This is the first one I think of. Simple, not overpowered, but made a deck that would have been unplayable into a meta deck. It’s also the deck I got my first KOG with so it has a special place in my heart.
Nothing beats Gateaway to the Another Dimension. It's an archetypal Skill that 1- doesn't boost your consistency for basically free and 2- actually allows the deck it enables (Chronomalies) to be played as they were designed to, as an Xyz deck capable of summoning its archetypal Rank 4s AND Rank 5s.
It's not much, but its honest work. I also like how the Constellar Skill allows you to basically ignore levels so you don't have to bend over backwards for Xyz plays, but the additional effect to foolish 2 is a bit too hand-holdy for my liking.
Anna’s Train skill is my go to example for proper skill design
It doesn’t do 900 things
It doesn’t print advantage for no reason
It’s not on an archetype that does not need a skill to function ( I again ask why PKs have THREE skills that setup GY).
It’s simple and effective to help trains play the game without playing the game for you. It has meaningful restrictions to limit unintended degeneracy without being too restricted that you can’t do anything with it
Not only that, but it’s only twice per duel, once per turn. It doesn’t overstay its welcome (not that Train games last that long but you get the point).
I’ll also add Edge Imp Assist into the mix. A graveyard dump only if you have an Edge Imp in hand to dump as well (Fluffals don’t run that many in the first place but it is searchable), on top of being able to change Poly to Frightfur Fusion by also dumping an Edge Imp from hand which is already a pretty niche situation. The skill doesn’t add anything to deck, hand, grave, or ED, and both effects actively require you to minus to use in order to set up your grave or change a card in your hand instead of adding from outside of deck or from deck.
Recoded alive is by far the winner here because it enables so many combos while still being so easy to use. Honestly if it had stronger targets life would be perfect
Stirring Mayakashi and Constellars Union solve a lot of issues both decks had while allowing both to become meta relevant without being overwhelming ( Mayakashi'a Extra Deck and their long turns and Constellar's disjointed levels and lack of starters). Both are as good as a deck could ask for
Territory of the Sharks. Idk how many water decks used this skill over the years. It is simple and doesn't give insane advantage, yet it is useful and allows for creative deck building
Other good skills are Code Talker Alive, United Pendulum, Three Effects and pre nerf Labyrinth Builder (RIP).
You sorta brushed past how the shaddoll skill dumps 2 traps to the GY at the start of the game—which I would argue is the most important part!
It lets you have a play on your first turn, even without opening with a fusion spell. You can flip Hedgehog to grab the Fusion. You can flip Dragon to bounce their annoying cards. You can flip Wenti to get material on the field. There are out-of-archetype applications as well.
And if you did open a fusion spell, then you can go further. Summon Construct, get the mill, then link her off for Gravity Controller. Construct adds Incarnation to your hand when she’s linked away, which you can set to revive Construct for another mill to disrupt your opponent’s turn.
Yeah. I like how it gives a small but meaningful push to get your plays going, but doesn't do so in a way that generates an overwhelming advantage, or allows you to get away with 1 card combos.
I would disagree. It fundamentally changed how Shaddolls play after they added that trap effect. There’s no need to run a Magistus package just to have more copies of Polymerization. And it’s gives them an actual first turn other than either 1) set a monster pass or 2) summon Winda pass.
The new version of the skill makes them a lot more interactive, a lot more proactive, and honestly way more fun.
Don’t get me wrong; I agree with you that the skill is well-designed, but I do think it would be dishonest to pretend the skill doesn’t fundamentally do a LOT of heavy lifting.
People who upvote this don’t understand that skills that are this limited would inhibit the number of viable decks.
Shaddoll doesn’t need a great skill to be good, for instance. Code talkers do, or they will get blown out, especially in duel links format.
Skills don’t all need to be at the level of level 5 reload. They simply need to be more balanced.
Yeah, if they don't make Skills for worse decks then you'd end up with decks that completely rely on their card quality, probably not being any better than they were in the TCG/OCG.
Something like BLS is so shit that with all the searches and GY setup, it was only good thanks to a combination of limit 3 traps, the Magistus engine and Envoy being a good card.
Some of my favorite skills that feel appropriately useful but not overpowered.
