Pokemon TCG Best Decks – Lost Box deck tech

In every competitive card game, there’s always decks that rise to the top of the pack. The Pokemon TCG is no different. Today, we’re going to look at one of the Pokemon TCG’s best decks for Standard, Lost Box. This is a deck that has a few variations to it as well. So we’re going to look at the deck and what cards from Pokemon 151 might be played.

If you’re looking to get into the game, check out our guide for the best Pokemon TCG Live starter decks. Also check out our guide on redeeming Pokemon TCG codes on TCG Live. These guides will help you get started with diving into Pokemon TCG Standard online.

Pokemon TCG Best Decks – What is Lost Box?

The Lost Box name comes from it using the Lost Zone mechanic, and is also a “toolbox” deck. This means that there are cards in the deck that allow you to handle a variety of situations. What makes this one of Pokemon TCG’s best decks is its ability to leverage a vast amount of resources, while also setting up some incredibly powerful Pokemon.

This deck has both Pokemon and Trainers that both will abuse the Lost Zone, as well as be very versatile in their applications. So, let’s take a look at a deck list, we’ll break down the ins and outs of this deck.

This deck list is a Lost Zone Giritina VSTAR list that has been floating around high competitive play. It’s also a more streamlined version of the starter deck that you get on TCG Live. For an importable list for Pokemon TCG Live, check out the deck list.

Lost Box – Lost Zone synergies

First things first, let’s look at the cards that we’re using for our first game plan, abusing the Lost Zone. The Lost Zone is essentially cards that have been removed from the game. Our deck wants to hit various thresholds of the number of cards that we own that are in the Lost Zone. These cards either help us get there or are our payoffs for hitting those thresholds

One of our key cards in the deck is Comfey. This allows us to draw cards from our deck, but also fill up the Lost Zone with cards. Then we have the big dog itself, Giritina V and VSTAR. Giritina V puts cards into the Lost Zone and has a powerful attack. Giritina VSTAR is the payoff for having 10 cards in the Lost Zone with its VSTAR Power. This power can knock out any Pokemon regardless of health.

Our back-up Lost Zone enjoyer is Sableye. We want to use its Lost Mine move primarily. If we have 10 more cards in the Lost Zone, we distribute 12 damage counters on our opponent’s Pokemon. This is a form of spread damage that gets around Manaphy. This can result in some very quick knock outs.

Finally, for the Pokemon, we have Cramorant, which gives us a quick 110 power attacker. We’ll have four cards in the lost zone, so getting in free attacks is never a bad way to go.

As for Trainers, we have a few that interact with the Lost Zone. Colress’s Experiement digs us five cards deep, letting us keep the best three, and the other two get sent away. Mirage Gate is the way that we can quickly set up our Giritina and Sableye with energy. This lets us start stacking damage counters and taking prizes.

Finally we have a Lost Vacuum, which can deal with a Pokemon Tool or stadium in play, even our own. It’s possible to target your own stadiums, which can help you get enough cards into the Lost Zone to start your game plan.

Lost Zone Toolbox Cards

Now, let’s look at our toolbox set of cards. Radiant Greninja and Manaphy are the only other Pokemon in the deck, which both provide their own utility. One is for card draw, and the other to protect against spread damage.

Now for our Trainers, Battle VIP Pass is a very powerful card to get our bench set up very quickly, and also it can be used as easy Lost Zone fodder after the first turn. 

Path to the Peak is a great way to stall out opposing Rule Box Pokemon with abilities, such as Raikou V. As mentioned earlier, it can also be used in combination with Lost Vacuum to push you over your threshold. 

Roxanne is very important for us finding cards, as we may end up having to sacrifice some of our early game Pokemon like Comfey in order to get online. So Roxanne essentially resets our opponent, and gives us a nice boost of resources.

Probably the two most important tools in this box come in the form of Switch Cart and Jet Energy. With these cards, you have the opportunity to switch in and out multiple Comfey in a turn, to give you a very quick start to your Lost Zone thresholds, or give you the last few cards you need to go off.

Lost Box variations

As we mentioned at the onset, there’s a few variations

Lost Box Variation 1 – Dragonite / Raikou / Kyogre / Hawlucha / Drapion

This variation of the deck is one that drops the Giritina setup and leverages Dragonite V, Raikou V, and either Kyogre and Hawlucha, or Drapion V. These variations look to set up a full bench very quickly, and then start sending in big attacks with Raikou, Dragonite and Drapion. It also is great at spreading damage around via Kyogre and Hawlucha.

This is the most common variation of the deck that you’ll see and this appears to be the slightly better way to play the deck.

Lost Box Variation 2 – Charizard EX

The second variation that we’ve seen for this deck is one that’s actually very new. Rather than play all these extra Pokemon, this variation only has one Pokemon in mind for its big damage dealer, Charizard EX. Particularly it’s using the brand new Charizard EX from Obsidian Flames. What’s very interesting about this is that it’s not playing the full evolutionary line. It’s only playing Charmander, Charizard and three rare candies to evolve. It has other means of finding those cards, specifically Ultra Ball and Raihan.

This deck wants to go fast and get the ball rolling quickly. We see one copy of Beach Court also in the deck to aid in this. This makes our basic Pokemon’s retreat cost one colorless less, meaning we can easily switch our Comfey in and out, and eventually leave a stronger Pokemon in our Active slot at the end of the chain.

Pokemon TCG Best Decks – Pokemon 151 additions

So with the new Pokemon 151 set releasing, what additions from that set would make an impact in this deck? 

Well, right off the bat, the Charizard EX from 151 would actually be incredible in the Charizard variant. We have the means to stack it with energy, as well as a way to evolve it without the full line. On top of that, it dishes out some insane damage. It also has an advantage over the Dark type Obsidian Flames Charizard in that, if we run into a Grass type Pokemon, we can actually deal super effective damage against it. Not to say that we’d replace the Obsidian Flames version, but there’d be a split of both.

Additionally, a few cards that definitely could be warranted include Mew EX and Zapdos EX as support and attacking Pokemon respectively. Also Erika’s Invitation is an incredibly powerful trainer card, and I wouldn’t be surprised if a couple copies sneak their way into these lists. Finally, in the Dragonite / Raikou variations, I could see Cycling Road be added in, as they want to leverage energy card manipulation, and this can help use that game plan to draw some extra cards.

And that’s all that you need to know about one of the Pokemon TCG’s best decks, Lost Box. This is a very fun and thought provoking deck so give it a try! Speaking of Pokemon 151, check out our Pokemon 151 set list guide, as well as our most expensive Pokemon 151 cards. Also be sure to check out our Pokemon TCG Classic guide to learn more about the upcoming collector’s box set that you’ll definitely want to try and get your hands on.