Let's complain about broken cards and combos on Trading Card Games

[Fj0823]

So what exactly makes a card or combo broken in a trading card game?

This video explains it quite well


I think it's best if you just don't post a brokencard.jpg and leave it like that, explain briefly what makes a card or combo broken and why you're salty about it

As a YuGiOh/Pokemon Player I could tell you about a lot of broken shit but this one REALLY pisses me off. Here's Firewall Dragon

This dick is one of the new Link Monsters, who get their effects activated based on wether or not there's cards in the spaces their red arrows point at.

For Firewall Dragon it gets a Once while face up effect that allows you to send cards on the field back to the hand up to the number of link monsters in the Zones Firewall is pointing at that are ALSO directly pointing at it.

In practice it sounds a bit difficult to pull off, but creating a set up where you got 3 firewalls pointing at each other was extremely easy, and pretty much allowed you to clean your opponent's board.

Since then the card became a 1 per deck limited card, but it still gives problems given how easy link monsters are summoned (basically tribute 1 monster for each arrow they have). Which creates a loop where you just tribute Firewall for more links, then revive it in a sweet spot and bounce 3/4 cards. Repeat.

Despite the numerous problems this card is giving, Konami won't ban it because it's the main card of their specially shitty 6th anime spin off. Instead they're pretty much banning every card that dares combo with it...which is just plain stupid.

Anyways, share your stories about broken children trading cards.

 

[Newt]

Can basically allow you to win the game in that turn.

 

[signal]

Can you not just craft this HS card he is talking about or is it actually some unique expansion card? Haven't played hs in ages.

 

[9-Volt]

That one time every competitive deck had four Neo Genesis Sneasel card. That card wasn't broken by any means but it was so useful, Wizards had to ban that card. I believe it's the second Pokémon card ever to be banned, after Energy Removal.

 

[Volimar]

Hearthstone devolved into too many OTK decks. Every game would be both players stalling until they get their combo cards. Winning like that is fun for a bit, but those games get boring. Hoping the new expansion injects more versatility.

 

[Yoshimitsu126]

That Revival Jam, Jam Defender, Card of Safe Return, and Slifer the Sky Dragon was ridiculous on the anime. Almost as ridiculous as the fact that Marik didn't anticipate a single card (brain control or any other mind control effect) can make the combo backfire and cost the game.

 

[Deleted member 9100]

Can you not just craft this HS card he is talking about or is it actually some unique expansion card? Haven't played hs in ages.

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You can craft the card just like any other HS card. His issue is that he hates going up against the combo that card enables.

That being said, the Shudderwock combo is nowhere near broken.

 

[CrunchyB]

Can you not just craft this HS card he is talking about or is it actually some unique expansion card? Haven't played hs in ages.

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Yes, although you also need the supporting cards like Grumble which are also expensive. But it's still quite doable on a tight budget, you just won't be able to play other decks.

The Shudderwock deck is pretty good, but it's not completely broken. It takes a while to complete all the steps to do the combo, it may take a long time to set up and other decks may beat you up before that. It can also fail in some occasions, some decks can mess with the other player's deck. If it was really that broken, everyone would play it, but it was never overwhelmingly popular and has already been outclassed by other decks.

Really, the most annoying thing about the Shudderwock deck is the extreme amount of time it takes for you to finally die, but you could always concede. I personally didn't have a problem with this deck, I think hyper-aggresive decks that kill you by turn 6 are more annoying.

 

[Lagamorph]

Exodia the forbidden one

Fortunately nobody has been able to summon him before.

 

[BLEEN]

That one time every competitive deck had four Neo Genesis Sneasel card. That card wasn't broken by any means but it was so useful, Wizards had to ban that card. I believe it's the second Pokémon card ever to be banned, after Energy Removal.

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Pretty sure Bill was banned too. Love that card. There's a newer version of Bill now (it's not Bill, but it's similar and nerf'd.)

 

[Lord Azrael]

Don't have anything to add unfortunately but this is a topic of particular interest to me since I've been getting into Yu-Gi-Oh lately and have played the Pokémon card game in the past.

