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[Mobile Gaming] How the Nyan Cat led to the death knell for a popular mobile game- the downfall of RWBY Amity Arena.
Note: Many of the links are to the Amity Arena Library, a website devoted to the game which includes tracking the history of it through patchnotes and a running history of what cards entered and left the meta. Their website was a valuable resource for this post.
Mobile gaming has taken off like a wildfire since the advent of the smartphone boosted the average processing power a phone could carry. Initially it took the form of crossing over older, more easily runnable games onto the mobile market to... mixed success, but in recent years we've seen both the West and East use mobile gaming to replace the old fashioned movie tie in game. It's easily accessable, has a much wider reach than consoles or PC, you can take it on the go and standards are inherently lower for mobile games than they are a full 60 dollar game. Since the 2010s, mobile gaming has shifted to what's called the "Freemium" module. The game itself is free to download and start playing, but is insideously designed with obnoxious paywalls or artificial limiters put in place to limit how much you can play each day. If the game is part of a pre-existing franchise, additional money can be made through a premium currency or a chance to obtain high-powered units by rolling a slot machine random chance mechanic. And thus, gacha gaming was born. This sub has had several threads in the past on high profile gacha games, such as the monolithic Fate Grand/Order, Pokemon Go or Genshin Impact. One of the more popular things to roll for in gachas as a consequence is wallpapers for your homescreen, especially for high-grade units as they're usually animated to move a little bit on the homescreen. Today we're looking a low to mid-tier gacha game that rose and fell with the advent of one catgirl. Let's talk RWBY. RWBY is an online web anime made by Rooster Teeth focusing on four prospective monster hunters who get embroiled in a world-spanning shadow war. It's of debatable quality in matters of animation, combat, voice acting, story, worldbuilding, romance, and it's kind of a little racist if I'm being honest, but one of the major positives of RWBY is that the series tends to have good character design. Series creator Monty Oum set in the guidelines for the show while making it that most if not every design should be made to be cosplay friendly, hence why most of the outfits have things most costume designers haven't heard of like... pockets. And Rooster Teeth, above all else, likes making money. So they know people like RWBY's character designs, enough so that in 2017 plans were made to release a gacha game themed around RWBY called Amity Arena, which would be developed by Korean company NHN Entertainment. Amity Arena is a PvP tower defense game. Each player controls two turrets and a tower and has three minutes to use units themed from the show to destroy the other player's structures. Whoever took out more wins, destroying a tower is an instant victory. When the game launched, it had three tiers for units- Common (generally held for mooks or low-tier characters in the show), Rare (roughly protagonist-level or elite mooks go here) and Epic (High tier characters usually with an active ability that did lots of damage or stopped enemies in their tracks). The game launched in October 2018 to generally positive reviews from both mobile game players and RWBY fans alike. Fans were happy to get a lot of new official art for the characters in the game and the base gameplay loop was fun. Criticism at the time was largely themed around the lack of content besides PVP matches and some issues with the meta but overall, the launch went well. Each month, the developers would add new units, including popular characters like Neopolitian, Cinder Fall, Zwei the dog, and more. But everything changed with February 20th 2019, which introduced Neon Katt, the titular catgirl (RWBY characters are themed around fairytales, except for Neon, who is themed around Nyan Cat, and her partner Flynt Coal, who is themed off a potentially racist joke made by Rooster Teeth). Neon is a character from RWBY Volume 3 who's part of a team that RWBY face during a tournament arc. Her partner, Flynt Coal, was part of the game at launch, and Neon would join him a few months later. Neon in the show is a cocky fighter who taunts the heroes and zips around on rollarskates, which in-game is represented by Neon skating towards the nearest enemy structure to her and hitting it, while all units within a radius of Neon are taunted and provoked into attacking her above all other targets unless they-selves are coded to hit structures. On its own, not a bad idea for a unit, but Neon came with four big caveats:
Neon was the fourth corner of the square that became known as the Artillery Arena meta, which saw Neon, Cinder (who had an AOE ability she could use which was wide enough to hit a turret and tower and single-handedly killed the entire launch meta of using fragile swarm units), Zwei (an on-summon high damage AOE on any part of the map) and Penny (another AOE ability that instead did chip damage and locked a location down) turn the game's meta into a chip game. Every player ran at least one of the above cards, if only to counter the others. Neon was the universal counter in being anti-swarm and the hardest to stop, especially at launch where her taunt range was so large, it could grab units from the other lane.
Neon launched with a unit weight of "Heavy", which meant that if she was behind a unit she could push it on her way to the turret. This launched a sub-meta where Neon was placed behind a larger unit such as the Ursa (which like Neon was a unit that focused on structures but was made slow to cover its tankiness), to push them towards the turret faster. This was called Disco Bear. They eventually patched this so Neon phased through units by making her a lightweight.
Neon couldn't die. She was invincible until she hit a structure, which combined with her taunt meant that Neon was very annoying to fight and could lock down an entire lane of the battlefield by being placed well and taunting enemies to let you prepare a counter.
Neon was a very cheap unit to summon. Amity Arena uses a mechanic called "Aura" where all units cost a certain amount and it recharges over the match- for instance, protagonist Ruby Rose has a Rare card that costs four Aura to summon, while Weiss Schnee has two rares that cost three and five. Neo only cost two Aura, which made her one of the cheapest units of the game and thus disproportionately powerful for her cost and easy to cycle through your deck so you could spam her.
From the word go, Neon is an unpopular unit; she's clearly overbalanced and elements such as the Disco Bear glitch have players thinking she'll have to get knocked down in a nerf- she'll either be made slower, more expensive, or able to die pre-hitting a structure, right? Neon doesn't show up in the next patch. Instead, before she's fixed, an entire new class of units called Legendaries are introduced, and this is where the game goes full gacha. Legendaries were meant to represent the highest tier characters in the game, the ones who were either the most popular characters or the highest-tier fighters in the show. Or in some cases, the popular ships such as combo cards for White Rose (Ruby/Weiss), Bumblebee (Blake/Yang) and Flower Power (Ren/Nora). Legendaries, representing their value, were impossibly rare and had an infinitely small chance of actually appearing (The most reliable method was to buy the premium chests and hope you'd roll a Legendary, which often cost tons of money), and if you did get one, there was no way to guess which Legendary you'd actually get. Some such as White Rose and Adam were high tier units, others like Hazel or Checkmate were... kinda broken at launch. The playerbase isn't happy at this, especially as free to play players are left out in the cold and reliant on the game giving them high tier units effectively out of pity. Neon would get a small nerf in the April patch which lessened her taunt range and killed the Disco Bear meta, but her invincibility would be left untouched, even as players submitted feedback regarding how to make it more efficient. The official Amity Arena discord has a weekly feedback section on Tuesdays where players could submit up to four suggestions on how to nerf/buff units and general requests for quality of life such as "Can this character get a new skin from this part of the show," or "Can we have an option to lower music volume that's not just muting all music?" (they never did add that second request) Neon would then remain in this state until the November patch, despite constant weekly requests for a Neon rework, and all it would do is make Neon functionally mortal, in that she had a flat shield bar of 20 that would be lowered by one for each attack before the next hit would kill her. Neon could now die... but your chances of actually doing enough damage to stop her were slim, and regardless, you were now at a serious Aura defecit. It took seven months for this one unit to get a substantial nerf, all while the game added new units every week and the number of units being affected by patches each month began to gradually sink. To round up some of the major issues people had with Amity that developed throughout 2019 alongside Neon's general existance making life hell:
Common units were meant to be chump fodder, but could level up the most amount of times with a level cap at 13. This meant longer-term units that had a long time to level such as the Xiong Family card, the AK-130s the Beowolf Pack, or the White Fang gunners, could become shockingly strong if players grinded the money up to reach max level.
A pre-existing divide between free players and players willing to burn money IRL to get access to premium currencies led to a huge disparity in play. Free players have long complained about how hard it is to scrounge money together to level up units at higher costs as even the basic currency of Lien is hard to get large quantities of (you get a certain amount every match win but otherwise you need to burn the Schnee Premium Dust currency for the highest payouts, but SPD is also needed for shop resets, buying crates or unlocking cosmetics). The developers used to do frequent double weekends where all gains were doubled for a weekend, but these became less and less frequent as time went on. Legendaries only added to the divide, as their rarity was bad enough for players willing to spend money (one player, known as one of the largest whales in the community, in trying to get Sienna Khan, reported burning nearly nine hundred dollars on her, while taking nearly six hundred to get the Ice Flower card).
One actual counter was born to fight Neon in the Argus Shield, a stationary unit that existed solely to stall units and take damage. At 2 Aura, it was the first structure to counter Neon, which allevated one of the primary problems with Neon in that no way to counter her was cost-efficient for an enemy player. They buffed the Wall to 3 Aura eventually which killed that hope, and all this happened before Neon's November nerf.
The Summer of 2019 saw a large number of defensive units released; alongside the Argus Shield, several different units were released themed around turrets for the technological kingdom of Atlas, such as the Beam Turret. The Atlesian Burrow Gun was the straw that broke the camel's back and made for a miserable meta as the Burrow Gun would only appear (and be available to take damage) when a unit entered its range. These three units together were all very overpowered on launch and led to a large exodus of players sick of defensive and chip-based metas, especially as what few offensive units that were good enough to counter these metas (such as Professor Port and Adam Taurus) were often nerfed into the ground within a month of release.
Also around this time it became apparent that the developers were unable to meet the quotas that Rooster Teeth was forcing on them. The social media team admitted that a certain number of units needed to be in the game in time for Winter 2019 when Volume 7 was set to start, and as the year went on more and more game-breaking bugs were being found in units, or they were at best horrifically undertuned or overpowered. The Apathy was perhaps the largest case of this, as an unfound bug pre-release meant that the Apathy (who have a passive ability that let them self-duplicate) had no cap on their power, meaning that they could immediately overwhelm defenses and in the case of some phones, be such a resource hog the phone would crash. Many Legendary units were especially guilty of being under-tuned due to low Legendary availability meaning they were simply weren't powerful enough to compare with high-levelled units. Checkmate's ability simply didn't work at launch, and Neon made several more such as Hazel Rainart a joke. May Marigold's invisibility bubble would have been an interesting game changer... were it not for a bug that made it that units placed in the bubble still played their sound lines, meaning players knew what to expect. Things were so bad that when Flower Power launched and wasn't broken or needed an emergency patch, the playerbase were shocked.
Unfortunately, the Novemember patch did little to stop the problems with Neon, and a new problem would rear its head for Christmas: Jinn. This unit embodied many of the problems players had: She was a Legendary so it would be hard for free players to get her, and only added to the sheer number of Legendaries that were out there. She was another structure card, and she was horrifically broken. Stopping time for seven seconds in an area around any friendly units, Jinn broke the game overnight, with players horrified at how little playtesting she'd clearly had. Most chip units now couldn't damage structures as Jinn simply could stop time and freeze the turret for the duration of the attack. And to make matters worse? She cost two Aura, meaning it was very easy to cycle a deck and start Jinn spamming. And yet at two aura she was still one of the only cost-efficient Neon counters... until they patched her to be worth three Aura instead. Talking of the feline menace, January saw Neon get a HP nerf that set her shield at 14. Finally, Neon could be realistically be taken out, still at an Aura defecit but at least it can be countered and now they just have to raise her Aura- why are you buffing her game? Less than a month later, Neon got, of all things, a buff. Her HP shield was set at 20, and her attacks now did double damage. This is around the point where a lot of players begin to suspect the developers aren't listening to feedback and more long-term players dip out or drop the game. Neon got touched one more time in April, which slowed her down (which itself was a problem as Neon's lessened speed on spawn simply made her better at generating aggro), she dealt 10% less damage and made it somewhat easier to hit her enough to kill her, but a new problem was on the horizon. Because Neon was now no longer the game's White Whale for patches. Meet the White Fang Gunner Barracks. Added in September 2019, the Barracks fell under many player's radar simply because they were horrifically undertuned. Their gimmick was that every few seconds, a White Fang Gunner would spawn, with three spawning on death. In April, as Neon got her last appearance in the patches, the Barracks got a huge buff and became the centerpiece of the meta; they now spawned two Gunners, which made them immensely valuable for just five Aura. You could overwhelm many anti-swarm units before they had a chance, and shred your way through turrets. The Barracks would then go six months before this overtuning was rectified, barring one nerf in August that lowered their health to try and stem the tide of units. To sum up every other thing that went wrong during the year meta-wise:
The playercount was getting so low that players were able to make lists of the AI bots the developers had in place so lower-level players had a challenge (Amity breaks up players by a trophy system where you gain trophies with every win, and by this point most of the active players were in the 2500 to 3500 range. This also meant new players steamrolled through the lower levels only to hit a brick wall in the 3000 range, with the only reliable solution being to willingly lose matches until you were in your optimal range and grind victories until you reached a certain level.
The patches became more and more threadbare, going from 8+ units getting changed each month in early 2019 to three units at most getting changed in 2020 patches outside of the anniversary patch going back to the golden days of eight. The only area where they didn't get more threadbare was in the cosmetics and emotes that the developers were cranking out, all of which were only available through hours of grinding or premium currencies. This was despite the fact that the units were being released slower, going from once a week to once a fortnite.
The majority of units added in 2020 were Epic or Legendary tier, which were the hardest to get for free players unless they got lucky and they were added to the store (and if they had the lien as a Legendary in the store costs a flat 40,000 Lien). One Common and four Epics were released compared to twelve Epics and seven Legendaries. The release of Moonslice Adam especially was annoying for this regard, as Adam already had a Legendary released (at least for Team RWBY, each of them headlined a Legendary when it came to the team attack cards), and this was clearly done to pander to Adam's fans again as his first unit saw a spike in interest in the game. The math was done and showed how artifically scarce Legendaries were made.
The undeovertuning was still in play. Colossus is seen as one of the worst cards in the entire game because of its gimmick. I have literally never seen anyone play it. Flynt became overtuned and now he's a staple thanks to his trumpet's AOE attack being able to hurt turrets and shred most units. Launcher Nora was an especially overtuned unit thanks to her high-damage constant AOE barrage and long range meaning she could annhilate most anything if given enough cover. Even after patches she's still dangerous. September saw the White Fang Dropship Formation added, which was widely seen as a terrible unit and done as an emergency addition because the planned unit for September in the Grimm Seer had to be cut last minute for technical reasons.
The game has barely had significant content added since launch, with the primary gameplay still just being PVP. Barring Battle of Beacon (a mode where you can play as Ruby and Weiss and fend off Grimm which most players just use to grind chests, and no, they still haven't added Blake or Yang) and Plaza (a lobby where you can dress up as a character and run around Beacon), the game has added no new features and quality of life content players have requested since launch (rerolling in the shop, Superior Crates having guaranteed Legendary spawn rates) have been released at a snail's pace (you still can't reroll Legendaries if you're looking for a specific unit). Academies where players can unite to trade units and chat still lacks features that have been requested for years such as the ability to delete messages. And Plaza immediately went to hell because players were doing erotic role play in the chats and after people came forward with proof that minors were being sexually harassed in the Plaza or being coerced into side-channels, the dev response was to... just turn off the chat entirely instead of banning the accounts or implementing moderation. This also removed the chatlog which deleted a lot of the evidence of said harassment.
