>Spike-
>
>i chose to send this deck to you for two reasons:
>1) of all the mechanics ive seen, your the most thourogh.
>2) i LOVE Blaine's Vulpix (the one with the pokeball in its mouth.)
>
>anyway, heres my Dark mind deck...as you can prolly guess...it features
>
>4-4-3 gengar and a 4-3 hypno lineup. (is the gengar line a tad
>overkill?) i
>finally found a use for that peskey porygon..to get rid to
>tuoros/kangaskhan/dragonite/etc. quicker.
>Item finders are to make those 2 bills seem like four.
>i think i skimped Grass a tad...(i know, but golbat has colorless
>attack!)
>i finally got all-fossil ghosts!
>this deck has a slight energy problem...got any suggestions?
>this deck otherwise does pretty good...its 15+ wins - 3 or 4 losses
>thus far.
>
>BTW, cards are pretty hard to come by here...try to keep cost
>reasonable :)
>
>ok, enough talk, heres my deck:
>
>Dark Minded-
>
>Basic Pokemon-16
>4-drowzee
>1-base mewtwo (ick. methinks i need to see the movie again...)
>2-promo mewtwo (gawd, i love this pokemon!)
>4-gastly (fossil)
>3-zubat (he helps when im in a jam.)
>2-porygon (explained him earlier)
>
>Stage 1 Pokemon-9
>3-hypno(dark mind)
>4-haunter(hes FOSSIL HAUNTER. dont get much better than this guy.)
>2-golbat.(wing attack is quite a surprise!)
>
>Stage 2 Pokemon-3
>3-gengar (might get a forth...heh heh)
>
>Trainer Cards-
>2- item finders(get those bills back!)
>2-bill (hes BILL.)
>2- G.O.W. (come here, tasty little magikarp...)
>2-switch (for Hypno's apparent troubles.)
>2-Prof. Oak (this one's a no-brainer.)
>
>Energy- 22
>5-grass
>17-PSI energy.

***

Okay. Good deck. For starters, anyway *grin*

1) You've got *ahem* *cough* 28 Pokemon, I see. This is a tad bit much, in my opinion. Let me take this opportunity to remind people of a basic tenet of deckbuilding: Most decks run much more off trainers than they do off of Pokemon. If you've got more than 20 Pokemon in your deck, that's a red flag that you want to notice immeditately. In this deck, we need to do some serious slashing. You can start by taking out the Porygon-- it is much simpler and more solid simply to run colorless and get around resistance. Now take out the Golbat family (I'll explain in just a sec.) We've created 7 card slots, which means we're down at 21 Pokemon. Now cut Hypno to 3-2 since you will have ways to search and draw, and cut Gengar down to 4-3-2. That is enough for most families, and it is good here because every stage of this particular family is excellent-- a phenomenon not often seen. We're down to 17 Pokemon. Now put in some Pokes to combat psychic resistance. They should be good solid basics with good colorless attacks.
2) Now that we've created seven card slots for trainers, let's start by adding in another Bill and Oak. 3 of each is good. Now stick in four Energy Removals (a must) and then put in two Computer Searches. Make the room for the extra Search by dropping an Item Finder--one will be sufficient for this sort of deck. There. Your trainers are now balanced out a little. By the way, the mere thought of Item Finding a Bill just to avoid putting more in makes me cringe. Get a grip.

3) It's your call whether to use any grass energy or not. Personally, I'd take it all out. Now a decision must be made on how to split the remaining energy between psy and DCE. You want at least 2 DCEs, I think, but exactly how many will depend on the conclusions you reach after careful playtesting. Try 20 psy, 2 DCE to start.

***

21 Pokemon:

4 Gastly
3 Haunter
2 Gengar
3 Drowzee
2 Hypno
3 Mewtwo
4 Scyther

17 Trainers:

1 Item Finder
2 Computer Search
3 Bill
3 Oak
2 GOW
2 Switch
4 Energy Removal

22 Energy:

20 Psychic Energy
2 DCE

***

Looking fine. You've got a pretty lethal deck going here. The only worry is whether Scyther can handle the many psy-resistant Pokemon you are likely to encounter. Personal experience suggests he should be fine. Try these changes out. Sorry to have to put in 4 Scythers. . . I know it doesn't make it any easier for you. . . but other than the computer searches, they were my only recommended rares--and, as I said, they're only one of a multitude of possibilities. I'm sure you can think of a good colorless substitute to use in the meantime.


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