This little on-a-budget deck is called Down the Drain for one simple
reason -- that's where your opponent's energy goes! Like other budget
decks, it's not quite tournament-level, but it's a strong casual-play
deck. It's also a lot of fun to see your opponent's face when you flip
over your starting Pokemon, the usual reaction being: "You're playing
with *Psyduck*?"

Deck on a Budget -- Down the Drain:

4 Psyduck
2 Golduck
4 Seel
2 Dewgong
4 Dratini
2 Dragonair (*Rare*)
4 Lickitung

4 Energy Removal
2 Bill
2 Switch
2 Gust of Wind

28 Water Energy (Optional: substitute up to 4 Double Colorless Energy)

I originally built this deck because I wanted to play with a Pokemon
that I had a lot of, but I'd never used before. The one I picked was
Psyduck. When I took a good look at Golduck, I knew I had a strong
energy-denial concept going.

How do you play this deck?
This deck is obviously a stronger take on the Blackout concept. Golduck
and Dragonair are the "engine" of the deck, which works by robbing your
opponent of energy. Problem is, Psyduck and Dratini are pretty small and
fragile. The fragility problem is solved by using Seel and Lickitung,
which are both large enough to withstand a beating until you get the
engine running. If you're playing against a deck that doesn't need much
energy, Dewgong handles that problem by hitting the small,
inexpensive-attack Pokemon really hard.

Why Lickitung?
Because Lickitung is possibly the single most effective yet inexpensive
big basic out there, *and* it's uncommon. I really think Lickitung is
very underrated -- I use it in many of my decks, especially in the
low-budget ones. It's got two status-effect attacks, 90 HPs, and only
needs one energy card to run. Sure, it doesn't have the raw power of a
Scyther, but that's not what it's there for. It's there to tie up your
opponent while you get your deck moving. Now, if you want to substitute
a Snorlax for one of the Lickitungs, that'd work just fine as well. I
have had one in the deck off and on while I was using my Lickitungs for
a different deck, and Snorlax works great. You don't want more than two
Snorlaxes, though -- their high energy costs make them harder to use
than Lickitung.

Why not Poliwrath?
Well, partially because he's a little harder to get ahold of, and
partially because he's slower. You'd need to go through Poliwag and
Poliwhirl to get to Poliwrath, unless you want to use rare trainers.
Since these are budget decks, Poliwrath is difficult to use, and I chose
to use Golduck instead.

Where are the Super Energy Removals?
Budget deck, remember? But if you've got them, you can choose to use one
or two. You don't really want to use more than that because some of the
Pokemon in your deck have some pretty hefty energy requirements.
Dragonair needs 4, Golduck needs 3, Dewgong needs 3.

Please feel free to copy and use this deck, or alter it to suit your own
needs. I like the feel of this deck a lot, and would enjoy hearing from
other players how they've used it or improved it. I'm sure some rare
trainers could turn this thing into a real monster. You can mail me
comments or constructive criticism at lopaskar@san.rr.com.

==Leanne

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Leanne Opaskar                  lopaskar@san.rr.com