March 1?

Every blog right now has a post about the new banlist coming up. Today, mine will be no different. From a quick look at the list, this is a format of "Play new cards!", hitting the most overused cards in the (O)card game and giving people the chance to try out something else.
Forbidden:
Goyo Guardian
Cold Wave
Mass Driver

Three new banned cards. I actually like the list, it will make the top tier decks a little more interesting.
Goyo - Best synchro in the game? Level 6 is ridiculously easy to make. 2800 attack laughs at 90% of all other synchro monsters. And it even has Change of Heart built into it via destroying cards. Banning it is a little extreme, but I think we can all agree that we're tired of Goyo being the go-to synchro if you have the option. A lot of people are saying that Brionac should have been banned instead, but let's think about that for a second....Brionac wins games. But winning the game isn't enough to ban a card, because Brionac itself isn't a win condition. Brionac is more closely comparable to Magic Cylinder. Cylinder can win games too, almost with less effort than Brionac. Also add in the fact that Brio has a cost and only has 2300 attack, making it a great card, but not a banworthy one.

Cold Wave - 99.9% of the blogs are saying that we all should have wanted this banned. Do I agree? Maybe. Destroying your opponents field without fear of repercussions AND locking them out of the game for an extra turn(barring monster effects) is insanely powerful. But only at that time is it powerful. Is that enough to make it banworthy? Probably lol.

Mass Driver - Bad card by itself. The only decks this card is used in are ones designed to OTK with said card. That alone makes it banworthy.

Hindsight - A lot of people wanted more cards banned though. Don't forget that Dark Hole and Monster Reborn were brought back in the last list. Does this mean that Konami thinks those cards are balanced? We all know that Monster Reborn can do amazing things, and win a duel out of the deepest pit of no-return. However, most of the time you turn a duel around isn't because you took THAT card that will win the game. It is usually because Monster reborn turned into fuel for you to pull off something great. So in fact, Monster Reborn could have been many many things, just the card you need to fill that gap in your hand/field. Dark Hole however is seemingly more and more balanced every day. Some people have stopped using cards like it and Torrential altogether, because the chances of you hitting something great is slim. Either your opponent has a Stardust on the field, Starlight Road set, MBAAS in hand, Sangan on the field, Dandylion on the field, or all the other cards that are just begging you to try to Dark Hole. In that sense, Dark Hole is almost not that overpowered anymore. What I really wanted to see banned though was Mind Master. Banning Mind Master would let emergency teleport come back, and stops the OCG Gusta infinite draw trick, using Mind Master as the fuel. Mind Master itself isn't a broken card, it is just poorly designed.

Limited:
Honest
Dandylion
Blackwing - Kalut the Moon Shadow
Book of Moon
Gateway of the Six

This is where things get sticky. Noone likes anything out of the limited list besides Gateway.
Honest - Ehhh. In the OCG, light beat and "Deep Draw Fairies" as i'll call it are doing fairly well. Not Six Sam well, but fairly well. Honest is good, and very hard to predict but that isn't what made it broken. In my opinion, Light Beat is what made Honest broken. Why? Because the deck stops you from playing that game. Summon a monster? BTH/Warning. Use a trap? Gemini Spark, destroy your monster. Attack my monster? D. Prison. Damage Step? Honest. That is not fun at all.

Dandylion - 2 is far too abuse-able. Essentially, Plant Synchro is only good because of Dandylion and Lonefire. The deck is "how can I abuse Dandylion and Debris as much as possible." What sucks is that 1 Dandylion is pretty much annihilated by your side deck. I wonder if Plant Synchro will be even half as good with only 1 Dandylion...(might have to use spirit reaper!)

Blackwing - Kalut the Moon Shadow - Ouch. I'm really hurting with BW players on this. Kalut is annoying, but Konami is really on the verge of neutering the entire deck if they keep up the limits. Oh well, they got a ton of new mosnters, surely one of them is decent.

Book of Moon - The rage on the internet about this is astronomical. According to the Yugioh Blog, 78.5% of the Duelists in Atlanta used at least 1 copy of Book of Moon in their Decks. In fact, nearly 50% of the field used a whopping 3 copies in their Decks – a huge increase from the 41.5% of Duelists who used 3 copies of Book of Moon in Philadelphia. In the Top 16, 15 Duelists ran an incredible total of 41 copies of Book of Moon, up from the 14 Duelists that ran 39 copies of Book of Moon in the Top 16 of YCS Philadelphia. If 78% of all decks run Book of Moon doesn't say "overused" to you, then I'm not sure what will. Book of Moon isn't necessarily a staple, it's just in everyone's deck<-?. Book of Moon is very often both the frontline and final defense against what your opponent can throw at you. Many consider Book as the ONLY counter to synchro summoning, and say synchro decks will run rampant with these gone. I highly doubt anyone will run 1 book when you can run 3 of something else, but who knows what will happen. (Salvo is back!)

Gateway of the Six - Few cards in the game are legitimately broken. Some cards are too splashable that they become broken, some cards are too powerful that they are broken, and some can do both! Gateway falls in the #2 slot. There are very few times that a Gateway in the hand is bad. A first turn gateway is one of the most powerful hands in the entire game(and that's just one card!). Cutting 2 of them doesn't even make the card any less good, it just slows it down. In fact, one can say that 1 Gateway is how Konami intended for the deck to be ran. Playing 2 gateway at the same time is what is REALLY broken. Playing 1 at a time is pretty balanced(powerful) gameplay.

Hindsight - I think that this format unfairly hit Blackwings and Plant synchro without hitting much else. Xsabers are still pretty powerful, all because of XX-saber Darksoul. Darksoul is a TCG exclusive card, so unless Konami pulls something interesting on March 1st, Darksoul will stay untouched until it releases in the OCG, and only if Sabers do well over there. Darksoul makes Sabers so good, the amount of searching it can do, coupled with being level 3 is crazy. I would love to see Darksoul Limited and Rescue Cat come back to 1.

Phew, 3 newly banned cards, 5 newly limited cards, and nothing unbanned. Tomorrow, I'll talk about the bajillion of new semi-limits and POSSIBLY the unlimited cards. I only have so much space after all.