Panty Raid

Pokémon [18]

2 — Hydreigon EX — Roaring Skies (62/108)

2 — Latios EX — Roaring Skies (58/108)
2 — Latios EX — Powers Beyond Tin (XY72)
3 — Mega Latios EX — Powers Beyond Tin (XY72)

2 — Regice — Ancient Origins (24/98)
3 — Deoxys — Roaring Skies (33/108)
4 — Unown — Ancient Origins (30/98)

Trainers [25]

2 — Enhanced Hammer — Primal Clash (162/160)
3 — Acro Bike — Primal Clash (122/160)
3 — Trainers' Mail — Ancient Origins (100/98)

2 — Steven — Roaring Skies (90/108)
2 — Professor Sycamore — XY Base Set (122/146)
2 — Giovanni's Scheme — BREAKthrough (162/162)
4 — Professor Birch's Observations — Primal Clash (159/160)

3 — Team Magma's Secret Base — Double Crisis (32/34)

4 — Latios Spirit Link — Roaring Skies (85/108)

Energy [17]

4 — Double Dragon Energy — Roaring Skies (97/108)
4 — Double Colorless Energy
4 — Psychic Energy
5 — Water Energy

MAIN STRATEGY

Steven & Latios Spirit Link: "Boys...we're going on a panty raid!!" Steven would be our frat brother (he's a bad-influence on us)—and Latios Spirit Link would be the girl's panties. Legend has it, this magical item can somehow be a divine link between us and the object of our affection. But no one has figured out yet exactly how to unlock that potential. They just seem to collect their panties for the rapture, when knowledge of this can send them all to hentai heaven.

As for Steven, just like around the house, we don't see much of him in this deck. He's just a supplementary resource that gives us an extension on our other Supporters. In addition to this, Steven also provides some selective diversity between the array of Supporters we have together.

In particular, the tactical pair of Giovanni's Scheme and Professor Sycamore. Ideally, they do two different things entirely—and both have such conditions that their greatest potential only becomes available at select times. This has prominently been my main use of Steven since its release (as the gateway between a tactical spread of many different Supporters).

In those spreads, copies of Steven appear in high volume—and so this deck here shows the opposite potential of that, using Steven in spare copies as an extension of our more prominent Supporters (rather than being the prominent Supporter itself that then connects us after).

And there is a good reason for that application here. You see—this deck is very desperate for resources, and vies on being able to obtain a diverse amount of resources very quickly. We need M Latios, we need Latios Spirit Link—Double Dragon Energies—and we also want to get Team Magma's Secret Base out as soon as possible. Due to this high demand, we can't afford to idle our turns away through Steven as our primary Supporter. He works best as an access extension here—helping tie up loose ends in a similar way that Random Receiver can be used to do.

The added bonus of Steven's energy retrieval is the main reason why I chose him over 2 copies of some other card (such as Shauna, Tierno, Acro Bike, or Trainers' Mail). Steven is a definite answer in the event you need to get to a specific energy right away, but can't afford to leave it on the luck of the draw. A definite answer is generally the best option over a gamble. And that principal is especially applies here, since we have two different types of Basic energy, and each are in spare numbers. Where despite the spare numbers of Steven, this low volume aims to serve us best when we need it most (late in the game—when such resources are few and far between).

Team Magma's Secret Base: The sorority house—Mega Alpha Bitch. This is where the panties be. Yet one should beware—this is a dangerous stronghold. Behind these cold walls lies a mob of young girls with poor nutrition, known to prominently stay awake all hours of the night indulging themselves—or cramming because they spent all their free time indulging themselves.

Aside from the flavor aspect, the main reason Team Magma's Secret Base is our select Stadium card for this deck—lies in M Latios' [Sonic Ace] attack and its damage limitations. [Sonic Ace] only does 120 damage, where that extra 20 damage from Team Magma's Secret Base puts us in range to one-hit KO anything at 140HP or below. Although this still doesn't put us in range to one-hit KO most Pokémon EX, it's still very useful to take out prominent cards with [Sonic Ace] (such as [Geomancy] Xerneas—and [Oblivion Wing] Yveltal).

