Hi, it's me Daniel with another deck report from Games Galore, this time, it's with a very original deck called Sliders. Sliders revolves around using Venomoth and splashable monsters like Movie Electabuzz and Squirtle TR to "slide" or shift into whatever color is needed to wipe out the defending Pokemon.

Sliders v 1.2 3 Venonat (Jungle) 2 Venomoth (Jungle) 2 Scyther (Jungle) 2 Ditto (Fossil) 1 Machop (Rocket) 1 Movie Electabuzz (promo) 1 Ponyta (Base Set) 1 Squirtle (Rocket) 12 Grass Energy 4 Double Colorless Energy 4 Bill (BS) 3 Professor Oak (BS) 2 Gambler (Fossil) 4 Super Energy Removal (BS) 3 Computer Search (BS) 3 Gust of Wind (BS) 2 Lass (BS) 1 Rocket Sneak Attack (Rocket) 2 Item Finder (BS) 2 Potion (BS) 1 Mr. Fuji (Fossil) 2 Nightly Garbage Run (Rocket) 2 Energy Retrieval (BS)

Strategy

Pokemon
Venomoth is the core of this deck, without him, well, you can't achieve the real strategy of Sliders. His Pokemon Power allows you to change Venomoth's type to another type in play. This deck gives Venomoth the chance to shift into most of the colors in the game.

Scyther is in for free retreat and a good damage soaker. He can be used also for attacking if you need to. Ditto is also an attacker, and can be used to trash Movie Mewtwos and other Psychic baddies like Alakazam.

Machop, Electabuzz, Ponyta, and Squirtle are my slide team, where their main purpose it to be shifted for Venomoth, but can be also used to attack, especially when Venomoth is hurting, just slap a Double Colorless on whoever and retreat Venomoth for free and start bashing away.

Trainers
Bill and Professor Oak are card advantage. Professor Oak has lots of it, but you should only Oak once or twice, but Oak three times and you'll be down in cards. And you should never play Oak when you don't need to, in any deck! (except maybe Rain Dance) The reason I have so many Oaks is so that I get some out easier, not necessarily to play them all.

Gambler is an interesting card, it can be used as a riskier Oak with many benifits, such as return cards you wouldn't want to Oak away, like members of the slide team; anti-decking; or just getting an enormously huge hand!

Super Energy Removal and Gust of Wind are for board control. Super ER just puts down Wigglytuff like no one! And it also stops evolution decks in their tracks. Gust of Wind brings either fatty Pokemon like Kangaskhan or Lickitung or weenie Pokemon ready for picking like Magikarp.

Lass and Rocket Sneak Attack are for opponent control. Lass is also good for anti-decking, but it's main purpose is ultimate trainer removal! What good is a Blastoise without Breeder? And if they need an Oak, oh yeah, Lass baybee! Rocket Sneak Attack is even better, without penalty to you, you can pluck out a trainer from their hand! Oh yeah, every deck should have Lass and Rocket Sneak Attack!

Potion is to heal Venomoth, duh. People say it delays the inevitable, but it doesn't, like if Venomoth has 40 damage vs. a charged Electabuzz, a potion saves Venomoth for another turn if his Venom Powder attack is unsucessful. So shame to all Potion bashers!

Mr. Fuji is an anti decking utility and a healer. Nightly Garbage Run is to get back dead members of the Slide Team mostly, but can also return Oaked away Venonats and Venomoths, and energy. And Item Finder gets your dead trainers back to reuse.

The Poison Strategy

There's a little more strategy here. What I find best when working with poison is to make it so that the defending Pokemon will be gone during their turn, so that the new Pokemon doesn't get a chance to swipe Venomoth and Venomoth can try to slap Confusion on them. Okay, so let's say you're facing an Electabuzz and your leading in with Venomoth and you have a Machop ready for shifting. It's your turn, you shift into Fighting and use Venom Powder for 20 and get heads, so now after this turn he gets another 10, so he has 30 inflicted on him. If he attacks and deals damage to himself, he'll then have 50 and another 10 when your turn starts, so that's useless. You should try to keep him from attacking by 1) Energy Removal tactics or 2) Psycho Warfare, especially if they don't know the confusion rule. Anyway, he doesn't attack, and so now he has 40. If you do Venom Powder, it'll be 20 + 10 leading to a KO, but that's not we want all the time, because you don't want something dealing damage to poor Venomoth. You should shift into a different color and deal 10, resulting in another 10 and 60 damage on the start of his turn. Next turn he'll die and the new defending Pokemon won't have a chance to hit you and you can try to inflict that again. So the bottom line of this strategy is to make it so that they die after their turn and not yours so that they hopefully will never damage you.

