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David "BobDole" Hoffman on Yu-Gi-Oh!

Every time I write an article, I question exactly how I'm going to begin. Should I start with a joke, with the word "Howdy" or with some random phrase. I just sit there and think whether or not the word "Howdy" has just gotten old and how when I started I wanted my word to be "Nifty". "Howdy" just kinda stuck though, and so I tend to repeat that word just about every article I write. However, since I did this whole thing about the word "Howdy" and how I never know exactly what to write, I have simply jumped the entire idea of a beginning. This is your beginning, and though you may dislike it, you just read it all.

Well, today's article will be on the booming world of Online Dueling. I'll look over two different ways to duel online. Though there are many more, there are only two ways which I have experienced. Let's take a look at the most common form of online dueling, Text!

Text dueling is popular because of the ease of it all. You just type what ya do. Simple as that. Before I weigh the pros and cons though, let me just state the completely obvious. Yes, your opponent can cheat very easily. The humorous thing however, is that often he will get caught. Easy ways to tell that your opp is cheating are: He has a response to everything, he plays more cards then he has in hand, he plays a 4th copy of something, he waits about a minute after you play a near-gamebreaking move and then response with something that just completely screws you over.

Well, it's time to look at the pros and cons of online dueling:

Pro: Well, it does allow for a ton of experience. You can try out new decks, fix old ones and there's almost always an opponent to be found. If you're on AIM you can go to the chatroom Zen and find a plethora of opponents. You gain knowledge, skill, and a well rounded understanding of the game by facing so many different kinds of opponents. I myself have grown substantially in the last few weeks of dueling online. I've come to understand when and how to play all the cards in my deck and I've ever switched over to a different kind of deck all together. Where I once run Toolbox/Chaos Warrior, I now run a pure Warrior deck that I am not only successful with but I absolutely love it. I only have dueling with my friends to thank for discovering my favorite deck. Which brings me to pro number two.

Pro: Friends! You can make a ton of friends online. As long as you play fair and respect your opponent, you will almost certainly gain plenty of friends. You may even form a team. I myself have joined a team now featuring three other members whom I would trust my entire binder with. That's saying a lot considering I have collected more then a few hundred dollars in cards. Though you may not see your friends, you will undoubtedly become close with them and you only have online dueling to thank. Now we have to take a look at a few cons.

Con: It can be incredibly frustrating when a game goes completely against you. You'll start to consider cheating, thinking your opponent already has. The thing you have to understand however, is that your opponent has absolutely nothing to gain from cheating and neither do you. Seriously, outside of a big online tournament with a $500 pot, what do you have to gain? A better record? Are you even recording correctly? Why risk the possibility of branding yourself a cheater just to win a game or two. Once you've been branded, there's almost no escape from that title. People will refuse to duel you, simply because they feel you can't be trusted. It's stupid, and chances are you'll frustrate someone else into cheating. That's even worse then stealing a victory from someone. It's obvious that you can become used to cheating online, and that's a huge con in itself. Just one of the many.

Con: Umm... Ah... You'll... Get... More frustrated? I really can't think of a worthwhile con. Perhaps if you have an internet connection based around pay-as-you-go. However, if you've got a set monthly payment, that's completely irrelevant. You may become addicted, which leads to problems with parentals but really, Online Dueling's considerably less addictive then some of the games out there. Even Runescape is more addictive. That's saying alot too.

Well now that we've gotten the basic Pros/Cons out of the way, we can look at another form of dueling online. This is basically the more trustable, and yet the less used version. There are two programs which you can use to duel online. Let's take a look at the more popular of the two: YVD.

Pro: Allows you to see everything your opponent is doing, therefore preventing him from cheating at all. This is a guaranteed fair game when it comes to down to the player. It's nice to know that everything that happens there is more a result of a players skill then their ability to magically draw the card that will win them them the game. Which may I add is the most frequent result in Text Dueling. It all comes down to who's abused their best cards more.

Pro: This also allows for quite a bit of experience. With the guarantee of no cheating, you can truely test decks. This is without question the best thing. Well, besides alleviating boredom. There are however, a few more cons then pros.

