Muk ex was the exception to the rule that Grass-types weren’t that great. While probably not a top-tier deck due to the presence of Gardevoir ex for the entire time it was legal, Toxic Gas could shut down the likes of Blaziken/Rayquaza ex and Blastoise ex, not to mention the completely dominated Dark Dragonite/Dark Electrode combination (a deck that I really need to mention more in the future, it was really good). That made this card a play that, while risky, could pay off immensely, and some players did actually win decently large tournaments with Muk ex at the center of their decks. There were some flaws here, obviously, but almost shutting down a few of the best decks around was too good to ignore.
100 HP was really bad on a Stage 1 ex, as it was the lowest possible that was still affected by Desert Ruins. The Psychic Weakness was also a pain, as Gardevoir ex could easily take advantage of it and still managed to win despite losing Gardevoir’s Energy acceleration. The Retreat Cost was average at 2, which was surprisingly low for Muk standards. Something like Warp Point was still useful, especially with the forced opponent switching, but Muk ex could retreat if required without it.
Toxic Gas was indeed the same name as the legendary Pokemon Power from Fossil Muk. It ignored all Poke-Powers and Poke-Bodies other than Toxic Gas, which shut down the likes of Blaziken, Gardevoir (though Gardevoir usually won), Blastoise ex, Pidgeot, and many others. There was a bit of a catch here that wasn’t in the original, however: Muk ex had to be the Active Pokemon for it to work. That was the one thing that kept Muk ex balanced, and turned it from a no-brainer top deck to a very good but probably second-tier choice. That was what gave it some match-up issues with Gardevoir and the like, and let Pokemon Reversal give other decks Muk ex usually did well against a chance to win.
Poison Breath did 10 damage for 1 Grass Energy with a guaranteed Poison. Poison also ruined Poke-Powers, but since Muk did that anyway, the Poison just added some nice chip damage. A low-Energy Muk could use this decently early on in its lock, but when available, the second attack was better.
That second attack was Slimy Water. For 2 Grass and 1 Colorless Energy, it did 40 damage plus 10 more for each Energy in the Defending Pokemon’s retreat cost. This usually added up to 60 or more, making Muk ex a surprisingly good attacker along with its lock. It helped against the likes of Team Magma’s Groudon and Nidoqueen due to their Grass Weaknesses as well, KOing both.
Of course, while this review has been very positive, Muk ex wasn’t perfect. It was very prone to Psychic-types, as mentioned before, and even one Pokemon Reversal flip that went the right way for the opponent could let the player set up quite quickly. Blaziken decks, for example, could get a Blaziken ex up and ready, get that active, and blast away that Muk ex that was forced to the Bench. Another Muk ex would likely be ready soon enough, but that gave up two Prizes and the Blaziken user would be in a relatively good position with other things likely waiting to attack as well.
Even with that in mind, Muk ex was still a very good choice. It basically ran over any Water decks out there, and had a solid chance against most other decks that weren’t Psychic-type. It was by no means unstoppable, and probably wasn’t as safe to use as several other decks, but it could absolutely hold its own. Pair this with Jirachi from the Deoxys set for drawing early on and Swoop! Teleporter to get that Grimer up and and Evolve quite early and you had a very dangerous deck indeed. Tough match-ups with Psychic-types made it very risky, but it just demolished certain other decks to the point that it was hard not to at least consider this.
Tell me if you’ve seen this before: A card that dealt 100 damage for 3 Energy, requiring 2 different types and heavy discarding. Yes, Latias ex just yesterday did this. Latios ex was on about the same level, with its own positives and negatives in comparison that basically evened out in the long run.
Latios ex had 100 HP, which was 10 higher than Latias ex. It was actually a worse number, as 100 had to deal with Desert Ruins and a Pokemon at 90 didn’t. The Colorless Weakness was still a pain with Rayquaza ex being popular, and the occasional Crystal Shard could help other decks hit Latios ex hard as well. Latios’ Resistances were just slightly worse than Latias, but still solid: Fighting was the same, and was probably the best type to Resist at the time, but Grass was quite useless compared to Latias’ Psychic. The Retreat Cost was 2, which was quite average. Due to Latios ex’s issue with discarding, packing Switch was ideal.
