Exceed Summoning; the new in-thing????

New format means new rules, well not really. But there has been a couple of new developments in the Yu-gi-oh card game, as well as other games. Now Exceeds is coming to the game, which is another new mechanic to the game like synchro summoning.

What exceeds basically does is like an evolution mechanic.



The stars in the upper left side of the card is the Exceed monsters rank.In order to summon an Exceed monster you need to overlay materials on your side of the field equal to the amount required, the overlaid materials have to be the same level as the exceed monsters rank. For example, No. 17 Revise Dragon takes two level 3 material monsters in order to exceed summon it.

When you exceed summon you stack the monsters underneath the Exceed monster. The monsters stacked underneath are more like tokens than anythings else. Most Exceed monsters currently revealed have effects requiring the removal of these materials. When an Exceed monsters materials are removed, they go to the graveyard, strangely enough they apparently don't count as getting sent to the graveyard so effects like sangan don't activate.

Currently, it is unknown what happens to Exceed materials if the exceed monster is flipped face down.

Exceed monsters apparently do not have any level while on the field, meaning they are unaffected by cards like Gravity Bind and LLAB, and can not be used as Synchro materials (at least from what everyone is gathering at the moment).

Also another interesting bit of unconfirmed ruling knowledge is on the Exceed summon being negated. According to once of the video clips floating around pojo, it is fairly useless to negate an exceed summon, because the materials will still be on the field.

Now a lot of the rulings involving these monsters are unknown, but they are an interesting addition to the game. I'm currently divided on whether they are going to be good for the game or whatever. I know a lot of people liked the old school yu-gi-oh, and felt like Synchros were a pretty drastic change, which they were, and they are wary on what Exceeds means for the game.

I think it's good that the game is getting new mechanics that make it unique, and it really feels like the game has come a long way from being considered the simpler version of MtG, but I am worried about what it means for the game in the long run.

I mean, games like Duel Masters (in Japan) apparently get away with introducing a lot of new mechanics, but I don't think yu-gi-oh players are as used to having a constant changing environment. Especially if the change just keeps sneaking up on us every 4 years. I mean I honestly thought synchros would be the last big change, but I was wrong.

Anyway, the mechanic looks interesting, should be fun.

~E.P.B.