Seaking

What Seaking looks like when you open the box

Across the 91 lists we counted, this deck runs 16 to 26 Pokémon, 28 to 38 Trainers and 5 to 8 Energy. Its attacks are paid for in Grass.

On results pages and on stream you will see it written « seaking-pre ». Every card named in that label turns up in the tables below, which is what makes it a fair name for the deck.

The bit they tack on the end, « PRE », is a set code: Prismatic Evolutions. They spell it out because several cards share that name, and this deck plays that particular printing.

Look at the Energy: 5 to 8 out of 60, when half the 125 decks we track run 11 or more. This one is lean. It lives on cheap attacks and leans on Trainers to find the right Energy at the right moment rather than stockpiling it.

It sets up fast. Seaking is a Stage 1 Pokémon: a Basic, one evolution on top, and you are attacking. Two cards instead of three. You lose fewer turns building, and you rebuild much more easily when an early knockout lands on you.

Look at the Trainers: 28 to 38 cards out of 60, against a median of 31 across the 125 decks we track. Inside that, 8 to 14 Supporters, and the rule there is strict — one a turn, even if you are holding three. The 9 to 22 Items you can play all of in the same turn. It also brings up to 4 Stadiums, and 87 of the 125 decks we track bring that many or more. Only one Stadium sits on the table at a time: the one you play sends the one already there to the discard pile.

What Tools and Stadiums do — the two Trainer families we skipped here — and why the Energy count says so much: how to read a deck list.

What the card in this deck's name actually does

Seaking gives this deck its name. Here is what is written on it.

Seaking is in all 91 lists, 3 copies of it. Its Ability is called Festival Lead, and here is what is printed on it, word for word: « If Festival Grounds is in play, this Pokémon may use an attack it has twice. If the first attack Knocks Out your opponent's Active Pokémon, you may attack again after your opponent chooses a new Active Pokémon. »

How Seaking actually wins

Seaking attacks with Rapid Draw for 60. It needs 1 Colorless Energy attached, and it has 110 HP. And the number is not everything the card says. There is one more line printed under the attack, and it is the one everybody skips: "Draw 2 cards."

One Energy to attack is enormous, and it means the attack cost will never be what slows you down. What slows you down here is getting Seaking up. Once the line is standing you swing every turn with nothing to recharge, and you can start again immediately when your attacker falls.

Good news on mobility: pulling Seaking back to the Bench costs you 1 Energy attached to it, and that is all. Retreating does not cost you your turn, so you step back and swing anyway. That matters enormously the day your opponent lands something nasty on it.

Not one ex Pokémon in the core, and only 26 of the 125 decks we track are in that position. It is a hidden advantage: every knockout your opponent takes is worth a single Prize, so they need 6, where 3 would do against a deck stuffed with ex cards.

The attackers in the deck's core, with their best attack, its cost and their Weakness

Pokémon	HP	Attack	Damage	Cost	Weakness	Retreat
Close SeakingStage 1	110	Rapid Draw	60		Lightning ×2	1
Close ThwackeyStage 1	100	Beat	50		Fire ×2	2
Close GrookeyBasic	70	Branch Poke	30		Fire ×2	1

The core: the 7 cards every list runs

These 7 cards appear in all 91 lists, without a single exception. That is 21 of the 60 slots. The other 39 are decided player by player.

Look at how those 21 slots break down: 11 Trainers, 10 Pokémon, 0 Energy. Trainers outweigh everything else put together, which is the mark of a deck that goes and fetches its cards rather than waiting to draw them.

7 of those 7 cards do not sit at the same count from list to list: Grookey (3 to 4), Seaking (3 to 4) and Thwackey (3 to 4), plus 4 more. Add those spreads up and you get 11 copies the 91 lists do not agree on, inside the core itself.

What "3 to 4" means in the copies column, what the "TWM 130" code under each name is for, and why we count dozens of lists instead of one: how to read a deck list.

The cards present in every list counted, with the number of copies

Copies	Card	Printing	Kind	Rotation
3–4	Close Grookey	TWM 14	Pokémon	leaves
3–4	Close Seaking	PRE 21	Pokémon	leaves
3–4	Close Thwackey	TWM 15	Pokémon	leaves
3–4	Close Festival Grounds	TWM 149	Trainer	leaves
1–4	Close Air Balloon	ASC 181	Trainer	stays
1–3	Close Boss's Orders	MEG 114	Trainer	stays
1–3	Close Brave Bangle	WHT 80	Trainer	stays

The 66 cards that change from list to list

66 cards fight over the 39 slots that are left: 13 above three lists in four, 44 below one in four, and the percentage on each row says how many players took it.

