Last time we did the OneHitKO.com Challenge, things didn’t go quite as planned. At the end, I discussed doing some sort of budget challenge the next time around. Well, things again didn’t go as planned and real life took its toll. I didn’t quite get around to working out a real challenge for the rest of you to participate in, but I do have something going on anyway.
Last time I wrote about how I was getting my 5-year-old into the Pokemon tournament scene. Well, I don’t think she’s quite ready, but I have been working on a deck for her. Interestingly enough, I think it’s a great deck for the OneHitKO.com Budget Challenge. Depending on the incarnation, I think you can purchase the deck at a place like Troll And Toad for anywhere from $30 to $90. If you already have some cards (which most of us do), or if you can trade/buy some cards locally or at cheaper places (like scrounging eBay for deals), I think you can easily cut those figures in half. Read More
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs here, today we will be talking about the possible rotation that may happen in late August. A rotation can be a scary thing, especially for newer players, but in this article we will analyze why it can be a good thing. The rotation is something that is fairly complicated, so let’s talk about that later after we talk to my extra-dimensional sidekick Pedro. How’s Pedro doing today?
Oh doing well. Enjoying the lovely spring/summer weather. You probably want me to do a news story to kick things off. Okay, today’s news comes from the world of literature. Today is the anniversary of the release of Bram Stocker’s most famous work, “Dracula.” Do you like the Dracula Pikkdogs?
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs here with a tournament report. This past Saturday I was able to go to my first Battle Roads. This one was in Toledo, although it is not currently in Michigan, Toledo is actually the closest venue for me, so I had to be there to defend my turf. I wasn’t looking forward to this event because Toledo events are usually held in the smallest game room ever, so it gets really hot and really stinky in there. Although it is not a fun place to play in, I still had to come and defend my back yard.
I have been trying to find a deck in this format that I like for a long time. I don’t really like Zekrom, its just too robot like for me. I would like to play CMT, but I am very poor and can’t afford the deck right now. And I am not convinced about the other decks in the format, so I went with a rogue deck.
For about a month now I have been thinking about a tanking deck with either Groudon EX or Kyurem EX. Onehitko writer TAndrewT convinced me to actually make the deck when he wrote an article about two tanking decks featuring both Pokemon. I made the deck and was pleasantly surprised that it seemed to hold its own fairly well. It did not really have an autowin, but it didn’t really have an auto-loss either. It seemed to give me a situation that was winable almost every time, though the situation was also very losable, it just depended on who had the most luck.
This deck idea is very simple, get Kyurem EX out there and have him attack. When he gets damaged, use trainer cards to heal him. Cards like Potion, MooMoo Milk, and Life Herb have been known as crap cards in the past couple years, but they actually worked in my testing. I did try this deck with some of those trainers and then Blissy DX, but the deck was more consistent with a bunch of trainers.
Smeragle is also in this deck to speed things up. He is actually a vital card in this deck, and he makes this deck fast and consistent enough to work.
Kyurem is a very under appreciated card. He may not be the EX that hits the hardest, but he has a weakness that is very hard to exploit. Plus, he can do things like discard Special Energies while still attacking. The goal of this deck is not to discard energies, but if you can it is always a good thing. Kyurem can hit for 120 damage, the downside is that he is unable to use the same attack the next turn. But, this deck does run 4 Switches and Smeargles with Skyarrow Bridge, so doing 120 damage twice is not a huge problem.
Here is the list. It is not a perfect list, it of course can be imporved. But, I did play this deck to see if I like it enough to play it for Nationals, and if the deck could stand up to the format. If you guys have any ideas on improvements, just let me know in the comment section.
Pokemon-7
4-Kyurem EX
3-Smeargle
Trainers-42
3-Potion
4- MooMoo Milk
4-Life Herb
4-Junk Arm
4-Switch
3-Pokemon Catcher
1-Super Rod
2- Skyarrow Bridge
2-Dual Ball
3-Eviolite
4-Professor Oak’s New Theory
4-Professor Juniper
2-N
2-Sage’s Training
Energy-11
Double Colorless Energy-4
Water Energy-7
The Tournament
I wake up at about quarter to 9, which is very early for me, but still a decent night’s sleep. I make some oatmeal and sit down to watch a rerun of the Graham Norton show, man that gay Irish guy isn’t that bad in the funny department. After waking up for a while I pack my car up and make the 40 minute drive to Toledo.
I get to the tournament early because I had to re-sleeve my deck, so I did that and turned my list in. Then I noticed that I had somehow got some kind of dirt on the front side of my shorts, so I walk across the street to the Family Dollar and pick up a cheap pair of shorts. Then I drive over to Little Caesars to get some lunch, and then head back to the venue to wait for the start of the tourney.
Round 1 vs John and Dark Deck
My first game is against a guy from Michigan named John. I think I might have played him earlier in the year, but I don’t really know the guy too well. I started the game with Kyurem EX and I have all the energies needed to get Kyurem going. I think I might have the donk on the next turn because he started with a lone Zorua, but on his turn he plays a collector and does “Ascension.” Once John started going with his attackers, he did well. I flip 1/8 on my first flips with Moomoo Milk and Dual Ball, and lose a Kyurem because of the bad flipping. But, my luck would soon turn around. I get another Kyurem EX and start discarding his Special Energy and knocking out Zoroarks whenever I am allowed to use my big attack. John pulls out all the stops once he loses his 4th Zoroark, and starts to use Darkrai EX to attack. This time however, luck was with me. I start doing well on my flips with Moomoo Milk and Life Herb, and use Potion to fill in the gaps. He ends up doing a lot of damage with Darkrai, but I am able to wipe away the energy. The game ends one turn before I can take my last prize, when he decks out.
1-0 – The day starts off well. I didn’t think I could keep it going, but its always good to get a win right away.
Round 2 vs Mike with Zekrom (eels with Pachi/Shaymin)
Mike is a Pokedad from Cleveland who’s family I met during the Cities season. They seem like a real nice family, they are a credit to the Pokemon Community.
I start with a Smeargle to his Tynamo. I got first and bench another Smeargle, I then use two N’s in a row thanks to Portrait, but I still can’t get a Kyurem. On his next turn he uses collector to get 2 Tynamos and a Zekrom. He then passes, and I use another Supporter, but I still can’t find a Kyurem. I do attach a DCE to Smeargle and use his attack to knockout a Tynamo. But, on his next turn he gets 3 energies on Mewtwo EX, uses a Pokegear 3.0 to get a Seeker, and then uses it to get the Seeker win,.
1-1 Not mad here. I knew that my deck did not play a lot of Pokemon at the same time, so it was vulnerable to a Seeker win. It just sucks that I am play the only guy who still plays Seeker.
Round 3 vs Frank S. with Zekrom
Frank is a good buddy from Michigan, so it should be fun to play him.
I start double Smeargle, and he starts with a Tynamo. I use a Dual Ball, and two Switches to use 4 Supporters on the first turn, but am still on able to find a Kyurem again. But, I have the chance at the donk, so I attach a DCE to Smeargle and miss both flips on his attack. So Frank lives for another day. He gets a lot of Pokemon in play, but runs into an energy drought. I do end up getting the first knockout on a Tornadus after I finally find a Kyurem. I then get another KO on something, I don’t know what, but here is where I make my misplay. I see a Mewtwo EX on the bench with DCE, and instead of attacking it and getting rid of the DCE, I knock something else out. I do get a 3 prize lead, but Frank loads up Mewtwo EX and is able to OHKO everything I have. Misplays suck, I don’t know if that would really have made a difference, but it couldn’t have hurt. ]
1-2- Any hope of doing good is just about gone, but I thought I must solider on and keep on playing to see what I can learn about the deck and the format.
Round 4 vs Eric Richard with Zekrom/Terrakion
Another guy from Michigan, that’s three in a row. Of course Papa Richard is playing a Terrakion variant, I think he did in every tournament this season. This game goes weird, as our games normally do.
I start with Smeargle again, and he has a Terrakion. I do find a Kyurem on the first turn, but I cannot find an energy. I use a bunch of “Portraits”, but none of those help. The only things I seemed able to draw were healing trainers. Those helped delay the inevitable, but I need energy to attack. It took me several turns, but I was able to get some energies. The only thing was to keep Kyurem alive, I had to Junk Arm 2 Kyurems. I later learned that my Super Rod was prized, so I was kinda screwed.
