March 2012

Pikkdogs Pikks Three Durant Counters: Victini #15, Volcarona NV, and Zebstrika

A big hello to all you OHKOers out there.  This is Pikkdogs here with another Pikk Three article for you.  This will be a special Pikk Three, where I will review cards that are considered Durant counters.

For those of you that know Ed personally, I have just received some great news.  Ed and his wife welcomed their fourth daughter Friday morning.  Baby Primrose is 9 pounds and 21 inches.  Both her and Ed’s wife are doing well.  So, big congrats to my buddy Ed and his wife, very happy for you guys.  On behalf of myself and the OnehitKo community, Congrats Ed we wish ya guys the best.

So now onto another baby, Pedro.  Let us see what Pedro has for us today.  Can you give us a news article to start things off Pedro?

Well sure Pikkdogs.  Foxnews.com is reporting that a Turkish shampoo company is being asked to pull its newest commercial from the airwaves.  It seems like the commercial features Adolph Hitler speaking to men and telling them to buy this new Shampoo.  Jewish activists are appalled that a company would use someone who is associated with hate and genocide as a spokesperson.  Would you buy shampoo from HItler Pikkdogs?

Shampoo, no.  Mustache cleaner, probably.  The question is, is it too soon?  I grew up watching “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure,” and that had Napoleon eating ice cream and Ghengis Khan playing hockey.  Napoleon and Ghengis Khan both killed thousands, maybe even millions, of people.  Ghengis Khan once conquered a territory, and poured melted silver into the eyes and ears of the former leader of that kingdom.  These were not good people, yet I grew up with them being a “ziggy piggy” and playing hockey in the mall, and nobody seemed to think that that was wrong.  If people in the media can do that, I don’t think it’s fair to single out that one shampoo company for a Hitler advertisement.

Do you think Hitler could “eat the pig” like Napoelon did?

The bigger question is will anyone get all these “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure” references?

I doubt it.  You are better off just going to your article.

Than let’s do it.  Cue the first review!

Card #1-Victini #15

Description– Victini is a basic 70 HP Fire Pokemon.  He has a water weakness and a 1 retreat cost.  It has one attack, and it is called “V-Create”.  This attack does 100 damage for RC, but if you do not have 5 Pokemon on your bench the attack does not do any damage.

Analysis– To start off our look into Durant counters we have Victini.  This is known as, “the other Fire Victini.”  There were so many Victinis released in Noble Victories that this one got lost in all the hoopla.   It was probably the one that got the least amount of hype.  But not from me, when it was released in Japan’s Red Collection I immediately saw how good of a card it was.  It seemed to me like a basic Cincinno BW, but that needed 2 energy cards to attack.  100 damage for 2 energy is always going to be good, I know that this card is the best out there, but it seems to be better than the amount of hype it got.

After its release, I cannot recall it getting that much play.  At first I thought it would help revitalize the ailing Stage 1 Rush deck, but I can’t recall anyone giving it the time of day.  I did use it in my Mew Prime/Unfezant/Vanilluxe deck as a Durant counter during Cities this season, but that’s the only play that I know that it had.

And that brings us to what we are here to talk about, Durant counters.  I think that Victini is my favorite Durant counter.  He is the only one on this list that is a basic Pokemon, so that is really great in a format where every card slot is crucial.  He does take one fire energy, but a lot of people are using Rainbow and Prism energy in their decks, and these energies work with his attack.  His attack is good because it does 200 damage to a Durant.  There may be some way to stop something that does 100 damage to a Durant, but you would have to run a lot of Defenders and Special Metals in order to survive 200 damage.  Because Victini is so versatile and powerful, I think he is the best Durant counter out there for an average deck.

There are some bad things about Victini.  70 HP is not good, and it can easily be KO’ed by your opponent’s Cobalion.  He also takes 2 energies to attack, this is not good in a format where Durant can run 8 energy removers.  It can be very hard to keep only 1 energy on the field at once, let-alone two.  He also needs a full bench to be able to attack.  This is not a huge problem because most decks run a lot of basic Pokemon and have a lot of Dual Balls and Pokemon Collectors.  But, I could see a situation where this could be a problem.

Final Rating7.5/10- Gotta love this Victini.  He is the most splashable Durant counter.  Whenever he sees a Durant, he cannot help but destroy it.  Sure they can try to take his energy away, but they will do that to every Pokemon they face.  It will always be a game of, “can I flip heads on Crushing Hammer.”  For all that it is I would say that Victini is a great Durant counter, and almost every deck needs a good Durant counter.

Card #2-Volcarona

Description– This is a Durant counter that I saw this past weekend at States.  I hadn’t considered it too much before, but it is not a terrible card.

Volcarona is a 110 HP Stage 1 Fire Pokemon with a 1 retreat cost and a fire weakness.  It has two attacks.  The first attack, called “Fiery Dance”, does 30 damage for R and lets you attach one basic energy card from the discard pile to one of your Pokemon.  The second attack, called “Heat Wave” does 60 damage for RCC, and it also allows you to burn the defending Pokemon.

Analysis– Let’s start with the basics.  110 HP isn’t terrible for a stage 1, though its always nice to have more.  The 1 retreat cost is about all you can hope for from a fire Pokemon.  And the water weakness is not that horrible in this format, its fairly good.

As mentioned, I have seen this card played at States 2012.  I don’t think I heard any hype from this card, and this card was not played during Cities.  So any play that this card gets is fairly recent.  I haven’t found any decks online that have the card in it, but a few have mentioned it as a secondary attacker in  a fire deck like Reshiphlosion.  Now, I think some people are using it as a Durant counter in non fire decks, because it works well with DCE.

Although you will need to evolve Volcarona, it is still a good Durant counter because you may only need 1 energy to attack if you run a decent amount of Plus Powers in your deck.  Sure its first attack only does 30 damage, but with a Plus Power, that damage goes up to 80 on the fire weak Durant.  That will be enough to OHKO one that has a Special Metal on it, but no Eviolite.  If they do have Eviolite on it, you may need to use “Heat Wave.” Although this attack does use two energies to attack, a lot of decks use DCE’s in them anyway, so it should be an easy fit in most decks.  Since “Heat Wave” also brings the burn into the game, it can also be good against those high HP SP Pokemon that seem to survive forever.

The bad things about Volcarona are obvious.  It is a stage 1 and that means that it takes up 2 spots in your deck.  It also means that it is twice as likely to be prized, and that it is harder to get out without being knocked out first.  There also is no guarantee that the one energy attack will knock out a Durant.  Because of Crushing Hammer and Lost Remover, it is very important to knock out Durant with only one energy, which this deck can do, but cards like Defender and Eviolite can stop that.  This card is also reliant on Plus Powers and DCE, if your deck does not run a lot of those cards, you can’t run Volcarona.

