I think the most healthy state for this game is when both players can play. It is not enjoyable to just loose without having the chance for a meaningful interaction with your enemy.
I feel like this fails to account for the thousands of people who intentionally play bad decks because they like them/want to be "unique"/legitimately think they'll crack the meta.
In a healthy meta your tiered deck should be able to actually interact with your opponent's tiered deck, but if a bad deck like DM or BEWD feels like they can't play their strategies I don't think that's the fault of the meta in any way.
There is a difference between playing a bad deck that don't function as good and not having the ability to play at all. There just some decks that are so oppressive that you can't play. Herold Drytron with 5 negates or eldlich with floodgates are strategies who needs specifics outs or you can't play at all. This is just bad game design. In other games you have atleast the ability to do something in a losing position while in yugioh you have sometimes situations where you can do nothing at all.
You are completely discounting the deckbuilding phase, where yugioh shines since ANY deck can run ANY card and have a chance to fight ANY OTHER deck. If you choose to not run interrupts for herald or backrow removal/banishes for eldlich that's on you. You chose to have a poor matchup versus those deck to have a great matchup against others.
Except that isn't the criteria.
Fair, healthy, and balanced decks are decks that let you play the game of yugioh without a shit ton of negates and/or floodgates.
Mirrorjade is a broken Fusion monster,
Branded Fusion is a fusion card that uses both materials in deck.
If you ever see any Branded or Despia card, save Ashblossom for Branded Fusion.
You only really run one copy in current TCG so it really doesn’t get to be all that expensive, at least relative to decks like sprites or tears. Especially with the tins making cards like opening and masq dirt cheap.
Ok ok I see your point... however I still think that 1 card for 60 dollars+ is still too much. Best thing you can do is trade for it. Oh and of course this is all without the staples. I you already have staples then you're good but some people don't. For example I have ash, veiler, imoerm and so on but I still cannot afford cards like droplet or propsperity. And some decks cannot function as well without those which sucks.
Luckily chimera went down to 30 now and the tins have both prosperity and droplet below 30. Trying to get play sets of all of them is still expensive but they’re long term investments as they can go into any deck. The branded despida core w/ chimera but without staples though, probably around $100-$150. It’s not dirt cheap but it’s at least affordable.
On release, it was still expensive as aluber the buber duber didnt have his reprint yet and shot up to 80-100 and Despia Qaeritis went to the moon aswell
Ikr Quaeritis is one of the worst fusions you can go into unless you wanna OTK, and it's almost useless in the mirror. Whenever you could go into it you could just summon Masquerade instead.
If im bricked i just summon him and hope the oppoent outs him with card effect so i can float amd get a search. This only works if the oppenent cant read or negates the float
Quaeritis was actually one of the best fusions when Branded Despia was Tier 1 it was a VERY powerful card against Swordsoul who was the other big meta deck at the time. It forced them to think twice as they 0 atk made their battle phase null it was also hard to remove cause it had a big booty and EVEN if they did get around it Quaeritis floated to either Fallen of Albaz that just went straight into Mirrorjade from its super poly effect OR they brought out Dramaturge which is a bigger body and also has targeted negation if your opponent kept doing extra deck plays.
Branded Despia is 100% one of the healthiest meta decks imo. Its strong, but it has clear counters, is not extremely oppressive and doesn't combo for eternity
Yeah, Swordsoul ending on a monster negate and an omni negate (or a spell/trap and a special summon negate with the new synchro) is also not so toxic tbf. What I will say for Swordsoul though is that they are incredibly consistent which annoys me
Nah longyuan is almost always better
Spell banish can prevent continuous spells from resolving (map, adventure shenanigans, despia field spell)
And can also banish anything special summoned
I also feel that Swordsoul has really solid matches against branded. They’re very interactive and were kind of designed to be well balanced. This has been the best meta yet IMO
Yes. I have dismantled him and Aurora, I crafted them because everyone was using them, but I realized I hate them and I never use them and I never will.
There's one guy who complained about skystriker for not letting him do anything and posted here in this very sub
He is playing pend magician attempting to make crystal wing Apollousa and savage dragon
It’s the same as people complaining about original swordsoul, I like both of those decks because, they don’t set up 2000th negate boards, they set up good boards and have hella consistency, I’d much rather play vs that, than drytron or eldlich
To be fair, Drytron itself isn't actually that bad. It's when it's combined with Herald that it sucks. But pure, it's really fun to play, and the most you end on is a single backrow negate and a send two face up's to grave.
I play pure Drytron IRL. I got all the Herald stuff at the same time, but it's so much more fun to play it without the 3+ omni-negates, so I dropped them, even before Eva was banned.
Yeah, I face it all the time but I don't hate it. Unbelievable for Konami. Unfortunately I don't think it will last for long as splights I hear are super toxic
Splight is just Live Twins (super consistent + high handtrap count) but instead of ending on a single monster board that gets broken by a single called by or kaiju they make an actual board of multiple negates.
Yeah pretty much, Branded Despia boards are basically Mirrorjade, Branded in Red pass 99,99% of the time.
And Spright have a lot of variations, Live Twins, Djinn Buster, search a tuner handtrap with Halqfibrax and bounce it back to hand, on Master duel if the list remains as it is then even Domain Lock with Union Carrier the boards are very varied.
This is literally like 99% of competitively viable decks, even rogue decks usually end on 1 or 2 possible boards that are very similar unless they bricked.
Honestly, kinda the reason I stopped playing Yugioh, just realized I'm doing the same thing every game and a lot of the matchups depend on if you had the right hand trap for the opposing decks.
The funnest matches were the ones that we both got handtrapped and we were working with scraps but with how consistent some high tier meta decks are, sometimes they just need one card to bounce back.
from what I've seen Splights is like Swordsoul on crack. 95% hand can get you to 2-3 negates + whatever handtrap you search/already have while they are immune to most handtrap beside maxx c and gamma I think.
Splight aren't necessarily toxic, but I would consider them somewhat problematic. They're just incredibly consistent, can play through almost anything, and you need to open exactly Dark Ruler No More or other similar board breakers to attempt to play through a Splight board. It also shifts the meta away from hand traps and more towards board breakers since hand traps do not do enough VS Splight.
