Cirrus's Generic Cards

[Darj]

Well, on the Qliphort argument, wouldn't Tribute to Greed be effective as well, and also have interesting combos? For instance, Normal Summon a Qlip, equip it with Saqlifice, Tribute it with greed for a +0 and search Tool, etc. while placing that Qlip in the ED; bonus points if the Tributed monster was Carrier/Helix and you can bounce/pop something; or just Tribute Carrier/Helix and trigger their effects. In short, while Soul Transition has more disruptive applications, Tribute to Greed offers speed.

 

Then, DP's Assault Dragons could use it to trigger monster's on-Tribute effects while thinning the deck.

And of course, we have the potential abuse from floater, swarmy, even Token decks.

 

My point is that its genericness looks a bit too abusable. Yes, you can't splash the card in every deck; well, you can try, but again, the card will be more effective in some decks than others, and I suspect that in those decks that can easily take advantage of it, the impact will be noticeable.

This kind of reminds me of Supply Squad: every deck with monsters can use it, but decks that focus on destroying themselves take advantage from it the most, while in decks that rely on the opponent doing the destruction the card is not as effective (becomes slow, cloggy, etc.).

But, again, I'm fine with giving it a try first, since this is mostly theory and I would like to see/confirm if the card will have an actual impact.

[VampireofDarkness]

Qliphort would probably prefer to Tribute for Disk, the main purpose of Soul Transition is to acquire advantage while disrupting your opponent. Point taken, but I see the purpose of a card like Soul Transition in Qli more for the fact that it can be used during either player's turn rather than the draw/effect

[Cirrus]

I would prefer the resilience offered by Transition over the speed offered by Tribute - but everything in the play after the monster gets tributed to trigger Saqlifice isn't the problem of this card. In Assault Dragon Tribute is just fine because you trade a potentially valuable fodder monster (as well as a Normal Summon, which is important for the deck) for card filter.

 

The "potential abuse" that's outlined for swarm / token decks (token deck???) has been responded to already ... like twice. The sentiment is nothing new, although I appreciate your concern.

 

Tribute would be super good in Black Garden control though. I really like that interaction!

[Darj]

I would prefer the resilience offered by Transition over the speed offered by Tribute - but everything in the play after the monster gets tributed to trigger Saqlifice isn't the problem of this card. In Assault Dragon Tribute is just fine because you trade a potentially valuable fodder monster (as well as a Normal Summon, which is important for the deck) for card filter.

 

The "potential abuse" that's outlined for swarm / token decks (token deck???) has been responded to already ... like twice. The sentiment is nothing new, although I appreciate your concern.

 

Tribute would be super good in Black Garden control though. I really like that interaction!

 

I guess that's up to player's preference: If you wanna go faster with Qlips, you may prefer Tribute to Greed over Soul Transition.

 

 Yeah, the "potential abuse" part was redundant and just me repeating myself to restate my point.

[Cirrus]

Updated OP with some more monsters. I think the next installment will be monster + trap or somesuch.

[Cirrus]

Updated OP with two more monsters ... I really need some Traps.

[Cirrus]

Update soonish! Finding pictures. Two cards primed and ready for release.

[Cirrus]

Large update! Too tired / lazy to comment any further.

[BtanH]

Hammer Spear and Blade might be a little strong if playable from the hand, too similar to kalut I worry. 
Consider making them like Horn of the Phantom Beast where they need to be on the field.

[Cirrus]

Revised accordingly as the alternative is mandatory-play status >_>;;

[Cirrus]

Updated with staple toys for everyone.

I'll get back to making more niche cards soon.

[Cirrus]

Updated with a different Dichotomy and a slightly experimental card.

[Cirrus]

Updated with two monsters.

[VCR_CAT]

For both my reference so I don't have to go back a page just to make sure I'm not speaking crap and for the overall ease of it being right here:
Equalizer Matrix
Quick-Play Spell
Target 1 face-up Attack Position monster. It loses its Level or Rank until the end of this turn. Choose and activate 2 of these effects, then resolve in sequence:
• Change that target to face-up Defense Position.
• Negate that target's effects until the end of this turn.
• Negate the next effect this turn that targets it.

