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NWR Interactive => Podcast Discussion => Topic started by: Jonnyboy117 on February 15, 2015, 03:15:40 PM

Title: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Jonnyboy117 on February 15, 2015, 03:15:40 PM
This is the official discussion thread for the winning game of our latest RetroActive poll. Pokemon: The Trading Card Game was first released on Game Boy Color and is now available on the 3DS eShop.


Comments here may be quoted for the RetroActive feature on Radio Free Nintendo. Please try to stay on-topic! This is also a great place to request or provide help for other players.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on February 15, 2015, 09:03:02 PM
One nice thing about this game is the fact that the CPUs aren't playing super-optimal decks, so you have the freedom to explore the cards more than you would have at a tournament back in the day (there were really only three viable tournament decks from the card pool in this game). If they were real people I'd feel bad about beating them so badly, though-I often have games where the CPU gets like one prize at most.

What does everyone think of the aspect of losing a game when your last Pokemon in play is knocked out? This is commonly brought up as a design flaw in the card game, so I was curious what people thought.

Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 16, 2015, 06:15:33 AM
What does everyone think of the aspect of losing a game when your last Pokemon in play is knocked out? This is commonly brought up as a design flaw in the card game, so I was curious what people thought.

It's problematic, to be certain. you're gonna have bad lucks of the draw more often than not, sadly. thankfully, this is from a time long before you could get something silly like 60 for a double colorless or such nonsense garbage.

That being said, I'd like to take a moment and get this thread kicked off with a couple of tips for folks that might be new to this whole thing or maybe only collected cards in their childhood and didn't actually try playing the TCG.

For example, there's a few Pokemon that you will want in your deck no matter what sort of deck you're running. sometimes you should fill up on these until you can mould your deck into something far more formidable, or sometimes you should run a lone copy or 'tech' it in to give your deck a sort of not too common trump play in a tight spot.

SCYTHER Lv. 25

This is a pretty great filler card. granted 30 damage for 3 colorless is not the best thing in the world, but what is is that Scyther is a basic pokemon with 70 HP, a fighting resistance, and most importantly, no retreat cost. Scyther is the go-to lead-off pokemon of the formatand can usually even take a weak hit from it's fire weakness from your opponent's basic fire type once or twice before eating a KO. Put these in your deck until you have something else with free retreat and a chance to stall (For me, this is usually Horsea since I run blastoise turbo usually. I'll get into what my deck looks like another time.)

HITMONCHAN Lv. 33

Fighting is probably one of the most splashable types early on in the game, as you can get a lot of mileage out of fighting's basic pokemon that have low energy costs. Mankey is a decent scout that doesn't have a lot of HP but that coveted 0 retreat, Onyx is 90 HP you can thorw out, even if it doesn't build to much, and Machop gets you 20 for one fighting energy.

Then again, so does Hitmonchan, who's also fairly beefy to boot. he also can build up to 3 for 40, which... again, not super great? but it's a basic pokemon that can really put in the work in the early to mid game while you're still scraping together for cards. I use a lot of him, hitmonlee, Ryhorn, Onix, and a couple of others in my Aerodactyl deck that I keep as a secondary deck to shut down stuff that has evolution based win conditions.

Likitung, Chansey, Khangaskahn

I group all these three together because they all serve a similar purpose of being colorless pokes that are beefy and can help you stall or accelerate the game.

Chansey has a whopping 120 HP, a health pool that will allow it to survive anything besides Charizard's fire spin. it also gets a coin toss to prevent damage and an 80 damage attack if you need one final gambit to desperatley get rid of something and you have no other options.

Likitung is probably the most common of this trio, and really isn't amazing other than he's 90 HP with 1 colorless for 10 damage and a coin toss for paralysis, which puts in a little more work than chansey, who just sits there until you hit a switch or you decide to pay the exorbant retreat cost.

Khangaskhan has the 80 damage final gambit of chansey and the HP of Likitung, but rather than being a stalling card, fetch gets you garenteed extra draws, which is extra chances to hit your draw engine, the pokemon/evolutions you might need, or a switch to get it out of there if it's running into trouble!

Professor Oak/Bill/Gambler

All of these facilitate keeping your deck moving, keeping the flow of cards going, keeping an advantage. more cards means more options, and you always want the options to get out of a jam if your opponent puts pressure on you. Pokemon TCG in the beginning had a TREMENDOUS ammount of draw power, generally because energy attachment dictated the pace of a game and not so much having cards in your hand. I still feel drawing is good in any TCG you play, as it gives you the access you need to the rest of your tools. just make sure you don't burn through your deck too fast.

Switch

ALWAYS Run switch, NEVER full restore. your pokemon are cured of status conditions upon a switch, and if you're playing this game right, you should always have a pokemon on your bench with zero retreat cost to cycle back to the pokemon you are curing of a status effect.

Switch also, y'know... lets you get past retreat cost when things get bad, or even lets you rebound from your opponent hitting you with something crippling like a super energy removal or a gust of wind.

Super Energy Removal/Energy Removal

as I said before, this game's primary version of advantage is energy. because you are (usually) limited to one attach per turn, the opponent who misses a turn of energy attachment is usually the one who ends up in deep trouble early on. for the cost of a trainer card (and possibly one of your own energy attaches), you can set your opponent back in this ever-important cycle. Dish out the big damage sooner than they can, and ripple them from being able to bounce back.

Bonus points if you ever snipe a double colorless energy with energy removals. That's why stuff like Enhanced Hammer is so good these days.



Anyhow, I hope those give you some generalized cards to look out for in the early games. I can't be bothered to remember what packs they come in, but know you've gotten a bit of a gem in any of those, no matter what deck you are running. It is currently 5:15 AM. good night.

Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 16, 2015, 09:35:48 PM
sorry to double post, but a quick pro strat; make a restore point as the victory fanfare plays when you win a card game. when the music for the overworld loads up, that signifies when the game has loaded up the contents of the booster packs you've won from an opponent. this way instead of having to grind for collesium packs, you can just load states until you get boosters that have copies of professor Oak, Bill, Scyther, Chansey, and also, I can't believe i forgot to mention it...

ELECTABUZZ Lv. 35

This is probably the second or third most important card to the Base set/Jungle/Fossil Metagame. 2 energy for 30 damage is already amazing, especially when one of those is a colorless, but 1 electric and 1 colorless for 40 on coin flip is the most bang for your buck you will get out of a single card in this format. Yes, Wigglytuff can do the wave for a cheap 60 if you fill your bench with a bunch of filler, but electabuzz requires all of 3 cards to set up as opposed to the 9 you'd need for a Wigglytuff sweep. Promo Mewtwo is probably the only thing comparable.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 16, 2015, 10:56:39 PM
I've gotten through the initial tutorial.  I find it a little silly that they've framed the intro just like you're playing a regular Pokemon game, but I guess that's Gamefreak's way of trying to lure in the people who may have played the pokemon games, but not the card game.


