I can't believe my shitpost about June 2018 FTK formats actually made it into the mid credits, I'm fucking dying

I can’t believe no one is talking about this, but Yuginono discovered a 4 day format from 2015 where dimension of chaos is legal, along side all the due list alliance decks. It’s called finish line and i recommend checking it out!

HAT might be it. Large number of decks, plays very different from modern, and is very much unexplored.

Can't believe no one picked the true best retro format, the first one! Who doesn't love normal summoning dark magician and gaia, only to get dark holed into oblivion. Pure grind game as both players wail on each other with silver fang, such incredible diversity too.

My group has been talking alot about "Dallas Format" which is mid to late 2015 with Hi-Speed Riders being the last set release. It's the last format in which Nekroz and Shaddoll are playable before getting culled on the next banlist, the Clowns are legal and so is Gamma. That's an interesting one to go back to since it took years for players to use Gamma as a HT and not part of Psy-Frames.dek.

HAT not mentioned despite being the most diverse meta I have ever played in.

I'd definitely be overjoyed if post AGOV became a retro format later on. Definitely one of the best and most memorable formats we've had in a while that almost everyone enjoyed.

As someone that actually plays TOSS, I don't think it will go much higher, while the Decks are extremely fair, even the non tier'd ones. HOWEVER the staples are so blowout, Mystic Mine, Imperial Order, Red Reboot, Pankratops, Lancea. It's just not as fun as it was back in 2019 as we have had actual fair formats since TOSS

I think the thing I like most about the twitter threads are Dires intros

Some people from my locals were trying to have a rotation of tengu edison HAT and goat but only edison is getting much attendance

Water-Fire (Jan 2014 - Post LVAL) and September 2012 are some of my absolute favorites. Huge amounts of diversity and really enjoyable gameplay for people who enjoy slower formats.

Power of the elements format was really exciting in my opinion. End boards were insane but known and decks that like tearlament and spright could and did play into them well/well enough. And 2014 Vegas format is like HAT format but without soul charge. A very fair format. The end of dragon ruler’s dynasty and post water and fire format the format is truly the “Edison of the xyz era” since it occurred within a week before the release of soul charge.

YCS San Jose 2015 , it was a time when Dimension Force was released but before the next banlist came into Effect , its like a 4 days Window but all the DUEA Decks were all still playable at that specific Event.

Maxx C in Tengu is actually pretty balanced because so many of the decks can play around it

When you consider a lot of the old retro formats, the 'Heart of the Underdog' formats where you can basically create your own custom banlist, Rivalry of the Warlords formats where you use pre-assigned decks (of any of your customisation), Sealed formats for set releases (it doesn't always work but its worth trying to see if we get a banger), Common Charity, some of the weird unexplored old side formats like Double Deck, 'Air, Earth, Fire and Water', Mega-Banned, and Beta formats. And that's just the tip of the iceberg... (and that's also not to mention stuff like Speed Duels or Rush Duels or the Video Game formats). The problem is Konami doesn't really support most of them. And that just leaves us in a situation where we only really have a handful of recognised formats.

I thought HAT format would be mentioned, as it is a well balanced format as well. Duelist Alliance/ New Challengers is good as well.

I think perfect circle format is a format that should be played more.

I loved TOSS format. Played Zombie World control the whole time and would 100% play it again

Since no one mentioned it, Tactical Evolution / GLASS format. The banlist had just come out to get rid of some heavy hitting staples like Metamorphosis, Confiscation, and Snatch Steal, as well as limiting Trap Dustshoot, and there were some genuinely cool decks like Zombie being playable. CCV is the main thing keeping it from being something more, I would guess.

NAWCQ 2015 and 15 respectively are the most fun I’ve ever had in Yugioh. HAT format has one of the widest deck libraries you can pick from and while Nekroz is the best deck in 2015 that format was very under-explored and who doesn’t love DUEA decks?

I loved 2011/2012. Right before Inzektors and Wind-Ups. XYZ was new but not needed in every deck. Synchro Decks had plenty of varied support and had a lot of mix/match. Boss monsters were still fun. Masked Heroes I think were new. I was playing Heros or Flamvell Synchro with Chaos Support, and that latter sounds terrible but it was consistent and worked. Flamvells playing with cards like TK Rai-o and Summoner Monk. I could still expect to get Flamvell Firedog's effect in most games and not die for relying on battle-phase and not winning that turn.