Final Rating5.5/10- Not a huge fan of this card.  Though it is useful against the EXs and a decent Durant counter, I think cards like Victini are much better Durant counters.

Card #3 Zebstrika ND

Description– This is the only Durant counter on this list that does not attempt to knock it out right away.  This card does not use weakness to knock out Durants, instead, it tries to provide an item lock to slowly choke the life out of the Durant deck.

Kind of like David Carradine?

Well, kind of.  But, if I talk any more about that we could get censored again, so we should just leave it like that.

Zebstrika is a 90 HP Stage 1 Lightning Pokemon with a fighitng weakness and a free retreat cost.  It has two attacks.  The second attack is called “Lightning Crash,” it costs LLC, and it lets you snipe for 80 at the cost of discarding all of the energy attached to him.  The first attack is what we are all here for.  It is called “Disconnect”, and it does 40 damage for LC.  The effect is that it also stops your opponent from playing item cards during his/her next turn.

Analysis–  Let us again start with the basics.  90 HP is fairly terrible, though you are not going to put him in a position to be attacked anyway, 90 HP is actually decent enough for what you are using him for.  The free retreat cost is always amazing.  It is always great to have something that you can use to just retreat for free whenever you need to.  The fighting weakness is terrible.  Again, you probably are not going to use this guy when a fighting Pokemon is around, but that doesn’t mean that this card has to have terrible stats either.

This card received absolutely no hype when it came out in Next Destinies.  Every body was talking about all of the EX Pokemon, and nobody cared to talk about Zebstrika.  Despite the lack of hype, it got play right away at the ECC as a Durant counter.  I think the deck even made Top Cut, it did turn a lot of heads at the ECC and here in the U,S.  It did not receive a ton of play at the States in the U.S., but it did see some play.  I even played against someone who used it with Mew Prime.

It can be hard to see why this card is a Durant counter, so I will show you how.  “Disconnect” does 40 damage and stops all trainers.  This means that your opponent cannot remove energy or replace fallen Durants.  The plan is to just keep this 40 damage up until all the Durants are gone.  You will be like a Burmese Python slowly  constricting your prey until it eventually cannot do anything.

Hey Pikkdogs, if Burma is no longer a country, shouldn’t they call it a Myanmarish Python?

No.

Anyway, on to the bad stuff about Zebstrika.  Like Volcarona, it is a stage 2 Pokemon which means you need to devote 2-4 spots in your deck just for him.  That is a lot for a Durant counter, so you will be investing a lot to your Durant counter.  Yes, you can use it in other match-ups, but it is more useful against Durant.  The amount of damage it does also scares me.  If it only does 40 damage, that means 30 of that damage can be taken away because of an Eviolite and a Special Metal energy.  That means you would only be doing 10 damage, and you cannot take out Durants 10 damage at a time.  You will need to do that 40 damage, so if they attach the Special Metals and the Eviolites early, you are in trouble.

Final Rating6/10– It does work in some Zekrom decks.  If you have some space you can throw some Zebstrikas right in there and have a decent Durant counter without having to run any other kinds of energies.  It can be fueled up fairly easy with all of the Eelektriks that people are playing now, so getting this thing out isn’t a huge deal.  I don’t think this is a great tech against Durant, but if you are playing a lightning deck, this will probably work better than trying to bring in fire energies.

Well, Pedro, that is all I have today.  Do you have something for us to close out the article with?

First, we must tell everybody to check out the OneHitKO store.  We now offer singles on the same website where you get all of your questionable strategy and deck articles.  So, make sure to help out the people who are helping you out by doing your shopping at the OneHitKO Store.  We offer fair prices on everything from the Next Destinies set, and we will soon have the best cards from other sets.  So, please follow this link and check out the store.   If you are a rebel, you can also follow this link to get you to the store, but don’t follow this link, because that’s to a Noozles video.

Love the Noozles.

Anyway, for our real news story to close things out.  Surgeons at George Washington University Hospital are reporting that this past weekend’s heart transplant on former Vice President of the United States, Dick Cheney, has been a success.  Doctors say that the world will probably have to deal with Cheney for about 10 more years.  Do ya like the Dick Cheney Pikkdogs?

Of course not, nobody likes Dick Cheney.  I think he even creeps himself out when he thinks of himself.  I do kind of have positive thoughts when I think about him, because he seems very close to a real life Penguin from Batman.  All he needs is an Umbrella and a couple of henchmen and he could be the perfect Batman villan.

He would have to change his last name to Cobblepot though.

Wouldn’t that be the best name, Dick Cobblepot?

No, sounds too much like a porn name.  And if anyone knows anything about us two gentlemen, it is that we don’t like to be involved with porn in anyway. 

That’s right.  Now I must go to…………….water my plant.

Is that what you call it now?

Just end the article!

Good night everybody!

Zekrom/Eelektrik (ZekEels): Calvin’s MN State Championship 2012

Trust me, the banana thing works.

Greetings OHKO!

I guess I’m going to start with a brief introduction. My name is Calvin Chang and I started playing Pokémon competitively halfway through the 2011-2012 season. I actually started playing Pokémon casually when I first investigated it for a high school composition class (yeah! long story). It was fun, the people were nice and I thoroughly enjoyed the game. Then I graduated from high school, moved onto the college campus at the University of Minnesota and took a hiatus from Pokémon since I had no car and no way to continue going to league. When January rolled around, some of the guys at Pokémon asked me if I wanted to compete at Midwest Regionals in the Dells. I figured it would be fun, grabbed a Magnerock deck from some friends and started playing competitively, all the way through Nationals. I wasn’t good but at least I went positive at all the events I played in and eventually finished 10th best player in Minnesota based off ELO points. Since then, I’ve been getting more and more into the competitive environment though still doing mediocre as always.

A week before Minnesota states, I went down to La Crosse with the other guys from league. I had no idea what I was going to play, as mid-terms just finished up and I didn’t have a chance to thoroughly test my options so Joey, Lukas, Michael, Curtis and I stayed up until about 1 in the morning so that I could figure out a deck to play. I didn’t. Read More

Mewchigan States Report

Choose deck at 4:00 am. Begin sleep at 4:30 am.  End sleep at 8:30 am. 

Apparently it’s been too long since SixPrizes published a “How to Prepare for Tournaments” article because I sure blew it this time. 

Here’s the (untested) list I decided to go with.

