Well, not exactly 'new' - I'm a huge Street Fighter fan so when I heard there was going to be a CCG based on (among other things) that IP, I quickly got me some decks to try it out. It never got much 'momentum' here - at least, I'm not aware of big playgroups in the Netherlands, and I only got some cards online - but still, I want to like the game.

For me, it's an interesting diversion to play it in between other card games I play. I never got in too deep though. I think it has some interesting mechanics, and it's very different from other card games I play.

Because I barely scratched the surface, I mistakingly think the game is 'relatively random' as compared to other games. I don't mind that. But I heard it discribed as "deep and strategic" by a game designer. This made me curious. How is it 'deep and strategic' - is that something that surfaces during deck design, or more during play? What are the key skills I should hone playing this game? Because I like UFS, but I would be more satisfied with it understanding what I'm doing...

Don't get me wrong, UFS is pretty fun to pick up and play, but to me, coming from Magic and even Yugioh, UFS is really easy to pick up. If you start to play a lot, you will see trends in cards that roll with a specific symbol; eventually, it will just come down to your deck will have to be able to counter the good stuff or play the good stuff.

People will argue that the better players with the same cards will always win, but sure, like any card game there is a luck factor. Checking will become your biggest friend and worst enemy. I have seen great players lose because they checked a crucial 2 in their matches.

As for your, I suppose, main question of how 'deep and strategic' is this game really, it is there, but its pretty minimal. Sure, there is some baiting here and there, but if you see a Chunners, you can probably imagine what the other 15 Chunners are going to do each and every time. Kick loop? Lame. Ira-Spinta loop? That required a lot of thinking. Not.

Don't get me wrong, I still think this game is fun, but I play miniblock and other little fun things just to keep it fresh, otherwise I'd be bored and tired of seeing BRT's everywhere and spintas.

UFS is weird in terms of it's curve.

At first from being explained / rules being read it can be somewhat convoluted and challenging. However once you get your hands on the deck, and start playing it, the fundamentals are actually easy to pick up.

The strategy for the game itself can be as deep as you want it to be.

Regarding deck building:

• What are your control checks like? How many of what check are you going to run, how is that going to affect how your deck is going to check?
• What difficulties are you going to run? Are you going to run a bunch of cheap cards that spam out quickly?

Depending on your school of thought there are a number of different ways to go. Some folks refuse to ever run a 1 or 2 control check, meanwhile Canadian National champ Kirk Polka ran a combined 16? 1&2 checks.

Some folks won't play a foundation unless it has a specific effect for the deck. Where as others will run a 1/6 foundation just because it has those 1/6 numbers.

• How many symbols will your deck chain off of?

Some folks swear by chaining off of only 1 symbol. More and more lately 2 symbols have been creeping into a couple of decks. At Nats this year, one of Paul Bittner's deck chained off of 4 symbols using seal of cessation to give the 4th symbol to the character.

That's just a quick run down of some of the strategy that can go into the deck building alone.

Scary enough, games can be won or lost during deck building if the deck idea isn't effective enough, or certain answers are left out.

Game Play:

• How many cards can you safely play out on turn 1 & 2 based on your checks?
• What cards do you need to not play out, because you need to keep blocks in your hand?
• Do you have discard protection, if not, do you have enough cards in hand to keep your defenses and still be able to deal with your oppoents discard strategy?
• Do you know your deck, do you know exactly how many of which card is in your deck. How many have you checked through? What are the odds that you are going to draw or check card X?
• What does your opponents deck do? Can you figure it out just because of their character? What symbols are they chaining off of? What kind of checks are they running? Are they setting up for a specific kill, can you figure out what that is, and disrupt it? If you disrupt it, do they have a secondary kill mechanism?

• On the fly, can you figure out alternate ways to kill if your primary method is disrupted.

On a personal level, having played a number of CCG's, UFS far outstrips Yu-Gi-Oh in terms strategy, and due to its card pool, and number of options out there, does actually require some strategy and deep thinking. Sure, there are some very simply strategies. But even the simpliest strategies in the hands of someone who is inexperied is not going to roll through a top tier tournament.

Wouldn't you agree that playing chess blindfolded is harder than playing chess not?

That's what Yugioh is, facedown cards here and there and you have to guess if they are baiting you into using so and so, and you cant just overextend hand in Yugioh, like you can in UFS. Ufs you can draw your ENTIRE hand size each turn, that is simply nuts! The reason I love UFS is because I can SEE everything on the playing field and plan accordingly. I always get my hand busted in YuGiOh because of facedown trap cards and chain links!

You must surly agree that being able to see all the cards on the field makes life A LOT easier than when there are facedown things.

Just Doin' Work said:

Most games I've played deal with 'card advantage' - meaning that you have a 'finite' amount of cards to deal with the situation. The 'fill your hand' style of UFS makes me think there is less 'risk' and more 'reward' for overextending your hand, even when you fail a check. At least you'll have more cards on the table, and having a good offense seems like the best defense. To my untrained eye, UFS seems a lot about racing, and you'll be racing a car that will accelerate more the faster you go. Which is the main reason I'm wondering about the game.

