Eternals ygo blog

Lightning Warrior and my big stupid Timmy.

2010-11-14T21:12:00.000-08:00

I consider myself first and foremost a casual player at this game (although that doesn’t mean I don’t keep up my knowledge over the metagame, and competitive strategy) and every once in a while a card just gets me giddy. This week that card is a new hard to get promo called Lightning Warrior.

Lightning Warrior
LIGHT/ Warrior – Synchro – Effect/ 7/ 2400/ 1200
1 Tuner + 1 or more non-Tuner monsters
When this card destroys an opponent's monster by battle and sends it to the Graveyard, inflict 300 damage to your opponent for each card in your opponent's hand.

Now, this card isn’t too great competitive wise, and there is little reason to use this over the other level 7 synchros that are available to us now. With that being said I would just like to point out that the art is badass.

Now that my fangasm is out of the way. I like this card for other reasons than it just being useful, but lets still dissect it’s effect just to have that done.

For starters, it’s a level 7 synchro, which is all right and fairly easy to get out. The 2400 attack is a bit low, just tying with Blackrose Dragon for the second highest attack in the level 7 generic synchros (not including Dark Strike Fighter). Other than that there isn’t much else to talk about in terms of its level.

The attribute is light, which means it combos with Honest. That gives this card a little bit more survivability and allows it to activate its effect easier. The effect really isn’t that great, providing a small amount of burn damage. Since the format isn’t really central on hand advantage since Storm is gone, the card’s effect will only be doing minimal damage. On average I would say 900 is the magic number, which isn’t enough to make the card warranted use over BRD or Scrap Archfiend. Although all of this is true, the card is yet another generic level 7 synchro which is something this game is short on.

The last bit of info has to do with this cards lore in the anime and manga. The card appears to be Yusei’s ace monster in the manga, seemingly being the manga version of Junk Warrior. This is cool I guess, if you are a fan of Yusei.

Personally, I just like this card because he is a Lightning Warrior, pretty silly to think something is cool because of a name and picture, but that’s what the big stupid timmy part in the title is referring too. It’s not a terrible card, but that’s only due to a lack of good level 7 synchros, all in all, when I get my one copy for collecting purposes it will probably see play in at least one my extra decks, because it’s just a cool card.

Mini-Golf

2010-05-07T20:16:00.000-07:00

So I played mini-golf yesterday. I got kind of blown out. My main problem was hitting the ball too hard. I blamed it on my muscles being too big. 1337

~E.P.B.

School Begone

2010-04-23T23:14:00.000-07:00

My classes are done, so I'll have more time to dedicate to the blog. As many of you people don't read it anyway though. I have some big plans, and I think I'll try and work on a new layout. Since I did that the last time I had a long break from blogging.

~E.P.B.

Match Post: Light Beatdown Vs. Zombie

2010-03-31T19:50:00.001-07:00

This next video is a Light Beatdown deck being played by Reggie against a Zombie deck piloted by Gary (in the original post I got the names mixed up, hence the video titles). The video is in 4 parts, so enjoy.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Update and Match: Batteryman versus Blackwings

2010-03-31T18:55:00.000-07:00

It's been a while huh? Well it's going to be a little while longer because of my huge amount of school work. So anyway, I have decided to post a couple of videos and photos from a trip to GR I took earlier this March.

This is me versus my friend. Ignore the bad rulings, I've never claimed to be a judge. This is Batteryman versus Blackwings, I'm playing with Batteryman. For starters my friend was annoyed at all of the rulings questions and stuff he was receiving that day, so please excuse his attitude.

Part 1.

Part 2.

The Tempo Argument.

2010-02-21T17:51:00.000-08:00

Chess. the gaining or losing of time and effectiveness relative to one's continued mobility or developing position, esp. with respectto the number of moves required to gain an objective: Black gained a tempo. ~ From Dictionary.com

Now, Yu-gi-oh is not chess, but the game does require set-up to the point where tempo plays a roll in the game. Tempo in Yu-gi-oh is a lot like how it was described in Chess. Tempo deals with the flow of the game, and how card advantage is interacting within a game of Yu-gi-oh. So here is my definition of tempo:

Tempo is the rate of play in a duel. Rate of play directly meaning the card advantage interactions that go on within that duel. Duels usually have different states of tempo. Tempo also deals with the number of options a person has in the game, much like card advantage. It is not just limited to the speed of the game.

If we look in Jason Grabher-Meyer’s article on Tempo, he lists the different rates of tempo and how they work. Being directly stated as the Slow Duel, Neutral Duel, and Fast Duel. To sum it up:

Slow Duel: Card exchanges rarely happens every turn. Both players can be viewed as building up resources.

Neutral Duel: Card exchanges are relatively even, both players maintain near equal card advantage.

Fast Duel: Card exchanges are relatively uneven, with one or both players using up card advantage faster than usual.

http://yugioh.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?id=1269~ Jason’s Tempo Article

The article discussed what the tempo states are, but did not mention the changing of the tempo states within a game, or how to directly analyze when the game state is about to change in a game. To understand this you must start at the beginning.

The first part of the in-game analysis is to ask yourself what role your deck is. Is your deck in the beatdown role or the control role? Miss-assigning deck roles can what cause a person to win or lose. Example being is that if your deck is in the beatdown role and is put into a control role than it will have less of a chance of winning, and vice versa.

More on this can be viewed in the MtG article of ‘Who’s the Beatdown?’ by Mike Flores. I know its Magic, but the central idea of the article is relevant to the game of Yu-gi-oh.

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/3692.html ~Who’s the Beatdown Article

These roles will ultimately establish what you will want your tempo role to be. Most Beatdown decks want a fast game speed to establish a fast tempo. Most control decks want to establish a slow game speed with a slow tempo starting out and then developing into a fast tempo position where they are in control and gaining multiple pluses (cards like Oppression make this possible).

Changes in a deck’s role effects tempo a lot. Example being that a deck that attempts to establish a neutral tempo faces a deck that attempts to establish a slow tempo are playing each other. The slower deck is able to create a better control on the games tempo early on forcing the game to change completely making the neutral deck miss-assign it’s role. The deck that miss-assigns its tempo role is at a severe disadvantage because it is not playing it’s optimal game.

This is essentially an expanded idea of the ‘Who is the Beatdown’ idea from Magic, but deals less directly a deck’s role and more directly with what your deck needs to do to accomplish it’s role.

Much like the role of ‘Who is the Beatdown?’ you can also design your deck with different tempo rates in mind. For example, Lightsworn is a beatdown deck designed to have a fast duel tempo, making multiple +1 or +2 card exchanges possible where something like Pacman is a control deck that has a slow tempo in mind and making 1 for 1 tades while gaining advantage.

A fast duel tempo does not mean how fast your deck plays cards though. What determines the overall speed of your deck is the card commitment to the field, what determines the tempo is the card advantage exchanges in the game.

To know how tempo effects the game we must also know how it changes. For starters, changes in card advantage are important to determine the rate of play, as it is the number of options a person has in a given game state. As we saw in Jason’s article, the tempo rates are defined by card interactions. A change in card advantage can cause a change in tempo.

For example if both players have been committing to the field and making 1 for 1 trades for a Neutral duel tempo and then one person drops Judgment Dragon for a plus 1 or 2 over the next few turns, then game changed from a neutral tempo to a fast tempo. The other person must now catch up to the advantage lost by making a trade of his own like that. If the other person can not reduce the tempo to a slower one or keep up then he will probably lose. Losing cards in hand helps this even further, because it makes it that much harder to keep up with the same amount of commitment or duel tempo.

Knowing the speed of a game is important as well. The speed is also directly related to card advantage but deals with focusing on what is on the field more so. While card advantage determines what your options are, the game speed is something that effects the decisions you put towards the field and towards what you want to change the tempo into.

For example, early commitments to the field are a good example of this, changing the games speed and thus possibly changing the game’s tempo. An early commitment towards the field with a deck like Blackwings can force your opponent to have to commit more cards to keep up with you, which can in turn give you +1’s or +2’s and changing the game into a fast tempo. Something to pay attention to is that agressive committments like this can backfire.

A Game’s tempo does not always affect the game speed however. As we saw in the JD example the tempo could be changed to a fast duel when JD was played, but the total commitment to the field was relatively the same for both players. A game’s speed is related to how many cards are played at a time during a turn, tempo is related to the card advantage trades going on in the game. So a deck that gains a fast duel tempo does not mean that it is a fast deck.

Also another thing to pay attention to is the cards on the field as they are increasing. By doing this you can further guess what options your opponent has and then try to best counteract his attempt to change the game tempo or improve your own attempts.

Analyzing an opponent’s options and commitments can give you a good idea of how the tempo is going, and how to best change it as well as give you insight on how to best play against the opponents strategy. If they like conserving cards then trying to get them to commit them to the field early may end up being a good idea, or even playing slower than them and conserving more cards than them. It is important to analyze what your opponent is doing and how to best out play that or change their deck tempo role.

Changes in roles and tempo are important because they directly reflect the game state. Know the difference of the game tempos and how they can be changed is important because it can help you pinpoint critical spots in the game. It also helps with card evaluations that are not directly related to the general +1’s or –1’s of the game.

Using the newest card Battle Fader as an example. In a Monarch deck a well timed battle Fader can change the tempo of the game, forcing an early over commitment to the field by a person who is trying to force you into a faster duel tempo. In turn allowing you take advantage of their early commitment by establishing the fast duel tempo first rather than allowing them to do it.

Establishing the tempo of the game is important because it will define how your opponent will have to play his game. For example, being the one to establish the initial +1 or 2 in the Fast Duel tempo game will give you an advantage by forcing your opponent to catch up. Vice versa in a slow duel tempo conserving more cards than your opponent will make them have to hold back their own options, allowing you to make better trades and control over the game.

If a player can analyze and pinpoint the tempo changes in the game then it can become easy to exploit and recognize the opponent’s decisions and play style. Knowing how tempo works can help you improve your game and become a better duelist overall.

~E.P.B.

Sphinx Control for MtG

2010-02-16T11:59:00.000-08:00

2 Sphinx of the Steal Wind
4 Sharuum the Hegemon
2 Identity Crisis
4 Glassdust Hulk
1 Sphinx Summoner
2 Day of Judgement
3 Master Transmuter
3 Esper Charm
3 Tidehollow Sculler
3 Esper Stormblade
4 Vedalken Outlander
2 Couriers Capsule
3 Celestial Purge
5 Plains
4 Swamps
7 Islands
4 Marsh Flats
4 Arcane Sanctum

Does ok at FNM's, but it still needs some work. The late game for the deck is really good. I haven't run into too much Boros, but I'm worried at how fast my face gets kicked in in that match-up.

E.P.B.

These Past Few Weeks

2010-02-16T11:55:00.000-08:00

Have been difficult to me. I cant really put forth much effort towards posting blogs or anything like that, I'd just look at the current progress of my journal entries too. I'd like to think I'll make a comeback with this. Two new posts are up for whoever still reads this. The posts are more for casual players at the moment, but I should have some stuff on whats new in the gaming world.

I've heard that Upperdeck has lost the rights to WoW tcg, which also means the mini game one would think. It worries me that blizzard may not pick the mini game up because of the lack of players, but whatever. I just want to play WoW minis sometimes.

If anyone who reads this knows of another good mini game to get into, let me know.

Thanks,

E.P.B.

Ole Times PT. 1

2010-02-16T11:54:00.000-08:00

I was feeling really nostalgic about the game so I decided to post some really old stories I have about the game.

I really love Batteryman, it was my first real love in the game ever since the Lost Millennium came out. So why did I latch on to this theme? Well thunder has always been my favorite type, so the thunder archtype I had to play. Another reason was that I went to the Lost Millenium sneak preview and played Batteries, and it was also the last time I actually played with my brother. Makes me miss those days. Other than that there have been some good times with the deck, but more on that later.

Another fond memory was this sort of cube draft me and my friends did. Although it wasn't really a cube draft. We all just picked cards out of my friends bad card basket to make a deck. What I ended up with was a pretty coherent deck (for being made of all bad cards) versus a beatdown deck made up of big monsters. The deck I had was a stall/normal deck, with so many random and bad cards you would cry. The most I remember is using Delta Attacker with triple Fiend Scorpion to beat my friends deck.

Aside from that there are many good memories of my friends that used to play. A lot of them involve me using an OTK of some sort (Chimeratech, Batteryman) to beat them, and although we weren't the best of players it was really fun. My favorite story would have to be a long one about a player who used to come into the shop.

This kid was a relatively rich kid who would always brag about how expensive his cards were. This was at the point that the first Champion pack came out. He always had the most expensive stuff at the time. One of which being Satellite Cannon. Me and the kid both really annoyed each other (I think we were about 13-14 at the time). I ended up winning out against the kid.

The next week the kid came back and was using the same cards that I did. Which would annoy me at the time. Since I played with stuff that was less than good I thought that I had a right to be the only one who played it (which was a dumb idea at the time, but I digress). The kid ended up doing horribly with it, and losing to one of my friends.

Looking back on it, it was just fun to have an enemy sometimes. Although I’d like to think I’m past childish things like that, it does make for a good story.

Newwwww post

2010-02-06T21:43:00.001-08:00

Well, I have to write journals for my english class, and they can be on anything, so anything to me translates into gaming so I'm all good.

