The New Challengers (November 2014) | The History of Yu-Gi-Oh!

[@Mia_Mor666]

Really sad that we didn't get a chance to spend more time looking at Duelist Alliance. While they're not everyone's cup of tea, the Shaddoll mirror match during this time was such an interesting battle plus it would've been great to see how BA interacted with Shaddolls (which had plenty of build options to explore) and tellarknights.

[@Rondron2000]

If they butchered all the matches since Duelist Alliance, I really don't want to see them screwing up the Shaddoll mirror. I hope they don't play the Nekroz mirror too.

[@anonymouskaiju9101]

@@Rondron2000 1000% they play the nekroz mirror it was a tier 0 deck

[@koyoyoyo1170]

@@anonymouskaiju9101 tbf they could just play trap ba mirror for nekroz format

[@A.C_B.]

I mean, BA and Shaddoll will remain relevant for many formats. We'll be seing a lot more of these decks in the future.

[@ogeid772]

@@koyoyoyo1170 Yosenju and Ritual Beasts also saw a bit of play, mainly because they had good matchups vs Nekroz

[@sallas09]

You missed it in the intro, but since we're at New Challengers, there was a new Ban List that went into effect in October 2014. For those who are curious, here are the changes that are now in effect for this new format: Newly Banned: No new bans this time Newly Limited: Glow-Up Bulb 0 -> 1 Infernity Archfiend 3 -> 1 Raigeki 0 -> 1 Soul Charge 3 -> 1 Super-Polymerization 3 -> 1 Newly Semi-Limited: Blackwing: Gale the Whirlwind 1 -> 2 Gorz the Emissary of Darkness 1 -> 2 Ceasefire 1 -> 2 The Transmigration Prophecy 1 -> 2 Newly Unlimited: Coach Soldier Wolfbark 1 -> 3 Magician of Faith 2 -> 3 Reinforcement of the Army 2 -> 3 Formula Synchron 2 -> 3

[@danielbeesley1326]

Having 3 ROTA legal blows my mind.

[@phoney4258]

I guess it had something to do with the Noble Knight box they were promoting

[@sekaihunter9378]

@@danielbeesley1326 Tellarknights players keep winning baby

[@metalmario1231]

So hard to picture any time ROTA wasnt limited

[@mikehawk8984]

Having 3 non once per turn rotas would be fucking nuts

[@RayquaSr.]

Seeing qliphort without towers was sureal

[@shawnjavery]

Funny thing is that it was out and no one played it.

[@alternatedimensions]

It was considered bricky and didn't see play in all decks. Also decks with rank 4 access could go into Diamond Crab and run into Towers that way

[@JohnnyMacs19]

Whoa what towers was out immediately i thought it was out in the 2nd wave of support

[@shawnjavery]

@@JohnnyMacs19 yeah, iirc they didn't run it until wavering eyes came out. Before that you didn't have any consistent way to get it out turn one. Even with wavering you needed like what, 1 scout 1 wavering and two other pend scales to do it?

[@flammeniv493]

@@JohnnyMacs19 Yup, and it was a rare no less. People realized that Floodgate Qli was way more consistent at the time than playing Towers. Sometimes he'd be a 1-of in the main or side but it was generally a bad call to play it. It wasn't until Wavering Eyes came out as a Special Edition sneak peek the summer after that Towers Turbo became a thing. WE would let you load up your ED with Qlis, while also being able to search Scout. So the deck just ran 3-of every Qli monster, 3 Wavering and 2-3 Towers and just got it out first turn. By the second turn the opponent was usually done for unless they could make Diamond Crab King.

