Discussion Is starting 2nd becoming a big problem? Should it be balanced?

IvanAipom93

IvanAipom93

Ice/Electric type member
Member
Hello everyone! I wanted to share a thought with you. I noticed that starting first or second is becoming a difference that really matters in a TCG battle. By this, I'm not saying that you just plain 99% win by starting 1st, and 99% lose by starting 2nd. I know a better deck could win by going 2nd. I also know that part of the game is facing hard times and countering stuff, but the question is: 1st has an advantage and has to face less troubles.

Starting 1st means you can't attack during your first turn, but that's the only ruling difference. Anyway you get to attach energies first, setup your bench first, play a Supporter first, evolve your Pokémon first. Imagine a mirror match: who starts 1st has a big advantage. For example, in a Zoroark VS Zoroark match, who goes first evolves his Zorua first and attacks with Riotous Beating first, on an opponent that still cannot have played his own Zoroark. Also, he has more energies attached. This applies to almost every Evolution deck.

I'm just saying the two cases are too much unbalanced, and the win percentage could skyrocket to the player who has the opportunity of going 1st. Even those decks who have less problems by going 2nd (let's say Tapu Koko, Sylveon GX or Sneasel) still will go 1st if they have the opportunity!

What could be done to balance the start? I have some suggestions:

  • 1st player does not draw for his normal draw during his 1st turn (like Yugioh). Yes, it's a very little adjustment, but better than nothing.
  • Previous point + 1st player does not draw any additional card if opponent does not have a Basic Pokémon. Just to make it sure you don't have more than 7 at the start, so your advantage is not too big.
  • 1st player can't attach any energy from his hand during his 1st turn. A heavier threat: you can evolve first, but you have one less turn of energy.
  • 1st player can't use any Supporter card from his hand during his 1st turn. Probably the worst and probably too much.

What do you people think? Do you notice a big difference between 1st / 2nd in sanctioned tournaments? I never played one and I'm just basing of my TCGO matches and PokéBeach tournament (right now I won every match I've played first and losed every match I've played second). Thank you!
 
Well you have a 100% chance of going second and a 50/50 of going first, as you know you get more time to setup if you go first. However there are cards out their that give huge advantages of going second right now, I've built a deck around them. It doesn't do heavy- heavy damage or tank but it's fast and lost thunder made it faster(and a bit stronger).

There really is no you win first you lose second, I can count plenty of times of me winning while going second. It all depends on your deck build and your strat, If one of those is hurting you then your going to lose. Going second also has it's advantages like stalling, completely disrupting your opponent by removing energies, Judging, Guzma, and being able to attack on your first turn.

IMO It's balanced already, if it wasn't then I'm sure there would have been a huge uproar around it, considering that people play this professionally.
 
Fafnirchaos said:
Going second also has it's advantages like stalling, completely disrupting your opponent by removing energies, Judging, Guzma, and being able to attack on your first turn.
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Technically that something player one can do and it can really kill 2nd turn player momentum specially for the fact he have to start his game with only 4 card
 
WillyCharizard said:
Technically that something player one can do and it can really kill 2nd turn player momentum specially for the fact he have to start his game with only 4 card
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That is true, and even though it can kill your hand, it can back fire even worse for the person playing it. You could end up getting a lillie/Ultra ball/Tapu lele and completely reversing Judge, and end up having a stronger hand then you started, while your opponent bricked himself.
 
Wow, finally, other people are also catching onto this.

Going first vs going second is a huge problem, especially in Standard where everything is just aggro OHKO - in Expanded, it's often better to go second, and if you're playing distrupt, stall, it's almost always better not to go first. (And that's what most of Expanded is about.) But in Standard the odds are highly skewed toward the starting player, especially with Lily being in almost every deck. I don't think it will be balanced anytime soon as most people seem to be ok with it. But looking at the bigger picture, I think the real problem with this tcg is that there are no resources that would limit the amount of actions you are allowed to execute on your turn.