First things first. I can't play yugi until the summer. I have a class on the day of my locals so I really can not go to tournaments, except eith an hour or so drive on the weekend. I am however playing MtG, so expect that to show up in my topics now.

I hjave two things I already hjave written as journal entries, I'll probably post them sooner or later. For starters though, I ended up getting third at the pre-release sealed tournament for Worldwake, I got some packs and some nice stuff. Today I played in the launch party, which was a draft (1 Zendikar, 2 Worldwak) and took second. I did end up doing poorly at the first pre-release tournament the day before the one I mentioned, but I made up for it, so 2/3 tournaments aint too bad.

Second I am low on money, not low enough to keep me from playing in tournaments, but low enough to keep me from buying substantial amounts of cards at a time. I did pull a Jace the Mind Sculpter that I'm looking to sell if anyone reads this and might actually be interested.

So thats it for todayss update. Catch yall later.

~E.P.B.

Preview Card: My Favorite Card in Absolute Powerforc

2010-01-12T20:28:00.001-08:00

With Absolute Powerforce coming up, we have an interesting amount of new cards coming to the game. While not all of them as game breaking as we would all like them to be, most of the cards do something for their decktype that they haven't already have done before, or adding playability to the deck in general.

Today I am going to look at the ritual monster Garandolph, Devil King of Destruction.

Garandolph, Devil King of Destruction
Dark/ Fiend- Ritual/7/2700/1400
This card can only be ritual summoned by the spell card Ritual of Destruction. When this card is special summoned successfully, destroy all other face-up monsters with lower ATK than this card, and this card gains 100 ATK for each monster destroyed.

What this guy is looking to do is be a miniature Demise. While not doing anything particularly special he can get to decent attack values as well as providing a lightning vortex type effect.

The real reason to use this guy, or any ritual monster to be specific (Relinquished being the most competitive) would be because of the ritual djinns. Those cards can be used for ritual fodder from the graveyard and give the monster a couple of nice bonuses with their effects.

The ritual card for this monster is Ritual of Destruction.

Ritual of Destruction
Ritual Spell Card
This card is used to ritual summon Garandolph, Devil King of Destruction. You must also release monsters whose total level equals 7 or more from your hand or field. You can remove from play this card in your graveyard to have any monsters destroyed by battle with a ritual monster you control during this turn returned to the top of their owners deck instead of the graveyard.

The nice thing about these new ritual spells is that they actually function outside of just summoning the ritual monster. This spell has little synergy with the monster though, so it is a little disappointing. The next time you destroy an opponents monster with Garandolph by battle, you get to timeseal the opponent for a turn, which is pretty nice.

If you combo Garandolphs ritual effect with the Djinn that lets you draw a card when your ritual monster kills something, you can generate a nice plus over the opponent. The way I ended up constructing my decklist was using a Necro Guardna control style deck, with Garandolph as a finisher.

Thanks for reading, I'm hoping to have some more actual competitive articles up later this week.

~E.P.B.

The Guide to Writing Guides...Pojo Edition

2010-01-10T22:11:00.000-08:00

Hi you all my know me as ***** ***** or if you follow my blog you would also know my username is EternalPhoenix13 or E.P.B. for short. What I am here to talk about today is a little something I would like to call the Guide to Guides. To tell you the truth this is a wee bit of a spoof, but it must be done because Pojo strategy section has essentially devolved itself into a place where it is all just guides. To start out let us look at how to start your guide.

First of all, pick a theme. You can pick any theme, or even a decktype! Hell you could even make one up! The reason why you do this is to poster child a theme. What I mean by this is that you are essentially slapping your name on the theme, so if the theme ever does well in an actual tournament not filled with four year olds then you can be the first jackass to raise his hand and go "I thought of that first."

Also you want your name to be forever associated with that theme, and be the authority on the theme. This entitles never ever never never ever being wrong about the theme never ever. See everyone is wrong, after all, you are supposed to be the authority to the theme and have your name attached to it, so how can you be wrong? The answer is you isn't!

The next thing to do is to start writing your guide. You have to begin your guide with something eye catchy and completely irrelevant to the actual because you need all of the sheeple to follow your every word. The way to start this is to include the lore and history of the cards, even if it is something as ridiculous as Batteryman. You in turn make up mythical stories that is something akin to a third grader writing a fairy tale, with terrible punctuation and all. Nothing is wrong with this though since technically you're not even wrong. Remember you are teh authority.

The next thing to do after you have finished writing the thesis/fairy tale is to find all of the cards for the theme. By all of the cards I mean all of the cards. Even if the theme has cards that no player in their right mind would ever run you still need to cover those cards because the cards are so irrelevant that they become relevant. So by golly gee, if your theme has a Thousand Eyes Idol, then you go on right ahead and include it.

The next bit is tricky. You have to write descriptions for all of the cards. The reason why this is so tricky is because you have to reword the cards original effect in such a way that you provide NO useful or relevant information, but still making it look like you did because you posted something in YOUR OWN WORDS. This is the most important concept. Being relevant is bad.

Don't forget to tell your ready how many copies he or she must include. Remember, when you are doing your best to promote originality, you must make everyone play the same original deck as you straight down to the very last original card. Originality is only original if everybody else is doing it the same way as you. Besides, it is not like decks in yu-gi-oh can have multiple variants.

Now we are starting to get close to the end of the guide. We still have a few more things we have to cover though. The next thing is including deck lists. You must now include deck lists to every variant the theme has. Make sure you only use the authorities on the theme. Which really should be you. This is the point where you use your most intelligent peons to make different deck lists according to variation. Don't worry if the variants of the decks contradict what you posted in your guide. Why? Because you are never wrong. You can't be. Also no one really notices these contradictions anyway. After all your peons wrote those deck lists, and they are sure as hell not as right as you.

Finally to give your guide credibility you should post some win loss records against relevant deck types. This is also an important step, you need to remember to make your test results as small as possible. For example if you have played a Blackwings only 3 times and have beaten them twice then you need to make sure everyone knows that you have a good match-up versus Blackwings. With a sample size that small and someone as right as you how could be wrong? Don't forget to make sure everyone knows how good at the game you are.

The last step is the final one. If anyone comes in telling you you ideas don't work then you must defend yourself. For example if someone says you are wrong (you know you can not be) than you must post some random insult to the credibility of that poster, even if your insult is not true. Or defend yourself with zero-logic. Zero-logic is the idea that if you sound logical, then your ideas will be presented as such and the masses will believe you. Make sure you get your peons to join in and tell you how right you are, and then you can agree that "Yes I am right, thank you!" Even if you look completely stupid doing so.

Writing guides is a difficult job, if you follow this guide than you will be ready to write your very own guide. All you have to do is follow these simple steps.

E.P.B.

On Competitive Originality

2010-01-07T21:29:00.000-08:00

For the purposes of this article, when I say original I mean deck types that do not see a lot of play. I do not mean that the deck has never been done before.

I think one of the main things in this game that other games don’t have is the concept of being original. Competitive originality is a hard concept. The two words go together almost as much as mayonnaise and peanut butter. The idea for some people is to play lower tier decks because they think it somehow makes them better (at deck building) than a person who plays the higher tier deck or even the copied idea. The truth in this game is that originality is meaningless to how competitive games are played.

As other articles before me have said, you get no points for being original, playing different decks, or making huge unnecessary plays. The point of originality is not to take the moral high ground but to have fun or if you like me, you enjoy a sort of self-fulfillment or pride when you are able to do well with decks that other people have stated to be trash. The trick is to not let the mindset make you believe that you are better by playing original decks.

I do not think that the right attitude at all is to feel like a player is taking the moral high ground by playing something original. Rather, in order to be truly good at originality I think a player must first be willing to accept the fact that the higher tier decks are actually really good, and I also think that people also have to get off of the moral high ground.

The point of doing this is self-discovery and will also help to build better original decks without having a negative view on the people who do play the game with tier 1 decks or netdecks. With that said, I think that in order to be good at originality you also have to know how the top tier decks work and have a better understanding of them than the average player. What that entails is also playing with the top tier decks and not necessarily restricting yourself to one decktype.

The next step is actually building the deck. When building with competitive originality in mind you have to first ask yourself what your deck’s goal is. This is where I feel like a lot of players get the wrong idea. What usually ends up happening is a person will build the original deck but hinder on its true goal or ideal by mixing it with something else, not focusing on the goal entirely, or being just plain wrong on the goal of the deck. This is much different than building a deck with an engine in it (like a D-hero engine in the Codalas deck).

I feel like some examples of this would be the Harpy Anti-Meta deck that did well at one of the nationals competitions or Gravekeeper decks revolving around swarm and beat down. The main thing to realize when deciding on the goal of your deck is to ask yourself if there is another deck that can accomplish that goal a lot better than your deck. For example, the Harpy Lady Anti-Meta deck did accomplish what a lot of originality players set out to do, but then a person could ask themselves “does this deck accomplish anti-meta better than Gadgets or Little City?” When judging how to build an original deck you should build around what theme or idea excels at the most.

The next thing is play testing. Play testing with an original deck has two different steps rather than the usual one. When play testing with a deck known to do well (more than likely a better tier deck) you play test to play the deck better and analyze what the best plays are in certain match ups. The difference with an original deck is that play testing in the earlier stages ends up focusing more on what works in the deck and what doesn’t more than what to do in the specific match-ups. What ends up happening is testing with an original deck or idea takes more time than play testing with a solidified idea.

What it comes down to is that competitive originality is innovation. The idea is to take an idea or a lower level deck, and try to turn it into the best deck possible. Doing this can lead to some great new ideas, or some great new failures, the trick is doing it right.

~E.P.B.

Coming to a Blog Near You.

2010-01-04T20:06:00.000-08:00

It has been a busy past few weeks. It has been pretty much the tournament season/ playtest session / holiday session part of the year for me, so it has meant that I have not put in a lot of time into the blog. With the next few weeks I am hoping to have new articles with original content, and hopefully get some videos on here as well.

Until then

~E.P.B.

Update and Elemental Heroes Revisited

2009-12-20T10:08:00.000-08:00

Well exams for me are pretty much done. Which basically means I get extra time to write and work on my blog. I’m also still attempting to find someone to play WoW minis with me but none of my friends aren’t biting.

One of the things I wanted to do was bring up one of my favorite cards coming up in Absolute Powerforce, which I am not going to do at the moment. Why? Because I really do not feel like it. If you have to know the card is a ritual monster that has been fanlated into Galandorf Dark King of Destruction.

The card itself isn’t very good, but it certainly is one of my favorites. That is a story for another day. Instead I am going to talk about 3 cards that were just recently released in the OCG that have caught my eye. Those three cards (fanlated of course) are Elemental Hero Shining, Elemental Hero Great TORNADO, and Parallel World Fusion.

Elemental Hero The Shining 「Ｅ・ＨＥＲＯＴｈｅシャイニング」
LIGHT/Warrior - Fusion - Effect/8/2600/2100
1 "Elemental Hero" monster + 1 LIGHT monster
This card cannot be Special Summoned except by Fusion Summon. This card gains ATK equal to the number of your removed from play "Elemental Hero" monsters x 300. When this card is sent from the field to the Graveyard, you can select up to 2 of your removed from play "Elemental Hero" monsters, and add them to your hand.

Elemental Hero Great TORNADO 「Ｅ・ＨＥＲＯＧｒｅａｔＴＯＲＮＡＤＯ」
WIND/Warrior - Fusion - Effect/8/2800/2200
1 "Elemental Hero" monster + 1 WIND monster
This card cannot be Special Summoned except by Fusion Summon. When this card is Fusion Summoned, halve the ATK and DEF of all face-up monsters your opponent controls.

Parallel World Fusion 「平行世界融合」
Normal Magic Card
Return removed from play Fusion Material Monsters of yours that are listed by an "Elemental Hero" Fusion Monster Card to the Deck, and Special Summon that 1 Fusion Monster from your Extra Deck. (This Special Summon is treated as a Fusion Summon.) During the turn in which this card is activated, you cannot Special Summon.

What makes me the most excited for these new cards is not because the cards have cool art or anything like that (although the art is amazing) but because the cards allow for an interesting new Elemental Hero deck that is able to become based on gaining card advantage rather than losing card advantage via huge fusions like Polymerization. What happens to the deck is that it ultimately loses Royal Oppression, but gains new ways to fuse and new ways to maintain card advantage.

Losing Oppression makes the deck less of an Anti-meta deck and more like a controlling powerhouse. I can’t say the deck becomes higher than tier 2 still, but it makes things more interesting. Here is a sample list with my idea.

Next Generation Hair Heroes

Monsters: 15
3x Elemental Hero Neos Alius
3x Elemental Hero Ocean
3x Honest
2x Elemental Hero Voltic
1x Elemental Hero Heat
1x Elemental Hero Stratos
2x Tragoedia

Spells: 16
3x Miracle Fusion
3x E – Emergency Call
2x Parallel World Fusion
3x Book of Moon
2x My Body as a Shield
1x Lightning Vortex
1x Future Fusion
1x Heavy Storm
1x Reinforcement of the Army
1x Mystical Space Typhoon

Traps: 8
2x Bottomless Trap Hole
2x Starlight Road
1x Solemn Judgment
1x Mirror Force
1x Torrential Tribute

Extra Deck:
3x Stardust Dragon
3x Elemental Hero The Shining
3x Elemental Hero Absolute Zero
2x Elemental Hero The Great Tornado
2x Elemental Hero Gaia

The most interesting and probably best card in the extra deck would be The Shining. Being able to cycle off into card advantage is key to the deck, as well as keeping Stratos cycled over and over again. The deck fixes the weakness of Stratos being RFG via bottomless trap hole. Essentially with the Shining this will not matter so much.

