Let's face the reality. Cards with good effects win games and matches. Many players enter tournaments because they want to win. Naturally, they will use the best cards available to them that they think will lead them on to the road to victory.
Why do they want to win so badly? That question has many answers ranging from turning a concept into a winning strategy, or playing for Hobby League points or playing for an invite to nationals. I'm sure you can give a few other reasons yourself.
It is not that these players with the drive to win haven't tested and thought about the rest of the card pool. They have, and after much testing and consideration, the result is the 40(+) card deck full of cards they think are good they intend to use to win the tournament.
Let's take a typical situation.
Player A starts the game and sets a
Mystic Tomato and a face down Sakurestu Armor.
Now, "I" think both cards are awesome.
Mystic Tomato can search for any dark monster with 1500 or less attack when destroyed by battle. This means when the Tomato is attacked and destroyed by battle, Player A will still have a total of 6 cards (4 in hand, 1 set Sakuretsu, 1 monster that was searched out by Tomato)
Player B draws, gives his moves a thought and summons a
D.D. Survivor.
Now, this is a good move because
D.D. Survivor is essentially immune to another commonly played trap called
Bottomless Trap Hole. In addition, many players also set a
D.D. Assailant or
D.D. Warrior Lady, which fall prey to
D.D. Survivor.
D.D. Survivor attacks the Tomato. Player A opts not to use his trap and lets Tomato search out a
Sangan.
Anticipating a counter attack, Player B sets a trap (
Sakuretsu Armor) and ends his turn.
At this point, both players have 6 cards each, counting both the hand and field.
It is now Player A's turn. He draws and tributes his
Sangan for
Mobius the Frost Monarch. Mobius uses its effect to destroy Player B's set trap, and that leaves the DDS wide open for an attack. In addition,
Sangan's effect searches out an
Exiled Force from the deck, to the hand.
Let's count the total card count of both players.
A has Mobius, a set Sakuretsu, and 5 cards in hand (including the
Exiled Force) for a total of 7 cards.
B has a DDS, and 4 cards in hand for a total of 5.
When the Mobius destroys the DDS by battle, B has only 4 cards left. When B draws, he has 5 cards total, compared to A's 7 cards.
As you can see, B is -2. Even if he uses one card each to destroy the Mobius and the set Sakuretsu, he will be left with 3 cards, while A still had 5 in hand. If the game continues with 1 for 1
Exchanges, B is going to quickly run out of cards (resources) to handle A's onslaught.
From this example, we can extrapolate that cards that get rid of the opponents' cards are good, or cards that force the opponent to use multiple cards to get rid of your one card will serve to become beneficial in the long run.
This is why smart players take some damage before activating
Torrential Tribute upon the opponent's summoning of a 2nd/3rd monster, or summon a bigger monster to destroy the opponent's weaker monster by battle.
Take a good look at the card pool and think about why certain cards are used much much more than others. Why would I want to use Two Pronged Attack when I can simply use
Smashing Ground?
Remember that the card pool is constantly expanding and thus some cards may become obsolete or more playable down the road. Yes, a majority of decks look very similar, but there are most certainly variations among them.