Our Pokémon can be expected to take a hit from Team Magma's Secret Base as well (which I suppose is the equal to getting whapped by one of the sorority girls). Yet this should hardly matter—since we're prominently flying high on M Latios EX's 220HP. And Hydreigon EX mostly just sits on the bench and never sees any combat. Then have Unown, which is an immediate expendable resource anyway (where the damage doesn't even matter). And lastly, if Regice goes active, it's generally to flawlessly finish the game for us anyways—so it's not a big deal.

Just like a real panty raid (or some real panties)—your best bet is to just put it down quick and forget about it. On a final note, keep in mind that we only have three copies of this card here. I had to cut back from four copies so that a more prominent resource of ours (Latios Spirit Link) could take the higher volume that it more prominently needs. Consistency with that card is far more essential to our success than with Team Magma's Secret Base—so I had to budget.

With this lower volume, it means that we can't be sure to come across another copy if we cash out our hand—so we want to just get it out there right away and roll with the punches. It'll be far more important to get those counters on your opponent's Pokémon during their next turn, than it will be to spare our own Pokémon from a couple damage counters by not playing it right away. Kind of like if someone confronts you during the raid—just push them over and run.

The College Board of Supporters: Here we have the part where the Dean of the school calls you into his office for questioning. "I heard there was a break-in at the Mega Alpha Bitch house..." But you didn't hear anything about it, and you've got to go right away, because you're late for class. "Ahhh, behold my glorious panty collection—and I sell some too." The Dean also leads a second life—but let's not go into that now. Let's just hope nobody blames him for it.

As I said before, this deck has a lot of diverse resources that we need to obtain right away, so it can't afford to idle much time away on short draws or round-about Supporters. In addition to that, this deck's resources are also incredibly precious to our success—so that we can't really afford to be throwing them away either. Since this deck was intended to be legal in the current Standard Format, this left me with Professor Birch's Observations as our lead Supporter. Yet that's not to say this was a bad thing by any means, because Professor Birch's Observations is a mighty Supporter here.

The technique for this deck revolves around Professor Birch's Observations pull out a bulk draw for us—then boost off our additional Item retrieval cards—to reach further into our deck, and thin out the contents so that Professor Birch's Observations is made more effective each play. These item retrieval cards also help to take the edge off the short end of Professor Birch's draw (in the event we only get four cards). There are 10 retrieval cards to back us up here (not including Deoxys)—which we'll need to use to reach through our deck and nab additional cards.

Professor Sycamore resides as a power back up to this. The potential of a straight seven card draw is a nice ace to have on reserve. Later in the game (once we've got the bulk of our content on the table) we can come to likely situation where we only need a certain specific resource to follow through for the win (like Double Dragon Energy or Double Colorless energy for this deck).

That event is a very likely scenario for this deck. So much so, that having Professor Sycamore around is probably essential to this deck. It's the only Supporter that can dramatically clear our a situation like this. Not to mention, since we have Steven in this deck, we can further that potential—since Steven operates an a round-about extension of Professor Sycamore. Steven can provide a gateway to Professor Sycamore whenever we need it, thus enabling us to cut back on the liability of running Professor Sycamore in high volume.

Giovanni's Scheme is our tactical back-up. I like to consider him a tactical pair with Professor Sycamore. They both do similar things, yet one offers some distinct contrast to broaden our overall potential. It might not be much, but those few extra cards we can get from Giovanni's Scheme can really save the day. And it also works along the same lines as Professor Birch's Observations does with our item retrieval cards (which is a nice bonus).

As for the contrast, every additional damage counter can be just as significant as every extra card—where the 20 additional damage that we can get out of Giovanni's Scheme can pull us ahead of the game—where we might otherwise fall behind a turn.

