Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Impactful Cards
• The Decks
  • Aerodactyl/Erika’s Dratini
  • Brock’s Ninetales/Misty’s Gyarados
  • Dark Vileplume/Snorlax
  • Lt. Surge’s Raticate/Mr. Mime
  • Rocket’s Zapdos
  • Moltres Stall
  • Wigglytuff/Mewtwo
  • Wigglytuff Trapper
• Fun Match-Ups
• Closing Thoughts
• Next Up: Would Wizards Fix the Game?

Introduction

Following the release of Team Rocket in 2000, one card had single-handedly taken over the game. Instead of players engaging in interactive battles of strategy, Rocket’s Sneak Attack turned Pokémon matches into two or three-turn contests decided by whether or not one player could top-deck a useful Trainer card. Describing this format, you may find it hard to believe it could get much worse, but that’s exactly what happened when the Gym Heroes and Gym Challenge expansions debuted in 2000.

Before I get into what went wrong in the Gym sets, let’s take a quick look at exactly where these two sets fell on the Pokémon timeline. Listed below are the game’s first six sets (excluding reprint sets), with their respective US release date in parentheses.

• Base Set (January 1999)
•  Jungle (June 1999)
•  Fossil (October 1999)
•  Team Rocket (April 2000)
•  Gym Heroes (August 2000)
•  Gym Challenge (October 2000)

Looking at the sets’ release dates, you’ll see the Gym Challenge expansion debuted only two months after Gym Heroes, meaning the Base Set–Gym Heroes format was short-lived. Rather than break the Base–Gym format into separate formats (Base–Gym Heroes & Base–Gym Challenge), I’ve decided to keep things simple by skipping straight to Base–Gym Challenge, which I’ll refer to simply as the Base–Gym format. The new decks and strategies that emerged from the first Gym set, Gym Heroes, continued to see play after the release of Gym Challenge, so don’t feel like anything’s been skipped over.

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s go back to what I mentioned at the beginning of the article, which was how Rocket’s Sneak Attack had changed the game. It took away a player’s most important Trainer cards, often before that player had even gotten to play a turn. With their best Trainer cards stripped away, players usually didn’t have very many options, but they did at least have some options. At the very least, players usually retained two cards to discard in case they were fortunate enough to draw a Computer Search. That is, until Gym Heroes debuted.

The Rocket’s Trap

Taking a look at The Rocket’s Trap, it’s hard to understand why the game’s creators decided it needed to exist. Was it too much to allow players to keep some marginally useful cards in their hand? Instead of just denying your opponent access to their best Trainer cards, The Rocket’s Trap now made it possible to shuffle away your opponent’s entire hand. To visualize it in action, picture a game where your opponent starts with two Pokémon. There’s now five cards left in their hand. You win the opening flip and play first. All it now takes is two Rocket’s Sneak Attacks to put your opponent’s hand down to three cards. Follow that with just one successful coin flip on The Rocket’s Trap and your opponent is now left without a single card in hand—all on the first turn of the game. Sounds too easy, doesn’t it? It was. And that was the problem.

Following the release of The Rocket’s Trap, even more matches began to be decided in the first few turns. Previously useful top-decks like Computer Search might no longer be enough to bail a player out as they might not even have any cards left to discard. Does this format already sound awful? Somehow, it got worse.

Chaos Gym

The Gym expansions introduced Stadium cards to the game, which included the infamous Chaos Gym. Chaos Gym was a way to defend against Energy Removal & Super Energy Removal and it was also effective blocking cards like Item Finder, since a player would not only need to flip heads to play the Item Finder itself, but then another heads to play any non-Stadium Trainer card they retrieved with it.

Chaos Gym by itself wasn’t necessarily bad for the game. In fact, the card can actually be a lot of fun to play with. But the terrible thing about it is that a player could drop it on the first turn after Rocket’s Sneak Attack and The Rocket’s Trap had crippled their opponent’s hand. The player on the receiving end of this now not only needed to quickly recover a Professor Oak (or some other card-drawing Trainer), but flip heads too! Needless to say, players who felt the full wrath of the Rocket’s Sneak Attack + The Rocket’s Trap + Chaos Gym combo rarely emerged victorious.

