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Tom's Bunker
Strategy Session #2
Sun Tzu – “The Art of War”

            Hello Pokemaniacs!  This is the companion piece to the first strategy session I posted on Tom’s Bunker –  more words of wisdom from the great Philosopher-General Sun Tzu. My goal is to take the wisdom of this great strategist and try to explain it to you in terms of deck building, tournament preparation, and general pokemon training advice. 

            My second strategy session from Sun Tzu is focused on winning.  He talks about the 5 essentials for victory – the essential elements you need to attain victory. 

1.  Know when to fight and when not to fight.  In every tough pokemon match, there is a point in the game where you have to make a tough decision – whether it be which pokemon to put another energy on, which pokemon to scoop up, which energy to remove, which pokemon to gust, or what to computer search for.  It’s not always an easy decision, and often if you make the wrong move, you could lose the game.  You must first be able to identify this moment in the game, and then you must know which move to do.  One way to know what to do is to know your deck inside and out.  Then, by looking through your discard pile, you can calculate your chances of getting a gust or DCE or Prof Oak with your computer search.  Another way is to calculate your opponent’s chances by looking through his discard pile.  Sun Tzu calls this “calculating your difficulties”.  I look through my opponent’s discard pile an average of 4 times a game.  I look at how many DCE’s are there before I gust up a guy with a retreat cost of 2.  I look at how many ER or SER are there before I load up non-basic energy on a pokemon.  I look to see if he has any odd trainers – to better determine his strategy.  This isn’t stalling – it is improving my chances of making the right move when I come to the tough decision in the match.  You also need to think a little longer before the tough decision.  If you don’t look and think, you might be using your precious trainers at the wrong moment.  “The quality of the critical decision” is the mark of the great general – the one who wins makes the right move at the right time.

2.      You need to know how to handle both superior and inferior forces.  When you are

winning a pokemon match, you just keep doing what you are doing.  If you are winning the game by attacking with a Venusaur, then energy transferring to another pokemon, then using pokemon center, then energy transferring back to Venusaur and attacking, then keep it up.  If you are losing a match with a Venusaur deck, think of ways you can turn the game around.  Some of those ways are using status effects to slow his attacks down, such as sleep or confusion, letting your active pokemon get knocked out in order to build up a benched pokemon, take advantage of a resistance that your pokemon might have, gusting up an enemy pokemon with no energy on it and a big retreat, running him out of cards, etc.   You don’t show that you are a pokemon master by winning every match.  You show it by how you deal with a losing game.  Sun Tzu said that “it is when you are losing that your true measure displays itself” and also “you must be disciplined and calm at all times, especially when you are losing”.  Create chances to make a comeback when you are losing and never give up hope.   Sun Tzu also said that “we must be always ready to seize an advantage in the midst of difficulties”.  This means that we must be thinking about turning the game around and winning even if we are losing.   Being positive is so important, and that leads into the next point…

3.  Develop a winning attitude.  Sun Tzu said that in order to win, you must desire the victory.  Just like a great athlete, you have to imagine yourself making that 15 foot jump shot, or hitting a home run or racing across the finish line in front of the pack.  Imagine yourself winning and you are beginning to establish a winning attitude.  You imagine your victory by knowing your deck so well that you know which card you want to draw to help your current situation the most.  Think about what you will do with that card if you draw it.  If you don’t, think about your best move and make the move.  Think before each move and you will make less mistakes.  Be positive.  Another aspect of developing a positive attitude is to put great cards in your deck.  If you play with the best cards, you will give yourself the best chances, and will feel better when you draw one.  Play with 1^st edition cards, play with signed cards – signed by players you respect or players you beat, or players you routinely playtest with.  When you see those cards, you may remember those great victories of the past and remember that you are a great player.  Your attitude will immediately improve.

4.  Prepare.  Sun Tzu said that the battle is won by those who prepare and rehearse.  This goes back to playtesting your deck against the most popular decks in order to refine it.  This has got to be the single most important aspect of deck building.  The reason that rehearsal is so important is that you will be familiar with the most popular decks, so when you face one in a tournament, you will know how to beat it.  Of course, you will also learn which cards to switch out to improve your deck.  In the Army before an operation, we plan for 1/3 of the available time and rehearse for the remaining 2/3 of the available time.  Rehearsal is the way to perfection.

5.      Think for yourself.   Internet articles are useful, and other trainer’s decks can give you

great ideas, but ultimately you need to think for yourself.  You can base your deck off of another person’s deck, but make little changes based on your own ideas.  You will be a better player for it because the deck you design has a goal that you came up with.  Another trainer might have a different goal based upon his playing style, and that style might not work for you.  For example, most top players (1900+ ranking) know how to play an Alakazam deck, but many of them have never made one.  This might be because those players are hyper-aggressive and can’t stand the draw-go aspect of Alakazam.  On the other hand, many “blue” players in Magic would feel very comfortable with Alakazam.  It depends on your style.  If you play a deck that another person makes for you, you run the risk of not feeling comfortable with it, and not winning.  This is even harder to understand when your brother wins all the time with the same deck!  Use the cards you like and are comfortable with and you will enjoy the game more and probably win more often as well.

            Sun Tzu also discussed deception, and I want to spend a few paragraphs talking about this topic.  Can you use deception and still be a honorable player?  Well, it depends on your definition of deception – let’s call it surprise.  Sun Tzu said that “in all fighting, indirect methods will be needed to secure victory”.  To me, this means using trainers such as gust of wind, scoop up,  and energy removal to surprise your opponent.  You can also use less often seen pokemon (but still with powerful attacks) to surprise your opponent.  Some of these include Jynx,  Nidoran, Rattata, Staryu, and Rhyhorn.   Depending on the type of energy in the deck, some of these pokemon have useful resistances (rhyhorn) or off-color weaknesses (nidoran).  It is good to have several resistance types in your deck, and if you have to have weaknesses, having many different weaknesses is better than most of your pokemon having weakness to one type.  Also remember that your opponent will make assumptions about the contents of your deck based on the colors you are playing.  He will have playtested a lot, and will know the best fighting pokemon to put into a fighting and psychic deck.  You can surprise him by playing with rhyhorn!, and help yourself if he plays with Rocket’s Zapdos.

            I hope this “lesson from the past” will help you with your tournament play.  Good luck, keep playing, and keep sending me your decks!