The most prominent example of this would be in a follow up attack with [Fast Raid], after we hit our opponent with [Sonic Ace]. M Latios EX is going to deal 120 damage, yet at the cost of two energy that we might not be able to replace right away. Instead, we can retreat M Latios EX, then follow up with [Fast Raid] & Giovanni's Scheme which would deal 60 damage—and bring us to 180 damage total (enough to KO most Pokémon EX—which reside at 170HP or greater).

Acro Bike, Enhanced Hammer, & Trainers' Mail: If you're on a panty raid, you want to get in and out as quickly as possible. First of all, you don't want to be walking, because that's an easy way to get busted near the premises with the goods (goods?). But you don't want to be running either, because that's actually not fast enough. It creates an easy trail to follow and it's suspicious. What you need for this job is a bike. It's fast, and blends right in with the surroundings. Oh, and don't forget your bandit tools—to bust into the panty drawer.

M Latios EX is a very technical card. [Sonic Ace] requires us to discard 2 energy just to use the attack—and although it's range is unlimited—for that cost it only does an average amount of damage. Based demanding resources such as this, I conceived that I would need to strongly reinforce the deck structure here with resource obtaining cards in order to stabilize it. From this, I choose to include two very prominent cards for this (Acro Bike and Trainers' Mail)—then placed them both at even numbers with one another. The even numbers were to ensure balance here, since both cards have their own unique potential in how they operate, yet this deck in particular wouldn't seem benefit from having the cards in some higher volume than the other.

For example, Acro Bike is the only one between the two that can get us special energy—while Trainers' Mail can get us to everything else (as well as to copies of Acro Bike). However, the drawbacks are that Trainers' Mail can't get to copies of itself (while Acro Bike can)—yet Acro Bike also forces us to discard a card in the process (something considerably counterproductive here). Not wanting to tilt towards either extreme, I felt like it would just be best to even them out—and that balance between the cards inevitably seemed to do what it was intended perfectly.

In deep pockets of our backpack, we have Enhanced Hammer, which has been included to provide some powerful support to this deck's momentum. It's a really great removal card, which works wonders to buy time that's desperately needed. Just one turn can be extremely significant to this deck, especially when it comes to M Latios EX and [Sonic Ace]. At only 120 damage a hit, it's generally going to take at least two hits to knock out most Pokémon EX. And with that, Enhanced Hammer becomes an amazing card for knocking our opponent's momentum back, so that we can more flawlessly overtake them with M Latios EX & [Sonic Ace].

Unown & Regice: Unown—our panty raiders; or sorority sisters (checking the house); or maybe even the police. You can bet that they're going to have some questions for us like the Dean. Now Regice—those are the granny panties. No one wants those. But they're great to pwn your enemies, so it might be intuitive to grab yourself a dirty pair if you have the personal space for them. Unown is here to further the concentration of cards such as Acro Bike and Trainers' Mail—helping to further accelerate the flow of the cards—and fulfill our resource demands faster. It's nearly essential too. It does literally take all this concentrated potential to bring this deck together. Without it all, there's probably no way we would be able to get as much use out of M Latios EX as we do here.

Now, making good use of Unown may sometimes involve a little technique.

For example, if you're going to use Professor Birch's Observations (unless you have a ton of cards in your hand)—it's generally going to be a good idea to wait until after you play Professor Birch's Observations before you active any {Farewell Letter} you have (just in case you pull the shortest straw). This doesn't mean you'll always want to save your card advantage stuff like this though. I find that it's a give and take, where you'll want to play one and save one for best results. Saving them all can actually end up polluting the deck and resulting in a dead draw whenever you do get around to using it. So do be mindful to apply a little technique when working with these cards. Don't just spam them mindlessly—but don't obsessively hoard them either. Try to create a flow with them—because that's exactly what they're intended to provide.