The card game itself seems pretty basic/simple after the tutorial.  I'm curious to see how much strategy can actually go into a game, as well as if the different deck choices actually make a difference.


Question for those who have gotten farther - does the pokemon type matter like in the proper games?  How so?
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 17, 2015, 12:49:57 AM
I've gotten through the initial tutorial.  I find it a little silly that they've framed the intro just like you're playing a regular Pokemon game, but I guess that's Gamefreak's way of trying to lure in the people who may have played the pokemon games, but not the card game.


The card game itself seems pretty basic/simple after the tutorial.  I'm curious to see how much strategy can actually go into a game, as well as if the different deck choices actually make a difference.


Question for those who have gotten farther - does the pokemon type matter like in the proper games?  How so?

HUDSON SOFT

this game was licenced out to Hudson Soft. :P it's why the overworld stuff feels a lil' jank-tastic.


As for pokemon typing, it does indeed matter. Pokemon deal damage of their card's type, no matter what the attack. they also have a weakness and resistance printed on their cards. Weakness at this point in the TCG's life multiplies the damage you do by two, while resistance does a flat -30 damage off of any attack.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 17, 2015, 08:30:52 AM
I've gotten through the initial tutorial.  I find it a little silly that they've framed the intro just like you're playing a regular Pokemon game, but I guess that's Gamefreak's way of trying to lure in the people who may have played the pokemon games, but not the card game.


The card game itself seems pretty basic/simple after the tutorial.  I'm curious to see how much strategy can actually go into a game, as well as if the different deck choices actually make a difference.


Question for those who have gotten farther - does the pokemon type matter like in the proper games?  How so?

HUDSON SOFT

this game was licenced out to Hudson Soft. :P: it's why the overworld stuff feels a lil' jank-tastic.


As for pokemon typing, it does indeed matter. Pokemon deal damage of their card's type, no matter what the attack. they also have a weakness and resistance printed on their cards. Weakness at this point in the TCG's life multiplies the damage you do by two, while resistance does a flat -30 damage off of any attack.

Jankey is the perfect description, thanks for correcting me.  It makes sense it wasn't GameFreak, so far the game looks pretty awful, and the sprites look off.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 17, 2015, 11:31:57 AM
I really think that only goes as far as the character design. the card art is surprisingly faithful to the actual cards as far as Gameboy graphics are concerned.

I'm currently at 216 of the game's 226 obtainable cards. 2 of them I can't get because I'm pretty sure that even though the 3DS has an IR port that Card Pop isn't available, and there's a promo venusaur and a promo mew that's only obtainable through doing this thing where you and a friend held the IR ports of Game Boy Colors up to one another.

Anyhow, my decklist...

Water Energy x 22
Horsea x 3 (can be subbed out for 2 scyther and a Double Colorless energy. were I playing the actual TCG, I would.)
Squirtle x 4
Wartortle x 3
Blastoise x 2
Lapras x 2
Articuno x 2
Articuno (GB Exclusive) x 1
Professor Oak x 3
Bill x 4
Pokemon Trader x 2
Energy Removal x 4
Switch x 3
computer search x 1
Pluspower x 2
Gust of Wind x 1
Gambler x 1


this is probably the most straightforward of the decks that were good in the meta, although mine runs a bit differently. I like having a 0 retreat pivot of sorts to heal statuses via switch, and Horsea does so well by forcing coin flips in this game, even if it only has 40 hp and 10 damage to it. Scyther would be a better pick to try and help deal with the electabuzz menace if I was playing against actual humans.

Most people run dewgong because it has 50 damage for 3 energy, but I honestly do not like seel as a basic pokemon, and just roll with Laprass instead because that's one less evolutionary line to worry about.

Articunos have no weakness and a fighting resistance. the GB Exclusive one can only be obtained by beating the Grand Masters, and I run more for the free shot at paralyzing the opponent moreso than for any prowess it might bring to the table.

Blastoise is the star of the show here. it is your win condition. the idea of a deck like this is to burn through as much of your deck as quickly as possible until you can develop a squirtle into a blastoise. at that point, you can attach as much energy as need be, and pretty much have several bruisers at ready because you just flood the bench with energy. especially when you start knocking out opponents and using energy removals to stymie their own energy output, you'll just overwhelm your poor enemies, even against decks you probably should be weak against. do look out for electabuzz, as it can peel through most of your deck.

I'll have another deck list for you all when this discussion really kicks off!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on February 17, 2015, 09:35:18 PM
You really should be running more than one Gust of Wind-that card is truly broken, in the same league as (Super) Energy Removal.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ejamer on February 17, 2015, 09:50:11 PM
I wasn't keen on playing this game from the get go, but the more I read comments here the less interested I become... 
 :(


On the upside, it's nice to see some people who are really passionate about Pokemon TCG offers.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 17, 2015, 10:25:52 PM
You really should be running more than one Gust of Wind-that card is truly broken, in the same league as (Super) Energy Removal.

But... but what do I drop for it? ;_; I know how potent dragging out your opponent's stuff is. Heck, it's why Lycandre is so good right now. I guess I could drop my teched copy of Gambler for a second one? maybe go 3 Gust of Wind/3 Energy Removal?

Also, if it seems like my posts are more about the TCG than the game and programming that abounds it... it's because really, the game itself isn't compelling outside of the TCG. there's really not a point to the overworld besides maybe going from club to club trying to hunt down that bastard Tomoaki Imakuni? I can think of YuGiOh games that handled this sort of stuff better, and let's not kid ourselves; YuGiOh! is not a bastion of great video game design either in spite of Konami being at the helm.

I do want to comment on the music. there's a few really good pieces here, particularly the theme for your rival in this game, Ronald. The Grandmaster Battle theme was my go-to Elite Four theme until Black and White rolled around with it's heart-pounding Drum n' Bass.

I also want to address the writing. oh GOD the writing. Pokemon is always a strange series to me as it is really, REALLY awful at world building. Between Pokedex entries that make No sense and are sometimes REALLY off putting, the NPC dialogue really bothers me because EVERYBODY in a pokemon game seems obsessed with Propane and propane accessories Pokemon and the technology that abounds them. Yes, I get it. this is a world where the animals are really crazy cool and some are eerily sentient, but not everybody on planet earth yammers on about their pet iguana to random passers by! Even if I was a professional cockfighter, I'd still want to...y'know, talk about technology, government, politics, religion (Hail lord helix!) issues our world has that ISN'T connected to pokemon.

