Antigoth said:

Hell, I'm tempted to return my Hugo deck to the All/Earth hybrid just because of that card. Also, the fact that Bitter Rivals targets more keywords means you can PROTECT the cards you want to use in the later turn by discarding attacks you don't really care about as opposed to ones with keywords.

Antigoth said:

I like you.

Immortal-JyNxX said:

True but still forcing them to call a zone if you have a big cyclone and rejection in hand will make them a sad panda.

kiit said:

SOOOO many useless cards at once. They hurt my eyes.

No one cares about: Double Gale Fist, Evil Illusion Slam, Raising Storm, The Evil Doer Destroyer, Pieces of Eight (IT ROTATES NOW), Shadow Exit (people SHOULD care), Breathern of the Coast (it ROTATES), Pieces of Eight form (ROTATES), Dark Chichiushi (crap cost for not worth effect, also UNIQUE and now a target for Bitter Rivals), Imeru Shikite (uh REVERSAL), rare Rera (only if your attack shares resources with Bitter Rivals), Bringing the Master to his Knees (First F, Breaker), Dan's Dragon Punch (really?), Darkness Blade (with a ready character, there's no way you can prevent Bitter from going off at least once), Great Gerdanheim (a 7-diff 5M attack needs to deal damage LOL change zones), Looks that Kill (LOL I won't block), Mega Spike (people are too busy Defender looping this one), Might Launcher (honestly? Well, first it doesn't commit the card. Secondly, no one uses it or cares to), Searching for a Place in the World (would only work if you get 4 momentum before they get a grand total of 5 foundations out), Roam the World (ROTATES), Trade your Passion for Glory (ROTATES), Self Sacrifice (uh good luck discarding enough cards and/or dealing damage), Start Over (ROTATES), Infiltrating (ROTATES), Begin Anew (no one cares but Ibuki, who will not see play because Suzaku is gone), Soul Absorbtion (also good luck with that one), Miser (ROTATES), Father Bull (only one character can use it), promo Nakoruru (also ROTATES), A Beautiful Nightmare (uh, no... terrible stats), Marksman (unless they decide to play something like The Tae Kwon Do Zephyr first, so Marksman becomes useless against it), committing it (Red Lotus says hi).

Wall of text right back at you.

Well, there's also supposed to be some anti-discard in general on the way, so that will likely help as well. I seriously doubt answers will be in short supply.

Of course, that doesn't change the fact that Bitter Rivals is a stupid card that should have never been printed, and as with any such card (Rejection, LotM, Owlface, BRT...) I'd be happy to see it go. But as always, with any of these redundant ban threads, it all goes back to that difference between whether you want to ban stupid cards that make the game unfun, versus banning only when absolutely necessary for high-level tournament balance. Although I can certainly understand the latter point of view, from a player-acquisition standpoint the former would be much better. (assuming we won't see anywhere near as many mistakes printed from now on, with James around and all) Considering that getting new players should be one of, if not the number one goal right now, I personally favor that option. But that isn't the track record, so I'm not going to get my hopes up -.-'

RUN MORE ATTACKS.

Jeez everyone compained that peopel dont run enough attacks, this comes along where a solid answer to bitter is to actually run more attacks to get throught he discard, and everyone loses thier mind.

I cant even begin to tell you how easy it is to prevent bitter rivals from really affecting you. BRT the thing if it gives you that many issues, Owlface it, begin anew. ANy number of cards deal with it on top of doing other desirable things, plus you can infact play around it by throwing your key word attack first, so on and so forth. It's also a 3/4 foundation so it should be powerful for thoes numbers.

I, for one, wouldnt mind if they brought back 'Stances' as a keyword. Each player only being allowed one Stance at a time. It'd work well for characters who are known for shifting stances in games, like Gen from SF or Siegfried from Soul Caliber. I rather like the changes beyond that.

As for Bitter Rivals. Two easy solutions...either dont run attacks with Keyword abilties (OMG ,there are attacks OTHER then Multiples or Throws?) or run muliple cards with those abilities to buffer the ones you want to keep in hand.

dshaffer said:

Exactly. Also, I would like Stance to make a comeback. I don't think it should be as drastic as terrain, though, but definitely something like you can only have one stance in a ready state.

*Sigh* I don't know why people are bring up ban threads. I am the last person you will see call for cards banning/Errata. In fact I think this is the first time that I have felt so strongly about it and the first time I have ever said that a card should be changed...

First off to the people saying to not run keywords...Wel that doesn't leave many options...Punch, Kick, Weapon...While I am aware that we haven't seen the new sets yet I know for a fact that there are now very few Kill conditions in B3 that cannot be touched by Bitter Rivals. My Top 3 fave Kill cards are now all discardable by Bitter. Spikes alwaysh as been but now Sardine Beach Speacial and High Plasma Beam as well? =/

I guess there is always Tiger Fury...

I still think something needs to change about Bitter. It basically goes against the new combo mechanic which I really would like if Bitter didn't exist...

Alsi I am quite aware about all the cards that can counter Bitter Rivals but as I said I don't care about those because I am not looking to get into a counter War...

