Once per duel restrictions have always been a terrible way to balance effects and should never be placed on custom cards

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Christen57
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Once per duel restrictions have always been a terrible way to balance effects and should never be placed on custom cards

Post #1 by Christen57 » Mon Oct 11, 2021 10:01 pm

There are so many ways players can balance their customs that have powerful effects. You can make it hard once per turn so you can't abuse multiple copies of the card in the same turn (in the case of something like Spell Power Grasp), you can add some kind of life point or discard cost so you have to sacrifice life points, card advantage, or both, in exchange for the powerful effect (in the case of Odd-Eyes Revolution Dragon's search effect), you can make it so you can't do certain actions for a certain period of time during or after the turn you use the effect (such as Dogmatika Punishment locking you out of the extra deck for at least 2 turns after you activate it), you can make it so you there's a certain amount of luck involved for the effect (in the case of something like Cup of Ace), and so on.

Many of Konami's cards have restrictions of them, and many of these restrictions vary from card to card, but there's 1 kind of restriction that has always led to literally every card with this kind of restriction being either so good that they're abused in degenerate combos (and then possibly banned), so bad that they see no competitive play, or not really in either of these 2 categories but still better off without the once per duel restriction and instead with a hard once per turn restriction.

I'm talking about the once per duel restriction. This is a restriction Konami put on cards and effects such as Abyss Actor - Curtain Raiser's pendulum effect so you can't use them more than once in any duel. The idea behind this is that if an effect is so powerful that it would be too broken if players could use it more than once in a duel, it could be balanced by making it so that players can't use it more than once per duel.

There are currently 38 cards in the TCG with once per duel effects at the time of writing this. These 38 cards are as follows:

1. The aforementioned Abyss Actor - Curtain Raiser
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2. Afterglow
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3. Alviss of the Nordic Alfar
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4. Armored Kappa
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5. Assault Blackwing - Onimaru the Divine Thunder
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6. Bacon Saver
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7. Blackwing - Hillen the Tengu-wind
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8. Blackwing - Steam the Cloak
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9. Blackwing - Zephyros the Elite
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10. Condemned Maiden
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11. Constellar Tempest
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12. Dai Dance
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13. Destiny HERO - Decider
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14. Destiny HERO - Disk Commander
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15. Dinowrestler Coelasilat
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16. Dotscaper
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17. Electromagnetic Turtle
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18. Exchange of the Spirit
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19. Galaxy-Eyes Cloudragon
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20. Glow-Up Bulb
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21. Infernoble Knight Astolfo
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22. Limit Code
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23. Magical Hound
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24. Mogmole
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25. Performapal Splashmammoth
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26. Plunder Patroll Parrrty
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27. Predaplant Darlingtonia Cobra
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28. Rank-Up-Magic - The Seventh One
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29. Rank-Up-Magic Argent Chaos Force
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30. Rescue Hamster
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31. Spore
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32. Stack Reviver
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33. Super Anti-Kaiju War Machine Mecha-Thunder-King
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34. Tasuke Knight
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35. The Seal of Orichalcos
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36. Twin-Headed Behemoth
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37. Unknown Synchron
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38. Xyz Agent
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I'll explain the problem with each of these cards and why each of their once per duel restrictions proved to be a bad/unnecessary way to balance the card.

1. Abyss Actor - Curtain Raiser

This card is one of the better designed cards that has a once per duel restriction, but since it already requires you to control no monsters and have an open pendulum zone to put it in to begin with in order to special summon it, it's once per duel restriction could have instead been a hard once per turn restriction and it would still be an okay card, not too strong and not too weak. Pendulum players usually begin their first turn combos with this card and then assemble a board, so once your board is assembled, you'll most likely end up having monsters on the field during subsequent turns so you won't be able to meet this card's "control no monsters" condition again anytime soon, and you'll also most likely end up having your pendulum zones occupied during subsequent turns so you won't be able to put another copy of this card in your pendulum zone to use it's special summoning effect again.

