Since I've become a Deck Mechanic, I've gotten more than a few inquiries as to what sort of deck I play. The people who ask these sorts of questions always seem to assume that I have some top-secret tech deck that wins every tournament I enter. Their motivation for asking is usually a desire to smack their friends up with the same deck. Understandable, but based on false premises. I don't play lethal decks designed solely to mow down everybody they encounter. Often they do, but that's merely incidental.


But the question remains: What the hell DOES Spike play?

Well, I have a few decks that exist only in the realm of electrons known as my computer. This is due mainly to a lack of funds to construct them in real life. If you want a look at one of them, pick up the May issue of Pojo's Pokemon Magazine. There's one of them in there, bearing the creative and original title "Spike's Mono-Lightning Deck." Yes, that is a deck that I play with--in fact, it's one that I came up with before I was even asked to create a deck for the magazine.

"But Spike, what do you play in real life? Come on, tell me so I can drop $40 making the stupid thing and crush all my friends with it!"

Okay. Well, there's one--ONE--deck I have in real life that's worth much. I have a fire/water deck that I haven't done much work on, and a mono-grass that's in the stages of construction, but my standby is a mono-fire titled "CINDER." Here it is:

CINDER
v. 3.(something)

4 Vulpix
3 Ninetales
3 Growlithe
2 Arcanine
4 Magmar (Fossil, like you had to ask)
1 Kangaskhan

2 Computer Search
3 Bill
3 Oak
4 Energy Removal
3 PlusPower
2 Gust of Wind
2 Energy Retrieval
1 Item Finder

21 Fire Energy
2 DCE

It may not be the most solid deck in existence, but it works well for me and it's a blast to play. Its main weakness, other than water, is Energy Removal (like, duh) but even then, the Magmars can put up a pretty good fight all by themselves. Now then, let's go through the traditional card-by-card rendition, just so you people know why I put this stuff in here.

VULPIX- Isn't he cute? Okay, he has a pretty bad attack (I think he kind of got screwed over--I mean, Oddish and others get 10 plus a status effect for one energy) and his 50 HP is the lowest in the deck. Having him as your starter is not the sort of position you want to be in. I have him wait on the bench until I can drop down Ninetales, at which point the cuteness, while still present, takes a back seat to mass destruction.

NINETALES- 80 HP, 1 retreat, 80-damage attack. That about says it all. It would be nice if Ninetales had a damage-dealing attack other than Fire Blast, but it's not a perfect world. And while it's true that Energy Removal does wound him, the 1 retreat means that you can almost always get him out of danger. All around, probably my favorite Pokemon of them all.

GROWLITHE- A halfway-decent basic. 60 HP and 20 for 2 is good for an evolutionary basic. But, like Vulpix, he's useful mainly for his ability to become an 80-damage-dealing behemoth in the blink of an eye. If I have a benched Growlithe with 2 Fire Energy, no Pokemon is safe.

ARCANINE- My other favorite Poke. Flamethrower is a standard Fire attack--pretty solid and can go off a turn sooner than Fire Blast. Take Down is actually used more often--although it damages Arcanine, this is worth it when you consider that it doesn't discard, can be powered up with a DCE, and obliterates many of the Pokemon out there. 100 HP rounds him out, and 3 retreat is not prohibitive when you consider that he usually goes down swinging rather than retreating. Why wasn't this guy a rare?

MAGMAR- Glad to see Fire finally has its 70 HP basic. One-energy attack is nice in a deck sorely lacking of them, and the fact that both his attacks deliver cheap damage and status effects without discarding is icing on the cake. Since his addition to the deck approximately 30 seconds after I found boosters of Fossil at my local hobby store, Magmar has been worth his weight in gold many times over.

KANGASKHAN- Colorless damage, psy resistance, and the comforting illusion of a defense against water. She can also yield card advantage when I want her to, and an all-colorless attack puts my DCE to good use. Only one is enough because I can search for it.. I might run another if I had the space, but I don't.

COMPUTER SEARCH- Have I really not explained this card enough? In many situations, its text might as well read "Discard two cards from your hand to get yourself out of a tight spot." 'Nuff said.

BILL- Mmm. Two cards. Need I say more??

OAK- The other "Dammit, I need more options or I'm toast" card. And yes, I have decked myself. And you know what? That's okay! Because I've won more games drawing through my deck like a speed demon than I've lost games by decking. Originally there were only 2 Oaks, but I took out a Fire Energy to add a third because I was tired of occasionally getting crap draws and not being able to recover.

ENERGY REMOVAL- Keeps you alive, pure and simple. Removal a Hitmonlee the turn before it smacks you with 50 damage, or keep an Electabuzz from unleashing its 30-40 points worth of hurt. Better than SER in many cases... ESPECIALLY this deck, which doesn't want to create more energy headaches than it already has.

PLUSPOWER- My experience with this deck (and many decks, for that matter) is that there will be countless times when your strongest attack leaves the defender with 10 or 20 HP left. In situations like that, PlusPower is invaluable, allowing you to save a whole turn that would otherwise be spent twiddling your thumbs and letting your opponent pull himself out of a jam.

GUST OF WIND- At one point, this deck had 1 GOW and 1 Switch. I decided that one or the other had to go, and despite the occasional retreat problems, I decided that Gust was much preferable due to its ability to pick off developing threats. That's especially true here, since this deck can nail anything with 80 or less HP the turn it gets gusted up, leaving my opponent with no time to retreat or attack. This was useful once against a certain Moltres deck =)

ENERGY RETRIEVAL- A Fire deck with only 23 energy finds this card very handy. Two are enough in almost all cases. These turn a potentially useless card in your hand into two very handy energies.

ITEM FINDER- I'd run more than one if I could, but this deck is stretched pretty thin already. The original reason for adding this was that, when I only had 2 Oaks, I was constantly winding up with them both in the same hand and having to discard both to use one of them. Since then, this card has proved its versatility in many ways.

FIRE ENERGY- Well, duh. 21 seems a bit low, but the deck ran fine on 22, and with the extra Oak we shouldn't have any problems. I only added the Oak last weekend, so extensive playtesting is yet to be done, but I don't anticipate any trouble.

DOUBLE COLORLESS- Arcanine 'n Kangaskhan's favorite sight. Two seem to be enough in most circumstances. I may try going to 3 at some point in the future, but 4 would be a bit much methinks.

That's it. That's what Spike plays. It won me a tournament, and it cleans up at League on a regular basis.

Questions? Comments? Tourette's syndrome? E-mail me at spike@pojo.com


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