Duelists of the Friendship Cup
Monster Tamer – Fluttershy vs Sour Sweet (Part 2)
-Fluttershy Life Points: 900-
-Sour Sweet Life Points: 2200-
Sour Sweet drew with a growl and a glare. “My move!” She looked at her drawn card, slipped it into her hand, and pulled out another. “I summon ‘Amazoness Sage’.” A woman with a pale beige cloak and blue hair materialized in front of Sour Sweet, a wooden staff adorned with animal teeth in her hand (1400 → 1600/700).
Sour Sweet pointed. “I switch my Amazoness Princess to attack mode. And now, Amazoness Queen attacks Ronin Raccoon Sandayu!” The Queen hefted her sword and hurled it across the field.
“I reveal my Trap card ‘Draining Shield’!” Ronin Raccoon held up its arm and a glowing disk appeared over it, projecting a barrier of green energy around it. “Your attack is negated and I recover Life Points equal to your monster’s attack points!” The sword hit the green barrier and shattered into sparkles that kept going and washed over Fluttershy.
-Fluttershy Life Points: 2500-
Rainbow Dash pumped her fist. “She took the lead!”
“Not for long!” Sour Sweet snapped. “Amazoness Sage, attack the samurai!” The sage raised her staff and shot a beam of yellow light. Ronin Raccoon endured the hit, its heels digging into the ground.
-Fluttershy Life Points: 1900-
“Since Amazoness Sage attacked, her effect activates, letting me destroy a Spell or Trap on your side of the field. I choose Roaring Earth!” The sage chanted and sent a rippling wave of magic from her staff. Roaring Earth shuddered and shattered.
“Next, Amazoness Princess attacks Ronin Raccoon. This also activates her effect, summoning an Amazoness monster from the deck in defense mode. I call out ‘Amazoness Fighter’.” A particularly muscled woman in furred green armor rose from the ground, pounding a fist into her palm (1500 → 1700/1300).
Amazoness Princess hefted her spear and threw it, the blade piercing Ronin Raccoon’s armor.
-Fluttershy Life Points: 1500-
“I set a card and end my turn.” A face-down card materialized in front of Amazoness Queen’s throne. Sour Sweet crossed her arms. “Make your move.”
“I will.” Fluttershy drew and held her hand towards Cat Shark. “I’ll begin by activating Cat Shark’s special ability. I detach its Xyz material to grant Cat Shark double the stats this turn.” The feline fish puffed up as a blue aura lit over it (500 → 1000). “Then I use the Spell card ‘Pot of Avarice’. I return my two Nimble Beavers, Mogmole, Hane-Hane, and Baby Raccoon Ponpoko to my deck, and draw two cards.”
Fluttershy looked at her new cards and held out another. “I activate the Spell card ‘Cross Breed’. I banish Ronin Raccoon Sandayu from my field and ‘Dark Desertapir’ from my hand. Since these two monsters have the same Type and Attribute, a monster with those same stats can be added to my hand. I choose ‘Chow Chow Chan’.”
As Ronin Raccoon dissolved, a ghostly black tapir appeared behind Fluttershy. “Banishing Dark Desertapir triggers its effect, reviving a Beast monster in the Graveyard. I revive my Baby Raccoon Tantan in defense mode. Then, I overlay Baby Raccoon Tantan and Catnipped Kitty! Using my two Level 2 Beast monsters, I construct the overlay network!”
Fluttershy put her hand over her duel disk as her two monsters turned transparent and slid together. “I unite the powers of the raccoon and the cat, to summon a brave new animal guardian!” She held out her card. “Xyz Summon! I call forth another Rank 2 Number 64: Ronin Raccoon Sandayu, in defense mode!” Another samurai jumped out of the portal, twirling its spear and stabbing it into the ground when it landed.
“I activate Ronin Raccoon’s ability, and detach one of its Xyz Materials to summon a Kagemusha Samurai Token with attack power equal to the strongest monster on the field. Right now that’s my current Token, so I get a second copy.” The ghostly red image of the Kagemusha Samurai lit up and split into two (2600/0).
“And now, to attack.” Fluttershy drew back her hand.