Pokemon – 16

4 Mew TM
2 Terrakion NV
1 Zorua BW
1 Zorua MCD
2 Zoroark BW
1 Tornadus EP
1 Mewtwo ND
1 Shaymin UL
1 Crobat UL
1 Chandelure ND
1 Jumpluff HS Read More

Quad Terrakion Deck – MN State Championship 2012

I really thought that I wasn’t going to make it to States this year. Part of me thought that I should make a strong effort to defend my title, and part of me thought that the effort would be wasted if I couldn’t attend anyway. I had it in the back of my mind that I might make it to the tourney, so all along I had been putting together a CMT deck. I really actually wanted to play a straight Celebi/Mewtwo deck (without Tornadus or any techs), but I didn’t want to go out of my way to buy a bunch of Mewtwo if I might not even use them.

I did end up scraping together all the pieces for a CMT minus the 2 Mewtwo EX. When I decided to try opening the OneHitKO Store, I bought 3 boxes of Next Destinies. I figured that if I did end up able to attend MN States, then I could just borrow a couple Mewtwo from the store for the day. Well, that idea fell apart rather quickly when I opened 3 boxes and saw a total of ZERO Mewtwo EX.

The weekend before the tournament, my wife went to the hospital 3 times with pregnancy issues, and I thought that each time we might have an extended stay there while delivering our new child. Nothing came of that, and on the Monday before States, I ended up emailing TAndrewT and talking about all of this. I told him essentially the same thing I just told you, still unsure that the pregnancy would last through the following weekend of MN States. I also added that I had considered Durant and straight 4-Terrakion deck.

I didn’t know if I even cared to build a deck at this point. Pokemon wasn’t a pressing issue, and I had barely played since Cities. Andy replied with, “Well, if you need Terrakions I have plenty for you to borrow.” and I thought that this sounded like the only plan I was going to come up with on late notice.

I netdecked a list, and I threw together the deck proxying the Terrakion (I had all the rest except for 1 old style Revive in place of the new one). There’s a guy here at work that I’ve been playing against over lunch sometimes. He has a Zekrom/Eelektrik deck (which I figured would be popular), so I challenged him to a match. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the deck with him, so he played an old Emboar/Reshiram deck of mine. The first game went very quickly as I lost due to not getting more than 1 Terrakion out. I think the deck wasn’t very shuffled yet, and 2 Terrakion were prized. The next game was a real match, and I think I ultimately won when he decked out. This one game turned out to be my only real tourney prep, though. Other than that, I never played the deck until the day of the tourney. At the tourney, a junior (another co-worker’s kid) challenged me to a game, and I ran though his Pokemon very quickly. Going into the tournament, I had only played one real and it was against a non-metagame deck.
Read More

Pikkdogs States Report and Scizor’s LGD (Late Game Durant) Decklist.

A big hello to all you OHKOers out there.  This is Pikkdogs here with a tournament report.  This past Saturday I was lucky enough to get to go to Michigan States at Okemos, Mi (which is just outside of Lansing).

The Deck

Before I talk about the tournament I will give you the deck that I used.  As you can see with the title, I ran a really weird deck.  I knew that I wasn’t going to win with this deck, but I just wanted to have fun.  I planned on doing a lot of testing and bringing a deck that I thought could win, but I came down with a case of Bronchial Pneumonia.  This really screwed up my states testing, and I couldn’t come up with a good deck since I was too busy coughing up my lung.  So I decided to just make up a quick rogue deck and just try to have fun instead of winning.

I came up with the idea for this deck while I was reading a Six Prizes tournament report by my buddy Airhawk.  He had played a guy who had made an Ursraing Prime/Durant deck that tried to win by milling.  The problem is that the deck didn’t turn out too well, and it seemed like it was an Ursaring Prime deck that could drop 4 Durants out of nowhere at the end of the game and win the game by milling.  This gave me an idea to do the same thing.  So I started the deck by using Scizor Prime, he is nice because he scares people by making them not use special energy cards.  The plan is to just use Scizor Prime for a long time, and then when they aren’t looking to use Durant for the mill.  I also put in Terrakion for the Zekrom match-up, and Victini for the Durant match-up. Here is the list.
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Bold Statements with Pikkdogs. Volume #2.

A big hello to all you OHKOers out there.  This is Pikkdogs here with an opinion article for you.  I didn’t really have many ideas on what article to write for today, so I decided we should do another opinion article.  Before we start the bold statements, let’s introduce my extra dimensionary sidekick, Pedro.  How’s Pedro doing?

Doing well. 

What news have you today for us?

Well, in entertainment news Michael Bay has announced that he is making a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, but he is making them aliens.  Which is weird because they are called “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles”, which means they should be mutated adolescent kung-foo users, not aliens.  Do you like the TMNT?

Sure,  used to watch the cartoon series growing up, and I used to have the good Super Nintendo videogame.  I agree with you Pedro, the turtles shouldn’t be aliens.  To me, they are an extension of the awesomeness that was New York City in the 1980’s.  You had lots of crime and pizza, so to stop the crime and eat the pizza you needed the turtles and a large rat.  They also behaved like Teens, which made them part human, and making them aliens would take away from that.

You seem to have a strong feeling about this.

Well, I do.  TMNT was also a lot about humanity, it just wasn’t about turtles eating pizza.  They had some culture in the program.  Even the fact that they are named after renaissance artists speaks to their connection to humanity.

And I thought it was just about eating pizza and chasing after cute tv newswomen. 

No, that’s what my life is like.

Ah, I see. 

Bold Statement #1- Lv. X’s were a better game mechanic than EXs (ex’s) or Primes.

We have had a lot of Ultra Rare mechanics in the last  several years.  The first was the ex mechanic, which had a long life.  This were just like normal cards, but they had more a few more HPs, and they could attack a little better.  The drawback was that if they got knocked out, your opponent took 2 prizes.  Than with Diamond and Pearl came the Level X mechanic.  Lv. X cards were cards that you put onto your active Pokemon of the same name.  You could then use the attacks of both cards.  But, you would have to use the HP, weakness, resistance, and retreat cost of the Lv. X.  After about a dozen sets with Lv. X’s, we made a change to Pokemon Primes.  Pokemon Primes were kind of like the old exs, but they did not need an extra prize on knockout.  They also didn’t have Prime in their names, meaning there was no real difference between Primes and other cards of the same name, just the rarity.  After only a few Prime sets, we shifted back to exs, but called them “EXs” instead.  These EXs had more HP than the former exs did, and hit just a little harder.

After all of those changes, I think that the best ultra rares were the Lv. Xs.  I believe this for two major reasons.  The first is that leveling up provided the perfect balance of draw backs and advantages.  The second reason is that the Level X mechanic kept prices down,

The Level X mechanic was great because it gave us a great system of advantages and disadvantages.  The advantages were that we could get Pokemon with more HP, better Poke-Powers, and better attacks.  These are similar to what we get with the EXs, exs, and the Primes.  But, the drawbacks to Lv. Xs I think are much better than the drawbacks to the others.  Instead of having to lose two prizes instead of 1, which never made any sense and made things balanced, it was a little harder to setup a Lv. X.  The Pokemon had to be active to get a Lv. X, which made it harder to get out.  And the fact that you had to put the Lv. X on a regular Pokemon was another drawback.  It not only made you run at least 1 extra card, but it made your setup slower.  These drawbacks made the game more balanced, the EXs now don’t have these drawbacks, and the game is a little more unbalanced because of it.

