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<TITLE>RE: Cards that Hardly See the Light of Day 11/27</TITLE>
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Hello Pojo. I've been reading the strategy articles here for a while, and
I've seen a lot of very poor strategies, and people not thoroughly reading
the cards they are rating. Most recently is this article over "cards that
hardly see the light of day," and some of them for good reason. Much of the
article is very unclear though, and I decided to give my opinion on the
listed strategies for each card. My comments are in red, and the original is
in black.
Cards that have seen the sunshine of every day in decks and constantly roam
tournaments are always being played. At this point, it's impossible to make a
card like Victreebel playable, but those much hated cards can still have a
little play or much improvement. I'll start with Trainers.
It looks like he decided to take unused cards, and try to come up with new
strategies for them. Good idea.....
Trainers
1. Devolution Spray - Don't tell me that this isn't true. Most people didn't
actually used this card to decide that it sucks. They just thought: "Well,
look at what it does. Not worth playing." How about devolving Aerodactyl to
Mysterious Fossil so that you can evolve? Or devolve Dark Vileplume so that
you use Trainers? Dark Gloom is not bad at all! Or devolving to put
Resistance back in place,etc? I bet this card will see more play in the
future.
Well, first problem is the fact that you can't use Devolution Spray if Dark
Vileplume is on the table, since it is a trainer. The Areodactyl combo works,
but Areodactyl itself is a rarely used card, and normal play doesn't see many
evolutions besides Wiggly, and it would be a waste in Prop 15/3t. Other than
the Dactyl thing, the only reason you may want to devolve your Pokémon is to
use moves from previous forms, and Recall is usually much more useful, as in
the Gyrados case mentioned by Ness.
2. Recycle - An all rounded unpopular card. Half a chance of getting one card
from your discard pile. Other than using Recycle and if it works,using Bill
to get that card or use Kangaskhan's Fetch, I just don't know how to use this
card.
Recycle isn't that bad, besides the coin flip. He explained what I see as the
only real combos, besides Comp. Searching for the card after you Recycle it.
3. Minion of Team Rocket - Two heads have to be flipped or else your turn is
over. It sucks. Don't ask me how to use this card. 25% chance of a Trainer
even working? That's even worse than Recycle!!!
Well, not much to say here. I frankly can't remember what This card does. The
least he could do would be to say what it does. For an article that is
supposed to be giving strategies to under used cards, mentioning a card then
saying how much it sucks isn't a great idea.
4. Poke'dex - It's not that it sucks. It's hardly used. The weakest
combination I found while using Poke'dex is: Misty's Wrath + Poke'dex. You
use Poke'dex first to look at the top 5 cards in your deck. Then, use Misty's
Wrath to get the best two cards of the seven, discarding the rest. The point
of this combination is to know what you're discarding before you actually do
so. If anyone knows how to use Poke'dex more effectively, you can email me.
The One combo he mentions for Pokédex is sort of good, but falls apart since
Misty's Wrath is look at top 7, not 5, cards of your deck. With his strategy,
you are left in the dark as to what is coming up after the first 5. A better
combo would be playing this before either Bill, Erika, and Comp. Error. This
means that for Bill and Erika you can move the three you need to the top, and
you can manipulate the cards so you can choose which ones to take on Comp.
Error. Either way, Pokédex still isn't very competitive
Poke'mon
1. Kabuto/Mysterious Fossil - A big improvement can be made in the usage of
these cards. Just don't use them as Active Poke'mon until they have reached
Kabutops. I must admit, 30 HP for a Stage 1 Poke'mon is extremely horrible.
It's still vulnerable on the Bench, so use Transparent Walls.
I admit that Mysterious Fossil/Kabuto/Kabutops are under used, but for a good
reason. He says not to send out Fossil/Kabuto until they have evolved to
Kabutops. This is a good idea, but Kabutops is horrible anyway. 60 HP doesn't
cut it for stage 2, and the fighting type makes the BBP Scyther/Rocket's
Scyther, and TR's Zapdos resistant. Yuck! That means every tournament winning
deck has at least one poke that nullifies Sharp Sickle(which is otherwise
good) and makes absorb a huge waste at 4 Fighting. Also, I'd be more worried
about gust If I had Kabuto on the bench. Very few powerful decks besides the
occasional Dark Raichu deck (I've played against good ones) focus on bench
damage.
2. Snorlax - I was wondering how could Snorlax not use its Poke'mon Power
when it is Asleep, Confused or Paralyzed if its Poke'mon Power prevents it
from becoming Asleep, Confused or Paralyzed. That's not possible, is it? Body
Slam is awful if you don't have Double Colorless Energy. An excellent
staller, though, 'cause it needs Four Colorless to retreat, but why would
anyone attack with Snorlax or retreat it unless it they had to?
First of all, Snorlax CAN be Para./Confused/Asleep. By using either Muk's
Power or Goop Gas, Thick Skinned can be turned off, during which time it can
be effected by status changes. If the effect is still on Snorlax when Muk
gets KO'ed/Goop Gas ends the power stays off, since Snorlax is effected by
one of the power disrupting effects. Other wise, this makes Snorlax's best
use as the attacker in a deck focused around Dark Glooms Power. A failed coin
flip results in so change for Snorlax.
3. Victreebel - Basically permanently impossible for it to become a popular
card. I really don't need to review how bad it is. There is no strategy I
found that could be used for this card.
Victreebel is just plain BAD. Its attacks are interesting, but wasted on a
bad stage two. With a big attack that does only 20 damage, with the bonus of
not letting your opponent retreat is decent, but the opponent can easily
counter this with Switch or Scoop Up. Even with low attack costs, the effort
it takes to get Victreebe onto the table is wasteful for what you get in
return. No decent strategy that would work in tourny play can be found here.
4. Butterfree - Whirlwind could be better if Gust of Wind wasn't invented.
Considerable damage and a free Gust of Wind all in one. Mega Drain is like
free Potions when there are already damage counters on the Defending Poke'mon.
Butterfree suffers problems similar to Kabutops. It has low HP(70) for a
stage two, but unlike Kabutops, the other aspects of this card make up for
it. Whirlwind is a handy attack, 20 to the opposing Poké, and it gets
switched. Even though your opponent gets to choose who comes out, doing this
to something like Ditto might KO it if it has 50 or more damage. The real gem
is Mega Drain. The cost is VERY steep, 4 grass energy. Even so, if it can be
pulled off the total change in damage counters puts Butterfree at a huge
advantage. 40 damage to the opponent, and 40 removed from Butterfree puts you
at an 80 HP advantage. Except in the case of defender, you will always do 40
since nothing is weak to grass (yet). The main drawback is the massive 4
grass energy cost for Mega Drain. This hurts, alot, since the environment is
so fast. The Fire weakness is another major problem, because of F. Magmar,
and Blaine's Rapidash. They both are fairly widely played, and both can kill
Butterfree quite easily. If Butterfree is already pumped, it has a chance
against F. Magmar since the 40 hits from magmar is nullified by Mega Drain
(except for poison). A solid card that suffers from its slowness and Fire
weakness.
Here are just a few examples. There are many, many more, but these are the
ones that really intruiged me.
In the end, I still couldn't figure out exactly what he intended to to do
with his article, since some of the cards he listed, he just ranted on their
poor power without any depth. I hope that people actually get down to reading
a card completely and consider all options in a game.
E-Mail me at <A HREF="mailto:Patb9@aol.com">Patb9@aol.com</A>