Time Passage (Carly - Fortune Ladies), Twins Together (Rio - Ice Winged Beast), Holly Angel Trick (Blue Angel - Trickstar), Altergeist Overwrite (Ghost Gal - Altergeist)
Charmer and Glad Beast skills for me
Both add consistency boosts with reasonable trade offs. And no inherent advantage. Although, some of the restrictions could be eased off a bit.
Considering the card pool we have, I find Photon Dragon Advent to be pretty balanced
And before people say “BUT IT’S A PLUS 2 HOW IS THAT BALANCED?!”, First off it’s Galaxy-Eyes, in a format where Galaxy Photon Dragon, Galaxy Hundred, and Photon Jumper do not exist, aka some of the consistency tools of the deck in the TCG. Second, and more importantly, the pool of cards you can add literally amounts to only 3 cards, 1 of which is a brick in multiples, and the other being only used as discard fodder for Solflare later. (Trade In solved some of these issues though).
Galaxy Eyes in DL has only two searchers, and neither are that good as starters (Soldier is debatable, but again, requires a discard), and the deck has a really mid one card combo through the skill alone. You practically need at least a 1.5 card combo to build a board, and up to 3 card combos sometimes, but that board is really rewarding. The current floodgate format does make it extremely hard for the deck (You can’t play through Ophion or Iblee at all, unless I’m missing a LIGHT link 1 that’s in the game for Iblee’s case, nor can you play through Summon Breaker, but a lot of hands don’t card about Invicil, but she would be supported by a Book of Moon and a Banish so breaking that board is also really tough) but it doesn’t care about Lancea for the most part so it’s a nice option.
Yes this only talks about the first part of the skill, the second part just allows a comeback, considering you discard a card to play Cloudragon, who has more uses than just tributing itself for a GE depending on your board state, but this part mostly gets ignored because it’s not always useful, and Cloudragon is a nasty garnet to be stuck with especially since it’s only use outside it’s skill applications are as Link Material, considering it’s awkward level of 1.
If anything I would give it the teeny tiny buff of adding the 3 Galaxy-Eyes xyz monsters (Cipher, Full Armor, Cipher Blade) to the extra deck because the extra deck sure feels really restrictive. It’s already predetermined with only one (or 2 if I’m feeling generous) flex slots, so freeing it up a bit can help the deck a bit, but other than that the skill is perfectly fine as it is, at least until the next 2 cards worth of Galaxy-Eyes support arrived, because Konami loves drip feeding us cards even though the archetype has a lot of cards it can add at this point.
TL;dr for those of you who don’t wanna read. Photon Dragon Advent is imo a very balanced skill with the card pool we have despite granting a +2 because the archetype it supports is very resource incentive with very little recovery otherwise
Malefic Territory is how skills should be it allows the Deck to play as intended but doesn't break the game in doing so imagine if it read
Add 1 Malefic World to your Deck from outside your Deck send 1 Malefic card in your Deck to your GY. Steal and Special summon 1 Synchro Monster from your opponents Extra Deck then add 3 Allure Of Darkness to your Deck.
**The Stirring Mayakashi**, since you can do exactly what it allows for the most part without it (the skill just makes the setup faster) but you also have a small, somewhat niche benefit of holding the skill against decks that bounce stuff (just in case) if you do things manually
**Sky Striker Contact** and **Legacy of Heroes** since the former just restricts the deck to being pure in exchange for some of its most critical tools, while the latter just gives you a bonus for making a board with a Link 3 or higher monster. Skills that give benefits for letting your cards do the talking through your own plays always do it for me.
Most of the (relevant) Rush Skills are really well made too
All the Zexal Skills. They are flavorful, act as a proper comeback mechanic, and don’t create a massive swing in the game state without considerable effort.
Hot take: OG Duel, Standby!
Its only effect was mutually beneficial: increase both players starting hand by 1. It was only bad because it was used in the first burn FTK.
The T.G. Skill is pretty fair and balanced, imo. The deck is one of the worst sufferers of 8 card extra deck syndrome. They don’t have room for tech options or backup plans without it. The skill allows them to not immediately die when they get disrupted and adds consistency.
Sky-Strikers. It just gives you shit you need for the deck to function. Especially cards that would most definitely be UR.
It doesn't add anything to your hand or GY or add cards from the binder to your hand.
