N's Zoroark ex

Intro + Notable Placings

• 6th, 8th at World Championships 2025 (1 Toedscruel build, 1 Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex build)

• 1st at Regional Pittsburgh (Toedscruel build)

N's Zoroark ex is the anti-meta deck, though not nearly as polarizing (or inconsistent) as Crustle. Its matchup against Gardevoir ex is very good (it sets up faster since it's a Stage 1, and hits for Weakness), and Toedscruel/Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex will handle Gholdengo ex, but the rest of the matchups are mostly a sea of even or unfavorable. Not to downplay its accomplishments, it put two players in the Top 8 of Worlds 2025 (like Charizard ex), and successfully denied a Gardevoir ex victory at Pittsburgh.

N's Zoroark ex draws its way out of low Ionos easily with multiple Zoroarks on the board. However, its damage output isn't very high; its bread and butter attack only does 170 damage.

Game Plan

Get N's Zorua into play and evolve it as soon as possible. Ideally you'll want to Buddy-Buddy Poffin for two of them, evolve both by your second turn, and try to draw into a third one. Trade is a strong draw engine that will sustain you for the rest of the game. It's at its best when you're using it to discard cards that you no longer need for fresh draws, but in the event that you have to discard something that you might need later, Super Rod or Pal Pad can get it back.

You usually want to set up a board of 3 N's Zoroark, 1 N's Reshiram, 1 Munkidori. You need lots of Zoroarks for draw power, and they rarely become liabilities; they're the highest-HP Pokémon in your deck, and if an Energy-less one gets Bossed out, you can switch back to the one with Energy using any one of the multitude of mobility cards in your deck, or do a manual Energy attachment + Energy Switch to get the new one powered up and attacking. With those 5 Pokémon, that leaves only one Bench slot, which you'll use reactively depending on what your opponent does: maybe drop Fezandipiti ex after a KO, or Pecharunt ex if that's your answer to their attempted Boss trap, or a second Munkidori if it'll let you snipe something on their Bench.

At the bare minimum, you can play N's Zoroark ex like Ceruledge ex: evolve into your bulky Stage 1 attacker, start bashing for 170 damage every turn, and worry about their high HP Pokémon later. Zoroark has more to it than Ceruledge, though. If you play Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex you could power that up instead, and if you play Cleffa you could set up more with Grasping Draw instead of attacking with Zoroark right away. In the Gholdengo ex matchup, if you're on Toedscruel, you could work to set up Toedscruel while sculpting your hand with Trade to have a means to get it back into play if they KO it.

Attackers

N's Zoroark ex is your main attacker. It's pretty bulky for a Stage 1, and functions as a draw engine too. You'll need an N's Reshiram on your Bench for it to copy attacks from. Virtuous Flame does 170 damage, which is not a lot, but is serviceable — it 2HKOs Stage 2 ex's (or 1HKOs with Weakness, i.e. Gardevoir ex), and with some help from Munkidori or Binding Mochi, can take out weaker Basic ex's in 1 hit too. Powerful Rage is the other copiable attack, threatening to 1HKO them in return if you survive their swing, deterring attacks that heavily damage but don't KO Zoroark.

N's Zorua can become an attacker on occasion. It doesn't need N's Reshiram to attack, though since its damage is low, you'll need to rely on Weakness, Munkidori, and/or Binding Mochi to get KOs. Against Budew, if you start T1 N's Zorua, attach Energy and pass, they attack with Itchy Pollen on their turn, on T2 you can drop Munkidori, attach Energy, Adrena-Brain the damage back, and Scratch for the KO. Against Gardevoir ex, a Binding Mochi-boosted Scratch will KO any of their non-ex, Darkness-weak Pokémon.

Bloodmoon Ursaluna ex is the late-game attacker. You don't have the usual suspect (Latias ex) to retreat it for free, but you have Professor Turo's Scenario to get it out from the Active Spot, and depending on the build Pecharunt ex or Switch too.

If you play Janine's Secret Art, Fezandipiti ex can also become an attacker. It's a Darkness-type, so it's a valid target for the Darkness Energy attachment. Combine that with Energy Switch for the other Darkness Energy and a manual attachment from hand, and you're ready to snipe stuff with it.

Pecharunt ex can attack too, though if your opponent is at 2/3 Prizes, Bloodmoon Ursaluna ex will have it beat in Energy cost or damage done. Nevertheless, you might have a spare Darkness Energy on it from an earlier Janine's Secret Art that you were planning on Energy Switching onto something else; if so, you can pivot to attaching another Energy onto Pecharunt ex and attacking with it.

First or Second?

Arven builds want to go second, as they're looking to play Arven → Buddy-Buddy Poffin + Technical Machine: Evolution or Nest Ball + Technical Machine: Turbo Energize. 

Cyrano builds want to go first, as it's less susceptible to hand disruption that way. If you go first, you can Buddy-Buddy Poffin for N's Zoruas on T1, then play Cyrano on T2 for multiple N's Zoroarks and evolve all of them immediately. If you go second instead and play Cyrano on T1, you will be sad when your opponent Ionos you and bottom-decks all the Pokémon you searched out. (The retort of "why not just hold the Cyrano and play it T2 instead to avoid the Iono blowout?" is answered by "that's exactly what you do when going first, so why didn't you choose to go first to begin with?")

ACE SPEC

Secret Box or Unfair Stamp. Secret Box increases setup consistency, being able to search for the Buddy-Buddy Poffin + Technical Machine: Evolution combo like Arven, plus Artazon for one more Basic. Unfair Stamp is Arven-searchable hand disruption.