Sour Sweet sneered. “Yeah, not yet, you don’t. I reveal my face-down card ‘Amazoness Shamanism!” Glowing magical glyphs appeared under each of Sour Sweet’s monsters. “First, every monster I control is destroyed. Then, for each of them, I can revive an Amazoness monster from my Graveyard in defense position.” Sour Sweet’s four monsters lit up and exploded in showers of green magical sparks. “I destroy my four monsters, and revive in their places Amazoness Sage, Amazoness Fighter, Amazoness Princess, and Amazoness Baby Tiger.
“Summoning Amazoness Princess activates her effect, letting me add Amazoness Call from my deck to my hand.” Light shone from the Graveyard on Sour Sweet’s duel disk. “Also, now that an Amazoness monster has been destroyed, the effect of Amazoness Village activates, letting me summon an Amazoness from my deck with a Level equal or lower than that destroyed monster. I’ll target Amazoness Queen as the monster that was destroyed, and summon a second Amazoness Queen!”
Amazoness Queen materialized in her throne, her sword between her legs. In a row in front of her, Amazoness Sage, Princess, and Fighter, kneeled with their arms crossed over their chests. At the end of the row lay a small tiger with a ring on its tail (500/500). Sour Sweet grinned. “Go ahead, attack all you like. I just hope you remember my Amazoness Queen’s effect.”
“I do.” Fluttershy frowned and looked at her hand. “I can’t deal any damage to you now, but I won’t let you damage me, either.” She took a card from her hand and held it up. “I activate the Spell card ‘Swords of Revealing Light’!” Gleaming swords of pale yellow energy rained down from the sky, stabbing the ground around Sour Sweet’s monsters.
“This card remains in play for three turns, and for those three turns you’re forbidden from attacking me. With that done I end my turn.”
Sour Sweet’s duel disk beeped and ejected the card for her draw. She picked it up and looked back at Fluttershy. “Ya know, I hate to admit it, but you’ve been one of the most annoyingly persistent opponents I’ve had in a long time.” She smirked and shook her head. “I never would have expected a duel this interesting from a Canterlot student, of all people. You’ve really put on an impressive duel today.”
Fluttershy slowly smiled. “You really mean that?”
“Nah.” Sour Sweet’s smirk turned into a vicious grin. “I’m just screwin’ with ya.” She drew her hand back and slotted a card into her duel disk. “I activate the Spell card ‘Fusion Recovery’ and return Polymerization and Amazoness Swords Woman in my Graveyard to my hand, and then activate Polymerization!”
A sparking purple vortex appeared behind Sour Sweet. “I treat my Amazoness Baby Tiger as ‘Amazoness Tiger’ and fuse it with my Amazoness Fighter!” The two monsters flickered and were drawn up into the vortex.
Sour Sweet held her hand up. “Prince of the jungle and brawler of hunters, combine your ferocity and strength and awaken the predator that even hunters fear!” Her card ejected from her duel disk and she snatched it up to slap it on her duel disk. “I Fusion Summon ‘Amazoness Pet Liger’!”
A pillar of dark red light burst out of the trees behind the Amazoness Village. The earth shook and the trees parted, revealing a massive liger, pale beige with black stripes. Armor plating with spikes covered its shoulders, gleaming blue against the dark orange of its mane. It prowled up next to Sour Sweet, glaring at Fluttershy with one red eye, the other closed by a jagged scar, and roared at her (2500 → 2700/2400).
“Isn’t he something?” Sour Sweet smiled and patted the monster on one of its armored portions. “He isn’t as cuddly as your little runts, but I think he makes up for it with brutality. You should also know he’s quite protective of his Amazon trainers. You see, as long as Amazoness Pet Liger is in play, you’re forbidden from attacking any Amazoness monsters except for my liger.”
Sour Sweet held up another card. “I activate Amazoness Call now, and add from my deck to my hand ‘Amazoness Archers’. Then, I set two cards and end my turn.” The card backs shimmered in front of Sour Sweet.
Fluttershy tensed. “I know what you’re trying to do.”
“Oh?” Sour Sweet batted her eyes. “Do tell.”
“One of those facedown cards is Amazoness Archers. If I try to attack, you’ll use it to lower the power of my monsters and force them to attack you. The only target they can attack is your Liger, and Amazoness Queen would prevent my stronger monsters from destroying it, so it could crush my weaker ones.” Fluttershy shook her head. “If I were to try and attack, I’d lose this duel.”
“Bingo.” Sour Sweet smirked. “Care to try it and test that?”
