STANDARD PLAY
Put on your game theory hats my friends, because we're gonna get deep on this one. Today I'll be talking to you about the benefits and drawbacks to "Standard Play".
So, there's obviously the first question that needs answering, "What is Standard Play?" Standard play is a term used in many different competitive games. In general, it means playing a game the way that theoretically makes the most sense and that gives you the greatest advantage over your opponent. It means not using "tricks" or any cutesy little tactics in order to win. It means playing it out the way that many would describe as "boring" or "overdone". In Yugioh specifically, I'll be considering Standard Play as:
1. Using a meta deck
2. Not teching non-standard cards
3. Using a minimal amount of bluffing while playing
Now, most of you probably already know what are considered meta decks, so I'm just going to take the 1 deck that for the current format most screams meta: Dino Rabbit. I'm almost certain that everyone has let out a groan whenever they play someone who is using this deck. Many of you have probably told people things such as "Good job using an auto-pilot deck" or "What sort of nub needs to use Rabbit to win?" Why do you think people react this way when they are faced against a meta deck? The answer is because they know it is going to be difficult for them to win the duel, even if the opponent's skill level is not as high as their own. Note, I am NOT saying that meta decks are by any means "auto-pilot" decks. A skilled player using the same meta deck as a weaker player will, over time, have a better win/loss ratio. Now, with this preface out of the way, let's get into the benefits of Standard Play.
The first and absolute most important benefit of standard play is consistency. This, again, is true across multiple competitive gaming platforms. Since Standard Play involves doing the things that are most logical, it means you are going to be able to repeat the same performance over and over again. This means being able to do the same moves that give a high chance for victory in nearly every game. Again, it's not particularly exciting, but when it's about winning tournaments where you have to play multiple games in order to achieve victory, it is a necessity. You are taking the moves in the game that are, almost no matter what, difficult for your opponent to directly counter, and you are playing them time and again with a high success rate. For Yugioh, that can mean playing Dino Rabbit and every duel summoning a Rabbit to bring out an Evolzar, then using Tour Guide to create Leviair to bring back the Rabbit for another Evolzar. You can do that (or at least attempt to do that) almost every game you play, and it will win you duels. Of course, this can be the case for other meta decks, but I'm sure you don't need me to list the basic principles behind every meta strategy.
Another benefit of Standard Play is what I would call minimizing luck. In competitive gaming in general, you'll hear people bemoan their luck. "Oh my strategy just couldn't come together" or "My opponent just got lucky and I couldn't do anything about it." I'm here to say that a benefit of Standard Play is that it typically allows you to be versatile enough to respond to your opponent's "good luck" without simply taking an instant loss. As mentioned in the previous argument, having the consistency of Standard Play means that the chances of you having "bad luck" decrease dramatically. For a Yugioh reference, people always complain "Oh the shuffler is trolling me again. That's why I keep getting bad hands!" The truth is far more simple. You receive bad hands because you have a deck that is capable of producing them. You have bad hands because you have cards in your deck that can be potential dead draws. People who use Standard Play are using decks where the number of dead draw cards in the deck is a low as possible. Therefore, the chance of getting a "bad hand" is much smaller. The lesson here is that if most of the cards of your deck can be useful at any point in the duel, then you're not going to end up with as many bad hands. Additionally, Standard Play and its logical consistency means that a player playing standardly uses cards that account for strategies they believe could be a nuisance and that might not allow them to make the plays they want to make every game. By using standard techs that account for many strategies, you again are minimizing your opponent's chances of getting lucky by having an answer to many of his/her big plays.
The last benefit I will discuss about Standard Play is one that some of you will likely disagree with if you are of the opinion that "anyone can win with a meta deck." Standard Play allows skilled players to show off their skill. This falls back on the other two benefits I've already talked of. If two players are both playing standard, then they are both able to be consistent and they both are able to minimize the factor of luck. Therefore, the player who is more skilled at the game will theoretically, over a long period of time, have a win/loss >1. By minimizing luck, you are maximizing how dependent the game is on your personal level of skill. This is why you can see tournaments where many of the same people make it to the top spots over and over again, even though there are many weaker players also attempting Standard Play.
Now, before I get people all pissed off at me for making points that nobody like to hear (like that playing meta decks is a good thing that brings out skill), I'm going to talk a bit about some of the drawbacks to Standard Play, and there are two big ones that I consider important to discuss.
