Spotlight: Donald William Buckley

Fighter's Spotlight is an ongoing project concerned with tracking real-world professional cardfighters across the globe.

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Donald William Buckley

Age: 18
Titles Won: Los Angeles Regional Champion
Current Status: Los Angeles Regional Champion (Reigning)
Deck Type: Granblue
Donald William "Will" Buckley is the reigning Los Angeles regional champion, and the final entrant in the 2012 North American national championship. A stand-out fighter among the participants, he is mainly remembered for being one of three North American regional champions in that year to not run some variation of Gold Paladin or Narukami, the dominant clans of his day. This claim to fame was considered unbelievable at the time, and as a result of it and his inexperience in the tournament scene, some accusations of cheating emerged from online critics. Unlike with the previous cases of Kanamaru Makoto and Thomas Cassidy however, none of these accusations were ever substantiated with evidence or testimony, and Buckley remains a powerful reminder of the influence of individual skill and often-underestimated outlier decks in the pro scene.

Buckley did not participate in the National Championship finals, and was instead substituted for by third-place fighter Austin Pham¹.

Decks and Play Style
Buckley's Granblue deck draws from the limit break play style introduced for them in Breaker of Limits. The main concept of the deck is to use their most recent first vanguard Captain Nightkid, along with the older cards Chappie the Ghostie and Ruin Shade, to bring key cards into the drop zone for later use in conjunction with card skills. The deck's trigger base is almost entirely devoted to critical triggers; because of the deck's ability to instantly and unpreventably send any card to the drop zone with Chappie, draw support becomes less necessary as the main strategy revolves around that same zone, also where healed cards go during the drive or damage check of a heal trigger. Dancing Cutlass and Rough Seas Banshee also act as support against this lack of draw power, actually fueling one another by sending Banshee to the soul and then using her as fuel for Cutlass.

The deck's key drop zone cards are Ice Prison Necromancer, Cocytus and the Deadly series of cards--Nightmare, Spirit and Swordmaster. The two skills complement one another, as when one is not available due to its restrictions, the other is. Cocytus' skill is activated by riding Skeleton Demon World Knight and discarding a Granblue, then riding Cocytus from the drop zone, but this can only be done when the opponent has a grade 3 or greater vanguard and only at the beginning of the ride phase, meaning it can be only used on the turn after it is ridden. So while it does not steal out the first turn advantage from them, it can ensure security and provide a powerful unit to make comebacks with. At more opportune times, Buckley can turn to the Deadly cards instead.

Nightmare and Spirit appear from the drop zone to the rearguard by soulblasting 2 and retiring a grade 1 or greater Granblue rearguard. This again plays into the soul provided by Rough Seas Banshee, as with even one copy of her in the soul after Nightkid's skill, both units can be superior called. While they do not allow for direct card advantage, there is no way to remove them from the game since they can simply appear from the drop zone if retired, and the two cards together form a base 16000 line for combating both the popular Garmore and Spectral Duke Dragon decks of that tournament season. Furthermore, when Nightmare and Spirit are both on the field, they can be retired at no other cost to superior ride Deadly Swordmaster from the drop zone if Buckley has a grade 2 or greater vanguard, providing another way of fighting and directly taking the lead when Cocytus would otherwise be unavailable or inappropriate.

Since Swordmaster himself is a base 11000 unit, it takes greater resources to assail him, and his defense puts strain on other cardfighters. Meanwhile Cocytus provides +5000 power at limit break 4, breaking the 21000+ line easily with twelve of Buckley's fourteen grade 1s, and on-ride he can counterblast 2 to superior call a unit from the drop zone--also opening up a combo with Demon World Knight by calling the unit that Knight dropped to the field.

The deck's name is a carryover from Buckley's experience with the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game, being named after the Infernities deck archetype; said archetype was a very dominant deck in 2010, thus the joke is that "Infernities topped" in Los Angeles. It was named alongside his friends, who similarly patterned their deck names after Yu-Gi-Oh! as "Wind-Ups" and "Madolches."