As OctobeNovember comes in, the players are getting more and more furious. The weekly feedback includes a near constant demand for an acknowledgement from the developers given how often it feels like the feedback is being ignored. The social media team get caught several times hyping up how the coming patch would address player concerns, only for said patch to lack those units. The meta has been locked down to the Xiong Family, Flynt, Launcher Nora, Spider-Mines and the hell-cat herself in Neon. Everyone runs at least one of these, people run meta decks not because they want to, but because it's the only way to have a chance of victory. And then in December, things implode. The patch for the month was set to launch on December 10th with the monthly event missions. But when the clock rolls around, the event missions (which usually take about two weeks to do if you're doing as many as you can a day)... has a six day timer. And the update doesn't come out. The art team doesn't release new unit art. The shop has no special timed bundles. There's no patch notes. And then the Twitter team who've been hard carrying the game through... actually talking to the players and acknowledging the grievances they have... admitted that they don't know what's going on either. The best guess is that the devs have come down with Covid, but no statements to confirm or deny this leave it as guesswork. The timer eventually got reset and people could do the event, but then on Christmas itself, another issue. Ruby has appeared in the plaza on Halloween (her canonical birthday) and Christmas, and if you go talk to her you get free stuff. But on Christmas people, people discovered that Ruby was talking as if you'd already talked to her. Because they hadn't updated Ruby yet for 2020. She still thought it was 2019 so if you'd talked to her then for goodies, she had none now. They patched it eventually but a lot of people didn't see this fix before the timer ran out to get the free stuff. Some have resorted to memes to cope with the fact that the game just seems to have died out of the blue. Others have been trying to desperately rally the players and find a way to save it. Some resorted to friendly mockery of the whales who'd spent thousands on a game that seems to be dying (seriously though gacha games need to curb this shit but they won't because whales are godsends for their bank balances). If the game doesn't get an update in January then two months without new content will mark the end, and the already significant playercount drops will only increase. And it's hard to say if any one thing could have turned Amity Arena's fate around beyond just "Have a better balancing team who can respond better to feedback." Neon began the time of death, but by the time December rolled around the meta was in a horrifically toxic place where if you wanted to make any progession, you had to get down and dirty with the pigs. The team just constantly failed to balance problem units outside of their emergency hotfixes of Jinn, and more often then not they went after units and buffed or nerfed them at random going off playcounts to determine what needed fixing instead of the actual written feedback they were getting. It's clear from the references to the show and some of the attempts to reach out to the community that at least one person in the team genuinely wanted to make the good appealing to RWBY fans, but somewhere during the game's lifespan, they lost their way. Less focus needed to be put on how to milk the players, and instead focusing on making a game sustainable and enjoyable enough to warrant the cosmetics and emotes. The game's failure ultimately isn't on the playerbase. It's on the people who were actually making the game who chose to slack off because they thought it acceptable to do so. Thanks for reading. EDIT: HOT OFF THE PRESSES, I JUMPED THE GUN Had I waited one more day, my story would have had a far more sudden ending, as the game just announced its shutdown for January. RIP.
Old Austin Tales: Forgotten Video Arcades of The 1970s & 80s
In the late 1980s and early 1990s when I was a young teen growing up in far North Austin, it was a popular custom for many boys in the neighborhood to assemble at the local Stop-N-Go after school on a regular basis for some Grand Champion level tournaments in Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat. The collective insistence of our mothers and fathers to get out of the house, get some exercise, and refrain from playing NES or Sega on the television only led us to seek out more video games at the convenience store down the road. Much allowance and lunch money was spent as well as hours that should have been devoted to homework among the 8 or 9 regular boys in attendance, often challenging each other to 'Best of 5' matches. I myself played Dhalsim and SubZero, and not very well, so I rarely ever made it to the 5th match. The store workers frequently kicked us out for the day only to have us return when they weren't working the counter anymore if not the next day. There is something about that which has been lost in the present day. While people can today download the latest games on Steam or PSN or in the app store on your smartphone, you can't just find arcade games in stores and restaurants like you used to be able to. And so the fun of a spontaneous 8 or 10 person multiplayer video game tournament has been confined to places like bars, pool halls, Pinballz or Dave&Busters. But in truth it was that ubiquity of arcade video games, how you could find them in any old 7-11 or Laundromat, which is what killed the original arcades of the early 1980s before the Great Crash of 1983 when home video game consoles started to catch up to what you saw in the arcade. I was born in the mid 1970s so I missed out on Pong. I was kindergarten age when the Golden Age of Arcade Games took place in the early 1980s. There used to be a place called Skateworld on Anderson Mill Road that was primarily for roller skating but had a respectable arcade in its own right. It was there that I honed my skills on the original Tron, Pac Man, Galaga, Pole Position, Defender, and so many others. In the 1980s I remember visiting all the same mall arcades as others in my age group. There was Aladdin's Castle in Barton Creek Mall, The Gold Mine in Highland, and another Gold Mine in Northcross which was eventually renamed Tilt. Westgate Mall also had an arcade but being a north austin kid I never went there until later in the mid 1990s. There were also places like Malibu Grand Prix and Showbiz Pizza and Chuck-E-Cheeze, all of which had fairly large arcades for kids which were the secondary attraction. If you're of a certain age you will remember Einsteins and LeFun on the Drag. They were there for a few decades going back way before the Slacker era. Lesser known is that the UT Student Union basement used to have an arcade that was comparable to either or both of those places. Back in the pre-9/11 days it was much easier to sneak in if you even vaguely looked like you could be a UT student. But there was another place I was too young to have experienced called Smitty's up further north on 183 at Lake Creek in the early 1980s. I never got to go there but I always heard about it from older kids at the time. It was supposed to have been two stories of wall to wall games with a small snack bar. I guess at the time it served a mostly older teen crowd from Westwood High School and for that reason younger kids my age weren't having birthday parties there. It wasn't around very long, just a few years during the Golden Age of Arcades. It is with almost-forgotten early arcades like that in mind that I wanted to share with y'all some examples of places from The Golden Age of the Video Arcade in Austin using some old Statesman articles I've found. Maybe someone of a certain age on here will remember them. I was curious what they were like, having missed out by being slightly too young to have experienced most of them first hand. I also wanted to see the original reaction to them in the press. I had a feeling there was some pushback from school/parent/civic groups on these facilities showing up in neighborhood strip malls or next to schools, and I was right to suspect. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First let's list off some places of interest. Be sure to speak up if you remember going to any of these, even if it was just for some other kid's birthday party. Unfortunately some of the only mentions about a place are reports of a crime being committed there, such as our first few examples. Forgotten Arcade #1 Fun House/Play Time Arcade - 2820 Guadalupe June 15, 1975
ARCADE ENTHUSIASM A gang fight involving 20 30 people erupted early Saturday morning in front of an arcade on Guadalupe Street. The owner of the Fun House Arcade at 282J Guadalupe told police pool cues, lug wrenches, fists and a shotgun were displayed during the flurry. Police are unsure what started the fisticuffs, but one witness at the scene said it pitted Chicanos against Anglos. During the fight the owner of the arcade said a green car stopped at the side of the arcade and witnesses reported the barrel of a shotgun sticking out. The crowd wisely scattered and only a 23-year-old man was left lying on the ground. He told police he doesn't know what happened.
ARCADE ROBBED A former employee of Play Time Arcade, 2820 Guadalupe, was charged Tuesday in connection with the Tuesday afternoon robbery of his former business. Police have issued a warrant for the arrest of Ronnie Magee, 22, of 1009 Aggie Lane, Apt. 306. Arcade attendant Sam Garner said he had played pool with the suspect an hour before the robbery. He told police the man had been fired from the business two weeks earlier. Police said a man walked in the arcade about 2:45 p m. with a blue steel pistol and took $180. Magee is charged with first degree aggravated robbery. Bond was set on the charge at $15,000.
First it was called Fun House and then renamed Play Time a year later. I'm not sure what kind of arcade games beyond Pong and maybe Asteroids they could have had at this place. The peak of the Pinball craze was supposed to be around 1979, so they might have had a few pinball machines as well. A quick search of youtube will show you a few examples of 1976 video games like Death Race. The location is next to Ken's Donuts where PokeBowl is today where the old Baskin Robbins location was for many years. Forgotten Arcade #2 Green Goth - 1121 Springdale Road May 15, 1984
A 23-year-old man pleaded guilty Monday to a January 1983 murder in East Austin and was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Jim Crowell Jr. of Austin admitted shooting 17-year-old Anthony Rodriguez in the chest with a shotgun after the two argued outside the Green Goth, a games arcade at 1121 Springdale Road, on Jan. 23, 1983. Crowell had argued with Rodriguez and a friend of Rodriguez at the arcade, police said. Crowell then went to his house, got a shotgun and returned to the arcade, witnesses said. When the two friends left the arcade, Rodriguez was shot Several weeks ago Crowell had reached a plea bargain with prosecutors for an eight-year prison term, but District Judge Bob Perkins would not accept the sentence, saying it was shorter than sentences in similar cases. After further plea bargaining, Crowell accepted the 15-year prison sentence.
I can't find anything else on Green Goth except reports about this incident with a murder there. There is at least one other report from 1983 around the time of Crowell's arrest that also refer to it as an arcade but reports the manager said the argument started over a game of pool. It's possible this place might have been more known for pool. Forgotten Arcades #3 & #4 Games, Etc. - 1302 S. First St Muther's Arcade - 2532 Guadalupe St August 23, 1983
Losing the magic touch - Video Arcades have trouble winning the money game It was going to be so easy for Lawrence Villegas, a video game junkie who thought he could make a fast buck by opening up an arcade where kids could plunk down an endless supply of quarters to play Pac-Man, Space Invaders and Asteroids. Villegas got together with a few friends, purchased about 30 video games and opened Games, Etc. at 1302 S. First St in 1980. .,--.... For a while, things, went great Kids waited in line to spend their money to drive race cars, slay dragons and save the universe. AT THE BEGINNING of 1982, however, the bottom fell out, and Villegas' revenues fell from $400 a week to $25. Today, Games, Etc. is vacant Villegas, 30, who is now working for his parents at Tony's Tortilla Factory, hasn't decided what he'll do with the building. "I was hooked on Asteroids, and I opened the business to get other people hooked, too," Villegas said. "But people started getting bored, and it wasn't worth keeping the place open. In the end, I sold some machines for so little it made me sick." VILLEGAS ISNT the only video game operator to experience hard times, video game manufacturers and distributors 'It used to be fairly common to get $300 a week from a machine. Now we rarely get more than $100 . Pac-Man's a lost cause. Six months ago, you could resell a Pac-Man machine for $1,600. Now, you're lucky to get $950 if you can find a buyer." Ronnie Roark says. In the past year, business has dropped 25 percent to 65 percent throughout the country, they say. Most predict business will get even worse before the market stabilizes. Video game manufacturers and operators say there are several reasons for the sharp and rapid decline: Many video games can now be played at home on television, so there's no reason to go to an arcade. The novelty of video games has worn off. It has been more than a decade since the first ones hit the market The decline can be traced directly to oversaturation or the market arcade owners say. The number of games in Austin has quadrupled since 1981, and it's not uncommon to see them in coin-operated laundries, convenience stores and restaurants. WITH SO MANY games to choose from, local operators say, Austinites be came bored. Arcades still take in thousands of dollars each week, but managers and owners say most of the money is going to a select group of newer games, while dozens of others sit idle. "After awhile, they all seem the same," said Dan Moyed, 22, as he relaxed at Muther's Arcade at 2532 Guadalupe St "You get to know what the game is going to do before it does. You can play without even thinking about it" Arcade owners say that that, in a nutshell, is why the market is stagnating. IN THE PAST 18 months, Ronnie Roark, owner of the Back Room at 2015 E. Riverside Drive, said his video business has dropped 65 to 75 percent Roark, . who supplied about 160 video games to several Austin bars and arcades, said the instant success of the games is what led to their demise. "The technology is not keeping up with people's demand for change," said Roark, who bought his first video game in 1972. "The average game is popular for two or three months. We're sending back games that are less than five months old." Roark said the market began dropping in March 1982 and has been declining steadily ever since. "The drop started before University of Texas students left for the summer in 1982," Roark said. "We expected a 25 percent drop in business, and we got that, and more. It's never really picked up since then. - "It used to be fairly common to get $300 a week from a machine. Now we rarely get more than $100. 1 was shocked when I looked over my books and saw how much things had dropped." TO COMBAT THE slump, Roark said, he and some arcade owners last year cut the price of playing. Even that didn't help, he said. Old favorites, such as Pac-Man, which once took in hundreds of dollars each week, he said, now make less than $3 each. "Pac-Man's a lost cause," he said. "Six months ago, you could resell a Pac-Man machine for $1,600. Now, you're lucky to get $950 if you can find a buyer." Hardest hit by the slump are the owners of the machines, who pay $3,500 to $5,000 for new products and split the proceeds with the businesses that house them. SALEM JOSEPH, owner of Austin Amusement and Vending Co., said his business is off 40 percent in the past year. Worse yet, some of his customers began returning their machines, and he's having a hard time putting them back in service. "Two years ago, a machine would generate enough money to pay for itself in six months,' said Joseph, who supplies about 250 games to arcades. "Now that same machine takes 18 months to pay for itself." As a result, Joseph said, he'll buy fewer than 15 new machines this year, down from the 30 to 50 he used to buy. And about 50 machines are sitting idle in his warehouse. "I get calls every day from people who want to sell me their machines," Joseph said. "But I can't buy them. The manufacturers won't buy them from me." ARCADE OWNERS and game manufacturers hope the advent of laser disc video games will buoy the market Don Osborne, vice president of marketing for Atari, one of the largest manufacturers of video games, said he expects laser disc games to bring a 25 percent increase in revenues next year. The new games are programmed to give players choices that may affect the outcome of the game, Os borne said. "Like the record and movie industries, the video game industry is dependent on products that stimulate the imagination," Osborne said "One of the reasons we're in a valley is that we weren't coming up with those kinds of products." THE FIRST of the laser dis games, Dragonslayer and Star Wan hit the market about two months ago. Noel Kerns, assistant manager of The Gold Mine Arcade in Northcross Mall, says the new games are responsible for a $l,000-a-week increase in revenues. Still, Kerns said, the Gold Mine' total sales are down 20 percent iron last summer. However, he remain optimistic about the future of the video game industry. "Where else can you come out of the rain and drive a Formula One race car or save the universe?" hi asked. Others aren't so optimistic. Roark predicted the slump will force half of all operators out of business and will last two more years. "Right now, we've got a great sup ply and almost no demand," Roark said. "That's going to have to change before things get- significantly better."
