Triple Triad Struggles

Maybe it's just me, but I can't for the life of me understand how to play. I started FFVIII last week, and I've just gotten back to Balamb after the SeeD exam at Dollet, near the beginning of the game. I've played at least a couple dozen games, and none of them were even close to winning. I end with maybe 1 or 2 cards of my color by the end, no matter what I do. I've gone through the tutorial, I've searched up guides online, and no matter what, I can't get anywhere with it. I had significantly less struggles with, say, blitzball, for example. One card game, I might go up against someone who has some cards that are strong, but reasonable, and yet I lose. I challenge the same guy again immediately after reloading my save, and suddenly, he's sitting on a bunch of 7s, 8s, and 9s, when all I have at best is a single 6 on one card. It just doesn't make sense to me. I've tried challenging multiple people, with the same result every time. The deck they start you with can't win anything, I've had no luck getting any more cards, and Ifrit doesn't make a difference, he just gets taken every time I play because I lose the game. I want to enjoy this game, but I'm finding it really hard because the rules don't seem consistent to me. The tutorial made sense, and I thought I understood, but when I put it into practice, nothing goes how I expect, and I don't know what I'm supposed to learn from it. Any tips would be appreciated, because I'm a fan of card/board games sidequests in games, and this seems like a really fun game, but I feel like I'm missing something.