Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

The latest screw up from Pokemon- Dragon Vault and Regionals

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ryanvergel

ryanvergel

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1. How do you know a set is going to be released on October 5th (earlier in France) and make no announcement about its legality until 9 days before its release, and 17 days before regionals?
2. Why, when you DO "make an announcement", it isn't even done through an official avenue?

The PokeGym is not affiliated with The Pokémon Company, International
or any anime or video game companies.
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If this website is not in any way affiliated with the product or company, why is this the only way to have heard about this?
3. Why is it unevenly available, supposedly? Why do you allow people to pre-order this stupid miniset, only to have it with uneven availability, and therefore supposedly not usable for regionals?
4. I thought that when a set is released, and a street date is BEFORE a tournament, that the cards are supposed to be legal for the tournament? I guess this is an exception, because they can't seem to figure out how to correctly release and announce and organize?

Seriously, just screw up after screw up after screw up. They didn't announce the structure until it was so late. PTCGO is still not up to par . How many hundreds of thousands of dollars do you all have to rob from us- (yeah, this thing ain't free, booster prices went up, we are PAYING for this online program) and still not give us a working system? I can't trade, and I can't play in a modified format. There are SO many bugs- I can't even BUY packs online. I have to get someone else to log into my account just to use codes, which have to painstakingly be entered online. How can a dude make an app for Android which can take pictures and upload, and yet this huge company with all these resources can't make this process anything but mind-numbing and tedious? Why were so many of the same mistakes REPEATED? We had the huge rescue scarf/energy bugs, the SAME BUGS which plagued as last PROGRAM, and they were repeated! What is the point of this overhaul and new staff is the staff does the SAME THINGS!? Coming soon! When?

I am getting seriously tired of defending this company. I won't even get into the decision to unevenly distribute prize support. That had it's time.

Thanks for making people preorder a miniset and then doing an AWFUL job of "informing" people that the set released BEFORE a tournament wouldn't be legal.

/rant


inb4 the auto-defends come in and say that this company is infallible, and I should be ashamed for speaking my mind and calling out a company for its poor performance.
BUT ERMAHGERD THE GAME IS FREE HOW CAN YOU CRITICIZEEE.

---------- Post added 09/26/2012 at 11:36 PM ----------

LOL infraction for reference to profanity. Real mature, guys! Like I've never seen a moderator use that SAME two letter abbreviation!

Hypocritical. Grow up. You must think I'm stupid or inexperienced. I have SEEN moderators use that same "reference to profanity". You guys can't actually say something of substance, so you have to take the low route and infract me. I'm calling you out on it, BJJ763. You didn't even edit my post to remove the reference, LOL. Nice job! First, you can't consistently moderate and police your OWN moderators for using the same reference, and second you can't even do the job properly by editing my post properly!

---------- Post added 09/26/2012 at 11:38 PM ----------
Latest Press Release (should be coming out October 12th said:
Dragon Vault will only legal for the Junior and Senior division.
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A friend's joke, which is both ironic and hilarious as the same time.
 
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ryanvergel said:
Why, when you DO "make an announcement", it isn't even done through an official avenue? If this website is not in any way affiliated with the product or company, why is this the only way to have heard about this?
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Ha, are you kidding me? This website is definitely official. Exobyte even stated in one of his posts here that TPCi is officially tied to these forums ("There is exactly 1 'fan' site with any kind of official affiliation w/ us. You're looking at it"). You'd have to be delusional if you didn't think TPCi has been in bed with PokeGym since 2003. So just remember, it's every player's responsibility to check PokeGym's front page for these last minute updates, especially since TPCi will never update its official website with the information or release any statements directly to other fan sites who can get the word out too. It's a very professional way of treating your dedicated player base, especially in this day and age. You'd think their dedicated player base is almost an afterthought the way they handle things sometimes. I mean, they don't even advertise their prereleases on the front page of their website or make them easy to look up. They expect (and rely on) their fan sites to get the word out about many things.
 
Water Pokemon Master said:
Ha, are you kidding me? This website is definitely official. Exobyte even stated in one of his posts here that TPCi is officially tied to these forums ("There is exactly 1 'fan' site with any kind of official affiliation w/ us. You're looking at it"). You'd have to be delusional if you didn't think TPCi has been in bed with PokeGym since 2003. So just remember, it's every player's responsibility to check PokeGym's front page for these last minute updates, especially since TPCi will never update its official website with the information or release any statements directly to other fan sites who can get the word out too. It's a very professional way of treating your dedicated player base, especially in this day and age. You'd think their dedicated player base is almost an afterthought the way they handle things sometimes. I mean, they don't even advertise their prereleases on the front page of their website or make them easy to look up. They expect (and rely on) their fan sites to get the word out about many things.
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Ding ding, sarcasm finally detected.


http://www.pokemon.com/us/play-pokemon/
They made an announcement on August 30th. Nothing since. They waited forever to even make that August 30th announcement, and they didn't even make this official announcement.