2. Afterglow

Already too slow, too situational, and too luck-reliant. Yet, on top of all that, Konami still felt the need to make this once per duel. This sees no play and will continue to not see competitive play because it requires you to activate it then wait until your next draw phase to possibly do anything, it doesn't generate you any actual card advantage and instead just burns your opponent, and it requires you to draw a specific card during your next draw phase — another copy of itself, and there will be only 1 possible copy you could draw since any other copies will be banished, leaving you with a very low chance of dealing that burn damage unless you've taken the time to thin out your deck first to increase your odds of drawing that copy of this. Yet Konami still felt that all those drastic downsides weren't enough and just had to slap a once per duel on top of all that to ensure that this card would be utterly horrible and see no play.

3. Alviss of the Nordic Alfar

This monster has the once per duel effect where If an "Aesir" monster(s) in your possession is sent to your GY by your opponent's card: You can banish this card from your GY; Special Summon 1 "Aesir" monster from your Extra Deck, with a different name from the cards in your GY.
At first glance, this seems like an okay effect worth the once per duel restriction, because if your opponent sends your Aesir monster to the graveyard by any means, you can use this monster's graveyard effect... at least that's how I initially thought this effect would work, until I read the ruling for this card which says that you, for some reason, can't activate this monster's graveyard effect in the damage step, meaning you can't trigger this monster's graveyard effect upon your Aesir monster being destroyed by battle and sent to the graveyard (only upon your Aesir monster being sent to the graveyard by an opponent's effect). That hurts, and yet Konami felt that that downside wasn't enough and had to also slap a once per duel on top of such an already super situational effect.

4. Armored Kappa

This monster is slightly less situational than the 2 previous cards, but still sees no play since it generates you no advantage, doesn't extend your plays in any way, and doesn't let you disrupt your opponent's plays. There are just far better rank 2 monsters to go into besides this, such as Toadally Awesome, Number 29: Mannequin Cat, and Number 64: Ronin Raccoon Sandayu, but Konami still felt the need to make this monster's protection effect once per duel. If you need to stop your opponent's attacks and battle damage, you're better off playing Mystic Mine at that point.

5. Assault Blackwing - Onimaru the Divine Thunder

I don't know what a once per duel on this monster's level-changing effect accomplished that a simple hard once per turn wouldn't have. A once per duel on this effect felt so unnecessary. Blackwing players most likely won't play this to begin with and would instead rather play Blackwing Full Armor Master which protects itself from all effects, unlike this card which only protects itself from effect destruction, and there are other level 12 synchros players would rather go into over this, such as Geomathmech Final Sigma which, again, protects itself from all non-mathmech effects instead of just effect destruction, and Ultimaya Tzolkin which lets you bring out Crystal Wing Synchro Dragon.

6. Bacon Saver

If Necro Gardna and Speedroid Tri-Eyed Dice see no play while those aren't even hard once per turn, let alone once per duel, there is no reason for this card which basically does the exact same thing to have a hard once per turn, let alone be once per duel.

7. Blackwing - Hillen the Tengu-wind

Again, if a effect is super slow and situational, and all it does is revive a Blackwing monster, there is no need for any once per duel. A hard once per turn would've been enough for this monster. Taking 2000 in direct attack damage and having both this and a level 3 or lower Blackwing monster in the graveyard are already difficult enough conditions to fulfill, keeping this card balanced, so if you find yourself taking that much direct attack damage anyway and having to use this monster's effect, you've pretty much already lost the duel at that point.

8. Blackwing - Steam the Cloak

Making this monster's effect once per duel proved to be pointless since it's now banned, meaning the once per duel restriction did nothing to balance this card.

9. Blackwing - Zephyros the Elite

The only time I saw this card used was in degenerate FTKs. Making an effect once per duel is pointless if all you need to win is to resolve the effect once anyway.

10. Condemned Maiden

Again, if this was simply a hard once per turn, it might have seen play, but since it's once per duel, you're better off just setting your quick-play spells and playing them like normal on the opponent's turn.

11. Constellar Tempest

This continuous spell card has the once per duel effect, During your End Phase: You can target 2 "Constellar" Xyz Monsters you control that have Xyz Material; detach all Xyz Materials from both Xyz Monsters, and if you do, halve your opponent's LP.
That is super slow and situational, not being able to be used during your main phase but instead during your end phase, and you need to have 2 constellar xyz monsters that both have materials, and you need to detach all of them, all just to reduce your opponent's life points a little. A hard once per turn would have been good enough. There was no need for an effect like this that doesn't give you any advantage, disrupt the opponent's plays, or extend your own plays be once per duel.

