This article is designed for the novice
player in mind. Older veterans to the game will probably not see much
use out of it, but sometimes I think everyone needs something to focus
on when constructing and playing Pokemon.
Drawing is a very important aspect of the
Pokemon Trading Card Game. Every turn you must draw one card, but that
is not the limit to the ways to pull cards from the deck. There are a
variety of cards from Professor Oak to Bill's Teleporter that help you
gain an advantage in the game early on or late.
Drawing power will get your deck
set-up. When I say "set-up", I mean all your heavy hitters out and
enough support to start causing your opponent to either attack or hurry
and set-up as well to counter your deck. For instance, you have Machop
active with several other supporting Pokemon on the bench. You take your
card per turn and find a Gambler. You flip the coin to see if you draw
one card or eight. Heads! You draw eight cards from the top of your deck
and low and behold you manage to find a Pokemon Breeder and a Machamp,
along with energies and healing trainers to support Machop (soon to be
Machamp). While on your opponent's side of the table, they have a lonely
weak thirty hit point Magikarp active with a Lapras on the bench. You
are clearly in the situation where you have the upper-hand since your
opponent has only two cards in their hand and no clear way to beat your
Machamp.
Simply put being
"set-up" is the situation where you are either exceeding or countering
your opponent's deck with your cards. Lack of Energies, in-play Pokemon,
and trainers will cause your opponent to gain the upper hand. Why? They
have more options than you do. The only way to remedy this problem is a
good draw engine so that you too can have more possibilities up your
sleeve and on the table.
Let me get a bit more technical in my
definition: You start off the game with 49 cards in a constructed deck
if your opponent did not mulligan and if you placed six prize cards
aside. So, lets say you are looking to find a Pokemon Tool to attach to
one of your Pokemon: Water Cube 01. You have put in four Water Cube 01
to your deck. So the likely hood that you draw a Water Cube from your
deck is about 1 out of 12. If you had three Water Cubes it would be
about 1 out of 16. The likely hood that you would draw two Water Cubes
out of 49 cards is 1 for every 24 cards. Odds are greatly against you if
you only have one Water Cube since you probably will waste 49 turns
looking for one. That is only if it is not in one of your prizes...
How do you
improve your odds of finding the card you need? Draw Power. The more
cards you have in your hand, the more options you have for this turn and
later ones. If you manage to draw more cards than your opponent, you
have an advantage over him with options.
Drawing the most cards is not the most
important thing to do in Pokemon. You must understand when to hold onto
a Mary or Professor Elm for a situation when you need it. If you have
your bench full, fully powered active, and enough cards in your hand to
make a quick profit on eBay, I would consider not playing a draw card.
Additionally the number of cards remaining in your deck determines if
you or your opponent wins. Playing a Bill with only two cards left in
your deck is not a smart move because come next turn, you will no longer
be able to draw a card, making your opponent the winner. Don't abuse
draw cards UNLESS you are trying to set-up or counter your opponent with
something you KNOW you have yet to have drawn/discarded.
Here are recommended drawing cards for
Constructed Unlimited and Current Modified:
Unlimited: Professor Oak, Cleffa,
Copycat, Professor Elm
Modified: Professor Elm, Cleffa, Copycat, Bill's Teleporter, Bill,
Professor Oak's Research
Officer
Phil sez: "Trainer Cards/Pokemon that draw cards are a privilege to
have, don't abuse them!"
Thanks for reading, see you next time
here at Pojo.com!
-GymLeaderPhil
blingbling@pojo.com