How To Train Your Dragon, Possible Rayquaza GX Decks

Rayquaza Gx is one of the strongest cards to come out of the Celestial Storm expansion causing mass hysteria over the set and with everyone itching to get a hold of their favourite emerald dragon, there are a few things first you must know about the mechanics of the card which will lead to the devastation of your opponents board state. But first you need to know your classification of your dragon!

Classifying Your Dragon - Rayquaza GX

Rayquaza is a 180hp Dragon-Type Pokémon which means that it has a weakness to Fairy-Type Pokémon, previously other Rayquaza cards have been colourless. With a hefty three energy retreat cost, Rayquaza is a powerful Pokémon that does not get around easily but uses the wind to gracefully soar the skies of the Hoenn Region. While appearing to look quite friendly and not very menacing with its mainly toothless grin, this Legendary can really pack a punch with all three of its key mechanics being an energy accelerator for itself to power up its Draconic attacks.

Stormy Winds is the ability on the Rayquaza Gx card which is much suited to the Pokémon due to its direct links to how the Pokémon works in its own origins within lore and the video games. This ability reads, "When you play this Pokémon from your hand onto your Bench during your turn, you may discard the top 3 cards of your deck. If you do, attach a basic Energy card from your discard pile to this Pokémon". This means that any energy cards that get discarded will get accelerated back into the field of play to allow energies to constantly recycle themselves. If you play 4 Rayquaza Gx you can discard up to 12 cards from your deck this allowing you to thin naturally without the need for Supporters such as Professor Sycamore. While being able to accelerate energy to itself, there is no other card which can do that from the discard pile other than Malamar or Rayquaza from Guardians Rising, without using a GX move.

Rayquaza GX, Celestial Storm.

Rayquaza's main attack is Dragon Break, making reference to the old Mega Rayquaza card with the Emerald Break attack which was previously extremely played. With the use of Dragon Break, "This attack does 30 damage times the amount of basic Grass and basic Lightning Energy attached to your Pokémon", Meaning that the energy acceleration of the Rayquaza GX can allow for stronger attacks to hopefully sweep the opponents Pokémon off their feet. Zoroark Gx being one of the main threats coming out of the format currently has around 210hp which means 6 energies in play and a choice band will allow the player to take a knockout. With Rayquaza being a basic it will also have access to a Fighting Fury Belt, meaning the card have 40+hp and 10+ damage still meaning either a Tapu Koko Spread or 7 energies in play will be required to take a knockout.



Finally the GX move being Tempest GX, quite fitting that it is the attack of Rayquaza with it being the Sky-High Pokémon being able to control weather aspects of wind and thunder. This Gx move allows you to "Discard your hand and draw 10 cards. (You can't use more than 1 GX attack in a game.)". This creates a similar effect of Drampa's Big Wheel GX, although it is discarding your hand. Which looking from multiple views can be seen as good with the energy acceleration from discard but I believe that it will not be used unless the player is incredibly desperate.


Now we have analysed our Dragon it is time to, just like the film, delve into other classifications we can put within our already founded Rayquaza Gx card to form deadly combinations to help devour the competition.

Strike Class - Attacking Aids

In terms of attacking, Rayquaza is by far one of the most powerful cards in the current TCG. The attack that does 30 for each grass or lightning energy stacks up to do disastrous amounts of damage as you stack up your bench with the emerald dragon. The question is how do you accelerate that energy onto Rayquaza and the answer? It is really easy.

Max Elixir, BreakPoint

With Rayquaza being a Basic Pokémon, it has access to Max Elixir which has been powering turbo styled decks since the release of the card in BreakPoint. For those who do not know what it does, you can look at your top 6 cards and if theres an energy attach it to a benched basic Pokémon. This in combination with Rayquaza's ability means that you will have to run an incredibly high count of energy both Grass and Lightning. I have seen some play as little as 12 and others as much as 16 (50-50 splits), which then will be easier on the eye if you end up not having as many in your deck. 

