Future card Buddyfight

OVERVIEW

    For those of you who don't know Future card Buddyfight is a new game released into the world. It's style of play is similar to Magic in the sense it is turn based, you start with 2 digit life, and you try to knock your opponent down to 0. You also rest cards to attack, and sometimes to activate abilities. This game still holds it's own unique characteristics that make it incredibly enjoyable. 

GETTING STARTED

     With every game the first step is deck building. Like Cardfight Vanguard this game has a set deck limit where you cannot posses more, or less, cards than required. Unlike any other games this card's deck limit is exactly 52 cards. The reason for that is there is a main deck consisting of 50 cards, one card in the flag area, and one card in the buddy area. You are only permitted 4 copies of any card in your deck. NOTE: Your buddy monster does not count as part of your deck. So you may have a copy of your buddy card in your buddy zone, then 4 additional copies in your main deck. A great thing about Future card Buddyfight is that there are no restrictions on the size of the monsters in your deck. You can have as many size 0, 1, 2, or 3 monsters as you wish. The only limit pertains to the flag you chose. There are several different flags to chose from but they all have the same rule. Your deck can consist of the cards that belong to this world. The different worlds are Ancient, Dragon, Darkness Dragon (Coming in set 4), Danger, Dungeon, Magic, Katana, and Legend World. So you can't have any Danger world cards in your deck if you posses a Dragon World flag, and Vice versa. The same rule applies to all worlds. On top of world specific cards there are also "generic" cards which, as it sounds, can be put in any deck. Now a lot of Generic cards are next to useless, and the ones that are useful are "conditional" (meaning they only work in certain conditions) so most people use strictly world card decks.

KNOWING YOUR CARDS

     This is your standard Buddyfight Monster. At the top left is the monster's size. In Buddyfight you have 3 monster zones. Left, right, and center. Meaning you can only have 3 monsters. Furthermore there is a rule that the combined size of all your monsters cannot exceed 3. So you can have 1 size 3 monster, a size 2 and 1 monster, or 3 size 1 monsters, on the field at once. More can be added thanks to size 0 monsters which so far only exist in Ancient world, and Danger World. Just below the size of the monster are 3 numbers. The red number is the attack points of the monster. The blue number is the defense points of the monster. Similar to Cardfight Vanguard to defeat a monster you must have equal or greater attack points than your opponent's defense points. The white number is the critical points. When a monster attacks a fighter directly the white number amount is taken out of the opponent's life points. Of course there are cards to nullify attacks, or destroy monsters, that can protect you. The text in the lower mid section of the card is the card effects. Not all cards have an effect, but the ones that do make it obvious what they can do. Below the effect text is the card type. In this case Jackknife "Thunder Storm" is an armor dragon, and a green dragon. Below the type is the world the card belongs to. Jackknife "Thunder Storm" belongs to Dragon World. So in order to have it in the deck you must be using the Dragon World flag. 

KNOW YOUR MAT

    Most of the mat is pretty self explanatory, but let me explain anyways. The area to the bottom right is called the "deck area". That is where you'll place your 50 card main deck. To the top of the deck area is the drop zone. Also known as the graveyard. When your spells are used, gauge is consumed, or your items and monsters destroyed, they will go there. To the left of the deck area is the "Buddy" area. That is where you'll place your buddy monster face up at the beginning of the game. To the top left of the buddy area is the flag/item area. Firstly this is obviously where your flag goes. Dragon world, danger world, etc. The "item" part of the area pertains to item cards. Cards in your hand that you can equip to increase your power. When you play an item, after paying any call costs, you can place it over your flag to equip it. NOTE: this does not mean your flag is null, and void. You can't just place an item, then play whatever cards you want. You still have a limit to whatever flag you fight for. To the left of the flag/item is a blank area. Usually that's where you place Set Spells, but there's no general rule on where to put them.  Above the flag area are the 3 monster areas. Left, right, and Center. Some monsters do have abilities that only activate in the left or right. Some spells can only target left, or right areas. And likewise some cards only activate abilities when monsters are in, or not in, the center area. The most important part of the areas is that you cannot attack a fighter if a monster is in the fighter's middle area. You must destroy the center monster first. On the left side of the mat is the Gauge area. The gauge area is where you place the gauge at the start of the game, and all charged gauge from the hand. Gauge is used for calling monsters, casting spells, and equipping items. To be covered in the gameplay section.