 

This is too much, and way too good of a card. A quick-play spell that renders a monster practically useless in almost all respects? Your description that you gave was "Like Book of Moon, but better". Well Book of Moon is limited, so unless your intention is to make a banned card you're going to need to rework this.

For one, the removal of a card's level or rank is HUGE. That effect ALONE: Shuts down any kind of Xyz play; Rank Ups included, shuts down any and all Synchro plays, effects even multiple kinds of lock strategies, and does not specify opponent's monster. What this means is this: Hello Amazing Infernity Tech.

But it doesn't stop there. See, the level removal would be enough to make this a fantastic spell to both tech in your own deck and shut down a HUGE chunk of plays, you offered in three alternative effects that open up a huge number of plays. To top everything off, there's no additional cost to the card's effect; you could blatantly use this in an Infernity deck to plant two big bosses on the field, and one of them can't be targeted for one effect. There's absolutely no downside whether you use this card on yourself or your opponent; even cards like Forbidden Chalice that offer advantage to using it on either your monsters or your opponent's are double edged swords with downsides to them. These downsides promote strategy and smart playing.

What I see in this is a mandatory three-of in almost any deck that offers great benefits to both your own monsters, and gigantic hits against your opponent's. You've taken the concept of the Forbidden ______ cards, but instead of offering a double-edged sword that demands smart play, you've presented something that gives almost no downside. The loss of a level seems almost inconsequential since the amount of times where your opponent will be targeting a monster on your side of the field during your turn where its level matters are so few and far between. Heck, Infernoids alone make this card incredibly busted.

The card alone is not "genius design"; it does way too much for its effect and does not promote smart play or good balance. Retrain and focus this card in on a specific strategy, because as of right now this would be banned very quickly in a real setting.

[Cirrus]

Replies in bold.
 

This is too much, and way too good of a card. A quick-play spell that renders a monster practically useless in almost all respects? Your description that you gave was "Like Book of Moon, but better". Well Book of Moon is limited, so unless your intention is to make a banned card you're going to need to rework this.

I never advertised that it was -better- than Book of Moon; I advertised that it was roughly equivalent, but different (I remember saying that it was slightly worse, but never at any point "better"; that is all in your head). Please do not distort what I said. It renders a fodder monster inoperable for the turn, yes, as it is designed to do. I don't see how Book of Moon's limitation status has to do with this card or Book of Moon's own design; one of the directions that my thread espouses is giving the ability for a wider spectrum of differently-powerful decks to compete against each other, and this card is part of that initiative. Book of Moon was at 3 for a long time while cards like Mirror Force, MST, and Dark Hole were at 1, but now cards like Raigeki are at 1. I would prefer not to design cards like any of these but would be very happy to design something as useful and multipurpose as Book of Moon, which is what I have aimed to do.

For one, the removal of a card's level or rank is HUGE. That effect ALONE: Shuts down any kind of Xyz play; Rank Ups included, shuts down any and all Synchro plays, effects even multiple kinds of lock strategies, and does not specify opponent's monster. What this means is this: Hello Amazing Infernity Tech.

Yes, and this is intended design except for the Infernoid part. I am glad you noticed that it slows down random ED plays.

But it doesn't stop there. See, the level removal would be enough to make this a fantastic spell to both tech in your own deck and shut down a HUGE chunk of plays, you offered in three alternative effects that open up a huge number of plays.

No, I would never tech this card in my own deck if it didn't do anything else. Yes, this card is a Swiss Army knife in what it is possible to accomplish.

To top everything off, there's no additional cost to the card's effect; you could blatantly use this in an Infernity deck to plant two big bosses on the field, and one of them can't be targeted for one effect. There's absolutely no downside whether you use this card on yourself or your opponent; even cards like Forbidden Chalice that offer advantage to using it on either your monsters or your opponent's are double edged swords with downsides to them. These downsides promote strategy and smart playing.