Last we have Regice, which is a far simpler resource to make good use of. If you need it, it's there for you—while the lower volume present helps to keep the card out of your way if it doesn't happen to be much use to you. Moreso than not, we should be able to get the job done with just M Latios EX alone (even against Pokémon-EX). However, there are always bound to be a few really tough scenarios (especially in regards to certain Pokémon-EX)—and primarily why Regice has been included in this deck. It's a somewhat lesser version of {Safeguard} Suicune—with its own advantages and disadvantages. Take it for what you will. It's definitely better than nothing—which ironically is how some poor souls feel about granny panties.

Latios & M Latios EX: This is you and your bro—digging through the panty drawer (and the dirty clothes) lookin' for the goods—then taking off like Sonic the Hedgehog once you've got 'em. M Latios EX is our centerpiece for this deck, which makes Latios EX our primary starter. Unlike most decks I create, the strategy for this deck involves always playing first if you can. It's the main reason why we have [Close Encounter] Deoxys here instead of something like [Solar Generator] Solrock. It's so that we can consistently play first, because consistency is very important in this, and our turn order is not something we can afford to be in the dark about it.

The offensive edge provided by [Fast Raid] is the main reason Latios EX is our primary starter—this damage helps to convex (or round out) the lesser side of [Sonic Ace]'s damage. [Fast Raid] gives us a jump start on the damage aspect, which can be expected to bottom out on us once we Mega Evolve. The energy advantage is another big reason why we want to lead with Latios EX. The energy demand for these two cards are very high. M Latios EX has to expend a vast amount of energy in order to keep attacking, and the energies we use for M Latios are also very susceptible to cards like Enhanced Hammer—so we want to get them on and off as quickly as possible. For this reason, taking the energy lead is also very important to us.

And with that, getting to M Latios EX as quickly as possible is also crucial to our success. As stated, that is why I've included Latios Spirit Link in such high volume. What M Latios EX offers is tactical power, an aspect that's naturally balanced in this card by curbing its raw power. This challenging factor becomes an aspect of time, which we can only make for by doubling time. And that is the logic behind how and why making good time is so important for this deck.

The tactical edge of [Sonic Ace] can be its own balance at times. With [Sonic Ace], we can go around our opponent's active Pokémon, and start to rack up the damage on whatever they might be trying to put together on the bench. This is another big benefactor of [Sonic Ace] over Latios EX's stronger attack, [Light Pulse]. That attack requires four energy (a much steeper climb)—is even more susceptible to Enhanced Hammer—and also forces us to play through our opponent's active Pokémon.

This factor can stall for turns against us—or take up unnecessary amounts of energy—as well as grind us against the force of explicitly powerful cards (such as Rock Guard, Dangerous Energy, and Lucky Helmet). This should stress the importance of getting to [Sonic Ace] right away in a littler greater detail. The ability to bomb around can be vastly superior to brute forcing your way through ranks of Active Pokémon. Give it a whirl and see what I mean. You might not be able to realize true greatness of this until the power's at your fingertips. Unfortunately, I don't think the same can be said about panties—so don't trust anybody that tries to say that.

Hydreigon EX & Deoxys: Here we have the sorority sisters. Deoxys represents what could be a [Close Encounter] in your panty raid—if say one of the girls suddenly comes home—or wakes up because she thinks that she hears somebody perving. The second—Hydreigon EX—represents the other sorority girls in a darker form. These pretty ladies look pretty pissed. Not only have their panties been stolen, but it's their fancy expensive ones that are missing. This of course—can bring about the Apocalypse. Which is why someone called the police—and that's why they were around earlier—but now we have everyone running around commando. Which is kind of neat, since it's exactly what we have Hydreigon EX do in this deck.