Well there is a lot to take from that long article, among other things, that the author confused "Dragonslayer" with "Dragon's Lair". I lol'd. Anyone who has been to Emo's East, formerly known as The Back Room, knows they have arcade games and pool, but it's mostly closed when there isn't a show. That shouldn't count as an arcade, even though the former owner Ronnie Roark was apparently one of the top suppliers of cabinet games to the area during the Golden Era. Any pool hall probably had a few arcade games at the time, too, but that's not the same as being an arcade. We also learn from the same article of two forgotten arcades: Muthers at 2522 Guadalupe where today there is a Mediterranean food restaurant, and another called Games, Etc. at 1302 S.First that today is the site of an El Mercado restaurant. But the article is mostly about showing us how bad the effects were from the crash at the end of the Golden Era. It was very hard for the early arcades to survive with increasing competition from home game consoles and personal computers, and the proliferation of the games into stores and restaurants. Forgotten Arcades #5 #6 & #7 Computer Madness - 2414 S. Lamar Blvd. Electronic Encounters - 1701 W Ben White Blvd (Southwood Mall) The Outer Limits Amusements Center - 1409 W. Oltorf March 4, 1982
'Quartermania' stalks South Austin School officials, parents worried about effects of video games A fear Is haunting the video game business. "We call it 'quartermania.' That's fear of running out of quarters," said Steve Stackable, co-owner of Computer Madness, a video game and foosball arcade at 2414 S. Lamar Blvd. The "quartermania" fear extends to South Austin households and schools, as well. There it's a fear of students running out of lunch money and classes to play the games. Local school officials and Austin police are monitoring the craze. They're concerned that computer hotspots could become undesirable "hangouts" for students, or that truancy could increase because students (high-school age and younger) will skip school to defend their galaxies against The Tempest. So far police fears have not been substantiated. Department spokesmen say that although more than half the burglaries in the city are committed by juveniles during the daytime, they know of no connection between the break-ins and kids trying to feed their video habit But school and parental worries about misspent time and money continue. The public outcry in September 1980 against proposals to put electronic game arcades near two South Austin schools helped persuade city officials to reject the applications. One proposed location was near Barton Hills Elementary School. The other was South Ridge Plaza at William Cannon Drive and South First Street across from Bedlchek Junior High School. Bedichek principal B.G. Henry said he spoke against the arcade because "of the potential attraction it had for our kids. I personally feel kids are so drawn to these things, that It might encourage them to leave the school building and play hookey. Those things have so much compulsion, kids are drawn to them like a magnet Kids can get addicted to them and throw away money, maybe their lunch money. I'm not against the video games. They may be beneficial with eye-hand coordination or even with mathematics, but when you mix the video games during school hours and near school buildings, you might be asking for problems you don't need." A contingent from nearby Pleasant Hill Elementary School joined Bedichek in the fight back in 1980, although principal Kay Beyer said she received her first formal call about the games last Week from a mother complaining that her child was spending lunch money on them. Beyer added that no truancy problems have been related to video game-playing at a nearby 7-11 store. Allen Poehl, amusement game coordinator for Austin's 7-11 stores, said company policy rules out any game-playing by school-age youth during school hours. Fulmore Junior High principal Bill Armentrout said he is working closely with operators of a nearby 7-1 1 store to make sure their policy is enforced. The convenience store itself, and not necessarily the video games, is a drawing card for older students and drop-outs, Armentrout said. Porter Junior High principal Marjorie Ball said that while video games aren't a big cause of truancy, "the money (spent on the games) is a big factor." Ball said she has made arrangements with nearby businesses to call the school it students are playing the games during school hours. "My concern is that kids are basically unsupervised, especially at the 24-hour grocery stores. That's a late hour for kids to be out. I would like to see them (games) unplugged at 10 p.m.," adds Joslin Elementary principal Wayne Rider. Several proprietors of video game hot-spots say they sympathize with the concerns of parents and school officials. No one under 18 is admitted without a parent to Chuck E. Cheese's Pizza Time Theatre at 4211 S. Lamar. That rule, says night manager David Dunagan, "keeps it from being a high school hangout. This is a family place." Jerry Zollar, owner of J.J. Subs in West Wood Shopping Center on Bee Cave Road, rewards the A's on the report cards of Eanes school district students with free video games. "It's kind of a community thing we do in a different way. I've heard from both teachers and parents . . . they thought this was a good idea," said Zollar. Electronic Encounters in Southwood Mall last year was renovated into a brightly lit arcade. "We're trying to get away from the dark, barroom-type place. We want this to be a place for family entertainment We won't let kids stay here during school hours without a written note from their parents, and we're pretty strict about that," said manager Kelly Roberts. Joyce Houston, who manages The Outer Limits amusements center at 1409 W. Oltorf St. along with her husband, said, "I wouldn't let my children go into some of the arcades I've visited. I'm a concerned parent, too. We wanted a place where the whole family could come and enjoy themselves."
Well you can see which way the tone of all these articles is going. There were some crimes committed at some arcades but all of them tended to have a negative reputation for various reasons. Parents and teachers were very skeptical of the arcades being in the neighborhoods to the point of petitioning the City Government to restrict them. Three arcades are mentioned besides Chuck-E-Cheese. Electronic Encounters in Southwood Mall, The Outer Limits amusements center at 1409 W. Oltorf, and Computer Madness, a "video game and foosball arcade" at 2414 S. Lamar Blvd. Forgotten Arcade #8 Smitty's Galaxy of Games - Lake Creek Parkway February 25, 1982
Arcades fighting negative image Video games have swept across America, and Williamson and Travis counties have not been immune. In a two-part series, Neighbor examines the effects the coin-operated machines have had on suburban and small-town life. Cities have outlawed them, religious leaders have denounced them and distraught mothers have lost countless children to their voracious appetites. And still they march on, stronger and more numerous than before. A new disease? Maybe. A wave of invading aliens from outer space? On occasion. A new type of addiction? Certainly. The culprit? Video games. Although the electronic game explosion has been mushrooming throughout the nation's urban areas for the past few years, its rippling effects have just recently been felt in the suburban fringes of North Austin and Williamson County. In the past year, at least seven arcades armed with dozens of neon quarter-snatchers have sprung up to lure teens with thundering noises and thousands of flashing seek-and-destroy commands. Critics say arcades are dens of iniquity where children fall prey to the evils of gambling. But arcade owners say something entirely different. "Everybody fights them (arcades), they think they are a haven for drug addicts. It's just not true," said Larry Grant of Austin, who opened Eagle's Nest Fun and Games on North Austin Avenue in Georgetown last September. "These kids are great" Grant said the gameroom "gives teenagers a place to come. Some only play the games and some only talk. In Georgetown, if you're from the high school, this is it." He said he's had very few disturbances, and asks "undesirables" to leave. "We've had a couple of rowdies. That's why I don't have any pool tables they tend to attract that type of crowd," Grant said. Providing a place for teens to congregate was also the reason behind Ron and Carol Smith's decision to open Smitty's Galaxy of Games on Lake Creek Parkway at the entrance to Anderson Mill. "We have three teenage sons, and as soon as the oldest could drive, it became immediately apparent that there was no place to go around here," said Ron, an IBM employee who lives in Spicewood at Balcones. "This prompted us to want to open something." The business, which opened in August, has been a huge success with both parents and youngsters. "Hundreds of parents have come to check out our establishment before allowing their children to come, and what they see is a clean, safe environment managed by adults and parents," Ron said. "We've developed an outstanding rapport with the community." Video arcades "have a reputation that we have to fight," said Carol. Kathy McCoy of Georgetown, who last October opened Krazy Korner on Willis Street in Leander, agrees. "We've got a real good group of kids," she said. "There's no violence, no nothing. Parents can always find their kids at Krazy Korner." While all the arcade owners contacted reported that business is healthy, if not necessarily lucrative, it's not as easy for video entrepreneurs to turn a profit as one might imagine. A sizeable investment is required. Ron Smith paid between $2,800 and $5,000 for each of the 30 electronic diversions at his gameroom. Grant said his average video game grosses about $50 a week, and his "absolute worst" game, Armor Attack, only $20 a week. The top machines (Defender and Pac-Man) can suck in an easy $125 a week. That's a lot of quarters, 500 to be exact but the Eagle's Nest and Krazy Korner pass half of them on to Neelley Vending Company of Austin which rents them their machines. "At 25 cents a shot, it takes an awful lot of people to pay the bills," said Tom Hatfield, district manager for Neelley. He added that an owner's personality and the arcade's location can make or break the venture. The game parlor must be run "by an understanding person, someone with patience," Hatfield said. "They cannot be too demanding on the kids, yet they can't let them run all over them." And they must be located in a spot "with lots of foot traffic," such as a shopping center or near a good restaurant, he said. "And being close to a school really helps." "Video games are going to be here permanently, but we're going to see some operations not going because of the competition," which includes machines in virtually every convenience store and supermarket, Hatfield said.
This article talks about three arcades. One in Georgetown called Eagles Nest, another in Leander called Krazy Korner, and a third called Smitty's Galaxy of Games on Lake Creek Parkway "on the fringes of North Austin". This is the one I remember the older kids talking about when I was a little kid. There was once a movie theater across the street from the Westwood High School football stadium and behind that was Smitty's. Today I think the building was bulldozed long ago and the space is part of the expanded onramp to 183 today. Eventually another unrelated arcade was built next to the theater that became Alamo Lakeline. It was another site of some unrecorded epic Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat tournaments in the 90s. But the article written before the end of the Golden Era tell us much about the pushback I was talking about earlier. Early arcades were seen as "dirty" places in some circles, and the owners of the arcades in Williamson County had to stress how "clean" their establishments were. This other article from a couple of weeks later tells of how area school officials weren't worried about video games and tells us more arcades in Round Rock and Cedar Park. Apparently the end of the golden age lasted a bit longer than usual in this area. At some point in the next few years the bubble burst, and places like Smitty's were gone by the late 80s. But the distributors quoted earlier were right that arcade games weren't going completely away. In the mid 1980s LeFun opened up next in the Scientology building at 2200 Guadalupe on the drag. Down a few doors past what used be a coffee shop and a CVS was Einsteins Arcade. Both of those survived into the 21st century. I remember the last time I was at Einsteins I got my ass beat in Tekken by a kid half my age. heheh That's all for today. There were no Bonus Pics in the UT archive of arcades (other than the classical architectural definition). I wanted to pass on some Bonus newspaper articles (remember to click and zoom in with the buttons on the right to read) about Austin arcades anyway but first a small story. I mentioned earlier the secret of the UT Student Union. I have no idea what it looks like now but in the 90s there was a sizable arcade in with the bowling alley in the basement. Back in 1994 when I used to sneak in, they featured this bizarre early attempt at virtual reality games. I found an old Michael Barnes Statesman article about it dated February 11, 1994. Some highlights:
Hundreds of students and curiosity-seekers lined up at the University of Texas Union to play three to five minutes of Dactyl Nightmare, Flying Aces or V-Tol, three-dimensional games from Kramer Entertainment. Nasty weather delayed the unloading of four huge trunks containing the machines, which resemble low pulpits. Still, players waited intently for a chance to shoot down a fighter jet, operate a tilt-wing Harrier or tangle with a pterodactyl. Today, tickets will go on sale in the Texas Union lobby at 11:30 a.m. for playing slots between noon and 6 p.m. Players, fitted with full helmets, throttles and power packs, stood on shiny gray and yellow platforms surrounded by a circular guard rail. Seen behind the helmet's goggles were computer simulated landscapes, not unlike the most sophisticated video games, with controls and enemies viewed in deep space. "You're on a platform waiting to fight a human figure," said Jeff Vaughn, 19, of Dactyl Nightmare. "A pterodactyl swoops down and tries to pick you up. You have to fight it off. You are in the space and can see your own body and all around you. But if you try to walk, you have to use that joy stick to get around." "I let the pterodactyl carry me away so I could look down and scan the board," said Tom Bowen of the same game. "That was the way I found out where the other player was." "Yeah, it's cool just to stand there and not do anything," Vaughn said. The mostly young, mostly male crowd included the usual gaming fanatics, looking haggard and tense behind glasses and beards. A smattering of women and children also pressed forward in a line that snaked past the lobby and into the Union's retail shops. "I don't know why more women don't play. Maybe because the games are so violent," said Jennifer Webb, 24, a psychology major whose poor eyesight kept her from becoming a fighter pilot in real life. "If the Air Force won't take me, virtual reality will." "They use stereo optics moving at something like 60 frames a second," said computer science major Alex Aquila, 19. "The images are still pretty blocky. But once you play it, you'll want to play it again and again." With such demand for virtual reality, some gamesters wondered why an Austin video arcade has not invested in at least one machine.
The gameplay looked like this. Bonus Article #1 - "Video fans play for own reasons" (Malibu Grand Prix) - March 11, 1982 Bonus Article #2 - "Pac-Man Cartridge Piques Interest" - April 13, 1982 Bonus Article #3 - "Video Games Fail Consumer" - January 29, 1984 Bonus Article #4 - "Nintendoholics/Modems Unite" - January 25, 1989 Bonus Article #5 and pt 2 "Two girls missing for a night found at arcade" (truly dedicated young gamers) - August 7, 2003
i'm starting to feel like modern Yugioh is a clown car, and every time the banlist apprehends the first few clowns that lead the format, 4-5 more step out to take their place. we didn't even have Linkross in handcuffs yet before VFD took the wheel and Vanity's Ruler got into the passenger seat. happy new year
This post will give recommendations for decks that can generally do well while generally remaining in the $50 to $150 price range.
Estimated pricing includes a sample completed main deck and some or all of an extra deck, but no side.
Pricing is based mainly on singles and you can easily save a lot of money by buying cores for most of these lists all at once.
Decks were chosen usually based on having some degree of success in recent TCG formats.
These deck choices and rankings are heavily based on online tournaments such as Konami's Remote Duel Invitationals, LCS, and other assorted online events.
Performance on DuelingBook's ranked ladder also slightly factors in to the placement of these decks, with data taken from Ygoscope.
Many decklists will include some middle-range power cards that might drive the price point up, which can be cut for players on an extreme budget. For instance, a set of Ash is $25-30 currently, but Ash is included in many of these lists as a generic staple that players might already own.
Conversely, decklists are oftentimes easily upgraded by adding power cards such as Forbidden Droplet and Triple Tactics Talent.
Decks are grouped into four "tiers" and listed alphabetically by tier. Decklists are built prioritizing simplicity and effectiveness on a budget. Not all of them are perfect, but this post is not an F. Unless there is a particularly offensive deckbuilding error that you want to point out, please don't use this thread to nitpick at the sample decklists. Don't feel obligated to stick to the sample lists either; you should experiment and play cards that feel comfortable and/or optimal to you. Feel free to leave suggestions for budget players, whether it's a budget tech choice for one of the decks on this list or whether it's a different deck that you think can compete in the coming months. [Last updated: 23 Jan 2021] Previous version: October 2020 Post
S Tier
The best bang for your buck. Decks in this category have the capacity to top premier events, though they're almost always supplemented with expensive power cards.
New Ritual-based combo deck from Genesis Impact that has a lot of recursion from the Graveyard, boasting a strong grind game as well as potent turn 1 boards that can win the game outright.
The level 1 Drytron cards tribute other Drytron cards or Ritual cards in hand/field, so this deck abuses Cyber Angel Benten's lack of a once per turn clause to gain a ton of resources and search a lot of power LIGHT Fairy cards, such as Herald of Orange Light and Vanity's Ruler.
Drytron Nova is an automatic 3-of inclusion in every competitive version of this deck, but also currently sits at around $40 each in NA. Novas are a massive boost in consistency, though the deck is honestly still playable without it, and is quite cheap otherwise. With even one copy of Nova, you should look to also include three copies of Drytron Fafnir (their Field Spell) which can search Nova as well.
The absence of Nova + Fafnir from the main leaves a lot of space to be filled. There are many ways you can go about this.
The sample list plays a small Pre-Prep engine with Herald of Perfection. It's very simple to play, especially if you're unfamiliar with the deck, and helps raise your overall ceiling - athough optimized competitive builds have generally moved away from Pre-Prep.
Another viable Ritual engine is the Megalith engine, which provides numerous options. These variants generally also suffer from consistency issues, made worse by the lack of Novas in the budget version. Less consistent access to Alpha means less consistent usage of extra Ritual monsters.
You could play cards that search Drytron monsters in an attempt to patch up consistency. Examples include Where Arf Thou, or normal summons that fetch Drytrons such as Cyber Dragon Core (getting Emergency) and Mathematician. Also viable is Neo-Spacian Aqua Dolphin, which is an interesting tech in Drytron that helps you beat handtraps like Droll & Lock Bird.
Finally, you can always just play more handtraps or generic power cards.
This deck is a relatively new deck, and is getting support in Lightning Overdrive, which might indicate that it's relatively safe from the next banlist. However, there's no telling what Konami will do, so don't take my word as gospel.
Combo deck with an extra deck toolbox, using Synchro and Xyz monsters to break boards or to win the game with True King of All Calamities and their recurring boss monster, Shenshen. The Virtual World monsters have a shared restriction which means that Link monsters are usually not played in this deck at all.
Most of the main deck VW monsters can dump other VW cards from Deck to GY, and their continuous spell Qinglong is a searcher in the GY. Combined with Virtual World Mai-Hime - Lulu's ability to search for VW cards as well, the deck is consistent at doing the same combos and executing its gameplan almost every game, as most combinations of 2 Virtual World cards result in some type of combo.
Despite being one of the top decks in the format, this deck is also quite cheap. Staples aside, the most pricey card in the main is Lulu at around $18-20 each. Can you get away with fewer copies of her? Probably, but you really want to get 3 due to Desires, and her being one of the best cards in your deck.
Saw success immediately after PHRA release, even in the previous combo-infested format where Virtual World took the most representation and top cut spots at LCS 8, eventually winning the entire tournament. Post-banlist, they also took the most top cut spots and then won LCS 9, versus an entirely different playing field full of Zoodiac, Drytron, and Eldlich variants.
