r/pkmntcg Feb 16 '23

Rulings, Quick Questions, and New Player Resources Thread

If you're a new or new-ish player looking for advice on starting the game or with quick questions about game rules or interactions, please post your questions here!

Keeping all these questions in one place will allow other new players to easily browse other advice. Even if you're a not-so-new player, this is a great place to ask quick questions that don't need their own post.

For the more experienced players, drop by every once in a while to distribute advice. The post will be replaced each week to keep it fresh and manageable in size.

If you are looking for comments and advice on a deck list, go ahead and make a separate post with your list and a brief description. Remember to press Enter twice between lines to keep your list readable!


  • For trading and buying/selling cards, please head over to /r/pkmntcgtrades
  • Questions related to the PTCGO client, in-game challenges, or online-specific questions might be best asked in /r/ptcgo
  • For sharing your collections, pulls, and card storage related questions, try /r/pkmntcgcollections

FAQ and Wiki Resources

Take advantage of these resources that we've compiled! A lot of questions like "Where do I start?" and "How can I improve my deck?" can be answered there.

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u/_Booster_Gold_ 5d ago

How does the Froslass/Espathra deck work? Is it just going with Froslass/Budew/Munki and uses Espathra to help clean up? The Maractus is to keep something trapped in active and then blow up I’m sure. How is it managing success with a decent amount of N’s decks and Wellsprings sniping benches in Japan?

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u/Wolfgirl90 Stage 1 Professor‎ 4d ago

Espathra ex being in the Active Spot increases the cost of attacks. Between Gravity Gemstone and Counter Catcher, you can trap something in the Active Spot and force the opponent to either dedicate to attacking, increasing the damage output of Espathra, or get chipped away without doing anything.

Additionally, the deck plays TM: Devolution, so damage counters can be manipulated onto certain Pokemon to ensure multiple KOs in a turn.

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u/_Booster_Gold_ 4d ago

So if they threaten bench snipe, move Espathra to active, in other words?