So wow this blog is not actually dead

We just, you know, moved from one house to another in the middle of winter, took way too long to get the internet set up, got a new cat to keep our cat company, got four more cats subsequently (but not because our first cat had any opinion on it) are now chasing six cats around the house rather regularly and oh yeah somewhere in the middle of all this our circadian rhythms got completely mutilated. The Game of Dreams comic has been, as those of you who follow it know, gamely resurfacing on and off through this process. GDG keeps insisting she's going to do more character studies (and she will) but recently has been rereading some of the ones in the queue and thinking "Wait I thought this one was finished?!" Invid can still be found at his blog three times a week, and GDG recently (a couple weeks ago) acquired a Tumblr for tumblring purposes. Here have a screenshot:

Invid's Bizarre Card Ramblings #3: Sword Breaker Vs. Vylon Disigma Vs. Ally of Justice Catastor

(Be warned: This is long and rambly; it's probably the most deserving of the title out of this series.)

Recently, I noticed a new card that I thought was interesting, Sword Breaker.

Sword Breaker
Earth Attribute/Warrior Type/Xyz
Rank 6
2700/1000
[2 Level 6 Monsters]

Once per turn: You can detach 1 Xyz Material from this card to declare 1 Monster Type; this card gains the following effect. At the start of the Damage Step, if this card battles a monster of a Type that has been declared: Destroy that monster.*

Note the neat bit: The card can remember up to two declared Monster Types, and will destroy either; if you somehow give it more Xyz Material to use with its effects (for example, Overlay Regen), it can remember even more Types.

As I thought about it a little more, I remembered another, similar card from a bit further back, Vylon Disigma.

Vylon Disigma
Light Attribute/Fairy Type/Xyz
Rank 4
2500/2100
[3 Level 4 Monsters]

Once per turn: You can detach 1 Xyz Material from this card to target 1 face-up Attack Position Effect Monster your opponent controls; equip that target to this card. At the start of the Damage Step, if this card battles a monster whose Attribute is the same as a card equipped by this effect: Destroy that monster.

I thought to myself that it would be interesting to compare the two, as they have many relative strengths and weaknesses, and decided to look at rulings on the cards. This led me to a third card, Ally of Justice Catastor.

Ally of Justice Catastor
Dark Attribute/Machine Type/Synchro
Level 5
2200/1200
[1 Tuner Monster + 1 or more non-Tuner Monsters]

At the start of the Damage Step, if this card battles a non-DARK monster: Destroy that monster immediately (without damage calculation).

Now that we've established the three cards, let's compare strengths and weaknesses in different categories.

Category 1: Summoning

Sword Breaker-Sword Breaker, as noted, needs two Level six Monsters. Level six Monsters are pretty hard to summon. On the other hand, lately Konami's released rather a lot of cards intended to help with Xyz Summoning by making these cards change the Levels of two or more Monsters to the same Level. The quickest and most card-efficient way I've found to get Sword Breaker out and ready: Summon Tour Guide From the Underworld, use her effect to Summon a Level three Fiend Monster with 1000 or less ATK, and use Tannhäuser Gate to make both Monsters Level 6.

This is actually pretty good, as lots of people use Tour Guide already (as of the time of writing, the card is restricted to two per Deck), and this only needs one extra card relative to what you would usually be doing with her; worst comes to worst and you can just grab whatever Rank 3 Monster you'd normally have used instead. Tannhäuser Gate can also be independently useful whenever you have at least two non-Xyz Monsters with low ATK on the Field, which is a bonus (though a limited one).

Sword Breaker Summoning = Easy.

Vylon Disigma-Vylon Disigma needs three Level four Monsters. Level four guys are pretty simple to Summon, although getting three can be tricky. There are plenty of fast ways to do it (Photon Veil for three Daybreakers plus a Photon Lead would do it, for instance), the most card-efficient way is probably to use Machine Duplication on a Level four Machine guy, the best choice of which is probably (because of the archetype) Vylon Pentachloro.

Note, though, that this combination is rather inefficient because you'll have to play three copies each of both Duplication and Pentachloro, and if you don't have other Monsters you can use Duplication with, those will probably be dead cards whenever you draw them. (There's only one other Vylon Monster you can use Duplication with, Vylon Sphere; I suppose there are worse targets for Duplication than a Tuner Monster with a relevant effect, especially with Vylon Omega out there, who rather wants two Tuners.)

Anyway, this is a bit clunkier than Sword Breaker, though it's not awful.

Vylon Disigma Summoning = Not hard.

Ally of Justice Catastor-Ally of Justice Catastor needs a Tuner Monster and non-Tuners, who all together have combined Levels of five. Let's see... Oh. Deep Sea Diva and a Level three non-Tuner Sea Serpent Monster from your Deck means instant Catastor action for just one card. You could also use Junk Synchron and any Level two non-Tuner in a later-game scenario with no more trouble.

Ally of Justice Catastor Summoning = SUPER EASY.

Winner: Ally of Justice Catastor.

Category 2: Attack and Defense

Each of these cards will only get to use its effect some of the time, and in the case of going up against other Monsters, being able to protect itself against being destroyed by battle against those Monsters that aren't affected by its effect.

Sword Breaker's ATK is a game-winning 2700, so the average Monster can't really touch it. Its 1000 DEF could be crippling if the opponent managed to use an effect to switch it to defense, though.

Vylon Disigma's ATK is a solid 2500, putting it out of reach of most Level six Monsters and tying with most of the remainder; its DEF of 2100 is also very solid, and will hold off a fair majority of Level four and lower Monsters.