Hydreigon EX is a tactical resource, which can also double as a backup to M Latios EX. Although Hydreigon EX also requires three energy to attack (and only does 80 damage) it's still an amazingly useful card to have around. Just the potential of [Shred] alone is considerably worth it, seeing as how [Shred] can get around stubborn abilities that would otherwise prevent us from damaging our opponent's Pokémon at all. Much like those backup granny panties you'll be needed to bust out—it's always better to have them and not need them—than to need them and not have them. This explains the tactical contrast Hydreigon EX provides, which I'm sure you'll find to be amazing if you ever face off against any granny Regice for yourself.

However, keep in mind that Hydreigon EX's main purpose here is not an offensive one. It's mostly to just to be seated on the bench, so that we can freely move between our copies of Latios EX. {Dragon Road} reduces the retreat cost of Latios EX to zero, which is really great to transition them between M Latios EX—for either the clean-up or the follow-up. {Dragon Road} also enables Hydreigon to retreat for free as well, and given how this is our primary use for Hydreigon EX, it's very helpful since we generally don't want to put much emphasis on attaching energy to them. M Latios EX is going to need those energy far more prominently—so try not to misplace them.

On the far end, Deoxys is our secondary starter for this deck. As previously mentioned, [Solar Generator] Solrock was a deep consideration in place of Deoxys. However, Solrock had no offensive potential here, and wasn't compatible with the play first power of [Fast Raid]. This took away my ability to consistently play first, and thus made the deck unstable.

Deoxys on the other hand (as a starting Pokémon) enables us to play first every time. As our primary attack, [Close Encounter] works arguably even better than [Solar Generator] to get us the resources we need here. [Close Encounter] can get us to special energies, it can get us Mega Evolved faster, and it can get to any Supporters we might need to keep our momentum going. However, keep in mind that Latios EX remain our primary starter between the two—so make sure to always bench Deoxys if you have to choose between the two.

Beyond the crucial demand for resources that we face, we also face the lower curve of [Sonic Ace]'s damage potential, which readily threatens to set us behind the pace of more aggressive decks. Playing first and getting that first attack with [Fast Raid] can essential to victory. Don't think you can make up for it with Deoxys & [Overdrive Smash], because that can actually end up putting you behind. [Overdrive Smash] requires two energy, and takes two turns before the damage it does becomes reasonable. That sets us three turns behind, and two energies behind even beginning to power up Latios EX. We need to start strong if we want to finish strong. A loss in momentum like that, and we're bound to crash and burn, so keep Deoxys as your secondary unless you opening hand suffers so terribly [Close Encounter] is your only hope.

As some secondary potential, Deoxys can also be thrown out there to stall for a few turns while we either put together another M Latios EX—or get one fueled up for another hit with [Sonic Ace]. Deoxys and its 110HP sets it a slightly above the curve and enables Deoxys to eat up a 100 damage attack without giving way. That added grit is going to be extremely significant in a tight spot, further proving Deoxys to be a superior resource. Much like your nerdy sorority sister who always stays home. If it wasn't for her, the panty raiders might have gotten away with your dirty toys too—and you would have probably blamed her for it—some sister you are.

Big Ol' Bag of Candy

Pokémon [17]

2 — Toxicroak EX — Flashfire (41/106)
2 — Toxicroak EX — Flashfire (102/106)

2 — Sigilyph — Plasma Freeze (118/116)
3 — Venipede — Boundaries Crossed (72/149)
4 — Skarmory — Roaring Skies (69/108)

2 — Gulpin — Phantom Forces (37/119)
2 — Swalot — Phantom Forces (38/119)

Trainers [26]

4 — Hypnotoxic Laser — Plasma Storm (123/135)
4 — Robo Substitute — Phantom Forces (102/119)

2 — Ace Trainer — Ancient Origins (69/98)
3 — Teammates — Primal Clash (160/160)
4 — N — Dark Explorers (96/108)

4 — Virbank City Gym — Plasma Storm (126/135)