[@Carlet_S]

Of course one of MBT's favorite decks is the one that maindecks triple Skill Drain, Vanity's and soon, Lose 1 Turn

[@NickWuebker]

Game 3 showed that El Shadoll Fusion really helped give Shaddoll the teeth they really needed to become a force in the meta. It being a quick-play spell and having the ability to drop a Shekhinaga or a Winda on your opponent’s turn could be devastating as we saw happen to Joseph. He was about to pop off and Alex just stopped him cold with Winda and he never really recovered. Yes he took an unnecessary risk with Helix, but Winda being already on board really limited what he could do in that situation.

[@UltimateCrusherJoe]

He could have used el shaddol to play around vanity in game one also

[@MiyaoMeow588]

33:22 "...it's very nice to know that you can combo off knowing that there's nothi-SO GUYS THAT'S GONNA WRAP IT UP FOR ANOTHER VIDEO!"

[@Torterra454]

Yeah wonder what happened there, why cut it there?

[@whitemagegoose]

I loved seeing you guys have so much fun with this match. Especially at the end when you guys were so excited that you spent 5 minutes going over what you could have done differently and how things would have gone.

[@shasan2393]

Okay, im gonna comment here becaus im really surprised noone said it yet. MBT made a critical game-losing misplay game 3 at 22:10 , just letting chalice go to graveyard. As someone who played a lot of qliphorts (in duel links, not tcg, but similar concepts), one of the huge utilities of forbidden chalice, instead of something like book of moon, is that chalice can be used as potent surprise offensive tool. Qlis that are summoned without tribute gain the effect of decreasing their attack to 1800. Chalice negates that effect, carrier base attack resets to 2400 (up from 1800), THEN also gains the effect of chalice to be 2800, THEN saclifice makes it 3100. This can be used damage step for surprise damage, if need be. But, that particular use-case did not apply in game 3, since Cimo later just ended his turn . What WAS relevant though, was that chalice effect negation lasts only one turn, but qli’s attack DOES NOT decrease again, and it regains its immunity to lower level/rank monster effects. So now you have a 2700 carrier (due to saclifice boost), instead 2100, which would let it easily beat over winda, allowing MBT to make further pend plays main phase 2, or do anything really. Having a monster on board that can out winda is huge. In qli deck, always consider using chalice on your own non-tribute summoned qli so that you dont completely minus from chalice being mst’d

[@shasan2393]

Btw, when mbt let chalice go to grave, i was immediately screaming, “use it on your own qli for permanent 600 boost!”. And then thought, “damn, hope that doesnt bite him in the ass”, which it did, when he couldnt out winda on board. I was hoping all you other viewers would set the roast mbt for that misplay, but to my dismay, NO ONE caught it. Just goes to show that non of you guys played qlis :P

[@ianr.navahuber2195]

1:03 MBT's deck Qliphort 6:12 Cimooo's Deck: Shaddoll 11:10 Game 1 15:35 Game 2 20:55 Game 3

[@alonsoarana5307]

I can already hear it soon, just a few more episodes until *Secrets of Eternity was released in January 2015. This set introduced the Infernoids, a series of monsters that can Special Summon themselves to the field by banishing other Infernoids from either the hand or graveyard. Notable cards in set include Farfa, Malebranche of the Burning Abyss, Qliphort Monolith, Uni-Zombie, Nephe Shaddoll Fusion, and a card that would bolster Satellarknight to combat the Burning Abyss Shaddoll meta, Stellarknight Constellar Diamond. In this series, both Nyhmnim and myself will be opening 24 booster packs or 1 box of a core Yu-Gi-Oh! booster set. We will build a deck and play a best 2 out of 3, and the winner will receive a small prize to upgrade their deck. HOWEVER! Each episode, we will open another box of the next set that was released moving in chronological order, constantly upgrading our decks before dueling each other at the end of each episode. This is the Yu-Gi-Oh! Progression Series.*

[@pickyphysicsstudent201]

We should just create a transcript of that entire episode.

[@Kirabetas]

I don't think we should, because I guarantee we'd expect that, despite all the advantages of the newer cards, I see the community running the joke that the match would be Blackwing v Chaos. I'm also going to beg that this joke isn't a prediction.

