Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Sleep over pokemon drama (kinda long)

A

algernon

New Member
Here is a fun little story about the start of my day. Hope this is ok to post here, this seems like the best forum.

Getting ready to take my son's sleep over guest home this morning before work, I noticed a sleeve from my son's water deck on the floor. Hmm, that's odd. But we sometimes have loose deck sleeves when we borrow cards for other deck builds so it may have fallen out by mistake. Then, by chance, I asked my son to get me the binder where we keep our lv.X, ex, and rare foil starters (absol, pachi, etc). He couldn't find it, but our guest knew where it was. Turns out he had fallen asleep with it looking the cards last night. OK... hmm... I'm not to crazy about that... but kids will be kids and no harm done. The guest hands me the binder...one of my absol's is missing. He nervously tells me it must have fallen out while he was looking at them last night. We search the bed for it. No luck. He goes and "finds" it in the play room. I then notice several open spaces in the binder. I ask my son and guest where the cards might be. My son has no idea. Our guest mumbles something about how he had brought some cards over and maybe he put them with those by mistake. He then pulls the following cards out of his pocket (no sleeves or protectors mind you).

including:

Flygon EX
Dialga lv.X
Torrterra lv.X
Infernape lv.X (taken out of a deck box and unsleeved from my deck) - when asked the guest was able to "find" the sleeve from under son's bed
Blastoise SW holo
Suicune SW holo (taken out of a deck box and unsleeved from my son's water deck) - this is the sleeve I found
Empoleon lx. X

Basically this kid had been systematically pulling rare cards from our decks and our binder last night and this morning. Luckily none of the cards were damaged and luckily I had a whim to check the binder before he left. I am pretty sure guest never had any cards of his own over here.

He not only tried to steal these cards but broke up 2 decks to do it. I am a tad miffed.

We didn't accuse him or make a scene, but I made sure he checked to see if he had mistakingly "picked" up any more cards. Needless to say I had to use my best poker face and tantric breathing to remain calm enough to collect our cards, do a quick card inventory, help him gather his things, and then drive the kid home. It was a long and quiet car ride.

Not sure how I will handle this. But at least our cards are safe. We also didn't make a big deal about it with our son and never mentioned "stealing", but the first thing our son asked my wife was: "do you think ______ was trying to steal these cards?"

Sorry for the long post but I had to share. The trust and invasion by a guest in our house is what really gets to me, that plus my son's feelings about a "friend" doing something like this.

I am just glad I happened to check before these cards left and got damaged or lost for good.

Anyone else have any stories like this? How did you handle it?:eek:
 
My son and I haven't had anything like this happen, although he's had a door prize "disappear" at a prelease. Unfortunately, our league had a bad incident with a binder full of valuable cards and a DS getting stolen. It's a shame. It is a good thing you checked your cards out that morning, and you definitely did the right thing by remaining clam and collected.

The best advice I could give you would be to talk to your son about it without directly addressing his friend stealing. It'll be a good chance to teach your son how friends should or should not act, how you have to be mindful of your stuff, and how you shouldn't take things that aren't yours. Even if your son is older, it never hurts to do a little preaching. :biggrin:

Also, I'd be weary of inviting your son's friend to sleep over again at least for a while or hid the silverware.

I hope this is helpful.
 
ouch :( sounds like you handled a very difficult situation well. i'd definitely be talking to the other child's parent(s) about this though: i'd certainly WANT to know were this my kid :(

just out of curiosity, how old are the kids? that would have a lot to do with how i would handle talking to my child about this.

the other child would not be welcome in my house again for a very long time, if ever; the premeditation of their actions...searching out the cards they wanted, hiding the sleeves, etc. really would bother me, as this doesn't really seem like a spur of the moment, i saw your charizard and pocketed it -type situation. the actions here were deliberate, and took some time to complete =/

'mom
 
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8 yo's. My thoughts exactly on the motive. The kid probably won't be invited over again. This was too premeditated and thorough. Plus, just last night the wife and I were discussing the "strange" vibe this kid sends out. He and his brother always make me nervous when they come over.

On one hand it seems silly to be bothered, but the time and expense of playing this game for real is quite an investment. I always want my son to be able to share his cards, but it's tough to keep them public when they are so valuable and easy to swipe. It is neat to bring binders to league, let his friends thumb through them, etc. I hate to think that I have to always keep one eye open. I do cringe at the grab fest that occurs when a group of kids is opening cards and thumbing through other people binders sometime. But the social aspects of this game are what make it so good.

This is a good learning experience about sharing and boundaries so I guess its not all bad. I don't think the guest truly understood the "value" and opportunity costs of what he was doing. Unless you really play, you don't know how bad a missing card affects a deck/game. But it still bugs me.