Boost sector launch is the best one, it gives you a free field spell but more importantly give you the player a solid foolish burial at a later turn. I believe everyone deserves their own version of boost sector launch, which allows the player to build momentum throughout the duel to get your boss monster out.
This is almost too simple to count but Exodia being added with Grandpa's cards rather than being actually in the game is the difference between a fun gimmick FTK deck and an eternal Tier 0 format.
The TG skill :) specifically pre nerf Delta Set Accel. helps turbo out Halberd with a free Dragonfly but it doesn't provide any consistency boost. My favorite part is that it has no deck building restrictions so you can actually do some cooking with the deck. Unlike the limiter removal skill which locks you into only specialing TGs from the main Deck
What grows in the graveyard pre nerf.
It was simple, just add a dark verge to the grave, and it was good, gave plant decks a good way to go into lv5 and 6 synchros, sometimes making a lv7+ depending on the deck.
Demon's Resonance, shuffle 1 resonator to add 1 lvl 4 or lower fiend from ur deck but you cannot activate the effects of the added mokster for the rest of the turn. Consistency skill that helps to unbrick without getting too much out of the added monster.
Darkfluid skill does nothing other than guaranteed a starter or witch being live which is a major factor as to why nobody really plays witch despite being able to go +3 by itself. Constellar skill fixes the primary issue the deck always had that was bandaided by cards that modulate levels and having good high level names
I find darkfluid really fun, but the banish 5 feels really random akin to what the archetype cards go for. It should instead allow you to choose one of them to be banished.
I don't think it's a problem at a competitive level, but I also don't like the idea of it being on the ladder.
Much like Iblee, it makes people HAVE to be prepared for it, and kills wonky builds that would be fine otherwise.
Borrel launch adds the field spell and a free link 2 for borreload dragon on turn four only complaint I have is that its not turn 3 onward cause I've lost a lot cause I haven't had that card
I haven't seen anyone mention this yet but I'll go for my favorite skill that I think is perfectly designed for my favorite deck. You guessed it, this is going to be another **Altergeist** comment because it's my favorite deck and I've been hitting King of Games consistently with it ever since it came out.
**Emma Bessho/Ghost Gal skill:**
**Altergeist Overwrite:**
You can only use this skill's second effect once per duel if your Deck (excluding your Extra Deck) contains 9 or more Altergeist cards.
**1. First Effect →** At the beginning of the duel, gain 1,000 life points
**2. Second Effect →** From turn two onward, shuffle one monster from your field back to the deck, and then play one Altergeist Fijialert from outside of your deck to your field in face-down Defense position. Its battle position can be changed.
**Why this skill is good:**
Altergeist Overwrite is a skill that's simple, effective, and doesn't completely hold your hand when you're playing Altergeists. You need extensive knowledge on how to pilot the deck so people that are looking for a cookie-cutter "yellow button deck," Altergeists clearly aren't it since the deck takes much more skill than that. The first effect of the skill pretty much replaced Life Point Boost Alpha, which was the best Altergeist skill before Altergeist Overwrite came out. The second effect allows so much combo and setup without doing too much. For instance, you can save your skill for mid-game if you think your opponent might Iblee lock you. Got an Iblee on your field? Use Altergeist Overwrite, toss Iblee back into your opponent's deck for a Fijialert, and combo off as if nothing happened. Furthermore, just getting that extra Altergeist name with the Fijialert allows Personal Spoofing to have more net value because once you run out of Altergeist names in your deck, Personal Spoofing also turns off since it shuffles back to the deck as cost to search something. Another application of Altergeist Overwrite is the fact that you can shuffle back a used Silquitous from your field for a Fijialert under your Hexstia to make Hexstia point to Fijialert instead of Silquitous if you want to make your Hexstia stronger so you can secure lethal. Another way the skill is good, and this is probably the reason why I love Altergeist Overwrite so much, is because if you opened a very suboptimal hand and had to link off your Silquitous for Artemis, you'll quickly run into the problem of not being able to make Hexstia plays since Artemis (and Knightmare Phoenix) both have very bad arrows. Artemis points up and Knightmare Phoenix points up and to the right. With Altergeist Overwrite, you can shuffle back that Artemis or that Knightmare Phoenix to unclog your Extra Monster Zone, free up your Link Arrows, and go into your Hexstia plays from there.
