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I am full aware that this is not the first article written about Prop. 15. I am also aware it probably will not be the last. But, I am going to write it either way, simply because I am a cocky teenager who thinks people hang on my every word. Now, carrying on, I am FOR Prop. 15. No, that is not a misprint...I think that Prop. 15 will do a great deal of good for the Pokemon TCG. But will it do what it is supposed to? Will it fail? The answer, my friends, is "a little from column A, a little from column B", meaning both. Prop. 15 will do a fairly good job of keeping Haymakers down, it will allow room for new (and more original) decks in the atmosphere, but, it WILL NOT conquer the all mighty Wiggly. No, that is the job of the aforementioned new decks. Prop. 15 barely even touches Wiggly, who still has the millions <and millions> of the Wiggly's fans Do The Wave over the icy corpses of other Pokemon. And that would be that...except for Prop. 15 opening the gates for fresh-like-mentos deck structure...which should serve the purpose of confusing Wiggly enough to keep him *slightly* at bay. Do I think he will still be up near the top in most tournament finishes? Oh yes. Will he still be numbers 1-4? Oh no...

The way I see it, Prop. 15 does two major and crucial (redundant!) things to the game of Pokemon...it forces decks to have more Pokemon, and it forces decks to have more energy. Now, with decks having untold millions of energy cards, ER and SER become less useful than before. Sure, forcing your opponent to discard energy is sweet still, that will never change, but it is less devastating than before. Pre-Prop. 15 format (AKA, now), a generic Haymaker deck is 10-14 Pokemon, 10-16 energy, and the rest is trainer laden. This is why Prop. 15 kind of buries Haymaker decks in cement and tosses them into a river...because without the kind of trainer backing that has become the norm, Hitmonchan fumbles around aimlessly because the deck no longer plays itself. The main yummy goodness of Haymaker is the fact it is self sufficient, you can set your brain on cruise control and win consistently. Prop. 15 makes Hay bad...

With the focus on energy and Pokemon, you can expect to see some older, former archetypes return. Raindance will make a comeback in a big way, although the deck structure will no longer be "turn two Blastoise, eat half of my deck for water energy, hit you for 60 a turn, with an ocean for a bench" and more "Get Blastoise out ASAP, Oak when needed, win because you play right". Another oldie that will return is good ol' TurkeyTrot, aka Peekaboo. If you aren't familiar with this deck name, I'm not surprised, because it was usually just called "I get Dodrio out and run away for free with all of my Pokemon". It'll be back...oh yes...it's true. I also expect to see new variations on Damage Swap...probably with MP Mewtwo being a big hitter. This deck, when constructed correctly, needs very little trainers to work...just like Raindance. Ah...memories...*trails off in thought*.

What new decks do I expect to bring the pain you ask? Well, I see London, I see France, I see energy disruption everywhere. It didn't rhyme, but it got the point across well enough. Killing energy may not be such a big thing when talking about ER and SER, this is true, but with the potential to keep your opponent at 1 energy or less EVERY TURN, it becomes evident that these types of decks will be around every corner. I expect Blaine's Charmander to be a main eventer...as well as Misty's Poliwhirl. Now, with oodles-o'-Energy Disruption abound, it seems to make even more sense for Raindance to return. Go Blastoise. Now, with everyone weeping softly about the trainer limit, and figuring that speed is the most important thing ever, I expect some intelligent people to begin playing Stall again. All kinds of Stall. Anything that will keep you alive long enough to watch a Wiggly deck burm itself from the inside out is good. Especially considering the fact that 6+ cards in most decks are going to be card draw, with a maximum of 4 (NGR) slowing the gas burning process.