I don't understand why you think there's no downside, aside from the unfortunate usage in Infernoids. Is switching your monster to Defense Position not enough of a downside for you? Or is the price of playing a card specifically to make the play outlined there not great enough? I get the mentality these days that card economy is woefully undervalued, and I understand that's certainly fine for the TCG, what with Burning Abyss & co. there, but DP aims to be measurably weaker than the TCG and thus card economy is actually a relevant downside. That is the price you pay for playing Matrix; it's not guaranteed to trade for a card and instead deals in the realm of trading a card for tempo, the same world Book of Moon is in.

What I see in this is a mandatory three-of in almost any deck that offers great benefits to both your own monsters, and gigantic hits against your opponent's. You've taken the concept of the Forbidden ______ cards, but instead of offering a double-edged sword that demands smart play, you've presented something that gives almost no downside. The loss of a level seems almost inconsequential since the amount of times where your opponent will be targeting a monster on your side of the field during your turn where its level matters are so few and far between. Heck, Infernoids alone make this card incredibly busted.

I have not taken any of this card's concept from any Forbidden [Thing] card at all. Forbidden Chalice and Forbidden Dress both have very important Damage Step uncounterability considerations, and neither are commonly played in decks that do not emphasize both the upside and the downside. This card is designed to, quite solidly, supplement Book of Moon in being one of the best Quick-Play Spell generic disruptors. This, too, is intentional design. As I said, I will make the Infernoid abuse case significantly less uncomfortable as that is an unfortunately unintentional interaction.

The card alone is not "genius design"; it does way too much for its effect and does not promote smart play or good balance. Retrain and focus this card in on a specific strategy, because as of right now this would be banned very quickly in a real setting.

I think the TCG banlist is bad, and Duel Portal has different goals in any case (the promotion of interactivity being an important one), so I'm not sure how that last sentence is supposed to impress me. The other two cards I posted alongside this card would be quickly restricted too in the TCG, and I am okay with that because the TCG simply has a different philosophy. (It's important to note that Temporal Maze will be actually Limited in tournament play in Duel Portal as Compulsory Evacuation Device parallels are extremely difficult to make.)

Now allow me to make my counterpoint. I think the argument that it gives "almost no downsides" is absurd. The card inherently is a -1; this is an immutable fact. Now, you may say: but so are Breakthrough Skill and Fiendish Chain! Sure, but Breakthrough Skill is 2 cards in 1 and Fiendish Chain has applications this card will never have (actively stalling out a card for multiple turns and thus guaranteeing the trade-even that way; for example, if/when your opponent MSTs it). All your statements about versatility, what it can do, et cetera are decently accurate, and it can do many good things if you decide to maindeck it.

The card itself also actually isn't that good if you use it on your own card. I don't understand why you think either switching to Defense Position or negating the effect are not valid downsides; they seem like pretty hefty downsides to me. I like to swing with my monsters, and most monsters have lower Defense than they do Attack; you can't just raise Superior Dora as your argument on why this card's broken. It has some features from Stygian Dirge, but Stygian Dirge is a continuous effect that affects every monster and forces your opponent to remove it. It has some features that Chalice and Dress has ... but Dress prevents destruction period, Chalice and Dress can both be activated during the Damage Step, and the Forbidden cards are pretty niche in any case, which is not the intent of this card. (In fact, I haven't seen Stygian Dirge being played at all.)

Finally, here's the takeaway. You seem to think that I wanted to design a niche card, when I designed the card to be a commonly usable maindeck Quick-Play Spell supplement to the Trap lineup to prevent Trap Stun from being overwhelming against the increased Trap lineup. Is that wrong? Maindeck it in 3 in every deck, or don't; it's your decision and still something akin to a defensive Trap. (It's pretty terrible offensively in almost every sense.)

[Cirrus]

By the way, and this is a pretty important fact ...

This card doesn't function the same way as Skill Prisoner. It doesn't affect cards that are already resolving.

[VCR_CAT]

(Side note, Dirge isn't being played on a large scale because the predominantly huge decks in the meta do not rely on a card's level on the field as much. Case and point: Nekroz, Shaddoll, HEROes, etc. It's too situational to side because there are too many big decks that wouldn't suffer from it.)