I kinda feel bad for th kid, he happened to mess with the wrongs kid's cards. Most non playing parents would not have noticed missing cards right away, if at all. Those Absols were actually mine!!! The only reason I even checked was because I wanted to check out a card for our new Garchomp deck before I left for work!!! I wouldn't have noticed until later otherwise. Who know's what condition those cards would have come back to us in (shudder). I almost screamed and lunged for the cards when he pulled them naked from his pocket!!!

It was a total slow motion NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! moment.

Anyway, thanks for the comments.
 
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Yeah, I'd definatly talk to the prarents on that one. Major no-no, gong throught the stuff like that.

Nothing like that's ever happened to me (being only a kid myself), but I've had a few things happen. About 2 years ago my stepbrother (not actualy, but our parents are together) was caught with some cards (Magcargo ex and an RH Flygon) that the house had been pulled upside down for. I asked "Where did you get these?", becuae I knew his collection, and I was suspicious. "Oh, I got those ages ago.". Riiiiiight. I brought up the fact, but no-one really believed me. I was always a bit upset over that just happening, especialy because that was not the first or the last time some odds and end "got lost".
The only other time that anything happened was at league. I don't know who did it, but it wound me up. After a afternoon at the league, I got home and went to put the rares from my deck away. Right away, I found 2 blank spots with my exs. A promo Zapdos ex and an Empoleon (usualy when I trade, I put the cards up front somewhere until I sort them out) were gone. What made me sooooo mad was how watchfull I was. There was a crowd of new kids hastleing me the whole time, so I assume it was one of them. But what drives me crazy is the persistance. I didn't let that thing ot of my sight, so someone was patient enough to waitand slip their hand under a page or something.


Anyways, it's really too bad that that happened. If I were you, I would clear thing up before having him over again, if at all. But from what you said, I wouldn't trust that kid.
 
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Hmmm, I think you did quite well with an extremely difficult situation. Of course you really wouldn't want this to happen again, and you obviously wouldn't want your child to get some of the same ideas. Discussing this between you and your child is important of course, but I believe discussing this privately with the offending party is also a good idea. Letting them know that you suspect them of wanting to steal and having the opportunity to do so. Let them know that you hold no grudge against them, but will tollerate no further attempts on their part. Knowing where this course of action will lead them might help them to realize that they need to change. If you "give them a second chance," they may surprise you. However, make sure they realize that you will never let them ever have a third. Your helping them in this manner might make a positive impression on a young persons life, your son's life, or your own. Good luck.

Interesting screen name, by the way. Does it have any reference to the classic literary science fiction work? If so, I'm impressed. It was such a interesting book, which - when looking back - helped me grow .... I guess you could say .... spiritually. I looked at people differently after reading "Flowers for Algernon."
 
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Yikes, sorry. At least you got the cards back, but IMO you should explain to your kid that his friend probably meant to steal the cards. BTW, I think I know what league Japple52 mentioned, if I'm right, it was my DS that was stolen, so I know how you feel.
 
I'm probably a terrible person. My first thought was, "That kid made some pretty amateurish mistakes."

That said, the most I've ever done was ninja some abandoned commons and basic land from drafts/sealed. As Mark Twain put it (and I think this is flavour text on some card or another), "It's better to take what does not belong to you than to leave it lying around neglected." I wouldn't apply this to cards of any value, mind you, because some people need statements like this to be made explicitly.
 
Boy you handled that Very Well. I would have just lost my mind and went off. For me i don't have to worry about other kids coming over trying to steal my cards, i have to worry about my Stepson stealing them. After three times of taking my cards, i finally said the heck with this and put them under lock and key. After i stopped him from stealing my cards, he decided to start taking his younger brothers cards, which i caught onto that real fast. To this day we still have to lock up anything that we don't want stolen, including snacks, etc. He is 15 yrs old, will be 16 in Feb. He is not allowed to be left alone in our room, car or house because we just don't trust him at all. He's stolen money from his Grandma and Uncle on numerous visits. His mentality is that he figures he won't get it anyway, so he figures stealing is the only option. His actions have basically gotten me to the point where i just can't stand to be with him much at all. Awesome job on how you handled that issue, but i do agree it might be a good idea to talk with the kids parents. And you might want to do it with him out of ear shot. Kids love to defend themselves or find an excuse. Just let them know what happened without any mention of theft, and let them decide what the next action should be. If you let it slide, then he/she may get the idea they got away with it with no punishment, and continue taking things that don't belong to them. No one likes to tell another that their kid steals, but it would be less painful to them now. Than it would be later when they hear their child stole from a store or other Public place.
 
@ MW regionals last year all these Junior player's decks went missing, so after awhile of searching they found that some guy stole all of them, so they called the police and they came and took him away
 
It's good that you stayed as calm as you did in this situation. Have you talked to your son about it yet? What are his thoughts on the whole thing?
 
secretsof2113 said:
It's good that you stayed as calm as you did in this situation. Have you talked to your son about it yet? What are his thoughts on the whole thing?
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Yeah, definatly talk to your son. He's a the age where he's still learning right from wrong, so you don't want to end any message that what happened was "normal" or "okay".
 
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