ISHIZU TEARLAMENT - Ten Minute Testing 

"I wish yugioh had more interactions rather than just negates. I really like when decks go back and forth on either turn" I said, as a finger on the monkey's paw curled.

I feel like Konami heard people’s complaints about modern combo decks being too uninteractive and then made Tearlament a bit too interactive.

It's wild that the 1st tier 0 deck that is named after an anime character is Ishizu

Using Mannequin Cat to summon End of Anubis at just the right time during Game 2 of the Best of 3 Match was super neat!

Mathmech is the new Satellarknight, Spright is BA and Tear is Nekroz. This is a new era folks.

“Ok and in response to the zipper” My LORD that caught me off guard 😂

Props on Joseph for talking at length about how intriguing the mirror ist without showing the mirror in this tmt. Give us the chainlinks!!!

I wish you showed a set of the mirror match as it is probably the most important match up currently for the deck.

The big problem for me is that this deck is only really skill testing in the mirror, what i mean by that is that unless both players are playing Ishizu Tears specifically, the deck is a lot more forgiving, it isnt difficult to mill what you want when you mill upwards of 15 cards per turn, not to mention the deck punishes the opponent a lot for just playing the game, like Havnis and Scream basically plus you if the opponent does something as basic as normal summon a guy or activate a monster effect, that's not really feasible to play around, you either play the game and allow the opponent to combo off during your turn or dont play the game and let them combo off during their turn because you have no interaction. I like that the deck is skill testing in the mirror, but if the deck makes it so that the game can only be enjoyable in the mirror, something has to change.

The concept of Ishizu Tear isn't terrible, responding to your opponent's cards during their turn in a way that isn't just negating them. But the end results of Ishizu Tear specifically is watching your opponent spend 15 minutes milling and chaining while you sit there milling quietly if you're not playing Ishizu Tear. For the format specifically, yes the Ishizu Tear mirror is extremely skill based, but that only matters if your playing the mirror, play anything else and it's like playing against unga bunga combo but they can do it when you're going first. TLDR; play anything other than Ishizu Tear and you're gonna have a bad time.

One of Konami's biggest contradictions was banning Chaos Ruler for being too strong as a generic mill 5 and then immediately printing an archetype and support that easily mills half their deck (sometimes on turn 0 as well). Not sure how that made any sense to them

what a time to be awake

I am so thankful for the part where you talked about the format. I constantly see people complaining about it and seeing someone actually acknowledge the good things about the format was really nice.

I think there's a balance between "lots of variety but everyone is playing solitaire" and "One deck minus 5-10 techs that's fun to play in a mirror". We've had similar types of balance before in past formats albeit briefly. Formats like Duelist Alliance had multiple top deck contenders then a variety of very viable and topping lower tiered strategies. The main issue and why it seems like nobody can be happy in my eyes at least is that Konami refuses to do something MTG did long ago which was set a power level and stick around that level for all future releases. Every time the community thinks the powercreep has hit a plateau there's suddenly a huge spike in power from a tier 0 deck (which then gradually gets crept itself) and then another lul. It's kind of just the limbo of the yugioh metagame. Maybe in say 5-10 more years they'll finally cap out on how much cards can do while still fitting the text on cards and we'll actually see the true highest possible powerlevel yugioh can reach.

I believe the tri-spright match was an example of an actually HEALTHY interactive deck that doesn't just make a million negates, tears are not only frustrating to play against but take "our turn" to literally, having an in hand monster negate and destroy that pluses you and mills 10 cards just seems to unfair.

I feel like surely we can have a middleground between Literally 1 Deck Being Playable and Multiple Degenerate Strats Being Playable At The Same Time.

This format seems very fun and skill based Only if you play ishizu tear, anything else gets completely drowned out and it isn't fun to play when you can't even activate a single effect before your opponent goes crazy and makes a turn 0 board before you can even establish your own

Prediction: I'll see you all in 6 months to a year when the next banlist comes out, two of the Tearlament engine cards are limited, and the videos decrying the strength of the archetype are mixed in with the videos touting the next broken archetype to be released.

