Royal Rebuke

[weeb 14]

Artwork Source: Guard by wlop

Royal Rebuke

Trap | Counter

Effect: If a card or effect would negate an activation or effect of a card you control: negate that activation and if you do, destroy it, also for the rest of this turn effects of cards you control that are of the same card type (Monster, Spell, Trap) as the card that would have been negated cannot be negated. You can activate this card from your hand by paying half your LP.

 

Design Notes: There’s a ton of negation cards out there, so I felt inspired to make a tech card specifically to counter these negations.

I’m not sure if my wording on the card is a little weird/unclear, but to give a basic example of the card in action: let’s say you activate Raigeki, and your opponent activates Stardust Dragon’s effect to negate it. You respond with Royal Rebuke, negating Stardust Dragon, and not only does your Raigeki resolve, but for the rest of your turn the effects of your Spell cards cannot be negated, since Raigeki is a Spell. Another example would be if your opponent hits your Elemental HERO Stratos’s search effect with an Ash Blossom if you reply with this card, since Stratos is a Monster, you get your search off Stratos, and your monster effects cannot be negated for the rest of your turn.

Granted, the card’s activation condition is a little situational, so I wanted to give the card a little extra spice because otherwise you’d just run a more versatile negation card. A card like Solemn Judgement can negate most negations just as well, but then again it can’t protect future activations the way this card can. And probably the most appealing part of the card is that it can be activated straight from your hand, thus subverting the inherent downside of being a Trap card. Adding the ability to activate the card right away was important, because hopefully it makes up for the card’s rather narrow scope. Though I imagine a player would have to use this carefully, because on one hand it can protect against getting hit with a Hand Trap on the first turn for example, but then on the other hand who wants to start the duel with just half their Life Points? Depending on your strategy, it may be worth it.  

This card can hit some pretty popular cards, such as Infinite Impermanence and Ash Blossom for two examples. And at the very least, I think this card could be some good Side Deck Tech. If you’re facing a deck whose keycard is all about negation, it could be a deadly surprise. But what are your thoughts?

[Saiba Aisu 11]

It's a pretty cool idea. I'm actually really tired of seeing the amount of negation that people are playing, whether that's splashable handtraps or fairly generic Extra Deck Monsters that do the same. It all seems focused on building an unbreakable board and playing solitaire, as opposed to meaningfully interacting with each other.

Moving on to the card itself, I would say the logic behind it is fairly sound, though half your LP seems like a rather steep price to play it from the hand, especially when compared to cards like Struggling Battle and Infinite Impermanence. If you're going to keep that LP cost, consider making this card's activation and effect unable to be negated. I feel that would be a fair payoff and would follow along with the theme.

[Summer Darj 292]

Called by the Grave is a personal staple for me, mainly as a counter for hand-trap monsters, although it does have the extra utility of GY disruption. Comparing this to Called... this has a couple of advantages such as also negating Spell/Traps, a coveted spell speed of 3, and of course protecting cards of the same Type for the rest of the turn. On the other hand, it's missing Called's GY disruption, plus this won't work against hand traps that don't negate, namely Snow Rabbit and Droll. Taking these things into account, IMO this would be the next best staple, since negation is so prominent nowadays. I would gladly pay half my LP for a spell speed 3 negation that will blanker the rest of my cards of same type, and you even get to skip the cost if you Set it and reserve it for a later turn.

[Sleepy 211]

From the above posts and the design notes, I'm actually liking the card more as I think about it.
If you can force a monster effect negation to trigger this card from your hand, 1/2 LP as a cost is not too great in order to make all your monsters impossible to negate for the turn. Granted that you have a combo worthwhile in hand, which is less likely the more disruption or anti-disruption options one ends up running.

I also like that it disrupts the negation and both reacts to card/effect and stops card/effect. I've been hearing about nitpicks of what Witch's Strike can't do against certain cards so this would ultimately counter things better. It'd probably become more favorable than Called by the Grave, not because of power-creeping it but because I think hand traps are starting to be less prominent in the game, and this card stops Ash anyways which is the most popular one, and stops Impermanence. This could change around depending on the format.

The LP cost is still something to look out for though IMO. I can't seem to gather data on similar cases and their amount of usage in the IRL game. There's Solemn Judgment but that card doesn't activate from hand. There's Red Reboot but that card only replies to Traps. Hmmmm.... 