I finally start attacking and I make Eric work with how many attacks he had to do just to get one knock out. I am able to heal off a lot of damage counters, but I eventually run out of healing trainers after using them as a crutch for the first 6-7 turns. Once he knocked out 2 Kyurems it was over because I had no Super Rod.
1-3– I wonder what would have happened if I didn’t hit an energy drought. Would have been a good match
Round 5 v.s. Lauren with Mew Lock (kind of)
Round 5 officially went in the books as a no show win for me since my opponent never showed up, but after I saw that my friend Lauren finished her game I asked her for a fun game.
I start with Smeargle and Kyurem and I get a good feel for the game going. I start setting the pace with some good supporters and some early knockouts on Mews. I take 4 prizes before she puts the lock on, but the lock eventually does come on. There was nothing I could do to stop the lock, I just had to wait for her to roll bad. She eventually knocks out a Kyurem with “Double Freeze” and decides to not use “Victory Star” to take the KO back. This allows me to get my last prize, and just as pairings are put up, she misses a “Fly” flip, and I end the game with a W.
2-3- Pretty easy match-up, I just gotta hope that eventually they roll bad, which they usually do. Thanks for the game Lauren, I really appreciate it. It made a deck report that would been horrible, to be just very bad.
Round 6 vs James H. with C.M.T. –T
This was a very pivotal game for my deck. If I win this game, I think this deck still has hope. If I lose, it is a crappy deck. And look who I am playing, my buddy and fellow OHKO writer James.
James and I play this game in a very laid back fashion since we all expected to do a little better. I again start with a Smeargle and Kyurem, and get a few Supporters the first couple turns to get going. I am able to get energies on Kyurem and am able to get a couple KOs on Mewtwos, but those things just kept on coming. I might have had a chance to win, but I was forced to burn some healing trainers on a Juniper early in the game, and then I didn’t have them when I needed them later. I should have been able to outlast the Mewtwos, but those healing trainers eluded me and James got the W.
2-4– The search for a Nationals deck continues as Kyurem EX kind of failed me this day. It is not a bad deck, I did do well in almost all of my games, but it just didn’t have that one or two cards that can put it over the top. I really need something to put a little kick in the deck. Maybe you guys have an idea, or maybe it is just a bad deck. I still need to look for a Nats deck, and that really sucks.
About the Deck
I did not do great with this deck, so it is no longer a front runner to be my nationals deck, but it is still a cool deck. It is also a deck that would be good for kids or people that are under a budget. This is a deck that you should be able to build for about 40 bucks, which is almost unheard of in this format. So I can recommend this to other players and hopefully they can do a better job with it then I did. I might try to run this deck with Groudon EX and see if that’s any better. Though, it is not a great deck, so don’t get the wrong idea about this deck. It won’t win Nationals, but its still pretty cool.
Well, that’s all I got. Thanks to the judges and T.O. in Ohio. And thanks to the Card Shop owner, I especially appreciated him when he took a big stick and hit the bar on the backdoor so we could open the door and get some air circulation in that sardine can. Thanks to all my opponents, you guys were all professionals. Have a good night, everybody.
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs here ready to debate James H.
Hi Pikkdogs!
The topic for this article is: “Are Dark Decks the Future?” Dark Explorers has a lot of cool Dark Pokemon, and a lot of trainers that can be used with Dark Pokemon. Some have speculated that dark decks may be the direction that this game is headed to. Will Dark decks soon be everywhere? Will they haunt the top tables? These are the questions we will be asking today. I am ready to take the affirmative and James is ready to take the negative. This article has been going back and forth for a while between James and I. We both had reasons to delay this article for a couple weeks, so that’s why it is not very timely. It would have been better to publish it a couple weeks ago, but I guess if you want quality you are looking in the wrong place. So as to not delay this thing any longer, let’s get this debate going.
Some may question if Dark Patch and Dark Claw can be considered an engine. I will admit that they do not have the bulk of the Holon or SP engines. But, as I tell my girlfriend just because an engine is small does not mean that it cannot get the job done. It’s not about the size of the boat on the sea, it’s the motion of the ocean.
Whoa whoa whoa, when did you get a girlfriend? How come I haven’t met her yet? I thought we were friends!
Hey let’s not dote on my love life, or lack of one. As I was saying, we have great trainers in the format right now, dark decks can incorporate those cards into their decks while still using Dark Patch and Dark Claw. These two groups will come together to be more than just the sum of their parts. It will make up an engine that will strike quickly for a lot of damage. With cards like Professor Juniper and Junk Arm around, the Dark Engine will not want for anything else.
One last thing before I make my next point. How great is Dark Claw? It’s like half of an Expert Belt without any of the draw back. Expert Belt was a great card that turned regular Pokemon into pseudo EX Pokemon. Dark Pokemon now get the ability to hit for 20 more damage per turn without having to worry about giving up an extra prize card. 20 more damage can meet a big difference; it can be the difference between a 2HKO or an OHKO, and a 2HKO on an EX and a 3HKO on an EX. And, getting timely KOs will go a long way to deciding the game for you.
My next point involves Dark Pokemon having psychic resistance. While not all Dark Pokemon do, the vast majority do have the psychic resistance. This is very important in a Mewtwo EX dominated format. Just that 20 damage can be the difference between a knock out, and the ability to hang around for one more turn and do some damage. It will make it that much harder for Mewtwo EX to take over the game. This makes Dark Decks the perfect counter to the current format. Only by joning the Dark Side can you save yourself from Mewtwo. It has the resistance that we need to go against Mewtwo EX, and to stop it from controlling the board very early.
My final point has to do with the return of Weavile UD. Since people will be playing more dark decks, it will be easier to splash in disruption cards like Weavile. I could see disruption decks making a comeback because of the energy acceleration that Dark Patch gives you. Darkrai EX will also give Weavile free retreat, which will make the deck work a lot better.
Let’s shed some light on the subject
Everything Pikkdogs has stated has merit, nothing stated above is false or misleading.
Are you sure? I seem to specialize in false and misleading information.
True, I meant more on the Dark Type cards, but anywho!
First, I feel that Dark Decks will be the new Reshiphlosion after rotation. Reshiphlosion was a good option for people to play because it had a semi fast, hard hitting Pokemon and engine available. It was also weak to Water which did not have a large showing in tournaments. Now what is the majority of Dark Pokemon weak to? Fighting. The others? Electric. Let me expand on that.
I don’t think you should be taking jabs at Reshiphlosion, Airhawk might read this and swoop down on ya.
Well honestly I wasn’t meaning it in a negative way. Two of my league mates, Jake Kart and Tim Bajema have been running Reshiphlosion for a very long time. I meant this as, after rotation people who were used to Reshi have a chance to go to something other than an Eels based deck. Also, Airhawk may swoop down but he won’t be able to carry me off as I am quite large, kind of like you Pikkdogs.
Ahhh, a fat joke. Now it’s getting personal. Well, your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.
Better than dingleberries!
Back to the task at hand, we now have some major hitters when it comes to Fighting. Groudon EX and Terrakion are the top Fighting type hard hitters. With QuadTerrakion and QuadGroudon decks on the rise in popularity, it can give the dark side a bit of a problem. Terrakion can revenge OHKO a Darkrai EX unless it is Eviolited. Having an eviolite on Darkrai would be very unusual as Pikkdogs stated above that they will attach Dark Claw. Groudon EX can decimate Darkrai and the bench too with rather fast attachments. Now I believe, I could be wrong, that the only other weakness that dark types have is Electric. We all know about Eels and how they can already go toe-to-toe with CM decks. Darkrai’s ability is nullified with Raikou EX, where you can hit the bench and snipe around high HP EXs. Electric also hinders Dark by having the same weakness. With Eel decks being popular, some will naturally play the weakness. That hurts.
Lastly, let me address Weavile UD. Now in this format you either need to go ultra-consistent or ultra-techy. Trying to meet somewhere in the middle will destroy each goal. The goal of Weavile UD is to pair up with the Supporter Holligans to disrupt your opponent. Between the amount of hand refreshers and tool cards to pull from the discard, I do not believe that it is a big enough threat. I also think trying to tech him into a more aggressive build would produce subpar results. I state that with theorymon in mind.
All in all I believe that Dark Decks will now be viable in competitive play but the timing is bad with Electric based decks being as strong as they are now and sharing the same weakness.
Now you have heard both sides. What do you think. Are Dark decks really Tier 1? Please let us know what you are thinking by leaving your thoughts in the comment box.
This BR season, I wanted to do some sort of OneHitKO Budget Challenge, but life took its toll, and I really didn’t do much Pokemon for a while. We hit up states, but we were fairly unprepared. Now that a new set is out and a new BR season is already upon us, my plans will have to wait for some other time.