1 — Rock Guard — Plasma Freeze (108/116)
4 — Rocky Helm — Boundaries Crossed (153/149)

Energy [17]

4 — Mystery Energy — Phantom Forces (112/119)
4 — Double Colorless Energy
9 — Psychic Energy

MAIN STRATEGY

Skarmory & Sigilyph: Skarmory represents going door to door on Halloween to collect candy—and Sigilyph is like when we get home and pour out the candy to see what we got. These two are not a starting pair though. Sigilyph holds about as much potential as a starter in this deck as Gulpin does. It's pretty low. Skarmory is our primary starter for this deck. And the strategy generally involves playing second, so that we can use [Call for Family] right away.

Even at first, the contents of this deck appeared to me as though they were going to be really difficult to work with. Yet by the end of the development process, it had been assured that this was one of most difficult deck structures I had ever developed. I was extremely surprised to learn that this deck would literally require Skarmory to stabilize the flow of the cards—especially since this deck doesn't run high on evolution chains, or rely on the bench in any way.

Given the prominence of item cards here, I had originally tried working with [Close Encounter] Deoxys—yet that card kept falling terribly short in the test runs (even with Dimension Valley—the original Stadium card for this deck). It was then I had the idea to try [Call for Family] instead—given how universal the potential of that effect tends to be. And it was from that decision that I had discovered it was the Pokémon base in this deck that had been polluting the flow of the cards.

And it was by filtering them out—with [Call for Family]—that I was majorly able to unlock this flow. Unfortunately, the art on the card for Skarmory didn't match the Halloween theme as well as the art on [Close Encounter] Deoxys did—but I guess I actually ended up getting a little more flavor out of it this way. Because sometimes it rains on Halloween, and other times you have to Trick or Treat in the daylight—both of which can spoil the fun of Halloween a little.

As for Sigilyph, it could probably double as our secret stash given how it often plays out here. You see, Sigilyph has a habit of hiding away, and doesn't see much action in this deck (at least based on my experiences with it). It's very much a distant backup resource, that you save for a rainy day (thus the double entendre). And even if you perceive that you don't need it, keep in mind that it can block up the flow of the cards if you carelessly shuffle them back into your deck.

For this reason, there is somewhat of an importance of not keeping them in your hand (even if you can't use them). In order to snug in all of the tactical content that was needed to stabilize the deck structure, it thinned out our card advantage resources pretty well. And given how many of them are conditional, we don't want to pollute the contents of our deck any—so try to play out the first Sigilyph you get into your hand (even if you don't need it)—and get it out of the way to help concentrate the flow of the cards.

Gulpin & Swalot:

"Why don't you give meee some candy?"

"Ewuuuu...I don't think so...you're fat enough."

These two represent our dysfunctional family—always trying to get us to do stuff we don't want to do. Which is an interesting gem of symbolism, since developing this deck literally involved forcing myself to figure out how in the hell to make good use of Phantom Forces Swalot. I had not choice either, because this card was the counterpart to Gourgiest, and the centerpiece for a post-Halloween deck revolving around the theme of eating candy. Ironically, figuring out how to use this card was more like Nightmare on Elm Street. Which is actually kind of funny—when you look at the art for the card.

In my attempts to work this magic, I had originally started with [Dimension Valley]—feeling as though its power was needed in order to bridge the high costs of Swalot's attacks. This didn't work out however—since the power of [Poison Gas] is miserably low for a Stage 1 Pokémon (even at 1 energy). And Swalot's HP is also too low to make consistent use of [Swallow Up] (even at 2 energy).

I had tried a bunch of different combinations trying to unlock the hidden potential. It was like the Hellraiser puzzle box. At first I included [Close Encounter] Deoxys and [Psychic Assault] Wobbuffet—both of which attack for one energy—and work incrementally with attacks like [Poison Gas] and [Triple Poison]. With such quick attack power, I was convinced that there had to be someway to get Dimensional Valley to in this deck with Swalot. However, I had come to conclude that the deck structure was just too unstable with Swalot.