12. Dai Dance

A weird trap card that basically forces the opponent to summon any monster they summon to an available zone you choose instead of the zone they want, which is cool for messing up certain plays they might be trying to make, like if they're trying to put a monster in a specific zone for a link monster such as Cross-Sheep. The problem with this card's once per duel restriction though is that it's already worded so you can't activate multiple copies, pick a different zone for each copy, and then permanently prevent the opponent from summoning to any zone since different zones are each at the same time trying to force them to summon only to it. In other words, if Dai Dance had no once per duel restriction, I activate copy A of Dai Dance and choose zone #1, it resolves, then I activate copy B of Dai Dance and choose zone #2, the first copy's effect will stop applying since zone #1 now became "unusable" due to copy B's effect making all zones except zone #2 unusable. This means Dai Dance received a once per duel restriction for nothing.

13. Destiny HERO - Decider

We already have a bunch of cards that add HERO monsters to the hand that aren't once per turn, let alone once per duel, such as the searcher Elemental HERO Stratos, so giving this monster's adding effect a once per duel instead of just a hard once per turn makes no sense. It's second effect also needs no once per duel due to how situational it is and could instead also have just been hard once per turn.

14. Destiny HERO - Disk Commander

This monster's effect used to just be "When this card is Special Summoned from the Graveyard: Draw 2 cards."
It was banned for a while because of this since you could revive it multiple times in a turn and keep drawing cards, so Konami made it so you couldn't special summon it from the graveyard the turn it was sent there. That would have been good enough, making the card much less abusable while still keeping it fairly strong, but then Konami just had to also add a once per duel on top of that, now making it too bad to play.

15. Dinowrestler Coelasilat

This card's restrictions make no sense. Monsters like Junk Forward already special summon themselves from the hand for free by controlling no monsters and never needed any once per duel or any effect preventing it from being used a link material for specific monsters, so I don't get why this needed both of those.

16. Dotscaper

Another card with a once per duel on top of enough other restrictions. This says you can only use 1 of it's effects per turn and only once that turn, yet that apparently wasn't enough so this also needed a once per duel for each effect. Now it's too bad of a card to play. It wouldn't have been so bad if it just had the hard once per turn, or if it just had it's once per duel, but it had to have both which proved to be too much. You're better off playing Salamangreats, over any other cyberse deck with this card, because at least then you'll have access to Salamangreat Spinny which will keep reviving itself with no once per duel restrictions, unlike this which revives itself only once per duel.

17. Electromagnetic Turtle

I haven't seen any deck other than maybe Lightsworns play this anymore. We have plenty of cards designed to stop battle phases such as Battle Fader, Waboku, Threatening Roar, Zero Gardna, and so on, and even without any once per duel or even hard once per turn, these cards don't see play. Cards that do nothing but slow down your opponent's attacks a little aren't seeing competitive play anymore.

18. Exchange of the Spirit

Like Zephyros, this card has only seen play in some degenerate deck out strategies and nothing more. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQDRET9UHwQ

19. Galaxy-Eyes Cloudragon

The Galaxy-Eyes players I've seen have only played this card for it's first effect, not the second effect that's once per duel. Making this card's second effect hard once per turn instead of once per duel would make Galaxy-Eyes decks a bit better but still far from competitively viable.

20. Glow-Up Bulb

Like Steam the Cloak, this card's once per duel restriction proved to be pointless since that didn't stop it from getting banned. This should've been limited to plant decks only, like a restriction that says "You cannot Summon, except Plant monsters, nor activate monster effects, except Plant monsters, the turn you activate this effect."
Right now, it's too easy to abuse alongside non-plant monsters such as Crystron Halqifibrax.

21. Infernoble Knight Astolfo

Most Infernoble Knight players who played this card competitively played it at only 1 copy and only played it for it's first effect, not it's second one that special summons during the 2nd standby phase, and many Infernoble Knight players weren't playing any copies of this. Yet both of it's effects had to be once per duel for some reason. Maybe just 1 of them needed to be once per duel while the other could have been hard once per turn, especially since Infernoble Knights already have access to a bunch of fire warriors that special summon themselves and aren't once per duel, so it doesn't make sense for both of this monster's effects to be once per duel. If Konami really wanted players to not be able to abuse multiple copies of this, they should've just made this card's effects hard once per turn instead of once per duel but limit this card on the banlist.

