I like the physicality of this game cause it takes a card grid system and actually makes the cards in the grid do something, as opposed to some games where the board cards do absolutely nothing.
Z/X is another card game that uses grid mechanics well - but yeah, it's something I like in card games as well. Given the number of tcgs with a grid, it's kind of baffling how few actually use it for more than a field limiter.
Back when the game first came out, our local shop stocked up on the trial decks for it. I wanted to give it a shot as a Vanguard and Buddyfight player, since Bushiroad was kind of in a "do no wrong" category for me at the time. What immediately turned me off was the price tag. $30 USD per trial deck. That was twice the price of Vanguard trial. The prices of the packs was nothing to scoff at being $7 USD per pack. It wasn't an easy game for people to want to get into locally.
Yeah, the prices were pretty rough. I got lucky and managed to scoop up all the starters and a couple booster boxes for something like 75% off right after the game died. I really couldn't justify spending full MSRP on the game when I first saw it starting to make the rounds.
@@tcgacademia See, I just can't justify buying anything for a game that is already dead. Like if it turned out I liked the game, I'd have been sad it was not getting anything else. If I didn't, that just means it'd collect dust.
@@BurstRevolver Yeah, that makes sense. For me, it's partially curiosity and seeing how all the mechanics fit together, and partially that I don't mind creating a small battle box of a few lightly modified starter decks if the gameplay is decent.
@@tcgacademia That, I completely understand. It's fascinating to see how a game worked and all the mechanics that did go into it. I never truly got to see how Luck & Logic worked as a game, but thanks to you I have a better understanding of it.
Great video. I got to play the game a bit when it first came out in Japan and dry is definitely the best way to describe how I felt playing it. The cards didn’t really feel super impactful as well. Wasn’t the biggest fan of the designs too since I was part of a wixoss group at the time which in my opinion is fairly top tier cute anime waifu design.
Yeah, it loses definitely out to the Wixoss comparison. Wixoss somehow has better waifus (LRIGs), and way more waifus (SIGNI) - and the gameplay is fantastic as well. Always neat to hear when my impressions match up with other people who played the game back in the day!
I didnt think that the game's rules kind of backed bushi into a corner as far as printing new cards. I just figured the game wasnt popular (both of these statements can be true though). With how hard everything is to track, on top of its futuristic theme, I feel like this game would have done better digitally. That doesn't solve the issue of the rules restricting card design, although being digital would make it a hell of a lot easier to change the game rules and the card effects to match.
It was less an issue stopping them from making new cards, more that the rules limited what card designs were possible from the start, which meant the cards all operated in a narrow range of power and effects and ended up being a bit sterile and unexciting. After the game died, I picked up a few booster boxes on the cheap, and there really wasn't much that jumped out at me. No reactions like: 'oh, that would be really interesting to build around', or 'I can't wait to add that card to one of my decks, it would fit in perfectly there.' As an extreme example, yugioh's base rules are dead simple - the complexity is all in the cards, and how all their effects work together in a deck. Luck and Logic is much the opposite - all the complexity is in the rules, and the cards themselves are overly simple. That was my impression anyway - despite the game being fairly complex, the cards themselves were kind of boring. Although like you said, having an online client that tracks the numbers for you would have worked quite well for this game - it might have been enough to keep it going a little longer.
@@tcgacademia I'd love to know what could happen to solve that issue. The level and stock system are neat, and tranceunion is unique as well. I think its the gate system that boxed everything in. What do you think could be done to loosen the restriction of the rules on card design?
@@RarecuisineGaming I think the Gate system and Luck drives are the two easiest mechanics to cut. Gates tie life to members in play, and Luck drives limit a lot of designs available for card advantage - instead of having luck drives as their own mechanic, you could instead include abilities like: (ACT: [3] Draw a card.) or (Logic Drive: [5] Draw 2 cards). I think this would help solve a lot of the immediate design limits, but it still doesn't really address the numbers problem. In the end, it might be better to just take the mechanics that worked and build an entirely new game using them, rather than trying to tweak L&L's formula. I think the level and stock systems work quite well (they're very similar to Wixoss, actually), and trance is a really cool mechanic to build a game around (arguably similar to yugioh, but much less convoluted). I think there's definitely a game out there waiting to be designed that can use these mechanics to create really good gameplay, but I don't think L&L is that game.
@@tcgacademia I agree. It would be foolish for Bushi (or anyone) to reboot and fix L&L and release it as L&L 🤣 I did not play this game for the anime and characters, I played it for the unique gameplay.
Mann I've always been curious about what L&L was( I have rewatched the entirety of cf vanguard g a few times already, which ofc overlaped with the tcg run of L&L) and i must say this video explains it very well. I actually quite like the designs of the cards but after seeing how complex the rules are I'm prob abit hesitant about buying some of the boosters and trial decks so i can play it myself but good video tho 🐧🖤
Thanks! And yeah, I get that hesitation. Honestly, I bought a few boosters back when the game died and they were getting sold at like 75% off MSRP. Still haven't done much with them - I opened them and they looked nice, but there wasn't really much mechanically that looked interesting to try building. So while it did have some interesting ideas, I can see why the game didn't do so well.
just watched this because I was so damn curious to actually know how L&L actually works and why it dies, is it gameplay problem I wondered. Then at the end of the video I wholly agree that the base rule itself is problem when the combat explanation span from minute 10 to about minute 19 lol, it is so frontloaded. anyway great vid and thanks for the information~
Some of the how-to-play videos I feel I could safely cut by a few minutes, but this is one that really ended up using its full run time. Glad you found it interesting!