And so, this forced me to try something new. And in the end, I had learned something unique from this experience. Normally, I like to run a broad line of 4/3—or 3/3 for my Stage 1 evolution chains. You need a broad line like that in order to ensure consistency. It's essential to quickly get your cards on the table and make decent use of your Stage 1 Pokémon.

However, it appeared to be that Swalot was a special case. Where seemingly, the only way to get the card to actually work—is by running the evolution chain in a thin line like we have here. The reason for this was because the card itself isn't especially useful. It does have potential, yet that potential is so narrow, it requires you to run a thin line if you want to actually make good use of it. If you try to run a broader line, then the lesser qualities of the card are going to hold you back.

As far as I can tell, Swalot's best potential seems to be as a late game finisher—when you only have one two prize cards left, and you need to deal a troublesome 100 damage to finish the game. This can't be achieved in one attack with any other Pokémon in this deck—and that's where Swalot rises above the crowd a little. So maybe it wouldn't be so bad to give him a little candy. After all, Swalot is likely to be the one that has your back when no one else does.

Toxicroak EX & Venipede: This combination probably sums up the fun of Halloween for us all. We all start out as a little peapod in this big world, looking back at Mom & Dad, and wondering if they're really going to send us up to the door all by ourselves—to a broke kid in college running around on Halloween all by ourselves with no shame in collecting free candy from other adults. Toxicroak EX can make quick of pretty much anything in this deck—like some horror movie killer. And that's why there are four of them here, because Toxicroak is an explicitly strong starting Pokémon.

In this deck, all you need is a double colorless energy, and you can totally dominate with [Triple Poison] between Virbank City Gym, Mystery Energy, and Robo Substitute. You'll be stacking up 50 damage a turn on your opponent without even needing Toxicroak EX to remain your active Pokémon, while Mystery Energy enables you to vanish like Michael Myers. Put a Rocky Helmet Toxicroak—and you'll be tearing them up like Jason Voorhees. Throw Rock Guard on there—and that's like Jason Takes Manhattan. Heads will roll.

Venipede on the other hand is our distant backup starter in this deck, and doubles as a transitional resource whenever we need to switch to a defensive stance. {Poison Point} and Virbank City Gym go hand-in-hand. This combination can keep a smart opponent at bay, while more reckless opponents are going to start stacking up some heavy poison damage on themselves from {Poison Point}—thus adding some offensive edge to what would otherwise be an unprogressive stalling tactic.

As such a resource, Venipede also doubles as an enabler for us—working powerful Supporters like Ace Trainer and Teammates. We couldn't possibly get this much out of any other basic Pokémon in the game, which kind of makes Venipede appear to me as the old lady at the top of the hill, who drops so much candy in your bag—you can't help but love her. She's our favorite person in the world to visit on Halloween, and just ringing her door bell makes our heart glow like a jack-o'-lantern.

Hypnotoxic Laser & Robo Substitute: Robo Substitute—that's like us at the hospital. I think we might have eaten too much candy. And Hypnotoxic Laser is like equipment they have to use to see if we're going to go into diabetic shock. Both of these cards are powerful resources for any Virbank City Gym deck. Hypnotic Laser can jump start the poison damage when we can't even begin to attack yet, while Robo Substitute can extend the range of that damage to at least 90 over the course of a single turn (and that's not even including our follow up attack).

Toxicroak EX makes a sweet pair with Robo Substitute as well, further increasing the overall synergy of the deck. Over the course of a single go, your opponent will get one attack on Toxicroak EX—and by the time it comes back around next turn (after Robo Substitute gets knocked out)—200 damage will have passed from [Triple Poison]. You can use this technique to bag fresh Pokémon EX that your opponent sends out from the bench but hasn't powered up yet. They won't even be able to get two energies on it and it'll be gone.