As for the "It does have a cost; itself!" argument, this is a rather poor one. There are plenty of cards that people run that don't contribute much to the raw numbers game in terms of cards because YuGiOh isn't as simple as just card numbers; it's about what those cards are and what they do. If you're minusing yourself to stop your opponent from achieving that one card and putting them in a position with two practically useless cards, you've put yourself at a big advantage. Another example (one of many) would be this: I summon Night Express Knight, and then chain Freight Train Derricrane. I'm not minusing there, that's two cards. Now I could go into Number 81, which would be a minus 1, but is a MUCH better option to have on the field than a monster with 1400 ATK and 1000 DEF and a monster with 0 ATK in Attack Position. If you chain your card and target my Night Express Knight (you cannot target defense-position monsters and I always summon Derricrane in defense position) and apply defense-position and negate next effect that targets, you've completely removed his effect and made him completely useless to me. It doesn't MATTER that you technically went a minus-1, because you possibly made me go -2 by making my field null. This is true to practically every Xyz play, and the card itself will just MURDER any Tellar or Seraph play on the spot. Not to mention that the level removal can shut down a lot of Synchro plays, but this also depends on how the play would function with a level 0 monster since that's not actually a part of the game's mechanics (existing level/rank 0 monsters are always treated as having specific levels or ranks)

Now I'll also clarify what I mean by "No Downside", using Forbidden Lance and Forbidden Chalice as examples, both being "Technical Minus-1's" that a lot of players use. Forbidden Chalice negates a monster's effects, BUT increases their ATK by 400. I've actually been hesitant to use this card on numerous occasions because of that attack gain; I look at the numbers and know that if I give them that 400 then they're able to attack over my monster. Same with Lance; you can reduce their attack sure, but you also make them immune to spells and traps and this can be bad depending on the situation. Both cards are give-and-take, and there ARE ways to use both very optimally with little downsides, but those aren't true for every deck.

Now as for your card, it does way too much. There are more than 4 good cards in that effect alone, but lumped together and you've made a card that's good in almost ANY situation regardless of what you run, and that's NOT a good thing to have. You may not agree, but that effect of losing a level or rank alone is a VERY powerful effect as a quickplay spell that can heavily disrupt plays. But coupling that with two other effects is big.

As for the defense position, this is another thing you clearly don't agree with, but this is a matter of play style. You may be a player who rams their monsters at every available moment, but I as a player take things more slow. I try to make my opponent expend their resources with more defense plays at the start, and I only go on the offense when I absolutely need to. If I had a card that could remove my card's rank/level and put them into defense mode AND make the next effect that targets them negated, it would be a large boost to my plays. Heck, I already enjoy baiting people into attacking 0-attack Night Express Knights only to surprise them with a Forbidden Chalice. Superior Dora is just one example, though. There are a lot of cards that would benefit from a fast defense-position play. Anyways, enough of this back-and-forth because there are more technical things to get to that really should be addressed.

- Removing the level is something that the game's mechanics don't really do, and especially with how Infernoids (sorry for calling them infernities once; force of habit with "infer" names) would abuse the crap out of this, I would suggest maybe making it reduce the monster's level by 1. It offers just as much of a disruption to Xyz plays (who honestly do hurt the most from it) but it keeps from being as abuseable.
- The effect that negates the next effect that targets it could be worded better if it's not meant to apply on the same chain. Maybe word it as "The next time this card is targeted for an effect". It implies better when the effect is being negated.

- As Toyo suggested earlier (if you remember), it would be better if it was EITHER the level reduction, OR the two effects. Being able to do both at once is way too much.

 

Swiss Army Knife cards are generally cards you want to avoid making. The idea is to have cards gell with each other a lot more rather than have one card pull all the weight. You also need to remember that just because YOU like to play a very battle-aggressive style, doesn't mean everyone else does. You need to keep in consideration how the type of player you hate the most would play the card, and balance it accordingly; not just design based on how you think the game should be played.

