Everything around me changes, and everything remains the same

http://www.yugioh-card.com/en/limited/

The banlist for the TCG is different! Yet the impact is kinda the same, making you think, did it really need to be different other than to appease people? Which is probably a major point in all of this, I mean, looking at the list, and the massive amount of changes (with a massive amount of bans that are less to hit a deck and more on everything), it seems that if you posted on pojo or a similar site lately, your post is likely to have affected this banlist.

Let's begin with the most notable similarities. Babies still banned, Judgment still banned, and if you are interested, Tenki still semi'd.

Now on the flip side. That Ice Barrier synchro went to 1 after all. Only it's not a 3 headed dragon but a tiger? Dewloren, Tiger King of the Ice Barrier to 1, Trishula, Dragon of the Ice Barrier remains banned. If you bought it, well, I am sure konami made sure to redirect their main site to a Trollface.jpg just for you. But hey, for what it's worth, they justified it. By bringing back T.G. Agents. Sorta. This is too gloomy though, so let's talk about another change! Brotherhood of the Fire Fist - Rooster is not limited! How great, it's that secret rare in the latest set, so now if you bought it early or pulled it you are not screwed. If you sold it after you learned of its upcoming limitation, well, it's a sad day to be you, buuuuut, if you kept it you can play Rank 3 Fire Fists! Only not really, because Brotherhood of the Fire Fist - Spirit instead got limited... So let's summarize, if you pulled it or bought it early, you are screwed, if you had it and sold it recently, you are screwed, if you have it, you will have issues using it. Well... your fault for buying cardboard, nothing else to say, surely someone told you before it was bad.

But, if you don't deal with actual cardboard that much and prefer either the budget options or the virtual variety, which 99% of you do (which is amazing when you consider I am talking to less than 100 people), this is a fine day to be you (and me), so let's talk about the changes this crazy, crazy company brought us.

First of all, Dragon Rulers. Babies banned.
Now, we all remember the redundant move the OCG did addition to that, when they limited Super Rejuvenation even though the discard outlets were banned. Thankfully TCG is the sensible kind and did not redundantly limit Super Rejuvenation. They redundantly banned it. But hey, to be fair, the discard outlets weren't just the babies in dragons, there was another major discard outlet which they could freely use due to their structure, and that was Card Destruction which was still limited. Well, while at it, let's ban that too.
Card Destruction, banned.
Now let's try and look at the reasoning behind that. While Card Destruction is a power card, which alone can justify its ban, it also was a long overdue Dark World hit, which may not have been much lately, but when you add some other hits, you see it could make a comeback in the gaps of this new format.
As for Super Rejuvenation, is it that they really hate Dragon Exodia Turbo that much? Or is it perhaps an interaction with the new Blue Eyes decks? Iunno, maybe I'll update this part if I can be sufficiently arsed to check it.
But that's not all for Dragons. TCG decided to go the extra mile, in addition to the 2 other extra miles, so it's like they are 3 miles away now. Gold Sarcophagus is limited. That is certainly a dragon hit, won't lie. And I guess it is a big point of difference between TCG and OCG because it directly damages a big deck of the new format, that being Tempest Dragunity. Gold Sarcophagus added a great deal of consistency, being able to search Mysteltainn or even Phalanx if need be. Without that the deck loses some of said consistency, and while it may be just 2 searchers in a deck that's full of them, because of the strength of the deck, it may be something actually impactful. At the same time, it should be noted dragon abusers in general are hurt. If you needed to add a dragon type monster of one of the 4 elements, all you needed was a Gold Sarco which is now limited. It should also be noted it's a bad time to be an exodia deck, or generally gimmicky.
Now here's a last, very interesting point, which should make dragon players happy. Number 11: Big Eye is NOT limited. That means neither of the money cards of dragons are hit, while they maintain their usefulness, so they get to keep their money. I have to say this makes a lot of sense, I feel stupid for not thinking of it.