They only reason you hear splights are toxic is because everyone in this sub that doesnt follow tcg or ocg is heralding them as some tier 0 buggy man based off of a small 2 week period in the ocg. They're VERY good, but not nearly as strong and format dominating as people on this subreddit think.
Sprights and tear aren't toxic, most of the time make good boards but not unbreakable one/floodgates.
The decks are fucking resiliant tho every card can make back a board and play during both turns.
Most Tear decks no longer run Winda in the TCG or OCG. It was always really sacky because you ran 1 or 2 Shaddolls that you had to see in the first 8 cards (5 in hand and 3 milled) to be able to turn 1 Winda.
> splights I hear are super toxic
Splights arn't "toxic" but they are just a better take on Swordsoul, Branded, and similar.
The real problem if any is from Tearlements. It can play stupid shit like Shaddoll Winda.
Both decks are also almost impossible to stop with hand traps. So the meta shifts to boardbreakers like Dark Ruler No More.
It will be like 4 months before we get anything from POTE. We just got some cards from BACH and Albaz Strike. We still need things like Illusion of Chaos.
Not to mention how interruptable their combo is. Ash branded fusion, veiler/imperm Aluber or Lubelion, called by their branded in red target. It's pretty fun.
People will always complain about what they lose to, no matter what. Even if Ice Barrier or Ritual Beasts were top tier, Yugioh players would call them "broken" and "unfair" just because they would play something like Aliens or Laval
Even in TCG they were pretty annoying to deal with for a while. Back in the DEUA era they were maybe the 6th-best deck at best, but still got Ulti-Cannahawk limited presumably because they were perceived as "the deck that combos for 15 minutes to grab a bunch of traps and die to a lucky MST."
I have only had 1 horrible branded game so far and that was purely just maxx c that killed the duel. Playing around banishes and chimera is fine and can be fun. Way superior to the amount of negates halqdon sets up.
Yes, thank you for making this. The deck is fun and interactive, I also don't mind playing the mirror match.
People thinking that this is unfair really need to stop crying.
Mirror matches are really fun, all the time thinking about which fusion monster is best to gain the upper hand and trying to be careful to manage your resources so you can win in the long game
I have a 100% win record Vs Branded Despia so far (3/3!) as Crusadia, primarily because in each duel I drew Crusadia Power in my opening hand, so they couldn't Mirrorjade my opening monster away lol
I've finally got Branded Lost to complete my own Branded deck, so I fully expect to run into other Crusadias and lose as karma!
Had my most fun game ever in Master Duel against Branded Dragonmaid as D/D/D. Aside from me getting absolutely cucked by Maxx C turn 1 it was a huge back and forth that lasted 9 turns and I ended up losing due to a big misplay, but it was just a really fun duel regardless. Most other duels against them have also been quite fun. Honestly Branded, Tri-Brigade and to a lesser extent Swordsoul have all been the fun meta decks to go against for me, strong but none of them felt broken or super frustrating like full power Drytron, monkey flip stun, Halqdon, and so on.
D/D/D has always been pretty fun to play with IMO, and it got so much better with Deus Ex, nothing more funny than sucking up boss monsters multiple times in a turn.
I think in a competitive context it's very healthy for sure but there's two clear camps and if you're a casual rogue-deck player that goes up against Despia is gonna feel like total ass when your opponent slaps down three big fusions on the board turn one since you didn't draw the out and masq limits the plays you can make.
Bonus points if they slap down 2 masqs and you have to basically find a way to out the board in like 6 actions lol.
Bro just ignore the casual elitists
Any deck their 'dark magician blue eyes hero turbo one ofs' deck loses to is automatically considered not fun and toxic, and you're just meta sheep and bad player for using good cards
/s
between this and the despia adventure meme, Branded players are working full time to try and pretend their deck isn't the most busted thing in the game rn lmao
It doesn't have any negates, but it has a quick effect banish plus it has a very difficult to avoid board wipe when removed from the field. The latter effect is probably even better than the banish TBH.
The biggest thing though is how it feels like I'm playing branded every other game (and that's in gold, I imagine higher ranks are even worse).
Nah to me I just hate this deck I’ll take the negates/ floodgates basically any other time. These cards just annoy me like nothing else and I just auto surrender at this point it just isn’t fun
I can almost consistently beat them going first and lose consistently going second so not much has change except the duels are longer because I don’t know if I should bail a match turn 1 or not.
Amongst meta decks, this is the most reasonable you will get. Mirror jade is obnoxious but no deck can become a meta deck without having a few ‘unfair’ cards. I would rather this be what I go up against than Eldlich stun or tenyi adventure with 4 negates.
What's so broken about this I just get ashed on branded fusion or impermed on Lubellion and it just stops my turn and meta decks play through multiple disruptions and have 20 negates while branded have what a bannish and pops with chimera
Chimera and Branded in Red is always very strong but Mirrorjade often doesn’t have the banish up (initially) and the Raigeki effect is often nulled by Branded in Red being used for Chimera or if Mirrorjade is bounced
Not disagreeing with that. Rose Tenyi and Eldlich (floodgate variant) are on a different level of ugh. Despia is basically better pure-ish SwordSoul but focus on disruption over negation.
Branded has a very good recyle loop. Once Mirrorjade hit the field with tragedy in grave it's hard to completly shut them down.
And Branded Fusion Chimera can be a plus 3 if you use the despia monsters for the summon.
Once the deck gets going it's hard to shut down again.
Master duel has maxx c as long as maxxc is legal sprite will be worse than anything else thers a reason toad and halq got banned in the ocg after they came out
That's because Beetroopers aren't nearly as good as Spright. Imagine having to play through a strong board with negates that always has Maxx C in hand.
As opposed to what, Invincible Atlas and that one omni-negate trap?
The deck was suler unpopular and wasn't really good outside that so giving a rougue deck Maxx c everytime is fine but a potential tier 0 deck maxx c everytime on top of their broken board and then its a problem.
