PTCG Live Will Make It Insanely Affordable to Build Pokemon TCG Decks!

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Today marked the beta launch of PTCG Live, the upcoming replacement for PTCGO! Currently it is only available to Canadian users, but it will get a full launch later this year.
With today’s launch, fans are learning just how easy it will be to obtain the cards needed for a deck.
Like in PTCGO, you only need up to four copies of a card to build decks. (You can use those same cards in multiple deck lists.)
In PTCGO, if you needed cards you didn’t have, you either needed to pull them from virtual booster packs or trade with other users. But like in real life, there was a small selection of desirable cards players wanted — and no need for junk commons that everyone already owned. This created a high barrier of entry to access the meta cards needed for decks.
In PTCG Live, you...

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If I'm understanding correctly so far, the so called "credits" are like a secondary currency, like coins in MTGA, and those purple things will be like the gems, stuff you acquire by putting actual money into the game, correct? Not having transactions is just a beta thing, right?
 
If I'm understanding correctly so far, the so called "credits" are like a secondary currency, like coins in MTGA, and those purple things will be like the gems, stuff you acquire by putting actual money into the game, correct? Not having transactions is just a beta thing, right?
There is three currencies: coins, crystals and credits. Coins are mainly for cosmetics. Crystals, as far as I know, is for boosters, bundles and cards related things. Credits is the "dust" that you use to craft cards. There is no micro transactions (and not only in beta)
 
There is three currencies: coins, crystals and credits. Coins are mainly for cosmetics. Crystals, as far as I know, is for boosters, bundles and cards related things. Credits is the "dust" that you use to craft cards. There is no micro transactions (and not only in beta)
So just like in PTCGO there is no direct means for you to pour money into the game? How do we get the purple stuff then? I assume codes will continue giving you the corresponding product in-game, except now you can't trade them for other stuff or for cards, so you'll have to open the packs and "dust" cards you don't want into Crystals, that turn into other cards, but how about the purple stuff, isn't that the currency that will be used to buy packs and other stuff directly from the game?
 
Is it certain that these aren't simply temporarily inflated values for the sake of making beta testing easier?
 
I hope they do this, as a person who doesn't get a lot of codes, I am really happy that they included this!!!
 
So just like in PTCGO there is no direct means for you to pour money into the game? How do we get the purple stuff then? I assume codes will continue giving you the corresponding product in-game, except now you can't trade them for other stuff or for cards, so you'll have to open the packs and "dust" cards you don't want into Crystals, that turn into other cards, but how about the purple stuff, isn't that the currency that will be used to buy packs and other stuff directly from the game?
People, please read the FAQ. The same questions that were already answered there keep popping up. Crystals are used to buy packs and products, Coins are used to buy cosmetics, and Credits are used to craft cards. You get all 3 from playing the game, and you also get credits from dusting cards.

Now for the parts that aren't in the FAQ directly: you can't manually dust cards. Cards you have more than a playset of are dusted automatically, and that's it. Also, you can still use pack codes, but only up to 400 per set, and I think you only get 5 cards per pack.

Is it certain that these aren't simply temporarily inflated values for the sake of making beta testing easier?
These are in line with other TCG clients, so I don't know why you're expecting worse.
 
Is it certain that these aren't simply temporarily inflated values for the sake of making beta testing easier?
Yes; the backlash from doing that would be so stupid and would not be worth it. They're a large company and likely did the math based on several factors, primarily focusing on what incentivizes the most people to buy product while not being too stingy compared to other mobile card game clients.
 
People, please read the FAQ. The same questions that were already answered there keep popping up. Crystals are used to buy packs and products, Coins are used to buy cosmetics, and Credits are used to craft cards. You get all 3 from playing the game, and you also get credits from dusting cards.

Now for the parts that aren't in the FAQ directly: you can't manually dust cards. Cards you have more than a playset of are dusted automatically, and that's it. Also, you can still use pack codes, but only up to 400 per set, and I think you only get 5 cards per pack.


These are in line with other TCG clients, so I don't know why you're expecting worse.

Sorry for not being very clear before. I mean, that was what I had read around, I was just so confused about there not being any way for you to just buy at least one of the currencies that I was asking to see if I had missed something, but apparently not... That is so weird to me, I mean, what is the point of the whole revamp then? I thought they'd be drooling over how much money can be made from something even half as predatory as Arena for instance. It also makes me wonder about a lot of weird stuff. For instance, ok, if I can only gain stuff from playing, and the way to get cards you need is by actually acquiring cards past their playset thresholds, the fastest way to achieve that is probably by just going all-in on a single set, right? I mean, why would you buy codes and/or open packs from different collections? You'll never get what you need, you should just choose a set, open it to oblivion so that you more frequently open cards that you already have playsets of, and gain the credits you need to buy the cards you actually want, right? Like, just choose the smallest set possible that currently exists in the client and open that. It just feels like such a weird system. Unless I'm still missing something? Is that limit of 400 codes per set also a limit for in-game acquired packs? Is that how they're gonna prevent what I just thought of?
 