This game takes it a step further. every last NPC... EVERY LAST ONE just wants to talk about the Pokemon TCG. Dr. Mason is a PROFESSOR OF TRADING CARDS! this is to a worse extreme than Triple Triad in Final Fantasy 8. Sure, people may want to play cards with you during TIME KOMPRESSION, but they're still... y'know, worried about other things. they'll talk to you about something else! the moment you dive into Pokemon TCG's Island (I refuse to call it a world), everything is about cards. there's even CARDS THAT START TALKING TO YOU ABOUT HOW YOU HAVE INHERITED THEIR CARDS . I'm not asking for brilliance here, but the dialogue is so stilted, and you are only going to learn about pieces of digital cardboard with pokemon drawings on them in this game.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Jonnyboy117 on February 18, 2015, 04:55:19 PM
It's funny to see so many familiar terms from Magic the Gathering in these posts, even though the rules are more different than I expected. I'm still grinding through the early stuff but look forward to building my own decks once I have decent cards.

Can anyone recommend which gyms are best to start? I wandered into one of them and fought a Fighting deck that ruined me. (If it helps, I chose Bulbasaur and friends as my starter deck.)
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 18, 2015, 05:50:37 PM
It's funny to see so many familiar terms from Magic the Gathering in these posts, even though the rules are more different than I expected. I'm still grinding through the early stuff but look forward to building my own decks once I have decent cards.

Can anyone recommend which gyms are best to start? I wandered into one of them and fought a Fighting deck that ruined me. (If it helps, I chose Bulbasaur and friends as my starter deck.)

fighting or Science should be fine, honestly. the best way to go about the game I find is to find one dude in a club you can consistently beat and grind booster packs out of 'em, Johnny. Try to find somebody who gives the Coliseum booster pack (Has Pikachu on the cover. lots of those cards I suggested earlier in the thread, and it's the booster you most commonly get energy from.) If you're going to stick with a grass deck as well, you might also want to be hunting for Executor and Venusaur in the Evolution booster set. (This game having imaginary booster sets makes things interesting as far as what cards come from where.)

make sure to check your mails from Dr. Mason as well, as somehow the guy sends you boosters electronically.

Also, has anybody tried the fan translation for this game's sequel? it's called Pokemon Trading Card Game 2: The Invasion of Team GR!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 18, 2015, 07:26:47 PM
Meowth Level 15 is a nice one to draw early in the game.

Also I've really enjoyed wrecking the cpu's day with an energy remover.

I started with charmander and friends fyi

One thing that's interesting is that in the main Pokemon games you want to have as many Pokemon types as possible whereas here you want to consolidate everything to as few types as possible.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 18, 2015, 08:07:40 PM
also dr mason uses smileys, wtf
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 18, 2015, 10:18:09 PM
I played Magic: The Gathering (MtG) quite a bit growing up, so it might flavor my opinions on the game so far. 


The mechanics of the card game itself are relatively simple compared to MtG.  Instead of developing a large mana pool you utilize across several actions, you have to permanently assign that "energy type" to a pokemon to meet their consumption requirement for an action.  This makes the energy a lot more important to success than in MtG, because it's a one-time use and you can't get it back. 


Additionally, only being able to use one monster at a time in battle creates a very urgent need to build-up the pokemon on your bench through assigning energy to them in advance or evolving them.  Unless you get a really good draw, you can expect your first pokemon to get knocked-out, so the strategy quickly turns to prepping for your next pokemon to be a beast from the outset.  If you don't, your whole bench will start falling like a line of dominoes.


I'm guessing what'll turn off most people from this game is that like most trading card games, while there's some strategy involved in choosing your deck and executing on a strategy, the luck of the draw is so important to start-off on the right foot in a match.  A bad draw in the beginning or a continual draw of the wrong card type in the middle of the game will sink you like a stone.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 18, 2015, 10:49:55 PM
sorry to double post, but a quick pro strat; make a restore point as the victory fanfare plays when you win a card game. when the music for the overworld loads up, that signifies when the game has loaded up the contents of the booster packs you've won from an opponent. this way instead of having to grind for collesium packs, you can just load states until you get boosters that have copies of professor Oak, Bill, Scyther, Chansey, and also, I can't believe i forgot to mention it...

ELECTABUZZ Lv. 35

This is probably the second or third most important card to the Base set/Jungle/Fossil Metagame. 2 energy for 30 damage is already amazing, especially when one of those is a colorless, but 1 electric and 1 colorless for 40 on coin flip is the most bang for your buck you will get out of a single card in this format. Yes, Wigglytuff can do the wave for a cheap 60 if you fill your bench with a bunch of filler, but electabuzz requires all of 3 cards to set up as opposed to the 9 you'd need for a Wigglytuff sweep. Promo Mewtwo is probably the only thing comparable.
Rapidash is also very strong, at least against the CPU, 30 damage and a coin flip to decide whether your opponent can attack or not? Yes please.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 19, 2015, 12:26:31 AM
First, I'd like to adress Pokepal's post on Rapidash.

1.) Electabuzz is a basic pokemon that is potentially dishing out 40 by turn 2, and the only set-up this requires is electabuzz himself, 1 lightning energy, and one of any other energy card. by comparison, Rapidash requires that you have had a ponyta for at least 2 turns to get it up to 2 Fire energy, and that you have drawn into it's evolution card, Rapidash.

2.) Ponyta has no 1 energy attack (neither does Rapidash), while electabuzz has 10 damage and a paralyze chance for 1 lightning energy.

3.) the moment electabuzz hits the field, it has 70 HP. Ponyta has at least one turn of being at a vulnerable 40 HP, which might I add, is in range to get 1 hit KO'd by a successful coin toss on thunder punch.

Electabuzz takes almost no time to set up. it is a low-maintenance, but high damage card. That is why it is so important to the time period unto which it was released.

If anything though, Rapidash has more peerity with Scyther than Electabuzz, as it has 0 retreat like scyther and type advantage over it, although again... you have to evolve it. the other thing is that because of Scyther's attack being all colorless energy, it can pay for it in Double Colorless energies, which cuts down on the time it takes to get a scyther set up even. I'd still say for a Fire deck, Rapidash can put in some work in a similar copacity that Seadra does for a water deck.


Onto Lolmonade's Comments:

Wizards of the Coast distributed Pokemon TCG in the US for the first several years of it's lifespan before NoA took over.

Energy is indeed precious now, although in later formats it's not so much, with decks running as few as 10 energies to instead facilitate their draw and search engines. there's even some sick ways of energy recycling in this game, such as Promo Mewtwo.

