Tournament Reports - Pokémon TCG Pocket Week 28

The early tournaments following the release of Celestial Guardians brought an unmatched level of diversity to TCG Pocket’s competitive scene, boosted by Rare Candy giving a newfound energy to archetypes centered around stage 2 Pokémon. But does this dynamic still hold, after the old Basic Pokémon ex archetypes have made a strong comeback in the latter half of the week? Let's analyze the three biggest tournaments and see how the metagame evolved.

FrogEX Weekly Cup #18

Player count: 378 players

Prize pool: $50

Compared to last week, the metagame has shifted back toward the big Basic Pokémon ex that once dominated: Giratina ex (often paired with Greninja) and Darkrai ex, similar to the Shining Revelry format.

So much so that Solgaleo ex, the most represented deck both overall and in top cut last week, failed to land even a single representative in top cut this week. We’ve somehow returned to a format where big Basic Pokémon ex dominate, especially decks featuring Giratina ex. And guess what: they can also exploit Rare Candy themselves.

ppitopin piloted a Darkrai ex/Giratina list with a twist: 2 Froakie, 2 Greninja, and 2 Rare Candy, cutting back on some Supporters to accomodate for the frogs. Greninja’s ability is one of the strongest in TCG Pocket, and when Water Shuriken combines with Nightmare Aura, nearly any Pokémon falls within OHKO range from Giratina ex’s Chaotic Impact. Evolving Greninja by turn 3 or 4 offers a huge edge in grindy matchups, but also against Rare Candy decks as Greninja can soften up opponents’ Active Pokémon early. A single Iono adds consistency for finding Greninja and Rare Candy. Although playing the whole Greninja package comes at the cost of sacrificing useful supporters and tools, playing more Basic gives slightly more resilience to hand disruption effects.

Fedped brought a similar list and reached top 8, losing only in the mirror match against ppitopin. Both players went undefeated against other Darkrai ex and Giratina ex decks: a solid proof of this variant's power. ppitopin himself lost to Fab from the FrogEX team, who went on to win the tournament.

A full Link deck centered around Arceus ex is pulling it off, two sets after Triumphant Light was released! Thanks to Rare Candy, it can now evolve Zubat into Crobat a turn earlier and skip the intermediate stage, the bat deals even more damage than Greninja! However, the main attacker in this Energy-only deck is Carnivine, which doesn’t need to evolve to start hitting for 50 damage from turn 2. That’s enough for a one-hit knockout against most decks running Rampardos, and a two-hit knockout against Darkrai ex, now one of the most played decks in the format. Arceus ex is essential not just to enable both Link monsters, but also to act as a powerful attacker in the late game.

The Supporter lineup is particularly interesting: beyond the obligatory Leaf, which helps retreat an unfortunate Arceus ex opener, and a single Iono to increase the chances of having both Crobat and Arceus ex on curve, the deck includes Guzma. Beyond the overall qualities of this new supporter like removing 20HP of Pokémon equipped with Giant Cape, there's also a very concrete use case that makes it valuable: against Darkrai ex, if your opponent goes second and attaches Rocky Helmet to their Active Pokémon, Carnivine can be knocked out by the combination of two Nightmare Aura procs + two Rocky Helmet triggers. As Rocky Helmet gets more popular than Giant Cape lately, this is all the more reason to run it.

Another spicy inclusion is Red Card, which has seen a surge in popularity as a counter to Rare Candy decks, especially those running only three Basic Pokémon or fewer like Charizard ex or Rampardos decks.

Fab finished the tournament with a 6-1 record against Darkrai ex decks, which strongly supports the viability of this archetype in a meta filled with heavy strategies.

$1000 Celestial Guardians Tournament | GODZLY

Player count: 810 players

Prize pool: $1000 (sponsored by Theo from Godzly's Discord)

Content creator Godzly organized a massive event featuring a $1000 prize pool, drawing over 800 players despite taking place on the same day as Ursiiday’s weekly. The result? Near-total dominance by the Gen 4 legends: Giratina ex, Darkrai ex, and Arceus ex made up almost half of the event's meta.

The top 8 was largely Giratina and Darkrai decks. Notably, three of the Giratina ex builds featured a new twist: Greninja, Oricorio, and Shaymin.

Here with Rozzi's list, the concept becomes clear: running just one Giratina ex, the deck shifts focus toward Energy: not only to enable Greninja as an attacker but also to benefit from Irida’s healing effect across the board. Fully committing to the Greninja strategy, all versions of this variant include 2 Cyrus. Oricorio serves as an excellent tank against Darkrai ex, and with the support of Irida and Shaymin, taking it down with Nightmare Aura becomes a slow, drawn-out process, while Greninja is free to chip away with Water Shuriken. Since the deck also runs a secondary Energy type in Energy, Oricorio isn’t just a defensive wall: it can strike back as well. G

The result is a highly modular deck: it can stall behind Oricorio while charging up Giratina ex, sniping from the Bench with Water Shuriken and healing its Pokémon, or it can shift into an aggressive mode with an early Greninja, pulling opposing Pokémon off the Bench for a Mist Slash knockout.

While it mostly won against Darkrai ex decks during the tournament, it struggled more against Giratina ex variants that included non-ex attackers. Fittingly, that’s the kind of list that brought Nosfeare to victory as the tournament winner.