So that's the deck, now onto the tournament.

The Tournament

About 15 people showed up, as usual. I saw some threatening Rain Dance decks so I asked a guy for a Movie Electabuzz, which I swapped with a Grass energy. But I forgot to give it back, but I got his email address from a petition to get a STS stop in NC (email me if you want on!). Anyway, I shuffled my deck, and we're ready to go!

Round 1: Sliders! vs. Adam w/ Venuplosion deck (Exeggutor/Venusaur)
I started with a Scyther and he had a Bulbasaur. I went first and drew a Ponyta, so I played him down, I put a Grass Energy on Scyther and Swords Danced. He benched a Bulbasaur and played a Grass on him. I had a gust in my hand, so I gusted him out, and played a DCE and Slashed him for the kill. He benched another Bulbasaur and played a Grass on his active. I played my Ponyta and sent him out and slapped a DCE and used Smash Kick for the KO. He played a Grass energy on his lone Bulbasaur and evolved into Ivysaur. I didn't want to risk getting Ponyta kill (because I wanted a perfect game, hehe) so I played a S. Energy Removal and the Smash Kicked him to death. Win!
Record 1-0

Between matches, I asked Paul, the tournament organizer, who he thought was hotter, Rocket Sneak Attack or Lass. No suprise he said Rocket, but what's better than one hot card? Two hot cards! Hee hee, there's a new poll topic to put on PoJo!

Exhibition Match between rounds vs. Eric (Magmar Wiggly)
I was talking strategy with this guy, and he knows a lot of stuff, he's from New York but was too old to enter the tournament. But he said he loved just playing Pokemon, and we started a match. I think I started with Scyther and he had a Magmar. I went first and I Swords Danced. He used smokescreen for 20, I slashed which was successful and he had 60. He Smogged but no poison, and then I retreated and sent out a Venonat to Stun Spore him for a KO. He sent out a Jigglypuff and Gusted my Scyther and used Lullaby, but I woke up. I Oaked and got a Machop and Squirtle and evolved into Venomoth and was going to roll him, but the next round had started.

Round 2: Sliders! vs. Carson w/ Sponge Variant
It started good, I began with a Scyther and started Slashing his Mewtwo, and I thought it was going to go well, but he Oaked and I was now starting to send out bait monsters like Machop and Squirtle to go stall so I could get Venomoth. Well, I never did and I got stomped!
Record 1-1

Round 3: Sliders! vs. Austin w/ Magmar Hay
This match was really close, I was using Scyther and Machops to put the beatdown on him, but he was doing the same, until it was like 1 prize to 2 in his favor I busted out Venomoth and he got some unlucky coin flips. It was close, and he was quite disturbed with his coin flips. Well, that's another win!
Record 2-1

Round 4: Sliders! vs. Tim w/ Rain Dance
What can I say? I tried to Rocket Sneak Attack him, but no avail. Turn two Blastoise and his Articuno just stomped me, I barely did any damage! IIt was so humiliating!
Record 2-2

Round 5: Sliders! vs. Tournament Newbie w/ Blackout precon
We were about even when he busted out a Wartortle and did some chomping, but I S. Energy Removaled him a bit and I started to roll him with Electabuzz and Venomoth. What made this even easier is that he started attacking with Geodudes! HAH HAH HAH, what a laugh! Anyway, I whomped him and ended a somewhat disappointing tournament.
Record 3-2

To my suprise, I got 4th place! I got two Rocket packs, which had crap, and a VHS Mewtwo which I could use for my Wigglysponge deck! I hung around the store for a while chatting with Adam and his bro who works at the store, I bought four packs of Rocket, in which I got that bad boy to the right!

