Hypno!!

     Hypno Hyp Hypno Hypno!!

     "Thanks to the miracles of modern technology and a generous grant from
the Pokemon Workshare Program, I'm able to communicate via this special
headset that I'm wearing.

      Dr. Crash has taken this week off to reduce the stress in his life.
Namely, he's spending a week somewhere where neither I nor his secretary can
find him. I don't know what she's got against her. She's a babe! Plus she
scratches my back with her nails and gives me the french fries that come
with her Big Mac Value Meal. It's his loss if he dislikes her.

     Well, it's just me myself and I this week. Crash is hiding. The
secretary and Vileplume are off in Barbados getting a tan. I don't know if
Vileplumes tan, but they do enjoy the sunlight I hear.

     However, Dr. Crash is confident that I know what I'm doing and I've
promised not to steal any wallets or go on any illegal spending sprees, so I
get to fix the decks this week!! Yay!! It's my first deck fix!!

     The secretary arranged a few patients to stop by for me while everyone
else is out. The first one should be coming through the door...now!

       (Silence)

     Ok, so I'm not clairvoyant. I can't be all things psychic. Well, I'll
just sit here and wait until (Slam!) Ah! Here he is.

      Come on in, no Dr. Crash isn't here, just me. No, I'm not joking.
Really. I'm tuning your deck today. Honest. I swear. Put your wallet back.
I'm not going to take anything. I'm reformed...for now.

     Let me see that deck. I'm eager to take a swing at this.



>    Dr. Crash-
>
>              I have a deck which I call The Nearly Invincible Deck. The
>point
>of the deck is to never have my attacking pokemon be weak to the defending
>pokemon, allowing me to destroy the competition. I don't know how to tune
>up
>my deck and I hope you can. A thousand thanks. Here is my deck:
>Pokemon (17)
>1 Ditto
>1 Dragonair
>2 Golem
>2 Graveler
>2 Seadra
>2 Kingler
>1 Dratini
>2 Geodude
>2 Horsea
>2 Krabby
>  Trainers (12)
>4 Potion
>2 Gust of Wind
>1 Bill
>1 Super Energy Removal
>1 Revive
>1 Defender
>1 Energy Search
>1 Energy Removal
>Energy (31)
>12 Water
>19 Fighting
>
>P.S. My strategy is to have a 'main' type and have a 'backup' type which is
>the weakness of my 'main''s weakness


     Ok, Dr. Crash is right. That secretary DOES have an evil streak to her.
Invincible? She would arrange this to be the first fix for me. Oh, well. I'm
stuck now. I'll see what I can do.

      I've seen the Doc deal with these so-called "Invincible" decks before.
Most of them are rainbow monstrosities with no real basis for strategy other
than hoping you can shove a Diglett in front of an oncoming Electabuzz and
stall.
      This isn't quite so bad.

     I'll be honest and up front. There's no such thing as any deck which is
invincible. All I would need to take this deck out is a solidly built
Electric and Grass deck. Let's see...Scythers, Electabuzzes, some Promo
Mewtwos to eliminate the Dittos...yup. That's all I'd need to remove any
threat from your deck. And since these are VERY common cards in decks, the
chances of your meeting up with them is quite good. You're not invincible.

     If one were aiming to create a deck that balanced the weaknesses and
resistances, I certainly would not choose the ones you've selected. All the
families there, except for the Dittos, are pretty mediocre, even in casual
play.
      Horsea and Seadra suffer from low HP and unexciting attacks. An early
Electabuzz tears these two apart.
      Krabby and Kingler are similar. Crabhammer is decent, but not the best
you can find in a Water Pokemon.
      Geodude is way too inconsistent and unreliable for damage. Graveler
and Golem cost a lot to retreat and have overexpensive moves. Since Scyther
has his way with this family, they're a bad choice.
      Dratini and Dragonair are all right. Dratini's attack sucks.
Dragonair's attacks are very costly. There's not a whole lot of great
strategy involved with these two. Psy resistance IS a plus though.
      Ditto is the only winner there. Too bad there's just 1 in this deck.

