About Formatting Banlist Dates

[Sleepy]

[spoiler=This is my rant, but you can skip the spoiler if you are not up for a little bit of extra read]

This is a topic that pops up pretty often when people talk about wanting to improve the game.

I don't think any of the ways the list has moved about over the years is inherently bad, but issues brought up often make me feel Konami likes the "Corrupt a Wish" game and does just that. Not saying everything they've ever done (or even half of it) has been a miss, but this has been lingering at the back of my head for a while now.

 

Anybody remembers those six month formats? They were fine for the longest time but at some points (or maybe from a certain point onward) they gave the sensation of being too long. Whole formats were predicted months in advance by the TCG courtesy of the OCG being strictly the same game three months in the future back in those days.There was no helping it but to suck it up or just go casual until the landscape changed half a year later.

 

Then we had quite a bit of experimenting during the Xyz era, when formats became four months long (three per year). This was what many people wanted: Not too long as to get stale but not so short that it wouldn't be able to shape up right. Though more often than not, the most meaningful changes came only every-other-format, while the other half of the time we'd see a slap in the wrist for the top decks, changing some things here and there but mostly leaving the format's kings the same. This means the idea of four month long formats would actually wind up being eight month long formats with very light alterations in the middle.

 

OCG followed suit for a little while, and I ignore how long that lasted, but I remember hearing a bit about them going through with three month formats. That is essentially a format change about every time a set release happens. I don't know how that turned out to be but sounds awfully short (even if it was just one month shorter than TCG's) and due to sets coming out every three months as well, well.... Anyways, this is mostly an addendum of the previous paragraph so moving on...

 

Now onto the current way things are done, we have no set banlist dates anymore. I'll speak at the very least for myself when I say I didn't expect much of a change of the formula but a slightly more lenient and with the addition of being able to make instant changes whenever needed and notify the community about them; all the while opening up the possibilities that Konami would have more ways to communicate with the players (somehow). It was not very likely, and I see it was wishful thinking. This idea sounded great and had been suggested before in the community.

 

What is it that actually happened though? DMoC was the first blatant example of an errata reprint that was left in the banlist for a while after its reprint, even though Konami should have had the power to unban it day one and push their product even further. Then PePe. Oh PePe... What is an "Adjustment List"? It is almost like they don't actually have the power to update their own list like they said they could in their article that talked about the "no set banlist dates no more" subject. Up until this day I've never really seen a single supporter that says we are better off without set dates.

None of these format ideas for banlist dates are inherently bad, and I'm not saying the game's state is exactly dreadful for what it is either. However, I keep having this sensation that Konami challenges themselves to do the suggestions the community thinks up that "would be great" and then finds some way to screw something up (and I realize I am not giving specific examples here, and I'm getting off the loop in terms of my involvement and overall excitement of the game so couldn't probably go into those details if confronted and admittedly might have some bias here).

 

I don't think any suggestion is gonna work in an ideal way because mostly all the changes I've seen some member(s) suggest (redundant term in this line, I know) them previously over the decade and a half that I've been into Yugioh, and something always ends up having issues. I've recently found the idea of bringing back banlist dates "like before". I find that every step in the ladder makes someone somewhere miss the previous system. I don't know if those are biased thoughts or if we are being conditioned to stop complaining about how things were when they do finally bring set dates back, or what...

but here's this anyway... [continues out of spoiler]...

 

 

 

 

 

I think set banlists should come back. Predicting them and discussing them by itself was an extra activity the community enjoyed indulging over. Though I'd still want them to be able to make adjustments when needed, a power they don't really seem to have, but would be nice if erratas were instantly moved at day one of their reprint, along with minor changes and not just during emergencies the size of PePe.

 

I'd also personally enjoy an extra spin that could keep things busy. Something along the lines of:
Card of the [x], where [x] is a certain amount of time.

Something like, say, a month or two inside that format. Konami would choose a card and tweak its place on the list for only that long, and then it'd for sure go back to how it was for the reminder of the format, only for a different card to taste the waters following suit.

 

- - - - - -

 

But what about you? What would you like to personally see change in the way the banlist is handled, or what way of doing the banlist do you think is better for the game? Or if you want to reply to anything I've said, also feel free to tell me your thoughts~

[Zauls]

I personally never had a problem with 6 month lists. Any risk of the format becoming stale was extinguished when new packs came out half way through the format. Also, most of the time, there was a big diversity in the meta, so you wouldn't be playing the exact same decks over and over again, so you wouldn't get sick of the format as quickly as you do these days. The only risk is that a pack will come out half way through the format that will release something really dumb and then you have to wait 3 months for anything to be done about it, though that's more a card design issue than a format issue.

 

Also there's the issue of cost. Back in the day, you could buy a deck at the start of the format and know you'll be able to use it for at least 6 months, probably more, so you'd be less worried about investing in the game. These days, you could spend hundreds on a deck that could get hit and lose all its value at any given time. There's a real risk in buying cards now and to me it's not worth it any more, especially considering how little I enjoy the game in its current state.

 

Overall, I think the game moves far too quickly these days and that's not something I enjoy.

[Sleepy]

I personally never had a problem with 6 month lists. Any risk of the format becoming stale was extinguished when new packs came out half way through the format. Also, most of the time, there was a big diversity in the meta, so you wouldn't be playing the exact same decks over and over again, so you wouldn't get sick of the format as quickly as you do these days. The only risk is that a pack will come out half way through the format that will release something really dumb and then you have to wait 3 months for anything to be done about it, though that's more a card design issue than a format issue.

 

Also there's the issue of cost. Back in the day, you could buy a deck at the start of the format and know you'll be able to use it for at least 6 months, probably more, so you'd be less worried about investing in the game. These days, you could spend hundreds on a deck that could get hit and lose all its value at any given time. There's a real risk in buying cards now and to me it's not worth it any more, especially considering how little I enjoy the game in its current state.

 

Overall, I think the game moves far too quickly these days and that's not something I enjoy.

 

 

Yeah, my stand is along the lines of "Kudos to those who like this speed, but I personally don't enjoy it at all". Can't speak for other people, but I think often less can be more, and the speed can get ridiculous.

6 month list's issues was just that; balance issues. Only the mid-point pack release really could ruin them, and more often than not that was a pattern at some point. What's more, we knew X themes were coming right from the start of the 6 months because OCG had them those 3 months earlier and we could just see them.

 

 

 

I think pretty much every single one of these methods would be able to work, but every one of them can be made to not work too.... It's not the system but in how it is used.

That said, 4 months is a little bit awkward because it covers that 1 extra month post release, and it makes it end at a weird pattern that slides over time, so I guess 6 months has been the most successful kind, and the one the game had for the longest time too.

 

 

Balance issues nails it.

[licorso]

I really like your idea on unbanning a certain card for a certain amount of time in the format, it would kind of similar to how Konami unbanned Snatch Steal for one format. However, i think it would be cooler to sort of have them do things similar to how Smogon will do a Suspect Test for a Pokemon. Maybe if Konami wants to consider unbanning one card, theyll let it become legal in tournament play for a month, and based on how impactful the card was on the game, keep it banned, or unban it permanently. Another thing they could do is have certain tournaments or weekends where a banned card will be legal. Like "Oh for this YCS, x card will be legal at one copy per deck" or "X card will be legal at all regional qualifier events this weekend". That would be a cool thing they could do, and it could also possibly increase attendance at YCS events, because of people wanting to play with that banned card.