All In!

Hello, Hello, ladies and gentlemen.

The day is September 30th, 2011, and it is time for another episode of SO IMBA!, where We learn how to be a better Card Fighter.

I am Rauzes, and today, we discuss All Ins.

In Vanguard, there are advantages to keeping cards in your hand, namely, to use for guarding.

In most games, you usually want to put out a maximum of two cards per turn, keeping the rest for future turns, and for guarding.

An All-In is when you forsake all guarding, and instead throw down all or most of your cards in your hand, in an effort to push for major damage.

The most common time you see this happening is when you both are at 5 damage, low on cards, and are trying to end the game in one or two turns.

In Other words, you know that you have no other option, and if you cannot beat the opponent this turn, you will lose (unless you hit double heal trigger or something.), because you have no more cards to save yourself...

And, although you are telegraphing your state to your opponent, meaning they know they almost have the game,

They are also forced to throw the maximum amount of guard, as one trigger can and probably will give you the game, in an attempt to survive until the next turn.


But, nobody ever said this is the best timing for an all-in.

Another good timing to throw an All-In is when the opponent still has very few cards, as they didnt have enough time to build up their army with Twin Drive: In the very early game.

If you went first, you will ideally reach grade 3 earlier, giving you one attack with grade 3 against a grade 2.

Grade 2s tend to be weaker and easier to hit, and hence harder to guard.

Additionally, the opponent, at this stage, will only have 9 Cards total... Of which 1 was used to ride to grade 1, and the other used to grade 2...

Thats 7 Cards to guard against a full force attack, if they did not call anything to attack you with.

Although the opponent will have at most 2 damage at this state, so they can ideally just take damage from every attack you throw at them.

But if you are playing a high critical deck, a multi stand deck, or a special call deck like Palemoon or Spike Brothers, which can throw at most 6-7 attacks per turn...

Although the first few attacks will go through, as early game at this stage means the enemy can simply take the damage, instead of wasting a bunch of cards guarding.(This actually means you can get away with attacking with smaller units!), the later attacks, especially the ones coming from Asura Kaiser Stand, or Spike Brothers special Call, will all probally be guarded

They are forced to guard, using cards that SHOULD be in their hand, to call and attack you the next turn!

Meaning not only do you throw the enemy into a highly defensive position, unable to push out, they will have nothing to push out with as well!

I mentioned before that at that point in the game, the enemy should only have about 9 cards.

Deck balance wise, that's statistically 2 10k Guards, 1 or 2 Grade 3s(Cannot Guard), and the rest 5k Guards.

For the amount of guard available to guard, yes, they will survive...

But at what cost?

By giving up their 5k Guards, they are sacrificing powerful fighting forces in an attempt to stay alive at about 4 Damage.

Therefore, the actual aim of the early all-in is not really to try to end the game, but to force many guards from the enemy, leaving you in a much more stable state.

Just watch out for cards like Blaster Blade or Berserk Dragon on the return turn.


This is Rauzes,

And you are reading SO IMBA!, where we learn how to be a better card fighter.

Tomorrow, we talk Splitting Critical Triggers.