Well, let me just say Timmy’s pissed. Timmy’s rarest card just got schooled by some weak little common spell. Is that even possible? I see this going through kids minds all the time as the try their darndest to rack their brains in some futile attempt to make their powerhouse rare playable. Alas, it would just be better off as mana it would seem.

This is what’s become of constructed Duel Masters. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad thing. All popular games it seems just have unplayable fatties. Eventually those kids are just supposed to grow out of them and play with the good guys.

But there’s a Timmy in every gamer. Everyone who deep down wants to tear your opponents head off in the fangs of Deathliger, or blast your opponent out of the cosmos with Hanusa. There’s nothing wrong with that, it’s just Duel Masters Constructed is following the ways of Magic: the Gathering.

Something Magic has that Duel Masters doesn’t is a heavy Limited scene though. In all honesty, how many times have you entered a Duel Masters Booster Draft or Sealed Deck event? I’ll be honest, 2 drafts, 1 sealed. That’s it.

The reasons why booster drafts and sealed decks aren’t played as much is because they cost money: 4-5 packs worth of money, plus entry fee. That’s why Constructed seems more appealing. So is there any way to fix what’s transpired in our souring Constructed Metagame?

Well, yes and no. Right now there are two Limited Formats: Sealed Deck and Booster Draft. And one constructed Format: Constructed. Now I’m going to mirror this game to Magic for a sec as it’ll help me illustrate my point a bit.

Magic has the two Limited events Duel Masters does, but they have a lot more Constructed ones. These formats may be right for Duel Masters either now or in the near future.

These formats are grouped in a way where you can only use cards from certain sets. Standard is the most common, where you use cards from the most recent few sets while Vintage allows cards from every set. This wouldn’t be a bad idea for Duel Masters in a year or two as more sets will be available. If it copies the way they do it in Magic, the first five sets would be banned in a DM Standard and may allow for some more balanced gameplay, since right now there are a lot of over-the-top cards that I’m sure would never be reprinted again: Illusionary Merfolk, Corile, Emeral, and probably Terror Pit.

Block Constructed is good for this game as it pertains only to cards from a certain block. Since WotC is releasing Duel Masters sets in Block fashion, I’m assuming Block Constructed will soon be apart of the game. The basic premise for it is a Base Set (120 cards) every April, with Expansion Sets (60 cards) throughout the remainder of the year. This will begin with Stomp-O-Trons of Invincible Wrath, and will kick off the Invincible Block with 3 more sets hitting in Summer, Autumn, and Winter.

In addition, Limited formats in Magic usually follow the Block pattern. For example, a Magic Sealed Deck is a Tournament Pack of the base set, and boosters of the two expansion sets. A Draft is one of each pack.

Since Booster Draft in Duel Masters uses four packs as it is, it fits perfectly into the Block Setting. Sealed uses as least five, and official ruling will probably be 2 Base Set Boosters, and one of each of the following expansions.

I personally loved the few drafts I did in Duel Masters. It’s getting quite a bit harder to actually find people who have the money and the time to participate in them.. Part of the reason they’re so popular in Magic is because the Pro Tour has the money to support it. Duel Masters Drafts are hit or miss. If you do good once, it rewards you once. Knowing the inns and outs of draft don’t really help you on a daily basis or in future events, unless you actually plan on going to ones.

In this aspect, I think Wizards has got the Pre-Release tournaments down right, in that they should be sealed deck. Side Booster Drafts are also a good idea. With Organized Play about to take off into the Invitational circuit, hopefully a finals draft would be an open option to decide the best gamers.

While I don’t expect it anytime soon, I also think a Block Season, or Limited Season for Duel Masters would be cool. While the game is still in it’s infancy, I’m keeping my mind open to the fact that Wizards may evolve the way it’s played when it starts showing the signs of habitual fatigue, where there’s the same 1 or 2 decks that are played over and over with little room for improvability. This is basically what the Yu-Gi-Oh! Metagame looks like according to most people I asked, a stagnant wasteland of broken cards are tier 7 strategies where you usually win your games based on dumb luck.

This is the last thing Duel Masters should turn into. The reason people like the game is that it’s not Yu-Gi-Oh!, and hopefully it never will be. While certain people may complain about the metagame now, know that you’re not alone. Magic players complain all the time for bannings, even when the format doesn’t need it. Duel Masters will hopefully and eventually cycle out of the amazingly powerful cards that were printed in it’s glory days and soon shift to a well balanced, and overall enjoyable card game that we all see it for.

Well, I’m going to cut my article short for today. I’m busy working on my review for the Stomp-O-Trons of Invincible Wrath set. Much like I did for Rampage, I’ll give you the lowdown on what cards I think are going to be big, and which might flop.

Until Then…

Ronald (Hydomorph) Waclawski