The most agreed on first: Goldeen at 99 %, Buddy-Buddy Poffin at 99 % and Poké Pad at 99 %, plus 10 more above 75 %. Add those to the core and you have the common build.

The dividing line runs through Moltres, at 52 %: 47 of 91 players took it, 44 put something else there. The ones who run it bring 1 copy. Right at the bottom of the table, Dipplin (22 lists out of 91) and Switch (19 lists out of 91).

Why a card at 45 % is not a bad card, and what order to buy all this in: how to read a deck list.

The cards some lists run and others don't, most common first

Lists running it	Card	Copies	Printing	Kind
99 %90/91	Close Goldeen	2–4	TWM 44	Pokémon
99 %90/91	Close Buddy-Buddy Poffin	3–4	TEF 144	Trainer
99 %90/91	Close Poké Pad	3–4	POR 81	Trainer
99 %90/91	Close Gladion's Final Battle	1–4	PBL 77	Trainer
99 %90/91	Close Sacred Ash	1–2	DRI 168	Trainer
98 %89/91	Close Lillie's Determination	2–4	MEG 119	Trainer
97 %88/91	Close Ultra Ball	3–4	MEG 131	Trainer
91 %83/91	Close Mist Energy	2–4	TEF 161	Energy
88 %80/91	Close Rabsca	1–2	TEF 24	Pokémon
87 %79/91	Close Rellor	1–2	TEF 23	Pokémon
82 %75/91	Close Secret Box	1	TWM 163	Trainer
78 %71/91	Close Shaymin	1	DRI 10	Pokémon
76 %69/91	Close Night Stretcher	1–3	ASC 196	Trainer
70 %64/91	Close Hand Trimmer	1–2	TEF 150	Trainer
60 %55/91	Close Goldeen	1–4	PBL 13	Pokémon
52 %47/91	Close Moltres	1	PFL 14	Pokémon
48 %44/91	Fire Energy	1–2	MEE 2	Energy
47 %43/91	Close Meowth ex	1	POR 62	Pokémon
47 %43/91	Close Tool Scrapper	1	ASC 212	Trainer
37 %34/91	Close Psyduck	1	ASC 39	Pokémon
34 %31/91	Grass Energy	1–6	MEE 1	Energy
33 %30/91	Close Dawn	1–2	PFL 87	Trainer
24 %22/91	Close Dipplin	1	TWM 18	Pokémon
21 %19/91	Close Switch	1	MEG 130	Trainer
18 %16/91	Close Kieran	1	TWM 154	Trainer
13 %12/91	Close Applin	1	TWM 126	Pokémon
13 %12/91	Close Maximum Belt	1	TEF 154	Trainer
13 %12/91	Close Spiky Energy	2–4	JTG 159	Energy
8 %7/91	Close Special Red Card	1–2	CRI 82	Trainer
5 %5/91	Close Applin	1	SCR 12	Pokémon
5 %5/91	Close Applin	1	TWM 17	Pokémon
5 %5/91	Close Prism Energy	2–4	ASC 216	Energy
4 %4/91	Close Judge	1	POR 76	Trainer
3 %3/91	Close Cornerstone Mask Ogerpon ex	1	TWM 112	Pokémon
3 %3/91	Close Rillaboom	1	TWM 16	Pokémon
3 %3/91	Close Bug Catching Set	1–3	TWM 143	Trainer
3 %3/91	Lightning Energy	1–4	MEE 4	Energy
3 %3/91	Psychic Energy	1–3	MEE 5	Energy
2 %2/91	Close Abra	3	MEG 54	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Alakazam	3	MEG 56	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Kadabra	3	MEG 55	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Stunfisk	1–2	ASC 62	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Abra	1	TWM 80	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Budew	1	ASC 16	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Patrat	1	CRI 70	Pokémon
2 %2/91	Close Gwynn	4	PBL 78	Trainer
2 %2/91	Close Energy Swatter	1–2	POR 73	Trainer
2 %2/91	Close Pokémon Catcher	1–2	POR 82	Trainer
2 %2/91	Close Hyper Aroma	1	TWM 152	Trainer
2 %2/91	Close Rare Candy	1	MEG 125	Trainer
2 %2/91	Close Super Potion	1	JTG 158	Trainer
2 %2/91	Close Growing Grass Energy	2	POR 86	Energy
2 %2/91	Close Legacy Energy	1	TWM 167	Energy
1 %1/91	Close Ethan's Pichu	1	DRI 71	Pokémon
1 %1/91	Close Pachirisu	1	MEG 51	Pokémon
1 %1/91	Close Rellor	1	DRI 24	Pokémon
1 %1/91	Close Colress's Tenacity	2	SFA 57	Trainer
1 %1/91	Close Energy Recycler	1	DRI 164	Trainer
1 %1/91	Close Forest of Vitality	1	MEG 117	Trainer
1 %1/91	Close Hilda	1	WHT 84	Trainer
1 %1/91	Close Lana's Aid	1	TWM 155	Trainer
1 %1/91	Close Redeemable Ticket	1	JTG 156	Trainer
1 %1/91	Close Voltaic Lightning Energy	2	PBL 84	Energy
1 %1/91	Darkness Energy	1	MEE 7	Energy
1 %1/91	Fighting Energy	1	MEE 6	Energy
1 %1/91	Water Energy	1	MEE 3	Energy