Moving on from dragons, we are going into Spellbooks. The hit on them remains the same, Spellbook of Judgment. There is a difference here too however. If you look at the list overlooking the Spellbook of Judgment hit, you will notice this is actually a very pro-spellbook list as it eliminates main threats to them, which we'll go through later.

Let's stay at those two. I'll be honest, I did not expect that. As an irl player, I'm glad with those, I can get in with other decks and have chances. As an online player, I'm happy with those, I can make decks again. From konami's standpoint, this is something they did for the players. Is it pro-consumer? Likely. Is it pro-customer? Not really. If I were in konami, I'd be saying "Eh? Really? Are we really going through with that?", because flipping the people who spent fortunes on your latest set, instead of letting it cool off for a bit, especially when you have a shorter list, is a really peculiar move.

Admittedly, Dragon players didn't lose much. Main deck was expendable, and the reason it was expendable in retrospect could be in anticipation of this banlist, especially the common babies imports. The expensive cards were Dracossac and Big Eye, of which neither was hit, including Big Eye which was hit in the OCG. Normally, when a deck is hit, its cards lose their value, but not in this case since Dracossac and Big Eye are universally good cards while lv7 engines are viable, so by the drop of the dragon deck, while they can lose quite a bit in their pricing, it won't be a massive drop. I can't state how much sense this makes. It was an excelent move, as, while the dragon deck was killed to open the way in the metagame, dragon players lost nothing but commons and rares, the format was looked after, the players were looked after, it was right in every way (other than the fact you still have to deal with multiple Big Eyes). When taking all that into account, the big winners of this format were without a doubt Dragon players. They were using the best deck of the format, which was way beyond most decks, and even when that overpowered deck was killed they did not lose their money.

Those that got shafted were Spellbook players. Their deck lost their massive power card, regressing towards a normal control deck with some consistency issues, the possibility of iffy hands and certainly not easy to get off plays. What they gain is some serious loss of competition, but that is likely not enough to make up for losing Spellbook of Judgment. The problem with spellbooks is that they were shinier than a Christmas tree right out of the box. No budget options here, you either buy the completely pimped out deck or you buy nothing, and since those shiny cards have higher rarities they were pretty expensive. Additionally, those shiny cards aren't exactly universally viable, so when the deck dies, they die. When they die, the guy who bought them loses a lot of money. And all that was when they could not help but be second in the format, struggling against their main dragon competition which got the much better end of the deal in every way. When you look at it like that, as a Spellbook player, you can't help but feel a bit salty to say the least.

Again, if you look at everything else in the banlist, it seems to be helping spellbooks, and that's probably konami's way of allowing spellbook players to keep their money. Allow me to say at this point though that they failed, books with judgment are a whole other deck, it's not nearly the same, no matter how many tricks they have (which aren't too many actually, if you just overlook Fate you see their real issues clearly), they are still a deck that has to find a consistent balance between offensive outputs combined with a specific spell lineup and that's before metacalls. For spellbook players to keep their money they'll have to either be really smart and quick about it, or work really hard in competitive play with their existing decks to push it up in the tiers to hold their deck's pricing at a reasonable amount to cool off the cost, while it seems that a certain blue eyed maiden, which can no longer be simply summoned from the deck like that, may have to work overtime to make that happen. No matter what, one thing is for certain. Right now, no one is getting their Spellbook of Judgment money back.

Let's move on to see what else KDE had in store.
Elemental Hero Stratos is now banned. While I like getting D-Heroes to my hand and all, I have to say this was a long overdue ban. Is Stratos broken? In the decks it is used and as limited, I'd say no, it is the just support of them to keep being a deck. What it is, is older than dirt and supporting the oldest consecutively competitive deck I've seen, so yes, the ban is perfectly justified. I have to say though, to see the love affair between konami and alius breaking off like that, it feels like something is missing. Is perhaps the romance limited to the OCG? With that, I can't expect heroes outdoing Buujin, in comparison they don't have that much more now. Stratos was a power card for them that will be greatly missed considering 1/4 of the deck was just for the purpose of getting that card. What will also have issues is Gate Dragons, a possibly viable deck this format which has a main engine hurt. No more Stratos into Alius for eternal Shining plusses loop. I want an Alius image with googly eyes and captions saying "Don't you love me anymore?".