Energy Stream was Latios ex’s weak attack, doing 10 damage for 1 Colorless Energy. A Coin was also flipped, and if heads, you could search your deck for a basic Energy card and attach it to Latios ex. It wasn’t reliable, but was certainly okay early in games just because Latios ex had little Energy support to speak of.
Luster Purge hit hard, no question about it. It had a weird Energy cost of 1 Grass, 1 Lightning, and 1 Colorless Energy and did 100 damage. It also required discarding 3 Energy. On one hand, it required even more Energy discarding than Latias ex did, and with two types with nearly no Energy acceleration to speak of. On the other hand, the Energy didn’t have to include 2 different Energy types, so the discards could be all of one type and let you have a slightly more consistent deck in the long run.
Overall, Latios ex was pretty bad, and was about on par with Latias ex in usefulness. 100 damage for 3 Energy was spectacular, but the strange costs and terrible amounts of discarding without much help to get Energy back just left it out of any serious deck. If you want to see how a card like this can be done right, see Rayquaza ex, which will be reviewed in 3 days. This type of card can work, but not when done like Latios ex was.
Magcargo ex was a Fire-type attacker. That alone made it viable, as Blaziken support could definitely make a deck running Magcargo ex go. It wasn’t as good as many other options, and clearly didn’t have the impact as Neo Revelation Magcargo did in its format, but Magcargo ex definitely had some things going for it. Being able to vary damage by altering the amount of discarding was a very nice perk.
Magcargo ex had 100 HP, which was actually as bad as there was for a Stage 1 ex. It was the lowest number to be hit by Desert Ruins, so Magcargo was actually quite frail for a Pokemon-ex. The Water Weakness was also annoying, as cards such as Suicune ex, Walrein, and Blastoise ex could pick on it. The popularity of the type to take on normal Blaziken-based decks didn’t help. The Retreat Cost was high at 3, and with all the discarding Magcargo ex was going to do, packing Switch and Warp Point was almost essential.
Melting Mountain did 20 damage for 1 Fire Energy, decent for that cost. You also had to discard the top card from your deck, and if that card was a Basic Energy card, you attached it to Magcargo ex. Interesting in theory to get more Energy onto Magcargo, sure, but Magcargo didn’t want to even be the Active Pokemon until it was ready to attack.
Lava Flow was a very nice attack. 40 damage for 3 Energy wasn’t that impressive, but you could discard basic Energy attached to Magcargo ex. For each discarded Energy, 20 damage was added. What was nice about this was that discarding was completely up to the player, and could be aimed at hitting the exact number to knock a Pokemon out. Sadly, it was common to see Pokemon that Magcargo needed to take a couple of turns to take down, and big attacks took a lot of resources, leaving Magcargo either stuck in a very bad spot or requiring a switching card in the hand to Retreat it during the next turn.
Magcargo ex wasn’t as good at taking hits or dealing damage as some other choices, such as Blaziken ex for the first and Rayquaza ex for the second, and was an ex which gave up an extra prize compared to Ninetales. That being said, it did still work a decent amount of the time, and was very usable in good decks if you didn’t want to use the other choices for whatever reason.
So I just had another on-stream Expanded match against pokedecks I managed to pull a win when I really thought I’d be dead. But here’s the WACKY deck I brought to the match.
2 Switch HS 102 4 Trainers’ Mail ROS 92 1 Shadow Triad PLF 102 1 Scramble Switch PLS 129 4 Ultra Ball DEX 102 4 Colress Machine PLS 119 2 Lysandre FLF 90 3 N DEX 96 4 Professor Juniper DEX 98 4 VS Seeker ROS 110 3 Sky Field ROS 89 4 Team Plasma Badge PLF 104
Energy - 11
4 Double Colorless Energy NXD 92 4 Plasma Energy PLF 106 3 Mystery Energy PHF 112
The idea is to speed power-up Snorlax with Shaymins and Colress Machines while getting out Deoxys with Hoopa. Ideally filling your Sky Field bench. Then attach Plasma Badges to the Hoopas and Shaymins so that they count as Plasma Pokemon towards Snorlax’s attack. In a bind you can also attack with Deoxys, but make sure it’s only against high-energy Pokemon.
It’s a fun deck, but it has it’s problems. There’s no response to Wobbuffet, Enhanced Hammers, Aegislash, Vileplume/Giratina, and probably lots of other cards. It’s just mean to be a for-fun/proof-of-concept deck.
