CanYouSayG(G): Hello everybody, this is CanYouSayG, and you are reading the CanYouSayBlog, the blog where YOU get to meet the people of vanguard from around the world!



G：Today, we will be speaking with the popular Youtuber, Vanguard tournament fight commentator, and this year’s World Championship Caster: Kris 'DifferentfFight' Brazas!



DifferentFight (DF): Hey everyone! Big fan of the blog itself, happy to have the opportunity to be interviewed like this!

G: Thank you for coming to this interview today. Let’s begin with some basic introductions.

What are some of your activities in the vanguard scene, and when did you first start Cardfight Vanguard?

DF: I first began playing the game in November 2011, somewhere after the release of BT04 in the Japanese version of Vanguard. It was just before Vanguard was announced to be releasing in English, so I remember it pretty well. Back then I was a big edgy Ren fanboy, so Shadow Paladin really pulled me into the game.

As for activities in the Vanguard scene itself – I make videos talking about various topics, mostly related to the competitive scene. I also dabble a lot in the comedy genre with the ‘How to Play’ and similar videos, and try to cater to the more casual players via series like ‘Set Breakdown’. Overall, I think there’s at least a little something for every type of player on my channel.



G: What, in your opinion, is the one best thing about Cardfight!! Vanguard ?



DF: If we’re talking about the game itself – it’s the endless thrill ride. I’ve played, and still do play, a very large variety of card games, yet none of them have ever delivered the same level of thrill and excitement that Vanguard manages to give me every single time. On top of that there are the many talented illustrators that work on the card designs, which help enjoy the game even more.

However, if we’re talking in a broader scope, the best thing about the game is the little, yet very significant changes that you can notice between the various international player-base communities. I realized this most last year, once I began living in Tokyo for my university exchange semester. It scaled from how in Europe (and many other parts of the world), we essentially only have 1 local tournament per week, whereas in Japan, you can find yourself a local shop tournament practically every single day of the calendar year, even on holidays. On weekends, you can jump between 2-3 shops and have several tournaments back to back.

This made me realize how and why the Japanese side of the game changes and evolves so quickly compared to the Western style. There are other smaller things in other countries as well, but that’s just one big example to illustrate what I find so fascinating about the game and its community. I won’t even start talking about how greatly playstyles differ between different regions, since that would probably take up several pages that I’m sure nobody has the time for. :’)

G: What clans do you use? What were the reasons you started playing those clans?



DF: The clan I’m mainly known for is Dimension Police! It wasn’t always my main, as I started off with Shadow Paladin, but some things happened in life and after switching to Dimension Police, I just feel that it fits who I am best. However, since I am a YouTuber, I play a pretty big variety of clans, but my other favourites would have to be Nova Grappler and Angel Feather. Each of these clans plays very differently, but there’s always something about them that makes me like them more than the rest.

G：How interesting! What is your favorite unit? It certainly is from that clan, isnt it?

DF: None other than Daikaiser himself! If I had to pick just one form, it would have to be the original ‘Super Dimensional Robo, Daikaiser’. It’s the one card that I’ll never get tired of, and I simply can’t go without it these days. I love practically all of Dimension Police’s boss grade 3s, but when it comes to personal enjoyment, I always find myself coming back to Daikaiser.



G: Let us enter the main topic: Your vanguard commentary and live casted commentated games in Vanguard at the World stage. How did you first get the idea to start commentating Vanguard games?



DF: I first started out like many others – just recording the finals of my local area’s regionals in order to share with the world. I never commentated over them back then, since I didn’t really feel a need to, or at least the realization of why it’s important didn’t quite hit me yet. However, even back then, I was a massive eSports fan. Especially that of Smash. Bros and League of Legends. The feeling of excitement rooting for your favourite players and teams was like no other, but on top of that, there were people who were talking to you, the viewer, who essentially got you hyped and excited. And on top of that, they didn’t just get you excited – they even explained WHY you’re excited.

At first I mainly just respected them a lot for their work and didn’t think too much about it, but almost every year in August I would catch myself watching the Pokemon Trading Card Game World Championships.This was the big turning point for me. Somehow, even though the card game itself isn’t all that interactive, the commentators managed to bring out the best out of the games to an extent that I would remember at least 1 or 2 games for many years to come. Even some of the professional eSports-based games wouldn’t do that for me, but the big caster names behind Pokemon TCG, such as Kyle ‘Pooka’ Sucevich and Joshua ‘JWittz’ Wittenkeller, didn’t fail to do so.