And no, designing commonly maindecked cards is not a bad thing. But you need to be careful to avoid the Pot of Greed Mistake (a card that you would be at a big disadvantage by not running it regardless of your deck) and you need to keep effects focused at not doing too much, but doing what they do well. Trap Stun is a great example of this because it's a simple card; negate traps for the rest of the turn. It's good, but it's also fairly balanced in my opinion. I am also of the opinion that if your deck can't stand on its own two feet without play-disruption traps and spells then it's not good enough, but that's irrelevant to this discussion.

[Cirrus]

You wrote a lot.

Let's address them paragraph by paragraph.

Your first point is that by stopping Extra Deck plays, you suddenly somehow minus your opponent. You then attempt to illustrate your point by raising an example involving Night Express Knight. There's a couple things wrong with both the example itself (Night Express Knight becomes a 3000 ATK monster after it gets negated, and has 3000 DEF anyway, thus being clearly not irrelevant; neither is Derricrane - or do you think that they somehow both become helpless cards with 0 ATK and DEF?) and with the thought that "oh, my play got stopped, my opponent's going to magically remove all my cards now and it's all the fault of that one pesky play-stopper". I don't accept this line of thought as valid. The card will indeed murder Seraph plays, insofar as making the Seraphs be unable to, uh, +3 on the summon of their Xyz (great! that's balanced!) ... but I don't see how it stops Tellarknight plays at all other than making their 3-mat play a 2-mat play instead. (Alternatively, you could Matrix the Altair, in which case it stops that line of play for the turn altogether … but they play a disruption suite of their own as well as Call of the Haunted to circumvent this.) And it does very little to cards like Dante and is only acceptably good against Shaddolls. How great of you to mention the decks that would get stopped by it the most (i.e. the most linear)! Maybe everyone should play linear decks and not get punished by it.

Re: Chalice and Lance I feel I only really need to say the following; Chalice is mediocre to bad, Lance is a good card and almost guarantees a break-even (because damage step activation as well as the ability to be chained to activations of S/T). You only run Chalice and Lance in decks that would be able to use them almost optimally; why would you run them in decks that don't? Why would you randomly Lance something you aren't going to kill in that battle or Chalice something without its effect being activated or it not actively battling? Do you think I am bad at this game and don't know how to play the game? Or do you do these things unironically? (And why would you Chalice a thing if it's not worth giving it the battle boost despite negating its effect? Obviously if it's not worth then don't activate Chalice. This is one of the reasons it's not very good.)

The rest of your words about how Matrix does "too much" - I've read it but I don't agree with any of it. If Matrix, over a period of time, proves to be indeed more dominant than its compatriots Lightning Blast and Reprisal, then I may consider a slight reduction to its limitation status. But I do not think that its design is flawed, and I am cognizant (and already have been) of -everything- that you state as "doing too much". You state that it is "4 good cards in one" but all of your stated "good cards" are also cards that barely anyone plays, except to maximize gains on the card (for example, Enemy Controller's secondary effect of being a Brain Control is useful alongside Treeborn Frog to get the effect for free-ish). The effects are worse than their single-card counterparts, which are all mediocre cards at best in the first place … I don't see how level loss is a "big" effect, seeing as how it affects many decks close to negligibly (Nekroz and Qliphort being among those Decks, but there are more). The activation requirement forces you to choose a face-up Attack Position monster, which reduces the efficiency of the card by ~30% at minimum. The power of this card lies in its versatility. It is supposed to be somewhat useful in almost every situation, albeit to varying degrees of usefulness.

Defense Position is not a playstyle thing. Poking for damage is a legitimate thing to do with control decks that cannot make big pushes. I do not generally play battle-aggressive decks; I'm not sure where you get the notion that being swapped to Defense Position is worse for aggro instead of control, when in fact it's the opposite since aggro usually has an easier time attacking to remove threats anyway (with another monster). Losing the Battle Phase hurts far more for control.

I see that you state as your last sentence that "I am also of the opinion that if your deck can't stand on its own two feet without play-disruption traps and spells then it's not good enough, but that's irrelevant to this discussion." Why are you invalidating an entire class of decks? Control decks rely on disruption of their opponent's plays and overwhelming the opponent over time through numerical advantage (for example, cards like Myrmeleo are the bread and butter of control … not that I am condoning Myrmeleo's design). This is control's entire schtick. I am not saying that decks should not have cards that are bad without disruption and rely on disruption to win alone, but it is acceptable and healthy for formats to be rife with disruption and require more thought. Do you think HAT would have worked without all its disruption? What about Gladiator Beasts and Gravekeepers?