The most common Seaking list, all 60 cards

Here they are in full, ready to build. 21 slots come from the core, the cards all 91 lists run. The remaining 39 come from the table just above, working down it: the cards the most players chose, each at its most common copy count, until the total lands on 60.

This list is nobody's list in particular. It takes, slot by slot, what the most people played, under the guardrails a judge would hold you to: never more than four copies of a card, and one ACE SPEC. Behind the core it took 19 more cards to reach 60. The whole thing comes to 19 Pokémon, 35 Trainers and 6 Energy.

One thing to know before you build it: the 91 lists we counted are all from players who came in the top twenty of their tournament. Nobody publishes the lists of the players who lost. So what you have in front of you is what the players finishing near the top bring most often.

The text under the table is the one the game expects: copy it, paste it into the deck manager, and the list builds itself.

Why we only read lists from players who came in the top twenty of their tournament, and what that changes about every percentage on this page: how to read a deck list.

Pokémon: 19
4 Grookey TWM 14
3 Seaking PRE 21
3 Thwackey TWM 15
3 Goldeen TWM 44
1 Rabsca TEF 24
1 Rellor TEF 23
1 Shaymin DRI 10
1 Goldeen PBL 13
1 Moltres PFL 14
1 Meowth ex POR 62

Trainer: 35
4 Festival Grounds TWM 149
3 Air Balloon ASC 181
2 Boss's Orders MEG 114
2 Brave Bangle WHT 80
4 Buddy-Buddy Poffin TEF 144
4 Poké Pad POR 81
3 Gladion's Final Battle PBL 77
1 Sacred Ash DRI 168
4 Lillie's Determination MEG 119
4 Ultra Ball MEG 131
1 Secret Box TWM 163
1 Night Stretcher ASC 196
1 Hand Trimmer TEF 150
1 Tool Scrapper ASC 212

Energy: 6
4 Mist Energy TEF 161
2 Fire Energy MEE 2

Total Cards: 60

How many different cards Seaking needs, and how long it will last

You need 73 different cards to cover every version of this deck, 7 of which nobody argues about. The rest is where lists differ from one another, and that is where you have room to choose.

All 91 lists bring an ACE SPEC, and that is where they part ways: 75 took Secret Box, 12 took Maximum Belt and 2 took Hyper Aroma. The flex table shows you all 4. You are allowed ONE ACE SPEC card in your whole deck, so a single copy covers it whatever it costs. New to this deck? Take Secret Box and watch what the others do with theirs before you switch.

Then there is time. 4 of the 7 core cards carry the letter H, the one that goes at the next rotation: Grookey, Seaking, Thwackey and Festival Grounds. The core table marks every one of them. In copies, that is 14 of the 21 slots the core fills. Which day it lands, we do not know yet.

What Seaking struggles against

The attackers in this deck are Weak to Lightning and Fire, so they take DOUBLE damage from those types. 22 of the 125 decks we track attack in exactly those types.

Concretely, here is what is waiting for you: Dragapult ex / Blaziken ex, Ethan's Typhlosion and Ceruledge ex, plus 19 more decks. The table below takes them one at a time, and those are the lists you practise against first before an event.

This table counts one thing, Weakness, and that comes to 22 decks out of the 125 we track. The other 103 do not attack into yours, and this table says nothing about them. You will still run into them.

Going the other way, your attackers are Grass, and 35 of the decks we track have an attacker Weak to one of those: N's Zoroark ex, Mega Lucario ex / Hariyama and Mega Sharpedo ex / Toxtricity, among others. That is you doubling, for once. Second half of the table.