Winning and Losing

April 15, 2014

I am going to start this article by saying none of this is meant to sound hateful or taking shots at people. All of this is strictly my opinion and how I view card games. If you agree with me then great, if you do not agree with me, then that is great as well. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I respect that and hope you do the same. Just because two people do not see eye to eye does not mean that one of them needs to force or convince the other that it’s their way or the highway. With that being said I hope you enjoy this article and you do not just write it off immediately if you disagree.

Kaijudo is a Trading Card Game. When playing a game there is a winner and a loser. There is no shame in winning or losing. You can’t win every match. It is your job as a player to play to the best of your ability and hope the outcome is in your favor. I always say it isn’t all about winning, but having fun, which is what I try to live by. That does not mean you shouldn’t try your best to win every game. It just means have fun while trying to win and if it does not work out, it isn’t the end of the world as long as you gave it your best while enjoying the match to the full potential. I started playing Kaijudo because it was the first card game I played in a while where I felt like there was a good back and forth game. You do not just draw your opening hand and realize the game was over. Every game in Kaijudo is a battle, there is hardly ever a time where you know you can just straight up win. At the last KMC I went to I started off 0-3. Does that make me a terrible player or make Kaijudo a bad game? Not at all. The games just did not go my way that day. Knowing that anyone can win on any day is important and very humbling to accept. If you put yourself or others on such a high pedestal where you think you/they cannot be beat, you only open up yourself for disappointment and anger. When you sit down across from someone and think to yourself that you already won/lost the match just based on who it is before the game even started is arrogant and flawed.

There is one person responsible for all of the victories and losses you have and that person is you. It does not matter who you playing against, if they have an invite or a flight to the Championship. They should be no different than any other opponent. Your goal in the tournament is to win, not to only win against certain people. As a player you should build your deck to defeat other decks and practice to make sure you can make the correct plays. If you want to get an invite, flight, or other prizes, all you need to do is win. Who you play against does not change the fact that you need to win in order to get those things. If you are in a KMC and you play against someone with a flight to the Championship already just think of it as practice. If you get your invite you might have to play them again at the Championship so take that match as to see what you might expect in the future. If a person with the invite was not at the tournament, you might have to play against someone just as good or even better anyway, you never know.

All you can do is control your match, not anyone else’s. It should not matter if other people are playing against friends or teammates and scooping or Intentionally Drawing because that has no effect on you winning that game you are in. If you focus on trying your best to defeat your opponent then what other people do will have no effect on you. I have gotten 9^th/10 twice this KMC season because I lost in the early rounds. Do I blame the people who intentionally drew that I didn’t make the top 8? Nope, it was my fault for not playing better in the earlier rounds which may have caused me to lose. After someone loses they go tell all their friends how they lost in game 3 and how they got so unlucky. Something I have been trying to do more is ask them what about the other game? Most of the time they can’t remember. It is best 2 out of 3 so you may get unlucky once, but there are still 2 more games you can use to make up for it.

I feel people with invites/flights to the Championship have every right to play in KMC’s. The main reason is because the invite and flight both pass down, so they aren’t taking any of that away from anyone. KMC’s are also competitive tournaments with great prizes. I feel that is wrong to deny someone who wants to spend $20 to win prizes to be shut out. Just because they have their invite doesn’t make it right to exclude them from winning boxes of product. Telling a fraction of the community that they can’t play in competitive tournaments only hurts the game. If you are trying to grow a game how is it productive to exclude people from tournaments?

To close with, there is always luck involved in every card game. This is the factor people dislike the most. The only thing you can do about it is try to prepare the best for it. When you lose strictly based on luck it can be very upsetting. You just have to accept it and move on. Dwelling on it only makes it worse. Before making a move think about doing the one that would leave your opponent open to the least amount of counters to it as possible. In the end if you are aiming to win a tournament, simply do your best to win it. As long as you did your best you should not have anything to complain about. Make all your moves count and please try your best to enjoy the tournament. If you are having fun, then your opponents will too.

Remember the Circuit Series comes to Richmond, VA on April 26-27, 2014! Click the picture below for all the details! Thanks for reading!