LIFEDECKING!! The Seven Deadly Sins of TCG Design Part 2

[@williambarnes5023]

One substantial difference between lifedecking and milling is that when you're lifedecking and lost cards you want to play, you blame the game, and the game becomes unfun. When you're being milled by someone, you blame the opponent, and that makes the game more fun because now you want to go stomp them into the dirt. And you CAN.

[@DarkAnd1000]

Just to reiterate this: Don't actually go and stomp your opponent into the dirt, you will go to jail. In jail they don't have trading card games.

[@williambarnes5023]

@@DarkAnd1000 Yes, and don't actually shave through the top of someone's head and throw slices of brain into the graveyard in real life either. Only in the game.

[@rileypowell5354]

idk about other games but in magic its pretty easy to grind mill players into dust because the strategy is atrociously bad and a worse win condition than pretty much any other win condition in the game

[@pnyhmsmx]

@@rileypowell5354 milling a deck of 60 cards when the game is about inflicting 20 points. Yup. It gets worse when the opponent can utilize the graveyard as the alternate hand

[@rileypowell5354]

@@pnyhmsmx yeah I always say that your best case scenario with a mill strat is that you kill an opponent 3 times slower than usual, and the worst case scenario is you spend the short time you actually survive for actively helping your opponent kill you.

[@MalevolentDivinity]

I'm just imagining this in yugioh. "So you're saying that, instead of taking damage, I send cards from the deck to the graveyard?" "... Yes..." "So I banish my three Mezuki..."

[@cathycrow7158]

There's actually a trap card that specifically does that.

[@burningcole2538]

Paleo shoots to top

[@kitetenjogalladeknighttosh8863]

"Wait...."

[@frankwest5388]

Oh no please anything but sending my Zombies and dragons to the GY. How could you do that!

[@e-tan3911]

@@frankwest5388 oh no, anything but sending orcust knightmare, cymbal, gizmek orochi, and ancient cloak to grave! What ever shall I dooooo!

[@12kidder1]

I think Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic both hold the key to making lifedecking viable: recursion. Plenty of decks in both games are more than happy to self Mill because they know their cards are just as valuable, if not more so, in the grave as in the hand. I could see a game where lifedecking works precisely because every card has the same value hitting the grave as hitting the hand. Maybe spells or creatures could be played from the grave for a steeper price. Perhaps cards would have a unique effect upon going to the grave from the deck. So long as most cards do something to maintain their value.

[@cephery8482]

Imagine if yugioh has life decking. Paying costs suddenly being massive advantage.

[@yugiwinninglex]

@@cephery8482 ygo can't. Gy nowadays is basically a second hand or resource area.

[@OscarGilFerrer]

my dredge deck from ravnica times can attest to that

[@lounowell4171]

"dont confuse interesting with fun"

[@ESPmrBrough]

exactly this. i came up with a lifedecking adaptation of yugioh to play with friends, and it feels way less oppressive for them. without having to worry about OTKs you can play a much more strategic and layered game. shame konami hate yugioh fans and limit necroface and emeral.

[@magnaillusion6085]

Yugioh players: "yeah, I already make 1/4th of my deck nigh unusable with a single card because it's a +1 in card economy"

[@TenebrisTemporis]

"Players want to use their cards" Gren Maju go brrrrrr

[@schwarzerritter5724]

It would be at least 3/4 of the remaining deck should Pot of Desires ever come to Duel Links.

[@user-vl8ck4gz6w]

not really since you run multiple cards of the same one and you mostly wont use the cards anyway. it also helps the next turn having less cards in the deck and knowing what you will likely draw this turn or using effects like sarjuya to draw up to 3 cards

[@schwarzerritter5724]

@@user-vl8ck4gz6w What does that have to do with Pot of Desires?

[@raonair]

@@schwarzerritter5724 Nothing, they weren't responding to you

[@AnonYmous-mc5zx]

"Discard as a resource" would also solve the lifedecking problem. Temporary triggers that are random and only serve to stop the attack are bad. Being able to shout "Jokes on you I can cast my big dumb dragon thing from the discard for HALF PRICE!" is priceless.

[@leonmercury3732]

Basically a self mill vs mill decks: "Jokes on you, that's literally my strategy"

[@sleazymeezy]

Where can I get my own big dumb dragon thing? Plz respond

[@a.dennis4835]

There was a Ben 10 life decking card game where cards damages forces the player not draw but not discard. As such, getting attacked gives you more cards to use.

[@KingZolem]

​@@a.dennis4835 Huh, that also gives you a chance to get the cards you need to turn it around.

[@infiniterer287]

​@@a.dennis4835 but in terms of "bad gameplay", this actually makes the game miserable for the attacker. What's the point of going on the offense when you know you're benefiting your opponent? 😂

[@keiyakins]

The entire time you were talking about bakugan's flip cards I was thinking "that sounds like a shitty version of Duel Masters/Kaijudo shield triggers" Fun fact: that entire mechanic was built to make Anime Moments happen. Both in play and literally, the manga artist asked them to ensure he could have massive turn arounds for drama.

[@tylerwaynes2107]

Flip cards also sound like a shitty version of Elder Scrolls: legends prophecy cards.

[@Shenaldrac]

Ugh. Never compromise on your product for the sake of the advertising vehicle for your product. Hey manga artist, instead of relying on something like that to give you deus ex machinas, how about you have tension and drama by having good writing? You know, instead of having a cheap cop-out that lets you just reverse fortunes without any narrative buildup required, you could actually put in the work and have moments be tense because of a mixture of stakes, character drama rather than mechanical drama, and the unknown that is the enemy's plans and abilities.

[@keiyakins]

@@Shenaldrac Except shield blasts are also fun as heck to play. Besides, the alternative is Yu-Gi-Oh where they straight up spent an episode teaching Joey to stack his deck one time. I mean sure they call it believing in the heart of the cards or whatever but arranging for good draws is cheating either way.

[@Shenaldrac]

@@keiyakins Hey, you're the one that called flip cards "shitty", not me. And uh, what? I never said people should stack their decks, I have no idea what you're talking about. No, the alternative to resorting to asspulls for drama and tension is to actually put in the work to build up to and inform the events happening in a story. Sure, in a story based around an inherently luck-based game like a TCG luck will play a role. But you know, in a lot of games players work to mitigate the luck. Or, let me put it another way: instead of a character relying on topdecking the exact card they need to win, and thus only winning because they got lucky, how about their deck is built with some tutors in it? So they play that card and use it to search their deck for the card they need. Now instead of "I win because luck" it's "I win because I constructed my deck well with good proportions of cards to increase the change that I get the pieces I need, and now I'm actually using a strategy to get the card(s) I need to win" which makes the character look smart and like they know what they're doing. Ultimately any work of fiction is going to be decided by the author, because it's fiction. But good fiction feels natural, the events occurring feel like they would happen if it was real. Whereas characters constantly winning by the skin of their teeth, always getting that shield trigger when they need it, becomes dull. You have to use it in moderation. Or, let me put it another way: Shield triggers work great in Duel Masters as a card game because in real life you don't always get the one you need when you need it. You can't just rely on luck and hope to win. So shield triggers function nicely as a way to use damage as a resource, as mentioned in the video, and possibly help out a player on the backfoot. However, as they work less well in Duel Masters as an anime or manga because they can easily end up becoming a crutch. How will Shobu and the gang get out of this hopeless situation? Oh, their last shield was Holy Awe. Something that feels amazing in a game you're playing can end up feeling like a cop-out in a story, because the story isn't based on luck like the game is.

[@keiyakins]

@@Shenaldrac oh. I meant shield triggers as "that mechanic".

[@thebokchoy6854]

"Players want to play their cards" Garnets: allow us to introduce ourselves

[@aidanklobuchar1798]

True, but you usually only have one of those in your deck. Having an ENTIRE CARD CLASS be Bricks is just a moronic design decision.

[@ESPmrBrough]

@@aidanklobuchar1798 [laughs in MTG]

[@cbbblue8348]

Infernity players:"Lol"

[@nekoluxuria7721]

Pot of extravaganze says hi

[@vonBelfry]

"Players want to use all their cards" Doesn't happen in MTG. One game often uses like... A quarter of the deck.

[@ManuelMerzinger]

Life Decking works well with the game Weiss/Schwarz though. The key: The horizontal cards cards are playable from the hand, always stop the milling damage. When you loose enough cards via damage, you cycle those cards back and get to play stronger cards. The whole game is built around the idea of recycling your deck over and over, keeping the good cards and loosing bad ones. I don't know if the meta currently holds up, but it was really fun to play a couple years ago.

[@monkee_handz]

To further expand on this, the life system is called the "clock", where the damage taken would go to a different zone to designate the damage taken. Once seven cards are in the clock, the player levels up, using one of the cards in the zone to mark the level, and the rest of the cards get sent to the discard pile (or "waiting room" as the game calls it). Leveling up means that you'll be able to play more of your (stronger) cards. However, once you reach level 4, you lose the game.

[@Xeroxthebeautiful]

If anything the meta's added more efficient ways of cycling through your deck over time. Most good Weiss decks have a really strong mill engine and when they're working as intended usually refresh very often per game. I've even had games where my deck refreshed nearly every turn before and typically that's incredibly advantages.

[@FtwGrickeyFtw]

And dont forget that a important part of WS is to keep track of both yours and your opponents climax (sida turned/ flip) cards in the deck (you can only have 8 in a deck) to know when you are woulnarble or when you can push dmg and try to finish the game

[@ScoptOriginal]

I don't think Weiss Schwarz was the best example. It's incredibly complicated and uses the clock system way too much. Vanguard (by the same company) does it way better by making it much simpler and making it a more usable resource

[@redundancycheck]

WS's clock system made the game too unreliable and random. We used to joke that any bad deck can win against good decks because there's always a top deck to make up for bad deck building. Shields on the other hand are okay and act as either a reward or catch-up mechanic for the game.

