Skill Drain

[·Toot]

 

I am so sick of running into this bullcrap. Lol.

 

I was wondering about this though. What if it got an errata or something that made it so it only hit monsters that activate on the field.

I know there are a few monsters that can probably get around it's effect (ex. Mystic Piper), but what if it didn't stop continuous effects? Or what if it didn't hit anything that was already activated while face up. Something like Slacker Magician or something. What do you guys think this would really do?

[Neochu-H]

I hate this card, every time I see a shooting star outside, I wish for skill drain to be banned.

 

Or maybe I hate how people use it. Making darkworld and qli's look like more BS than usual

[Wildflame]

Is it weird that I want this back at 3..., ok, maybe not at 3, but at 2.

[Slinky]

Would rather this be at 0. Only decks that use it are decks that are unaffected and/or bolstered by it.   And the sheer amount of advantage they get from it when they happen to get it is far too large to ignore.

[Resident Fascist]

[Obligatory it's an Anti-Meta card so it can't possibly be bad for the game argument goes here.]

 

Even though I like all the decks it goes in, honestly should be banned. I don't really mind either way due to my enormous bias toward grindy control decks. 

[mido9]

[Obligatory it's an Anti-Meta card so it can't possibly be bad for the game argument goes here.]

Floodgate wasnt even in anyone's dictionary until drain/fissure/macro got limited and everyone realized "opponent cant play the game anymore" is a shitty way to slow down the game.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Well seeing that the current OCG duels last a lot longer than standard TCG duels, (easily hitting 2 hours per match), maybe having the flood gates isn't such a bad thing after all. Card should be at three.

[Wildflame]

Only decks that use it are decks that are unaffected and/or bolstered by it.

 

Why else would a deck run a card?

[Maeriberii Haan]

Well seeing that the current OCG duels last a lot longer than standard TCG duels, (easily hitting 2 hours per match), maybe having the flood gates isn't such a bad thing after all. Card should be at three.

 

Why would we waste 2 hours on a match?

 

Duel shouldn't last too long and it shouldn't end too fast. This is why people hate FTK, ridic fast formats, and stall.

 

And Skill drain doesn't actually help slowing down the duel anyway tbh. Most decks that do run it has beaters that can aggro the game to the end.

[Resident Fascist]

Well seeing that the current OCG duels last a lot longer than standard TCG duels, (easily hitting 2 hours per match), maybe having the flood gates isn't such a bad thing after all. Card should be at three.

 

please no. We've already established that the TCG and OCG are vastly different at the present time.

[jackelgull]

I just hate how monster effects can still be activated. I'd prefer a straight, all monsters can't activate their effects while on the field, they basically become normal monsters, then skill drain would become less broken. 

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Why would we waste 2 hours on a match?

 

Duel shouldn't last too long and it shouldn't end too fast. This is why people hate FTK, ridic fast formats, and stall.

 

And Skill drain doesn't actually help slowing down the duel anyway tbh. Most decks that do run it has beaters that can aggro the game to the end.

Why should this card take the fall for Qli or BA? There are a lot of decks that can use this and not be broken. Don't hang the masses for the crimes of a few, hang the criminal 

[The Warden]

But, Skill Drain IS the criminal. In the days of old this card was a cute card sure, I even used it myself in a Moja deck. But, see, a card can change graphically over time. Nowadays monster effects are highly valuable, and not being able to use them can outright kill a deck. When it doesn't, it's because it's being used by a deck that can circumvent the cost, which is what makes it so brutal. Skill Drain is no longer an equalizer, it is a crippler. Its purpose is to cripple decks while leaving yours completely unharmed, which is completely unfair and very abusable, as shown when Dark Worlds threw this card around like free candy. It's not forcing other decks to your level, it's forcing them BENEATH your level, so you can kick the dog all you like with your beaters while your opponent's monsters are completely useless. So riddle me this Batman, who is the criminal here? The getaway driver (BA/Qliphort), or the one holding 1/3 of the game hostage (Skill Drain)?

