The Big Blue Machine
By John "da Hamsta" Khaou
Saturday, June 10, 2000
Toys 'R Us
Pokemon League
Around 15 participants

    Hello Pojoholics, and here's another phat report from yours truly.  Now
that i've acquired my 6th badge, I decided to go ahead and take the gym
leader challenges.  I wanted to step into the right direction so I took an
easier one.  Misty's challenge, to be exact.  Misty's challenge states:" 
Opponent may draw 2 additional cards at the start of the match."  This does
give the opponent an advantage, but against a raindance, it doesn't measure
up as well.  In addition to this rule, the other universal rule was this: 
All of your pokemon must be of the respective type.  This wasn't a problem
for this challenge, but for other challenges, it may be troublesome.  Once
you've won 10 matches with your deck, you are award a sticker on your badge
book proving that you've completed that Gym Leader's challenge. Plus, I
haven't played this archetype for quite awhile, so I needed to revive my
raindancin' skillz.  :)

19 Water Energy

Pokemon:18
4 Squirtle (3 TR, 1 Base) That's right, i don't have 4 of 'em, yet.....
1 Wartortle
3 Blastoise (Base)
3 Magikarp (TR)
2 Gyarados (Base Set, only a fool would consider Dark)
3 Lapras
2 Articuno

Trainers:23
4 Bill
4 Oak
2 Comp. search
2 ItemFinder (This card played a HUGE role in my success)
3 Gust of Wind (ends games quicker)
2 Pokemon Breeder
2 Energy Retrieval
2 Nightly Garbage Run (Retrieve lost allies and energy to wreak more havoc!)
2 Switch (also helped tremendously, due to the high retreats)


The Report

Match 1- Rainbow deck

    I had a bad start, having to play defensive through the start.  My Lapras
took out his Kangaskhan with ease, and a gusted TR Charmander gave me another
cheap prize.  His Clefable gave me some trouble, but by now I've another
Lapras pumped so I brought a fresh Lapras out, and easily confused and
pummeled it.  I eventually got Blastoise out through an oak, and now a lapras
and articuno were in the discard pile.  I garbage ran Articuno and some
energy back in the deck and started pummeling him with the other.  His Dark
Jolteon's Thunder Flash wuz extremely annoying, but I eventually stopped it
dead.  I grabbed my last 2 or 3 prizes easily after that.

Match 2-Viet w/Grass

    Ah Viet.  We haven't played each other since a few weeks.  I remember his
Grass/Fight deck that barely decimated my ghetto Raindance decks before, but
now it's finally time for a li'l revenge.  His deck ran w/ straight Grass
mainly consisting w/ Dark Muks and Venomoths.  This was my most challenging
battle of the day.
    Viet jumps at me in at the start, paralyzing my active Articuno with a
fossil Grimer as I have a Squirtle, Magikarp, and Lapras benched.  I quickly
salvaged a few turns later, using some ItemFinder and cpu searches and got a
Blastoise.  I garbage ran a fallen Articuno and energy and promoted my other
Articuno, pummeling his Grimer.  Now he brings up his Dark Muk and gusts out
my Blastoise and sludge punches it.  I had to use energy retrieval to get
enough energy to pay Blastoise's STAGGERING 5 retreat cost, and Articuno
makes a failing freeze dry.  The next turn he did the exactly same thing,
gusting out my Blastoise again.  (Sigh)  He simply was relentless, but lucky
me I topdecked a switch and replaced it w/ my Articuno again, but this time I
saw this time I gusted out his Grimer and got a nice li'l prize out of that. 
His scyther slashes, and another unsuccessful freezing continues.  Luckily,
he didn't carry any pluspowers, so Articuno was able to nail it w/ blizzard. 
Another scyther successed it and took care of my articuno.  I ran into an
energy drought, and so my Gyarados jus' sat there in front of his Scyther
(bad situation, right?).  Then I was able to make an unsuccessful bubblebeam
and gyarados took a 120 damage slash(he swords danced the previous turn).  
By now i've another Gyarados pumped and now all he has are simple, low HP
basics, simply being torn apart by dragon rages.  His Dark Muk tried to make
a commendable effort, but I gusted out a Venonat to grab my final prize. 
That match definitely gave me a run fer my money.

Match 3-Gym Leader Jayson w/Fight/Grass/Light

    His lone Hitmonchan confronts my active Lapras, and Lapras succesfully
confused it.  It hits itself, but then special punches away my Lapras.  With
only 10 HP left, I brought up my Base set squirtle and bubbled it for the win.

Results
    Well, these victories gave me my marsh badge, and 7 victories closer to
completing this challenge.  Also, did anyone watch the Britney Spears in
Hawaii concert?  Anyways, that 's the bottom line 'cuz HamstaJ said so!!!!!




   


John "da Hamsta"

hamsterjohn@britney-spears.com or
hamsterjon@aol.com