After a day of content creators playing, it turns out that the initial gems you start out with are incredibly difficult to get. Without gems, you can't buy packs. Without packs, you can't get cards to turn into credits. Without credits, you can't build new decks.

Buying code cards will be the only reasonable way to get enough credits to build more decks, and even they aren't infinite. There's a 400 limit cap on importing codes of any set forever (once this limit is reached, whenever you try to import a code of that set, you get 25 coins instead).
 
Wow, nothing new for people that read information.
They announced this on day 1 but Pokemon fans aren't willing to do any research if it means their opinion of a game will be improved. I explicitly had to go out of my way to explain this to SO many people when PTCGL was announced.
 
Wow, nothing new for people that read information.
They announced this on day 1 but Pokemon fans aren't willing to do any research if it means their opinion of a game will be improved. I explicitly had to go out of my way to explain this to SO many people when PTCGL was announced.
The credit amounts were not there.
 
It's worth opening some Brilliant Stars packs in the current client due to getting more cards per pack, but I'm not entirely convinced it's worth opening "all" your (code) packs, unless I'm missing something and you can get more rares than the rare and reverse rare slots per pack.

When considering that 0 trade value commons and uncommons (e.g. the upcoming Brilliant Star Corphish, Hitmontop, Castform, etc etc) can pile up in the 10-50+ count depending on how many packs/boxes you bought, at least waiting for the new client would result in all of those being dusted and being "traded" for something actually desirable that would never happen in the current client. It's definitely worth opening code card packs in the current client until you get 4 copies of several (or most) of the commons, but after that it's probably not worth chasing after rares/ultra rares/secret rares (or 4 copies of them) in the current client. This is all also not considering using coins in the current client, which you might be able to get some commons to 4 copies from just free packs alone before the client shuts down.


The only thing that I'm miffed about is the 400 codes per pack count... I think I've only ever reached around 250-300ish by buying multiple boxes and ETB's, but considering how often they shoehorn older packs into various products, it's not an impossible number to reach even without directly buying code cards.


I was missing something as I thought, and the first 3 slots CAN potentially be a Pokemon V, VMAX, Ultra Rare, Rainbow Rare, or Secret Rare, meaning you can in theory (albeit extremely unlikely) get 5 big hits in 1 pack, where as right now the max is 2 (from the rare and reverse slot). Even if the odds are extremely low, this makes it even less reason to redeem pack codes in the current client beyond getting some commons to 4 copies, but that can be done with free packs bought with the current client's gold so it's still probably not a good idea to redeem any pack codes in the current client.
 
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I think it’s good that cards are so accessible, even if it means newer player will have a deck of V’s trading was painfully slow to find the right cards and pack were rubbish, also I like the fact that you only have up to 4 pokemon and get points as common build up so fast like I have over 25 Elecktrikes from Darkness ablaze.
 
By having 5-card packs for in-game booster means a lot. Technically the set will be a bit easier to collect in higher rarities and 2 Common per pack means you won't get filled of commonly hated stuff.

Also, Japan TCG regular booster is 5 cards, Brazil is 6. So, nothing new techinically.
Feel free to redeem the TCGL codes as you want. It's your account after all.
 
After a day of content creators playing, it turns out that the initial gems you start out with are incredibly difficult to get. Without gems, you can't buy packs. Without packs, you can't get cards to turn into credits. Without credits, you can't build new decks.

Buying code cards will be the only reasonable way to get enough credits to build more decks, and even they aren't infinite. There's a 400 limit cap on importing codes of any set forever (once this limit is reached, whenever you try to import a code of that set, you get 25 coins instead).

Things in its current state are looking grim. Right now, you can buy codes and easily build what you want, despite what everyone keeps saying (it's like I live in a parallel universe where having to look for a card in trades is considered "hard stuff", it's clunky at worst). I don't know how the droprates will be in those packs (Brazil packs don't come with a guaranteed rare btw, you can get boosters with nothing but commons and uncommons, don't know if that will be the case as well for those ptcgl 5 card packs), but even if you go like all-in on a set and get to the maximum 400 packs, I doubt you'll get to 5ths and beyond on higher rarity cards, so it will all depend o how much commons and uncommons will give you credit so you can buy the rares and up that you actually want. And I just realized now...that's probably why they made the pack smaller and with less commons and cards overall, they knew that you would probably get a lot of credits from those....things looking shady already.
 
I would personally refrain from saying "Oh wow this system is actually good" when it's very well known that CCG app systems are generous at the start and then it's much, much harder to accumulate resources.

Feels like some people are starting to hit roadblocks after building a single meta deck or attempting to build one from zero resources, which fits in with how card-game apps are designed nowadays...

This is also a personal peeve, but holy ****, the UI and the avatars are butt-ugly. I wasn't expecting Master Duel-standards of graphics and music, but it's like they put as little of an effort as they could.
 
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