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- If I want to play against real people, Casual Duels are much more fun than Ranked Duels. Ranked Duels seem pointless anyway, since everyone's ranks get lowered again when the new ranking season starts. And everybody seems way too driven to win and get ranks in Ranked Duels. Even without being able to talk to the other players, I can tell from the way they duel. They are often overly aggressive. Casual Duels, meanwhile, are just that, something for fun.
- People can rank up because of a connection failure on their opponent's side. Gah. I don't think a connection failure should be rewarded with ranking up, because the "winning" player hasn't even really earned it and may not be ready to play with the bigger boys. I ranked up twice in a row because of that problem. **headdesk.** So I ended up in Bronze before I really belonged there. I'm in Silver now, and I think I do belong there, as many of the other players seem to be on my level. But I improved a lot while going from Bronze to Silver.
- I often win because of opponents surrendering. Occasionally I wonder if their finger just slipped while checking the Duel log, but usually it looks like it's on purpose if I've summoned a powerful card. Apparently they would rather surrender instead of experiencing defeat down to the last attack. It's kind of amusing and kind of exasperating, because I want a chance to play my card! At the same time, I hate being defeated and I can understand preferring to surrender and quietly retreat. But I always stick it out, except one time when I made a stupid mistake of forgetting that cards have to be face-up to equip stuff to them. (That's such an annoying rule. I want to equip stuff to face-down defense monsters sometime!) When I was faced with having to equip the opponent instead, I chose to surrender.
- All cards have weaknesses, and my most powerful card has been used against me several times, which is especially frustrating since it's hard to even get it on the field. Hence, it seems like there's a higher ratio of it being used against me than my other cards have. (Or it's one of my most powerful cards, anyway. It isn't Ra, but I don't think I'll say what it is because I'd like to keep some surprises instead of revealing my whole deck.) Part of me wonders if it's worth hanging onto, but then a duel happens where it is useful and I want to keep it in my main deck for a while longer.
- Cards that keep coming back are more trouble than they're worth. I tried playing Horn of the Unicorn for a while, but its boomeranging was causing a lot of trouble, because a monster would get destroyed and I'd desperately need to try to draw another one, but I wouldn't be able to because of that dang equip card coming back again and having to draw it.
- Some of my defeats have been so humiliating that I honestly feel like to some extent I can understand how Seto feels when he's trounced by Yami Yugi. Especially when I know I could have defeated the other player had the card draw been nicer to me.
- Sylvan decks and Spellbook decks are highly aggravating and seem rather unfair in how much more powerful they are than other decks. I can trounce both kinds of decks if I'm having a good card draw, but if the cards are not being kind to me, I will easily get bowled over. I also find this card highly unfair that allows a player to block up to all of your monster spaces indefinitely. WTH? Then you don't even get a chance to fight back at all if they choose to cover up every one of them, unless you can draw some really good spell or trap cards (which I was unable to in that duel). And then there's the Pumpkin Princess card or whatever that keeps dropping all your monsters' attack power every turn, with no restrictions on how long it will go on! That's terrible! Most cards have a limit on things like that!
- Along those lines, I also find the Vagabond unfair in how he imposes handicaps on his opponents but doesn't put himself under the same restrictions. Of course, I realize that's part of the point, to see how you deal with various situations, but it doesn't come across that way and just feels unfair. I'd like to see how well he'd deal with some of the situations I get thrown into by dueling him! However, I have gotten better at beating him and it always feels good when I do. I wonder why we're not allowed to save Replays of Vagabond duels. That seems strange. Isn't he willing to let people save occasions where he gets trounced?
- Even if you're not playing in the GX world, you have to watch the GX cutscenes. Or I had to at least during this Syrus event. I'd be minding my own business and all of a sudden a GX cutscene would pop up, I guess when I'd earn a certain amount of points or something. But you'd think the game might realize that if I haven't ventured into GX world once, I'm probably not interested in its cutscenes! That said, they were a little amusing, although I was soon rolling my eyes at how often Syrus being chased by a bear got brought up. I also managed to unlock Syrus without trying to, LOL. Apparently I only needed to acquire a certain amount of points to do it.
I finally got Yugi unlocked! Squeee! The unlock missions were really hard, but I determined to finally try to do them and I took care of them in one session one early morning. The weirdest ones were two duels where I had to win with 1000 or less lifepoints. And unlike the Yami Bakura duel with Tea where lifepoint loss happened naturally, in both of those duels I had to deliberately lose lifepoints in order to make the requirement. The one where I played Seto against Yami Yugi was the strangest, because I got him boxed in but had to keep dragging the duel out and deliberately losing some lifepoints before delivering the final blow that I could have delivered many turns earlier. I find it odd that beating Yami Y with Seto was an unlock mission to get Yugi.
I also got Ishizu unlocked! My problem of winning with 6000 lifepoints was solved when Tea acquired a skill that lets her start with 6500 if she agrees to an opening hand of two cards. I tried that and managed to win! Now if I can just get Rishid.... Playing 10 traps in one duel to unlock him, WTH. Duels hardly ever go on long enough for that to even happen! I'm lucky to get in three traps!
Arkana has been added to the Gate. I find it supremely weird that characters like Arkana, Bonz, and the Paradox Brothers are available to play against and even unlock as playable before we even have a popular key character like Marik Ishtar! WTH?