[@thesexybatman263]

In Latinamerica, we have a sinner called "Mitos y Leyendas" that, surprisingly, lasted from 2000 to 2010, was revived on 2014, and is still going on. It's not as popular on the competitive scene, but on it first 2 or 3 years after arriving to my country, Mexico, I saw it selling as much, maybe even more, than Magic and Pokémon, since it costed only half, and was promoted as a didactic game that taught childrens about myths, legends, and actual history from different cultures around the world. Being a broke nerdy middleschooler, I also fell victim to the allure of cheap TCG, and so did half of my classmates. We never liked the lifedecking rule, but there were some cards that relied heavily on it, so we made a homebrew rule that allowed each player to chose before the duel to either discard from your deck, or lose imaginary life points.

[@dianauwu1312]

Honestly, a TCG based on IRL culture and history sounds really cool. Is it, like, fantasy versions of historical figures?

[@gonzaloaguilera5909]

@@dianauwu1312 yup, the only good thing that has ever came out of Chile xd I'm Chilean, so I know what am talking about haha

[@pohatunuva3771]

I've been really interested in this one, the art is outstanding but I've got no idea where to find it in high quality. Also got not shot at playing it myself because I'm burger.

[@elhugox1]

@@dianauwu1312 yup, sometimes the art is sort of faithful to the source, other times is more "old us fantasy" (like heroquest artwork) and other times is sort of anime like (I have a card that...I think is a US native spirit? but the art is basically a Kamen Rider armor with an eagle motiff... it's pretty fucking cool) There's an online version in steam

[@elhugox1]

@@pohatunuva3771 There's a digital version in steam

[@SMAXZO]

Meanwhile in Yugioh...some cards WANT to be sent there. Hell, that's Lightsworn's gimmick. Then again, YGO also had GY refresh cards. Also in YGO, cards you DON'T want to be in your hands aka Garnets.

[@TheGoodOne1998]

Chaos and definitely zombies decks would be even more powerful with life decking.

[@ScionStorm1]

Burning Abyss laughs in the GY. Infernity wants you to play with no hand at all. In Yu-Gi-Oh, people see sending cards from the deck to the Graveyard as quicker access to resources.

[@paulolucero9864]

@@ScionStorm1 this, most decks (at least from 'Tier 3' and above) do as much playing from the hand and field as from the graveyard.

[@V2ULTRAKill]

Ygo and mtg avoided lifedecking by adding a ton of grave manipulation,

[@thebokchoy6854]

It isn't just some cards, in most of the meta relevant decks nowadays the grave is basically a second hand

[@a.dennis4835]

I remember there was “Ben 10: Alien Force” card game that had an odd twist on life decking. Basically when you do damage, your opponent puts that number of cards in their hands not in their discard pile. This means by doing damage you are giving your opponent more resources.

[@kagemushashien8394]

How about this, No Life decking unless this happens. When you run out of cards, you don't lose the game, instead you shuffle your discard pile, and make a new deck, the way to lose to life deck is to NOT have a Deck and Discard Pile, the cards are either expelled, on field, and/or in your hand.

[@a.dennis4835]

@@kagemushashien8394 That seems needlessly obtuse and sounds like it would drag out the game.

[@kagemushashien8394]

@@a.dennis4835 At least you won't have to worry that you'll lose to having zero cards in your deck, but what are your thoughts to making this system better? Since this is what my game has I'm looking for new ways and better ways to form a fun game without having to worry about everything, and not having more ways to lose because who wants to worry that there are 5 ways of losing and those guns are pointing at you at different angles making decks not having enough space to move around in.

[@asthmeresivolisk3129]

@@kagemushashien8394 That would depend on the number of cards players are allowed to put in their decks. Some ideas to make life decking less problematic. 1) Recursion: Make it so that you can play a good chunk of cards from the discard pile like a second hand. 2) Damage Gate: Make cards that when revealed stop you from discarding, like Bakugan. However, also let them be cards in their own right when drawn to the hand. 3) Recovering: Make it possible to put X number cards back into the deck (preferably at the bottom) to increase longevity. As the designer you control the rate at which cards will be discarded from the top and how many cards must be removed to win. If cards deal 2-4 damage on average, and you expect players to attack 1-3 times per turn then figure out how many turns you want a game to last on average. 4 turns? 6 turns? 10 turns? Based on the previously stated numbers that'd be a 30 card deck, 40 card deck and 60 card deck respectively. Also remember the types of interactions you can have. "When this card is sent to the discard pile from your deck: Do effect", "When this card is placed into the deck from the discard pile: Do effect", "This card counts as 3 cards when taking damage", "Discard this card from your hand to prevent the next 5 damage", etc. etc. etc. Remember, it's your card game, you get to define what types of interactions occur. The interactions you focus on will become the driving forces of the game. Try to get innovative. on average you want your games to last 4-7 turns, with 2-4 turns being aggro outlier strategies and 7-10 turns being control outlier strategies. Games that tend to pass 10 turns or that can be ended turn 1 usually aren't much fun. Also try to pack you game with interaction. Nobody wants to watch you play solitaire. If you have any further questions you can shoot. I'll give what advice I can offer. But I'm not an expert so take all my advice with a wee grain of salt.

[@mikayelalikhanyan1587]

gotta ask how was that game, was it fun or playable

[@shmarfle47]

Cardfight Vanguard did the life deck mechanic and innovated upon it really well. When you take damage flip over the top card and put it in the damage zone. Whoever reaches six damage first loses. 1.) Trigger checks. Grade 0 cards have special triggers attached to them. When you do a drive check (when attacking with Vanguard) or a damage check and you flip over a trigger you get a bonus effect and extra power. 2.) Cost. Some cards use Counter Blast as cost to activate an ability. What this means is that they flip over a card in the damage zone face-down as cost. A card with CB 2 as cost flips two cards and due to the 6 damage nature of the game, means that usage of abilities that use CB must be done carefully or you’ll have no more cards for CB later on. There are also cards that Counter Charge which flip the face-downs back face-up but those are rarer. 3.) Special abilities. Namely Limit Break. Some cards have a Limit Break ability. A card with LB 4 means that you can’t activate the ability until you reach 4 damage. This allows for some extra spice and strategy in the later part of the match. There are other things to potentially talk about but these are the main points that I feel Vanguard did well regarding the life deck system

[@wavewingman5993]

Agreed, Vanguard doesn't even entirely fit the 'life decking' thing because the main win condition is incurring 6 damage, not decking out. Plus, heal triggers are a thing, and of course, Angel Feather exists

[@fullmetalspartan4726]

@@wavewingman5993 and of course, vanguard is currently successful and about to hit its 10 year anniversary

[@Skelliiie]

i just need to say this, i fucking love vanguard so much. It's so fun especially after the reboot

[@MTGWolfMan187]

Vanguard is the only game I play now. I played magic for 15 years and Yu-Gi-Oh of 8yrs. I have had more fun playing vanguard than either of those. I liked duelmasters and kaijudo but wizards only gives a f**k about Magic.

[@BerserkKings]

The only sin Vanguard has commited is Rotating to Standard while they went apeshit with Zeroth Dragons in G Format... At least Standard is fixing some of the mistakes but Standard is getting slowly to power creep town... With some players even fearing a second rotation/reboot happening

[@Stefan_ex]

*Lightsworns/Burning abyss/Dark worlds/Banish players* LAUGS IN 90% OF THEIR DECK BEING IN GY

[@theermac6024]

Do we even mention "That grass looks greener"?

[@haruhirogrimgar6047]

Shadow Imprisoning Mirror or Light Imprisoning Mirror for the win. Back when those decks had any meta relevance anyways.

[@40astmdhm3]

Effects in graveyard are almost the definition of meta. So dope

[@Hynotama]

Red-Eyes actually found a way to recycle Red-Eyes monsters either by reviving them with Return of the Red-Eyes or shoving them back into the deck with Black Stone of Legend or with the effect of Archfiend Black Skull Dragon.

[@haruhirogrimgar6047]

@@Hynotama Just use Fusion, summon Dragoon, set Necrofusion, pass. All the deck is good for.

[@nirast2561]

Seeing someone praise Duel Masters as such has brought a tear of joy in my eye. That's the game that really introduced me to card games, and the shield system, along with their mana system, is still one of the best thing in CCG in my opinion. They've even made their way into modern, digital CCGs, with The Elder Scrolls: Legends using something similar to their shield with their runes, and Mythgard having a similar way of generating mana, although the cards are reshuffled into the deck as opposed to being in a special mana zone.

[@Penbin123]

DM is still alive and well in Japan, rumors say it died over here because it got stuck in a T0 format because the company that had the rights in the West refused to do a banlist.

[@flametitan100]

​@@Penbin123 Which is weird, because, you know, Duel Masters is made by WotC, who are no slouches when it comes to curating ban lists.

[@corhydrae3238]

I ended up being a Magic player, but I still fondly remember Dual Masters from my childhood. I actually wish that Magic had the mana system that uses your regular cards instead of lands. The simple possibility of being manascrewed is my only big gripe with MtG.