The other thing that was great about the Lv.X mechanic was that it helped keep prices down.  Mewtwo EX is about as sought after today, as Flygon Lv. X was three years ago.  They both had a similar price ($50-$70), but Flygon Lv. X forced you to build a much cheaper deck than Mewtwo EX does today.  This is because you almost always only ran 1 Lv. X in your deck.  If it was a stage 2, you would normaly run a 4-2-3-1 line.  Even if it was a basic, you still normally ran a 2-1 or 3-1, depending on the Pokemon.  Sure, sometimes you did run 2 Lv.X’s, but that is still cheaper than the 3 Mewtwo EXs that are standard in a CMT deck today.  In fact, a CMT deck normally consists of 3-4 Celebi Primes and 3 Mewtwo EXs, that is 6 or 7 Ultra Rare cards.  If Mewtwo EX’s attacks were on a Lv. X card instead, you would probably run a 2-1, 3-1, or 2-2 line.  You  would also run the same amount of Celebis, if “Forrest Breath” was on a Lv. X.  That means you would be between 2 and 4 Ultra Rares, instead of 6 to 7.  That would make the deck much cheaper and make it accessible to more people.

That is why I love the Level X’s, I think they gave us a slower and more balanced format than we have right now.  Even though things did get out of hand once they introduced the SP Lv. X’s, I think that I will blame it more on the SP mechanic more than the Lv. X mechanic.  The one thing I didn’t like about Lv. Xs were that it was harder to have a bench sitting Lv. X than it is to have a bench sitting Prime or EX.  However, this now rarely comes up because the only bench sitting prime or EX that I know of is Slowking Prime, and we all know how good that card is.

Bold Statement #2- The Current Shiny Mechanic is the Best.

There have been a couple different systems of Shiny or Secret Rare Pokemon in the past coule years.  I think that our current system, of having reprints is the best.  I think they are really cool to play with, and are challenging to collect.  Under our old systems of shinies and secret rares, the “cool to play with” factor rarely came up.  Now it does, and it gives you a way to show off your collection.

In the Diamond and Pearl era, the secret rares were Shinies of basic Pokemon like Yanma and Duskull.  Duskull saw a little play when Dusknoir DP was played, but for the most part, nobody cared about these cards.  They were only valued at a couple bucks each.

This trend was continued in the Platinum era, but they did also change the secret rares a little.  In the Rising Rivals set they released Rotoms as secret rares.  These Pokemon could be used to make their own deck, but the deck was never anything more than expensive.  The same was for the Arceus cards that came out in the Arceus set.

I think that now we have the best system of secret rares.  The Diamond and Pearl method of giving us secret rares of basics that nobody likes wasn’t that fun.  And, although Rotom and Arceus decks were cool, they were never a great deck.

I really like when we can actually use the secret rares in decks we are playing.  It also covers the weakness of secret rares, because nobody has to play with Secret Rares because they are all reprints.  But, a lot of people do want to use the SRs because they have really cool art. That is what Secret Rares should be.  They should be really cool looking.  They should be hard to collect.  And, they should be playable.  The only SR model that has been used in the past couple years that covers all of those three areas is the current one.

Bold Statement #3- Spring Regionals will be all about the Rogues.

We will be playing in a similar format for Spring Regionals that we did for States. Coming into States we didn’t really know what was going to be played.  Just a couple weeks before it started, people were still creating decks like CMT and Zekrom.  Now that we have a solid format that people can plan for, Regionals should be all about rogue decks.

It was  very hard making rogue decks for States because rogue decks usually are made to go against meta decks, and since meta decks were so new, it was hard to counter them.  Now that we have had a whole states season to find out what the meta is, we now have about a month to counter these decks.  In fact, it is already happening.  People are starting to work with cards like Cofagrius, Chandelure ND, and Vanilluxe ND to make rogue decks.

I predict that Spring Regionals will be all about the rogue decks.  Now I won’t turn my back on CMT, I know that it is the BDIF and it will win most regionals.  I also know that Zekrom and Durant are also good and will see a ton of play.  But, all the story lines will be about the rogues.  Compared to the beginning of the season, our format has a ton of cards.  That means a lot of new combinations that people haven’t tried before.  We should be seeing a lot of different combos that go outside of our normal box of thinking.  If you think of it, we are really only talking about 3-5 decks doing well right now, come Regionals we should see the format getting broken open.  Just like the Truth opened up the format during Worlds, we should see rogue decks taking over soon during Spring Regionals.

Bold Statement #4- Comic/Card Shops are the Worst Place for a Pokemon Tournament.

I can’t say that I have been at Pokemon Tournaments all the world, but I have been at tournaments all around the Great Lakes Region, and I think that my experience shows that card shops are generally the worst place for tournaments.

I first started out playing Pokemon in Minnesota.  Almost all tournaments in the Minneapolis region are at card shops.  Generally, I found that card shops in that area were very nice and fairly spacious.  Of course, you also get the advantage of having a store that sells things like dice, sleeves, and snacks.  But, upon starting to play in Michigan and Ohio, I realized that card shops in that area are terrible for tournaments.

While Minnesota card shops were big enough for tournaments, shops in Ohio were very small, and that seems to be the trend.  Even though you do get the convenience of a store by a tournament, card shops are for the most part much to small to handle a Pokemon tournament with the current player base.  There is just no where to move, and getting to your table is very hard to do.  The whole tournament becomes one hot and sweaty encumbrance, and the game is no longer fun.

Most Michigan tournaments are held in places like Hotel conference rooms.  These rooms are usually much bigger than card shops, and are designed to handle hundreds of people.  We almost never have to turn people away, and there is plenty of room to spread out and relax.  The inconvenience of not having a store on site, is more than made up for by all the space and comfy furniture.  This is more important today because tournaments are getting bigger and longer.

I think that this is a very important topic for the game today.  I do not think that the game can grow if tournaments are being held in shabby places that are not attractive to new players.  Tournaments should be fun places to be where you can talk with friends, not a place where you can recreate what happens in a sardine can.  It is important that the game be allowed enough space to grow, and card shops do not have that space.  I can admit that not all card shops are small like this. I have heard of a large shop in Florida that works well, and of course the shops in Minnesota still work well, but it seems like card shops are too small for Pokemon tournaments over all.  Tournament Organizers should think about moving away from card shops, and instead moving to municipal or commercial buildings.