[@EinDose]

I think they should do most of that same intro, but have MBT read it instead. You know he'd love it.

[@Gustxr1]

Love both of these archetypes! They had innovatory play styles and managed to bring old school mechanics back to the forefront. Although I understand the bad reputation that stems from their frustrating boss monsters (Winda and Towers). Shaddolls managed to finally make FLIP monsters viable again while bringing fusion summoning back to the meta. Similarly, Qlis revitalized tribute summoning by using the advantages of pendulums while maintaining their identity by not allowing special summoning of monsters from other archetypes.

[@ellachino4799]

It's actually insane to think that flip monsters hadn't been relevant for almost a decade before Shaddolls came out

[@danha3107]

agreed! Love their concepts, hate what they became

[@cascada5200]

1:10 Deck List/ Breakdown 12:00 Duels

[@igeniusyounot6187]

14:40 why didn't he just chain CL3 El Shadoll Fusion to CL2 Vanity's Emptiness?

[@kirbyale7948]

Yeah… I was like screaming at my screen when he forgot to do that… EDIT: he mentioned it after game 1, he said that a winda was not big enough but idk… a draw and a search could have made a huge difference in that game

[@cutebuttzlolz]

@@kirbyale7948 yeee but a 2100 atk qli isn’t big enough to out winda lol

[@kirbyale7948]

@@cutebuttzlolz skill drain was on the field so their atk returned to their original value

[@john-hanner]

cause he just forgot how quick spell works

[@8XHuXBgkok]

@@kirbyale7948 What you are saying is pure hindsight. Cimo didn't know MBT had skill drain at that point. There is no reason not to use El Shaddoll, except that he just forgot it was a quick spell.

[@Ch00choh]

Are we gonna see Masked Heroes during history? The release of Dark Law in the starter deck truly changed my life

[@verbalengine95]

The Saqlifice, the knowing to survive That first decline, another state of mind

[@RealKingChief]

I'm on my knees, I'm waiting for a sign

[@jamespolk6146]

Apoqliphort Towers sleeves. To this day, exactly what I feared. As soon as Apoqliphort Towers dropped on the field, there's nothing you can do. Game is already over.

[@metalmario1231]

I mean...i can cry....so theres that

[@jamespolk6146]

@@metalmario1231 There there. You'll be okay. Years ago when Apoqliphort Towers dropped the board, I gave up on against Qli for good until they banned towers a few lists prior.

[@TheMatt_SD]

Flip effects aren't always mandatory. Hedgehog, specifically, isn't mandatory.

[@metalmario1231]

Was thinking that as well

[@lordflarus]

YGO players when a card says "you can"

[@ObsoletePerson]

Shame to see Qlis get stumped like that but ah well. I never played competitively but I loved playing Qliphorts. I never used the floodgates; I relied on the effects of the Qlis to protect themselves and used the Field Spell to abuse Disk and keep Tribute Summoning. I look forward to when they come back to this deck for Towers.

[@Dz73zxxx]

Till this day i still playing Qlis..i slotted in 1 skill drain eventho i have reqliate just for a farther measure..and of course, tons of handtraps to deal tier decks (EDOPRO casual server is not casual...)

[@TengoSuenho]

On the first game couldn't Cimo chain El Shaddoll Fusion to the Emptiness and Summon Winda? It wouldn't change much, but at the very least he would get a search and a draw to out the floodgate.

[@ClashOfClansTyree]

I said the same thing

[@paulyg9630]

I thought the same thing

[@Aaronrules380]

game 1 Cimooo needed to mst his own moraltach when mst was targeted. I think he got greedy and thought it wasn’t losing the moraltach pop but realistically at that point he had no other way to proc it himself and MBT wasn’t going to do it for him since he knew that was moraltach and with vanity coming down next turn at least having something on the board is better than a useless backrow

[@jonl7893]

also he could have chain El Shaddoll to emptiness

[@Neg2YGO]

Saqlifice protects from battle so the 2100 Qli could've just hit into it and made no difference

[@rohitminhas4247]

He says so at the beginning of game 2

[@pro711200]

They both misplayed very often and appeared to have no idea what they are doing. I was screaming at my screen this entire episode. Tbh Cimo misplayed less in comparison.