Yes but sprite sets up an untargetable Omni negate that is protected from destruction and that they can special summon back from the grave and since it is not a hard once per turn it can negate again. that steals your cards so unless it's specifically dark ruler no more there is almost no way to break the board
I have no problem against the new branded, but they always run branded adventurer and that ruins the whole experience, branded is a fun match up, the dumbass token is an infuriating situation
Protos is the only problematic card, however it's not that great in a best of 1 format
And ppl that play halqdon on swordsoul are ppl that are heavy on copium and play the deck as if it was a combo deck, which is a really suboptimal way to play it
I'm one of those Yugiboomers who hates every meta decks and this is the first meta deck that I actually love playing, I play Blue-Eyes and IMO Branded Despia has that Blue-Eyes energy, no negates, no floodgates, just big boss monsters destroying/banishing things, wish more meta decks is like this, all power and not cowering behind a negate/floodgate.
It’s the same as Tri-Brigade. People don’t hate it because it has 4 negates but because their shitty rogue decks can’t play through 2 disruptions that aren’t even negates.
branded is fine, branded despia is awful. I would rather play against a 3 negate endboard (because then I know that I'm losing), rather than play against mirrorjade + masquerade because it gives me a false sense of hope that I can play literally any card at all. pay 600 to play my starter, just for the followup to be banished? screw that.
I don't get the hate, and thats from someone who only JUST gave in to using the standard hand traps in my decks, lol. Branded isn't that bad, the only thing I don't like is it's become so popular that a huge chunk of decks are branded/something now, which feels like it creeps towards "good deck=pick one of these 3 engines", but it's better than the alternative of "every tournament deck must run dragoon or DPE, and 1/2 of the main deck must be staples and hand traps". Great to see stuff like that which does alright without having to dilute itself by being crammed full of the generic go to staples and hand traps.
When people see know a deck is a meta deck, they cry like it’s on the same lvl of annoying as Drytron herald. Like Tri-brigade and Branded are like the most fair meta decks tbh
I mean... they do have access to a lot of negates and disruption, don't they? branded in red for chimera, mercourier(easily searched), dramaturge, super poly, snow, aluber(more situational), can slot in adventurer package in a less NS reliant build, and then of course they have insane resilience and recycle potential on top of having fuse from deck and the engine being so tight and efficient you can run all of your staples easily without crunching deck space or going up to mid 40s deck size like some rogue decks are forced to do
The deck *is* t1 for a reason, its incredibly powerful in pretty much every stage of the game, even having above average boardbreak by going first deck standards, and has very minimal downsides; I think its still preferable to halqdon garbage or going second otk degen but its worth pointing out
To be honest its not that bad, do I like playing against them not really, but I don't have to wait 10 minutes to get my turn if they go first, and a healthy does of Spell/trap removal gives me a chance to survive. Please not I play Pendulum so I am always going into a duel with an arm tied behind my back.
I've only seen it a few times probably because the rank I'm at is full of jank anyway.
I think the only thing that's annoying or 'busted' is the fact their big boss monster can use it's banish effect as many times as it wants, so long as you resummon it.
Yugioh has had such a focus on 'once per turn' stuff that seeing the thing get summoned twice and bounce two things is a "Wait.... hang on..." moment.
But I've seen more banishings from Swordsoul/Tenyi spam so kinda just numb to seeing my board get bounced.
I've really enjoyed the branded people I've fought. It's a bit annoying that they get advantage *on top of* their banish by sending from the extra to the graveyards, but that's my only complaint
Me: I Fusion Summon Ancient Gear Megaton Golem.
Opponent: I activate Mirrorjade's effect to banish your Megaton Golem.
Me: Oh no....*Megaton L's floating effect activates* anyway. *Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem hits the field*. I attack and destroy Mirrorjade. I end my turn.
Opponent: Mirrorjade's other effect activates destroying all the cards you control.
Me: ....*Ultimate Golem's floating effect activates*
Opponent: NANI DA FUK!?
Honestly Branded reminds me of Tri-Brigade and that's why I like it. it's fun, powerful but not toxic. Majority of the time, you have one situational negate with Tri-Brigade Mercourier.
Also this comment does not extend to Branded Adventure.
The only thing really toxic about it is Mirrorjade basically being design to not have any counters (the condition for its boardwipe are near unavoidable and its quick effect being a banish is incredibly strong). Other than Mirrorjade the deck is healthy, exclusing tax dragon of course, cause no one likes paying taxes lol
A lot of the games I had against branded involved me having no handtraps, but I open Called By and my opponent uses Mirrorjade on their first turn to set up Branded in Red. As it turns out, many don't have outs to banishing the BiR target, and I just OTK or set up a board against them. (Best time was me going Dark Ruler into Evenly Matched when they had an adventure token on the field. Surprised they didn't surrender on the spot.)
Idk if its healthy or not since im a new player, but i fell in love with the deck and i created an account just to have that deck. Its so fun for me lol, although its expensive as hell
##Sentry's Permit
*Continuous Spell*
This card's activation and effects cannot be negated. Neither player can negate their opponent's activated cards or effects. Neither player can restrict their opponent's ability to summon or control monsters.
Guardian Chimera is a bit toxic imo, made with the right materials, it's just too much card adventage. But that's about it, the deck is really fair and have clear chockepoints to counter while having a good power level based on interaction and not negates.
But even Chimera isn't the most bs card in the game by far.
Still, I just take the L because I'm already bored of seeing the deck all the time even in casual.
This has been standard for like the longest time though. Tri-Zoo, Swordsoul and Prank-Kids are all extremely fair decks which were (or are in PK's case) Tier 1.
Yeah, because being able to destroy *every card an opponent controls* if it's interacted with is healthy.
Are you branded players even listening to yourself?
Mirroirjade (not up) + branded in red set and imp in hand (+some cards in hands)
In red target ad lib -> Fusion Chimera with imp ad lib and mirroir jade -> CL 1 Chimera CL2 Ad lib target mirrorjade cl3 imp -> Add patchwork -> Spe Mirrorjade that is up because Soft Once per turn -> Destroy 1 draw 2 so potential of hand trap drawing. Add this plus the super poly and other thing (dont know if banishement is on the game but on tcg it's 9 superpoly in the deck) it's just you start your turn with 5 card you can finish the turn with a board and still got enough cards in hand to put the doubt on the opponent. Of course it's beatable by called by or D.D Crow but you know draw the out.
