A new deck from Destined Rivals is hot on the Pokemon TCG Live scene right now, taking down big online tournaments everywhere. That deck is none other than Marnie’s Grimmsnarl ex, and it’s absolutely wrecking havoc and devastation in its wake.

In this deck overview, we’ll be diving into everything you need to know about this Marnie’s Grimmsnarl deck that took first at a pretty large online tournament, and how you can use this deck to absolutely dominate the Pokemon TCG Live meta.

Pokémon: 19
4 Marnie's Impidimp DRI 134
3 Marnie's Grimmsnarl ex DRI 136
3 Munkidori TWM 95
2 Snorunt TWM 51
2 Froslass TWM 53
2 Marnie's Morgrem DRI 135
1 Maractus JTG 8
1 Budew PRE 4
1 Shaymin DRI 10
Trainer: 33
4 Iono PAL 185
4 Arven OBF 186
3 Professor's Research JTG 155
1 Boss's Orders PAL 172
3 Counter Catcher PAR 160
2 Buddy-Buddy Poffin TEF 144
2 Rare Candy SVI 191
2 Night Stretcher SFA 61
1 Secret Box TWM 163
1 Super Rod PAL 188
1 Energy Search SVI 172
1 Ultra Ball SVI 196
1 Rescue Board TEF 159
1 Bravery Charm PAL 173
1 Technical Machine: Devolution PAR 177
1 Technical Machine: Evolution PAR 178
2 Spikemuth Gym DRI 169
2 Artazon PAL 171
Energy: 8
8 Darkness Energy SVE 15

Marnie’s Grimmsnarl ex quick start guide

Load up your bench with Impidimps and Snorunt so you can evolve them the following turn.
Going second shut down your opponent with Budew, whereas going second you can use Maractus to box your opponent out or force them to damage themselves.
Evolve Snorunt into Froslass and start filling the board with damage.
Spread damage around with Munkidori while you evolve your Grimmsnarl ex into play. Take knockouts via Shadow Bullet while also adding additional damage to the bench.

Breaking Down Marnie’s Grimmsnarl ex

Buy on TCGPlayer

Marnie’s Grimmsnarl ex is a pretty fearsome Pokemon. Being a stage 2 Pokemon ex means it has that beefy HP that makes it a hard Pokemon to knock out. Its weakness to grass type isn’t an issue right now (unless if someone pulls out a Hydrapple ex deck on you), and it’s got an attack that does plenty of damage to opposing Pokemon as well as 30 damage to the bench.

The Punk Up ability feels a little strange at first, making you think it wants to power up your Marnie’s Pokemon with a bunch of energy in order to get some high energy attack payoff. However, that’s not so much the case as it’s just a really nice, built-in energy accelerant, solving the need for adding a bunch of other cards that get the energy you need from your deck onto your Pokemon.

Evolve Marnie’s Grimmsnarl once and you have two-and-a-half more Marnie’s Grimmsnarl to go afterwards.

Spread damage like you wouldn’t believe

Marnie’s Grimmsnarl pairs incredibly well with Munkidori and Froslass to pull off some pretty insane, damage spreading combos.

This is certainly not the first deck to leverage the Froslass Freezing Shroud ability, but by being able to combine it so easily with Munkidori it does make it one of the stronger decks to utilize the strategy. Essentially, you use Froslass to deal damage to both yours and your opponent’s Pokemon each turn, and then shoot that damage around strategically with Munkidori. Of course, Shadow Bullet is also adding an incremental 30 damage as well, giving you plenty to work with in order to take multiple knockouts in a turn.

While this kind of insane damage output is enough to KO Pokemon without any special tech, this deck does run the potentially devastating Devolution TM.

Get enough damage onto your opponent’s evolved Pokemon, then attack with Devolution and you could wipe an entire board out.

Marnie-only stadium adds consistency to Marnie’s Pokemon

Like most Trainer’s Pokemon decks, Marnie has her own special tech that benefits her from using Marnie’s Pokemon. It’s called Spikemuth Gym, and it gives you the ability to search out any Marnie’s Pokemon each turn. Because it only works for Marnie’s Pokemon, you don’t need to worry about your opponent gaining an edge from this stadium – a huge advantage when it comes to Stadium cards in general.

Early game plays to give Marnie’s Grimmsnarl an edge

Despite focusing on later-game payoffs via a stage 2 Pokemon and plenty of damage spread, Marnie’s Grimmsnarl ex does have some early game plays.

While using Budew isn’t exactly a new concept, few decks benefit from the relatively new Maractus Pokemon. Going second, you would be better off leveraging Budew and its item-locking effect. If you go first, however, lead with Maractus and hope your opponent knocks it out. Doing so will just give you additional damage to inflict onto your opponent.

Additional staples that make this deck sing

While we’ve covered the bulk of the strategy already above, there are several additional more staple card choices worth highlighting.

Shaymin for bench protection
Arven for consistency
And finally Secret Box to help you get just about everything you need to get this deck up and running.

Grimmsnarl ex deck matchups

Now that we’ve covered everything that this deck does best, let’s look at some of the key matchups with other decks that are trending positively following the release of Destined Rivals on Pokemon TCG Live.

Versus Gardevoir ex: Advantage

Not only do you have type advantage against Gardevoir ex, your damage spread can absolutely spread havoc against that deck’s board, turning the small Pokemon that deck relies on into massive liabilities.

Versus Raging Bolt ex: Disadvantaged

Raging Bolt ex is the main problem deck for you. Raging Bolt ex’s ability to OHKO your Grimmsnarl massively evens the odds here, and the ability to spread damage is much less effective against a deck like this one that fields very few low HP Pokemon.

Dragapult ex: even

Dragapult ex and Grimmsnarl trade evenly with one another, with different pros and cons per each. On the one hand, Grimmsnarl’s energy acceleration is considerably more consistent. It also gets access to more damage output potentially thanks to Froslass. However, that being said Dragapult ex gets around Shaymin more easily as it doesn’t deal damage like Grimmsnarl ex does.

Regardless of the matchup, Grimmsnarl is looking like it’s likely the best Destined Rivals deck right now, and having a pretty heavy impact on the Pokemon TCG Live meta.

Marnie’s Grimmsnarl ex Deck List and Guide