One of the potential problems I could see with the deck is drawing dead cards early on. While you want to see the fusion cards sooner rather than later seeing multiples in the early game could become a problem. Another minor conflict is between Parallel World Fusion and the Shining. It is not necessarily a matter of confliction though, it is just how you time using them.

Having Miracle Fusion and Parallel World Fusion just means going for a different option other than the Shining. The other card that this deck should be making a lot of use of is Absolute Zero because it also provides a ton of advantage in the face of cards like Brionic or just removal in general.

Granted this deck is by no means a finished product, but it does seem like it can create some interesting situations. It also offers a ton of recycling for one of the best monsters in the game (being Stratos). It will be interesting to see what these 3 cards can bring to the game.

(any card fanlations are taking from Shriek's OCG news site)

~E.P.B.

Oh Look, a Filler Post.

2009-12-15T11:56:00.001-08:00

So for the past few days I’ve been shacked up in my house with nothing to do. Having a dead car is anything far from tits, so I just haven’t been able to do anything. I haven’t had the tenacity or annoyance to write about anything involving serious gameplay at this point. There is one thing I’d like to cover briefly though and that would be Starlight Road.

If you don’t know what this card is by now then you are seriously reading the wrong competitive gaming/ mostly YGO blog. Anyway, this card will change things, probably how people play and possibly some card choices in the main deck etc. Granted this card will also make spotting bad players easier. I can not stress this enough how setting your whole hand is never good.

Many players disregard information as a form of advantage, and I’m fairly certain this will continue. So after I’m done being bored I will probably write my next post on information and why Heavy Storm is not the only reason you don’t set your whole hand.

~E.P.B.

I think I’ll spend some time previewing a new card from the next set in the mean time.

Card of the Week! Destiny End Dragoon

2009-12-12T21:48:00.000-08:00

So I figured I could use a column or two for this blog. Just to make sure I’m still attempting to write things and so I’m not getting lazy. Today’s card of the week I am going to look at a personal favorite of mine. That card is Destiny End Dragoon.

Destiny End Dragoon
Stats: [Warrior / Fusion / Effect] LV10 ATK/3000 DEF/3000
Monster Class-Type: Dark
Card #: LODT-EN042
Description: "Destiny Hero - Plasma" + Destiny Hero - Dogma"
A Fusion Summon of this monster can only be conducted with the above Fusion Material Monsters. Once per turn, you can destroy 1 monster your opponent controls and inflict damage to your opponent equal to its ATK. If you activate this effect, you cannot conduct your Battle Phase this turn. During your Standby Phase, if this card is in your Graveyard you can remove from play 1 "Destiny Hero" card from your Graveyard to Special Summon this card.

So to start things off I am not going to do a standard rating for the card. Why? Because most yu-gi-oh cards are either bad or great, with a few mediocre ones in between, the in between ones are the ones I’m concerned about with this section. Which brings me to DED here.

If you notice, you’ll probably have to take a huge hit in card presence to bring this guy out, but after that point of getting by Bottomless Trap Hole, this guy becomes one of the best boss monsters in the game in my opinion. With that being said, a deck needs to be directly built around this guy to be worth anything.

Luckily a deck being built around the powerhouse is really easy. In fact it is fairly easy to get him out on the first or second turn since everything is searchable and the deck has a massive amount of draw power. The main problems are Bottomless Trap Hole and the huge hit in cards a player takes for bringing him out, it also doesn’t help that a lot of the cards in the deck are either combo pieces or draw cards, so the card utility is really on the low side.

So in conclusion, a deck built around this guy can go a few rounds at a locals, and probably win a tournament or two, but the deck just doesn’t have the staying power or versatility to be able to do anything above that capacity.

Match-up Analysis: The True Point of Playtesting

2009-12-09T12:08:00.000-08:00

Before the actual strategic content of this article, I just want to say a few words on the state of elevated discussion on this game. It’s practically non-existent. A quick comparison with Magic: The Gathering will show you what a sorry state our discussion is in. They have several sites devoted to high-level strategic content and more articles produced in a week then Yu-Gi-Oh has produced in several months. I’m not really interested in why this is, and I know there are several reasonable explanations. I just find it sad that there are so few resources in this game to help players get better (and of the few resources they do have, many simply cannot be trusted. Of the articles on this very site, most of them have either negligible actual strategic content or terrible content. Many of these articles see much praise, despite helping no-one). As such, I’ve decided to contribute what I can. I’m not the greatest player of this game, but I do bring a more scientific mind to the table then many Yu-Gi-Oh players, which should enable me to write articles that set up some form of discourse on the game. I’m not deluded here – I don’t expect anything I write to help my audience greatly; I’m not that good. I’m publishing these in a forum for a reason: I want to discuss the ideas in a rational manner, and hopefully raise the level of discourse about this game. With that being sad, the article:

Match-up Analysis: The True Point of Playtesting

Soon after a player begins playing this game competitively, the concept of playtesting is introduced to them. The idea, on its surface, is simple enough; you play games with the purpose of improving, rather than winning or simply having fun. Like many others, when I first discovered this concept, I didn’t understand it in its entirety. For several years, to me, the point of playtesting was to improve one’s deck, not one’s play skill. After all, this game is simple, and I’m good at it. I can’t get better, right? Wrong. Improving a deck is a facet of playtesting, and an important one, but not a particularly time consuming one. Decks that don’t work as intended are quickly identified when played, and can either be thrown by the wayside or tinkered with until a better form is found. This side of playtesting can be accomplished by playing against any deck, and is, I believe, where most players get stuck. Players play against whatever decks they can find to play against and keep tinkering with their deck, making small card swaps that, despite what they think, don’t actually change their deck that much. It is easy to fall into the trap of believing that only your own deck matters; after all, it is what you have the most control over.

True playtesting of a deck takes a deck that works reasonably well and plays it against specific decks, generally whatever is in the meta. Knowing your own deck is not enough, you need to know how it interacts with the decks you are likely to come across. And please, don’t think that I mean you need this information so that you can figure out how to sidedeck; I don’t mean that at all. It is true, but at an almost trivial level. Without knowing how the matchup he is playing in, how can a Lightsworn player decide if he should activate Necro Gardna on any given attack, or if he should use Honest to save his Jain? How can a Blackwing player determine whether or not he should Synchro summon Armor Master, or if the time is right to set his Torrential Tribute? These are all decisions that players do not link to match-ups enough of the time, and instead decide based on some other criteria, but are, in fact, best answered through knowledge of the match-up being played.

For example, last format, when playtesting Lightsworn vs Blackwings, I realized that Icarus Attack was a key card in that matchup. So key, in fact, that on the first turn of the game, I would prefer to play Lumina+ Aurkus rather than Lumina + Garoth. In a vacuum, Lumina + Garoth was a stronger play because of the potential to draw a card in the endphase. However, in that matchup (and, in fact, for the majority of Lightsworn’s matchups last format) Lumina + Aurkus was a field that was more conducive to victory, despite being theoretically weaker. This is the kind of knowledge that only playtesting can bring you.

Average to good players of this game play tactically – they look at their hand and field and their opponent's field / hand size and make plays based on what they feel would give them the best advantage under whatever advantage system they feel is the best (card advantage, LP advantage, hybrid, etc) at the time. Tactical playing really only requires knowledge of how your deck works and basic knowledge of what your opponents deck contains and how their cards work. This requires only minimal playtesting to understand your own deck, and is the level of play that most players are stuck on. I believe that the reason that many players think that this game takes no skill to play is because they are stuck at this level. This game's mechanics are not hard to comprehend, and understanding how cards interact and how to count is all that is required to play tactically, and it is therefore fairly simple.

Good to great players of this game play strategically – they use their knowledge of how a matchup works to influence their plays. They play to ‘critical positions’ from which they have determined, through playtesting, that they are favored. This is the true level of skill in this game. Having this kind of matchup knowledge allows them to make reads on what cards their opponent has based on the way they are playing and how their opponents deck has to play to counter theirs. Sometimes they make plays that are, to the eyes of a tactical player, suboptimal because doing so allows them to conserve resources for a push to a critical position, or to beat a critical position of their opponents. Playing strategically is difficult because the game of Yu-Gi-Oh is so dynamic: the game state changes radically all the time, and one must be able to identify and properly address all they key points of it every turn. No two games are identical, so this is not some kind of memorization of what happened in playtesting – it’s a true test of adaptive learning from playing the matchup.

Please, respond with any thoughts you have on tactical and strategic playing, and whether or not you think I’m crazy.

~Jake

[E.P.B. notes: for the record I think you're crazy]

An Extensive Guide on How to Side Deck Successfully

2009-12-09T10:36:00.000-08:00

Side Decking is a skill that should be used by almost every competitive player once they realize that the game can be played on a competitive level. Side decking is designed to be a tool that a player has in their arsenal to improve upon a certain match-up no matter what that match-up may be. When a player dives into his or her side-deck he wants to change things into his or her favor. There are currently a number of ways to do this but all of them attempt to achieve the same goal of disrupting an opponents strategy or counter Strategy. For today’s article I am going to touch on what I believe are the basics.

Every time you side deck you are attempting to make the match-up better. For starters, you have to know what kinds of cards are good against the predicted metagame. For this to work successfully you have to make a deeper read than just knowing what types of decks are standard in the format.

For example lets dissect and analyze the metagame calls and side-decking skills I utilized last format for the 2009 National Championship LCQ’s. First I present you with a decklist.

Lightsworn

3 Lumina Lightsworn Summoner
3 Wulf, Lightsworn Beast
1 Garoth Lightsworn Warrior
1 Lyla Lightsworn Sorceress
3 Necro Guardna
1 Plaguespreader Zombie
2 Judgement Dragon
1 Jain Lightsworn Paladin
1 Ryko Lightsworn Hunter
2 Celestia Lightsworn Angel
2 Arkus Lightsworn Druid
3 Honest
1 Herald of Creation
1 Gorz Emissary of Darkness

3 Charge of the Light Brigade
3 Solar Recharge
2 Monster Reincarnation
1 Heavy Storm
1 Monster Reborn

1 Crush Card Virus
1 Beckoning Light
3 Royal Decree

As you can see it is pretty much a standard Decree variant of Lightsworn. Decreesworn was not as popular as a standard Lightsworn variant that sided Decrees. The main reason being that the metagame did not call for it. My friend made an amazing metagame call at the LCQ event by suggesting that people would be playing G-beasts as a safe bet, Blackwings would probably be second most played, then Lightsworn, and then some weird anti-meta decks at the time. Most of these decks have a bad match-up against Decree Sworn (save for the actual Lightsworn variants) so the Decree’s were mained.

For the LCQ event my friends metagame call was spot on when I faced 2 Gladiator Beast Decks, 1 Anti Meta Deck, and 1 Lightsworn Deck. The metagame game call is more vital and important to the side deck than the main deck though. Main deck metagame calls can be a big gamble and is not always needed as the deck can still handle its own even if the call was right. What ends up happening if the metagame is wrong is that it can leave you with less than optimal card choices, or in the worst case scenario dead cards.

With that said, the second skill to remember in side decking is knowing what to side out versus what match up. The goal that you are trying to accomplish with this is have more optimal card choices in a match-up where this was not entirely possible before. The most important thing to remember here is optimize your card choices and effects while still maintaining a degree of synergy.

This is why I’m not a fan of cards like D.D. Crow and Mirror of Oaths. The cards to me feel too situational for what they provide, since they give little to no use outside of a very linear scenario, and they do singular things rather than affect the match-up directly. In side decking I like to think of these cards as Micros, since they effect the game state once, and are very singular in use and purpose. The cards I like to think are better are the Macros, or cards that I feel like effect the match up continuously, do multiple things for the match-up. Cards like these are Dimensional Fissure and Light Imprisoning Mirror, because they do something directly to the opponent and apply continuous pressure to the game state.

Now lets take a look at what my side deck actually looked like for the LCQ.

Side Deck:
3 Threatening Roar
1 Lyla Lightsworn Sorceress
1 Lightning Vortex
1 Brain Control
1 Ryko Lightsworn Hunter
2 Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer
1 Giant Trunade
1 Beckoning Light
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Ehren Lightsworn Monk
2 Dust Tornado

The side deck continued with the metagame call, focusing on how most decks will be siding into Oppression or Dimensional Fissure. This format of course is different, but the main idea of most side decks you’ll come across and build is to side into Macro effects that continuously affect the match-up. Examples being Royal Oppression, Skill Drain, Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer, and Light Imprisoning Mirror.

As you can see with the side deck in my example, the Macro effects for the expected meta are already mained, so the idea with this side deck was to include the original main deck choice of 3 Threatening Roars. This is mainly for the special occasion of when I actually had to play Cat Synchro in the LCQ, the other card choices in the side deck are cards that can increase my optimal card effects for when the 3 Decrees are not as effective, or do things to stop my opponents Macro effects. None the less, contrary to the example most side decks have their macro effects side decked rather than in the main deck,, unless of course that deck is an anti-meta variant.

