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Sunday, March 8, 2015

Dragon Week Day 1: Salamence

To kick off Dragon Week, I thought I'd do a little throwback to Pokémon Week and talk about my Salamence-focused Pokémon TCG deck. Just a heads-up before I say any more about it, this deck does not fit in the Limited Format, I'm purely playing this deck for fun within a small group of friends.

                            

Ah, okay, so, in order to get Salamence to the field, we have to evolve him first from Bagon, then Shelgon. This means it needs to be easy to find one of Salamence's lower stage evolutions, which isn't hard because the deck is draw-heavy. I chose three Bagon, two Shelgon and one Salamence (I would have put another Salamence into the deck but I didn't have another one).

Next, let's see what types this deck is running, shall we? The Salamence deck is Fire and Normal-typed, focusing more on the Fire side of the deck. For Fire Pokémon, I like to run some Stage 1s like: Rapidash, Charmeleon and Macargo. For the Normal types, I like  Delcatty, Raticate and, of course, the Stage 2 Salamence.

Now, because of Salamence's unique attack, Dragon Finish, I need to put both Fire and Water type energy cards in my deck. I tend to run a ratio of about 1:1 for energy types. However, even though his attack costs 4 energies, 2 Fire, 2 Water, it is worth the cost. Th player I given a choice, they can discard 2 Fire energies to deal 100 damage to the defending Pokémon OR they can discard 2 Water energies to deal 100 damage to a Pokémon on your opponent's bench! This makes Salamence twice as useful, even though he has to have a steady stream of energies coming to him.

Now, as you might be able to tell, the Stage 1s are there only as backup and protection for Salamence. This is what makes the deck so risky and exciting! It's a constant race with my opponent rose if I can get Salamence out first or if they can defeat me before I get him powered up!

I hope you enjoyed the first day of Dragon Week! Check back tomorrow for Day 2!


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