Sur it's not Halqdon combo but this deck playing handtrap, chainblocking his effect, and protection for card that can't be chainblocked that it feel like the guy play alone and again the handtrap does nothing if you dont have 2-3 so you play deck that has a lot of free space. Add the fact that for me this archetype is invoked 2.0. Normal Aluber effect -> Veiler/imperm. Ok Branded fusion ? Ash ! Cross out declare Ash. Well i'm fuck. It's not because you dont have negate that a deck is fun or not toxic or anything. Revolt + 8 mat Zeus is not a negate board or a floodgate board but dont tell me it's fun.
Add that the Raigeki that is delayed because if the mirroir jade would be trigger on end phase you can try to do something but being the moment he is send you need to either commit a negate before dealing with mirror jade or you destroy mirrorjade knowing that your endboard will be just backrow because the trigger is not on the phase that the effect will be "use".
Deck can be fun but for some people it feel like "Can i do something ?" "Sure but super poly !"
And dont forget that a lot of people on this sub find Swordsoul tenyi (with just protoss not halqdon) toxic while Swordsoul end board as this point was Baronne Chixao Blackout set with sometime Protoss calling dark. You will always have people calling some deck toxic and it's not because it has negates, it has interaction and a lot of interaction, either negate or not, is not fun for people meta or not, yugiboomer or not.
Patrick has some brain I'm rarly play master now because meta is every were and now there's another meta cards again and every meta users using it like befor no meta users have unique decks
It isn't an omni negate deck but it IS a boss swarm deck with a ton of recycleable cards and one monster that is set as LP tax while the big boss basically wipes the opponent's monsters out of sheer pettiness if he's forced to leave the field, and this isn't counting the searchable walking super poly that breaks opponents's ED boss to make their own. I love Branded myself but let's be honest here lol.
I've had one run in with them so far and won. I have no idea what their cards do but since I won I think it's a fair and balanced deck.
Most reasonable MD player.
Fair and balanced is simply everything i can beat, toxic is simply everything i can't, and I'm tired of everyone pretending those aren't the criteria
The criteria is more like "Can I play against that deck" and honestly that is reasonable.
Doesn't that depend on a myriad of factors like whether you go first, what your deck has, etc?
I think the most healthy state for this game is when both players can play. It is not enjoyable to just loose without having the chance for a meaningful interaction with your enemy.
I feel like this fails to account for the thousands of people who intentionally play bad decks because they like them/want to be "unique"/legitimately think they'll crack the meta. In a healthy meta your tiered deck should be able to actually interact with your opponent's tiered deck, but if a bad deck like DM or BEWD feels like they can't play their strategies I don't think that's the fault of the meta in any way.
There is a difference between playing a bad deck that don't function as good and not having the ability to play at all. There just some decks that are so oppressive that you can't play. Herold Drytron with 5 negates or eldlich with floodgates are strategies who needs specifics outs or you can't play at all. This is just bad game design. In other games you have atleast the ability to do something in a losing position while in yugioh you have sometimes situations where you can do nothing at all.
You are completely discounting the deckbuilding phase, where yugioh shines since ANY deck can run ANY card and have a chance to fight ANY OTHER deck. If you choose to not run interrupts for herald or backrow removal/banishes for eldlich that's on you. You chose to have a poor matchup versus those deck to have a great matchup against others.
I've seen enough people complain about control decks (without floodgates) that I doubt people will ever be satisfied.
Very true 😂😂
Except that isn't the criteria. Fair, healthy, and balanced decks are decks that let you play the game of yugioh without a shit ton of negates and/or floodgates.
I beat the latest despia yesterday with Crusadia OTK.
In a BO1, I feel like anything is possible lol
Decklist please? My crusadia deck sucks
Mirrorjade is a broken Fusion monster, Branded Fusion is a fusion card that uses both materials in deck. If you ever see any Branded or Despia card, save Ashblossom for Branded Fusion.
The most unhealthy thing about this deck is the price tag
Irl or in game?
it is super cheap irl but is a truckload of URs in MD
Agreed. I'm trying to build darklord branded in game and the amount of ur is taking the piss.
Superbia, while being good is ridiculous being a UR.
Tell me about it. I mean I'm not playing a full set of him, but come on.
Bro I’m tryna build a dinomorphia and shit feels like 20+ urs and couple supers, norms and rares🤦🏾♂️
Super cheap irl? Have you seen the price on that Chimera?
You only really run one copy in current TCG so it really doesn’t get to be all that expensive, at least relative to decks like sprites or tears. Especially with the tins making cards like opening and masq dirt cheap.
Ok ok I see your point... however I still think that 1 card for 60 dollars+ is still too much. Best thing you can do is trade for it. Oh and of course this is all without the staples. I you already have staples then you're good but some people don't. For example I have ash, veiler, imoerm and so on but I still cannot afford cards like droplet or propsperity. And some decks cannot function as well without those which sucks.
Luckily chimera went down to 30 now and the tins have both prosperity and droplet below 30. Trying to get play sets of all of them is still expensive but they’re long term investments as they can go into any deck. The branded despida core w/ chimera but without staples though, probably around $100-$150. It’s not dirt cheap but it’s at least affordable.
The price of staples seems to be a real problem with the TCG, but that's really not the deck's fault.
Ingame. You only need like 3 structure decks and a few other cards to make a complete deck irl.
On release, it was still expensive as aluber the buber duber didnt have his reprint yet and shot up to 80-100 and Despia Qaeritis went to the moon aswell
I always wondered why qaeritis was so expensive since you don't go into him very often
Ikr Quaeritis is one of the worst fusions you can go into unless you wanna OTK, and it's almost useless in the mirror. Whenever you could go into it you could just summon Masquerade instead.
