an article by Merlin Schumacher and Dominique Mitolo

On August 29th the most recent Forbidden&Limited List for the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game became effective.

This article deals with the changes the list included and how they affect the metagame.

We are going to share some of our firsthand results from tests as well as our personal opinions with you, lean back and enjoy!

you can check out the entire list here: http://www.yugioh-card.com/uk/limited/

Newly Forbidden Cards:

Performapal Monkeyboard

This card was the core search card for pendulum-based decks and allowed you to get your Pendulum Zones filled with a 1- as well as an 8-Scale all on its own.

Also it allowed for great advantage plays with Performpal Scullkrobat Joker.

All in all the card was too powerful and versatile to stay in the game and is therefore right where it belongs at the moment.

#R.I.P. HARAMBE

Kaiser Colosseum

While many have speculated, that this card was purely banned because Konami was tired of their judges being confronted with weird scenarios to solve, I can assure you that cards like Kaiser Colosseum are just not healthy for the game and therefore shouldn‘t be released in the first place.

Konami has taken the correct measure in banning this card even though it has not seen much play since Bujins were around.

Newly Limited Cards:

Cir, Malebranche of the Burning Abyss

Cir is one of the most powerful Burning Abyss Monsters in the game, it allowed for a pretty nasty loop with Dante, Traveller of the Burning Abyss and also made OTK-plays much more likely when milled.

With Cir limited to 1 the risk of playing Pot of Desires in a Burning Abyss Deck was also increased, since you risk losing the one off Cir to the banishing cost of Pot which would leave you with almost no access to it for the rest of the game.

Ehther, the Heavenly Monarch + The Monarchs Stormforth + Pantheism of the Monarchs

These three cards gave the     popular Monarchs Deck a lot of consistency as well as some of its most powerful plays.

Pantheism of the Monarchs allowed for a great start and gave you access to almost any Monarch Spell/Trap in the deck, while The Monarchs Stormforth in Combination with Ehther the Heavenly Monarch allowed for a versatile removal that could even be used in your opponent‘s turn and cause heavy OTKs as well as tremendous card advantage.

Even though some will claim that the monarch decks were not that consistent before anyway, I feel like this was necessary because the deck was an incredibly powerful budget deck that annoyed a lot of players.

Kozmo Dark Destroyer

This card enabled the infamous Fireking-Kozmo Combo and also gave you access to any kozmo you needed at the time you summoned it due to being able to destroy itself and special summon another Kozmo from the deck. Also it was a 3000 Beater with a „free“ removal effect that was way too easy to summon. Now that it is limited to 1 the card has lost some of its power but is still powerful and doesnt criple the kozmo deck. The card can still be recycled multiple   times through Kozmotown, Kozmo Strawman or Call of the Haunted.

Majespecter Unicorn – Kirin

Majespecter Unicorn Kirin is a searchable Pendulum Scale 2 as well as an incredibly Powerful Pendulum Monster on the field.

It can neither be destroyed nor targeted by card effects plus it can bounce back one monster each turn to its controller‘s hand.

Also it comes with 2000 ATK/DEF and helped Pendulums to establish nearly unbreakable boards.

-enough said

Emergency Teleport

Emergency Teleport gave Kozmo Decks easy access to a variety of their „pilots“ and enabled them to either search with Kozmo Tincan without giving the opponent a chance to use Effect Veiler on it (because you could summon it past M2). It also allowed for easy OTKs with Kozmo Farmgirl or nasty loopholes with Kozmo Soartrooper.

The card also had no drawback for Kozmos since their monsters would not stay on the field to be banished in the endphase anyway.

Pendulum Call

Pendulum Call was just another card that allowed Pendulum Decks to set up their high- and low scale in one turn plus it came with the nice sideeffect that the scales could not be    destroyed that turn.

It just searches too many cards too easily to stay in the game at 3 right now. I wonder if it will see much play still at 1.

Beatrice, Lady of the Eternal

Beatrice, Lady of the Eternal gave Burning Abyss Decks easy access to ANY of their monster effects they needed in the specific situation, be it Farfa to banish an opponent‘s monster or Scarm to search.

It also comes with rocksolid stats: 2500ATK/2800DEF and has another broken effect when destroyed and sent to the graveyard.

These points make it way too powerful and now with it being limited to one Burning Abyss players have to think twice before randomly spamming it onto the field.

Newly Semi-Limited Cards:

Maxx „C“

Maxx „C“ is one of the strongest handtraps in the game as it enables you to draw both your keycards as well as your other handtraps to interrupt your opponent‘s play if they choose to continue.

It sometimes even forces them to stop playing and leaves their field wide open for a counter attack.

With Maxx „C“ being limited to 2 now the chance to draw it when you need it has been heavily decreased and some players will think twice if they choose to rely on those lower probabilities or not.

Thunder King Rai-Oh!

Many players will love this chan   ge since Rai-Oh! used to be a toplevel sidedeck choice for years until it got limited.

It gives you an answer to decks that rely on searching out their keycards and also works as a great beatstick.

It applies pressure while preventing your opponent from playing the game – gotta love that card.

Wind-up Magician

The Wind-up Deck has been crippled way beyond repair and without Wind-up Carrier Zenmaity this change will probably not do anything relevant to the game at all.

Rank 4 Spam is not competitive at the moment and that‘s really all wind-up can do with this change.

Newly Unlimited Cards:

Thousand-Eyes Restrict

This card has been banned for ages due to its synergy and popularity with Metamorphosis. Since that card is banned for a long time now as well many players have demanded for a comeback of Thousand-eyes Restrict. It has finally come back and will not have any impact because the only viable way to use it would be with Instant Fusion.

Allure of Darkness

This is a very interesting change since Allure of Darkness is a draw card that gives extra drawpower to all decks with a certain count of dark monsters in the deck.

These decks include but are not limited to Monarchs, Burning Abyss, Dark-Synchro and Kozmo. I‘m looking forward to seeing how this change will affect the met   a and hope we will not regret it when Blackwing decks are starting to take over the meta :D.

Gold Sarcophagus

A lot of players never really understood why Gold Sarcophagus was limited in the first place but maybe Konami felt like a search after 2 turns is still a search and by that logic Gold Sarcophagus searches any card in your deck which admitedly would be pretty broken. But in my eyes the fact that your opponent has 2 turns to prepare for the card you banished with Sarco plus the temporary card disadvantage it generates make it very specific to decks that can afford to do so or absolutely have to rely on getting their key cards. Therefore I believe it will not affect the meta even after being unlimited again.

Forecast:

Our tests have resulted in Burning Abyss with Phantom Knights still being a very strong deck even after Beatrice and Cir have been limited. It can still apply a lot of pressure and hold on long enough to draw out of sticky situations and steal games with Barba or Nightmare Shark.

Pendulum-based Decks that focus on the new Metalfoe archetype are one of the top contenders for this coming meta since they have a whole new engine that allows them to establish big boards and fill their extradeck in the blink of an eye.

Blue-Eyes White Dragon Decks have not lost anything and profit from Maxx „C“ having been limited to 2.

With the release of the New Structure Decks a new deck type will be introduced, which many players believe to become a serious threat: The ABC monsters.

This deck has had a huge impact on the OCG metagame and even though theres a different Forbidden and Limited List in effect over in Asia it is still always good to keep an eye out for what is being played over there.

All in all I think the list has made some pretty good changes and no absolutely terrible changes and I‘m looking forward to play in this meta and hope so do you!

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