 

Well, that’s all I got.  Feel free to share your thoughts.  If you like Primes, card shops, basic secret rares and meta decks at Spring Regionals; please let us know in the comment section.  So Pedro, what do you got for us to close the article?

Well, today the whole world is going cockahoop for the new movie, “The Hunger Games.”  Pikkdogs, you are a librarian and you like to read, do ya like the Hunger Games?

Never read it.  I’m a fat guy, why would I want to hear about a place where there is no food?

I’m sorry I forgot.

I would much rather lay in my bed clutching my Big Mac.

And by “Big Mac” you mean?

My penis.

Okay, we should just end the article, good night everybody. 

Pikkdogs Pikks Four: Engineer’s Adjustments, Seeker, Fisherman, and Copycat

A big hello to all you OHKOers out there.  This  will be a special edition of the Pikk Three article.  It will actually be a Pikk Four, and it will feature 4 supporters that have fallen out of favor in the format.  Maybe we can drum up support for these cards and they will see some play.

This is where I usually introduce Pedro and we talk about boobies and stuff.  But, not today.  Today there will be no boobie talk or fart jokes.  I just found out that the older brother of my best friend during high school has died from an overdose.  He, Jeremiah, had always struggled with substance abuse problems, but he was a nice guy.

I just don’t feel like making fart jokes today.  I don’t feel bad for Jeremiah, he knew what he got himself into.  But, he left his 3 year-old daughter without a father, and he forced his parents to bury him, that’s who I feel sorry for.  So instead of making jokes today, I just want to tell everyone out there to be careful.  I know that college students make up a lot of our reader-base, and I know that there is a lot of drug use among college students.  So, I just want to tell you to be careful, and to think of how your decisions effect other people.

A man died, my friend died, and a beautiful three year-old girl will never know her father.  There is nothing funny about that, and so that’s why I have no comedy in my heart today.  Pedro will be back later this week, but I just hope that at least one of our readers can learn from this terrible story.  Feel free to share your similar stories in the comment section. 

Card #1 Engineer’s Adjustments

Description– Engineer’s Adjustments is a drawing supporter card.  It has a simple effect, you can discard one energy and then draw four cards.  It is kind of like a colorless energy version of Ninetales HGSS’s “Roast Reveal.”

Analysis– Engineer’s Adjustements has always been a card that I have liked, but it has never received too much play.  The most competitive play that this card has seen was when Steelix Prime was a playable deck.  Since he had an attack, “Energy Stream”, that let you attach energies from the discard pile, this card worked well.  But, when Steelix Prime fell because of the rise of Blaziken FB, Engineer’s Adjustments has fallen out of favor.

Like I said before, I really love this card.  There are a couple reasons why you want energy in the discard, and this card can do it while letting you draw 4 cards.  Although it is not the best drawing card in the format, it does 2 things fairly well.  This makes it versatile and really good for some decks.  I really like this card with Eelektrik, since he needs energy in the discard pile to be useful.  I especially like this card in Magnezone/Eels, because Magnezone almost never puts energy in the discard pile.  So, there would be no reason to use Eelektrik, unless you use Engineer’s and get energy in the discard pile quickly to power up attacks.  It also works well with Typholosion Prime, since that card too can attach energies from the discard pile. Even though Reshiram does discard energy by himself, it never hurts to put a copy or 2 of this card in a Reshiphlosion deck, it can only make the card more consistent in the early game.

 Without Eelektrik and Typhlosion, I probably wouldn’t use this card.  I would probably go more for a hand refresh card like Professor Oak’s New Theory.  Drawing 4 cards is great, but people do not usually have an abundance of energy in their deck, and this card is not worth playing more energy. 

Final Rating7.75/10– I love this card in the format right now.  It has a lot of decks that it can sneak into and do well.  It is not a great card, but it is a really good card that works well with a lot of decks out there. 

Card #2 Seeker

Description– This is a supporter card that forces each player to pick up one of their benched Pokemon. 

Analysis– This card was used a lot when it first came out, and then it slowly fell out of favor.  It first saw play in almost all decks when it came out.  It was used to disrupt your opponent, and to re-use Uxie.  A lot of donk decks were playing it for the ability  to take one Pokemon out of the game.  When Lost World came out, Seeker was used in conjunction with Gengar Prime to get Pokemon in the Lost Zone.  But, Gengar Prime is not played anymore, Uxie has rotated out, and Donk Decks are a thing of the past.  So Seeker is a very rogue card right now.

I do like this card, it is very versatile.  You can use it for disruption or to accomplish a goal in your deck.  It can be very damaging to unexpectantly have to pick up one of your benched Pokemon.  You can lose evolutions and energy very easily.  I think it would work very well against the Terrakion deck, since it does not traditionally have a lot of benched Pokemon. 

There doesn’t seems to be a great use for Seeker right now.  It is a powerful card, but there just isn’t a deck that it works well in.  The only deck I have seen it played in is a disruption deck with Weavile.  If you collectored for 2 Sneasels last turn, you can evolve into Weavile, use “Claw Swipe”, pick up Weavile with Seeker, and then evolve the other Sneasel so you can “Claw Swipe” again.

There is nothing about Seeker that makes it bad.  It is a good card that works in a lot of ways.  The only bad thing is that there are not a lot of Pokemon to go with it.  Uxie and a lot of good coming into play Poke-Powers are all gone, so there is less of a reason to use Seeker.   

Final Rating 6.5/10– A good card that just needs a good reason for someone to use it.  It is an under-rated card that can  help some decks out there, a lot of people should consider running 1 copy of this card in their decks. 

Card #3- Fisherman

Description– This card let’s you take up to 4 basic energy cards from your discard pile, and put them into your hand. 

Analysis– This is probably the best energy recovery card in the format.  Getting 4 cards in your hand is amazing.  It works really well with Emboar, this card means that you do not skip a beat when you lose a Pokemon.  You just attach the energies back onto another Pokemon and go from there. 

This card has not seen a lot of play in the past, the most play has been with Emboar in Reshiboar.  It was really easy to recover from a couple “Blue Flare’s”, and it was easier to load up RDL for a two prize knock-out.  This card made the deck work.  However, when Typhlosion Prime replaced Emboar, the card fell out of use. 

It is still seen in some rogue decks.  If you see any Blastoise decks, or maybe sopme Rehiboar’s, you will almost always see Fisherman.  It is good in some rogue decks, but it does not have a lot of use in Meta decks right now. 

I do like the card.  4 energies to your hand gives you a lot of  choices on what you want to do next.  That will set you up on energies for 4 turns, or you can use it with another card like Engineer’s Adjustment or Ninetales HGSS for draw power. 

