A number of weeks in the past, Konami launched twenty fifth Anniversary Tin: Dueling Mirrors for the Yu-Gi-Oh! buying and selling card sport. To say that these tins have been met with applause and reward could be so removed from the reality it’s not even humorous.
These tins are one of the hated merchandise that Konami has launched for the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG in fairly a while. In actual fact, I’ve not been hiding my frustrations with them both from mates. However why are individuals so mad about these tins?
I need to not solely define issues that duelists are having with these tins, but in addition talk about how I believe they could possibly be saved for subsequent 12 months’s tins, and even see if we will discover any positives with the discharge of Dueling Mirrors. Whereas I can’t personally suggest shopping for these tins, should you actually need to you should purchase them out of your native OTS or sport retailer for $21.99.
Earlier than we get into all of the factors I discussed, I do need to first cowl what the Dueling Mirrors tins provide duelists. Contained in the tin, you’ll discover three Mega-Packs. Every Mega-Pack contains 8 Commons, 3 Extremely Rares, 1 Prismatic Secret Uncommon, and 1 Quarter Century Secret Uncommon.
General, it doesn’t sound too unhealthy. There are 400 playing cards out there within the set with 50 QCSR, 100 PSR, 150 UR, and 100 C. The majority of playing cards come from the next units: Energy of the Parts, Photon Hypernova, Cyberstorm Entry, Duelist Nexus, Age of Overlord, Maze of Recollections, Superb Defenders, Wild Survivors, and Valiant Smashers. I believe that’s sufficient fundamental info to start out with.
Additionally, I do need to acknowledge some constructive results of the Dueling Mirrors tins. First, the precise bodily tin seems to be good and it’s purposeful. Lots of people like to make use of these tins to retailer playing cards (sometimes the Commons) they usually do work for that.
Second, whether or not we prefer it or not, the costs of playing cards from the tins have decreased. Earlier than the tins, S:P Little Knight was $75+ and now you will get one for about $40, so whereas it’s nonetheless not preferrred, it’s much better than it was and we do have to admit that.
My last constructive is that I’m a sucker for alternate artworks and fairly frankly, Dueling Mirrors has fairly a couple of and they’re superior. That Raigeki and Purple-Eyes Black Dragon go exhausting! Now let’s talk about the not so good.
Allow us to begin with in all probability probably the most noticeable downside with Dueling Mirrors: the dimensions of the cardboard pool. There are 400 playing cards on this set. That’s over 100 playing cards greater than the 2023 tins! This set is so bloated that even when each card was the identical rarity, you wouldn’t have nice odds of getting any given card that you simply needed.
So as to add insult to bloat, so most of the playing cards are simply unhealthy. For starters, there are playing cards which are two years previous included! Then, you add the entire nostalgia bait and two tokens and the tins are already not in a great place. Why is there a lot nostalgia bait in right here?
Right here’s how I’d repair the big card set: simply decrease the depend! For my part, a tin shouldn’t have any greater than about 200-250 playing cards in its set and it ought to be a celebration of the final 12 months (give or take) of the sport providing the very best playing cards from that timeframe.
Actually, that solves numerous the issue. Second, the nostalgia bait ought to have been restricted to not more than about 10 playing cards. “However Tommy,” I hear you say, “how will individuals get pleasure from their favourite unhealthy nostalgic card within the shiniest rarity ever to have fun the sport’s twenty fifth anniversary?”
I’ll let you know how. There’s an upcoming product referred to as Quarter Century Bonanza which is an ideal container for nostalgia bait! That set has a 200-card nostalgia pool that are playing cards assured to be Platinum Secret Uncommon or Quarter Century Secret Uncommon! It makes much more sense to me to have Hyperlink Spider in that set relatively than the tin.
As well as, the 2 tokens and the three new playing cards ought to have been promos. You don’t have to incorporate all 5 in each tin both. You could possibly simply have a particular 3-card promo pack that has some mixture of the 5. This incentivizes a number of purchases, reduces the cardboard pool, and feels higher to duelists as a result of they’ve some type of assured repay for his or her buy.
The following huge downside is the rarity choice. The QCSR pool feels so scatterbrained to me. There are some playing cards that make some sense equivalent to Yubel and the Exodia items, however so many others like Hyperlink Spider, Crystal Beast Ruby Carbuncle, and the Devices appear so unhealthy and higher served in a product just like the upcoming Quarter Century Bonanza set than a tin!
Then, we’ve got the PSR pool which isn’t solely huge, however a lot of the playing cards in that slot have been already both a Secret Uncommon or Extremely Uncommon that means that they have been already fairly exhausting to acquire.
The huge UR pool does have a mixture of rarity bumps equivalent to Shadow Ghoul of the Labyrinth in addition to some rarity downgrades together with Gold Delight – Curler Baller, however many of those have been simply playing cards that nobody appeared to care an excessive amount of about as a result of each chase card was put in at PSR.
Lastly, as a result of Konami determined to ditch Tremendous Uncommon on this tin which is de facto the best spot for giant chase playing cards, we’ve got a bunch of Commons that I’m fairly positive have been already Frequent and due to this fact most duelists have already got playsets of the helpful ones. Due to this fact, we may actually simply take away the Frequent slots interval.