Another aspect of side decking is using card choices that affect multiple match-ups. It is in this aspect that D.D. Crow would be greater than Mirror of Oaths, because the crow can be used against multiple deck types. The best effects in the side deck to look for are macro effects that have an effect on multiple match-ups. The great example of this would be Royal Oppression and Skill Drain , these cards have a lot of uses in various match-ups, making them incredible in the role that they play in side-decking. My personal view on it is:

Macro Effects (Multiple Match-ups)>Macro Effects (singular Match-ups) > Micro Effects (Multiple Match-ups)> Micro Effects (singular Match-ups)

Now that you have gotten what kinds of cards are best to put into your side deck, now we have to talk about actually doing it. First thing first, you should map out what your overall plan is for sidedecking. Having the list is great, but the most ideal thing when building a decklist is to also map out what you side in and out against expected matches in the metagame. Going back to the Lightsworn example, here is what I sided in and out for a Cat Synchro match-up last format

VS. Cat Synchro

-3 Decree
-2 Monster Reincarnation
-1 Ryko Lightsworn Hunter
+3 Threatening Roar
+1 Beckoning Light
+1 Lightning Vortex
+1 Ehren Lightsworn Monk

When making a decklist you should be mapping out what to side in and out as I’ve done here. Doing this lets you know immediately what to take out and put in without having to spend time during a match trying to figure out what to put in, and also helps prevent making costly decisions in between matches. It also helps build confidence in knowing your match and being prepared. Although a player should remember to leave room for variation when side decking, but having a general idea makes it a whole lot easier.

Expecting variance to the plan is important. After all coming up against a rogue deck could put a wrench in your side decking plans. When this happens it is important to recognize what cards in your side deck will help you maximize you strategy against the deck type you come across. This is sadly just one of those skills that you learn from practice, but a helpful tip is to recognize what the goal of the other deck is, and possibly recognize decks more commonly seen in the meta with same goal or strategy, and then side deck similarly to how you would against the meta deck.

The final aspect after having the deck put together, the side deck decided, and the general plan mapped out is playtesting the side deck. What this requires is setting up a gauntlet and playtesting games 2 and games 3. The difference between the two is crucial, because in each of them it changes who is going first. The reason this is important is because some cards are better in the opening rather than mid or late game. Cards like Thunder King (against Blackwings) and Dimensional Fissure (against Lightsworn) are examples of these cards because opening with them can mean a detrimental disruption to the opponent’s goal.

So what the side deck comes down to is a strategy and skill that is as important to the main deck. I feel like some players don’t recognize all of the skills needed for good deductive side decking. Like I have said, this is essentially just the basics.

~E.P.B.

Doing it Right: How to Get Better

2009-12-08T09:04:00.000-08:00

There are a lot of misconceptions about Yu-gi-oh competitive play, and most of these misconceptions are not only false, but said by people who say they get the game but in all honesty do not really understand the fundamental mechanics of how getting better at something works. But enough about bad players, the fundamental misconception about Yu-gi-oh is that it is a completely luck based game. Yu-gi-oh is a card game so luck plays a portion, but I can say with certainty that Yu-gi-oh is more skill based than luck based.

I’m hoping that makes everyone feel better. Personally, the idea that Yu-gi-oh is a skilled game is better than it being a luck based game. The main reason is because my skills in the game are controllable, where as luck is not. I think that a person controlling the outcome of his or her game is also the main reason that people want Yu-gi-oh to be a luck based game. By doing this a player can blame whatever losses they have to luck. Some losses are luck, but I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that a majority of games lost are due to skill differences between the two players more so than luck.

With that said, I feel like the first way to get better at the game is to just completely remove luck from a player vocabulary. Doing this will do a couple of things for a person. First of all it makes every single loss the losing players fault. It also opens up a more critical analysis of your own game, if something is your own fault then you can better analyze it and make sure you do not do it again.

The next step to this would be analyzing your game. As a player I know it is almost impossible to remember every play you do, but it is still possible to pay attention to the critical plays you have to make throughout the game. A player has to be able to recognize when a play could lead to his own defeat, or when a play is critical to the tempo and flow of the game.

A player should also be paying attention to some of the minor misplays that he makes, sometimes the minor misplays can effect the outcome of the game just as much as the big misplays. Minor misplays are also a lot more common than bigger misplays so it is important just as important to pay attention to those.

The next thing is to never assume that you have played a perfect game, even if you win. Assuming that you have played a perfect game can stunt growth as player and leave an analysis looking like it was completely blown off. If the immediate answer to the question “Did I misplay?” is no, then the player is probably doing something wrong with analyzing and should be more critical of their loss.

Winning does not mean you have played a perfect game either, and that is something people need to understand. Just because a player won does not mean that they made the right plays, and someone who is striving to get better needs to be just as critical of their wins as their losses. This is one of the most important things that players need to recognize. Winning does not mean you have played the perfect game and I cannot stress this enough.

In one of my earlier posts on this blog I commented on how everyone sucks. This is true and everyone needs to realize it. What I mean by that is that there are always ways to improve your game and that a crucial part of analysis is realizing that there are always ways to get better. So yeah, everyone sucks at this game.

The final important thing I would like to talk about is in game analysis. This is harder to do than out of game analysis because there is unknown information presented at the time. The best thing to do is to analyze the outcomes of the plays you are able to make, and then pick the play that has the most best possible outcomes. This is hard to do on the fly though and may take some extra attention, but eventually it is possible that it just becomes a subconscious process.

These are what I believe a player has to do to improve his or her game. I may have missed some things and will probably do a follow up article if necessary.

~E.P.B.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

2009-12-07T11:46:00.000-08:00

YEP.

It is getting there, added a new template so far. I have to do some minor things like make a new banner, change around the HTML a wee bit. Hopefully tonight I'll have two new articles up.

Among Other Things

2009-11-20T11:17:00.000-08:00

So where have I been and why should you care?

Well, I couldn't write any articles partly because of college. College was essentially kickin my ass but I was able to get most of my work done. I've also started to play Magic, in an effort to find a better designed game to play around with (after the statement by Kevin Tewart about the card designers not believing in card advantage, I'm starting to believe that doing so was a good idea). More importantly though I haven't quit, just haven't had time.

So the new format to me is honestly looking pretty good, but I didn't want this first article back to be truely competitive, so I'm going to start with something more on the lighthearted side of things and focus on other formats the game has to offer.

One of the things I've enjoyed about magic is all of the different formats, yu-gi-oh doesn't really have that but yu-gi-oh can do some interesting things with its games types, and I really like the idea of the Pegasus league. The sad thing is is that none of these formats (save for pegasus league) have been supported at all, whether it being the players who are disinterested or just that Konami doesn't and wont provide the support for them.

This article is about other formats, casual or competitive, that i'd like to point out.

Traditional

This is probably the most know format other than Advanced, but it is really rarely played, and it is also undersupported. That is a shame really. Every game at one point or another in its early sets had designed broken cards (Magic had the "power nine", yu-gi-oh had its "staples") One of the most fun things to do is to be able to cut lose and play with the old cards.

Not only would it provide fun memories, but it would also be interesting to see how the metagame in that format has evolved. Sadly I know stores that do traditional formats every onece in a while, but its not often enough to be considered an alternate format, or used enough for their to really be a competitive player base to it. I think players generally don't like the idea because some of those memories are bad, and of course the cards are absurd, that is part of the fun.

Tag Team Dueling

I like the support Upperdeck gave this but Konami just seemed to have dropped it. Along with the Pegasus league, to see this back would feel like a welcome addition to the side event roster. I don't know if they have been doing these again, but they should.

Sealed AKA Sneak Preview

Sealed is basically recieving a number of packs (Sneak Preview it is 5) and building a deck out of those packs. It sounds like a really fun idea, but when you get down to it, the format is really flawed. Yu-gi-oh just doesn't print enough stand alone cards in a set for their to really be a lot of skill in this area. Usually what things devolve into is whoever has the bigger monster.

I feel like Konami has done a better job with the sets, but sealed would still need a bit of a push in set design for the decks to work. My favorite Format was the Raging Battle format. Mainly because I could combo off with various cards like the Ojama's or doing some nifty things with Morphtronics.

One solution if this were to become a dedicfated format would be to use multiple packs from two different sets. An example being using Raging Battle and Crimson Crisis. Still though the sets have so many cards that deal with other sets that the format is basically a luck based format. I think optimally, a competitive format would use 3 different packs 2 of each pack so 6 packs total.

Pack Wars

Essentially, this format is used as a casual way to open packs. You open a pack, not look at the pack, and use that to play a really small game. I don't know how well it would work in yu-gi-oh, so it is difficult to get a pick me up game out of this style of play.

Since yu-gi-oh packs have 9 cards this style of game is incredibly difficult to come up with a way to do. i think you could do something like both players have 2000 life points, and then play a game as normal, it would work better with the reprint set packs.

Exiled Format

Exiled format is one where you can use a 1 off of a banned card. I like this format because it does change some things around and make normal games more interesting. The only side part is that the power boost is given to everybody, so Dark World with Graceful Charity would have been amazing, it would have still lost to Twilight with 1 random CED or BLS.

None the less, I've seen a couple of home tournaments using this style. It is definitely interesting to see what people choose, but I feel like the novelty would wear off.

Old School Lists/ Custom List

Old School banned and restricted lists would be an interesting format. Its another one of those what if things. As a side event it would be interesting, and I think it would also be a good idea to not only see which older Bannerd and Restricted lists were popular, and to see how harmful some cards unrestriced/ semi limited would be if brought back to the metagame. A win for game design and for the players.

Well thats all I can think of for right now, so until next time.

~E.P.B.

You All Suck

2009-10-14T21:05:00.000-07:00

Yes...yes... even you.

Now I want you all to sign off and think about this, and if you can't figure it out then you just really suck. Thank you.

~E.P.B.

Some Clarification on Netdecking

2009-09-23T21:21:00.000-07:00

So…as I sit here listening to “Pretty Woman” on my Aerosmith Playlist on Pandora, I decided to look at the thread about netdecking. The issue has been probably one of the most debated issues within the game. Well, I can say that I’ve never been more surprised by the judgmental and misrepresentation of ideas on the net decking thread. I think the idea of netdecking could use some clarification.

Netdecking is for a Purpose

If you think this purpose is winning…why sir you deserve a gold star. Of course that is the goal of the game after all, and I hate seeing this idea that winning is somehow wrong or bad. In the long run however, netdecking is done for different purposes that can lead to improving your game and winning more.

There are many reasons to netdeck, the first one is to get a basic list going for the deck you want to build. I feel that this is where pojo usually draws its line of what is “innocent” netdecking. The truth is that sometimes you just don’t know where to start, so why shouldn’t you start with what has had the best results for others? This just feels like it should be common sense for most people. After finding what works and what doesn’t for you, you can make adjustments to the deck accordingly to what works for you. For those who don’t understand this it is fairly simple.

What Works for Others-----What Works for you

Playtesting

Another reason to netdeck is that it can give you a basic structure for a deck type that you might see, and also gives you a standard to use in play testing. When play testing you should always ALWAYS vary what deck you are using and what you are playing against. Now unless you have an abundance of time, writing down your own list for every single top tier deck can be very time consuming, so you need to stick to the standard deck choices.

Need Something to Play

The last reason seems to be the one most associated with netdecking. That reason is just because you need something to play in a tournament so you decide that if it won for someone else then it might just work for you. The success of this varies from player to player depending on how much they play test. Of course if Little Johnny were to walk into a store with a deck he has played with once, then he is probably going to lose a lot more than Big Spike who has tested his netted version of a deck against every deck in the format.

This reason isn’t the worst reason to do it, but it has varied results due to testing. That is pretty much the same with anyone using any deck though.

The Misconceptions about Netdecking

The more and more I read, the more and more people seem to think that people who netdeck are this small group of players who are mindless zombies who just want to win so they go and find the best deck they can and play with it. Honestly, this is way too far from the truth. Granted there are a small number of people who netdeck, don’t play test, and just laugh at everyone else who is running another deck claiming that they will win because they copied the Canadian national champion. Yes these players do exist, these are what we call bad players.

The misconceptions involve but are not limited to these ideas. The first one being that theperson playing their original deck will know their deck better. True, you may know what cards you put into your deck, but the harsh reality is that play testing is what leads to this knowing of the deck. Players do not automatically gain the knowledge of how to make flawless plays because they built their deck, the same goes the guy netdecking as well.

The second misconception I’ve noticed is that the netecker is a free win, this is true, if your opponent is as bad as the person who came up with this notion. Where you got your deck from in no way affects how the match will go unless you haven’t play tested like you should have.

Another misconception is that it proves you have no idea how to build a deck. This isn’t true at all. If anything, it shows that you are competent enough to use your resources to try and produce the best results you want. Honestly, yu-gi-oh has little variance between its best decks anyway, so even if you did build your own version you would probably end up only 1 or 2 cards off of the netdecked version.

Netdecking is Needed

For there to be any form of competitive theory or ideas in this game netdecking is absolutely needed. As a player you need to know what the top tier decks are, how to play with them, and how to beat them. For this to happen you need to get base ideas and builds for decks somewhere.