HAT is the single old format I'd go back to if play for it started picking up. I've seen that's there's a few tourneys and stuff but there's not enough attention to form a ladder somewhere yet.

I'm surprised he didn't make a comment on FireWater, I saw it mentioned a couple times in the thread (Other than my own mention which I put in kinda late.) Its arguably the best post-ruler Zexal format, a few people adore it even more than HAT.

I was going to answer Six samurai format, because who doesn’t love playing a deck with 4 rotas 3 pot of greed and 3 cards that say win the game! But I really just want to play my pet deck. So I’m good with any format in which six sams is playable (so I guess I’m fine with meadowlands)

We got a community playing the core 2 and rotating other random formats. My buddy got me to dust off the rust and play Troop Dupe Scoop Format. Like it is so much fun revisiting an old format with new age ideas. I feel HAT is most likely the true 3rd pillar, or at least from my community that plays the legacy formats. I bet as we get further away from some of the closer to modern day we will see some pop up. My community did try to play some of the covid formats, they didn't do so hot, but maybe with time we could see those formats also revisited since we didn't really get to play them.

The cheese stands alone!! Love seeiing the mtg refrences. I still watch you and joshua schmidt regularly even tho i dont play yugioh much these days

My personal take: Pre RotD is a perfect little introspect into the format of early Xyz, you have Full power Inzektors Dino Rabbit Wind-Ups Ninjas Dark world Even Gravekeeper's to an extent

I misssed the thread but I'm glad someone repped Meadowlands, the first format when I started really getting into the swing of Yugioh I really felt the balance was in a Goldilocks zone.

I could really see Tear Ishizu format after the ban of Mytic Mine being a thing. Even if this format was Tear 0 and nothing else, the game was in a state where when a Tear duel occured, it was the best player who wins. It was unfair to play with another deck, but this match-up was really fun to watch and very skill-rewarding. Also, the match-ups of the other decks of the format (Kash pre-Ariseheart, madolche, floo, swordsoul, crystal beast) are cool even with Shifter in line.

You gotta remember that alot of Toss players are Thunder players who have been left high and dry for the last 5 years, hell, even in the video you listed the other 3 decks as still seeing play but one of the four is noticeably absent, and for equally obvious reasons. Honestly wed be happy having our big dumb purple lizard back, but unless you play MD, theres no way to scratch the Colossus itch, even moreso in paper play.

Take me back to YCS Toronto 2012 I know we can crack that Grandsoil Psychics Deck.

In my opinion the next Edison shloud be one that includes a generic low-power XYZ toolbox, most of the classic XYZ era decks like Fire Fists, Mermails, Geargia, Fire Kings, Evilswarms and healthy cards like Pot of Duality.

The 2016 Format with Pepe/Ba/Kozmo/Monarch was the Format i really understand how to play Yu-Gi-Oh. I played it as a kid but i didn't had friends who watched the show longer then the original DM so nobody had cards or anything, so i forgot about it for years, then I heard about Arc-V and that the Main Character has a go bonkers and do cool shit mode so i was back on it watched the show, learned how to read cards, and had much fun YGOPRO and other automatic simulators. So bring that format back to life.

Perfect Circle format is slept on

One format that I’ve been trying to push amongst my friends is 2015 NAWCQ (Clash of Rebellions, pre-Norden release). You still have all of the DUEA era decks at mostly full power, plus stuff like early Kozmo, accessible Minerva Turbo/Clownblade, and a lot more. Only real downside imo would be Towers Turbo being around, but luckily we had a wave of Kaijus by then

2023 post September banlist prior to AGOV release was such a interesting one, wish we could’ve gotten more time with that than the one YCS (Dortmund)

I think I may have seen more mentions of HAT in the thread than TOSS which, based if true

I'm surprised none of the showcased were HAT or Fire Water Format, these were a really good place in the zexal era where you could go into a solid rank 4/5 tool box, solid synchro stuff and so on.

I really want Tengu Plants or FireWater format being the next one to be popular

Bro Agov pre ban list was so much fun I really hope It can take off as a format l.

I'ma still say 2014 nats format (HAT format). Probably my favorite format in all of Yugioh. It just felt like you could play just about anything and so long as you were competent you'd have something that if not "the best" was at least playable in a competitive setting.