But let me go a little more offtopic and rant a little.

YGO in recent years has become a game of rampant plussing and consistency, or alternatively of easy-to-play invincible cards. Games nowadays between top decks are more about cooldown management and making sure your opponent can't get their super plus engine off and randomly win, instead of resource management like it used to be. It's very easy to make big plays without much investment as well as fetch pieces that assist you in making said big plays, and since this is the case players and decks are forced into an escalating arms race to stop the opponent's plays as quickly and soon as feasibly possible (hence the popularity of Mind Crush) because otherwise, you will straight-up lose. How can you stand against the ridiculous insurmountable advantage that cards like Qliphort Scout, Shaddoll Fusion / El-Shaddoll Fusion, and Cir / Graff / Scarm generate? You cannot, unless you have your own ridiculous insurmountable advantage engine and / or invincible boss monster.

So nowadays, instead of people trading blows against each other and having interactive gameplay, YGO is like rocket tag. I don't think that's better or worse for skill, but I think it is certainly somewhat less fun than actually having to manage resources and interact with the opponent. Matrix is a card that promotes interaction by being widely applicable, well known, and possible to play around and over. Player interaction is almost objectively a good thing, and the benefits of having an adaptable and functional piece of easily maindeckable disruption far outweigh any supposed downsides (which I am still not convinced exist, except in an imaginary world where your draw consistency somehow doesn't get screwed by defensive Traps; that's not how the game works though). You do not have to worry about "if I don't get to bounce back then I will surely die because I couldn't +2 or make an unbreakable board this turn and my opponent will do that on his turn!" The current TCG may be like that, but Duel Portal's objective is to not be like the TCG much if at all. Why play Duel Portal if it's just TCG with more advanced and creative weapons to kill each other with? I wouldn't be surprised if the TCG evolves into solitaire one day (not that everyone's not trying to play solitaire as hard as they can already).

On the technical issues you raise; third point goes out the window. I will consider rewording the third effect but I'm not sure how it's particularly unclear currently if you actually think about what it says. How do you negate effects that are resolving on chain when they have already targeted the card? Re: first point, I will make an anti-Infernoid clause (something like … "except when determining the total Level/Rank of face-up monsters you control") but I like its neatness and widespread hose-ability it has currently so I am not inclined to change it to a somewhat ineffectual effect against Synchro Summoning.

[VCR_CAT]

I will concede in that its effects are not broken, fair enough you can have that. But the card in itself still does way too much and I'm definitely not alone in thinking this. What you're saying about the goodness of the card's effects doesn't change much, since it's still, in design, 4 very commonly used effects in one. In PRACTICE, it's realistically 3 good cards in one. Alone, coupling effect negation + defense position + level removal is a lot of uses in one card.

The level effect needs to change, however. I looked it up, and it's legitimately in the rules that monsters cannot be level 0
http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Level
Real examples still include Ultimaya and Future Hope who are always treated as having a specific level. Whether the effect becomes "Reduces the level to 1", "Halves their level" or what; it cannot be "Removes their level".

Overall, however, the card still does too much with one effect. Cost or whatever aside, I'm not alone in thinking it does way too much. If your goal is to make a game that is not like the existing TCG, then creating a card that's useful in practically every situation is not the way to go about it.

As for the chalice thing, thinking simply in terms of attack numbers is not enough. You need to consider what effect you're negating, what's currently on the field, as well as whose turn it is. If the effect is something such as a Scrap Dragon destroying my monster where the attack boost would mean it can attack over anyways, yes that is a situation where using a chalice is a waste. If the situation is me having one monster and my opponent using a nuking effect where the nuking monster stays on the field and would be able to attack over with the boost, then yes using the chalice is a waste. But the situations where allowing your opponent to attack over your monster at the cost of their effect is the smart choice VASTLY outweigh the situations where it is not. If you're bringing up statements like these, I wonder if your purpose is to argue with logic or to simply say something simply to make me look wrong.