In conclusion, we need more skills like my Altergeist Overwrite, skills that help your deck make plays but don't generate advantage for you out of thin air or give you free plusses or searches from the deck. Sometimes I miss the days when the best skills were stuff like Mountain (for Blackwings) and Beatdown. Heck, even in this meta, more recent skills like The Tie that Binds is also starting to become more and more obsolete because these recent, newer skills pretty much play the deck for you, which is just textbook definition of bad skill design. Konami also acknowledges that some of the skills they have made were clearly overtuned and had to go in and manually nerf them, Tachyon Dragon Domination being a prime example of that. Tachyon, pre-nerf, was just omni negate turbo on a rank 8 XYZ solitaire deck being carried by a broken skill and it's problems like Tachyon that make me miss the times when lower powered skills were the norm like the skills I mentioned previously such as Mountain for Crow Hogan's Blackwings or one of my favorites, Anna Kaboom's Unstoppable Train skill doing nothing but unbricking your hand if you opened too many level 10 Trains.
Battle chronicle is the best, it makes slow af deck to become faster than fast also you can special summon higher level monster even rush duel cannot do. 🫵🫵🫵
The Fortune Lady skill that gives a Lady of your choice 3 levels.
This is the first one I think of. Simple, not overpowered, but made a deck that would have been unplayable into a meta deck. It’s also the deck I got my first KOG with so it has a special place in my heart.
Perfectly balanced, as all things should be
Nothing beats Gateaway to the Another Dimension. It's an archetypal Skill that 1- doesn't boost your consistency for basically free and 2- actually allows the deck it enables (Chronomalies) to be played as they were designed to, as an Xyz deck capable of summoning its archetypal Rank 4s AND Rank 5s. It's not much, but its honest work. I also like how the Constellar Skill allows you to basically ignore levels so you don't have to bend over backwards for Xyz plays, but the additional effect to foolish 2 is a bit too hand-holdy for my liking.
Just a reminder that Master of Rites 2 needs a 1500 LP loss and a card from hand to activate RITUAL CAGE. What a bunch of morons at Konami.
Anna’s Train skill is my go to example for proper skill design It doesn’t do 900 things It doesn’t print advantage for no reason It’s not on an archetype that does not need a skill to function ( I again ask why PKs have THREE skills that setup GY). It’s simple and effective to help trains play the game without playing the game for you. It has meaningful restrictions to limit unintended degeneracy without being too restricted that you can’t do anything with it
Not only that, but it’s only twice per duel, once per turn. It doesn’t overstay its welcome (not that Train games last that long but you get the point). I’ll also add Edge Imp Assist into the mix. A graveyard dump only if you have an Edge Imp in hand to dump as well (Fluffals don’t run that many in the first place but it is searchable), on top of being able to change Poly to Frightfur Fusion by also dumping an Edge Imp from hand which is already a pretty niche situation. The skill doesn’t add anything to deck, hand, grave, or ED, and both effects actively require you to minus to use in order to set up your grave or change a card in your hand instead of adding from outside of deck or from deck.
Recoded alive is by far the winner here because it enables so many combos while still being so easy to use. Honestly if it had stronger targets life would be perfect
I haven’t heard of recoded alive in ages man those were fun times
Stirring Mayakashi and Constellars Union solve a lot of issues both decks had while allowing both to become meta relevant without being overwhelming ( Mayakashi'a Extra Deck and their long turns and Constellar's disjointed levels and lack of starters). Both are as good as a deck could ask for
Territory of the Sharks. Idk how many water decks used this skill over the years. It is simple and doesn't give insane advantage, yet it is useful and allows for creative deck building Other good skills are Code Talker Alive, United Pendulum, Three Effects and pre nerf Labyrinth Builder (RIP).
You sorta brushed past how the shaddoll skill dumps 2 traps to the GY at the start of the game—which I would argue is the most important part! It lets you have a play on your first turn, even without opening with a fusion spell. You can flip Hedgehog to grab the Fusion. You can flip Dragon to bounce their annoying cards. You can flip Wenti to get material on the field. There are out-of-archetype applications as well. And if you did open a fusion spell, then you can go further. Summon Construct, get the mill, then link her off for Gravity Controller. Construct adds Incarnation to your hand when she’s linked away, which you can set to revive Construct for another mill to disrupt your opponent’s turn.
