Crack the Whip

Pokémon [23]

1 — Virizion EX — Plasma Blast (96/101)
2 — Shaymin EX — Roaring Skies (106/108)
2 — Venusaur EX — Red & Blue Collection Venusaur Box (XY123)

3 — Combee — Plasma Storm (4/135)
3 — Vespiquen — Ancient Origins (10/98)

2 — Serperior — Dragons Exalted (125/124)
2 — Serperior — Fates Collide  (7/124)
4 — Servine — Fates Collide (6/124)
4 — Snivy — Black & White Blister Promo (BW06)

Trainers [25]

2 — Devolution Spray — Dragons Exalted (113/124)
4 — Ultra Ball — Flashfire (99/106)

2 — Pokémon Center Lady — Generations (68/83)
3 — Professor Juniper — Plasma Blast (84/101)
3 — Shauna — X&Y (127/146)
4 — N — Fates Collide (49/124)

4 — Forest of Giant Plants — Ancient Origins (74/98)

1 — Life Dew — Plasma Freeze (107/116)
2 — Weakness Policy — Primal Clash (164/160)

Energy [12]

3 — Double Colorless Energy
9 — Grass Energy

Epilogue

Be it the D...or the P...being whipped is serious business. And our deck here aims to bring the full experience of this to life against its opponents—with the heavily paralysis beatdown it can bring about.

This all revolves around our Serperior line (the whip) and Forest of Giant Plants (the whipping pole). Be it the bedroom that becomes your resting place—or the switch that lights that *ss up. Take it for what you will, but Forest of Giant Plants is the card that helps to put the lock down on the opponent right off the rip. This tends to be really crucial at the start of the game, as it either give us a heavy jump on the damage stack, or lessen the severity of the certain time-lapse challenges we face.

Challenges like this would involve a delayed evolution climb with Serperior, or the extensive energy climb with Venusaur-EX—where cracking the whip on our opponents, and successfully paralyzing them with {Serpentine Strangle}—hopes to keep us on the dominant side of the relationship. This may not always necessary to control the game, but against more aggressive and possessive opponents, it can be very important to keep us from being pushed into any bad situations.

A successful {Serpentine Strangle} is the first crack that hopes to break the skin. But even if it misses, a second crack of the whip from Fates Collide Serperior right away can be sure to draw blood. Vespiquen isn't likely to do anything too significant early in the game, and Venusaur-EX can suffer some mobility issues due to its high attack and retreat cost.

Fates Collide Serperior however—is all offensive power. Serperior hits heavy for a single energy, has an elevated amount of HP, and only gives up a single prize if lost. Serperior is a man-eater—one could say—and once it gets that first taste, there's no telling how many Pokémon it'll swallow whole before its pursuit comes to an end.

{Royal Heal} Serperior on the other hand isn't really intended to be an offensive power, it's best potential lies in doing what it does best, and helping to take the edge off us from the bench. If it does have to go out there as our starting Pokémon, all is not lost, because [Leaf Tornado] holds some special potential with Venusaur-EX (providing a dramatic energy boost—for Venusaur to make a very powerful follow-up after).

This potential doesn't make it a move that we really want to pursuit though, because it often means losing {Royal Heal} Serperior, and that's something we really want to preserve as best as possible, to brace the HP of our stronger whip cracker (such as Venusaur-EX) so they can keep our opponents wrapped around our finger as long as possible.

Venusaur-EX is one of our biggest whip crackers—representing that D or P that really brings the pain. In combination with {Serpentine Strangle}, this card sees new worlds of potential as a Slugger or a Swarmer.

Just locking down the opponent for a single turn can put Venusaur-EX on the offensive side of the damage stack (something it would traditionally never see). And if a one-two hit is made with [Poison Powder] and [Jungle Hammer]—it's going to effectively Knock Out any Pokémon that isn't seeing some elevated amount of HP—as this one-two hit ultimately racks up 180 damage on the opponent's Pokémon (and possibly puts us 2 prizes ahead of the game).

Just one turn is all it takes. But with Servine's high curve, and the addition of 2 Devolution Spray to intensify the impact, our opponent's Pokémon can end up locked down permanently!

And that's only beginning to express the power of whip we crack, because we have a number of other accessories here that can further Venusaur's power and endurance. It's own attack [Jungle Hammer] would be the first, which not only deals a heavy 90 damage, but heals 30 damage from Venusaur-EX as well. This stacks perfectly with Pokémon Center Lady and {Royal Heal}, where the elevated amounts of damage healed, and massive amounts of damage dealt, can make it impossible for an opponent to get ahead (before any hope of that is obviously lost).

We don't ever want to be on the other side of that whip, and that's why Virizion-EX has been included as a tech accessory to prevent us from getting whipped by any Special Conditions ourself. With its high retreat cost, Venusaur-EX especially benefits from this, because Special Conditions such as Poisoned and Confused can be really big problems for Venusaur. Pokémon Center Lady is here to back us up on this, I think that's what helps to make the 1-of tech for Virizion adaptable.

Our last two accessories are Life Dew (the luxury whip) and Weakness Policy (the document that states Certified Whipped). Life Dew is an amazing card for this deck, because losing the collection when facing off against such a deadly combination of speed, power, and heavy disruption.

Weakness Policy does just the opposite, and assures that whipping us is going to be harder than imaginable, even when our opponent has the Fire-type advantage. {Serpentine Strangle}'s effect first provides an immensely challenging disruption to get around, while Weakness Policy puts us on even ground against the whatever Fire-types our opponent puts us up against.

Whew~ Hot! ...But we can handle it.

We're not sure if anyone else is going to make it though, because this deck cracks the whip so hard, it almost always bring its opponent to their knees.