While the two titular cards of this deck have often been used in Future Box decks, in recent Pokémon TCG tournaments one has been more likely to see them as their own duo spearheading a deck that’s become among the leading forces in today’s metagame. A highly adaptable and flexible deck, the Iron Hands ex/Iron Crown ex deck deals out serious damage at a rapid pace.

Iron Crown ex from Cyber Judge [SV5M] provides the setup via its Ability of Cobalt Command. The futuristic Paradox form of Cobalion adds 20 damage to the attacks of any of the player’s other Future Pokémon. The effect of this Ability stacks; thus, with all four Iron Crown ex cards in play, the player’s Future Pokémon get an impressive boost of 80 damage per attack.

This in turn sets up the Iron Hands ex card from Future Flash [SV4M]. At first glance, its Amp You Very Much attack appears somewhat unremarkable—one would likely expect an attack that requires four Energy cards to deal more than the 120 damage that it does.

However, Amp You Very Much allows the player to take an additional Prize card if the attack is used to KO an opposing Pokémon. This is where the synergy with Iron Crown ex comes in—Cobalt Command makes it far more likely that Iron Hands ex picks up the KO and the extra Prize card.

A recent twist on this deck features the inclusion of the Technical Machine: Crisis Punch card from Shiny Treasure ex [SV4a]. Part of a build pioneered by Finnish player Juho Kallama, this card’s inclusion serves as a late-game solution for decks which would’ve otherwise hard-countered this one.

The total cost of every card in the Iron Hands ex/Iron Crown ex Deck is at least 23,500 JPY (~US$152).

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