 

[chaosaeon]

Remember when Blue Eyes was a "legendary dragon" and super powerful lol. Here's an immortal one that only gets stronger, and due to how broken special summons are, you can summon it in one turn.

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And almost every 3rd effect on Planeswalkers in Magic. I dislike them for about a dozen reasons including this. Check out the 3rd effects on these. The other player goes down to 1 life. Remove every card from the other player's deck except 1. Destroy every one of the other player's lands.

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I stopped playing Magic for 10 years so had no idea it had these, so coming back to it it feels real weird to see "character cards" that you can summon. Feels more like those characters are more important than you as a Planeswalker and half of them look like anime characters.

 

[Won]

Hearthstone devolved into too many OTK decks. Every game would be both players stalling until they get their combo cards. Winning like that is fun for a bit, but those games get boring. Hoping the new expansion injects more versatility.

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I watched a bit of HCT earlier and tuned in right in time for a Malygos Druid vs Mecha'thun priest.

It still early in the expansion, but fun times sure are ahead!

 

[Deleted member 2802]

Exodia the forbidden one

Fortunately nobody has been able to summon him before.

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.

 

[WhateverItTakes]

Can basically allow you to win the game in that turn.

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It's been a few years since I played magic but that's goddamn disgusting.

Remember when Blue Eyes was a "legendary dragon" and super powerful lol. Here's an immortal one that only gets stronger, and due to how broken special summons are, you can summon it in one turn.

And almost every 3rd effect on Planeswalkers in Magic. I dislike them for about a dozen reasons including this. Check out the 3rd effects on these. The other player goes down to 1 life. Remove every card from the other player's deck except 1. Destroy every one of the other player's lands.


I stopped playing Magic for 10 years so had no idea it had these, so coming back to it it feels real weird to see "character cards" that you can summon. Feels more like those characters are more important than you as a Planeswalker and half of them look like anime characters.

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They aren't really that bad tbh. Since you have to commit so many resources to get them on the field, and then spend at least 2/3 turns charging the card for the ultra effect, with another to activate, you'll really only be able to pull it off if you've set yourself up really nicely or your opponent is being particularly negligent. Great cards for sure (Nico Bolas with the 2 draw is like jheeeeeez), and forces your opponent to lay off you for a bit, but I wouldn't say they're broken. Unless there's particular synergies I'm missing.

 

[Siggy-P]

When I was young a kid in school seapped me a bag of like 100 or more Yu-Gi-Oh cards (I don't remember the specific number )for my one dragon card so he could have the 3 heads thing. Amd he felt he got the better trade.

God that was a broken game...

 

[Dream Machine]

That Revival Jam, Jam Defender, Card of Safe Return, and Slifer the Sky Dragon was ridiculous on the anime. Almost as ridiculous as the fact that Marik didn't anticipate a single card (brain control or any other mind control effect) can make the combo backfire and cost the game.

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Except yugi had to brain control revival jam mid-special summon, which makes no sense. Battle city was still showing its early seasons fast and loose rules on occasion. It was still awesome when I watched it, though.

 

[Thurston Last]

Painters Servant + Grindstone

Mill's out the entire deck assuming you can get the cards out.

 

[SaviourMK2]

Frankly, I'm sick to fucking death of Darkrai, Rayquaza, Yveltal and Mewtwo commanding meta formats in Pokemon

here's another asshole that needs to go away

 

[collige]

Yes, although you also need the supporting cards like Grumble which are also expensive. But it's still quite doable on a tight budget, you just won't be able to play other decks.

The Shudderwock deck is pretty good, but it's not completely broken. It takes a while to complete all the steps to do the combo, it may take a long time to set up and other decks may beat you up before that. It can also fail in some occasions, some decks can mess with the other player's deck. If it was really that broken, everyone would play it, but it was never overwhelmingly popular and has already been outclassed by other decks.