Next up, Number 16: Shock Master joins Zenmaity as the second banned Xyz monster in the TCG and is the first pro-Spellbook hit in the list if you don't count dragons and generally decks getting hurt. It's a hit many have been asking for, but I have to say I disagree with it at 0. While it is an issue with decks that get it out easy along with other monsters (like Wind-Ups), it is otherwise a card that favours balanced decks by punishing one-track mind decks, or generally decks that work off of a single thing. It is generally not bad for those one way decks to exist, it is good though for those balanced or niche decks to carry counters to them. Anyways, the people have spoken and so have the spellbooks. Shock Master is banned.

Listening to the public outcry of the masses that were getting their Solemn Warnings and Super Polymerizations negated by the almighty, unstoppable deity that is Shi En (I wanna make that WDA pantheon of deities, he shall be Shi En, the No), Konami decided to no longer deal with the deck anymore and banned Gateway of the Six. Does it kill the samurai? No, Gateway is as unsearchable as it always was. What it also is, is a big power card, so, the ban can be justified. You can argue something though. Did the samurai do something this format? Well, no. Are they expected to do something in the upcoming format? Well, looking at the list and cardpool, to be honest, no. The only notable thing is that one great matchup they have. And that is probably the reason Gateway was banned, since that matchup is Spellbooks. Therefore, Gateway joins Shock Master as the second pro-spellbook hit.
Wait, wait, before the next, I got a good one. Ahem...
Shi En can negate his own summon.
Ok, next.

You know what else people wanted banned? Karin, I know there's no way you'll read past the first sentence, but this one is for you:
HEAVY STORM BANNED!
Actually, I'm not that excited about it, but some people are, so w/e. I mean, many of you will bring up a certain issue, as backrows are easy to overextend and should generally be punished for that. Set 5, go? Yeah, that's a thing. Or that would be a thing if there were any things left to set, but we'll get to that. Wait, actually, let's stay on that for a tiny bit. If there is nothing left to set, then why is Heavy Storm banned now, when most of its prey was mass restricted. I mean, yeah, it would suck if heavy storm was used against field spells and continuous stuff, and it hit for example at the same time your tower, star halls, set fate and set wisdom to rush for game but- oooooooooooh. Ok, let's add Heavy Storm to that list as the third.

Speaking of power cards, Monster Reborn and Pot of Avarice are now banned. I can shrug it off as just hitting power cards for random rotation. I will comment on it a bit though because they have something in common. It's a matter of pacing. Both Monster Reborn and Pot of Avarice are there to assist explosive plays. While any time to ban them would be good, banning them after having banned a lot of backrow is actually pretty sensible.

Notice how I never referred to Spellbook of Judgment as just Judgment. There's a reason for that, and that is another Judgment hitting the banlist. Much to EW's dismay that is not Judgment Dragon, but Solemn Judgment.
I have to say I disagree with the hit, while splashable, Solemn Judgment is generally a card that promotes better ygo. There is a very right time and a very wrong time to use it, while generally being able to do a variety of things with the right timing, at the same time as being balanced as a limited card, especially with the backrow available as of September 1st. Power card rotation I guess? It's not like any are rotated in though. Can't say I can tell their reasoning behind this one right now.

What I can tell their reasoning for is Ultimate Offering. How big things could Madolche do with it? Not really familiar. I know of course what Gadgets could do. Are decks using it hurt that much in structure? No, it was a limited, unsearchable, continuous trap card. Having it or not having it makes little difference for the player using it. What it does make a difference on is the opponent, who may be thinking, that single backrow could be Ultimate Offering and if I don't do something about that I may get OTK'd next turn, so the decks using it certainly lose something important. At any rate, it only supported OTKs and generally loops lately, so why not ban it.