GAMEPLAY

     After constructing your deck, and finding an opponent with a constructed deck, you're ready to play the game. First pull out your flag, and buddy, card. Then place those two cards in the respected areas. Shuffle your 50 card decks, and place them in the deck zone. Now this is the important part. Each player will draw 6 cards, and THEN put the top two cards in their gauge. You don't put two cards into your gauge first, you don't draw 6 place 2 from your hand into your gauge then draw again, and you don't draw one at a time, charge the ones you don't want, and continue drawing. Draw six, charge 2 from the top. There's actually no ruling on gauge, or looking at gauge, that I'm aware of. I have a pretty good memory so I don't look at my gauge, but I don't argue when my opponent's do. If you don't like your opponent being able to check your gauge let them know before hand. If anyone gives you crap let them know the rules state specifically you can't look at the cards you charge at the start of the game so it's logical you shouldn't be able to check your gauge at all.

     Once you've drawn your cards, and decided who's going first you start the draw phase. The process for the draw phase is to draw a card from the top of your deck, chose a card from your hand to place into the gauge, and if you placed a card into your gauge draw an additional card. If this is the first turn the first player only chooses whether or not to charge a card from their hand, then draw an additional card. The players then move from the draw phase to the main phase. There any player can place as many monsters as they wish, equip as many items as they wish, and cast as many spells as they wish (card restrictions apply). The main phase is also when ACT abilities can be activated. Like in Cardfight Vanguard there are 3 types of abilities.        ACT: Activated abilities which usually require a cost to be paid to activate an ability. So long as you pay the cost you can activate ACT abilities as many times as you please, but only during the main phase (unless stated otherwise)

     AUTO: Auto abilities can be activated at any time so long as the conditions are activated. For example of a card has the ability AUTO: When this unit is called XXX that card can use the XXX ability when it's called, regardless of which phase it is in; HOWEVER, auto abilities can only go off one time. Meaning you can't use the XXX ability as many times as you want.

     COUNTER: Counter abilities can be used at any point during any phase, when any action is performed. Counter abilities may only be used once.

     After you've made your field how you've wanted, and have no more cards from your hand you can, or want to, play you move to the attack phase. During the attack phase you turn your standing cards to rest, and declare who is attacking where. You can attack any creatures on the battle field, or the fighter. NOTE: You cannot attack the fighter if they have a monster in the center. If they have a monster in the center you must destroy the monster BEFORE attacking the fighter. If an opponent's monster has such high defense points that it cannot be destroyed by any 1 monster or item you can have monsters attack together to perform what is called a "link attack". Just as it sounds Link Attack means an attack consisting of two or more monsters. To my knowledge you CAN Link Attack a fighter, and in some cases knowing that is very important.

     NOTE: If it is the first turn the first player may only attack once with 1 monster. Meaning they can't link attack for the first attack, they can't attack with a monster then stand it back up, and double attack. One attack, with one monster/item.

     After the battle phase is over the turn goes to the opponent, who starts the process all over again. While the gameplay mechanics are simpler than a card like Cardfight Vanguard, and Yu-gi-oh, strategy is still very important in Future card Buddyfight. As it would be in any game. The childish name, and simple mechanics does not diminish the difficulty of this game. Especially for those who don't have the money to buy all the cards they could ever want. Future card Buddyfight is still a low budget game so don't let all the fancy cards, and shiny graphics intimidate you into not playing.

STRATEGY

    Just like in Cardfight Vanguard I'll give some basic strategies that applies to most, if not every, situation to help anyone reading this to get started. The first strategy I'd like to give is going first. While I prefer going second there are those who like to go first and just botch the first turn. So here's how your first turn should go. Don't call down all your cards in your first turn. It diminishes hand size, and leaves you vulnurable to counter strategies. Especially those for clearing fields. If you call anymore than 1 monster/item card it had better be because the cards you called have abilities you need. Otherwise you should only be calling one monster, preferably with soul guard, into the center and attacking your opponent. Another HUGE piece of going first strategy is if you deal any less than 2 damage your first turn is considered a failure. The only exception is placing a monster with plenty of defense points into the center to be your meat shield. Meat shields generally only do one damage. 