Netdecking promotes a healthy environment for the competitive play of this game. It isn’t there for just a tool to decide what deck you are going to use in the next tournament. It is there as a tool for identifying a metagame and play testing as well. Without netdecking there really can’t be a defined metagame for this game, it is part of the reason why everyone has to wait for the first jump to see what’s good, and part of the reason why everyone wants to know what is winning regional events.

Not the Anti-Christ of the Game!!!

Players using decks they copied off of online are not evil, or in any way shape or form less skilled than anyone else. I feel like the people who say this are overestimating how much the deck plays a part in a person winning. The idea of netdecking promotes a healthy metagame, and an environment where you can pit your own idea against the ideas of a format and help you improve your own game. It isn’t evil, or immoral, that really is just the idealism of people who are frustrated that they can not get their deck to win, after all, it is easier to blame the deck, rather than the player.

Thanks for reading,

E.P.B.

Why Some Theme Decks Fail

2009-09-21T19:24:00.000-07:00

Okay to start off, I’ve dabbled in pretty much every game that’s out. Magic was my first game, Pokemon was my second, Yu-gi-oh my third, and so on and so on. Every game has certain deck types that just won’t cut it for competitive play, and I guess for today I’m going to be discussing those decks in yu-gi-oh.

To understand why something fails though, you must first understand why it is good. Lets look at Lightsworn for my first example. Here you have a deck that can play aggressively, thins the deck, benefits immensely from this thinning, has a searcher card, a draw card, multiple monsters that can control the battle phase, and a boss monster that fits in amazingly with the them. The same is said about Gladiator beasts, and blackwings, and X-sabers but for different reasons. Also to a lesser extent, the D-hero engine contains these as well. Right now, those are the theme decks that are good or show promise of being good.

Why Some Theme Decks Are Good

The decks all have synergy between their cards, as well as multiple effects that are singularly powerful within the theme and for what the theme is trying to accomplish (utility). One thing I’ve noticed players saying though for a theme to be good is that they need a set of cards, like a draw card for the theme, an incredibly broken boss monster, revival cards, etc. This isn’t necessarily true. Gladiator beasts for example contain no draw card (except for Respite, but that isn't used in top builds anyway), no mass destruction card (Guyzarus counts sort of, but you can look at the deck before they had that card for an example), the trick is synergy.

SYNERGY, is the key. Synergy is the potency your cards to generate advantage, when used together. Using Blackwings as an example, they have effects that all work together. Sirocco works best when used with other monsters, Black Whirlwind needs other cards to generate advantage, Icarus Attack generates field control for a deck that will probably overextend. The way the cards work together is what makes the deck good.

UTILITY is what makes those cards be worth playing. A card with high utility can be beneficial in multiple situations and have a low cost or requirement to activate them. Judgement Dragon for example, has an easy play requirement and is useful in practically any and every situation, as well as having a huge body even if you don’t activate it’s effect.

So Why Do Some Theme Decks Fail?

Some themes are just terrible. These themes are themes where their general basis and idea is just really bad. Themes coming to mind are Koa’ki Meiru, Spirits and Guardians. These themes are themes that base themselves on decent to bad effects, while eating up card advantage like a fat kid in a twinkie van. Granted, there are some borderline doable and decent themes in yu-gi-oh, for a theme to be this, the general basis and idea of the theme must be solid.

Believe it or not, some themes out there are not terrible by any means, Frogs, Fortune Ladies, plants, X-sabers (Plants and X-sabers are fairly borderline, but coming up will explain why they fall short) and Batteryman, can come to mind at this point. All of these decks have ways to generate advantage, have defined win conditions that are not terribly hard to pull off, and can even have good boss monsters (Industrial Strength comes to mine), so if these themes have all of these what necessarily makes them fail?

Again that answer comes down to synergy and utility. These decks are not top tier because they lack potency and support in areas that they are lacking, and the cards just don’t generally work well together or in stand alone context.

Using Short Circuit as an example. Short Circuit is a very powerful card, it can create OTK scenarios, give you card advantage, and dish out a good size amount of damage to the opponent. The problem is that the card does not have a very high utility. The card can only be played in a situation where there are 3 Batteryman monsters on the field.

When synergy comes to mind, a lot of lower tier decks can have quite a few powerful cards, but none of them work particularly well together. Take for example, Batteryman AA, he just doesn’t really do anything for the theme. Sure he provides it with its win condition but other than that he is a particularly useless monster. Even if you use him with Battery Charger you still just end up with a useless monster on the field that doesn’t generate any kind of advantage within the theme.

An even better example would be Industrial Strength. You have a monster with a very DaD-like effect, the problem is that he completely goes against what the theme is trying to do. Instead of a dump and revive tactic leading to an OTK, he does an dump and RFG…this is bad when most of the cards in the theme revolve around bringing them back from the graveyard. Again it’s a powerful card, but it just has too low of a synergy within the deck.

The Other Reason: Lack of Support

No, this isn’t about how every theme needs their own D-draw or Judgement Dragon, this is more about how some themes are just missing some very key elements.

X Sabers is the main example in this area. Here you have a deck that is based on swarming and discarding your opponent hand, has relatively good synergy and utility, and some powerful card effects, the problem is that there are just not enough cards to make the theme worth while. The deck partially requires loading the graveyard with X-saber monster, but really there are not enough X-sabers with good effects that makes this whole part of the strategy worth while.

This is also where a lot of decks fall flat. Where as Elemental Heroes problem would be synergy and utility, a deck like Frogs and X-sabers would be under lack of support. The decks just are lacking support in a certain area of the theme. Frogs feel like they are lacking good themed spell and trap support (although Froggy Forcefield is relatively badass).

Fewer decks fall into these categories then you think, but I suppose to fix the other two problems the deck would need more support. Granted under supported and GOOD support are two very different things.

So Where Do You Go From Here?

Sadly, a lot of these lower theme decks won’t get you anywhere in the long run in terms of competition. Playing with one can be fun as well as a learning experience, but there are a lot of times where you just think “Wow, if I only had a card like this in the theme, I could probably win!”

Theme decks are not all about broken cards (yes, they do help) because like Batteryman Industrial Strength shows us, even if your theme has its own Dark Armed, doesn’t mean it will be a good theme.

So if you decide to play with one of these themes, it doesn’t mean you can’t play competitively, it just means that your results might not be as great as other decks. When building the deck, try to build onto the decks strengths first and then cover the weaknesses as much as possible.

So to wrap things up, always play to win no matter what deck you use, and in the end you may just find a couple of surprises in certain “trash” themes.

So until next time…

E.P.B.

Not Your Real Article

2009-09-19T21:37:00.000-07:00

Well, after some recent discussions on pojo, I feel like its necessary to post this. It is an article on the three different psychological profiles of gamers. It fits for MTG, and I assure you it fits for yu-gi-oh. So check it out.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/daily/mr220b

Yes, I understand that it's very very old.

E.P.B.

Something to Lighten the Mood.

2009-09-10T21:10:00.000-07:00

Funny conversation, pretty random for a blog post, but still.

E.P.B. Rambling about WoW Mini's:

Jason: and his base ABC's are the ones you should use too, which is convienant.
Jason: (sorry, I'm probably rambling about htings you have no idea what I'm talking about)
Jake: lol
Jake: yeah, tbh no idea
Jason: well its basically in basic english...: Translation: Pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro pro. <----Make sense?
Jake: definitly

Improving your Yugiz 1 – Tactics vs. Strategy Part 1

2009-09-09T19:20:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone. I’m Jake – I originally cofounded this blog with Jason, but in the following weeks have completely abandoned it. I’ m trying to return to helping out when I can (sorry Jason) and will be writing this Improving your Yugiz section once a week (or trying to). So, enjoy, and hopefully improve your Yugiz!

So, today I’ll be talking about the difference between strategy and tactics. Just to make sure we’re all on the same page, here are my definitions:

Playing tactically: When you play tactically, you are playing for the short term. Maybe you’re aiming to gain some card advantage, or maybe your trying to take their lifepoints down a notch. Most of the plays the average player makes in Yu-Gi-Oh are, in my experience, tactical, designed to make their board position as good as it can get in the short term.

Playing strategically: When you play strategically, you are playing for the long term. The plays you make may not be optimal (you could have gained CA or LA by making a different play) but you are trying to set yourself up to have a favorable position later in the game.

The way I look at it is that tactical playing is what all the what do you do in this scenario puzzles (gameboy games, dumb pojo threads)encourage. These puzzles give you a game state, and ask what your move would be – you are disconnected from the game, as you are not really playing it, and try to find the play sequence that puts you in the best position at the end of the puzzle. In other words, big flashy plays that kill your opponent, or elegant plays designed to gain as much advantage as possible, these are tactical plays. Strategic plays are more subtle, designed to win the game in the end. How about an example.

Last format: Blackwings vs Lightsworn. BW player has a reasonable field and hand, BW Armor Master and 2 facedown s/t (Book of Moon and Bottomless Trap Hole) with a Kalut and Whirlwind in hand, while the LS player just has a full hand. The LS player summons Lumina and pitches a Garoth to special summon itself.

Should the BW player activate BTH?

Tactically, the answer is yes. Garoth hitting the field will yield the LS player more mills and possibly more cards, which puts you in a certainly worse situation.

Strategically, in my opinion, the answer is no. After playing the Lightsworn vs Blackwing match-up countless times last format, I realized that without BW having a killer hand, Judgment Dragon hitting the field is inevitable. Bottomless Trap Hole-ing a Judgment Dragon is much more important the Bottomless Trap Hole-ing a Garoth. In fact, in the BW-LS matchup, an unanswered JD is generally a game-ender. So saving the BTH for JD is strategically important.

Obviously, there are exceptions to this idea, depending on what the field and hand states are. If the BW player has a good chance of ending it before JD hits if he BTHs the Garoth, then that is probably the right move. Otherwise, saving it is probably right. (It gets complicated when you consider LS’s other main win condition, Celestia, so I’m leaving her out. The example is clearer this way, but if anyone is playing last format still…know that the existence of Celestia makes this decision harder. FYI, if you have Solemn, its better to Solemn Celestia and BTH JD.)

As I think I hinted at earlier, most yugioh players are more tactical. You will often hear players talking about the ‘best’ play – a concept that is generally tactical. While there is generally one play that is better than others, its much harder to find strategically than it is tactically, and when players talk about it, they generally mean tactically. Let’s face it, tactically, Yu-Gi-Oh is not such a complex game. With enough practice and experience, you can learn all the card interactions and rulings, and start to be able to maximize your resources with every play. This is where most average to good players are. To get better, you need to start realizing when you have to give up the most advantageous (best tactically) play for a play that is better in the long run (strategic plays).

So, how can you get better at strategic playing? Playtest! Play the different matchups (including the mirrors) and when a game ends, figure out what caused one deck to win. Keep playing, and figure out if you see a pattern in the winning game states. I bet you do. Start playing in a way that ensures that you get to that gamestate – that is strategic playing. In the earlier example, a pattern I saw in the BW vs LS matchup was that BW won more when they had answers to JD. Therefore, saving my JD answers benefited me strategically, and I started doing this more in the matchup.

OK, this is getting longish, so I’ll just continue this discussion to next time. What you can expect:

Next time: Exercises and examples!
The time after that: Strategy vs Tactics in deckbuilding

Before I leave, a quick discussion of Lightsworn. Now, Lightsworn have long been called a ‘sack’ or ‘autopilot’ deck. The main argument here is that LS takes very little skill to play.

The people who say this are right. Lightsworn takes very little skill to play.

Very little tactical skill that is.

Strategically, however, Lightsworn is one of the more complex decks out there. One of my friends has had a lot of success with LS over the last few formats, much more than me, even when we play the same build, and I’ve recently discovered why: he is a much more strategic player than I am. Timing is everything in LS: when to Honest, when to JD, when to Garoth, when to Aurkus (last format, the answer to this was simple: always), when to Gardna, and when to Celestia. It’s a little simplistic, but timing issues like this almost always boil down to strategy. The truth is, the answers to these questions are different for each matchup, and understanding your best route to victory for each matchup is critical. So, to sum up: stop calling Lightsworn a no-skill deck. It just takes a different kind of skill.

Moving Foreward....

2009-09-08T20:30:00.000-07:00

This blog has been pretty dead the past few weeks, in between college and stuff I've been pretty busy. Now this is the part that yu-gi-oh players may want to skip over, or read more closely, its really up to you. In my spare time I've been studying WoW minis extensively (spare time as in the past 3 days, last week was hell), since I have to take a break from my yugi locals I wanted a new game to look into.

From what I've read and my understanding so far, the game is really actiuon based. I was minorly (minorly)dissapointed with how bored position didn't affect the game so much. I say this because it seemed like the main ideawas to gain control over the victory point. I haven't seen too many of the other bored designs mind you so it could just be me.

The victory point is an interesting concept though, it basically ensures that the game will be one of action and not multiple turns sitting on your arse. I like this concept, since I enjoy my action in my games. Another game design I adore is the concept of time being a resource in the game. This idea was amazing, and well done. Even though it takes multiple turns to be able to use a character again you still get the feeling that game is steady paced, and once again, you're not sitting on your arse twittling your thumbs.

