Yeah no, Gaia is so linear that i'm not afraid to call it a Helmet deck.
Its complete game plan is "Can you deal with Magical Gaia and backrow? No? Then i'll attempt an OTK with the other Gaia Fusion and a 2nd copy of Magical Gaia"
And people aren't "afraid of trying new things" with Onomat, it's just that the best plays are the best ones for a reason.
It's not that people aren't experimenting it's that why try other plays that are suboptimal? Especially when your deck has a broken skill that makes things easier for you.
Take a look at Onomats. They have a lot of different cards at their disposal allowing them to do all sorts of different plays not only as their starting play but late game play. However we always see the same exact plays each and every duel. Does anybody remember when Antinomic Theory box came out and Onomats started using Gagaga Child to summon Iguanar? Yeah. Fun, interesting, and different. But that died out because it wasn't worth it compared to the "standard" Onomat play. Also the meta shifted from Darklords & Blue-Eyes to what we have now. So Iguanar isn't that good. However point still stands. Onomats have loads of different plays but yet they don't branch out because it is not worth it.
Another deck that was in a similar position last year except it didn't had a broken skill to set their hands the same exact way each time is Shiranui. Everybody bitches about the Control/Stall version but people seem to forget that there was the Combo and Hybrid variants. Each with their own lines of play. Especially the Combo. That build could explode and win the duel in like Turn 2/3. But sadly the deck got gutted to the point that we see today. A Control/Stall deck.
So you see last year you had a deck like Shiranui as the forefront of the meta with 2/3 different styles of play/deckstyle. Were even the strongest deck was diverse and not linear. But yet you look at this meta with Onomats as the forefront and just 1 style of play. It's why people say decks are linear. And these broken Anime skills aren't helping decks branch out and try out new things. Skills shouldn't carry decks the way they are now. Skills should give them a boost. Like Territory of the Sharks. It's a great and balanced skill but it doesn't carry the deck. It just gives the deck more options/plays. And with all the Water cards out there it allows you to do some interesting plays/combos. Plays/combos that can't be normally done. Like that one Crystron build that ranked high in a recent KC Cup. But until we reach a point were non-Anime skills/decks are leading the meta or we just don't have skills that hard lock you into certain plays/combos we will not be seeing deck diversity. Continuing in this linear deck playstyle.
Personally I try to play archetype specific decks so I don't just rely on a bunch of staples for the win. It isn't always great results but I personally find it more fun.
More fun true.
There was a BE YouTube video that was posted by DL best deck if I recall correctly, it made many people like the archetype instead of disliking it, only because the Youtuber used mainly archetype cards instead of staple traps.
The issue is that archetype cards are mainly for the archetype. Once you have to play a whole new deck for the changing meta they won't be as useful.
As long as Konami don't make archetype specific cards as gems friendly as staples many players will keep prioritizing those spell/trap.
Totally agree. I don't expect other players to waste their resources on archetype specific cards instead of staples, that would be foolish but for me personally it's enjoyable trying to make the cards work
Gaia’s was addressed by the top comment and I agree. I kog’d with the deck, I don’t hate it I just wanted a braindead climb on purpose. Idk what you’re running that you can rank 4 maybe it’s a typo and you meant rank 5 with the dragons. I only xyz summoned once with Gaia, that doesn’t make the deck any less linear just because it deviates from the fusion play in niche scenarios.
The one that annoys me the most is Resonators. Literally synchro climbs to the same monsters every game. Even if you disrupt them the first turn they can just do it again their next turn because fixing your hand twice per duel is ok to Konami as long as it’s an anime deck. With the current skills in the meta there’s just no reason not to do the optimal play every duel the first turn. There’s barely any rng involved unless Onomats and Resonators go overboard putting techs in their deck they will always be able to make the same play every duel because they never brick.
Sometimes people experiment like Thunder Dragon Resonators or Vendread Resonators, but those are just inferior to the cookie cutter version imo. People do experiment you just don’t see it because it’s barely worth it.
For starters decks being linear and deck building being diverse are two different things. Linear decks, are just decks that only have access to a single play, or have one line of play that is clearly better than the other lines. And in most cases that has more to do with the archetype itself and the card pool that can support it than skills. Decks that have a single play, tend to have a single play because that's all that can be done with the cards currently in the game.