Imo, what the game really needs is to limit the amount of item cards that can be played per turn. For example, you can't play more than 1 copy of the same item per turn - might sound harsh, but it could eliminate the advantage the starting player gets by not being able to spam several ball items, treasures, etc. If this had been implented sooner into the game then the cancer known as "item lock" would probably never have surfaced.

Similarly, there are lots of abilities that need to be limited to once per turn use. (And without BS ruling like Propagation.) Since both of these changes would fundamentally alter the way the game plays as a whole they will probably never be impleneted as TPC and TPCi probably cannot allow themselves to alienate a large amount of the player base. It would also render a lot of (mostly Expanded) cards completely obsolete, which could cause even more players to drop the game.
 
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Here is my theory about how to balance going first versus going second. If really requires a better approach to card design and balance but here is the short term patch:

1) There are no T1 Rules. Any rule that applies to Player 1's first turn (T1) applies to Player 2's first turn (T2).

2) Pokémon may Evolve if they were in play during your opponent's previous turn.

3) Ignore all damage done by attacks during a player's first turn.

I am well aware that this is not perfect, but I believe this is about as good as it gets while keeping the rules streamlined. So, you may have missed how what I just said balances out going first versus going second. Look at the minor revision to how Evolution works; Player 1's opening Pokémon cannot Evolve, but Player 2's opening Pokémon can Evolve on Player 2's first turn, because they were in play during Player 1's first turn. Now, neither player gets to attack for damage before the other has a chance to setup, so hopefully... oops, out of time. XP
 
Personally, I haven't experienced this issue unless playing a Rayquaza or Blacephalon mirror match, and even then it's not a guarantee, but appears more of a moderate advantage to going first. I am thoroughly enjoying the standard and find it well balanced. The volume of top tier decks is greater than any other time I've experienced in my limited 2 1/2 years of playing. The vast majority of decks, in my opinion, have the ability to win when going second assuming the player has the skill to play their cards in a efficient and strategic fashion.
 
First Turn Advantage will always exist and has been an issue any game with alternating turns. Even with Chess which is touted as the most balanced and skill based game still has a 55% win rate average for white in tournaments.

As such we need to look at the severity of the first turn advantage. This is hard to do accurately from just looking at a single individual's various matches since there are a lot of factors like player skill and deck match up. Especially since something like this is particularly prone to confirmation bias.

It's would be great if we had a statistical analysis of win rate to going first, instead of just various personal opinions and observations. That said IMO I don't notice much of an issue with First Turn Advantage
 
It really all depends on what deck you are playing. The rules are going to stay and they won’t be changed, so stop complaining. If you dontlike it, build around it! They literally printed a card “Wait & See Hammer” that would be absolutely perfect if you went second. This is all just for the format, you can always build around. Plus, with attacks like whatever blace GXs first attack is called, Burst GX, Tempest GX, the new shuckles attack, etc., existing, going 2nd is wya better than it has been before too. It all depends on what deck your playing if you like going second or not. There’s no problem with starting second, just your deck.
 
I agree that starting first is almost always an advantage, and this has only grown with the gen 7 shift of the format towards evolution-heavy decks making turn 1 attacks a lot less relevant, and evolving first far more so. (But even in gen 6 I never willingly went second, way too much risk of getting hit by powerful disruption cards.)

Not 100% sure that it's a big enough advantage for rules tinkering, or if OP's proposed changes won't just shift the balance too far the other way, but right now going first is thhe automatic choice with virtually every deck, not even a decision, and it probably isn't a bad idea for the playtesters at Creatures to look into rebalancing it.
 
Nyora said:
It really all depends on what deck you are playing. The rules are going to stay and they won’t be changed, so stop complaining.
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The Pokémon TCG has changed first turn rules multiple times. One could argue that they're set in stone now but it is probably more likely we're nearing the next time they'll change. ;) Even if they had it right, it wouldn't matter because I don't think the powers-that-be can stop meddling. XD
 
By going further in the November tournament (and that's by far my first and only semi-competitive experience), I'm having confirmation of the unbalanced stuff of T1/T2. Sure, I am NOT a statistic, as I have only played a total of 4 rounds (and 11 single matches). As @CrownAxe said, it would be great to have a real wide statistic. But still, in my very little experience, this was the reality. These are the little data I gained.