     When going first the preferred deck to have is either Ancient world or Dragon World, maybe even Dungeon world, since all three decks either have huge draw power, or huge defensive power. So they can take the hits, and keep on coming. Going second works for any deck, hense why I like going second. One more important piece of strategy is long game, or short game, tactics. If you have a primarily defensive deck, with a lot of shields, draw power, and/or strong defensive monsters, you can plan to have the game go into multiple turns. The only thing you need to worry about is running out of deck. Though it rarely happens you should still try to end the game before your deck depletes itself. If you're going for a short game, a quick win, don't be in such a rush to just OTK. Slap down some strong offensive cards, but save your ace for turn two, or three. Then just smash the enemy. If you're playing a long game deck against a short game deck attack the monsters first, and try not to let your life points hit 0 before you can destroy them all. If you're playing short game against long game keep in mind monsters would be your opponent's main target and call down the weaker monsters with high criticals first. Then call your stronger monsters and demolish your opponent. If your opponent decides not to attack your weaker, high critical, monsters first they are fools and the game is yours. Since most long term decks can't OTK.

    My preferred strategy is to go second with my dragon world, or katana world, decks and summon my strongest creatures, keep my strongest spells ready, and get in my opponent's face right from the get go. My strategy does go against what I said earlier but because my dragon world deck has plenty of shields, and dragoenergy cards, I don't have to worry about my monsters getting destroyed by attacks. Effects, and spells, are my achilles heel. My Katana World deck is naturally defensive with Phantom Ninja Kashinkoji, and art of body replacement I basically have a great shield. Then when that runs out Tsuchikage can back me up. So my decks are designed for short game wins, but can adapt to long game if it fails. Again spells, and effects, that destroy cards are my achilles heel.

    One more strategy that most new players seem to overlook is gauge control. Putting size 3 monsters with 3 gauge call costs in the same deck as impact cards with 3-4 gauge cast costs is a huge mistake. Unless you have cards that build up your gauge you only go up 1 gauge per turn, and you only start at 2 gauge. Even going first, and even with an impact card with only 3 gauge call cost you're basically saying "I'm not going to lose within the next 3 turns". For short game decks that's not a realistic goals. Your only hope is to face a long game deck with little to no attack power. Then hope they have no destroy monster spells, or return monster spells. Keep an eye on how much gauge your using to call/cast your cards. Plan your turns accordingly.

     For players who use low attack point monsters. Keep in mind your maximum attacking power. An easy way to figure how much attacking power you have is take any combination of cards (excluding copies of the same card) and see how much your maximum attacking power is. The highest defense point monster I've ever seen is 12000. Make sure you can make that number. You may not get the cards you need, but you always want the possibility. Otherwise you'll want plenty of destroy/return spells.

     The final strategy I want to talk about is soulguard and Penetrate. What most people don't know is if a monster with soulguard, and is in the center, gets hit by a monster with penetrate the damage is still dealt even if the monster does not leave the field. The reason is the soulguard monster is still destroyed but soulguard prevents it from leaving the field. And Penetrate only designates the monster being attacked has to be destroyed. It doesn't specify that the monster has to go to the graveyard.

EPILOGUE

   That's pretty much all the time I have for Future card Buddyfight. Hopefully if you've read this you're either ready to play, or you have a much better handle on strategy. Go out, buy your decks, and find a partner to buddyfight with. Or future fight if you prefer a more manly version. Also keep in mind with any TCG game decks are always being improved so be sure to check the future card buddyfight page, and any wikipedia pages, to see what future sets can bring to you. Remember there are no bad players, just bad strategies, and bad strategies can always be fixed.

Cardfight Vanguard

OVERVIEW

This blog is dedicated to awesome Trading Card Games (Hereon referred to as TCGs), and how they compare to one another. I have been playing TCGs since I was 8, and saw the pilot episode of yugioh, and went to Wal Mart buying my first pack. First note, Wal Mart sucks for trading cards. Go to your local card shops, find the best prices, and make that your spot. Mine is Uncles Games in the Spokane Valley mall. They have great prices, and a great selection. I've played a wide variety of card games, and have the thousands of dollars hole in my pocket to prove it.

The first game I'd like to talk about is my current favorite Cardfight Vanguard. It's a mouthful to say I know, but this game is a great, and the only game you can't make a (Enter tcg name here) vs Magic rule for. I first got started in this game because I was posting on gaiaonline in a roleplay, I saw an ad for booster set 2 on my right hand side, and figured like many other card games it had an anime to go with it. I was right, there was a Cardfight Vanguard anime. I watched the first four episodes, you have to suffer through 1, and 2, but 3, and 4, are much better, and I was just hooked. While the first episodes does the classic change rules, and cards, and effects, to better suit the storyline the rest of the episodes do not. You also have to suffer through the fact that the main character is wishy washy, but even strictly as a card game this game is all right.

