Interview with Cardfight Vanguard World Champion Nuno Raimundo (Standard)

CanYouSayG: Yahallo lads and ladettes, its me its your best friend its CanYouSayG, and you are reading the CanYouSayBlog, where we learn how to be a better Cardfighter.

Today, we have a very special guest on with us, the Ace fighter of Ventura Games, and our Bushiroad Championship Series 2019 World Champion (Standard) himself, Nuno Raimundo of Portugal!!



Nuno Raimundo: Hiiii, its a pleasure and thanks for hosting me.

G: Thank you for being on the show with us today, Nuno Raimundo. We have a great many questions we ourselves want to ask you, as well as some questions our readers from America, Europe, and Japan have sent in today, but let’s start with some quick introduction. How long have you been playing Cardfight Vanguard, and what is your Favorite Clan?



NR: Ive been playing vanguard since the release of the original BT09 when Platina Ezel and Vermillion “The Blood” were introduced, my favorite clan is narukami

G: What is your personal avatar unit?

NR: I would say Dragonic vanquisher, always loved Narukami but it just became better for me with the bind mechanic, also I loved the artwork.

G: and very quickly, what do you personally think is the single best thing about Cardfight Vanguard?



NR: Probably the fact that you have to be really careful with your resources and try to control your opponent board, since generally you don’t have cards of effects in your opponent turn, you have to play more carefully around your opponent and utilize the most value out of your cards.

G: Today we will be going over a few topics: The World Championship and your Preparation towards it, as well as your thoughts on the community and the near future of Vanguard community.

Let's start with the World Championship. The World Championship is a high level invitational only tournament with the best of the best, a concentration of only Bushiroad Championship Series winners from across the globe.

Do share a bit about your journey to the World Championship!

NR: It was a really fun experience, this year I decided to travel a bit more than usual to go for regionals and do my best to get the invite to Worlds. For this goal I went to three regionals instead of just one (London, Cologne, Lisbon) and got 3rd place in 2 of them, after this and after playing in vbt06 meta for so long I felt I was ready for the worlds so I just looked into the new decks and decided that I still wanted to play the deck I took to London (Pale moon), turned out to be a pretty good choice since the deck was really consistent.

G: Do you mind sharing a bit about how you prepare for a high level tournament such as a BCS or the World Championship?

NR: Basically I play test with my team mates at Ventura games team(Marton Miko and Jacob Linder), since both of them went to worlds last year, and with my girlfriend, after we play tested the various meta decks it felt like I was ready to face anything.

G: And what are some resources (videos, programs, articles) you used to practice and learn about the game during your preparation?



NR: I would normally use Cardfight Area for understanding the decks theme and combos, play test on discord sometimes just to play with the cards in my hand and get used to the deck, I also watch WCC and Canyousayg videos/articles to keep me updated on the future metagame.

G: Thats is great insight.

Throughout your whole journey you have been backed by your sponsor Ventura Games. For the people at home watching, do you mind sharing what Ventura Games is and how they support you?

NR: Ventura games is a card game store located in Portugal, they sell cardfight vanguard cards using Cardmarket and Ebay, they normally get me the cards I need to play when a big tournament comes out. It's one of the most trusted sellers in all of Europe.

https://venturacardgames.com/

G: In the World Championship, you chose to play Palemoon Silverthorn over your favorite clan: Narukami, despite both being powerful contenders in the format. What lead to you choosing to play the Palemoon deck? Did you regret your decision of deck choice at any point of the tournament?



NR: I never regretted playing pale moon, I did this choice because I do not really like gauntlet buster dragon as a card since it makes you reliant on your opponent using an accel clan, in a meta of accel clans this can be pretty easy but I wanted to be prepared for everything, I also played against 1 force clan, so I was pretty happy I choose pale moon in the end.

G: That is quite some things to consider while picking a deck indeed. Thank you for sharing!

Of all the top players from around the World you fought in the tournament, who is one fighter that truly stood out to you?

NR: For sure it was the Tachikaze player from the Cardfight Vision team I faced in both round 7 of Swiss and Top 4, he was really calm while playing but you could also see he was doing every right choice, had a really good two games against him and hope to play him again next year!

G: What are your thoughts on Japan not being able to participate in the World Championship, instead having their own Worlds with a few East Asian Countries?

NR: It is normal to me since they get the releases earlier, I think it's better to divide into two tournaments instead of force Japanese players to play an older format in worlds.

G: Once again congratulations on being crowned the 2019 World Champion. How do you feel being called World Champion?

NR: it was a really weird feel since after getting the 3rd place in 2017, I never though I could go higher than that, really happy that I won and looking forward to more challenges as the game continues to grow and newer cards come out.

G: As a very experienced and proven player, what is one mistake you see players make very often?



NR: Guarding, I feel like many players don't think about what the opponent deck can do and don't guard accordingly to that.

G: Next let’s move onto some questions regarding the Vanguard community and player base.

What is the community over in Europe like? What are some of your favorite parts of the community?

NR: Its still small compared to other regions I feel like but we are growing each year and getting more players into worlds, my favorite aspect would be that we have many players here who travel a lot so we end up seeing each other on more than just one BCS.

G: Do you see an increase in newer players in your local community? If so, are they more casual players or more hardcore players?

NR: As the game in Portugal grows we see an increase on the newer players, which leads to the game being more casual.

G: Would you say the community as a whole for Vanguard is headed in a more casual direction? Or towards a more competitive environment?

NR: I would say the game is getting more competitive from year to year and people are trying to playtest more and analyze the new decks and cards that come out, the various youtube channels also help creating a more competitive mentality

G: What are some things you want to see in the future of the Vanguard Community?

NR: I would really enjoy people to play both formats instead of just one, both formats are fun and competitive so I would like to see more people who play one trying to play the other.

G: As the World Champion, what do you think you can do from now on for the Vanguard community?

NR: I will just try to keep showing consistency in my results and hope that can inspire others in trying to travel more and getting more interested/competitive in the game.

G: Thank you for sharing all of your experiences regarding the community with us! Hopefully we can see the community continue to grow in the coming years.

G: Our final question for Nuno Raimundo today is our classic interview question, but its a tiny bit awkward because Nuno Raimundo here has not only made it to the finals of the World Championship, he has gone and won it! But here it goes anyways:.

Imagine it! you are in the Finals of the World Championship, of all the fighters, which three fighters would YOU like to fight on the greatest stage for Vanguard?

NR: Ahah thats a funny one actually, for me I would personally choose these three: Ryan Kai, Kevin Cho and Togen Kyo, because in my opinion they are the three strongest players in each region (Asia, Americas, Europe) and I would love to play against them on a finals!

G: Thats all for today folks thank you once again for tuning in to the show! We are very thankful to have the World Champion for Standard, Nuno Raimundo of Ventura Games with us today to answer the questions that you the viewers have sent in. Lets give him a big round of applause!

Thank you everyone for watching the show tonight. Be sure continue to check out the CanYouSayBlog, where we learn how to be a better Cardfighter!