“No. But I think I know a flaw in your plan.” Fluttershy drew her card and looked down at it. “You only have one copy of Amazoness Archers, because if you had drawn another copy before now, you would have used it already. You might have drawn a second copy last turn. But you would also have used Fusion Recovery before if you had it, so you probably drew that.” She smiled confidently. “One of those facedown cards is Amazoness Archers, and the other is a bluff!”
Rainbow Dash cheered. “That’s my girl!”
Rarity nodded. “She’s followed the game perfectly to deduce such a trick.”
“Well, whoop-dee-doo.” Sour Sweet scowled. “Aren’t we so clever? So what, it doesn’t matter if you know or not, the card is still there, ready and waiting.”
“Actually, it does.” Fluttershy placed her card on her duel disk. “First, I activate the Spell card ‘The Big March of Animals’!” The field shook as auras of green light lit up over her cards. “With this card, for every Beast-type monster I control, all my Beasts gain 200 attack points!”
“Nice one!” Applejack called.
The Kagemusha Samurai Tokens grew larger and their katanas longer (2600 → 3400), Ronin Raccoon’s polearm got a larger blade (1000 → 1800), and Cat Shark’s fins grew longer and sprouted claws (500 → 1300).
“So you powered them up, big deal.” Sour Sweet shrugged.
“It is, because now, my Kagemusha Samurai Tokens have enough power to take the lead in this duel!” Fluttershy pointed. “Kagemusha Samurai Token, attack and destroy Amazoness Pet Liger!” The ghostly red warrior drew its katana and charged.
Sour Sweet sneered. “You idiot! I activate the Trap card ‘Amazoness Archers’!” The card flipped up and lit up red. “This saps the attack power of all your monsters by 500 points, and forces them to attack!”
“I don’t think so!” Fluttershy called back, holding up a card. “From my hand I activate the effect of Chow Chow Chan!” A small dog wearing a red kimono appeared in front of Sour Sweet and pounced on the hologram of Amazoness Archers, forcing it back down. “By discarding Chow Chow Chan when you active a Trap while I attack, that Trap is negated!”
Sour Sweet gaped. “No!” Amazoness Archers exploded and Chow Chow Chan faded away.
“And now my attack continues safely.” Fluttershy smiled. The Samurai Token reached Amazoness Liger and raised its katana over its head.
Sour Sweet’s expression of shock suddenly turned into a sneer. “One tiny little flaw in your deduction, by the way. My second facedown isn’t Amazoness Archers. But it isn’t a bluff, either!” She reached to her duel disk and tapped the screen, the card flipping over and rising into the air. “I activate ‘Trap of Darkness’!”
The front of the card shimmered and clouded over in dark purple mist. “This card lets me pay a thousand Life Points, and then I can copy the effects of a Trap card in my Graveyard.” Sour Sweet laughed. “Guess which one?”
Fluttershy’s eyes widened. “Oh no.”
“Oh yes!”
The clouds on the front of Trap of Darkness cleared, revealing Amazoness Archers. The card lit up and shot out a flurry of arrows, striking Fluttershy’s monsters. As they growled in pain from the arrows, their eyes began to pulse red.
Sour Sweet crossed her arms. “So much for your attack.”
The Kagemusha Samurai Token (3400 → 2900) stumbled to its knees at the arrows and swung its katana into the Liger’s paw. Amazoness Liger snapped its paw up and flung the Token away.
-Sour Sweet Life Points: 1000-
The red-eyed animals on Fluttershy’s field began to creep forward, eyeing Amazoness Liger. Fluttershy bit her lip and stepped back. “It didn’t matter which card I tried to destroy. You tricked me…”
“Welcome to the big leagues. Now, where were we? Ah, yes, I think you have another attack or three to declare.”
Fluttershy looked down and whimpered at the glowing eyes of her monsters. She sank to her knees swallowed heavily. “I… I attack Amazoness Pet Liger with my other monsters.” As soon as she finished, the horde ran forward.
The second Kagemusha Samurai Token reached the Liger and stabbed its shoulder. The katana glanced off its armor and the Liger knocked it back.
Sour Sweet Life Points: 800-
Ronin Raccoon (1800 → 1300) jumped up and descended with its polearm. The Liger glared up at it and rose on its hind legs to swat it to the ground, keeping its paw on the raccoon to slam it into the dirt.
