text: July 5, 2014 in Game Feedback
  Iam a new player, i dont have many cards, i have completed all the trainer challenges, but the AI is so stupid it is a joke.
  I go to play matchmaking...it pairs me with this guy...who has a FULL deck of Ex pokemon (no non Ex pokemon), all full art cards on stuff like trainers etc etc. Avatar has customised stuff as well, deck is customised with stuff which is not available to new players (i.e. you got to work for it)..
  HOW IS THIS FAIR, you pair a new guy...say I HAVE THE ADVANTAGE... and the opponent has a full deck of Ex pokemon...for god sake, the game does not even give you decent cards at the beginning. All booster packs are 5 cards (a fricking joke) unless you pay (which is understandable, however they could have the free booster packs (earned through these tokens) give you 10 cards but untradable.
  Really would love to slap the programmers of this game in the face for having a system which clearly has not been tested properly.
  My point in this little rant is this: The game needs SERIOUS balancing, the ranked matchmaking...is abysmal at best, it puts beginners with high end experts and then has the cheek to say the new player has the advantage...such utter rubbish.
  Also the programmers need to randomise coin flips more, i can predict 99% of the time what the coin will be...75% of the time is is always against the player and in favour of the opponent (this is for trainer challenge). Now i know the AI is pathetic and easy to do, but for the love of god, do not make it harder by rigging the coin flips, at least do something decent with the programming of the AI.
  Has fantastic potential this game, but they really should not restrict it so heavily...people play this game because they do not want to/are not able to play this game with other people face to face (for a whole load of reasons) and so you force people to spend 10's of hours just to obtain 1 booster pack of 5 cards...giving an extra 5 digital (absolutely worthless) cards too much??
  My two cents people. Feel free to object or agree, i will not be coming back to this forum thread.
  no idea why there are stars, no rude words were used.
  just played 8 more ranked matchups...i conceeded all - within 2 turns each player had a bench FULL of pokemon Ex...in my entire collection i own 2 pokemon Ex...and i have typed in 49 booster pack codes.
  So from that, there is good evidence to suggest these players are incredibly experienced and yet for some reason this stupid game matches me against them.
  The catapie - metapod - butterfrie and milktank deck needs to be banned. It gives 80+ damage within turn 2.
  So many balancing issues, this game used to be extremely good over the past 10 years, now its gone potty. Oringinally there was no banned pokemon card...now there are loads, how stupid is that.
  Again my point from this rant...balance...balance the game but nope, all this horrible american company wants to do is take our money and squat over everyone else.
  16 games IN A ROW where the opponant has had a MINIMUM of 3 Pokemon Ex as active and bench.
  22 games in a row i have lost...still being paired with people who have full decks of EX pokemon...seriously something is wrong with this system. This is a huge concern.
  nothing i can do about my deck...i cant get anymore cards or points from trainer challenge. unless i spend another tonnes more cash for online codes, physically unable to play this game, since it wont give me any cards and there is no method available to do so...unless i wait 20 days for the log in bonus.
  they put in the battle wheel at least, so you should be getting extra tokens for ranked pvp battles.
  also, i believe you get:
  15 tokens for log-in and clicking on shaking poke-ball on the front screen
  11+ tokens for your 1st pvp battle of the day on ranked
  Total: 26+ tokens daily
  (If you're lucky, you might get a booster pack from the wheel)
  to your comment about the deck known as "Buttermilk":
  Lol, use Pyroar.
  (Note: Pyroar isn't an EX.)
  PS, not the Promo Pyroar. the Pyroar with the Intimidating Mane ability
  many ex users will be the ones conceding when they see this.
  PPS, if you get so mad at the ex users, just play ranked theme deck mode all day every day
  I do not get the battle wheel every game, its 1 in 3 games for me...if that, and it the most points i got from it is 3, never get anything more than that.
  I do not have pyroar... As much as i would love to try to counter peoples decks, the game wont let me because it takes 95 tokens for 5 cards.
  You dont get 26+ free per day, 2 of those 5 days you get something else. it will take months to accumulate enough tokens to actually collect enough cards to even be able to make a single extra deck (not using previous cards).