As for Bitter Rivals. Two easy solutions...either dont run attacks with Keyword abilties (OMG ,there are attacks OTHER then Multiples or Throws?) or run muliple cards with those abilities to buffer the ones you want to keep in hand.

Haha that advice is just as bad as the people that told the Olcadon's complainers to not run bad foundations...

Bitter Rivals being a 3/4 with block does do a lot for what its worth. It reveals hands and changes zones or discard cards, plus it can be done repeatedly. Each of those 3 effects are in itself effective. Compared to other 3/4 foundations, it is very powerful. Other powerful 3/4 foundations like Chinese Boxing or Gorgeous Team, both having a higher block modifier, have a commit cost at least so they couldn't be done repeatedly. And there's many 3/4 foundations that would never see the light of day. So it is understandalbe for people wanting an errata and I do wish it were designed differently.

Regardless, there's a plethora of powerful cards in this game to watch out for that Bitter Rivals does not stick out among them (unless you're talking from a design point of view, then maybe I can see it that way). It can be dealt with, but the same can be said with many cards. But the question is whether you want to deal with powerful-card-to-be-dealt-with A or powerful-card-to-be-dealt-with B or powerful-card-to-be-dealt-with C and so on. There's only so much you can deal with, so it's just up to the player's judgement to figure what's most important. You can build a good competitive deck that just doesn't deal with Bitter Rivals well because many decks don't run the card or it's symbols, Order or Water decks are tough symbols to deal with. So would you want to build a deck to make sure you can deal with Bitter Rivals or cards commonly found in top Order and Water (or other symbols) decks.

And I'd difinately want to see stances in this game. Certain stances could probably make certain attacks three times more effective. I'm always for anything that encourages an action pack gameplay.

One Very useful way to negate the effectiveness of Bitter Rivals. Just Run Bitter Rivals Yourself!

That doesn't change ANYTHING. I have no problems with this zone changing effect. I have a problem with the fact that we just got 5 new keyword abilities tha it can discard.

I have never felt that there was anything wrong with Bitter since like you guys said it's a 3/4. Before these keywords were all added I had no problem with it at all. And while I do see why it was done and think that it was a good idea it just pushes Bitter a bit over the top IMO. I guess it's true that you have to be runnin those symbols to run it but I still think it's a bit much...

I guess ill just wait for the next set before I make any final judgements...

Sol Badguy said:

Honestly if your character has those symbols and you're not running Bitter Rivals, you better have a good excuse.

IF bitter rivals had been printed with a commit cost instead of being a free E (and i mean commit bitter rivals, not "commit 1 foundation") would people be satisfied? Would that be too much? Maybe if it was only playable on your or your opponents turn/attack?

then again, look at what happened to maternal instincts. not saying they should, but if bitter got an errata, it might make it go from being decent at release, to awesome with set 12, to unplayable with errata...

my first question is NOT should bitter rivals be errata'd to commit, but "what if" it would of been that way all along?

on a diffrent note to bitter rivals

nnnnnnnnnnnnnoooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

my lotus garden deck is never gowing to work now.

Smazzurco said:

I think it'd have seen play regardless, but much less than today where it's pretty much an auto-include in any All, Evil or Fire deck. It gives you one advantage, seeing your opponent's hand (at the cost of him seeing yours), and thus preparing the rest of your turn in consequence.

Homme Chapeau said:

just seems that at least if you had to commit it, it would be more balanced. Being able to use it on EVERY attack, wether on your turn or opponents, no matter who is attacking, is huge.

Homme Chapeau said:

You read my mind, Hatman. So at the beginning of your turn, you can only ready one of your stances. You can only ready a stance during your combat phase (using abilities) if all of your stances are committed.

Dshaffer, along with Gen and Siegfried, we need to remember all of the stance-based fighters coming out in Tekken 6, such as Ling Xiaoyu, Yoshimitsu, Kuma/Panda, Eddy Gordo/Christie Montero, and (most especially) Lei Wulong.

Lei's whole fighting style is based around stances. I would love to see a bunch of cheap assets and maybe a foundation with that keyword, a different continuous ability or free E on each one, and an additional bit of text on each: "You may ready one Stance card that has not been readied this Combat Phase." That text could be preceded by an " Lei Wulong F Commit:" or by " Lei Wulong R Commit: After the E on this card resolves," so that it works smoothly.

----------------------------------------------

As far as Bitter Rivals goes:

1) Some have pointed out that BR gets weaker, because you now have a greater choice in _which_ of your cards you discard to BR.

2) Some have pointed out that BR gets more powerful, because now you are forced to discard cards that wouldn't have been discarded before (especially when you only have 2-3 cards in hand, and your best blocks happened to have Ranged or Throw or Terrain or Unique).

In reality, both are true, but 2) is the stronger. BR gets MUCH more powerful, because:

Say you have 4 cards in hand on your opponent's turn. (That means you are playing a 7 HS-er and only played 3 cards last turn--yeah right--or have been using some card draw. This is an optimal position.) It is now much more likely that all (or at least 3) have keyword abilities. This means that Bitter Rivals' text essentially became the free E that Promo Ukyo had back in the day: make your opponent discard one card for every attack you play. It's actually worse, because Ukyo (as a character) was the only one you could have out. You can get out 4 BRs. Then it becomes a simple matter to discard the opponent's hand.

