Today I will rant about what is screwing the Pokémon TCG and making it less
enjoyable for others. This includes trading with idiot kids or their parents
getting in the way, battling against kids who don't know the rules, Wizards
screwing up new expansions, and annoying decks. 

First, trading with little/inexperienced kids.  There are always kids who
have their parents supervising their trades. When Jungle was brand-new, maybe
out for 3 days, a kid on my block bought 3 Jungle packs. Actually, his mom
bought them, and the $12 for each pack she paid already shows her idiocy and
lack of understanding. Her main goal was obvious--spoil the kid to death.  I
got news of him having Jungle cards, so I went to his house so I could
possibly make a few trades. He told his mom to get his binder for him, and
she sat there flipping the pages and showing them off. She wouldn't let the
kid touch his own binder. As I saw the Eevee card, I said, "That's a
cool-looking card."  (Oh, come on, I wanted some Jungle cards, even just some
commons, because it would take a while before my favorite card store gets a
shipment of 1st edition Jungle packs for $4. Plus, cards like Eevee and
Jigglypuff and Nidoqueen looked cool and I had never seen them before.) His
mom said, "don't even ask to trade, he's not allowed to. I don't spend my
money on things for my kid to give away." I retorted, "Well, he doesn't know
how to play the game, and he can't trade. I guess his 'Trading Card Game'
cards are useless." She just yelled at me and kicked me out of her house.
What a moron!  What is the kid supposed to do with the cards, look at them
and admire how shiny the holographic Scyther looks? He even wanted to trade,
as he didn't have many base set cards or Japanese cards.  There are also the
kids who can only trade cards they have more than 1 of, and usually their
doubles are cards everyone else has doubles of too. 
Next, there are the kids who are allowed to trade whatever they want, but
they refuse to trade their good cards.  When I missed the Mew promotion at my
local bookstore because I had a guitar lesson, a spoiled little kid I know
came to my house and said, "Look, Will! My mom bought me a box of Fossil
packs at Borders and I got 3 Mew cards!!"  I wanted to kill the little brat.
I was trying to get a Mew and the promotion was over, so I offered to trade
with him. I offered a Blaine's Charizard for it, and he said, "no thanks." I
said, "why?! You have Blaine's Charmander and Charmeleon, plus this Charizard
has double Mew's HP, does way more damage, and it's HOLO!" He said, "well,
you can't get this card anymore because you missed the promotion."  I still
hate the kid, and he's so moronic because I would have been ripped off so
much! Plus, I eventually got a Mew from joining the Pokémon League a month
later.
Next, I will rant (complain?) about battling kids who don't know the rules or
anything about the game but play anyway. I battled a 10-year old kid at a
tournament who had way over 60 cards in his deck, and the only basics he had
didn't have any evolve forms. He had mostly single cards, randomly taken out
of his binder and thrown into a stack. He played an Alakazam, Dragonite, a
Japanese Gym set Koga's Pidgeotto, and a Rocket Evil Golbat on his bench, and
Charizard as his active. He said, "Fire Spin, I killed your Clefairy. He had
no energy, evolutions, or anything else to play the game. I told him, "you
can't do that. You need to evolve, and attach energy." He said, "well, this
is how me and my friends play." I called a judge over and had him
disqualified, and I laughed as he started crying and picked up his cards.
Also, I hate the kids who use the same type of deck over and over. Haymakers
are over-used, and although they are powerful, they require little strategy
and are used way too much. A new archetype is needed, because the "big three"
are getting on everyone's nerves.
Another problem is Wizards screwing new expansions. Every booster pack made
so far in Japanese has looked very cool, but the American packs look
terrible.  They just take a picture of a Pokémon from the set, and put a lame
background behind it. Jungle looked halfway decent, but Fossil looks
HORRIBLE! Just Lapras's head poking through a piece of cardboard. I wonder
what they have in store for us with Rocket..... 
Also, some of their ideas aren't so perfect, either. The holo and non holo
thing for every new expansion is retarded.  It's just an excuse to buy more
booster packs to get the exact same card, only with a different finish, and
make the set harder to collect. That's so annoying! I hate buying more and
more packs just to get a stupid holo version of the card I have a million of
that's non holo. It's the exact same card, but it counts as a separate card.
Base Set 2 is another mistake. It's just another excuse to buy the same
cards. The holos look cool, though. :-) 
Well, that was long enough. Any questions/comments? E-mail me at
raiden9984@aol.com. Hate mail will be deleted.

-Will
(raiden9984@aol.com)