The gameplay is a little complicated, but once you get the hang of it you couldn't have more fun. The concept is you start at level 0, and each turn you go up a level stopping at level 3 (or level 4 but that only occurs in 2 decks). The goal of the game is to deal damage to your opponent. Each card only deals one damage, but there are ways to increase how much damage you can do. The great thing about this game is the only way to deal damage is to attack. There are cards that deal damage to yourself, but they undo the damage at the end phase, and there is one card that can damage your opponent without attacking, but it has a super high cost, you can't deal the winning damage that way, and you can't do it more than once per turn. So the real fun in the game is you can fairly predict how the turns will go. There is plenty of surprises that you have to watch out for, but that comes with any game.

Like magic Cardfight Vanguard's rules are overuled by the cards themselves. Basically it goes what the card says, then what the rules say, in terms of what you listen to. Aside from that this game is pretty independant of all other card games. For example in any other game you can draw a card that is useless, or you can't use without certain conditions. In Cardfight Vanguard every card can be used. There's no such thing as a useless draw, or a useless card. The reason for that is almost all cards (Grade 3s and 4s being the exception) can be used to guard against attacks (Covered later in how to play section.), and even grade 3s and 4s are useful because they are the final level cards. Meaning once you become grade 3 and/or grade 4 the game kicks into high gear. Even if you get multiple grade 3s, or 4s, they still have uses as attackers, or fodder for what are called Ulti-guards (Or perfect guards and also covered later in how to play.)

HOW TO PLAY

Cardfight Vanguard starts with the deck building. Each deck MUST contain 50 cards, and each deck MUST contain 16 "trigger" cards. "Triggers" (Hereon just referred to as triggers or trigger cards) are grade 0 units that have a special mark at the top right of the picture. The picture at the top right determines what kind of trigger it is. There are 4 different types of triggers, each one has their own effect. Each trigger gives 5000 power to a unit, and an effect depending on the trigger. You can chose which monster gets the effect, and which monster gets the power. You can also give all effects to one monster. The four types of triggers are draw, stand, critical, and heal. Draw triggers give you the option to draw an additional card. There is also a ruling that will be covered later. Stand triggers allow someone to stand (Or untap if you're stuck on magic terms) a unit and attack with it again. Critical triggers increase the critical mark by one point. (The critical mark is a small gold mark at the bottom of the card. The critical mark determines how much damage can be dealt by an attack. All cards have 1 critical point.) Heal triggers can heal one point of damage. Healing is taking one card from the damage zone (Covered later) and placing it in the drop zone (Or graveyard if you're stuck on yugioh terms). Aside from 50 cards, including exactly 16 triggers, there's no other restrictions on how your deck can be made. It is recommended all cards have the same clan. 

Once you've built your deck it's time to play the game. To the right is the standard vanguard mat. The purple area on the right is where you place your deck. Above the deck is the trigger area. That is where you place your triggers during drive, and damage, trigger checks. The area below the deck area is the drop zone. Cards that are destroyed, healed, or used as shield, are placed there once they are finished performing their task. The gold circles are the rear guard circles. If a creature on the rear guard circle is attacked with a monster with equal, or greater, attack points the creature is destroyed. The blue circle is known as the Vanguard Circle. A creature attacked there by a creature with equal or greater attack points is dealt damage. The green circle is the guardian circle. If you are attacked you may place cards in the guardian circle. Creatures placed their adds their shield points to the targeted monster's attack points. 

When looking at cards there are various points to look for. At the top left is a number in a hexagon. That is the cards "Grade" or "Level". Underneath that is an ability mark. There are 3 kinds of ability marks. An arrow pointing up is a boost mark. that means if the card is on a back row rear guard circle (The bottom 3 rear guard circles) it can add its power onto the unit in the same column as that unit. Underneat that, turned sideways, is the shield counter. That tells you how much power that unit can add to a targeted unit during an attack.  The center of the card, just below the picture, is where the abilities of the cards go. There are 3 types of abilities. Auto: Abilities that activate once when certain conditions are met, provided the cost is paid. 

ACT: Activated abilities that can be activated as many times as the cost can be paid during the main phase. 

Cont: Continuous abilities that are always active.