I do want to say that yes, building your bench IS important. I would like to point out the cards I mentioned earlier in the thread though. they all share some common themes.

1.) a cheap costing attack so that they're contributing to you winning right out the gate
2.) a high ammount of HP so they can sponge a few hits while you set up your benched stuff.
3.) 0 retreat cost so that at a moment's notice they can peel out to allow something else to start doing the heavy lifting.

Take Horsea for example that I run in my deck. No seadras, just Horsea. See, horsea has a 1 water energy attack that does 10 and forces the opponent to coin flip to even attack at all. sure, it has 40 HP, but it's also got 0 retreat.

Lapras? 80 HP. for 1 Water energy it has an attack that if I invest further, gets stronger.

Even Squirtle has a paralysis attempt on it for 1 water energy should I end up in the doomsday senario where I'm forced to lead off with Squirtle.

About the only bad lead in my deck is articuno, which has 70 HP, no weakness, and a fighting resistance so it can take a couple of weaker hits while I try to go through my deck and maybe stumble across a switch.

The idea that the pokemon you send out in the lead is dead meat is a bad mentality to have. yes, you have to pick and choose to develop your pokemon appropriately, but there is an element to speed to the game, especially since gaining prize cards can especially swing the momentum of a game in your favor!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 19, 2015, 08:41:31 AM
So Clex....I'd say your comment about first Pokemon not being a meat shield is right/wrong, like most things, depending on what's in your hand.  If I have a bulbasaur & 2 grass energies I can assign right away, his leech seed is a good tool to knock out a few undeveloped opponent Pokemon while I attempt to develop a bench Pokemon to be running right out of the gate.

IF you start with a lousy hand, because you can't take the option to re-draw, your best option may very well be to toss out the Pokemon with the highest HP to absorb damage while hoping to draw something with utility.


On an unrelated note, why the hell can't we forfeit a match?!?!  There have been a few times I was getting trounced, and knowingly had no chance of recovering, but the game makes you sit there and take it for the extra 10 minutes it takes for your opponent to finish you. Very, very frustrating.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 19, 2015, 11:11:38 AM
yeah, the lack of a forefit button is annoying, considering I've played plenty of other TCGs that allow such.

and to further talk about Lolmonade's comment, I'd like to talk about the deck that was at the top at the time; the deck that if you take the time to make, you will win lots of games (as I have taken the time to do so and it works wonders!

Lightning Energy X 9
Fighting Energy X 8
Double Colorless X 4
Scyther X 4
Electabuzz lv. 35 X 4
Hitmonchan X 4
Bill X 4
Professor Oak X 4
Energy Removal X 4
Super Energy Removal X 2
Energy Search X 2
Pluspower X 4
Gust of Wind X 3
Computer Search X 2
Itemfinder X 2

This is a deck that in my experience running it through about 30 games last night had all of one bad start last night, and that was namely because one of the opponents in my opponent pool I was choosing from had a lot of fighting resistance in his deck and it made it really hard to dish out any damage of any sort.

The 12 pokemon in this deck are all basic pokemon that fill 2 of those 3 requirements of a good basic pokemon. considering you have the 4 bill, 4 Oak, 2 energy search, and 2 computer search, there's a chance you will hit at least SOMETHING you can use that is good and good immediately because of how low maintenance your pokemon are. the absolute worst case senario is that you're maybe stuck with a scyther that takes 3 turns of set-up because you haven't hit a double Colorless energy, as Hitmonchan only require one energy of their respective color to go live.

In addition, this deck actually gives you a rather nice spread of types, unlike most ones. you can cover pretty much any colorless pokemon, most water pokemon, and lightning Pokemon  with ease. Scyther's fighting resistance also makes it a fine tool to deal with those pokemon as well. this rather nicely covers Electabuzz's weakness.

There is a variant of this that drops Hitmonchan for Magmar Lv. 31, which switches out your electric and colorless coverage and raw damage for some rather nasty status effect play and some grass coverage... then again, I think this is inferior, because you could be just using Hitmonchan or electabuzz to dish out the big damage.

If I didn't have to get dressed and ready for work, I would probably have done some odds calculations to show how much of the dime you have a chance to get a lemon of a hand with this deck list I have provided. I tend to also drop some combination of trainers to run 2 fossils and a aerodactyl, as prehistoric power trolls on your opponent's ability to develop pokemon that can even compete with the hosses you're tossing out. (The cool thing about fossils is because they're a Trainer card, they do not count as a basic pokemon as far as the Mulligan rules are concerned, so you will still always be starting with a scyther, an electabuzz, or a hitmonchan.)
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 20, 2015, 10:41:52 PM
Sorry to double post again, but uh... Tonight, (Feburary the 20th, 2015), I have decided to spontaneously stream some Pokemon TCG Gameplay! and I'll probably do it again before the retroactive episode is recorded, but here's the link!

http://www.twitch.tv/clexyoshi
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on February 21, 2015, 06:04:08 PM
What do folks think of the Challenge Cups? There are two that occur during the main game, then in the post-game they appear (randomly?) when starting the game. They give you a chance to pick up some of the promotional cards, which is pretty neat. Of course,you can save between matches and reset your game to make sure you don't lose out.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Jonnyboy117 on February 22, 2015, 04:00:47 PM
One tip I haven't seen much yet is that Dr. Mason will send you free packs with his emails, and there's one sent out for each gym that you visit, even if you don't clear it. You might need to complete a battle in each one, I'm not sure, but you can suck it up and then check the PC for some more free cards.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 22, 2015, 08:05:21 PM
My current deck (charmander and friends)
3 Charmander
2 Charmeleon
1 Charizard
4 ponyta
4 rapidash
3 magmar level 24

4 rattata
3 raticate
1 kangaskhan
2 Lickitung

2 Bill
2 energy search
2 energy removal
3 pokeballs
2 gust of wind

22 fire energy

good enough to give the Ai a horrible day if they don't resist fire,
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 22, 2015, 09:05:42 PM
My current deck (charmander and friends)
3 Charmander
2 Charmeleon
1 Charizard
4 ponyta
4 rapidash
3 magmar level 24

4 rattata
3 raticate
1 kangaskhan
2 Lickitung

2 Bill
2 energy search
2 energy removal
3 pokeballs
2 gust of wind

22 fire energy

good enough to give the Ai a horrible day if they don't resist fire,

Not bad, Pokepal! I'd consider dropping some of the pokemon in lieu of some more trainers or double colorless energies. You shouldn't run evolution cards at the same number of basic pokemon in your deck, because for every one of those basics that become a prize card or faint or get dumped from your hand or deck by something, that renders the corresponding evolution card a dead draw. If you must keep running Rapidash, go down to 3, if not 2.