22. Limit Code

This card already had enough restrictions on it so it didn't need a once per duel on top. It's a trap, so you have to set it and wait a turn to use it, you need to have cyberse link monsters in the graveyard to use it, you can only special summon Code Talker monsters with it and not just any monster, it doesn't treat the special summon as a link summon so you won't be able to revive the link monster from the graveyard, this card equips itself to the special summoned monster and has to stay equipped or else the monster gets destroyed, making this card vulnerable to spell/trap removal, and it eventually destroys both itself and said monster once the counters run out. Yet despite all of this, Konami still felt that this needed a once per duel on top of all that instead of a hard once per turn.

23. Magical Hound

Currently, the 7 tuners with once per duel effects are all either banned or see no competitive play. This card sees no competitive play. It's effect is situational enough where it could be hard once per turn instead of once per duel.

24. Mogmole

We have a card like this called Marshmacaron which special summons copies of itself when destroyed like how this card special summons itself when destroyed, and Marshmacaron is hard once per turn instead of once per duel, yet even that sees no competitive play, so why would this?

25. Performapal Splashmammoth

I actually used to play this card a lot in my performapal/odd-eyes deck prior to Master Rule 4 and I was in love with it but still didn't get why it's monster effect needed a once per duel restriction, especially when Performapals Odd-Eyes Dissolver, Trump Girl, Trump Witch, and U Go Golem all had fusion summoning effects too and those weren't once per duel.

26. Plunder Patroll Parrrty

I've been looking at Plunder Patroll deck profiles and I haven't seen any of them run this. This is a worse Jar of Greed. Why would I play this which requires me to control a plunder patroll monster and is hard once per turn when I could play Jar of Greed which requires none of those and isn't hard once per turn? This card's equipping effect should have been hard once per turn instead of once per duel.

27. Predaplant Darlingtonia Cobra

Like Zephyros and Exchange of the Spirit, this card was used only in degenerate FTKs alongside Predaplant Ophrys Scorpio and nothing else. Cards like Brilliant Fusion had to get banned in the TCG, while the OCG had to limit Scorpio, all because Konami made the terrible mistake of giving this card a pointless once per duel restriction instead of simply limiting it to dark decks so it would be harder to abuse outside it's own archetype. Instead of a once per duel restriction, a better restriction would have been "You cannot Summon, except "Predaplant" and "Fusion Dragon" monsters, nor activate monster effects, except DARK monsters, the turn you activate this effect."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70pCOHzBK58

28. Rank-Up-Magic - The Seventh One

This card was probably the reason Konami changed the rules of the game so you no longer draw during your first draw phase of the duel. Prior to that, people were running this card, drawing it for their first draw phases of the duel left and right, and bringing out either Number 101: Silent Honor DARK or Number C107: Neo Galaxy-Eyes Tachyon Dragon. Nowadays both it's once per duel restriction and it's requirement that you draw and reveal it for your normal draw to use it make it see no play.

29. Rank-Up-Magic Argent Chaos Force

Like Glow-Up Bulb and Steam the Cloak, this card's once per duel restriction did nothing to keep it from getting banned since you only needed to resolve it's adding effect once in your duel anyways to abuse it with Number S0: Utopic ZEXAL, but then Utopic Zexal got banned so this could come off the banlist and now it sees no play.

30. Rescue Hamster

This didn't need a once per duel. It was already situational enough, requiring you to first setup your extra deck with pendulum monsters that had the same name as each other and then requiring you to banish this card from your pendulum zone for cost. This effect could have been hard once per turn instead.

31. Spore

The fact that this is unlimited while Glow-Up Bulb and Steam the Cloak remain banned shows that restricting cards to their own archetypes, or in this case restricting Spore to plants, is better than just making things once per duel but generic and abusable alongside things like Crystron Halqifibrax. This card's once per duel could've still instead been a hard once per turn though since it was already somewhat restricted to plants.

32. Stack Reviver

Other Cyberse monsters like Cyberse Gadget already had floating effects upon being used as link material, didn't have any once per duel restriction, and still saw no play, so this card with a similar floating effect wouldn't see any play either with a once per duel restriction.

33. Super Anti-Kaiju War Machine Mecha-Thunder-King

Special Summoning a 2200 ATK monster during the end phase with no other remotely good effects simply isn't worth it's once per duel restriction. There are better high level monsters out there than this that can also bring themselves back from the grave such as Gizmek Orochi, the Serpentron Sky Slasher and Eldlich the Golden Lord.