Below the abilities of the card is the card names. Very little cards specify an actual card names, but many cards nowadays require the name to have a certain word in the card name. To the bottom left is the attack points of the card. That is how much your card can attack for. This can be increased either by abilities that increase attack points or with boosting. When a unit attacks, if a unit in the back row has the boost ability mark, that unit can be rested to add it's attack points to the attacking monsters attack points. If your attacking monster has equal to, or greater, attack points your monster destroys, or deals damage to, the opposing monster. The bottom right tells you the cards clan, and it's type. Very few cards specify a type, but many cards specify a clan, when using abilities. The critical mark is the little golden mark between the attack points, and the clan type.

The goal of Cardfight Vanguard is to get your opponent to 6 damage. The first player to have six cards in their damage zone is the loser. The interesting thing about Vanguard is there is virtually no way to end the game in a tie. (Depending on where you play there is a very small chance of going into a tie, but I've only seen it happen once in three years). The only other ways to win a Vanguard fight is A. With your opponent running out of cards in their deck (Magic rules the moment your deck hits 0 cards you lose. No matter what), and with a card called "Star vader Glendios Omega" which is the only card in existence that specifies winning without putting your opponent to 6 damage. In any case the end results will be someone wins, and someone loses. To deal damage to an opponent your attacking monster must have equal to, or greater, attack points than your opponent's monster. When you attack an opponent, or an opponent attacks you, they rest (tap) the unit in the front row, and then rest (tap) the unit in the same column that is in the back row. Provided said back row unit has the boost mark. The attack points of the monsters are added together, and any abilities that apply are activated. After this the defending player can place cards from their hands into the guardian circle. The number on the left hand side of the card are called "Shield points" and increase the attack of the defending monster by the amount of the shield points. Shield points are increments of 5000 and start at 0 going to 10000.

When a player attacks with a vanguard they do a drive trigger check. That is where they take the top card of their deck, and reveal it face up. The revealed card then goes into the attacking player's hand. If a trigger is revealed the attacking player can declare where to give power, and where to give an ability depending on the trigger. As covered earlier the four types of triggers are draws, heals, criticals, and stands. You can also divide up which creatures gain effects, and which ones gain power. For example lets say you attack with your vanguard, and your opponent declares "no guard" or "I don't guard" meaning they're just going to take the damage from the attack and conserve their hand size. Then lets say you drive check a critical trigger. You can give the critical to your vanguard, thereby increasing how much damage is dealt, and give the power to a rear guard unit to make that attack stronger. To review the proper order of an attack is attack is declared, defending player chooses to guard or not, if the defending player guards they put as many cards as they want into the guardian circle, and the shield points are added to the attack points. After that the drive trigger check is made. What this means is if you chose to guard yourself to the point one trigger will put your opponent's attack points higher than yours you can't put down more guard to cover for it. So when you guard be sure of how much you want to guard for. When any player takes damage they do another trigger check called the damage trigger check. Like the drive trigger check the player taking damage will reveal the top card of their deck only now the card is placed into the damage zone.

The damage zone is a special zone where damaged cards go. When a player receives six damage they lose the game; however, receiving damage is necessary for skills. Vanguard cards (Like Blaster Blade in the earlier text) has skills that require cost to be paid. When you see a white rectangle, an arrow signaling to turn over the white rectangle, and making it a purple rectangle that symbol is called the "Counterblast symbol". "Counterblast" means turning X amount of face up cards in the damage zone face down to activate skills. Cards turned face down cannot be turned face up without specified abilities. (Almost all clans have a card that can hit, and turn damage face up.)

As mentioned before cards in the damage zone are damage. And as mentioned before "Heal triggers" can place damage zone cards into the drop zone (or graveyard); HOWEVER, heal triggers come with some rulings. 1. Heal triggers don't activate their healing effect if your opponent has more damage than you do. You must have equal to, or more, cards in your damage zone when the trigger effect resolves. 2. If you damage check a heal trigger, and that heal trigger would put you to equal damage to your opponent you do not get the heal. That is because the effect resolves when the heal trigger is in the trigger zone not the damage zone. 3. If you drive check a heal trigger, and your opponent would take damage that would put them above the amount of damage you have you still get to heal one damage. Because your trigger effect resolves BEFORE your opponent takes damage.

The only other ruling involving triggers is draw triggers. If you twin drive, and your first check is a draw trigger you draw a card BEFORE doing your second drive check. If you drive check a draw trigger, and are unsure of where to put damage because you don't know if you want to risk the next card being a trigger you actually draw before doing your +5000 power effect. So you can see what the draw card is before placing power. Some rash players put the power somewhere before drawing. That is also acceptable.

