Rule Minutiae

[DionHouston]

Hi all,

I have encountered a few questions and I'm interested in opinions, but I'm especially interested if anyone has links to authoritative interpretations. I haven't really found any on the Pokemon website.

- Weakness on non-damage inflicting attacks. Say for example the "attacking" pokemon is a Ralts, defending is a Gardevoir (W:Psy+30). Ralts does a future sight. Does Gardevoir take 30 damage because Ralts did an "attack" that does 0 damage?

- Rare Candy on Pokemon just put down. E.g. Do a Bebe's search to put down a Wurmple, and then use Rare Candy to put down a Beautifly. Illegal because Wurmple was just put down, or legal because Rare Candy is a trainer card?

- Attacks affecting benched Pokemon when none exist. For example, Zangoose Invite and Strike (switch defending Pokemon with one of your opponents benched Pokemon and do 20 damage on the new defending Pokemon). If the opponent has no benched Pokemon can Zangoose not do this attack?

Thanks in advance for your collective wisdom. To date I have been playing a) Ralts' attack does damage b) Illegal because Wurmple was just put down and c) Zangoose cannot attack, but I'm curious if there's a forum that this has definitively been settled.

Dion

 

[ShinjisLover]

- Weakness on non-damage inflicting attacks. Say for example the "attacking" pokemon is a Ralts, defending is a Gardevoir (W:Psy+30). Ralts does a future sight. Does Gardevoir take 30 damage because Ralts did an "attack" that does 0 damage?
No. The attack doesn't even come into contact with opponent.


- Rare Candy on Pokemon just put down. E.g. Do a Bebe's search to put down a Wurmple, and then use Rare Candy to put down a Beautifly. Illegal because Wurmple was just put down, or legal because Rare Candy is a trainer card?
It's legal.

- Attacks affecting benched Pokemon when none exist. For example, Zangoose Invite and Strike (switch defending Pokemon with one of your opponents benched Pokemon and do 20 damage on the new defending Pokemon). If the opponent has no benched Pokemon can Zangoose not do this attack?
I'm not sure, but I think the attack just affects the current Defending Pokémon.​

 

[donavannj]

With the Zangoose attack, if it doesn't say it can't use the attack if there aren't any benched Pokemon on the opponents bench in the attack's description, it can, if I recall.

 

[DionHouston]

Thanks Shinjislover and Donavannj for your replies! Of course after reading what I posted for accuracy a couple times I re-read the rulebook (for I don't know the how many-th time) and my first question was very clearly there, and I took the professors test and derived the answer to the second question as well. That leaves only the Zangoose question open.

But taking the Professor's test actually brought my mind back to the question of authoritative interpretations. MTG has for example a website which includes officially sponsored forums for asking questions and answers (I'd link it but apparently I'm not allowed -- I can send links through email by request). The closest thing I've seen for Pokemon is a site with tournament rules that don't really answer questions like 2 and 3 above. The Professor's test does contain some very card specific questions but I wasn't able to find any official references for the test.

So is there a resource or forum available that is more technical and card focused, or is this derived in large parts from participating in Organized Play, or something like that?

Thanks,

Dion