Just the same where stopping an opponent from any sort of ED play and leaving them with two useless materials is not something you should simply say "That's invalid". You gave no good reason for invalidating that and it only shows irrational arguing. Practically every 2-material Xyz play and most Synchro plays where the player is denied making a summon with a card such as Book of Moon is a big deterrent for the player trying to make the play as they just wasted their cards for making the play which will likely be destroyed in battle or by card effect in the next turn. Whoops, there goes your Junk Synchron. 

As for the technical side, don't be so quick to dismiss suggestions for wording changes. If you're going for design, then the wording that is more fool-proof is always the one you should be going with. Your wording makes sense WITH THOUGHT, yes, but mine makes sense right out of the get-go as triggering when the card is targeted.

And finally, be careful when you say something like "Defense position is not a playstyle thing". You're definitely not right on that.

http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Superheavy_Samurai

[Cirrus]

You haven't proven to me with any concrete evidence on -why- you think it does too much. You're still saying it's 3 good cards when I have outlined why and for what reasons it's not 3 good cards. What three good cards is it, pray tell? I wrote two paragraphs debunking the "combination of multiple good cards" and you're not supplying any reasons for the alternative.

I suppose I will simply have to revise the Level clause to "It cannot be used as a Synchro or Xyz Material this turn." instead. It's less elegant and interesting but just as functional. A suggestion from BtanH is "Until the end of this turn, if it has a Level, it is treated instead as a monster with equivalent Rank, and vice versa." It seems more abusable with Astral Force and other RUMs but it could also work.

Regarding design and clarity; perhaps, but I prefer concision and clarity over verbosity and clarity even if the former would be slightly hazier than the latter. It's a matter of personal preference and it's not like Konami doesn't have hazy wording. I am a bigger fan of having elegant wording (and sometimes parity of wording) over adding explanatory banter just to make sure that it doesn't get played incorrectly a fraction of the time. Thinking is usually good.

You have just outlined a situation where it would be impractical to play Chalice over a card like Fiendish Chain at all. I rest my case on why Chalice is bad except in specific decks that play it. Why would you play Chalice in the first place if your monsters didn't have an interaction with it?

I quote myself ...
 

"Chalice is mediocre to bad [...] You only run Chalice and Lance in decks that would be able to use them almost optimally; why would you run them in decks that don't? Why would you [...] Chalice something without its effect being activated or it not actively battling? [...] (And why would you Chalice a thing if it's not worth giving it the battle boost despite negating its effect? Obviously if it's not worth then don't activate Chalice. This is one of the reasons it's not very good.)"

And I will write some follow-up explanation.

Having Chalice in the situation you outlined is similar to having a Mystical Space Typhoon or Night Beam when your opponent carries no backrow, or having a Set Moralltach which your opponent refuses to destroy. Instead of trying to make Chalice seem like "it's a good card a lot of the time, but look at the things it can't do!", I have assigned a "mediocre to bad" value to Chalice /because/ it is dead a lot of the time. Look at cards like Black and White Wave or Spellbook of Miracles; they are good cards, absolutely, but too situationally useful to be of great application. A better examples might be having battle Traps like Mirror Force and D-Prison set against a Hyunlei summon in Saber format. Chalice is a disruption card that disrupts effectively only a fraction of the time, and thus cannot be relied upon as a disruption card in the first place unless you can abuse it (for example, with Beast King Barbaros and its ilk that benefit from being negated). Lance, on the other hand, is still situationally useful for the 800 battle modifier even if it's not applicable as a copy of kind-of-MST. Which is why it's much better than Chalice.