I really feel like this downside requires a little bit of self-discipline to repair. As duelists, we love our shiny cardboard. The shinier, the higher, proper? Nevertheless, Konami must implement some unstated (or perhaps spoken) guidelines.
The primary huge one could be no horizontal upgrades. If a card was initially launched as a Secret Uncommon, it shouldn’t be put within the tin as a PSR. To coincide with this, rarity bumps ought to concentrate on playing cards that have been Tremendous Uncommon and under.
I believe it’s nice that playing cards like Shadow Ghoul of the Labyrinth bought upgraded to Extremely Uncommon from Uncommon. That’s a rarity bump that makes me really feel good as a duelist (particularly since I play a Gate Guardian deck in the meanwhile).
Seeing Triple Ways Thrust go from Secret to UR to PSR or S:P Little Knight go from Secret to PSR, doesn’t really feel good. These tins ought to put the very best playing cards from the final 12 months in new rarities to both give them rarity bumps for individuals who need shinier variations for his or her decks or rarity downgrades to make them extra accessible.
On a associated observe, the large staples (together with authentic URs like TY-PHON) ought to all be downgraded not less than one rarity.
Yet one more space the place Konami fell brief was of their normal card choice. I’m unsure what Konami’s standards is for choosing what packs will probably be out there in a given tin. I do know previously, the tins have been like a celebration of the final 12 months of the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG.
Based mostly on somewhat little bit of analysis, it seems that tins now return roughly one 12 months. For instance, the 2022 Tin of the Pharaoh’s Gods featured playing cards from 2021. Even final 12 months’s twenty fifth Anniversary Tin: Dueling Heroes was stuffed with playing cards from 2022.
Nevertheless, Dueling Mirrors goes all the way in which again to August 2022 with the latest pack being Valiant Smashers from November 2023. To make issues worse, they have been very selective on what playing cards from totally different archetypes to incorporate and fully ignored different fan favourite archetypes to provide us rubbish like Bunny Ear Fanatic.
Why have been Ghoti playing cards not reprinted right here? Why was the one Memento card included the sphere spell, Mementomictlan? Why weren’t the brand new Gate Guardian Fusion Monsters given a rarity improve? It’s actually bizarre to have their Essential Deck monsters now all out there in larger rarities than the boss monsters. So many of those decisions simply appear baffling to me.
How would I handle this? Simply be extra purposeful concerning the playing cards within the pool. If you wish to embrace one card of an archetype, embrace not less than a handful and make it possible for handful contains key/good playing cards.
For instance, in the event that they needed to incorporate Mementomictlan, they may have added Mementotlan Angwitch, Mementotlan Bone Barty, and Mementoal Tecuhtlica – Mixed Creation on the very least.
There are numerous playing cards within the 400-card pool that duelists simply merely don’t care about and there have been numerous playing cards that not less than some duelists would have gotten excited for that bought ignored. Preserve archetypes collectively, and ensure to incorporate larger worth items.
So, now that I’ve gotten all of that off my chest, I need to share my preferrred model of future tins. In a really perfect world, Konami would mix the legacy of the tins (aka celebration of the previous 12 months of the sport) with their probably most profitable product ever, the Rarity Assortment mannequin.
I do know that is extraordinarily unlikely to occur, but when they selected 100-150 playing cards from the final 12 months of Yu-Gi-Oh! (they may determine to be extra like the unique tins and have 2025 be about playing cards from 2025 or they may stick to the extra fashionable selection in order that 2025 could be about playing cards from 2024) and every card is on the market in each rarity out there within the set, individuals could be so excited for each tin.
They don’t even have to incorporate the flamboyant rarities just like the QCSR or Collector’s Uncommon or Final Uncommon (though that does make issues extra thrilling if I’m trustworthy). This can be a a lot smaller card pool than the present tins which is already a bonus, however you would inflate it over the Rarity Assortment I and Rarity Assortment II to advertise a bit extra of that chase.
This smaller pool would additionally promote (hopefully) extra cautious collection of included playing cards in order that related playing cards from archetypes are saved collectively. As an alternative of a Memento right here and 4 Vanquish Soul there after which full rubbish that may in all probability by no means get performed, take away the rubbish and provides us key Memento and Vanquish Soul playing cards together with fan favorites like Ghoti.
As well as, as a result of each card is on the market in each rarity, that routinely implies that every card is concurrently a rarity bump and a rarity downgrade serving to the secondary market in order that extra individuals can truly purchase playing cards and play the sport whereas additionally giving duelists bling for these max rarity decks.
I do know it’s extremely unlikely that Konami will learn or care about what I’ve laid out right here. I do suppose that the Dueling Mirrors tins have been very poorly designed and a present of unhealthy religion on the a part of Konami.
I do know there are a good quantity of people that have lately left the sport or are very earnestly taking a look at leaping ship due to how merchandise like Dueling Mirrors are being dealt with.
I like this sport and need to see it’s higher and I believe I’ve supplied some good concepts that might assist restore a few of Konami’s picture.