Variants

There are many different ways to build N's Zoroark ex. The main questions are:

1. What is your Gholdengo ex counter? This is the most popular deck, so it makes sense to target it with a tech. Possible answers are:

   • Toedscruel, shutting down Superior Energy Retrieval. It's also applicable against Dragapult ex, as that deck usually runs 4 Night Stretcher.

   • Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex walling it. If you play this, you'll want to add 1 Fighting Energy (obviously), and stick to Arven with 2 copies of Technical Machine: Turbo Energize.

   • N's Darmanitan hitting it for Weakness, with the option to use Flamebody Cannon against other decks. If you play this, you'll want to add 1-2 Reversal Energy and 1 Powerglass.

2. What is your main setup Supporter? Your options are either Arven, or Cyrano + Hilda. With Arven, you have a toolbox of Items and Tools that can turn it into 2 Evolutions early (TM: Evo), 1 Evolution late (Ultra Ball), 1 Basic (the 3rd Nest Ball), or 2 Energy (Earthen Vessel). Cyrano is more reliant on drawing into the right cards, but your Supporters give you access to 3 ex's, or 1 Evolution + 1 Energy; the same things Arven can find. Cyrano covers some Basic (Pecharunt, Fezandipiti) ex searching duties, so Artazon is preferred over the 3rd Nest Ball.

Other Options

• Cleffa: Setup attacker. If you play this, go up to 2 Professor Turo's Scenario so you have more outs to free up a Bench space if your opponent doesn't KO it.

• Roaring Moon ex, Okidogi ex, Hoopa ex, Bombirdier ex: Outs to Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex. Roaring Moon ex and Okidogi ex can use Janine's Secret Art for acceleration (Okidogi ex also benefits from getting Poisoned by it). Bombirdier ex requires Powerglass for acceleration; you'll only see it in builds that use N's Darmanitan.

• Pecharunt ex, N's Castle, Switch: Additional mobility options. Pecharunt ex can enable Binding Mochi, but the Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex build doesn't use it as it's a liability.

• Janine's Secret Art, N's PP Up: Energy acceleration. Janine's Secret Art also enables Binding Mochi, and N's PP Up can save some space on additional recovery cards (Night Stretcher/Super Rod).

• Team Rocket's Watchtower: Hates on several draw/search engines: Noctowl, Pidgeot ex, Fan Rotom, Squawkabilly ex, Dudunsparce. Note that it also removes Bloodmoon Ursaluna ex's Ability, so you might want to take it out of the deck if you play Watchtower. Usually played in Cyrano builds.

The huge amount of deckbuilding options available to N's Zoroark ex can be overwhelming. If you're building it on your own instead of netdecking, here's a checklist of things that the top lists have, to ensure you don't stray too far off the beaten path:

• A setup attack. This could be Cleffa, or a Technical Machine.

• Enough Basic searchers. Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex builds have 4 Nest Ball, 3 Buddy-Buddy Poffin, 2 Artazon. Arven builds have 3 Nest Ball, 4 Buddy-Buddy Poffin. Cyrano builds have 2 Nest Ball, 4 Buddy-Buddy Poffin, 2 Artazon.

• 3 hand disruption cards. That means either 3 Iono, or 2 Iono + 1 Unfair Stamp.

• Some kind of Energy acceleration. This could be Technical Machine: Turbo Energize, N's PP Up, or Janine's Secret Art.

• At least 2 Stadium bumps, i.e. Artazon or N's Castle.

Tips

• When you have several useless cards in your hand that you could discard to Trade, try to save the Pokémon Tools for last if you're playing Arven, or ex's if you're playing Cyrano. If you get Iono'd low and happen to topdeck one of those Supporters, you can play them to find discard fodder for Trade to rebuild your hand.

• Using Adrena-Brain on your attacking N's Zoroark ex reduces Powerful Rage's damage output. Don't use it (or choose to move only 1-2 damage counters) if you need N's Zoroark ex to remain damaged for a 1HKO.

• If you're using Pecharunt ex + Binding Mochi to boost your damage, the attacking N's Zoroark ex should start the turn on your Bench. Don't bring it to the Active Spot immediately after your opponent takes a KO. Arven can find both pieces of the combo (getting Nest Ball as the Item for Pecharunt ex).

• The Poison from Janine's Secret Art or Pecharunt ex's Subjugating Chains can be used to generate damage on your side for Munkidori to Adrena-Brain over, albeit very slowly (you only get 20 damage every turn cycle).

• You can discard Darkness Energy to Trade in order to set up N's PP Up.

• You do not need to bench N's Reshiram if you're not attacking with N's Zoroark ex. This is more common with the Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex build; some decks just cannot beat Ogerpon and you can go all-in on it, using N's Zoroark ex purely as a draw engine and not an attacker.

• Against decks that play Dusknoir, hunting their Duskull lines is a priority. These decks usually rely on Cursed Blast to set up 1HKOs on N's Zoroark ex, so if you keep them off of it, they can't attack your Zoroark without eating a Powerful Rage KO in return.

• In the Toedscruel build with Arven, against Gholdengo ex, if they KO Toedscruel, you can Super Rod both Pokémon back to deck, use a Basic searcher to get Toedscool on the Bench, and evolve it with Technical Machine: Evolution. Normally you wouldn't think of attacking with a setup move in the mid/lategame, but in this specific scenario, it maintains the lock on Superior Energy Retrieval and kills their damage output, so it's a valid thing to do.