Now you see the Pokémon TCG at its lowest point: a game where whoever goes first can eliminate their opponent’s entire hand and a top-decked Professor Oak might not even be enough to save them. It cannot get worse than that, right? Somehow, it did.

Erika’s Jigglypuff

In all the years the Pokémon TCG has existed, no single card has ruined more players’ days than Erika’s Jigglypuff. Hitting for 40 damage with a Double Colorless Energy, Erika’s Jigglypuff could be loaded with PlusPowers to score a first turn knockout on any Basic Pokémon with 80 HP or less. I recall playing tournaments back in 2000 at a local book store friends and I frequented. After Gym Challenge debuted, the entire mood of these events changed. At the start of each round, you could almost feel players’ uneasiness when they sat behind a single Basic Pokémon, wondering if they’d even get to play a turn. While Rocket’s Sneak Attack & The Rocket’s Trap gave the opponent a limited number of turns—maybe only one turn—to draw something useful and Chaos Gym might make them need to hit a lucky coin flip too, it at least gave them a chance. Erika’s Jigglypuff didn’t even allow a game to occur.

By now, I’ve probably made Base–Gym sound like nothing more than two players trying to beat each other on the first turn, but I do want to point out that not all Base–Gym decks were based around The Rocket’s Trap and Erika’s Jigglypuff, nor were such strategies anything close to unbeatable. The more aggressively a deck sought to destroy the opponent’s hand, the more it relied on winning the opening flip. That’s because clever opponents would take advantage of going first against these decks by filling their Bench, ensuring they had enough Pokémon to buy turns to recover from their hand being stripped away. Since the aggressive decks needed to fit all of their hand-disrupting Trainer cards, they skimped on Energy and other valuable cards, making them fall apart in prolonged games.

There were also plenty of cards you could include in your deck to make yourself less vulnerable to quick losses: Kangaskhan was one, Base Set’s Chansey another. While it was impossible to build a deck that could always withstand the reckless aggression of Erika’s Jigglypuff and Rocket’s Sneak Attack & Trap, don’t think of these cards as the entire format. Plenty of Base–Gym decks didn’t rely on these cards and plenty of Base–Gym games developed into fun and strategic matches that resembled the game’s earliest formats.

Now that you’ve seen the cards that nearly ruined the Pokémon TCG in 2000, let’s take a look at the other impactful cards from the Gym sets.

Rocket’s Zapdos

Before I go on about how great Rocket’s Zapdos is, can we take a moment to appreciate just how beautiful this card is? (Look closely and you can even see rainfall in its holographic background.) Not only does Rocket’s Zapdos resist the type most Lightning Pokémon before it were weak to, it bears no Weakness at all. Plasma was not only perfect with Professor Oak and Computer Search, but also provided the Energy required to deliver repeated Super Energy Removals. Zapdos’s second attack, Electroburn, hit for an impressive 70 damage and could land KOs on just about any Pokémon, especially after a few Plasma attacks. Equipping Defender allowed you to reduce Electroburn’s self-damage while also protecting Zapdos on your opponent’s following turn.

Erika’s Dratini

Basic Pokémon like Movie Promo Mewtwo and the newly released Rocket’s Zapdos remained strong in the Base–Gym format, making Erika’s Dratini’s Strange Barrier extremely useful. An added bonus of this Pokémon Power was that it could stall crucial turns after you’d been hit with Rocket’s Sneak Attack, giving you more turns to recover.

Misty’s Wrath

Misty’s Wrath came with a steep down-side: discarding five cards. Pitching too many valuable cards always came back to bite you in long, drawn-out games, so Misty’s Wrath was best used in hyper-aggressive decks committed to beating the opponent as quickly as possible. The Rocket’s Trap and Erika’s Jigglypuff were often used alongside it.

