...finally I drove home, made a couple phone calls, and passed out for about 12 hours.

Nice.

Final thoughts...

While it was convenient to have the tourney just down the street, the layout of the mall really sucked a lot of the energy out of the event. It was too spread out and no single place had the mass of people and sounds that the last tourney had. It really changed the flavor of the thing...even the Nintendo guys were talking about it.

They really should implement a system wherein if you show them badges from previous tourneys, you can win higher badges. Or at least this time, they should have moved on from Boulder and Cascade...you still need 8 to enter the Indigo League and, based on the show, they aren't in any particular order of difficulty.

There really is a huge amount of luck involved when you play the way I do. My victories are probably more a factor of probability than skill, but who cares? I had a lot of fun and really enjoy the Pokemon League metaphor.

Out of 16 official and many unofficial matches, only one person has ever used Double Team and I've still never seen a Substitute on my Gameboy.

Out of 24 enemy Pokemon at this tourney, Hitmonlee is weak to 19 of them, standard to 3 of them, and strong against only 2 (both Snorlaxen). Man, did Fighting Pokemon get screwed or what?

Out of the 4 times Lee entered a tourney battle, he was killed dead by a single Psychic from Mewtwo 4 times.

Special-based attacks are totally unnecessary at a tourney, altho, I have to admit, I was getting bored with my 2 main guys using Body Slam all the time. I wish there were a better variety of Normal moves available to my guys. Water, Ice, and Electric attacks would have been nice in a couple limited cases, but they're still not exactly necessary.

Since Lee and Koffing were so totally useless in the last spot, I am considering raising my Magikarp to L100 and using him at least once next tourney. He certainly can't do any worse. I wonder if he'd survive a Mewtwo Psychic...

I only encountered Zapdos once, but he was the bastard I remember him to be.

To understand how much Mr. K hates Zapdos, you’ll have to read the report of his First Tourney.

What happened to the trainers' collective consciousness to make them all decide to use Mewtwo last, when last tourney nearly every one went first? This really put a damper on my style, but, as we saw, Lee was pretty much screwed no matter what. Still, he could have lasted more than one turn against just about any of the guys other than Mewtwo.

Gengar is a prick.

There's no time for Amnesia on a Snorlax, and it's not really necessary. Then again, there's no real evidence that Blizzard would have been any better...except for Dragonite, who Wiggly pretty much took care of. Perhaps Selfdestruct, for Mewtwo...

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve since put Selfdestruct on Snorlax.

There's no doubt that Snorlax did a good job, but still...I don't think we really bonded. He might just be too grumpy, but for some reason, I don't think he really fits in with the rest of the gang. I'm going to have to give this a lot of thought, because I can't really imagine anyone who can take his place. I like him better than Dodrio, tho, so that's an improvement...and I really like that Selfdestruct idea.

I am considering replacing him with Buzz, which is not really very smart, since Lax is clearly one of my best (if not, my best) Pokemon, but...I dunno...he’s such a lump. Stadium has helped me like him some more, tho, and spending more time with him has helped.

As I realized before, Speed is really important. Poor slow Snorlax...

The more I play, the more I realize how outrageous Mewtwo is. He effectively eliminates the usefulness of half my team and really makes it difficult to come up with likable alternatives. Also, 3 on 3 battles are krap. When 1/3 of the team is always Mewtwo, it just makes your choice of teammates too slim. They should have a No Mewtwo League. It would be a lot more fun.

While they didn't check for Game Sharking, they DID check to make sure the Mews were legit. Looks like they'd be easy enough to forge, tho.

Much to my relief, I finally saw Fire Blast and Hydro Pump miss a few times. Glad to see that probability SOMETIMES comes thru for me.

However, I was really unlucky with paralyzing enemies and not as lucky as before with regards to total paralysis. Never got a flinch off Rolling Kick, either. Thems the breaks.

Buzz would have had a much better chance than Lee in most cases. I gotta get me one of them.

What the Hell was up with Rest?!?

Now we know!

Same record as last time...2 wins and 6 losses, but I'll take a Boulder and a Cascade Badge over 2 Boulder Badges any day!

Well, that's about it. This thing has taken me forever to write, and it's a goddam epic. Still, it's time well-spent. I now have the event documented for all eternity and I enjoyed reliving it.

What a great game...