Weakness question

[Redhawk05]

I just started playing Pokemon TCG with my son, who's 7, and am still learning having never played before myself.

I've bought some starter decks, XY decks, elemental decks, and don't know anything about what generation cards we're playing with, but I don't think it matters.

1. When I look at a weakness chart online they don't correspond at all to what the weakness says on the card. For example, the chart says electric does double damage to water, but the card says grass does double damage to water. And instead of 2x damage, it says ~20. What does ~20 mean? Do I go off the online weakness chart I found, or what it says on the card?

2. Why do some decks come with OP basics, like a basic Kyogore with like 150 health and does 100 damage or a basic Groudon like that? I tell my son we can't use them because they're too powerful. He doesn't like that I won't allow them.

Thank you for your help. I can't find anything about this online.

 

[Inkblots]

1. You go off what it says on the card. The weakness chart you found online is likely for the video games, where weakness and resistance work a bit differently. As for the ~20, you are probably looking at resistance, not weakness, which is usually –20 (attacks to that pokemon do 20 less damage)

2. In my experience theme decks are fairly evenly matched (assuming they were released within a few years of each other. A deck from the very early days of the TCG probably won't hold up against one released in the last year or two, but I've never actually tested this). All theme decks have one or two powerful cards in them, and each deck has a fairly strong strategy built into it (even though they often have a lot of useless cards), but sometimes the strategy and those powerful cards aren't obvious until you've used the deck a few times. I would suggest you DO use those cards you think are overpowered, you might be surprised to find that they don't offer as big an advantage as you think, and you will probably find the game more interesting and challenging. Beating them often requires creative use of your trainer cards and pokemon abilities, or sacrificing a few weak pokemon in order to build up your stronger ones. Likewise, relying on those strong cards can come back to bite you - they often come with a caveat, like having to discard energy in order to use an attack, and so can actually be quite a big risk to use - you have to either build up a lot of energy on them before you send them out, and risk losing all those energy cards if it gets knocked out; or send it out with the minimum energy, hope that you keep drawing more each turn, and use your allotted one energy per turn to keep attacking and risk not having any backup if it gets knocked out; or choose not to attack (allowing your opponent more time to build up their pokemon) and instead make sure you have a backup on your bench

I mostly play using theme decks for a variety of reasons, so if you have questions about a specific deck, or general strategies for theme decks, feel free to shoot me a message and I can help you figure them out.

 

[Electricbluewolf]

I just started playing Pokemon TCG with my son, who's 7, and am still learning having never played before myself.

I've bought some starter decks, XY decks, elemental decks, and don't know anything about what generation cards we're playing with, but I don't think it matters.

1. When I look at a weakness chart online they don't correspond at all to what the weakness says on the card. For example, the chart says electric does double damage to water, but the card says grass does double damage to water. And instead of 2x damage, it says ~20. What does ~20 mean? Do I go off the online weakness chart I found, or what it says on the card?

2. Why do some decks come with OP basics, like a basic Kyogore with like 150 health and does 100 damage or a basic Groudon like that? I tell my son we can't use them because they're too powerful. He doesn't like that I won't allow them.

Thank you for your help. I can't find anything about this online.

As Inkblots has mentioned you're probably looking at the video game one, which has 2, 4 times weakness. Card games have weakness and resistance just like video games, but the -20 if the resistance. It means if the resistance was against lightning, the attack of the attacking pokemon does -20 (So say it usually does 140, it'll do 120 base damage, then you figure out if the damage is increased/decreased by any items/abilities)
Don't forget (I know this sounds patronising) that all the types aren't covered in TCG. Ice types-such as Regice-share the same symbol with water, but instead of having a weakness to grass/lighting, have a weakness to steel. So what is weak for one "water" Pokemon, isn't for another.

If you think that is OP you should check out EX's. Usually high HP Pokemon have high energy cost attacks, and you can only attach 1 enegry per turn (there are Pokemon abilities that allow you to attach more than one) For example, for an EX, I have a Manectric EX deck, Manectric EX has 170 HP, for 1 energy does 20, and 20 to one Pokemon on the bench, and for 2 energy does 60, then if the Pokemon has an item attached to it 120. The Mega Manectric does 110 for 2 energies.
I do have to say though stopping him from using them isn't going to help his play. If he went to a local league his deck would probably get smashed as it's very competitive (even for juniors) and they don't care if something is OP or not (and basic Kyogre to use in a deck wise there isn't much around)

 

[donavannj]

One of the things about that Kyogre being so much more powerful than the other Basic Pokemon is that Kyogre is, as far as the game's story goes, a Legendary Pokemon (and a powerful one at that), so they give it better stats in the TCG to account for that.