Ally of Justice Catastor's ATK is 2200, which means it can't be defeated by many Level four or lower Monsters, though that's the best one can hope for, while its 1200 DEF is better than Sword Breaker's, but by a negligible amount. It's also notable that Catastor is the only one of these three that's vulnerable to Burden of the Mighty, a fairly commonly played card.

In terms of raw power, Sword Breaker is a clear winner, while Vylon Disigma is a close second for its defensive prowess.

Category 3: Effect Limits

Sword Breaker can be used to declare up to two Types. There are 23 Types in the game. The most common are Machine and Warrior; declaring those types because one was for some reason assuming random Monster types would as of this writing allow Sword Breaker to automatically destroy about 25.5% of all Monsters in the game just by its effect. (Yes, I did the math.**) Many Decks primarily use specific Types, such as Blackwings (Winged Beast) or Machine Decks (...Machines, duh), and this card clearly has the potential to be back-breaking against such Decks.

Vylon Disigma can be used to equip Monsters to itself of up to three Attributes. There are seven Attributes in the game, although you might as well ignore Divine because there are only four Monsters with it, one of which can't be targeted by the effect, and any of which are likely to end the game the turn they come down or not long after if you play them correctly (especially this one, since its effect is literally "If you Summon this, you win").

It does, however, have a rather unique advantage over both Sword Breaker and Catastor in that it can get rid of Monsters without actually attacking, and if it would be redundant to equip a Monster to itself, it can still clear a path for a direct attack that way. The most common Attributes are Earth, Dark, and Light, which combined account for about 72.3% of Monsters. Perhaps more Decks actually use just one Attribute than Decks that use just one Type, as well.

An additional note-the fact that it has the Monsters equipped to itself is a significant potential liability in three ways: The cards could be removed from the Field by your opponent, they clutter up your Magic/Trap Zones, and in a battle with either Sword Breaker or Catastor, due to card rulings Disigma's effect wouldn't work on them if it was the attacking Monster.***

Ally of Justice Catastor just destroys Monsters that have an Attribute that isn't Dark. Note that this is slightly different than its effect as written: As written, it shouldn't affect a multi-Attribute Monster that happens to have Dark as an Attribute, but it actually does destroy any Monster with an Attribute other than Dark, even if it's Dark too (the rulings say so).++ It does this immediately upon Summoning and doesn't need to activate an effect independently of this.

It obviously lacks flexibility, as it's obviously less than terribly useful if your opponent's Deck is dominated by Dark Monsters, but non-Dark Monsters also account for about 74.7% of Monsters in the game, which is actually the best score of these three cards in the "randomness" department. And yes, it would destroy one of the game-legal God cards with its effect, even good ol' untargetable Obelisk.

It also has another distinct advantage: When most cards Summon a Monster back from the Graveyard, an Xyz Monster is at the disadvantage of not getting its Xyz Materials (here's a notable exception). Catastor doesn't have that problem. On the other hand, Catastor can't not destroy a Monster its effect would destroy, so if you want to deal battle damage, you're out of luck.

Comparing these effects to each other is a little more involved. Catastor's effect is totally inflexible but the most powerful as well (you can't really argue with being able to destroy just shy of three out of every four random Monsters in the game). Disigma's effect is nearly as powerful in terms of sheer volume, even stronger with its potential to avoid dangerous Monsters, and incredibly flexible, but also has the drawbacks associated with turning things into equipment. Sword Breaker's effect is more flexible than Catastor's and doesn't have the cluttering disadvantage of Disigma's, although it has the same rather slower and less responsive requirement than Catastor's. (Note that all three of their effects don't work on face down Monsters.)

Ultimately, I'd have to give Catastor and Disigma a shared win here.

Category 4: Additional Factors

Sword Breaker is an Earth Warrior. Both types are heavily supported, though a lot of that support isn't very helpful to a random Xyz Monster, as much of it is either random ATK boosting (largely irrelevant to a high-ATK guy) or Summoning stuff (not really too helpful except for getting out his Materials, and his Materials don't need to be Earth/Warrior). His relatively high Rank could help him out here and there, but again, it's rather edge case stuff.

Vylon Disigma is a Light Fairy. Light has some of the very best support in the game, most notably Honest, who makes people cry when they attack into Light Monsters at the wrong time. Fairies get tribal help from the Counter Fairy archetype, which probably has better finishers than Disigma, but probably also wouldn't mind using it to mop things up, and there's other support cards that would probably benefit Disigma, not the least of them of course being its very own archetype which it's a part of.

Ally of Justice Catastor is a Dark Machine. Dark has a lot of great support, and Machines also have a lot of great support. (That stuff about Honest? Replace "Honest" with "Limiter Removal" and "Light" with "Machine" and you've got another true statement.) As the easiest to Summon and the easiest of these Monsters to keep its effect going, it's also the easiest to use with DNA Transplant (or DNA Surgery for Sword Breaker).

So: Catastor wins at easy two-card combos, while Disigma is an interesting control option. ...Poor Sword Breaker (though I'd say Sword Breaker has potential in some random beatdown because of its raw power).

Tallying Results

Summoning: Catastor, Sword Breaker, Disigma (with the margin between Sword Breaker and Disigma being narrow). Catastor gets three points as a clear winner, while the other two get one each.

Attack and Defense: Sword Breaker, Disigma, Catastor (with Sword Breaker and Disigma being at relatively more comparable levels). Sword Breaker and Disigma get two points, Catastor gets one.

Effect Limits: Catastor, Disigma, Sword Breaker. Catastor and Disigma once again get two points to Sword Breaker's one.

Additional Factors: Catastor, Disigma, Sword Breaker. Again, a 2/2/1 split.

Sword Breaker: 5.

Vylon Disigma: 7.