I'd also consider cutting down on rattata line and just putting in more trainers. keep in mind you'll only be going through at most maybe... 11 of the pokemon in your deck in a game. around 10 basics and 6 evolutions is what you should be shooting for in your deck ratio. you don't have to play that way, but it's my suggestion.

Also, if you wanted an alternate flavor in your deck instead of ratatta, you might want to maybe try Arcanine or Moltres or such...!

As for Yoshi1001, I like the idea of the challenge cup, but i don't like that it's a random trigger. playing multiple decks in a row without changing decks is actually a pretty tall feat, as there will almost always be a possibility to hit an an opponent who's strategy hard counters yours. Take for example... using that Electabuzz/Scyther/Hitmonchan deck against Murray, the Psychic Club leader.

His whole deck revolves around using Mr. Mimes to mitigate damage and then using Alakazam to move damage counters to something like a Chansey that he scoops up before it takes too much damage. Scyther is completley walled out by Mr. Mime, and Electabuzz can do 10 and paralyze it, but the only real pokemon in that deck that can hang is Hitmonchan. his jab does 20 and thus doesn't hit the invisible wall damage cap... of course, Hitmonchan is weak to psychic and there are plenty of psychic pokemon that just straight-up resist fighting pokemon.

Would anybody else be interested if I tried streaming more Pokemon TCG Tomorrow evening?  (Monday, Feburary 23rd)
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 22, 2015, 09:39:21 PM
The issue is that my selection of trainers is very limited.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 23, 2015, 02:20:07 AM
The issue is that my selection of trainers is very limited.


That is indeed problematic. I'd find somebody in the grass club or science club that you can kinda just steamroll and do it over and over again and keep getting packs. do take Johnny's suggestion and get Dr. Mason's Electronically mailed boosters as well.  you might want to make a restore point before you read those so you can control what you get out of those packs too.

Another thing you folks can do to cheat (even on an actual cart of the game) is that a coin flip's results are not determined until you leave the coin flip screen. if you reset the game/turn it off and on, it will let you pick up right where you left off just before you performed the action that required a coin toss!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Halbred on February 23, 2015, 02:40:22 PM
I'm also running a Blastoise deck that incorporates Machop and Hitmonchan to deal damage while my Blastoise powers up. I really wish we got the sequel, which brings in the first Team Rocket expansion. Very interesting cards in there--low HP evolutions but spectacular attack potentials.

I was able to blow through every gym by using my Blastoise deck and doing some very minor tinkering before certain gyms, like the Electric gym. Even then, I killed everyone with Machop and Hitmonchan. By the time Blastoise was powered up, he didn't give a **** about type advantage.

One thing I should note here, about coin flips: you'll notice they're not random. That is, try doing a restore point just before making a coin flip. If you get tails, reset to the restore point and try again. It'll be tails again, forever. Why? Because the coin flips are pre-determined. The game pre-determines ALL of the coin flips for a match before it begins. Not sure why it wouldn't just randomize the coin flip, but there you go. It's always bugged me, though. There will be times where coins flips seem to seriously favor your opponent, but no, it's just that in the order of pre-set positive coin flips, your opponent just happens to be using coin-flip attacks.

One more thing. A lot of people pass over RATTATA because of his low HP and Fighting weakness, but he's actually really good as an opener. 20 damage for one Colorless energy, no retreat cost, and Psychic resistance? He wipes the floor with Psychic and Ghost decks, and his damage is low enough that it skates through Mr. Mime's Barrier. At least one of the Psychic trainers uses a deck that's heavily dependent on Mr. Mime. If you take Rattata in there, that deck is finished before it even gears up.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 23, 2015, 05:41:05 PM
Thank you for reminding me and correcting me on the bad info, Halbred. It's that you can control coin flips by not using attacks that use them and let the CPU use a coin flip instead before trying again. it even saves this coin flip table if you turn the game off and on. :P
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 23, 2015, 10:10:36 PM
So that pidgeot card sounds absolutely broken, I love it.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 23, 2015, 11:34:20 PM
So that pidgeot card sounds absolutely broken, I love it.
Yeah not really, it's annoying to deal with but that's about it.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on February 23, 2015, 11:35:31 PM
The issue is that my selection of trainers is very limited.

This brings up another trait of the early TCG I didn't like-rare trainers. Base Set actually has ten of them, many competitively useful:

-Computer Search (reprinted and yet not reprinted in Boundaries Crossed in 2012)
-Item Finder
-Lass
-Pokemon Breeder
-Pokemon Trader
-Scoop Up
-Super Energy Removal

Thankfully, the number of rare staple trainers went down later into the card game's life.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 24, 2015, 08:46:28 AM
I hadn't dabbled in deck creation yet, partially because I wanted to see how far I could get with just the base "bulbasaur & friends" deck.  The answer is "not very".  I get steamrolled by the water gym boss each time I play her, so i've had to resort to beating the low-levels to get more booster packs until I have enough cards to build a competent deck.
My most effective games have been ones which I've been able to draw half my deck very, very quickly.  The card game (at least in this game) moves horribly slow, so anything you can do to effectively "speed-up" movement through your deck will give you a distinct advantage.
 
To those of you who have dabbled more into the deck building side, it appears pretty similiar to MtG in that you want to limit your pokemon types to probably 2 at the most (or 1 & colorless, like pokepal's deck indicates).  Is there a particularly good ratio of energy/cards in a deck or base pokemon/evolution that works most effectively? 
 
ALSO - Are the 2nd evolution cards (Venusaur, Charizard, Blastoise) worth holding in a deck?  My experience so far makes me think not, takes far too long to build up a pokemon with the evolutions & enough energy cards to utilize their attacks.
 
Finally, which pokemon have useful pokemon powers?  Do you find yourself even bothering with those?
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 24, 2015, 11:00:34 AM
I hadn't dabbled in deck creation yet, partially because I wanted to see how far I could get with just the base "bulbasaur & friends" deck.  The answer is "not very".  I get steamrolled by the water gym boss each time I play her, so i've had to resort to beating the low-levels to get more booster packs until I have enough cards to build a competent deck.
My most effective games have been ones which I've been able to draw half my deck very, very quickly.  The card game (at least in this game) moves horribly slow, so anything you can do to effectively "speed-up" movement through your deck will give you a distinct advantage.
 
To those of you who have dabbled more into the deck building side, it appears pretty similiar to MtG in that you want to limit your pokemon types to probably 2 at the most (or 1 & colorless, like pokepal's deck indicates).  Is there a particularly good ratio of energy/cards in a deck or base pokemon/evolution that works most effectively? 
 