Luckily someone posted this on Facebook, or I would have never known about this change. Well, I check your website quite often, and this probably would have been announced there, but I rarely (maybe once a month) come to this website.
 
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I had to read your post twice to get the sarcasm =P

That's how good your sarcasm is haha.

---------- Post added 09/27/2012 at 12:00 AM ----------
I know this is futile, but I'll put it out there once more: if you don't see something announced on an official site (not one claiming to be an official site, not one claiming to be friends with the official site, not one who's uncle totally knows a guy that knows a guy) you're dealing with a healthy dose of speculation, unofficial wording, guesses, and sensationalism.
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So in the same breath exobyte says this site is officially affiliated, and then says that^, and this website has the disclaimer at the bottom denying affiliation.

That isn't confusing or anything =(
 
It sure is easy to detect sarcasm on this website. Especially since there aren't many people on here who defend the pokemon company...
 
I feel your frustration... Both at TPCi's continued missteps and frivolous infractions (from that same mod no less!)
 
I also want to say, that even IF they say that Rayquaza is legal, it still doesn't change the fact that, yet again, their communication error caused serious problems/rumors, and that in-and-of itself is still part of an ongoing problem.
 
ryanvergel said:
So in the same breath exobyte says this site is officially affiliated, and then says that^, and this website has the disclaimer at the bottom denying affiliation.

That isn't confusing or anything =(
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Walls of text incoming.

Here's a history lesson from one of the few people who's been involved in the online fandom since 1999 in all three of its major aspects (games, TCG, anime), who's worked for several Pokemon sites since 2000, who's visited the earlier versions of this site daily since the Jungle days and watched it / been a member of it until now, and who's run his own TCG site since 2003.

The statement on the bottom of this website is just paper when it comes to certain things. Not all things, but certain things.

TPCi is in bed with PokeGym. They have been since 2003. No one can deny this. There is active communication between the Gym and TPCi all the time on many different levels, mainly because a lot of them are actual PTOs (mods and admins of the site, TOs/PTOs in real life). This link isn't necessarily a bad thing - TPCi is comfortable here because it's run by the people who dedicate their lives to running their tournaments (and naturally, these people HAVE to follow TPCi's rules and terms, which is why TPCi is comfortable here.)

However, I suspect TPCi *had* to align themselves with PokeGym when they took over the card game in 2003 since all the people running the Gym would also be running their card tournaments. They would have needed their help and experience to get the TCG back on its feet after what Wizards of the Coast did to it (and even if they didn't, there was no reason not to align themselves with people who were so experienced with running the TCG under WOTC - there was an established base). And remember, PokeGym WAS official under WOTC.

So naturally, with the Gym in existence when TPCi took over from WOTC, TPCi aligned themselves with them. Had the Gym not been transferred from WOTC to its own fansite back then and died, I'm sure TPCi (then PUSA) would have started their own thing. But things were different back then, so TPCi essentially grew up on the Gym and is still affiliated with them now. It's a very intertwined relationship.

On that note, PokeGym is used to announce most of TPCi's announcements. This can be seen many times, such as when SD Pokemom posts P!P updates almost at exactly the same time when the official site does (she probably gets PM'd from someone at TPCi who says "look what I just finished, post it!"). Heck, even their new workers feel comfortable enough to announce themselves on the Gym's front page. As Exobyte even said, there's an official relationship here. The site is NOT official - at least not on paper - but TPCi definitely uses it for official purposes, as with the issue you are discussing in this thread where a "fan" site is announcing official policy changes that affects the entire player base.

Why does TPCi continue to use PokeGym? Well, the TCG is the smallest aspect of Pokemon (the anime gets like, millions of viewers per episode, and we all know the games are the #1 selling or whatever). Competitive TCG is an even smaller portion of the pie. And anyone who's involved in competitive TCG is probably checking the Gym, which is why, especially with everything I talked about above, TPCi chooses to "announce" things here. It would probably be very silly to see such a small update on the front page of Pokemon.com stating that the Dragon Vault won't be legal for Regionals. Most of the little kids viewing the site won't know what the heck Regionals is, what the DV is, or why any of this matters. So TPCi chooses to use this website to channel that info because they know the player base will eventually see it or hear about it from here.