Really, the most annoying thing about the Shudderwock deck is the extreme amount of time it takes for you to finally die, but you could always concede. I personally didn't have a problem with this deck, I think hyper-aggresive decks that kill you by turn 6 are more annoying.

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It's not even "pretty good", it had a negative overall winrate during the last expansion and is currently completely outclassed by other combo decks. The vid in the OP simply doesn't have enough Hearthstone knowledge, which is why it got downvoted to hell.

 

[jon bones]

every post about HS makes the wait for Artifact that much harder

 

[Maledict]

It's been a few years since I played magic but that's goddamn disgusting.

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Show and Tell isn't in the top 10of broken cards from that set alone. It's a very flashy cool effect, but there's far far worse. Urza's Saga had decks that were capable of winning on turn 1 and 2 it was that broken.


A relatively more recent broken card was Skull Clamp, which everyone missed and resulted in the entire format being broken until it was banned. Wizards wrote a really interesting article about how it slipped through the net which is worth reading to this day:

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/skullclamp-we-hardly-knew-ye-2004-06-04

That card itself looks innocuous and just 'decent'. Turns out it was utterly broken.

 

[Deleted member 15737]

This guy seems to misrepresent a few of the issues.

Blizzard tends to give full dust refunds when a card is nerfed.

And you wouldn't need to spend 60 to get shudderwock.

And shudderwock was a mediocre deck. Sure, the long animation was a drag, and it is a OTK, but it takes a decent amount of set up and combo cards, and there are answers. Either by aggro, or with deck manipulation.

I will give him that playing it pre-nerf was a slog, simply due to the slow animation speed.

 

[Htown]

so there's a reason the video in the OP has so many dislikes, and it's because the guy makes a lot of mistakes

You don't have to spend any money to get Shudderwock. Just disenchant cards you don't want into dust and craft it. Battlecries also don't work the way he says. When a Shudderwock summons a second Shudderwock, its battlecry doesn't go off because battlecries only happen when you play a card from hand. And if you don't want to wait for the animations, you just concede. There were a couple of platforms where conceding didn't work during the animation, but it was patched within a few days.

Shudderwock is also not broken as a card. It seemed that way in the first couple of days after the expansion where it came out, but as it turns out Shudderwock decks just aren't that powerful, for the same reason that a lot of combo-oriented decks aren't powerful. For every time you successfully get a shudderwock combo off, you'll see another game where you just die before you assemble all the necessary cards.

The actual problem with Shudderwock (in the beginning of the expansion where it was released, before people figured out it wasn't actually broken) was that Hearthstone's animations in general are too slow, but you can speed them up a bit if you're on the receiving end by clicking on the cards as they come up. "No inputs are allowed" is just incorrect.

Also Blizzard does refund you when a card is nerfed. For a couple of weeks after the changes, you can disenchant the card for full dust value so you can use it to craft other cards.

 

[Deleted member 8561]

Boros Reckoner infinite life combo in MTG was pretty fun if you pulled it off

 

[Fj0823]

Exodia the forbidden one

Fortunately nobody has been able to summon him before.

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Exodia is not broken, just boring as fuck, long turns of watching the opponent play nothing but spells to draw and draw

They even had to make a "complete" Exodia card to try and make the deck less boring to play against

 

[TheeFanatic]

Combos? Like Daigo style combos?

 

[TheDestructiveSquirrel]

 

[Fj0823]

Click to shrink...

Isn't that card worth more than my car?

 

[duxstar]

Nothing beats the pure boredom of playing against a storm deck in magic.

Basically you sit there for 20 minutes while you wait for them to see if they can combo off and kill you.

It's like the other player was playing solitaire and you just had to sit there and watch. They can do this sometimes before you play your first land.

It's a reason that force of will is almost a must have in legacy, and the format is predominantly blue.

They literally created a scale to determine how broken/unlikely a mechanic was to come back and named it the storm scale.