The bad thing about Fisherman is that the discard pile seems like a good place for energies right now.  A lot of decks have Eelektrik and Typhlosion Prime to attach energies from the discard pile.  So you don’t really want the energies in your hand. Another bad thing is that draw power is very supporter heavy right now.  You always want to use your supporter for drawing, so you won’t have time to use Fisherman.  There are a lot of bad things about this card, but it is still cool and fun to use. 

Final Rating6/10– It is a nice card, it just doesn’t fit that great with the format right now.  It will see some rogue play, just not that much. 

Card #4- Copycat

Description-Copycat is a supporter that let’s you match the handsize of your opponent.  You shuffle in your hand and draw the same number of cards that they have. 

Analysis– Copycat has been in the format since HGSS and has a long history.  When it first came out people were not sold on it being a great card.  It did seem like a lot of the better players did like the card, but it didn’t really catch on to the greater playing community.  That is until Yanmega Prime came out.  Yanmega Prime’s “Insight” Poke-Body let you attack for free as long as you can match your opponent’s hand size.  After Yanmega Prime became super popular, Copycat became a staple.  It was used a lot and saw a ton of play.  But, all good things must come to an end, and that was how it was with Copycat.  Once Reshiram and Zekrom became more popular, Yamega Prime fell out of favor, and so did Copycat. 

Copycat is an old card that is still around and is still good.  There is no longer a reason to want to match hand size, but you can always use the card just for hand refreshing and draw power.  You should be able to get a decent number of cards each time, and this card has the oppurtunity to get you more cards than even Juniper can give you. 

Of course, it also could give you 2 or 3 cards.  You never know how many cards you will get with Copycat, it might be just a couple.  Pokemon is all about consistnecy, and in a day when the average hand size is small, around 5 cards, it doesn’t make sense to rely on this card for draw power.  You can’t be losing  a game just because your opponent has a small hand, so there might be better supporters out there. 

Right now, I think I would use this card as a general supporter.  It really doesn’t have a good partner anymore, because Yanmega Prime is no longer played.  So, it should be used as a general supporter.  Decks that have Ninetales and Magnezone Prime in them usually have large hand size, so Copycat works well against opponents who play those cards. 

Final Rating6.75– This is no longer a great card like it used to be, but it is still a nice rogue choice.  You don’t need to play this card, but this card probably deserves more love than it is currently getting.

That’s it.

 

Rest In Peace Buddy.  This ones for you.

Balasar’s Indiana State’s Report and Durant Decklist

Hello, OneHitKO readers! As this is my first article ever, I feel that I need introduce myself and show a little bit of what I can do. You may have seen me on 6p and PokeGym as Darkwing34, in person as Scott Creech, or in comments as Balasar. I have been collecting the cards for seven years, and have been playing for four. I have never made it to top cut, but I’ve gotten close in the past two tournaments. One of those tournaments was the Muncie City Championship, and the other being the Indiana State Championship. In the Muncie Cities, I placed third out of eight, and at Indiana States I placed fourteenth out of fifty-three. Without further ado, let’s get to the article.
What I Ran
I decided to play Durant just because being a Senior puts a budget on you. This meant no Mewtwo EX for me. Here is my personal list. Please feel free to use it; just don’t take credit for it.
Pokemon: 5
  • 4x Durant
  • 1x Rotom
T/S/S: 44
  • 3x PONT
  • 4x Collector
  • 2x N
  • 2x Twins
  • 1x Black Belt
  • 1x FSL
  • 2x Prof. Juniper
  • 1x Skyarrow Bridge (SAB)
  • 1x Battle City
  • 1x Alph Lithograph (FOUR)
  • 3x Lost Remover
  • 4x Crushing Hammer
  • 3x Level Ball
  • 2x Pokemon Catcher
  • 4x Revive
  • 4x Junk Arm
  • 3x Pokegear 3.0
  • 3x Eviolite
Energy: 11
  • 1x Prism
  • 1x Rescue
  • 4x Special Metal
  • 5x Basic Metal
The basic strategy is the same as any Durant deck. I found Black Belt needed in this deck over other cards just in case I needed to attack with Rotom. The tournament was smaller than I expected. We only had forty-some Juniors, fifty-three Seniors, and about 160 Masters. The tournament in general certainly was a little odd as far as what I saw play.
Round 1: Tristian V. (Terrakion/Electrode Prime/ Zekrom/Kyurem/Kyurem Ex/ etc.)
This was against a major binder deck. After setting up, he won the coin flip and started out with a lone Terrakion. He wasn’t able to get energy on it until T4 or T6. I had three Durant up until T5.  On my first turn, I was able to Devour his 1-1 Electrode Prime line, which was his only form of energy acceleration. I was able to discard all of his Pokemon with the exception of his lone Terrakion starter. This was quite the easy game.
(1-0)
Round 2: Asher K. (Samurott-Ability/KGL/Feraligatr)
This certainly was a fun match since Asher is from my league (GO SUMMIT CITY ELITE FOUR TRAINING!). Asher has been constantly trying to get Kyogre & Groudon LEGEND to work in a deck for a while now. This just happened to be one of his attempts. I won the coin flip and opened with a lone Durant against his lone Oshawott. I played Collector to get two Durant and my Rotom because my fourth Durant was prized. I wasn’t able to get it out of my prizes until T7. That didn’t matter as much as it should have because he wasn’t able to get his Oshawott evolved at all until T8. I think he only drew two prizes. This was also a relatively easy game.
(2-0)
Round 3: Kaitlin Y. (CMT-actually stands for Celebi/Mewtwo EX/Terrakion)
For those of you who don’t know, Kaitlin is, as of 6:36 PM March 17th, ranked sixtieth in Championship Points for Seniors. I knew that this would have been an uphill battle from the start. I went first, and at the time when we started, I realized what she was playing. She opened with a lone Smeargle against my lone Durant. I was able to get two of my other Durants out, but wasn’t able to get the fourth until T7. Kaitlin wound up taking all of the six prizes with one of her Terrakion. This was probably the hardest of my battles today.
(2-1)
Round 4: Alexandra K. (Mirror)
Alexandra’s form of shuffling showed me that her deck contained a Junk Arm, Collector, and Lost Remover. I recognized that she was also playing Durant before we even got set up. After the flip, I was able to get two more Durant and my Rotom in addition to my starting Durant. She was able to get all of here Durants out T2. At first, I thought about scooping because I know that in mirror matches, whoever gets four Durants out first, wins. I’m really glad that I didn’t because of a few misplays that my opponent made. First of all, she played a Juniper when she was getting low on cards. Second, she decided to PONT when she had fewer than six cards in her hand. She also only played one Pokemon Reversal instead of Catcher. I don’t mean to insult her or anything; it was just obvious that she didn’t have much experience with it. After the match, I asked her how long she had been playing Durant, and she said that today was her first day using it. I wound up never getting the fourth Durant, but still won due to her misplays. She certainly wasn’t a bad player because I had only one card left in my deck when I won, so luck just may have been on my side.
(3-1)
Round 5: Alder P. (Zekrom/Zekrom EX/Eels)
I had no clue who I actually was playing until the end of the game. I was able to pull of the T1 Durant set up, but that didn’t help a lot. What actually saved me was Lost Removing his DCEs. I was able to deck him down to seven cards, when he pulled out a Juniper to pull out his last DCE, attached it to his Zekrom EX, and Strong Volt for his final prize. After the game, he mentioned that I almost beat the Senior that is placed tenth in the country for Championship Points. If that wasn’t a confidence booster, I don’t know what is.
(3-2)
Round 6: Nicholas S. (Zekrom EX/Zebstrika/Eels)
By now, the other two guys from my league had also gotten a record of 3-2. This proved our consistency as a league. I recognized my opponent from previous tournaments, so I knew a little bit about him. This allowed me to crack a few light-hearted jokes here-and-there, which lightened the mood a lot. Once again, I went first and started with some extra draw power due to some Mulligans that my opponent had. I was able to start with two Durants in play and a Collector in hand. I got even better luck, and my other two Durants were in my deck. I was able to get the Devour engine going from T1. My opponent wasn’t able to get much energy out on the active because Dynamotor can only attach to the bench. He got one Zebstika loaded up with energy, but wasn’t able to retreat or Switch his active Zekrom EX. Let’s just say that this was a relatively easy game.
(4-2)
Conclusion
As stated above, I placed fourteenth out of fifty-three. I missed the top cut by six places though. There was one mantra in particular that I found helpful with Durant. That was “Deck out or die”. This was said by one of my fellow leaguers (and Durant players), Josiah. What this means is that with Durant, you should never attack, only mill. This definitively helped in some of my matches. I just want to take some time  to thank James H., Josiah K., Jesse K., Rob, Michael W, and my sister (Stephanie C.) from my league for lending me about one-third of my deck.

