Mightyena/Seaking

Overview

This deck uses Mightyena and Seaking, two Stage 1s with decent attacks and 0 Retreat Cost. Mightyena can set up with Seek Out and disrupt hands with Pull Away. Seaking can spread damage with Triple Breach to set up Rend's bonus damage, or an eventual Ancient Technical Machine [Rock] devolution KO.

Ideal Gameplan

Play your Basics, play your Stage 1s, attach Energy, and go to town. It really is that simple. All your Pokémon are single-Prizers, so virtually any time you draw a Basic, you want to throw it on the Bench and worry about evolving it into an attacker later.

Mightyena is better early-game, as it can set up with Seek Out, and Admin-ing them followed by Pulling Away leaves them with 4 cards in hand. Note that some opponents will draw to 4 off Admin instead of 6 to avoid discarding, but their hand size will still have been reduced regardless.

Seaking's Triple Breach sets up its Rend attack to do 50 damage. You can also aim to Triple Breach an Evolved Pokémon multiple times, then devolve it with Ancient Technical Machine [Rock] for the KO.

Be careful of what you put Energy Root on; you can't change your mind and replace it with Cessation Crystal later. You usually want to play Energy Root later, after running your opponent out of Windstorms, so they can't Windstorm Energy Root and get a KO from the reduced HP. Energy Root lets your Stage 1s survive 70-80 damage attacks from big δ ex's (Rayquaza, Gardevoir, Flygon, Kingdra).

Unique Points

This deck doesn't have any Basic-searching attacks or Trainers. Instead, it relies on straight draw Supporters to refresh its hand into more Basics.

This deck doesn't have discard outlets like Holon Supporters or TV Reporter to thin the deck, but it arguably doesn't need them. If any cards are dead in the matchup, you can just play them to be rid of them. Rocket's Admin. and Professor Oak's Research encourage this, as they draw back up to a certain number of cards, so dumping as much as possible from your hand before playing them results in the most card advantage.

Tweaks

Solid Rage: Replacing Energy Root.

Cursed Stone: Replacing either Stadium.

Strengths

This deck gets set up and attacking fairly fast. Both Stage 1s have 1- and 2-Energy attacks, so you start swinging very quickly — it's not like you're sitting behind a Jirachi using Wishing Star, or waiting to hit your 3rd Energy to use your Pokémon's strongest attack. The 2-Energy attacks are efficient for their costs: Pull Away with a Darkness Energy (which you can find with Seek Out one turn before) does 40 damage, and Rend on a damaged Pokémon does 50.

This deck is resilient against Pow, as all the Stage 1s are attackers and can retreat for free. The deck doesn't use Double Rainbow or Scramble Energy, which can be Pow-ed to a Basic and consequently discarded.

Weaknesses

This deck will struggle if your opponent is able to build up (via Stage 1, instead of Rare Candy) to a Stage 2 that can one-shot your Pokémon. Stage 1s typically have 70-80 HP, so you will have to hit it twice with Rend and/or Pull Away before ATM Rock-ing, meaning they'll get to take out two of your attackers and four of your Energy. If they Candied the Basic to Stage 2, it's slightly easier to handle, as you might have been able to sneak in 10 damage with Triple Breach or Desert Ruins, so you only need one Rend/Pull Away followed by ATM Rock to KO the Stage 2.

This deck cannot beat anything that tanks damage with Metal Energy. With even a single Metal Energy attached, Triple Breach does no damage, and the next best thing is to Pull Away with Darkness Energy for 30.