Fear of the Dark - Eternatus in the new metagame

Hello everyone! This is Elena from Gaia Storm TCG and, I’d like to cover one of the most aggressive and popular Pokemon decks in recent TCG history: Eternatus VMAX. Sure, everyone has already faced or played Eternatus, but the deck is about to acquire a completely new dimension with the release of Chilling Reing. And yes, it might not be the best deck of the entire format, but it will remain one of the top contenders until we have a major new set. So, let’s analyze what this Legendary Pokémon can do!

The reason why Eternatus is as solid as a deck can be has a name (and maybe a surname?): Galarian Moltres V. This card, apart from having stunning artwork in every rarity, seems to have been designed with Eternatus in mind. Each turn, Moltres can use Direflame Wings to attach itself basic darkness energy from the discard pile and then attack for a solid 190 damage.

Moltres solves, single-handedly, two of the biggest problems Eternatus had: energy recycling and a good non-VMAX attacker. If you have played Eternatus in the past, you know how hard it was to survive Crushing Hammer in the early turns of the game. In fact, one head could directly make the difference between winning or losing. With Moltres, however, this is a situation of the past. Energy Switch and a manual attachment mean that Eternatus is ready to attack even if you had no energy on the field!

The second big problem Eternatus had was that it lacked a good 2-prizes attacker, so the opponent only needed to concentrate on taking down 2 Eternatus VMAX to win the game. Moltres offers a fantastic attacking alternative, taking down Dedenne GX and Crobat V in one hit. It can also deal pretty well with Zamazenta V, one of the biggest stoppers Eternatus could face.

Moltres is, therefore, a fantastic and instant addition to Eternatus decks. If you’ve played Eternatus before and after Moltres, you will soon see the huge difference it makes. But is Moltres enough to make Eternatus a top-tier deck after all the changes that we’ve seen in Chilling Reign? 

The release of Chilling Reign has caused an earthquake in the metage, and Eternatus is precisely part of these waves.

On the other hand, one of the most powerful new decks of the set, Shadow Rider Calyrex, is weak to Dark. That means that Eternatus has a favorable matchup because of its typing (we will see more on the Calyrex matchup below). However, on the other hand, there are new enemies that Eternatus needs to be extremely careful with. One is precisely Galarian Zapdos V, one of the other members of the Bird Trio. Zapdos can deal 170 for one single Fighting energy, which is more than enough to take Eternatus VMAX down in one hit. With Aurora Energy in the format, basically, every deck can abuse Zapdos.

The other problem Eternatus faces one of the best Stadiums recently released, Path to the Peak. It shuts down Eternatus ability, prevents Crobat V from being used, and forces the player to discard many valuable Pokémon.

With these two big menaces in mind, it is clear that Eternatus has to adapt to remain a contender in the game. Let's see how.

No matter which Eternatus version you want to build, I would dare to share that the base below is the structure, the backbone if you wish, of 90% of any Eternatus deck. We will always ideally start with the following:

4 Crobat V DAA 182

4 Eternatus V PR-SW 44

2 Galarian Moltres V CRE 176

2 Galarian Zigzagoon SHF 151

3 Eternatus VMAX PR-SW 45

2 Energy Switch ROS 109

2 Big Charm RCL 206

4 Switch PRC 163

4 Marnie SSH 200

2 Chaotic Swell CEC 187

3 Boss's Orders RCL 189

3 Pokémon Communication TEU 196

4 Professor's Research SSH 201

4 Quick Ball SSH 216

3 Great Ball SUM 119

9 Darkness Energy BUS 168

As you probably notice, the biggest additions compared to the last format are Big Charm and Chaotic Swell. Chaotic is a must, as it is a defensive Stadium against Path to the Peak and Big Charm allows a VMAX to survive Zapdos’ deadly hit.

Another thing that stands out is that we are no longer running Weakness Guard energies. Now, it might seem that this makes no sense, but to be honest, when you face a Fighting match-up (Urshifu), the chances of you being able to win are almost non-existent. Furthermore, in my experience, even if you run and consistently draw your Weakness Guard Energies, there are a lot of possibilities of you losing the game, so it is no surprise that many players have directly opted to assume the auto loss and focus on consistency.

So, after all these details about the deck, it’s truly time to analyze how Eternatus performs in the current environment:

As we’ve seen, Eternatus is for sure one strong candidate in the format, so if you already had the deck and didn’t want to spend a lot on new cards, I would suggest you give it a try in this Chilling Reign environment. It is exciting to see how this triangle between Eternatus – Shadow Rider Calyrex – Urshifu (each has a weakness to the other) is taking a central place in the metagame, so I would expect Eternatus to be played a lot, at least during the first weeks of Chilling Reign.

I hope this article was of help, and don’t forget that you can get your PTCGO codes to build Eternatus and many more Pokemon Online decks here at the PoTown Store. Thanks for reading!

Elena has been playing Pokémon TCG for years and leads one of the biggest TCG-dedicated channels in the world. You can find her on Youtube & Twitch (@gaiastormtcg) as well as on other social media channels. Drop and say hi!