[@rescuerex7031]

@@Penbin123 The Game was already Dying by the time Bombazar Popped up, it just overall wasn't handled well by Wizards, poorly marketed, the Dub of the Anime was an absolute shitshow, and probably partially since early Duel Masters was very simmilar to MTG if you weren't paying that much attention

[@Sarah12471]

​@@rescuerex7031 Also not helping the tie in video games looked like the sprites were made in MS paint and poorly ported

[@The5lacker]

Having played Magic for... a while (Alara gang represent), I don't know if I'd call Mill effects "Deprived of resources" any more than taking damage to the face makes it harder to, like, pay life for things. Cards in deck are a completely different beast from cards in hand. Not to defend some of the terrible systems we see in this video, but I don't think Life Decking is as cardinal a sin as it might appear. The big problem is that reducing the resources you have to work with (Life and Deck as separate resources become LifeDeck, one resource) which reduces variation in win-cons, and if you introduce discard pile interactions there's a very fine line to walk between "watching the cards you need to win go down the tube" and "the discard pile is just a second hand." If damaging your opponent becomes a guaranteed boon to them, especially in a system as large and granular as 40 cards in deck instead of the 5 card shields of Duel Monsters, it makes aggro really, really bad. There's potential there to wind up with a system where the only winning play is on-hit-ko, all day every day, lest you risk giving your opponents the resources to completely turn the tide on you. I feel like a good way to thread this needle is to split the discard zone into the "Damaged cards go here" zone and a "Played cards go here" zone, and never, ever, EVER allow a player to pull cards from that second pile. That way you can have cards that pull from the first pile, making it an accumulating resource potentially, but you don't have the threat of infinite recursion on your hands. Something like the "flip in graveyard" mechanic from that one game you mentioned. That way lifedecking isn't just depriving you of (theoretical) resources, but it also isn't just a second hand where actually hitting someone in a close fight is actively punished.

[@elhugox1]

Mitos y Leyendas, using both life decking and deck milling at the same time: "im going to do a pro gamer move"

[@warzertel]

And having a deck size of 50, and for a long time it didn't have a set rotation xDDD

[@PatoRoro22]

Me ganaste kajakajk

[@elhugox1]

@@warzertel And broken cards came with educative/edutainment magazines XD

[@elhugox1]

@@PatoRoro22 sjakajs

[@flaetsbnort]

If you're life decking, isn't deck milling just direct damage?

[@ylie_21]

"Players want to play their cards".. YGO Mystic Mine/Anti-Meta players: *haha.. their turn go bye-bye*

[@BussyDestroyerTrue]

C O S M I C C Y C L O N E (if I bait out your backrow interuption and open it)

[@dieface12]

Heh _Spell/Trap destruction go brrrrr_

[@ESPmrBrough]

"Noooo, this is a 2 player game, there's supposed to be interaction nooooooooooo." "Hahaaa omni-neg go brrrr"

[@gamercore5216]

But the difference is it's a player rather than the game screwing you over

[@fatguyfrommy8421]

Mystical Space Typhoon goes wooooshhhh byebye mystic mine

[@seyproductions]

I really enjoyed Duel Masters, tbh.

[@zaddyxyborg9873]

Was actually underated. I loved playing it as a kid.

[@TheMisleduser]

used to play the ps2 game. it was fun

[@zaddyxyborg9873]

@@TheMisleduser me as well i rented it from blockbuster for 3 weeks at the time.

[@nero1ncore215]

I hope that duel master get a reboot unlike the kaijudo version

[@altoid345b]

Looked cool on my vhs

[@Stroggoii]

Mitos y Leyendas made it work because they had cards that triggered on going to the graveyard from the deck, cards that could be played from the graveyard, cards that got empowered by your graveyard size or activated abilities when cards went to the graveyard and eventually a full on dredge suicide aggro deck. It was rather neat.

[@drakke1489]

Here in Chile there is a very popular TCG called Myths & Legends (known as MyL), where it's life its the Deck's size, it has a resource system of energy cards to pay costs know as "Gold", you start always with 1 Gold card. And for the most, it really happens that you take damage, you lose a card you may be waiting for, that you depended on drawing to actually have a chance. And it becomes a real Snowball effect. Whoever gets their best card first wins, rarely a chance to comeback. If your Gold cards get sent to discard, can't play them, so you can't play cards so you are stuck with the same field then you lose. In the reboot, and near the end of it's 1st iteration, they actually realized they could make use of this by making cards do something in the discard pile, pay their cost to be played, or something else to bring them back. It was actually worse. If your card didnt do something on the discard pile it was near useless, they needed to make the cards go to a banish pile after being used there but the game it's still nuts and broken and awful. They defend it because nostalgia + the game itself its kinda cheap in comparison to the rest, but it's still a flaw design that its unremovable of the game, as it was designed to work that way.

[@Zilopochtli]

Te invito a jugar el formato de MyL Primer Bloque Unificado en el Reino de los Duelos o cualquier otra tienda grande de Santiago (o simplemente buscar MYL Racial Edición en yt y ver un par de partidas) para que conozcas un formato que arregla casi todos los problemas que tuvo MyL en su momento y que se juega caleta. Por lo demás, no entiendo tu primer argumento, eso no se soluciona con el tema del baraje?

[@KazeMemaryu]

Lifedecking isn't a bad concept. The problem is simply how it's being handled: once your deck is gone, you're gone. If Lifedecking was tied to using your deck as a resource for effect costs, then a system could be put in place to either grant a majority of cards additional effects when they get kicked from deck to discard, or universal rules to gain benefits from, like erasing generic costs for discarded cards to quickly use in a pinch or something like that. It's why I liked the apporach from Luck & Logic. It's not really Lifedecking at all, but whenever you run out of deck, you can reshuffle your discard, and then have to remove the top card, and you lose when you have three removed deck cards, or in other words, if you've restocked your deck three times. Such a system can turn deck milling and Lifedecking into a very strong mechanic (which Luck & Logic didn't do, sadly), and with enough flexibility for card usage, it would keep the game at a strong pace where almost every turn has the opportunity to flip the table.

[@MansMan42069]

One of the based card games literally built around lifedecking: WWE Raw Deal

[@SuperfieldCrUn]

I think Weiss Schwarz has handled this well. Like Luck & Logic, deckout isn't a win/loss condition - you just take the discard pile, shuffle it and that's your new deck (this process is called "rebuilding"). When you flip cards for damage, they don't go straight into the discard pile; instead, they go into an area called the Clock. The Clock can have up to six cards in it at any given time; once a seventh card is added, you choose one of those seven, put it to the side in an area called the Level, and put the remaining six into the discard pile. The first player to have 4 cards in their Level loses. Also, when you rebuild, you put the top card of the deck into the Clock as a penalty. This means that the only cards that are truly lost as a result of damage are the ones that go to the Level, and the player gets to choose which one that is from among 7 choices. Every other card is just waiting for the next rebuild and/or the next time the Clock fills up (appropriately, the discard pile is called the "waiting room"). You're also restricted on what cards you can play based on what's in your Level and Clock, so taking damage can open up your options, combating the snowball effect. This also means that high-level cards you can't play yet can be safely used to pay for effects or to draw additional cards, because you know that they'll loop back around later when you're more likely to be able to use them. So you essentially start with 28 health, and the game manages to represent losing that health with no more than nine cards at any given time, and usually does it with around 3-6 cards. They even used the Flip card mechanic from Bakugan that stops the bleeding when drawn for damage, except that their horizontal cards (called "Climax" cards) aren't useless when drawn normally. One Climax can be played per turn to power up your cards for the remainder of that turn, and many cards have additional abilities that trigger when a specific Climax is in play. Also, hitting a Climax when flipping for damage not only stops further damage, but also makes every card flipped so far go straight to the discard pile, skipping the Clock entirely. This means that you can't just unload as much damage as possible and hope that not too much of it gets stopped; the harder you hit, the more likely it is that you will end up doing no damage at all (apart from some light milling), so it can often be a better idea to intentionally do less damage than what you're capable of. For this reason, you're capped at 8 Climaxes in a deck of 50 cards, and keeping track of whose Climaxes are where is probably the most important skill to learn.

[@Scientiavore]

The funny thing is that life decking is more of a pain in the ass to keep track of than standard life totals. If you're not constantly keeping track after every card draw and hit, the only other option is to count exactly how many cards you have left in the deck. That's probably a factor in why a lot of people don't like them as well. All the examples you provided that were considered "good" examples had easy to keep track of systems (ie you only have 5 or 6 cards representing your life).

[@MrVovoda]

Exactly what I was going to comment. It is extremely anoying to have to re-count every time. Especially as you need to know about your opponent's : either you have to ask them to count, or you have to manipulate their (hidden) cards, both of which are bad.

[@somekindofdude1130]

As an avid Yugioh player who likes zombies. I feel personally attacked.

[@radordekeche947]

The Zatch Bell card game might be an interesting look at this mechanic. You play with a set, ordered deck. Every time you play a spell, to deal damage or block incoming damage, you pay cards from your deck. Whenever you're damaged, you lose cards. When you have no cards left, you lose the game. So the game teaches players to use their deck as a resource, and allows the players to plan and strategies how to get the most out of their cards.

[@135forte]

Gundam had a similar system. You could also exile cards from the discard to be able to play cards, so you could double dip.

[@TheL0rd0fSpace]

One downside, which I don't recall if you mentioned, is that being able to know your opponent's life total quickly is quite important, since a lot of choices can ride on what that number is. If decks aren't very small, then forcing players to manually count every time can be annoying and tedious. In addition, in games like Magic, it can be very telling if you ask your opponent what life total they're at (if you're the aggro deck, it could indicate to your opponent that you think you have lethal, which could make them play more protectively than they would otherwise), so the tried and true "pen and paper" is an excellent option since it allows each player to know each other's life totals *literally at a glance*, and subtly enough that they can check without giving the game away.

[@BunnyFuMaster]

I really like the idea of lifedecking in some games. I think the Decipher Star Wars card Game did a great job of both using the deck in an interesting way. It's also a good example of restrictive deck building with light and dark side cards being unmixable. It was a bit more work in tournaments because you had to bring two decks, but I think that made for more skill testing game play. Power creep was certainly a problem though...