What has happened, though, is that I think it’s time to teach my second daughter how to play Pokemon and get her in on some tournament play. This past weekend, I brought Petra (my second daughter behind Ava) to Battle Roads. Ava and I played, and Petra watched. She sat with me quite a bit, and she was excited each time I won. We cut the day short, when I dropped (which helped TAndrewT get second on the day). The whole thing sparked the idea to get her started on playing the TCG, but she’s only 5 years old. How can we pull it off?
This article won’t get too deep into my plans for Petra. I hope to get to that in a future article. I will, however, discuss a bit of what I did when Ava was getting into the game 2 and a half years ago.
What I did at the time was take a known deck and childproof it. I did everything I could to choose a deck that had a single goal and build it in a way that limited all the options. You might say that I wanted an “autopilot” deck, but to a 6-year-old (as Ava was at the time), even “autopilot” requires plenty of thought. Read More
I had thought about bringing the Groudon EX tank deck that I wrote up in my last OHKO article, but in testing, it always seemed as though QuadGroudon couldn’t keep up with opponents who played a lot of Tornadus or Mewtwo. Even though the deck was designed to heal away damage with cards like Potion and Moomoo Milk, the amount of damage that could be healed with those cards was just too low. Mewtwo piled on damage too fast, and Tornadus’ resistance to Fighting types was too just difficult to surmount. EX tanking, I thought, would work much better if multiple different EX’s could be used in the same deck to counteract resistance, could be switched at will, and could be healed more quickly and completely than I wrote about just two weeks ago.
1 Klinklang EPO. This deck has real trouble with energy denial. If the opponent plays a couple Lost Remover, well, it might survive that. But if the opponent plays Crushing Hammer as well, and sends some special energy cards to the discard, the deck gets into trouble fast. Klinklang EPO’s first attack, Charge Beam, does 30 damage and rescues an energy card–any energy card–from the discard pile onto Klinklang, back into play. But I only used this guy once in the tournament, and he could easily be replaced with a third Klinklang BLW.
10 Energy: 3 Prism, 4 Rainbow, 3 Special Metal. As I mentioned, Prism and Rainbow count as both Dark and Metal, but only Rainbow can be Shift Geared onto and off of Klinklang. Meanwhile, Special Metal is key to raising the HP of Klinklang above what your opponent can deliver. Zoroark DEX usually hits for 140-150 (with Dark Claw and Special Dark Energy attached), and ZekEels players can easily double-PlusPower a Zekrom’s Bolt Strike for 140. Parking 1-2 Special Metals on Klingklang can foil this strategy.
1 Juniper, 1 Twins. I don’t know. Other than Professor Oak’s New Theory and N, what other Supporters does this deck want to run? I included a copy of Twins because the deck is frequently behind in prizes, but Twins only nets you two cards, so I actually don’t even like it that much when I am behind. And there’s very little in this deck that I like to discard, but Juniper is powerful, so I included one.
My Battle Roads Report
As it turns out, there was some drama to the Dreamers tournament before it even started. On Sunday only, the MN Department of Transportation closed down Interstate 94–the major east-west freeway through the Twin Cities–but didn’t post a lot of information or detour signs about the closure. I-94 is one of very few access routes to St. Louis Park, mainly because of a chain of lakes to its east that cut off most surface streets. That meant that folks coming to the tournament from the east were dumped into downtown Minneapolis, with no labeled detour, along with thousands of other commuters in the same boat. Paul and I had left very early, and I knew how to detour the closure, so we made it to the tournament just at the end of registration. But ~10 others, including players driving from Wisconsin (such as NA top-50 players Mike Lesky and Andy Reynolds) were stuck longer, arrived to the tournament after the beginning of round 1, and received first-round losses. This meant that there were really only 21 Masters competing for top 4.
Round 1: Jason Crawford (Kyurem/Kyurem EX/Kyogre EX/Feraligatr Prime)
Vileplume prevents Klinklang EX from using Max Potion or Rare Candy, and I was pretty concerned about that. I became even more concerned when I did my first Heavy Ball search, and discovered that my single Stage 1 Klang was prized. Luckily, I managed to squeeze in a Rare Candy to Klinklang BLW before Mike established the lock. In testing, Klinklang EX had done terribly against status condition lock decks like Vileplume/Lilligant and Vileplume/Accelgor, because there was no way to retreat a damaged EX or heal it. I had considered including a Steelix line to deal with this (because Steelix Prime is immune to status conditions), but I knew that I wouldn’t be able to search for Steelix under lock, and Steelix falls pretty readily to Mewtwo, so I abandoned the idea. Fortunately, against Mike’s Donphan as the only threat, I simply cycled though active EX’s, retreating damaged ones to sit on the bench, while I KO’d his attackers. 3-0
Round 4: Ed Mandy (QuadTerrakion)
I had e-mailed Ed my list for advice a couple of days before the tournament, and I knew that Ed was running a very similar list to the one he had used at MN States, because he was once again borrowing many of the cards from me. So I think we both knew exactly how bad this match was going to go for me. Ed’s deck ran 3 copies of Lost Remover and 4 Junk Arm, meaning that he was going to be able to send 7 of my 10 special energy cards to the Lost Zone over the course of the game. My only chance was to start fast, getting energy on the board before he could remove it. But Ed was able to play a Lost Remover turn 1, and then Junk Arm for it multiple times over subsequent turns. By turn 6, I had just 2 energy cards on the board, and had managed to KO one Terrakion, while he had taken 2 prizes and was about to take a third. At that moment, Ed’s daughter Ava came over to say that she had finished in Juniors. Ed looked over at his other 5-year-old daughter Petra–who wasn’t playing, and had behaved so patiently throughout the tournament, but was clearly getting bored. Ed debated out loud, and then decided, that he would scoop and drop. Believe it or not, depending on whether Ed had any Junk Arms or Lost Removers prized, I still think I had a tiny shot at winning, but things were awfully grim for me. Ed’s drop gave me a win that the deck and I probably didn’t deserve. 4-0
This was a pretty quick loss for me, mainly because I didn’t pay attention to Zoroark DEX’s second attack, Dark Rush, that does 20 damage for each damage counter on Zoroark. That meant that Shift Gearing all of my board’s energy onto my only Klinklang, putting it active, and then Gear Grinding for 80, was probably not my smartest move. After Soari announced his 160-damage KO on Klinklang, I scooped. Soari set up great, so I’m not sure I could have won this one anyway, but my dramatic misplay really didn’t give me much of a chance. 4-1
Mike had clearly thought a lot about how to approach our Top 2 matchup, and had decided on early-game Catcher-KO’s with Tornadus EX, followed by a late game sweep with Mewtwo. In my pre-tourney testing, this was exactly the right strategy for CMT against Klinklang EX. But I had included Mewtwo in my deck to counter precisely this scenario, and after Mike’s deck setup stalled through an early energy drought, I figured I had a chance. My setup was also a bit slow, but soon enough we were both rolling, taking prizes, and waiting for the moment that Mike would load up and unleash Mewtwo. He took out my Darkrai, denying me free retreat because my other one was prized. And then he used Shaymin to Celebration Wind 7 energy to Mewtwo with 3 prizes to go, to KO an Eviolited Groudon with 3 energy attached. This put him in the lead 1-2. In my next turn, my best route to winning the game was to KO his active Mewtwo.
And I could have. I had Mewtwo in my hand. But I didn’t. If you watch the video, you’ll notice that I missed many energy drops throughout the game, mostly with energy in hand. I just wasn’t paying close enough attention, and misplayed repeatedly. And so, when Michael KO’d my Groudon, I calculated that I didn’t have enough energy on the board to both pay a retreat cost and attack with Mewtwo. But as judge Mark Janssen pointed out to me at the end of the match, I actually did have enough energy on the board; Kyurem’s retreat cost is normally 3, but I failed to calculate in the effect of Mike’s Skyarrow Bridge. That one extra energy, plus a Gear-able one on the bench, would have been enough to fuel Mewtwo’s X-Ball and win me the game. But I didn’t see it. And so Mike–definitely the more skilled player in this match–took a 40-minute Game 1.
At this point, I was hungry, and tired, and I think it was affecting my play. Even worse, I looked over at my son Paul, who hadn’t really eaten anything for many hours, and he looked practically comatose. Paul won (6-0) in Juniors, but that had finished hours before, and the excitement of being at Dreamers had worn off for him. Knowing that I wouldn’t have a great chance at winning a Sudden Death match even if I took Game 2, I decided to scoop. I think Mike would have won anyway. And I’m glad Paul and I were able to get some dinner and get home in time for bed.
