The reason I took up faking again in the first place (and consequently ended up on here asking questions) is that I wanted to retool the Pokemon TCG. I like some features of the game but am not so crazy about others, so I wanted to try altering the rules a little and making cards that use the new rules. This thread houses my current progress on that project.
Rules
There are several key alterations to the Pokemon TCG rules. First, steps have been taken to eliminate all the coin flipping. I'd like the results of battles to be somewhat less dependent on luck. Towards this end the coin flipping has been removed from attacks and rules.
Along with this change, the special conditions have to be redesigned. There is now a frozen condition. Also, most of the conditions can be followed by a number (when they are not, the number is taken to be 0). This number represents the severity of the effect. Only Asleep and Confused lack this number:
~Poisoned X - put X damage counters on the poisoned pokemon at the end of its owner's turn.
~Burned X - when the opponent draws an energy card she may reveal it to put X damage counters on the burned pokemon
~Frozen X - the frozen pokemon requires X more energy to use its attacks or retreat.
~Paralized X - the paralized pokemon can't attack or retreat as long as it is paralized. It is paralized as long as there is a paralysis counter on it. Remove one paralisis counter at the end of each turn.
One other change to special conditions is that they are not automatically removed by benching. They stop doing harm to a benched pokemon, but still must be removed.
Also, I added one more pokemon type. To me, dragon type didn't seem as badly needed as poison. Since poison often gets lumped in with grass and bug in the tcg the combined type they form has too many pokemon in it, and while bug and grass seem to fit together nicely, grass and poison less so. Thus the types are normal, fire, water, electricity, psychic, fighting, grass, darkness, metal, and poison.
Also changed are the legend rules. A player may have four copies of a legend card in her deck, but can only play one of them during a given game. So, imagine you have and play legendary Jirachi and Jirachi gets knocked out. Now, even if you have more copies of Jirachi, you cannot play them this game. It's as if there is only one Jirachi.
Finally I've added a new type of trainer card called a resource. Once played, resources remain in play until some other effect removes them. (There are some other small changes, but I'll leave those until I've written up the rules more thoroughly.) However, unless a card says otherwise, each player may only have one copy of a given resource in play at a time.
Blanks
For this project, I'll largely be using Aschefield101's B/W blanks with custom borders. However, I don't like the B/W trainers so I'm making my own. Here are two I have so far (see the 'Cards' section for examples of how they look in use.
TCG 2.0 Trainer Blank - I took my inspiration from the old Neo trainer cards.
Trainer-Resource blank
Cards
Charmander > Charmeleon > Charizard
Cubone > Marowak
Hoppip > Skiploom > Jumpluff
Grimer > Muk
Voltorb > Electrode
Zangoose (This guy owes more than a little to the Zangoose from EX Sandstorm.)
Absol
Skarmory
Mr. Mime
Numel > Camerupt
Sneasel > Weavile
Seviper
--------------
Potion - Yes, potion is a better card now.
Switch - My only card so far that's just like the old one. There are some things you just can't improve on.
Maintenance
Energy Pass
Energy Transfer
Disruption
Poke Ball
Individualized Training
Caretaker - Rather than make cards of the gym leaders themselves, I opted to make cards corresponding to more generic roles which the gym leaders happen to exemplify.
Energy Expert
Pokemon Nurse
Spikes - The latter part of the text is to deal with attacks that put spikes into play. (Skarmory has one.) I wanted those attacks to be useful more than once.
Mobility Energy - Double Colorless is just too broken, and puts too much of a premium on attacks with large colorless costs. So I'm going to use several other special energy cards, like this one, which provide lesser benefits.
--------------
Growth Energy
Maelstrom Energy
No-holds Energy
Pollution Energy
Thunder Energy
Thorn Energy
Rules
There are several key alterations to the Pokemon TCG rules. First, steps have been taken to eliminate all the coin flipping. I'd like the results of battles to be somewhat less dependent on luck. Towards this end the coin flipping has been removed from attacks and rules.
Along with this change, the special conditions have to be redesigned. There is now a frozen condition. Also, most of the conditions can be followed by a number (when they are not, the number is taken to be 0). This number represents the severity of the effect. Only Asleep and Confused lack this number:
~Poisoned X - put X damage counters on the poisoned pokemon at the end of its owner's turn.
~Burned X - when the opponent draws an energy card she may reveal it to put X damage counters on the burned pokemon
~Frozen X - the frozen pokemon requires X more energy to use its attacks or retreat.
~Paralized X - the paralized pokemon can't attack or retreat as long as it is paralized. It is paralized as long as there is a paralysis counter on it. Remove one paralisis counter at the end of each turn.
One other change to special conditions is that they are not automatically removed by benching. They stop doing harm to a benched pokemon, but still must be removed.
Also, I added one more pokemon type. To me, dragon type didn't seem as badly needed as poison. Since poison often gets lumped in with grass and bug in the tcg the combined type they form has too many pokemon in it, and while bug and grass seem to fit together nicely, grass and poison less so. Thus the types are normal, fire, water, electricity, psychic, fighting, grass, darkness, metal, and poison.
Also changed are the legend rules. A player may have four copies of a legend card in her deck, but can only play one of them during a given game. So, imagine you have and play legendary Jirachi and Jirachi gets knocked out. Now, even if you have more copies of Jirachi, you cannot play them this game. It's as if there is only one Jirachi.
Finally I've added a new type of trainer card called a resource. Once played, resources remain in play until some other effect removes them. (There are some other small changes, but I'll leave those until I've written up the rules more thoroughly.) However, unless a card says otherwise, each player may only have one copy of a given resource in play at a time.
Blanks
For this project, I'll largely be using Aschefield101's B/W blanks with custom borders. However, I don't like the B/W trainers so I'm making my own. Here are two I have so far (see the 'Cards' section for examples of how they look in use.
TCG 2.0 Trainer Blank - I took my inspiration from the old Neo trainer cards.
Trainer-Resource blank
Cards
Charmander > Charmeleon > Charizard
Cubone > Marowak
Hoppip > Skiploom > Jumpluff
Grimer > Muk
Voltorb > Electrode
Zangoose (This guy owes more than a little to the Zangoose from EX Sandstorm.)
Absol
Skarmory
Mr. Mime
Numel > Camerupt
Sneasel > Weavile
Seviper
--------------
Potion - Yes, potion is a better card now.
Switch - My only card so far that's just like the old one. There are some things you just can't improve on.
Maintenance
Energy Pass
Energy Transfer
Disruption
Poke Ball
Individualized Training
Caretaker - Rather than make cards of the gym leaders themselves, I opted to make cards corresponding to more generic roles which the gym leaders happen to exemplify.
Energy Expert
Pokemon Nurse
Spikes - The latter part of the text is to deal with attacks that put spikes into play. (Skarmory has one.) I wanted those attacks to be useful more than once.
Mobility Energy - Double Colorless is just too broken, and puts too much of a premium on attacks with large colorless costs. So I'm going to use several other special energy cards, like this one, which provide lesser benefits.
--------------
Growth Energy
Maelstrom Energy
No-holds Energy
Pollution Energy
Thunder Energy
Thorn Energy
.