So I thought ‘hey, why don’t we have this in Vanguard?’ and after seeing that it doesn’t exist yet, I decided to take things into my own hands. At first it was just commentating my own recorded gameplay from regionals I had visited, but then later on I started bugging various tournament organisers about whether or not I could ask them to record their tournaments’ finals for me to commentate at a later date. Thanks to their cooperation, I managed to get a lot of good commentary in, so I’m very thankful to be given these opportunities!

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G: What do you think is important in commentary? How do you keep the viewers interested in every game?

DF: In terms of the gameplay itself, as I mentioned before, it’s the ability to create excitement for the viewer out of thin air, all while explaining why they should be excited about what’s happening. The people that both I myself watch play, and the viewers at home watch play with my commentary on top of that, are all very skilled players that have made it to the top tables consistently. I think the best way to please both the more hardcore competitive folks and the more casual folks is to explain the more advanced plays that are being made, analyze whether or not that was the most optimal choice in that scenario, as well as have topics to talk about during the ‘filler’ time – when players shuffle their decks, when a judge has to interrupt (if necessary), when there’s some looping going on.

However, on the topic of advanced plays, there have been cases where even I was baffled for some time mid-commentary, because some of these incredible players make such turns of play that even I can’t immediately wrap my head around them. The most obvious example would actually be the most recent commentary that I uploaded, in which I genuinely got confused while watching Ryan Kai play out one of his last turns, and only later realizing the true motives behind his moves. Times like this do happen and I’m certain they will happen again in the future as well, but I try my best to always be able to explain all lines of play. In the end I’m just a guy that talks to a camera, and these are genius players that are able to win tournaments back to back consistently over a large period of time. Also, I mainly do commentary on my own, but during August last year I was able to commentate together with my good friend @Zystral, who now runs a pretty cool livestream that I recommend everyone to check out. It was amazing to be able to bounce our ideas off each other, and I think he did an incredible job as well. Luckily, I’ll have a co-commentator to bounce ideas off of at the World Finals as well, so it should prove to be a very entertaining learning experience.

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G: What do you think is important about commentary for the game?



DF: I think one of the most important factors is that of pulling in the viewer. There are many times when I’m watching tournament matches on YouTube without any commentary where I may start to drift away when one of the players starts looping for a good 5 minutes. Commentary solves that, because the commentators have plenty of great filler topics to talk about while something like that is happening, which then helps the viewer not lose their attention as they wait for the action to return.

Another thing is creating memories. People will better remember the most mind-blowing plays if there is someone to emphasize those plays to them. I personally aim to conduct my commentary in a way that’ll leave people going “whoa, did you see that?!” after something incredible happens, which then creates a discussion topic and the community can continue to evolve. Many other card games like Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh! And Magic have this by default because of their high commentator rate, and I feel Vanguard needs more of it as well.

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G: What does commentary at the World Championship mean for Vanguard going forwards?

DF: I honestly think it matches with Bushiroad’s image of trying to create a better competitive environment for Vanguard, as they have been aiming to do this year. However, even more importantly, it will be the first step in fixing one of the biggest issues that I’ve always had with the community – the fact that tournament winners are not remembered by their names, but rather by their deck lists. There are very few names in the competitive community that you can say in any part of the world that will be remembered. That’s because the community’s perspective is “did you see that Nightrose list that topped?”, while in other card game communities it would be “did you see Ray Winnesa’s Nightrose list that topped?”.

Personally, as one of the commentators for the event, I will be doing my best to not only make the games memorable, but also the players that play out those games. I want to do my best to make sure that the players who always work the hardest to strive for the top are remembered for their great efforts, because as it is now, it just doesn’t seem that motivating to try hard at the competitive scene when you won’t be remembered by your name, but rather by your deck list. I really hope that the commentary will be the first big step in changing this.



G: On the topic of World tournament, what do you think of the format that Worlds will take place on?

DF: The English BCS finals which I’ll be partially responsible for commentating will be in the G-BT13 (Ultimate Stride) format, so the most clear decks looking to take the top cut will be Overlord, Chaos and Thavas, with several other lesser-played decks having a very strong chance, such as Vanquisher, Luard, Zodiac Time Beasts, Deletors, amongst others. However, I think taking Chaos is quite risky, as it now has a fairly bad matchup against several decks in the meta, with Overlord being a Vanguard-centric deck, Thavas having access to all that resist and unlockers, as well as the existence of the Messiah deck which can counterplay it quite well.

On top of all that, there is one very important thing to realise for the finals – not all players are participating with the intention to win it all.