I also adore the sculpts on the minis. Its part of the reason why I wanted to play the game so much. They just look stunning, and nothing beats feeling like you're controlling your own mini army (they just look that good).

I also enjoy the extensiveness that comes into building your own party. I'm still a beginner on a lot of things to this game, but I still feel like I need to learn more about this. Granted from what I'm looking at so far I've been spendng hours studying whats good with what, there is a lot but thats a good thing.

Granted there are a few things with the game that I didn't like so much. The bases for the minutures are poor, and for a clumsy giant like myself its hard to turn the bases to the correct didgets, especially when the minis get in the way (Varimathras I'm looking at you...)

I don't like the price of boosters, but I hear most miniture games are expensive. The singles are relatively cheap, so it sometimes feel like I wouldn't make my money back from the boosters. The boosters do make up for the fact that you get a playable party out of each booster however, I feel like thats pretty cool.

The major problem is the player base. I haven't been to my local tournament (This saturday, wish me luck ;) )so I wouldnt know about it here but from what I understand is that this game is small. I would like it to be bigger...nao. That won't happen like that though.

I feel like although a majority of its player base are WoW players it seems like they wouldn't have time to pick up a minis game. I mean they already have the computer game and card game being shoved down their throats...Plus UD has been pretty dead since they lost Yugi, they just haven't advertised the game enough. Also it was a pretty terrible idea to schedule the minis events at the same time as the card game events. From what I heard at the major tournaments the WoW card game and minis game tournaments were both at the same time, which basically means that revenue was cut in half >.<;

So if anyone actually reads this blog, give WoW minis a try. Its a really great game and I've only heard good things about it.

Tactics vs. Strategy

2009-09-04T14:15:00.001-07:00

Coming Soon!!!

~Jake

Update

2009-09-03T06:05:00.001-07:00

Its going to be a slow week since college has started. I'm going to try and post something this weekend.

~E.P.B.

First Impressions: X-Saber Deck

2009-08-26T22:14:00.000-07:00

X Sabers are a theme that revolves around discarding cards from the opponents hand. The main way that the deck does this is through two cards. One being XX-Saber Gottoms and the other one being X-saber Airbellum. The deck accomplishes this through either looping things with XX-Saber Faultroll and XX-Saber Gottoms, or getting attacks through with multiple X-Saber Airbellums.

First things first, the deck is primarily an aggro control deck. It plays it field aggressively while maintaining control. The main feeling I had when playing with this deck was that the deck needs to gain an early +1 or 2 to win. If it could do this it would be in a pretty good spot. The main thing I noticed is that the job is A LOT easier when a Rescue Cat can go off. Immediately the card nets you to Airbellums, as well as loading up the Airbellums in the graveyard for further plays in the next two turns. Which brings me to the next point, that the graveyard is an important piece of the puzzle for the deck to work correctly.

The graveyard is primarily important for the deck. Gardstrike, a card that revolves around having 2 X-saber in the graveyard is a great starting place for extending into the game winning field for the deck, Ragira, and Faultroll, also need X-saber monsters in the graveyard to work. The deck accomplishes this through mills from Card Trooper, and Raiko Lightsworn Hunter, and of course a Rescue cat play.

The game winning field for the deck usually involves some back row destruction (Mystical Space Typhoon, Heavy Storm, Cold Wave, Giant Trunade, and Solemn Judgment) 2 X Saber Monsters, and a Faultroll. This field wins by being able to discard multiple cards out of your opponent’s hand, limiting their abilities to make a comeback next turn. The field this way is almost guaranteed to get the multiple pluses that the deck needs to win. In order to get this field you’ll probably have to overextend, or in other words, get multiple X-saber monster on the field to discard the opponents hand, the real trick with this deck is knowing when the best time to overextend is.

If by some reason, you can’t get the game-winning field, it becomes a control game until you can. The deck can make small pushes with X-sabers and sets with Ryko to keep the field in check. You want the presence of floaters in the early game as well. Cards that can have replacing effects but not take a massive amount of card advantage to pull off. Most of these cards are defensive. The cards being Gorz, Sangan, Card Trooper, Giant Rat, and Ryko. The reason being is that you want to maintain this card advantage over the opponent. In my minor preliminary testing, I’ve found that the deck has trouble coming back from being hit with a minus. Cards that are able to do this would be cards like Raiza or Phoenix Wing Wind Blast, any card that can mess with the decks tempo and your card advantage has a huge effect on the deck. The deck plays a lot like Cat Synchro in this aspect.

The Weaknesses the deck has?

The X-Saber deck doesn’t always get the best hands. If you draw a lot of graveyard reliant cards, or back row removal, you end up being royally screwed. The deck also has problems if it can not control the tempo early game. If you play into your opponent’s cards you end up losing with the deck really easily (playing the rescue cat with no back row destruction and getting the X-saber Airbelluns bottomlessed, usually means game for you)

With that being said, this is my basic analysis of the deck. The deck is okay, I think it needs a bigger push to be top tier, but ultimately the deck works fairly well.

SJC Indy Report and Video from Andrew

2009-08-22T11:50:00.000-07:00

Hey Andrew stepped up to the plate, and wrote a tournament report for SJC Indy (aka the one at Gen Con). He also got a deck profile on Mkohl40 youtube channel, so here are those.

SJC Indy report

So I never actually planned on going to Indy...but Thursday my friends had a cancellation so I said I would go. I have been playing Black Heroes for the past 4 weeks at my locals after I saw Zaki Said playing it at Nationals this year. I got a peak at his deck and built my own, interestingly enough it was 2 or 3 cards from his exact build.

So I pack, and Friday morning Jake picks me up, we pick Evan up, and then meet Anthony and I start driving down. The drive down was rather uneventful except we started singing Seether's "Careless Whisper" cover while listening to it on my ipod connected to the radio - a result of chronic boredom.

4 hours later we arrive at the hotel, we will call it FailLodge. Jake booked it on Travelocity, it was 15 minutes away and pretty cheap. So they won't let us check in until 3:00, we got there at 12:00...and we were confused because Jake called before and asked if we could check in early.

So we just decide to go the convention center. I drive there, we park about 5 blocks away for $10, and start walking down to the center. Once we get in, the line was relatively small. A 5 minute wait would be a good estimate. We all get 4 day badges, and head to the vendor hall for some sleeves. I pick up 2 White PCs. Then we go to the TCG hall and I resleeve my deck, meet up with Zaki, show him what I'm playing, we play, and I change my deck to his because I liked his better. I ran a Necro Garda where he ran a second Tomato.

Friday night we eat at Dennys which was right next to the FailLodge, FailLodge must've rubbed off on Dennys (more on this later). I get a Lumberjack Slam, and the waitress sucked. Then we head back to the hotel, and we discover that it is, in fact, fail. I end up sleeping on the floor the first night. I wake up at 4 not feeling so good, and I crawl my way to the bathroom. I say "****!!! I'm sorry guys..." and I turn the light on and I vomited...when I washed out my mouth and lay back down, Anthony retorted with "Denny's fail?" If I wasn't so tired I probably would've laughed at that.

Okay, now on to the matches...I can't remember a lot of the names. Sorry if I forgot your name :/

Round 1: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Lightsworn Guy #1
Game 1: I see he is playing Lightsworn, but he doesn't get Aurkus out on me and I am able to drop DAD and Dark Strike for game.
Game 2: I draw Crow and LIM with Solemn. He is shut down with LIM and Crow and can't come back.
1-0

Round 2: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Blackwings Guy #1
Game 1: He gets a game loss for having an illegal decklist. He had two torrentials in his deck and wrote down 39 cards on his decklist.
Game 2: I beat him down in a couple of turns after I Grepher for Plague with Double Mali, discarding one for Grepher's effect. Then drop Dark Strike for game. So glad that card is getting banned.
2-0

Round 3: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Lightsworn Guy #2
Game 1: He takes it pretty easy, I didn't draw so well due to me forgetting to pile shuffle.
Game 2: LIM shuts him down.
Game 3: It was really close, but in the end he pulled out of me having control.
2-1

Round 4: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Lightsworn Guy #3
Game 1: He T-Sets, and I'm like...Crush. I double Allure my double Shura, and dodge his CCV completely. Then I Crush him for his entire hand.
Game 2: I control with Armor Master and Colossal Fighter.
3-1

Round 5: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Lightsworn Guy #4
Game 1: He has amazing card advantage, but he fills up his field and I stall with double Krebons on the field along with a facedown Tomato.
Game 2: We go into time, we are both at 8000. Turn 2 of his time he Charges and hits a Wulf after he's already summoned. He gets a Ryko, and says "Go." I remind him of Wulf, but he forgot to attack and he already ended his turn. Lucky me. Turn 3, I really can't do anything except stop his attack with a Malicious and facedown Tomato. He sets Ryko after attacking my Malicious, and ends. I have a Destiny Draw in hand with a Mystic Tomato facedown that I had set. I draw Stratos. He has Wulf, and a facedown Ryko on the field with double Necro Gardna. I summon Stratos, get Plasma, D-Draw it away and draw Dark Armed. Plasma gave me my 3rd dark, sacking ftw? I dropped the Dark Armed off the table by mistake, picked it back up, and he was like "Wtf?" But the Judge was watching and I had two people behind me say they saw me draw it off of D-Draw so it was cool.
4-1

Round 6: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Levi Nissen (SalvoDAD)
Game 1: It goes back and forth, but he gets the upper hand and flips Return for game.
Game 2: I draw pretty well, and control the game pretty well.
Game 3: He has a Valley, and two backrow to my Shura and two facedown Solemns. He tries to mind control, but I solemn. I draw, summon Plaguespreader, synchro for Goyo. He thinks for a second, but then has no response. I drop DAD, he asks if I am using priority. I confirm that I am. I target one of his facedowns, which happens to be Torrential. He flips both Roar and Torrential, I ask which one is he chaining first, he says the Roar. I Solemn, and then the Torrential can't be chained. I'm left with Brain and Plasma in hand, with a Mali and Plague in the graveyard. I remove Mali to special, and then put Brain Control on top for Plaguespreader, syncho for Colossal, and blow up Valley and he concedes. Robbie Kohl was recording the last minute or so when I made that play so when he gives it to me I'll post it. Levi tells me he had game during game 2, but I had Crow in hand to shut him down.
5-1

Round 7: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Toni (Blackwings)
Game 1: I end up having Plasma on the field with his Colossal Fighter equipped to it. He synchros for Armor Master, and attacks, a misplay on his part. I inform him that Armor Master is negated. I take this game.
Game 2: Jerry Wang is watching from behind, and Toni has 3 backrow. I D-Draw my Diamond Dude into Heavy Storm and play it. Toni looks up at Jerry, and is like "He drew that off of Destiny Draw didn't he?" I nodded. He has a Bora on the field. I summon Sirocco, special summon Gale, Reborn his Kalut, pump Sirocco, half Bora, and attack for game.
6-1

Round 8: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Matt Hoey (SynchroCat)
Game 1: He drops Gorz on me early and I can't really get around it. He takes this one no problem.
Game 2: I draw trash, Double Nobleman, Dark Armed, Threatening Roar, and Goats, and Malicious I think. It was pretty bad. I end up scooping after like, two turns.
6-2

Round 9: Andrew Leffew Moore vs Charles Easton (Blackwings)
Game 1: I was repaired against Charles. I would've much rathered play the TeleDAD player I was paired up against first before the fire alarm went off. I'm sure I would've taken it. But Charles takes this one pretty easy after forcing me to overextend to keep field presence.
Game 2: He Kalut's his Shura when I attack, and then flips Deck Dev hitting a couple monsters. I scoop after a few turns.
6-3

So I ended up 6-3, 49th place. Oh well, I was happy with the decks performance. Zaki ended up dropping early on, but he was pretty excited to see me doing well with the deck.

Quote:
Monsters: 18
3 Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind
2 Blackwing - Shura the Blue Flame
2 Mystic Tomato
2 Krebons
2 Destiny Hero - Malicious
1 Elemental Hero Stratos
1 Destiny Hero - Diamond Dude
1 Destiny Hero - Plasma
1 Dark Armed Dragon
1 Dark Grepher
1 Plaguespreader Zombie
1 Sangan

Spells: 12
2 Allure of Darkness
2 Destiny Draw
1 Heavy Storm
1 Monster Reborn
1 Brain Control
1 Mind Control
1 Emergency Teleport
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Scapegoat
1 Reinforcement of the Army

Traps: 10
3 Solemn Judgment
2 Threatening Roar
2 Bottomless Trap Hole
1 Mirror Force
1 Torrential Tribute
1 Crush Card Virus

Side Deck:
3 Light Imprisoning Mirror
2 Mirror of Oaths
2 Nobleman of Crossout
2 Blackwing - Sirroco the Dawn
2 D.D. Crow
2 Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer
1 My Body as a Shield
1 Dust Tornado

Extra Deck:
2 Blackwing Armor Master
2 Stardust Dragon
2 Colossal Fighter
2 Black Rose Dragon
1 Dark Strike Fighter
1 Arcanite Magician
1 Thought Ruler Archfiend
1 Red Dragon Archfiend
1 Magical Android
1 Goyo Guardian
1 Gaia Knight, the Force of Earth

Props:
Doing decent
The Champion sports bar
Jake
Anthony
Evan's cards
Playing "Name that Yu-Gi-Oh player" on the way back home
Destiny Hero - Plasma

Slops:
FailLodge
Anthony for failing
Jake for thinking Black Heroes are bad when they are good
Zaki failing
Dennys
Not having time for my duelist intervies with Paul Levitin, Roy St. Claire, Jeff Jones, and Dale Bellido.