Final Words
Alex Solomonson at Battle Roads. Not really related to the article, but fashionable nonetheless!
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs with a weird article for you guys. I say “weird” because this article doesn’t really fit into any cookie cutter mode that’s out there now. Its not that all my articles aren’t weird, this is just a little more so. Do you guys remember how Oprah used to have a special where she would take a look at some her favorite products? It was called “Oprah’s favorite things”, and since I am just as fat as Oprah, I thought I might as well do my Favorite Things-Pokemon Edition. I am not just limiting myself to products here, it could be cards, or strategies. So just sit back and enjoy the bumpy ride. Wait, we gotta get Pedro in this. Hey Pedro, what are some of your favorite things?
Raindrops on Roses and Whiskers on Kittens
Okay? Those seem like popular choices, why don’t you get us started with a news article?
Alright. In world news, it seems that there is a controversy about the new $20 bill in Canada. The new design has a picture of Queen Elizabeth II and the Vimy Memorial. The controversy came about because the Vimy Memorial has a statue of a naked lady on it. Some say that the design on the bill is “shockingly pornographic”, why others state that it is a good depiction of a patriotic symbol. The Vimy Memorial is a statue in France that honors members of the CEF (Canadian Expeditionary Force) that died in the battle of Vimy Ridge in World War I. What do you think of this debate Pikkdogs?
I gotta be on the patriotic side here, the monument is a patriotic symbol of honor for brave men that gave their lives for the Allied cause. And, I always like to see a picture of the Queen with naked women. It gets me hot.
That’s understandable. I think this is a brilliant idea, it should start a new trend. I think all bills should have pictures of the Queen with Naked Women, its kind of kinky.
My vote for the next one is Megan Fox.
She’s nice, but doesn’t she have a toe thumb?
Hey, she can have a pig thumbs for all I care, that’s not the part of body that I focus on.
One, pigs don’t have thumbs, and two before out talk gets too centered on lesbian scenes with the Queen, we should get to the article.
Pikkdogs’ Favorite Things
Japanese Sleeves and Deck Boxes
The first of my favorite things are Japanese character sleeves and deck boxes. These are fairly normal sleeves and deck boxes that have Pokemon characters and scenes on them. There are all kinds of different designs, from Pikachu in a meadow to Stunfisk, these sleeves and matching deck boxes are cool and have unique Pokemon scenes on them. The deck boxes are usually the biggest and roomiest around, with lots of space for your deck and other cards. The sleeves are not the highest quality around, but they are from the lowest.
The biggest problem with these products are that they are very expensive in the United States. They are usually only sold in Japan, so, in the United States, the demand is high and the supply is low. These products can be found on Ebay from anywhere around 25 bucks to 40 bucks. That does not include shipping, which could cost from $8 to $15. If you add the two weeks or more that it usually takes to get these products to the U.S., they usually are not practical for everyday use.
But for special events like Nationals, these cool character deck boxes and sleeves are a great way to add some individuality for a special day. I don’t know about other people, but I do enjoy playing with unique sleeves. I do love my regular Dragon Shields, but sometimes you need to show some bling bling, and these Japanese sleeves are a good way of doing that.
Eviolite
One of my favorite cards in this format is Eviolite. It was released alongside one of my least favorite cards, Rocky Helmet. Eviolite will always be compared to Rocky Helmet because it is a similar Tool Card, but I think Eviolite is very superior to Rocky Helmet.
If you don’t know what it is, Eviolite is a tool card that when attached to a Basic Pokemon allows you to deduct 20 damage from each attack done to it. Donphan Prime had a similar Poke-Body, and it propelled Donphan to being one of the most successful cards from the HGSS sets. It works perfectly with today’s BBP (Big Basic Pokemon) that have decent attacks and a lot of HP. It almost seems unfair that a basic Pokemon can have up to 180 HP and attacks that do up to 150 damage, while being able to bottle Donphan’s Poke-Body and give it to them.
Although it can be hard to find room in a deck for a non essential card like Eviolite, I still think it is one of the best cards in the format. The One Hit Knock Out is very important in this format, even though it is getting harder and harder to obtain, an OHKO can help you set the pace for the game. Even a 2HKO is very important, if you can’t at least consistently get a 2HKO, you will not win. This is where Eviolite really shines. Eviolite makes it very hard for any Pokemon to OHKO you, and it can also prevent a 2HKO. Eviolite is a great defensive card that can change the face of a game, nobody really prepares for Eviolite, and it is this surprise factor that can give you a big advantage is a game.
As I said before, this card will always be compared to Rocky Helmet. But, I must argue that Rocky Helmet is not a great card. It does cause your opponent some problems, but it can be played around with cards like Pokemon Catcher. Plus, who knows if those 2 extra damage counters will make a difference in a game. It always makes sense to stop an OHKO, so it seems to me that Eviolite is a much better and versatile card than Rocky Helmet.
Locking
One of my favorite deck strategies is Locking. Locking is a broad term that means trapping one of your opponent’s bench sitting Pokemon in the active spot. There is not really a concept of locking in the current format because there are really not many bench sitting Pokemon. Most of the bench sitting Pokemon that are currently in the format like Celebi Prime and Eelektrik are easily retreatable in one turn, but there was once a time when Locking was popular.
In modern times, the heyday of locking was when Claydol GE was in the format. Claydol GE was a great Pokemon with draw power, but he had a 2 retreat cost with no DCE in the format. It was very hard to get Claydol out of the active spot once he was pulled in, so it was fairly easy to pull off locking decks.
The next most popular strategy is to mill your opponent’s deck. Milling means discarding cards from the top of your opponent’s deck (the term comes from the Magic TCG and the “Millstone” card), you will win the game once your opponent has no card to draw at the beginning of the turn. Milling is also one of favorite strategies in this game. I just love the ability to discard cards from your opponent’s deck and know that your opponent can do nothing about it. Unfortunately, the most famous milling card in recent history is Durant. Durant is widely considered to be an unfair card that is no fun to play against. Games against most milling decks are very fun, Durant has just given milling a bad name.
Considering all the good and bad things about locking decks, I still really love the strategy. Right now the strategy is not really feasible. Switch is a card that is popular, and Skyarrow Bridge is a card that gives a lot of Pokemon free retreat. There are too many ways to get out of a trap right now, but I do love trapping.
Good Luck Varsity
Now for some plugging for the Unofficial 2012 U.S. Pokemon Nationals After Party. Good Luck Varsity will be headlining this concert, and I can’t wait to see it. GLV is a band from the Detroit area that releases some really cool Indie rock music. They are not just rock stars in waiting, but are some amazing Pokemon players. They are some real cool guys that make some awesome music. They actually just released a new CD, you can hear the single “Lakes” by following this link (I seriously can’t get this song out of my head). You can find a little more about the concert here. You can also find more about The Noozles here.
The Unofficial 2012 U.S. Pokemon Nationals After Party should be really fun. I am very excited to see and hear the three bands perform, and what tricks they have up their sleeves. It is sure to be a cool party that will give everybody a good time. So if you will make it to the Indy City for Nationals, make sure you stop by the VFW at 1850 S. East Street which is just a couple miles away from the convention center.
Nationals
Speaking of Nationals, it also is one of my favorite things. I think one big Pokemon convention in the summer is a great thing. It feels so great to test your skills against people from all over the nation. Last year I played against people from California, Texas, Florida, and New York. People from all over the U.S. come to the Indy City to celebrate all things Pokemon.
Nationals is not a perfect event. It would be nice if there were some more vendors there, and if there were some events that take place to give it more of a Comic-Con like feel, but I do think that it is a very cool event. One of the things that caught my eye last year was the decoration. There were a ton of cool banners that were hung to the tall ceilings of the convention center. There were also statues, large balloons, and people in character costumes. The convention center looked very awesome, and that really added a cool ambiance to the event.
Card Art
Not everybody can pickup and play a Zekrom deck correctly, but everybody can enjoy some card art. That’s why I love me some card art, it transcends competitive play, and possibly Pokemon all together.
Modern Pokemon TCG art is fairly varied. In recent sets we have had some real cool Pokemon cards with people in the background. We have also had Pokemon art that have an almost clay like look to them, those have been kind of hit and miss in my opinion. The greatest contribution to modern Pokemon TCG card art has been the Ultra Rares. In the HGSS sets we had the Legend cards which were very cool to look at, possibly some of the best looking cards ever. Now, we have full art cards and full art EX cards. This mixes great art with playable cards which is always awesome.
