Garchomp: Can Forbidden Light push it to competitive status?

When Ultra Prism cards began to come out of Japan, one of the most hyped up cards was Garchomp. While the fact that it had HP lower than the stage two average from the Sun & Moon era, the fact that it could do 200 damage simply by playing a draw supporter was enough to turn some heads. Combined with the Lucario from the same set, which allows you to get any card from your deck as long as a Garchomp is in play, and it seemed like a legit contender in the meta. But, like so many non-GX powerhouses that get hyped up before their english release, it just couldn't hold up to the hype. But now that a new version of the Ultra Prism Garchomp coming out of Forbidden Light, could we see Garchomp-Lucario become a viable deck?

The Core of the Deck

Garchomp-Lucario is one of the more strategy heavy decks in the format, and that mainly comes from the fact that you have to constantly play a specific supporter in order to hit the needed damage to compete. And without the Plasma Magnezone in standard, it makes this deck very skill intensive to play.

Now, in expanded, if you can somehow fit a Plasma Magnezone into a Garchomp deck, absolutely do it. Some may argue it goes against the idea that you should never play multiple stages 2s in the same deck unless one of them provides a draw engine, but the fact that you can play a draw supporter and something like a Guzma in the same deck, Plasma Magnezone essentially provides a draw engine. Albeit, maybe playing two stage twos and a stage one is a bit clunky, but I'm not the one to test that (Mainly because I wasn't playing during the Plasma era).

But if in standard, if you can figure out how to be able to work without heavily relying on Guzma to take key KOs and instead use stuff like Escape Rope, you might have a chance. And with Lucario having the ability to search anything, including Cynthias to boost damage, or Escape Ropes to attempt to pull up KO targets, it's a relativly consistent deck.

 Learning to Fight

With the release of Forbidden Light, we may have the card we need to push Garchomp to success. And that card is... Garchomp?

No English Scan at the time of writing. Sorry!

But here's the thing: It's now a fighting type. And unlike Zygarde-GX, it has access to all the tricks fighting pokemon gain. You get Strong Energy to add damage, Diance Prism to also add damage, and since a fighting type Gible is also in forbidden light, you can use Brooklet Hill to search out either the Riolu or Gible. But the big thing with this new Garchomp is that it hits things for weakness. With the Dragon version, unless you were playing against a RayBoar deck in expanded, you weren't hitting anything for weakness. But now you hit Zoroark for weakness. And while Zoroark may drop in play due to Buzzwole becoming the king of the format, Zoroark will likely see play as a draw engine in some decks. Which mean hitting a fighting weakness is still going to be relevant, and that's especially true if Zoroark-Greninja becomes relevant in the meta. But the one question that will decide it's relevance is if it can hit relevant numbers.

Crunching the Numbers

In the current meta, there are going to be 3 number you want to be hitting: 170, 190, & 210. 170 for stuff like Tapu Lele, 190 for Buzzwole & Ultra Necrozma, and 210 for Golisopod & Naganadel. I don't mention Zoroark because, again, you're hitting Zoroark for weakness and because of that, you simply need to attack and have any sort of damage boost (Choice Band, Strong Energy or Diance Prism) and you have a Zoroark KO.

For all of these numbers, I'll be looking at how to hit them if you don't play Cynthia. With playing Cynthia, you just need a damage boost of any sort and you get the KO. For 170, without playing Cynthia, you'll need a Strong Energy, Diance Prism and a Choice Band to hit it, which isn't the most difficult thing to hit at the moment. After this, however, it gets a bit clunky. For 190, you need to add another strong energy to hit the number, but if you do attach a second strong, you probably don't want to attach a double colorless to finish the attack cost. And for 210, you need all 3 energy to be strong energy, and have the Diance & Choice Band, which makes it incredibly vulnerable to enhanced hammer if you don't play special charge, and combined with it's grass weakness makes it not the best in a Golisopod matchup. So, not as great against pokemon with more than 190 HP unless you play Cynthia. But the ability to now be able to Guzma up a Tapu Lele and KO it because of stuff like Strong Energy will definitely help Garchomp in the long run.

Will "Sharks Spottings" go up?

Even with the fighting damage boost options, without a playing a Cynthia, Garchomp can't hit relevant numbers. But most decks that Garchomp would have a hard time against generally can attack multiple turns in a row, and therefore, those big pokemon don't have to be dragged up with a Guzma and that allows you to still play Cynthia. Even if you need to drag something up, just play Escape Rope. While it doesn't give you choice on what gets put up, it can still force your opponent into an awkward position. But all of this comes down to whether you want to play a non-GX stage two deck that's relativly slow in the early game, but can hit huge damage after it sets up. If players can find a way to set up quickly, it could be a great option. Otherwise, it may just be relegated to being a fun league deck like it has been in the months since Ultra Prism released. We'll just have to wait.