Final Update Before Articles

2009-08-21T22:17:00.000-07:00

So it looks like my friends writing about Gen Con was a big flop. =/ Anyway I'll write up results of test findings for next format shortly.

Another Blog Update

2009-08-14T21:58:00.000-07:00

So while my friends are at Gen-Con I figured I would write something fun and lighthearted for the blog, while they cover the knitty gritty stuff that I can not write about. Unfortunately, I was not able to attend Gen-con, and I haven’t written in the past few days, party because I’m lazy, partly because I’ve been reading The Nightside Novels (which are incredibly entertaining), and partly because I was helping my friends play test for the upcoming event.

Anyway, here goes what, I’d figured I’d lay low with the really heavy stuff, especially for this format, since next format’s OCG list is officially confirmed (we hope). Assuming we still have the same list, writing about next format will soon follow if and when the list is confirmed as ours. So I figured I’d write something that everyone can enjoy, and that would be about the Sneak Preview.

Starting off, the format for the sneak preview is rather simple. You put together a 20-card deck from the 5 packs you get and you play in free play or if your tournament is boss they might be doing flights). The things you look for if you are playing in flights are high defense and high attack monsters, and various minor combos here and there. Nothing really too complicated there, just use common sense and put two and two together when it comes to cards with effects that you may want to use. Don’t use too many cards that you want ever be able to use.

Now, when it comes to values, sneak previews are usually the place to pick up, or get rid of cards before the secondary market decides on a final price for them. In this set, the cards a competitive player will want to be on the lookout for will probably be Blackwing- Vayu the Emblem of Honor, the Ko’aki Meiru ultra rare cards (if only for testing and trading), and any X-Saber card that’s above a rare. Fortunately for us, Black Shiny C is a common and a main anti-synchro card that Lightsworn will be able to use.

At the sneak preview, pretty much any holo can net you some good stuff in trade stock, you just have to push your cards right. The value for sneak preview cards are usually hard to determine, so players will either trade freely, or become much harder to trade with. I guess a lot of it would depend on whom you talk to.

Anyway, enough about the sneak preview, lets look at the Turbo pack. The pack itself is an amazingly well done set.

Ultimate Rare:
TU01-EN000 Judgment Dragon

Ultra Rare:
TU01-EN001 Doomcaliber Knight

Super Rare:
TU01-EN002 Garoth, Lightsworn Warrior
TU01-EN003 Krebons
TU01-EN004 Gladiator Beast Samnite
TU01-EN005 Black Whirlwind

Rare:
TU01-EN006 Crush Card Virus
TU01-EN007 Satellite Cannon
TU01-EN008 Rescue Cat
TU01-EN009 Grandmaster of the Six Samurai
TU01-EN010 Trade-In
TU01-EN011 Armageddon Knight

Common:
TU01-EN012 Book of Moon
TU01-EN013 Terraforming
TU01-EN014 Hand Destruction
TU01-EN015 Gladiator Beast Murmillo
TU01-EN016 Gladiator Beast Bestiari
TU01-EN017 Gladiator Beast Laquari
TU01-EN018 Golden Flying Fish
TU01-EN019 Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter
TU01-EN020 D.D.R. - Different Dimension Reincarnation

It’s a really good set. If you have seen the pictures, the Judgment Dragon is a really amazing piece of hawtness. Any of the reprinted supers will be a must have if players want to shine out their decks, and plus they just look so amazingly cool. The Ultra Rare Doom Calibur Knight is a really nice surprise, especially since it’s a reprint of a really (I mean really) hard to obtain card.

My only personal gripe would be Crush Card getting released and then possibly getting the axe, but that is really only a minor annoyance, because honestly, it’s a good card that probably should be banned. Either way definitely be on the lookout for Turbo packs when they finally hit shop (or be sure to win a lot, since the only way to officially obtain them is through tournaments).

So that it for now. Hopefully when my friends get back I’ll have some juicy Gen-Con coverage. If not, well then you’ll be sure to hear about that too. Either way, really big blog update, thanks for reading.

E.P.B.

Blog Update

2009-08-08T12:56:00.000-07:00

Well, I've finally gotten the site banner down and perfected. A huge thanks goes to Andrew Moore for designing it and making it (even though I dislike the french, they do have good taste.)

Recently there has been a lot of discussion over a post on a forum made by Kevin Tewart, basically hinting at Heavy Storm being banned and that blackwings are one of the top decks being played the most. Granted there has been a lot of s discussion among forums over whether Heavy should be banned or not.

Personally, I'm one of those whatever happens happens type of guys. I don't think Heavy Storm is the beacon of skilled cards in this game. Truth be told Heavy Storm being banned would be a shift in the metagame, and playstyles of people, but I think it would eventually even out. Going along with the trend of the last article goes my post that I made on a forum.

"The arguement that Heavy Storm provides skill for the game is flawed at best.

Last time I checked, counting cards is not skilled, its just counting cards. I think everyone knows that you can use Heavy Storm to get more than 1 card.

The thing that banning Heavy Storm would do would be opening up the real reason why setting so many cards at 1 time is bad. That reason is information.

Setting all of your cards is bad, not only because of Heavy Storm, but because you let your opponent know exactly what you have. For example, you set four out of six cards, I now know that I can probably beat you using monster attrition and my own backrow to destroy whatever threat your monsters can cause, now that I know you have at most possibly two monsters, I can use this information to my advantage and adjust my playstyle accordingly.

The truely skilled players will be able to use this information given freely by the opponent to their advantage. It happens now as well, my friend pounting this out to me while I was playing G-beasts, he said that if I set 3 cards (obviously one of them being solemn, like storm would be going through anyway) he could safely assume that one of those cards was something to protect the backrow (solemn) and two orther cards to support my monsters.

Now granted he was playing Blackwings, but the difference is as subtle as selecting Kalut to keep his monsters going with BW, over Gale. Its recognizing these subtle differences, that is the true skill in this game.

So granted Heavy Storm may be skilled in the way that puts the fear of overextension, but without Storm people can begin to realize why setting multiple cards is bad. The truely skilled wouldn't need Storm to punish their opponents, Storm in reality is just a crutch."

A huge Credit would also go to Jake for discussing and making great points about this idea for me.

Until Next Time,

E.P.B.

The Unseen Advantage: Information

2009-08-06T19:24:00.000-07:00

Written by: Jason
Covers: the basics of information advantage

In most card games when people think of advantage, the only thing that they really think about is the card advantage. Usually the idea of advantage is calculated in an equation of pluses and minuses pertaining to how many cards a certain player has, its also a idea that determines whether or not a card can warrant use. The more advantage you gain from a card, the more you’ll want to use that card.

What most people don’t realize is that there is an advantage in knowing the cards your opponent has well. The more knowledge you have of what your opponent has the more you can make your own successful power plays and set-ups.

Advantage doesn’t always have to be seen to be had. That is part of the reason why you don’t go setting all the cards in your hand if you have all spell and traps (albeit, you don’t want to overextend, but most people have the wrong idea). If you let your opponent know what you have ahead of time, then it makes part of their job so much easier. It is also part of the reason why you don’t want to make comments about how bad your hand is, or whether or not you’ve drawn all monsters until after the fact ( its not that hard to tell when your opponent is bluffing, but you also want to be careful of what information your trust that comes out of your opponents mouth). You want to keep the opponent guessing.

This is part of the reason why Trap Dustshoot is such a great card. Not only do you get the card out of your opponent’s hand but also you get an advantage of information over your opponent that they won’t have over you.

Playing around the information you have received is not that hard, but it does take some skill to be able to recognize when you have the advantage of information over your opponent. It also takes skill to know how to play using this advantage to your own benefit. If you can master this, you will find yourself being able to win a lot more games than what you did before.

So until next time, keep the other guy guessing,

E.P.B.

DOUBLE FEATURE: Hero Decks

2009-08-05T23:05:00.000-07:00

by: Jason

We’re going to have a double deck feature over these next two days. One of which being my good friend Leffew’s D-Hero and Blackwing variant called Black Heroes (he really calls it Andrew Heroes, but that’s the original deck name.) and today’s deck list, which is a Big City varient, that I call Hair Heroes (I’d call it Cloverfield though if it needed another name). The side deck and extra deck you'll have to figure out on your own, but here are the main decks.

Hair Heroes

For starters, my deck plays a lot like how it looks like it would. The basic strategy is obviously a lot like playing with any other anti-meta deck. You use Wildhearts and Oceans to control the field while using spell and traps to back them up. It plays a lot like gadgets would but is more on the offensive. Tragoedia is a key card in this deck, since the majority of the opponent’s monsters will be level 4 or 3. Also if you play it right, Tragoedia can be a huge beat stick backed by protection. Letting you get out of one turn kill situations. I haven’t finished the testing for this deck, but this is the latest updated version I have so far.

Monsters:14
1 Elemental Hero Stratos
1 Elemental Hero Heat
2 Elemental Hero Ocean
3 Elemental Hero Wildheart
2 Thunder King Rai-oh
2 Legendary Jujitsu Master
2 Tragoedia
1 Cyber Dragon

Spells:15
1 Reinforcements of the Army
3 E Emergancy Call
2 Skyscraper 2 Hero City
2 Lightning Vortex
2 My Body as a Shield
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
2 Book of Moon
1 Monster Reborn
1 Swords of Revealing Light

Traps:11
3 Solemn Judgement
1 Mirror Force
1 Torrential Tribute
2 Phoenix Wing Wind Blast
2 Bottomless Trap Hole
2 Royal Oppression

A. Heroes

Written by: Andrew Moore

A-Heroes, strikingly similar to a deck run by Zaki Said (2 card difference, nevertheless I recieved the idea from him), utilizes both 8 star, and the ever-so-popular 7 star synchro monsters. 7 star monsters are so incredibly powerful this format, Blackwing Armor Master allows to an annoying beat stick that just doesn't seem to go away, Dark Strike Fighter allows OTK potential, as well as just a game-ending effect when Shura is on the field with a Gale in hand. It runs similar to TeleDAD without, of course, the ridiculous speed and overpowered-ness that TeleDAD had.

Monsters: 18
3 Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind
2 Blackwing - Shura the Blue Flame
2 Krebons
2 Mystic Tomato
2 Destiny Hero - Malicious
1 Elemental Hero Stratos
1 Destiny Hero - Plasma
1 Destiny Hero - Diamond Dude
1 Dark Armed Dragon
1 Sangan
1 Plaguespreader Zombie
1 Dark Grepher

Spells: 12
2 Allure of Darkness
2 Destiny Draw
1 Brain Control
1 Mind Control
1 Heavy Storm
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Monster Reborn
1 Reinforcement of the Army
1 Emergency Teleport
1 Scapegoat

Traps: 10
3 Solemn Judgment
2 Threatening roar
2 Bottomless Trap Hole
1 Mirror Force
1 Torrential Tribute
1 Crush Card Virus
__________________

Playtesting and How it Should be Done.

2009-08-01T19:03:00.000-07:00

The main misconception about play testing in yu-gi-oh (and probably a lot of other games) is that you are play testing to make the deck better. This idea is false. The main reason you play test is so that you can make yourself better, not the deck. Granted there will be times where you will probably want to make changes to your deck, and this method of play testing will insure that you get some more optimal results.

Okay so now that you have this idea of what you should be play testing for, a good method of playtesting that me and my friends use is a 20 game method. The 20 game method consists of, you guessed it, 20 games. The idea is to have five games of you going first and then five games of your opponent going first. After the first set of 10 is completed you side deck and do five games with your opponent going first. Then you side deck again and play the last five games with you going first.

This method allows you to become comfortable with the deck for multiple situations, letting you plan the matches ahead of team. Obviously you should do this for multiple decks and then after the set of 20, you and your opponent can (and should) also switch decks between you two so that you can get a feel for the other decks main strategies. Knowing how your opponents deck plays is just as important as knowing your own, and allows you to make skilled reads on what they will do (granted, we're talking about four common decktypes you'll play against, blackwings, gladiator beasts, lightsworn and cat synchro).

You probably wont feel the need to play test like this unless its for big events, but at least doing the 20 game set will allow you to keep your skills sharp with the deck, as well as giving you a just reason to eliminate cards that you don't feel are working optimally.

So until next time:

E.P.B.

Blackwings and the iCamp Theory

2009-07-31T18:35:00.000-07:00

Written by: Jason

So everyone knows about those ugly ass birdies right? Ya know the ones that got highly over hyped after they first came out and are basically the most sack deck since six samurais? Well if your play style is to swarm the field whenever you can then you are playing the deck wrong, and probably wont have much success with it.

Basically, Blackwings have three incredible cards in their decks, not counting the access to numerous powerful synchro monsters. Those cards being Blackwing Gale the Whirlwind, Black Whirlwind, and Icarus Attack. Now if you look at these three cards you begin to see the amazing control potential that Blackwings do have.