Pokemon art is cool because it is very diverse. Some art is scary like Terrakion Full Art, while others are scenic like Lapras ND, while still others are cute like just about every Pikachu card ever made. The art does communicate a lot of different emotions that the world of Pokemon should convey. Art let’s us feel that we are in the Pokemon World, and you can not ask for any more than that. You gotta love Card Art, even if you think “The Starry Night” is a song by Paris Hilton.
POP Merchandise (or whatever they are calling it nowadays)
POP merchandise refers to a lot of cool exclusive merchandise that is only available for purchase to Pokemon Professors. Judges earn points for every event they judge, and with those points they can get this cool stuff. I am not sure exactly what kind of merchandise that are in the store, but I have seen anything from Binders to sleeves to bags of all sorts.
I somehow was able to acquire a Groudon bag that was originally a POP item. It is a really cool and really big bag. Kind of like the sleeves and deck boxes that I mentioned earlier in the article, POP merchandise is cool because it has a lot of exclusive art on it. Nintendo does not sell the professor mats, hats, and sleeves anywhere; so you need to get them here or from a professor to get them. What you end up with when you order POP merchandise is really cool licensed stuff that really makes you stand out from the crowd. I am thinking of being a judge just for the swag, it’s that cool.
Max Beef and Cheddar from Arbys
Finally, I gotta say that Pikkdogs loves his Arbys. One of the most important parts of Pokemon is the lunch/dinner stop after the tournament. While I can not find anything wrong with any fast food place ever, I gotta say that I prefer my Arbys. Who doesn’t love Arbys, they have burgers made of Roast Beef, ya gotta love Roast Beef. Plus, in commercials they used to use Barry White’s voice. If you don’t like Barry White, you just shouldn’t play Pokemon.
Conclusion
So, those are some of my favorite things. I think we are all done here, let’s get to the end of the article. Why don’t you wrap things up Pedro?
Okay, on this day in history the Buttonwood Agreement was signed in 1792.
Is that dirty? It sounds dirty. Buttonwood.
It does sound dirty, but its not. It was the agreement to begin the New York Stock Exchange.
Stock trading, nothing more dirty than that.
I guess, even porn stars feel dirty when they walk past Wall Street.
Have you been to New York Pedro?
Nope, never. Have you?
Sure, I went there in 1999. It was pretty cool. But you gotta be careful in New York, it’s quite a dirty city, you can’t touch anything because people have pee’d on it.
It’s like your house after you had too much to drink.
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs here with a Battle Roads preview for you. Now I do know that we already did a BR preview here on this site, and that the article was much better than this one will be, but I will come at it from a different angle. Before we get this started I must apologize for not posting an article in a while, the bossman has been riding me hard and taking time away from writing. Hopefully, in 2 weeks things should get more quiet. So let’s go on and get this thing started by saying “hi” to Pedro. Hey Pedro.
Hey Pikkdogs.
Do you have a news story for us to get things started.
Sure. Everybody has been cockahoop since last week when the new Time Magazine came out. This magazine gave us a new figure to talk about, the breast feeding man. Jamie Lynn Grumet is known as the Breast Feeding Mom. She was the one that was on the controversial Time Magazine cover a week or so ago. The article was supposed to be about a parenting style called Attachment Parenting that creates a bond between mother and child by spending more time with the child and becoming more intimate. But, this was not to be so. The discussion was more on the cover photo. What did you think of the cover photo.
It made me thirsty.
Understandable.
In all seriousness, that was quite the interesting technique they have for breastfeeding. Usually the kid is reclining back, here he is using a step ladder. Which is one way to do it I guess.
Yeah, that doesn’t seem efficient. But, I think it is safe to say that of all the three moms that have been in the news lately, Breast Feeding Mom is by far the hottest.
By far Pedro, by far. She is very attractive. I’m curious Pedro, in your dimension do they use attachment parenting and nursing until your 5 years old?
No, babies don’t drink milk in my universe, they drink Whiskey.
At least that gives them a reason for the irrational behavior of babies.
It does. What do you think of the extended breast feeding Pikkdogs? You are a man that is famous for liking boobs.
Well, most men are, but I do like boobs. I guess I don’t really see anything wrong with breastfeeding until they can go to school. It probably makes snack time at soccer practice awkward, but I don’t think there are any health risks besides sore nipples.
Toughens your nipples doesn’t it?
Nice Silence of the Lambs quote. Anyway, nothing wrong with it, just seems a little awkward. But I think I am happy for the kid. If I could still be breast feeding I probably would.
At least your honest about being creepy.
Toughens your nipples doesn’t it?
On the Road to the Indy City
As Nationals is getting closer and closer, people have been coming up to me and saying, “Pikkdogs, put on your pants!” Then after I put on my pants they say, “how are you preparing for Nationals?” I tell them that the best way to prepare for Nats is to begin in Spring Battle Roads.
The Spring Battle Roads never has the competitiveness that the Fall version has. Spring BRs are all about getting ready for Nationals. They are a good dry run. Even though the layout of BRs are different from Nationals, you still can benefit from BRs by getting adjusted to the format. There will be no big changes to the format until after Nats, so BRs are going to give you a good look at the Nationals format.
Nationals is such a great event that it is worth giving all the preparation that you can. Remember, it was won last year by an unknown-
those weird letter things
No not “Unowns”, an unknown player. Nationals is up for grabs for every player, if you put enough work into it, you can win Nationals. But, the process begins here and now in Spring Battle Roads, so let’s see what things are like.
The Format
Like I said, a big article on all of these decks was already written on this site, so I will not talk about it too much. Here is just my quick take on what to watch out for during Spring Battle Roads.
Tier 1
Zekrom– Zekrom decks will be the most played decks now that Durant lost a little steam. They can snipe and hit hard and are great at recovery. The weaknesses to Zekrom are the setup and the fighting weakness. If you can kill all of their Tyanmos before they can evolve, their hands will be tied. Look to play a fast deck like CMT to take advantage of this. The second weakness has to do with playing fighitng types. Although some players might play Tornadus EX to cover their weaknesses, Zekrom as a whole is vulnerable to fighting Pokemon. Look for Terrakion NV and Groudon EX to come up big. Even though this deck is fairly boring and has holes, it will probably be the most successfull deck during BRs.
CMT-Mewtwo is back again for domination with this really fast deck. Players that play Mewtwo EX as a tech can try to out Mewtwo CMT, but if you don’t have Mewtwo you will be in trouble. CMT is the fastest deck out there and it is great (on paper) against any deck. Maybe people will have pulled enough Mewtwo EXs by now that CMT can gain more popularity as a whole, even though it did recently take a hit against Zekrom decks. Look for this deck to be played a lot, and for it to do really well.
Tier 1.5
Dark Deck– The dark deck is the new kid on the block. It has a lot of hype, but a lot of questions needs to answer. Perhaps it will prove itself to be a Tier 1 deck, bet we are not sure yet. It is a fairly fast deck that can hit for a consistent amount of damage. It may not hit as hard as Zekrom, but its not that far off. It uses a lot of different trainers to accomplish its goals. Dark Claw is like Expert Belt and Dark Patch is kinda like Eelektrik. This helps increase consistency and damage output. The Dark deck should have a fairly even match-up across the board, while it struggles with fighting decks.
Fighting Deck– Fighting decks is a broad term for any deck that uses fighting Pokemon as the main attaker. These decks usually use some combination of Landorus, Terrakion NV, and Groudon EX. This deck relies on weakness and revenge kills to get a good match-up against other decks. Tornadus EX will be tough for this deck to get around, so that is a huge challenge. It also struggles against CMT decks. This seems like an all or nothing deck based on what the match-up is. There will be a decent number of these decks, but not a ton.
Durant– There ain’t no Heatmor that can kill the durable ant, it will survive. Since Heatmor is in the format, look for people to assume Durant will not be played. If they assume that, they will probably not play Heatmor, and will open the door for Durant. I think that Durant will lose some play, but not a whole lot of play. The better players probably will leave the deck, but the bulk of the players will still play the deck. Durant has a pretty good match-up against most decks that will be played. It may not be autowin against the best decks, but it at least has a good chance at every deck. Expect Durant to do better than most people expect.