No Removal Gym

Definitely one of the game’s quirkiest cards, referencing two of Base Set’s strongest Trainers by name. Unfortunately for players who were tired of constantly having their Energy cards stripped away, though, No Removal Gym was not very effective at stopping these cards. It could easily be countered by another Stadium card and many times players simply had extra cards in their hand they could afford to discard. However, Gym Challenge did offer a more reliable solution for dealing with Energy Removal & Super Energy Removal.

Brock’s Ninetales

Brock’s Ninetales’s strength stems from the fact that it can equip Brock’s Protection, allowing whatever Pokémon it Shapeshifts into to be immune to Energy Removal & Super Energy Removal. Brock’s Ninetales would continue to see play in future formats, only gaining strength as more strong Evolved Pokémon debuted.

Tickling Machine

One of the most bizarre cards ever printed, Tickling Machine revived a Base Set Trainer that previously had gone almost unused: Imposter Professor Oak. This combination allowed you to shave seven cards off of your opponent’s deck, speeding up the deck-out process. With a few lucky flips, an opponent with 14 (or even 21) cards left in their deck could be decked out on your turn.

Erika

It might just look like a worse Bill, but Erika had some neat combos. It could be added to Stall decks that aimed to run the opponent out of cards and it could also be combined with Imposter Oak’s Revenge, which would negate the cards it provided your opponent.

The Decks

Here’s my take on eight decks that showcase cards from the Gym expansions.

Aerodactyl/Erika’s Dratini

Pokémon (14)	Trainers (30)	Energy (16)
4x Erika’s Dratini 3x Mewtwo 2x Chansey 1x Mr. Mime 1x Mew 1x Ditto 2x Aerodactyl	1x Resistance Gym 1x Celadon City Gym 4x Mysterious Fossil 4x Professor Oak 3x Potion 3x Computer Search 3x Super Energy Removal 3x Item Finder 2x Gust of Wind 2x Scoop Up 2x Nightly Garbage Run 1x Lass 1x PlusPower	10x Psychic Energy 4x Double Colorless Energy 2x Potion Energy

With Aerodactyl’s Prehistoric Power, you can keep your opponent’s Pokémon unevolved, ensuring Erika’s Dratini takes only 10 damage a turn from attacks. If you manage to get Aerodactyl out only after your opponent has evolved some of their Pokémon, Mew’s Devolution Beam allows you to devolve these Pokémon, at which point Prehistoric Power will prevent your opponent from re-evolving!

Brock’s Ninetales/Misty’s Gyarados

Pokémon (18)	Trainers (28)	Energy (14)
4x Brock’s Vulpix 3x Brock’s Ninetales 3x Misty’s Gyarados 1x Dark Blastoise 1x Poliwrath 4x Chansey 2x Erika’s Dratini	1x Narrow Gym 4x Professor Oak 3x Computer Search 3x Item Finder 3x Brock’s Protection 3x Energy Removal 2x Super Energy Removal 2x Potion 2x Gust of Wind 2x Nightly Garbage Run 1x Lass 1x Brock’s Training Method 1x PlusPower	12x Water Energy 2x Double Colorless Energy

Getting four Water Energy cards to stick on a Pokémon isn’t happening in a format with Energy Removal & Super Energy Removal. That is, unless you’ve got some tricks up your sleeve. Perhaps the best trick, then, is to get a Brock’s Protection on to Brock’s Ninetales, then use its Shapeshift Pokémon Power to turn into a Misty’s Gyarados that’s immune to your opponent’s Energy Removal & Super Energy Removal. The best part about Shapeshifting into Misty’s Gyarados is that the usual drawback of not being able to inherit the Pokémon Power of the Shapeshifted Pokémon now becomes a plus—Rebellion is hardly a useful Pokémon Power!

Misty’s Gyarados isn’t the only Pokémon we can Shapeshift into with this deck, either. Consider using Poliwrath for its Whirlpool attack when the opponent is low on Energy, or going for a knock out with Dark Blastoise’s Rocket Tackle, which can protect it from attacks on the next turn.

