I wanted to find out about getting started in this game and I have a couple of questions on getting started.

First question is: as far as the "Trade-up promotion", can I send any deck of another CCG or do I send a tourney legal deck of any CCG I don't play anymore. ( I have a lot of old MTG cards and some are out of format and I didn't want to send one and get rejected. It'd be a waste of money and time.)

Second question is: I've heard alot about rotation of sets and I still didn't understand how do they rotate? Does this mean that certain card sets will become illegal after so long? I hate to have a good deck going and before I can get too far with it it becomes old and illegal.

Third and final question: I play Yu-Gi-Oh! (No I'm not one of those jerk players! I'm of the honorable bunch. I've even played over the phone against other YGO! players and never cheated. I play for fun not to win, it's a difference!!!) and I run into a lot of obnoxious and arrogant players who win mostly by over-powered cards and not by strategy. Is that a problem with UFS?

The reason I'm asking is because I'm taking a break from Yu-Gi-Oh! and hoping to find a better and hopefully, cheaper CCG to play. I'm looking to avoid those that are based on winning by having outrageously rare cards and super broken decks. I like for one's strategy to matter and not their collection. Also, I'm not trying to sound like a jerk or anything but FFG is an American based game and I figured by it being home based it wouldn't have as many issues as foreign based CCGs. I love Yu-Gi-Oh but I'm not a fan of all of the drama behind it so I hope that UFS is a little more fun. Perhaps fun enough for me to divorce all other CCGs and marry UFS. If I was based in Japan, sure I'd love YGO but I'm not and I hate looking at japan only cards that I can't play. It's a terrible tease. lol. Anyways I've pondered the idea of playing a Guile deck or a mix martial artist themed one. : )

there are people who play for win rather than fun in every game. It's sad.

As for your questions though... sorry, I'm no help.

Are you buying cards on a regular basis for a card game that you play?

Are you sick of a guy beating you over and over again with a group of cards that were released years ago and are almost impossible to get a hold of these days?

Then a a 'standard environment' is nothing to be upset about.

Yes, it does mean that every year some cards become 'illegal to play in a standard environment'. But by then you're probably been making decks with new cards any how. Sure, it means that for SOME games you'll have to put your deck that uses cards that were released some time during the neolithic era off to the side. But this is GOOD FOR THE HEALTH OF THE GAME (another reason being that new players, like yourself, have a chance to jump in and not be expected to have to find some uncommon from set 2 of the game just to begin to compete).

At local tournaments, I have seen all sorts of things win that aren't packing the 'power cards' (not always rares mind you). I've seen plenty of things lose that were expected to win (they WERE packing 'the power cards'). And its usually often. This is my experience.

Sure... if you go to the VERY BIG EVENTS the one's where people are really... REALLY really trying to win you'll encounter some rare cards that cost maybe 20 bucks each in some decks that are tough to get ahold of and are integral to that person's deck. But when the guy kicks your butt he's usually cordial about it (unless you were being a snot about it) and most of the time I've seen people offer deck help. Heck, Worlds (the big game) last year some newer player showed up and got some cards loaned to him for the event to play with. That's pretty impressively nice of the guy.

SO... yes rotation means some of your cards won't be officially legal in ONE format of playing the game. But there are many positives of that. And yes, some cards in thsi game are good, help people win, and are tougher to get a hold of than some other cards which may/or may not help them win as much as the former cards and may/may not be easier to get a hold of... This is pretty much a reality of most modern TCGs that last more than 2 years.

The promoton you're referring to: we have little detail. HOWEVER I'm sure if you mailed them, say, 60 (or whatever the deck size is for a given game) common cards from a game that are mostly crap and the deck is hardly functional at all, that FFG would probably not notice (I mea really... are they going to look through each of these decks and say "oh this deck isn't even playable! no deck for this guy!" and then lose a potential new player?!? NO!).

I'm going to send them one deck that's a real deck for a card game I think they should be aware of, and then some commons from another card game I have sitting around.

Cool!!! It took me a grip to think about it and like you said, it'd suck to have to battle broken cards from two years ago that are teamed up with more broken cards released recently. From what I've seen thus far, I don't see too many metagamers in this game. I mean the character selection is rather limited and you might face a mirror of your own deck. But, I bet you'd face a different version of the deck you have. Also the veteran players are very friendly. I like to how everyone likes to help out eachother yet are still competitive, just on a friendlier scale. When I started out in YGO! I got pencil whipped and cheated quite a bit when I began to do tourneys. Then I had to become a certified judge so I could learn how each card works so I could detect a cheater. It was too much of a headache! Thank you UFS. I still play YGO but I've found another CCG to fall in love with.

Charitsune welcome to the game and I also sent you an email look forward to hearing you from you .

Yeah... about cheating .... not cool, and not tolerated.

Regarding limited selection of characters and mirror matches - Not too much actually. There's a lot of characters, and you're mostly limited by your imagination.