What to Watch For
The first thing to watch out for is rogue decks. The only new deck that people are really talking about is the dark deck, but there must be a lot more new ideas out there. Expect the unexpected for battle roads. Spring BRs are a mix of the best players, and some middle of the road players with some interesting decks. Expect to be surprised at a lot of the decks that you see. Remember, some people count this season as a prep for Nats, so they might not be trying to win, but trying to get a hold of a deck they want to play. So there should be a lot of rogue stuff out there.
If you are trying to win Spring BRs, remember that it is a sprint. We just came out of States and Regionals, those are marathons. To win at spring Battle Roads, all you have to do is get lucky a handful of times. So you can try some lucky decks and still do well. Consistency will never be unimportant, but it is not as important in the smaller BR tournaments. So try some of those flippy decks, and maybe give disruption decks like Sharpedo a try, you could get lucky all the way to a trophy.
Another thing to remember out Spring Battle Roads is that you shouldn’t get discouraged. If you are playing in Nationals, don’t get upset if things don’t go your way at a BR. You must be lucky to win a BR, but don’t forget that it is more important to be practicing for Nationals then to win a BR. It is more improtant that you guys are familiarizing yourself with the format, and begin to look at different rogue strategies. If you get a tournament win, all the better, but I think your eyes should be on the bigger picture: competing at Nationals.
What Is the Play?
Well, there is no bad play for Battle Roads. As long as you are out there learning about the format, you are not wasting your time. But, I do think that for winning a single tournament, I would try a fighting deck. Zekrom decks will win most tournaments, but you should be able to get a win easier with fighting decks. These decks struggle the most against CMT, but CMT might have a little drop off in play and we all know that Zekrom will increase in play. So, it seems that if you can get a good fighting deck that beats Zekrom decks most of the time, that would be a good play. There is no bad play among the top decks, but I think next I would choose Durant. Most people expect Durant to die off, so now is the time to play it. You can’t go wrong with a top tier deck choice at Battle Roads. Just make sure you are comfortable with your deck. Make sure you know everything about your deck that there is to know, and it will give you a big advantage. When picking a deck it is always best to go with what you are comfortable with, so go with what you feel confident with and you will have a good shot.
Conclusion
Well, that’s all I got about Battle Roads. I hope I get shocked with a lot of cool rogue decks when I go to one. Hopefully you guys do well and get one more step closer to doing well at your own Nationals.
Well Pedro, I am all done. Why don’t you give us a news story to end the article.
Okay. Foxnews.com is reporting that scientists who studied fossils of an ancient sea monster type creature have diagnosed the animal with arthritis.
He might want to take something for that.
If he wasn’t dead, he might. This creature is known as a pliosaur.
Pliosaur, sounds like a finishing move in wrestling.
Is a Plliosaur a better move than a German suplex?
Yes, but not as good as “The Scorpion Death Lock.”
Do you like to watch the wrestling Pikkdogs?
A little, I did more when I was a kid. Though I think wrestling doesn’t like me, because when I was a kid they had all kinds of cool things like Bra and Panties matches, and everybody swore a lot. But, now that I am older and can appreciate obscene things, everything is clean. It’s like Vince McMahon doesn’t like me.
Well you know what they always say, wresting isn’t fair.
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs here with a deck review for you. I recently got a chance to get some testing time in with a dark deck, and I thought I would share my findings. Before we get to sharing findings, I have a couple announcements for you.
The first is that the newest OnehitKO contest is coming to an end. You can read everything about the contest here, but I am changing it a little. I didn’t get a whole lot of responses to the contest, but still want to give away some tickets. So if you want a pair of tickets, just email me at (pikkdogs@onehitko.com) and I will hook you up. See you guys at the rock show!
The second is that we need to introduce my extra-dimensional sidekick Pedro. Hey Pedro!
Hey Pikkdogs. Shall we do the thing.
Sure, but I want another this day in history. Don’t worry if the date doesn’t make sense.
Okay. On this day, May 14th, in 1998 the chairman of the board Frank Sinatra passed away. Do you like the Frank Sinatra Pikkdogs?
Hate the Frank Sinatra.
What? Sinatra is an American icon, everybody loves him. You gotta love him.
Nope, don’t care for him.
Why not.
The man was a gangster. At the very least he hung around people who were criminals and killed people whenever they felt like it. Even though I like his singing, I just can’t look past the fact that he hung out with a bunch of murders.
Oh come on. Everybody hangs around with a bad crowd. Regis loved the Frank Sinatra, and if Regis loved somebody, he can’t be that bad.
I guess, if Regis likes him, you just gotta like him. Nobody can argue with Regis.
A scientific fact.
Unless we’re talking about College Football. Wolverines all the way baby! The Irish suck.
Really, I’m a University of South Carolina fan. Go Cocks!
Go Cocks indeed.
Goal of the Deck
The goal of this deck is to use the trainer cards released in the Dark Explorers set to deal damage efficiently with Dark type Pokemon. Not many decks in Pokemon consist of only one type. Besides Reshiphlosion and Reshiboar, not many decks have focused on one type like this one in recent history. But, this deck primarily used Dark type Pokemon to take advantage of Dark Claw and Dark Patch. Dark Claw is kinda like Expert Belt, it helps you do an extra 20 damage on each attack to the defending Pokemon. Dark Patch is kind of like Eelektrik’s “Dynamotor” Ability, it lets you attack a dark energy to a dark Pokemon on your bench. These cards make Dark Pokemon more powerful and consistent.
There are two Pokemon that are normally in this deck that can be considered the main attacker. The first is Zoroark DE. Zoroark has a swarming like attack that does 20 damage for each Dark Pokemon that you have in play. That means that if you have 5 Dark Pokemon on your bench, you can do 120 damage. This is increased to 140 with Dark Claw, and 160 with 2 Special Darkness Energies. 160 damage is nothing to sneeze at, it is really good, and it is better because it only costs CC. There are some bad things about Zoroark though. He has a fairly low HP, which means that your opponent will knock Zoroark out easily. That means that you will need to put out 4 Zoroarks, and then have another attacker waiting in the wings.
In the wings is Darkrai EX. Darkrai EX sports a great 180 HP, which means your opponent will probably need at least 2 hits to knock him out. Darkrai has an attack that does 90 damage and snipes for 30. With a Dark Claw and 2 Special Darkness Energies, that is increased to 130 damage to the active, and 30 for sniping. 130 may not be as good as 160, but it is still really good, especially for a Basic. The 30 damage to the bench doesn’t really matter that much, the baby Pokemon are almost all gone, people will start playing the 40 HP Tynanmo, and almost all other low HP Pokemon will require 3 attacks for a knockout. The bad thing about Darkrai is that you need 3 energies on him to attack. I know that you can load energies on him faster with Dark Patch, but if you get a bad start, those Dark Patches may not be there.
Setup
Speaking of the setup, it is very important for this deck. Since you have at least 2 attackers in this deck, your setup will determine the order in which you will use him. Ideally you would want to attack first with Zoroark because all of those Dark Pokemon that fuel your attack may not be around later in the game, but it could be hard to do this since Zoroark is actually a little faster than Zoroark. Setup is also important because this deck relies on at least 1 evolution line. Since decks are very fast right now with Mewtwo EX dominating the format, you will need to evolve quickly before they can start controlling your field with Pokemon Catcher.
It is hard to give you a blueprint for a setup since the list is not very focused right now. Hopefully you either start with Zorua or a benched Darkrai EX. No matter who you start with, you should try to attack energies right away, get a Pokemon Collector, and try to get an energy in the discard pile for Dark Patch. Your first job is to load energies on an attacker, and get ready to evolve into Zoroark and any other Stage 1 that you have. If you are trying to attack with Zoroark you can consider using DCE to attack quickly, if you are attacking with Darkrai EX you should try to load him up with energies with Dark Patch. You need Dark Patch with Darkrai EX because he is just too slow with his large energy requirement. Hopefully by turn 2 you should be able to get enough energy on whatever it is you are using to attack, and you are also filling up your bench with big HP basics and evolved Pokemon.
After your setup you can just start bringing up one attacker after the other. It doesn’t really matter which of your main attackers you are using, just make sure you keep the damage coming. I will give you one hint, try to use the sniping damage from Darkrai EX’s attack to setup a future OHKO instead of trying to chip away at a Pokemon that may or may not ever be active.