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

BA and Qli obv. Those two cause problems skill drain or not. Just like Nekroz cause problems Djinn or not. Just like Shaddolls and Super Poly, stop robbing the commoners (tier 2 and lower) to keep circle jerking off to the top decks

[The Warden]

... I... I... just... you....

 

I just went and explained why Skill Drain is bad. It doesn't matter WHAT deck uses it, it's just a crippling card in general. Just like Macro/D. Fissure are. BA and Qli have their own issues in terms of balance (Qli even have their own Skill Drain for god's sakes). It literally makes no difference what deck uses this card, since the effect is ALWAYS the same: It cripples the opponent's deck while having little to no impact on your own, because your deck was built to factor in Skill Drain. By the sheer merit of having this card active isn't promoting anything healthy, it's just forcing your opponent to play beneath your own level, since your monsters will be inarguably stronger than theirs, and thus they can't fight back. You metaphorically broke their legs. How is that fair to the likes of Synchrons, or Deskbots? How is it fair to Raid Raptors? You think Skill Drain is most harmful because of the circlejerking top tier decks? It's the lower tiered decks that are hurt THE MOST by Skill Drain, regardless of who uses it. Noids, Nekroz, Shaddolls for the most part won't give a sheet, as they also have beaters. But it's the lower tiers who suffer because of this card's existence. How can you even claim the carrier is the problem when it's Skill Drain that most assuredly and enthusiastically nails the coffin shut on those sort of decks? How is that IN ANY WAYS promote creativity and the beauty of combo design when their pieces aren't even allowed to function? This card @3 would force stagnation, not growth because every deck that can't take advantage of Skill Drain would be forced to consider it in deck design. Because, at the end of the day, in reiteration, it doesn't MATTER what deck, meta or not, uses it, as the effects will always be the same.

[Blake]

BA and Qli obv. Those two cause problems skill drain or not. Just like Nekroz cause problems Djinn or not. Just like Shaddolls and Super Poly, stop robbing the commoners (tier 2 and lower) to keep circle jerking off to the top decks

you complained about casuals, and then you post this?

 

"How dare my weak deck that gets a small buff get hurt because a card is unfair!" is all you posted. It's not the fault of BA or Qli or even YZ. It's this card's fault.

 

People constantly make excuses for broken cards that it's the fault of the decks that use them, but again and again that's untrue.

 

That's why Lavalval finally got the axe in TCG land. It was always a problem with decks, but it always got off scott free at the expense of those decks. And what happened?

 

It just got crept to a point where both of its effects were too good. And try as people might to argue it's the fault of Nekroz/Clowns, it's really not.

 

Without Lavalval Chain, Trick Clown is generically weak. Not bad, but weak, because getting it to go off is difficult. Shaddolls help this, but most decks don't have a means. Without Chain, Thousand Blades is pure garbage, it was always crappy but Chain + R4 was too amazing, especially considering it meant you could recover more easily.

 

The stack helped both SeraphClown and Nekroz a lot, which is another reason it got killed off.

 

These are cards that were 'so broken' while Chain existed (stick still is, but shush), yet they're a lot more tame without the things Lavalval (and djinn) gives them, and they're totally fine.

 

Qli wouldn't be totally fine without Skill Drain (or L1T), but they would definitely be more tame.

 

Same for Shaddolls and Super Polymerization. And no one cried becauyse of a Super Poly lack, because the TCG doesn't have stupid sheet like CDI or Shock Bastard or Rafflesia to deal with.

 

You cannot argue that generic cards should not be hit like that, as your argument comes across as casual bawwing more than anything, and Broken even covered how Skill Drain/Floodgates actually hurt lower decks more than top decks on the whole.

[ihop]

Well seeing that the current OCG duels last a lot longer than standard TCG duels, (easily hitting 2 hours per match), maybe having the flood gates isn't such a bad thing after all. Card should be at three.

