Road to Worlds Series #1 (Getting Better)

Hello everyone welcome to a special series, I'm sure everyone's goal is to win their Regional Qualifiers and go to Worlds and win the whole thing. Being a World Champion is something many covet, it is a long and tough road. Grinding countlessly and hoping that your cards all align on the day of the competition. While the luck you have cannot be changed, the way you play can. 

A look at Worlds Matches

First off, let's take a look at Game 1 of the World Finals. As you can see the Horus player went first and has set-up his board. By this point you should be expecting 1-2 Luucy in their hand and you have to play around accordingly. However, the DD player has made the mistake of going for the greedy play. He called Agonia and Epis right after, while having D. Suction in his hand. This gave the Horus player 2 timings to null both Agonia and Epis, crippling the DD player enough to outright lose the game right then and there. The correct play would have been to call Agonia and used D. Suction on it to guarantee the effect going off. This is extremely crucial as you play around Luucy and you can fish for more outs. As you can see, sequencing is especially important at the highest level of this game.

Now let's take a look at Game 1 of the Semi Finals. Andrew waited for the Flame Horus to be called before using Luucy to nullify both Flame and Freezer Horus, there are pros and cons to this play. First off, if Sean has to do a 'blind' call for Freezer Horus it means that his hand lacks Duric. If he had Duric it would have been played first to either bait a Luucy or punish Andrew by farming into more outs. But why would you go for Duric first when the usual play is always draw first before using effects that check the top few cards of your deck so that you have information on what you lack thus being able to have near perfect information on what to take (No perfect information because you cannot see your opponent's hand). This is because you want to force your opponent into making a decision, either use their Luucy to stop the Duric from giving you advantage or letting it through. But based on how the opponent plays this out you can assume two things.

If he does not use Luucy, there is a higher probability that he does not have 2 Luucy in his hand which is usually the case or that he is just saving them all up for later turns. If he does use Luucy, expect that he has another in hand obviously as the main priority is to stop the Buddy Call effect from Horus resolving. This is the mirror and it will get grindy as whoever runs out of resources first will be the one that is unable to defend from the other player. 

  

With this information in hand, he should have used Luucy on Freezer Horus's effect preventing the Flame Horus from coming down unless Sean commits another 2 gauge. This alone forces Sean to have Aharamat to gauge 2 just to call. Moreover, if he has the spell 'Victory' in his hand he can only cast it after committing an item to retrieve Jutha and call it. Forcing the opponent to commit more resources means they require specific cards to get out of their unfavored position. By requiring specific cards lowers the possibility that they can win on their turn, however if they have the nuts you lose either way. This is just a way of mitigating the possibility of giving your opponent unnecessary advantage.

Sequencing & why it matters

Buddyfight is a simple game to learn however difficult to master, one of the main reasons are the counter timings and sequencing. Sequencing is crucial in this game due to the fact that it lowers the possibility of dead draws or lower quality of plays. The standard rule of thumb is always to draw first before using 'Super Hero Time' & 'Darryl Berk' like effects. This is so that you draw your cards first giving you more options as to what you need after the additional card draw. 

When you are playing against decks with 'End Battle Phase' effects always remember to link attack with enough damage to pressure the opponent into doing something. Asking the question is always better than giving the answer. This is because there are specific answers to questions, so theoretically your opponent will have a lower possibility in having answers to your questions. Sounds confusing right. 

With Loyalty being the bane of almost every deck's existence. Always take into account that the opponent has Loyalty in their hand and sequence your calls accordingly and do not blindly play into it.

To surmise, sequencing is important to maximise on the information that you have so that you can make more informed decisions over the course of the game therefore increasing the probability that you will win. Moreover, you can bait cards from your opponents by sequencing the correct way which I will talk about now.

Baiting & Hand Reading

The game at higher levels are all about mind games, baiting cards out of your opponent's hand is crucial and testing for certain cards so that you can read their hand is important as well. Simple cards like Sweet Happy Time can be used to bait cards out of your opponent's hand. For example you have a huge board and your opponent doesn't know if you are going to call more monsters so they keep their rest spells in their hand, by calculating the total damage output that you are able to do, sometimes entering battle phase is the right choice. This is to prevent giving the opponent a counter timing to rest your cards without you being able to react. So you want to go into battle baiting a rest spell, only to cast Sweet Happy Time for maximum value. Always remember that if you can afford to bait out cards, do it. Ensure that the risk & reward for baiting is positive net value. 

Hand Reading is crucial, however this is harder to do as you require deck knowledge of how the turn goes for each deck and what is crucial for them. Only after many hours of testing will you know the optimal sequence the opponent will play using a certain deck, with this knowledge you can do hand reading and guess. This is where you can go 1 for 1 with them with your cards. The best example being Horus against Dimension Dragons. Where their most optimal play is to go Set Spell into Nice One, followed by Agonia, suction into Epis if they go second against Horus. Any other sequence and they are susceptible to their cards getting destroyed, taking the risk.  

Always be Ready

Always be wary of certain combos that are available to the opponent. An example is the Dogma and Epoch combo, this is crucial as a timely Epoch can destroy you completely. This is why game and deck knowledge is crucial, study the meta and test to figure out what stops you in your tracks and what lines of play the opponent can make. Buddyfight is a simple game that you only have to see what you need to do on your turn to either win or go to your next turn with the most advantage. You do not have to think so far into the future. Practice more and you can improve your play speed to the point where it becomes a muscle memory as to what is the best play automatically, this is crucial especially when it comes to official tournaments where there is a time-limit. Imagine losing due to time-out when you know you have game, thats a very bad feeling that leaves a sour taste in your mouth. 

I hope that this series has helped you in some shape or form in improving your game. 

Peace.