Ally of JusticeCatastor: 8.+++

Incidentally, there have been a few older cards with somewhat similar abilities to these three; despite the fact that Disciple of the Forbidden Spell and The Hunter With 7 Weapons are both easy-to-Summon Monsters, and The Hunter requires no additional setup at all while the Disciple can hit over 50% of Monsters in the game by declaring Light and Dark (to get the Disciple to be able to hit two Attributes without having two already in the Graveyard, you can use your own Chain Destruction on it when you Summon it, and that'll be all you'll need), I wouldn't rate either of them as highly as even Sword Breaker because their effects don't have the blanket "[appropriate thing] that battles this card DIES."

(The Hunter just gets an ATK boost, which is rather lame with its original ATK, and with only one Type, its maximum amount of stuff it gets the bonus against is pretty low. There are guys with no drawbacks at all who have that much ATK against everything.

The Disciple, on the other hand, only gets its Monster kill while attacking, and thus is more vulnerable.)

My favorite of the bunch is Sword Breaker despite all this, though I quite like all three (I also quite like Disciple of the Forbidden Spell). It's just so... elegantly and conceptually pure, I think.

*I appreciate what the new card grammar is trying to do, and occasionally it's very useful and even important on what once would have been ambiguous effects. On those cards that were obvious enough before, though, it's actually just ugly. Sigh.

**These calculations don't account for tokens, or for the game's several multi-Attribute Monsters. They aren't that relevant to the calculations, which are only really intended as a rule of thumb, so they can largely be ignored.

***The reason for this is because of the way the effect chains-if Disigma attacks, its effect activates first, but will resolve second, and it won't have any Monsters equipped to it to power its effect. Note that if Disigma still has Xyz Materials, it can just eat the Monster without risk, though, so it's likelier that Sword Breaker/Catastor would be attacking, rendering the point moot, as the two Monsters would be mutually annihilating in this case. Probably, anyway-Sword Breaker's rulings aren't as thorough because the card is newer, and I've had to infer a bit.

++I bring it up because both linguistically and in other games, it wouldn't work that way.

+++Note, of course, that all this is completely arbitrary. Also note that Catastor is on the receiving end of a lot of hate from newer cards that mess with Level five and higher Monsters, a subject which will probably be covered the next time I ramble about this stuff. It's gonna be kind of angry-sounding.

-Signing off.

Oh Yugi

Haven't been keeping with our update schedule as planned because of crazy all up and down going on. So here's Yugi being out of character to tide ya'll over!



XD

Yu-Gi-Oh! Solitaire (or, as my kid brother likes to call it, AUTO-OPPONENT BLAST!)

For a while now, I've been considering how one would create a Yu-Gi-Oh! solitaire format. After some inspiration from a Magic: The Gathering multiplayer format (here, if you're curious) and some experimenting, I've come up with a basic structure that I think makes for a robust single-player game. Note that this format probably won't be helpful in improving your gameplay against a living opponent; there are no allowances for bluffing, metagaming, or other psychological aspects. The (imaginary) opponent is rock-dumb by necessity; it can't "reason," but instead relies on a set of "instincts" (rules) that I have provided. Feel free to experiment with your own variations (and even to share).

One key to a format of this nature is that it should be intuitive; I've tried to make this as much so as possible. I've helped my kid brother (who is 10) play it a few times, and he seems to have picked up on the basics pretty quickly. (At any rate, he always realizes right away when the opponent is likely to have a big turn.) Something that amazes me a bit about the format is that many of the cards that feel like well-balanced cards for it are actually some of the worst cards in the game. (If you want a sampling, either of cards I've actually put into the experimental version of the deck or cards I think potentially would work [possibly, in fringe cases, with additional rule suggestions], ask in the comments.)

The key here, of course, is to have fun, especially with cards that you wouldn't necessarily do anything with otherwise. While it can be wearing, the (imaginary) opponent can provide an interesting and unique experience, as it is innately powerful and relentless, even with a huge pile of weak cards.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

REQUIRED MATERIALS:

-For the opponent:

A large number of Monster cards. (Preferably, Normal Monsters and effectless Fusion, Ritual, Synchro, and Xyz Monsters, and Effect Monsters with simple effects that don't require any decision making processes.) These are the opponent's Deck. Do not separate out Extra Deck Monsters; they go in the opponent's Main Deck. When I say "a large number," we're talking a hundred or more-forty cards is almost certainly too few (although older versions I experimented with needed more cards, I've streamlined things a bit so that fewer cards are more viable) unless you're going to experiment with some of the odder variations.

A standard Duel mat.

-For you:

A playable Yu-Gi-Oh! deck.

A way to track your Life Points. (I recommend keeping a calculator on hand.)


You play as normal; it's your (imaginary) opponent who plays by special rules.


RULE 1: SHIELDS

At the start of the game, put the top five cards of the opponent's Deck face down in the opponent's Magic/Spell/Trap Zones. These are the opponent's Shields. If you've ever played Duel Masters, you'll be familiar with the general idea, but there are some differences here.

When attacking the opponent directly, pick a Shield. That Shield is flipped up, and your attacking Monster's ATK are compared to the Shield Monster's ATK and DEF. If the Shield's ATK OR DEF are higher than the attacking Monster's, the Shield isn't destroyed. If your attacking Monster has lower ATK, it is destroyed. (No damage is inflicted... unless you want to raise the difficulty level. It's still a Damage Step regardless, so you could use cards like Honest normally.)

Shield Monsters aren't treated as Monsters on the Field, and can't be affected by any card effects. (I suppose you could have effects for these Monsters applied, especially if you want to up the difficulty level; just keep in mind that there's no way to counter those effects except get rid of the Shields.)