Triggers are what make the game complex. Because they are random, but can be devastating. Like when you hit your opponent for their sixth damage, and they damage check a heal trigger to stay alive. Or when you take a vanguard attack at 4 damage and your opponent drive checks a critical trigger. Some people think this diminishes the game's value because it's "luck based". The fact of the matter is all games are luck based. Even in magic you can't control what your starting hand is, or what your mulligan hand is, or what you draw, or when you draw it. All games are "luck based", but Cardfight Vanguard plays on that luck giving it that slight gambling rush.

Now that you know the general rules you're ready to play Cardfight Vanguard... As soon as you get a deck put together, and find someone else with a deck put together who knows the rules. Now lets move on to strategy.

STRATEGY

When you make a deck you should always have in mind "What is my ideal field?" If you could pull cards out of your deck, and place them on the field, what would they be, and how would they be positioned? To know that you first have to think "How much power is each column (or lane) going to need to be effective?" Two years ago I started playing this game. At that time when both players got to grade 3 they could have 10000 power vanguard, or 11000 power vanguards. There was a fair amount of both. So my thoughts was since shields come in increments of 5000 I only need my lanes to be 15000, 16000, 20000, or 21000. Since most of your attacking power was between 8000 and 12000 with grade 2s and 3s back then I only needed boosters to make it the numbers I want. Meaning to make 8000s into 15000s I needed 7k boosters. And 8k boosters in case I wanted those 8000 to be 16000. In the event my opponent had an 11000 grade 3; however, nowadays all grade 3s are 11k, or 13k if your opponent is running crossrides. meaning you want your attack rows to be 16000, 18000, 21000, 23000. 21000 is difficult to hit with natural rear guard power. Some vanguards increase the power of their rear guards but generally you're dealing with rear guards that give themselves power. Basically to hit 21000 you're trying to get a 12000 front row, and a 9000 booster. 9k boosters are conditional, but not too incredibly difficult to hit. 12k front rows exist as grade 2 9ks with an ability to gain 3000 power when conditions are met. Those conditions are easy since most of them specify your vg has to have an archtype in it's card name "Such as eradicators, or liberators, or Star Vader, etc.) So with today's decks you want 9k boosters, 12k attacks, then 7k boosters, and 9k grade 2s to hit those 16000 lanes. Plus you can put 9, and 9, together to make the 18k lanes if you know your opponent is running cross rides.

Cross rides are grade 3 units that, when another certain grade 3 unit is in your soul, you gain 2000 power continuously. Cross rides are always base 11000 so an additional 2000 makes 13000 base power. Attacking, and defending. This helps when guarding against your opponent's attacks. Especially if your opponent specializes in 16k lanes.

Now that you have your ideal field in mind you need to know how to adjust it to fit your opponent. For example if you think "Oh all I need is 16k lanes for my rear guards, and my super strong vg, and I'm golden" You're going to lose a lot of matches. It used to be there were few crossrides. 2 to be exact. And one card that was unique having a 12000 base. Sets 8, and 9 brought 5 additional crossrides, and set 12, 13, 14, and 15, bring plenty more. Not to mention the extra booster that contains Transcedence dragon Novelle vague (Not sure if it's spelled correctly but you can still google it.) which all have 13k bases. Now your ideal field of 16k lanes for rear guards COULD still be acceptable. Thanks to Break Rides some people don't need to run the card that makes cross rides cross rides, but some people still do. Especially if their cross ridden card IS a break ride. Such as Vowing Saber Dragon Reverse, Omniscience Regalia, Minerva, Dauntless dominance dragon Reversed, Etc. When you see these cards in drive checks, or damage checks, you know you'll need more than 16k lanes. 18k is going to be your goal on rg. Yes 19k is o.k. 17 is not. To tell if someone is still running the cross ride version, if their cross ride card is not a break ride, check their damage checks, drive checks, and soul charges. If any one of those cards is the base for a cross ride adjust your plans. Usually people only run the base cards in a cross ride deck nowadays if 1. Their deck does an incredible amount of soul charging. 2. Their deck's break ride sucks. To my knowledge no deck's cross ridden card exceeds the usefulness of their break ride card. 

