The answer is: play in a Pokemon TCG prerelease. I haven't done anything like that for probably 15 years, and decided that, hey, might as well. Here is where the problem lies:

• You get 6 packs... of 10 cards each. Yes, you still have to build a 40-card deck, about 24 of which will come from the packs.
• There are 9 colors. Nine! One of them was the focus of the set, meaning everyone played it. After that you threw out four or five out of hand, then chose one from the rest and threw in all your colorless cards.
• Evolution (i.e. 90% of the good Pokemon need to go on top of a specific other Pokemon. Pure luck whether you have it in your pool, and mostly luck if you get it during the game or not.) A nice result of this: I, and most of the other people there, didn't get to play our best cards because they would have literally been completely dead.
• Why not play Bo3 in a game heavily affected by card flips, not to mention highly variable decks?!

That being said, it was nice to see a lot of kids at the event that knew how to play and were more respectful than the average adult player, and the Pokemon foil effects are really nice... But overall, I have a new appreciation for what Wizards has done to make a game that makes sense for limited play.

Anyone else have similar experiences lately with other TCGs?