Let's talk mermail, as they are a hot topic lately. TCG took a very different approach to the OCG. What OCG chose to hit was mermail archetypal engines, those being Mermail Abyssteus and Abyssphere. Those harm a lv7 mermail-centric deck indeed, while harming different things in fact. Teus is a card of explosive plays, while sphere is a card of a control pace.
What the TCG hit instead was Dragoons and Diva, attacking the sea serpent engine and leaving the mermail archetype alone.
Now, there's an arguement over whether Abyssteus or Dragoons is the harder hit. There's a main difference between the two. Teus is a combo starter, functions alone (with any other water ofc), is unsearchable and in the worst case will work with a 141 search. Dragoons on the other hand is a combo piece, it has issues working without a discard outlet, many of which were lost in the OCG. Teus is at 1 there, sphere is at 1 and stream is banned, that's 7 discard outlets lost for a monster that depends on them, which is a minority compared to what it has left, but they were perhaps the better ones for the card, so dragoons loses a lot of value like that. Let's also keep in mind that dragoons is often searched by Marksman, not often relevant for its main effect, but it can be when a sphere/pike can enable a dewloren, although that's not as easy with 1 Diva. What is very relevant for its main effect is milling it with Undine, which is still just as much possible even if it's at 1.
Another main difference to note is that Teus is a super rare TCG exclusive while Dragoons is a structure deck common, while at it, Sphere is new, Diva is old, so you can more easily see where Konami is going with it there. Now, diva hit actually hurts quite a bit, at least it hurts me as a mermail player, I love divas and they have shown quite a bit they love me back. They allowed for some pretty big plays which now have issues happening without an Undine engine. But again, Diva is searchable because Dragoons is millable, so when Undine comes into the equation it balances out a lot of what is lost for mermail (not to mention that afterwards Diva is salvageable).

Now, while OCG has a slightly wider (but very useful) arsenal still for the deck, I'd say TCG mermails have the better chance of recuperating just because Undine fixes so many things. The answer people have been bringing up for OCG was undine as well, and in that deck it didn't make it look like the list didn't happen for the deck, like it does for the TCG version. Then you consider that Tidal + Teus is still a thing and it seems like TCG mermails got the better deal here, even though the loss still hurts them.

Let's talk a bit Fire Fist too. Tenki still at 2. Rooster in, Spirit out (well, at 1). I'd say that again, here, TCG got the better deal, which is understandable when considering Rooster is a brand new card here, while we saw a bit of lv 3 fire fist over there. Spirit is vital in the engine, won't lie, but the time the 2 function in the deck are very different. As a card you'd want to have, you'd want rooster early to set up, spirit late to pull easy plays. To demonstrate, between the cards: Spirit, Rooster, Leopard, Tensen, Tenki, the only combination of 2 that is completely unplayable alone is Spirit + Tensen. For anything else, even in the worst case, over the course of 2 turns there will be a play available. Spirit and Tensen needs another level 3 to pull any play, and if you have another lv3 you already have a Tensen + Rooster or Tensen + Leopard which is a first turn combo on its own anyways which will give you a horse, a rooster, a rooster search, any face down Formation of your choice and in the case of leopard a face up tensen as well. Spirit is then searched in the process and can be recycled from that point onwards with the use of an xyz, meaning that even if the chain breaks once, it can be fixed. What more Spirits help in is the topdecking process of midgame, which the deck is generally not dependent on as it thrives on searches and maintaining a loop. The real issue is that the rooster search in the afforementioned combos cannot be a spirit, so you have to manage for the Lion Xyz summon without it, if you want the Spirit back.

The second Fire Fist hit was Tenki, but while that was the same, there is a major difference. The unlimited Rooster can search Tenki, which in certain variants of the deck is a great help even with a semi'd Tenki. Rooster can be in other variants of Fire Fist as well, exactly because of how high accessibility to Tenki it can have at times. Obviously, it should be mentioned that the Tenki hit affects other decks as well. Buujin most notably lose a Yamato searcher they very much need, Constellars take the hit to their Kaust searcher, but it's managable, the rejuvenated T.G. could also use the card.