Now I don’t know about most people, but when I think of anti-meta, I think of gadgets. What most people don’t realize is that blackwings can play that very same play style that gadgets have. Black Whirlwind is the amazing card that can allow you to do this. You just camp on it and control the field with Icarus Attacks, Bottomless Trap Holes and Solemn Judgments. Even remember when one of my friends played against gadgets with blackwings, when asked if he won, he responded with “I out Gadget them,” personally, I found this hilarious.

Granted, you won’t be able to do this against skilled players using Gadgets, but you get the idea. All I’m saying, is that unless you’re bad, you want to play the Blackwing deck as a control-based deck.

Okay now that you’ve read that, there is a right time to go for the swarm as well, and that’s when you know you can win or back up the over extension with something that can guarantee that you keep your field presence. If you can’t win, do not play out all of the cards in your and, because you’re only going to set yourself up to lose.

So basically to some it up, Blackwings are more about control than swarming. Until next time.

E.P.B.

Round 4 Table 1 of Locals

2009-07-30T19:34:00.000-07:00

(Please note: I am not the table judge for this match, any bad rulings and mistakes are on the players and judges)

The match tonight is between Sean Ailes and Andy Truong. Both players are playing Lightsworn in a mirror match up, Andy is playing a standardized varient while Sean is playing a teched version utilizing Card of Safe Return and Resoning. The players are playing for the 1st place prize of 50$ store credit.

The dice roll goes to Sean and Sean decides that he will start things off first. Sean draws his sixth card and starts off strong with Charge of the Light Brigade, milling Wulf Lightsworn Beast, another Charge and a Solar Recharge. Sean searches his deck for Lumina and special summons Wulf. Afterwards Sean activates his Foolish Burial, allowing him to send Garoth Lightsworn Warrior to his graveyard. Sean summons Lumina activates its effect discarding his Arkus Lightsworn Druid, and revives it in defense mode. Sean ends his turn by sending 5 cards to his graveyard, one of them being a Necro Guardna.

Andy starts his turn off with a move common many formats ago, the T-set, setting one monster and one spell or trap and ending his turn.

Sean draws, and enters straight into his battle phase. Sean attacks but Andy activates Crush Card Virus, and tributes his Necro Guardna. Crush card kills the Wulf on the field and a Wulf in Seans hand. Whats also important is the information Andy recieves from this strong opening play in the Lightsworn mirror match. Sean continues his assault with Lumina, hitting for 1000 and ending his turn. Sean sends 5 cards to the graveyard, none of them being anything that can activate in the graveyard.

Andy draws, sets a monster, and passes his turn.

Sean draws Lyla, and it gets hit by Crush Card. sean switches Arkus to attack mode and attacks Andy's facedown Plaguespreader and then Lumina hits for another 1000.

Andy's turn, will he do more than just set monsters? Yes he will. Andy activates his Charge of the Light Brigade sending three cards to the graveyard, one of which being his own Wulf and selects Ehren Lightsworn Monk, and adds it to his hand. Andy asks if Sean has any Necros in his graveyard and Sean responds with a reassuring 1. Andy summons Ehren with 1600 attack. Andy enters his battle phase and sends Wulf into Arkus, Sean doesn't respond with Necro Guardna and Andy decides to pump his Wulf up to 3300 with Honest. Sean takes the 2100 and Andy tries to attack Lumina with the Ehren, but Sean responds with Necro Guardna. Andy ends his turn.

Sean draws, both players forget that Crush Card is still active. Sean discards to summon Wulf with Lumina. Sean runs Wulf at Ehren, Andy asks if Sean is going to Honest and Sean replies with no, Andy tries to Necro Guardna, but is not able to because they were already in the damage step. Wulf then kills Ehren and the score shifts to 5900 against 5500, in Sean's favor. Sean ends milling three cards, two of which are Wulf and Necro Guardna.

Andy draws, and decides to bring back Plaguespreader Zombie by putting a card on top of his deck. Andy tributes his Wulf for Celestia, Andy targets Sean Lumina and Wulf and mills four cards. Wulf gets special summoned off of this mill and Andy enters into his battle phase. Andy attacks over Wulf and Andy activates his Honest, forcing the 2300 down Sean's throat. Sean negates a Wulf attack with Necro Guardna and then takes the 400 from the attack mode Plaguespreader. Sean is left at 3200 and Andy synchro summons for Darkstrike Fighter and ends his turn.

Sean draws and now has four cards in his hand to Andy's one. Sean summons Arkus and atacks Darkstrike and Andy negates with Necro Guardna. Sean sets a spell or trap card and ends his turn after milling two cards.

Andy's turn and he draws, and starts calculating to see if he can get game this turn. Andy asks how many cards are left in Sean's deck and Sean responds with six. Andy tributes his Wulf for another Celestia and targets Sean's back row. The set Heavy Storm gets destroyed and Andy enters his battle phase. Andy attacks the Arkus with Celestia and Sean Necros. Andy checks graveyards and decides not to attack with Darkstrike fighter. Andy enters his main phase 2 and tributes Celestia and Darkstrike to bring Sean down to 800.

Sean draws and summons his Honest. Sean attacks with both Arkus and Honest, and then mills down to three cards in his deck.

Andy draws and uses a top decked Foolish Burial to send a Necro Guardna to the graveyard, Andy sets a monster and ends.

Sean draws and tributes the Arkus for Celestia, not able to activate it's effect. Sean attacks Andy's facedown Necro Guardna and ends.

Andy passes.

Sean draws and summons Honest and attacks for 1100 and tries to move in with Celestia and Andy negates.

Andy draws and seta a backrow and passes.

Sean draws and summons Plaguespreader. Sean hits with Plaguespreader and Celestia gets Necro Guardna'd. Sean synchro summons for Darkstrike Fighter and brings back Plaguespreader, using Darkstrike's burn effect for game.

Both players reach for their sidedecks in an attempt to side deck hate for the mirror match. The real question is whether or not the side deck choices will be effective in the next games.

Andy decides to go first this time, and starts off by activating Charge of the Light Brigade, milling three and selecting Arkus Lightsworn Druid as his target and special summoning a Wulf off of the Charge. Andy summons the Arkus, and sets a spell or trap. Andy then ends his turn with a Wulf and Arkus on the field and by milling two cards.

Sean draws and plays his own Charge of the Light Brigade for Lumina Lightsworn Summoner. Sean then summons his Ehren Lightsworn Monk, but loses it to Bottomless Trap Hole. Sean sets a back row and ends his turn.

Andy draws and plays his Garoth Lightsworn Warrior, and hits Sean directly with Wulf and Garoth, bringing Sean down to 4050, Andy then ends his turn after switching Arkus to defense mode. Andy does not hit anything off important of his mills.

Sean draws and plays Card of Safe Return, and then Foolish Burial. Sean sends Wulf to the graveyard with Foolish, Andy tries to negate Wulf with a D.D. Crow, but is then promptly reminded that Arkus will not let him target Lightsworn monsters with card effects. Sean draws a card off of Card of Safe Return and activates his Reasoning card and Andy calls level 4. Sean mills over a Wulf with his Reasoning and special summons Arkus to the field, and then special summons Wulf, but forgets to draw his card off of Card of Safe Return. Sean summons Lumina Lightsworn Summoner. Sean enters his battle phase and attempts to hit Arkus with one of his Wulfs. Wulf runs over Arkus and Sean decides to push into Andy's Wuld with his own. Sean's next attack was against Garoth with his Arkus, Sean obviously activates Honest's effect and deals Andy 1200 damage. Then, finally, Lumina hits Andy directly for 1000. Sean ends his turn and mills five cards, one of them being Wulf. Wulf is special summoned and this time Sean remembers to draw his card from Card of Safe Return.

Andy draws a card and plays Charge to select Lyla Lightsworn Sorceress. Andy summons Lyla and attacks Sean's Lumina. Sean activated Beckoning Light and Andy chains with a D.D. Crow to remove Sean's Honest! Sean discards his Necro Guardna to return a Celestia to his hand. Sean takes 700 from the attack and Andy ends his turn.

Sean turn, he draws and tributes Arkus for Celestia and blows up the Lyla. Sean tries to attack with his Wulf and hits successfully for 2100, the other Wulf and Celstia get Necro Guardna'd..

Andy's turn again and Andy does a T-set once again, and ends his turn..

Sean draws and tries to attack, but Andy activates his Crush Card Virus and tributes Plaguespreader, wiping the field clean! Sean plays his last card, Gold Sarcophocus and selects Monster Reincarnation from his deck.

Andy draws, and plays Lumina and discards for Ehren and attacks into Threatening Roar. Andy ends after milling a Guardna.

Sean draws Celstia and it gets destroyed. Sean sets a monster and ends.

Andy's turn and time is called. Andy discards his card he drew to special summon Wulf, Andy then special summons Plaguespreader from his graveyard and synchros Plaguespreader and Lumina for Magical Android. Wulf runs over a Necro Guardna and Sean is able to negate the next two attacks with Necro Guardna.

Sean draws and Garoth he drew gets hit by Crush Card. Sean concedes and declares that he will be going first in game 3. Since time was called neither player would be allowed to side deck.

Sean declares that he will be going first. Sean starts by playing Card of Safe Return and the Solar Recharge. Sean discards Lyla and draws two cards and then mills two cards. Wulf gets special summoned to the field and Sean is able to draw another Card. Sean then activates his Charge of the Light Brigade for Lumina. Sean summons Lumina and discards Arkus and revives it, this play also nets Sean another card off of Card of Safe Return. Sean sets a face down back row and ends his turn and mills a Wulf, which also lets him to draw a third card off of the Card of Safe Return.

Andy draws and plays Heavy Storm. Sean chains Beckoning Light bringing him a Lyla, Judgement Dragon, and Honest to his hand. Andy plays a Charge of the Light Brigade selecting a Lumina and sets two backrow spell or trap cards and ends his turn.

Sean draws and summons a Lyla. Andy activates a torrential Tribute and Crush Card Virus destroying the field, and leaving Sean with two Honest in hand.

Andy draws on the last turn of the end of match procedure. Andy summons a Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer and attacks directly for game.

Andy wins in time and takes home 50$ in store credit.

The Bad Card Theory of YUGIOH

2009-07-28T19:58:00.000-07:00

Experience level: For beginners
Topic: Deck building
Written by: Jake (Bluemaster)

So, recently, I decided that the game of Yu-Gi-Oh contains no good cards. The flip side of this, of course, is that every card in the game is bad, although some are worse than others. Why, you ask? Well, for one thing, it opens the door for a variety of bad card humour ("Crush card? That thing's almost mediocre!" "Wow, I can almost see the mana cost on that one"). Jokes aside, thinking of every card in the game as bad makes good deck building easier.

Most players, when they begin the game, see all the cool cards in the game, and like them all so much. They cram them all into their decks, and when told that they should stick close to the 40 card minimum (IMO, there is no reason, ever, to exceed the 40 card minimum) they wonder why. After all, all the cards in their deck are so gooooood.

Wrong.

By thinking of cards as good, you can't see a reason to not play a lot. By thinking of cards as bad, you want to play as few as possible. This mode of thinking is supported by statistical argument, and thus makes sense in deck building.

If you're not a beginner, and you've read this far, you're probably thinking to yourself that this is just a very simple way of trying to trick newbies into playing 40 card decks as they should. It does function as this, but there's more to it. Even good players, heck, even the best, have trouble cutting some of the last few cards from their decks. This is because they focus too much on what good things the cards do for them.

Recently, a friend of mine, while debating Solemn Judgment in the Cat Synchro deck, said to me that he can't decide if it's good or not because sometimes it flat out wins games, and sometimes it flat out loses games. He was concentrating too much on the fact that it wins games, and wanted to play it, to win.

If you look at the bad side of a card, in this case, the fact that it was losing games, life becomes so much easier. Why in the world would you ever want to play a card that loses games? (Yes, there is, to some degree a risk v reward argument here, and no, I'm not saying Solemn is bad Cat Synchro. It's just an example.)

When you need to make those last few cuts from a deck, don't think about which one is best. Think about which one is the worst, and cut that. Think about how often a card is dead, how often it isn't dead but can't help in an efficient way. Think of every card in the game as bad, and you may find yourself winning more often with your new 'bad' deck than your old 'good' ones.

Until next time, may your cold waves always cost blue and two.

Blogity Blog for the Gamer's

2009-07-27T23:53:00.000-07:00

Introduction
Written by: Jason (EternalPhoenix13)

So Starting off, if you haven't read the About Us then you'll probably be wondering what exactly this blog is about. Well, quite frankly it is about gaming. Me and my friend Jake (Bluemaster on Pojo) will be co-writing on this blog. We'll let you know who's speaking to you at the start of each post. For starters, this is Jason (EternalPhoenix13 on pojo.biz) writing this post.

The games me and Jake will be woring on will be Magic; the Gathering, Yu-gi-oh, and WoW minis for starters. We'll try to let you know our opinions on new games coming out as well as keeping you up to date on the theories and mechanics behind some of the more competitive ideas involved in this games. We'll also be discussing our own exploits (and failures) in the card and board game world, so bear with us. Like I said though, this will be a ygo blog for a good portion of it.

This is primarily a test post. Tomorrow I plan on working on the graphics and spreading the word about this blog.