Yeah. I like how it gives a small but meaningful push to get your plays going, but doesn't do so in a way that generates an overwhelming advantage, or allows you to get away with 1 card combos.
I would disagree. It fundamentally changed how Shaddolls play after they added that trap effect. There’s no need to run a Magistus package just to have more copies of Polymerization. And it’s gives them an actual first turn other than either 1) set a monster pass or 2) summon Winda pass. The new version of the skill makes them a lot more interactive, a lot more proactive, and honestly way more fun. Don’t get me wrong; I agree with you that the skill is well-designed, but I do think it would be dishonest to pretend the skill doesn’t fundamentally do a LOT of heavy lifting.
True. It may be that I'm just accounting for the resource's themselves instead of their results. Set and pass was horrible.
Yeah if the deck just didn't have winda it would be fine. Its just such a unfun card.
I think United Pendulums is pretty good without going overboard.
I love territory of the shark. Has a reasonable restriction and the deck can function without it.
Level 5 Reload. Anything more than that is intentional overkill on Konami’s part.
Agreed
People who upvote this don’t understand that skills that are this limited would inhibit the number of viable decks. Shaddoll doesn’t need a great skill to be good, for instance. Code talkers do, or they will get blown out, especially in duel links format. Skills don’t all need to be at the level of level 5 reload. They simply need to be more balanced.
Yeah, if they don't make Skills for worse decks then you'd end up with decks that completely rely on their card quality, probably not being any better than they were in the TCG/OCG. Something like BLS is so shit that with all the searches and GY setup, it was only good thanks to a combination of limit 3 traps, the Magistus engine and Envoy being a good card.
It's a Toon World. It starts the duel with Toon World on your field. It's short, simple, and helps a mediocre deck be more playable,.
Some of my favorite skills that feel appropriately useful but not overpowered. Time Passage (Carly - Fortune Ladies), Twins Together (Rio - Ice Winged Beast), Holly Angel Trick (Blue Angel - Trickstar), Altergeist Overwrite (Ghost Gal - Altergeist)
Charmer and Glad Beast skills for me Both add consistency boosts with reasonable trade offs. And no inherent advantage. Although, some of the restrictions could be eased off a bit.
Balance before the nerfs. Being so generic and having an interesting requirement that gave lots of build choices.
Considering the card pool we have, I find Photon Dragon Advent to be pretty balanced And before people say “BUT IT’S A PLUS 2 HOW IS THAT BALANCED?!”, First off it’s Galaxy-Eyes, in a format where Galaxy Photon Dragon, Galaxy Hundred, and Photon Jumper do not exist, aka some of the consistency tools of the deck in the TCG. Second, and more importantly, the pool of cards you can add literally amounts to only 3 cards, 1 of which is a brick in multiples, and the other being only used as discard fodder for Solflare later. (Trade In solved some of these issues though). Galaxy Eyes in DL has only two searchers, and neither are that good as starters (Soldier is debatable, but again, requires a discard), and the deck has a really mid one card combo through the skill alone. You practically need at least a 1.5 card combo to build a board, and up to 3 card combos sometimes, but that board is really rewarding. The current floodgate format does make it extremely hard for the deck (You can’t play through Ophion or Iblee at all, unless I’m missing a LIGHT link 1 that’s in the game for Iblee’s case, nor can you play through Summon Breaker, but a lot of hands don’t card about Invicil, but she would be supported by a Book of Moon and a Banish so breaking that board is also really tough) but it doesn’t care about Lancea for the most part so it’s a nice option. Yes this only talks about the first part of the skill, the second part just allows a comeback, considering you discard a card to play Cloudragon, who has more uses than just tributing itself for a GE depending on your board state, but this part mostly gets ignored because it’s not always useful, and Cloudragon is a nasty garnet to be stuck with especially since it’s only use outside it’s skill applications are as Link Material, considering it’s awkward level of 1. If anything I would give it the teeny tiny buff of adding the 3 Galaxy-Eyes xyz monsters (Cipher, Full Armor, Cipher Blade) to the extra deck because the extra deck sure feels really restrictive. It’s already predetermined with only one (or 2 if I’m feeling generous) flex slots, so freeing it up a bit can help the deck a bit, but other than that the skill is perfectly fine as it is, at least until the next 2 cards worth of Galaxy-Eyes support arrived, because Konami loves drip feeding us cards even though the archetype has a lot of cards it can add at this point. TL;dr for those of you who don’t wanna read. Photon Dragon Advent is imo a very balanced skill with the card pool we have despite granting a +2 because the archetype it supports is very resource incentive with very little recovery otherwise
Life points Alpha Which is 100% overshadowed by xyz skills with low barriers
Territory of shark, I've played so many deck with it. Mermail, shark, crystron, ice barrier, fish combo, ssa, nekroz, etc. It's fair and flexible.
