Banlist vs. the metagame

[Returner]

It's interesting to see how much attention a thread on the banlist receives. The original banlist was created to deal with Chaos, more specifically, a stagnant metagame lacking any variety. While the purpose of the banlist may have been to keep competitive play fresh, it's debatable as to whether or not the banlist has solved any problems.

Net-decking still exists and the variety of competitive deck-types are still extremely narrow. Prior to the banlist, many of the same cards saw play at tournaments and strategies, just as they are today, were very similar, if not identical. In fact, the metagame always shifted to a dominant deck-type that didn't take very long for many copies to emerge.

With each new set, Konami/UDE create maybe 10 cards out of 50 that will be used at all, meaning 40 cards out of every set released is garbage. On top of that, rather than creating more unique effects to create opportunities for more unique strategies, there are cards that are created that simply replace older cards that serve the same purpose. Why release cards that make other cards obsolete AND reprint those obsolete cards within new and future sets?

Which brings me back to my point- the banlist is ineffective and serves only to perpetuate the sale of more cards and artificially inflate the demand for particular cards without any change in supply to those cards, thereby forcing all competitive players to pay more for their decks. Just look at Normal and Ritual monsters.

So here are a few proposals I would make to keep a wider variety of strategies in play, dilute the trend of net-decking, and ensure profits for UDE/Konami-

1. New official formats for tournament play. We've had draft and constructed forever. And only advanced constructed is nurtured. Introducing different banlists and/or slightly different rules for each official tournament would immediately make net-decking extremely difficult, if not impossible. Other new formats could include team dueling, which has become popular recently. Slightly different rules or even new rules altogether can apply to the different formats, and the biggest incentive to play in these tournaments? Bigger prizes.

2. New original cards. I'm tired of seeing set after set with card themes (e.g. Dark World) but a lack of support beyond the initial set introducing the theme. Toons haven't seen any new support in a while, nor have spirit or union. Instead of making cards designed to fit a particular deck, entirely original and versatile cards with multiple uses need to be released. And the focus should not be on whether or not an effect will create an unfair advantage, but that there are other equally effective cards to keep each other in check. In other words, for each effect created, there must be an equal or opposite effect made to counter it.

3. Errata effects to dilute their usability. This is a more retroactive approach that wouldn't be profitable but wouldn't cost UDE/Konami anything either. Instead of creating new original cards, all cards on the banlist could simply be edited to make the conditions of their use more difficult. Maybe something like adding to Monster Reborn "1 monster sent to the graveyard as a result of battle this turn" or to Change of Heart "Pay half your life points."

What other ideas would be better than the banlist to deal with the cookie cutter trend?

 

[densetsu_x]

My serious answer would be to go play Magic: the Gathering, or World of Warcraft, or some other TCG.

No, I'm not being flippent. It's just Yu-Gi-Oh! is just not that kind of card game. There is no "resource" based control as far as what you can or cannot do beyond the cards in hand (which is true of all TCGs). There is no "expiration" of cards. The sets in of themselves rarely are "complete" and tend to have some random additions.

However, you have to look more behind the history of the game. For starters the game came about because of the popularity of the manga. It was the part people gravitated to, though it was never the intention of the artist to focus so much on a "card game" (The Pharaoh was in fact adept at all kinds of games in general. This is esp. obvious with the original anime.) So literally, they "winged it" and made things as they went along, slowly coming up with some coherent set of rules.

Further, to get any substantial changes in the game, you will need to get that past not UDE, not Konami, but Shueisha which you are not likely to see happen. And remember that a substantial number of cards created come about from the manga/anime stories as well as "original" creations. That will always be a major factor into card creation.

Now, let's look at the Original Ban List:
Rakgeki
Change of Heart
Delinquent Duo
Painful Choice
Cyber Jar
Fiber Jar
Imperial Order
Injection Fairy Lily
Yata-Garasu
Harpie's Feather Duster

Doesn't look like it did a thing to "stop" Chaos now did it. It wouldn't be until the second one until Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End would be banned and even then both Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning and Chaos Sorcerer would still be playable for 1-2 years more after this. (This would be an article in of itself). Further cards that get restricted/banned these days often come about that way because of something new that could take advantage of their usefulness. Last Will for example was always as potent (though it took a long time for that to get sorted out) but noone used it until it gained some notice with the Rescue Cat OTK and then moreso once it was restricted because it provided easy access to search out whatever you needed off of things like Exiled Force.

Rescue Cat btw, is also a good example of how things that people thought were crap suddenly became very playable. Gyaku-Gire Panda, Milus Radiant, and The Wicked Worm Beast. All cards generally overlooked until Rescue Cat was released in Flaming Eternity. Suddenly a bunch of never used cards were fueling OTKs.

Of course I can think of the biggest example of cards that were looked down upon for the longest time as "not too playable" until someone discovered that were good in tournament play:

Zaborg the Thunder Monarch

Yes, Zaborg was not a common choice to start with because it was a tribute. Mobius saw some play once BLS-Envoy was banned because with the shift away from Light/Dark, it became more fashionable to destroy S/T cards than to simply negate them (Jinzo). But once Chaos Sorcerer gained some interest again, Zaborg helped provide one of the best ways to fuel that support so much so that even when Chaos finally had the last nail in the coffin, Monarchs emerged as their own support type.

Lastly, there is no point in errata-ing old cards. They do what they were meant to do. That's why new versions do come out (Lightning Vortex for Raigeki for example).

All that said, you can't say that they haven't been trying to support old deck types. Normals have received the largest push ever since Cyberdark Impact starting with Justi-break. They have new searchers, new ways to get them to the field (from hand and Graveyard), and still provide the strongest monsters of comparible levels in the game. And, not to rehash an old debate, 2007 has seen more diversity than any other year. You've seen Chimeratech Overdragon, Gadgets, DDT, Monarchs, and Demise deck types all win major tournaments (that's 5 different deck types, not to mention that Monarchs have 2-3 different variations as well) not to mention 2 other deck types (Six Samurai and Crystal Beast) making strong appearances as well.

But yes, this is a copycat game and at the highest levels the reason why you see so many people apparently play the same decks is because they work (Monarchs are among the cheapest you can build esp. for the return you usually get). It's been tried and tested and for those who enter tournaments to play and win, that's what you will have to deal with. Creating "new tournament rules" isn't going to change things. You're just going to annoy and frustrate both players AND judges (don't forget the people who have a hard enough time keeping up with the rules without creating a whole new set of way of doing things). And by increasing the prizes, you increase the number of people who will cheat to win (that much is a fact). When more is at stake, more people will do whatever it takes to claim said prizes. Not to mention that whatever the "new rules" are (no matter what you change, limit, add, or whatever, people will still find the way that allows them to win the most and everyone will copy that). And even if "something new" does break through, then guarenteed, a lot of other people will try it too.

Basically they're doing the best they can with what they do have to work with. Noone said the ban list was perfect and in fact has grown rather large over the years. However, it is there to limit the overuse of the strongest cards that really degenerate the game to "who draws their combo first". To "fix" this game would require a complete overhaul of the entire gameplay. If you do that though, you're not playing Yu-Gi-Oh! anymore. You're playing Magic: the Gathering or World of Warcraft or some other TCG.