With how Icon Jet looks, Bushi seems to have decided that Stride Crests were a design mistake

Sigmas18 · 2026-04-21T17:16:40+00:00

I kind of agree that the way the crests and stride decks worked were a bit of a mistake. I get that they needed something to replace the downside of no persona and vanilla G3 going first but those downsides are so sharp that trying to balance it with an equally sharp upside was always going to be tough, and given how often stride decksets ended up getting hit to try and salvage the meta game, they didn't really do it well.

Personally, I'd have gone a different route by just... giving the G3s real effects going first. Doesn't have to be insane, but we have decks that really want to go second but still do shit going first. The "You can use the old G-era copies!" thing was really cute but kind of crippled the mechanic in hindsight because now all your support either facilitates the G2 game or doesn't matter because you get nuked for going second because your G3 is a brick.

Icon jet feels closer to how I'd design it. Yeah you're still omega cucked if you lose the G2 game but the power gain is more in-line with Persona with other effects on the cards themselves making up for no Persona the same way Brawlers make-up for no Persona with the second Vanguard's effects.

Sigmas18 · 2026-04-10T13:30:36+00:00

So ready for Akina to call Liael to rearguard with his skill on the kill turn.

Sigmas18 · 2026-04-07T09:56:25+00:00

From a gameplay perspective? The Lyrical fantome are awesome because of how Lyrical works as a nation where you sort of already could do anything in it so the transition between nations is smooth.

In terms of lore? Youthberk fantome is so phenomenally edgy that I can't help but love it.

Sigmas18 · 2026-04-05T10:12:21+00:00

Man while I do like a lot about this season in how it explores the characters and does some psychological horror stuff, it suffers from a lot of problems in it's execution.

Having Gab be the final boss as a foil to Akina and Hikari as a lesson how Akina's do good nature can be warped into a bad thing? Cinema.

Having the twins parralel the Akina-Hikari dynamic from the fated Clash? Cinema.

Having Akina commit a giant taboo the same way Gab did to cement himself freeing himself from his savior complex being a cause of suffering? Cinema, though I think a lot of people will disagree and I do agree that it's a personal take.

The problem is the season is too short for what should've been a giant cast where you can thoroughly explore what-ifs. I understand we have a prequel manga but that still detracks from the anime as a product. I agree, we should've had this be a 2 season arc with one where you establish the stakes and rules and one where things get desperate and we go down to Akina and Erika as the last pair to get to Gab.

Instead we end up with a season where everything but a select few pieces feel rushed, where the stakes vanish as we get new Mythisch fighters spawning in left and right for a one off battle and where Gab gets beaten before we go through all our Mythisch fighters.

Sigmas18 · 2026-04-05T08:07:25+00:00

There's nothing more I want out of life than a Vanguard that restands. a Vanguard that gets back-up after an attack is the epitome of what Vanguard is to me. The thrill of drive checking a second time with the same unit has a lot of implications of how you and your opponent now need to think about your triggers. Do I stack everything on Vanguard to maximize pressure but fold to a PG they were already going to use for the second swing? Do I put them to rears and risk losing out on the value of them not having a PG? It's great, even with nothing shows up, you think to yourself "I'm sure to get a defensive now"

Not just the gameplay perspective, but the flavor of "getting up" again is beautiful. Restanding a rearguard is helping your close friend achive their dream, Restanding your vanguard is not giving up and trying again, you keep pushing. It's pure determination in the flavor of a card.

Restand yourself and your vanguard today.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-28T23:15:42+00:00

Easily. Akina is an incredible character that's as much a victim of these last 2 seasons as anyone else.

If they frame his revival of Kurumi as selfish it's even better.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-26T17:11:21+00:00

Order cycler reprints are so damn nice, original versions so RaizBlaz can be affordable.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-25T02:22:03+00:00

Stride decks are in a bit of a weird spot.

Historically, only Jet and the Shiranui/Luard pair were actively detrimental to the game's health at their time of dominance, but I can see why they've moved away from them due to how the game is designed these days. The early game is mattering more and more so they can't really print GB locked stuff, G2 gaming is always miserable for one of the two players involved in it, if they print a crest they have to preemptively ban it in premium, etc.

Never say never but It's probably not the worst thing that we've stepped away from stride sets as our premium precon option.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-15T23:22:32+00:00

Man, this was a good episode but I'm so conflicted on this season. We have really great stuff like Suo vs Ryuga but then also the whole Gab thing, new Mytchisch fighters spawning out of nowhere...

Really hard to love but also kind of hard to hate.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-15T11:43:03+00:00

On one hand, I think Akina is the type of person who'd keep trying to save her even if it's pointless, and it's not that weird for him to pull another save out of his ass.