 

[Mezentine]

Frankly, I'm sick to fucking death of Darkrai, Rayquaza, Yveltal and Mewtwo commanding meta formats in Pokemon

here's another asshole that needs to go away

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All the EX, GX, eta ultra powerful cards in Pokemon that have a downsize of "costing two prizes when knocked out" or whatever just made me completely check out of playing the TCG online. The way that the game plays with all of them dominating even the casual online meta just is completely the opposite of the version of that game I want to play

 

[Xtortion]

Gotta find the time to make an exhaustive post with how Teen Titans fuck you on turn 5 in Vs System

 

[TheDestructiveSquirrel]

Isn't that card worth more than my car?

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Probably

 

[bangai-o]

Isn't that card worth more than my car?

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I remember the days with Black Lotus was worth only 350 dollars. It is crazy how they have jumped in value.

 

[Busaiku]

Frankly, I'm sick to fucking death of Darkrai, Rayquaza, Yveltal and Mewtwo commanding meta formats in Pokemon

here's another asshole that needs to go away

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None of those decks are broken.
They're good, but they have notable counters.
Other decks are also very viable against them.

 

[Fj0823]

Literal fuck you. The card.

Early YGO had zero QA. People can complain about newer mechanics all they want. Nothing will ever reach the BS of cards like this one.

 

[rude]

Were decks revolving around the toon mechanic ever as oppressive irl as they seemed in the anime?

 

[RedHoodedOwl]

It's funny that Amazoness are broken in the Duel Links while in the actual card game they are weak.

 

[Sordid Plebeian]

What the hell is a link monster? Yugioh really got ruined when they started with that xyz shit

 

[Fj0823]

Were decks revolving around the toon mechanic ever as oppressive irl as they seemed in the anime?

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No.

They centered around Yata-Garasu. Thank you for bringing that BS into this thread

You either won by the bird or lost by the bird

Usually people used this other OP fucker to leaveyour field with nothing.

Then use the bird to take 100 LP and prevent you from drawing next turn. So your opponent has no option but to pass the turn.

Repeat 80 times. Win.

Toons are good today though. Thanks to great new cards and the Xyz and Link mechanincs

 

[BlackAdder]

Planeswalkers aren't broken in Magic. Maybe Jace, The Mind Sculptor was overpowered, but not for his ultimate ability.

 

[Yeef]

"You know that good back-and-forth we had going for the last 15 minutes in this game? Yeah, none of that mattered."

 

[Wood Man]

I haven't played many card games, but I remember Akuma's card in Card Fighters Clash was a nasty card that instantly KOed a card. And you can have up to 3 in your deck.

 

[TheGreatDirector]

Wasn't this broken as fuck?

 

[Fj0823]

Wasn't this broken as fuck?

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Still is.

They try releasing more "Pot of" cards with more restrictions every now and then. They still get banned or limited most of the time

 

[Imperfected]

I give the Copycat combo--Saheeli Rai and the Felidar Guardian--a special shout-out for being the only infinite combo I'm aware of that you could actually lose to in a prerelease event, Magic's go-to "welcome" party for new players.

Hi, enjoy your first time playing Magic, and watch out for the arbitrarily large number of cat tokens eating your face.

It also gets special marks for being banned off-schedule (ie, "emergency" banned).

 

[lacer]

that video is terrible. he says he quit after 2 days cuz shudderwock 'dominated the meta' which is an inherently contradictory statement since the meta of an expansion doesn't settle in two days, and also completely inaccurate

 

[bangai-o]

"You know that good back-and-forth we had going for the last 15 minutes in this game? Yeah, none of that mattered."

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So, what is the deal? Gain control of opponent, and during that turn forfeit the game?

 

[Lagamorph]

Wasn't this broken as fuck?

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But what does it do?!

 

[Fj0823]

that video is terrible. he says he quit after 2 days cuz shudderwock 'dominated the meta' which is an inherently contradictory statement since the meta of an expansion doesn't settle in two days, and also completely inaccurate

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He also got the YGO combo a bit wrong. But I think his general idea of what makes a broken deck boring is spot on.

I let the YGO blunder slide because he said he never really played it.

Guess he doesn't know either game well lol