[@bradwheeler4119]

Bakugan could simply make flip+action cards similar to the dual or fuse cards from MTG or pendulum from Yu-Gi-Oh. Simply have both card types in a single resource.

[@pikapuffin368]

WHY is this only being done in 2020?! Like, seriously, such a comprehensive breakdown of principles of card game design could have, and should have, been done YEARS ago in this format! Thank you Kohdok so very much for doing this.

[@waterhorse928]

Fire Emblem Cipher adds another layer to this. In the game you have a main character. When that character would take damage, you can discard copies of the card to avoid the damage. Sometimes you let yourself get hit to gain cards, sometimes you dodge powerful effects. A good part of the game is designed around this mechanic. It creates very intense and fun moments! I don't know how popular the game is in the card game world, but I half expected it to be mentioned!

[@kylefrid5911]

I really liked the way Zatch Bell did lifedecking. Since your book order is completely set, you end up setting up your deck with lifedecking in mind. Paired with only gaining MP by turning pages and the matches become a quick succession of interesting and fun decisions as you have to adjust your strategy on the fly and determine if flipping a page is worth the risk. Also, the Bakugan flip cards could honestly be solved by a mechanic where you used cards in your hand as a resource, shuffling them back in the deck when used as such. It would create more decisionmaking as you need to determine which cards you are going to play and which you are going to put back in the deck and allow you to return flip cards to the deck if drawn.

[@jamham69]

So when i first saw this video, me and a friend had just sat down to design our own card game as an ongoing hobby. As an attempt to prove you wrong, and just because i could, we deliberately chose a lifedecking system, but Duel masters lessons (a favourite game of my childhood and one we still play time to time) have been learnt. when you take damage, you look at the damage you took, add cards from them to your hand up to your hand limit, and bin the rest. almost always, "that card you need" you find, and you make some kind of small comeback. We also included "Abrupt", which is just shield trigger- cards played straight from the deck as they're revealed as part of damage. Our game still needs some ironing out in terms of balancing and design, but so far everyone who has played it has enjoyed it, and few of those people are the type to be polite for the sake of it.

[@Rewwgh]

I've been watching MTG content for ages and now YT decides to recommend me this channel? Well better late than never I guess.

[@ClubbingSealCub]

Counterpoint: Android - Netrunner pulls this off perfectly.

[@Dahras1]

Counterpoint to your counterpoint: Netrunner doesn't really do lifedecking. It just puts the way that you win in the deck and gives you a consolation prize if you don't find that way to win (trashing assets). It feels fair to the Corp player because a) you let them access R&D in the first place and b) they still (usually) have to pay to trash your stuff. Also, I'd say the real issue with lifedecking isn't that you discard cards from your deck, its that you discard *tons* of cards from your deck, which really doesn't happen that often in Netrunner. Counterpoint to my counterpoint to your counterpoint: What I'm describing is just lifedecking done right.

[@timothymimeslayer]

Also counterpoint: Star Wars CCG was the greatest card game ever made.

[@regal6930]

Why doesn't he like Vanguard? They actually do this concept quite well.

[@azuredominion837]

I love vanguard its fun as hell

[@BulletShaba]

I think it is an exception that proves the rule deal. Love vanguard and have zero open on my phone right now. It also is pretty close to damage as resource. As for the why vanguard specifically, you play the game, you know the community xD

[@gnarly814]

Prolly cause cardfight is awful balance wise and doesn't provoke much thoughtful gameplay.

[@DragonicDude]

@@gnarly814 did you not play ott. Also vanguard kicks ass

[@gnarly814]

@@DragonicDude I assume you mention OTT because you believe it offers thought provoking gameplay? I legit mained the clan until a few months after its second wave in standard in both standard and premium and I can tell you that while it may have a little more thought than some other clans at the end it plays the same as every cardfight deck: play unit cards during call phase, attack the vanguard, and guard during the guard phase. While at first glance it might seem that with the top deck manipulation there could be more variety and more choices to make but in reality you are 95% scrying only triggers to the top. Every deck wins the exact same way theres no such thing as a control deck or an aggro deck, and the deck that is the best is always the deck that got unreasonably power creeped high rarity cards from the latest set. Game is okay for playing a few casual games with your friends but if you try to take a serious look at it it crumbles quickly. Also sorry for the paragraph lol

[@SonofSethoitae]

I mean, the Decipher Star Wars/Star Trek games used Life Decking, and they were both good and the former was almost as popular as MtG until they lost the license.

[@Diyomaro]

I think the best way to fix Bakugan's problem is that if flip effects were extra effects on some cards. Say there's a generic draw 2 card, but if it's milled, it does something else instead.

[@rhodrigoyamamoto3563]

Card game players:I want to play my cards! Yugioh players:I want to... Opponent:ash... imper...veiler..

[@poortom4337]

utopic zexal...

[@RealCodreX]

MTG opponent: White-Blue DM opponent: Mono water Etc. ...

[@axoa-noah8331]

I've been working on my own game where the players deck functions as their life, and I had never considered some of the points you brought up. You've really given me something to think about and I'm excited to see what else you have to say. Keep up the amazing work!

[@MGDrzyzga]

Well, maybe look at Yu-Gi-Oh for how the discard pile can be a resource. "Lightsworn" cards tend to send the top of their deck to the discard pile, and That Grass Looks Greener because potentially sending 20 cards from the top of your deck to the discard was very powerful. With some decks, the discard pile can be "a second hand," so a game designed like that could use lifedecking as a resource gain rather than a resource loss.

[@ScionStorm1]

In Yu-Gi-Oh there are so many ways to access the cards that got sent to the discard from the deck that effects that do so have to be regulated because players see having those cards dumped as quicker access to resources.

[@axoa-noah8331]

ScionStorm that’s true, I think in a deck that has heavier focus on mechanics like being milled or activating effects from the grave, that having the cards go to the grave as a life could help make late game combos by setting them up naturally, but if the decks doesn’t do anything like that, then it just becomes a hinderance. I think having a card that says something like “when you take damage, discard top card if your deck” would be a fine supplement. (Sorry if I was rambling a bit.)

[@ScionStorm1]

@@axoa-noah8331 Konami just revealed a new Yu-Gi-Oh archetype where all the main monsters have this effect _"You can Tribute 1 other “Draitron” monster or 1 Ritual Monster from your hand or field; Special Summon this card from your hand _*_or Graveyard_*_ in Defense Position, then you can..."_ Resurrecting out of the discard pile isn't even the end of the effect, it's just a means towards another effect on the same card and it's only cost is sending another member of it's archetype to the Graveyard that also has the ability to resurrect the same way.

[@blackheartzerotheundergrou3225]

I've been thinking of a Card Game where every monster unit has a "Defeat Cost." Where if that card is destroyed in battle, you take a fixed amount of life point damage thats printed at the bottom of the card. And this fixed amount gets bigger and bigger depending on how strong the unit its printed on is. So like if a low level unit is destroyed, you may lose like 5-10 LP, but stronger units make you lose 20-40 LP if they're destroyed. Of course, there can also be card and unit effects that make you take less, or even no Defeat Cost when your units are destroyed. Just in case you weren't too keen on taking craploads of damage from losing your heavy hitters...

[@alexandersuciu9841]

You have no idea how happy it makes me to hear someone bring up Duel Masters nowadays :)))

[@Kohdok]

My nickname for it is "How to Make a TCG 101"

[@alexandersuciu9841]

Kohdok I officially challenge you “kettou da” !

[@Big-Image]

You mean Magic the Gathering: Japan Edition?

[@bryanmerel]

@@Big-Image i love how duel masters solved Magic The gathering's problem in such a simple way.

[@user-vl8ck4gz6w]

Duel masters is till popular today but in asia not in the west. Different target grouos and the over the top sparkly cards work good over there. Also it was always meant to be magic but for asia amd they accomplished that pretty well

[@animeluu26]

Weiss Schwartz have a pretty good/fun way to deal with cards, I suggest looking up the rules and maybe try it

[@psychicflora]

And a lot of anime characters from other series

[@TioFranTV]

I just came to the comments looking for this game, he mentioned Vanguard that shares with weiss, because both are from Bushiroad, and despite it has other problems, the damage and lifes system is pretty good, if you are loosing you have the advantage of have access to better cards than the rival, and the "flips effects" can be used from your hand to have a different use, also, you don't loose for mill, you just take a damage after shulfure your graveyard into your deck, so you never loose cards, the only ones are the ones you played or are low level, so or are almost useless or you have arready played. It was what I liked the most of that game

[@Zoey587]

Weiss does a good job letting you play cards. Since the Climax cards can cancel damage but also be used in hand

[@ignithas3150]

While I think that the life system is fun, it makes a lot of games way too random for a competitive card game.

[@OGNoNameNobody]

The main life deck issue *I* disliked was the fact that "One of/Fun ofs" were *HEAVILY Discouraged* by design.

[@ArkCiD_Z3r0]

Haven't seen it mentioned but Mitos y Legendas, a Chilean game running to this day in South America -in between a brief hiatus caused by its publishing company shutting down- is based on life decking: instead of having life points, your deck is your life. It is/was fairly popular in its country (and continent) of origin, to the point of having a similarly sized playerbase to Pokemon TCG and Yugi back in the day

[@AlexanderMartinez-kd7cz]

I miss that game :(

[@ArkCiD_Z3r0]

@@AlexanderMartinez-kd7cz It's running again -and apparently the company was either bought or revived- and they're releasing old sets in a live game format along with new sets on a TCG format

[@STEMpunk28]

It's going pretty stable nowadays. They are reviving the older "Primera Era" format as well as the new generation format

[@Zilopochtli]

@@STEMpunk28Tres años después puedo decir que Mitos es el TCG más entretenido que he jugado en años, en especial Primer Bloque X

[@chummer2060]

Raw Deal was the WWE TCG in the late 90s/early 2000s. They did life decking well.