-Fluttershy Life Points: 100-
Cat Shark ran up to the Liger’s paw and jumped to bit into it. The Liger lifted its limb to glare at the cat hanging off of it by its teeth.
Sour Sweet smirked. “And this is how our duel ends; with a whimper.”
With a growl, the Liger stomped its paw, shattering Cat Shark.
-Fluttershy Life Points: 0-
Radiant Hope raised the microphone to her lips. “The first duel of the Friendship Cup is decided! The winner is Crystal Prep Academy’s Sour Sweet!” On the projection of the tournament standings, Fluttershy’s portrait greyed out and receded back into the row of Canterlot High duelists, while Sour Sweet’s lit up purple in its row.
“As if there was any doubt?” Sour Sweet gathered her cards from her duel disk and snorted. “I’m just annoyed it took so long.” She tossed her hair and marched back to the Crystal Prep bench, crossing her legs.
On the field, Fluttershy slowly pushed herself to her feet, she turned off her duel disk and began to extract her cards from it.
“You rock, Fluttershy!”
The cheer from the crowd drew her attention. The assembled CHS students cheered and clapped again, shouts of encouragement and congratulations among them. Fluttershy, her face red, bowed and hurried over to the bench where her friends were on their feet.
“Ya did good, hun,” Applejack said, nodding.
“Yeah, you whooped butt!” Pinkie chimed in.
“Thanks. I did my best.” Fluttershy put a hand on her chest. “I’m sorry I couldn’t win.”
“Don’t be.” Rainbow shook her head. “It’s one duel out of seven. We’re still in this.”
Before Sunset could add her compliments to the conversation, Hope spoke again.
“We will now choose the opponents for the next round. After the second duel there will be a brief intermission before continuing with the third duel.”
On the display the rows of students began to blink again, blue and purple cursors highlighting a portrait and enlarging it before moving on. After several seconds the cursors stopped and the portraits grew to encompass the screen.
“Our next duel is decided! Canterlot High’s Jacklyn Apple will face Crystal Prep’s Sugarcoat!”
The students clapped politely. Applejack adjusted her hat and raised her duel disk. “Well, that’s mah cue.” She nodded at the group and walked onto the field.
On the Crystal Prep bench, Sugarcoat stood and followed Applejack. When Applejack stopped at her side of the field, Sugarcoat paused next to her and turned her head. “I heard you’re one of the best duelists at this school.”
Applejack nodded. “That’s right.”
“What’s your record?”
“From the last semester? 39-4.”
“Hmph.” Sugarcoat pursed her lip. “You’ll do.” She turned forward and continued to her side of the field, swiftly spinning to face Applejack.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Applejack called, glaring.
“I would have preferred to face Sunset Shimmer. She seems the one of you most likely to pose a challenge for us. But your record is adequate enough.” Sugarcoat raised her arm in front of her. “I’d prefer you at least make me exert effort to win. I have no patience for unfulfilling duels.”
Applejack’s glare turned into a small smile. “Well then, ya came to the right girl. I’m gonna give ya a duel ya won’t soon forget!”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” Sugarcoat pressed the button to activate her duel disk, the device projecting a card tray of pale purple light. Applejack activated her own disk and her tray swung outward and lit up.
“And now let the second duel begin!”
Fluttershy was so close! I hate it when bullies win. I hope Applejack has better luck against Sugarcoat.
9143578
Fluttershy did her best, I give her an A for effort. now, let's see if Applejack can beat the glasses of Sugarcoat.
Sour pulled that out by the skin of her teeth, and she knows it. Looking forward to the next duel.
Interesting, can't wait for the next duel!
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She likely does. That's why she's so upset despite her victory.
Fluttershy was so close! Great end to the battle though.
Hey, first time commenting on Fimfiction at all. Though I've been following this story since just about its inception, after reading Duelist of the Awesome Crown.
Let me go on record as saying I love this fic and DOTAC, warts and all. In combining a good franchise (Pony) with one that I enjoy even though I'll freely admit it's junk food, they, mostly, capture the essence of both, with only minor missteps along the way. I'm going on record to say most of my Yu-Gi-Oh familiarity is with the original anime and chunks of GX, along with Dark Side of Dimensions. Next to nothing with 5Ds, Zexal, Arc-V or Vrains. I have dabbled in the game briefly since, and often chat with other Yu-Gi-Oh players at my local card league (I'm there for Pokémon myself), so everything up to XYZ summoning is familiar enough to me.
