Gengar Alakazam (2009)

Once SP pokemon received all of their best cards by Supreme Victors the format pretty much revolved round them and the only few other non SP decks that could counter them. SP pokemon were really so fast and so consistent that seriously every other non SP deck that was strong during that time had some aspect or some gimmick that was about countering them. Whether it was speed and low energy costs with Kingdra and Gyarados, Machamp’s auto KO with Take Out, or trainer lock with Gengar to slow them down. Stormfront Gengar was an extremely strong card from when it first came out but by the end of the era, the Arceus set gave it even more excellent partners to work with along with its own Lv. X card. Gengar decks are some of the most famous and iconic from the entire DP era even going forward to the HGSS era too. They were strong, so that fame and iconicity comes naturally but they were also easy to build with some pretty basic deck skeletons. And yet even with that, Gengar decks could also take so many different forms with all the partners you could use it with. Today we’re gonna be looking at one of my versions partnered up with Alakazam, Gengar’s video game rival with a lot of similarities. Here’s the deck list:

Gengar Lv. X x1 Gengar x3 Haunter x4 Gastly x4 Alakazam x2 Abra x2 Claydol x2 Baltoy x2 Uxie x1 Unown G x1 Spiritomb x4

Moonlight Stadium x2 Broken Time Space x1 Roseanne’s Research x4 Professor Oka’s Visit x4 Bebe’s Search x3 Cynthia’s Feelings x1 Looker’s Investigation x1 Rare Candy x3 Luxury Ball x1 Night Maintenance x1 Switch x1

Psychic Energy x8 Call Energy x4

While Compound Pain can be a game winning attack mid to late game the main reasons to include Gengar Lv. X in the deck are the nice 30 HP upgrade and the Level-Down poke-power. The Diamond and Pearl is synonymous with Lv. X cards and this effect allows us to remove such huge threats, slow our opponent’s set up process and make those pokemon easier to finish off with their lower HP. This can backfire a little bit as in some cases you just allow your opponent to reuse strong poke-powers easily again, notable examples being Bright Look on Luxray GL Lv. X and Healing Breath on Garchomp C Lv. X. This is still too good to pass up though, helping you kill those pokemon easier with their weaker HP and since the Lv. X cards go back in the deck it won’t always be so easy for your opponent to get them back. After all, this is where Alakazam comes in too, to negate those poke-powers.

Hands down the strongest Gengar card ever printed, this card is so strong it’s not even funny. HP might seem on the low side when you have many stage 2 pokemon with 130 HP in the era but 110 is still in the range where it can take at least one big hit and still live. The lower HP is also more than balanced out by coveted free retreat, not the most common occurrence on stage 2 pokemon. Colorless resistance is also handy against Garchomp C and Flygon, some relevant colorless pokemon in the era along with any others. Even so, this card’s main power comes from its two attacks and what pushes it to be so easy to use. Shadow Room will place 3 damage counters on one of your opponent’s pokemon and 6 if they have a poke-power. From 3 to 6 is a night and day difference in the era and is a lot of damage for just 1 energy.

This Gengar doesn’t hit as fast but enables some nice combos. Shadow Skip hits for a fixed 60 damage and 10 to a benched pokemon but sometimes that fixed damage will work out better than taking risks with Poltergeist. If you would have got a KO anyway the mini spread is just free extra damage as well. Curse also combos well Shadow Skip and the other two Gengar attackers above. Moving a damage counter allows you to spread around your damage and get KOs before you even attack; not wasting any excess damage on your opponent’s pokemon. The best part about this Gengar though is the ability to switch after you attack with Shadow Skip. This helps preserve this attacker and its energies for more attacks while promoting Spiritomb for trainer lock on top of that. The only reason this card isn’t favoured over Stormfront Gengar is because it’s much slower and Stormfront Gengar always has that chance to make your opponent lose just by getting lucky.