The first major drawback is that people will be gunning for you. Not all good players engage in Standard Play. In Yugioh, we call these people "anti-meta" duelists. They create decks made to counter the current meta. Even if the meta player has a counter to the opponent's counter, this still can result in two problems:
1. The game is still more difficult to win than normal.
2. You may not be able to use the strategies that Standard Play dictates you should be applying over and over again.
Those are the goals of an anti-meta player - to make it so that even if you're using a meta deck, that you cannot engage in Standard Play. It's an effective strategy, that typically suffers primarily from a lack of consistency when compared to Standard Play. In other words, you'll often see an anti-meta player feeling sad because he/she couldn't draw the card(s) necessary to stop the opponent. This is because making a true anti-meta deck is very tricky, and involves still needing to have a way to make plays consistently, which is difficult when they are typically running a larger than normal number of control cards, which tend to take up the spaces in the deck that would often be used for draw power and searchability. However, even with this lack of consistency, anti-meta players are a definite drawback to being a player who believes in Standard Play.
The other major drawback to Standard Play is that your opponent will be able to predict what moves you are likely to make at almost any point in the duel. While that doesn't mean they'll necessarily be capable of countering those moves, the fact that you are predictable does present a problem. Your opponent will be able to prepare, to the best of his/her abilities, for the moves you are most likely to make. In comparison, running non-standard techs or, for that matter, non-meta decks can give you the advantage of being less predictable, which can sometimes create more opportunities for your opponent to make mistakes and fall into your traps. Again, while playing like that can be effective, it does lead to a lower consistency in your overall strategy and is therefore not considered Standard Play.
So, we've taken a look at Standard Play in this article and delved into stuff that for some of you might be common sense, but that all of you need to hear (mostly so that you can stop complaining every time you come across a meta duelist). Standard Play results in consistency that reduces luck and increases skill level, and although it has some downsides such as people who specifically attempt to counter it, and the inability to be unpredictable, it is still typically considered the best way to consistently win games in a competitive setting. Thanks for reading and I hope I was able to learn ya something.
Put on your game theory hats my friends, because we're gonna get deep on this one. Today I'll be talking to you about the benefits and drawbacks to "Standard Play".
So, there's obviously the first question that needs answering, "What is Standard Play?" Standard play is a term used in many different competitive games. In general, it means playing a game the way that theoretically makes the most sense and that gives you the greatest advantage over your opponent. It means not using "tricks" or any cutesy little tactics in order to win. It means playing it out the way that many would describe as "boring" or "overdone". In Yugioh specifically, I'll be considering Standard Play as:
1. Using a meta deck
2. Not teching non-standard cards
3. Using a minimal amount of bluffing while playing
Now, most of you probably already know what are considered meta decks, so I'm just going to take the 1 deck that for the current format most screams meta: Dino Rabbit. I'm almost certain that everyone has let out a groan whenever they play someone who is using this deck. Many of you have probably told people things such as "Good job using an auto-pilot deck" or "What sort of nub needs to use Rabbit to win?" Why do you think people react this way when they are faced against a meta deck? The answer is because they know it is going to be difficult for them to win the duel, even if the opponent's skill level is not as high as their own. Note, I am NOT saying that meta decks are by any means "auto-pilot" decks. A skilled player using the same meta deck as a weaker player will, over time, have a better win/loss ratio. Now, with this preface out of the way, let's get into the benefits of Standard Play.
The first and absolute most important benefit of standard play is consistency. This, again, is true across multiple competitive gaming platforms. Since Standard Play involves doing the things that are most logical, it means you are going to be able to repeat the same performance over and over again. This means being able to do the same moves that give a high chance for victory in nearly every game. Again, it's not particularly exciting, but when it's about winning tournaments where you have to play multiple games in order to achieve victory, it is a necessity. You are taking the moves in the game that are, almost no matter what, difficult for your opponent to directly counter, and you are playing them time and again with a high success rate. For Yugioh, that can mean playing Dino Rabbit and every duel summoning a Rabbit to bring out an Evolzar, then using Tour Guide to create Leviair to bring back the Rabbit for another Evolzar. You can do that (or at least attempt to do that) almost every game you play, and it will win you duels. Of course, this can be the case for other meta decks, but I'm sure you don't need me to list the basic principles behind every meta strategy.