 

2 hour games are cool and all but I quite value my sleep at night so I really don't want to be ending round 8 of a YCS at 5am.

 

BA and Qli obv. Those two cause problems skill drain or not. Just like Nekroz cause problems Djinn or not. Just like Shaddolls and Super Poly, stop robbing the commoners (tier 2 and lower) to keep circle jerking off to the top deck

 

You're scapegoating BA and Qli here, Skill Drain has always been a problem in top decks that have played it from TG to Dark World, it's only once the concept of floodgates started to arise that people started realising "damn this card is really broken". 

 

I think it should be banned, needless to say.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

you complained about casuals, and then you post this?

 

"How dare my weak deck that gets a small buff get hurt because a card is unfair!" is all you posted. It's not the fault of BA or Qli or even YZ. It's this card's fault.

 

People constantly make excuses for broken cards that it's the fault of the decks that use them, but again and again that's untrue.

 

That's why Lavalval finally got the axe in TCG land. It was always a problem with decks, but it always got off scott free at the expense of those decks. And what happened?

 

It just got crept to a point where both of its effects were too good. And try as people might to argue it's the fault of Nekroz/Clowns, it's really not.

 

Without Lavalval Chain, Trick Clown is generically weak. Not bad, but weak, because getting it to go off is difficult. Shaddolls help this, but most decks don't have a means. Without Chain, Thousand Blades is pure garbage, it was always crappy but Chain + R4 was too amazing, especially considering it meant you could recover more easily.

 

The stack helped both SeraphClown and Nekroz a lot, which is another reason it got killed off.

 

These are cards that were 'so broken' while Chain existed (stick still is, but shush), yet they're a lot more tame without the things Lavalval (and djinn) gives them, and they're totally fine.

 

Qli wouldn't be totally fine without Skill Drain (or L1T), but they would definitely be more tame.

 

Same for Shaddolls and Super Polymerization. And no one cried becauyse of a Super Poly lack, because the TCG doesn't have stupid s*** like CDI or Shock Bastard or Rafflesia to deal with.

 

You cannot argue that generic cards should not be hit like that, as your argument comes across as casual bawwing more than anything, and Broken even covered how Skill Drain/Floodgates actually hurt lower decks more than top decks on the whole.

Ok, lets look at this claim shall we.

 

If we were to look at my complain on Casuals it was thus 

 

"What irritates me is when casual players cannot make up their damn mind. Example?

 

Magician Pendulum. Before the Structure deck everyone was crying that Yuya was getting s*** on and that they could NEVER play their deck as long as Nekroz and Heroes existed

 

After the structure deck, they cried that Konami made their deck meta....make up your damn mind, do you want it to win or not.

 

Another thing, when they try to asswipe their casual logic on the banlist.

 

Get the f*** out, I don't care how much Castel ruins your Gate Guardian deck, it's not hitting the damn list"

 

I'm not making an excuse for Skill Drain based on meta decks along, I'm using exp with Skill Drain without those meta decks. Qli got hit in April, that's six months of 3 drain and and Qli hit. Unlike Vanity, it hasn't been helping the top tier decks much, instead bring out the weaker decks like Shaddolls to the front of the meta. Are BA starting to abuse Drain? Sure, NOW it can be hit to 1 if you don't wanna hit BA.

 

Skill Drain is much like Shock Master in that it's a marker card. Shock Master has only been problematic in 3 decks up to date. WU (which I personally feel like could have just stayed the way it was with LTGY coming) Star Seraph Shaddoll (a tier 0 format) or m&m's ( a + engine that can look down on March Rulers), notice the common trend here, Shock was fine in Raptors, Clown Blade, or even in HERO's, the former number 2 deck. It's only a problem when the deck itself is broken as hell. Therefore having it acts as a marker to indicate if a deck is too strong (with regards to rank 4).