As a duelist, I understand that it's skill testing and isn't just an insta-win strategy. This isn't a VFD, Utopic Zexal, Scythe Lock, etc. But at the same time, when it makes many previously good decks, including ones that were able to handle the deck decently before the new support into chaff, while basically the only way to win is to play the same deck, or to build a deck so targeted at specifically THIS that it's frankly ridiculous. Yes, having targeted strategies against decks isn't new -- all those cosmics in the side deck are proof of that -- but when you're making both your main AND side deck as just more ways to attempt to beat this one deck... yeesh. There's also the fact that the deck is... nigh brick proof? Basically everything has an effect somewhere, and even though mills are RNG, when you're dealing with anywhere from 3-15 or so mills, you're *GOING* to find what you wanted. And as a spectator... I hate it. It's boring to watch, it's confusing and it pains me to realize that it's like... just this. Interacting is fun, but when we're on the 3rd chainlink 5+ on turn one, and come the second turn it already looks like the 3rd turn... it's terrible. The concept of turns lost its meaning. And again, yes, playing extensively on your opponent's turn isn't a new thing; fuck, look at Floo or if you wanna get a little spicy, Crystron. But normally, in order to play on your opponent's turn, you needed to have gone first, not being able to have essentially both players have a turn 1, and the Tear player still gets the advantage of the first battle phase.

Can't wait for next week's One Hour Testing, where the episode is exactly the same except that best of three is against an actual meta deck - another Ishizu Tearlaments.

I think the main thing that frustrates me about the ishizu stuff in particular is that mudora and keldo individually invalidate so many other possible deck options just by existing. Lots of decks that are grave reliant but aren't even dark / light decks weak to bystials die really hard to getting stuff shuffled away at a critical time, and the ishizu cards do it so easily and at essentially no cost. Besides that tho, I do at least appreciate that ishizu tear is outrageously strong without locking you out of the game entirely like nekroz did back when that was tier 0.

I've never seen a Yugioh deck look so much like MTGs Vintage Dredge before.

"at least its skillful" is the equivalent to "just draw the out" at this point

This situation is super similar to brawl MK imo For those who don't know, Metaknight was blatantly the best character in Smash Brothers Brawl, this meant every matchup was MK vs MK. The problem, however, is that the MK ditto was the most skillful way to play the game, but if you fought any other character as MK it was a sweep in your favor (usually with heavy air camping), or if you wanted to play something else you would get stomped yourself. This lead to the situation of: MK + MK = Fun and interactive MK + Anyone else = horrible nightmares.

I remember going to my locals, and seeing a tearlament ishizu mirror. Their duel lasted the whole fucking 40 minutes of the round. This deck is fun and balanced I swear.

Ngl I haven't played YGO in ages but your description of the format makes me want to hop back in

So, I disagree in regards to liking the format. Yes, this deck is skill intensive, but we've had skill intensive formats in the past that were interactive and skillful while offering variety. July of last year was a good example of that imo, and so was TOSS format, hence how it's so beloved people still play it. Secondly, Tier 0 formats, including this one, are EXTREMELY unfriendly to budget players. Tier 0 decks are almost never cheap. The only way to compete at all right now on a budget is to maybe play Flunder. Diverse formats tend to be cheaper, due to how many viable decks there are. I'm a firm believer that some of the best formats are the most budget-friendly ones. While I understand to compete in YGO, you need to offer some money, it shouldn't cost a kidney just to compete. Thirdly, while this deck doesn't focus on negation, the Ishizu Tearlament cards give so much Graveyard control that you can't really compete with Graveyard-reliant decks, which take up about 90% of decks. Most decks instantly lose to one Mudora or Keldo shuffle-back, even ones that were powerful right before MAMA. While this doesn't involve negation, this still can shut off interactivity for the other player if they aren't also on Ishizu Tears or the small niche of decks that don't care about their Graveyards. Fourth, the banlist was created to stop players from using the same 20-30 cards. Yu-Gi-Oh, at its core, is a trading card game where one of the key features is customizing your deck and competing with your strategy. If you can only win with 30 cards, this might as well just be Poker or something similar rather than a TCG. Being able to play with different builds allows for this. I'm aware there's always a meta in YGO, but even 10-ish strategies being competitively viable can at least allow for more experimentation and creativity, something pro players get to express much of their skill in through deckbuilding. I mean no disrespect with this comment btw. I love your content and personality. I'm just throwing out my thoughts and opinions. Tldr: we don't need a Tier 0 to have interactivity. We can have budget friendly, diverse formats that also involve skill. This ain't it.

Nothing wrong with the best deck being interactive and incredibly skill-testing I just wish there was more than one playable deck in this format

Poor mathmech so much hype behind it then mama came around

I like how he says the deck is great cause it doesn't aim to lock you out of playing as if we didn't see someone Abyss Dweller 4 turns in a row in Game 3 of the Finals of YCS Pasadena.

I still can’t get over the phrase “yeah imma mill 10”.