Ofcourse UFS does have some 'face down' cards - it's the cards in hand that are the 'hidden' cards here.

I'm a bit discouraged by the comparisons with YuGiOh, though. The fact that that doesn't have a 'balancing' system makes it pretty crap to me. But UFS has the 'check values' to balance things out a bit.

Initially, UFS looked random to me, but you can 'load your dice' in this game, which is interesting to me. I wouldn't have pegged 'Deep and strategic' on it so far, as it has been described to me - What makes skilled players win more?

Just Doin' Work said:

You can see everything on the field, but you can't see everything in their hand. This is where the face down part of UFS comes in. What zone block do they have, what modifier, what action cards, etc.?

In Yugioh there is less strategy becuase you do get to see face down cards. basically, the large majority of cards that can be played in 'response' to opponent's effects come from face down on the field. So by the opponent laying traps you know that there are 'x' things you have to bait or deal with before you can have your way with them...

There is less knowledge in Yugioh, I will give you that. But just becuase it is harder playing with a blindfold doesn't mean it is more strategic... In fact, it is less strategic because all you have is mind games. You can't figure out the vast majoirty of things, it is 'trial and error' as opposed to a 'determined' strategy.

Chess is widely held as the base of strategic games, and trust me, playing it blindly would not make it more strategic, it would just make it more random.

What you can't see in UFS also comes from the control check factor, you can't see what is on top of your deck or your opponent's and you can't tell if you can play your own cards (and what will be ready, or in play on your side of the field once you do so).

And yet, you partially control what checks 'could' be on the top of your deck via deckbuilding...

UFS is rich with strategy and pinioned by an element of luck, I'm pretty sure you would be hard pressed to find someone playing at the top level who doesn't agree with this.

- dut

Marius said:

If there was a single answer I could give you that is ably shared, everyone would be hard pressed to find new ones (becuase then it would be a dice roll, everyone with the answer to what needs to be done to win).

In my opinion, the skilled UFS player manages the Ebb and Flow of the game and is able to capitalize on the opponent's situation in relation to his/her own. Being able to capitalize may come down to building a deck that can strike early, often, or whenever or it can mean building a deck that can live long enough to strike late, or simply outlast the opponent, strip him/her of all weapons and strike when victory is all but assured.

- dut

dutpotd said:

So, it would be fair to state that the majority of the skill goes into deckbuilding, not actually playing?

Marius said:

The opposite actually. From what I said - Ebb and Flow of the game - is a playing thing. Deckbuilding is where strategy starts, but not where it is executed.

- dut

Marius said:

For the "complete player" the skill starts with deck building, because if the build isn't any good, then there won't be much of a game to speak of. Not to be punny, but it's your foundation.

However if you give a player a phenominal deck, but they don't have the skill to pilot it, the deck also dies.

Antigoth said:

Not only that, but in UFS, decks tend to be extremely well-tailored to certain pilots. One man's deck definitely is his own, as no two players will play it exactly the same.

UFS has cards that are hidden in several forms.

The first are Cards in opponents hand.
> Blocks
> Action cards
> Anti-discard effects

The second are cards that are checked
> Yeah they've got some foundations out, and maybe you know you can push your attacks through, IF you can fricking make the control check for them. YOU DON'T KNOW THAT, so you have to plan for that accordingly.
> Often times things come up so that "Yeah ok... I'll take that gamble... he will only win if he can check a 6" after you kung fu training (an action card your OPPONENT DID NOT KNOW ABOUT) your attacks speed up... and lo and behold, he checks that 6 control, and OOPS there goes your kill!

The third are cards that are in his deck
> UFS YOU DRAW LOTS OF CARDS. You WILL be seeing a lot of these cards, and due to seeing these cards, you're sure that your OPPONENT will be breaking out his cards in his deck, where as in 'one card per turn' games, this is not the case, and you'll often NOT be seeing thsoe cards that one doesn't know about. This is about the same 'lack of information' threshold that YuGi has, so I'll just use it to seque in to the next piece:

UFS LETS YOU DRAW LOTS OF CARDS!
In one card per turn card games, you're makign the decision on one, maybe two cards to play / trigger. More at some points. In UFS you're playing MANY cards per turn, interacting with MANY cards in play (yeah you can see them, but player's choices to USE them or not is another thing entirely), and your OPPONENT may even be playing many cards ON YOUR TURN (which you DID NOT KNOW ABOUT).

So if you want 'hidden' information, yeah sure... UFS has some permanents that stick around for a while. but given all the other things you just DON'T KNOW ABOUT vs. YuGi's... what... ONE THING you don't know (trap cards)... yeah... I think the criticism is quite clear

(note: YuGi still plays nice and fine and all. just don't try to argue that its the 'better more strategic' game because of a fact that is easily disproven, as i have attempted to lay out above).

Game on! In the end its about having fun, ya know?