 is mandatory in your deck to force a specific knockout or delay the opponent with a Pokémon that can't go head-to-head against your Hisuian Goodra.

- Mirage Gate LOR 163 is excellent for power-up, as it can take two different basic energies and put it on one of your Pokémon. But for that, you need to have at least 7 cards in the Lost Zone to fulfill its effect.

- Training Court RCL 169 increased in price, given the current meta-game and how it behaved, and valued the Rebel Clash expansion. Its effect: you and your opponent, between turns, can take a basic energy from the discard pile and put it in your hands.

- Crystal Cave EVS 144 is just a complement to heal your Hisuian Goodra.

- Ordinary Rod SSH 171 helps to recycle resources, returning two energies from discards to the deck and two Pokémon as well; and always being able to choose either the energies, or the Pokémon, or perform both.

- Pal Pad SSH 172 is the recycling of Supporter cards that are in the discard pile and can be returned to the deck. And precisely the maximum urgency to want to recycle resources is the card Fantina LOR 157 that guarantees the durability of your Hisuian Goodra.

- Air Balloon SSH 156 reduces the retreat cost by two colorless energies for the Pokémon it is equipped with. We have only one copy in our deck, so be careful when choosing which Pokémon to call.

- Choice Belt BRS classified as a Tool card, grants 30 additional damage against Pokémon V this card is attached to.

Advantages

Without the harm of having some weakness, the dragon type in the current format can last well against most decks, guaranteeing durability for many turns, unlike the Blissey-V deck that has a weakness to Fighting type.

And with that, it goes well against cutting-edge decks like Origin Forme Palkia-VStar, Arceus-VStar + Flying Pikachu-VMax, Jolteon-VMax, Urshifu-VMax (Rapid Strike), Ice Rider Calyrex -VMax, Shadow Rider Calyrex, Hisuian Zoroark-VStar and even with great effort Mew-VMax.

Even with massive damage, these decks will experience damage closing issues if your Hisuian Goodra VStar plays on the Fantina LOR 157 turn to take 120 less damage, even more with the benefits of Goodra's second attack effect, Rolling Iron, which grants an additional 80 damage reduction.

There's also the Pokémon's total healing factor thanks to the Moinsture Star ability that gives the opponent a headache, causing damage from 330, for example, to be reduced by 200 points.

Disadvantages

The same problem that you have with Lost Zone decks in general is discarding key cards that can get in the way of some resource shortages with Late and End Game deadlines with Comfey LOR 79 abilities and Colress's Experiment LOR 155.

Therefore, be cautious with the selection of cards that end up in the Lost Zone so as not to harm your set-up and resource management.

Decks that guarantee auto knockout, like Giratina VSTAR LOR 131 and Yveltal SHF 46, are matches that Hisuian Goodra can easily lose.

It's a fun casual deck. It is not known if there will be a big space for a top tier 1 or 2 within the regionals or at the International in São Paulo soon, but that it will guarantee itself as a consistent tanker deck, that's a fact.

However, only time will tell if it will be able to move up the ranks to be taken seriously in the format.