Dear PoJo:

A friend of mine recently took 1st place at one of the GenCon Pokemon 
tournaments with his hyper-Blastoise deck. He had spent a great deal of time 
and energy fine tuning the damn thing so that 3 out of 4 times he has a fully 
powered Blastoise on the bench by turn 3. He was very proud of the fact that 
he could mow through just about anyone's decks with very little trouble... 
and we are all very proud that he took 1st place at a tournament as large as 
GenCon... 

However; if I see one more frigging Raindance deck Im gonna scream! I am 
soooo sick of spending weeks putting together and honing an 'origioinal 
concept deck' only to go to the gameroom and get stuck playing against 
someone whose deck is as unorigional as they come, and then to have to listen 
to them WHIIINNNEEE when, after being beaten 3 times already, I decide not to 
play thier stupid "Raindance" anymore. Let's not even talk about tournaments. 
I firmly believe that walking into a tournamnet with a "Raindance" or 
"Firespin"  is a very very cheap way to win tournamnets. 98% of the people 
playing will be using an origioinal concept deck, but Ive seen most of the 
winners be people with those stupid "SURE KILL" decks. Don't get me wrong, 
there's nothing wrong with developing a "Haymaker" or "Raindance" or 
"FireSpin" to learn about the deck and it's playability, but there's 
something to be said for the person who can come up with their own concept 
and deck design, and I find people who can't win a tournament with an 
origional deck pathetic. 

Feel free to agree/disagree--send me an email either way.

]The Pokemon Lady
Klvyonne@aol.com