First Week of States Recap Plus Terrakion Decklist

A big hello to all you OHKoers out there.  This is Pikkdogs here with a short article about the first week of States.  The first week has come and gone.  Some things about States were very expected, while others were kind of a shock.  We will go through all of that, and hopefully you will be all ready for your second week of states. But, before we go to that, let us say hi to my inter-dimensionary sidekick Pedro.  How’s it going Pedro?

Going well, how is Pikkdogs?

Actually not doing that well.  I am sick, I got a cold or something, but, as we all know that doesn’t matter to Ed, he makes me work no matter what disease I have.

How did you get sick this time?  Did you catch something from all the Pokemon groupies that hang around you?

I think so.  One was kind of sneezing, so that could be.  In fact, that was the reason that I couldn’t go to States last weekend, lots of groupie sex.

Will you be doing more groupie sex this weekend, or can you go to States?

Well, I was going to States, but something came up.

So you are doing the groupie sex?

No, that’s not what I meant.  Hey Pedro, I heard there is a new box coming out in the spring, can ya tell us more about that?

Sure, I am very excited about this box, it is called the “Forces of Nature Collection”.  It retails of about 13 bucks, and it contains six things.  It has a Full Art Landorus,and two special promos of Tornadus and Thundurus from Emerging Powers.  The three other things are three booster packs.  Two Emerging Powers and one Call of Legends. 

That is pretty cool.  I love the full arts, and this one looks really cool.  The Thundurus and the Tornadus also look pretty cool, you can never have enough Tornadi, so its a good deal.  Hey Pedro, since we didn’t really have time for a joke today, can you do a real quick one?

Sure, really quick.  AOL’s Urlesque, their entertainment news program, recently featured a story where a full sized cat got stuck in one of those claw machines (the ones that have stuffed animals in them).  The story has a happy ending, the cat was eventually rescued by the fire department.  It is too bad that it took 17 dollars in quarters to get him out.

Okay, good enough.  Let’s get on to the article.

Overview of the First Week of S/P/T’s

Before we get in to what won, let us look at how the attendance went.  The numbers overall were not very impressive.  Most states got about 75 people in the Master’s division.  I think Alberta’s Province Championships had about 50.  But, Ohio States had their attendance numbers go through the roof! There were 220 Masters!  This kind of sucked for the people who were there.  Not only did it slow things down, but they still only had 8 rounds and a top of 16, when they should have had at least a top 32.  This made it really hard to stand out.  So, besides Ohio, most States were fairly average in attendance.  About 7 rounds with the customary top 16 is probably what you are looking at this coming weekend.  Unless you are going to Indiana, which will probably have about 250 people, if last week’s trend continues, you shouldn’t have too hard of a road.

What Won in the First Weekend of States/Province/and Territory Championships.

According to www.pokegym.net, this is the list of decks that won on the first weekend of states.

  1. Zekrom/Eelektrik-8
  2. CMT-6
  3. Durant-2
  4. Terrakion-1
  5. Reshphlosion-1 (This was in Italy, but I won’t really count this win because most of the Pokemon players got distracted that day by making Pizzas.

These are the decks that won the S/P/T’s.  For 2nd to 4th places, the trend seemed to continue. CMT and Zekrom/Eels were two top decks from 2nd-4th places.  Durant was 3rd and Terrakion was 4th.  It seems like the day was won by Zekrom/Eels and CMT.  These results were consistent with my predictions, so there are no surprises there.  Zekrom can hit really hard, and CMT is faster than Usain Bolt.  Durant did well and won a  few, that was also expected.  The surprise was when Terrakion did well.

Terrakion?

On Saturday night, in between all the groupie sex, I went to McDonalds and brought my laptop.  I had the Mushroom and Swiss burger, which was really good.  Anyway, on my laptop I saw that the guys from www.thetopcut.net were streaming coverage of States.  In Top 8 there was a match between a normal Zekrom deck and a weird deck with only 4 Terrakions in it.  The Top Cut personality, and former Onehitko.com guest writer, Kyle “Pooka” Sucevich nicknamed the deck 4 Terrakion. I really like that name.

This deck seems really simple, it just uses 4 Terrakion.   There are a lot of trainers and supporters in the deck.  This deck seemed to forgo the use of one of the best cards in the format, Eviolite, for Exp. Share.  That way the player could attack with Terrakion even if he had lost one last turn for just the one energy that you can attach on that turn.  I have also heard some people are using Landorus in this deck as well.  The use of Landorus won’t change the deck up too much.  Although Terrakion is the better attacker, Landorus gives you some more options.  It is nice because if you were to prize 2 Terrakions, your deck would not instantly fall apart.  Landorus is also resistant to lightning Pokemon, which makes it very good for the current format. This deck is different because it doesn’t use Mewtwo EX, which makes it a good choice for people who couldn’t find a couple Mewtwos.

