This Space
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Never Get Hyped By Anything 

Only the finished card matters. Anything else before it is white noise.

So when Aurageyser Doomed got revealed in Japan how many of you let out a sound resembling disappointment? Because at my local scene everyone was very quick to express their disdain for what is basically a chance-ey Phantom Blaster “Diablo”.

I review cards five times a week. The risks are great, the tasks are thankless and the rewards are few, but I do what must be done. To me, only the actual card in front of me has any chance to prove its worth before I declare it a steaming pile of shit, the meta’s god-king of fucking space, or not interesting enough for anything in-depth; I am aware that is a flaw of mine but I’m not fixing what ain’t broke. So when Bushiroad drop the name and picture of a new card, I flit around its wikia pages with trepidation until they decide to drop the next set of spoilers.

As someone who only cares to buy what is good and what will seem to possess a reasonably decent shelf-life, I don’t hold stock in any potential scenarios. Apart from inviting idiots to throw in opinions and skills that matter to no-one but themselves, it also drives up prices of cards that are expected to work together with it in anticipation of the hype train. Take Crimson Roar Metatron for example. When its picture got revealed suddenly the price of the original Metatron went up because they thought it was a Legion revival. And then its actual skill was revealed and it was shit gravy. I’m sorry, but it is. More fucking field consistency? That barely warrants not Striding and running the risk of a 10k Vanguard on top. It’s just a way to emergency spring Medical Bomber Nurse or similar. Not to mention that as I type, eBay is currently putting up Maiden of Venus Trap for thirty fucking dollars (Indonesians mostly) all because of an upcoming G-Unit that no-one at the time knew WHAT the fuck it does (but now we do) and one G1 unit that was a +0 wash. What the actual hell?

This is completely unjustifiable until people actually know what the fuck it does. It makes no sense to try and sell anything at this point in anticipation of stuff we know next to nothing about nor to buy in case it’s shit and we cheated ourselves out of a bargain later down the line. I am fairly confident it won’t be anything absolutely devastating like a re-stander and if it’s for something incredibly old, odds are it’ll be a case of bad nostalgia, especially since archetype decks are notorious for basically being more of the same old strategy regardless of how good it actually is.

What I’m trying to get at is that expecting too much of something is only going to leave you disappointed when it arrives. It’s like E3. Or at least I’m told that, I don’t play too many video games. In all honesty, when I see a new unit, I basically assume it’s going to be pretty bad, or if not bad, basically the same dog playing the same tricks wearing a different coloured collar. It’s easy for me to assume this since we have more clans than mechanics so I don’t know what sort of trick they can pull without me rolling my eyes at how predictable they are. And then if the skill is actually good, I’m pleasantly surprised rather than contemplating suicide at all my wasted money. Actually, we’re going through a pretty fucking long Kagero drought until April aren’t we? Think of all the rent I can catch up to!

I can understand why someone would get excited about something getting revealed. One reason may be because of a renaissance of a card that was for a long time rather terrible. But I’ve said before decks have a shelf-life and if it’s considered to be mediocre now, odds are what it’s getting may not improve it to any noticeable levels: not all cards are Dragonic Overlord the End after all. It’s largely down to the fact it has to work within the limits of the old crowd, so it tends to either make it happen sooner, or with a bit more potency but not to game-breaking levels. It makes more sense therefore to not expect too much of it because it’s got the ridiculously fast new toys to compete against and only a mediocre card to work with.

Another reason may be because it’s seen as an evolution to an already existing card. This used to be Crossrides and now most recently it was those three ace cards for the main characters in Vanguard G. Once Aurageyser Doomed got revealed I ceased to be emotionally invested in those three being any better, primarily because all of them save for Gear Chronicle honestly weren’t that brilliant in the first place. So of course once they had their skills dropped I felt immense surprise when they turned out to be actually NOT horrible, so at least I still win.

Thing is, even when we actually know what it finally does, depending on the nature of the beast it may still suddenly jump up to unjustifiably high prices simply because of its perceived worth in a fight. This, I reckon, is probably the worst sort of hype. Think about it. The rarity of a card doesn’t affect how much of a complete shit-fest a card turns out to be. Or for the other card reviewers. I don’t know if this is the case for them, but for me it’s because I have for the most part stopped being excited by everything, it’s a lot easier for me to look at a card and make a decent enough call on how it would perform in an actual fight. At least until further support is added, which may make or break it for me. I think G Booster 6 is a pretty solid example of this: three of its own RRR cards are basically just fail-con Grade 3s that you could just not run without any noticeable penalty and currently support a build that is sort of incomplete. And I don’t know about you, but that’s not exactly the sort of thing I would shell out money for.

So until we actually get a leaked confirmation of the skills of unrevealed shit, can people at least freeze the fucking prices until we learn what it does? The quality control on cards varies due to a complete lack of understanding on what makes a card, therefore, is it not easier to assume it will be shit until it proves itself otherwise? Oh and for the love of god, don’t look at fan-submitted skills in the wikia comments unless you actually enjoy the sensation of complete and utter brain-rape.

Tell me it’s sort of not if you actually enjoy it at saikyocardfighter@outlook.com