  What is the point in theme if you are meant to build your own deck and try to counter others. i understand that it is trying to mimick the real world by making it hard to obtain the rare cards but these rare cards are soo common, entire decks are made out of EX.
  They need to add extra options in the verses ones like - Max limit of Ex pokemon (4, 8, 12, 16 or 20). They can add other options too.
  This standard mode where apparently pokemon are banned...is just not working.
  So unfortunately your suggestions dont work.
  the only other thing i can say is that you dont get the wheel if your battles are too short.
  but yeah, it really comes down to luck as in what you get from the trainer challenge packs.
  I think that standard mode only remove old cards (not new ex). Ex-deck doesn't mean that the player is skilled, just that they could afford having those cards. There are lots of great deck without ex or only as support (sableye, flygon-duknoir). When I began, I tried to make a deck against ex (cryptero, Gourgeist, Bouffalant) and it worked (sometimes) but then I made a deck without thinking about ex (and without ex) and it seemed better.
  As for finding cards, you might gain booster in the trainer challenge (36), in the battle wheel or in the tournament (just go to theme deck, the rewards are the same)
  all I can say is your decks are just not good enough for standard play. honestly speaking a lot of the complains you make are really unreasonable. Basically you're asking that the game punish other good players [Content removed - please keep all discussion polite and constructive. -Prof. Poplar]
  lastly whether they have a bench full of pokemon ex or not does not matter. by the sounds of it its not going to take EX pokemon to defeat you, at least with ex pokemon you lose the game faster and can play another game sooner and gain more tokens.
  Emergence, good advice, i came across a few opponant decks which were very well thought out and work very well with all the cards, those decks are very very few. Nearly all the opponants which i was matched against had the same deck builds - buttermilk as mentioned above and an EX heavy which almost always consists of the X and Y legendary pokemon EX cards and that horrible energy ball attack which as far as i know cant not be countered without having a pokemon yourself to KO that one.
  Chronophysicist, I am certainly not the only one in 'my league' and there are many others because my starting position is with 40+ booster codes already used (excluding all the ones given to you in game), i am pretty sure there are many players out there who start this game without even using a single code and only have the very few given at the beginning etc.
  so no iam not a bad player who is the only one miles below the 2nd worst player online. Matchmaking is terrible, they need to sort that out and it needs to take into account peoples card collections, match people with similar collections for example (it is doable, it is reasonable). there are many solutions to this issue.
  they need to add filter options where you can play with certain card restrictions, maybe even set up a customisable vs system. When someone hosts what they want, and someone else can search for hosted games. keep the current matchmaking system (but better algorithms etc etc) for those who just want a quicky.
  As i said earlier, there are many many many many areas of oppertunity for a vast amount of improvement, this company just has to actually read, listern and act on what the community say. Iam not saying my ideas would work but they are something worth thinking about and improving on/taking into consideration.
  honestly 40 booster codes is nothing, especially in the online tcg where you can get codes for so cheap.
  the mods have said time and time again that they are not interested in further fragmenting the player base. If you feel that standard battles are too hard then go ahead and try playing in practice matches instead of the ranked ones.
  also am I understanding correctly that you want to basically play against decks that have no proper strategy(EX not allowed, buttermilk not allowed, seems like you just want to ban everything except your own deck) so that you can have a chance of winning? I think its quite selfish for you to dictate what other people are allowed to play just because you keep losing. If they did make a matchmaking service where you could enforce all these limitations, do you really think there will be many players out there willing to play with you?
  [Content removed - please keep all discussion polite and constructive. -Prof. Poplar] when you enter ranked matches, you are already declaring that you are ready to face anything and you should not be complaining when you get a bad matchup. The reason you keep getting matched against good decks is because the amount of people at your level is too small so the chances you would get matched with them is very small as well, which is why I would recommend you start at the practice matches where the amount of beginner players are higher, it doesn't prevent good players from going there, but I would imagine majority of good players would get bored quite quickly playing there.
  Yes there is a flaw to how the game determines who has the advantage, but fixing that does not change the fact that you are a bad player still.