Dark Vileplume/Snorlax

🏆 Top Deck

Pokémon (15)	Trainers (33)	Energy (12)
4x Psyduck 1x Dark Golduck 3x Oddish 2x Dark Gloom 3x Dark Vileplume 2x Snorlax	4x Erika 4x Bill 4x Computer Search 4x Misty’s Wrath 3x Pokémon Trader 2x Sabrina’s Gaze 2x Pokémon Breeder 2x Professor Oak 2x Imposter Oak’s Revenge 2x Nightly Garbage Run 2x Switch 1x Warp Point 1x Item Finder	6x Psychic Energy 4x Double Colorless Energy 1x Potion Energy 1x Full Heal Energy

You’ll want to use Erika and Misty’s Wrath to dig through your deck, ensuring your first turn ends with a benched Oddish and a Headache attack from Psyduck. Before attacking, though, you’ll want to use Imposter Oak’s Revenge to take away all the cards Erika gifted to your opponent. In the turns that follow, you’ll evolve to Dark Vileplume, then prepare an attacking Snorlax that is sure to devastate your Trainer-locked opponent.

Lt. Surge’s Raticate/Mr. Mime

Pokémon (17)	Trainers (28)	Energy (15)
3x Lt. Surge’s Rattata 3x Lt. Surge’s Raticate 3x Mr. Mime 2x Doduo 2x Dodrio 2x Erika’s Dratini 2x Mewtwo	3x Resistance Gym 4x Bill 3x Computer Search 3x Professor Oak 3x Energy Removal 3x Super Energy Removal 3x Item Finder 2x Gust of Wind 2x Potion 2x Nightly Garbage Run	9x Psychic Energy 4x Double Colorless Energy 2x Potion Energy

Using Dodrio’s Retreat Aid, you can easily alternate between attacks from Lt. Surge’s Raticate and Mr. Mime. First, you’ll use Raticate’s Super Fang to halve the Defending Pokémon’s HP. On the next turn, you’ll retreat to Mr. Mime to Meditate. This one-two punch scores a knockout on all Pokémon, unless they’re Resistant to Psychic. For that, we have Resistance Gym!

Rocket’s Zapdos

Pokémon (11)	Trainers (35)	Energy (14)
4x Rocket’s Zapdos 2x Erika’s Dratini 2x Chansey 1x Electabuzz 1x Erika’s Jigglypuff 1x Scyther	1x Narrow Gym 4x Professor Oak 4x Rocket’s Sneak Attack 4x PlusPower 3x Computer Search 3x Bill 3x Energy Removal 3x Super Energy Removal 3x Item Finder 2x Defender 2x Gust of Wind 1x Nightly Garbage Run 1x Goop Gas Attack 1x Scoop Up	10x Lightning Energy 4x Double Colorless Energy

Consider this the final variant of the original Haymaker deck, which evolved over time to replace Hitmonchan with Mewtwo, and then, finally, replaced Mewtwo with Rocket’s Zapdos. Plasma works great with and against Super Energy Removal, preparing the powerful Electroburn attack. Erika’s Dratini & Chansey give the deck a chance at surviving early hand disruption, while Erika’s Jigglypuff is sure to give you some first turn wins.

Tip: Use Double Colorless Energy as the fourth Energy for Rocket’s Zapdos’s Electroburn attack, reducing its self-damage.

Moltres Stall

🏆 Top Deck

Pokémon (14)	Trainers (30)	Energy (16)
4x Lickitung 3x Moltres 2x Chansey 2x Grimer 2x Muk 1x Mew	4x Professor Oak 4x Energy Removal 4x Super Energy Removal 4x Scoop Up 4x Item Finder 2x Computer Search 2x Energy Retrieval 2x Nightly Garbage Run 1x Pokémon Center 1x Full Heal 1x Imposter Professor Oak 1x Tickling Machine	14x Fire Energy 2x Psychic Energy

The Moltres Stall deck gains one neat trick from the Gym sets: Tickling Machine. When combined with Imposter Professor Oak, a successful coin flip on Tickling Machine can shave 7 cards off your opponent’s deck, giving you a deckout victory out of seemingly nowhere!