Also, last week Yami Marik sacrificed my monsters to give me Ra in Sphere mode just to torture me, since he figured I couldn't use it. He wasn't counting on me having Ra too, and using the Sphere to summon mine! ROTFLOL! His trick totally backfired and I won because of what he did. **snerk.**
- People can rank up because of a connection failure on their opponent's side. Gah. I don't think a connection failure should be rewarded with ranking up, because the "winning" player hasn't even really earned it and may not be ready to play with the bigger boys. I ranked up twice in a row because of that problem. **headdesk.** So I ended up in Bronze before I really belonged there. I'm in Silver now, and I think I do belong there, as many of the other players seem to be on my level. But I improved a lot while going from Bronze to Silver.
- I often win because of opponents surrendering. Occasionally I wonder if their finger just slipped while checking the Duel log, but usually it looks like it's on purpose if I've summoned a powerful card. Apparently they would rather surrender instead of experiencing defeat down to the last attack. It's kind of amusing and kind of exasperating, because I want a chance to play my card! At the same time, I hate being defeated and I can understand preferring to surrender and quietly retreat. But I always stick it out, except one time when I made a stupid mistake of forgetting that cards have to be face-up to equip stuff to them. (That's such an annoying rule. I want to equip stuff to face-down defense monsters sometime!) When I was faced with having to equip the opponent instead, I chose to surrender.
- All cards have weaknesses, and my most powerful card has been used against me several times, which is especially frustrating since it's hard to even get it on the field. Hence, it seems like there's a higher ratio of it being used against me than my other cards have. (Or it's one of my most powerful cards, anyway. It isn't Ra, but I don't think I'll say what it is because I'd like to keep some surprises instead of revealing my whole deck.) Part of me wonders if it's worth hanging onto, but then a duel happens where it is useful and I want to keep it in my main deck for a while longer.
- Cards that keep coming back are more trouble than they're worth. I tried playing Horn of the Unicorn for a while, but its boomeranging was causing a lot of trouble, because a monster would get destroyed and I'd desperately need to try to draw another one, but I wouldn't be able to because of that dang equip card coming back again and having to draw it.
- Some of my defeats have been so humiliating that I honestly feel like to some extent I can understand how Seto feels when he's trounced by Yami Yugi. Especially when I know I could have defeated the other player had the card draw been nicer to me.
- Sylvan decks and Spellbook decks are highly aggravating and seem rather unfair in how much more powerful they are than other decks. I can trounce both kinds of decks if I'm having a good card draw, but if the cards are not being kind to me, I will easily get bowled over. I also find this card highly unfair that allows a player to block up to all of your monster spaces indefinitely. WTH? Then you don't even get a chance to fight back at all if they choose to cover up every one of them, unless you can draw some really good spell or trap cards (which I was unable to in that duel). And then there's the Pumpkin Princess card or whatever that keeps dropping all your monsters' attack power every turn, with no restrictions on how long it will go on! That's terrible! Most cards have a limit on things like that!
- Along those lines, I also find the Vagabond unfair in how he imposes handicaps on his opponents but doesn't put himself under the same restrictions. Of course, I realize that's part of the point, to see how you deal with various situations, but it doesn't come across that way and just feels unfair. I'd like to see how well he'd deal with some of the situations I get thrown into by dueling him! However, I have gotten better at beating him and it always feels good when I do. I wonder why we're not allowed to save Replays of Vagabond duels. That seems strange. Isn't he willing to let people save occasions where he gets trounced?
- Even if you're not playing in the GX world, you have to watch the GX cutscenes. Or I had to at least during this Syrus event. I'd be minding my own business and all of a sudden a GX cutscene would pop up, I guess when I'd earn a certain amount of points or something. But you'd think the game might realize that if I haven't ventured into GX world once, I'm probably not interested in its cutscenes! That said, they were a little amusing, although I was soon rolling my eyes at how often Syrus being chased by a bear got brought up. I also managed to unlock Syrus without trying to, LOL. Apparently I only needed to acquire a certain amount of points to do it.
I finally got Yugi unlocked! Squeee! The unlock missions were really hard, but I determined to finally try to do them and I took care of them in one session one early morning. The weirdest ones were two duels where I had to win with 1000 or less lifepoints. And unlike the Yami Bakura duel with Tea where lifepoint loss happened naturally, in both of those duels I had to deliberately lose lifepoints in order to make the requirement. The one where I played Seto against Yami Yugi was the strangest, because I got him boxed in but had to keep dragging the duel out and deliberately losing some lifepoints before delivering the final blow that I could have delivered many turns earlier. I find it odd that beating Yami Y with Seto was an unlock mission to get Yugi.
I also got Ishizu unlocked! My problem of winning with 6000 lifepoints was solved when Tea acquired a skill that lets her start with 6500 if she agrees to an opening hand of two cards. I tried that and managed to win! Now if I can just get Rishid.... Playing 10 traps in one duel to unlock him, WTH. Duels hardly ever go on long enough for that to even happen! I'm lucky to get in three traps!
Arkana has been added to the Gate. I find it supremely weird that characters like Arkana, Bonz, and the Paradox Brothers are available to play against and even unlock as playable before we even have a popular key character like Marik Ishtar! WTH?
Also, last week Yami Marik sacrificed my monsters to give me Ra in Sphere mode just to torture me, since he figured I couldn't use it. He wasn't counting on me having Ra too, and using the Sphere to summon mine! ROTFLOL! His trick totally backfired and I won because of what he did. **snerk.**