Now, in this day and age, is that professional? No, it's not. TPCi opened up their fancy new Pokemon.com a few years ago with clear places to post information targeted to competitive players. Yet they continue to exclusively relay announcements through PTOs here (which wouldn't be a problem if they ALSO made these announcements on their official site). I'm pretty sure the PTOs are just as curious as the players about certain things and, because they have that line of communication with TPCi, they ask them about these issues and then post their findings (as with Bulbasnore on the front page today).

Where TPCi is failing is that it's not anticipating these issues or announcing them when/where it should be. And no offense to PokeGym, but I would venture to argue that *most* players no longer exclusively visit the Gym as was the case maybe 3-4 years ago. There are so many other TCG forums out there now, attesting to the growth of this game. I would *almost* say that this site's popularity nowadays comes solely from the fact it's officially supported (by TPCi and by the TOs/PTOs) - from the fact that people know they're going to get heard here when it comes to Play! Pokemon.

But to continue doing that now isn't acceptable in my eyes because the Gym is still technically a fan site and it's DEFINITELY not professional to tell your players to check a fan site for OFFICIAL policy changes and announcement related to OFFICIAL tournaments. If Jonny is a new player at a tournament and asks where he can hear about Play! Pokemon news, he's going to be told to check PokeGym. That's totally unprofessional when you guys have your own official site, and especially when this website says on the bottom of it that it's an unofficial website.

You guys (TPCi) are much larger now, the game is much more established now, and you need to grow up and start using your own official site for relaying your official policies about your official events. And in a timely manner!
 
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The reason I don't post here often?

The inconsistency in the moderation.

The reason I DO play pokemon?

I enjoy the game. Despite any lack of public information on any timeline, I know for a fact I'll be attending events. Maybe TPCi knows this, thus making it less of a priority. I do wish we had access to what's "top tier" on the TPCi to-do list.
 
Austino said:
The reason I don't post here often?

The inconsistency in the moderation.

The reason I DO play pokemon?

I enjoy the game. Despite any lack of public information on any timeline, I know for a fact I'll be attending events. Maybe TPCi knows this, thus making it less of a priority. I do wish we had access to what's "top tier" on the TPCi to-do list.
Click to expand...

I will second that. You never know what will get you a warning anymore. I even got in trouble for writting and posting a silly pokemon song in a new thread on the Random Topic Page. Excuse me but I thought that was what the Random topic section was for?
 
I basically only come here when redirected from other websites or if I’m looking for something pretty specific. Speaking only for myself, the Gym isn’t a good place to make announcements that you actually expect me to know about anymore. I agree with WPM that this wasn’t the case a few years ago.

I agree also that P!P doesn’t communicate well or very professionally & that it’s a problem.
 
Just to prove your point, I dont even know which announcement youre talking about, anyone cares to enlighten me? Whats up with the dragon vault boxes?
 
http://pokegym.net/forums/showthread.php?t=169212

Furthermore,

Even after this "announcement", players are still having to speculate on whether or not certain cards will be legal. The Rayquaza reprint. Will it be legal? We shouldn't even have to be speculating over this right now. If you make an announcement, TPCi, at least do it in full. You know and announce Dragon Vault won't be legal? Well, that begs the question, will any reprints be allowed?

If the Rayquaza won't be, that will be ANOTHER poor decision.

So that's 1, and maybe 2 more poorly done things to add to the list. Even upon announcement, the announcement was incomplete and leading to speculation and sensationalism, and if these crucial cards (one in particular) aren't going to be legal, you're going to have a lot of upset players.

Just wanted to update you all on two more failures I noticed and thought of :)

Well said, WPM, well said. :clap:
 
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Oh god... It would be a serious joke if the rayquaza wasnt legal, for brs? annoying but its brs so whatever, but for states? Are we playing ygo?
 
Who knows! They didn't tell us.

They announce on an unofficial website, not affiliated with them, that this miniset won't be legal, 9 days before its released in the USA (after its launch in France), but don't announce if the reprints will be legal, as if they didn't realize that is the very next question people would ask...

Sigh.
 
ryanvergel said:
Thanks for making people preorder a miniset and then doing an AWFUL job of "informing" people that the set released BEFORE a tournament wouldn't be legal.
Click to expand...

I don't get this. You pre-ordered it from someone other than TPCi, right? TPCi didn't make you do anything.

And it's a pre-order, you can cancel it.

Lastly, did TPCi announce the availability of Dragon Vault somewhere? Or did it just come from the vendors who want to take your money ahead of time, and the players went ERMAHGERD?

P.S. It's not like Team Compendium isn't looking out for you. As bulbasnore said in the fourth post, they are seeking clarification of SR Rayquaza specifically. This reaction from the players is honestly infuriating me....the leaders are damned if they withhold information, and now they are damned if they try to give you any nugget of information as early as possible. (They just get crucified either way when the players don't like the information.)
 
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