Con: YVD is not fair in the least. I'm sorry if I lead you into believing this was the best way to duel online, but honestly I'd rather risk my opponents honesty to the chances of YVD shuffling correctly. In the many times I have used, I have never gotten a well balanced hand. I'll draw into some crap like Airknight Parshath, Mobius the Frost Monarch, The Warrior Returning Alive, Call of the Haunted, Premature Burial and Royal Decree, just to discover my opponent drew Breaker the Magical Warrior, Snatch Steal, Heavy Storm, Don Zaloog, Sangan, and Reinforcement of the Army. Basically I'm boned in every way imaginable. This is more frustrating than thinking your opponent is cheating. With this, you know this program just crapped out on you.

Con: The whole port forwarding/cannot host thing. I don't pretend to know everything about the Software of my computer. I can handle the hardware, considering I built my computer out of parts from two other computers. Honestly when it comes to programs and whatnot, I don't know jack squat. I also have very little interest in it. Therefore, I am completely boned when someone attempts to explain how I can YVD working. Even if I follow everything they've said, there's always something important that they just managed to leave out. At that point, my computer just freezes up or bursts into flames. More often the former then the latter. Anyway, there's just so much crap you have to do to get this thing working, it's hardly worth it.

Con: Anyone can end up winning. One of the ways you win tournaments, is by having better cards then your opponent. This is because you've traded more often or have more money. That's the way life works, oh well. However with YVD, anyone can have great cards. Why am I stating this as a Con? Well, chances are you'll end up using cards you don't own. Then what happens when you go to a tournament and can't trade for all those cards. Suddenly you're playing differently and unrealistically. You're so used to your opponent having the best things, you're maindecking two Trap Jammer's expecting your opponent to activate one of his 3x Sakuretsu and 3x Widespread. The thing is, not everyone has all those cards and now you're used to countering unrealistic scenarios. Sure, maybe the World Champion has all those cards, but what're the chances of you running into the next World Champion at your local tournament/Regionals. If your playing in the US, your chances are between 0 and 0. Not dissing the US - I'm from the US -, just saying that we're not exactly renowned for our massive win ratio at Worlds. So my point is plain and simple. You'll get used to playing tons of incredibly advanced decks that you'll almost certainly never run into in real life and you may even start playing differently. Tis not a good thing.

Con: Some people on YVD are just huge a**holes. Even more so then on AIM or YIM. I've run into more people cursing me out in YVD then I ever have in chatroom. They'll start claiming that I'm somehow hacking the YVD client to make it give me all the cards I need. Yea, because it's obvious that I'm such an amazing computer geek. Did I not mention the whole "I can't get YVD to work 90% of the time?". Granted every now and then it decides to work, but for the most part no. I'm not that good, though I'm sure there's someone out there who has figured out how to hack YVD. I imagine however, that the amount of people capable of doing so have better things to do than constantly win an online version of a trading card game. If they don't, I'm sorry that's just sad. They may win this YVD duel but they've lost at life.

Anyway, there's another online dueling thingy you can use. It's call Apprentice and I do believe Pojo itself hosts it. I don't have much experience with it, so I can't really note all the pros and cons. I can however point out that it does give out much better hands, and it is a rather good way to duel online. Main problem stems from the lack of people who use it for anything outside MTG. I would most certainly suggest it over YVD if you intend to duel your friends through it. Check the Pojo main site and find the link to the left side. It's really quite a good way to duel online.

Well that's good enough for now. This article has gone on for forever and a day, just like every other one I've done. I'll be back next week with somethin' good. I'll probably have another guest writer around. I've gotten a few e-mails from people asking to Guest Write, and I figure I can stand to review another card or two. I'll even do an article based around my deck, which if any of you know is more akin to my original Warrior Build. The one I ran back when BLS and CED were rampant. Before the idea of a Banlist had even occurred to anyone. It served me well back then, and it does so today as well. I'll just dissect it for ya'll. But anyway, have a good weekend and a Happy New Year!


- David "BobDole" Hoffman


Notes: I got a job. I'm now working at a Daycare that's about a 5 min walk from my house. It's money, and that's all that matters to me. Props to everyone I've dueled with my new deck, as it's been hell fixing it up. Props as well to my new Team: Fate. "It wasn't coincidence you lost this duel, it was Fate". How's that for a kickass title.