When you're in the middle of battle, and you're deciding how much to use as guard the answer is simple. With rear guards it is obviously enough to surpass their current attacking power. When it is the vanguard; however, the answer is 2 triggers to pass, or 2 to pass. That is easy to calculate. Simply take your opponent's attacking power, add 5000 to it in your mind, then place enough guard to get just above that. Why? Because the only situation in which your opponent can hit is if they get a trigger on their first drive check, give the power to vanguard, and then get another trigger on their second check. This does happen, but it does not happen often. Some people have asked "What if I have a perfect guard in hand, and an additional amount of shield to make it 2 to pass? Wouldn't I use the perfect guard, and guard a rear guard? See this logic only works in a certain situation. That situation is if your opponent's standing rear guard (which unless your opponent is a total newb that will be the case) has similar attacking power to where it's the same amount to block. This is followed with the condition that your opponent does not hit a trigger on their drive check. That way you used the perfect guard you would've used either way, but you only need 10000 to guard the rear guard. In many cases when your opponent is at grade 3 they usually drive check a trigger once every 2 turns on average. I have faced opponents that have hit no triggers in six twin drive checks, and opponents who have hit double trigger checks each turn for three turns. So this rule is not absolute. 

The main point I'm trying to make is if your opponent hits a single trigger you're right back where you started. The reason i say put 2 to pass, and keep the perfect guard for the rear guard is for the following situations. Situation 1: Your opponent's rear guard has such a higher attacking power than your opponent's vanguard that what would be 2 to pass for your opponent's vg is just enough to block your opponent's rear guard as is. This situation most commonly occurs in Liberators with gancelot Zenith, Great nature decks, and decks where rgs gain power each time conditions are met. Such as Link Joker with the rgs that gain power when a unit gets locked, and Narukami, with when units get retired gain power abilities, plus several others. So you would push 2 to pass on vg, then perfect guard their supser strong attacks. Situation 2: Lets say your opponent's vg, and rg have similar attack power, and you perfect guard the vg and your opponent checks a trigger, gives power to rg, and checks another trigger. You are boned; however, if you push 2 to pass on vg, and your opponent does the same thing you can perfect guard the now super powered, double trigger, attack. Doing things my way you make the following gamble "I am betting that my opponent will not take the risk of giving any first trigger power to vg." The only way my way fails to the alternative is if your opponent is going to double trigger, and has a set of brass ones. Most people won't take the risk of giving first trigger power to vg. Some do, and sometimes it pays off. Just remember hitting two triggers on a twin drive check is difficult. It doesn't happen often enough to rely on.

 When deciding what to call to rg, and when to call it is all about 2 factors. 1. How many times can I make my opponent guard? and 2. How much can I make my opponent guard for. what this means is how many attacks can I make where my monsters can hit my opponent, and if my opponent decides to guards said attacks how much does he need to guard? So lets say for example you have an opponent with an 11k vanguard, and on your field you have your vg, and a booster, that makes 18000, and one rg lane that makes 15000, an empty lane, and in your hand you have the cards to make a 16k lane. Newbish players will call over the 15000 lane with the 16000 lane. Some amatuar players will simply call over one of the cards on the field with a card in their hand to make it a 16k lane. What you must remember is more importantly than how powerful your lanes are, is how many times you can hit your opponent. The more attacks that can hit your opponent the better. 

One more strategy I want to talk to anyone who reads this is about calling triggers. Triggers are grade 0 cards and therefor have an attack power range of 4000-6000. (the 6000 is usually just the condition that you're boosting a unit of the same clan). Newbish, and even some amatuar, players call down triggers to hit their numbers. Most commonly to call down 5k triggers behind an 11k attacker when their opponent has an 11k vanguard. There is only two instances in which you should call triggers to be boosters. 1. You know for a fact you're not going to be able to properly guard your opponent the next turn (meaning you won't be able to block all of your opponent's attacks) which means you HAVE to win this turn. in that instance it is fine to call down triggers to increase how much your opponent guards. 2. Your triggers can go back into the deck. Some clans have triggers that, when they're done boosting, can be shuffled back into the deck. Some triggers will specify "When an attack hits that this unit boosted" those triggers usually only have 4k attack, and I recommend against putting these ones down on the field. The best triggers to slap down to boost are triggers like Lozenge Magus, Sunny Smile Angel, and Battleraizer. Triggers like these are 6k boosters when they boost for the same clan, and then go back into the deck to be reused later. If you can spare the 10000 shield I say slap them down. That doesn't mean if you have 3 Lozenge Magus, and a full field, to retire the three boosters you have, slap down the lozenge magus', and send them back. That's stupid. Some players chose to retire ONE unit, in favor of sending them back. I am one of those players, and while the risk is low it is still a risk. Remember that.