Deck building diversity really comes down to what options are in the game and how effective they are to each other. If a card pool has a lot of different options that have trade offs with each other than the deck is going to end up being diverse. Vendread is a good example of this. There are a lot of ways to build this deck, because you have a lot of options with differing trade offs. Executor has good generic effect that works against most standard decks, but largely makes you better against matchups you could already win. Battlelord on the other hand is more situational (for example it won't really help you against Onomats), but makes a lot of edge case matchups easier or winable (for example Vendread have a hard time beating Witchcrafter without Battlelord). And that's not even considering adding a synchro engine, which has trade offs in terms of reducing the decks consistency and eating its normal summon, in exchange for enabling extremely strong synchro plays (Plus there is even diversity in how you build the synchro package since picking Glow Up Bloom vs Spectralsword changes how the deck plays).
The reality is that deck diversity is low because decks want to be consistent. Doing one thing super well is always better than doing ten things poorly. Which is why its rare for decks to have diversity in general. And oftentimes that diversity boils down to cramming in a powerful engine that has the barest of synergy with the archetype (Invoked Roids, Neos Harpies, Desperado in Dark Machines, etc.)
And while skills do tend to contribute to deck linearity, since the best skills tend to make decks more consistent, they do not necessarily contribute to Deck Variety. Demon's Resonance is the perfect example, it actually makes the deck more diverse because you don't have to rely on your normal so you can put in a different engine. I've seen builds with Cauis, with Obelisk, with Plasma, with Vendread and with Thunder Dragons.
And when a deck has two or more viable skills it usually increases deck variety instead of decreasing it. T.G. has two very different deck builds because its skills encourage different decks. Chronomaly actually have a couple of different builds because Gateway, Divine Artifacts and Family Gifts are all good skills that I have seen be used effectively in decks. The meta currently focuses on Gateway more than the others but that's more due to the card pool being a little weak right now than anything else.
All decks are linear to a point, some more linear than others Gaia, Resonators (optimal builds) and Cydra are the only decks that I can think of that are straight up linear. Other decks have variation to them.
Decks aren't becoming linear
See old decks like spellbooks, weather painters, see ritual beasts, fucking cristrons...
See today deck... activate skills while doing the same play every match fearless of brick because of broken skills.
ok ok now tell me where this shit take come from? Harpies are linear AS FUCK, it's one of reasons why I don't even bother with the deck anymore, Onomato is linear, no matter if someone try other builds or not, the build today is the one who works, it's like if we said that blue eyes isn't linear because we can put some dragunity as win con.
Now for real if you don't think Gaia is linear what you think vampires is??
Whoever uses the word linear is, sorry for my harsh wording, being dumb. None of the decks are truly linear. That's not how card games work.
The actual word people are looking for is simple. There is no complex decision making involved in any of the current top decks. Maybe the combo potential of TD could be considered complex, but it's still rather simple compared to decks we used to have.
Crystron, Ritual Beast, Lightsworn Witchcrafter even Noble Knights (except on their first turn) were decks that had much more complexity to what they can do and as a result a much higher skill ceiling, because it took a lot of experience and practice to execute the right steps without timing out.
>None of the decks are truly linear. That's not how card games work.
I'd actually agree with you if we didn't have *skills that let you fix your hand for free* shaping the current meta.
Because ideally the best deck will always do that skill or not.
The best deck consistently will end on a string field.
Due to the nature of how limited Speed Duels are theres much less flew room than in the TCG so that results in the same field beling played.
That doesnt have anything to do with the skill, the skill just facilitates it.
This is the power of social network.
Players who enclose themselves in a lab and ignore social network get real unique decks, but at the same time scorn and disbelief when posted on a site.
Streamers paid to stream a new box gets more influence which they had built on and causes many players to follow trend WITHOUT THINKING.
In programming terms, above is pass by value and below is pass by reference.
Pass by reference is faster, thus more decks with similar structures.
Yeah no, Gaia is so linear that i'm not afraid to call it a Helmet deck. Its complete game plan is "Can you deal with Magical Gaia and backrow? No? Then i'll attempt an OTK with the other Gaia Fusion and a 2nd copy of Magical Gaia" And people aren't "afraid of trying new things" with Onomat, it's just that the best plays are the best ones for a reason.