I started 1st for 5 times, and I went 2nd for 6 times.
I won every single match I played when starting 1st; and lost all the matches where I went 2nd, except one. In the last match when I went 2nd, I lost very unfortunately due to a 50/50 draw from prizes AND a 33/66 draw from my deck, simultaneously. I was very, very close to victory.

Sure, this may mean that I have to improve my deck to include some counter weapons when I go 2nd. But still, should this mean this thing is valid for all of my opponents? I have battled 4 strong opponents using very different decks, spacing from Rayquaza to Zororoc to different types of counter toolbox. They ALL lost against me in every single match I have played when I went 1st - and this was my 1st tournament and 1st semi-competitive space, so I am NOT an experienced player. Some of them are. And some of them were strong Tapu Koko users - that first Flip attack didn't stop from losing with a high distance. Is every player the problem? I don't think so...

What @Otaku said is very interesting, because the three rules balance with eachother. At first I didn't see the synergy but now I see them more clearly. I think some options should actually be considered. I can't find it right that the destiny of a player could be so much influenced from the beginning coin flip. Sure as Crown said, 1st turn advantage will never be deleted. But still I think it should be reduced: its impact is too strong, the odds are too much oriented. Anyway, like @Wechselbalg said, I don't tink it will be balanced soon...
 
Post hoc ergo propter hoc...

Personally, I haven't observed this problem for the most part. At the most recent tournament I participated in I had the reverse during one of my matches. I won 2-1, and lost when I went first and won when I went second... Not that an anecdote qualifies for a legitimate sample size :p I find that when I lose it's often because the other player had a superior game plan. There are many options for equalizing, and even capitalizing on going second. I am sure that with more game play you will refine your skills and improve your second turn win rate.

I'd be interested in seeing a large sample comparing experienced player to newer players with regards to first and second turn outcomes.
 
I've been curious about this stat too: I think though you have to do some filtering of data- like throw out games with obvious type advantage. (But i mean Eggs can still give Fire a run for the money- due to prize trade)

Different decks suffer disproportionately about going 2nd; (i.e. a Spread Deck is ok going 2nd & Getting a 1st attack in more so than a Stage 1 or 2 which will more than likely lose its initial starting basic.)

I also think things might shake up with TagTeam's coming out in a few months- having that 3rd prize out there... where that first attack might amount to something... We'll see i guess.
 
semurphy444 said:
I've been curious about this stat too: I think though you have to do some filtering of data- like throw out games with obvious type advantage. (But i mean Eggs can still give Fire a run for the money- due to prize trade)

Different decks suffer disproportionately about going 2nd; (i.e. a Spread Deck is ok going 2nd & Getting a 1st attack in more so than a Stage 1 or 2 which will more than likely lose its initial starting basic.)

I also think things might shake up with TagTeam's coming out in a few months- having that 3rd prize out there... where that first attack might amount to something... We'll see i guess.
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Yeah, this only was a little example, but maybe I can get some data I collected during october before the tournament (with different decks) to obtain a more decent statistic. This was just for the sake of doing it :p and well, if there are players out here that are able to get data in different and much better ways, everyone's welcome!
 
Here's an idea.

What if we took all the meta decks in standard

and we had each of them play against each other 20 times for each deck

and 5 of those games would be going first with player 1 playing the deck, 5 of them would be going first with player 2 playing the deck, 5 of them going second with player 1 playing the deck, and the other 5 would be going second with player 2 playing the deck

and you repeat for each of the other meta decks (including mirror match)

this would remove player skill, bad matchups (as it's testing the deck's winrate against the entire meta) and only leave going first or second.

then we could apply some of the rules posted above to see if they balance the format.
 
You’d need a much larger sample size. The randomness of tcgs means that 5 games per variable is not going to be particularly accurate.
 
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