[@scottcampbell5713]

Seemed to fit the wrestling theme somehow too. There was enough recovery that you didn't see a good card get flipped and lose on the spot.

[@MansMan42069]

I'm surprised he completely missed it for the sake of shitting on Bakugan.

[@Jim4815162342]

@@MansMan42069 From the cards I have seen him use in videos, I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't know about it.

[@darkdeltakai5863]

There's just something amazing about 6:08 you put me into a 2-minute laughing fit. Whew! Anyway, I've only seen a handful of your videos but love your content. Keep up the great work.

[@sharkjack]

It is so interesting how you can see early choices in card games have huge rammifications down the line. Lifedecking intrinsically ties life to remaining cards, but that also means that getting cards back into your deck is auto healing, and drawing resources from your deck to play with becomes entangled with damage. So if you want to design around healing, now you have to worry about that where that healing comes from. You could allow players to draw on a 'side deck', potentially allowing players to adept their deck during gameplay, but it is always more complicated to design for than a simple counter. Any TCG has to make choicces about what it does and doesn't focus on, but conflating life with cards in deck just doesn't net you any interesting design space compared to milling as a potential strategy in a game that has a health pool. It feels so obvious to me that you would not want this in your game that I'm curious what the design philosophies were that did guide designers towards putting this in their game. I suppose clear/tangible damage is one, but that feels so weak to me.

[@dylansheaves4743]

Why is vanguard the game that shall not be named?

[@Zestmistergamer]

I know right, especially when clans like grand blue, pale moon, dark irregulars, and angel feathers have life decking playstyles that can often mess up a player's goals of winning.

[@Zoey587]

All 3 of Bushiroad card games honestly do well in this topic

[@MommyViper]

Hes just ultra salty from its design. Mainly cause he hates that theres no clan mixing. That's it. Literally it. Good chance he played back in the day but dropped it as soon as Clan Fight was implemented like a child

[@garretnelson2771]

@@MommyViper Isn't being able to just mix whatever cards you want end up being the main reason a lot of broken shit happens in a lot of card games?

[@magneto1992]

Coming from Yugi oh and Pokemon the gameplay for vanguard is very fun. But once I dip anything competitive it went downhill south. Two big factors were: Limits on deck Creation What essentially is a critical hits via their game mechanics by revealing and applying random effects when taking damage. As a competiré player I can only imagine setting up for gane only for my opponent to randomly ducking heal. Like, sure a good player might account for it but sometimes shit just spirals out of control due to that. Haven’t try the game again so maybe it got address but the second I see this gane mechanic I run sprinting the other way. And no I am not one of those “competitive card games are lame”. I been playing Yugioh and Pokemon competitively in some manner for at least 7 or so years, through regionals, nawcq, YCS, and nationals on yugioh and Pokemon Regionals.

[@Lightman0359]

The old DBZ/GT card game used lifedecking but [eventually] implemented a mechanic called "endurance X", it was an optional trigger that gave you the option of exiling the card to prevent the next X damage. It also had what later would be called "Recover X" that allowed you to move the top X discards to the bottom of your deck. Used together they let you weigh the chance of recovering and using the damaged card vs leaving the next X cards on top of your deck A few personalities [commanders] and masteries [cards that reward you for playing mono-colored decks] even allowed you to draw cards from your discard pile or discard a card to restore a discarded card to your hand

[@darthnixilis304]

A Lifedeck game you should check out is WWE Raw Deal. The flip cards can also be played from hand. They not only stop the bleeding but end their turn. It's discard pile interaction is diverse and worth playing. Depending on who you're playing the damage you take becomes a resource, and recovering cards picks what is put back in your deck. It's worth taking a look at.

[@justsomeguywithkaminasshad7145]

Just realized how Kohdok's and Mark Rosewater's voices sound very similar.

[@kingdragoonmk10]

The Heck did Vanguard do to you? Also good points

[@bigchumbo6489]

nah cause it says voldemort, also known as he who should not be named

[@lampostsamurai2518]

The fanbase exists entirely online(because nobody wants to invest in a game that shits out a new expansion every month, and only 1/4 playerbase want to buy it.), and is very self-concious about its lack of physical presence.

[@annoyingoranger100]

Lampost Samurai I have no idea where you’re getting this info from. Vanguard definitely has a huge physical fanbase.

[@user-ko7lz3kr1d]

@@lampostsamurai2518 There were some people who played it at the card store I worked at. They even had tournaments held there, although pretty small. Most people seemed to have a bit of a negative stigma with it because the main game of the store was Magic and few of the Magic players wanted to play some anime-esque card game.

[@RedsByrd]

Lampost Samurai hot take, but i dont see why this makes the games name so unspeakable

[@byeguyssry]

I once agreed with this, but no longer do. There's functionally no difference between lifedecking and having a normal life system, except that it punishes drawing a bit more. If you simply discard cards face-down, and if you want you can make them discarded from the bottom of your deck, you can remove the problem of players seeing the cards that were discarded and being sad they can't use them. Discarding from bottom of deck also means that if you have cards that do interact with face-down cards in discard pile, they can reassure themselves they'll never get to play it anyways since it was at the bottom of their deck. If your card game has very few search cards, then lifedecking really isn't very different from normal life mechanics, so I wouldn't bother trying to change it up, but the main benefit of punishing draw might be worth it to make card draw not a purely good thing. This can make some cards in hand useless if you have 2 cards left in deck when a card in your hand let's you draw 3, but it also creates interesting moments. Do I draw the last 2 cards in my deck and try to get a win this turn since my opponent only has 1 card left, or do I try to stall out my opponent even though my hand is, defensive-wise, really weak. This is already common in games with a singular card that can mill you until you have few cards left in deck, such as Maokai or The Watcher from LoR who mills you until you have 4 cards left in deck, which I do find interesting, and lifedecking will make these scenarios more common.

[@VestedUTuber]

So, some people were mentioning how life-decking would actually be really fun with Yu-Gi-Oh style graveyard effects. Obviously there's a lot of things that could go wrong with that as well (imagine how ridiculous Chaos Dragons would have been if that was a thing) but it would allow you to be able to still play your cards in a life-deck based game - effectively turning life-decking _into_ a form of damage-as-resource.

[@pabloleiva8568]

Oooohh good old Mitos y Leyendas, fun game but so unbalanced and with card texts so badly written. Many have already told in the comments about how it is a life decking game at how sucessful it was despite it, but my favorite part about that part of the game was how they tried to fix it. At the begining of the game's lifespan, when you took damage it went to the graveyard, and with time, more and more cards started to interact with the graveyard, allowing them to be played from there. At some point it got so common that it seemed that the graveyard was a part of your hand. Gold cards (your resources), creatures and every other type of card could be played from there. During this process, the game designers decided that they needed a new zone where the cards could not come back from, and called it the exile. Being able to exile a card was a huge deal, but then some cards started to interact with it and the floodgates were open again. Many cards could either come back into play from the exile or move to the graveyard, so with the exile lost its purpose. What did the game designers do to fix this problem? Make another zone! This time they just said that cards could be removed from the game and this time for real they could not come back. This lasted a few years until the game got rebooted and finally canceled. Now, the game started around 2000-2001, and the exile zone was implemented around 2003-04. The whole remove from game showed up around 07-08 and the game died in 2010 I think. During this time the cards got severe powercreep and suffered a bunch of changes that with time killed the playerbase. During the peak of its popularity Mitos y Leyendas was even released in english in the US (I still have some english decks that I bought when the company that made the game was clearing its inventory) and german, but clearly wasn't as popular as it was in its country of origin, Chile, and Mexico.

[@Alikaoz]

Myths & Legends lasted over a decade with this system, falling to hubris and trying to redo the whole game.

[@jonathantillian6528]

Star Wars, the original, lasted for 6 years until it was literally forced off the market (it still has a wonderful community too). Battletech lasted 6+ years as well before they lost the license as well.

[@STEMpunk28]

And it's still going

[@Dunhilina]

I really liked Panini DBZ which uses Lifedecking as a main win condition. A ton of cards have Endurance X where the card stops you from getting hit for X damage for the attack it would be put into the graveyard on (so if you take 5 damage, on your 3rd card it has endurance 3 you would stop taking damage there with 1 of the damage reduction from endurance being wasted). There are a ton of cards and strategies that interact with the graveyard and Rejuvenation is everywhere (where you put the card from your graveyard back into the life deck). Finally there are a few other win conditions, including Dragon Balls which can't go to the graveyard unless an equivalent ball is on the field (so they are never really gone as a win condition).

[@deloctyte]

I rarely comment on videos, but you know what? You made me stop and think about the design of a game I'm creating in which life-decking is a core component, and usually I'm a very stubborn goat. Very well laid-out video, thanks! :)

[@Threads_Of_Fate]

Weiss Schwarz is an interesting game to look at when considering how it avoids the pitfalls. It predates Vanguard, but it very clear that Vanguard is an attempt to make WS a much faster game, and in my opinion WS ends up with the better design decisions. In WS you shuffle you cards back into your deck when you deck out and take 1 damage. Damage is taken as cards from the top of your deck. Every 7 damage you level up and remove 6 of the cards from damage and move the last to a level zone to indicate how instances of 7 damage you have taken. You will shuffle your discard pile into your deck a few times each game and there are cards that cancel damage when they are revealed off damage, but they do stuff when you play them.

[@V2ULTRAKill]

Ehh CFV turned into a much better tournament tcg (before the reboot destroyed any sense of player control)

[@WangerZ3291]

i want to get into WS, but no one in my LGS plays it. and with the separate jp/non-jp meta, kinda makes it harder to get into.

