Sleeves and Playmat Question

lukkul

lukkul

Aspiring Trainer
Member
How good are Mega Gengar Play! Pokemon sleeves and other Play Pokémon! sleeves comparing to the popular commercial sleeves? My local card shop gave me a free pack for my purchase.
What is the usefulness of playmats and should I get one? Isn't card protection by sleeves enough?
 
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The Play Pokemon! sleeves are fine. I haven't had any problem with them.

As far as playmats go, they have one main use outside of looking cool: Generally they are more "grippy" than tables, so your cards will be less likely to slide around (which happens a lot on smooth surfaces, especially when sleeved). But you may not notice that big of a difference. You could probably go without one for now.
 
Are Elite Trainer Box sleeves the same as the Gengar sleeves? If so, the ETB sleeves that I have are really bad, they started to fall apart in less than 6 months, after only minimal tournaments and solitairing.
 
tototavros said:
Are Elite Trainer Box sleeves the same as the Gengar sleeves? If so, the ETB sleeves that I have are really bad, they started to fall apart in less than 6 months, after only minimal tournaments and solitairing.
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I haven't had that happen to my ETB sleeves very much, but I think it's fairly typical of any sleeve to start breaking down after 6 months of competitive play.

That said, if you want to maximize durability, I'd recommend the Ultra Pro Matte sleeves. You can get a 50-count for a couple bucks, in a selection of colors. Pretty much everyone at the local tournies I go to use them, and they tend to last a long time.
 
Purrloin said:
I haven't had that happen to my ETB sleeves very much, but I think it's fairly typical of any sleeve to start breaking down after 6 months of competitive play.

That said, if you want to maximize durability, I'd recommend the Ultra Pro Matte sleeves. You can get a 50-count for a couple bucks, in a selection of colors. Pretty much everyone at the local tournies I go to use them, and they tend to last a long time.
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I am double sleeving my cards with KMC perfect fit and KMC Hyper Matte. That is why I do not to want to open the mega Gengar sleeves and use different sleeves to go thru the hassle of re-sleeving the staple trainer cards every now and then. I do like the idea of my night march deck with mega Gengar sleeves though.
 
Purrloin said:
I haven't had that happen to my ETB sleeves very much, but I think it's fairly typical of any sleeve to start breaking down after 6 months of competitive play.

That said, if you want to maximize durability, I'd recommend the Ultra Pro Matte sleeves. You can get a 50-count for a couple bucks, in a selection of colors. Pretty much everyone at the local tournies I go to use them, and they tend to last a long time.
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It wasn't 6 months of competitive play. That's the sad part. It was a States, a LC, and a few games of solitaire against myself (which occurred over the span of 6 months).
 
Ah, yeah that sounds rough. What sort of shuffling do you do during turns? I've always been curious if some forms of shuffling degrade cases faster than others.
 
Playmats aren't needed, but they're used for two things
1. Protecting your sleeves,
playing on dirty tables ruin your sleeves faster, take care of your sleeves!
2. They show who you are; kinda;
See me personally, I have a custom mat made; a huge sableye on it
or you can just have a pokemon mat to just protect your sleeves
 
While many have said - you don't really need a Playmat, but they are very helpful and nice to have. Especially if you use glossy sleeves instead of Matte Sleeves.

ETB sleeves are the kind of sleeves I wouldn't recommend. They are best used as binder/collection sleeves.

I may need to double check this but I'm pretty sure Double Sleeveing isn't allowed in tournaments. However if you are to go with any matte sleeves, pick out a 100 count pack. I've been warned in a tournament for using two packs of 50 count sleeves because apparently the way they're cut can make it easy to determine where your cards are. ((Yeah I know, my opponents and everyone at the table thought that was a pretty uncalled for and ridiculous warning)
 
TokenDuelist said:
While many have said - you don't really need a Playmat, but they are very helpful and nice to have. Especially if you use glossy sleeves instead of Matte Sleeves.

ETB sleeves are the kind of sleeves I wouldn't recommend. They are best used as binder/collection sleeves.

I may need to double check this but I'm pretty sure Double Sleeveing isn't allowed in tournaments. However if you are to go with any matte sleeves, pick out a 100 count pack. I've been warned in a tournament for using two packs of 50 count sleeves because apparently the way they're cut can make it easy to determine where your cards are. ((Yeah I know, my opponents and everyone at the table thought that was a pretty uncalled for and ridiculous warning)
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Players may use inner sleeves inside their normal sleeves as long as they follow all other sleeve rules and they do not create a marked card situation.
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From Play! Pokemon TCG Tournament Rules and Formats
 
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