From: Anteaus44@aol.com [mailto:Anteaus44@aol.com]
Sent: Saturday, March 25, 2006 1:59 AM

Subject: The Game-a bland title, but whatever-Anteaus

Hello, and welcome to yet another installment of Anteaus' [insert cool name here]!

Today, we're talking about the game. Yes, the game. All of it, from A to Z, from SJC to your local store. And how to fix it.

First off, we'll start off with the banlist. Now, the banlist is a great thing, because now we have some sort of idea of originality and diversity in deckbuilding and actually more than one road to go down to win at SJC. However, it sucks because now all those cards that we all love (Yata, anyone?) are collecting dust in a trade-binder that we never touch because of this zany hope we hold on to that we may be able to own people with our Yata-Garasu again.

The banlist, in my opinion, sucks right now, but we have to live with it. But really, the only reason it sucks is because we're all stuck with decks we all hate, with even less originality because FTK and OTK decks are gone. However, I feel that it is somewhat necessary to gloat right here because Konami decided on a global banlist amidst all the bitching and moaning from Americans that it's "not possible" and I'm the only person that ever argued for it. But that's beside the point. Konami was hell-bent on destroying the Japanese metagame of FTK's and OTK's and establishing a more agressive style of play, while at the same time using us as an example that the rest of the world is supposed to follow. How nice.

Unfortunately, Americans don't want to be examples. We hate this format, we hate this list, and we hate the cards we run even (albeit when they're played against us). Americans want this list to change, and it's not just Americans; everyone wants this list to change. And change it will, if--by some random act of God--Konami gets their head out of their ass and realizes that problems in the metagame don't wait six months for the new banlist before manifesting themselves.

So, now that the rant is over, onto the current metagame, which is actually a good metagame in my opinion. People bitch and moan about the abundance of 141's and Sakuretsu Armor and Smashing Ground and Widespread Ruin. Ok, get it through your head: if these cards were limited to one, we would see total ownage by vanilla decks again and a total lack of respect for stall cards. We'd be pre-Legacy of Darkness, pre-Yata, pre-Chaos again. We'd be in the Bronze age of Yu-Gi-Oh! (which I kind of miss, actually), and no one wants that really. We want to win. 

That's really the metagame in a nutshell. But it will change, although slowly and subtly. The metagame will slowly change. We're going to see a much more conservative style of play, a style that will ultimately mimic Team Superfriend's and Team Scoop's idea at Shonen Jump Durham (for coverage, head on over to Metagame.com). We're going to see a flip-effect dominated metagame, we're going to see increased Monarch use, we're going to see substantial Frog abuse, and all the while we're going to notice a subtle trend away from the Bazoo/Return deck that we are already seeing.

The metagame revolves around the banlist, and the banlist revolves around the metagame. It's almost like a Catch-22: we can't have the banlist without the metagame, but without the banlist there wouldn't be a metagame at all. Hmm, something to ponder I guess.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that we all need to adjust and play and create and be creative and follow the leader that is blazing the path of creativity. Another paradox, eh? So take a break and have fun.

Cheers,

Anteaus

If you would like to talk, e-mail me at anteaus44@aol.com.