If you’ve been playing Pokemon TCG Pocket for a while, you’ll know that the ability to trade cards has been one of the most highly-anticipated and fiercely requested features since the game’s launch. As of last night, it seems the devs are finally turning their words from last year into action, providing a tell-all post about the upcoming feature for eager fans.
The post, which can be found on the official Pokemon TCG Pocket Twitter account, goes over a lot of critical details in trading, including what kind of cards can be traded to other players, which card packs will be available to trade from when the feature launches, and who exactly will be able to trade with each other. Oh, also, the team went ahead and announced that a new pack will be available later this month!
Okay, let’s break it down. So first up, what sorts of cards will you be able to trade? Well, according to the post, only cards ranging between the one diamond and one star rarities will be tradable. That means you’ll be able to complete your collection of regular variety cards easier, though those super rare variants will be locked to your account. A reason why wasn’t provided, but we can assume it’s so those who want those super duper rare cards (see golden Pikachu EX as an example) will have to keep busting open packs. A way to keep whales engaged, if nothing else.
Then, what card expansions will be tradable? Well, when the trading feature launches you’ll only be able to trade cards from Mythical Island and Genetic Apex. This doesn’t sound like a huge point, as those are the only packs available as of writing. However, given we’re set to get a new card pack later this month, it appears this limit has been set so players will still end up opening packs as usual when a new set comes out, rather than fishing for trades from other players.
Speaking of other players, who will be able to trade with who? Well, according to the post, only friends will be able to trade with each other. At a guess, this limit has been placed so that you can’t just go out and Google community hubs and search for folks with a particular card you want. However, you’ll still be able to do this as long as you add them to your friend list first, but it’s another barrier to a method of gathering cards without actually opening packs.
So, all in all, this appears to be a set of guard rails to allow friends to trade between themselves, without ripping out the desire for players to keep opening packs. In fact, at the tail end of the post, the team urges readers to “open your packs each day”. So hopefully it’s the best of both worlds. This surely will disappoint folks who had dreams of big money trades with some of the game’s rarest cards, but for what it’s worth, this is probably best for the health of the game for the casual player. You’ll still be able to trade for basic EX cards and everything else you’ll need to build out a great deck. It just won’t be the fanciest deck in the world.
But enough about my thoughts, what do you think about these details about trading in Pokemon TCG Pocket? Let us know below!