As for some players, the objective of the entire circuit was to get the free trip to Japan, as well as the special promo card and playmat that is given to all finalists. Technically, the only other thing you can win is an achievement associated with your name. Not all of the participants will be interested in this, so I wouldn’t be surprised if some players showed up with their favourite pocket picks, such as Gaia Emperor, Garmore, or decks of that similar genre.

There are some big names amongst those that have qualified that are highly likely to bring something very interesting to the deck line-up however, including Liubo Chen who currently stands at the top of the participants with 9 total official Bushiroad tops at a regional level of higher, who is very known for his interesting Royal Paladin decks.

There’s also Kevin Cho with 6 total official Bushiroad Vanguard tops, who I’m sure many people will keep an eye out for, as he is the highest achieving player of the North American participants, with Hank Hwang with 5 achievements being closely behind.

For Mexico, I’m personally quite interested in seeing what Moya Jesus and Max Carreno will show us, as they are both prominent players in their local communities.

As for Asia, there are several players that seem to be relatively new, but some of the bigger names include Wong Chir Hung and Ray Winnesa. It’s a bit of a shame that Ray won’t be able to use the new Nightrose stride though, since it’s not released in English yet. :’)

On top of that, as we do not have G-EB02 released in English yet, I doubt we’ll be seeing much of any of those 3 clans. It’s a pretty big shame that in the end the BCS and WGP is a split tournament, but the even bigger shame is that they removed Japan from the participants of the English-side of worlds as well. I think it was until either 2014 or 2015 that Japan almost always had at least one qualifying round into the English side of tournaments, and I know several WGP players that would prefer to play the much more competitive BCS format instead. Hopefully in the future we can have a full on “World Championship” where all countries involved in the game will be able to play together.



G: After abolishing Continentals and instead taking winners of each Spring and Autumn Circuit, this years World tournament has 49 contestants. In 2018 they will be changing this again to instead have Spring circuit be a team event with no progression to Worlds, and only the Autumn Circuit providing a ticket to the World Championship. What are your thoughts on this change?



DF: I think this is a very difficult discussion topic. On one hand, you have people like myself who wish for the most optimally competitive environment possible – such as that of the BCS 2017. We had 2 day events, we had best of 3 day 2, we have a world finals with the largest pool of players ever – it’s as good as it’s ever been. However, on the other hand, you have the more casual folks who miss the team spirit of Team League and have been asking for a long time to get it back. One of my team mates, AmberSAMA, ESPECIALLY loves Team League, so this announcement lifted his spirits a lot.

As we don’t know Bushiroad’s main plans for the latter half of 2018, I’m slightly assuming that there may be more qualifiers than usual in order to bring together a similar amount of people as this year to the world finals, but in the end it won’t be the same as 2017. I think 2017 was the optimal competitive format, but in order to cater to the more casual folks, I don’t think Bushiroad could give up Team League that easily. In Japan, they have the luxury of having both single and team-based events at the same time, due to how efficiently everything is run and the overwhelming amounts of staff. Maybe one day we’ll reach that stage in the West – one can only hope.

G: What are some of your personal goals in 2018?



DF: One of the goals I previously mentioned is that of trying to make the big player names more remembered. I already attempted it last year by starting the Cardfighter’s Spotlight series, but I feel there’s even more I can still do with my voice. One of my inspirations was actually your blog, as you not only featured the big names, but allowed them to speak about various interesting topics regarding their career, so that the readers can get a peek into what goes on in the heads of these talented players.

My other big goal is arguably more naïve, but I aim to try and unify the international community this year. Not unite, as that would suggest that everyone would get along and love each other, which I think is close to impossible. But rather unify and be able to discuss the differences between each region without poking fun at other regions and dismissing different playstyles just because they don’t match with the norm in one’s own region. It annoys me that I keep seeing people in various regions, whether they’d be Europe, North America or Japan, where anything that is not seen as the standard in that region is dismissed as “they’re from X nation, they don’t know how to play this game”.

There are reasons why various trends exist in different continents, and why there are very prominent players in each of these regions. Although the more I look into it, the more I notice that the most prominent ones are the ones that appreciate and learn from these cultural differences the most, rather than dismissing them. I’m going to aim to promote this mindset – even if you don’t use the trends that are used in different regions, you can at least learn from them and aim to understand why they are being used. I think that’s very important for any aspiring competitive player as well, as well as for a great international card game community.



G: On the subject of Youtube and content creation, after many years of youtubing, this year you have hit 13000 followers to your channel. Do you mind sharing a bit about your channel?