Tech Options
There is a consensus that this deck should have 4-4 Zoroark and 2 Darkrai EXs. There is also a consensus that there should be at least 2 more Dark Pokemon in this deck. The problem is answering the question, “who should take the last 2-6 spots?”. Here are some of my favorite options
Tornadus EX and/or Tornadus
The first tech option will not help Zoroark’s attack, but they will still help the deck. These Pokemon have fighting resistance and will help cover the weakness of the other Pokemon in this deck. These Pokemon are almost your only line of defense against fighting decks. Since fighting decks will be out there a lot, you will need to have a plan against them if you plan to play this deck in a tournament. Tornadus EX sounds like a good play in this deck. If you expect to see a lot of fighting decks, than I would suggest running 2 EXs and 1 normal Tornadus.
Absol Prime
Absol Prime is one my current favorite dark tech in this deck. I do not like this card because of the attack, a base damage of 70 isn’t bad for two energies, but I still don’t like the fact that you need to put a Pokmeon in the Lost Zone to attack. In my deck I could Lost Zone 2 Tornadi, but once those are gone, this attack will interfere with Zoroarks attack. It is also hard to get Pokemon in your hand at the right time without a good draw engine. What Absol has going for it is that it is basic and can attack if needed. It is really hard to evolve, so even though it is a fairly sucky card, Absol’s speed can make up for its pitfalls.
The Other Houndoom UD
There was one Houndoom Prime that was released in Undaunted, but there was another Houndoom in that set too. The other Houndoom is not that great of a card, but it does have an attack that could help in this deck. For one Dark Energy, “Fire Counterattack” does 80 damage to a fighting Pokemon. With a Special Darkness Energy and a Dark Claw you can do 110 damage, which is enough to OHKO a Landorus. It doesn’t help in most matchups, but with Tornadus it will all but guarantee you a win against fighting decks. Although it does not help against decks that aren’t fighting, it is still a Dark Pokemon that can help fuel the attack of Zoroark. Even though Houndoom could get pulled up with a Pokemon Catcher at the wrong time, you do not need to pay the retreat cost if he has an energy attached and Darkrai EX is in play. There are bad things about Houndoom, but there are also some good things. If you look at all the good things and bad things about the other Houndoom, I would say that he is a very good play if you are expecting a lot of fighting decks.
Weavile UD
Probably the most popular tech in this deck is Weavile UD. He has the “Claw Snag” Poke-Power that allows you to discard a card from your opponent’s hand upon Evolution. This is an amazing Poke-Power, and it is really nice to have this card in your deck. The problem is that this is not a disruption deck, it is one that tries to do a lot of damage. And if there is one thing that Weavile does not have, that is a good attack. In my opinion, playing Weavile UD is like putting snow tires on a Lamborghini. Lambos are built for speed, and snow tires are for grip in bad conditions. Although snow tires are great, it makes no sense to put them in a car that should not be driven in snowy areas in the winter. So don’t play Weavile, it doesn’t make much sense. The Power is nice, but you need to attack. Absol is the play if you are going for speed and consistency, and Houndoom is the play if you are expecting fighting decks.
The Dark Bisharp
Like the other Houndoom, the Dark Bisharp was ignored until now, but it has a one energy attack that can do 80 base damage. The catch with Bisharp is that you need at least 2 damage counters on the defending Pokemon to do the 80 damage. If you plan ahead, you can make sure that Darkrai EX hits the right Pokemon on the bench for the 30 damage, and then you can finish that Pokemon off later with Bisharp. It is a decent strategy if things go as planned, but in Pokemon you can never count on things going as planned. If things do go as planned, Bisharp is probably the tech that offers the most upside, and it gives some kind of use for Darkrai’s sniping damage. I have not tested out Bisharp yet, but it does have some good potential.
The List
Here is a list that I used to test with. I will point out that it is not a great list of this deck because it is not yet focused. There needs to be a better focus on what the deck does at what time, and the trainers need to be improved to make sure that happens. But, for the sake of this article I will show you the list that I am using.
Pokemon-18
4-Zorua DE
4-Zoroark DE
2-Tornadus EX
2-Darkrai EX
2-Houndoor UD
2-Houndoom UD (non Prime)
Trainers
3-Dark Claw
4-Dark Patch
4-Junk Arm
3-Pokemon Catcher
1-Super Rod
3-Pokemon Communication
4-Pokemon Collector
4-Professor Oak’s New Theory
4-Professor Juniper
3-Sage’s Training
1-Cheren
Energy-11
5-Basic Dark Energy
3-Special Dark Energy
3-Double Colorless Energy
Concerns and Future of the Deck
There are some big concerns with this deck. It did work better than I thought it did, but my testing did show some holes in the deck. The biggest hole in the deck is consistency. Your first two turns almost never go the same way twice, and if you run into a supporter drought you have no way out. If you want to make this deck really good, it has to be more focused than my build is. You need to have the deck focused on one attacker at one time and have a strict strategy for who you use to attack. Your deck needs to be really focused when it comes to trainers too. You will need to try out different trainers and see what works. Perhaps Engineer’s Adjustments or Ultra Ball would be better in this deck, you will need to try different combinations of trainers and see what works the best.
Even though there are a lot of bad things about the deck, I do think that it has some promise. If you can get the deck focused on one strategy, I do think that it can stand up on its own. If you can focus the deck, it will be the only deck that does not have a glaring weakness. With Tornadus and Houndoom in this deck, it will have no major weakness. This could be a good deck for Spring Battle Roads and Nationals.
Matchups
I did talk a little bit about matchups in my last paragraph, but here is a little more in depth talk. In this section I will assume that we are talking about my list with the other Houndoom and Tornadus EX, and I will assume that the list is more polished than the one that I gave you. So these matchups may be a little bit of wishful thinking, but it’s not too far off.
Zekrom
I would say that this matchup is around even or slightly favoring Zekrom. Zekrom is also a deck that has a lot of variants, so that makes it hard to get a good picture of a matchup. But, I think it should be a fairly even game. Both decks should be about as fast as the other one, so there is no big difference there. Zekrom can do a little more damage, but if Darkrai EX is used right, his high HP can even up the score. Watch out for Zekrom, he can do a lot of damage to Zoroark. In this matchup it might be nice to run Zoroark BW, but I don’t recommend running it unless you plan on running into Zekroms a lot. Zekrom should have a very slight advantage here, but if you have a really focused deck you should be able to get some good wins against this deck.
CMT
CMT is a very dangerous deck, it can flat out outspeed the Dark deck. If CMT gets setup early, watchout because it can control the board with Pokemon Catcher. But if it does not take control early, it will have to deal with the resistance of Darkness Pokemon. The resistance on all of those Dark Pokemon do make a big difference in this matchup, just that 20 damage can make a huge difference. If I would have to give someone an advantage, I would have to take the easy way out and call it even. CMT can take an early advantage, but the Dark Deck can win a long game. The game will come down to how fast you are able to rotate in attackers. Mewtwo EX will get a lot of knock outs, so you are going to have to keep bringing in attackers that can do damage. You don’t have anything that can OHKO Mewtwo EX, but if you keep on chipping away at the HP you should be able to get the job done.
Fighting Decks (Decks with some combination of Landorus, the Terrakions, and Groudon EX)
If you tech against Fighting Decks like I did, you should actually have a good chance against them. You should start out by using Tornadus to take a lot of hits and dish out some decent damage. Then you can get the last couple knockouts with Houndoom. If needed you can then bring in Darkrai to be your closer. This matchup is not as easy as I may make it sound, but you should have a slight advantage in this game. Although it may not seem that great to tech your deck so much and only get a slight advantage, you are still taking an autoloss and turning it into an advantage, and that is a great thing to do. I do need to test this match-up a little more and polish my list, but if I can do that, this match-up shouldn’t be that bad.
Durant
Durant may be losing a little bit of steam right now, but I don’t think it’s going to be going away anytime soon. I know that some people think that Durant will be an amazing match-up for this Dark Deck, but I just don’t see it. Darkrai and Tornandus just need too many energies to be effective. So now we look at Zoroark. Zoroark can do a lot with only one DCE, so he should be a good attacker to focus on. Durant will try to take out your energies, but you will need to use Dark Patch to try to balance that out. I would think that this match-up should be fairly even. You will have a little trouble getting energies on the right Pokemon at the right time, and that will give Durant the opening that it needs. Zoroark will need to lead the pack if you want to win this match-up, and hopefully you can keep energies on him.
Conclusion
I do like the Dark Deck now that I was able to test it a little bit, but the jury is still out on it. There are still questions like focus and consistency that it will have to answer, but it just could be a tier 1 or 2 deck. You just need to polish the list and make it more focused, than maybe you can answer the many questions of the Dark Deck.
Well Pedro, we are all done. Why don’t you end this with a news story?