34. Tasuke Knight

Another monster with an attack-stopping graveyard effect that sees no play because it's once per duel even though it's already restricted enough requiring you to have no cards in hand. A better restriction would have been either a hard once per turn or making it banish itself (or put itself on the bottom of the deck) when it leaves the field.

35. The Seal of Orichalcos

A once per duel restriction proved to be too much for a card that simply boosts your monsters' ATK and protects only the weakest among them from attacks.

36. Twin-Headed Behemoth

An even worse Super Anti-Kaiju War Machine Mecha-Thunder-King. At least that could special summon itself no matter how or when it got in the grave. This card on the other hand has to specifically be destroyed on the field and sent to the grave so it can special summon itself and only during the end phase of that turn.

37. Unknown Synchron

We already have a level 1 tuner called Tenyi Spirit - Adhara that has easier summoning requirements than this (only requiring you to control no effect monsters) whereas this required both your opponent to control a monster and you to control no monsters, also Adhara is only hard once per turn while this is once per duel, and yet even Adhara barely sees any play, so no way would this see any. This card would also see no play even if the once per duel restriction was removed outright, because Adhara is still the better option with it's much easier summoning requirement with it not being as reliant on the opponent controlling something.

38. Xyz Agent

I couldn't find any Utopia xyz monsters that could abuse this if this had it's once per duel restriction replaced with a hard once per turn. Seriously, what's the worst that would happen if this had a hard once per turn instead of it's once per duel?
Number 39: Utopia and Number 39: Utopia Roots each get to stop 1 additional attack?
Number 39: Utopia Beyond gets you an additional 1250 life points?
Number C39: Utopia Ray gets an additional 1000 ATK?
Number C39: Utopia Ray V gets to destroy an additional monster?

So those are all the issues with the currently-existing once per duel cards, as well as why I never put any once per duel restriction on any of my own customs, always opting for less strict restrictions instead. You can see how these once per duel cards either saw no competitive play or were only abused in some degenerate combos and nothing else, while at least 2 of them still ended up on the banlist because their once per duel restrictions proved to be pointless.

If you give an effect a once per duel restriction, you have to make the effect devastatingly powerful enough to be worth that once per duel restriction, but then if it's powerful to the point where resolving it even once usually ends up winning you the game, the once per duel restriction becomes pointless, so now you need to either throw in more restrictions, or reduce the overall power of the effect itself to make it weaker, so it isn't so game-breaking upon a player resolving it, but then if all you needed to balance the card was those additional restrictions and maybe a hard once per turn, or if you just weakened the effect itself so it's no longer that powerful upon resolving once, that also makes the once per duel restriction pointless since it means you should have just implemented those other restrictions/nerfs from the start instead of a once per duel to begin with since that would've been enough to balance the card. It's like in the case of the errata'd Disk Commander, where just the restriction that you couldn't revive it the turn it was sent to the graveyard would've been enough to keep this card from being abused, but then the additional once per duel restriction, on top of all that, made the card too bad to play.

Not to mention once per duel effects are especially bad in tag duels since if you're playing a card with a once per duel restriction, or something like Sekka's Light that locks you and your partner out of other spells/traps for the remainder of the duel, your partner won't be able to play their copy of that card if they have it (in the case of the once per duel card) or play any of their own spells/traps (in the case of Sekka's Light).

For these reasons, Konami has never managed to get once per duel effects right, I don't think Konami will anytime soon, and it has always been (and always will be) better to have a fairly strong (but not broken) effect you can use possibly multiple times in a duel, with some simpler restrictions/downsides than a once per duel, than to have a broken effect you can use only once the entire duel that will end up winning you the duel if you resolve it once anyway.

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Post #2 by Renji Asuka » Mon Oct 11, 2021 10:06 pm

I personally wouldn't use Dogmatika Punishment as an example, considering it's built around a deck in mind that doesn't use the extra deck (typically).
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Post #3 by Fredblade » Mon Oct 11, 2021 10:48 pm

Imagine if Bacon Saver wasn't once per duel, I already hate that card in duel links, the amount of stall they could get + kiteroid + sphere kuriboh... no thanks.