As someone who took a break just before Duelist Alliance (until Tear format)... that's my vote. It seems like such an interesting format that I feel stupid for missing out on.

How about revisiting the various formats that turned out to be Tier 0 to check whether the supposed Tier 0 decks were actually that much stronger than the competition?

I would do anything to be able to go back and play the schoolyard format, where half the cards were bootlegs and people just made up rules based on the anime and a quick glance at the card text.

For TOSS perhaps the format for the Panama City UDS invitational that Jesse Kotton won would be best? It’s after the Mermaid ban but also pre-Chaos Impact. One Major issue with TOSS era Yugioh, however, is Mystic Mine which could very easily drag down any part of TOSS post Dark Neostorm. It would have to be after to April 2019 list though.

The intro was peak, big props to the editor on this.

June 2017 Format is an interesting one cuz it was the 3 week period after PEVO dropped but before "Link Format" (MR4) where the new Pendulum Magicians were full power and yet went almost completely under the radar (understandably so, since Tier 0 Zoo was still running around.) That deck was honestly very fun and sadly would never see the light of day again (at least not in the same way) due to the later mechanical nerfs to Pendulum

Getting the community to agree to a rule change would be nigh impossible, but I think several retro formats could be improved/fixed by changing the parameters that the format follows. Like, many retro banlists are bad, often more to push new product as opposed to creating a diverse and fun play experience. Some intelligent tweaks could push "ok" formats into "great" ones, imo.

Now I want to know where you can play the format you mentioned I really want to try super quants they sound right up my alley

Nobody mentioning dabl format pre ishizu is kinda wild that format was so sick so many different decks tear wasn't even figured out runick cards were still good enough to play it was a great time. Been messing around with a runick tear deck from that format and man it just makes me wish we had it for longer before ishizu

I hope some retro format of post cyac pre current banlist catches on, on top of the format just being super diverse, I wanna play Mathmech, and even with circ at 1 I optimized the deck so much I felt that it was in it's prime, even back during pote format it's night and day what cyac support does to the deck

I think that post POTE pre Mavens is an amazing format. The mirrors for the two best decks, Spright and Tear, are incredibly skillful and the play between those decks is also very intense. There were also plenty of other decks just below the surface that were very playable. I played Agents most of that format and it was actually putting up results!

I think a format pre-duelist alliance could work as a format

I’ll be the ass to pitch post-goat/early GX. A lot of the broken goat cards are banned out, but enough are still limited/semi for some big plays (triple trunade a premature burial anyone? Graceful charity and ring of destruction at one?) Ik it’s basically goat-lite, but I do honestly love the pace of the game at that time

man, i was not expecting the cheese stands alone

dire killed it with the intro this week nice work

What about picking up a World Championship or Tag Force game to have a community around As a side format 2011 has Turbo Dueling where Speed World 2 is literally yugioh if it had manna

Fire/Water, NWCQ Nekroz and NWCQ Zoo/Draco formats would be my top 3

I want to go back to the day of rank 4 decks.

Is there any point in trying out a format like pioneer or modern with yugioh? Where you set a cutoff date that is well in the past and move forward. I figure with powercreep and agressive banned lists this is kind of a moot point - though it could be a way to soft ban maxx c in master duel. Something like Duelest Alliance (or the equivalent there of) forward as a master duel only format. I'm sure people would be mad about not being able to play mushroom man #2 but it does seem like an easier pill to swallow than a standard rotation.

2013 to 2015 imo i know the banlist changed drastically during that time but that was height yugioh for me i topped my first ever regional with Mermail in 2014 i just love that deck hell i even played dragonsworn at that time and had tons of success the only issue is letting full rulers and judgement aloud due to the lower power lvl

The 2016 NAWCQ format needs to include Dark Side of Dimensions and Dark Illusion to be good imo, so many decks get unlocked between the time of those sets and the banlist that the format doesn't have the necessary amount of diversity without them

The other big 3 are TOSS, HAT and Tengu Plant right? Meadowlands sounds fun as well but that's cause I have a soft spot for Mermails, it was my deck in high school so I'll always want to play it, I'd agree on Duelist Alliance format for a top 5 retro formats that aren't "official" yet

we also had decks like evilswarm that made Ophion ad just wrecked anydeck playing 5 or higher and could search its never touch me card i loved yugioh back then there was so many more possibilities to the format people were playing naturia back then as well was a great format imo hell while im thinking about it infernity started having some success then also bujin i could go on for days my personal favorite days of yugioh for sure

I love post-Agov pre-January format too. Variety was the spice of life. Rogue decks like Madolche, Blackwings, and Marincess could top events. Unchained was fun to play against but not entirely unbeatable.