I guess that could make this pair of cards something like having to fend off our siblings from our candy with a Super Soaker (because they ate all of theirs already). They might be lucky to get one to two pieces, but it'll take a true fat ass to stand there and mooch our candy in the face of getting hosed.

Our Halloween Crew & Virbank City Gym: Ace Trainer reminds me of the perfect Halloween date. There's nothing quite as romantic as a night on the town together amidst the Halloween atmosphere. Virbank City Gym is like our neighborhood on Halloween—or possibly our real home afterwards (where everyone steals our candy). Ace Trainer also represents our friends, where Teammates is like our little sister and her friend. We said that we would take them Trick or Treating so they didn't have to stay inside on Halloween. We don't mind if they tag along. It would have broke their heart to have had to stay inside—which I guess makes us like the brave and endearing hero N by default.

This spread of Supporters is truly beyond anything I would ever think possible. Yet it was through forcing myself to develop this deck that I had unlocked the potential to do the impossible. I had first tried a bunch of different Supporter combinations, many of which were very successful for similar deck structures of mine—yet none of them seemed to work very well at all for this deck in specific. Ultimately, it was in the final major revision of the deck—that there should be some extremely rare and unique potential for this deck's Supporter spread.

After I had unlocked the secret of Skarmory's potential for this deck, and switched over from Dimension Valley to Virbank City Gym (adding Venipede to the deck to suite it)—I had concluded that this deck should have the potential to run an explicitly tactical Supporter pair featuring both Ace Trainer and Teammates. This was something totally unprecedented otherwise (due to their restrictions)—yet in this deck should thrive, given the immense number of satellite resources we have to heavily support both cards. For this same reason, it was obvious to me that N would make a beautiful compliment at the core of this Supporter spread. It works along the lines of the main strategy—and provides the support needed here to accentuate the flow of the cards.

Ace Trainer makes a really great follow up to N, mid-game for example, after your opponent has knocked out one of your Skarmory, Venipede, or even Toxicroak maybe. Yet it's still too conditional to see any extensive use here (due to the prominence of poison damage). The style of this deck is not intended to provide some perfectly one-sided landslide victory. It vies on explicit tactic—revolving around the consistency of poison damage, and all of our tactical resources to support that. Our opponent is likely to pick up more than a few prize cards as we strive to counterstep them, yet we should ultimately pull victory out from under them.

This tactical style is one of the greatest techniques in the game, because it not only works best deck's that are based on simple brute force, it is the only type of deck that has a chance to best other explicitly tactical decks. And this is where title of endearing hero is going to take full perspective for both Ace Trainer & N—with their ability to aggressively short our opponent's hand while they collect prize cards off our satellite resources.

While Teammates plays for free off Robo Substitute—giving us all kinds of tactical retrieval power—that's sure to be especially dangerous in this deck. In fact, it should not only save the day for us—but keeping the pressure on our opponents with Hypnotoxic Laser, Virbank City Gym (and anything else we might need) should come natural.

Rocky Helm & Rocky Guard: Rocky Helmet is like the knots on your head—tryin' to steal my candy; and Rock Guard is like our candy collection when there's nothing left but Tootsie Rolls. You can have them all. It could also be like our stash of the good stuff I guess, versus all of the junk stuff that we give to our family to keep the fiends out of our stash. It could even be our stomach in knots after eating too much junk food (that's how we ended up in the hospital). There are lots of possibilities here...makes it hard to pick just one.

Luckily, making good use of these cards is about as simple as can be—you won't have to put too much thought into it. You'll just want to save Rock Guard for Toxicroak as often as possible—as well as Rocky Helmet for something like Swalot or Skarmory. We want to get the most out of these cards, so we don't want to attach them to any Pokémon with low HP, unless it would be a game winning move. So eat up all the good stuff right away, but try to savor the flavor if you can. That's what's most comfortable, so that's always going to be our best move.