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Hey everyone!  Just another quick article to wrap up the year from yours truly, but I figured I'd try to twist this one around a bit and do something a little bit different.  Let's break down some of the reviews that you might see at any given time for a year-end article, and my short mini-articles to knock that out of the way:

1. Player of the Year - Tyler Tabman, loved that he was able to break Countdown, top with GKs in a combo format, and then win nats when he finally played a big deck.  (Truthfully my favorite player this year is probably Simon He, but I'd like to see him do well with a non-agent deck.)

2. Best card printed in 2012 (State-side) - Tie between #11: Big Eye, Wind-Up Carrier Zenmaighty, Inzektor Dragonfly, and Lightpulsar Dragon.  All of these cards have been format defining at one point or another.  It's hard to narrow it down to 1 of them.  Big Eye will be a lot better in the next few months. (Honorable mention: Temtempo and Maestrok for just being all around solid.)

3. Best tournament of 2012 - Gonna go with YCS Long Beach, huge tournament, pretty good top 32.  Only beef was the lack of staff

4. Best deck of 2012 - Gonna have to go with either Dino Rabbits or Wind-ups.  I think that Wind-ups were better without hate, but, the Bunny deck was more resilient to veiler/Maxx C.

5. Favorite set of 2012 - Battle Pack, easy.  I hope that Konami keeps doing more sets like it. 

6. Least favorite aspect of 2012 - My lack of activity for about half the year.  I get too greedy whenever my collection breaks about the $2000 mark and usually sell out. 
 

Now that all that is out of the way, I'm going to do a review that is a bit rarer, and, can be done by you, the reader, at home.  Without further adieu, I present:
 
The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly; a review of myself in 2012
 
I know, this sounds just about as ego-stroking, hot headed, and full-of-it as it gets, but I'm going to be serving myself a slice of humble pie towards the end of this article.

What have I done this year?  Truthfully, I have been playing a LOT more Magic: The Gathering than I have been playing Yu-Gi-Oh!  I won't get on my soapbox and start preaching, as I imagine most of you have the option to play whatever game you want and choose Yu-Gi-Oh!  There is nothing wrong with this.  Since 1/1/12 I have won 2 Starcity Games Invitational Qualifiers, Top 8'd 3 more, and traveled all around the east coast for MTG.  For Yugi?  I have only played in a single regional (I top 16'd for my World Championship Qualifier Invite in March) and played in said WCQ.  Most of my work for this game  has been testing with people I know and theory-crafting for my articles.  I can't complain too much, as I have done relatively well given the lack of experience I have given myself in the Yugi world this year, but, I hopefully can improve upon that this year. 
 
What decks in Yugi did I play this year?  I'm not going to list every deck I tested for the WCQ, as that would add about 40 decks to the list, but, this year, I have played:
Gallis Agents (March-April)
Samurai (April)
Wind-Ups (May-June)
Empty Jar (June)
Dyno-Rabbits (June-August)
Hieratic Chaos Dragons (July-August)
Took a break (August-November)
Mermails (November-December)
Gladiator Beasts (November-December)
Gravekeepers (December)
Infernities (December)
 
Hopefully I'll play a plethora of different brews next year, without card availability being an issue.  This year MTG was a much bigger priority for myself, and whether or not that will be true in 2013 is hard to tell.  I plan to at least not drop out of Yu-Gi-Oh! at all this year, so that is a start, eh?
 
 
What can I do next year?  What WILL I do next year?
 
I have several things in my 'inventory' that I need to work on in order to reach a new plateau in Yugi that I have not been able to conquer as of yet.  I have several readers that will write to me and assume that because I write for a website and have some experience, that I cannot do anything to improve my game.  Let me nip that thought right now.  Literally every single player there is can improve on aspects of their game in order to improve themself as a player.  Some players are going to have less to improve than others.  I imagine there are fewer things Frazier Smith needs to improve on than I need to fix about myself.  Just to give people an idea on what aspects to think of, here are the biggest things that I need to work on:
 
1.  My pace of gameplay
Generally, I think of every single card that somebody could be playing, and what plays I can make to minimize the risks of being completely being blown out.  There are many times where this is appropriate, but, I tend to play a bit slower than most people unless I am incredibly ahead and it doesn't matter what cards they play.  To put it in perspective, if my opponent has 3 facedown cards in their back row, and I have none, I may consider why they set so many cards if I haven't activated Heavy Storm.  Do I think they are playing Starlight Road?  If so, should I try a blind Mystical Space Typhoon to hit the 'Road and then just take a +1 off of the storm?  What if it is the same scenario, but I have a Solemn Warning facedown?  Do I still try to blind MST to hit the
'Road?  Do I just Heavy Storm?  If I MST and then Storm, it is a 3-for-3, which does not net me any kind of card advantage.  Academically, this tells us we can just Heavy Storm, and then Solemn Warning their Starlight Road if they have it-  Wait, what if they have "The Huge Revolution is Over!" ?  That would just negate the Heavy Storm, and Solemn Warning doesnt do anything about that.  Should I just go for the Mystical Space Typhoon to try to hit 'Road/THRIO!?  Do I care if my Heavy storm is a Pseudo-MST?  That is the kind of thinking I generally run through my head on any given turn. 