Recent combos using Chaofeng, Phantom of the Yang Zing to search either one of the Virtual World tuners (Lulu or Laolao) have opened up some new combo routes that make Foolish Burial Goods a lot more forgiving to play, allowing you to still end on impressive boards despite using Qinglong somewhat suboptimally. On the other hand, Chaofeng's price also spiked quite heavily after LCS 9, so you may not want to play it.
Non-budget players will first and foremost want to add Zeus to the Extra Deck, as it helps greatly with going second and also dealing with threats like Dragoon. Another common inclusion is Triple Tactics Talents, though this card is by no means mandatory in the deck, and has also seen a decline in popularity lately.
A Tier
Strong decks, but limited either by a lack of access to powerful staples or by the natural ceiling of the deck. You could still top a regional with one of these decks on a good day.
Control + backrow deck with incredible recursion and the ability to come back from almost no resources
Altergeist have seen sparse success ever since FLOD, and are a respectable budget contender. They've have had a fairly modest showing online, and saw recent success with a top 8 finish at LCS 9. That deck was a Dogmatika variant piloted by Lars Junginger, playing the recently released Artemis, the Magistus Moon Maiden to make it slightly easier to summon Ecclesia in some hands.
The Dogmatika engine is viable even on a modest budget. It's possible to simply play Dogmatika Punishment as a powerful trap capable of utilizing your extra deck, and even a single copy of Ecclesia (around $20 each right now) goes a long way for improving the power of this package. Of course, the deck is also perfectly playable as pure Altergeist.
Budget players are most hurt by a lack of Pot of Extravagance, Infinite Impermanence, and Evenly Matched. The first three of these cards have reprints, but none are quite cheap enough yet to be easily accessible on a budget.
The extra deck is extremely flexible (as Altergeist are typically played with Extravagance, anyway) and several options are simply tech cards, such as Elder Entity N'tss.
Main deck trap choices are also extremely flexible. Torrential is quite powerful against Virtual World, but this could easily be swapped out for many other cards depending on your budget, available card pool, and locals demographics.
The release of Blazing Vortex in early February also brings along an incredibly powerful staple card in Pot of Prosperity. Altergeist, along with virtually every other deck that enjoys running Pot of Extravagance currently, will appreciate Prosperity as well. Many OCG decks are choosing to play both Extrav + Prosperity in their decklists. Of course, Prosperity is also a Secret Rare, and is virtually guaranteed to be around $100, so this is not applicable on a budget.
Floaty combo/control deck with 4 maindeck Prank-Kids that all float into any other Prank-Kid when used for a Link or Fusion summon
Got a great boost in Phantom Rage with Prank-Kids Meow-Meow-Mu, a Link 1 Prank-Kid monster that makes this deck incredibly consistent and turns any single Prank monster into full combo.
Prank-Kids Place is a little pricey, currently sitting at around $17 per copy in NA. While it contributes to your overall consistency (as it's equivalent to any Prank name), you can definitely get away with cutting copies of Place if your budget is tight.
Notably took 1st place at the Canadian Remote Duel Invitational in mid-January, piloted by Hanko Chow.
This deck appreciates the inclusion of Predaplant Verte Anaconda (currently over $30 apiece in NA) which can dump Thunder Dragon Fusion to help field Battle Butler, your main win condition. It was dropped from the provided list for budget reasons, but it's a great inclusion if you have a copy already. In conjunction with cards like Link Spider, it also improves your ability to play through disruption and through Nibiru.
This deck has many characteristics of a great deck, but suffers from similar problems as Zoodiac in that it struggles to play through disruption on your normal summon, or cards like Ash negating your first Prank-Kid effect. The inclusion of Polymerization in the main deck helps to combat this, but also popular are builds that don't play Poly at all and instead just load the main deck with handtraps and powerful staples like Forbidden Droplet.
Pot of Desires is included in this example main deck to help boost consistency and overall power, but some players opt not to run it.
Link-based midrange deck with a lot of recursion and a special in-archetype technique, where 1 Link Monster is used as the entire Link material to summon another copy of that monster, granting bonus effects
The deck is somewhat halfway between control and combo, establishing respectable boards turn 1 with a fairly compact engine, allowing many handtraps to be played. Their real strength comes in turn 3 and beyond, where their arsenal of free summons from the GY, coupled with their stellar resource recycling, easily overwhelm the opponent.
The majority of the deck is dirt cheap and is mostly able to be built with commons from SOFU+SAST supplementing 3 copies of Structure Deck: Soulburner.
Accesscode Talker is a huge part of this deck's success, able to steal games easily with the help of Update Jammer. Accesscode is not at all affordable on a budget, so the sample list plays Zeroboros instead. Owning one copy of Accesscode is a tremendous improvement to this deck's strength.
Salamangreat has found little competitive success in bigger online tournaments this format, but still regularly performs well in smaller events, remote duel locals, and the like. It's also a fairly safe choice, as it's somewhat unlikely we see further Salamangreat hits on the next banlist.
The provided list plays Rivalry + Strike, a potent option allowing you to sometimes win games even into established boards. Strike is quite solid in the current format, as even the combo decks don't usually end on ways to punish a lot of set backrow.
Parallel eXceed is an optional card, and can be cut in favor of more backrow or handtraps. On one hand, it allows you to more easily link climb when going second, and can easily add a Dweller or Bagooska to your board going first (Dweller is very good right now, as well). On the other hand, players may prefer to run more defensive cards instead of eXceed.
Subterrors are a control deck with a focus on flipping monsters face-down and generating constant advantage with Subterror Guru.
Pure Guru control is the most played variant, and is more or less a stun deck that tries to abuse Guru as much as possible. While most Guru lists online are Numeron and/or Dragoon hybrids, the pure version saw some success earlier this format at the Benelux Remote Duel Extravaganza, finishing top 4. You can watch that deck profile here, and the sample list is generally based off of that list.
While Dragoon isn't budget-friendly, the Numeron engine is very accessible for little cost, and is a viable variant of this deck as well. Numeron cards aim to make Number S0: Utopic ZEXAL going first or simply OTK going second. S0 is an extremely powerful card that can prevent the opponent from playing the game entirely if it resolves. If you are interested in this version, you can check the Subterror list on the previous budget post.
The sample list doesn't have a complete extra deck, mainly because it doesn't play Extravagance and you barely go into the Extra Deck to begin with. Relinquished Anima is a decent option if you can shell out the $7-8 for it, since sometimes you can turn Fiendess into Anima. Apart from that, provided Extra Deck options include anti-Maximus cards for the Dogmatika matchup, and Aussa + Zoodiac Drident in case you face a Zoodiac player. Taking their Zoo monster and then slapping your Drident on top can be potent.
This deck usually plays Extravagance over Desires, but Desires is quite a serviceable replacement. Similarly to Altergeist, this deck also enjoys Pot of Prosperity post-BLVO.
B Tier
Like the above category, but generally weaker, less consistent, and/or impacted harder by a lack of access to a certain card(s).
Dinosaurs are an aggressive deck with consistent access to Evolzar Laggia/Dolkka and Ultimate Conductor Tyranno, a formidable boss monster with incredible OTK power and disruption.
Dinosaur's strength tends to be largely meta-dependent, particularly how well it can counter the existing top decks. During the previous two combo-infested formats with decks like Dragon Link and Adamancipator running around, Dinos had several extremely impressive showing at events, such as TeamSamuraiX1's win at the first NA Remote Duel Invitational, as well as all three first-place players at LCS 7 (a 3v3 event) playing Dino.
In the current format, Dinosaurs are struggling. The Virtual World matchup is difficult, and it's hard for Dinosaur to build to beat all of VW, Drytron, Eldlich variants, and the plethora of rogue decks running around. Additionally, Mystic Mine is not very potent this format as both Virtual World and Eldlich have in-engine outs to the card, which is another blow to the Dinosaur strategy. Finally, the popularity of handtraps like Skull Meister and Artifact Lancea in the side or even the main deck are also reasons this deck has declined.
The provided variant still plays Mine, as it has utility breaking boards. Deckout is a much less reliable strategy against VW and Eldlich, but you can still stall for some turns until you can make a push for game. The addition of Cosmic Cyclone is also an attempt at neutering cards like Chuche and Conquistador.
If you wanted to build this deck without Mines, you would have to find replacements for quite a few cards (and frankly, Dinosaur does not have very many good ones). Most power staples are not budget, such as Lightning Storm, Talents, Droplet, etc. This deck also really appreciates Pot of Extravagance, which still sits barely out of budget range at around $25 each in NA.
Budget Dino must also deal with the lack of Animadorned Archosaur, an extremely powerful addition to the deck that opens up many new combos. However, sitting at around $60 per copy, the card is inaccessible on a budget.
The provided list plays the Simorgh combo, bringing out the WIND barrier statue on turn 1 to steal games. Though a full extra deck is provided, very few cards are actually needed, as the deck typically plays Extravagance anyway.
Dragon Link is a Link-centric combo deck that was a dominant force in the meta for about half a year, but lost a lot of resilience and power with the recent bans to Linkross and Dragon Buster Destruction Sword.
The provided budget version of this deck actually has a ton of extra deck flexibility due to not needing to play Synchro/Link cards related to the Halq/Kross package, meaning that you can play Knightmares, anti-Dogmatika cards, etc. This also means that the budget version doesn't actually care about the Linkross ban at all.
This deck has seen a great deal of variation online, playing a variety of different engines and tech cards. A few of these include Vylon Cube + Smoke Grenade, the Rose Dragons, several different Dragonmaid cards, and even an FTK variant involving Earthbound Immortal Aslla piscu. However, few of these are viable for budget players, especially if you do not own a copy of Halqifibrax.
An interesting option the deck has is to use Union Carrier to equip handtraps such as Artifact Lancea. On the opponent's turn, Hieratic Seal can be used to return the handtrap to your hand, making it live immediately. This is something you may want to consider in the main deck if you frequently have to deal with decks like Virtual World and Dinosaur. Another option is to equip Ally of Justice Cycle Reader to Carrier (they're both machines) and then bounce it to hand, as a weapon against Drytron. Carrier isn't in the example list, but this is a really interesting option to consider.
With Linkross out of the picture, playing Fibrax alone is an option if you either already own a copy or can afford the $20 needed to obtain one. You may have to retool your combos to incorporate Fiber, but the card can definitely add flexibility and resilience to your deck if you use it well.
Backrow-heavy control deck that summons its Traps to the field as monsters and pressures the opponent with Toadally Awesome
After being absent from the budget post for about a year, Paleo makes its triumphant return as its boss monster, Toad, returns to 3. Toad's reprint in Maximum Gold also brought this card down from $20 each to just a few bucks, making the entire deck extremely cheap.
As a control deck, Paleo suffers from more weaknesses compared to Eldlich, Altergeist, and Subterror. Notably, the engine tends to bleed advantage unless you've managed to maintain access to Swap Frog, and you can be quickly outpaced by stronger decks. However, in games where you can establish a Toad early, or where you can maintain control with your backrow, you can do quite well.
Paleo saw a surprising amount of success in various remote duel events this format, though some of that success is likely due to the format being unexplored and some sort of "new toy syndrome" as Toad recently went from 2 to 3.
Paleo struggles to out Dragoon, especially without access to Ice Dragon's Prison, a $40 card. An interesting option catching on in the meta lately is the use of Mirror Force cards, particularly Quaking and Storming, as they both pressure Dragoon. Still, the card puts quite a lot of pressure on this deck.
Speaking of Dragoon, some Paleo players opt to play that package in this deck as well. Swap Frog is a one card Dragoon as you can simply dump Ronin, turn Swap into Almiraj, and then revive Ronin to make Verte from there.
Fiend Griefing is presented as an interesting option which is very decent in the current meta, particularly vs Drytron. Combining it with Absolute King Back Jack is a classic combo that Paleo played a long time ago in 2017, during early Zoo formats.
Price: $100+, can be closer to $50 with fewer copies of Schism Imgur | DuelingBook
Classic Fusion-based archetype from 2014, debuting in Duelist Alliance. Somewhat of a midrange combo deck that can slow the game down with El Shaddoll Winda or be very aggressive with El Shaddoll Construct
Winda is a troublesome floodgate that many decks struggle to out, especially combo decks such as Drytron. Shaddoll cards are currently played in several Dogmatika variants due to the sheer power of Winda and the utility of Shaddoll Schism.
The current meta is favorable for Shaddoll not only due to Winda being effective vs Drytron, but also due to Ariel being very strong against a large chunk of the format, including Eldlich variants. Her ability to banish 3 cards from the GY is so strong that some decks are splashing in Sinister Shadow Games + Ariel just for that option, which we saw played in some of the 60-card Eldlich decks at LCS 9.
The growing popularity of Shaddoll cards has also caused Shaddoll Schism to go up in price substantially. Currently, it's around $17, but it may continue to rise.
The deck's biggest problem has always been its inability to consistently resolve a fusion spell on turn 1. Invoked Shaddoll was a popular hybrid in earlier formats, but with the release of the Magistus archetype in GEIM, Shaddolls got access to Rilliona and Magistus Invocation. This is an improvement since Magistus Invocation can fuse from hand and field whereas the regular Invocation can only fuse from hand when summoning Shaddolls. Additionally, Artemis provides a super convenient way for the deck to turn any Shaddoll into a LIGHT monster, which is important for summoning Construct.
While the full Dogmatika package is very expensive due to Nadir Servant being a $75 card, one option is to play just one copy of Ecclesia (around $20) along with Maximus and a playset of Dogmatika Punishment. Maximus and Punishment have a ton of synergy in the Shaddoll deck in conjunction with Apkallone's GY effect, and this combination is deadly even on a budget.
Other normal summons such as Mathematician and even Gale Dogra are potent on this deck, and can be played in addition to Rilliona or as a replacement for her. Yet another option is to run 1 copy of the now-cheap Eldlich the Golden Lord as a LIGHT monster for Shaddoll Fusion that can easily revive itself.
Another popular variant is a very trap-heavy list, sometimes cutting the Magistus cards entirely. PAK and SirEmanon's YouTube channels both have their own takes on this, if you're interested.
Floaty destruction-based archetype that generates advantage when its cards are destroyed, enabling its gimmick of using your opponent's monsters to Link Summon.
Can be built to go first or to go second quite effectively. Since going second is very difficult this format, the provided list aims to go first, playing a bunch of trap cards.
Fairly modest online performance, doing alright at smaller events and more recently finishing top 8 at the second YuGiJoe online series as well as occasional Luxury events. After the December banlist, Unchained has rapidly gained popularity in online remote duel events, and is one of the more prominent rogue decks this format. This success could be because the format is generally slower compared to previous ones, and many destruction-based cards such as Torrential Tribute are very popular currently, which this deck enjoys.
Mega-Tin reprints of Abomination's Prison as well as their Link 2 have helped make this deck a great deal more affordable. I:P Masquerena being more affordable is also a nice boost, though it's by no means essential in this deck.
This deck's best weapon is its opponents being unprepared for it. Playing improperly into backrow or Unchained floats can very quickly be fatal. It also matches up decently into some backrow decks as well as Dogmatika variants, which rely on destruction-based removal from Dogmatika Punishment and Elder Entity N'tss.
C Tier
Decks in this category have the capability to be just as good as the ones above at times, but often tend to suffer from multiple problems including consistency and power.
Versatile control-based Graveyard toolbox deck that has been swinging in and out of meta relevance since its release way back in 2014.
Gradually got more and more cards back from the banlist, with Cir and Graff being unlimited on the December 2020 list. The deck is now more or less "full power" with the exception of Beatrice, who is still limited.
The deck aims to establish Beatrice on turn 1 backed up with trap cards. The BA cards as well as Beatrice are extremely floaty, so this deck can put up quite a fight in grind games. Fiend Griefing is a solid card in the current meta, and is excellent in the Burning Abyss deck as you can send Farfa for further disruption, Graff/Scarm for followup, or Back Jack for more traps.
This deck was frequently mixed with Phantom Knight cards back in 2016 (often called PK Fire). Nowadays, Phantom Knight decks are typically either built pure or with an extremely compact BA engine. While it's possible to play a more dedicated hybrid build, the release of PK Torn Scales combined with most key BA cards being unlimited means that it's just better to focus on one or the other.