Personally, I don't agree with the "You are either playing a format with multiple decks that all end on boring one-sided games or playing a Tier 0 skilled format with Ishizu Tear" take. You 100% can have a format that is both inclusive towards multiple decks within a format that is not reliant on floodgates or build a board of negates. Look at TOSS and Swordsoul format.

END OF ANUBIS JUMPSCARE

That "End of Anubis" play was poggers.

I will say that watching the finals changed my mind. I'd gotten so accustomed to a large portion of my yugioh matches be decided by flipping rivalry, anti-spell, etc. and going next game. I mean Rikka yon a ycs by doing just that. So it was a breath of fresh air to watch that final be so intense with so much interaction between both players. Tier 0 formats shouldnt last forever, but I am excited to see this one for a month or two, then hopefully move back to a triangle format. Either is much preferred over the floodgate turbo format that was pre pote.

Guy who has Tear Ishizu: yeah i really like this current tier zero format

"Interactive, skill-intensive and exciting matches that use 30 of the same cards" you just described goat format

I like that this deck isn't based around negates/flood-gates, floodgates or non-interactive boss monsters, but I would like to not be presented with the ultimatum of "lose to Tear or play mirror matches all day." The skill-rewarding part, hilariously, comes from the fact that the mirror involves your opponent doing things on your turn. It's as if people enjoy being able to make decisions rather than hoping to draw the correct opening hand.

At 12:18, you should have put Bagooska in the Extra Monster Zone as Knightmare Cerberus can only target and destroy monsters in the main monster zone.

In regards to your Faustian bargain you raised about interaction vs diversity, I would like to offer a third option. ITS POSSIBLE TO HAVE BOTH IF YOU DESIGN CARDS BETTER AND USE YOUR BANLIST EFFECTIVELY

For this specific TMT, final match it would have been cool to see a mirror.

Depending on how the next couple of events go, I could see Konami dropping an adjusted list to try and reign Ishizu/Tear in a little bit.

While I will always prefer interactive formats over "don't play the game" - the game, in a game like ygo, variety and the ability to choose is a huge part of what makes the game fun and interesting. The strategy might be complex, but it's still one strategy. I want to see many different things, and therefore I will probably always stick to more casual metagames anyways.

I love back and forth gameplay in yu gi oh, and I love the way that isis' cards play into her hold exchange of the spirit build, with the whole milling and putting cards back thing. I just wish it was in anything other than tear it gives me migraines. I absolutely want YGO To move away from negates, I love that battle focused hand traps like bystial are coming back, and I absolutely love that decks like floo and swordsoul and spright are getting their booty's blasted because they 100% deserve it. But having a completely one sided format is never fun, and I miss my favorite older interactive decks being playable because I'm still a yugiboomer at heart.

the negation of the zipper down to piss with Orange Light had me dying on the floor

My plan to counter this is to play chain-burn. Except I'm going to put Jackpot 7 in the deck, so making me mill is a win condition for me.

New Egyptian themed cards getting owned by Anubis was both ironic and hilarious btw

What MBT didn't show, and what I secretly know, is that the Floo game, which I piloted Floo in, actually continued as a best of 3, because Rebby accidentally forgot to make it a best of 1. While the game 1 which is featured here in the tmt saw me creamed by Ishtear, in game 2, I easily set up an unbreakable Floo board and won, and then in game 3... well, idk. I guess Rebby just didn't get good mills, and only ended on a Bagooska which I easily outted for the win. TL;DR, Floo can decently win a match against Ishtear.

This has nothing to do with Yu-Gi-Oh, but is anyone else deeply unsettled with MBT's closet being ever so slightly open in the background? Shit like that scares the hell out of me.

I love this format I am happy playing birbs lol

I feel like any goodwill this deck curently has is just because it's a break from Floodgate Hell rather than the format itself being good

I love this format. It's skillful. It's interactive. It's not set up 6 negate board + Scythe lock.

Personally I would prefer both, but it I was forced to choose, I would go versatile gameplay over versatile builds every single time

ISHIZU effect mill 5 ? Well well, i milled 3 Wolfs.

so crazy to me that Konami looked at Magic the Gathering's single most busted mechanic (dredge) and was like, "what if we made that but infinitely better"

For those of you who haven't seen this decklist from the deck reporting for the event, skull mark ladybug is in the side deck. Which is just amazing to see

What I've learned from Tier 0 formats over the years is that it isn't the monotony that kills them in the first few months: it's the price tags. The monotony will get you eventually, but it's the deck costs that will vacate the early crowds.

"A series of mermaids.... and one twink." Yes exactly.

