In the new Pokémon TCG: XY—BREAKpoint expansion, players are discovering all kinds of incredible new cards and strategies. With 11 new Pokémon-EX, 5 new Pokémon BREAK, and many other Pokémon to choose from, there’s a lot to explore. One card that has the potential to be a game changer is the flagship Pokémon of XY—BREAKpoint, Shiny Mega Gyarados-EX. Let’s look at how to get this powerful card into action.
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Blast Off with Mega Gyarados-EX!
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11Water Energy
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4Professor Birch's Observations
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3Professor Sycamore
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1AZ
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1Judge
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1Lysandre
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1Skyla
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4Dive Ball
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4VS Seeker
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3Max Potion
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2Gyarados Spirit Link
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2Mega Turbo
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2Ultra Ball
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1Rough Seas
Mega Gyarados-EX has a lot of qualities you’ve come to expect from a Mega Evolution Pokémon. It has a massive amount of HP and can deal a lot of damage when it’s powered up. But it also shares the struggles of a Mega Evolution Pokémon: it has to wait a turn to evolve, it ends your turn when it comes into play (unless it has Gyarados Spirit Link attached), and its attack costs a lot of Energy. Plus, if it goes down, it takes a lot of resources to prepare another one. To use a Pokémon like Mega Gyarados-EX successfully, it’s going to need some help.
Once Mega Gyarados-EX
gets going, its attack power is virtually unrivaled. With four Water Energy
attached, its Blast Geyser attack hits for 200 damage, which is enough to take
down most Pokémon in one attack. With six Water Energy, it deals 240 damage,
meaning that even Mega Evolution Pokémon aren’t likely to withstand the attack.
If you can keep using Blast Geyser, you’ll be taking all of your Prize cards in
no time.
The biggest drawback to Mega Gyarados-EX is its lack of speed. Mega Evolution is a slow process to begin with, and the Blast Geyser attack requires four Energy to use. It’s hard to eliminate these issues completely, but our example deck includes a few methods to accelerate the process. Mega Turbo is arguably the simplest solution, letting you attach a basic Energy from the discard pile to Mega Gyarados-EX. Palkia-EX’s Aqua Turbo attack can grab two Water Energy from your deck and attach them to Mega Gyarados-EX, but it can be a little slow because Aqua Turbo requires two Energy. If you’re feeling risky, you could try Gyarados-EX's Stormy Seas attack to get some extra Energy onto it, but it’s better not to put Gyarados-EX in harm’s way as the Active Pokémon until you’re ready to attack with full force. It’s going to take a few turns to get the Blast Geyser attack going, so any way you can speed things up will be important.
It takes a lot of resources to power up Mega Gyarados-EX, so keeping it healthy long enough to
make multiple attacks is crucial. This monstrous Pokémon does have 240 HP, so
it’s likely to withstand an attack or two before going down. To maximize its
survivability, our example deck uses a combination of Golduck BREAK and Max Potion. If Mega Gyarados-EX takes damage, you can move the basic Energy from it to another
Pokémon using Golduck BREAK’s Hyper Transfer Ability. Then Max Potion can heal
all of the damage with no drawback, and then Hyper Transfer can move the Energy
back. Mega Gyarados-EX will be fully
healed and ready to keep using that Blast Geyser attack!
A few other supporting Pokémon can help round out this strategy. Most of the Pokémon in this deck have a high Retreat Cost, so switching between them can be painful. Manaphy-EX can lend a hand with its Aqua Tube Ability, which removes the Retreat Cost of any Pokémon that has Water Energy attached. Golduck BREAK’s Hyper Transfer can move that Energy around, so any Pokémon can benefit from Aqua Tube when you need it.
From the right Pokémon, to large Energy needs, to useful
Trainer cards, it takes a lot of resources to get this deck functioning
properly. With that in mind, Octillery is a great fit. Each turn,
you can use its Abyssal Hand Ability to keep at least five cards in your hand,
making sure you always have options to work with. Just like every other Pokémon
in this deck, it’s a Water type, meaning Dive Ball can search
for it. You could replace Octillery with Shaymin-EX for its one-time Set Up Ability, but a slower deck
like this might prefer the steady flow of cards that Abyssal Hand provides.
The biggest threat to a defensive healing strategy like the one this deck employs is a Pokémon that can do enough damage to take down your star player in one attack. Fortunately, there aren’t a lot of Pokémon that can deal the 240 damage needed to take down Mega Gyarados-EX in one hit—but Weakness is a problem. Since Mega Gyarados-EX has Weakness ×2 to Lightning, any Lightning-type Pokémon just needs to do 120 damage for a Knock Out, and there are plenty that can hit that mark. Our example deck has a whale of a solution: Wailord-EX! This 250 HP behemoth has a Weakness to Grass types instead, so it can be used to combat Lightning-type Pokémon. Even if you aren’t facing any Lightning types, you can hide behind Wailord-EX for a few turns to set up your other Pokémon. Odds are, your opponent won’t be able to take it down quickly no matter what they’re playing. Weakness Policy is another way to deal with Mega Gyarados-EX’s Weakness problem, but it could get removed by an opponent’s Xerosic or Startling Megaphone.
Shiny Mega Gyarados-EX is just one of the exciting new cards in XY—BREAKpoint. Many new strategies are waiting to be discovered! Be sure to check back at Pokemon.com/strategy for the latest news and updates.