BR was always overpowered. Now it is more so. I see no reason to keep this card around. It makes the game less fun, and that's enough reason to get rid of it.

ARMed_PIrate said:

Before making these sweeping statements, can we just please wait until the entierty of set 12 is revealed.

The new rules don't go into effect until the cards from set 12 are legal.

So right now, Friday March 13, Bitter Rivals functions the same as it did yesterday, and the day before.

In block 3 there is approximately 900 cards currently available.

There is about to be a 30% increase in the card pool. So people are currently reacting without seeing all of the picture.

Antigoth said:

That's fair to ask of most; though in my case, I've been making the same sweeping statement (BR is overpowered and should go) since it was printed. And I really hate the "wait for fixes in later sets" policy on cards that are overpowered. I haven't seen it work in a smooth way yet, and it always leaves painful interrim time. (For BR, that painful interrim time is at least since it was printed through this April. If it doesn't get better with Set 12, that time will only be longer.)

interesting take on the combo keyword. I really didn't expect that approach but it does add interest to the game's system.

I do like the changes. The 2 things that stands out to me most while reading Jame's announcement was.. omg.. Bitter Rivals just got so much more powerful and the fact that the new watermark looks awesome.

This is a bit of a rehash, (sorry Steve if you read this thread ) but I think both sides of this BR business are just arguing against thin air. Whether or not there are enough answers to consider it "balanced" has absolutely nothing to do with the arguments posed by those in favor of action. And being unfun, or discouraging attack chains, or being overpowered in a vacuum has absolutely nothing to do with the arguments of those who think it's fine.

Are there answers to it? Plenty, with more certainly on the way in set 12 via text-blanking, commital, anti-discard, etc. Is it going to create an imbalanced environment at high-competetive levels? No, not at all. Most everyone will find some way to answer it, and although aggro decks will randomly lose games outright when they fail to find theirs, all in all it's not going to single-handedly destroy the health of the top-level metagame.

On the other hand, is it an overpowered card that never should have been printed? Absolutely. Answers or no, I'm quite sure we would find this in the early pages of FFG's binder of shame. Does it discourage attack chains, something that FFG wants to become the norm? Well, yeah. Unless you want to limit your options to roughly 1/3 of available attacks, (a *mostly* weaker 1/3 as *generally* keyword abilities make an attack better) an unanswered BR will usually keep you from playing more than maybe 2 attacks in a turn, especially considering they can make you discard an attack on each of their attacks if they like. Is that unfun for newer players, less high-powered playgroups, or any non-uber-spike? Most certainly.

(As an aside, I think the "if you don't like building all of your decks in fear of a few overpowered cards, UFS isn't your game so GTFO" argument should be wholly rejected. We need players a heck of a lot more than we need that mentality. I don't see anything wrong with thinking we should try not to scare people away -.-')

So really, the arguments made by both sides are more or less accurate. The disagreement lies in what consitutes a need for action. Do you only take action when absolutely necessary for the health of the high-level tournament metagame? Or do you take action in order to clean up blatant mistakes that make the game unfun for everyone else?

I think, perhaps, action is best left till there are acutal results to be looked at instead of speculation and to how it will affect us all.

How bout this. GO TRY THE NEW RULES. Then you know what. TRY THEM WITH THE NEW SET. Then we can revisit this.

Protoaddict said:

How about this even further : WE STILL HAVE NO IDEA ABOUT THE REST OF THE NEW RULES. So chill out guys and be happy Big Cyclone's 4 stars. "BITTER RIVALS? HM HM BETTER NOT SAY KEYWORD SON!"

OK my question is was does tiRa do? ppl keep talking about how cool she is and i have no idea what it is.

Secondly, since eveRyone else is tossing aRound opinions, i might as well too (i know, i know. im such a followeR.) bitteR Rivals is bRoken now. befoRe when my Reliable thRows weRe untouched, i felt at least i had a chance when i was playing chaRacteRs that couldnt Run bitteR Rivals. now im getting the same headache i got when i fiRst played against it duRing the prerelease of w/e set it came out in. all the stuff hata said made me happy. i like how all the keywords do something, minus punch, kick, and weapon. and seRiously, answeRs to pRoblem caRds DO NOT make them any less of a pRoblem. I hate when ppl tRy and use that aRguement. all it does is tuRn into what me and playgroup have dubbed the "Mr. Freeze vs. the Flash" debate.

Example:

Player A- Card X is broken.

Player B- well if i have caRd Y out, i can stop it.

Player A- well if i have caRd Z on the field, i can counter youR caRd Y.

if you couldnt tell, this is a neveR ending cycle. instead of coming up with answeRs to the pRoblem, tRy and see if the what is causing the pRoblem in the fiRst place should be allowed to stay in the current meta of the game. i dont mind if caRd gets banned and then is unbanned later on when the meta has changed and its power has been decreased. but as of Right now, bitteR Rivals does too much foR it's stats, and cost of the effect in my opinion.