Summer 2012 Regional Tournament, Los Angeles: Infernity
Card Pool: TD01-BT03, BT06-BT07
Grade 0
x2 Chappie the Ghostie
x4 Knight Spirit CT
x4 Rough Seas Banshee CT
x1 Captain Nightkid (FVG)
x4 Ghoul Cannonball CT
x4 Doctor Rouge HT
Grade 1
x4 Gust Jinn
x2 Dancing Cutlass
x4 Samurai Spirit
x4 Deadly Nightmare
Grade 2
x4 Ruin Shade
x2 Skeleton Demon World Knight
x4 Deadly Spirit
Grade 3
x4 Ice Prison Necromancer, Cocytus
x3 Deadly Swordmaster

Citations and External Links
1. "[Press Release] Top Four Cardfight!! Vanguard North American Finalists Heading to Japan to Compete in World Championship 2012." Official Cardfight!! Vanguard USA. Bushiroad, 6 Nov. 2012. Web. 15 Nov. 2012. <http://www.facebook.com/notes/official-cardfight-vanguard-usa/press-release-top-four-cardfight-vanguard-north-american-finalists-heading-to-ja/363826427040389>.

News: Cardfight!! Vanguard 3DS

To much applause yesterday, subscribers to the video game magazine Famitsu were revealed an up-and-coming Spring 2013 3DS title, Cardfight!! Vanguard Ride to Victory. The game is being developed by FuRyu, previously known for the Tsukumonogatari PSP visual novel-RPG hybrid and the 3DS/PSP dungeon crawler Unchained Blades, and will be retailing for 5229 yen, about 66.82 USD. While information is scarce at this time and the game is allegedly only at 40% completion, it is currently known that it will recreate the experience of playing the tabletop game, but on a handheld console. If and how this will take advantage of the 3DS' glasses-free 3D is unknown at this time, but the announcement is drumming much excitement from fans. As Cardfight's publisher, Bushiroad Inc., has had its hands in the video game market since before they turned their eyes to producing the CFV franchise, many have been waiting for this announcement since the anime debuted in January of last year.

While there are many questions in the air as to how the title will be executed, already we do have some answers. The game is to feature its own original storyline, but still based on the anime series, with the protagonist seeking to challenge Japan's fictitious pro scene and fight for the national title. Aichi, Ren, Kai, Shin, Misaki and Kamui have all been confirmed through screenshots or scans to be making appearances, but their exact role at this time is uncertain. Players will be able to use points earned in the game's story mode and free play to buy cards from the in-game Card Capital to modify their decks.

The current phase "battle phase" and inside of it "attack step" is listed in katakana at the top left; current number of cards remaining in deck, number of cards in the hand, cards in soul, and available counterblast are at the top right alongside a fighter's portrait. This setup is mirrored for the bottom left. Note that despite the season 1-inspired plot, Aichi is wearing his Circuit-era outfit. This pattern is likewise true for the remaining cast. Assuming that this screenshot comes from the 3DS' top screen, the hand seems to be shown on the bottom.

Other confirmed details are that the in-game shop will sell booster packs directly patterned off of their real-world equivalents. Noticeably, none of the screenshots or magazine reveals so far have shown any cards from after TD07; due to the game being less than halfway complete, it may be speculated that cards from BT07-08 will be included in the final product, depending on its date of release. Additionally, magazine scans appear to reveal a new, original character not present in the existing continuities.

This character may be a protagonist to embody the player in the game, if Aichi himself is not the protagonist.

While these initial shots look promising, there are many predecessors in the genre already pinning the fledgling game's shadow. As early as 1997 MicroProse's Magic: the Gathering had recreated the earliest TCG in computer form, boasting free character customization, accurate recreation of gameplay and an expansive overworld to explore. Hudson Soft's 1998 Pokémon: Trading Card Game featured similar depth of innovation by converting the experience into a portable game accessible to a broader age range, taking advantage of the programmed environment to include cards that did not exist in the real world. In 1999 Konami completed this early triumvirate of VTCGs with the last entry of the "Big 3," Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories, a PlayStation release frequently criticized for its inaccurate gameplay but lauded for its detailed graphical presentation--more akin to a visual novel than a VTCG as was established then--and for taking its own direction with an at-the-time incomplete storyline. Ride to Victory appears to follow a middle ground between the Memories and Pokémon patterns that were previously used in the Tag Force games, not sewing its plot from wholecloth but instead providing a different adaptation of a past storyline.

Aside from these early forerunners, Japan's domestic VTCG market is already flooded by purely virtual innovations based out of arcades that deal real trading cards for use with scan machines (Monster Battle Road, Mushiking et al.), and nearly as many handheld Yu-Gi-Oh! releases as Street Fighter II remakes. Despite the small amount of information presently available, there are already many expectations riding on Ride to Victory, and challenges that it must overcome in the highly competitive environments both domestically and abroad. Given how Bushiroad has handled similar challenges facing both its real TCG and the anime, the future is nonetheless looking bright for Victory.

In other news, a second Big Vanguard Fest event was announced for 2013. This event will take place on from 27 April to 28 April, in the same two-day style as the 2012 Fest.