The player who makes the disrupting play will have to make their own play in order to kill the monsters by battle or by card effect. Why is it that Normal Summoning a monster just to have it maybe trade for one of your opponent's Set S/Ts has suddenly become a terrible thing that equates to it being the end of the world and you having lost the duel? You can set your own backrows to try to prevent them from killing your monster in battle, or simply keep making plays if possible (many Synchro-focused Decks will be able to do this). Either is an acceptable recourse. The worst thing that has happened is that you lose some time (during which interlapse, of course, you assume wildly that the "invincible monster or infinite plus" syndrome occurs ... if you'd only actually read the other half of my rant-ier post). And what happened to "Whoops, there goes your Night Express Knight"? Are all monsters targeted by Matrix as weak as Junk Synchron when in your last post you listed two monsters with very large bodies? Clearly not every Matrix activation is created equal. I could say that Straight Flush is horrendously overpowered because my opponent has 5 Sets, or that Cards of Sanctity is basically Pot of Greed since you can just draw 2 cards if you have no cards, but that's hyperbolic. While your statements are not as hyperbolic, they consider only the optimal case and not the average case and are thus inaccurate in painting a picture of the realistic usage of this card.

In closing, I must say that I really enjoy the mention of a very specific archetype with a very specific playstyle that wouldn't be hosed by Matrix anyway because most of their monsters are summoned in Defense Position. Unless you're saying that I would summon my own Superheavy in Attack Position and intentionally Matrix it somehow ... what kind of logic is that? This brand? That doesn't actually counter my point, since (1) Superheavy is not a control deck but a combo deck and attack in Defense Position anyway, and (2) they are entirely irrelevant to what I said and what your previous post said and you're just shifting the goalposts (in an attempt to ... do what? Simply have a counter-not-counter to my statement?).

I'd be happy to, uh, rationally discuss our differences in card design philosophy instead of engaging in more "irrational arguing", but you don't actually seem to understand where I'm coming from so I'm not sure how that would go. I invite you to take another look at the paragraphs below my disclaimer sentence of ranting in my previous post.

I believe that consensus in the Secret DP Chat of Secrets has been to Semi-Limit Matrix for the tournament format, which is completely fine by me since the desirable number is 2 and not 3 in any case; I would rather have triple Book of Moon over triple Matrix any day of the week because the former is actually reasonable to run in 3, and since Book is at 1 we have a 1/2 Book/Matrix split which is generally what you'd want in decks that have the space and inclination to run Matrix anyway.

[Love of Ghibli]

On Topic: I'm not that much of a fan of Four Gatherings non-special summon clause. It seems like a psuedo- limitation seeing as it can only be activated at the start of Main Phase 2. I can't think of many decks that have explosive main phase 2's that also run multiple attributes. If anything I would like it to take away from its Dichotomy counter part and have something slightly more important to the turn.

 

Off Topic: While it doesn't seem to be listed here there is a quick play spell called Puppeteer Curtain (something like that) that is send a monster from hand to grave to draw a card. But if that monster was a flip effect monster you get to activate that monsters ability. The question is...if the flip effect monster had the ability to ss other monsters (i.e. Super Nimble Mega Hamster) does the monster summoned by its effect treated as being summoned by a monster?

[Cirrus]

The Special Summon anti-clause actually hurts a bit more than one might think (because it's not playmaking resource until you activate it in your MP2, but generally removal monsters have to be Special Summoned so you can't access as much of the utility as you would like) - and the 4-attribute limitation hurts a lot more than Dichotomy's 3-type clause. Deceptively so, actually, which is interesting especially after I playtested with it ... but I will definitely consider revising it should its necessity become more evident, as BtanH has also raised this point to me offhand. Thank you for the feedback.

Puppeteer's Curtain ... I'm not sure, actually. I will think about it but I am inclined to say yes, simply because OPT effects are not intended to be able to be used more often than just OPT regardless of source (so it'd be treated as from the same source). However, the -type- of card ...

[BtanH]

I'm personally inclinded to say no in regards to Puppeteer's Curtain.
The effect is the same effect for the purpose of OPT, but the effect is being activated via a spell card. So, the monster is summoned with the effect of a monster, but it's summoned by a spell.
So if the monster in question needs to be summoned by the effect of a monster, then yes. If it needs to be summoned by a monster, then no.

[Cirrus]

BtanH's interpretation is the correct one.

[Cirrus]

Bumping for new incoming update. If you see anything new that is also interesting feel free to pick it up but I won't add anything actually to DP myself. Just a place to dump some interesting ideas that Adv won't appreciate much anyway.

EDIT: Update complete.