The opponent has no Life Points. Instead, once you have destroyed all the opponent's Shields, you must simply attack directly one more time to win.

This rule exists primarily to simplify the things you need to keep track of. Only one Life Point total is much easier to track, especially if you're masochistic like me and try to do it in your head. Note that it means your Deck will need to be more focused on battle than your usual play style might be.


RULE 2: OPPONENT SUMMONING PROCESS

The opponent doesn't draw cards or have a hand. (If cards would somehow be added to the opponent's hand, instead they're placed in random order on top of the opponent's Deck.)

Depending on the number of Monsters you control and the number of Monsters the opponent controls (remember, don't count the Shields!), the opponent begins one of two automatic Summoning procedures. The opponent never needs to meet any Summoning requirements of any kind.

If you have any Monsters that are face down, it will place all Monsters in attack mode. It will place all Monsters that have a higher ATK than the current weakest stat among your face up Monsters in attack mode. If it has any Monsters that meet those requirements in defense mode from previous turns, it will switch them to attack mode, too; if it has any Monsters that are weaker than any of your Monsters and have a higher DEF than ATK, it will switch them to defense mode. (Take any stat changes that Monsters may have into account during this process.) Any Monsters it does not choose to Summon in attack mode are summoned in defense mode.

If you choose to give the opponent Flip Effect Monsters or other Monsters with effects that activate when flipped, have it Set them instead (but keep in mind that there shouldn't be any decision-making effects, so the flip effects that actually make sense for the opponent are few and far between).

-SWARM!: If you control more Monsters than the opponent, the opponent Swarms. Start this process by placing the top card of the opponent's Deck face up in the Extra Deck Zone. Check that card's Level or Rank. Then, start taking cards from the top of the opponent's Deck and Special Summoning them, up to the Level/Rank of the card you put in the Extra Deck Zone. If the opponent runs out of Monster Zones and there are still more cards left, put the next card in the Field Zone, and then stop the process. Once you complete this process, put all cards other than the top card of the Extra Deck Zone and the Field Zone that are in those Zones in the opponent's Graveyard.

-SIEGE!: If the opponent controls an equal or greater number of Monsters, the opponent Sieges. If the opponent has an open Monster Zone, the top card of the opponent's Deck is Summoned. Count that card's Level/Rank, and pick up cards from the top of the opponent's Deck equal to that number (if it isn't, put the top card of the opponent's Deck in the Field Zone in the same way you would if Swarming). Attach any cards with the same Attribute as the Summoned Monster to that Monster; these Monsters have their ATK/DEF added to that Monster's. (Don't treat them as Equipment cards, even though that's essentially what they are; just imagine that they're part of the Monster.) This effect can't be negated because it doesn't come from a card, and so regardless of effects such as Imperial Order, Jinzo, or Skill Drain, this stat boost remains. If you want to reduce difficulty somewhat, you can choose to ignore this effect, or to ignore the Swarm procedure (which actually makes games drag out much longer). If you want to raise the difficulty and you're having the opponent use Effect Monsters, you can have the Siege-attached Monsters' effects be added to the Siege Summoned Monsters.

-PURE INSANITY!: For greater difficulty, instead of using the above rules, have the opponent use the Siege Summon procedure, and *then* additionally use the Swarm Summon procedure. (For a slightly lower level of difficulty, have the opponent Swarm, then Siege. Why is it lower difficulty this way? The Siege Summons will be successful less often.) For the highest and most ridiculous level of difficulty possible, use the Swarm Summon procedure, but treat each Monster the opponent Summons as if it has been Siege Summoned.

-STORM!: As an addendum, if you're wondering why you're sticking Monsters in the Extra Deck and Field Zones, it's because of this rule. The ATK/DEF of Monsters whose Attributes match the Attribute of the Monster in the Field Zone are increased by the ATK/DEF of that Monster. To reduce the difficulty, you can ignore this rule (even if the Monsters you give the opponent are weak, they can be quite strong with this effect going), or choose to have Storm only be active if the Attribute of the Monster in the Extra Deck Zone matches the Attribute of the Field Zone Monster.

Note that any cards you have that would interact with the opponent's Extra Deck/Field Zone cards don't interact with these cards, as they aren't following the normal rules for those Zones.

-A note on Xyz Monsters: Obviously, they won't naturally have a way to get their Xyz Materials if you're using these methods. A few possible rules for giving Xyz Monsters their Materials for the opponent:

+If you don't mind the Swarm Summoned Xyz Monsters being at full power, just have all the opponent's Xyz Monsters randomly attach cards from the Graveyard or the top of the Deck equal to their default number of Materials to them.

+If you like the idea of the Siege Summoned Monsters having their full potential effects or more, you can either use the above method only for Siege Summoned Monsters, or have any cards that fail to attach for the Siege stat boost be attached as Xyz Material instead/additionally.


RULE 3: OPPONENT'S BATTLE PHASE

Once the opponent has gone through the turn's Summoning process, the opponent starts attacking. The weakest Monster that can attack attacks a random face down Monster you control (assuming one exists) or the weakest face up Monster you control (randomly choosing between equally weak Monsters). If the opponent controls multiple Monsters with the same ATK, one is randomly selected to attack. If there are no face up Monsters that have an equal or lower ATK or a lower DEF among your Monsters to a Monster that would attack by this procedure, that Monster doesn't attack. If your Field is empty, the opponent attacks with all Monsters, starting with the weakest and working up to the strongest.

Note that this would probably be a robust procedure for programming an AI opponent in a computer game, although not necessarily a smart procedure.