While we're now used to seeing Snorlax as a non-ex attacker in Giratina ex decks, Darkrai ex decks have generally avoided including a non-ex option. But as we've just seen, Oricorio is now slotted in a bunch of decks specifically to counter Darkrai ex Giratina, so it becomes a necessity. Instead of running Snorlax and Barry, Nosfeare opted for the new Komala, whose ability puts it to sleep whenever you attach an Energy, essentially preventing it from attacking the turn you're powering it up. So why go with it?

First, Komala can one-shot Oricorio with Rolling Tackle and crucially survives the Water Shuriken + Mist Slash combo, hanging on with 10 HP. Its attack also threatens other key Pokémon in the format, being capable of two-shotting Darkrai ex, and it comes online quickly for just . Second, since status conditions only apply in the Active Spot, you can attach Energy to Komala on the Bench and then retreat it in with something like Leaf, allowing it to attack immediately. And if you do have to attach Energy to it while it's Active, Pokémon Center Lady can wake it up in a pinch.

Unlike Snorlax, which requires a significant commitment (2 Snorlax and 2 Barry), Komala frees up deck space for more impactful Trainer cards, including 2 Mars. While running two hand disruption cards might seem excessive –especially given that Mars saw almost no play in previous formats– it shines in mirror matchups, where players often hold large hands full of Supporters they can only play one of per turn. It’s also particularly strong against Rare Candy decks, which often have to sit on a combo piece (either Rare Candy or the Stage 2) while waiting to draw the other. Mars can easily punish that.

In this overwhelming sea of Darkrai ex and Giratina ex decks, gustavo01gk managed to bring a different archetype into the top 8: Meowscarada Decidueye.

Focusing on Meowscarada, which can one-shot Darkrai ex by turn 4, the list included a single Rowlet and Decidueye ex, used either as an early aggressor or a late-game threat after two Meowscarada have gone down, forming an optimized 1-1-2 point map. Leaf Cape pulls Meowscarada out of knockout range from combos like Chaotic Impact + Nightmare Aura or Water Shuriken. Supporters like Erika and Lillie help suppress any attempts to take down at the Stage 2 Pokémon with sub-100 damage pressure.

The deck leans heavily on going second to hit its timing curve and overwhelm the opponent early, but it also wrestles with the classic Rare Candy deck weakness: consistency. Even with Sprigatito doing its best to stabilize the early game, the draw and setup demands are still tight.

Ursiiday's Pocket Weekly #28

Player count: 941 players

Prize pool: $400 (sponsored by XPCollect)

It was, unfortunately, a complete domination by the Generation 4 legendary Pokémon. A clash that Giratina ex ultimately won, thanks to this innovative list played by MST:

While pairing Greninja with Giratina ex is now standard, including 2 Tapu Lele, a new card from Celestial Guardians previously seen only in the Banette Psychic Toolbox deck, is a bold new twist. In mirror matchups, the little legendary guardian can deal massive damage to Giratina ex, whether it's Active or on the Bench, making it a clean counter to strategies that rely on Oricorio as a frontline tank to safely use Broken-Space Bellow.

In addition to Greninja’s Water Shuriken damage, Tapu Lele trades extremely well on the point map and does so quickly, for just 1 . It also chips at any Pokémon with Energy attached, helping your own Giratina ex reach a one-shot range with Chaotic Impact. Tapu Lele only needs a single Energy to attack and retreat, which also lets Giratina ex come online faster by tapping into Energy in the Energy Zone (which is usually the only type of Energy the deck runs).

This synergy gives even more opportunity to make the two Cyrus live, since both Greninja and Tapu Lele can trigger it, with Tapu Lele doing so without even needing Rare Candy. Overall, this version is more versatile and more cost-efficient than Snorlax, and might just become the new reference build for the archetype.

Where Is the Celestial Guardians metagame at?

Stage 2 decks thrived last week, but the consistency of big Basic Pokémon ex archetypes, combined with a growing trend of including one to two hand disruption cards like Red Card and Mars, has completely shifted the early dynamics. While Rare Candy is far from dead, decks that use it successfully now limit themselves to at most a single Stage 2 line in two copies. Greninja and Crobat, the only Stage 2 Pokémon with abilities that directly deal damage, are the biggest beneficiaries of it. They're often used as a support and not even attackers for the big Basic ex archetypes.

Looking at the top three decks, they all feature Pokémon with abilities that damage the board even before attacking: Darkrai ex’s Nightmare Aura, Greninja’s Water Shuriken in Giratina ex lists, and Crobat ex’s Cunning Link in Arceus ex decks. The opportunity cost of running a single Stage 2 line with such a powerful ability is negligible when the payoff is this high.

Oricorio’s Safeguard raised hopes of countering the dominance of Pokémon ex, but these damage-dealing abilities are equally as big of a problem. They allow big Basic Pokémon ex to one-shot threats they normally couldn’t handle, circumventing their standard damage output without needing to commit to type advantage or specific Supporters like Red. It's hard to imagine a fair solution that addresses this issue without creating others.

Looking ahead, it’s unlikely the format will see major shakeups. The foundations are simply too strong. Relying on a Stage 2 as your main attacker just isn’t efficient in Pokémon TCG Pocket, they serve better as support for the far more efficient Pokémon ex. For Stage 2 aggro Pokémon to compete, their power would need a dramatic boost, something on par with Charizard ex in the main TCG. But at that point, they might be too strong to handle. That kind of power creep would push the game closer to the feel of modern TCG.

Which raises a difficult question: is it time to consider modifying existing cards to promote deck diversity?