Not to mention you have access to the bench with this too. No matter what deck your opponent is using they are bound to have some pokemon with poke-powers making this attack very exploitable and very powerful. Poltergeist is even stronger with the right timing dealing 30 damage for each non pokemon or energy card in your opponent’s hand. Doing 60 for 2 isn’t bat at all, but it only takes 3 cards to do 90 for 2 which is incredible damage in that time. The nature of this effect also means seeing the cards in your opponent’s hand too, yet another advantage. It really isn’t hard at all to get a OHKO on fully fresh stage 2 pokemon and it only takes 2 energies. Your opponent has some control in this damage with the cards they have in their deck and what they try to keep in hand but we also have a say in that with all the trainer lock this deck can perform. The combination of fast and strong damage from both of these attacks would be more than enough to make this card incredible but as unfair as it is it also gets another deadly boon. Fainting Spell only needs a lucky coin flip heads to grant you an auto KO. Regardless of your opponent’s HP, regardless of any contribution this card had you could still get a free KO DURING your opponent’s turn. Beyond overpowered.

Out of the 4 different Haunter cards in the Diamond and Pearl era these 2 are your best options in my opinion. The Stormfront one is a common choice in this deck since it can inflict auto poison with no energy and has 80 HP. Hoodwink can also be a good option dealing a solid 30 for 1 and maybe even give them some useless cards that could make your future Poltergeists stronger. The Diamond and Pearl print is outclassed in every regard besides the very handy free retreat. Realistically, if you can’t attack with Stormfront Gengar it won’t usually be a good idea to leave Haunter and active and attack; you’d rather maintain a trainer lock with Spiritomb while building your field.

You better believe Gengar stage 2 decks were great in the era also because this Gastly is also amazing. For the most part, basic pokemon meant to evolve aren’t really expected to provide too much into a deck because they usually don’t making this card pretty exceptional with the Pitch-Dark attack. It will prevent your opponent from playing trainer cards during their next turn making this card a very good opener just like Spiritomb if you have to play first. It’s also a costless attack on top of that, what the heck. Even Trick Gas is also very useful, as if you have to open with Gastly and then draw a Spiritomb as your first card, you can still hit for 10 and switch into Spiritomb.

DP Haunter aids in this, if start with Gastly and evolve into this Haunter we can move it out of the way for Spiritomb, the usual pokemon we’d rather have active early game. That utility is appealing to me, as once noted by Frank Diaz so it’s my preferred option with a 3-1 ratio.

The main merit of having this card is Power Cancel, doing exactly what’s described in the name. It will negate an opponent’s poke-power during their turn in the style of a Yugioh negation card. The cost for it is discarding 2 cards from your hand but it’s not as bad as you may think. Gengar can use a very simple and consistent deck skeleton and once you’ve build, or half-way build your field you won’t need a lot of extra supporter cards. Extra copies of Spiritomb and even an un-played Uxie may also be discarded. You’re bound to have something. Having the option to negate a poke-power is good as we can stop some powerful and annoying poke-powers some of the best pokemon in the era and perform. The Luxchomp duo is a great example but even slowing our opponent down negating Claydol could be game winning.

This is our only Abra card to choose from in this era thanks to what I briefly explained above with Alakazam. I sympathise with the card designers as no matter how they tried to get around the lack of Kadabra it was always gonna be either to weak or too strong. Ultra Evolution is meant for you to skip Kadabra and evolve to Alakazam from your deck instantly. The problem is a 50 HP pokemon trying to pull off this attack with 2 energies is pretty risky. On the other hand if it only worked with one energy it’s arguable that it might be too good. Regardless, our main way to get Alakazam out is till with Rare Candy. Play Search is definitely handy though, letting grab any card from the top 5 of your deck.

Uxie gives you some nice insurance if you don’t have much going on but can’t/didn’t quite get Claydol out yet. If you do get Claydol out quickly and efficiently you may not even mind discarding this with Alakazam instead of playing it down. Even if you could dig for even more cards with it on a particular turn it’s probably not worth the easy prize liability it gives.

Claydol is a perfect fit for this deck since we aim to slow the game down with Spiritomb and even Gastly. The draw this card gives you is second to one and thanks to Spiritomb and the rest of this deck’s skeleton it won’t be that hard to get it out. From there it can help us get Alakazam into play and so on. The only problem with Claydol is that all canons are aimed on it after it comes out, or even while it’s still a Baltoy. 80 HP is on the lower end for a stage 1 in DP as well, 90 HP would have made it a bit more respectable. Even so, it’s not as bad as when Garchomp C got Double Colorless Energy from HGSS.

