Regionals have just begun and people are going to use the next few weekends to play as much Expanded as they can to make some big wins. Players may be playing a lot of old favorites with new friends splashed in to take a seat at the top tables. This does not mean that we can ignore the new things blooming around us. Especially as there may be some new strategies sprouting up in a format that has just started. There can be some mischievous new tricks coming up thanks to some recently released cards. This week we will be featuring the beautiful card, Florges EX.
Florges EX was originally released in Phantom Forces. It is a 160 HP Fairy type EX Pokemon with two attacks. The first attack that Florges EX has is called Lead which cost a single Fairy energy. Lead allows you to search your deck for a Supporter card and place it in your hand. Florges EX’s second attack is called Bright Garden and cost a Fairy and another energy. This attack does 20 damage times the number of Fairy and Grass type Pokemon that you have in play. Florges EX has a weakness to Steel type Pokemon and a resistance to Darkness type Pokemon. It has a two energy retreat cost.

The Pros
The first good thing about playing Florges EX is that it has an attack that is quick and easy to set up. You just need two energy attached to Florgest EX to start attacking for hopefully a lot of damage. You will need a full bench of five to do at least 120 damage but that is actually a lot of damage for just two energy. The amazing part is that this damage output can go even higher with cards such as Sky Field which will allow you to place even more Pokemon on the bench and Muscle Band.
There are plenty of Grass and Fairy Pokemon that can be on the bench while Florges EX is out in the active battling. Most of these Pokemon are support Pokemon that will help out Florges EX. Some of these Pokemon include Xerneas who can accelerate energy from the deck and Aromatisse who can move energy around. If you need some useful Fairy type Pokemon then there is also Carbink, Klefki, Xerneas EX and Slurpuff. This bunch of Pokemon should be more then enough to fill up your bench for Florges EX to draw power from.
The Cons
The one thing that makes Florges EX a risky play is the amount of HP it has. 160 HP is a low amount of HP for an EX Pokemon and can easily be knocked out by heavy hitting non EX Pokemon or EX Pokemon.
It doesn’t help that Steel have seen a raise of popularity with M Rayquaza taking advantage of Bronzong’s Metal Links ability. This deck likes to run a few Aegislash EX and Heatran who can easily knock out Florges EX thanks to it’s weakness.
To make matters worst, Florges EX can be a little slow to set up. In order to do heavy damage output, you need to hurry up and fill your bench with Fairy and Grass type Pokemon. That can be a bit difficult as you also trying to flood your field with Fairy energy using Xerneas and set up an Aromatisse to freely move energy around. That can be a lot to manage in such a small amount of time. It also leaves you open to a Lysandre from your opponent who wishes to knock out Aromatisse before it gets set up.
How to Play It
If you are going to play Florges EX then you will need to make sure you are running at least two cards: Xerneas and Aromatisse.
You will want to start off with Xerneas who can use Geomancy for a single energy. That way you can take two Fairy energy out from your deck and attach it to two of your benched Pokemon. Aromatisse can then move that energy however you want to power up Florges EX. You will want to run a few Xerneas in order to ensure that you start with at least one while also have others who can sit on the bench to fuel Florges EX’s Bright Garden attack. You will want to run a few Aromatisse for similar reasons. It is advised to place a few Spritzee on your bench because they tend to be popular targets for your opponent’s Lysandre. Your opponent may want to knock out your Aromatisse in order to prevent you from move energy around to power up a Pokemon and keep it on a heavily injured Pokemon.
Other potential partners for Florges EX includes Gardevoir EX and M Gardevoir EX. These two cards use to lead the way for the Fairy decks while Florgex EX was used as a backup attacker. Now the roles have reversed as Florges EX has taken the lead while M Gardevoir EX has taken the back seat. M Gardevoir EX is still a strong attacker but it can be rather slow and risky to play in case you do not get enough Fairy Energy on the field. So you may want to reserve M Gardevoir EX as a late game attacker after you spent a few turns using Bright Garden and slowly put energy from your hand on to your bench.
A stadium is needed for this deck and there are two great ones to play. You could use Fairy Garden in order to give your Pokemon free retreat as long as they have a Fairy energy attached to them. That can be handy when getting a Xerneas out of the active.
The other stadium you may want to play in this deck is Sky Field. This stadium allows you to expand your bench to have eight Pokemon on it. This makes Florges EX’s Bright Garden attack go from doing 120 damage to 180 damage. A bench filled with Grass and Fairy type Pokemon with Sky Field out will allow you to knock out those pesky 180 HP EX Pokemon.
You could run both Stadiums but that could risk your consistency. If you do opt to run just Sky Field then you may want to run a few Switch in your deck in order to freely retreat your Pokemon.
If you are playing this deck in Expanded then you have a few options. You may want to run at least two or three Exeggcute and use Battle Compressor to put them in the discard. If you do that then you can use their Propagation ability pull them from the discard and place them on your bench to increase the damage output of Florges EX. You may want to keep at least on Exeggcute in the discard just so you can save it so you can pull it out to pay for Ultra Ball when the time comes to use it.
Max Potion is another card that you want to run along side with Florges EX. This card will help ensure that Florges EX stays on the field for a little bit longer. If you have Max Potion in your hand and Aromatisse is on the bench then you can easily move the energy off Florges EX to use Max Potion. This will heal off all the damage off Florges EX without losing your energy.
Florges EX can really sprout some heavy damage once it gets set up. If your garden is well tended then you will have a beautiful flower that will outshine your opponent. If you play your cards right then you will be growing victory after victory. So make sure you give this card a try and show some real flower power to your opponent!
The post TCG Jump: Featured Card- Florges EX appeared first on Pokémon Crossroads.


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