Combating Major Archetypes

Yes, archetypes, you either love 'em or you hate 'em. But it's something we have to live with. So here's how you use Sliders! against the popular archetypes.

Haymaker
First off, if you are in a Haymaker environment, you're slide team should probably consist of 2 Machop, 1 Ponyta, and 1 Squirtle. I favor Machop because Electabuzz is probably the most popular Pokemon out there in the many Haymaker variants. Ponyta is to whomp Scythers, and Squirtle is for Fossil Magmar. Haymaker does lots of damage, so you want some one-shot Pokemon out there and not to leave Venomoth out to get beat up. Venomoth should take care of Hitmonchan, but use the poison strategy so that you don't get beat up by a baddie like Electabuzz of Magmar. So then you can retreat and send in whatever you need. Oh, and Lass/RSA often so that you save your DCEs on the slide team (you are using DCE on the slide team, right?) because there's no way to retrieve those.

Rain Dance
Okay, the slide team should definately favor Electabuzz, put in as many as possible, I would try four, but getting those won't be easy, so I might suggest league Promo Pikachu because it has Growl, and all the other splashable lightning monsters like TR Magnemite, BS Pikachu, and BS Voltorb are all Hitmonchan bait. If your really brave, swap the slide team and maybe a Ditto and put in 3 Eevee from League or Jungle and 2 Jungle Jolteon. Or the slide team, 3 Grass Energy, and a Ditto for 3 Base Electabuzz and 5 Lightning Energy. But whatever you choose, the strategy will be the same. RAIN DANCE CAN'T WIN WITHOUT TRAINERS, so Lass and Rocket Sneak Attack them hard! Oak and Search for the combo early and take out their weenies like Squirtle, Magikarp, and Seel, and hammer away and keep Item Findering for Lass and RSA.

Psychic Stall
Your swaps should be probably in favor of 2 Machop and 2 Jigglypuff. Machop is for Chansey, and Jigglypuff is just so that you don't have 4 Machop ready to be munched by a Kadabra or Movie Mewtwo. Psychic Pokemon are weak to themselves, so shift into them to give you a damage edge. Anyway, Super Energy Removal Movie Mewtwo and hammer it away. When you can, Gust out Abra/Kadabra/Alakazam and give him the Smackdown! This deck chomps Psychic stall, so don't worry.

Moltres Stall
Save you Gamblers and Nightly Garbage Runs, and womp him with Lass and RSA because Moltres Stall can't win with Trainers. Hammer Moltres and whatever other monsters he has. This deck doesn't use Water Pokemon, so take out movie Electabuzz in favor for another Ponyta and a Machop for a TR Squirtle to combat Scyther and Magmar, which are commonly found in stall.

Wigglytuff
All I can say is Super Energy Removal baybee! And RSA and/or Lass to take out any RSAs or Lasses he might have to combat SER. And just give him the old fashioned Smackdown!

Cleaners
If you have a big cleaner environment, definately go with 4 Squirtle as your Slide Team. Or better yet, try going swapping the Slide Team, 4 Grass Energy, and the Dittos for two or three Lapras and the rest Water Energy. The original one just gets destroyed by Arcanine. And just hammer away.

Ash Ketchum
Man, these decks are a joke, these little kids either should get a clue or get a better deck than these stupid decks. Hit him hard so that their on the verge of tears, and then be nice and help him out with their decks.

Props and Slops

PROPS to my dad for putting up with me and driving me.
PROPS to Games Galore for holding tournaments.
Mad PROPS to Pojosama for the awesome website.
PROPS to the Pojoleague for giving a place to playtest.

SLOPS to Wizards of the Coast for not having a STS tour stop in North Carolina
SLOPS to Haymaker because their soooo unoriginal!
SLOPS to Duke because THEY SUCK!!!!

I'll be back in August from prerelease with either Sliders, a Rain Dance deck, or my WigglySponge.

Peace out!

Daniel Duterte
dduterte@earthlink.net

(go heels)