Dotscaper was played once a time in Burning Abyss monster mash (when Light of Sekka was at 3), also, Cyberse Decks have ways of reviving monsters from grave so each turn this card could make link-2's by itself and it's a level 1 on top. It's not that bad, there are ways of sending it from deck to graveyard, also you point out Salamangreats are better in that department with Spinny, but guess what? SALAMANGREATS AREN'T THE BEST EXAMPLE OF CARD DESIGN EITHER, seriously, 1 card engine ends on a pop/negation almost consistently so you can fill the rest of your deck with staples, handtraps and backrow because you can get your standard salamangreat board out of 1 card combo, that's not good design, and it proves it by having both their spell rota and Gazelle limited at 1, they also had Miragestallio banned for some time and even Cyberse Playmaker decks have to suffer the consequences of it by having Lady Debug on the list as well.

Dinowrestler Coelasilat is an example of how Konami failed to balance the generic dino engine from the structure deck and now there can't be any new Dinosaur-type archetype that is good because guess what? Soul Oviraptor, Lost World, the baby saurus, ultimate conductor tyrano, misc, etc.; without mention they have a better ROTA that hasn't been limited yet. It just takes 1 good dino archetype to break this appart just like Zoodiac and Tri-Brig, another 2 horribly designed archetypes, ruined it for every other Beast-Warrior Deck by having Tenki on the list.

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Post #4 by Renji Asuka » Mon Oct 11, 2021 10:51 pm

Fredblade wrote:Imagine if Bacon Saver wasn't once per duel, I already hate that card in duel links, the amount of stall they could get + kiteroid + sphere kuriboh... no thanks.

Dotscaper was played once a time in Burning Abyss monster mash (when Light of Sekka was at 3), also, Cyberse Decks have ways of reviving monsters from grave so each turn this card could make link-2's by itself and it's a level 1 on top. It's not that bad, there are ways of sending it from deck to graveyard, also you point out Salamangreats are better in that department with Spinny, but guess what? SALAMANGREATS AREN'T THE BEST EXAMPLE OF CARD DESIGN EITHER, seriously, 1 card engine ends on a pop/negation almost consistently so you can fill the rest of your deck with staples, handtraps and backrow because you can get your standard salamangreat board out of 1 card combo, that's not good design, and it proves it by having both their spell rota and Gazelle limited at 1, they also had Miragestallio banned for some time and even Cyberse Playmaker decks have to suffer the consequences of it by having Lady Debug on the list as well.

Dinowrestler Coelasilat is an example of how Konami failed to balance the generic dino engine from the structure deck and now there can't be any new Dinosaur-type archetype that is good because guess what? Soul Oviraptor, Lost World, the baby saurus, ultimate conductor tyrano, misc, etc.; without mention they have a better ROTA that hasn't been limited yet. It just takes 1 good dino archetype to break this appart just like Zoodiac and Tri-Brig, another 2 horribly designed archetypes, ruined it for every other Beast-Warrior Deck by having Tenki on the list.

Just to point out, ROTA was limited cause Tellars won worlds, where the card was already limited. While ROTA was fine at 3 during that time.
Last edited by Renji Asuka on Tue Oct 12, 2021 10:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post #5 by greg503 » Tue Oct 12, 2021 1:33 am

Have you ever considered that some cards need to be bad?
Buy Floowandereeze

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Post #6 by Christen57 » Tue Oct 12, 2021 7:16 pm

Fredblade wrote:Imagine if Bacon Saver wasn't once per duel, I already hate that card in duel links, the amount of stall they could get + kiteroid + sphere kuriboh... no thanks.


I wrote this post based on the TCG and OCG, not on duel links. Kiteroid doesn't exist in the TCG or OCG, so I saw no need to bring that up.

Dotscaper was played once a time in Burning Abyss monster mash (when Light of Sekka was at 3), also, Cyberse Decks have ways of reviving monsters from grave so each turn this card could make link-2's by itself and it's a level 1 on top. It's not that bad, there are ways of sending it from deck to graveyard, also you point out Salamangreats are better in that department with Spinny, but guess what? SALAMANGREATS AREN'T THE BEST EXAMPLE OF CARD DESIGN EITHER, seriously, 1 card engine ends on a pop/negation almost consistently so you can fill the rest of your deck with staples, handtraps and backrow because you can get your standard salamangreat board out of 1 card combo, that's not good design, and it proves it by having both their spell rota and Gazelle limited at 1, they also had Miragestallio banned for some time and even Cyberse Playmaker decks have to suffer the consequences of it by having Lady Debug on the list as well.


