Discussion Double Battles in TCG?

President Pokemon

Aspiring Trainer
Member
Wouldn't it be cool if you could be able to put out two active Pokemon like a double battle in the video games? What would that look like in the game and how would it work? I'd love to hear any thoughts, opinions or ideas!
 
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Otaku

The wise fool?
Member
Wouldn't it be cool if you could be able to put out two active Pokemon like a double battle in the video games? What would that look like in the game and how would it work? I'd love to hear any thoughts, opinions or ideas!

You can... it is just when they introduced it, we didn't find it particularly fun. ^^' You can go here to the official Play! Pokémon Rules & Resources page, then download Play! Pokémon Rules and Formats for the rules to it and many other things in the TCG. Page 23 of this document Explains the "Unsanctioned Fun Formats" and begins with 2-on-2 rules. At the time 2-on-2 was introduced, players were still trying to get the-powers-that-be to revive the Team Battle format, which WotC had introduced. Regrettably, this led both to fall by the wayside. You'll find official rules for Team Battle in that same document, as well as a 30-card format; I don't know if the latter was every really used.

All of these alternate formats are options for unsanctioned play; the reason they are in this rules document is for use in unsanctioned side events. I would like to see some of these added to the PTCGO. While I still have little interest in 2-on-2 play (if you read those rules, you'll see why XP), Team Play was great (though I played it under a previous set of rules, so maybe that won't be true now). 30 card seems great for those struggling with the costs of building competitive decks; the 4 Copy Rule doesn't apply, but instead is replaced by a two copy per car per deck rule!
 

FourteenAlmonds

Helipotile
Member
@Otaku !!!

It seems that the link to the Rules and Formats is now broken (although that's not a huge surprise given it's been almost three years now). Would you be able to find it again and post a new link, or somehow be able to send me the document?

Thanks :)
 

Otaku

The wise fool?
Member
The good news is that the old link for the Play! Pokémon Rules & Resources page still works (and even if it didn't, I just gave it again). The bad news is that, while I can provide a link to the current Play! Pokémon Trading Card Game Rules And Formats document (here), a past revision of it removed the section covering the three alternate rule sets I mentioned. The mostly good news is that I made sure to save past versions of the document, so I still have the most recent Revision (from November 2, 2017) that contained the rules. I don't have time to copy/paste them here, because they formatting isn't quite compatible with the board (re: I'll need to spend time making it more legible).

If a moderator notices this, could they let me know if I should post the 2-On-2 rules here, or start a new thread for it? I was thinking - though I kept forgetting >.> - that I could (should?) start threads about the other two Formats (30-Card and Team Battle), now that the rules are harder to come by.
 

Merovingian

Dead Game Enthusiast
Member
I think they implemented battles where you had two Active Pokemon during GEN III. I was out of the game at that time, but I know it was a thing.
 

Otaku

The wise fool?
Member
For better or worse, I did post a thread with the rules posted here. As I may end up adding the other fun Formats to the discussion, and even if not, because I hoped for it to become a semi-permanent fixture to discuss these Formats, I thought it best to start fresh.
 

Yaginku

H-on Will Save Pokemon
Member
Just last week (for Valentine's Day), we have ran a special, unsanctioned 2v2 tournament with an original ruleset. While a couple of sessions of playtesting + a tournament isn't enough to judge how viable a format is, it wasn't immediately exploitable and the games had a fair bit of strategy to them.

The basic rules are as follows:
  • Two players in each team, with their own decks.
  • Each team selects a Leader.
  • Each player puts four cards into their team's Prize pool, for a total of 8 prizes.
  • Each player takes their turn separately, starting from the Leader of the team that goes first, following to the opposite Leader, then the second player from the first team, and finally the second player from the second team.
  • Leaders cannot play Supporters nor attack on their first turn. The third player can play a Supporter, but cannot attack. The fourth player can play their first turn as normal.
  • Each attack targets one of the opponent's Pokemon.
  • "Your opponent" refers to only one opponent (you can only target one opponent with a card like Reset Stamp). "You" refers only to you (cannot Potion an ally's Pokemon). Only "each player" and "each Pokemon" refer to everyone.
There are some other minor details I have written down, but feel free to test these rules if you want to play 2v2.
 
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