Because the deck only runs a maximum of 8 Pokemon, it has a lot of room for energy removal cards.  Lost Removers and Crushing Hammers are great cards, but we usually can’t fit them into decklists.  These techs work really well against Mewtwo, and decks like Durant that don’t run a lot of energy cards.  This should give you a decent advantage against some of the other decks in the format.

I really like this deck for two reasons.  The first reason is that this deck is really simple.  We have a lot of good trainers in this format, so why should we not try to play a list that let’s us maximize the potential of each of the good Item cards we have?  The second reason is that Zekrom decks are being played a lot.  One ‘Retaliate” shot can knock out both Zekrom and Zekrom EX.  Those Pokemon are very very popular right now, and Terrakion is auto-win against it.  If you play this deck, you will probably get 3 to 4 wins very easily.

I do have a lot of questions about this deck.  The first question is, “how does it beat Durant.”  Although Durant will not outspeed this deck, it should be able to use Eviolite and Special Metal energies to make sure that the 90 base damage that Terrakion can do is not enough to consistently OHKO Durants.  The Terrakion player will try to remove energies, but will that be enough to stop a deck that relies on a 1 energy attack?  The second question is, “How does this deck beat CMT?”  Although this deck is fairly fast, it should give up KOs on “X-Ball” really easily.  This seems like a deck that CMT will have no problem with.  90 damage will only put it in 2HKO range, and the Eviolite will make it 3HKO.  So the Durant match-up seems iffy,  and the CMT match-up seems like an Auto-Loss.  The final question is, “does Seeker kill this deck.”  If the Terrakion player only has 2 Pokemon in play and his/her opponent plays a Seeker and gets a knockout, the game is over.  If people start playing more Seeker, the Terrakion player will need to play more Pokemon in their decks.

But, the deck did do well with very little play, so it must be a good deck.  It really was the surprise of the tournament.  I have not seen a list from one of the players last weekend, but I can come up with a sketch of what it might be like.  Again, I have not tested this list, this is just me sketching something up.  Hopefully in a week or so I will have time to test the deck. hopefully an article on it will be coming.

Pokemon-5

  • 4-Terrakion
  • 1-Landorus

Trainers-42

  • 14- Hand Refresh/Draw Supporters/Pokegear
  • 3-Lost Remover
  • 4-Crushing Hammer
  • 3-Plus Power
  • 4-Junk Arm
  • 4-Exp Share
  • 2-Revive
  • 4-Pokemon Catcher
  • 2-Defender

Energy-13

  •  10-Fighting Energy
  • 3-Rescue Energy

What to Look Out For on the Second Weekend

Well, I think that we can expect more of the same on the second weekend, with more Terrakion decks.  You can expect to see a lot of CMT, Zekrom, and Durant decks.  Those should be all around any States that you go to.  What will be interesting is to see how fast that Terrakion catches on.  Terrakion was not played a lot last weekend because not many people thought of the deck, it will be different this weekend.  Just how many people play it will have to be seen.  But, it will be around more than it was last weekend, so be cautious if you are playing Zekrom.  You might want to play some Zapdos and see if that will help you at all.  The deck choice that I think will the safest is CMT.  It has a decent Terrakion matchup, and is pretty good against everything else.  The rise of Terrakion should not stop the rise of CMT.  If you don’t have enough cards for CMT, Durant might be a safer deck than Zekrom, if you think that Terrakion is going to played a lot.

Conclusion

Well Pedro, I know that was a short article, but I’m sick and that’s all I can do.  Why don’t you close the article out.

Okay.  Foxnews.com is reporting that a New York Advertising Agency is trying to use homeless people as “walking Wi-Fi Hot Spots.”  The plan, before it was recently canceled, was to give equipment to these homeless people, and a user would pay the vagrant 2 bucks for every 15 minutes they spend online.  So Pikkdogs, would you follow  a homeless person around with your Ipad?

I already follow them around.

Okay, would you get Wi-Fi from them?

No.  Though it could have a catchy name, “Ho-Bo Hot Spots!”

That would be nice.  But is a Wi-Fi hot spot worth spending time with guys who are smelly and sometimes crazy? 

Sounds like dinner with my family.

True, if you use it at your families house, you might as well do it with the homeless.

That’s what I do.  Anyway, this sounds  a lot like Kramer’s idea of using the Homeless to power rickshaws in Seinfeld.  That didn’t work either, but it was a lot funner.  That’s enough,  good night everybody!

OneHitKO Store – Pokemon Cards For Sale

Hey guys, it’s Ed here to talk to you about something new going on at OneHitKO.com. Maybe you’ve noticed the new ads around the site, but maybe you’ve been conditioned to ignore all the advertisements. I really can’t blame you for ignoring the ads. I mean, I do appreciate when you guys have clicked on the ads in the past, but let’s be honest. They ads are rarely related to anything you care about and they can get annoying.

Lately, Pikkdogs has been busy providing you guys with plenty of entertaining Pokemon TCG content. As a side note, we really ought to thank him more for that.

While he’s been writing articles, I’ve been working on something new, The OneHitKO.com Store. I just got it working, and while I’m pretty proud that it’s up and running, I know that it still definitely needs work. As you can see from the look of it, it’s a low budget operation.

We are currently only selling Next Destinies cards, and the shop looks a bit weak. I know. I mean, take a look around here. The site works, and we are pleased to have so many loyal readers. We’re not kidding anyone, though. Aesthetics is not the focus. I’m working on the issues, though.

I want this new idea to work out, because I think it will be a good thing for our readers. Ultimately, I want us to be able to provide any cards you guys might need, but right now we have to start somewhere. I also want to make it look more professional, but I just think that it’s better for us to get something up and running ASAP than to get it perfect before launching.

What does this mean to you? Well, we’re hoping that OneHitKO readers will support the site by patronizing http://shop.onehitko.com. Whenever you need some cards, all we ask is that you check out the OneHitKO Store and see if we have the cards you’re looking for.

Please consider taking a moment right now to browse our Pokemon Card Shop. Leave us some feedback about what you think. I know the selection isn’t impressive yet, but we need to start somewhere. Also, keep in mind that I will be editing the store quite a bit in the near future. The look and feel of it will likely change.

If you experience any technical difficulties, be sure to let us know. If you don’t like something you see (layout, pricing, etc.), let us know. If you make a purchase, leave a comment here and let us know.

Thanks guys! I really think this will be a better way bring you both the information you need and the cards you need to act on that information. The process will require some growing and learning, but I’m excited about this new way for us to serve the Pokemon TCG community.