[@thenightstalker6165]

That's what I said too game 1 didn't set El Shaddoll fusion for 2 turns also could have chained El Shaddoll fusion to vanity's and had a 2800 beater and gotten a draw

[@pokemasterskye4231]

History of Yu-Gi-Oh! episode wins Cimoooooooo: 53 MBT: 49

[@goldenglaive8078]

Damn, I can't believe we're already within 5 years of current- wait, what? 2014 was 8 years ago? Oh... Oh no...

[@wickederebus]

I know. Soon they will enter 2016-2020 yugioh.

[@verymelonman12]

I guess this super late episode of History was to balance out the super early episode of Seale Showdown.

[@petercross1879]

"Cloaked in Shadows and Relentless in its Objective, I Call Upon the Most Dangerous of Dragons! DARK REBELLION XYZ DRAGON!!!"

[@hallucigenia7149]

Is Shaddoll Hedgehog's flip effect really mandatory? It says "FLIP: You can"

[@mewdiamant]

The effect is optional but the activation is mandatory

[@metalmario1231]

No activation would not be mandatory if its a "you can"....if you choose not to then the effect doesnt activate

[@donjuan6996]

@@mewdiamant That doesn’t make any sense.

[@alecroberts6643]

Bruh hearing cimo say the thing at the end of game one made me say this. 1 the flip effects is not mandatory, so it does not lock you out of the other effect. 2 It's only if sent to grave by card effect, not by battle. That's why you can't trigger it in the online simulators.

[@shockz1715]

Past Cimo: "They brought back Raigeki! ARE THEY ON FUCKING CRACK!!!" Future Cimo: Na, Raigeki is fair.

[@yusheitslv100]

Qli having a good matchup against Shaddoll kinda makes sense if you know the lore.

[@ismailcalsr2226]

if we're going by the lore they should have synergy

[@Hclody95]

thing i learnt this episode: mbt has 0 idea of how to play qliphorts... at least that was a quick one

[@gtg4175]

I remember just quitting yugioh for a few months cause of qlis and than coming back just to see that I cant special summon against the newly released Nekroz. Fun times

[@natekurt]

Sad we didn’t get to see Apoqliphort towers :( such a crazy card

[@omi-kuro4323]

Game 1 Tunnel(Cimo): He didn't chained his own MST to destroy Moralltach

[@Raging]

Something ironic about the shadoll deck using towers but not the qli deck

[@HapsterHap]

I love how Leo, Keeper of the Sacred Tree is in Cimo’s ED and it’s also on the art of El Shaddol Fusion. Great coincidence.

[@SeraSmiles]

God I fucking loved this meta, no matte what anyone says Qlis were one of the coolest control decks ever at this point

[@xXbaker115Xx]

I'm still mad they never made pen cards that had different scale numbers based on which colour they were in. Like blue 2 red 8 and then give them effects like. If this card is in the blue scale use this effect or red vice versa

[@SplashCity46]

I wished this for a long time, but I think now what it would have to be is different restrictions. Since most cards are same scale both sides, these cards would be extremely versatile and would need restrictions to keep them in check. At least my opinion

[@shawnli4746]

They have it in that new card called Clock Arc but with the restriction that it doesn't apply if you control non-Pendulum monsters

[@xXbaker115Xx]

@@shawnli4746 never seen that before they should have just made the scale on the left (blue) 1 and the right (red) 4 then given it effects based on which scale its set as

[@ContraryASMR]

This Sneak-peak was the first ever event I ever attended. I was running a shitty HERO beat build, the beginning of an era

[@scar_black]

Cimmoo playing 3 dragon and he side 1 out and starts complaining that this build is not running 3 copies lol

[@frankyquilavafireblast895]

Talk about a come back. Good job, Alex!