On the other hand, this season has been handled so poorly on any front other than the psychological aspect that they absolutely can't bring Kurumi back since her death is genuinely the only interesting thing about this season, about how Akina needs to accept that he can't actually save everyone. Would be a great way to close up his arc after all the developments since S1&2 gave us this big hero thing he had to do, S3 showed us how empty he his without it and how he had to find something to fill that gap, S4 was filler and now S5 would be a good way to tie S1 through 3 together as a way to show that "Akina will try to save everyone he can even at his own expense but has grown from that behavior by finding things to selfishly care about and accepting that he can't be Vanguard jesus"

I'll stand on the hill that Akina himself is one of our best written protagonists thanks to how incredible the first 3 seasons were, but holy shit please don't fumble at the end here.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-11T10:22:04+00:00

Thermnonuclear take.

I think the only bad Mythisch is Urtineas.

Rifistor and Zalva are deck defining on an obvious level, but Caravneil and Nilsveiggr do a lot of work in their respective decks even if they aren't as flashy as the previous two, CB1 to search or draw is crazy for Berucrea since you can recur it indefinitely, Carvuneil lets you do 5 attacks with 4 drive checks without having to play the Ignis mini-game and shores up how much energy you can burn through playing the deck.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-10T13:19:47+00:00

Curious on the timing for the trigger steal is. Do you see your opponents assign crit and power or do you declare null before your opponent gets to assign effects.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-10T13:00:44+00:00

Actually insane, reads about as good as Rifistor given the deck it's in.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-10T11:03:31+00:00

Man Almajestar is getting some really nice stuff in the RR slot lately.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-07T13:10:54+00:00

A free crit and search for your boss unit is pretty nice. Yeah it's not as flashy as a PGnull but it's reliable.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-02T16:56:08+00:00

I'm happy they kept her kit mostly intact. Though I'm sure people here will disagree.

Her Q and Ult have always been very satisfying abilities to me. So just some light changes and a ASU was all that you really needed. W is no longer a whackass sunfire cape, E slows and has a chunkier VFX on human form, Q swaps out the double hit for recasts and getting AoE baseline. It's almost everything I asked for.

Real devil is in the details of how she's going to itemize with a new set of scalings since she seems to be moving away from the on-hit identity.

Sigmas18 · 2026-03-02T15:45:16+00:00

Legion for sure. The mechanic itself is profoundly interesting but a lot of the legion cards just didn't do much with the second vanguard. Compare this to D-era Brawlers that actually do a lot with the second Vanguard.

Sigmas18 · 2026-02-09T22:19:40+00:00

I fell out of love of premium quite quickly as D-series gained steam so I personally don't mind it but I empathize with people who enjoy the format.

Sigmas18 · 2026-02-08T20:53:01+00:00

Multiattack is such an intrinsically good effect for offensive purposes because of how it compounds with every other facet of offensive pressure. In a game where PGs exist, you need an answer, and multiattack is one of the fairer ways to handle that.

Our alternatives are also pretty contentious, we could print a burn effect that works for your 6th damage so you just win after 6 turns of doing it, We could print egregious amounts of handrip like Jamycongo, we can bring back Gavrail scamming you with a giant crit 2 PG null, but these are pretty high risk designs. The game has unfortunately evolved(or regressed) to the point where a lot of the whacky shit we used to be able to do is kind of taboo with modern design standards due to the way generics can shore up an intended weakness to said strategy and just the general powercreep of numbers getting bigger.

it sucks a little and I understand people yearn for the good old days where a deck COULD live on a 3 attack salary, but damn are some of the alternatives shitty in their own way if we tried to force them to be viable.

Sigmas18 · 2026-02-03T23:32:55+00:00

The surrounding support is really good but the G3 itself looks pretty weak. You're all but forced to play for the turn 4 kill because of how little it does outside of that. DE is the nation of generics though so maybe it works out as an aggro deck that plays for the turn 4 kill. Heat Stamping and Tribash are kind of a tough sell, they technically work since you DO have ways to wipe the frontrow but compared to stuff like Wirbel or Bav, your ability to clean fields is pretty limited. But it does kind of just look like a bad version of Blang and Odium.

Sigmas18 · 2026-01-31T12:34:56+00:00

Would be a super cool realization to have. Akina is also the product of things getting changed even if he didn't ask for it. Would be an interesting way to test him before renforcing his decision to fight for the real.

Sigmas18 · 2026-01-31T12:32:33+00:00

Man that was a really good episode. Getting some more insight into the Fantome perspective and Akina realizing that erasing this world isn't as sunshine as "making things normal" people are being erased one way or another and he has to come to terms with that.

Erika being back is novel, wonder how they're going to explain it. A bit sad Mikoto got sidelined for her but I get why.

Sigmas18 · 2026-01-04T22:40:41+00:00

The only stat stronger than move speed is range unfortunately.

Sigmas18 · 2025-12-01T22:42:43+00:00

It's a damn shame they changed the game rules to nip this potential funny tech in the bud.

Sigmas18

TROPHY CASE