Many other options are playable - Desires for draw power, playing more traps, more handtraps, etc. Consider Needle Ceiling over Torrential as it can be harder to pull off, but combos better with Trap Trick. Players with access to Ice Dragon's Prison should play it, and adventurous duelists can even opt to play Fire Lake of the Burning Abyss.
As a deck easily capable of churning out Rank 3 Xyzs, you also have easy access to Divine Arsenal AA-ZEUS Sky Thunder, one of the most powerful extra deck cards in the format. If this is an accessible option, it should be played.
Spell-heavy control deck that usually maintains only one monster on the field at a time, in the extra monster zone.
Formerly an extremely dominant control deck, modern-day Striker no longer accrues infinite resources through resolving Engage multiple times, but instead is easily able to kill you with an Accesscode Talker push after whittling down your LP and resources for a turn or two. The standard combo involves laddering from Halqifibrax -> Selene -> Accesscode and then dismantling your opponent's board before swinging for game.
You may have noticed a problem: if you're on a budget, you can't use Accesscode. This is a pretty big blow to the deck's overall strength. Some players opt for alternatives such as the Utopia Double package, which Zoé Weber played in the second EU Remote Duel Invitational last format. Another option is to simply not run it at all, and close games the old-fashioned way.
In previous formats, this deck was oftentimes played like an anti-meta going second deck, packing tons of removal cards and usually 3 copies of Mystic Mine in the main deck. In the current format, this strategy is a lot more difficult due to several factors - it's very hard to go second this format in general, and Mine is a lot less effective vs the top decks right now.
Instead, the sample list plays a going-first strategy with powerful trap cards like There Can Be Only One and Solemn Strike. It's possible to build this deck to go second, but you'd probably want to play board breakers instead of trap cards, and potentially also maindeck PSY-Framegear Gamma.
Yet another way to play this deck involves (surprise) Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon and multiple copies of Red-Eyes Fusion. Instead of using cards like Widow Anchor and Afterburners to muscle through disruption and stick a Mystic Mine on the field, you use them to get to your Dragoon and either win the game immediately or put yourself in a position where your opponent can't play through the Dragoon disrupt.
Roze is the most expensive card in this list. If your budget is tight, you can definitely cut her down to 1.
Xyz-focused deck with a gimmick allowing you to use any one Zoodiac as the entire Xyz material requirement for another Zoodiac. This lets you stack Zoo Xyz monsters on top of each other, making use of their effects.
Plays a compact engine combined with around 20 slots dedicated to handtraps, traps, and draw power. This deck is also commonly played as a hybrid deck, oftentimes with Eldlich and sometimes with Dogmatika cards. Both of these options are quite expensive, so they are not shown.
The deck's strength in competitive play comes almost entirely from Divine Arsenal AA-ZEUS Sky Thunder, an extremely powerful Xyz monster that Zoodiac can effortlessly make due to Zoodiac Boarbow. Zoo is also easily able to summon Zeus with many materials, allowing it to repeatedly nuke the board.
Budget Zoo without Zeus is extremely weak by comparison. Relying solely on Drident + handtraps is not a reliable win condition, so cards like Parallel eXceed and Pot of Avarice are included in the sample list to give this deck a boost. While Megaclops is a troublesome boss monster in some matchups, the big three decks (Drytron, Virtual World, and Eldlich) generally don't have much trouble dealing with it.
Even with Zeus, the deck has been struggling in the current competitive meta. Noteworthy is its performance at LCS 9, where out of a whopping 51 Zoodiac variants that entered the tournament, only 1 survived until top 16.
Up-And-Coming
Decks to watch out for, oftentimes due to recent online success or new support being announced. Some might also be decks that could potentially be on the main body of the post, but need a little more time to prove themselves.
Link-focused deck that plays a variety of Beast, Beast-Warrior, and Winged Beast monsters. The maindeck Tri-Brigades cheat out powerful Link monsters, provided your GY is set up. This deck also trivially access the Simorgh link, which can sometimes seal games on its own through the WIND Barrier Statue.
In the current format, Tri-Brigade has seen fairly sparse success, usually mixed with Zoodiac. However, BLVO gives us Tri-Brigade Kitt, a great boost to this deck and a fantastic combo piece.
Further support in LIOV and beyond is also very promising, making this deck a potentially solid investment for the future.
The Tri-Brigade core is currently quite cheap, but this could change in the future depending on hype and the market.
Control deck with an extremely powerful Link 1 monster, Traptrix Sera, that pumps out constant advantage.
The sample list incorporates a very small Dogmatika engine. Dogmatika Punishment itself is very cheap, and is one of the best generic traps in the game right now. Just 1 copy of Ecclesia (around $20) provides a substantial power boost to this mini-engine, as dumping one copy of Titaniklad with Punishment and grabbing an Ecclesia for next turn is extremely powerful. Another option is to dump El Shaddoll Apkallone, then adding and discarding Ariel in order to trigger her effect and banish 3 cards, which is insane value.
If you can't get Ecclesia, you could simply play just Punishment as a generic trap. Another option is to play pure Traptrix, incorporating more power traps/handtraps, and quite frequently the Utopia Double package as well.
Pirate archetype with ridiculous recursion and a unique tag-out and equip mechanic based on Attributes being used in the game.
The pirates become equips for one of (currently) three Patrollships, extra deck monsters that can all discard Plunder Patroll cards in hand to fuel powerful effects. The ships become stronger when manned (equipped with) a Plunder card, with bonuses such as ignition effects becoming quick effects, or being able to replace the discarded card with a new one from the deck.
Many Plunder lists play Forbidden Droplet, as it has great synergy with the cards. Without Droplet, you could fill the space with several different options. This deck chooses to play the Undine package, but you can also go for cards like Foolish Burial Goods, Salvage, Silent Angler, Tenyi Spirit - Shthana, Toadally Awesome + Bahamut Shark, or just more generic staples.
This deck is getting at least one more support card in LIOV, that being Ravenwing. Many people speculate that they'll also get another Patrollship of a new attribute, which would be a huge buff to the deck.
Honorable Mentions
Megalith, Madolche, Pendulum decks, Cyber Dragon, Orcust, Mermail Atlantean, Magical Musketeers, Crusadia (Guardragon), ABC, D/D, Generaider, and more - Decks that are fairly decent but have been left off of the post to make room for other decks that have seen more recent success or have fewer budget resources online.
Dragonmaid, Eldlich, Infernoid, Invoked variants, HERO, etc - Decks that are pretty good but are sorta in limbo due to some expensive individual cards, such as Chamber Dragonmaid, Cursed Eldland, Invocation, etc.
Cubics, Phantasm, Chain Burn, Evilswarm, Yosenju, Dinomist, and much, much more - Unfortunately, there is not enough room to cover every single decent, super-cheap deck.
I hope to keep this post updated for the foreseeable future. Feel free to leave any comments or suggestions.
Live maintenance schedule may change. We will update you if any changes occur.
PUBG GLOBAL INVITATIONAL.S
https://preview.redd.it/d8anlqj7q6c61.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=c44c416ae857b6538948813afcb21dc6827640d8 Are you ready for the new PGI.S? The PUBG Global Invitational.S sets teams from around the world against each other in a week-long tournament. Teams will battle for placements in weekly tournaments and rack up prize money as the overall tournament goes on. There’s a new Pick’em Challenge available as well, giving you a chance to earn sweet PGI.S gear for predicting the winners. This will be a tournament unlike any other, so tune in, pick’em, and win!
PGI.S Lobby Update
PGI.S themed lobby has been updated for the normal match with kickass BGM.
Other PGI.S Related Updates
PGI.S logo graffiti has been painted around the buildings of Erangel and Miramar.
Starting plane will be dragging PGI.S promo banners in Erangel, Miramar, Sanhok, Vikendi and Karakin.
New PGI.S loading screen splash art has been added.
Due to performance issues, digital screens on Erangel and Miramar will not be supported on console platforms.
https://preview.redd.it/jnuthi8fq6c61.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=8749893203dbf5c0347d3f56849499680db4b017 Keeping in-game interactions healthy is important to us. We know passions can run high on the Battlegrounds, but toxic behaviour is never justified. To help keep things more civil while you kill each other, we’re introducing a new Reputation System to PUBG. This system will assign you a Reputation Level from 0-5 depending on how you treat your fellow players. Your Reputation Level will be displayed in the Team Finder, giving players searching for a group an idea of what kind of teammate you’ll be. Your Reputation Level will naturally increase as you play games, as long as you are not exhibiting toxic or otherwise disruptive behaviour. We hope this helps everyone have a better time on the Battlegrounds! https://preview.redd.it/wvkyk8eiq6c61.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=2d6d0031e48fadb8618f0ec7f3e58bfa91b3659e New reputation level will be displayed next to the players IGN.
Reputation level designates whether a player is well-mannered or toxic towards others.
Reputation level will be displayed in the Team Finder and team member list next to player IGN.
Reputation levels range from 0 to 5, for a total of 6 levels.
Players reputation level will naturally increase with normal gameplay of Normal/Ranked Battleroyale matches.
Leaving a match repeatedly failing to return may lead to a decrease of reputation level.
Player’s reputation level can be decreased when reported with negative behaviour (obstructing gameplay, verbal abuse, team killing, etc.) or when banned due to violation of terms of service.
Being reported for suspected use of cheats itself does not affect reputation level.
01/21 2021 After live server maintenance – 01/25 2021 4 PM KST
01/20 2021 After live server maintenance – 01/24 2021 11 PM PST
01/21 2021 After live server maintenance – 01/25 2021 8 AM CET
Arena Mode – 2nd Iteration Changes
Perspective – TPP
Only available in TPP.
Changes in default pistol
Changed default pistol to P18C.
For the first Arena Mode, we received feedback that players with the default P1911 pistol did not stand a chance against players with purchased weapons. As such, we’ve replaced it with the P18C, which comes with an auto-fire mode.
Loadout store improvements
Adjusted the amount of ammo given when purchasing a weapon.
Increased helmet price, which is now higher than the vest.
Starting from Round Four, weapons purchased from the loadout store will include attachments.
Players on a winning streak will earn bonus rewards accordingly and the teams who don’t lose any chances before the final round will be rewarded with an upgraded loadout store which has the following items:
Care Package items.
Special consumables like Adrenaline Syringe and the First Aid Kits.
Pistols and shotguns can now be found under the same category.
Loadout point balance adjustment
Reduced points earned for a kill from 150 to 100.
Reduced end of round points earned (both win/lose).
Since squads with fewer players are at a disadvantage, they will earn more kill points depending on their squad size.
Considering player feedback on how hard it is to win the next round after losing your items upon defeat, you’ll now get a small bonus to help you rebuy the gear you need.
UX improvements
To help reduce confusion during combat, we’re disabling kill feed messages from the other arenas, so now only events within your current arena will be shown.
There were quite a few players leaving the game after losing their first chance, thinking the game was over. We’ve added a message to let players know they’re still in it!
When starting a new round, map features such as zoom option and markers will revert to default.
Addition of the reporting system
Players in spectate mode can now report other players for cheating or behaviour that goes against our Rules of Conduct.
New Stunt emotes exclusive for a dirt bike has been added.
6 new default stunt emotes can be played.
The Stunt Emotes are triggerable only mid-air on a Dirt bike – and when the player is not about to hit something.
Hold L3 to trigger a random stunt emote
Release L3 to stop emote
Please note that the Horn functionality has been replaced with the Stunt Emotes for the Dirt Bike.
Other
Adjusted the reload animations of M416, Scar-L, QBZ, G36C to better match the reload speeds.
The reload animations adjustments are a follow-up to the Balance tweaks to the 556 guns in the 9.2 November update.
Haven gameplay mode update
Haven's selectable gameplay mode has been updated
Duo / 1-man-duo → Squad / 1-man-squad
Inventory Improvements
To maximize PUBG’s strategy and the core fun of the Battle Royale, we continue to make improvements, including reducing the steps of unnecessary controls in console PUBG gameplay. The ‘Auto Attachment Options’, ‘Controller Preset C’ and ‘Custom Key Binding’, which were updated in the past, are good examples. We hope that the ‘Inventory Improvement’ will also be an update that will satisfy the survivors. Of course, we don’t want this change to give a negative impact on the UX experience that has already been learned, but to improve the inconveniences. Please, continue to send us your feedback! https://preview.redd.it/tj03wqium8c61.png?width=1439&format=png&auto=webp&s=2843d511f7a8a9512283b631b2c6c06debbd3c67
Keep the existing movement controls and added grid controls
You can navigate around the inventory from right to left and top to bottom with the D-pad and R-stick.
(Tap) R-stick will function the same and the select(A) key.
Intuitive improvements on item pick-up/drops
Added the ‘Quick Pick-UP/Drop’ feature to allow rapid item distribution between squad members.
You can quickly adjust the number of items you wish to pick-up/drop by using the R-stick.
Weapon/attachments UI/UX Optimization
Removed the unnecessary steps when selecting attachment slots in weapon slots.
Swapping from main weapon 1 to 2 can easily be done by selecting the new ‘Weapon slot change’ key.
Displays all attachment slots regardless of weapon type, and intuitively displays the availability of specific slots.
Applied animation to provide feedback on actions such as equipping/removing weapon/attachments
Button guide improvements
Button guides are displayed at the bottom of the inventory in the same location and content.
Tool-tip visual improvements
The tool-tip visuals have been improved to enable intuitive information recognition.
Fixed the issue where some pass missions could not be accomplished in Haven.
Fixed the issue where players could respawn with a ghillie suit equipped when killed while equipping a ghillie suit in TDM.
Fixed the foliage clipping through a vehicle while in FPP mode in certain maps.
Fixed the case where character’s body equipping a ghillie suit could be invisible to others.
Fixed the issue where players could change perspective to TPP when spectating other players in FPP game mode.
Fixed the awkward POV when viewing a kill cam of a character equipped with a ghillie suit.
Fixed the issue where the deaths in Blue Zones were recorded as suicides.
Fixed the issue where the two characters collide after going prone in a moving ferry, they receive fall damage.
Fixed the issue where the headshots were not reflected in the Career page.
Fixed the issue where the AI pillar guard positions are rendered in wrong locations.
Fixed the store issue where it only displays the loading screen after purchasing an item or requires a long loading time for the item popup to be displayed.
Fixed the issue where the completed missions were displayed in the System Menu’s Mission List.
Fixed the issue where sending a cross-platform invite to another player in a custom match causes abnormal behaviour.
Fixed the issue where players are able to use the emergency parachutes while in a DBNO state when falling from non-fatal heights.
Fixed the issue where certain bots would constantly walk around.
Fixed the issue where “Enemy Spotted” ping would function while navigating through the inventory when it is bound to the RB/LB buttons using the custom key binding feature.
Fixed the issue where the message ‘Invalid Season’ is displayed when checking out the profile of an invited friend.
Fixed the issue where you cannot navigate either GNB, LNB after pressing the Options button two consecutive times.
Fixed the issue where the character’s wrist is bent too much when equipped with certain weapons in preview.
Fixed the issue where the localization was not complete in the Team finder guide popup.
Fixed an issue where partially accomplished missions were not visible in the mission list.
Sound
Fixed the unclear sound of UMP45 if another player is firing from a distance.
Fixed the duplicate click sound played when clicking on the preview button in the customize screen.
World
Fixed the issue where players could clip through a certain building in Abbey, Vikendi.
Fixed the issue where enlarging the minimap while flying in the helicopter, makes the minimap glitch.
Fixed the issue where the last Blue Zone was set as a non-playable area in Haven.
Fixed the issue where the vehicles collided with the land when driving over low hills.
Fixed the issue where it was hard or impossible to enter certain buildings in Georgopol of Erangel.
Fixed the issue where the buildings were not loading properly in the southern village of Georgopol, Erangel.
UI/UX
Fixed the issue where inappropriate RP changes were displayed in the match history section during placement matches.
Fixed the issue where starting plane’s seat UI were sometimes displayed as empty.
Fixed the issue where some pages of the store page not loaded when entering store page after restarting a lobby.