I recall you describing the Dragon Ruler mirror as one of the most skill-intensive versions of Yu-Gi-Oh! ever. It seems like the Tear mirror has taken the crown. Now before anyone attacks me, I’m not a fan of Tier 0 formats, but when two decks are equally powerful, it actually does come down to the skill of the pilot. That I actually respect. This will appeal to the pro players. Unfortunately, that scenario is only happening in Tearlament mirrors in competitive Yu-Gi-Oh! Konami could easily create a diverse meta with that kind of competitive atmosphere. They choose not to.

I would agree except I have like exactly the 4 cheapest cards in this list and the rest costs more than I make in a month. Until they reprint it as OTS supers I hate it

When I first heard about Tears, I was so excited because I love Lightsworns and figured they’d work well together Then I found out they were THE meta and no I’m upset 😢 The same thing happened with Virtual World, I thought they seemed neat and then turns out everyone hated them

The mirror is the definition of interaction

God I miss this format, holy shit is this better than snake eyes

In regards to MBTs question: yes, this is one of the best tier 0 formats ever. Regardless, I do not like tier 0, (and simply don't enjoy mirrors, although I don't really know why I feel that way). While this format is certainly better than 3 or 4 floodgate fests decided on turn 1, I don't think we *have* to choose between one or the other. I'm aware of the fact that at some optimism becomes delusion, but I don't think it's literally impossible to have a format with 5 or 6 decks that feel interactive and skill intensive. Yes, it's VERY hard for that to be achieved, but if the healthiest gameplay we can currently have can only be found in Ishizu-Tear mirrors, I think the problem is bigger than just this specific format being good or not. Ban mystic mine anyway

"Zipper effect, special summon penis"

Man tear 0 format even though it was a one deck format was so much more fun than the abysmal ones that followed it, floodgate to floodgate to floodgate since the kitkallos ban.....

Who's here just hours before Master Duel finally gets Tear? :D

Imo the occasional tier 0 format is fine so long as a) the tier 0 deck in question is actually fun, and b) it doesn't last a literal year (looking at you zoo). Since the meta is such a known quantity it provides some interesting opportunities for rogue players to metagame it, and we get to see some cool tech cards for corner cases the deck produces. I think where it'll have gone too far is if we're still playing these mind-meltingly hard mirrors well into summer 2023. It's also ignoring the frustrating but inevitable price premium that tier 0 formats create, too much demand for the limited supply of cards. At the end of the day I welcome our new overlords, so long as they don't outstay their welcome.

I think it is kind of the end of Yu-Gi-Oh as we know it. We were already in a sizable powercreep with power of the elements. Bysstials have rendered literally any GY reliant light or dark deck that's not branded,tear and dragon link unplayable. Ishizu fairies has rendered nearly every GY reliant deck unplayable. Only a few mill decks can play anymore, like tearlements right now bricky worse version little brother naturias. And how do they play? By playing ishizu fairies against the ishizu fairies. That my friends is not only anti any semblance of diversity,but extremely unhealthy. Very few decks are modern enough to play that also don't require the GY or use light/darks, hence why floowandereeze has rose from bricky rogue, to solid tier 2, to meta defining without receiving support. The sheer amounts of unplayable decks is unfathomable. Even archtypes that just came out within 2 years (dinomorphia,beetroopers, Ghoti) aren't seen above casual play. And other older archtypes like predaplants and gem knights that got support, didn't get support well enough to be viable. So many decks need support to be able to play now.but Konami spit it our faces by continuously giving branded.over 20 cards of support in a year,more tearlement and spright support after nonmeta decks were having trouble playing against them, dragon link support, swordsoul support, sky striker support,etc. Why top tier decks keep getting support, who knows

Upside to all this is if Konami actually listens to the discourse they might start building more interaction into archetypes in general. Its a big ask but it could happen

My only issue with Ishizu Tear (besides It being too strong right now) is the cards that got released to stop it, aka Bystial. This archetype is going to be really annoying for future formats. Honestly, after a January 2020-style banlist, we could have a very good, diverse format that's skill-intensive... Or it'll devolve into negate spam again lmao.

"Enjoyable tier zero format" Sir I believe you have been infected with madness

Archetypes are my favorite thing about YGO, and the reason I play it over other card games. The amount of personality and individuality archetypes allow is pretty cool, and thus, naturally, I prefer diversity. So, while I appreciate the interactivity, this format isn’t for me. If I wanted to play a skill-heavy game where everyone was drawing from the same deck, I’d play poker.

people then: ugh there is no interaction people now: ugh there is too much interaction

0:32 Kekw That was actually insane! 🤣🤣👏👏

That End of Anubis is a spicy tech lol

This deck is literally one of the biggest problems ppl have with modern ygo lmao Takes forever to do a turn and then it takes forever for them to do a turn on your turn as well. Games not dead but it's clear to anyone who played when the game was healthy that it's definitely gone and continues to go down hill.