I guess it's time to try up a good old Ariadne engine for search and cost evasion. Tier 1 decks would make the cost worth it meanwhile xD

[Summer Darj 292]

Sleepy's comment made me realize this is like a counter to a counter, as it can stop Called by the Grave too. It's a rather funny thought to run cards to counter a counter, but in this card's case it is not as situational or impractical.
Reading the card again I have a question: how do you want it to interact with cards that don't directly negate a card or effect, but instead do so as continuous effects? I'm referring to cards like Skill Drain, the Mermail Equips, and the Magician's Left/Right Hand, which don't exactly chain to the activated card/effect to negate it but instead their continuous effects will stop them. Is this card meant to also respond to their activations and negate them, even if they are not answering to anything at the time of their activation?

[weeb 14]

5 hours ago, Darj said:

Reading the card again I have a question: how do you want it to interact with cards that don't directly negate a card or effect, but instead do so as continuous effects?

I sort of thought about this a little bit when making the card with how I wanted it to interact with cards like Skill Drain or Imperial Order, but I'm glad you asked this because I realized that I didn't think it through all the way. My intention with the card was simple enough: Player A activates an effect, Player B chains something to negate it, and Player A responds with Royal Rebuke. This was true to the extent that, when I first got the idea for the card, it was going to start with the condition "Must be activated as Chain Link 3 or higher." So in other words, the plan with how it is supposed to work is that: 1) the card can only be activated in response to effects that start a chain and 2) it can only respond to effects that, when their activation or effect would resolve, would negate the card effect they are responding to.  But after reading this question and thinking about it more, (and taking cards like those Mermail Equips and those Magician's Hands into account), the way the card effect is currently worded doesn't reflect that well, and leaves room for ambiguity, which in a game like this is a problem. I came up with a couple case scenarios that go into a bit more detail behind how I imagine the card should work:

A) Royal Rebuke can't negate the Mermail equips for example because since their initial activation is Spell Speed 1, they obviously can't be chained to anything, and when they do go off, they don't start a chain.

B) If your opponent activates Skill Drain, even if you control an Effect monster, you can't use Royal Rebuke, unless you activated your monster's effect, and your opponent chained Skill Drain to it. If your opponent Chains Skill Drain to Exiled Force's effect, you can't use Rebuke since Skill Drain wouldn't negate it anyway, but it could counter Effect Veiler in the same scenario.

C) Along the same lines, if you have a monster with a continuous effect negated by Veiler, Rebuke can't be activated here either. But, if you control a monster that activates an effect that starts a chain, and Veiler tries to negate it, then you can use Rebuke against it. 

D) If you activate a Dragon's Ravine but decline to use its effect, and after it resolves your opponent activates Imperial Order, you can't activate Rebuke. But, if you activate Dragon's Ravine's effect and your opponent chains Imperial Order, you CAN activate Rebuke. (This is similar to the Skill Drain ruling).  

E) Royal Rebuke can't actually counter Called by the Grave at all since 1) it can only protect cards that activated their effects on the field and 2) CbtG banishes a monster in the Graveyard as part of its effect, so even if a face-up monster would have its effect negated (and even if CbtG was chained to that monster's effect), since the banishing and negation happen as the card resolves, its "too late" to use Rebuke (I think this is how it would work anyway). 

F) Witch's Strike can't be used to after an Ash Blossom, since Ash Blossom negates effects not activations (which Witch's Strike specifies), BUT you can use Royal Rebuke against Ash Blossom (so long as the effect Ash Blossom is negating at the time activates and resolves on the field) since it counters cards that respond to an activation, and negates an activation or effect. 

Those are a couple case scenarios up above that I think for the most part should clear up how the card was intended to work, at least with how I understand the game's rulings (and I am no expert on the deepeer nuances of Yu-Gi-Oh.. I swear you gotta be a lawyer sometimes to understand some of these card interactions). So, after thinking about it some more I came up with an Errata for the card that I think should reflect my intentions better:

If a card or effect is activated in response to the activation of a card or effect you control (and would negate that activation or effect): negate that activation and if you do, destroy it, also for the rest of this turn effects of cards you control that are of the same card type (Monster, Spell, Trap) as the card that would have been negated cannot be negated. You can activate this card from your hand by paying half your LP.

The effect is still the same, and maybe it's a bit wordier than it needs to be, but I go into more specifics about what it should respond to. 

[Summer Darj 292]

I figured you would want something like case #2, that it can only respond to a card directly responding to another card to negate it. Was already thinking on how I would go on to write the effect, but IMO your errata does the job and you got it covered. If anything, I would debate whether it needs the parentheses, but keeping them or not makes little difference.