So what else that makes Rayquaza Uber charged? Latias Prism Star. For a single energy it attaches an energy to each of your Dragon-Type Pokémon, on your bench. So, if you're running out of energies in your deck and you need to storm the field with energy, play down the prism and you can attach up to 5 energies which can tally up to 150 damage ready to roll. Latias also can be used as an energy tank for your Rayquaza's attack as it has 130hp which does not make it easy to knock out with a Zoroark GX which is seeing a lot of play.

Latias Prism, Celestial Storm

We have ways of attaching from the discard and from our deck, surely there can not be that much else that can turbo charge Rayquaza anymore with a howling roar of Dragon Break. Well there is, we can actually switch energies around when we need to with energy switch. This card has been in the TCG for a long time and the effects of the card help in these turbo styled decks. With your active Rayquaza maybe only having two energies attached it may be worth while playing two of these over a Parallel city or a extra Band/Belt. Energy Switch adds so much more versatility to an already dynamic deck which makes this archetype one of the best coming out of Celestial Storm. 

Fear Class - Fear into your Opponents!

When you play Rayquaza you have to understand that you are bringing the Year of the Dragon back early from the Chinese Calendar and show that the card will be destined to be one of the best decks at the World Championships in Nashville. To do this you will need to test vigorously against other decks so you know your outs and theorise how you will get round your bad match ups. Either that or.... I can just tell you what I have worked out from my own testing:

Hoopa, Shinning Legends

• Rayquaza outspeeds anything that does not return one hit knockouts
• In a matchup between Buzz and Rayqyaza, Which ever deck sets up quickest wins.
• Single Prized attackers are not Rayquaza's friend. (Baby Buzz, Dedenne, Hoopa etc.)
• Safeguarding Pokemon love playing Rayquaza (Baby A. Ninetales, Hoopa, Jolteon EX etc.)
• Rayquaza is fantastic against Malamar with use of Parallel City
• Rayquaza is very good at hitting on average between 150-210 Turn 2
• Rayquaza does have consistency issues so shuffle draw cards are needed in this deck.
• Gardevoir is a difficult match up but depending on each players start, it can develop quite well for the Rayquaza player. 



Dedenne, Forbidden Light

• Dedenne is an incredibly powerful card. Beware of the mouse.

In terms of testing, these are my brief notes of theorising and testing incredibly little into the pre-rotation format due to my consentration being solely on post format. Although I have enjoyed some games recently of the Worlds format as it is such a cool period to play as usually there is a lot of developing archetypes from the new set that go with old rotated cards like Max Elixir and Rayquaza.

Anyways, from these notes I have put together you can see that Rayquaza is a very favoured card in the current meta with not many bad match ups apart from those one or two players who will be developing rogue decks to come into play with single prized attackers.

Mystery Class -  How will it cope?

In Conclusion, how Rayquaza will do is a complete mystery due to how short this Worlds format is, lasting only a month before older sets are kicked out. But with the support of the new and the old I believe that Rayquaza will have a place in the future format with Dragon Majesty coming out in September which will provide a much needed boost for the typing which has seemingly been forgotten by the Pokémon Company. Especially with the amount of resources that we are losing in the coming rotation, there will be a lot of staples that this turbo deck will be missing. 

Although looking positively into Worlds format, Rayquaza is held up in some of the highest regard possible as it is a deck with a chaotic streak in the deck which can break anybody playing the TCG this summer at any events. Even with the possibility of Gardevoir seeing an uprise in play, the Emerald Dragon will sure enough be doing circles in the sky over Nashville at the end of the month.

Thanks for Reading my article, I would like to note on my absence of writing on this blog page. It has been a hard few months for myself both with my University work and launching Paradigm TCG with weekly streams and dedicating my time finding ways of expanding the team further. It has been in the pipeline for a long time and it is something which has exhausted my time greatly, but for now I am back to writing articles and hopefully solely developing my game for the moment.

Once again thank you to everyone who supports my content,

Charlie

@ThePelipperPost
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