Talk:Haymaker (TCG)
Galactic's Conquest
Well, it seems like we're getting back two of the major players in this deck... in fact, until Fossil, they were the major players. But can Haymaker make it without Bill and Oak? I know we've got Mom's Kindness to replace Bill, but can Professor Rowan work as well as Oak did? TTEchidna 18:06, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
- Mom's Kindness is horribly marred by being a Supporter card. As for Rowan...we'll just have to see. My concern is, will a classic archetype be able to stand up to modern archetypes? I think not, to be honest. Regardless, no doubt this article will get a much-deserved makeover when DPt1 is released here in February. Cipher 18:21, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
Early Haymakers
Perhaps it's just me, but back in the early days of Pokemon TCG, I never heard of a Haymaker with Dark Vileplume. In my experience, Dark Vileplume decks were specifically anti-Haymaker decks. The Haymaker decks that I was familiar with never had evolution cards; that was part of the definition of a Haymaker deck. Those Haymaker decks had over 20 trainer cards, with 4X Professor Oak mandatory. Scyther was used in most of the Haymaker decks that I saw, to block Hitmonchan from other Haymakers and also for a possible second turn knock-out (Swords Dance on the first turn, attach a DCE and Plus Power on the 2nd turn to Slash for 70). Trainers like Energy Removal and Super Energy Removal were also mandatory, as defense against opposing Haymakers. Pikabruce 17:23, 12 November 2010 (UTC)
- Pikabruce is correct. "Haymaker" came to be synonymous with a mono-Basic Pokémon deck; if it had Evolutions, it was just a beatdown deck, or control/beatdown if you want to be technical. Competent Haymaker decks would a minimum of 20 Trainer cards. Yes, when I ran one I (at times) had less, but I stumbled upon the concept on my own and then ruined my deck after some tweaking. ;) While my research is hardly thorough, since then between stray (good) lists and my own testing, I've found that a competitive Haymaker list may run as few as 8 Energy.
- Sadly, don't have the exact list anymore, but the breakdown was 12 Pokémon/40 Trainers/8 Energy. I think the most a good Haymaker had was 16 Energy, with 10-12 being pretty typical. You're supposed to be relying on single Energy attacks, augmented by Gust of Wind, PlusPower, and/or Weakness to score easy OHKOs. Even though the deck is sort-of named after Special Punch, it was more likely Electabuzz would use its Thunderpunch for the heavy lifting. Scyther using Swords Dance into Slash wasn't all that common though; it meant running basic Grass Energy or (later) using a Rainbow Energy on it. Energy Removal and Super Energy Removal didn't do much good AGAINST Haymaker, but were mandatory FOR Haymaker decks. Its 70 HP attackers were difficult to OHKO for just one Energy, so S/ER kept decks that could have otherwise steamrolled Haymaker attackers once they got going from every setting up.
Otakutron (talk) 00:07, 22 July 2017 (UTC)
Don't forget Scyther!
Haymakers were around since day one, and when Jungle was released, it got even better. Jungle Scyther was a key card in Haymakers, because of its ability to do 60 damage by turn 2 (1st turn: Grass Energy, Swords Dance. 2nd turn: DCE, Slash). I definitely recommend updating this article to reflect Scyther's role in Haymaker. -- Nick15 05:13, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
Promo Mewtwo
The Promo Mewtwo card also saw a lot of play in haymakers decks alongside the 3 in the article and of course Scyther, whom should also be in there. Mewtwo's ability to quickly pick up energy and his basic 3 energy haymaker damage move made him very quick. He saw a lot of play back in the day.
This Is Not Haymaker
Some of the following was addressed by older discussion comments, but there is no indication of any resolution. The content in question is still present, with no evidence to support it as being correct, and sometimes it is questionable within itself.
Haymaker decks, by definition, only contain Basic Pokémon. If the deck has an Evolution, it isn't a "Haymaker" deck. Haymaker's are a kind of beatdown deck; relying mostly on a fast but reliable attackers, with most of the higher strategy coming from Trainers. "Beatdown" decks themselves span most TCGs.
The goal of a Haymaker deck (besides winning) was to minimize how many Basic Pokémon and Energy you needed to maximize room for Trainers, in turn allowing you to hit hard, hit fast, and hit reliably. The deck needed Trainers to function; as such not only is it incorrect to claim Dark Vileplume was run in the deck (because the deck by definition was not meant to include Evolutions) but even if you did bend that rule, Dark Vileplume completely countered the deck's own strategy. Trainers were important for speed and advanced strategy in Haymaker decks; without the assault of Trainers to keep an opponent from building, those 70 HP Basic Pokémon were in big trouble against a lot of other Evolutions.
Haymaker decks did change over time, but the article doesn't get their "evolution" correct and has some issues with how it says cards were used.
1) Why would someone run Erika's Clefairy instead of Energy Search?
2) Double Colorless Energy was used in the deck, but you only attached it to Hitmonchan (Base Set 7/102) if you thought you were a bit desperate (needed to manually retreat or it was the only Energy available to meet the (C) Energy requirement of Special Punch). Its best application was to power up the "Slash" attack on Scyther (Jungle 10/64, 26/64) or to power-up almost any attack on Ditto (Fossil 3/62, 18/62).
I'd be happy to edit the page with what I know: I didn't have access to Organized Play or the online community pre-Neo Genesis, but like many I stumbled upon Haymaker on my own, and once I did learn about the online community I quickly read up on these things.