Another benefit of Standard Play is what I would call minimizing luck. In competitive gaming in general, you'll hear people bemoan their luck. "Oh my strategy just couldn't come together" or "My opponent just got lucky and I couldn't do anything about it." I'm here to say that a benefit of Standard Play is that it typically allows you to be versatile enough to respond to your opponent's "good luck" without simply taking an instant loss. As mentioned in the previous argument, having the consistency of Standard Play means that the chances of you having "bad luck" decrease dramatically. For a Yugioh reference, people always complain "Oh the shuffler is trolling me again. That's why I keep getting bad hands!" The truth is far more simple. You receive bad hands because you have a deck that is capable of producing them. You have bad hands because you have cards in your deck that can be potential dead draws. People who use Standard Play are using decks where the number of dead draw cards in the deck is a low as possible. Therefore, the chance of getting a "bad hand" is much smaller. The lesson here is that if most of the cards of your deck can be useful at any point in the duel, then you're not going to end up with as many bad hands. Additionally, Standard Play and its logical consistency means that a player playing standardly uses cards that account for strategies they believe could be a nuisance and that might not allow them to make the plays they want to make every game. By using standard techs that account for many strategies, you again are minimizing your opponent's chances of getting lucky by having an answer to many of his/her big plays.
The last benefit I will discuss about Standard Play is one that some of you will likely disagree with if you are of the opinion that "anyone can win with a meta deck." Standard Play allows skilled players to show off their skill. This falls back on the other two benefits I've already talked of. If two players are both playing standard, then they are both able to be consistent and they both are able to minimize the factor of luck. Therefore, the player who is more skilled at the game will theoretically, over a long period of time, have a win/loss >1. By minimizing luck, you are maximizing how dependent the game is on your personal level of skill. This is why you can see tournaments where many of the same people make it to the top spots over and over again, even though there are many weaker players also attempting Standard Play.
Now, before I get people all pissed off at me for making points that nobody like to hear (like that playing meta decks is a good thing that brings out skill), I'm going to talk a bit about some of the drawbacks to Standard Play, and there are two big ones that I consider important to discuss.
The first major drawback is that people will be gunning for you. Not all good players engage in Standard Play. In Yugioh, we call these people "anti-meta" duelists. They create decks made to counter the current meta. Even if the meta player has a counter to the opponent's counter, this still can result in two problems:
1. The game is still more difficult to win than normal.
2. You may not be able to use the strategies that Standard Play dictates you should be applying over and over again.
Those are the goals of an anti-meta player - to make it so that even if you're using a meta deck, that you cannot engage in Standard Play. It's an effective strategy, that typically suffers primarily from a lack of consistency when compared to Standard Play. In other words, you'll often see an anti-meta player feeling sad because he/she couldn't draw the card(s) necessary to stop the opponent. This is because making a true anti-meta deck is very tricky, and involves still needing to have a way to make plays consistently, which is difficult when they are typically running a larger than normal number of control cards, which tend to take up the spaces in the deck that would often be used for draw power and searchability. However, even with this lack of consistency, anti-meta players are a definite drawback to being a player who believes in Standard Play.
The other major drawback to Standard Play is that your opponent will be able to predict what moves you are likely to make at almost any point in the duel. While that doesn't mean they'll necessarily be capable of countering those moves, the fact that you are predictable does present a problem. Your opponent will be able to prepare, to the best of his/her abilities, for the moves you are most likely to make. In comparison, running non-standard techs or, for that matter, non-meta decks can give you the advantage of being less predictable, which can sometimes create more opportunities for your opponent to make mistakes and fall into your traps. Again, while playing like that can be effective, it does lead to a lower consistency in your overall strategy and is therefore not considered Standard Play.
So, we've taken a look at Standard Play in this article and delved into stuff that for some of you might be common sense, but that all of you need to hear (mostly so that you can stop complaining every time you come across a meta duelist). Standard Play results in consistency that reduces luck and increases skill level, and although it has some downsides such as people who specifically attempt to counter it, and the inability to be unpredictable, it is still typically considered the best way to consistently win games in a competitive setting. Thanks for reading and I hope I was able to learn ya something.
Last edited by nekofjung on Sat Jun 23, 2012 12:55 pm; edited 1 time in total