 

Skill Drain I would say the same thing. It represents a time when a deck can become so unreliable on field effects and still top. What two decks have done that so far? BA and Skill Drain as of recently? Dark Worlds before that. Can you look me in the eyes and tell me any of those three were healthy decks? 

 

So you want to get into the Lavaval Chain discussion?

 

Anyways, as for this argument: If you can't count to 4, you've got a problem and it's not Lavalval Chain.

 

4 is the exact number of decks I have been able to dig up where Chain could have even a slight competitive impact: OniZombie OTK, Norleras wipe, Infernities, and Fenix/Igknight FTK.

 

The first 2 are bad, like Flint Lock bad, Infernities got well-deserved hits on their own, and Fenix/Igknight FTK has hits that are well-deserved, that incidentally aren't Lavalval Chain (and while Noden still has to build up some history, Fenix has a well-known one).

 

Clownblade used to be an argument, but it literally doesn't need Chain anymore to be broken. There are other weird loops, like the PsiBlocker loop, but these are on the level of Ojama OTK, Nurse Burn FTK, or Quillbolt CannonSoldier FTK, and are both not worth talking about nor worth using as a reason to put anything on the list - absolutely no impact in a competitive scene.

 

Super Poly next? Let's see, Omni Heroes, Star Seraph Shaddoll and Star Seraph Heroes? Why put down a card that will barely make Shaddolls less of a threat when you can put shaddolls and seraphs down and keep a card that helps lower tier decks.

 

Now you're gonna say I'm flip flopping, I'm not, I dislike when people want something banned cause it hurts their casual deck, that's not the same as what I said above?

 

Broken makes it sound like there are no casual decks that have high attack beaters, sure use your Skill Drain, see if my infernoids give a f*** for example. It's been more of a crutch for weaker decks than it has been for top tier decks recently. Examples? Omni Heroes during Ruler-Book format. Rulers during Hero Shaddoll Format. Shaddolls during m&m, Nekroz, Hero format.

 

Riddle me this Robin, if you hit Qli, will skill drain not be more tame?

 

 

2 hour games are cool and all but I quite value my sleep at night so I really don't want to be ending round 8 of a YCS at 5am.

 

 

You're scapegoating BA and Qli here, Skill Drain has always been a problem in top decks that have played it from TG to Dark World, it's only once the concept of floodgates started to arise that people started realising "damn this card is really broken". 

 

I think it should be banned, needless to say.

 

They're not scapegoats here. BA and Qli are Serial Killers to Skill Drain's Public intoxication. One can be tolerated the other is a cancer that needs to be put down. So tell me this ringo, ignoring the fact that DW are cancerous as f***, how often do you see DW and TG top as of recently? 

 

Time was a bad argument. I'll conceded that 

[Slinky]

Look at Sangan TEW. Sangan is a victim of that logic. Hit the tutord instead of the tutor is almost mirrored by hitting the deck itself instead of hitting what makes the deck busted.

 

Ultimately, Sangan got banned and has not since returned. Then suddenly people realized Sangan was never the problem, it was TGU. and then BA came out. TGU is now far too powerful to allow in high numbers, so it got limited. And the damage it has caused is far greater than anything Sangan ever did.

 

Same scenario here, if you hit Qli or BA without getting rid of Skill Drain, Skill Drain is only going to cause significantly more problems in the future than whatever BA or Qli caused combined. Its inevitable. BA and Qli do however have some blame and do deserve to get hit a littlre more, but Skill Drain is not exempt.

 

You have other cards with the same fate in the future. A lot of Zombie Support (mainly Book of Life/Mezuki, moreso Mezuki) are time bombs waiting to happen once an extremely powerful zombie archetype makes its presence. Secret Village of the Spellcasters (an often overlooked card), has now become a huge problem thanks to the existence of majespecters. Generation Shift has suddenyl become a good card thanks to Kozmos, but it isn't a time bomb like the others. 