RULE 4: VICTORY

Obviously, if you manage to eliminate all the opponent's Shields and then attack directly again, you win. However, a few other notes are important:

-For a lower difficulty level, have the opponent lose when it decks out, or have it simply sit and do nothing when it would Summon. If the opponent's Deck is particularly thin, I wouldn't necessarily suggest this method.

-For a higher difficulty level, whenever the opponent runs out of cards, pause in the middle of whatever procedure you're performing to shuffle the opponent's Graveyard and replace the Deck with it. This can potentially turn the game into a survival game, as getting through all the opponent's Monsters is difficult when Swarming happens every turn. It also might be a way to allow a thinner opponent Deck to last longer; perhaps you could set some kind of limit, or have the opponent lose a Shield whenever it recycled, and if it has no Shields, it can't recycle.

-For the highest difficulty level, YOU lose when the opponent decks out. I came up with this when the first ever game of the format, in much cruder form, stalled out and the opponent was effectively stalling almost indefinitely despite having lost all its Shields thanks to massive Swarm Summons every turn; if the opponent is weak for whatever reason, this can spice things up a bit.


ADDITIONAL NOTES

-Since I don't mention it elsewhere: You take the first turn.

-Many cards are useless for your Deck in this format. Don't bother with cards like Trap Hole (which only works on Normal Summoned Monsters, although there are fringe cases where it would do something, but I wouldn't recommend it) or Mystical Space Typhoon (your opponent has no Magic/Spell/Trap cards, remember?). Focus on ways to eliminate as many Monsters as possible and then swing in directly with as many Monsters as possible. Also note that certain cards, such as Spirit Reaper and Gravity Bind, are potentially very unfair because the opponent generally has no way to get around them. If you do use cards with long-term defensive effects, it'd be fairer and more fun to stick with cards with once-or-twice per turn effects, such as Fortress Warrior or Scrap-Iron Scarecrow.

-Note that the format has an easy way to increase or decrease the difficulty level of the opponent just by changing up the composition of the opponent's Monsters. More matching Attributes lead to bigger Siege Monsters and Storm effects, and higher Levels/Ranks lead to bigger Swarms and Siege Monsters. If you're having the opponent lose/cease Summoning when it decks out, a thicker Deck will also increase difficulty, although it will decrease difficulty if you're a bit crazy and want the opponent to auto-win when it decks out.

-If you want the opponent to use Effect Monsters and Magic/Spell/Trap cards, keep in mind that they must be simple ones, and you should use the following simple rules and procedures... but note that they add an additional layer of complexity (especially Magic/Spell/Trap Cards).

-Effect Monsters should have effects that don't require decision making, such as paying costs or selecting targets. You can choose to ignore costs for some cards, but others just wouldn't work without costs (e.g., if Cannon Soldier had its cost eliminated, it'd just kill you instantly whenever it was Summoned). Extremely simple decisions, such as "should I do this all-upside thing or not?" can be ignored, e.g. using Grenosaurus's effect, despite having a cost, is a no-brainer-if you can pay the cost, you're going to, and so the opponent always will. If you must have the opponent use targeting effects, have it select the strongest Monster (in terms of its current battle stat) on your Field (if a negative effect) or its own (if a positive effect), or perhaps experiment to see what works best for you.

-Magic/Spell/Trap cards are a slightly more complex issue. I'd suggest that, if you use them, you should keep them simple (Fissure, Dark Hole, etc.) and don't choose any cards for the opponent that have specific timing requirements, as few of those cards make sense at other times. If you're having the opponent use them, during Summoning procedures, if a M/S/T card is the first card flipped up, activate it and then treat the next card as the first card for the procedure. (This means that it will get tons of free activations if you give it lots of M/S/T cards.) During the procedure, whenever an M/S/T card would be "Summoned" or placed in the Field Zone by that procedure, instead activate it, and continue the procedure normally (it does count towards the number of Summons). You probably shouldn't use Continuous M/S/T cards at all, as they'd probably be awkward and confusing without proper Zones to put them in. If a M/S/T card is revealed as a Shield, have the opponent activate it immediately, and it goes to the Graveyard. If you have the opponent use Trap Monsters, treat them as Monsters for the process (ones with timing requirements for the effects that let them be Summoned aren't good choices).

-To make it more fun, while the main purpose of the format is obviously to play a game by yourself, you can form a team of players all up against the opponent. You can ramp up the opponent as necessary; the only way to determine how strong it needs to be is experiment. However, I'm pretty sure it can scale up to a pretty high number of players easily.

-If you're having trouble figuring out how to do something, feel free to ask about it. I think I've covered everything, but I'm hardly perfect.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well, there you go. A little late for Make Single People Feel Miserable Day, I guess...

(Once again, if you want to try this out, feel free to ask questions.)

-Signing off.

Character Study: Mai Valentine

AUTHOR'S NOTE: There is a possibility I'm coming back to change bits and pieces of this later, as it was posted when I was short on time and was written a while ago. I don't think so, though. Also, as a reminder, these character studies follow mixed continuity. In any event, Happy Valentine's Day!



Character Study: Mai Valentine

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Twenty-three to Twenty-four
Character Archetype: The Femme Fatale crossed with the Good Goddess, seasoned with a touch of Mentor.
Probable Element and Alignment: Wind/Air, swings between Chaotic Good and Evil.
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: She's overly familiar, and is very outspoken.

Mai is another one of those characters who is much deeper than the casual fan gives her credit for (If I find another reference to her being an anime Paris Hilton, or any other vapidly chosen blonde flavor of the month... Raar. I may have to start injuring people.) Most fans find her very hard to hate, even when they don't want her to "steal" Joey. It's possible that she's just the kind of female character that American audiences have an easier time accepting-- while highly atypical of such, she's an obviously feministic character. She's also someone who's been around the block a few times, and spends most of the series wrestling with old scars.