DF: As mentioned earlier, the main players that I cater to are the more competitive ones, with series like ‘Cardfighter’s Spotlight’, as well as some others that I’ve done in the past, such as ‘How to Beat’ or the ‘Meta Analysis’. My ‘big breakthrough’ (if you can even call it that) was with comedy videos however, which was the ‘How to Play’ series. I still make those every now and then, but I try to not push them out until I have a really good and funny idea.

I feel the strong point of the comedy videos is that they generally last a long time, as some of them are just general jokes about the clans themselves, which rarely change. One of the things with competitive-related videos is that formats change, and thus some videos are simply irrelevant after some time. To accommodate the competitive part of my channel, I try to commentate various games from around the world from big unofficial (or sometimes official) tournaments, which I feel the game desperately needs in the community.

On top of that, I have my “Cardfighter’s Spotlight” series, where I try to focus more on the interesting developments in the constantly evolving meta on a semi-frequent basis. There are other videos that cater to the more casual player as well, such as the ‘Set Breakdown’ series as well as the ‘Road to Worlds’ which is a basic survival guide to the upper level regional tournaments that Vanguard has, which are best for the new player.

G: What is the process of creating a video on Youtube?

DF: Usually the filming process is the shortest and the easiest, taking anywhere from 10 minutes to 2 hours (for Set Breakdowns). I don’t script most of my videos, but there are exceptions like Cardfighter’s Spotlight where I do. Otherwise I just go off bullet points. The most time consuming part is always the editing, which can take anywhere from an hour to 2-3 full days. By far the most time consuming are the fight videos I rarely do, but Spotlight also takes a really long time to put together as well. Finally, the finishing touch that is out of my hands is the thumbnail, which has always been taken care of by my good friend Belladonna Toxin – she’s been part of the channel since the beginning, and has created all the gorgeous thumbnails you see on my videos.

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G: Do you mind sharing about your filming setup?

DF: My set-up is a bit different now while I’m on exchange in Japan, but for editing I currently use my updated Lenovo G50 laptop, and for actual filming I have my Nikon 1 J4 for recording, but I’m planning to upgrade in a few months so that won’t stay for too long. I record my audio separately on my Samson Go Mic with a pop filter attached, which produces surprisingly high quality (most of the time) for a $30 mic. The only difference back at home is that for editing I use a beast PC that I had one of my friends build for me, so editing goes a lot faster and smoother. My current video editing software of choice is Videopad 4.10, but I’m probably gonna change to a different one sometime soon.



G: How did you meet the greatest Vanguard player you know?



DF: I think everyone has their own definition of ‘greatest’ in this context, and honestly, while I do focus on the competitive side of the game a lot, the greatest players to me are my teammates that I playtest with the most, and I think for a lot of other people it would also be their playtest partners. In the end, ‘greatest’ can mean anything, whether it’s the strongest, the most consistently topping, the brightest personality, or simply the ones that you have the most enjoyment playing against.



G：Who are some famous vanguard players around Europe?



DF: I’ll mostly share players, but there are some great content creators I’d like to bring attention to as well;

Liubo Chen, obviously the most famous of the current top players, he has the brightest and most fun personality fitting for a champion and it’s always incredible to be watching him play

Edwin Talahatu, he quit a while ago, but before Liubo there was Edwin, and at the time he had amassed the highest amount of Bushiroad tournament tops in a short amount of time to the point that it was baffling. Fun fact – the two are teammates!

Jey Kobus, basically the star of Germany, travels a lot for tournaments and is very open minded to ideas from other regions. In my opinion one of the most advanced competitive players.

Andy van den Ouwelant, the first ever Belgian player to win a regional and has been topping consistently ever since. He hasn’t reached the World finals stage yet, but in my opinion he’s just as much of a strong player today as he was in 2012.

Ashley Annaert, got himself a top 8 finish in BCS Germany 2017, overall a very consistently topping player from Belgium and always nice to hang around.

Krzysztof Buczynski, finally got his qualification this year, I don’t know him personally as well but he’s definitely a formidable player.

Arnaud Faber or JUN, the voice of the French community and one of the most charismatic players I know. Great player, known for Tachikaze, great tournament organizer, great personality, overall 10/10 dude.

Mohammed Abumahlula, I don’t know him as well either but known for being prominent with Oracle Think Tank, namely Susanoo, and I have a lot of respect for him for that. Well known UK-based player, also qualified for Worlds this year.

Kyo Togen, another French talent who tops very consistently. Travels a lot for tournaments and overall has a very strong competitive mindset. Also qualified for Worlds this year.

Maxime Solemn, a sweet summer child that loves his marine boys and music production. Great YouTuber and player as well, plays very seriously and competitively while making great content at the same time. When I lack motivation to get creative with my content, talking with him inspires me to keep working my hardest. Overall great guy.

