We’re here with more Battle Pack first-timers! Every Duelist here today is special for being among the first in the world to try out Battle Pack: Epic Dawn!

Here we have the two Shanes, Duckworth and Wise! They are fresh out of their Public Event and were having a great time playing in a sealed event.

Shane Duckworth thought the Battle Pack was awesome, but said that sealed play requires a lot of reading. He was most excited to see Beast King Barbaros by far. He also liked Divine Wrath, Creature Swap, and Dark Magician of Chaos – even though he couldn’t summon it. He also managed to get three Gem-Knight Pearls! He said sealed play was a lot of fun, and he’d definitely do it again.

Shane Wise said the Battle Pack was great, especially for new players because it’s easier to get a lot of the cards. He the most excited about any Xyz Monsters he got, especially Grenosaurus. He really liked his Mysterious Guard, Bazoo, and Autonomous Action Unit too.

Tyler McCartin thought the event was a lot of fun, though he couldn’t claim his prize right away because he forgot his ID! His mom had to send a picture of his school ID to his phone! He loved the Starfoils in general, especially Dark Magician of Chaos and Bazoo the Soul-Eater. He thought it’s a lot of fun to play in events like this sometimes for something different. He even went so far as to say that Battle Pack tournaments should replace Advanced Format tournaments!

He thought Beast King Barbaros was nuts, and adding Skill Drain to it was even more nuts. One of his favorite cards was Creature Swap. At one point, he Set a Gyroid and Creature Swap traded it for a Mobius the Frost Monarch. Then he equipped Mobius with Big Bang Shot, and he was able to repeatedly attack Gyroid with it! Tyler was surprised at how useful some cards were, like Kunai with Chain, Big Bang Shot, and Giant Soldier of Stone.

David Podmijersky loved playing in a sealed format. “It’s one of my favorite events,” he said. He felt that it was a lot less stressful than Advanced Format play. One of his favorite things was using Forbidden cards like Pot of Greed and Makyura the Destructor. One card that surprised him was Yaksha, which turned out to be very useful. His strategy in the event was to focus on monster destruction, because he knew the packs were heavy on the monster side. He used cards like Doomcaliber Knight, Exiled Force, and Twin-Barrel Dragon for this.

Stephen Minnich felt that sealed play was a lot of fun. It was really exciting to just get some packs and play with them straight away. Since this was first ever sanctioned event, he thought it was a great way to jump in. He had looked online at some of the previously revealed cards and liked it already. He liked that you the packs have cards that are useful in Advanced Format play, but you also get to play in a sealed event too! He also said that the new black rare cards looked really nice. He really liked pulling two copies of Gorz the Emissary of Darkness, and found that Grave Squirmer was a surprisingly good card. “I always get excited with Horn of the Unicorn, I’m not gonna lie,” he said.

Russell Miner traveled here from Long Island, NY! He’d played in sealed formats before in other games, and always thought they were the most fun, so he was very happy to see Yu-Gi-Oh! get a pack designed around sealed play. He liked that you don’t always play against the same decks every time. “It’s not like ‘Oh there’s Elemental HERO Neos Alius, he’s running HEROEs’,” he said. He said that while it was nice to see cards reprinted in the set, he wasn’t actually too concerned with that.

His favorite card was definitely Change of Heart. He pointed out that we have Mind Control Limited and Brain Control Forbidden, and Change of Heart is better than both of those. It always won him the game when he drew it. He also liked Damage Gate and Phantom of Chaos. And finally, he found that Helping Robo for Combat was very… helpful!

Earl Le’Roy was here all the way from Baltimore, MD. He said the Battle Pack was overall pretty awesome, and it actually had some pretty unbelievably good cards. He said it was ironic that there were quite a few tuners but no Synchro Monsters, though. He really liked the Tour Guide From the Underworld he got to play with. He said it looked amazing in its different rarities. He found that the monarch monsters were actually the boss monsters of sealed play, as those were the cards everyone was afraid of. He really liked seeing the return of some Forbidden cards like Witch of the Black Forest, Raigeki, and Change of Heart. He opened one pack that had both Premature Burial and Dark Magician of Chaos! He said he was surprised at how useful some cards were, like Horn of the Unicorn. When he played it, his opponents just could not get over it. Before today he’d never even played that card.

Vince Calantoni travelled from Edison, NJ. He felt the Battle Pack was a great concept. He liked that there were a lot of cards people are used to seeing in every deck, like Dark Hole, which are absent from sealed play. Being able to use Forbidden cards was a blast. He said it was awesome to use Harpie’s Feather Duster. His favorite card, hands down, was Injection Fairy Lily. He was also surprised at how useful Gravitic Orb was. In one game, he used it on his opponent’s tokens from Scapegoat! Vince also said he found a lot of cards which he wasn’t familiar with, and nearly lost a game because he didn’t read Big Jaws and Fox Fire closely enough.

He said he wanted to see sealed events done more frequently. “I’ve had more fun in my one match than in all of yesterday, and I got some pretty choice cards I didn’t have before, like Fiendish Chain and Pot of Duality.”