 

Do you really want to wait until a new deck abuses the funk out of Skill Drain even moreso than Qli? And your OCG still has 3 of it.

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Look at Sangan TEW. Sangan is a victim of that logic. Hit the tutord instead of the tutor is almost mirrored by hitting the deck itself instead of hitting what makes the deck busted.

 

Ultimately, Sangan got banned and has not since returned. Then suddenly people realized Sangan was never the problem, it was TGU. and then BA came out. TGU is now far too powerful to allow in high numbers, so it got limited. And the damage it has caused is far greater than anything Sangan ever did.

 

Same scenario here, if you hit Qli or BA without getting rid of Skill Drain, Skill Drain is only going to cause significantly more problems in the future than whatever BA or Qli caused combined. Its inevitable. BA and Qli do however have some blame and do deserve to get hit a littlre more, but Skill Drain is not exempt.

 

You have other cards with the same fate in the future. A lot of Zombie Support (mainly Book of Life/Mezuki, moreso Mezuki) are time bombs waiting to happen once an extremely powerful zombie archetype makes its presence. Secret Village of the Spellcasters (an often overlooked card), has now become a huge problem thanks to the existence of majespecters. Generation Shift has suddenyl become a good card thanks to Kozmos, but it isn't a time bomb like the others. 

 

Do you really want to wait until a new deck abuses the f*** out of Skill Drain even moreso than Qli? And your OCG still has 3 of it.

The March 2013 list was a poor list in general. It was a knee jerk reaction to WU. 

 

In the case of Skill Drain BA and Qli are busted with our without it. Sangan was neither buster with or without TGU

 

Like I explained with Shock, Skill Drain is a marker card, sort of a safety warning when a deck can go full beatdown and still win against the rest of the meta

 

People always claim the ruler effect is bad, it's not. This game is creeping way to fast, we need a mechanism to hold back more broken support. Konami funked themselves by hitting the rulers and it's gonna show

[Slinky]

Soooo, let me get this straight.

 

Your logic... for a deck you'd consider to be busted regardless of Skill Drain... so you'd rather keep Skill Drain, a card that makes them harder to deal with AND more broken than they need to be?

 

That just sounds like a desperate defense that contradicts itself.

 

Let me lay this out for you in more simple terms

 

"Qli are broken with or without Skill Drain" Okay, that's fine. But Skill Drain makes them even MORE busted. And if they are busted regardless, then it just shows that Skill Drain really just doesn't have the right to exist.

 

Basically, your logic is backwards and it opens up a huge can of worms. You're only looking at the present and not at the future. and thats not what game design does, or even cares about.

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

I never fully understood the "yugioh is broken so floodgates are good for the game" argument. I mean, the game is meant to be played, right?

[ENMaker]

I never fully understood the "yugioh is broken so floodgates are good for the game" argument. I mean, the game is meant to be played, right?

 

Only by you, your opponent is just there to spectate.

[jackelgull]

I never fully understood the "yugioh is broken so floodgates are good for the game" argument. I mean, the game is meant to be played, right?

 

Floodgates in my opinion are a necessary evil. Yes they're broken, but they're the only counter to overpowered decks. Basically, it's the same idea as "to fight a monster you need to be as strong as or stronger than the monster."

[Ryusei the Morning Star]

Skill Drain isn't broken in every deck, same with Shock, or MOST flood gates. When a deck reaches a point where it can abuse them, For Shock it a marker that a Rank 4 deck has become too strong. For Skill Drain its a marker that beat down or grave reliant deck has become too strong. ETC.

 

Yang Zing are grave reliant, but not that potent. Malefics are beat down, but not that potent. Clown Blade, Tellars, and Heroes (before m&ms) were great rank 4 deck, but not that potent. You need some level of "Broken" to make a banlist, and Flood Gates set that limit

 

Level is lower in TCG than in OCG (which is fine ofc), so you guys are trying to compensate by putting Drain to 1, but that's not the way to do it unfortunately.