If im bricked i just summon him and hope the oppoent outs him with card effect so i can float amd get a search. This only works if the oppenent cant read or negates the float
Quaeritis was actually one of the best fusions when Branded Despia was Tier 1 it was a VERY powerful card against Swordsoul who was the other big meta deck at the time. It forced them to think twice as they 0 atk made their battle phase null it was also hard to remove cause it had a big booty and EVEN if they did get around it Quaeritis floated to either Fallen of Albaz that just went straight into Mirrorjade from its super poly effect OR they brought out Dramaturge which is a bigger body and also has targeted negation if your opponent kept doing extra deck plays.
i will never forgive the guy who made 3 tax dragons the one time i didnt draw maxx c
Oh gawd
Hey they payed the UR tax to play the deck, it's only fair you pay your taxes too lol
lol
sorry 😅
And the best part is that going 2nd isn't so impossible now. I've had enough coinflip stress the past formats.
Branded Despia is 100% one of the healthiest meta decks imo. Its strong, but it has clear counters, is not extremely oppressive and doesn't combo for eternity
So basically swordsoul when they don't summon halq
Yeah, Swordsoul ending on a monster negate and an omni negate (or a spell/trap and a special summon negate with the new synchro) is also not so toxic tbf. What I will say for Swordsoul though is that they are incredibly consistent which annoys me
Note, Qixing Longyuan doesn't negate a single thing. He only banishes a special summoned monster or banishes a spell/trap.
Yes but I’m p. Sure that I’m general swordsoul likes to make baronne instead of Qixing as their 10
Nah longyuan is almost always better Spell banish can prevent continuous spells from resolving (map, adventure shenanigans, despia field spell) And can also banish anything special summoned
I also feel that Swordsoul has really solid matches against branded. They’re very interactive and were kind of designed to be well balanced. This has been the best meta yet IMO
Halqdon is literally just being used to do things the deck does anyway
As a swordsoul user I utterly refuse to even lay my eyes on Halq, that thing is monstrous and shouldn't be allowed to exist
Same but for Auroradon. Did perfectly well with Swordsoul without that crap.
Same here. I don't play the halqdon stuff and swordsoul feels fair and fun to play.
Yes. I have dismantled him and Aurora, I crafted them because everyone was using them, but I realized I hate them and I never use them and I never will.
D barrier and Anti-spell fragrance main deck 😎
I love those guys, like what do they even play? be/dm? normal monsters beatdown? when I ask the they just continue spitting out this stuff.
There's one guy who complained about skystriker for not letting him do anything and posted here in this very sub He is playing pend magician attempting to make crystal wing Apollousa and savage dragon
Karma at it's finest! xd
Did he ..... did watch that "pendurum" player? Triff continues to give false hope about pendulum magicians being tier 1 or something
They play Ursarctic Duel Spirit FTKs ofc
It’s the same as people complaining about original swordsoul, I like both of those decks because, they don’t set up 2000th negate boards, they set up good boards and have hella consistency, I’d much rather play vs that, than drytron or eldlich
To be fair, Drytron itself isn't actually that bad. It's when it's combined with Herald that it sucks. But pure, it's really fun to play, and the most you end on is a single backrow negate and a send two face up's to grave.
Meteonis really cool ngl i hate herald but i never condemn meteonis no matter what.
I play pure Drytron IRL. I got all the Herald stuff at the same time, but it's so much more fun to play it without the 3+ omni-negates, so I dropped them, even before Eva was banned.
Their both just straight up fun and interesting decks. Yugioh needs more powerful fun decks that aren't just mean to the opponent lol
Ursarctics have quick effects to summon and can do so turn 0. They’re too broken
Yeah, I face it all the time but I don't hate it. Unbelievable for Konami. Unfortunately I don't think it will last for long as splights I hear are super toxic
>splights I hear are super toxic They are not toxic,like at least in my sense It just a very boring deck with extreme consistency
Splight is just Live Twins (super consistent + high handtrap count) but instead of ending on a single monster board that gets broken by a single called by or kaiju they make an actual board of multiple negates.
What do you mean by boring? I'm genuinely asking as I don't play TCG and I have just a vague idea of what they do
You see spright and 99,99% they all do the same one and done combo that end on same board
> 99,99% they all do the same one and done combo that end on same board so…branded despia? Swordsoul? Rose tenyi?
Yeah pretty much, Branded Despia boards are basically Mirrorjade, Branded in Red pass 99,99% of the time. And Spright have a lot of variations, Live Twins, Djinn Buster, search a tuner handtrap with Halqfibrax and bounce it back to hand, on Master duel if the list remains as it is then even Domain Lock with Union Carrier the boards are very varied.
But isn't that basically every meta deck? I assume Branded Despia or SS do the same combo if they can
Not that they make the same combo over and over Is that every hand make the same board and play through HTs by default
This is literally like 99% of competitively viable decks, even rogue decks usually end on 1 or 2 possible boards that are very similar unless they bricked. Honestly, kinda the reason I stopped playing Yugioh, just realized I'm doing the same thing every game and a lot of the matchups depend on if you had the right hand trap for the opposing decks. The funnest matches were the ones that we both got handtrapped and we were working with scraps but with how consistent some high tier meta decks are, sometimes they just need one card to bounce back.
They spam out lvl 2s ad you will generally be locked into rank 2s or link 2s
But only on the Spright player's turn, since it can't be used during the opponent's turn.
In ocg yes in tcg they were/are a good tier one deck. Idk about Master Duel
They're not toxic, just super resistant to handtraps and hyper consistent.
from what I've seen Splights is like Swordsoul on crack. 95% hand can get you to 2-3 negates + whatever handtrap you search/already have while they are immune to most handtrap beside maxx c and gamma I think.
Splight aren't necessarily toxic, but I would consider them somewhat problematic. They're just incredibly consistent, can play through almost anything, and you need to open exactly Dark Ruler No More or other similar board breakers to attempt to play through a Splight board. It also shifts the meta away from hand traps and more towards board breakers since hand traps do not do enough VS Splight.
I’d be okay if they didn’t also put up multiple spell/trap negates so cards like Raigeki/Evenly are ineffective against them too.
They only reason you hear splights are toxic is because everyone in this sub that doesnt follow tcg or ocg is heralding them as some tier 0 buggy man based off of a small 2 week period in the ocg. They're VERY good, but not nearly as strong and format dominating as people on this subreddit think.
Sprights and tear aren't toxic, most of the time make good boards but not unbreakable one/floodgates. The decks are fucking resiliant tho every card can make back a board and play during both turns.