Off and on I’ve been building and rebuilding a TCG concept because of my love for all card games, and thankfully I found your channel, idk how I found you, but you’re a diamond in the rough my friend! I used to frequent a LGS/LCS near me when I was a preteen/teen to play lots of Cardfight Vanguard over the years, and remembered hearing about L&L. After having watched this video- *phew*- I can understand why I never heard anything else of it after having moved on from Cardfight and into other TCGs. This game has to be one of the most convoluted concoctions made, there’s so many different rules to keep track of that also limit its gameplay design. It’s like they took Cardfight and added a whole new card game on top of it, this game died because it was designed poorly but the mechanic where cards take up zones/gates on the board, and the level system seem fairly interesting.
"Like cardfight but with whole new game added on top" is a really good description. There's definitely some interesting things going on in the game, but yeah, overall it's a bit of a mess. Thank you!
There's exactly one thing I like about this game and it's the fact that it uses my favorite kind of mulligan. I like the idea of gaining an advantage as you lose life, but the execution doesn't appeal to me at all, way too much card stacking going on here. I found myself disliking pretty much every other design choice here. Thanks for the review though.
Yeah. Some games can be really well designed and fail anyway - I don't think this is one of them. I don't hate the game, but it does have some very significant design flaws, and I'm not exactly sad to see it discontinued.
great video, i have wondered how luck and logic games would play out, after watching i agree with what you said on why it could of failed. id also add on that during the time it came out people were enjoying vanguard and buddy fight a lot and didn’t want to sink money into another game that they weren’t to sure on, i do remember and still have my luck and logic demo decks i got at the regionals it was demoed at in 2016 The character like decks didn’t really appeal to me and i know a few were put off bit by how much fan service it had along with the game play, i don’t think many locals i knew back then ever picked up the td or the set in english i do look forward to more 101 vids and if you are doing a dragonbourne 101
Hey there, just wanted to thank you so much for this tutorial video! I just have a small question about the paradoxes: why was the paradox in one instance of the match discarded and in the other it was kept in game for the remainer of the turn?
It's entirely possible I missed something while recording the gameplay, but if a paradox is cancelled it's discarded at the end of battle, and if it's not cancelled, it remains active for the rest of the turn (or until cancelled).
@@tcgacademia oh I see thank you! Then I have a follow-up question: In the situations in which, let's say a paradox I played remains in play, does it count towards the limit of cards I can play during the next battle?
@@GemaCoven Nope, it doesn't count. Technically, at the end of the battle, if it isn't cancelled, then it goes to stay in a 'Paradox Zone' - so even though it's still providing its effect, it isn't counting towards the number of cards you can play out in the next battle (if it gets cancelled while in the paradox zone, it's discarded at end of battle as usual).
@@tcgacademia hmmm, and should the opponent want to cancel that "residual paradox" in the paradox zone, they have no option but to use up 1 limit to play a paradox card... I see, thank you so much for this!!!
Wow. Just wow. I “won” three boxes. I had no idea how to play. Trying to decide “open boxes or sell.” …. After half an hour watching this video, I know I won’t be able to convince friends to play but doubt I can sell. Chess = simple rules, insane depth. This looks like complex rules, restricted depth. Wondering which gameplay mechanics & rules we can eliminate to make it playable. Maybe minimize card draw?
Your comparison to chess regarding complexity of rules vs depth of play is definitely on-point. I think Luck drives and the life system are the two biggest issues, and you'd probably either have to remove them or drastically dial them back, or lean into the them REALLY hard. Pokemon is probably the best example of a life system being tied to units leaving play, and the game is very focused on making sure that coupling works. A more playable Luck and Logic would probably either look closer to Weiss Schwarz, or Waifu Pokemon.
Even if they were to make the power boosts from individual effects more relevant, I wonder how they could've made interesting cards that weren't simply power boosts. Even with interesting conditions, as you mentioned, it's bound to get samey after some time. Perhaps they needed more things for each card to be able to interact with. Like maybe if attacking a gate doesn't instantly destroy it, but rather each gate had some health that you needed to take down (albeit this would be annoying to track. Maybe they could rebalance the numbers and all gates could have 4000 Health and you turn it clockwise by 90 degrees for each 1000 damage). That would, imo, allow for more interesting effects. You could implement some cards with effects similar to MTG's Trample, where if you destroy a card, you can deal excess damage to one of the gates it's on. And you can have some really powerful card that can deal excess damage to up to 2 gates that a card is on, complete with other abilities that increase its limit to potentially let you destroy two gates in one attack even despite them having health now. It also allows you to rebuild your gates, but you can reduce its Health to basically 0 to balance it out, or make them be rebuilt only while a card is on it. It at least sounds interesting to have a deck where you just constantly rebuild gates and constantly get their on-death effects. It then also allows your gates to have passive effects, so maybe you'll be scared of flipping a gate face-up and activating any passive effects.