Mai got out into the world at a fairly young age; according to the Japanese, she was orphaned, while the dub implies that she was neglected and says that her parents were never home. This is one of the few times I prefer and defer to the dub version of a backstory: beyond Mai making for one too many orphans in the cast, her frivolous behavior in Duelist Kingdom reminds me of a person whose parents tried to buy her affections, and that shot of a little girl alone at a window late at night doesn't seem at all like an orphanage setting to me. (An orphanage would have had a strict curfew. And probably wouldn't have been a mansion.) At any rate, Mai seems to have ended up on her own as soon as she was an adult, possibly younger, either because of "unfriendly" caregivers dumping her out as soon as they could, or because she was desperate to get out of an enormous empty house.

In order to support herself, Mai seems to have chosen a path that required wit and wiles: she becomes a house gambler on a casino ship of some kind. Whether she took this path because she was working with what she had in brains or in beauty is impossible to tell, but it would have forced her to become good at manipulating people, and fast.

I tend to suspect that if Mai had any friends at this point, they would have been other casino bunnies taking her under their wing, because of Mai's consistent behavior with the younger female members of the cast: despite having reason to fight with Téa, she was kind and offered advice, while Serenity was quickly under her wing and stayed there. I think that Mai sees this as the thing women do for each other: they protect and help one another, and if they have to, they beat a little toughness into each other. Mai doesn't believe in deep friendship at her first appearance, but she does believe in Sisterhood. (One wonders if, in Serenity, Mai saw a little bit of the scared girl she used to be. She definitely likes Serenity very well, regardless.)

As for the men, Mai clearly found them generally disappointing. She probably had good reason to, as well- there were surely other Jean Claude Magnums back there, all egotistical and shallow, crazy in their own ways. At a casino, regardless of whether she was in a place where gambling was legal, shady characters would have skirted the edge of Mai's life on a regular basis. So not only were the men shallow and annoying, they were probably often dangerous, and there was no way of telling who was and who wasn't. Little wonder that Mai would be constantly on guard, moving among people like this.

Once she got out of the casino, there's some indication that Mai then dueled in some less "family friendly" tournaments, making enough money to live comfortably and shining enough to attract the attention of I2's talent scouts for Duelist Kingdom. I highly doubt that Mai started as a Duelist: she's the same age as Pegasus, probably was in the casino before he got Duel Monsters off the ground (might have been out on her own before Pegasus even aquired the Millenium Eye) and probably picked up Duel Monsters later because it struck her as more challenging and interesting. I don't know if she started the game before or after leaving the casino, or if it was a catalyst for her being able to get out of the casino. I doubt that it matters much outside of speculative fanfiction. In any case, at this point the game is just that; a game that happens to rake in enough money for her to exploit it. If it means anything deeper to Mai, she hasn't realized it yet. It would have been during this time period that she met and shot down Jean Claude.

Thus we come to Duelist Kingdom. Mai is a hardened warrior in many ways now, clever, tough and dangerous. But I wouldn't say she's all the way grown up. In a lot of ways, especially socially, she's still that little girl standing alone by the window in the middle of the night. Yugi and company are the most sane and decent people she's been thrown in with in a long time, and she's not entirely sure what to make of them.

She's puzzled at how Joey treats her, perplexed that Yugi can be both gentle and strong enough to stand up for both himself and other people, and shaken, because she didn't really believe that decent people exist. She also realizes for the first time, when Joey beats her, that yes, she IS proud of her dueling skills, dammit, and yes, this game does mean something to her! (We never hear of her cheating after dueling Joey, so it's possible she's decided that cheating at the game means she's treating it too frivolously.) And when Yugi helps her, he helps her out of the simple compassion out of his own heart, and Mai is stunned. How, she wonders, can people be this way? How could someone like this even survive?

Mai says it herself: Nobody's done anything for her like what Yugi does by dueling Panik on her behalf. Nobody's ever potentially risked his life for her, and nobody's ever done anything out of simply caring about what happens to her. Mai has eight star chips the evening of the first day, and Yugi wins them back for her. She could have easily been in the castle before noon of the next day, and the old Mai would have been waiting for them with a smug grin and a flirtatiously unsettling wave. But the new Mai doesn't even arrive at the castle until the sky is starting to go scarlet: She spent the entire day getting eight star chips she didn't need, not even knowing that Yugi would potentially need them himself. Moreover, she also earned herself two more stars, meaning that Mai could have been in the castle the first night, if she'd only worked hard enough. She goes to quite a bit of trouble to repay her debt, and turns her matronly "tough love" on Yugi in the meantime. (She's been turning it on Téa since Day 1; it's actually during their duel together that Mai realizes that Téa is plenty tough and really doesn't need Mai's wing.)

So Mai is maturing into a more rounded person, taking what she already knows about tough love and learning how to tell when someone deserves it, and combining that with the new generosity of spirit that Yugi has shown her. (How far she's yet willing to go, we don't really know; after all, she didn't need the entry card she gave Joey anymore, but what it represented to her was still pretty powerful.)

Something that makes Mai already more mature than most of the cast is that she knows when to quit. Mai is one of maybe two characters to surrender in a duel, and the first that we see. She knows Yugi has her outmatched, she knows that she's been drawn into an inevitable checkmate by someone she can accept as a spectacular duelist, one she "can't even keep up with on the sidelines." And instead of pitching a fit or swearing revenge, like at least half of Yugi's other opponents, Mai cedes the duel. This could be a sign of new maturity, but I think it's a facet of maturity that Mai already brought to the tournament. Yugi has also treated her with respect she's rarely gotten from a man, and Mai returns it with interest. (So, okay, she might not have surrendered like that to any other man, but I doubt she would have needed to. I mean, really.)

