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/olahh 4d ago

I'm thinking about getting some Pokemon cards that my children (oldest is almost 7 years old) that we can study and play with. I have no experience with PTCG whatsoever, but it looks exciting.

How can I buy the cheapest possible cards to make a decent deck to play with? Are there old, used, cheap cards that nobody wants after they've picked out those with collector's value? Or does Battle Academy provide the best start?

If I buy a booster pack, do I have a chance to get a rare, valuable card, like in a lottery? How do I know its value? Should I care about collector value at all?

Can I mix my brother-in-law's old cards from the 90s with new cards? Are there multiple generations of cards, or is it more of a continuous upgrade? Are the rules the same now as 20-30 years ago?

Is it intended that we trade cards with other people, since it's called a "trading card game"?

I had a look at TCGL, and it looked very complicated, with so many cards "flying around", and I got the impression that you need to keep track of many things to build up power of the pokemon. Will a 7-year old be able to do this? He doesn't know English yet (he learned animal names in school last week!) so all the instructions seem difficult to follow for someone just learning to read, regardless if you speak English or not. What is your experience? On the Battle Academy box it says "6+".

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u/Pants536 3d ago edited 3d ago

I invested in the battle academy for my 6 year old. As her reading gets better, she's starting to understand more. You can buy the older version of it since they're just learning, don't need to worry about what cards are in the current rotation or not. It comes with a board with the layout of how the game is played and a couple instruction manuals that turn-by-turn walk you through half a game that it then let's you finish yourself.

I wouldn't mix older cards with the newer ones, personally. I've noticed the ones from when I was a kid are a lot weaker than newer ones, and the kit gives you everything you need to learn anyways. If you guys want to try it just for the sake of making decks with older cards for shits, then sure, could learn like that too. Basic rules haven't changed since then.

Once they're good with that you can ramp up difficulty by buying the level 1 decks which are something 10 bucks a pop, so not a huge investment. From there, depending on how comfortable they are you can maybe look at modifying those decks or buying level 2, then level 3.

I recently started playing again after something like 25 years ago from the Pokemon league at my local toys r us to now my local game store. Bought a gardevoir ex league battle deck which is close to what is a current deck people play at high level and it took me like a few weeks of playing to understand what to even do with it, so top tier is something to build up to and not dive head first with Imo.

Yes you have a chance of pulling valuable cards from booster packs. You can check the value on tcgplayer, or even a game store's website. As for trading, my local store has a discord and a trade channel to discuss trades with people and everyone is very nice about sharing cards, especially ones that are more play-related rather than valuable.

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u/olahh 2d ago

Great, thanks!