As for the Fire Fist deck, it will again, probably function better in the TCG given all the cards, which we actually got with Judgment of the Light. Don't give up Fire Fist players, you can still pull through!
...
ahem...

Next I need to take another moment out if you'll excuse me to express myself.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-
Genex Ally Birdman, one of my favourite utility cards, is limited, which I guess is for participating in, how many is it now, his third loop for game? And that's not counting otks. But still, birdman, he's a fun dude. That's the harpie FTK hit btw, we didn't get a Divine Wind hit but we got this one. To which I object, ban Wind, Harpie Dancer, Ancient Fairy Dragon, Black Garden, that lv8 Genex Synchro and the friggin lv1 tuner it searches because it's obviously broken, then unlimit Birdman. I find that fair, thank you. In fact, structure the entirety of ygo around stopping Birdman from going under such extreme loop abuses just so you can keep Birdman unlimited. I'm serious here.

Let's get further in this hit a bit though (I mean, yeah, sure, FTK self explanatory, but let's regardless). KDE hates you putting things in your hand. In particular, she hates you picking things up from the field and taking them in your hands. Seriously, bouncing (the act of returning a card from the field to a player's hand) was destroyed in this banlist, let's count them, that's 4 cards newly limited which return things to the hand, 3 of them going there right from unlimited, the 4th being previously semi-limited just to break a very specific loop which requires 3 copies to function, so technically unlimit worthy itself, while only one of them, the FTK enabler, is a hit shared with the OCG list. Either they had enough of something, or they are about to release a monster that really shouldn't return to your hand, I hope it's not the latter though as that means they are never coming back. I love bouncing, things should be bouncing, bouncing is fun. Think about it.

Again, responding to public outcry, Rescue Rabbit is limited. I recon outcry wouldn't be as bad in the TCG if the thing wasn't a secret rare when released, but I digress. How wrong and how right is that hit. The wrong part is that it kills much of the vanilla potential that was opened before. Box of friends isn't really able to make up for it from what I see right now. So as it is, the only reason to run a vanilla is if it fills the role of a neccessary archetypal beater in a stun deck (Heliotrope), is required for an effect (Mystical Shine Ball) or generally has an extremely niche use (ally mind, vanilla dragons etc.). And even then, I can see Heliotrope being dropped in cases. As for why it's right, it's the only friggin Verz hit and it generally hurts some heavy stun potential.

Thunder King Rai-Oh could offer some decent regulation to several decks in this new format in order to combat some of the more spammy threats. Ever since it was semi-limited it was always suggested as a cure to the format's issues, as it generally isn't an overpowered card while promoting healthier formats instead. And so, listening to the public outcry, TKRO was limited.
...
What?
...
Spellbooks, that's what. Number four, join the party.

Evigishki Mind Augus is limited so that you can't tribute one to ritual summon the other, getting it in the graveyard, getting it in your hand, looping, you get it. Deckout FTK reason.

And next, the Ice Barrier we were all waiting for going to 1!
Dewloren, Tiger King of the Ice Barrier!!!!!!
...
O...k?
I'm sorry, I'm drawing a blank here. Why? As far as I know, for looping purposes, there's no combo that requires 2 of them as Dewloren can just bounce itself as part of the combo... Is there a loop I'm overlooking? Is there a deck that spams Dewlorens which I am overlooking? I mean, mermails in their prime didn't over-Dewloren, and even if they did, it's a monster that bounces cards in your hand in a water deck. I mean, yeah, useful, not game-breaking. Not to mention, a certain Diva just went at 1, so if you are making multiples, you are not making them with that Diva unless you salvage. And archer, well, prefers doing other things usually, right? Is it because Archer + Undine? Is the play that big? No, seriously, I'm forgetting something, aren't I? There has to be a real reason for this. I'm telling you guys, something fishy is up with bouncing.