Fixed the issue where profiles of players located in ‘Unassigned’ ‘Observer’ section of custom match session cannot be loaded.
Fixed the issue where centre pointer not displayed in replays.
Fixed the issue where the earned/lost RP was displayed in the Match History in Ranked.
Fixed the issue where the currency and system UI are not displayed when returning after completing the TDM.
Skin & Item
Fixed the issue where the visor of Mad’s Motorcycle – Helmet (Level 1) is not displayed when equipped by a male character.
Fixed the issue where the nose of Killer Clown Mask could clip through when equipping face-covering helmet items.
Fixed the issue of the clipping issue when Gas masks and Helmet skins are equipped at the same time.
Fixed the issue where the hood of the Survivalist Parka costume blocks the view in FPP Mode.
Fixed the issue where the Battlestats were printed on the Mk47 Mutant Skin.
Ive been playing for just a little over a month now and even with the best T1 decks you can netdeck youre still just stuck sitting there every game hoping you draw better cards this game than last. Oh youre mono red and going second? Congrats your robber is going to run into a lovestruck beast and without embercleave the games over. Youll get a perfect hand with 1-2-3 drops and get stuck at 2 mana and theyll have 2 life left and some garbage turn 10 win jank deck vs your red aggro and youll just sit there for 4 turns straight pulling lands or 3+ drops just waiting for anything. Youll get 2 torbans, 2 embercleaves, 2 lands, mulligan and get virtually the exact same hand again. Losing isnt your fault 75 percent of the time its just opponent gets good cards and you dont. How the heck do you guys keep this interesting when there isnt any way to actually improve your game and get better at it? Even the tournaments are just a bunch of T1 netdecks with (maybe 2-3 cards swapped out) that rely entirely on card draw and not skill. Autumn played muxus and smashed everyone and this other guy just played straight lurris rogues and smashed everyone lol The game really just feels like a vegas slot machine, you pull the lever and wait 5-10 minutes too see if youll win this game or not. Obviously much better win rates but the point is i feel like you control the outcomes of both the same amount Edit: Thank you guys so much for all the advice! I currently have one account I play mono red aggro and one account i play lurris rogues ( I hated them so much I decided to try them out, im sorry guys). This post was really about my red aggro experience as 90 percent of games that I used to lose with rogues were just me not saving a counter spell or the guy has gruul and a great hand and i cant deal with all his creatures or theyre one of the frusterated players who build decks solely to counter rogues so no complaints about control at all from me here lol. I read all 80 comments here and many of you guys all make great points. Ive been grinding 15+ wins a day on 2 different accounts since december 20-25th ish (30+ wins a day so maybe 50-60 games a day?) so i could try 2 different meta decks simultaneously without dropping too much cash to get the wildcards to put them together. I think only playing aggro BO1 is the biggest contributor to why Im not having much fun anymore so im currently thinking of putting together a dimir control deck of some sort with shark typhoon next. It would be nice to feel like i have more of a say in if i win or not tbh. I watch both of HGGs videos every day which I think are pretty great for one big reason. Every time I go against an odd deck that I havnt seen before (this is fairly rare too) he has a video up of him using it barely a day or 2 later. I also watch a lot of CovertGoBlue and when Im in the mood ill watch a little MTG Arena Decks with the angry table banging guy with the funny magic card names lol.
▪ We need poker tournaments, people are just killing their tables here, they aren't playing poker, they're playing heads or tails ! ▪
I've been playing RDO poker for 2 days now and guys...it is just ridiculous to see how many ppl eventualy start playing big with ridiculous hands, they have absolutly no respect for the game. You can't test the table because nobody is scare of anything, it's not like they were playing their last 25$. And it's true, there's no reason to be affraid of a bluff or a certain bet, 25$ it's nothing ! You just can't test the table to see if ppl are concervatives, bluffers or both. They eventualy lose their shit or a random dude join the table ready to burn his whole 25$ with stupid pre-flop bets to finally bluff like a complet morons because he's too engaged in the hand. I've seen a crap ton of bad bluffs, they're actually bluffing to really bluff right away. Not to test if he can bluff or not or if the dude infront of him is just a silent baitter looking for the perfect dove or something. They are literally killing the table, at this point you are just better leaving the table, keeping playing is just like playing to a slot machine. We need tournaments, with increasing blinds and something to win. Something that will make the players actually think before betting and/or will get the agressive players out of the tables eatten by opportunists. I think the game needs that because right now, the RDO poker is completly useless (doesn't worth our time) and completely unengaging. It is just an ingame feature... Am i wrong !?
The Germany 2014 World Cup winning squad: Where are they now?
During the latest season break both André Schürrle and Benedikt Höwedes announced their retirement from football having both achieved the ultimate prize with their country back in 2014. Since that incredible victory in Brazil, the team has experienced a quite drastic change in fortunes and personnel, despite manager Joachim Löw still overseeing the German side. Some of the 23-man squad remain at the top level, with the stars of others fading; here then, is where the victorious 2014 Germany World Cup squad are now… #1 – Manuel Neuer – Goalkeeper – Bayern Munich Winning the Golden Glove in 2014, Manuel Neuer was undeniably the best goalkeeper in the world back in 2014 and his name was even in the hat for the Ballon d'Or, coming 3rd with a healthy 15% of the votes, especially considering the freakish talent he was up against with Messi and Ronaldo (who won it) ahead of him. Nowadays he captains the side to regular Bundesliga titles and is still as quick-reflexed as ever, sensing danger from with predator-like precision and bailing out rare errors from his back line. Injury problems seem to be behind him too, and he’s still holding down the number 1 jersey for the national side. He’ll undoubted have his eye on a 9th Bundesliga trophy and a 3rd Champion’s League winner’s medal in the next 12 months, being the serial winner he is. #2 – Kevin Großkreutz – Defender – Free Agent A lifelong Borussia Dortmund fan-become-legend, nobody on this list’s star has fallen quite like that of Großkreutz. Having left the side he adored in 2015, things went downhill faster than a Sadio Mane hattrick; some factors out of his hands, but other issues were firmly of his own ridiculous doing. First came the paperwork issue as the big bossmen at Galatasary failed to submit the relevant documents in time, meaning the defender was ineligible to feature until January 1st. FIFA rejected any appeal and Großkreutz collected his paycheck before returning to Germany on January 6th without a single showing for the Turkish club. It was Stuttgart who bought him back home and the player looked happy to be back on the field, but the club were unable to retain their Bundesliga status, finishing 17th and being relegated for the first time in 41 years. The worst was yet to come though… Four days after being in a bar fight which saw he and a 16-year old be taken to hospital and a further four suspects arrested, the club terminated Kevin’s contract by mutual consent. “I made a mistake and for that I’m very sorry. I accept the consequences and regret that my time at Stuttgart has come to an end in this way,” said Großkreutz before adding “I don’t want anything to do with football for the time being.” One month later, he signed for Darmstadt 98. Make of that what you will. Recently e was kicked out of Uerdingen and has now sued the club over outstanding salary payments. Additionally he has resigned as manager of Landesliga (6th tier) club Türkspor Dortmund which he coached for a year. The man lives for the drama. #3 – Matthias Ginter – Defender – Borussia Mönchengladbach The youngest player on this list, Matthias Ginter was just 20 when he was selected for the World Cup squad following an impressive season with Freiburg. After the World Cup he signed for Borussia Dortmund before switching to his current club, Mönchengladbach, in 2017 where he has performed to a very strong level, helping the side return to the Champion’s League last season, a feat the side will be looking to repeat in the 20-21 campaign. #4 – Benedikt Höwedes – Defender – Retired Here he is then, the first of the retirees and a bonafide Schalke legend. Höwedes somewhat surprisingly featured in every single minute of the 2014 triumph, along with Neuer and captain Philipp Lahm – he was exceptionally reliable and versatile, slotting into the left back role with ease and providing the solid performances expected of him throughout. He almost opened the scoring in the final too, his header cannoning off the post late in the first half, placing him centimeters from immortality. Having racked up 240 professional games for Schalke, a vast number of which as captain, he departed on loan to Juventus in 2017. Sadly, the injuries had caught up with him incredibly quickly, resulting in Höwedes only being able to feature in 3 games for the Italian champions. A move to Lokomotiv Moscow followed, ending his 17-year affiliation with Schalke. After two seasons in Russia, the club and player agreed to terminate his contract by mutual consent due to family reasons with his retirement arriving less than two months later, on July 31st of this year. #5 – Mats Hummels – Defender – Borussia Dortmund Another sure-fire legend of the professional game; Mats Hummels has been a leader at the heart of every defensive line he’s featured within. Scoring a couple of goals at the tournament, including the vital winner against France in the quarters, Hummels was a shining light of this German era. A Bayern youth player, Mats made the unholy switch back to the champions in 2016 following over 200 games for BVB. There, he would win three league titles, adding to his two previous collected with Dortmund, before making the £30 million return to the yellow and black, where he remains today, having had a wonderful season back towards the peak of his elegant defensive powers. Most noteworthy however, is that he was one of three veteran players (alongside Jérôme Boateng and Thomas Müller) who Löw would no longer be considering for selection as of 2019. Many have questioned this decision, especially given Germany’s less-than-consistent performances over the past couple of years, but the finger sniffer has held firm, and Hummels hasn’t featured in the national side since 2018. #6 – Sami Khedira – Midfielder – Juventus The ticking midfield maestro at the heart of the 2014 midfield, Khedira had another exceptional tournament to follow on from his 2010 success which saw him move to Real Madrid, where he won everything Spanish football has to offer. As his contract expired with Madrid, he was picked up by Juventus, in typical free transfer fashion. A consistent performer in Italy, introducing others into play delightfully, he’s managed a tidy amount of goals over his five-year Italian tenure too. Injuries have really started to ramp up however, and his legs are getting heavier on the field, so it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him depart The Old Lady come the end of his contract in summer. #7 – Bastian Schweinsteiger – Midfielder – Retired Rightly hailed by Joachim Löw as one of the greatest footballers Germany has ever produced, Bastian Schweinsteiger enjoyed an illustrious career at Bayern Munich, racking up 500 games across all competitions and playing a variety of important roles through the years. For many, he was man of the match in the 2014 final. Man-marking Messi out of the game for massive periods, controlling the midfield and launching attacks from deep – without him, the result could have been very different. Truly his finest hour. Post World Cup injury issues became ever clearer (this is becoming a bit of a theme, isn’t it), and with his career in Germany winding down, a switch to Louis van Gaal’s Manchester United army ensued. Sadly though, he struggled to pick up the pace the side demanded, and it never really felt like he achieved what was hoped of him at Old Trafford. Mourinho’s arrival spelt the end for the German, being harshly treated and effectively pushed out of the squad and placed on the unwanted list. As a result, he moved to Chicago Fire in the MLS and performed really well, seemingly having a new lease of life as he looked to guide the club to World Cup victory, if some journalists are to be believed… Retirement in 2019 followed and he now works as a pundit, casting his footballing brain across the airwaves. #8 – Mesut Özil – Midfielder – Arsenal During the 2010 and 2014 World Cups, and for every season in between, Mesut Özil was one of the finest players on the planet; a serial assister who glided across the pitch with craftsmenship and fluidity like no other, he was the heartbeat of the attack for Germany, Real Madrid and Arsenal. Having experienced massive success at Werder Bremen and Real Madrid, his move to Arsenal in 2013 was met with glee, as another giant of the game was set to make a splash in the Premier League – and splash he did. It’s easy to forget due to Arsenal’s turgid recent years, that for many years Özil way THE man for Arsenal. Nowadays, he’s sometimes not even bench warming, and instead is smashing Fortnite whilst collecting his £350,000 per week and failing to make any sort of impact within the plans of Arteta and Unai Emery before him. The real controversy lies in his retirement from the national team though. After being pictured with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (along with İlkay Gündoğan) fans were outraged, as the image was seen as an endorsement of the president’s highly controversial policies. The DFB publicly distance themselves from the situation, but following a frankly horrendous 2018 World Cup campaign, the issue reared its head again. Özil addressed the concerns, stating that they solely discussed football, not politics, and that he was simply respecting the office of his family’s nation. He even battled back by zoning in on a potential lack of criticism received by Lothar Matthäus, who had met with Russian president Vladimir Putin before going on to accuse Reinhard Grindel, the DFB president, of racism. He promptly stepped down from the nation side in protest of his treatment, sparking yet more criticism in the direction of the Arsenal attacking midfielder. Nothing has changed since, but there was that occasion in 2019 when Erdoğan was best man at Özil’s wedding. I’m sure they only spoke about football though… #9 – André Schürrle – Forward – Retired The man who assisted that famous winning goal, André Schürrle, has experienced a turbulent career following the World Cup win. Leaving Chelsea in 2015 having never cemented his place in the starting line-up, he moved to Wolfsburg for approximately £22 million, performing to a high level in the green shirt and pushing him back towards the very top of his game. The result, a move to Borussia Dortmund for another sizeable fee but again his career took a nosedive. Injuries struck, and alongside it, poor performances. A loan move to Fulham showed promise, including a banging goal against Burnley, but he wasn’t the player Premier League had witnessed 4 years prior as Fulham dropped down to the Championship at the first time of asking. Another loan to Spartak Moscow failed to spark an upturn in form and retirement followed at just 29 years of age, with Schürrle stating that he no longer wanted to face the loneliness and endless competition of top-tier football. A beauty to watch on his day, it’s a real shame he never quite acheievd what was anticipated of him. At least we’ll always have that assist, and that performance against Brazil in the infamous 7-1, everyone else had downed tools, but Schürrle, brilliantly, was having none of that. #10 – Lukas Podolski – Forward – Antalyaspor Despite playing a bit-part in this crowning moment for his country, Lukas Podolski will live long in the memory of German fans, with wonderful World Cup campaigns in both 2006 and 2010 and a team of the tournament appearance at Euro 2008. The King of Köln, possessing unreal speed a foot like a traction engine, often saved his very best for the German national side, and is a cult hero for many across the globe. Having played in Germany, England, Italy and Japan and now Turkey with Antalyaspor, the man is best known for his dual spells at FC Köln where he racked up a mightily impressive 79 league goals, using his explosive pace to maximum effect in the Bundesliga. Nowadays, when he’s not appearing in the Turkish Süper Lig, he putting his well-earned cash to a good cause, having founded the Lukas Podolski Foundation for Sport and Education which aims to give prospects to disadvantaged children and young people, fight child poverty, and promote social inclusion and integration and understanding among nations. #11 – Miroslav Klose – Forward – Retired I simply cannot do this man justice in words. The all-time leading goal scorer in World Cup history, having converted in the famous 7-1 demolition of Brazil (surpassing Ronaldo Nazário’s as he went), Klose retired from the national side following his greatest triumph. Whilst well-regarded as a scoring machine for both club and country, he is often boxed in as simply an aerial threat when in reality, he is far more than that. Possessing a rapid change of pace, strong build-up abilities and ultimately, some of the finest movement you’re ever likely to see, Klose was a complete striker. Plus, he could even pull off a somersault celebration, and what’s not to love about that. Spending almost his entire club career in Germany, he eventually retired at Lazio with, as expected, a solid scoring record. Having been part of the national side’s coaching set-up, he is now second-in-command to the incredible Hansi Flick at Bayern, where his tactical nous is certain to help him to flourish into a blooming boss in future. #12 – Ron-Robert Zieler – Goalkeeper – FC Köln Imagine making your professional debut with Northampton Town and ending up in a World Cup winning squad. That’d be bloody mint. A Manchester United youth prospect, Zieler carved out a fantastic career for himself. The goalkeeper made over 200 appearances across two spells for Hannover and had a strong season with Stuttgart before a second tricky term, when he scored a calamitous own goal against Bremen. Caught out pulling his socks up when a throw-in came his way, he miscontrolled the ball and was forced to dive in vain as