Arceus and the Hidden Key
The science and story behind the ArKeyus Aero deck and how I was unintentionally involved going into Milwaukee Regional 2023
The Preparation before Milwaukee
Milwaukee Regional 2023 was coming up and it was that time of the month again where I had to figure out what the deck to play was. For everyone this process looks different but talking with friends and sharing list is surely a common similarity for many. During this I spent a lot of time talking to a friend named Harrison Burch and we had pretty quickly decided we would be on Arc Tina. We had the 60 figured out pretty quickly too. There was not anything too spicy but we knew we wanted to play Dunsparce which ended up being a really good call for the weekend. Long story short Harrison and I both finished top 256th at 5-3-1, not the finish we were looking for but still had a blast nonetheless, especially because I got to cheer on my roommate at college’s first day 2 followed by a top 8. Bryan is a legend.
But this article is not about Arc Tina the focus is on an a different deck. A couple weeks before Milwaukee I wanted to try out an idea I had bouncing around in my head. I already knew my deck for Milly, so might as well try other stuff. I had been playing basketball on a Tuesday and I looked at the time as it said 5:12pm. So I registered for a Late Night which started at 6pm. I threw together a list in about 4 minutes and hopped in the shower and came back to play round 1 with this wonderful pile.
I ended up getting top 8 out of 242 players which is a pretty decent finish even for an online event. I really liked Aerodactyl as a partner with Arceus. Even though, you cannot use both of their strong VStars in a game, they both served different versatility in different matchups. Aero is strong into Mew, Lugia, and even mirror, while Arceus is good into basically everything else including Lost Zone Tool Box decks. Judge spam is very good of course, especially combo with your own Bibarel engine to draw out of it. The Hawlucha package was, of course stolen from the crew that made Arc Dumbreon. Hitting 280 with Aero just seemed pretty good, while admittedly I never got it off in the tournament. The crushing hammers were a big meme to combo with the Aero V’s first attack, just ignore them.
Even though this was a cool placement, I semi disregarded the concept as a whole. It was cool but I did not want to trap myself with an unfinished concept and was pretty confident in Arc Tina especially with the testing Harrison and I put into it. However, I do remember saying to the people in my car, I think I was on to something with this deck and I bet them that there would be at least one Arceus Aerodactyl in day 2. If you have read my last article then you will know that the title speaks the truth.
The Story behind the Arc and Keys
I had the pleasure of being able to talk to the main mastermind of this deck and Lost Zone Kitchen’s very own, Dominic. He went over the backstory of how the deck came to be. The story starts off with another team member Joe T going to Dominic and asking for a deck that beats Lost Box consistently. Dominic said at the time he threw together a list that played a bunch of Klefki and Empoleon V. Obviously this destroyed LZ but there needed to be something more.
The next route that Dominic took was to mess with Arc Pile decks. Dominic threw in Aerodactyl in the list. This was not the first time this has been seen but it was usually a 1-1 line and not the focus of the deck as it was only for the Lugia matchup, pre-rotation. But it was discovered that Aero has way more uses as semi permanent ability lock used combo’d with Judge is super strong into many decks as well as current Lugia.
One of Dominic’s teammates, Sawyer was toying around with both ideas and threw 2 Klefki into an Arceus deck. Dominic’s eyes lit up and this officially marked the beginning of Arc Keys. The first draft looked liked this.
Dominic played the list all night on ladder and was winning so many games. The group simply saw no way this deck could get outplayed. The Keys were too strong, the fact that LZB players cannot use Escape Rope, as the Key player can simply bring Klefki into the active and negate any abilities from Comfey, was way too good.
One of my good buddies, Christian F saw that I posted my top 8 list from the Late Night tournament. Some of the people on the team started freaking out as the word was getting out that Arceus Aerodactyl was a good deck and that people could potentially prepare for it. Thankfully (for them) there was not too much hype around the deck and with no Klefki in my list the group still felt very confident in the deck. Also, the deck was strong enough in its own that even when known about, it is still bound to have success. Some last minute inclusions came about in the week before Milwaukee such as the potential inclusion of Yveltal from the Celebrations set for Fusion Mew. The group ultimately decided it was not worth the tech. But one idea that came up was playing Battle VIP Pass. Starting double Klefki was very important in the LZ matchups. And with Trekking Shoes this would allow for overall stronger set up games. An Arceus V was also cut to lead Key more often. And thus this led to the final list.
The group had a great showing at Milwaukee as Christian F got 17th, Joe T got 56th, and Bryan F got 103rd!