I've been (re)watching your TCG design videos lately, and with the complexity of this game's rules-based interaction and the seeming lack of ability to interact with the opponent outside of battle, would you say this is an example of a printed TCG that basically doesn't have effect-based interaction?
I hadn't thought of it that way, but that's a good point! Technically there is tons of space for effect interaction, but basically every interaction is just increasing or decreasing power, since nothing else really plays nicely within the rules. So while they've left tons of space in effect timing for effect interaction, in practical terms there really isn't any in this game. Good call, that's definitely an interesting way of looking at this game!
This game was brutal with the skill to luck factor, and personally i loved it for it, but unfortunately if newbies cant feel like they have a chance to win and theres of course the pricing, it's basically unable to grow and gain new players. Which unfortunately means the game never had a chance, i still have every card that came to my area bought the collections from the few people i knew who did try it, and one of these days ill finally get off my lazy bum and create a L&L cube to bring to game night with the boys
I could definitely see it as a high-skill game - the gameplay is so tight that you're really trying to build a series of tiny edges over the course of the game. Honestly, it feels like a game that would work a lot better as a cube or battle box than as a TCG.
1- solid video. 2- the gameplay explanation goes on for too long and quickly becomes boring. Perhaps a staged 2 person game would work better? or perhaps a series of short videos for each part? 3- Common to japanese TCGs, luck and logic shares many gameplay elements, not presenting much originality, and was backed by anime/manga. Also quite wordy and cards were often referenced each other. 4- Physical tcgs have to compete with digital one these days, opting for game with longer run times is a risk. there is an crowd that loves it, but you are mostly choosing to go niche 5- 26:21 Never forget, what makes you game unique? 6- a strong set of general rules is fulcral to the sucess of a game. just look at what yugioh has turned into since going all out with new rules, summoning mechanics and card effects. 7- with that said, deck variety comes with time, if games die to soon, there is no time to change what is wrong at first.
1 - Thanks! 2 - Yeah. I don't really like how-to-plays broken into segments, since the best way to get a feeling for how a game plays out is to see full gameplay. That being said, this video definitely tested that - 30 minutes is a lot, even with the review portion. Part of the problem is that luck and logic has so many damn rules. It's not exactly more complex than the average tcg, but all that complexity is front-loaded into the rules - the cards themselves are very simple. I appreciate your honesty here; good constructive criticism is important to improving. Hopefully the next how-to-play rambles on a bit less. 3 - Japanese tcgs definitely tend to be more iterative rather than innovative. This game more so than most, though - it really feels like a tweaked Vanguard or Weiss Schwarz - there's a LOT of Bushiroad DNA in this game. 4 - Fun fact - the review portion of the video was 20 minutes of gameplay, and I was playing quite quickly - I had to make a lot of edits to cut it down to 5 minutes. Game is long. 5 - I feel like L&L really suffered from this. 6 - One of the appeals of yugioh's rules is that they're dead simple. It's a lot easier to add to a simple rule set than try to maneuver within overly complex rules like L&L had. 7 - It would have been interesting to see where luck and logic went long term. Although realistically, it would likely have been just a bunch of collab sets playing second fiddle to Weiss, like Rebirth for You is doing now.
Wow. The card designs (not even talking about the art on it, which is not my thing) is just terrible. The play cost being so small and next to another stat, the name of the card being written on the side, and just the general business of the card just hurts my brain. Oh, and the playcost being zero for most of the cards is really funny, because why even bother putting it there if it doesn't exist. The amount of space it takes up on the board is also just put on the side where it's not super noticeable, which seems to be an issue when that's kind of important to know at a glance. Yes, I know cards from Magic, Pokemon, YGO, etc. all have become busier and busier over time, and their card designs aren't exactly perfect, but the thing about playing cards is that they need to be, well, playable. I can look at a card from any of the Big 3 and even without knowing the mechanics, can probably pick out stuff like "okay, here's what this card does, here's its name, here's its card type, etc." but just... this is not good. Sure, they're translated from japanese, but it would have been a hell of a lot better to just start from scratch with something that works better for the english language for an english language release.
It feels like they were really trying to maximize the art without just copying Vanguard and Weiss's minimalism, but it somehow ended up with the worst of both worlds - the frame elements are still intrusive and the readability is not great. Like a lot of this game's design, it feels like it's trying to do to much, and not really satisfying anyone.
@@tcgacademiaIndeed. One test for any TCG Design is readability from the other side of the table. Hilariously, this fails it so poorly that the cards aren't even readable on the side of the table of its player, which is just an epic fail. Full Art cards in mechanically-intensive games can be difficult. But this just takes it to another level. It's just so scattered, and where text should be, there's just a generic anime waifu quote. It's like looking up something on google because you need help and it's just a page of unrelated ads.