During the first VR arc, Mai seems more comfortable than during Duelist Kingdom, possibly because being part of an active team is something she finds appealing. She instantly agrees to help, both showing her continuing gratitude and the fact that it's Not Okay with her if her bosses start kidnapping teenagers. (That would be Seto, btw.) Mai is very kind to Mokuba, displaying none of her usual animosity or guile toward males she's not familiar with; this is probably because Mokuba is a child, and one that she knows has already been through quite a lot. Mai is downright maternal with Mokuba (who doesn't seem to quite realize.) She treats Yugi as a friend and equal, and the two admire their new outfits together. (XDDD)

And last but not least, she's all over Joey in these episodes. She jokes that Joey isn't noticing the "real woman" right next to him when Joey charges after Adina. She even hugs him enthusiastically, jumping on the poor boy when he's half naked in a bearskin (no wonder Joey freaks out, when I say it like THAT. XD) And she's so inflamed with rage, passion and pain when Joey "dies," that she charges in completely without thinking, which is absolutely nothing like Mai.

Mai during Battle City is slightly more guarded again. She's back into her Tournie Mode, and though she seems to have been keeping out of her old circles, she doesn't waste time any more than she did in Duelist Kingdom. She was probably on her way to the Finals location even when she almost ran over Duke and Serenity. (Either that, or she was looking for Joey and Yugi, intent on giving them a ride because she knew they'd need one. Which is an entertaining thought.) A lot of what we get on Mai here is backstory, and the fact that Mai is now weary of her old life and willing to leave it behind in favor of new memories.

Then Joey inadvertently hurts her feelings by lying about his dream-- and then Yami Marik hits her with a Shadow Game that turns out to be one of the most violently traumatic things she's ever gone through, followed up by a Punishment Game that is slow torture and by its very nature meant to shake her very being to the core.

I tend to think, while parts of it were a touch clumsily done, that what happened with Mai during the Oriechalcos arc was actually the result of post-traumatic stress. She chose to act like everything was fine when it wasn't, and things that might not have bothered her in the past are now crushing. Valon's method of "therapy" is to play into her depression and anxiety, and while he loves her, he's exactly the opposite of what she needs, despite being a listening ear. He maneuvers her into blaming people for not giving help she didn't ask for, and encourages her to stir her own anger and lash out. Mai IS brainwashed, just not by magical means.

It's understandable, then, that Joey has to work so hard to remind her that yes, he does care about her, that her passion for him is love, not hatred, and that he'll do anything for her, even give up his soul.

So what does Mai do? She charges right into another confrontation without thinking, just like when Joey "died" against the Ultimate Dragon. Mai is a reasonable, level headed, calculating woman, but her raging love throws all of that right out the window. And like after Duelist Kingdom, Mai takes off to sort her own heart out. (You can keep your "She wants to be a better Duelist!" comments to yourself, thank you. She wants to be a better duelist? Yugi has taught her that a duelist has honor, strength, gentleness and love. She wants to be a better person. That's what she leaves to work on.)

I tend to think Mai will do better this time, even though I have to wag a finger at her for just sprinting off again (with Valon it's probably for the best, since he needs to do some sorting out of his own, but Joey is very connected to her best potential support group: Téa, Serenity and Yugi.) If the epilogue with Vivian is any indication, she's already better off than at the end of Battle City.

Final Distillation:
Mai's story is about breaking through jadedness into wholeness.
Mai is not only clever, she's very intelligent.
She became who she is in order to survive.
Mai forgets herself when her temper flares up enough.
Mai is a feminist, and held Sisterhood above any other bonds prior to Duelist Kingdom.
She still holds Sisterhood very high.
Mai has a motherly side, which she turns on random women and specific men in the form of tough love.
Mai is totally unabashed about using the tools at her disposal, and is a master at manipulating people.
Mai wants to be whole very, very badly, and spends most of her life (all of her life up until the end of the series) trying for it.

In light of Love and Rock and Roll starting...

Mai's "Jean Claude Proposed!" face. XD

Also, first page of Love and Rock and Roll, for someone stumbling in here unawares and wondering why this is appropriate.

Invid's Bizarre Card Ramblings #2: Chaos End Ruler -Ruler of the Beginning and the End-

Here we are with another of these talks about cards on a blog about a comic where there hasn't actually been any dueling.

This week's entry is not, and hopefully will never be, a real card.

If you have any familiarity with the real life version of the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game, you are likely aware that there are a couple of Monsters who are often regarded as the strongest ever printed who happen to have "Chaos" in their original Japanese names: "Black Luster Soldier (originally "Chaos Soldier") -Envoy of the Beginning-" and "Chaos Emperor Dragon -Envoy of the End-". There is also a lesser but still powerful Monster called "Chaos Sorcerer" who is a similar if weaker card. (There's also Dark Magician of Chaos, a similarly insanely powerful card, but it doesn't factor into this discussion as it isn't actually related to these cards despite its name.)

These Chaos Monsters were an early experiment in creating strong cards with steep requirements. Konami quickly discovered, however, that these particular cards did not have nearly steep enough of a cost.

In case you don't feel like clicking on the links and investigating the cards yourself (and don't know much about the cards), the Envoys and Chaos Sorcerer require you to banish a Light Monster and a Dark Monster from your Graveyard in order to Summon them. Yes, just one each. Why the Envoys, who have 3000 ATK apiece, have the same requirements as the comparatively wretchedly small Chaos Sorceror (2300 ATK) is a mystery for the ages.

