After Keith's advice on my 3-color attempt, I removed the electric Pokemon
and went with Water and Psychic. Then suddenly I had an idea, and took it
to a tourney at a friend's house in Maquoketa (and you thought MY name was
weird!), IA. The top prize was a 1st edition booster and a regular booster,
2nd place was 2 regulars. In total 12 people were in it, and it was
single-elimination. Here's the deck I had:

"BRAINWASHER X"
ENERGY:
9 Psychic
18 Water
2 Double Colorless

POKEMON:
3 Abras
2 Kadabras
1 Alakazam
2 Chanseys
3 Magikarps
2 Gyarados
3 Squirtle
2 Wartortle
1 Blastoise

TRAINERS:
4 Bills (DUH!!!!)
1 Professor Oak (Again, DUH!!!!)
2 Pokemon Breeders
3 Pokemon Centers
2 Super Potions

The strategy behind this deck:

With Kadabra and your Chanseys on your bench, you simply keep transferring
the damage your Active Pokemon (Gyarados or Blastoise preferably!) to your
Benched Pokemon, then use Pokemon Centers to fully recover them. The best
part: THEY SHOULDN'T HAVE ANY ENERGY ON THEM ANYWAY. In short, Chansey and
Kadabra act as the damage magnets, while Gyarados and Blastoise pulverize
the opposition.

How things went for me at the tourney......

Round one:
Me vs. Adam Vilens, a guy who was using....what a joke....a Charizard deck.

GAME 1:
Got Blastoise out on round 2 via Pokemon Breeder. He only had 2
Charmanders. You do the math.

GAME 2:
2 words: INSTANT REPLAY! Only this time he DID manage to get out
CharMELEON...not that it HELPED. :)

Round 2: Semi-Finals

Me vs. Josh Costello. He looked like a challenge since he had a
grass/psychic deck.

GAME 1:
Due to some major bad luck on my draws, he got to mulligan-draw about half
his deck. On top of that, I was out of luck with getting a Blastoise or
Gyarados. My only 2 Pokemon were Chansey and an *UGH* Abra. However, after
3 rounds, my luck changed. I drew a 2nd Chansey and put it down. Then, just
when I thought my first Chansey was dead-meat, I drew a Pokemon Center.
Full health. Then things got ugly. Josh got out a Jynx. Sure, Chansey's
strong against Psychic, but he was good with coin flips *so to speak* and
kept getting 2 heads on Double Slap. So my Chansey slowly dwindled
down....till I drew an Professor Oak. I ditched my almost-empty hand
(Magikarp and a Psychic Energy) for 7 cards...WOOHOO! Pokemon Breeder,
Alakazam, and Double Colorless! I immediately got back on track. I bred
Abra up to Alakazam and laid down the Double Colorless on Chansey and went
on a Scrunching campaign, transferring damage to my 2nd one when necessary.
Finally I did just what I had to. DECKED HIM.

Game 2:
This one was much quicker. Starting hand: Chansey, Squirtle, Wartortle,
Blastoise, and 3 Water Energies. I popped out Chansey to stall while I
built up Squirtle. On turn 3 I was ready, but I still needed to make the
switch. That's when things got bad. Josh had out...GULP....a Venusaur. I
couldn't get a Double Colorless in time and lost Chansey. First Pokemon I'd
lost in the whole tournament. Now I was mad. I pulled out Blastoise, even
though I knew it wouldn't be quite as effective. Meanwhile, Gyarados was
sitting on my bench with ONE energy on it. After 2 turns of trading damage,
my Blastoise had just about had it. I moved all his energy over to
Gyarados, put a double colorless on him, and used that for the retreat. Now
I had a fresh Gyarados out with enough energy for Dragon Rage. Needless to
say, I USED IT. That was that.

Round 3: THE FINAL MATCH

Me vs. Bret Costello, Josh's brother. Crap.....he had a
Raichu/Zapdos/Mewtwo deck.

Game 1:
He got Mewtwo out right off the bat. Since I had neglected to put any
energy removal in, he just stalled the game out until I was decked. I just
about did the same to him....literally.

Game 2:
He got Mewtwo out again, but didn't have enough energy. I took advantage of
it with a Chansey that I'd gotten 2 Double Colorlesses on. One Double-Edge
was all it took. His next pokemon....SHUDDER.....Zapdos. Next turn, Zapdos
made KFC (Kentucky Fried Chansey) out of my poor damage-magnet. That's when
I got mad. My next pokemon: My usually-benched Alakazam. Pulverized him
with Confuse Ray, somehow confusing him every time. His Zapdos wound up
killing itself. Then he pulls out, to my surprise, his last pokemon.....a
Pikachu. I made quick work of him with Confuse Ray, sat back, and sighed.
One game to go.

Game 3: For all the marbles

Bret was so frustrated over his loss that he forgot to draw his prizes. I
hinted the judge to it. Technical win. I won. *YAHOO!!!*


Xaq Shenor