Constellar Ptolemy M7 is now limited.
IT'S A CONSPIRACY AGAINST BOUNCING AND ALL THAT IT STANDS FOR!
I'm guessing Hieratic Gishki loops are the reason behind it. Hieratic is getting some love, so the loop must lose some. With it, Ptolemys. More than 1 is needed in more or less nothing (was there a pure hieratic loop that used multiples? I think there was) than that hand loop. The implications of the hit are, well, close to nothing other than the fact it's a nice card.

Dimensional Fissure, Macro Cosmos AND Soul Drain were limited. The graveyard must be defended and that is apparent in this list. Unfortunate, those cards were responding to some pretty unbalanced threats most of the time, although often some decks couldn't be made because "they die to macro". Then though, you realize, why not just play 1 of each instead of 3 of 1? It's not like siding 6 of them was a sensible choice. And then there's Banisher of the Radiance too. Seems more like a hit to appease rather than something actually sensible. Cool, now my side deck will be multicoloured.

Royal Tribute, many have asked for it. Is it rightful or not? Depends on your perspective and format, yes and no. Were GKs going to be relevant? Probably not, not with half the trap lineup of ygo gone. But it was nice to see it limited regardless, it's one of the more annoying power cards. There aren't many moments when it worked against you and you weren't making an indescribable face, at least for most people. Not fun.

Bottomless Trap Hole, Torrential Tribute and friggin Compulsory Evacuation Device are limited. Yes, Compulsory Evacuation Device. Add to that the semi-limiting of Dimensional Prison and the fact Mirror Force is still semi'd in the TCG, along with the hit on Rai-Oh, Rescue Rabbit and Solemn Judgment and you get a really anti-stun TCG, even without Heavy Storm. Hitting stun makes sense, especially with TCG being more stun oriented, I'm sure TCG wanted to get rid of all of them for a while now and did as soon as they got the chance. We've discussed it, stun decks keep by a big percentage (compared to other decks of course) a similar core which is mainly those older cards. While those older cards are there, newer ones are bought less, and since TCG'ers are more on stun, it's been a thorn on KDE's side for a while. OCG had that issue less and kept them around, but they are no longer bound as much it seems. That's my best explanation for this particular hit. Now on to whether it was right, well, I'll say no. The things they punished in the metagame were really accurate, their presence much needed. CED in particular was a card that returned health to several metagames that are constantly occupied by extra deck monsters made at 141 or less. Being able to get rid of them at 141 as easily was a huge balancing factor, which is no longer there. Then, BTH and TT joining Solemn Warning at 1 while Solemn Judgment is banned brings the grand total of viable summon responses (and negations) to 3, which seems unhealthy for the metagame to say the least, especially when combined with the limitation of CED. The semi-limitation of Dimensional Prison does come as an additional hit, but not as important, if it weren't for the rest, it would be hardly impactful.

Eradicator Epidemic Virus is easy to access now with rank 4s, which many are bringing up as the reason for its limitation. It's a bit valid and a bit not, as it tributes the monster while in many fast stun/control decks that rank 4 will often happen at -1 if forced, so you lose basically 3 cards to get it off. Of course it's a good card, we all remember it in Dark World, but we also remember it was format specific and wasn't always used because of its pacing. Similarly, even in a spellbook format, dragons would rarely main it at 3, at least as far as I remember (while of course sided there were more, but that was a specific metacall). Still, with the current circumstances I'd say that EEV at 1 was a right and unbiased move by konami, which promotes a healthier ygo under terms of equal chances, world peace and-
nah, jk, spellbooks, get in there, that's five.

I swear, we are not done yet, there were 46 friggin cards in this banlist. Let's move on.

Plaguespreader Zombie and Mezuki at 2, Destiny Hero - Malicious at 3. I wasn't kidding here when I said your post on pojo mattered. You see that? It's konami giving you back half an old deck, all at once. Your post mattered. Double the Plaguespreader, double the fun, what can I say, get those 6 tuners in there. And then we got ourselves a proper Malicious loop, can't wait to see what this does, I wanna see some quasars and stuff happening, no half assed things. Hieratics maybe? That too. No doubt they'll be regretting that one by October. Or some will at least.

