Standard format (TCG)

From Bulbapedia, the community-driven Pokémon encyclopedia.
Revision as of 18:29, 15 January 2020 by Otakutron (talk | contribs) (→‎List of Standard formats: Corrected the final legal set for the 2001-2002 Standard Format)
Jump to navigationJump to search

The Standard format of the Pokémon Trading Card Game is one of two formats used for officially-sanctioned Play! Pokémon events along with Expanded format. It was called the Modified format prior to the 2013-2014 season. It is also used in the Pokémon Trading Card Game Online.

The Standard format (then referred to as the Modified format) was introduced in 2001. Tournaments in the 2001-2002 season were played in a format that only allowed cards from the Team Rocket expansion on up through Neo Genesis (with the exception of Sneasel, which was banned). Since then, Play! Pokémon has continued to rotate out expansions once per year, usually after the World Championships, to keep the game fresh and, some speculate, to keep players buying cards. The 2009-2010 tournament season did not feature a rotation, and the rotation for the 2010-2011 season rotated out only four expansions, keeping roughly two years' worth of cards in the pool. Additional expansions are added to the current Rotation three weeks after they are released in the United States. Starting from 2016, they were added to the current Rotation on the third Friday in the month of release.

If a card in an Standard-legal expansion is a reprint of an older card, all prints of the card can be played in an Standard-legal expansion-legal deck (e.g. Aquapolis Energy Switch). However, some cards significantly differ in wording between older prints and newer prints (e.g. Pokémon Fan Club from Aquapolis compared to its Ultra Prism iteration); those cards cannot be used in sanctioned tournaments. The exception is cards that have received errata (e.g. Base Set Potion); all printings of cards with errata may be used in sanctioned tournaments. The Yellow A Alternate cards were introduced in 2017 which were reprints of cards from previous expansions with an alternate artwork. These cards are only allowed in the same formats as the original print.

Foreign language cards

Prior to the 2009-2010 tournament season, foreign-language prints of cards could also be played without limit, as long as the user provided a local-language reference outside the deck. Starting with the 2009-2010 season, however, sanctioned events began to require players to play with cards printed in English or an region's local language (for example, players in the United States are restricted to English cards only, whereas players in Canada can also use cards in French). Some American players who had invested in Japanese versions of cards which were generally less expensive, voiced their displeasure with the change of rules, and as a result, the rules were amended for the 2009-2010 tournament season to allow up to 10% of a player's deck (six cards) to consist of foreign-language cards. Beginning in the 2010-2011 season, Play! Pokémon followed through with their initial plan to allow only English and local-language cards in premier events.

List of Standard formats

In other languages

Language Title
Denmark Flag.png Danish Standard
The Netherlands Flag.png Dutch Standaard
Finland Flag.png Finnish Standardi
France Flag.png European French Standard
Germany Flag.png German Standard
Italy Flag.png Italian Standard
Norway Flag.png Norwegian Standard
Brazil Flag.png Brazilian Portuguese Padrão
Russia Flag.png Russian Стандартный Формат Standartnyy Format
Spain Flag.png European Spanish Estándar
Sweden Flag.png Swedish Standard

External links