[@Daniel-ne5ms]

Saqlifice was such a busted equip card: 1. Boost ATK and protection from dying in battle. 2. Count the monster as 2 tributes 3. Get a Qli monster if sent to the GY.

[@Sanjipika]

Kept us waiting, huh?

[@michaelaburns734]

Game 1 11:10 Game 2 15:35 Game 3 20:55

[@pedrohenriquecontente332]

Cimo, if you chained your El Shaddoll Fusion to that Vanity's Emptiness, that game would've been completely different

[@pedrohenriquecontente332]

Not because of winds, but because you could've survived longer and searched for dragon with hedgehog, which is a card that deals with backrow

[@MasterQuestMaster]

What did he mean with flip effects are mandatory? It says „you can“ on Hedgehog.

[@DemonFox369]

Game 1 14:40, activate Shaddoll Fusion, cl2 Vanity’s, cl3 El Shaddoll Fusion?

[@ogeid772]

The Shaddoll Flip effects are not mandatory, they literally say "FLIP: *You can...* "

[@tyranitararmaldo]

Do I watch this or sleep? Hmmmm....oh well. In for a penny, Cimoooooooooooooooooo xD

[@EmCeee411]

This episode almost just gaslit me into thinking Towers wasn't out yet, even though Shekhinaga in lore is Construct fused with Towers

[@yamispade]

As someone who played Qli enthusiastically from release up to Nats of 2015, from the jump they were the first archetype that checked off a lot of blocks most archetypes have never done; that is release will all main support necessary to make the deck playable, introduce a new mechanic properly, and enter the game as a tier 1 archetype from release with minimal fillers or external support. I don't fully agree with the premise it took a few turns to get going, unless you didn't open scout you could easily setup towers turn 1 which is one of the most whined about cards that most somehow also called a bad card to play in the deck. The only real threat to the deck was Fire Lake in Burning Abyss which tbh i think is far worse to play against than towers as its recyclable and a better Icarus Attack in a deck that doesn't mind being sent to the grave so they can plus even more. One last thing, Storm became very popular shortly before the next set release because you could search Sacqlifice and then potentially pop 2 backrow along with searching another scout to do it again if you had multiple copies of Storm.

[@MomirViggwilv]

Did Qli not play Towers competetively?

[@jamesbrincefield9879]

I had thought it was going to be an easy 2-0 for Joseph going into this, especially after the first game. That was crazy 😮

[@vprime7209]

New Challengers was the set that got me back into the game! I fuckin love Qliphort man.

[@shockz1715]

I joined Yugioh after a couple year's break around this time, and ppl were salty, quitting or taking their breaks at this point in them.

[@CarniTato]

Game 3 cimo missed a winning play: Summon Mathematician, dump felice. Summon felice. Go for black rose. If Joseph has skill drain, he can El shaddoll fusion for grysta. Board gets nuked, cimo gets El shaddoll fusion back for next turn to make a winda.

[@kaihaken5200]

We are getting to Pepe format

[@coreygolphenee9633]

That's why they called Qli Helmet

[@thenightstalker6165]

This was a sub optimal artifact version of dolls

[@Carlitonsp1]

Man I forgot how ugly the Pendulum zones were. Makes the banished pile the most awkward spot.

[@LazurBeemz]

Considering everyone in the comments asking about Towers, I feel like MBT should have acknowledged its absence in the intro.

[@UltimateCrusherJoe]

Cimoo in game one you go shaddol fusion he chains vanity's THEN you chain the quick play fusion and get a summon

[@lordflarus]

Flip effects are not mandatory if they say "You can" I should know, I play Shaddolls plenty

[@samwill7259]

Thiiisss is where my ingrained understanding of YuGiOh falters, actually it was a good deal before this, ending at around t he one quarter mark of zexel. But this is new territory for me and part of why YuGiOh seems so overcomplicated when i try to get back to it. Educate away!