Ben Anuworakarn or Zystral, one of my closest friends and one of the most efficient judges I know. Topped a few Team Leagues with his team, very efficient player, and has a pretty sweet stream on Twitch on top of that.

There are plenty more I could go into, but I think those are the most necessary ones to go over for now!



G: And what about some famous players from around the world that you know of?

DF: If I had the liberty to list everyone I thought needed the attention around the world I would make this article way too long, so I’ll do my best to keep it shorter:

CanYouSayG, he’s a pretty cool guy whoes travelled the world and kicks my ass to stop being lazy and start taking things into my own hands.

Kevin Cho from the US, very consistently topping player not only in Vanguard but also Buddyfight. Haven’t met him in person yet, but looks like a great sport.

Adam Jackson from Canada, my long lost twin, fellow YouTuber and very good player. Has plenty of regional tops under his belt and his ability is definitely justified.

Ryan Kai from Malaysia, charismatic dude and very famous. A great role model for other competitive players.

Steven Low from Malaysia, the strongest Dimension Police senpai of all, tops locally very frequently with his favourite pocket picks, which I think is very respectable.

Joshua Rava & Kenneth Lim, they’re both god-tier judges which is why I put them together. We need more incredible judges around the world as efficient as them.

Mikael Lee from Indonesia, an inspiration to (especially younger) fighters around the world to travel more for tournaments. Very good player, also a tournament host from a very young age (in comparison to the norm, at least).

CardOtakuDesu from Hong Kong, one of my good fellow YouTuber friends, very chill person to talk to and soothing to listen to. He hasn’t been feeling it as much lately, but I hope he still enjoys the game at least a little bit.

Crossbone Vanguards from Singapore, fellow YouTubers – I honestly see them as my little siblings in the community. They make great and very fun content more geared for the casual player, very high production quality!

CardProtagonist from Singapore, he’s been doing a lot more Buddyfight content lately, but the quality of his content has improved a lot and he’s overall fun to listen to. Has the personality of an idol, which I think the community needs as well.

Chiroyann from Singapore, not a player per se, but an incredible artist who designed the Daikaiser mat that I always carry with me, and she still does occasionally draw Vanguard art so definitely worth a check.

Scarlette @Sra_Ammy from Chile, one of my favourite Vanguard fan artists, I very highly respect her for making her own merchandise and she’s overall a very fun person to talk to!

みやじゅんのヴァンガードチャンネルfrom Japan, one of my favourite Japanese Vanguard channels that I feel is underappreciated in the west. They have a very good chemistry between each other and produce some very entertaining Vanguard content in Japanese.

もんもんfrom Japan, I wish I had the opportunity to meet them in person, but their edited fights were the reason why I started to work so hard in editing my own fight videos. Inspirational and very fun channel, but I’m sure you already knew that.

SHINさん from Japan, a very fun and respectable player and personality. Has many achievements under his belt, but above all else he’s very respecting and interested in how Vanguard is played outside of Japan, and I personally love seeing that level of curiosity in people.

Nekobus from Japan, a very friendly and talented artist, had the pleasure of meeting them at the last Stand Up convention where they had a booth set up. Definitely recommend following, especially if you like Ahsha and Gavrail!

@ansuerer from Japan, the leader of Team TriCriTS, which is a fairly competitive team of fun people in Japan, most of them being slightly older than the majority of the playerbase. Very successful player, very kind personality, definitely the kind of player I would want to introduce to my own local friends.



G：And now to the last question. Imagine you have made it to the finals of the World Championship!! Who would you like to fight on the grand stage of the World Finals?

DF: If I’m given the freedom to go full weeb then it’d have to be Mitsusada 'Koutei' Kenji!

But on a more realistic level, I think in the end from the people I know that still play the game I would want it to be Maxime Solemn, as I think we both have a similar perspective on the game, and I think it would turn out to be a very exciting match.

The other person would not be Liubo himself, but rather his teammate Edwin Talahatu who doesn’t really play anymore. Main reason being that back when I didn’t really have much of a name for himself, he was the one that was blowing everyone’s minds in Europe with just how much he was topping and his level of playmaking. And fun little fact of trivia, the very first time I ever tried commentary was with him!

G: That’s all for today folks. Thank you everybody for coming tonight and reading our interview we had with DifferentFight! Be sure to watch the World Tournament on the 21st and stay tuned to his commentary and interviews with the players!



G: I have been your host, CanYouSayG. Keep on being awesome, and we will see you again next week, right here on the CanYouSayBlog.







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