I also recommend against using triggers like Lozenge Magus if, without them, you can't properly guard. It's tempting to send your heal triggers back because you can only have 4 heals in any deck, and the more in your deck the better; however, if without the triggers you can't guard the next round of attacks I say keep them. Just because if you can get one more turn where you're not desperate to win that's even better than having more heals in the deck. There's a risk to both sides, but the way I've found it is if I can get more turns out than my opponent can I win. That sentence makes sense to vanguard players.

Strategy is most used when buying packs. Like in any game certain sets have certain support. Vanguard is no different. Most commonly people buy a trial deck, then buy sets that support that trial deck. People who buy the link joker trial deck buy from sets 12, and 13, people who buy the dimension police trial deck buy from set 13, and maybe sets 8 and 4. I say just do the standard. Buy a trial deck, then buy from the set that has the most value. Then use that value to trade for your support. I did that when I first started playing. I bought a kagero trial deck, then bought from set 6 which had just came out. I had so much value, and Kagero had a couple cheap builds that were pretty good, I was able to trade for everything I needed within a month. I tried the same thing with royal paladin, but royal paladin was pretty expensive. I ended up having to take the long way of buying the trial deck, then buying from sets that support the trial deck.

Here's one bit of strategy most players overlook. Lets take a situation like this. you have 2 grade 0s, and 2 grade 1s, and no intercept units. you have no intercept units, and you're at four damage. It's 10k to block each lane of your opponent's field. Your opponent attacks with vanguard first. Most newbies, and amatuars, will either take the hit, or guard 1 to pass. The idea being "My enemy won't trigger" or "My enemy won't get a critical". That should not be your approach. What you should do is block your opponent up to 2 to pass in the event they get a critical trigger. The reason being is most decks consist of at least 8 critical triggers. Why? Because Stand triggers suck. They work only in certain conditions. First chance you get trade stands for crits.

Everything else on strategy is pretty much just experience, and preference. Meaning how often you play can adjust HOW you play, and what you like can also adjust your strategy.  What I've listed are just the helpful hints that will help you win more games faster. Like my favorite character from Chaotic said "It's not the cards it's the player". It may feel like at times the person with the most rare cards wins, but if you stay vigilant, focus on just one deck, and master strategy, you'll beat any player.

TRADING AND VALUE

For most new players, especially ones who are new to card games in general, they will hear things such as "oh that's a 30 dollar card" or "Oh that's only a 2 dollar card" and be confused as to what constitutes value. The most common thing you'll hear is "Go on ebay, look up how much the card sells for and that's how much it's worth". The key words are "sells for" I could go on ebay right now, and post a flogal with an asking price of 1,000,000 dollars. That doesn't make flogal a million dollar card. I buy, and sell, vanguard cards online, so I get a little box of pictures at the bottom that say "Related items that recently sold" And I can see what cards have sold for. For those who don't do that just find the lowest buy it now price, add it onto the shipping charge, and that's the value of your card. Be sure to also search the code at the bottom left of the card for better results.

When you're trading a card you have to remember marketability. How many people do you see regularly that play cardfight vanguard? What decks do they have? What decks do they want to build? Of those decks how many of them need, or would benefit from, having your card. Depending on how easy it would be to trade the card you can evaluate weither you can get the maximum value for the card, or if you have to cut a deal to trade it off for something you need. For example I have four copies of Dragonic Overlord The End (which is a cross ride for Dragonic Overlord) that I'm saving to go with the Dragonic Overlord break ride. Now if I did not WANT to build that deck I know a few people who would from my local card shop tournaments. A couple of these people already have a playset of these cards, but if they didn't and they still wanted to trade for it I could make them trade for full, maybe even a little bit more than full, value in trade, but because they all have playsets of the card I can't trade it to them because the only reason they'd want them is so I couldn't have them.

EPILOGUE

I think I've covered everything I can about Cardfight Vanguard. I may edit this post, add some more pictures, maybe add a little bit of flare, some extra pictures, but essentially what I covered here is all you really need to know. Anything else, or any advice that goes against what I said here, is completely situational. My advice is general, and for newbies, or amatuars who wish to improve their own skill. If you have any general questions, or questions for specific vanguard situations sendme an email. I assume my email is somewhere on here, but if it is not send it to acollinson92@gmail.com