Sometimes I do feel characterisation and character insights are a little lighter then they should be, considering how good they generally are, but the pace and tension are always there. Doubtless I'll find more to say on the two fics as a whole later, but for now, I'll stick with this chapter.
Before this duel begun, my initial prediction was that Fluttershy would lose, but give Sour Sweet a pretty rough time. Less then 1000LP left with no cards on hand certainly qualifies as that, even if such finishes are kind of the norm with Yu-Gi-Oh! anime duels, being scripted and all. After the first chapter, I'd actually believed Sour Sweet would win on her very next turn, so I'm glad to see Fluttershy held on a little bit longer. A part of me believed Fluttershy might actually win, and Sour Sweet would get reprimanded by her peers for losing, causing the following Crystal Prep students to hold nothing back from the start. The way the duel played out, that would have been fine. Classic case of losing because you underestimated your opponent. Joey Wheeler could tell a tale or a dozen about opponents who did that against him and lost as a result for sure!
Though we should have still seen Sour Sweet getting verbally insulted for almost losing to Fluttershy, the other Crystal Prep students remarking that despite her win Fluttershy made her look weak. Maybe such a scene will still happen during the break after Applejack's duel, especially if Sugarcoat loses. Wouldn't surprise me.
Now, a couple of nitpicks in this chapter. At first, I was trying to figure out how Sour Sweet could have Amazoness Sage in her hand during the first turn of this chapter already, and why she wouldn't have Normal Summoned it last turn. But then I remembered she banished Amazoness Call last turn to allow Empress do a Diffusion-Wave Motion on Fluttershy's field, at the cost of none of her other monsters being able to attack, so she held it in hand, as it wouldn't have affected that turn at all. She could have still set it in Defence Mode, but minor quibble, wouldn't have affected the game as Fluttershy couldn't have targeted a Set monster for Kitty's effect, and Sour Sweet would have simply switched it to Attack Mode either way at the start of this chapter.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but given the duelist that goes first doesn't draw on their first turn, and Life Points are at 8000, isn't this the real-life game Advanced Format to a T? I didn't mind when Monster Reborn made a cameo in DOTAC to be copied by Magia from Fluttershy's Graveyard, since that had some different rules. I dunno, given how you avoid overpowered banned cards otherwise, it's a little odd. The obvious fix is one the Yu-Gi-Oh Scripted Duels use all the time: Shard of Greed. Just have Fluttershy play that two of her turns prior, and then at that turn, with her hand being at zero, she draws for her turn and then gets two off of that, giving her three cards as she does here. The five monsters being returned to the deck doesn't affect the rest of the game at all, so nothing else would change. I'd wager Shard of Greed is probably a weak card in the real game as it's a prime target to destroy to really cut down your opponent's hand advantage, but Sour Sweet's only chance for Spell/Trap removal is used on Roaring Earth, a better target, so it should go off fine. But not a change worth going to the trouble of making, I suppose.
Um... how is Catnipped Kitty still on Fluttershy's field if it was used as Xyz material? On this final turn, she should only have the two Samurai Tokens, Ronin Raccoon and Cat Shark. Doesn't affect the duel outcome, as it just means Cat Shark attacks for the losing move instead, and it's still a 1900 LP loss. I take it this one's a typo.
That leaves us with one typo, one Forbidden quibble, and not incorrect goof on my part. The final one is a big one. There's no way around this: Fluttershy threw the game.
Why didn't Fluttershy negate Shamanism with Chow Chow Chan? If she had, both of her Samurai Tokens could have attacked Amazoness Princess for game. Sour Sweet had 2200 LP, Princess had 1400 ATK, the two tokens had 2600 ATK each. 2400 LP loss. Boom. Even if the math had been different and Sour Sweet hadn't lost there and then, her LP would have still being 1000 or less, meaning no getting off Amazoness Archers later, as Princess would not have been revived, Sour Sweet wouldn't have gotten another Amazoness Call to get Archers out.
Not to mention Cat Shark doubling its own stats that turn to no effect off of its last Xyz material (I understand this was done to have 6 monsters in the GY, so Pot of Avarice could be used and still leave Tantan there to be revived as Xyz material; if the Shard of Greed fix mentioned above had been done, this wouldn't have been necessary, and it could have doubled the stats of the new Ronin Raccoon instead, letting Raccoon, with ATK of 2000, chip off 600 more LP).