ALSO - Are the 2nd evolution cards (Venusaur, Charizard, Blastoise) worth holding in a deck?  My experience so far makes me think not, takes far too long to build up a pokemon with the evolutions & enough energy cards to utilize their attacks.
 
Finally, which pokemon have useful pokemon powers?  Do you find yourself even bothering with those?

10 to 15 Pokemon (I'd run more pokemon if you don't have as many trianers to plug in.)
20-25 energy
20-30 Trainer cards

Considering that trainers are the thing you can do as many times as you want during a gain is why i'd say your deck should favor trainers. Trainers can help you get to pokemon and energy faster, recycle said things, or do a number of other tricks.


Most of the time, I feel ANY evolution isn't worth it. very few times in any TCG would I recommend somebody run a card that is effectively a dead draw without a prerequisite card. This doubly goes for something that requires not one but two prerequisites, especially in a game where it's VERY possible that you won't start the game with said prerequisites not in your deck due to the Prize mechanic... Unless your deck can do quite a bit of digging and tutoring to bring those cards together, I would say stay clear of Stage 2 Pokemon for the most part. there are a few that are worth it though.

Blastoise: After getting a Blastoise evolved, he pays for himself with his Rain Dance Pokemon Power, especially in a mono water deck, as he basically removes the cap on energy attachment and makes setting himself and the other stuff on your bench up a matter of how fast you can draw into it.

Venusaur (Not the promo one from Card Pop, the normal one.): Energy Trans doesn't quite pay for itself in the way that Rain Dance does, but smart use of Energy Trans can make for a solid strategy, especially if you are playing a Huge Explosion deck.

Alakazam: bouncing damage about is an interesting stall tactic if nothing else, and using this in conjunction with 4 Chansey, 4 Mr. Mime, and Scoop-up can artifically dialate a game if that's your sort of thing.

Finally, yes. Pokemon Powers are VERY much worth it. they are an action you can take using your pokemon outside of attacks. usually, these are very passive, yes, but good use of pokemon powers can be paramount to one's strategy as a whole!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Halbred on February 24, 2015, 04:30:38 PM
I tend to build decks that do NOT require a lot of Trainers to be effective. My strategy is to use strong Basics out of the gate and wipe out the defender's Basics while they are trying to power them up. I tend to use:

10-12 Trainers (if that)
25-30 Energy
Everything else is Pokémon

My evolution rubric is: Four Basic, three 1st Stage, two 2nd Stage. You have to assume that not all the Basics you find will survive, and then you use Poke Balls, Pokémon Traders, and Pokémon Breeders to evolve them quickly. However, I do not often run with an evolution-heavy deck. This might be different if the Neo expansions were available, because then it would be ALL TYRANITAR ALL THE TIME.

As for Pokémon Powers, some are great, others suck. I hate dealing with Muk's power, because it affects both players, same with Aerodacyl.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 24, 2015, 11:01:45 PM
I tend to build decks that do NOT require a lot of Trainers to be effective. My strategy is to use strong Basics out of the gate and wipe out the defender's Basics while they are trying to power them up. I tend to use:
The only reason I throw out the suggestion of running so trainer heavy is that while Lass is an option, I have yet to run into somebody who even employs the card, let alone does it effectively in the opponent pool in Pokemon TCG.

For the basic components of the game there are counters. if your opponent runs a ton of trainers? Punish them with Lass. if your opponent crutches on lots of Pokemon powers and you don't...? Muk is worth throwing in just to have it sit on your bench doing nothing...! If your opponent has really strong evolution cards and crap basic pokemon? Splash in Aerodactyl. heck, Aerodactyl is splashable because it has a lot of scyther like properties such as 3 colorless for 30 damage, 70 HP, and a fighting resistance!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 25, 2015, 08:58:42 AM
Dismantling my base deck & trying to build-up has shown me that I basically don't have a great pool of cards to work with.  I made a frankendeck that does a better job of increasing my deck production output, but I just simply don't have that great a pool of cards yet to turn it into a real powerhouse.  It has increased my win rate against the low-level matches though.
 
This game is good for me to play passively while I have a show or movie on in the background, I can't see myself single-focused on this.  Probably part of why grinding through matches to get more booster packs doesn't seem that enthralling to me.
 
 
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on February 25, 2015, 12:10:15 PM
You can get a bunch of energy cards from one of Dr. Mason's assistants if you need some. Just put all your energies in some junk deck and you'll be good.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on February 25, 2015, 09:56:38 PM
Wigglytuff is another evolution worth running-doing 60 for 3 energy is extremely useful, and it's not hard to fill up your bench (Scyther and Mysterious Fossil are great candidates). There's a reason it was so popular back in the day.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 26, 2015, 02:21:26 AM
as the eve of the potential podcast recording looms upon us, I want to get in one more big post; one that works as one final opinion piece that chunks can be pulled from for the show. I realize I've dominated this thread, but a lot of what I've had to say has been moreso tips for folks whom the game might have clicked with than an actual opinion (do note I did have a post about the game engine itself earlier, though.)

Digitized versions of TCG are a tricky subject to be certain. it's almost never possible to code in all existing cards unless a game is in it's infancy. Opponent AI can be exploited, sometimes cards don't work as intended, etc. I happen to love single player TCG games, with the MTG game for PC that came out in 1997 probably being the best example of the genre, and YuGiOh! The Eternal Duelist Soul for the GBA being the game I've put the most time in, and the game I would catagorize as the best "Toilet" game.

Pokemon TCG certainly doesn't move at the pace you'd need to play a game in 2 minutes, especially if you have battle animations on and you don't have the swiftest of decks, which you will not in the beginning. at the same time, it doesn't do the "This is a JRPG but played with cards!" thing quite as well as MTG 1997, which made it easy to sit down for a while simply because a lot of the time you'd run into a random battle with a goblin that had 2 life points in a red deck who's mission was to drop as many lightning bolts on your face as possible before dying out and leaving you in need of some stay at an inn or something. I digress, though.

Pokemon TCG, developed by Hudson Soft under license from Gamefreak, Creatures Inc., and Nintendo, is still a competent game that makes for what Johnny Metts would refer to as a multitasker. Much of my time playing this game for this retroactive was spent catching up on Box Office Poison and Discover Music Project, or watching youtube stuff. A lot of this game's difficulty comes from grinding out cards to make a deck with some level of consistency, and it's good to find an opponent you can consistently beat that gives the collesium pack, as that's the one that things like Bill, Oak, Switch, Energy Removal, Gust of Wind, and Computer Search comes in, as well as a lot of those solid basic pokemon I mentioned as well as some decent stage 1 evolutions come in!

