>CripplerCrossface80@hotmail.com
>Subject: Rapidash Revolution
>Date: Thu, 18 Jan 2001 05:01:50 -0500
>
>Heya, HHH here. I've got a deck for you to fix, so step to it! ;P Just
>kidding, I'll post the deck up first and then info about it.
>
>Deck Name: Rapidash Revolution
>Deck Types: Fire, Fighting
>
>)Pokemon(
>3x Blaine's Ponyta
>3x Blaine's Rapidash
>2x Blaine's Rhyhorn
>3x Scyther
>2x Chansey
>2x Ditto
>2x Koga's Pidgey Lv9 (w/Messenger)
>
>)Trainers(
>4x Professor Oak
>3x Computer Search
>3x Item Finder
>3x Gust of Wind
>3x Super Energy Removal
>4x Plus Power
>3x Rocket's Sneak Attack
>3x Nightly Garbage Run
>
>)Energy(
>6x Fire Energy
>4x Fighting Energy
>4x Double Colorless Energy
>3x Full Heal Energy
>
>Ok then...no Neo whatsoever included here as this deck was built prior to
>Neo's release...this must change. MUST....ADD....NEO....There are too many
>good cards in Neo to not have something from it. Also, I need a Gym. I was
>thinking maybe Cinnabar Island Gym or EcoGym but I dunno. I would also like
>to include Golden Berry or possibly Scoop Up to save Ditto or that Ponyta
>that ran to the bench. I was also thinking of possibly Gligar over the
>Rhyhorn. However, the Rhyhorn's attacks are good. Horn Attack ko's a Jiggly
>in one hit with heads and will do the same to a Buzz with a Plus Power
>(hence 4 Plus Power) and the other attack is an all colorless bench hitter.
>I know that you're going to try to eliminate the Pidgey because most people
>think it sucks. True, it's a victim for GOW and then TR Zappy but that's
>not the way to play it. You play when you KNOW that it will be safe. Play
>it like a trainer card even. I was thinking that keeping 1 would be ok, as
>it returns to the deck and is therefore unlimited. Am I low on Energy?
>Should I have SER or not? Well, I'll leave that up to you...peace out.

Hey Tony, thanks for sending me this deck. I have personal experience beating
this deck so I wasnt sure if I wanted to fix it for you or not, since it will
probably come back to haunt me. (mostly kidding). It's a pretty good deck and
doesnt need a lot of work, so lets get to it. Also.  to every one else out
there who sent me a deck,  I want to thank you and ask you to be patient with
me as a major family crisis came up 2 days after I got the job, so I dont
know how many decks I'll be able to fix the next couple of weeks. I will try
to get an answer to all of you as soon as possible.

Lets look over your pokemon first.

Blaine's Ponyta/Rapidash line. Yup.

Blaine's Rhyhorn. It' s not horid, but the part about flip a coin if tails
this attack does nothing is bad. 2 retreat for a 60hp, grass weak pokemon is
also bad. The second attack is just SER bait.You said you might wana switch
them out for Gligar, and I'm going to agree 100% with that. Although our gym
wont keep them from being a 1 hit ko by a scyther like it will for the
Rhyhorn, the zero retreat vs a 2 retreat will help make up for that. As for
the loss of lightning resistance to slow down Rockets Zapdos, we are about to
address that.

Scyther is a great pokemon with the free retreat and to ko all the grass weak
pokemon that have started poping up in decks, but with Gligar around with its
fighting resistance and zero retreat, 2 of them should be enough, lets drop
one to make space.

Koga's Pidgey is neat. A recyclable way to get basics/evolutions is a  good
idea. Lightning weakness is a BAD idea. Koga's Pidgey vs Rokets Zapdos is a
first turn ko. I know how much you like this pokemon though (he is basically
your signature pokemon) so we will keep one around. Besides, its a game first
and formost. If we can't have a LITTLE fun with our decks, then maybe its
time to find something else.

Now came a really hard decision. I love Ditto and Chansey. In fact, I play
them in the deck I play most often. They have been fixtures in that deck
since Fossil came out. But for this deck, they just dont fit. We allready
have a LOT of pokemon who need those 4 Double Colorless, and we just cant run
a whole deck full of those. I am taking them out and replacing them with
Clefairy (neo) and Clefable. Not too long ago, Clefable was considered
inferior to Ditto mainly because you had to evolve it, and to make matters
worse, its basic was a 40hp, sucky pokemon. Not any more. Its really nice to
have a pokemon that can destroy Rockets Zapdos with no self damage and that
can often take out a Sneasel for the price of a single energy. Lets go 3-3
with this line too.

At this point I considered Cleffa. He is a great Dark Vileplume and Slowking
beater. He also has the advantage that, in a clefable deck, you can allways
evo him to Clefairy to remove paralization or sleep, but I decided it was too
risky because we allready had 6 pokemon with 50hp. If you are having problems
with Slowking/Dark Vileplume decks, you might want to take out the 2
Professor Elm im gona put into the deck in a minute and replace them with
Cleffa.

Ok, our pokemon are set. Now lets look over your trainers. Not a bad mix here
at all, but we can make it a little better.

Computer Search, Item Finder, Gust of Wind. and Nightly Garbage Run are all
fine fits at the levels you have them.

Rocket's Sneak Attack can be a good card, especially against all those decks
that run Pokemon Breeders for things like Dark Vileplume and Blastoise. If
you are having lots of problems with those kinds of decks, you may want to
squeeze them back into the deck in place of the energy removals I am going
replace them with.

That leaves Plus Power and Professor Oak. Plus Power is another good trainer
in some decks, especailly those with lots of pokemon that have 30 or 60
attacks so you can 1 hit ko the 70hp pokemon that are everywhere. While its
true that we have Scyther here, he probably wont be called on to attack many
pokemon except the grass weak ones, and those typically have 60hp anyway, and
with Blaine's Rapidash, we just hope we flip a heads once in 2 attacks. Lets
replace those with 3 Cinibar Island Gyms to help protect our Rapidash, and to
discard those annoying Ecogym and No Removal Gyms so we can use our ER/SER
without discarding or returning the energy to their hand.

Oak is fantastic, but lets drop it by one and use the 2 trainer slots we have
open (the other one is open because we replaced 4 Plus Power with 3 Gyms)
with 2 Professor Elm to help keep our evolutions trainers and energy in our
deck, and also because it can help keep us from decking at the end. Once
again, Cleffa is another option here for the Dark Vileplume or Slowking
intensive environments.

Energy looks very good. Only one minor change here. Lets drop one Fighting
Energy and one Full Heal Energy for 2 Recycle Energys to help with our SER
and to help retreat Clefable. I know 3 fighting energy looks low, but we only
have the 2 Gligar that use it, and Gligar allways has the colorless attack
option. Runing just the 3 worked well in playtesting, where it went 4-0
(though i didnt see any sneasel/dark vile/slowking decks surprisingly). Here
is how the final deck looks.

POKEMON (17)
3 Blaine's Ponyta
3 Blaine's Rapidash
3 Clefairy (Neo)
3 Clefable
2 Scyther
2 Gligar
1 Koga's Pidgey

TRAINERS (26)
3 Professor Oak
2 Professor Elm
3 Computer Search
3 Item Finders
3 Super Energy Removal
3 Energy Removal
3 Nightly Garbage Run
3 Gust of Wind
3 Cinibar Island Gym

ENERGY (17)
6 Fire Energy
3 Fighting Energy
4 Double Colorless Energy
2 Full Heal Energy
2 Recycle Energy

Good luck with your new deckfix Tony. Let me know how it does. Just don't
play it against me.

Underdog