Major complaint with the Ranked Ladder
I've played pokemon and competitive tcgs my whole life. I have 2 main complaints which I think are limiting mine and many others enjoyment and they both regard ranked mode on pokemon tcg live.
- Monthly reset / Arceus Tier
Monthly or Seasonal resets for ranks are typical, but this full reset down to minimum rank every month is brutal. It takes so long to get to arceus tier which is where the community agrees that the "real games" begin. Playing in arceus tier is the best way to practice against strong opponents with strong decks, but it takes a while to get there and is an unenjoyable experience for people who have limited time for their hobbies throughout the day but want to engage in real games. If you reached arceus tier in the previous month you should be reset down to Ultra Ball, not all the way back to the beginning. - Leaderboard
There needs to be a leaderboard in game and on the pokemon website. We want to see who is reaching the highest rating and what it is. Striving to reach top 1,000, top 100, or even number 1 are highly sought after goals in every game even other pokemon titles like Pokemon TCG Pocket and Pokemon Scarlet & Violet. This is sorely missed in Pokemon TCG Live.
Comments
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I echo everything said here by the OP.
The monthly reset is, frankly, ridiculous at this point. If the idea is to keep people playing the game, this could be done much more easily by not forcing players through the same monotonous slog. I am much more interested in playing games in Arceus tier than I am in getting to Arceus. And with the frequency of reset, I'm barely able to enjoy the benefits of the climb before being shoved back down the mountain.
PLEASE allow Arceus ranked players to stay there, and to play more quality games against evenly-matched opponents.
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Completely agree with everything above. The ranked reset in particular is a huge issue and is very discouraging toward anyone who uses PTCGL with competitive play in mind.
After grinding all the way from Pokeball to Arceus, I noticed a significant uptick in the quality of games once I reached about 1600 ELO. I’m having a ton of fun and am very satisfied with the quality of games and level practice. It just makes me want to keep pouring more into the Pokemon TCG to improve. In my opinion, this skill cieling is one of the most attractive facets of the Pokemon TCG (or any TCG, for that matter).
So, after hours and hours of grinding - cutting through all the cheese/donk decks, all the stall decks, all the brand new players - I am finally rewarded with opponents who, like myself, have competitive experience and a desire to learn and improve. And yet, there is no escaping the doomsday clock counting down to the next ladder reset. Just one week until I have to start again from near the very bottom of the ladder. It’s just incredibly discouraging, and frankly it is pushing me toward spending time on another game where I feel like my progress is not artificially capped by an outdated and out-of-touch online system.
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- 1) Ranked Ladder - Totally agree. The full reset makes no sense. Not only does it take a while to grind back up to Master rank, the incentive to play troll dunk decks spikes because its the fastest way to Master. Also say you do have a quickish grind to master…now your que times are drastically longer because the Master rank population is so small and you can only match against other masters. I agree dropping a single tier instead on a full reset is ideal.
2) Leaderboards - Not having a leaderboard seems like an inexcusable feature in 2025.
3) Tournaments - To further satisfy competitive players I would strongly consider implementing an in-client 8 player tourney system similar to what we had in PTCGO. Its one thing to grind ladder but a diff ball game when you're in tourney mode. Also having exclusive cosmetics obtainable only by performing well in ranked/tourneys is what pokemon players love. We flex our play stamped cards and "top x" playmats all the time.
4) Card visuals - Pokemon cards have some of the most talented artists in the world. Yet some of the holo effects on the cards completely ruin the beautiful artworks. The green diagonal lines look incredibly displeasing. Even having an option to remove holo effects would make many cards look much better.
5) Money - I can't think of a single player in the tcg community that would be opposed to this game becoming monetized if it meant the game got some serious resource increases to make the overall experience more enjoyable.
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I don't play TCG Live nearly as frequently as I would otherwise because of the ladder reset. It takes an excessive amount of games to reach a point where I'm getting gameplay of high enough quality for me to justify spending time practicing for tournaments via the TCG Live ladder. As a result, I stick to primarily games against myself in-person or on other programs.
A softer reset, or some faster way to climb the pre-Arceus ladder—like making larger and larger winstreaks count towards exponentially more points—would significantly improve my experience in the game and make it worth my time again.
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Fully agree with op. PTCGL being about the only pokemon game without a ladder is completely ridiculous! Striving for the top, is the number one incentive in every competitive endeavor, why do we not get to see our standing? Also whish you could fix the high elo matchmaking. If I waited for a minute or more for an opponent, please just que me with someone with lover elo and adjust point payout accordingly. Having to wait 10+ minutes, only to get qued into the same person over and over makes the game boarderline unplayable at high elo, again killing every incentive to strive for the top.
And don't get me started on the ladder reset...
Sry for ranting, I am sure ya'll have a full schedule, and want the best for the game too. But yeah its just so frustrating, when it's such simple things missing, making the game soo much worse than it could and would otherwise be.
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I 100% agree with comments about the ladder reset. It should not be a full reset every month.
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+1 to everything said by OP.
We REALLY need a Leaderboard. At this point it's just the most basic thing in ANY game.
How it's possible we've been going for so long without a semblance of minimal features in this game's development is beyond any possible justification.
I'm not even going to go into comms/friends messaging/card variety. Start with the simplest: Leaderboards & Soft resets together with a real ELO system.
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