Supposedly, Light and Dark Monsters aren't supposed to work well together. However, there have always been plenty of solid Dark Monsters in the game, and a few good Light ones had come out only a little while before. The game also had Painful Choice, a card that ultimately wasn't painful at all, as it let you take five cards from your Deck and get one in your hand and four in the Graveyard. (The "painful" part was that your opponent chose which cards go where. Not really much of a drawback when you want those cards in the Graveyard, as Konami would soon realize. Painful Choice was restricted to one for most of its history, until Konami introduced banning cards, after which it has been permanently banned.)

The ease of summoning these cards meant that people were willing to try, and it turned out that 3000 ATK Monsters with incredibly strong effects were worth the investment. Chaos Emperor Dragon blows up both player's fields and hands (and incidentally inflicts damage), letting you set up an instant unbreakable lock (earning it one of the top spots on the first list of banned cards, and also an eternal spot), Black Luster Soldier can potentially attack twice or, instead of attacking, banish an opponent's Monster (has been restricted for a long time, although it took longer than Chaos Emperor Dragon, and was banned for a long time, although again it took longer, and has seen an apparently experimental unbanning recently), and Chaos Sorcerer can banish a face up Monster (it's been on and off the banlist at multiple levels of restriction). As all of these cards are also Special Summons, they don't even restrict your Normal Summon for the turn (a key to setting up the Yata-Lock that Chaos Emperor Dragon enabled in the old days).

So why am I talking about some of the most powerful cards in the game, cards which likely shouldn't have been printed or which have been in decks that are unfairly powerful?

Because they've got nothing on this one: Chaos End Ruler -Ruler of the Beginning and the End- (link)!

Chaos End Ruler -Ruler of the Beginning and the End-
Light Attribute/Warrior Type
Level 10
ATK 3500/DEF 2000

Cannot be Normal Summoned or Set. You can Special Summon this card (from your hand) by banishing 1 LIGHT Warrior-Type and 1 DARK Fiend-Type monster from your Graveyard. Cards and effects cannot be activated in response to this card's Special Summon. You can pay 1000 Life Points; banish all cards your opponent controls and all cards in your opponent's hand and Graveyard, then inflict 500 damage to your opponent for each card banished by this effect.

Now, what makes this card so much more vicious and nasty than any of the other cards I've been talking about?

Well, the first part is its requirement: It needs its Light Monster to be a Warrior and its Dark Monster to be a Fiend, but that's not necessarily an additional requirement.

See, the first Chaos decklist I heard of used Light Warriors and Dark Fiends as its staple Monsters already. So this card could be put in that deck with essentially no changes. Not only that, but in a pinch, if one was playing multiples, this card would fit the requirement itself.

So it looks restrictive, but it really isn't.

The next part is that cards can't be used in response to it being Special Summoned. Cards with effects like this exist, but haven't been used much that I can tell because they're usually expensive. As I've established, though, that wouldn't hurt this guy at all, because he'd be playable even if he wasn't essentially uncounterable. Players have always been able to use cards like Solemn Judgment to stop guys like this, but here it wouldn't work. Since the days of the original Chaos Monsters, card rulings have changed, and the original Chaos Monsters are a little weaker than they used to be due to these changes, but those same rulings don't affect this card because of this line of text.

Now, here's the doozy: Pay 1000 Life Points to banish all cards in your opponent's hand, and on your opponent's Field, and in your opponent's Graveyard, and inflict 500 damage to your opponent for each card banished this way.

I'm not even sure how to express the unfairness and brutality of this effect. Basically, the only way to stop it is with the counter trap Divine Wrath (there are very few other cards that could), thanks to Solemn Judgment having no effect on it. (Solemn Judgment is supposed to stop everything. It doesn't, but most of the exceptions are defensive cards.) If it just banished your Graveyard, or your hand, or your Field, there would be a faint semblance of fairness, and there would be ways to counter this card.

But banishing the Field means there are very few cards that can do anything to protect you (Reborn Tengu, Waboku, Threatening Roar, Hallowed Life Barrier, Rainbow Life, and that's about it), banishing your hand means that most of the things players rely on for escaping nasty pinches like this don't work (Effect Veiler could probably shut it down), and the Graveyard is also gone (Necro Gardna and probably Damage Eater would provide a small amount of protection). The only cards listed that could actually keep you from taking huge amounts of damage are Hallowed Life Barrier and Rainbow Life, and they're Trap cards, which means that you need to have them set and they'll be vulnerable there-everything else on the list can only stop Chaos End Ruler's attack or its effect damage. (Reborn Tengu can't even actually do either of these things-it'd only be a help if Chaos End Ruler's controller didn't have enough Life Points to activate its effect more than once.)

The reason this is so bad is because, other than the Life Point cost, there's no drawback to this whatsoever. Most defensive cards care more about being sent to the Graveyard or destroyed, and this dodges both of those. And as long as there isn't one of the few Trap cards that can stop it involved, if this card gets summoned, the player who didn't play it is going to take huge amounts of damage, guaranteed, whether the 3500 ATK of Chaos End Ruler, the multiple of 500 from its effect (which will nearly always be absurdly huge), or both. This card could easily deal 8000+ damage in the turn it comes down, with no assistance or combo setups, virtually for free.

And the best part? It leaves the other player with nothing, and the single card that the other player draws the following turn probably won't be able to do squat to Chaos End Ruler, especially if it's a Trap card or a Monster.

They ought to call it "Chaos End Ruler -Ruler of Unfairness and Epic Ragequits-".

(If you're wondering where the card comes from, it's mentioned as a rare banned card in an episode of ZeXaL. Whoever made it up in-universe was a sick puppy; whoever made it up for the show should be watched carefully, and kept away from the real card game.)

-Signing off.