Article 40: The Best, Worst, and Change of 2005
OK, let's start off the complete recap of this year, in terms of the game. This article would touch on the sets (and other products), the ban/restrictions, the tournament result/metagame, or just anything.
Sets/Related product
In a trading card game, nothing is more important than the new cards themselves. I had touched on my first impression on each booster set that was released this year (except reprints): The Lost Millennium, Cybernetic Revolution, Elemental Energy, and Shadow of Infinity. But in those articles, I have not actually GIVE a "score" on the set. In addition, I had never review a structure deck or reprint sets in a whole in any of my articles. I may had done it in some of my forum posts, but they're everywhere. Don't worry, I would do it right here. All of the scores would be determined by its playability, its choice of cards, the theme/art, etc.
The Lost Millennium: 7.2/10 - Even if this set first introduced to the behated E-Hero theme, it is still well balanced between number of GX anime cards vs. number of "original" cards. The Rock monsters are nicely done, even if sometimes they're not the best. The set lack, however, any number of good Magic/Trap cards, outside of [Brain Control]. Otherwise, there're just lots of thing cards from this set can do.
Cybernetic Revolution: 6.8/10 - This set introduced the cards that dominate every standard tournament deck right now: Cyber Dragon series. The Sho's vehicles are OK, but not too great in its own theme deck. The worst thing is, however, the "0 card in hand" theme is a complete failure, since there're just not enough ways for this game to win without hand advantage. There're some nice cards, but not enough to make my rating higher.
Elemental Energy: 4.3/10 - It give E-Heroes a nice boost (as for the Fusions). The Dark Realm monsters are suppose to be good, and tourney applicable, but just purely no one try it. Outside of those two, however, this set SUCK. The Manjynome cards could have...well...not release here, and put another better theme in this set.
Shadow of Infinity: 3.7/10 - The set is wasted. The mechanic of "more in Graveyard, the better" just didn't work out for most decks, not even counting it to be competitive. The Phantoms are just...Phantoms, it's sad that they're nowhere close to be competitive. The Insect boost is needed and it's nice, but outside of that, too much wasted opputunity to make the cards better.
Duelist Packs: 1.2/10 - Nothing but a way to make more money...I mean, REPRINTS? Why in the world they don't released them earlier so some of the cards do not have to "waste" spaces in a "real" booster set? The new cards are too meh, maybe 2 cards from Manjynome pack are playable, but that's it.
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Structure Deck:
Scorched Earth - 6.9/10 - It try to make Fire deck accessible, but too bad that the Fire cards are still too weak. If they start the 3 new cards in this structure, I bet it would be WAY better.
Anger of Sea Dragon God - 8.9/10 - Although this deck does not gave people anything new, Water deck is always a powerful deck type. This deck basically gave all the cards that someone needed, with few singles to buy, to start using a good water deck. The playability and card choice gave this deck a big plus.
Legend of Warrior - 6.1/10 - This deck tries to touch on the equipment side of Warrior deck. The cards are nice, but with the way this deck is put together, it's just not too playable without a LOT of fixes.
Judgment of Spellcasters - 7.4/10 - The new cards are actually PLAYABLE! Well, anyway, this deck can be play, it's not competitive (they're never meant to be), but it's still great. The card choice, however, could have been better, and they could have gave a non-Black Magician related Spellcaster.
Fortress of Divine Protector - 5.1/10 - This deck is just basically a "big reprint" of all of the Rock monsters from TLM. The new cards are REALLY good, but the card choice needs to be improve. Not enough staples is actually a minus.
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The ban/restriction list!
No matter what, everybody should HATE the list. I mean, it get more and more ridiculous each time a new list comes out. WHY? The list just get longer and longer, and have never stop growing. It makes the game really boring consider some of the powerful cards stills runs everywhere. With no "color control", there would never be theme on what can be mixed up and what cannot be.
Anyway, just brief rating:
3/1 banlist: 7.3/10 - Even if I disagree with some card choice, in general the list is good. What I hate, kind of, is two things: one is the complete gone of Combo deck (it can be good or bad), and the other is Chaos Soldier stills runs around.
9/1 banlist: 7.0/10 - It stops cookie-cutting Chaos Control and the annoying Goat Control, but it gives back the more boring mindless Beatdown. COME ON...there should be some control over every aspect of winning, and certainly this list boost the aggro aspect.
TCG 10/1 banlist: 0/10: Lies, faults, and no logic. I cannot explain why Pot of Greed needs to be ban, with people then just runs more Dekochi.
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Tournament/Metagame:
With how big this game had came about, World Championship is just matters. Well, the problem with tournament scene was never resolved: ALL of top 8 decks looks the same.
The thing is, people just love to cookie cut other's winners deck and use it themselves for the sake of winning. That's bad idea for players like me, who don't care about winning but more about having fun with using cards. With >65% of the tournament using the same deck type, it's really normal to have 65% or higher amount of that deck type in Top 8.
And at the end, just a little metagme check in Japan right now:
- If you say there's A cookie-cutter deck, not really, since there're actually 5 right now: Cy-Calibar, Recruiter (include Tomato Control/Neo Chaos), MPT/MMPT variant, Gadget, and Yomi-Tei (Emperor). There're also certain deck types popping up sometimes: Warrior or Earth beatdown, lock (usually with Magic Cancellar, Victory Dragon, and like), Burn, etc. This, of course, is a big improvement over from Chaos/Goat Control to Gadget Control.
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The good, the bad, and the ugly...and of course, hopes
Here I would choose my "good, bad, and ugly" thing in this game from this year.
Good: The metagame is actually more diverse with some better cards coming out, with help of banning of Chaos Soldier
Bad: The insane amount of Heroes and support versus other character's deck had gotten out of control. Just who wants cards that only work in EXACTLY one deck type while they could have think of more "generic" support cards?
Ugly: The separation and glitch between OCG players and TCG players. This separation stills continue, from the "defiance" of Upperdeck to make their own restriction list for no reason (not saying Konami's one was any better) to the continue of lashing out at English speaking OCG players. That is just ugly and sad...when does ONE game have two sides, and people that plays language of different version yelled their ass off to another to see "who's better"?
Hopes:
- More boosts to underrepresented main/sub-type, like what they did in SOI with new Insect monsters (through they could have actually release new Magic/Trap ALSO!)
- Let's just release NEW CARDS in Duelist packs, and forgot about putting them into a regular booster. I mean, who wants reprints?
- Konami making better corporate decision, and that should stops the continuous whining of certain Upperdeck representatives
- Promo reprint pack: if they want money, THIS is the chance
- Upperdeck changes their official communicator: Kevin Tewart did good job changing the game, but he's a HORRIBLE communicator, and his jokes is not even funny
- People stop copying my translation like it's nothing
- People stop praising Furigana pronunciation guide when they don't even understand what they mean
- People starting to READ the rulebook and UNDERSTAND the rules, and Konami STOP giving out stupid rulings.
That's it, and hope for a better new year!
- Baron, 12/30/05
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