T.G. Striker semi-limited, The Agent of Mystery of Earth unlimited. If only you had that trishula too, huh. Those are the reason we don't have her probably (or the excuse) but I'll be nice to them regardless. Both enable the T.G. Agent deck, with some new toys to make it even more viable, like the transturn thing that makes earth into venus right on board which I cba to remember atm and will update later. Then, when you consider both the format, the backrow options and the new cards, a semi-limited striker makes T.G. decks look slightly more viable even with the loss of a Tenki and a Rai-Oh. I can see them happening, especially with their swap card being an actually decent chainable in the format, now that CED is limited.

Tsukuyomi, Pot of Duality and Scapegoat unlimited, for similar or not reasons. Surely Pot of Duality will be aiding some of those now viable control decks (that are far less viable without friggin traps), surely scapegoat will help those small (or bigger) synchros (speaking of quasar I guess) and surely Tsukuyomi will continue being the exact same Tsukuyomi, only less useful because you are not running the dragons that are getting verz'd anymore.

A hero lives and emergency call unlimited caaaaaaaaaaaaan~
~
not even come close to making up for the loss of Stratos. You could have 6 e-calls and it would be the same, like searching heroes was ever an issue.

Hieratics are getting some very, very suspicious attention in weird places... Hieratic Seal of Convocation (their search spell) is now unlimited, and the deck is kinda much more viable now, at least in terms of this format. Or are they? Still one redmd, one ptolemys, one birdman, but then again, malicious, bewd deck, dragon rulers. They have stuff they can do with their time, surely.

Finally, attempting to take the TCG by storm (pun intended) Blackwings return with not 2, but 3 Black Whirlwinds! Here in the TCG, we (sometimes) don't do half assed jobs, here in the TCG (sometimes) we go all the way! Now you can go full BW BS on your opponent, flashing your chainable Icarus Attacks against his wtf-do-I-even-have-left-backrows, and if they do have them, delta crow them, because unlike them you can mass destroy backrows. Have to say, for stun options, when all is considered (upcoming cards etc.) BW seems like a pretty viable stun option.

Now on what we have different from the OCG changes. We still have Big Eye, now you can keep losing your monsters to anyone who can spam lv7s, although Dragons are hit more in this side of the formats, so I don't see multiple Big Eyes being that much of an issue. The most important thing is, you can still sell it, and that is important because it's damn expensive.

No Wind-Up hit trade, your wind-ups are just as useless as they were before in the TCG, fair is fair, you had your fun with them.

Chaos Sorcerer makes perfect sense to not change since Chaos Support will take a while for us.

Bestiari is the exact same thing no matter at how many it is right now imo, sorry, why they didn't semi it is beyond me, but then again, what does it matter. You have a bazillion cards to go Gyzarus already.

Grand Mole is not semi'd either, and I could give many explanations but above all BOUNCING FRIGGIN CONSPIRACY. It's real man, I'm telling you.

Gorz not at 2, which is kinda understandable as something to not do in general, Gorz at 2 can be viewed as pretty unhealthy and there was plenty of outcry against it. On the one hand, we don't have heavy storm so not as needed. On the other, we don't have friggin traps.

How relevant could Advanced Ritual Art be at 3 instead of 2? It came in at a bad time, but now we could find out with this difference. It seems TCG did not want to take that chance, we did. Then again, we have more Earth, so more Fairy help, no need for more Perfect Herald support perhaps?

We don't get Reasoning which I think is perfect as those lists don't have much reasoning really. I won't justify it, instead I will note how weird it is to not add that spellbook milling card. I guess that would make too many cards?