the ball trickled into the net. If that isn’t legacy, I don’t know what is. Now he sits happily on the bench for FC Köln, but if Timo Horn continues his current form, he could find himself between the sticks once more. #13 – Thomas Müller – Forward – Bayern Munich The Bundesliga champion, assist master, space-invader, world cup top scorer, Germany centurion. What can be said about Müller that hasn’t been already. He’s perennially underrated, being one of the finest and most consistent players of a generation. Aged just 24 when the 2014 contest rolled around, he had already accumulated 49 international appearances, and followed on from his destruction of England and Argentina in 2010 with another 5 goals at the finals, pairing a silver boot with his previous gold in South Africa. The man has hardly missed a beat since, with his only real blip coinciding with the turbulent tenure of Niko Kovač. Now at 30 years of age, he’s leading Bayern to yet more league glory, with this year’s Champion’s League being a cherry atop his sporting cake. As mentioned earlier however, Müller has been frozen out of the Germany squad by Joachim Löw, seemingly one of the scapegoats of the group stage exit in Russia. He stated that he was “angry and surprised” by the dropping of himself and his fellow teammates and given his incredible form (particularly this past season) it is more than understandable as to why. #14 – Julian Draxler – Midfielder – Paris Saint-Germain Destined for great things was young Julian. You’d have found him floating around the top of many a top prospect lists around the time of the tournament in Brazil; and whilst he’s had a more than respectable career in many a sense, he hasn’t truly hit the heights expected of him during those early Schalke days. After moving onto Wolsburg for a hefty sum, it felt like Draxler was set to kick his career into the upper gears, helping the club reach the Champion’s League quarter finals for the first time ever. However, the club felt he had not met up to the lofty expectations and Draxler duly wished to move on. Offers arrived but it would take until Christmas Eve later that year when PSG would stump up €42 million to secure his services, ending what the midfielders described as “the worst first half of a season of my career.” He only made 20 appearances across all competitions for the French capital club in the previous term, without registering a single goal. Maybe the farmers have too much for him and again, it may be time to move on. #15 – Erik Durm – Defender – Eintracht Frankfurt When I heard Huddersfield Town were signing former World Cup winning defender you better believe my fantasy football senses were tingling off the charts. The tingling was short lived. Huddersfield finished bottom and Durm was an absolute shadow of the player many Yorkshire fans had expected. But enough about the bad part, let’s hear some good. With BVB he had some good times, racking up a tidy half century of appearances in the yellow and black, and now he’s back in the Bundesliga with Frankfurt where he hopes to reignite his career on home soil. #16 – Philipp Lahm – Defender – Retired Captaining a side as gargantuan as this is no easy task, and there aren’t too many captains that measure up to the golden goose that is Philipp Lahm. Lahm was the ultimate in high-level versatility, playing in the back line and midfield, with technical ability and tackling acumen on either foot – he’s also one of the most tactically intelligent players I’ve ever had the joy of watching, always appearing in the correct position and barely breaking stride to disrupt opposition moves. At the World Cup he was imperious, starring in multiple positions and staking his claim as one of the best players at the tournament. Watching him lift the trophy (a first for unified Germany) was a joy to be hold and the highlight of a career that included a multitude of awards. Should he move into management, I have no doubt he would be a success, given his second-to-none understanding of the game. Plus, he’s a wonderful man, helping to support a number of charities and advocating for tolerance of homosexuality in football. #17 – Per Mertesacker – Defender – Retired Back in the day Per Mertesacker was one of the most effective centre backs in Europe. At Hannover and Werder Bremen he established himself as a sensible centre back with an exceptional understanding of the game and disciplinary record. Obviously dominant in the air (being a whopping 6 foot 7) it is often forgotten how cool the man was with the ball at his feet – sure, he has a lack of pace, but was rarely caught out in the Bundesliga or internationally. At the German World Cup in 2006, the 2008 Euros and the 2010 World Cup Mertesacker was a regular feature, showing a strong partnership with Christian Metzelder at the heart of defence. The emergence of Mats Hummels, Holger Badstuber and Jérôme Boateng ultimately played into the stepping back of Mertesacker, but he’ll be fondly remembered at international level. At Arsenal, he was a great leader and player, but injuries derailed his later years. His performance in the 2017 FA Cup final will live long in the memory – having not started all season, he rolled back the years and put in a titanic performance, leading Arsenal to yet another FA Cup triumph. He’s still at Arsenal now, as he manages the academy and continues to showcase his professionalism and desire to the next generation. #18 – Toni Kroos – Midfielder – Real Madrid You obviously don’t win the World Cup nowadays without a premium squad, but the stacked level of this squad this squad is just absurd. At the time of the tournament Kroos was still a Bayern player, moving to Madrid shortly after and continuing his meteoric to the top of the midfield tree. His incredible performance in that 7-1 demolition was a huge statement on the biggest stage, yet he still somehow moved for just under £30 million. One of the transfers of the millennium without a doubt. He’s been a constant at the spine of the side since, forming a fruitful relationship with both Casemiro and Modric, helping to capture La Decima, the first of a hattrick of Champion’s League trophies for Toni in white. And he’s still doing it to this day, dictating tempo, snaffling attacks and scoring the occasional banger (see Germany v Sweden at the Russia World Cup), simply put, he can do it all and we’re incredibly lucky to be able to witness a player of his calibre week in, week out. #19 – Mario Götze – Midfielder – Free Agent From a talent fully realised, to one who was destined for so much more. After coming off the bench in the final and quite brilliantly squeezing home the winning extra time goal Götze had punched a one-way ticket to mega stardom, individual awards and championship glory throughout his career. And whilst much of this success reigns true, the train much have gotten a little lost en route to the destination. A mixture of less-than-incredible form and ultimately, a metabolic disorder which causes the fibres of the muscles to not function correct, meant young Mario pulled into the station a few stops short of the all-time greats. Now he’s a free agent, and the versatile forward could be of some use to a number of Bundesliga sides, depending on who can afford his wage demands. Who knows what the future will hold for the 28 year old, but I’m sure everyone hopes he’ll be able to somehow rediscover that electric form that put him on the roadmap in the first place. #20 – Jérôme Boateng – Defender – Bayern Munich The younger brother of Ghana’s Kevin Prince-Boateng, Jérôme backed his abilities when leaving Manchester City in search of more playing time in central defence, rather the being farmed out at right back. People weren’t sure he was good enough, but not only did he talk the talk, he walked the walk, ran the run and showed everyone in England exactly what they had been missing, becoming one of the most decorated defenders the game has ever seen along the way. Sure, there have been some downs (mainly Kovač dropping him and Messi imploding his ankles with the force of one thousand suns) but its been a career in Germany full of ups, including last season. With David Alaba moving to centre back, Boateng was imperious, cleaning up attacks and helping build from the base of Bayern’s traditional 4-2-3-1, helping the side add yet another European trophy to their illustrious cabinet. This year will be more of a challenge than the last given Flick’s pancake-thin squad, but Boateng will likely shine once again before inevitably moving to Manchester United as his decline hits. #21 – Shkodran Mustafi – Defender – Arsenal Everton > Sampdoria > Valencia > Arsenal – Shkodran Mustafi has had quite the memorable career path thus far. Eligible to represent Germany, North Macedonia and Albania, Mustafi made the right choice in opting to appear for his birth nation, appearing as a substitute throughout the 2014 tournament, and getting his hands on sport’s greatest prize. Following the tournament, he moved to Spain and was one of the standout centre backs in La Liga, hence why Arsenal came sniffing for his signature. Surprising as it may be, he hasn’t always been the meme player he is now and he’s definitely shown a return to form under Arteta, whether he’s the standard they require anymore remains to be see, but this season will likely tell all. #22 – Roman Weidenfeller – Goalkeeper – Retired Another Dortmund legend, Roman Weidenfeller was unfortunate to only total 5 international games for Germany, largely due to the wealth of goalkeeping talent they’ve had the pleasure of selecting from throughout the years. Having played for the black and yellow club from 2002 to 2018 he was the number one choice for many a year, until being overhauled by current keeper, Roman Bürki. Still on the payroll at the club, he continues to work for BVB as an international ambassador. #23 – Christoph Kramer – Midfielder – Borussia Mönchengladbach Last but absolutely not least, it’s the man who had the weirdest experience of the final by far. Starting his first game at the tournament due to Sami Khedira’s last minute injury, he suffered a concussion early in the match following a collision with Argentinian defender Garay, eventually being replaced by André Schürrle. The real kicker was that Kramer spent 14 minutes charging about the pitch in typical fashion before famously asking the referee whether it was the final that he was playing in, prompting his much-needed substitution. Providing strength and leadership in the centre of the park, Kramer now turns out for Mönchengladbach where he is soon to rack up a century of appearances.
Beat VW on Maddening/NG. Sharing my thoughts, strategies, hard chapters and character tier list!
Introduction Hey everyone! I recently completed a Maddening/Classic/NG run of this amazing game on Verdant Wind and thought I’d share my experience. Some background:
This is my 2nd Fire Emblem game, the first one being Awakening way back in 2012.
I picked up FE3H during October of 2019 and played my first route on Azure Moon, Hard/Classic/NG.
While I greatly enjoyed the run, by mid-game it felt like my characters were extremely overpowered, especially Byleth, Dmitrii and Felix.
I did the AM run without any kind of guides and just played blind; I didn’t know who learned which combat arts or what abilities you got from mastering which classes.
Even then, the game felt ridiculously easy as I never felt in any danger of losing any missions. I barely needed any strategy either, simply selecting one of my strong characters and plopping him in the middle of the enemies meant they all died.
Was hoping Maddening would deliver the challenging, strategically deep gameplay I was hoping for from a tactical RPG (and oh boy, it delivers. Sorta.)
Chose Golden Deer because I wanted to romance Hilda. She’s cute af
Some of the rules I had on the run:
Did it without consulting strategy guides; however I religiously studied the SereneForest for class mastery abilities, proficiency abilities etc.
No warp cheesing. It is considered cheesing if I seek to kill a bare minimum of enemies then warp an ace unit next to the boss for a fast win.
Only 2 recruits from other houses are allowed.
Knights of Seiros are allowed.
No DLC characters were used. However, I did use the DLC stat boosters (mostly cause I forgot they were from DLC, lol)
General Thoughts on Maddening Difficulty
To me, Maddening gives an excellent tactical RPG experience which requires me to carefully consider, calculate and make use of the mechanics at my disposal.
Stuff like combat arts, abilities, item weights, battalion stats, gambits, adjutants, cooking stat boosts, stat boosting items, support stat boosts all felt like irrelevant, unneeded fluff for Hard, but in Maddening you’ll be striving to optimize all of them to help your beloved characters survive their next battle.
Maddening is nowhere near the RNG-fest that some say it is. The only time this ever crossed my mind is during the early chapters where your hit rates are really low, and this is remedied by using Combat Arts.
To be able to beat missions, in particular early chapters, you need a strategy and proper planning. For example, ensuring everyone has potions to heal, light weapons, good battalions and gambits, and also keeping them in a good formation to protect your weaker members from being one-shot.
The game is hardest in its earliest chapters, specifically chapters 1-5. No shocker there, you have limited options and skills against vastly overpowered enemies.
The game does stabilize quite a bit in difficulty from chapter 7 onwards, although paralogues can be hard.
In fact paralogues can be some of the hardest but most fun chapters in the game; stuff like rescuing Manuela or defending a key point against waves of powerful enemies makes things really hectic and bumps up the requirement for tight planning and strategy.
Unfortunately, I found that you can still become quite overpowered and trivialize missions come mid-late game; my Vantage-Wrath Byleth was fully operational from chapter 16 onwards and it really felt like he could’ve done some of the chapters alone.
General Strategy Free Time
Up to timeskip, spend all free time on Exploring to raise professor level.
Fetchquests, botany, choir, cooking, meals and tournaments are easy must-dos, I never needed to grind fishing that much aside from the Lots of Fish event.
Early on, cooking for the +1 speed or +1 def meals helped boost my stats for the difficult early game missions.
Mid-game onwards, use Sauna with at least one character each month for quickly training Byleth’s and that character’s proficiencies.
In-Battle
The “Box” formation was critical in many of the early levels.
Basically this means you put tanky units like Byleth, Claude, Leonie, Raphael and Lorenz on the outside facing enemies, just on the edge of their aggro range, and keep the remainder “tofu” units like Lysithea, Ignatz, Marianne and Mercedes inside the box.
Sometimes it is necessary to press up against a wall so that enemies with Pass cannot simply go through your tanks and kill the backlines anyway.
Early on it was extremely important to pay attention to some key personal skills and position units accordingly. * For example, Leonie gets boosts from males being next to her, Hilda boosts males next to her, finishing off a unit with Byleth adjacent gives more exp.
Every unit carried a lightweight training/iron weapon for basic hits, and a steel variant for maximizing combat art damage.
Every physical attacker carried an iron bow at least to contribute to chip damage.
Before priests are unlocked, healing is sparse so every character has to carry his or her own vulnerary.
Making smart use of Knowledge and Experience gems, including trading them mid-battle as necessary allowed me to optimize and train up characters much faster.
I hardly ever used shields on the run for fear of being doubled.
Character Optimization
Fed Lysithea as many kills as possible for the first couple of missions until she could spec to Monk at level 5. I’d heard she’s one of the strongest characters and needs to get out of Noble to get better Mag growths.
Where practical, the characters that would frontline went through Armored Knight promotions at level 10 for a free +4 defence stat boost. Did this for Claude, Hilda, Raph and Lorenz.
After proficiencies were at a good level for unlocking desired classes, I made every character prioritize Authority.
Battalions and abilities were to be kept up-to-date and optimized for the current mission.
Every physical attacker went through Brigand for Death Blow
Every magical attacker (only Lysithea and Lorenz really) went through Mage for Fiendish Blow
In late-game once a character had achieved their desired class and had authority of at least A, I got their primary weapon proficiency to S for +10 crit and prowess lv 5.
Character Reviews Image version here: https://imgur.com/NB4v7KO S-tier: Characters that were top performers in every situation
Byleth (M)
Class progression: Commoner (HP+5) —> Fighter (Str+2) —> Mercenary (Vantage) —> Brigand (Death Blow) —> Warrior (Wrath) —> Wyvern Rider —> Hero Deserves S+ tier really, I wouldn’t have known what to do without him in the first few stages; perhaps that could be an interesting challenge for future runs. Able to tank, dodge tank, reliably kill foes, reliably hit gambits, Byleth carried the Golden Deers before they were able to stand on their own two feet, and well into the endgame. I originally had a Wyvern Lord endgame in mind for Byleth, but hit a snag around level 10. Because I focused on rushing professor levels in the first few months, I had no time to train any of his skill proficiencies, so I couldn’t promote to Brigand for Death Blow. Training in Merc made me realize how interesting a skill Vantage was. It came in clutch in missions like Reunion at Daybreak and Lorenz’s paralogue, where I was dodgetanking like 6 foes at once in bushes. This led me to gain interest in the Hero path. I know Hero is strictly outclassed by Swordmaster especially in growths, but I liked the outfit and at that point the game was getting kinda easy so I thought “why not”. He completely roflstomped nearly every mission, especially when supported by rallies, Retribution, a guard adjutant and dance. I’d just toss him into the largest chunk of enemies I could find, and he’d crit every last one of them into oblivion. My final setup was Swordfaire, Vantage, Sword Prowess 5, Sword Crit+10, Wrath, Alert Stance and Death Blow.
Claude
Class progression: Noble (HP+5) —> (Armored Knight) —> Fighter (Str+2) —> Brigand (Death Blow) —> Sniper —> Wyvern Master —> Barbarossa Claude did not start out hotshot like Byleth, but still pulled his weight being able to tank a hit and reliably kill. I rushed armored knight with him for the +4 defence, and also upgraded Heavy Armor to C for the -3 Weight skill. As soon as I got to those and Death Blow, Claude became a murder machine, being reliable in slaying almost any foe either from full health or with the smallest bit of chip damage. His post-timeskip class upgrade was even more obscenely powerful, getting flying while also rocking the overpowered Immortal Corp battalion with its excellent stat boosts and awesome gambit.
