Spinning Tail
       modified deck
Jason Klaczynski

       1.21.05  Out of all the modified decks, this deck has one of the coolest concepts.  Not only does it rely primarily on one card, Dark Tyranitar, but one attack especially: Spinning Tail.  Dealing 20 to every Pokémon starts off as insignificant, then turns into a threat, then becomes multiple prizes per turn after that.

       The point of this deck is to get Dark Tyranitars out as quickly as possible, and keep them in play long enough so that it can use Spinning Tail repeatedly, because every deck will become eventually overwhelmed by the ridiculous amount of damage being done.  There's two ways to prevent your opponent from stopping you:

1) Get your Dark Tyranitar out as quickly as possible.  And we play high draw cards and Pidgeot to do that, and also R Energy so that Spinning Tail can be used Turn 2.
2) An interesting tech trainer card.  Read below!

Pokémon (15)
4x Larvitar (TRR, Fury Attack)
2x Dark Pupitar (TRR, Explosive Evolution)
  3x Dark Tyranitar (TRR, Spinning Tail)
  1x Dark Tyranitar (TRR, Second Strike)
2x Pidgey (FRLG)
1x Pidgeotto (FRLG)
  2x Pidgeot (FTLG)

Because you only need a Larvitar backed up eventually by a Pidgeot, Dunsparce is unnecessary.  You simply want to lay an energy on Larvitar on turn one, lay the second energy on Dark Pupitar turn two, then after that, Spinning Tail as many times as possible.  If your hand is strong, you may be able to skip into a turn 2 Dark Tyraniar and keep using R Energy (get them with Pidgeot's Quick Search) each turn after that.


Energy (13)
5x Fighting Energy
4x Darkness Energy
4x R Energy

You want to play enough fighting energy so that you can take advantage of fighting weak cards like Elekid, Voltorb, Dunsparce, etc. which have a chance of being knocked out first turn by Larvitar.

R Energy is great for speed, the ability to do high amounts of damage with Grind, and also allows Dark Tyranitar to use its Bite Off attack when necessary.


Trainers (32)
4x Steven's Advice (HL)
4x Celio's Network (FRLG)
2x Rocket's Mission (TRR)
1x Copycat (TRR)
1x Mr. Briney's Compassion (DR)
4x Claw Fossil (SS)
4x Rare Candy (SS)
4x Great Ball (FRLG)
3x Energy Removal 2 (RS)
2x Ancient Technical Machine [Rock] (HL)
2x Rocket's Poké Ball (TRR)
1x Strength Charm (TATM)

The Great Ball gets you whetever you need: The Larvitar or the Pidgey.  This way, you don't need Dunsparce, and don't waste a turn using Strike and Run.

The Claw Fossil doesn't seem to make sense, but it's great.  It's a solid opener that can stall until your Dark Tyranitar is ready.  Not only that, but when they attack it, they get a damage counter, which can end up giving you a knock out later game. 

The Energy Removal 2 is a new idea I've been trying.  The idea is to slow your opponent's first few turns down so that they lose one to two turns of attacking the Dark Tyranitar (at least prevent it from being knocked out), because like I said, the more turns you use Spinning Tail, the more likely you are to win the game. 

ATM Rock is of course, amazing with Spinning Tail, because damaged evolutions are transformed into their low HP basics and immediately are knocked out, and also it is useful if your opponent has used Rare Candy to get out a Pidgeot immediately on you.  Use ATM [Rock] immediately to hopefully negate the tremendous advantage they will have by having a Pidgeot before you.


What beats Dark Tyranitar?
Dark Tyranitar has become more popular, and the following cards are somw ways people are dealing with it:

Milotic (HL) - Removing all damage in play is definitely going to be to their advantage, negating the effect of your Spinning Tails.  Milotic is hard to deal with, but you can go for one-hit KOs with Tyranitar rather than Spinning Tails if necessary.  No deck is unbeatable, but at least this deck plays Energy Removal 2 (something that gives you a chance to get lucky against any deck you play, no matter how much of an underdog you seem to be.)

Butterfree (FRLG) - Butterfree removes one damage counter off of each of your Pokémon in between turns.  This also negate's Dark Tyranitar's damage by your turn.  However, it must be active to use it's power, and has weak attacks, so you should be able to take it out with Dark Tyranitar.

Togetic - Togetic can't be damaged by Dark Pokémon, but it can't protect it's bench.  Just remember to not have a Dark Tyranitar on your bench because Togetic is allowed to use your benched Pokémon's attacks.

Nidoqueen -  Nidoqueen easily one-hit KOs Dark Tyranitar.  Energy Removal 2, and Rock TM [which can cleverly be used to discard their Double Rainbow energies by turning their Pokémon back to basics] can handicap the deck for crucial turns while your Spinning Tails add up.

Anything I didn't comment on should be self-explanatory.  The deck's amazing.  Try it.


Jason "Ness" Klaczynski
aim:aatwoson

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