[@ronelm2000]

@@WangerZ3291 it's actually easier than ever, tho you'd need Tabletop Simulator and Discord nowadays because of covoldermort-19

[@stoic_hero_tcg]

This video seems to be more of a critique of Bakugan than of Lifedecking itself. 40 card lifedeck with the only cards to prevent damage are unplayable if you draw them? That is just bad game design all around. Lifedecking, then, would not be a deadly sin of game design, but the implementation of it, could be. I would not consider Duel Masters "Lifedecking" as there is very little interaction with the deck outside of the sheilds you set at the start of the game and a few mill cards and cards that give you an additional sheild. Duel Masters is ingenious design with the beauty in its simplicity. You do not need anything outside of your cards to play the game (no tokens, dice, etc) and you do not have to worry about overfilling your deck or the correct ratios of resource cards, as any card can be a resource card in that game. It is really efficiently and well designed from the ground up. Probably the most popular example of Lifedecking in a card game was only briefly shown with one card in this video: that is the Score (and subsequent Panini) Dragonball Z card game. I think it is one of the most healthy and robust life deck systems, already being able to block attacks and having Endurance built into the cards (which was added later to the Score game) instead of being a separate card type all together. Combine that with enough Rejuvenation and fetch effects, leads to a pretty solid game design. So, Lifedecking itself would not be a sin of game design, but having Lifedecking without the proper mechanics to support it would be. You can not just lazily throw Lifedecking into your card game without thinking of the repercussions and drawbacks to it. Also, I would consider mill to be as bad as Lifedecking without proper support. In a game where milling is a viable or broken strategy without interaction from the receiving player, it can be incredibly frustrating, as you mentioned. Yu-Gi-Oh! pretty much solved this by having so many GY effects (and certain decks that use the GY merely as a second hand) to where milling became a non-advisable strategy, as you are far more likely to help your opponent than hurt them. Not that there is no milling in Yu-Gi-Oh! anymore, just mostly banishes from the deck now, sometimes face down, and is still fairly balanced (although annoying nonetheless).

[@RegiRuler]

2:25 : nobody tell him about Gem-Knight Garnet

[@a.dennis4835]

What is Gen-Knight Garnet?

[@MVAS-mp9oo]

@@a.dennis4835 A normal monster card (monster without a special effect) that you don't want to see it in your hand, but vital enough to an engine (as a material requirement for a "fusion", but this card must be in the deck to function). Now the term "garnet" is used for a card that's a part from combo piece/engine but you don't want to see it in your hand.

[@dripdoutfish]

Pokémon: Draw 3 cards Yu-Gi-Oh: Banish 10 cards from the top of deck, draw 2 - classed as meta staple

[@IamGrimalkin]

Yes, but the Pokemon supporter restriction means it should read in Yugioh-language: Draw 3 cards, you cannot use other spell cards this turn. But seeing as Sekka's Light was also a staple until it got limited and that locks you out of other spell/trap cards for the whole duel: yeah, that would still be busted in Yugioh.

[@MrBadclyde]

I mean if you can use other spells/traps just not in the same turn and then banish them from the gy to use sekka's light the next turn

[@IamGrimalkin]

@@MrBadclyde Well you can, but that's incredibly inconsistent and nobody does it in practice. In practice 3 Sekka's Light was played as the only spell/trap in the deck. Also, then Sekka's Light still locks you out of spells/traps for the rest of the duel after activating it.

[@MrBadclyde]

@@IamGrimalkin man my dyslexic ass completely swapped "turn" in place of "duel" my b

[@sebastianfalzarano4715]

Pot of Desires is a whole nother level of depth. In a game as fast paced as yu-gi-oh, you don't really have turn by turn plays. You either commit or you loose. Desires gets rid of those top ten cards that you will probably never need, see, or use in exchange for cars that you would. None of my decks play it, but it is a staple for a reason.

[@tatters8236]

I'mma be real, I actually really like exactly 1 lifedecking system: the Zach Bell card game, where you arrange your deck instead of shuffling it and whenever you lose cards you also get two of the mana needed to cast more cards, so, for example, you get punched in the face for 4 damage, you now have 10 extra mana for whatever cards are now availible to you.

[@goncaloferreira6429]

intersting

[@epic4fish]

One of the best tcgs I have ever played uses life decking. I'm surprised it wasn't mentioned, or maybe you never got a chance to play it. The panini dragonball z tcg. Some attacks would deal damage in life cards. For life card damage you would flip cards from your life deck into your graveyard. Cards could have an endurance number on them. If one of those is flipped, you have the option to exile the card with endurance and that would absorb that number of life cards of damage. Eg, you are hit with 5 life cards of damage. The second card you flip has endurance 3. You can exile that card and not have to take the next 3 damage. You can also interact with your discard pile. And as part of playing, any turn you don't enter combat, you put the top card of your discard pile at the bottom of your deck

[@artstsym]

This is less "lifedecking is an automatic failure of a mechanic" and more "if you don't spare a thought to how your mechanics work, they won't." If Magic had 10 power 1-drops, that wouldn't be an indictment of the life system, just how it was implemented. As duel masters demonstrates, it's perfectly reasonable to create a card with a normal functionality and a "break glass in case of emergency" functionality, and you could put that in a game with lifedecking too. THAT SAID, there are just people who, no matter what, will hate seeing their cards go in the bin (I happen to play with one regularly), so you are losing out on those specific customers by choosing this mechanic.

[@deadlypandaghost]

The Naruto CCG actually had a pretty neat version of lifedecking. An attack directly to the player earns 1 battle reward if

[@sharksuperiority9736]

See, when I saw this, I assumed that it said “Seven Deadly Sins, TCG”, and I got really excited Still cool though

[@kyoya941]

I wish duel masters didn't flop

[@nilus2k]

I was around during the late 90s CCG craze. So many good games flopped.

[@blacky7801]

Bakugans design is very interesting. From what you described it looks like every attack always does so much damage, that they mill cards until one of those attack negating cards is flipped. In effect they turn into your life points. Instead of a fixed 6 life points like in many games, you can deck build to include more or less life points. At the cost of dead cards if you draw them of course. That sounds interesting tradeoff

[@xolotltolox7626]

It sounds intetesting on paper, but in play it is not fun

[@littleoni0]

I kind of disagree on this being a deadly sin. In the sense that it's not usolvable. I have played ChaOS TCG for a long time (well, now the game is dead, but that has less to do with it depending on lifedecking and more with it's target audience being absent in Japan, where the game was mainly sold) and they just designed the game around the mechanic and that was it. Most decks used discarded cards as a resource (by removing them from play to pay for costs); it allowed draw effects to be actually a leverage: you get more options but less life (life as a resource thing), and thus cheaper; and the auto-level mechanic (3 out of 50 cards in the deck will stop the remaining damage and give you a permanent boost. They can still be played from hand to get the boost anyway) acted as another point to strategize around: very big, all-in-y hits would be stopped by an auto, drawing too much would lead to draw your autos, and other such stuff. Yes, some games you drew your autos at the very beginning and had to play uphill (more or less getting mana-screwed on MTG, same odds too. MTG does have strategic decision in deckbuilding tied to it, so it's clearly better in that regard, tho). My point is: you can make a decent system around lifedecking. It's harder and you shouldn't do it because it's harder for you and may be harder for your players, but you can do it, it's not "deadly".

[@fero_zetta]

I'm from Chile, and i used to play (Before the PowerCreep attacked and damaged very severely the game) "Mitos y Leyendas" (Myths and Legends), a game with historic and mythological references. And that game uses LifeDecking... and uses none of the above mentioned sistems... But OH BOY it Homosexually and Heterosexually abuses three things, shuffling cards in to the deck, draw power and the Exhume mechanic. The first one is obvious, but damn, i could shuffle a QUARTER OF MY DECK EVERY TURN once i got my Hero deck up and running. And the Exhume mechanic allows you to play certain cards from your discard pile, and if it is an Talisman (The equivalent of a sorcery in Magic) it banishes itself, but it remains indefinitely in the board if it is an Ally (Creature). And finally... you could draw almost all of your deck with the right set up... and believe me, it was somewhat easy. The game has one type of resource to pay, gold, and cards are somewhat cheap, most of them not exceeding 4 gold. So you can see explosive comebacks if your opponent's deck is an Exhume deck, or your damage could be ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT if he can just take his discard pile and suffle it back. It was an awesome game.

[@xavierflores3483]

Bless vampire in the bottle tho, Banish all the cards on your oponent discard pile, or shuffle your entire discard pile back into your deck. Funiest card to use against Exhume decks, for a time at least

[@matthewarnold4557]

I love that MTG has a whole archetype devoted to this, it's called dredge. and let me tell you nothing is better and casting a turn 1 griselbrand in legacy.

[@the11382]

Dredge is degenerate as hell. Friends don’t let friends play dredge.

[@Kahadi]

Its a keyword, not an archetype. But it works in MTG because its optional and there's many cards that benefit from being in the graveyard, can still be used from the graveyard, and lots of deck renewal options to let you Dredge more or to save yourself if it backfires, such as if against a control deck that keeps sending your dredged card back to the graveyard without getting any use resulting in you nearly killing yourself with mill

[@nZaneVal]

tubefan90000 these days dredge is very much an archetype. So much so that in pioneer, a format where none of the dredge mechanic cards are legal, the self mill deck is still referred to as dredge. It’s become synonymous. -sincerely a modern dredge player

[@TheOblomoff]

When the whole game is designed around lifedecking, it very much works. Like, Blood Card is a slay-the-spire-alike, but it's gritty and a bit punishing. In game design and art. So match made in heaven :)

[@oblivi8games808]

I will say, personally the card game that I think handles something similar to lifedecking best is probably Weiss Schwarz. In Wiess Schwarz, you take damage by placing cards from the top of your deck in your clock, but a key thing is that when you take 7 damage and level up, all but one of those cards go back to the discard pile and can be used again if you go through the deck or somehow search them from the discard pile. The game also has something similar to flip cards in the form of climax cards which cancel damage if flipped for damage (they add a lot of strategic depth when you have to consider thinning your deck to make cancelling damage more likely as well as taking into account how many climax cards your opponent has left when deciding the order of your attacks), but the key thing is that climax cards can still be played as cards if you draw them, they aren't just dead cards meant to be discarded.