  If there were ever to be a filter system for this game where hosts can implement restrictions to the game I would expect it to be only in the practice matches as you are intentionally limiting the variety of cards playable which is already a clear sign of a bad player not willing to make adjustments to cover his weak points and instead uses restrictions to get around it.
  Lastly I think the other good options to get what you want would be to just try get to know people on the chat and find people at your level, then just challenge them in friend battles, that way you can agree on the restrictions beforehand and play the way you want.
  wazzwatson
  i agree its hard on new players if you jump straight into pvp but theres plenty of ways to pick up new cards/decks through trainer challenge ect if your that bothered by it just buy packs and go from there and check out deck disscusions . ive been playing 2/3 years on ptcgo and iv learnt that it takes alot of experimenting and testing to find the right decks to play competitivly its took me long enough to play well on online and i do once or twice a month do by packs but i suggest hitting the tournaments when they are on and use the theme decks to win them free packs
  Save up your tokens, buy a theme deck with them and play PvP with that to collect more tokens which you can then spend on booster packs. The idea of the online game is to somewhat mimic the real life card game which primarily has two formats; standard and unlimited. If you wish to play people with limited or no EX cards then you'll need to ask people specifically for that type of game just as you would have to in real life. There's plenty more whiny kids who want to play no EX games. Alternatively learn to beat the decks, you see the same decks coming up all the time so look out for their weaknesses and build a deck to beat them.
  The Nationals in the States has just been won by a deck containing no EX in the Seniors Division, so there are decks out there that can win.
  Spoiler alert for OP: Every TCG in the history of ever is pay 2 win. If you want to play for free, you WILL lose. This applies to every singe TCG ever and not unique to PTCGO.
  I don't have my copy/paste answer about EX's being OP at the moment, so I'll sum it up: Good decks with good card synergy and flow are good. A deck with bad card synergy and flow are bad. Some decks are a step above others and thus are considered "Tier 1" decks. These "Tier 1" decks have absolute fine tuned card synergy and flow. The EX's are not OP, it's finding the right EX to syngerize with your decklist. In fact a "Tier 1" deck often is very reliant on being trainer heavy with the bare minimum pokemon needed to make the trainers do their thing.
  All in all, you need to way calm down. This is a TCG and there is a Pay 2 Win element. The reward AND matchmaking system are quite improved since several months ago when I made some posts highlighting their previous problems.
  Matchmaking in particular got WAY better. More than likely you are such a low ranking (due to having awful decks and questionable game understanding) that the system gives you sometimes stronger players to avoid 10+ minute que times.
  Either way you are at the bottom of the barrel. Maybe you need to just spend some money for codes, or maybe (and more likely) you also need to look for resources outside this forum to improve your play.
  I went from basically a newbie like yourself to a very high MMR with a 68% winrate over 300 games. I did it because I did not blame EX's for being "OP" or complain about how everyone had better cards than me. I went in with a mindset based around improving, and nothing else.
  On a final note, the big thing would be "Why am I bad at this game?". I believe it's because the game offers you no assistance to get better, and this post is further proof of that point. Plz PTCGO, help players improve by giving them good resources to do so!
  TL;DR: Play more practice, you are very obviously NOT ready for ranked. EX's aren't OP, good deck lists with top synergy and flow are what make some certain EX's seem op.
  Is Flygon-Dusknoir-Accelgor considered Tier 1 now?
  Because that deck is seriously good.
  Without any Ex's.
  [quote=ArtichokeCat;870465*** Flygon-Dusknoir-Accelgor considered Tier 1 now?
  It's amazing!! I would build it, but i have none of the three cards plus no Beach
  Eh? I like built it from scratch... you can see my secondary list in the deck construction section.
  Under the post, Flygon-Dusknoir...Raticate? (No Beach.)
  3 Flygon= 3
  2 Dusknoir= 4
  Edit: I forgot i was promoting it in my signature.
  Actually forgot in my previous post. Just play theme if you must play ranked. It's perfect for players that are looking to play competitive without a good collection/deck.