The amount of contemplation I do is not always necessarily a bad thing, as it makes me a pretty competent Gladiator Beast player.  If you always tag-out for the correct Gladiators, the deck is pretty formidable.  The deck isn't seeing as much play because a single mistake WILL cost you the entire game, and the deck can be realtively difficult to side-deck with. 

Overall, I would like to try to think outside the box when deckbuilding, but, learn to try to stick to cards that people will realistically be playing in-game, so I do not go to time every single round.  At the WCQ in Columbus, OH, for example, I only finished one of my rounds before time all of Day 1.  Against Rabbits round 4, I opened up Magician/Shark/Reborn going first Game 1.  Game two I opened up Nobleman of Crossout, Heavy Storm, Magician, Factory, Shark.  GG.
 
2.  Become Better at Side-Decking
I know a lot of what there is to know about side-decking, but just flat-out don't do it.  Falling for n00bish tendencies that I feel I should have moved past at this point.  I could write another entire article on side-decking (I already have one that I posted this year) and still wouldn't cover all of it, and I still find myself taking more than about 90 seconds to side-deck and not being sure what I should take out in a particularly common matchup.  This is also contributing to my slow-pace in rounds.
 

3.  My acceptance of new ideas
I am very wary to even test a new deck.  I generally think they will fall under the same fold that older overhyped garbage has fallen under and try to stay away from the decks.  Take for example
Naturias
Scraps
Nordics
Fableds
and now, even Harpie Ladies are starting to fall into this category.  Before you run to  locals talking about how you've broken the format, make sure you have tested a competent player with the deck multiple times, pre- and post sideboard, and against multiple decks.  No, having a 1200 rating on Dueling Network does not count as a competent player.  I have played against total trash at those levels of DN, and had people try to get me with some of the worst rulings you've ever seen.  Just because someone has picked on chumps with a sub-100 rating 6 hours a day for 6 months, does not mean they are good. 

This flood of decks has caused me to become caloused to decks that actually are good.  This year's nationals, I was on board with what I thought to be the best deck, and, in hindsight, what proved to be a top-contender (Wind-Ups).  Last year, I was on Agents because I knew the Shine Ball into Trish plays were good, and thought that all of the talk about T. G.s were just hype.  I was completely wrong on this one.  (I did believe that Reborn Tengu was roughly just as nuts as he is/was).
 
4.  Trading fairly
This is going to sound like me just looking for attention for some silly 'First World Problems" story, but, I seriously have trouble trading if I think the trade is fair.  If I am going to take the time to get out my trade binder, go through all of someone else's stuff, finally agree on values and everything, I feel that I am going to have to get some sort of value out of the trade for it to be fair.  If I am going to start the trade with a binder worth $100, spend 20 minutes trading, and still have a binder worth $100, then I feel I lost 20 minutes of my life for no reason. 
It sounds really petty, but, after being a hustler for so long and just ripping people off, it is literally boring for me to trade fairly.  I am trying to adopt a much better attitude about it, but the process is long.
 
Those arej ust a handful of things I am going to try to work on involving the gameplay of Yu-Gi-Oh!.  There are some other aspects that I will also be trying to work on, in 2013:

1.  Write more for Pojo
There are times where I had an article every week for this website, and, as often as three times a week on here, and lately,  I struggle to have two a month.  I want to try to become better as a writer and player, so I have better material to write about.  I enjoy connecting with the community and it legitimately brightens my day to open my email account and read the responses to my articles.  Good or bad.  My profiting articles were generally well received, so I will hopefully start that up again. 
 
2.  Begin streaming
I know I've been talking about this for a long time, but, my compter has a few issue with it that make it able to run the streaming program, but only for a short time.  It probably just need to get a new heat sink for my computer, clean out the fans, and/or just replace the cooling system.  I'm not in a financial position to do it at the moment, but, just you wait!
 
3.  Attend more large events
I am already looking at attending a YCS in February, but I haven't worked out all of the details as of yet.  I definitely plan to attend Nation- er, the North American World Championship Qualifier this year, but, it is hard to plan without a location being disclosed as of yet.  I am teaming with someone who I have a very good history with, and will probably be able to swing traveling more as a result of it. 
 
4.  Get my online store up and running
Myself and the aforementioned teammate are trying to start an actual store for cards, not just doing Youtube videos and throwing stuff on Ebay.  We haven't worked out all of the logistics yet, but we plan to have the site put up by October or November. 
 

If you have any questions, comments, want to talk about a deck idea, or just play around online or talk, feel free to reach me via the internet!

facebook: facebook.com/shakezilluh
duelingnetwork: Shakezilluh
pojo forums: themcshakealchemis (no T)
youtube: themcshakealchemist (with a T)
email: andro_sphinx@yahoo.com
twitter: @paper_gangsta_
 
I love talking about the game or just learning more from people who read my stuff.  Most of writing is an attempt to reach out to the community and meet people after all! 

Thanks a bunch for for reading!
Sean Handy
The McShake Alchemist