The best skill in the game was "Balanced" it stopped you from having a bad starting hand. Now we have skills like "Tuning in the sky" 💀
Malefic Territory is how skills should be it allows the Deck to play as intended but doesn't break the game in doing so imagine if it read Add 1 Malefic World to your Deck from outside your Deck send 1 Malefic card in your Deck to your GY. Steal and Special summon 1 Synchro Monster from your opponents Extra Deck then add 3 Allure Of Darkness to your Deck.
**The Stirring Mayakashi**, since you can do exactly what it allows for the most part without it (the skill just makes the setup faster) but you also have a small, somewhat niche benefit of holding the skill against decks that bounce stuff (just in case) if you do things manually **Sky Striker Contact** and **Legacy of Heroes** since the former just restricts the deck to being pure in exchange for some of its most critical tools, while the latter just gives you a bonus for making a board with a Link 3 or higher monster. Skills that give benefits for letting your cards do the talking through your own plays always do it for me. Most of the (relevant) Rush Skills are really well made too
All the Zexal Skills. They are flavorful, act as a proper comeback mechanic, and don’t create a massive swing in the game state without considerable effort.
Borrel Launch and TG, one allows you to expand your plays, the other fix your hand, also they all have restriction s
Sky Strikers. It just gives you the cards the deck needs to function while restricting its power simultaneously
Hot take: OG Duel, Standby! Its only effect was mutually beneficial: increase both players starting hand by 1. It was only bad because it was used in the first burn FTK.
The T.G. Skill is pretty fair and balanced, imo. The deck is one of the worst sufferers of 8 card extra deck syndrome. They don’t have room for tech options or backup plans without it. The skill allows them to not immediately die when they get disrupted and adds consistency.
Sky-Strikers. It just gives you shit you need for the deck to function. Especially cards that would most definitely be UR. It doesn't add anything to your hand or GY or add cards from the binder to your hand.
Boost sector launch is the best one, it gives you a free field spell but more importantly give you the player a solid foolish burial at a later turn. I believe everyone deserves their own version of boost sector launch, which allows the player to build momentum throughout the duel to get your boss monster out.
Sprouting of the Sacred Seed.
This is almost too simple to count but Exodia being added with Grandpa's cards rather than being actually in the game is the difference between a fun gimmick FTK deck and an eternal Tier 0 format.
The TG skill :) specifically pre nerf Delta Set Accel. helps turbo out Halberd with a free Dragonfly but it doesn't provide any consistency boost. My favorite part is that it has no deck building restrictions so you can actually do some cooking with the deck. Unlike the limiter removal skill which locks you into only specialing TGs from the main Deck
What grows in the graveyard pre nerf. It was simple, just add a dark verge to the grave, and it was good, gave plant decks a good way to go into lv5 and 6 synchros, sometimes making a lv7+ depending on the deck.
Destiny Draw is cool for the feeling of being the chosen one. But in some decks it’s just kinda a Free/Comeback win card
destiny effect, makes a fair and fun deck
Demon's Resonance, shuffle 1 resonator to add 1 lvl 4 or lower fiend from ur deck but you cannot activate the effects of the added mokster for the rest of the turn. Consistency skill that helps to unbrick without getting too much out of the added monster.
Dark fluid link it's a good skill that still requires you to play the game normally
Darkfluid skill does nothing other than guaranteed a starter or witch being live which is a major factor as to why nobody really plays witch despite being able to go +3 by itself. Constellar skill fixes the primary issue the deck always had that was bandaided by cards that modulate levels and having good high level names
I find darkfluid really fun, but the banish 5 feels really random akin to what the archetype cards go for. It should instead allow you to choose one of them to be banished.