      Even if those WERE good selections, the ratios are improperly stacked.
When dealing with evolutions, you always want more of the Basics than the
Stage 1's. You should have either a 4/3 ratio or a 3/2 ratio. This 2/2 and
2/2/2 stuff with Golem isn't gonna cut it, playwise. You'll get the
evolutions you need sometimes, but not always. Close only counts in
horseshoes.

       As for the Trainers, those are equally unattractive. In casual play
there's a lot less pressure to have the best cards, but it still helps you
win and gain respect amongst your peers as being a good deckbuilder. So I'll
tell you which Trainers you picked generally aren't worth including.

      Revive - Just not worth the effort to bring back a Pokemon, only to
have it Gust of Winded into action by an opponent and killed again for an
easy prize. This is a very probable risk, so don't chance it.

      Defender - Unless your deck's goal is to stall and run the opponent
out of cards, you should always be on the offense. This certainly does not
appear to be anything close to a stall deck, so Defender's no good.
Actually, it's not even that terrific in a Stall deck.

     Energy Search - With so many other cards that let you get things, like
Bill, Computer search, Professor Oak, even Gambler, it makes little sense to
include a card whose scope of effect is so narrow as just finding Energy.
t's better to have a choice in selecting what you want to get. It won't
always be Energy.

     Potion - This card looks helpful at first, but usually just becomes an
inconsequential part of many matches. I tried to make it work myself, but it
just wouldn't. I gave up. Potion isn't all it's cracked up to be.

      The rest of the cards were good, but certainly not in the small
amounts you chose. If a card is important to strategy, like Bill or Gust of
Wind it's smart to have 4 in the deck to maximize the odds of having one
ready to use.

      The last part I see that needs some help is the energy situation.
Ouch. This deck is over half Energy!! You don't need 31 energy!
      Dr. Crash has worked out Energy proportions to a mathematical average.
Your deck consists of 60 cards. Usually, 8-10 of these cards will be
dedicated to getting you more cards, a la Bill, Oak and Computer search. So
the opportunity to draw mass quantities is there.
      If every third card you draw is an Energy card, then you'll be doing
fine. The best Pokemon don't require a lot of Energy to attack and you only
place 1 a turn usually. If you have a stockpile of around 3 in your opening
hand, this means that, between the 1 Energy per turn rule, the hand
replenishing cards and your regular draw each turn, your hand should always
contain at least one energy, which is all you really need each turn anyhow.
      Since every third card being Energy works out as being a good rule of
thumb, then it means that one third of the deck, or 20 cards should be
Energy. Naturally, some decks will need a bit more if they use some higher
attack cost critters. Other, faster decks like a Haymaker for instance, can
escape with less than 20 and still be fine.
      This said, it's obvious that 31 is just too imbalanced. My wager is
that you usually get an Energy card you didn't want when you could have used
a Gust of Wind or had hoped for a Seadra.

        I hope it's clear that no deck is invincible. I honestly suggest you
start from scratch and build a new deck. This one isn't going anywhere. You
cannot build a deck around what you THINK your opponent will be playing. You
can add a few Pokemon for this likelihood, but only if they already match
your current strategy. Like many Wigglytuff decks contain Scyther.
Wigglytuff is weak to Fighting types and scyther is Resistant, hence they
offset each other. Scyther is weak to Fire, but Wigglytuff has no big
problem with Fire. It's all a careful balance. But always AFTER the deck's
original goal is established. Metagaming is not a goal for victory; it's an
aid.

           Find a deck idea that is more solid than hoping to counter
anything the enemy throws at you. It may work sometimes, but often it just
fails miserably.


         With that, I pronounce this fix, as it were, finito. He he, I
always wanted to say that. Dr. Crash always gets that line. I'll um, take
the payment and put it right in this drawer so it's obvious I'm not
stealing. The Doc was VERY explicit on this matter.

        Well, I've got another appointment coming soon, and he's the one
with all the problems, not me. I'm just a kleptomaniac. I don't really have
any madcap hijinx or neurotic blatherings, so I'll just take this
opportunity to rip off Spike and leave everyone with a random quote for the
day. Hey, I gotta steal something!

       HYPNO'S (Not Spike's) Random Thought of the Day:

              They say "let a smile be your umbrella.", but aren't smiles
bowl-shaped?  Bowls don't make very good umbrellas, ya know?

                    Good Luck!!
                 Dr. Crash's Hypno

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