[@chadmrrsn]

kohdok: Mark Rosewater might be qualified to talk about cardgames you guys Me: looks at The current State of standard

[@ryandruid6796]

Exactly this

[@goncaloferreira6429]

what so bad about it? also i am sure everybody could do a better job

[@chadmrrsn]

@@goncaloferreira6429 embercleave, joiner of forces, familiar and witches oven, oppresive control. Also the better job argument is tired at this point, especially when wizards employees say that maro is quite stubborn

[@goncaloferreira6429]

it is so easy to badtalk. standard is bad right now? but you like the game? isnt rosewater at the head of the game for something like 20 years? surely he must have done something good Like making products that sell and fill the coffers of the company employing him. About the game: emberclease is very strong but i dont dislike it as much as others. It is a bomb and since it is red it ends the game on the spot, as it should. there are many answers to it most colours. cat oven anoys me to death. oven being free to activate is too good. i also dont like it because i mostly play cavalcade decks. oppresive control? its what control is. there are ways to beat it( again i play aggro). Also note that we are almost at rotation and the catd pool is huge. decks are stronger than ever because they have all the cards at their disposal.

[@chadmrrsn]

@@goncaloferreira6429 just because maro did a good thing that I like, that doesn't undo the multitude of mistakes he has made. There is a difference between control and oppressive control

[@ZephyrofGale]

Cardfight Vanguard uses life decking and its just fine XD

[@revimfadli4666]

It's a hybrid of life decking and Duel Masters' shield though, plus the various comeback mechanics

[@ShantottoCast]

Final Fantasy nails it with the EX-Burst mechanic. Players can take up to 7 damage, and each damage is a single card milled off the top to the damage zone. But if that card has an EX symbol on it, the receiving player may trigger that ability (search, killing an attacker, buffing remaining defenders, drawing, etc) with the attacker unable to respond, and many cards play off taking damage while on the field, so losing the cards to damage doesn't often feel bad. Hell, there's some times where cards end up in damage, and it feels okay because you didn't want it in that match-up anyway. Certain cards also allow re-use of EX-Bursts, or swapping of cards in damage with cards in hand.

[@herrhartmann3036]

OK, now I have this idea for a necromantic game: 1) Players don't have any cards "in hand" 2) The only place where you can play cards from is your discard. Players start the game with a few cards in their discard. 3) There is no self-milling. The only way to move cards from your deck into your discard is by taking damage from your opponent's attacks. 4) If a player has no cards left in their deck, they lose the game. In such a system, attacking your opponent may at first seem to be a bad idea, because it will give him more material to play with. But it also brings him closer to losing the game, and you closer to winning.

[@timorr6008]

I still play Duel Masters!

[@alexandersuciu9841]

Same :))

[@goldensimp7729]

There's also Duel Masters! Plays! On mobile. You need a VPN or some way to download it from Japanese servers and it's only in Japanese, but it's the game we know and love. Hopefully it will come to us soon

[@timorr6008]

Heck yeah mate! I play that too. I used Qooapp for it instead of VPN though.

[@shakirmeherrem6672]

What sleeves do you use?

[@timorr6008]

@@shakirmeherrem6672 I don't actually use any sleeves for the app -- been trying to save up the in-game currency to get more packs.

[@cyril957]

As a Star Wars CCG vet, can confirm most of his points haha

[@FenrirEX]

As a SW CCG vet, holy shit there are other survivors.

[@cyril957]

@@FenrirEX "Survivor" is such a pejorative term! That game was f l a w e d, but it was still a big part of my life as a baby nerd. I keep thinking about hopping on to the online version, but I'm not sure how much I want my nostalgia goggles to be shattered haha

[@PaybackJack]

Star Wars was made worse by tracking than by milling tbh.

[@cyril957]

@@PaybackJack Agree to disagree, I guess. Maybe I didn't play at a high-enough level to grasp/notice tracking (I was, like, 10 lol), but the milling was very obvious and visceral to me. Maybe that makes it just a worse experience rather than a worse game, but whether that makes it more or less important is pretty subjective.

[@PaybackJack]

@@cyril957 Well I mean the milling is the core mechanic of the game so you either like it then you don't like the game. Tracking was a part of the game that created an even more negative play experience because as you "won" you actually lost more because your opponent would have better control of their power cards. I do feel you though, I remember playing A New Hope and trying to set up an Attack Run and constantly not being able to draw the pieces of the combo while also having parts of them get removed from the game was definitely a negative play experience.

[@lucci-bro935]

at this point I am starting to really appreciate Pokémon's life system a lot more now

[@haosmagnaingram6992]

I thought about it more and I think I understand why bakugan went with life decking as a mechanic. The primary purpose all seems to come back to their value of spectacle and creating a game that’s fun to watch being a huge priority. Life decking creates a clear visual representation of one’s life total which makes it easy to follow, just like the other physical life resource discussed in the video, but to a grander scale. It then takes one of the most engaging suspense aspects of vanguard and amplifies it. The lower probability of hitting that needed trigger somewhat lowers the anticipation (by comparison) behind it as there is less of an expectation. Where as with bakugan each card milled gets more suspenseful, with big attacks it is less a question of if but when the flip will appear and each result has a big impact every damage dealt is an important resource (and seeing those blows to a strategy is definitely enjoyable/engaging to watch from an audience perspective) and being able to stop a hard attack early can be critical as they are now far from another team attack or had used valuable resources to get a larger attack in. See the cage matches at the conventions the most hype moments are counting down the cards from large attacks or the audience in shock as a pact of darkness is flipped on the first card of a massive team attack. Is this necessarily the best design for gameplay enjoyment probably not, but it is a weakness they took and spectacle was likely a reason they took it. Furthermore there are two other strategic elements that I think they wanted that fed into this system or was gained by this system. Firstly, I think they really wanted a secondary stat that could be manipulated. (and really you can only add so much critical to a card when they only have 6+ possible life cards) this stat could be messed around with to balance some bakugan or to make other bakugan even more enticing. I feel they especially wanted it for alternative win con cards which while _might_ be a bit uninteractive, it is once again enjoyable to watch upset battles turned around by a Mac/MOC. They could have also just had it were critical = something like damage divided by 5 rounded up to the nearest whole number and have only 8 shield cards/damage (and honestly I’d be done to have a format like that) but it would have lost the previously mentioned spectacle. Lastly Flip cards shouldn’t be looked at as a comeback mechanic the are a probability tool where a player will need to gauge the chances of them stopping the attack of that nature and whether or not to expend their energy. There’s an entire strategy behind know when to cut one’s losses, getting certain flips online, saving energy till after the damage phase to play certain cards... etc and by contrast when attacking you can make plays to avoid flips by using specific cores, recollecting which factions bypass their flips, using frost strike... etc. It’s less of a randomizing antisnowball mechanic and more of a tactical one to be worked around. This isn’t to say it isn’t a mechanic with its own share of problems, (it definitely does,) just looking into the potential strengths and reasoning behind those systems. (I really doubt the high damage came from flip cards and not the other way around. Had it been the case of flip cards not being played at all, I feel like they would have just made them better either with comeback capabilities or lower costs)

[@marsproductions7484]

Every game : milling your deck is bad Me an intellectual: laughing in my light sworn deck

[@MGDrzyzga]

Even though it doesn't have it, I could point to Yu-Gi-Oh as something that *could* make a lifedecking approach work. Mainly because of strategies that Lightsworn, or Lightsworn Zombies, or Lightsworn Infernoids, or That Grass Looks Greener - decks that function by throwing their own cards from the deck to the graveyard, and then use the graveyard as a resource. A "second hand" I've often heard it described as on the Pojo forums. And I'd say the easiest fix to the "Flip" cards would be: make cards that have a Flip effect, but also a normal effect. Again, comparing to Yu-Gi-Oh, cards like Galaxy Cyclone, Breakthrough Skill, and Lost Wind succeeded in self-mill decks because they were useful in the discard, but if you drew them, it potentially gave you two uses. And then Mischief of the Yokai and similar cards didn't have an identical effect in the discard, but still had something.

[@dracomasters9039]

A way to make lifedecking better is to allow the cards to have an ability like “Exile X amount other cards from your discard pile to return this card to your hand.” The X would be a number based upon power level of the card.

[@donutak74u]

The idea of giving you cards as your life total goes down was also something used in elder scrolls legends. Which I thought was a pretty cool system

[@alecwesney2031]

I feel like life decking makes for a more serious and competitive game because you are punished for losing life, making you think about how to better counter or overpower your opponent, and when your best cards aren’t available, it makes you get creative and work with what you have

[@egoalter1276]

Strongly disagree. There is no possible way to construct a seriously interactive deck where you are liable to lose most of your pieces before you get a chance to play them. It kills combo decks, makes control overpowered, and shifts the aggro/midrange balance heavily towards aggro. It reduces the complexity of a format.