Really, most of my observations don't really affect the game, other then clarifying some things. But holding Chow Chow Chan for a turn was a straight-up misplay. While the obvious fix would be Sour Sweet having Trap of Darkness Set here to get Shamanism off even after it was negated, that means only Archers would be Set on Fluttershy's last turn, and with her having used Chow Chow Chan and having no way around it on hand, she'd pass and wait to draw a way around it while Swords of Revealing Light is protecting her.
Is this something you honest-to-god didn't notice? Or did Fluttershy intentionally hold Chow Chow Chan on hand, for something later? The latter would be fine, it her thoughts had clarified it as such.
That really is only a quibble, though. This was still a fantastic duel. The one advantage this fic has over DOTAC is that, with the sole exceptions of Derpy Vs. Rarity and Applejack Vs. Rainbow, all the duels there had a duelist using new cards you created. Which were both great decks, but the fact that this sorry keeps changing the duelists and decks being used keeps the duels fresher. A bit of work, googling every new card that's used, but you make it worthwhile.
Also, are breaks of 3-4 weeks to the day between chapters the norm for you? Looks that way. Guess I'll have to be patient to see my favourite Pony's human counterpart show off her improved Plant deck and give Sugarcoat a duel she won't soon forget.
Keep it up, DrakeyC: this story may have a small enough audience, but its audience are really loving it! I do have some of the same quibbles others are having about Sci-Twi's characterisation here, but I'll wait until more details are revealed before voicing my opinions there.
Also, can someone remind me if EqG Applejack saying 'hun' is a canon thing, or something DrakeyC (and possibly other authors too) have adopted as being an equivalent of 'sugarcube'? Honestly can't remember if EqG Applejack has ever said it. Don't know how I feel about that, though I feel Applejack in this and DOTAC is probably the Mane 6 with the weakest characterisation, in adopting a Duel Monsters outlook to her normal personna, compared to the others, for what it's worth.
9143612
Yeah I know that. It just bugs me a bit is all. During the Friendship Games it annoyed me that the Shadowbolts never really payed for being bullies and unsportsmanlike for nearly the whole film, and Sour Sweet was easily the worst of them all (even if she got better later). So her winning here bugged me, but I guess her knowing she only barley won instead of a complete victory will need to do for now.
Good duel with plenty of jive pacing on moves. Next looks fun!
Sort of expected this to be honest. Still good fuel and chapter.
9143769
Sadly that sort of thing happens with bullies in real life.
9143768
Wow. And here I thought my comment in the last chapter was long. Still very insightful
Oh, I get it now: You're matching the Elements against their counterparts. I guess it'll come down to Flash vs. Shining Armor, and then of course our magic girls.
9143769
Sour Sweet was in no doubt ruthless in that duel against Fluttershy, it was like survival of the fittest. When I saw the third Movie, I thought the Shadowbolts and Crystal Prep were huge jerks towards Twilight. Sugarcoat and Indigo Zap are my favourites in the Shadowbolts, while Sour Sweet is a meh for me.
9143768
Thanks for the corrections. For Pot of Avarice, I simply don't follow the Forbidden lists for the game and didn't in the original fic, though I don't think it came up.
You're right about Chow Chow Chan, that came about as an oversight. Originally Fluttershy was to draw Mystical Space Typhoon, but that was at the time I forgot about Liger having the power boost from Amazoness Village. Fluttershy thus had to draw Big March instead and searched out Chow Chow for the S/T play. As is I revised the chapter to have Sour Sweet use Amazoness Shamanism before Fluttershy gets a chance to attack, which is a logical play given she saw her get it and knows it'll stop her Trap if she hesitates.
9143843
Smart way to get around it! Lucky that Chow Chow Chan can only be activated against Traps activated against attack declarations. Otherwise, I can only imagine you having a minor panic attack like with the situation on DOTAC that required the use of G-Force and Amber Crystal Circle. And since the chapter's already out you'd probably go "screw it, I ain't rewriting the whole thing, people won't mind". And we wouldn't have.
Also:
The Yu-Gi-Oh Dub dramatic cheese is in full force today.