  Also with the new reward wheel, PTCGO has by and far the most fair free to play system of any online TCG, I have played almost all of them. In fact one of the most popular ones for a game that is much older and established than Pokemon literally gives you NOTHING for free. Not a thing. Boosters sell for full retail price of a physical pack and several cards have $100+ USD value.
  I'll gladly admit that I'm a bad player (a scrub one might say), but I refuse to believe that I'm so bad a player that there's literally no one else around my level to play against. Yet I go up against people with decks filled to the brim with Mewtwo EX, Yveltal EX, Blastoise/Keldeo EX, any other randomly overpowered EX they happened to have in their collection or just fill their entire bench with 100+HP legendary Pokémon.
  I don't see how the matchmaking system can match my scrubby deck up to that ****, so I usually just sit out the first 2 minutes of the match AFK, then concede to at least get the wheel spin reward.
  But honestly, something needs to be done about this matchmaking system, because it's just not working properly. I've tried Practice mode for a week or 2, but even in there people throw around EXes like its candy (though not as bad as in ranked).
  Also, it's not that I lack the EXes to build my own overpowered deck (I do in fact have quite a good collection), but there's simply no fun in instant playing 170+HP basics that do 50+ damage with 1-2 energy. Most of the fun matches are against players that play a deck similar to mine. Just a bunch of regular Pokémon that actually need to evolve (like they're supposed to, that's the whole concept of Pokémon, lol). These matches are fun, exciting and aren't over in a few turns because not everything on the field is hitting for over 100 after turn 2.
  Dude, have you heard that Level Ball will be rotating?
  Sounds like you have issues with the design of PTCG which PTCGO has nothing to do with.
  I was talking about the one Pooka talked about on his channel! The one that came second in a country's nationals..
  Yeah I know. Henry Prior used a similar list in US Nationals.
  But Beach is EXPENSIVE and is going to rotate along with Accelgor...
  I was thinking that PTCGO will also add an extended format as it tries to mimic real life TCG!
  Yeah, there was a rumor that they would make a BW on format.
  Sorry CHRONOPHYSICIST, but having a weak deck (through no fault of his own) does not make him a bad player, and entering Practice matches does not guarantee him an easier time in battles, as they have the same chance of battling a so-called skilled player whose victories stem from their having cloned a championship deck from a decklist. When someone enters a "Ranked" battle, they expect it to be exactly that: Ranked according to skill level.
  While establishing a ranking based on collection or number of cards obtained is impractical (not to mention inaccurate, since one person could open hundreds of packs and only end up with cards they'd put through the shredder if they were only real, while another could open only a few and end up with the makings of a killer deck), there are more practical ways to establish a ranking and pair accordingly; such as number of games played, a player's personal win/loss ratio, the win/loss ratio of the deck they're using, and so on. "Ranked" battles does not mean throwing you into the deep end of a shark pool and hopeing there's no Great White nearby to swallow you like a little minnow.
  Accordingly, I do agree with him that the Boosters available in the online "store" are too expensive for what you get, particularly since the only productive way to earn tokens is to enter "Ranked" battles. It used to be that you could earn plenty by going through the Trainer Challenge. While the decks they used were often too over powered, especially since you yourself were restricted to weak Theme decks, at least the AI was dumb enough to make stupid mistakes no human ever would, and that gave you a fighting chance. Additionally, if you beat them well enough on a high enough difficulty, you could earn a large amount of tokens in a short amount of time. Now, however, no matter how well you do or what difficulty you choose, you'll only earn a single token for each victory and nothing at all if you lose (plus a free booster if you beat 12 different ones with a deck you physically bought in the store).
  While the Bonus Wheel is a nice improvement to the PVP games, increasing the number of tokens you can earn there, to my knowledge it is only available in the so-called Ranking matches, meaning you have to brave a dive into that shark tank to get those coins. It'd be much better off if they restored the old rewards system to the Trainer Challenge (or even add the Bonus Wheel to it), so the starting players can better build their decks and hone their skills in order to be ready to challenge other players in PVP.
  I don't expect you to agree with me, [Content removed - please keep all discussion polite and constructive. -Prof. Poplar]