I wish i knew about the Duelist Alliance meta, i love PK FIRE and it’s the deck that made me get into the competitive yugioh meta

Never clicked so fast, it's time for another banger you guys!! 😁

I think there’s 3 formats that could potentially do it: 1. NECH format 2. Sept 2013 format 3. Sept 2012 (ABYR) format NECH format is an interesting triangle format that I’d love to see developed. It might honestly be the most extreme triangle format that’s existed since on paper the matchups in that format are super polarised. I reckon it’d be pretty interesting to see how such a format would develop to attempt to equalise the matchup spread, and the unique solutions people would come up with. September 2013 format is quite interesting due to the perceived dominance of dragon rulers. However, unlike the prior format, dragon rulers feel really fair in this format. We already had interesting developments like dragunity ruler in this format, and it overall feels quite unsolved. ABYR format is probably the best candidate. There are so many playable options during this format including; wind-ups, grandsoil psychics, rabbit, inzektor, chaos dragons, gravekeeper, chaos, horn of the phantom beast piles, hero beat, agents, mermail, etc. this format is super diverse and serves as a distinct step up in power from edison while being unsolved.

2016 was peak yugioh for me

I had never heard of Meadowlands format but I like the thought of it, but I am pretty biased toward Atlanteans. When Atlanteans were a big deal the game was at a place where landing your boss monster was generally enough of a push to win you the game, aside from getting the rug pulled out by trap cards (which is true for literally every other format pre-Imperm), and you could have some explosive turns to really turn up the heat but that wasn't EVERY turn, because the ceiling was high enough to make your cards feel cool to wield when you make a cool play but also low enough to where sitting on next to nothing for 1 turn wasn't detrimental, so you'd also have moments where just setting Snowman Eater could also net you a ton of mileage, but it wasn't the slow paced Yugi-boomer style tortoise of a game either. Xyz cards weren't so blatantly "I win" buttons like they became later on and cards that are laughable now like Gagaga Cowboy and Maestroke were extra deck staples, and quick effects were almost nonexistent so the game in general was way more back-and-forth. I'd love to participate in a format like what, where one of my favorite decks of all time doesn't get immediately power crept in the deck building process. Also, I've said this a few times before, but thanks you for specifically calling Satellarknights bad (not literally but you get it). I don't want to come off like "that guy" by saying it but I've always thought they were mid at best and Shaddoll never stopped being the superior deck between the two. No comment on Burning Abyss though because nobody in my circle or locals could afford to play them lmao.

Meadowlands is super close to an ideal for me. It had Six Sams at a reasonable power level and relevancy so my Dad could play. Geargia is close enough to Guru control. I like messing around with Hunders and my Dad enjoyed toying with Constellars. The main issue is I would rather pull teeth than play against Mermail.

I was actually at the nawcq in 20q6 with gravekeepers i was 4-0 and my first loss was to utopia spam because I didn't have any non battle traps to stop lightning.

Pre-Nekroz/Pre-Secret Forces or bust Amazing viability between BA, Shaddolls, Qli, but so much was viable like even U.A. had relevance because Mighty Slugger are Shaddolls and BA.

AE Creation Pack 01 format is pretty fun and should be good retro format if people knew about it, only 3 good but not crazy ht (ash droll ogre), very few generic extra deck and no definitive best deck yet but there are multiple decks you can play

I agree with the fire fist mermail format, would be such a cool format

James Bond intro lets goooo 😂

2019 format was one big flaw. The Ib ftk. It wasn’t explored during the format itself but it could be a serious problem in a format that doesn’t include nibiru.

I'd say Hat is a very good format. I say it's more of the Edison of Zexal, than any other format in that period. It's got some of the highest amount of viable decks in a format I've seen, the top decks are generally pretty fair for the most part, and the powerlevel and pacing is pretty much perfect for Yugioh imo. It's super fun to play and I wish that more people played it because I would LOVE to not ever have to touch dueling book to play my Geargia Karakuri deck

What format was it that had Ultimate offering at 1 shock master at 1 i think it was 2010 or 2011? All decks had an equal chance of playing in a grind game..