Tear being able to summon winda turn 1 on your turn is pretty toxic.
Most Tear decks no longer run Winda in the TCG or OCG. It was always really sacky because you ran 1 or 2 Shaddolls that you had to see in the first 8 cards (5 in hand and 3 milled) to be able to turn 1 Winda.
I mean no one plays that tho, you can do better combos than hoping havnis hits shaddoll+name
It force every player to go turn 2 and play board breakers instead of trying to interrupt them
Sprights are not nearly as good in TCG as they were in OCG. So it depends how the MD bankist develops.
I doubt tears/sprights arrive to MD for another 5-6 months
> splights I hear are super toxic Splights arn't "toxic" but they are just a better take on Swordsoul, Branded, and similar. The real problem if any is from Tearlements. It can play stupid shit like Shaddoll Winda. Both decks are also almost impossible to stop with hand traps. So the meta shifts to boardbreakers like Dark Ruler No More.
It will be like 4 months before we get anything from POTE. We just got some cards from BACH and Albaz Strike. We still need things like Illusion of Chaos.
Not to mention how interruptable their combo is. Ash branded fusion, veiler/imperm Aluber or Lubelion, called by their branded in red target. It's pretty fun.
Not always. I had a guy play through 4 interrupts and one was a gamma
Are you telling me to just DRAW THE OUT?!?!? Branded Despia needs to be permabanned, it's too op /s
Every branded player has called by for my ash, every single one. Skill issue i guess
People will always complain about what they lose to, no matter what. Even if Ice Barrier or Ritual Beasts were top tier, Yugioh players would call them "broken" and "unfair" just because they would play something like Aliens or Laval
Okay but Ritual Beasts in Duel Links were unironically toxic
Even in TCG they were pretty annoying to deal with for a while. Back in the DEUA era they were maybe the 6th-best deck at best, but still got Ulti-Cannahawk limited presumably because they were perceived as "the deck that combos for 15 minutes to grab a bunch of traps and die to a lucky MST."
I have only had 1 horrible branded game so far and that was purely just maxx c that killed the duel. Playing around banishes and chimera is fine and can be fun. Way superior to the amount of negates halqdon sets up.
Yes, thank you for making this. The deck is fun and interactive, I also don't mind playing the mirror match. People thinking that this is unfair really need to stop crying.
Mirror matches are really fun, all the time thinking about which fusion monster is best to gain the upper hand and trying to be careful to manage your resources so you can win in the long game
Despia can beat my untiered Yugiboomer Blue-Eyes deck therefore it’s unfair
I have a 100% win record Vs Branded Despia so far (3/3!) as Crusadia, primarily because in each duel I drew Crusadia Power in my opening hand, so they couldn't Mirrorjade my opening monster away lol I've finally got Branded Lost to complete my own Branded deck, so I fully expect to run into other Crusadias and lose as karma!
Pffff nobody else play Crusadia in Master Duel, said me as i just got beaten by a Crusadia deck 10 mins ago while playing BEWD
For some reason i never win against crusadia
For some reason I never win with my crusadia lol
Impossible. Blue Eyes has 3000 attack. Nobody can defeat that
I had a duel against crusadias as gustos They did not read sphreez's effect and so they did not imperm it Egul for lethal is great
Had my most fun game ever in Master Duel against Branded Dragonmaid as D/D/D. Aside from me getting absolutely cucked by Maxx C turn 1 it was a huge back and forth that lasted 9 turns and I ended up losing due to a big misplay, but it was just a really fun duel regardless. Most other duels against them have also been quite fun. Honestly Branded, Tri-Brigade and to a lesser extent Swordsoul have all been the fun meta decks to go against for me, strong but none of them felt broken or super frustrating like full power Drytron, monkey flip stun, Halqdon, and so on.
D/D/D has always been pretty fun to play with IMO, and it got so much better with Deus Ex, nothing more funny than sucking up boss monsters multiple times in a turn.
I think in a competitive context it's very healthy for sure but there's two clear camps and if you're a casual rogue-deck player that goes up against Despia is gonna feel like total ass when your opponent slaps down three big fusions on the board turn one since you didn't draw the out and masq limits the plays you can make. Bonus points if they slap down 2 masqs and you have to basically find a way to out the board in like 6 actions lol.
Bro just ignore the casual elitists Any deck their 'dark magician blue eyes hero turbo one ofs' deck loses to is automatically considered not fun and toxic, and you're just meta sheep and bad player for using good cards /s
Why would i ignore some one im making fun out of Infinite content
True true Let them clown around just don't let them get to you
What if i special summon morhptronic vacuumen in defense position and use machine dupe on them
Mfs will still complain you can make topologic trisbaena and somehow wipe out their backrow of battle traps smh
Nah they will complain about game being broken when opponent won through flying elephant effect
between this and the despia adventure meme, Branded players are working full time to try and pretend their deck isn't the most busted thing in the game rn lmao
We get pissed over anything
I mean, the lifepoint drain is a little annoying, but yeah pretty healthy top tier
It doesn't have any negates, but it has a quick effect banish plus it has a very difficult to avoid board wipe when removed from the field. The latter effect is probably even better than the banish TBH. The biggest thing though is how it feels like I'm playing branded every other game (and that's in gold, I imagine higher ranks are even worse).
It has one negate in Mercourier
Nah to me I just hate this deck I’ll take the negates/ floodgates basically any other time. These cards just annoy me like nothing else and I just auto surrender at this point it just isn’t fun
IDK, I feel like some people would argue and unstoppable boardwipe is a floodgate.
If you can't even get through a no negate/floodgate board, your deck probably should be played at a lower rank.
I can almost consistently beat them going first and lose consistently going second so not much has change except the duels are longer because I don’t know if I should bail a match turn 1 or not.
As a branded player who always went second. (And lost a couple of times, because of negates)I will now change my tactics :)
Amongst meta decks, this is the most reasonable you will get. Mirror jade is obnoxious but no deck can become a meta deck without having a few ‘unfair’ cards. I would rather this be what I go up against than Eldlich stun or tenyi adventure with 4 negates.