Standard card to get basic pokemon and energy early game and then mid to late game you’ll likely be collecting psychic energies. The extra copies don’t really hurt that bad when we can get rid of with Alakazam or even Claydol.

A regular Switch is your out in case Claydol gets stuck in the active spot, every other card in the deck has low retreat and is even compatible with Moonlight Stadium.

The funny thing about Moonlight Stadium is that you could go an entire game without needing it, especially if you never build and use Arceus Gengar. However, I’d still say it’s an important card in situations where you want to switch pretty much any pokemon in the deck that’s not the Claydol line (if you don’t choose to run SV Baltoy as my list here). It doubles as a counter stadium and a switching outlet that we may utilize more than once if it stays on the field. I’d rather have this card than Unown Q but I know other Gengar players wouldn’t agree.

The main problem with running Alakazam is that it’s not that great of a pokemon outside of its poke-power. 100 HP is the lowest you’ll find on a stage 2 in the DP era and Psychic Guard is very average too. The worst issue though is the nature of the Alakazam line in the tcg during these past times. Because of some legal issues with Uri Geller Kadabra cards could not be printed for the longest time leaving you required to run Rare Candies to get this card out. No evolving thorough Broken Time-Space or Spiritomb. We were going to be running some Rare Candies for this card and Gengar anyway, but it’s unfortunate that we don’t even have the option for one stage 1 Kadabra copy in the deck.

Without the bonus draw Cynthia’s Feelings is a very average supporter, but with the bonus she becomes the best supporter in the era. Shuffling your hand to draw 8 cards is amazing, but the condition also makes it a bad supporter to have in the set up process. Some pokemon are really aggressive, but realistically you don’t want to be in a position where you’re losing prizes so easily, especially at the start of the game so you won’t be getting her full effect. For this reason I’d rather not favour her so much.

Baltoy is necessary to get Claydol out and this is usually the better one to use in the off chance you utilize Psychic Balance. Even with this attack though Baltoy is one of the worst opening pokemon for this and probably any deck using Claydol, another drawback from running the line. The psychic type one could be more useful in this deck since we’re running Moonlight Stadium but the weakness to psychic can cause other problems so I decided against it. If you would open with this and Call Energy you’d still opt to grab basic pokemon instead of retreating.

We can sort off afford the space for it so 1 Unown G can be handy against some popular pokemon. Opposing Stormfront Gengars are a big problem easily sniping down Claydol with Shadow Room. Uxie is also going to be an easy prize for your opponent if you played it down against that card. Stormfront Gengar can also play around its own poke-power Fainting Spell by using Shadow Room twice. Unown G can help with that as well.

The majority of the decks I’ve featured up to this point have always included only one Bebe’s Search and some of them didn’t even run the card at all. I explain in those decks my reasoning behind that but for this deck the card is favoured heavily due to the inclusion of Claydol. With Claydol in the deck this card’s cost and trade-off doesn’t bother us that much as if we get Claydol out with Bebe, we can use its effect to draw more cards for the turn. If you burn space in your deck for Claydol but are unable to get it out in time you’re only making your deck less consistent have stuck Claydol cards in hand with no Baltoy, or Baltoy on field with no Claydol in sight. Besides Claydol, an early Alakazam on our field will also be a great asset so if we happen to have the Abra and Rare Candy Bebe’s Search can be used to get Alakazam no problem.

The other reason we can afford to forfeit extra copies of Broken Time-Space is of course this card. Rare Candy would be needed in the deck anyway to get Alakazam out but obviously if we have to we can use this to evolve into Gengar too. It may look that Spiritomb will interfere with a lot of copies of this card in the deck and while true to an extent it’s not that big of a deal once you get Gengar up front and start attacking.

Spiritomb is your best and most desired opening pokemon for your deck to flow well and slow down trainer turbo decks and SP decks. It helps you evolve into Claydol quickly and your Gengars of course. If you’ve readied Arceus Gengar this is also the pokemon you want to promote after using Shadow Skip. Being stuck at 60 HP makes this pokemon a potential liability mid to late game but it’s too important to forsake for that small drawback.