Yeah, I would've rather seen Dotscaper limited to earth cyberse decks, since it's earth cyberse itself, and then given a hard once per turn instead of a once per duel that made it unappealing to play.

I didn't say Salamangreats were the best example of design, just that they were at least more playable than the once per duel cyberse monsters Dotscaper and Stack Reviver.

Dinowrestler Coelasilat is an example of how Konami failed to balance the generic dino engine from the structure deck and now there can't be any new Dinosaur-type archetype that is good because guess what? Soul Oviraptor, Lost World, the baby saurus, ultimate conductor tyrano, misc, etc.; without mention they have a better ROTA that hasn't been limited yet. It just takes 1 good dino archetype to break this appart just like Zoodiac and Tri-Brig, another 2 horribly designed archetypes, ruined it for every other Beast-Warrior Deck by having Tenki on the list.


Coelasilat should've been limited to it's own dinowrestler archetype, or at least earth dinosaur archetypes only, so at least then it would still be strong but not abusable alongside the dark dinosaur oviraptor or the light dinosaur tyranno. A once per duel restriction just makes the card too unappealing. Nobody likes to be able to play their cards only once per duel.

That's the pattern with most of these banned and limited monsters — most of them wouldn't need to be on the banlist if they had a hard once per turn, were limited to their own type/attribute or archetype, or both, instead of a once per duel.

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Post #7 by Fredblade » Tue Oct 12, 2021 11:11 pm

Christen57 wrote:Yeah, I would've rather seen Dotscaper limited to earth cyberse decks, since it's earth cyberse itself, and then given a hard once per turn instead of a once per duel that made it unappealing to play.


There's no pure Earth cyberse decks appart form one from the anime that hasn't been released, also that is one of the cards used by the MC and he uses multiple attributes so that would make the card unplayable in his own deck. Despite all of this, the card has seen some experimentation in mill decks and level 1 decks as well.

Also you seem like you think the solution is just make everything hard once per turn but hardly restrict everything to its own archetype but that sometimes is far worse because you eliminate one of the fun things about yugioh and that's experimenting with multiple possibilities, there's a reason why CCG's with attribute deck restrictions don't work, nobody wants to feel arbitrarily forced to play a certain type of deck, even in Magic and Pokemon where they used "colored" energy systems, they have sometimes decks that mix different colors.

And even if that lead to things like Halqifibrax breaking half the Tuner cardpool, Zephyros enabling insane loops, that's why we have the banlist after all, also that's more on other design choices like not making Tiger a hard once per turn or Halqi's mere existence, and not on the once per duel card itself.

Also cards like Bacon saver, electromagnetic turle would be very annoying do deal with in mill decks, and as I said, maybe those card are trash in TCG advanced, but in other formats like Speed Duels and Duel Links it might be actually decent cards.

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Post #8 by Renji Asuka » Tue Oct 12, 2021 11:44 pm

Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.
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Post #9 by greg503 » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:00 am

Renji Asuka wrote:Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.

Random Archtype/support with a niche strategy (like P.U.N.K.): Are you sure about that?
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Post #10 by Renji Asuka » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:05 am

greg503 wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.

Random Archtype/support with a niche strategy (like P.U.N.K.): Are you sure about that?

*looks at every niche archetype/support prior to Speed Duels or Duel Links*
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Post #11 by greg503 » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:22 am

Renji Asuka wrote:
greg503 wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.

Random Archtype/support with a niche strategy (like P.U.N.K.): Are you sure about that?

*looks at every niche archetype/support prior to Speed Duels or Duel Links*

Irrelevant because that doesn't disprove that they have *ever* done it
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Post #12 by Renji Asuka » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:27 am

greg503 wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:
greg503 wrote:Random Archtype/support with a niche strategy (like P.U.N.K.): Are you sure about that?

*looks at every niche archetype/support prior to Speed Duels or Duel Links*

Irrelevant because that doesn't disprove that they have *ever* done it

It's actually quite relevant, as your argument is "Niche Strategies" were in design for Speed Duels or Duel Links, meanwhile the game always had niche archetypes or even support prior to them existing. Speed Duels is nothing more than re-released cards that were already printed in the TCG. Duel Links combines Anime/Manga cards with the TCG/OCG which already existed, however they gate keep what is allowed and what isn't.
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Post #13 by Fredblade » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:31 am

Renji Asuka wrote:Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.


