Legion and the State of Vanguard - My Thoughts

We've entered a new season.  We have a new mechanic.  Obligatory cries of "overpowered" and "I'm going to quit!" everywhere.  People judging the mechanic before thinking about it, trying it out, or extensively testing it, well, this is the norm for our community.

This reminds me of the release of the break ride mechanic in season 3 and the limit break mechanic in season 2 (of which the ending season 1 decks were still superior to literally all of the season 2 decks, so the community was wrong in this regard).  Each iteration had an outcry with it that made the community rise up in anger over the power creep.  Season 1 exclusive decks, barring crossride DOtE, haven't been viable in ages.  Season 2 exclusive decks couldn't hold a candle to set 12+ power creep, and struggled against sets 10 and 11.  Legion has given us a viable alternative to break riding and the Link Joker/Restander dominated meta while making a huge fix to the poor natural balance of the game.

Here's where I'm going to start off.  I am extremely happy with Legion as a mechanic.  Is it a toxic amount of power?  Sure.  They've essentially made every vanguard Amon with a second ability.  That's pretty damn strong, I'm not going to lie to you.  But it's a healthy amount of power, currently.  If these units didn't have this much power, the only units we'd even remotely care about that have been released would be Brawler, Bigbang Knuckle Dragon (Attacks all front row units for 2 counterblasts, essentially balances out Vermillion's skill with the current 1 counterblast for a +1 solidified in set 14) and Brawler, Wild Rush Dragon, who gets 10k and a crit if he checks himself or his mate.

People will argue that the Dimension Police unit negging perfect guards would be up there, but without the large base power of the Legion, it won't be strong enough to make a major impact compared to the already superior Echo of Nemesis, which can have a Doreen boost essentially making the attack unblockable.

So, the power is a necessity to give these cards weaker effects in comparison to the extremely undercosted units of the past 3 sets to make them playable.  Let's discuss the other two facets of Legion.  Returning triggers to the deck, and the grade 3 requirements for Legioning in the first place.

How much does returning triggers to the deck actually help?  Well, not that much.  Unless you legion multiple times in a match, the actual impact will be small on your trigger checking likelihood.  This is due partly from damage checked triggers being unrecoverable without healing/being Angel Feathers.  The other part of it is that you just aren't likely to have 4 triggers in the drop zone to legion.  Typically, you'll be tossing 2-3 triggers and 1-2 non-triggers back into the deck.  You're only increasing your odds to hit a trigger by roughly 3-4% on average per drive check, and 5-7% on Twin-Drive!!.  It'll make a difference over a large number of playtests, but it's not significant enough to make an impact on most games.  It's handy, but by no means the end of the world in terms of brokenness or consistency.  CEO Amaterasu's ability increases the odds of hitting a trigger on a twin-drive by 15%, for comparison.  That's twice as much.

The final thing I want to discuss is the Legioning mechanic's requirement of a grade 3 Vanguard and why I feel that this is one of the best things that's happened for the game.  I don't know if Bushiroad has noticed, but in this game going first is extremely advantageous.  Most players will inherently pick up on it, others need to be told outright.

Here's a list of advantages to going first:

No passing a 7k Vanguard + 5k starter boost with a 10k shield if you land a ride chain/ride a vanilla.

12k beaters forcing 10k unboosted from your opponent.  They also don't get negated by a single damage trigger while unboosted.  And if they're boosted, even if your opponent is grade 2, it's still 15k shield.  (I would like 12k beaters to be errata'd to require a grade 3, like they were originally, but it's too late for that).

You get the first damage, so you get to have only one check (first damage check) where a heal can't go live.  The player going second can't heal on first drive check or first damage check.  Add more to that list if they call a second rear guard or hit a critical trigger.

You get Twin-Drive!! first unless your opponent superior rides, which always cost more than simply riding to grade 3 to negate their own advantages.  This plays into the next one.

First player has the first opportunity to break ride.  The first opportunity to crossride.  The first opportunity to ride to grade 4.

You always have one more card than your opponent, save the end of their turn.  But, you immediately draw after their turn ends, and they can't utilize any of the cards in their hand as a resource, barring some extremely outlying examples.  So there isn't an instance where them overtaking you in card advantage actually has an impact until you catch right back up and have the lead until it no longer matters again.  Let's compare:

Starting out, 5-5
Go first, 6-5.
Opponent's turn, 6-6, attack, 6-7.
Your second turn, 7-7
Attack, 8-7
Their second turn, 8-8
Attack, 8-9
Your third turn, 9-9
Attack, 11-9
Their fourth turn, 11-10 (they now have the permanent card deficit)
Their attack, 11-12 (they gain it back in twin-drive, but don't get to use it at all before...)
Your fifth turn, 12-12 (you have as many cards as them before attacking that you have full, main phase access to)
Attack, 14-12 (Now you're way ahead)
Their turn, 14-13 (They're sitting a card behind that they can actually play)
They attack, 14-15 (They pass you just long enough for you to overtake them again where the situation of them having the card lead still doesn't matter because you draw before they can use any of their new cards)

As you can see, going first allows you to field more units.  You simply have more cards to play during your main phase.  It gives you ease of early guarding.  Total advantage over early healing.  You get your Twin-Drive!! a turn sooner, giving you an extra potential trigger over the opponent.  Your rear guards are harder for them to guard.  You can fend off their rear guards more easily with your higher base-power units in comparison to their lower base power units on defense.  You gain the "one-card" advantage in late game, post turn 4.  You have the raw unit power, healing, and drive checking advantages early.

The advantages to going first are simply overwhelming in comparison to the advantages of going second, which is a 2% less chance to be gradelocked, and access to cards that require an opponent to have grade 2+ units a turn earlier (Pellinore).  Yay?

Legion forces the individual who goes first to wait a full turn before Legioning.  This means player 2 has dibs on Legioning first.  While I don't think this is the do-all, end-all for rebalancing this game's poorly balanced turn system, it is definitely a start.  One that I look forward to.