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Ness' Card of the Day

Gastly

"Ewww." - Jedi

"Better than Magikarp if you want it to be." - Joe Brom

"One hit KO's for everyone!" - Colin Peterik

"Too weak for words." - Kane Keller

"Using base Gastly is like using a blind hamster to fight a badger." - Souper

"So broken it's not even funny. It should be banned in 49 states (discluding Tennessee)." - Alex Brosseau

"What type of sick joke is this?"

12.08.00  Okay, I got swarmed with people that want to try out to be quote givers for card of the day. Remember, only three additional members will be selected, and I am choosing them now. I'll have the winners posted on the next card of the day.

Anyway, I guess a bunch of people got sick of above average cards being done for card of the day, and want to see something bad, I mean really bad don't for card of the day. Let's look at the dreaded.. base Gastly.

Sleeping Gas- Just Wrong

Base set had the wrong idea about sleep. Let's compare attacks. Sleeping Gas to Jigglypuff's Lullaby. Gastly's requires a specific energy for a 50% chance of sleep, and Jigglypuff requires any energy to auto sleep. I think that's a good enough example to give you the idea that Sleeping Gas is just wrong. Sleeping Gas is about as sick and wrong as Devolution Spray. (but don't get me wrong.. there's got to be a few games that took place where a Devolution Spray could have been useful!) Sleeping Gas, flip wise, has a 25% chance of keeping the Defending Pokémon asleep before your opponent even gets a turn! 12.5% chance that they won't wake up before your next turn. (Aww, your poor Dream Eater plan was ruined.)

Destiny Bond- Hope Someone Got Fired for That One

Destiny Bond is also a joke, pretty much. Despite the fact that it's too expensive, and it's hard enough to let a Gastly go a turn with energy on it (without it getting knocked out), this attack is really, really bad.  Your opponent can just wait a turn if they don't really want to knock it out, or they can knock it out with something like Magmar's Smog, as the poison as a knockout would not allow Gastly's Destiny Bond to knock out the defending Pokémon. People suggest that Gastly's Destiny Bond is at least somewhat good against heavy evolutions. It's not. It's just terrible. They can just wait a turn. Afterall, you're burning an energy every time you do it.

But for those rare situations where the psychic deck and Hay are tied with one prize left and they can't poison you and you have lots of energy and your opponent's deck is low and out of Gusts of Wind and Energy Removal, Destiny Bond might be semi-useful. Also notice how that's simply not going to happen.

30 HP- The Worst Part

The worst part of Gastly is the 30 HP. A Thunderpunch, Slash, Smog, Do the Wave, Psyburn, Pulled Punch... anything, pretty much, can knock it out. With 30 HP, and absoloutley no offensive attacks, Gastly just proves it's wrong, and one of the worst basic Pokémon in the game.

Great Bottom Stats, but it Doesn't Matter

Surprisingly, I guess you could say Gastly has some of the best bottom stats. By bottom stats, I mean weakness, resistance and retreat. It has no weakness, but this just doesn't matter since anything can pretty much knock it out, anyway. It has a resistance to fighting, which pretty much also doesn't matter since something else can easily knock it out, and last of all, it has no retreat, which sadly, also, doesn't make much of a difference. Gastly won't have much of a chance to retreat, it pretty much just gets knocked out. If you are ever going to play a Gastly, make it Fossil. No matter what. You should never, ever play a base Gastly in your deck.

My Rating (1- Almost completely useless, 3- Pretty bad, 5- Useable, 7-Tournament level, 10-Totally broken)

This Gastly is among one of the worst Pokémon in the game, as it has low HP and no offensive attacks, at all. I would give it a 1.5. The only reason it doesn't get the lowest rating of 1.0 is because it does have the best bottom stats, you can have, but I already explained that they don't really make much of a difference, anyway.

In 15/3, Gastly is just as bad. All the traits are just as harmful to itself in this format. It gets a 1.5.

~Jason Klaczynski

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