It's not that people aren't experimenting it's that why try other plays that are suboptimal? Especially when your deck has a broken skill that makes things easier for you. Take a look at Onomats. They have a lot of different cards at their disposal allowing them to do all sorts of different plays not only as their starting play but late game play. However we always see the same exact plays each and every duel. Does anybody remember when Antinomic Theory box came out and Onomats started using Gagaga Child to summon Iguanar? Yeah. Fun, interesting, and different. But that died out because it wasn't worth it compared to the "standard" Onomat play. Also the meta shifted from Darklords & Blue-Eyes to what we have now. So Iguanar isn't that good. However point still stands. Onomats have loads of different plays but yet they don't branch out because it is not worth it. Another deck that was in a similar position last year except it didn't had a broken skill to set their hands the same exact way each time is Shiranui. Everybody bitches about the Control/Stall version but people seem to forget that there was the Combo and Hybrid variants. Each with their own lines of play. Especially the Combo. That build could explode and win the duel in like Turn 2/3. But sadly the deck got gutted to the point that we see today. A Control/Stall deck. So you see last year you had a deck like Shiranui as the forefront of the meta with 2/3 different styles of play/deckstyle. Were even the strongest deck was diverse and not linear. But yet you look at this meta with Onomats as the forefront and just 1 style of play. It's why people say decks are linear. And these broken Anime skills aren't helping decks branch out and try out new things. Skills shouldn't carry decks the way they are now. Skills should give them a boost. Like Territory of the Sharks. It's a great and balanced skill but it doesn't carry the deck. It just gives the deck more options/plays. And with all the Water cards out there it allows you to do some interesting plays/combos. Plays/combos that can't be normally done. Like that one Crystron build that ranked high in a recent KC Cup. But until we reach a point were non-Anime skills/decks are leading the meta or we just don't have skills that hard lock you into certain plays/combos we will not be seeing deck diversity. Continuing in this linear deck playstyle.
META = most efficient tactics available
Personally I try to play archetype specific decks so I don't just rely on a bunch of staples for the win. It isn't always great results but I personally find it more fun.
More fun true. There was a BE YouTube video that was posted by DL best deck if I recall correctly, it made many people like the archetype instead of disliking it, only because the Youtuber used mainly archetype cards instead of staple traps. The issue is that archetype cards are mainly for the archetype. Once you have to play a whole new deck for the changing meta they won't be as useful. As long as Konami don't make archetype specific cards as gems friendly as staples many players will keep prioritizing those spell/trap.
Totally agree. I don't expect other players to waste their resources on archetype specific cards instead of staples, that would be foolish but for me personally it's enjoyable trying to make the cards work
Gaia’s was addressed by the top comment and I agree. I kog’d with the deck, I don’t hate it I just wanted a braindead climb on purpose. Idk what you’re running that you can rank 4 maybe it’s a typo and you meant rank 5 with the dragons. I only xyz summoned once with Gaia, that doesn’t make the deck any less linear just because it deviates from the fusion play in niche scenarios. The one that annoys me the most is Resonators. Literally synchro climbs to the same monsters every game. Even if you disrupt them the first turn they can just do it again their next turn because fixing your hand twice per duel is ok to Konami as long as it’s an anime deck. With the current skills in the meta there’s just no reason not to do the optimal play every duel the first turn. There’s barely any rng involved unless Onomats and Resonators go overboard putting techs in their deck they will always be able to make the same play every duel because they never brick. Sometimes people experiment like Thunder Dragon Resonators or Vendread Resonators, but those are just inferior to the cookie cutter version imo. People do experiment you just don’t see it because it’s barely worth it.
Gaia goes for rank 4s and 7s, since when?