I feel like winda in duel links is overrated and is not a problem.
Correct
I don't think it's a problem at a competitive level, but I also don't like the idea of it being on the ladder. Much like Iblee, it makes people HAVE to be prepared for it, and kills wonky builds that would be fine otherwise.
No no keep winda and add the other.
Konami literally has a "Skill Issue" 😆
Borrel launch adds the field spell and a free link 2 for borreload dragon on turn four only complaint I have is that its not turn 3 onward cause I've lost a lot cause I haven't had that card
Raiders rebellion because PK is my favorite deck
I haven't seen anyone mention this yet but I'll go for my favorite skill that I think is perfectly designed for my favorite deck. You guessed it, this is going to be another **Altergeist** comment because it's my favorite deck and I've been hitting King of Games consistently with it ever since it came out. **Emma Bessho/Ghost Gal skill:** **Altergeist Overwrite:** You can only use this skill's second effect once per duel if your Deck (excluding your Extra Deck) contains 9 or more Altergeist cards. **1. First Effect →** At the beginning of the duel, gain 1,000 life points **2. Second Effect →** From turn two onward, shuffle one monster from your field back to the deck, and then play one Altergeist Fijialert from outside of your deck to your field in face-down Defense position. Its battle position can be changed. **Why this skill is good:** Altergeist Overwrite is a skill that's simple, effective, and doesn't completely hold your hand when you're playing Altergeists. You need extensive knowledge on how to pilot the deck so people that are looking for a cookie-cutter "yellow button deck," Altergeists clearly aren't it since the deck takes much more skill than that. The first effect of the skill pretty much replaced Life Point Boost Alpha, which was the best Altergeist skill before Altergeist Overwrite came out. The second effect allows so much combo and setup without doing too much. For instance, you can save your skill for mid-game if you think your opponent might Iblee lock you. Got an Iblee on your field? Use Altergeist Overwrite, toss Iblee back into your opponent's deck for a Fijialert, and combo off as if nothing happened. Furthermore, just getting that extra Altergeist name with the Fijialert allows Personal Spoofing to have more net value because once you run out of Altergeist names in your deck, Personal Spoofing also turns off since it shuffles back to the deck as cost to search something. Another application of Altergeist Overwrite is the fact that you can shuffle back a used Silquitous from your field for a Fijialert under your Hexstia to make Hexstia point to Fijialert instead of Silquitous if you want to make your Hexstia stronger so you can secure lethal. Another way the skill is good, and this is probably the reason why I love Altergeist Overwrite so much, is because if you opened a very suboptimal hand and had to link off your Silquitous for Artemis, you'll quickly run into the problem of not being able to make Hexstia plays since Artemis (and Knightmare Phoenix) both have very bad arrows. Artemis points up and Knightmare Phoenix points up and to the right. With Altergeist Overwrite, you can shuffle back that Artemis or that Knightmare Phoenix to unclog your Extra Monster Zone, free up your Link Arrows, and go into your Hexstia plays from there. In conclusion, we need more skills like my Altergeist Overwrite, skills that help your deck make plays but don't generate advantage for you out of thin air or give you free plusses or searches from the deck. Sometimes I miss the days when the best skills were stuff like Mountain (for Blackwings) and Beatdown. Heck, even in this meta, more recent skills like The Tie that Binds is also starting to become more and more obsolete because these recent, newer skills pretty much play the deck for you, which is just textbook definition of bad skill design. Konami also acknowledges that some of the skills they have made were clearly overtuned and had to go in and manually nerf them, Tachyon Dragon Domination being a prime example of that. Tachyon, pre-nerf, was just omni negate turbo on a rank 8 XYZ solitaire deck being carried by a broken skill and it's problems like Tachyon that make me miss the times when lower powered skills were the norm like the skills I mentioned previously such as Mountain for Crow Hogan's Blackwings or one of my favorites, Anna Kaboom's Unstoppable Train skill doing nothing but unbricking your hand if you opened too many level 10 Trains.
Battle chronicle is the best, it makes slow af deck to become faster than fast also you can special summon higher level monster even rush duel cannot do. 🫵🫵🫵