Ace Trainer Caleb said:
That about sums it up, I know most of my questions probably sound like common sense to most of you.
Yeah, it's fairly common sense for veterans of the game.
It just comes with practice.
I'm not sure if I'm the best player to answer your questions, since I never played in the 2008 format, or anything close to it, but I have been playing the game for a while, and know it pretty well, so I think I can answer most of your questions. Also, just a heads up, getting used to an older deck like this won't be that helpful if you're trying to get into the current format. Almost all of the cards that were played in this era aren't allowed in tournaments anymore, and basically the game is totally different. But if this is all you've got, it's better than nothing. There are definitely things you can learn from this deck that can be adapted to any format, including managing resources, establishing a good board position, and applying different strategies to different decks you face.
- While there are a lot of Pokemon with Poke-Powers in this deck, none of them are 100% essential for the deck. Other decks at the time probably revolved around Powers/Bodies more so than Empotech, so it would have been worth it to attach the Cessation Crystal (We have deck in the current format that has the same mindset: Darkrai/Garbodor). Also the most dominant deck at the time, Gardevoir/Gallade, prevented you from using Poke-Powers anyway, and that deck had some strong abilities in it, so you wouldn't be losing anything for having the Cessation Crystal attached.
- This one I'm not totally sure about, but my guess is Baltoy is much easier to search your deck for than Claydol, so you wouldn't need as many Baltoy as you would Claydol. Call Energy, Rosanne's Research and Tarous all search out Baltoy/Basics, and nothing searches your deck exclusively for Claydol/Evolutions. Right now, there aren't many cards like that, so it's not a very common thing now-a-days.
- Because you play 4 Rare Candy, which allows you to skip the Stage 1 when evolving to a Stage 2.
- Just looking at the card, I can see some uses for it. Since the focus of the deck is to spread damage with Empoleon, Mew * can spread damage early on against Water decks, before you've set up an Empoleon. Also if you're facing other Empotech decks, Rainbow Wave could be very painful to them early on. Mimicry also seems useful, especially with Scramble Energy, so you can copy pretty much any attack in the game (not that many attacks cost 4 Energy at that time). Since Mew is a basic, and most good attackers at the time were Evolutions, Mew can be set up easier than them, thus giving you an edge against your opponent. The low HP does hinder you though, so for all I know, it's only purpose was for Rainbow Wave.
- This also just comes with practice, and playing the deck over and over again to figure out which cards are the most useful. Here's just an example of the thought process behind some card counts: A card like Night Maintenance, that only works when you have Pokemon or Energy in your discard, is more situational. Thus, you wouldn't need as many of it. Same with Dusknoir. Your opponent needs to have 4 or 5 benched Pokemon for it to use it's ability, and since it won't be attacking, it will very rarely get knocked out, and you probably won't need more than 1 per game. However, a card like Rare Candy, that is incredibly useful for getting out Empoleon's early on, as well as any other point in the game, combined with cards like Celio's Network or Bebe's Search that can get you Empoleon whenever you need it, having 4 Rare Candy makes it more likely that you'll have one when you need it, and makes sure you won't run out of them. And same goes for your 4-3-4 Empoleon line (4 Piplup, 3 Prinplup, 4 Empoleon). You need a lot of Empoleon's because they're going to be on the front line taking hits, so you could need up to 6 of them in a game. Again, this comes with practice, and even high level players can be bewildered at card counts other high level players use, and even disagree with them. There is no right or wrong; it just comes down to the players preference.
- Well, if you're ahead on prizes, that's a good thing and you shouldn't purposefully fall behind. But with this deck, you'll be hitting multiple things for small amounts of damage with Dual Splash, instead of high amounts of damage on 1 Pokemon, so logically you would take your first few prizes slower than other decks, but eventually you will catch up and possibly pull ahead of them. Hopefully by that point, you would've had time to attach enough Water and Double Rainbow Energy to the point where you wouldn't need Scramble Energy anymore.
- It really just comes down to the player and the deck. Some players prefer to have a more consistent strategy, with 3-4 copies of most of their cards. Some players will prefer to have multiple 1-of cards and give themselves more options. Generally, consistent strategies are easier to use, and better for newer players, but there are definitely really skilled players that will use consistent decks and very few 1-ofs. They have their advantages, and sometimes, certain decks just have to be built that way. Not all decks are strong enough without those 1-ofs to give them a boost in certain situations, and some decks need to be able to get a fast start and keep their strategy going throughout the game.
Hope I could help you out! If you have any more questions, I'd be happy to answer them!