When you can put together something that has some flow to it (and maybe even a backup deck), the opponents at the clubs kinda become chumps who only win if they get incredibly lucky. I do like that not every club's ritual isn't quite the same, such as having to find all the fighting club members on their sojourn to the other clubs, or trying to find the grass club leader. I do have to admit that they had to kinda stretch things thin on the clubs, especially considering the Science Club and the Rock Club (where the club leader is literally country bumpkin Prof. Oak!)

Some things that doesn't work are the auto-deck machines and having multiple decks. there's one auto-deck machine that can save your deck lists, and then several more that unlock that basically will let you make duplicates of all the CPU opponents' decks. the issue here is that these auto-deck machines require you to have all the cards in said decks. even worse, if you have cards that are already wrapped up in a deck, you cannot use that card between both decks. I get that that's a bit hard to do IRL, but like... man, if I have a card I'm using in more than 1 deck in real life, I make a proxy (a turned over card back in a sleeve with the text of the card written on it to stand in for the real thing) and if I have to play in some sort of tourney with that secondary deck, I move my copy between decks! The difference here is that this is a digital game with digital cards, and it should fucking assume that if I own a card and want to incorperate it into multiple decks that I can have it automatically moved between decks, instead of manually having to plug a bunch of garbage into my deck to make it exactly 60 because maybe I want to try a second deck with a playset of Prof. Oak and Bill?!?

The Music gets a special mention, as I feel the soundtrack has some of the catchiest stuff that's ever been in a  pokemon game, especially the theme for Ronald and the Grandmasters. I still hum the standard opponent theme every now and then, and Imakuni's theme does a good job of being comical and tipsy, which perfectly frames the strange cameo of the japanese electronic artist. (Hey, maybe you guys should do an episode of Discover Music Project on Imakuni?)

Regardless, as a fun quick diversion, I used to own a copy of http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/8/8e/ImakuniDoduoChallengeDarkness.jpg back in the day. I think it's Pokemon Power is that you have to do the hokey Pokey when it hits the active pokemon slot or it confuses itself... and then it has 2 colorless for 30, but you have to like... thow the card at your opponent or something. it's a weird joke card, just like every other Imakuni card.

Regardless, even after you get all the cards you could want, there's still plenty of fun to be had in the challenge hall and the challenge machine. playing against 5 opponents with a single deck is no easy task, because there is no one single deck that can handle anything and everything you could encounter, and your ability to adapt to this is paramount to success!

Overall, I like this game. the sequel, The Invasion of Team GR! is much better, although that game recycles a lot of content form this one, so I wouldn't play them back to back. What I feel this game does show is the strength of the Pokemon TCG in it's early days. it's a great tool for teaching your friends how to play, as several times I lent this game out ot get my friends to try the TCG out so I could actually have people IRL to play against. that's also how I ended up losing this game since someone decided to keep my copy when I let them borrow it and move away. I still have my original rain deck sitting in my drawer that I keep my TCG stuff. I've bounced in and out of the game a few times, but never got quite as serious with the game as I was during that initial Base/Jungle/Fossil/Rocket/Gym Leader era. Neo Genesis came out, and then Slowking borked the game and things became very unfun and I dropped it for Yugioh and didn't really look back.

http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/0/00/SlowkingNeoGenesis14.jpg Bonus points to whoever can figure out why this card is a problem. (except for Yoshi1001 and halbred, because they probably already know why.)
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Shaymin on February 26, 2015, 07:09:49 AM
Depending on how the coin flips go, you could be screwed by playing a Bill?
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 26, 2015, 09:24:31 AM
Depending on how the coin flips go, you could be screwed by playing a Bill?

Bill doesn't have a coin flip. it's just Draw 2 cards. Gambler however has a coin flip.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Shaymin on February 26, 2015, 08:24:07 PM
OK, because the way I'm reading it is if I play a trainer card of any stripe, you flip a coin and if you get heads, you make that trainer my next card - cutting me off from the rest of my deck.

That's more than a little abusable if you've got coin luck.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on February 26, 2015, 08:48:20 PM
Gambler illustrates another reason why evolution cards were so hard to play in the early TCG-lack of good shuffle draw.

Moving onto something more positive, I like the music in this game as well-all the battle themes are good, as are the ending and end credits themes.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 26, 2015, 09:31:26 PM
OK, because the way I'm reading it is if I play a trainer card of any stripe, you flip a coin and if you get heads, you make that trainer my next card - cutting me off from the rest of my deck.

That's more than a little abusable if you've got coin luck.

Oh, right! you were talking about Slowking! Uh... yeah. the problem with slowking is that the way the english card is worded, the Pokemon power STACKS!

If you manage to load your bench with 3 Slowking? Well, congratulations! your opponent now needs 3 Heads to play ANY Trainer card. and failure to activate puts it on top of your deck. this is worse than discarding it. you wanna know why? because YOU ARE DRAWING A CARD THAT REQUIRES 3 COIN FLIPS TO ACTIVATE!

Anyhow, Slowking, rather than getting eratta, just got Banned outright along with Sneasel, which pretty much had an attack that was 120 for 2 energy (Which is what Night March decks do these days, ironically.)

and yeah, the Music is lovely. <3 been Jammin' out to Ronald's theme while I draw tonight!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: lolmonade on February 27, 2015, 03:45:22 PM
Can any of the podcasters comment on if retroactive is this week?  Want to determine if I should hold out on listening until I make more progress in the game.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Shaymin on February 27, 2015, 08:25:16 PM
It's next week per @RFNPodcast:
https://twitter.com/RFNPodcast/status/571190848190164992

Quote
RFN 419 Preview: >2 hours of Lindy, Kirby, MonHun, Ueda, Star Fox, 100%ing, DKC, and Space Presidents! This is going to be a favorite show.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on February 28, 2015, 06:08:13 PM
one thing I'm kinda curious about is what people think of Tomoaki Imakuni?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQ6sQ382hRU

He's actually had his fingers in many different pies as far as the series goes. eccentricities aside, the guy composed music for the Japanese Anime, has done card art for not only the cards that center around himself, but for some others that actually look REALLY good!

(http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/d/dc/MedichamEXPowerKeepers34.jpg)
(http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/c/c1/MagnezoneStormfront6.jpg)
(http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/9/90/DarkDragonairEXTeamRocketReturns32.jpg)

there's also his trainer, which has been reprinted at least once in japan! He's quite the overt presence out in the land of the rising sun, and yet... besides the card art he's done, he's almost unheard of outside of japan besides his presence in this game, which is something they honestly could have easily removed alltogether since the only point of him is to be an easy opponent who randomly shows up and gives you a joke card when he's defeated 3 times!
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: Evan_B on March 02, 2015, 12:12:50 AM
I found the progression of this game to be a bit backwards. Why make me wait until I defeat 4 club leaders to challenge the psychic (science?) leader? It feels like it's railroading for no other reason aside from typical Pokemon progression.