Leonie
Class progression: Commoner (HP+5) —> Fighter (Str+2) —> Brigand (Death Blow) —>Pegasus Knight (Darting Blow) —> Sniper —> Bow Knight Her personal skill was really helpful in the early game, letting her be both offensively and defensively solid. She played a bit like a slightly weaker (but still solid) Claude early on, but then I realized it was fairly easy to side-spec to Pegasus, and the flying archer playstyle was incredible through several missions and paralogues, especially for sniping other pegasi and wyverns. As soon as she got Death Blow, Darting Blow and Point-blank Volley, things got absurd. Coupled with a Killer Bow+ I had 70+ crit every time, and it became a game of “pick which unit you want to die” just like in Hard mode. Post-timeskip she was probably the only unit that could compete with Byleth and Claude for MVP. A-tier: Characters with minor flaws but mostly excelled
Lysithea
Class progression: Noble (HP+5) —> Monk (Mag+2) —> Mage (Fiendish Blow) —> Bishop —> Gremory She did need some training wheels to get going in the early game; box formations were necessary to protect her, her spells had few charges and could be inaccurate, and I had to feed her kills to get her levels up fast, but this is a case where the babysitting has a such a massive payoff you’d still gladly do it every time. I can see why this is the best offensive spellcaster in the game; her spell list is ludicrously good and the important spells come at the best times. Dark Spikes made the Death Knight look like a fool every time he appeared, and Seraphim was invaluable throughout the early-mid chapters and paralogues which are usually infested with Beasts. Let’s not forget the sheer utility of Warp even in a run where Warp-cheesing was intentionally avoided. She had huge contributions in nearly every single mission from chapter 6 onwards, and I’ll have to consider in future runs whether I hire her, because she almost makes the game too easy.
Marianne
Class progression: Noble (HP+5) —> Monk (Mag+2) —> Priest —> Dancer (Special Dance, Sword Avo+20) Any GD player will know that early on your only reliable healing option is Marianne, and truth be told she is kinda mediocre at it. I mean heal and physic are nice, but her physic range isn’t that good with the low Mag growth, and she is a very fragile unit early on with even kinda low Res so she can’t tank magic attacks like Mercie can. I recruited Mercedes to take over her job as healer and that was much better, then sent Marianne into Dancer where she really shone. Dancing is insane utility, helping me do otherwise hellish paralogues like Mannuela/Hanneman. The sword boon and decent Mag stat she has made her an effective Levin Sword user. Her Silence spell was also clutch in some situations where I’m swarmed by mages. I usually let her follow one of the units listed above, sticking to bushes wherever possible, and she got hit like once in five missions even when situated on the front lines.
Mercedes
Class progression: Monk (Mag+2) —> Priest —> Bishop The best healer in the game for me, also my spouse from the previous BL run so I didn’t want to kill her. Not much to add on Mercie except that I recruited her around chapter 7, and just stuck her at the backlines for the whole game using Stride, Physic and Fortify. B-tier: Characters that were good (but not great) throughout
Hilda, Petra
Class progression: Noble (HP+5) —> (Armored Knight) —> Fighter (Str+2) —> Brigand (Death Blow) —> Wyvern Rider —> Wyvern Lord I consider these two as having similar playstyles, though I got Petra around chapter 9. Both were able to dish out good damage that killed with some prior chip, but were never as reliable at “alpha-strike” nuking selected units from full health like Claude, Leonie and Lysithea could. Hilda’s personal skill was also rather handy in the earliest chapters. Of course, by endgame they were solid attackers and invaluable for space control and baiting with Canto hit-and-run tactics.
Ignatz
Class progression: Commoner (HP+5) —> Fighter (Str+2) —> Brigand (Death Blow) —> Sniper —> Assassin My most RNG-screwed character, his damage output suffered greatly even with Death Blow backing him up. However, he made up for this by being a toolkit, with rallies and interesting debuff arrows like Break Shot and Warding Blow, which were clutch for monsters and mage swarms respectively. He was also pretty ok in the early game with his Hit+20 skill making him the most reliable chipper. Post-timeskip I made him assassin (no longer targetable), a Retribution battalion, Venin Bow+ and kept him next to Byleth, providing rally and chip/debuff support. Ended up pretty satisfied. C-tier: Characters that were kinda disappointing
Lorenz
Class progression: Noble (HP+5) —> (Armored Knight) —> Dark Mage (Poison Strike) —> Mage (Fiendish Blow) —> Dark Bishop —> Dark Knight I actually started the run with the intention to bench Lorenz, since from using Felix as Mortal Savant in BL I felt that there was no point in hybrid units- I was gonna be sticking with one or the other and hybrids ended up mediocre in both. However, after feeding him a few levels I found him doubling more often than Lysithea with fire, which made him useful to snipe armored knights. Besides that, his surprisingly beefy HP stat made him a useful meat shield for box formations before level 6. Ultimately he still did OK as a Dark Knight and I didn’t bench him, but it does feel like you could plug that slot with someone more powerful like Wyvern Annette, Catherine or Felix.
Seteth
Class progression: Wyvern Rider —> Brigand (Death Blow) —> Wyvern Lord So I expected more from one of the 3 Swift Strikes users in the game. My Seteth wasn’t necessarily bad, but by the point I got him up and running my Hero Byleth, Barbarossa Claude, Sniper Leonie and Lysithea (just Lysithea) were already fully functional and could reliably kill threats in one turn anyway. Even with Killer Lance+, Death Blow and Swift Strikes I found him falling just short of killing enemies by chapter 19. Still used him as a filler unit and flying support with Impregnable Wall. D-tier: Characters that I dropped
Raphael
Class progression: Commoner (HP+5) —> (Armored Knight) —> Brigand (Death Blow) —> Wyvern Rider I love this big boy — his support scenes are great and I love his well-adjusted maturity. Sadly, he’s just not so great a unit. He could kinda-sorta tank one or sometimes two hits early on, but otherwise he was getting doubled (low SPD), missing gambits (low CHA), being susceptible to mages, and most importantly not reliably killing foes. I eventually made a quick spec to Wyvern for him pre-timeskip so he could just fly around and assist Lysithea in sniping during Reunion at Daybreak, then just benched him after that. Sorry big boy. Difficult Chapters
Chapter 1: Three Houses
As anyone who has tried Maddening will know, your first real foray into the world of Maddening FE3H can feel hilariously overwhelming. You immediately realize that each of the opponent’s units can kill your units in 1 or 2 hits and double all of them, while you deal a pittance of damage to them even from your Lord unit and you only have a measly 5 charges of Heal. Even though it’s a mock battle and you can sacrifice units with no long-term penalty, strategy and preparation is still mandatory as Byleth and Claude can run out of steam if left to fight the others alone. My first couple runs went badly- either Ferdinand immediately killed my healer, or I got to the Blue Lions at the end with only a low health Byleth and Claude and got murdered by Dmitrii. Got it on my 3rd run. I brought Byleth, Claude, Marianne (for heal), Ignatz (for Hit+20) and Leonie (for Rivalry). Outfitted all 5 characters with bows and vulneraries. The first step was to draw Ferdinand and Ashe with Byleth, kill them with combined might of everyone’s bows, then retreat into the bushes to the west. Then draw Edelgard, Hubert and Dorothea over with Byleth shooting an arrow. Those units are strong, but while hiding in the bushes and keeping Ignatz/Marianne tucked well out of sight, you can dodge tank with Byleth/Claude and kill them eventually. Finally you crawl up the left wall, defeat Manuela, and draw the Blue Lions over, fight them in the bushes for the victory.
Chapter 2: Familiar Scenery
I actually consider this the hardest mission in the run, at least by number of restarts I had to do. You are in immediate danger from fast, powerful foes with Pass, half of your units die immediately, and are really underpowered compared to the foes they are up against. Basically, you have to git gud right here, right now, or else you lose units. Had to play around the bridge for the first ~20 turns, drawing over the brigands by placing my “tankiest” units like Byleth, Leonie and Raphael just barely within their aggro range while keeping my tofu backliners far, far away. Spamming combat arts like Curved Shot and Tempest Lance, and making full use of Leonie and Hilda’s personal skills are mandatory. Once you cross the bridge it gets a bit easier, but you still need to have good formations to protect your weak units, not to mention conserve healing since your Marianne STILL sucks at this point. Vulnerary on everyone. Probably took me 6 or 7 resets.
Chapter 3: Mutiny in the Mists
This chapter felt like absolute bullshit at the start. I sent my tanks North but the endless units popping out from the forests dogpiled and killed them, while archers to the West appeared out of nowhere to snipe Lysithea even through my box formations. Eventually I learned about the existence of torches, and that a slow, cautious crawl through the bottom forests made things much easier. Took maybe 3-4 resets.
Chapter 5: Tower of Black Winds
The big one, and the single mission that took me most turns (I think 80+) to complete. I only had to reset once, but geez this is easily the most gruelling mission in the whole game. The whole thing is like an endurance test; your healing will not last you through the insane length of the map coupled with its dense waves of enemies, which once again are able to Pass. Also, same-turn reinforcements make their first appearance here, and boy it is brutal. The first step is to let Gilbert die to the reinforcements that appear behind you. I’m not sure if the mission is doable without letting him die. Then you start your slow crawl forward through the first third of the map. The second spawn of Pass-thieves reinforcements is quite simply the gates of hell, and I burned like 20 turns and a handful of Divine Pulses here. I used Byleth to cross ‘that’ pillar, triggering the reinforcements, but before that I had to tweak my entire remaining army into a perfect box formation, huddled against the nearby corner. Failing to do so meant that the thieves would immediately zero in on the character they could kill in one turn. On the Northern stretch, I accidentally triggered aggro from an archer next to Miklan, causing the ENTIRE HORDE of enemies including Miklan to come crashing down the corridor towards me. Needless to say I couldn’t handle this, especially with my exhausted Divine Pulses, Gambits and heals from dealing with the reinforcements. So I had to reset. On my next run I was a lot more careful, and this time managed to beat Miklan. The last wave of enemies before you engage Miklan were still really troublesome to beat and required perfect placement and distribution of damage from my units, but ultimately I pulled through and mercifully they drop Vulneraries, healing up my battered units. Miklan himself was tough to beat what with my low accuracy and charisma at this point, but I exploited him not being able to move past the stairs. Ultimately Byleth landed a crit on Miklan’s last life bar.
Chapter 6: Rumors of a Reaper
The bulk of this mission is fairly simple, but I have to deal with one last hurdle at the end: killing the Death Knight. Surely, the route where Lysithea is available by default means this is easy? Unfortunately either I was underlevelled or my Lysithea wasn’t growing well at this point; I barely couldn’t get the one-shot even with Dark Spikes. This made me have to reset once, since I didn’t bring any units that could go against DK and take a single hit, not even Byleth. The next round I brought Catherine and she dealt some chip to DK, allowing Lysithea to annihilate him.
Chapter 9: The Cause of Sorrow
Trying to rescue all the villagers wasn’t easy on this difficulty. Had to rely on stride+warp antics to do so, and even then in my first run Jeralt dived right in to die. Wasn’t expecting that, had to reset once.
Paralogue: Oil and Water (Manuela/Hanneman)
This goddamn mission was already difficult on Hard mode, since Manuela dies almost immediately every time. As expected, it was even worse on Maddening. I probably reset 10 times all told, experimenting with different setups. I first tried using Lysithea to Warp Byleth onto Manuela’s platform, but this didn’t help against the pegasus knight that just zooms in on her for a 1HKO. Ultimately I used Marianne (dance + silence + stride), Flayn (rescue), Claude, Catherine and Byleth. Catherine and Byleth would first rush right to tank and defeat the enemies there, while Claude and Hanneman dealt with the enemies coming down from the left. Then came some dance-stride-rescue shenanigans that came down to the last tile, and I was able to rescue Manuela to safety. The mission after that was fairly straightforward, though I failed to get the Rapier.
Paralogue: Tales of the Red Canyon (Sothis)
Monster battle royale! This wasn’t extremely hard and didn’t require any resets but I should mention how bloody intense it felt since I needed to perfectly calculate every last action to make sure no one died. Dancer Marianne was beyond invaluable.
Paralogue: Land of the Golden Deer (Lorenz)
Most people list this as the easiest paralogue, but they tend to warp cheese it or use flyer Byleth. Seeing as I use male Byleth and have a strict no warp cheese policy, this turned out really goddamn hard and intense, involving at least one reset. The waves of enemies crashing down on you get really overwhelming. I stuck Catherine in the bushes to the left and Byleth to the right while using all other units to pick off and support. Keeping an archer in the fort to shoot down pegasus invaders was important. Marianne’s Silence came in clutch to stop mages from killing Catherine, Hilda or Leonie in one hit. Thrysus is worth it though, and I had so much fun with the strategy needed to beat this mission by routing.
Chapter 13: Reunion at Dawn
To no one’s surprise, this makes the list. However, I didn’t really find it an issue keeping my other units alive. Ignatz and Lorenz would probably have been easy pickings for the enemies, if they bothered to move. But by not touching Ignatz and Lorenz until Byleth/Claude was nearby, they didn’t move, hence I was never in any danger. The really difficult part was the beginning, with Byleth and Claude hopelessly outnumbered. I wonder if the mission would even be possible without Claude’s spanking new Immortal Corps battalion. Even then, you only get 2 charges of the gambit, so luckily I had Vantage equipped on Byleth from his Mercenary specialization earlier. Hiding in the bushes, my low health Byleth took down the massive queue of mobs after his blood. After this mission, I told myself I wanted to make Byleth a Hero, since I was absolutely in love with Vantage. As for killing the boss; nothing special. After I got all the chests (especially Axe of Ukonvasara), Lysithea with Thrysus just nuked him from a mile away with Hades, then got a dance from Marianne and double nuked him. Easy peasy.
Paralogue: Forgotten Hero (Marianne)
This one is kind of infamous but with Dancer Marianne (Sword Avo+20) I didn’t find it too bad. Just camp her in the fort up north and no monster can hit her. The rest of the party is in a bit of a pickle due to an evil combination of giant monsters, weird aggro ranges and fog. Eventually I did figure the correct way to get through the forest without aggroing too many beasts at once, and killed the boss monster with my last available character. Pretty tense, a fun mission once you get past the frustration of monsters appearing from the fog.
Paralogue: The Sleeping Sand Legend (Claude)
Probably the last mission to give me any kind of pause. The enemy formations are pretty insane with archers and wyvern riders that can’t wait to pick off your weak units. Followed by a ferocious boss at the end that also comes with endless same-turn reinforcement wyvern riders. Fun. Had to divine pulse quite a few times to figure out how I could dispatch of the bloody bird, who has surprisingly high charisma to lower your gambit hit rates. Ultimately had to create an exact sequence of gambit usage so that my characters could link-boost each others gambits, especially Lysithea’s Resonant Lightning Magic. Other Frivolities
Started out wanting to romance Hilda but ended up choosing Lysithea instead for the interesting dual-crest storyline
Pairings:
Claude-Petra (I like the bonding they get from being outsiders to Fodlan)
Ignatz-Marianne (it’s kinda sweet how Ignatz encourages Marianne to get out more)
Seteth-Leonie (given that they’re both kinda serious and bond over fishing I thought they’d be nice together)
Lorenz-Hilda (feel a little bad for Hilda especially since I started out wanting her, but their supports were kinda cute so eh)
Still didn’t manage to get Rhea’s support points up in time to see the supports
Between Heaven and Earth (the music for the Gronder Field battle in Chapter 17) is the best fucking battle music on the planet
The animated cutscene where you kill Edelgard actually made me sad for the rest of the day
The post-timeskip cutscene with Claude doesn’t hit nearly as hard as Dmitrii’s did in Azure Moon. Still love Claude though
The Leicester alliance parts of the storyline felt kinda….weak, not gonna lie. It was just glossed over. Could honestly have been cut to trim off some of the fat on this campaign which I find overly long
I have no idea how I’m gonna go against Lady Rhea in my upcoming Crimson Rose run. Like I grew to love Rhea like a mother over the AM and VW runs, but then again Edelgard is best girl so
Similarly don’t look forward to killing Golden Deer members in the Crimson Rose run
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