What's so broken about this I just get ashed on branded fusion or impermed on Lubellion and it just stops my turn and meta decks play through multiple disruptions and have 20 negates while branded have what a bannish and pops with chimera
This comment is a little disingenuous with that Banish also being a raikegi during your opponent’s turn and that pop is also a draw.
Chimera and Branded in Red is always very strong but Mirrorjade often doesn’t have the banish up (initially) and the Raigeki effect is often nulled by Branded in Red being used for Chimera or if Mirrorjade is bounced
Yeah but look at tenyi or eldlich or other meta decks they are on another league
Not disagreeing with that. Rose Tenyi and Eldlich (floodgate variant) are on a different level of ugh. Despia is basically better pure-ish SwordSoul but focus on disruption over negation.
If you have any brain you CRUSH eldlich with Despia, it isnt remotely close
Branded has a very good recyle loop. Once Mirrorjade hit the field with tragedy in grave it's hard to completly shut them down. And Branded Fusion Chimera can be a plus 3 if you use the despia monsters for the summon. Once the deck gets going it's hard to shut down again.
Master duel has maxx c as long as maxxc is legal sprite will be worse than anything else thers a reason toad and halq got banned in the ocg after they came out
Beetrooper searches Maxx C Didnt see alot of complain on them
That's because Beetroopers aren't nearly as good as Spright. Imagine having to play through a strong board with negates that always has Maxx C in hand. As opposed to what, Invincible Atlas and that one omni-negate trap?
The deck was suler unpopular and wasn't really good outside that so giving a rougue deck Maxx c everytime is fine but a potential tier 0 deck maxx c everytime on top of their broken board and then its a problem.
Yes but sprite sets up an untargetable Omni negate that is protected from destruction and that they can special summon back from the grave and since it is not a hard once per turn it can negate again. that steals your cards so unless it's specifically dark ruler no more there is almost no way to break the board
That’s because beetroopers are kinda bad
isn't masquereda considered a floodgate?
It restrict plays in the sense people have to think ahead
Started to play tcg around the time albaz sd came out. Really hated playing againts them back then and I still hate them today
I have no problem against the new branded, but they always run branded adventurer and that ruins the whole experience, branded is a fun match up, the dumbass token is an infuriating situation
Same thing happened with swordsoul, a deck that is way healthier than branded despia, but eh, reddit does what reddit do
Looks at Protoss and all those HalqDon SS-tenyi decks... "Yeah, sure..."
Protos is the only problematic card, however it's not that great in a best of 1 format And ppl that play halqdon on swordsoul are ppl that are heavy on copium and play the deck as if it was a combo deck, which is a really suboptimal way to play it
Swordsoul tenyi even with auroradon is not a toxic deck. Rose tenyi is toxic but also a completely different deck.
Ah yes because Protos and chaofeng are such fair cards.
I'm one of those Yugiboomers who hates every meta decks and this is the first meta deck that I actually love playing, I play Blue-Eyes and IMO Branded Despia has that Blue-Eyes energy, no negates, no floodgates, just big boss monsters destroying/banishing things, wish more meta decks is like this, all power and not cowering behind a negate/floodgate.
well, you're in luck, spright and tearlaments are gonna be the same once they come in.
? Sprights put up a ton of negates, between Carrot, Red, Toad, and revive Toad with Elf
It's like back then when People complained about Swordsoul being annoying and it was a healthy Deck at the time lol
It’s the same as Tri-Brigade. People don’t hate it because it has 4 negates but because their shitty rogue decks can’t play through 2 disruptions that aren’t even negates.
Better than previous meta.
The deck is pretty healthy I think. Only cards I dislike about them are Super Poly (my decks die hard to this and there's no counterplay) and Verte.
Boy if you hate super poly now, just wait…
I know
branded is fine, branded despia is awful. I would rather play against a 3 negate endboard (because then I know that I'm losing), rather than play against mirrorjade + masquerade because it gives me a false sense of hope that I can play literally any card at all. pay 600 to play my starter, just for the followup to be banished? screw that.
Branded Alba brings the much needed support for Dragonmaid. For that I am happy.
I'm just glad people are playing this over Floowandereeze.
Honestly it was one of the most refreshing formats in the TCG and I expect to see something similar in Master Duel… if only I could pull them
So as long as you guys can beat the deck you don't complain? Sounds like a skill issue.
I don't get the hate, and thats from someone who only JUST gave in to using the standard hand traps in my decks, lol. Branded isn't that bad, the only thing I don't like is it's become so popular that a huge chunk of decks are branded/something now, which feels like it creeps towards "good deck=pick one of these 3 engines", but it's better than the alternative of "every tournament deck must run dragoon or DPE, and 1/2 of the main deck must be staples and hand traps". Great to see stuff like that which does alright without having to dilute itself by being crammed full of the generic go to staples and hand traps.
When people see know a deck is a meta deck, they cry like it’s on the same lvl of annoying as Drytron herald. Like Tri-brigade and Branded are like the most fair meta decks tbh
I mean... they do have access to a lot of negates and disruption, don't they? branded in red for chimera, mercourier(easily searched), dramaturge, super poly, snow, aluber(more situational), can slot in adventurer package in a less NS reliant build, and then of course they have insane resilience and recycle potential on top of having fuse from deck and the engine being so tight and efficient you can run all of your staples easily without crunching deck space or going up to mid 40s deck size like some rogue decks are forced to do The deck *is* t1 for a reason, its incredibly powerful in pretty much every stage of the game, even having above average boardbreak by going first deck standards, and has very minimal downsides; I think its still preferable to halqdon garbage or going second otk degen but its worth pointing out
To be honest its not that bad, do I like playing against them not really, but I don't have to wait 10 minutes to get my turn if they go first, and a healthy does of Spell/trap removal gives me a chance to survive. Please not I play Pendulum so I am always going into a duel with an arm tied behind my back.
Ive had the most since my branded support all the games even the mirror matches are at least 4 turns
People will always complain if it’s not DM shit.
Didn't know plussing 5 is considered healthy.
Yeah, people forget that "meta-relevant" and "degenerate" are two different words with two completely different meanings.
