Miska Saari's Suns & Moons Deck Strategy

By Michael Martin

Miska Saari attended a "Pokécamp" in Finland to help him prepare for the 2006 World Championships. There, he decided to go with a Lunatone/Solrock deck, and he worked hard to fine-tune it, naming it "Suns & Moons." Apparently he made a good choice, because he went on to use the deck to earn the 11–14 Pokémon Trading Card Game World Championship title.

Lunatone and Solrock are an interesting couple of Pokémon. Whenever the pair are in a Pokémon TCG expansion, their Poké-Bodies and attacks always interact with each other in interesting ways. The pair that were released in EX Deoxys have especially good synergy. Lunatone (EX Deoxys, 36/107) has an attack that does extra damage for each Solrock in play, letting it do a maximum 60 damage for only 2 Energy when you have a Bench filled with four Solrock. Meanwhile, Solrock (EX Deoxys, 47/107) has a Poké-Body that bumps up the Hit Points of all Lunatone in play from 60 to 80. That’s very good for a non-ex Basic Pokémon in this format. So, if 80 Hit Points for a Basic Pokémon is good, how would 100 Hit Points be? Miska added in some Energy Root Trainer cards (EX Unseen Forces, 83/115) which can be attached to Lunatone to boost its Hit Points up by 20 more, bringing it to a level that you usually only see on Basic Pokémon if it’s a Pokémon-ex. The end result is that Miska had a main attacker with 100 maximum Hit Points and the ability to dish out 60 damage per turn on the second turn.

Miska also put one each of another version of the two cards in his deck. These alternate Lunatone (EX Legend Maker, 20/92) and Solrock (EX Legend Maker, 25/92) Pokémon can each shut down another of the popular Pokémon that might help an opponent get any card he or she wants out of his or her deck: Lunatone shuts down Magcargo (EX Deoxys, 20/107) and Solrock shuts down Pidgeot (EX FireRed & LeafGreen, 10/112). By being able to shut off the main search powers of many of his opponents, Miska was able to take them out before they could respond in kind.

The Stadium cards Cursed Stone (EX Legend Maker, 72/92) and Desert Ruins (EX Hidden Legends, 88/101) are useful for doing extra damage to Pokémon-ex and Pokémon with Poké-Powers, which most other top decks rely on. And since Miska’s deck has neither of those kinds of Pokémon, he didn’t have to worry about taking any of that damage himself.

One final thing to look for in Miska’s deck is the group of cards that has become known as "The Holon Engine." A deck’s engine is the combination of cards that are used to get out all the cards actually needed to set up the deck’s strategy to win. The Holon Engine is a group of Trainers that all have "Holon" in their names. Most are from the EX Delta Species set, along with one from the EX Holon Phantoms set. Each one serves a different function, such as getting Pokémon out of the deck, drawing cards, or putting cards from the discard pile back into the deck. The card that really makes this engine roar, though, is Holon Transceiver (EX Delta Species, 98/113). Holon Transceiver allows you to search your deck or your discard pile for any Supporter that has Holon in its name. And because Holon Transceiver is not a Supporter itself, you get to use the Supporter card that you retrieved immediately! This gives you tremendous flexibility to get whatever kind of Trainer that you need the most on the current turn, even if you have already used it and it’s in your discard pile. Look for this engine to remain popular throughout the upcoming tournament season, so pick up the Suns & Moons deck and get familiar with it now!