[@dakotadoyle7573]

If this was a Rock Paper Scissors meta, did the mirror matches get just plain weird?

[@aleksandarpocanic4659]

Cimoooooooo: Screw the skills, I have luck!

[@christopherhodges7607]

Cimo, awhile ago I saw a post you made asking for video ideas. Would it be possible for you to do a couple based around one of my favorite archetypes, The Six Samurai? Can be anything from history and gameplay, to modern meta deck build. I just would love to see them get a bit of a spot light since I feel they just kinda got swept away despite being such a cool archetype.

[@pandaman1331]

For how much we tend to crticise these two, we have to agree with MBT this time, Cimo really played the last duel out very well.

[@nigamnation]

Wasnt there a banlist before this?

[@TheMatt_SD]

October 2014, yes. It put Raigeki, Soul Charge, and Super Polymerization to 1.

[@Efflee]

Cimo making missplays all day; "could I have done something different, no, no I couldn't"...

[@itsluke7]

I played a variation of this shaddoll list last year, it was pretty fun before the meta crept too far ahead

[@prankkidsduelist]

My favorite part is that we are about to see snatch steal format

[@metalmario1231]

Odd eyes in qli....later on odd eyes becomes the big pendulum threat as it should be

[@Br0oham]

Game 1 not chaining El Shaddoll Fusion to Vanity's? Cimo please

[@egnimaticnobody]

That game 2 mbt should have not shot gun skill drain on the tach attack and chain it to the fairy wind so that disk goes up to 2800 and itll be unaffected by 7 and lowers because of skill drain.

[@andrejv.2834]

If wouldn't have mattered since skill drain would be face up at resolution of fairy wind

[@hannes_r]

have a good day everyone

[@Chris_Tootoo]

Gladiator Beasts by this point we’re a good counter pick vs Shaddoll and ok against BA. Qli’s however we’re impossible to defeat.

[@massmaritimeexperience7779]

Wait so why wasn’t mbt playing towers it came out this set were people not playing it till later

[@shawnli4746]

The Qli deck not had Towers in it even though it was in New Challengers?

[@donjuan6996]

Like Joseph said, nobody knew what the hell they were doing. Players were so dumb back then with their deck building that they didn’t even know about Anti-Spell being a big blowout against Qli.

[@andrejv.2834]

​@@donjuan6996 maybe they didn't know how pendulums work under anti spell or smth

[@jcprofit]

I just realized, shek, which has towers on its art came out before towers. So does towers actually have shek on its art instead?

[@lamiaprincess6371]

Towers came out in New Challengers but didn't see play. You might be thinking of Apoqliphort Skybase which did come later (and was really bad)

[@jcprofit]

@@lamiaprincess6371 really? I thought it came out in secrets of eternity

[@lamiaprincess6371]

@@jcprofit If it did it would be in the cimo intro

[@TheDevilDeVille]

Game 3, MBT misplayed pretty hard by actually activating Helix, especially with the wiretap in the backrow. Its well known alex is on a bunch of artifact stuff by then and fishing blindly is not a good idea. Even if he hit the moralltech instead and disk lived it set him back a turn by giving cimo more defenders. Absolutely shoulda said no on the helix activation there, would have been fine.

[@defectivesickle5643]

He goes into this after the match

[@MonosEx]

Couldn't he chained had chained Shadoll fusion quickplay to the activation of vanity emptiness at least to get a draw and get another shadoll monster to have an extra body on board.

[@votedthatoneguy]

I'm just here waiting for the unbanning of Snatch steal so Cimo can just have it for game every game

[@fredericodias562]

why isn't MBT playing towers? It got out in the new challengers

[@apastelpinkfox]

why didn't he El shadoll fusion in response to vanity game 1?