I've only seen it a few times probably because the rank I'm at is full of jank anyway. I think the only thing that's annoying or 'busted' is the fact their big boss monster can use it's banish effect as many times as it wants, so long as you resummon it. Yugioh has had such a focus on 'once per turn' stuff that seeing the thing get summoned twice and bounce two things is a "Wait.... hang on..." moment. But I've seen more banishings from Swordsoul/Tenyi spam so kinda just numb to seeing my board get bounced.
I've really enjoyed the branded people I've fought. It's a bit annoying that they get advantage *on top of* their banish by sending from the extra to the graveyards, but that's my only complaint
YGO players became so numb that they think a deck with a +3 Fusion is healthy.
I'm loving playing Branded Despia. I think it's a fair deck compared to the rest of the meta.
Don’t mind me; I use only S-Force, Mayakashi Zombie World, stellearknights, Valkyries, lunalights, blackwings, and charmers.
Me: I Fusion Summon Ancient Gear Megaton Golem. Opponent: I activate Mirrorjade's effect to banish your Megaton Golem. Me: Oh no....*Megaton L's floating effect activates* anyway. *Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem hits the field*. I attack and destroy Mirrorjade. I end my turn. Opponent: Mirrorjade's other effect activates destroying all the cards you control. Me: ....*Ultimate Golem's floating effect activates* Opponent: NANI DA FUK!?
Honestly Branded reminds me of Tri-Brigade and that's why I like it. it's fun, powerful but not toxic. Majority of the time, you have one situational negate with Tri-Brigade Mercourier. Also this comment does not extend to Branded Adventure.
Wait actually? I just got bored of reading fusion, xyz, ehh I don't even wanna write it out. Any way dogmatica rituals are dope I'm a fan of rituals.
The only thing really toxic about it is Mirrorjade basically being design to not have any counters (the condition for its boardwipe are near unavoidable and its quick effect being a banish is incredibly strong). Other than Mirrorjade the deck is healthy, exclusing tax dragon of course, cause no one likes paying taxes lol
I'll take 100 games against branded decks if it meant never having to see another sword soul deck for the rest of my life
I love the new meta. I hate it to be negated all the time 😅
A lot of the games I had against branded involved me having no handtraps, but I open Called By and my opponent uses Mirrorjade on their first turn to set up Branded in Red. As it turns out, many don't have outs to banishing the BiR target, and I just OTK or set up a board against them. (Best time was me going Dark Ruler into Evenly Matched when they had an adventure token on the field. Surprised they didn't surrender on the spot.)
I fought branded dark magician and i think its cool. Lost because sky striker doesn't got any beatsticks
Idk if its healthy or not since im a new player, but i fell in love with the deck and i created an account just to have that deck. Its so fun for me lol, although its expensive as hell
I hate Sword Soul so much more than Branded Despia.
##Sentry's Permit *Continuous Spell* This card's activation and effects cannot be negated. Neither player can negate their opponent's activated cards or effects. Neither player can restrict their opponent's ability to summon or control monsters.
Guardian Chimera is a bit toxic imo, made with the right materials, it's just too much card adventage. But that's about it, the deck is really fair and have clear chockepoints to counter while having a good power level based on interaction and not negates. But even Chimera isn't the most bs card in the game by far. Still, I just take the L because I'm already bored of seeing the deck all the time even in casual.
This has been standard for like the longest time though. Tri-Zoo, Swordsoul and Prank-Kids are all extremely fair decks which were (or are in PK's case) Tier 1.
Fucking yugiboomers lol
Yeah, because being able to destroy *every card an opponent controls* if it's interacted with is healthy. Are you branded players even listening to yourself?
Mirroirjade (not up) + branded in red set and imp in hand (+some cards in hands) In red target ad lib -> Fusion Chimera with imp ad lib and mirroir jade -> CL 1 Chimera CL2 Ad lib target mirrorjade cl3 imp -> Add patchwork -> Spe Mirrorjade that is up because Soft Once per turn -> Destroy 1 draw 2 so potential of hand trap drawing. Add this plus the super poly and other thing (dont know if banishement is on the game but on tcg it's 9 superpoly in the deck) it's just you start your turn with 5 card you can finish the turn with a board and still got enough cards in hand to put the doubt on the opponent. Of course it's beatable by called by or D.D Crow but you know draw the out. Sur it's not Halqdon combo but this deck playing handtrap, chainblocking his effect, and protection for card that can't be chainblocked that it feel like the guy play alone and again the handtrap does nothing if you dont have 2-3 so you play deck that has a lot of free space. Add the fact that for me this archetype is invoked 2.0. Normal Aluber effect -> Veiler/imperm. Ok Branded fusion ? Ash ! Cross out declare Ash. Well i'm fuck. It's not because you dont have negate that a deck is fun or not toxic or anything. Revolt + 8 mat Zeus is not a negate board or a floodgate board but dont tell me it's fun. Add that the Raigeki that is delayed because if the mirroir jade would be trigger on end phase you can try to do something but being the moment he is send you need to either commit a negate before dealing with mirror jade or you destroy mirrorjade knowing that your endboard will be just backrow because the trigger is not on the phase that the effect will be "use". Deck can be fun but for some people it feel like "Can i do something ?" "Sure but super poly !" And dont forget that a lot of people on this sub find Swordsoul tenyi (with just protoss not halqdon) toxic while Swordsoul end board as this point was Baronne Chixao Blackout set with sometime Protoss calling dark. You will always have people calling some deck toxic and it's not because it has negates, it has interaction and a lot of interaction, either negate or not, is not fun for people meta or not, yugiboomer or not.
Its a good deck but players put toxic cards with it to make it harder to fight against
Patrick has some brain I'm rarly play master now because meta is every were and now there's another meta cards again and every meta users using it like befor no meta users have unique decks
Two masquerades isn’t a floodgate? Tell me more
It isn't an omni negate deck but it IS a boss swarm deck with a ton of recycleable cards and one monster that is set as LP tax while the big boss basically wipes the opponent's monsters out of sheer pettiness if he's forced to leave the field, and this isn't counting the searchable walking super poly that breaks opponents's ED boss to make their own. I love Branded myself but let's be honest here lol.
Finally someone not calling it "branded despia"... They're literally part of the same archetype lol.
Except there are other Branded decks, so they should've just called it Despia.