So the previous tournament was the end of the semester, it would seem.
9143827
Yeah I realised after that I went a little overboard. But hey, first time connecting both on this story and FimFiction in general, you can forgive me for getting a bit excited.
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Not so much, I just had to look at the cards in question.
On the subject of characterization, aye for Applejack, plants is a generic archtype but she has a new one in the next chapter. Sugarcoat though I really had that problem with, it was hard to think of a deck theme fitting for her, but I think what I'm going with works. I can't precisely explain why, though.
I may just be totally confused but shouldn't it say Fluttershy and not Sour Sweet on the first two LP counters?
9143893
No
9143889
Oh, I wasn't referring to her deck of choice. Obviously stories like this, and anime like Yu-Gi-Oh, should always have characters using decks that reflects their personality, even if no one in the story ever comments on or realises this. No, I more meant the characterisation of Applejack herself. Given everyone's focused on card games here, their personalities are a bit different, as they always think and speak strategically especially when duelling. It's a hard thing to put into words, but I'm sure you know what I mean. Basically since this world's all about card games, retaining a character's personality through that is a delicate thing to pull off.
I'd say the rest of the Mane 6 retain their personalities pretty intact: Rarity still has her fabulous flair about her, what little we see of Pinkie works great, though that may change once we see her duel, Fluttershy's timidness and fear of the game's harsh competitive side is a perfect counterpoint for her to be based off of, and Rainbow's competitive streak translates perfectly to the game, if we allow her to be less reckless so as to play properly.
Though as our protagonist, she still got plenty to wow us with personality-wise, I did often feel Twilight's timidness as shown in the first EqG film was almost fully abandoned in DOTAC. This was one of my few legitimate complaints of that story. Maybe this was by design, something you felt was a flaw in the film. I can see that, though I still felt some of that should have been retained. I'm not talking about her adapting to the game so quickly, that's fine and necessary for the pacing and for her to stand a chance in the tournament (well, that and her ability to create new cards when in a pinch).
Anyway, I'd say Applejack is the only one who comes off as kind-of flat as a result of characters being focused on Duel Monsters, as least as written. The competitive nature of the game driving a wedge between her and Rainbow was all fine and good, it's other things. As we all know, not-Background-Pony is a tough one to write for everyone, show staff and fanfiction writers, so it's not too aggravating. She is just the only real notable one, whereas the tiny shortcomings with the others aren't worth worrying about.
This is the point where I feel more glimpses into a character's thoughts as they duel would be apt. Even if it's still all about the field layout, what their opponent is planning, and so forth, simply how such things are phrased can say a lot about a character, given duel dialogue sticks to saying things formally, no matter the character (as it should). But hey, that's just me.
9143893
I understand your confusion. Basically, Fluttershy's two Samurai Tokens still had more ATK then Liger (2900 to 2700), so those first two forced attacks still chipped off 200 LP apiece from Sour Sweet, even though this was the move that won her the game. Then Ronin Racoon, which only had 1300 ATK, caused Fluttershy a 1400 LP loss when it attacked, knocking her from 1500 down to 100. Then Cat Shark's forced attack ended the game.
9143937
Ah, I see what you mean. That's totally fair too.
I figured Fluttershy would somewhat lose but we'll have to see how Applejack does against Sugarcoat.
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9143937
Ohh. Gotcha.
Yea I was just skimming through and lost track of everyones ATK.
At the very top of the chapter...
I'm legit not joking, this chapter and the previous chapter quote the previous story's title rather then this one's. Painfully easy to skip by since returning readers will gloss over the underlined part at the top, but still. I can only assume, DrakeyC, that you worked these chapters off of a template from the previous story or something. Not that it really matters. But thought you might appreciate the heads up.
9144111
thank you
Poor Fluttershy. She was so close.
You did your best Fluttershy... Amazon decks are very hard to get past if things fall into play the way they did for Sour.
But you did damn good... you got her to 800LP (1000 of it self-inflected) but you still showed them, your no push over.
Also, good luck Applejack, cant wait to see what plants monster you have (fingers crossed for the 4 seasonal princess ones)
Just a Thought bring in one or two of the signer dragons like black rose or Stardust dragon
Got to appreciate Sugarcoat's attitude, at least. She wants a challenging opponent instead of a cake walk.
...This is why I use Banishing Decks... I get to banish Amazon cards...