"I'm quitting for Digimon" nah, I'm staying here but also picking up Pokemon.

MBT: "Tearlaments is so interactive, it's not like the other decks that run a million negates" dragostapelia, bagooska, dweller, baronne, cryme, sulliek and orange light: *bruh*

I’ll argue that the former answer to your question at 3:50:a diverse meta with auto-win cards is more financially accessible than a tier 0 interactive deck. That’s part of why I’m playing Master Duel instead of TCG: it’s cheaper. Even if they make every Tear a UR, it won’t be hard for a player to build a full deck for the price of a play set of Perlereino. I’m looking forward to exploring how I feel about this particular format when I experience it for myself in MD.

"Tearlaments don't set up any locks or floodgates" *cough* *cough* Abyss Dweller *cough* *cough*

First format in a long while where I'm just dropping YGO until all this shit's over.

“In response to the zipper we’re going to go orange light” LOL

Normally I don't necessarily like playing the same deck over and over again, but Ishizu Tear is actually extremely fun. The fact that it is fucking hard actually makes it seem more fun to play, though I am fucking autistic with a knack for puzzles and Ishizu Tear is like the dodecahedron rubiks cube of yugioh decks.

This format feels like modern goat

You playing Mathmech in the skit was so BASED.

Ahh yes the age old question: "gameplay VS deckbuilding", because you clearly can never have both.

A diversity of decks with twiks through banning limiting an support is what I like having different playstyles gimmicks and extra decks is fun especially if we could come up with a power system to limit the busted decks

Dang I joined 2018 in toss and never thought I would live long enough to see a tier zero

re: your question, I definitely prefer an enjoyable one-deck format over a miserable twenty-deck format. When I lose the die roll and get scythed G1 and G3 I don't leave the table thinking "wow! I'm having fun because the decks in the top cut are different from each other!" also! heartbeat isn't only there as a mine out; if you mill a trap you want to search before making kitkallos, you simply use her effect to mill heartbeat and add it back.

i like this format

Formats with one strong and engaging strategy are gamers only formats, like chess or call of duty. Not to deny the merits of varied formats, but formats like these isolate some of the most beautiful and important things you can hope to achieve in game design.

As a long time fan of MTG's Dredge archetype (look it up for a laugh), I almost want to buy into yugioh to play this format, it looks rad

The TEAR 0 pun will never get old.

There's been 3 fun tier zero formats: teledad, zoo pre fsub or nekroz post djinn. 4 if you count drulers. This one is up there for sure. I'd say it's just below nekroz in terms of funness, and absolutely number 1 in difficulty.

That intro isn't even skit anymore, it's too real lmao

And it sort of feels like nothing's changed at all 🎵

I forgot who said it, but a yugituber said "how far removed your pet deck does in a metagame is inversly related to how much you like the metagame". My favorite deck of all time was and still is Dragon Rulers. So that's probably why I dont particulary mimd this teir 0 format.

I’m going to push back against the “doesn’t lock you” thing. A deck that, without diluting itself, puts up a solemn warning, a continuous OPT monster negate, multiple spin backs, and an effective 1000 attack point debuff on all your monsters pretty handily locks you out of the game. And that’s not even touching on the fact that sending them to grave, the most common form of removal, doesn’t even deal with the problem. People who say “Oh, Tear is so interactive. They don’t lock you out of the game” is clearly basing that assessment off of exactly the mirror and nothing else. If it was truly as interactive and fair as people claim, it simply wouldn’t be T0. As for where I stand on the question in the video, the short version is that I think that being able to pilot a deck through a wide variety of other decks to land at the top is a more true test of skill than rising to the top because the only actual threat was a mirror match. I also believe that skill based doesn’t necessarily equal healthy, and that T0 formats are always unhealthy, regardless of whether one considers them skill based, because decks just don’t become T0 by being fair and balanced. That being said, the idea that it’s either an interactive T0 format or a variety format of solitaires is a false dichotomy. Variety and interactivity aren’t somehow mutually exclusive, and trying to paint them as such makes it seem like you’re trying to sell me something that I don’t want.

2:08 AKA Ishizu's "Exchange of the Spirit" EARTH Fairy Support