I don't know, it seems very suspicious when Konami makes shitty archetypes and support then suddenly after its release it gets imported in Duel Links, just wait for War Rocks. Also, I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver in that example.

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Post #14 by Renji Asuka » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:41 am

Fredblade wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.


I don't know, it seems very suspicious when Konami makes shitty archetypes and support then suddenly after its release it gets imported in Duel Links, just wait for War Rocks. Also, I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver in that example.

Konami has always made shitty archetypes and support. Not really sure why you're using it to make your point.
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Post #15 by Fredblade » Wed Oct 13, 2021 12:50 am

Renji Asuka wrote:
Fredblade wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:Speed Duels are irrelevant, and Duel Links is irrelevant since the cards are made for the Anime/Manga or even the TCG/OCG in mind. Cards are not made in mind for Speed Duels or Duel Links.


I don't know, it seems very suspicious when Konami makes shitty archetypes and support then suddenly after its release it gets imported in Duel Links, just wait for War Rocks. Also, I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver in that example.

Konami has always made shitty archetypes and support. Not really sure why you're using it to make your point.


I was just pointing out that even if a card is terrible or not played at all in advanced TCG, it can still be picked up for another format and be good there.
And i said "I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver."

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Post #16 by Renji Asuka » Wed Oct 13, 2021 1:10 am

Fredblade wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:
Fredblade wrote:
I don't know, it seems very suspicious when Konami makes shitty archetypes and support then suddenly after its release it gets imported in Duel Links, just wait for War Rocks. Also, I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver in that example.

Konami has always made shitty archetypes and support. Not really sure why you're using it to make your point.


I was just pointing out that even if a card is terrible or not played at all in advanced TCG, it can still be picked up for another format and be good there.
And i said "I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver."

Considering the topic is about Custom cards, you bringing up other formats, are irrelevant as you can't play custom cards in other formats.
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Post #17 by greg503 » Wed Oct 13, 2021 1:29 am

Renji Asuka wrote:
Fredblade wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:Konami has always made shitty archetypes and support. Not really sure why you're using it to make your point.


I was just pointing out that even if a card is terrible or not played at all in advanced TCG, it can still be picked up for another format and be good there.
And i said "I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver."

Considering the topic is about Custom cards, you bringing up other formats, are irrelevant as you can't play custom cards in other formats.

When was this about customs?
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Post #18 by Renji Asuka » Wed Oct 13, 2021 1:34 am

greg503 wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:
Fredblade wrote:
I was just pointing out that even if a card is terrible or not played at all in advanced TCG, it can still be picked up for another format and be good there.
And i said "I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver."

Considering the topic is about Custom cards, you bringing up other formats, are irrelevant as you can't play custom cards in other formats.

When was this about customs?

Look at the title of the thread.
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Post #19 by Fredblade » Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:01 am

Renji Asuka wrote:
Fredblade wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:Konami has always made shitty archetypes and support. Not really sure why you're using it to make your point.


I was just pointing out that even if a card is terrible or not played at all in advanced TCG, it can still be picked up for another format and be good there.
And i said "I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver."

Considering the topic is about Custom cards, you bringing up other formats, are irrelevant as you can't play custom cards in other formats.


Considering your reasoning is that is that they're not well executed, but that's the thing, it's an error of execution, not that Once per Duel clauses are inherently bad design.

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Post #20 by Renji Asuka » Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:04 am

Fredblade wrote:
Renji Asuka wrote:
Fredblade wrote:
I was just pointing out that even if a card is terrible or not played at all in advanced TCG, it can still be picked up for another format and be good there.
And i said "I was talking about cards that already exist in the game like Bacon Saver."

Considering the topic is about Custom cards, you bringing up other formats, are irrelevant as you can't play custom cards in other formats.


Considering your reasoning is that is that they're not well executed, but that's the thing, it's an error of execution, not that Once per Duel clauses are inherently bad design.

Not well executed isn't my reasoning. Just that Konami has always made underwhelming cards regardless of Duel Links or Speed Duels and will continue to do so.
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