Anyway, aside from that, I enjoyed the game, however as a MtG fan, I found the mechanics to be unbearably slow and I have no idea who thought they were a good idea. Energy attachment is just a terrible concept and it turns the game into a much more stall- and trick-based game. The game practically discourages evolution which is absurd considering the nature of the brand.

Ultimately, I think that Pokemon TCG is a passable card game, and that this game is at least functional as an introduction to the early waves. I think the amount of cards in this game I'm particular fits just about all the time you can get out of the game since the grinding mechanics are aggravating and the card variety only goes so far until you realize certain setups are just plain better than others. I wish there were more cards so I could make something deeper but I don't think I could handle the card grinding mechanics of there were more cards.

My main issue with this game existing on the eShop, however, is that it further highlights how stupid Game Freak and Nintendo are in terms of Pokemon-based VC titles. I know their current reasoning for not putting the mainline Pokemon titles on VC is that "each new game in the series is more definitive than the last, so why would you want to play am inferior version...?" Which is damning in two aspects- for a yearly release series like Pokemon the Devs are saying the previous entires are not as good as the past efforts (which is not true in a number of ways) but also they're refusing to feed the nostalgia of the series' fans. I can think of very few people who wouldn't want to pick up specific versions of old Pokemon titles- and with VC functionality you could even me trading and battles easier! But instead, we're stuck with Pokemon Pinball and the TCG.

(Honestly the only reason I mention this is because there's already been exhaustive discussion of the TCG mechanics so I was hoping we could talk about something else.)
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on March 02, 2015, 02:58:27 AM
yeah, it gets a lot better in future rotations where they figure out what makes good cards and such. this would pretty much be the equivalent of playing a MTG Video game with the format only including Alpha, Beta, and Unlimited. this game came out EERILY early in the TCG's life span, and they made exactly one sequel that added one expansion.

I've dumped a shitton of time into Yugioh: the Eternal Duelist's soul, but I would MUCH rather play something much more updated like... maybe World Championship 2010?

Pokemon Online just doesn't do it for me like these single player TCGs do.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on March 02, 2015, 02:51:58 PM
That magmar card with smog and smokescreen is just stupid. Even if you resist fire I can just poison you and try to stall you out with smokescreen.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on March 02, 2015, 05:21:01 PM
That magmar card with smog and smokescreen is just stupid. Even if you resist fire I can just poison you and try to stall you out with smokescreen.

This is why there are variants of the Hitmonchan/Electabuzz/Scyther deck that take out Hitmonchan and replace it with Magmar, as it effectively then serves as a more airtight Mr. Mime counter.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: SupaKirb on March 02, 2015, 05:27:49 PM
I just wanted to share comments about this game from someone who's fairly new to card games in general. This game so far has been a great way for me to learn how the Pokemon card game works (or at least how I think it works). I remember collecting these cards as a kid, but I never really understood what things like energy cards and trainer cards did. I would either toss those cards out, or just store them in the back of my "Poke-binder". Anyway, this game is taking me back to a period in my life where I really adored everything Pokemon. I think it's pretty amazing how an old game I've never even played before is making me feel this way.


As far as the game itself however. I like the fact that it looks like Pokemon Red and Blue, and I don't care what anyone says, the dialog in this game is genius! It's so bad it's good! I also enjoy the freedom of assembling my own deck. It's a learning process, but it's always great to receive new cards to add them my main deck. I don't know about you all, but I wouldn't be opposed to a new Pokemon Trading Card Game if it ever came out...


Would you guys pay for a new version of this game if it was released on the eshop for a decent price?

Lastly, in honor of Mr. Lindemann's return, and the new streak beginning... 
[/size]I want James to read this out loud it this makes it on the show..
[/size]"Jon Lindemann is more than a man, but less than a God.."[/size]
[/font]
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on March 02, 2015, 09:03:19 PM

Would you guys pay for a new version of this game if it was released on the eshop for a decent price?

Probably, though I hardly ever use the TCG online that exists now (I actually tried to give away some spare codes through the RFN telethon a few years ago).
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on March 03, 2015, 03:30:11 PM
pokemon TCG online is a very unattractive product for me, but I could get behind another game like this, provided they give this to an actual Gamefreak team to work on and they don't just throw some generic Ken Sugimori character designs at a third party.

the game could have the cards project Pokemon holograms reused from the X and Y models, and use the X and Y Engine's overworlds, incorporating 3D far more because of improvements to the engine. the best part would be ease of access to cards by making an AR mode where if the 3DS picks up the card art for a pokemon, i tpops out the model for that pokemon/trainer/etc and then the card becomes available in a special card shop for you to purchase for a small fee of Pokedollars.

Oh, and because the 3DS has an IR port, Card Pop can return!

... speaking of which, Card Pop. Has anybody gotten to try it...? I briefly remember doing it with my 10 year old self. you'd hold your game boy color's IR port up to a friend's and if they saw each other for a few seconds, random cards would get added to one another's collections...! there was even 2 promos you can only get via it. one was a Venusaur without Energy Trans, which immediately made it garbage (it instead gets a Full heal in the form of a Poke Power, and it can't even heal itself, so... you might as well use switch!), and the other was a Mew card that has 1 psychic and 1 colorless for an attack that did whatever the **** it wanted. random damage, random statuses.

You actually got a physical copy of the Venusaur with copies of the official Nintendo Power strategy Guide.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: yoshi1001 on March 03, 2015, 09:16:59 PM
I used Card Pop a few times back in the day. Unfortunately, you had to pop with a bunch of people before you could use the same person again, so even though I went to TCG league I never got that many.
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: pokepal148 on March 04, 2015, 12:04:27 PM
Card pop feels like one of those things where they shouldn't have had to remove it for the virtual console.. They should have been able to hack it in somehow, maybe make it into a streetpass thing or something, I don't know, but that's another rant for another time that you can maybe expect a listener mail type thing on it.

I wish they still made these things, this is easily one of the best spinoffs for Pokemon we've ever had. (Although as a certain James Jones knows Mystery Dungeon reigns supreme).
Title: Re: RetroActive #31: Pokemon: The Trading Card Game (Official Discussion)
Post by: ClexYoshi on March 05, 2015, 10:55:37 PM
so, the episode is probably recorded by now. I'm actually really excited for sunday, even if I feel that most of the cast of RFN won't be down for the grindy nature of the game.

I'm especially curious about Johnny's opinion, given his magical credentials and his lax stance on pokemon as a whole.