Now as to what this means, I think I've listed the differences between OCG and TCG formats in the hits, so combine that with the OCG list analysis and you get a perfect picture, almost, kinda. We get more mermail and fire fist, making more way for spellbook, less dragunity, less stun universal support, a tad bit less verz, more hieratics, more blackwing, more zombies and dark stuff to make up for the fact we have no chaos to play with, less powercards, perhaps less buujin, obviously no cards we don't yet have and NO TRISHULA! Why... I guess I'm ok with it because I can buy a cheap Trishula now to look at it. Yes. Look at it. I'm serious.

Now looking at all that, it's not THAT different, we have a list with very big differences between them, but due to hitting mainly the dominant decks and not having much established after that, hits seem to have an effect but not as much of a main one. It's different and it's the same, which is a bit weird when you consider they are different sets and different lists. Possibly something the TCG had to abide by.

As for the list intervals. To those that say it's a 3 month list, that's a 31 on the December, dumbasses. So next list January 1st, which judging by previous sets should also be the month Legacy of the Valiant is released, meaning we are trying to match OCG lists starting there, at least closely enough. Either that or we get 3 lists with 4 month intervals or something else weird, but it's probably the first.

Now we see lists can be different, now we see TCG has a certain degree of freedom in its banlists. Note we are applying the 2 month (or 1 and a half) banlist for 4 full months instead, which could turn out weird, but you like the banlist anyways so why care. Note that once we get in set rotations like the OCG, we will see an annoying spike in card prices, which hurts the TCG much more than the OCG. Also, mark my words, we are about to see wicked TCG exclusives in the following sets, things are now just too normal and the TCG is just too free to not do something evil about it.

So, that's my third banlist post in a couple of weeks? And then we are entering banlist prediction period in a month or so yet again... meh, this is getting exhausting...

Also, wtf am I going to do with the WDA Tiers now? Dammit konami, you did this on purpose...

Me and my Tier 14 decks.

The only thing I consistently play online and offline, got a fairly big hit. Compulsory Evacuation Device all the sudden being limited, banned Solemn Judgement, limited Thunder King Rai-Oh, not getting 2 Neo-Spacian Grandmoles. It seems like no matter how little they're supporting the archetype they just want to keep making it harder for me to play extremely old deck Counter Fairies. On that note, at least banning Heavy Storm means I don't look stupid setting 5 cards with Bountiful on the field.

I always ran Macro and Dimensional in D.D. decks, so outside of when I try to side it with Counter Fairies and Monarch variants (Where I can side those two cards and Soul Drain) that's another deck off my play list... at least my nameless random destruction deck is still fi- oh wait.

Dimensional Prison, not getting more Mirror Forces or Moles or Gorz, Limited Torrential Tribute and banned Heavy Storm also make it harder to use my Nameless Troll Destruction deck... think nothing but D.D. Warrior Ladys, Smashing Grounds, Dimensional Prisons, Bottomless Trap Holes (I get less of that too?) etc.

None of these are high-tier decks, but Cyber Dragons, Counter Fairies, Spellcounters, Random Destruction Annoyance and D.D. are what I own in real life. Spellcounters was already Tier 24 niche, but when other spellcasters (Prophecies) came out that filled that Spellcaster niche better, it felt just plain silly to keep using the deck in the name of having a Spellcaster Deck. Cyber Dragons became impossibly hard to run when Future Fusion disappeared. Now everything I have left got nerfed into the Tier 52 bracket.

I know I have no right to whine because it honestly looks really great for the players as it stands now. I expect an interesting meta to evolve from this, but that's just not what I play. I also completely understand that what helped my decks greatly are cards with virtually no requirements that work anywhere. I'll probably keep playing my weird bad decks as I always do now and again, but I just wish some general support for the archetypes would come along that's not demanding of your entire decks attention (looking at you Perfect Herald) and if they're not going to give me that... then give me back my 3 Honests or 3 Solemn Judgeme- *shot*

i like the ban list it help my deck

Hieratic/Spellbook for next format...(oh yeh I don't play anymore, nvm).

God, I love your articles. Always so knowledgeable and hilarious. I feel like I level up every time I read one. Although, I read them out of order. So glad we get more F&L lists since that means I get more of these amazing articles. <3