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So it's Prop15- What Does That Mean?

Everyone probably knows by now that unlike the West Super Trainer Showdown, the East STS has been declared Prop15, and not only that, you are not allowed to play more than 3 of non-basic energy cards in your deck. Ouch. Take that, Wigglytuff.

This really changes a lot of things, and most importantly, speed. Energy denial, an important part of many tournament-level decks, must be slimmed down with the 15 trainer limit, but it is still an important part of the game.

Card-drawing a.k.a. Oak is stole a necessity, but Bill loses significance. With room for 15 trainers, the simple Bill just isn't worth it. The big stuff, Computer Search, Oak, and Item Finder, still, should be important parts of the game still. With 15 trainers, Wigglytuff can waste almost all of it's trainer spots for card drawing, and it can get away with it. An example is 4 Oak / 3 Comp Search / 3 Rocket's Sneak Attack / 2 Item Finder / 2 Super Energy Removal / 1 Gust of Wind. You see the PlusPower and Bill disappear.. however, with 15 trainers, stadium cards gain more power, actually it's more of a stadium card: Chaos Gym. Chaos Gym will be a very important part of the game if it gets out, it makes all trainers almost not worth playing. If someone manages to get a Chaos Gym out, against a deck that plays no stadiums, it can be trouble. Your Oak could be useless, and also give your opponent a new hand to work with.

Another interesting strategy is 4 No Removal Gym, or 2 No Removal Gym / 2 Narrow, or pretty much 4 of any stadium card besides Chaos Gym, and then 4 Chaos Gym. Chaos Gym cannot stop stadiums. Play Chaos, and after a few turns when you have a large hand of trainers, play No Removal, Narrow, Minefield, Rocket's Training etc, then you can Oak, Super, Gust, whatever you need to, then get the Chaos Gym out again. It's just like the strategy of letting your Dark Vileplume getting knocked out, then next turn after playing a large amount of trainers, evolve again!

I think many people may overlook the necessity of certain trainers, this includes Gust of Wind. I think a couple decks might go without it, which can be trouble.

I already see the most powerful cards in Prop15 as Wigglytuff, Clefable, Scyther, Rocket's Scyther, Rocket's Hitmonchan, Arcanine, Ditto, Dark Gloom, Venusaur, Slowbro, Dark Weezing, Magmar, Electabuzz, Scyther, Hitmonchan, Blastoise, Rocket's Zapdos, Rocket's Mewtwo, Muk, Promo Mewtwo. You will still see Haymaker traits in Prop15 decks, I guarantee it, but you will see more variety. Watch out for some nice Sabrina's Pokémon combos, also.

Since Wiggly decks still can focus on Wigglytuff, get some help from your bench! (Muk) Dark Gloom and Wiggly are nice, since you can evolve Jiggly to get rid of confusion. I am working on a Clefable/Wigglytuff/R's Zapdos/Muk deck now, and I think I am saying bye-bye to Wigglytuff or Clefable for Electabuzz. Electabuzz is too strong to pass up, even in Prop15. It's Thundershock is slightly stronger, it's punch is slightly weaker, either way, it's still good. Blaine's Rapidash is a nice version of Buzz, too, and fire will do better in this environment than lightning, because of a lot of grass, but Buzz is stage 1 and can paralyze, so Buzz can still rank a little better in most situations.

The 3 max on non-basic energy also slows decks down more, but not much. It does stop 4 Oaks, and 4 Jiggly, but this won't have a huge effect on speed, although it will have an effect. In Prop15, you must rely on more than one thing for your deck to succeed.

Prop15
What's stronger, what's weaker?

MORE ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Status effects to your opponent's Pokémon!
Less Scoop Up and Switch will be played, which used to eliminate any chance to buy yourself losses as people are forced to play a few turns.

LESS ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Going first.
There will be way less first turn more basic and less PlusPower because of a 15 Trainer limit.

MORE ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Speed
15 Trainer does really reduce speed, but if you can stay fast and manage to Oak one, two times on your first few turns, you can really set your opponent up in a bad situation. This combined with the next advantage in Prop15, is still deadly.

LESS ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Energy Recovering Trainers
Since they take up a spot for the 15 trainer limit, and all decks should have more than enough energy
with the limit of 15 trainers, why bother?

MORE ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Trainer Denial
A first, second turn Rocket's Sneak Attack can be deadly. Stealing the single Oak or Comp Search is easy with 15 trainers, plus you can get it easier because no one wants to Oak first turn and get rid of their evolution in Prop15, since recovery trainers won't be in there, most of the time. That gives you a couple turns to RSA then go for any speed you can get, yes, we're talking about Doing the Wave for 60.. (is the PlusPower worth it?)

LESS ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Small card drawers
Bill, for example, is a small card drawer. Why bother wasting a trainer spot for the two cards?

MORE ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Stadium Cards
No one has room for many, if even one, Stadium Card in their deck. Your stadiums can dominate, and Chaos Gym can dominate too, watch out for it; if it's put out and you play No Stadiums, you'll be.. in trouble. :P

LESS ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Aerodactyl
You'd think more advantageous.. everyone plays evolution.. Nope. The Scythers are still there to Gust for an easy knockout, although Gust could be overlooked, like I said before. Doesn't matter though, you need your evolution, too. Pokémon Powers will be stopped by Muk, too. Muk will be more popular in Prop15.

MORE ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Clefable
It's just beautiful against Rocket's Zapdos, Arcanine, Wiggly...

LESS ADVANTAGEOUS IN PROP15
Erika's Dratini
What a shame.. it was just getting popular. Let's just put it this way: No one's going to play a Haymaker, Dratinis almost useless against evolution decks, which all these decks will rely on, Pokémon Powers are shutdown easily by Muk, and her Dragonair, although decent, won't be worth it with the Dratini.

EQUAL
Pokémon Powers(all, in general)
You'll want some since you'll have such a large variety of Pokémon, but Muk will be there.

Jason Klaczynski aka NeSS

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