Wigglytuff/Mewtwo

Pokémon (15)	Trainers (31)	Energy (14)
4x Mewtwo 3x Jigglypuff 3x Wigglytuff 2x Grimer 2x Muk 1x Erika’s Jigglypuff	2x No Removal Gym 4x Computer Search 4x Professor Oak 4x Bill 4x PlusPower 4x Rocket’s Sneak Attack 3x Item Finder 2x Super Energy Removal 2x Switch 2x Nightly Garbage Run	8x Psychic Energy 4x Double Colorless Energy 2x Full Heal Energy

Wigglytuff remains strong in Base–Gym as No Removal Gym teams up with Rocket’s Sneak Attack as an additional way to protect Wigglytuff from Energy Removal & Super Energy Removal. With 4 PlusPower, Erika’s Jigglypuff is an easy fit to give yourself a chance at some Turn 1 wins.

Wigglytuff Trapper

🌠 Iconic Deck 🏆 Top Deck 🤡 Fun to Play

Pokémon (13)	Trainers (41)	Energy (6)
3x Mankey 3x Jigglypuff 3x Wigglytuff 2x Scyther 1x Rattata 1x Erika’s Jigglypuff	1x No Removal Gym 1x Chaos Gym 4x Erika 4x Bill 4x Rocket’s Sneak Attack 4x The Rocket’s Trap 4x PlusPower 4x Item Finder 4x Computer Search 3x Misty’s Wrath 3x Imposter Oak’s Revenge 2x Professor Oak 2x Energy Removal 1x Nightly Garbage Run	1x Grass Energy 4x Double Colorless Energy 1x Full Heal Energy

This deck highlights the craziness that is the Base–Gym format. With a previously unheard of 41 Trainer cards, this ultra-aggressive deck easily draws through most of its 60 cards on the first turn of the game. Start by exhausting all of your Erika, then hit the opponent down to 4 cards with Imposter Oak’s Revenge. From there, Rocket’s Sneak Attack will bring them down to 3 and The Rocket’s Trap can finish the trifecta, leaving your opponent with no cards in hand. After that, you can even keep on eye on the top card of their deck with Mankey’s Peek, intervening when something useful appears.

Tip: If you know your opponent has one useless card in their hand, don’t feel obligated to shuffle it away with Rocket’s Sneak Attack or The Rocket’s Trap. Instead, leave it in their hand. That way, if Mankey’s Peek reveals a useful card on top of your opponent’s deck, you can use Rocket’s Sneak Attack or The Rocket’s Trap to shuffle your opponent’s deck.

Fun Match-Ups

• Rocket’s Zapdos vs Brock’s Ninetales/Misty’s Gyarados
• Rocket’s Zapdos vs Lt. Surge’s Raticate/Mr. Mime/Dodrio
• Rocket’s Zapdos vs Wigglytuff/Mewtwo
• Dark Vileplume/Snorlax vs Wigglytuff Trapper

The Dark Vileplume/Snorlax vs Wigglytuff/Trapper match-up is fun in its own kind of silly way in that whoever wins the opening flip will win about 90% of the time if playing well. A fun side game you can play with a friend is to alternate playing first in this match-up, seeing who can first overcome the odds by achieving a win going second.

Closing Thoughts

Though the Gym expansions brought the total amount of cards in the game to over 500, this rich card pool was overshadowed by the luck-based format they created. That isn’t to say the Base–Gym format can’t produce fun and strategic games, but if you do plan to play it, don’t expect every game to develop into the drawn-out tactical battles you may have come to expect playing the game’s earliest formats. Despite the one-sided games this format frequently produces, the Base–Gym format is still one that’s worth experiencing. The aggressive decks and wild turns enabled by the Gym expansions’ Trainer cards are sure to leave you and your friends laughing and having fun.

Next Up: Would Wizards Fix the Game?

Following the Gym sets, players’ dissatisfaction with the game reached a boiling point. Hearing and also sharing their frustration with what the game had become, Wizards of the Coast aimed to develop a new format that would reign in the game’s heavy use of Trainer cards and also bring more Evolved Pokémon into decks.

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Base–Team Rocket | Base–Gym | Prop 15/3