Matchup Spread
Lugia (65-35)
This deck definitely had Lugia as a target when being created. Lugia is very strong and seemingly unstoppable when set up. The trick is simply to not let Lugia set up. That can be done with Judge and Path and ultimately cause the most damage with Aerodactyl and the Ancient Star VStar attack permanently shutting off Lugia’s VStar until it is knocked out, which is unlikely to happen since Lugia can never accelerate energy into play.
LZB (75-25)
Lost Zone is the other big dog in this meta. 2 Klefki down turn 1 is so strong into LZ and they often times just draw pass. Once your Arceus is ready to attack you can send it into the active and follow it up with a Judge plus Path. This is usually too much for LZ along with Escape Rope being essentially a dead switching option makes Lost Zone a very favorable matchup for Arc Keys.
Gardevoir (40-60)
Gardy is a bit tough. Winning the die roll definitely helps and trying to slow them down with the infamous Judge, Path combo is definitely a winning play. But if Gardy sets up well and starts swinging by turn 3 its probably over, unless they fumble and mismanage resources such as stadiums.
Mew DCE (70-30)
The more disruptive version of Mew is a favored matchup. Klefki, Path, and Aero VStar all shut down Genesect V’s ability to draw cards. In this matchup you want to try and Ancient Star and combo with a Judge in the same turn. More times than not this will completely brick Mew and you can grind them out. If they go first it can get tricky but as long as Klefki is active they should not have too many plays available to them.
Mew Meloetta (50-50)
Mew Meloetta or Fusion Mew, is a similar idea however their fusion energies negate all of the effects of Klefki and Ancient Star allowing the Mew player to draw the cards. Mew Meloetta can really pop off and run the Arc Key player out of the game quickly. This matchup is hard to gauge as some might think its more favorable than others depending on who you ask. Ultimately, I decided to put it as even because Fusion Mew does not play as many path outs as the other version, so a well timed Judge plus Path can put Fusion Mew out of the game.
Arc Tina (50-50)
Arceus Giratina can be an iffy matchup. If they play Dunsparce and can find it, it looks to be unfavored as having to answer the Giratina VStar is quite hard. But if they do not draw as well as this deck is very good at making other decks do, and miss key pieces, Aero can definitely win this matchup (no pun intended.)
Arc Dumbreon (60-40)
Same notes as Arc Tina but his deck plays no Giratina thus making it a lot more unreliable to take easy knockouts on VStars for Arc Dura Umbreon.
There are a few more matchups I can go into but I am going to cut it here. With Paldea being introduced a lot of this can be considered out-dated data, but if this deck were to ever mount a comeback, which is definitely possible this can be worth coming back to as a starting point, as these decks will mostly be sticking around.
Will this Deck Still See Play?
With Paldea Evolved right around the corner is this deck done? Was this a one time wonder tournament run? First I wanna makes some thoughts on this deck for Fresno the last Regional of the season.
At the time of writing this article the decklist registration is locked, but I want to make some thoughts anyways as well as some predictions. I do think this deck is still very strong. Lost Box as well as even Lugia cannot really do too much to tech for this deck. Not to mention this deck is still a low percentile usage deck so the question has to be asked, is it even worth teching for? It is hard to say how much Aerodatcyl paired with Arceus we will see in Fresno but I am willing to take a bet that there will definitely be some in day 2 and perhaps with even more of a twist on them. Going to keep the thoughts short here though.
So how does this deck stand up to the new PAL format? Well the new big deck to come out is Chien Pao ex. This is a heavy hitting water type attacker with a deluge reprint backing it up. This deck seemingly has to be good into Arc Keys, so playing something like a Flying Pikachu VMax might be worth the inclusion as most of the attackers in the deck are basic or weak to lightning.
There are cards that come out that do benefit this deck heavily however. Jet Energy is a big one, as it allows this deck to have an easier time switching into the active, whether it is bringing a Klefki up or switching out the key itself. Iono is the other big one. While this card is extremely game altering and affects most decks in a positive way, this Arceus Keys deck is specifically designed in a way to disrupt your opponent. Iono is the perfect partner to have with this game plan in mind as it becomes a stronger late game Judge.
The deck will definitely have to evolve and adapt to the new meta as Paldea creates other archetypes and changes the current ones, but I do not think it is completely fair to rule this deck out. Either way I think a cool story came out of this, as the format is always changing even to the very end. Once again it is proven that Arceus truly does always bring the unexpected.
Thanks for reading and God Bless,
Connor
Great job getting points at Milwaukee!