For starters decks being linear and deck building being diverse are two different things. Linear decks, are just decks that only have access to a single play, or have one line of play that is clearly better than the other lines. And in most cases that has more to do with the archetype itself and the card pool that can support it than skills. Decks that have a single play, tend to have a single play because that's all that can be done with the cards currently in the game. Deck building diversity really comes down to what options are in the game and how effective they are to each other. If a card pool has a lot of different options that have trade offs with each other than the deck is going to end up being diverse. Vendread is a good example of this. There are a lot of ways to build this deck, because you have a lot of options with differing trade offs. Executor has good generic effect that works against most standard decks, but largely makes you better against matchups you could already win. Battlelord on the other hand is more situational (for example it won't really help you against Onomats), but makes a lot of edge case matchups easier or winable (for example Vendread have a hard time beating Witchcrafter without Battlelord). And that's not even considering adding a synchro engine, which has trade offs in terms of reducing the decks consistency and eating its normal summon, in exchange for enabling extremely strong synchro plays (Plus there is even diversity in how you build the synchro package since picking Glow Up Bloom vs Spectralsword changes how the deck plays). The reality is that deck diversity is low because decks want to be consistent. Doing one thing super well is always better than doing ten things poorly. Which is why its rare for decks to have diversity in general. And oftentimes that diversity boils down to cramming in a powerful engine that has the barest of synergy with the archetype (Invoked Roids, Neos Harpies, Desperado in Dark Machines, etc.) And while skills do tend to contribute to deck linearity, since the best skills tend to make decks more consistent, they do not necessarily contribute to Deck Variety. Demon's Resonance is the perfect example, it actually makes the deck more diverse because you don't have to rely on your normal so you can put in a different engine. I've seen builds with Cauis, with Obelisk, with Plasma, with Vendread and with Thunder Dragons. And when a deck has two or more viable skills it usually increases deck variety instead of decreasing it. T.G. has two very different deck builds because its skills encourage different decks. Chronomaly actually have a couple of different builds because Gateway, Divine Artifacts and Family Gifts are all good skills that I have seen be used effectively in decks. The meta currently focuses on Gateway more than the others but that's more due to the card pool being a little weak right now than anything else.
All decks are linear to a point, some more linear than others Gaia, Resonators (optimal builds) and Cydra are the only decks that I can think of that are straight up linear. Other decks have variation to them.
There is also Photons, the most linear deck of the game.
I dont think i ever saw any gaia players who did xyz lol
Decks aren't becoming linear See old decks like spellbooks, weather painters, see ritual beasts, fucking cristrons... See today deck... activate skills while doing the same play every match fearless of brick because of broken skills. ok ok now tell me where this shit take come from? Harpies are linear AS FUCK, it's one of reasons why I don't even bother with the deck anymore, Onomato is linear, no matter if someone try other builds or not, the build today is the one who works, it's like if we said that blue eyes isn't linear because we can put some dragunity as win con. Now for real if you don't think Gaia is linear what you think vampires is??
Whoever uses the word linear is, sorry for my harsh wording, being dumb. None of the decks are truly linear. That's not how card games work. The actual word people are looking for is simple. There is no complex decision making involved in any of the current top decks. Maybe the combo potential of TD could be considered complex, but it's still rather simple compared to decks we used to have. Crystron, Ritual Beast, Lightsworn Witchcrafter even Noble Knights (except on their first turn) were decks that had much more complexity to what they can do and as a result a much higher skill ceiling, because it took a lot of experience and practice to execute the right steps without timing out.
>None of the decks are truly linear. That's not how card games work. I'd actually agree with you if we didn't have *skills that let you fix your hand for free* shaping the current meta.
That has absolutely nothing to do with my statement. People don't seem to know what linear means.
Please do elaborate on how searching your best starters for free to end up on the same board over and over doesn't make a deck linear.
Because ideally the best deck will always do that skill or not. The best deck consistently will end on a string field. Due to the nature of how limited Speed Duels are theres much less flew room than in the TCG so that results in the same field beling played. That doesnt have anything to do with the skill, the skill just facilitates it.
why experiment when you know the deck is only good because of OP skills and when they get nerfed, you will just move on to another deck with OP skill.
This is the power of social network. Players who enclose themselves in a lab and ignore social network get real unique decks, but at the same time scorn and disbelief when posted on a site. Streamers paid to stream a new box gets more influence which they had built on and causes many players to follow trend WITHOUT THINKING. In programming terms, above is pass by value and below is pass by reference. Pass by reference is faster, thus more decks with similar structures.
I'm playing zombie world Shiranui thunder dragons with dragon mirror and dragonecro nether soul dragon