Order Pad Gardevoir – Is it viable?

Gardevoir with Order Pad seems to be the new hot deck so I figured I would give it some coverage with my version of the list and talk about its Pros and Cons. Gardevoir has clearly been a powerhouse with an Intercontinentals win and a Worlds win, but over the last month it seems to have fallen out of favor with a lot of players. The deck seems to recreate itself frequently with the classic consistency version, then Sylveon, then BrokenVoir and Zoroark Gardevoir; Order Pad may be the new way for it to stay relevant. On the other hand, Order Pad does have some problems.

This is a short piece and I will accompany it with another article this Sunday. For this piece you will find my lists for Order Pad Gardevoir as well as a more ‘Brokenvoir’ build. Before I get into this piece I want to mention that Christian Franco is where I got this concept from originally, I believe he should be credited with coming up with this variant.

Cons of Order Pad Gardevoir

Variance

The most obvious downside of Order Pad is that it is a coin flip card, meaning you are only going to get the effect half the time, but even that statement is idealistic. In reality, you are not getting the coin flips half the time, you’re getting rounds where you flip almost all heads and then others where you flip almost all tails. This is what players tend to miss; with only four flips in a game, you give yourself few flips to let your luck even out.

I remember Toad Tina back in 2015 with 4 lasers, 4 crushing, and 4 Super Scoop Up, and although it appears ironic, the deck ended up running pretty consistent. But it is not ironic if you think a level deeper and realize that the high number of flips allows variance more chance to even out. My point here is not that you should add more flips to Gardevoir, but that the coin flip in Order Pad is even more of a downside since you only have four flips for the whole game.

It is an item

With Espeon Garbodor winning the last Regionals in Portland as well as getting second, the fact that Order Pad is an item card is certainly a downside. Order Pad being an item is actually a very good thing for multiple reasons that I explain in the Pros, but it is worth noting that there is a big downside around it because of the Garbodor matchup.

Takes up four slots

The cards that Order Pad searches out are often used as the cuts for Order Pads. One of the main problems with the card is that it needs to be added by dropping four resources! That’s a lot to ask for.

Pros of Order Pad

Synergy with Octillery

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