We sort of eat up the stadium spots for this card to have Moonlight Stadium but I don’t regret it. More than likely your opponent will also drop this stadium and then the extra copies you have will be even more useless. If you’ve opened or made sure to get Spiritomb in the active spot you’ll be able to evolve to your pokemon without much hassle.

Oak is good because we can use him after we resolve Claydol’s poke-power without worrying about hand size or other conditions. A lot of cards are played in fours in this deck so you’ll usually draw something you can use to develop your board. I’d rather have this card in the deck maxed out and not run any Felicities because we want unnecessary cards as fodder to discard for Alakazam. Extra copies of this card can also be used for this purpose too.

Dusknoir and Nidoqueen were more popular stage 2 partners to Gengar than Alakazam because their overall card package was better and their powerful effects had no costs. They were also easier to evolve into since you could run their middle evolution and evolve through Spiritomb or Broken Time-Space. With Alakazam you were pretty much forced to use Rare Candy. Poke-Power negation with Alakazam is good though as it helps control your opponent’s plays and weaken SP decks even more by stopping Garchomp C from using Healing Breath. Because every good deck in the DP era will have pokemon with poke-powers Gengar fares well against most of the best decks able to reap the bonus of Shadow Room. If they’re not favouring Spiritomb, most of the best decks are also trainer card heavy, whether they’re SP decks or turbo decks turning Poltergeist into a very strong attack too. As mentioned above, thanks to Fainting Spell Gengar can put in work even against pokemon that can kill it easily so your opponent could still lose games even if they did everything right. Gengar’s only real weaknesses are ironically some lower tier decks that may not use a lot of trainers and also rely on evolution through Spiritomb.

I wouldn’t mind a way to have more copies of this card in the deck as it ensure we make the right call when attacking with Stormfront Gengar. However, I only run 1 because it conflicts with Claydol, unlike Oak’s Visit. In general, to get the best out of this card you’ll need to have a lower hand size. That won’t always be the case making it riskier to run compared to Oak’s Visit. You can also use this card to have your opponent draw a new hand, combing with Poltergeist again but I usually don’t want to do that.

We only have this card for any form of card recovery in this deck but it should be enough if your deck was flowing correctly in the game. Stormfront Gengar doesn’t need that many energies to attack so you’ll probably get by if you didn’t discard any of them with Alakazam or Felicity.

The usual 1 Luxury Ball, you’ll probably get the most out of this if you grab Alakazam since we can’t evolve into it through Spiritomb but Claydol or Gengar will usually be good grabs too.

8 psychic energies should be enough for you to get by especially if you’re able to put Shadow Room to good use, getting KOs with only 1 energy.

Call Energy doesn’t interfere that much with Gengar’s attacks so running 4 copies of it usually doesn’t backfire in this deck. In my opinion if you open with Spiritomb and one more basic pokemon you won’t really want to grab more basic pokemon with it and rather just start evolving with Spiritomb. But it still works as some insurance if we only open with one basic pokemon and our opponent is running a turbo deck.

Spread decks with Abomasnow and Bronzong could also cause problems for a Gengar deck that doesn’t have Nidoqueen turning any low HP Spiritomb left on the bench into an easy prize while also taking advantage of your many pokemon with poke-powers dealing even more damage with Bronzong. Opposing Stormfront Gengars are a big problem since Shadow Room plays around Gengar’s own poke-power so if your opponent sets up their own Gengar quicker it might result to a quick loss. Sableye needs to be mentioned because it can get a cheap and easy victory if you open with Gastly and they open with Sableye plus it also usually runs at least some other darkness type attackers that can hit you for weakness. Other popular pokemon could give Gengar trouble but what makes Gengar so good is that it always has some way to trouble them back depending on the circumstances. Whether it’s targeting something on the bench with Shadow Room, getting a OHKO out of nowhere with Poltergeist or just getting lucky with Fainting Spell. It’s one of the strongest decks in the era for a reason. Hope you guys enjoyed my take on Gengar in the DP era and thanks for reading. As always, I’ll see you guys on the next article.