Maybe it's because it's the format I got really into competitive Yu-gi-oh but the format in 2017 where the 3 best decks were Zoo and it's variants, True Draco, and Dinos. I feel like there were a lot of interaction points and it was a skillful format. Also there were a bunch of other decks that were viable like the Invoked variants and 60 card grass decks.

I have to agree that yugioh needs more formats, it opens a lot of opportunities for more players to enjoy the game since they are able to choose what they see fit for them.

I was expecting at least one HAT mention. Tbf, I only looked at it because of the Traptrix structure deck, but it's a fun format.

im largly surprised that MBT didn't mention HAT format. I'd argue that HAT is probably an even better bridge to modern formats than Edison. It has "Problem solving card text" and the rules are largely the same as modern yugioh, with at least a few exceptions such as field spells as well as how chain links work.

no mention of celtic guardian format is wild

If I remember correctly, there was a time period after the Eternal TOSS format was officially over following the banlist that murdered every single one of the "Big 4", but the next big things (Adamancipator and Eldlich) hadn't been released yet. I don't even know what to call this short period, but because that banlist was such a bloodbath, let just name this format after the card "After the Storm" for now.

That voice crack at the start of the video actually jump scared me wtf

*Insert orangutan meme* "Where HAT?"

Kind of surprised there wasn't a mention of Reaper Format, tbh. O.o

Felt like this particular video for the thread was rather short for such a plentiful discussion, or there really weren't many formats on the video itself 🤔 I know every twitter thread video has to be around or exactly 8 minutes because algorithm and monetization reasons, but this one definitely had more room to be longer!

man i miss slash draw, my favorite lightsworn tech, it legit never missed, it either otkd, or set up my grave with great cards and put my jds back. man it sucks it was put to one, at least two please

Give me January 2015. Nekroz were top dog then, but Teledad could plop out 3 void ogres and dark law before they got a chance to go nuts. We has soul charge too. It was a really fun time.

2015 Dallas is one of my favorite formats of all time. However, 2015 San Jose, if you want more experimentation, is an extremely interesting format since it's right before the ban list but with dimension of chaos legal.

What is the format that was right before POTE? That’s probably my favorite format with swordsoul being tier 1.

after all this time, i now understand prozd's card game spoof skits with the cows and the cheese. THE CHEESE. omg. i feel so dumb.

September 2012 was rad

I'd be curious what some retro formats would look like if we went back in time and pretended that set rotation was a thing. Something like around Mystic Fighters where you're forced to play like Dragonmaid, Generaider, and Time Thief.

Lots of good options, though whatever gets the most traction I just want to be able to play kozmo or nekroz :)

New Challengers, my opinion is one of the least explored formats of all time while carrying an amazing variety of decks. Shaddoll wasn't the absolute broken mish-mash of graveyard dependant archetypes (DIS) yet Qliphort showed what pendulum can do without being tier 0 like pepe showed later BA had some really cool tools to play with including techs like RUM astral force and with access to Fire Lake, alich, and rubic, giving BA access to synchros it gained a huge boost to their disruption There's even a large variety of solid rogue options which are more than capable of standing up to the higher tiers such as UA with access to midfielder and jersey, tellarknight with access to Triverr and can make use of the new rank 4 toolbox thanks to castel, dark rebellion and in previous sets exciton knight, 101, bujin tsukuyomi. I think that out of everything discussed, this one is the best even just to lab out and explore

The Branded/Swordsoul meta (early 2022). Say what you will about Branded and the Albaz lore archetypes in general, but the Branded/Swordsoul meta right after branded fusion came out was probably the most fair and balanced modern yugioh has been for a long time. The top decks were midrange decks that felt very beatable. You could simultaneously use them as really good engines. Branded single-handedly brought many effectively dead decks back to life via branded fusion. And honestly I think it's a shame that Springans was never "figured out". It always felt "almost there" and I think with time and more experimentation someone could crack it. And for those to care to look it up, it would be the May 2022 TCG banlist. This features hitting Prank Kids, Banning Verte, and Banning Auroradon, and quite a bit more.

There are quite a few wierd modern formats that got missed out on because of short livedness. The post bode banlist period for example, when everybody thought rusty griffin turbo was going to be the best deck. The issue is a lot of the time these formats are good BECAUSE somebody didnt go back and discover what was really the best deck.