[@Zilopochtli]

@@egoalter1276 I play MyL (Mitos y Leyendas) that is a lifedecking/Mill as damage game, and tbh everybody hates combo decks in general, but they did exist, you would have to check it's 20 long years of existance but they are there. For example the Priest deck (Sacerdote) was very much a combo deck in the Furia format that made use of a self exile mechanic to swing for lethal damage in the mid to late game Control is very rarely strong because the early and midrange cards are stronger usually, but I think it comes from balancing. In any case, the game gets its complexity for your skill to know which cards to shuffle from your GY into your deck (lifegain is way more important as a mechanic than in classic Life Total games) so in the later stages of the game you know which cards you are more likely to draw.

[@LockonXDynams]

What is your deal why do you hate Vanguard so much

[@gamezilla345]

Old video, but the Final Fantasy TCG is probably the best instance of true lifedecking I've seen. When you take damage, a card from the top of your deck goes to your damage zone. 7 of those, you lose. Now, the interesting thing is that certain cards have "EX Burst" effects that trigger when they are put into the damage zone- the effect is casted for free and does not use the stack. The effects can have a big impact on the state of the game, so smartly playing around the threat of one is a huge factor in the combat phase. In addition, there's a healthy amount of effects that are available only when you reach a certain damage threshold, like 3 or 5. These factors combined lead to a lot of interesting choices both in deck building and piloting. The main downside is that it can be a feelsbad moment when an ex burst doesn't pull through even when you loaded your decks with them, or when you unluckily get punished for an attack with a burst you couldn't play around. That being said, those moments are offset when the ex burst DOES pull through, or when you luckily seal away a strong card that your opponent could have used, respectively. Gate Ruler is similar, but has far more interaction with the cards that are in the damage zone, with it almost acting like a second graveyard.

[@jamesbaccino54]

Fftcg uses its damage zone quite well with its EX Burst mechanic, which when you take damage from an attacking forward, you put the top card of your deck into the damage zone. Victory is achieved when your opponent reaches 7 damage, but there are various ex bursts that can be utilised that could help turn the tide of battle. Some that deal with opposing monsters, some that can either give you or deprive your opponent of resources. Additionally, these cards with ex bursts can also be played. I've had games where defeat was all but inevitable, but got that 1 extra resource that allowed me to pull it back at the last moment.

[@rdmages]

"You don't play cards you don't want to use" Gem-Knight Garnet:

[@HunterSerge]

How does Vanguard's damage system not fall into your main point of losing access to cards you want to play? Very confused in it being grouped in with the shield games.

[@Kohdok]

1) it's only six cards out of 50. 2) Drive Triggers cost nothing 3) you can use them to pay for costs, so they still serve a wider role. The regret is at least tempered by "Oh well, at least I can use it to CB." Having this second function is better than Bakugan where you basically light the cards on fire and throw them in the trash.

[@HunterSerge]

@@Kohdok I thought this video was about lifedecking in general. Two of your points here seem to be direct comparison with bakugan.

[@Scarveilix]

Vanguard also has an entire clan that revolves around the damage zone in angel feather that uses it as almost an extension of hand.

[@HunterSerge]

@@Scarveilix that's an improvement via card design that came in the game's 2nd year so doesn't really apply when talking about game design issues. Also to be clear here; damage checks *suck*. Being only 6 cards actually just makes it feel worse because you know how low the likelihood is. How bad it is gets intensified by Vanguard's reliance on specific cards (riding up, ace grade 3s that decks die without, sentinels) as well. It suffers hard from this flaw, especially since the card design fix is completely limited to 1 of 20+ clans, one that is specifically often underpowered.

[@Scarveilix]

HunterSerge yes I agree that getting your 4 of grade 3 to damage is horrible design. But to the specifics of the argument in the video it is still damage as resource. Unlike bakugan or other lifedecking games it is physically impossible to get more than 1 playset of a card unplayable due to damage in a game (without healing shenanigans). Which is not comparable to a life deck game and much more comparable to Pokémon’s prize cards, since you can theoretically get your playset of necessary basic Pokémon to play your deck stuck in prize.

[@montywh]

back when it was popular, my friends and i would play the DBZ card game. one friend had a namekian deck that had so much regen potential that he'd get every bit of damage he recieved back into the deck at every turn

[@JasonRobinette]

I'm surprised that Star Wars CCG or Raw Deal weren't mentioned. They were (and still are) hugely popular games.

[@off-the-grounder568]

Did you actually change the backs of your Cardfight!! Vanguard cards to say Cardfight!! Voldemort instead?

[@Kohdok]

NGEH HEH HEHHHHHHH!!

[@MDKShady]

Kohdok I didn’t even catch that, wow

[@Hurricayne92]

Haha in a bit of a fan of Cardfight not sure why it’s Voldemort but I like it 🤣

[@StigmaKRL]

should have changed it to vangarbage tbh

[@off-the-grounder568]

Ah, but that’s no fun!

[@scorpions7153]

Why do you dislike Vanguard?

[@V2ULTRAKill]

I mean the tcg reboot ruined player agency and control

[@scorpions7153]

@@V2ULTRAKill How?

[@qwcew]

@@scorpions7153 The next episode in this series covers part of it; the main two main takeaways are as follows: the rule which restricts you to one clan in your deck and having a large number of clans causes issues both in the game and for the LGS. kzbin.info/www/bejne/bJiYYWNnlMSWj5I

[@V2ULTRAKill]

@@qwcew theres also the removal of stand triggers, the reduction of impactful card effects, and imaginary gifts

[@qwcew]

@@V2ULTRAKill As someone who isn't well versed in Vanguard, could you explain what that terminology means/give some examples? I assume that stand triggers are abilities which are 'triggered' when some sort of effect occurs or a card is played; while reduction of impactful card effects I assume to mean cards which significantly affect the board state and give some extra benefit; imaginary gifts is something which I have no context for (as someone who follows mtg) [Token creation, maybe grabbing a card from the sideboard?].

[@actualmadscientist]

One thing that makes discard cost cards in yuguioh really useful and fun is the large abundance of graveyard effect cards. That is to say, cards that can activate a beneficial effect from inside your graveyard. This makes your graveyard effectively a second hand or pool of resources, while also being a great counter to mill decks. The card "foolish burial" is forbidden because of this.

[@BeetleBuns]

easy fix for Bakugan: you can play cards other than flip cards from your graveyard, but each card played from the grave increases the cost of the next by 1 (stacking) until your next turn.

[@bs_nerdman9582]

Does he not like vanguard lol

[@johnm.7643]

Yeah he had made a video about it, which I think has been deleted? I can't find it. Essentially he said that vanguard "hurt" him. What happened? Well he was at a tournament and he had a match with a younger kid. He played a certain card can't remember which and the kid said " Whoah did you get that from the new booster? " He thought he was making a joke because a very similar line was used in the first season of the anime and he said something along the lines of " Seriously? That line from the anime? That's like the worst line" Can't remember exactly what he said but imagine something similar. The kid almost cried and it was vanguard's fault for whatever reason? According to him vanguard made him hurt the kid. He was a bit rude, the kid was a little over dramatic, but then again it was a kid so I give him a break however our friend here is not a kid and should just admit that he f*cked up instead of blaming a game. And he never mentioned anything, during the video, about apologising to the kid. Whether or not he likes vanguard, I couldn't care less but that level of hypocrisy is just beyond me. Edit: Side note he mentioned some other reasons as to why he hates vanguard with a few of them if any being debatable but one stuck out to me: the vanguard anime is brainwashing you. No you didn't read that wrong. The original video is deleted or private but video responses are out there if you are interested some of them have bits of the video I believe.

[@jariu9612]

@@johnm.7643 That edit is both bizarre and interesting, I remember being the only player at my local store that didn't watch the anime before the scene died, and still haven't outside of some funny clips friends point out.

[@Maru4992]

@@jariu9612 I feel this I'm literally the only vangaurd player at my locals who doesn't watch the anime. I'm usually so lost in the conversations...

[@V2ULTRAKill]

See I LIKED vanguard then they rebooted the tcg and it turned into a mess

[@bs_nerdman9582]

@@johnm.7643 The hell? Like that makes no sense not to dis on the game that hard lmao. Just stupidity

[@therustystart7055]

I mean bakugan did made life deck more interesting and nobody knows if they make a card or bakugan that can say put the card that's in the gy or discard pile goes to your hand or back to your deck and they might just make a flip card that can be used for your hand like like hand traps I know it might be over power but if they do it right then its coming better then most life decks

[@alfredosaint-jean9660]

When I read the rules from the first set, my immediate question was: why the hell did they not do playable cards with flip effects?

[@haosmagnaingram6992]

I don’t think hand trap flips are necessarily the answer but rather flip cards that have alternative effects that can be played from the hand

[@therustystart7055]

@@haosmagnaingram6992 you just said the samething

[@haosmagnaingram6992]

James Williams I thought by hand traps you meant you could play the flip’s normal effect from the hand (possibly for a different cost though that was not implied).

[@therustystart7055]

@@haosmagnaingram6992 it does have to be hand flips there can be some card that can use card effects in the gy like yu gi oh

[@FengLengshun]

Recently Shadowverse added a Fusion mechanics which allows you to just feed cards to another card, which is often used for decks with a lot of cycle mechanics and/or that card comes with a cycle mechanics of itself. I've always loved the cards that allows me control of my deck and actually use the deck as opposed to just "You probably wouldn't touch the other half of your deck unless something went terribly wrong," situation that it was before. Discarding cards, especially key ones, because your hand is full also feels bad so it's been great for me. I've always liked the Artifact Portal and Spellboost Rune playstyle so having parts of those decks' playstyle available to other classes just makes it really fun for me.

[@CrestofPotential]

The old MegaMan TCG, releases along side the NT Warrior anime, uses a life decking system. And while there are ways to get cards from the discard pile back into your deck they're generally in the green color for that game. Meaning if you don't play green you're essentially doomed to just lose resources