>Hey Spike. I've just made a deck that I'm not very serious about, but
>it's
>still fun to play with, and isn't that what this game's about? I've
>just
>started playing Magic, (as you might remember me harassing you with
>several
>letters and IM's regarding the game. =) ) And in a stupor of looking
>through
>the pretty pictures and the flavor text, amoung many others, I found a
>paticularly catchy quote which my deck is based on:
>                
>                "The Dogs of War are nothing compared to the Cats"
>
>Yeah, that is kinda a stupid thing to base a deck on, but where I play,
>you
>can walk in with a Zap! Theme Deck and come out on top, so that isn't
>really
>an issue. Hell, you can walk in with a Justin Smith deck and win, and
>we both
>know his "superior" deck structures, contaning Japenese cards, rigged
>coins,
>and 2-3 stage 2's.
>   Sorry, that was unnecessary, I'm still a little irritated with
>him, I
>also responded to his article with the Cards that dont belong in
>Psychic
>decks article which has caused him to send you, myself and many others
>who
>have responded to his article, little flames of hatred and
>biggot-likeness.
>  getting back to the subject of my deck, here's the list:
>
>Pokemon-18
>4-Meowth (Promo)(Yes, it did take a while to get them)
>3-Persian (Jungle)
>4-Vulpix (Aren't foxes a sub-breed of cats, or is it dogs? I don't want
>to
>take the time to look it up...)
>3-Ninetales
>4-Magmar (need I say which set)(it kinda looks like a cat if you squint
>hard
>enough or something...)
>
>Energy-22
>18-Fire
>4-Double Colorless Energy
>
>Trainers-20
>4-Bill
>3-Oak
>4-ER
>2-SER
>3-Comp. Search
>2-Rocket's Sneak Attack
>2-Lass
>
>The Strategy: Get out Persian or Magmar and stall with Pounce and
>Smokescreen
>until you can wipe out the remaining Pokemon with Nintales. RSA and
>Lass are
>in there to prevent the ever-present Super/Energy Removal threat on
>Ninetales
>and Comp. Search is to get him out there faster. S/ER are there for
>disruption and to help Magmar and Persian stall. Bill and Oak, are
>self-explanatory. Vulpix is welcome to shame me on building this deck,
>but I
>have a feeling he won't with the large quanities of him and his
>evolution in
>there. =) As always, thanks for your help!

***

Actually, Vulpix was offended. No, not because of your inclusion of him in this deck. To quote: "A CAT??! I'M NOT A CAT!" He's now refusing to speak to me (despite the fact that it's YOUR deck) so I hope you're happy. For the record, I believe foxes are actually related to dogs, not cats. Since the whole theme of this deck is cats (no problem with that, I mean, Cinder sort of has a theme of dogs and doglike creatures) this means we gotta make some changes.

1) Ninetales goes. Magmar may go as well, since we'll probably be changing colors. To my knowledge, there is no other true cat Pokemon (barring anything we may recieve in Neo; I don't know the Neo Pokemon that well yet) so we'll have to shoot for close similarities. Mewtwo sort of suggests himself to me. He seems rather catlike, and I don't know what else we'll find. The thought of Mewtwo suggests Mew. Mew also looks vaguely like a cat, and of course there's the name (Mew, the sound cats make.) So Magmar goes bye-bye, and we have our new deck: Persian, Mewtwo, and Mew. 4 of each basic plus 3 Persian should do us nicely.

2) We've turned this into sort of a Sponge. The trainers should reflect that. I think 4 Comp Search are a lock, along with some Item Finder. Lass vs. RSA was a tough call for me. Some Sponge variations can absolutely abuse Lass, but I don't think this deck wants to Lass itself early, and for your intended purpose, Lassing in the late game is rather pointless. I think I'd drop Lass and run 3 or 4 RSA instead. A Gust or two is always yummy. Lastly, I think I'd add another SER, maybe dropping an ER.

3) We can afford to drop the energy a bit more. Persian uses DCE, Mew will never need more than 2 energy, and Mewtwo is... well... Mewtwo.

***

15 Pokemon:

4 Meowth
3 Persian
4 Mewtwo
4 Mew

25 Trainers:

4 Bill
3 Oak
4 Computer Search
2 Item Finder
3 Energy Removal
3 SER
2 GOW
4 RSA

20 Energy:

16 Psychic Energy
4 DCE

***

Try this arrangement out and see how it works. If you find yourself blowing through your deck too quickly and either decking or running out of energy in the endgame (which shouldn't be a problem, with our absorbing friend) I'd add some Nightly Garbage Run, taking out perhaps a Bill, an RSA, and either a SER or a Search.

Hmm, maybe I should make a deck based on some of my favorite Magic flavor texts... like Wake of Destruction (Fire/Fighting?), Lightning Blast (Electric), and perhaps Hypnotic Specter (Psychic with ghosts.) Any ideas?


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