[@dannybishop9179]

Dude 11pm upload lol, 3pm uploads (uk times) it used to be around 5/6 pm I’m not used to this much change

[@something12340]

As much as I like the RPS format of NECH, I think the Tellar matchups should be explored. Feels a lot like Salad in Eternal format and requires careful navigation from both players.

[@something12340]

I should also say that I'd love an episode or two with dark matter dragon ruler when they get to that point

[@lamiaprincess6371]

I imagine the next episode will probably be Burning Abyss versus Triverr Tellarknights. I don't remember exactly when Stick and Chair come out so I'm not sure if that's legal yet too.

[@xatuyou8045]

Cimo summoned a qli monster against the qli deck.

[@Big_Green]

Could have chained the el shaddoll fusion to vanity's in game 1 to get winda on board and run over the 1800 helix, outing vanity's in the process.

[@geiseric222]

He had skill drain set so it didn’t matter

[@cwovictor3281]

Would Vanity's be destroyed if Helix was destroyed? It'd go to the Exxtra Deck, no?

[@NewtBannner]

Do you guys know what the next core set is?

[@ducky36F]

I still have nightmares about Towers

[@kabutobond8377]

Um why does Cimo has El Shaddoll Shekhinaga and MBT doesn't have Apoqliphort Towers?

[@mattr791]

The towers turbo version of qui was not particularly popular untill scout and skilldrain were limited

[@HellfireBowsa]

Wow... to think there was a point in time where people played Qlis WITHOUT Towers. Crazy.

[@brycepowell6639]

SO CLOSE TO NEKROZ XD

[@SecretMiner]

shaddoll flips aren't mandatory aren't they?

[@OmegaRpg953]

Awsome vid and love the series

[@knessy6446]

Today I learned: Shadoll Falco is a tuner.

[@maximumcrys1s141]

Geez this release was late

[@8XHuXBgkok]

14:40 Why on earth don't you activate El Schaddoll Fusion in response to Vanity??? It's a quick spell for a reason. 15:10 And you complain about not being able to "opt to use the other effect of Hedgehog"??? The second effect is not activatable anyway when it's killed by battle.

[@yurisbest2892]

Did I miss something, why didn’t cimo chain el to vanities

[@braxtoncomix]

Oh shit the single format Snatch Steal times are coming up soon 😂

[@xdevo14]

I feel like I'm probably missing some ruling with counter-traps and "new chain" effects, but why couldn't Joe chain the Wiretap to the Sanctum effect in grave to negate the effect at the end of game 3? One thing I've noticed and found very strange about HAT and DUA formats is how many of the games were decided by floodgates. I know these formats are beloved by a lot of people, but these types of matches do a really bad job of endearing me (and apparently both MBT and Cimo, given the comments at the end of each duel) to the format in the same way that the Edison, Goat, or TenguPlant matches did for their respective formats. Are people fans of the floodgate metagame or is it some kind of rose colored glasses situation? Or was this just several really unfortunate duels that were decided by one of a handful of floodgates?

[@jeremycarromero5302]

Because Artifact Sanctum GY effect is an effect that activates in the GY, not an activation. Wiretap can only negate activations, so it can't do anything about the GY of AS.

[@xdevo14]

@@jeremycarromero5302 So, there's a difference between an effect activating and starting a new chain and an activation in this case? I was always under the assumption that effects that didn't have an activation didn't start new chains. I really wish Konami would simplify or clarify a few of these differences on the card somehow.

[@Orfeh9999]

@@xdevo14 the difference lies in: activating a card vs activating an effect of a card. Both start a chain, but cards like wiretap can only respond to card activations, which is placing the spell card face up from hand or flipping the trap.

[@Erictime4fun]

Not a lot of pendulum summoning even though this is the era of it. Just show me the broken mechanic of getting five monsters out on turn one.