The King of Decks

Hello, this is Travis. Because of the off topic discussion lately, I think it’s important to get back on track. I will be doing a LuxChomp review and analysis, complete with matchups, and how to tech for your metaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa…

Sorry I fell asleep thinking about how horribly boring that would be. While I was asleep I had a dream about a Pokémon. A Pokémon who has been sitting in the corner with all of the other un-playable rare cards. I think I’ll write about him instead. His name is Nidoking, and with the right list, this Pokémon might be able to shake things up a bit. Let’s start off with the Poke-Man himself.

Nidoking

Nidoking starts off with a very nice 140 HP. His Body gives him +20 HP for every Nidoqueen on your bench. His attack does 80 and guaranteed poison for FFCC. The water weakness is a big deal as Gyarados is a very widely played deck as of late. I’ll talk about that nightmare later. Let’s assume we’re not fighting someone who can OHKO a fully loaded Nidoking using no energy on turn 1.

The retreat cost is 3 which hurts, and the resistance is nice, but un-needed when you consider the only well played lightning type is Luxray GL and he will “Bright Look” around the Nidoking, pulling up Nidoqueens to get stuck, and then the resistance really isn’t an issue anymore.

With some Magnezone decks on the rise, it could prove useful. Assuming the game is going average, a Magnezone Prime would have to discard 5 energy to get rid of 1 Nidoking. That could prove to be an issue for them late game.

Why is Nidoking plausible you ask? With the help of science! Assume that middle game, you will have at least 2 Nidoqueen, and 1 Nidoking. It’s almost a necessity to Belt the Nidoking. With a belt, and 2 Nidoqueens, Nidoking’s HP is at 200.

What’s that? 200 HP isn’t enough. Well, you my friend are very picky. However there is more. 80+20 is 100 base damage, plus the 10 for poison. That my friends is the magic number. You know who has 110 HP? Luxray GL, Garchomp C, and lots of other annoying SP friends. But wait there’s more!

The other Nidoking that you should include brings a whole new dimension to the main Nidoking’s attack. This one deals 2 damage counters back to your opponent if they attack your active with his Poke-Body “Teritoriality”. That’s ANY active. This Nidoking will save your life by just sitting on the bench. Assume you attack first. Nidoking does a total of 110 damage. Your opponent has limited options, assuming they survived.

If they attack the active, that brings them to 140 damage. 10 for poison, and 20 for “Territoriality.” Even if they remove poison and attack, it still brings them to 130, which is perfect for most stage 1 or 2 Pokémon. An important part to realize is that if the opponent is knocked out, there’s a good chance that it was caused by Poison or Territoriality. Anyone want to say goodbye to “Fainting Spell,” “Water Rescue,” and Rescue Energy?

The attacks on the RR Nidoking aren’t too bad if you’re down either. Seriously, this deck calls for one or two of these Nidokings.

What’s better than having a 200+ HP tank sweeping with one explosive swing of his horn? That’s right, getting healed while you do it. Or pizza. Anyway, Nidoqueen from Rising Rivals is a must for the deck. Its Body allows you to remove a damage counter from each of your Pokémon between turns. That can build up. I’ve cycled Nidokings on the bench to keep them going for much longer. Warp one back until “Maternal Comfort” heals one completely, and then warp again.

With 200+ HP Nidoking should be able to hold his own for a while. The attacks on Nidoqueen are useful, but you’re going to want this one to just sit on the bench and not be knocked out, or become active.

Because you may only use one “Maternal Comfort” Poke-Body in between turns, you may choose to put in one Nidoqueen from TM. I’ve had to use it’s attack “Return” to draw before and it gave me the cards I needed to get a Nidoking the next turn. The RR Nidoqueen has some useful attacks though so it’s really player preference.

You may choose to try this Pokémon. His name is Spiritomb and he’s got multiple items on his “To Do” list. He both holds the line by stopping your opponent from playing very needed and helpful trainers, and he evolves your Pokémon as an attack. This may give you the time you need and the resources to do it before your opponent starts kicking.

The downside? Well, that’s all he does. After a while he’s just a bench sitter waiting to give your opponent a prize. He also becomes dead weight in your hand mid game, and slows you down a bit as you have to lower your trainer count to compensate. It’s really a player’s preference over whether or not they play Spiritomb. Try it out if you want.

Regirock only has one use. He’s pretty much your energy. With a Regirock Stark Mountain Combo you can set up a Nidoking in 2 turns instead of three. Simply use his Power, move the energy with Stark Mountain and you’ve given him an energy without even using your energy for the turn. Awesome right? I know!

Now for the Trainer part of the deck, it really depends on if you want to run Spiritombs or not. A Spiritomb run deck is played alot like this but you’ll want to max collectors and bebes so you’ll be sure to start with one and get to evolving as soon as possible.

Spiritomb slows your opponent, not stops them, so be careful. You’ll want some trainers, but not too many as you don’t want to have too many useless cards in your hand at the beginning of the game, or be locked when a Spiritomb accidently becomes active.

If you’re not running Spiritomb, max Pokemon Communication, and throw a Luxury ball in there. Max Rare Candy, throw a bunch or Warp Points, and Junk Arms in there, and just trainer it up. Sure the VileGar matchup will be bad, but this deck is so slow you’ll need all the help you can get. That’s my opinion on it anyway.

You’re also going to need some Expert Belts in this deck. In the best case scenario, your opponent will be fighting 3 Nidokings. Three of them alone should prove a challenge, and for the damage to work, the belt is needed. You can choose to run 2 or 3 depending on if you run Junk Arm or not.

I am torn between Broken Time-Space and Stark Mountain for this deck. Both of them help speed quite a bit. Most decks that aren’t SP run BTS so you can assume it will be there for you, or you can run it yourself to get your Kings and Queens set up quickly. The Stark Mountain really helps with the energy acceleration late game, so you can run one or both.

Skeleton List

This list is 47 cards. This is what I think is the bare minimum the deck should run as far as cards to just generally set up. The 13 other spaces could be used for techs or for more consistency.

The Reason This Deck Is Not Normally Run

Alright actually there are a few reasons this deck is not run. The first is that it is mega slow. Not only do you need a stage 2, but you need two or three stage 2s, a tool, and four energy. This deck is so slow, it can make Regigigas look like Gyarados. Luckily Nidoking has weakness on Regigigas. Both points bring me to reason two.

Gyarados. In a normal situation Gyarados will be doing 90 to 110 damage. x2 weakness is just horrifying. That’s 180 to 220 damage that Gyarados will be doing by turn one or two. Really, there is only one way I can think to even remotely deal with this, and that is Exploud from Supreme Victors.

He removes your Pokémon’s weakness, letting your Nidokings survive two or three turns against one Gyarados. I’ve actually never tested an Exploud, but I don’t think Gyarados has many ways to get to the Exploud should it be benched. Keeping one there could shift the match to a pretty favorable one.

So really that’s it. It would be awesome to see some Nidokings being played around. I believe that if played right, this deck has some serious potential, even in today’s meta.