Alright, I’m ready. In my, I mean our, last article I talked about the tanning mom who is accused of putting her child in a tanning machine. Now we have another award winning mom. There is a mom in New Jersey who was recently arrested for Prostitution. The kicker is that she is a stripper and hooker by night, but a hot dog salesman by day.
So you can visit her and she will handle your wiener, and then you can come back for a hot dog.
Good one. I do not really like this woman, but I do like the principle of combining food and sex.
Kind of like George Costanza in that Seinfeld episode where he ate food in bed. I always thought I was the George of our group.
Okay, you are George and I can be Kramer. Who’s Jerry?
I guess we gotta give that to Ed, he is the creator of the site.
Then can we get an Elaine?
Of course not, this is a Pokemon site, there are no girls here.
Than why are we still here?
Good point, I think it is time to get to where the girls are. Good night everybody.
A big hello to all you OHKOers out there. This is Pikkdogs here with a stupid deck idea for you. A stupid deck idea is like a regular deck analysis, but for some reason we do not have a lot of confidence in the deck. It could be more of a fun deck, or it could be a good deck that we just didn’t test out enough. A comment on one of my recent articles inspired me to check this deck out. It is kind of a swarm deck that features Empoleon as the main attacker and Aerodactyl in a Plus Power like role. We will get to that later, but now we must say “hi” to Pedro. Hey Pedro.
Hey Pikkdogs.
Would you care to start us off with a news story?
Sure. Journalist Dylan Byers at “The Poltico” blog is reporting that the POTUS, President Barrack Obama, has told us a lie. He did some researching and found out that in his 1995 Autobiography, Obama fabricated a story about a girl friend, when in truth no such girl friend exists.
He lied about having a girl friend? And that’s a scandal? I made up about 75 girl friends, I hope I don’t come under fire for this.
Maybe there should be more of an investigation going on in this matter. I don’t think you should be able to lie to the world of Pokemon players. You always talk about your collection of “Pokemon Groupies”. Describe one of them.
Hmmmmmmmmm…………well…………..of course I can name you one of my Pokemon Groupies, I have a bunch of them whom I have a lot of casual sex with.
Then, what is the name of one of them?
Okay, one of them is Annie, a reporter from Baltimore. She recently got engaged to her fiance, Walter.
You just described Meg Ryan’s character in the movie “Sleepless in Seattle.”
Oh, I sometimes get them confused. Okay, give me another chance. Another one of my groupies is Janet. She is originally from Indiana and now lives in California with her two roommates. She’s great, she has short brown hair and works in a flowershop.
You just described Joyce Dewitt’s character in Three’s Company. I’m beginning to think that you don’t have any groupies.
Well, if the President doesn’t have to stop making up girlfriends, then neither shall I.
Seems fair, start the article.
The Purpose of Aeropoleon
The goal of this deck is to build of a steady stream of Empoleons while having Aerodactyls on the bench. Empoleon has a Jumpluff like attack that does 10 damage for every Pokemon in play for one energy. It also has a built in draw engine that lets you draw two cards if you discard one. Aerodactyl has the Ability that lets you deal an extra 10 damage for every Aerodactyl in play. It is basically a free Plus Power on every attack. The decks goal is simple, just keep on doing damage with Empoleon while Aerodactyl bumps up the amount of damage dealt.
This deck is kind of weird because it includes a Fossil Pokemon ( or a Restored Pokemon if you want to be politically correct, which I don’t). There are two ways to get a fossil Pokemon out. One of those is to play its corresponding card (in this case Old Amber) and hope it is one of the 7 last cards in your deck. The other way is to play the Twist Mountain stadium card and hope you get heads on the coin flip to search out a fossil Pokemon and put it onto your bench. These two ways are not great and they are far from efficient ways of getting these cards out, but they are not too unreasonable.
To help consistency in this deck I added Smeargle CL. Smeargle lets you use a supporter card that is in your opponent’s hand if Smeargle is active. There are drawbacks to this of course, you never know when you will hit a supporter or which one it will be, and it is hard to get Smeargle back to the bench because of his retreat cost. There are a lot of drawbacks here, but I don’t think this deck would work very well if it didn’t have something like Smeargle in it.
Setup
On the first turn you will want to get Smeargle active. This will help you get 4 Piplups on the bench. You need to set yourself up for at least 1 Empoleon on turn 2, so your first turn is very important. On your second turn you need to use Rare Candy to get an Empoleon, hopefully you will also be setting up a backup Empoleon. Don’t forget that Empoleon has that built in draw engine, so you should be able to find almost any card you want. Once you get an Empoleon out, you can start thinking about the fossils. The easiest way is to get a Twist Mountain out and start flipping coins. It can get frustrating if Aerodactyls always get stuck in your hand, but try to use Pokemon Communication to put them back in there. Hopefully you will also be finding the fossil cards and hitting heads on the Twist Mountain flips. Once you get a bunch of Aerodactyls out you should be able to do a lot of damage.
The List
Below is the list of the deck that I tested. I will tell you guys that I don’t like this deck how it is, and I would not run it like this. I would probably take out Aerodactyl and try to find another partner for Empoleon. If I wanted to fix this deck, I would probably take out the Old Ambers and see if that would give me a little more speed.
Pokemon-16
4-Piplup
2- Prinplup
4-Empoleon
2-Smeargle
4-Aerodactyl
Trainers-37
Sage’s Training-3
Oak’s New Theory-3
Juniper-4
Pokemon Collector-4
Pokemon Catcher-3
Junk Arm-4
Dual Ball-1
Pokemon Communication-3
3-Rare Candy
2-Switch
1-Super Rod
3-Twist Mountain
3-Old Amber
Energy-7
7-Water
Testing Reaction
I didn’t get to do a lot of testing with this deck, but I did do enough testing to form an opinion about it. After testing, I just don’t like the deck. I don’t mean to doom Empoleon, he could still work, but I think he needs a secondary attacker with him in the same deck. Right now, all your opponent has to do is kill 3 Empoleons and 1 Piplup and the game is over. The deck also needs something to cover the lightning weakness, it doesn’t really have a chance on its own against Zekrom. So, we need a fighting type Pokemon to attack.
I will give you a little thoughts about things that were good with this deck when I tested it. One of the good things about this deck is the draw engine that Empoelon gives us. It almost always gives you enough cards to find what you are looking for, and that is a huge advantage. Another good thing is Smeargle, it usually gives you the extra supporter you need to either setup or recover from a knockout. The bad things are mostly about Aerodactyl. Aerodactyl always gets stuck in your hand, and there’s nothing good about having a fossil Pokemon in your hand. Plus, it always sucks when you flip tails or find no fossil Pokemon in the bottom 7 cards of your deck. So, having fossil Pokemon really hurts consistency. And what’s worse is that he always gets stuck active and you can’t really do anything when that happens. There is one more bad thing about this deck, and that is the slow setup of Empoleon. If you don’t get a good setup and the right cards on turn 2, you are kinda screwed. You need a lot to get this deck right.
Conclusion
So what is the future of this deck? I think that if you rework the deck, it could possibly work. I do not like fossils in this deck, so you need something else. I don’t wanna say that Empoleon will never work, but I think that you need a couple things in this format to change in order for the deck to be tier 1 or 2.
Hey Pedro, its time to end the article.
Alright. One of the biggest stories in the news is this mother of a 5 year-old girl who is accused of putting her in a tanning bed. Have you seen this lady Pikkdogs? The people at TMZ said that she looks like Admiral Akbar.
Oh yeah. Well, then It is easy to see why she is saying that all of the attention she is getting is a “trap”.
Do you think she looks like Admiral Akbar?
A little bit. Though I do think that she looks more like Cuba Gooding Jr, or maybe Isiah Washington.
One thing I think we can all agree on is that she is just one hamburger shy of going David Hasselhoff crazy.
Yes, but the bad thing is that we are all done and we have nothing more to talk about.
Well we could talk a little more, did you see the new Avengers movie? That was pretty cool.
Yeah, but I am just mad that they cut Ant Man out of the Avengers. Ant Man is so much cooler than Thor.
Ant Man is only good at a picnic. Thor is much better, there is even a whole day named after him, Thursday.
I guess you got a good point there. There is no Ant Man day, at least not yet. But, Ant Man is really cool and versatile. He can shrink down to microscopic size, or he can grow to be as tall as a giant like Khloe Kardashian.
Maybe they can fit the good Dr. Pym into the next movie.
Ed 
Pikkdogs 
James Hall 
TAndrewT 
