TCG Design Theory - Is 0-cost card draw broken?

In some games having a 0-cost effect that draws one card seems dangerously overpowered, and in some games it's nearly irrelevant. So what gives? Is this class of card fundamentally broken, or is it only powerful in very specific circumstances?
Also, if the 0-cost draw is giving you more than one card, the answer is yes. I figured that bit wasn't especially controversial.

I slightly changed my recording set up for this video. Everything here really came together quickly, so hopefully the next video is equally quick.

[evilagram]

Card draw is powerful relative to the other cards in the game. Upstart goblin became worse because if you're going second, you might draw it instead of a 0-cost hand trap, whereas a draw 2 has enough utility to be worth risking a dead draw during your opponent's first turn.

Additionally, deck thinning is more powerful the smaller the starting deck size is, so a draw 1 is more powerful in Yu-Gi-Oh than magic.

The theory in general goes, if there was no minimum deck size, players would make a deck that consists of their wincon, disruption, and absolutely nothing else, then win the game on the first turn. Draw effects & search effects bring you closer to this with larger minimum deck sizes.

[featherlessbiped]

I actually disagree with your point about disruption. If your opponent uses counter/negation on your free cycle, they have one less counter/negation to use on your most impactful cards.

[epicunderworlds]

I absolutely love your tcg design theory videos. They help way more than you know!

[Zetact_]

I think that it really depends on how much leeway there is in deckbuilding and how much space there is for a playset of cards that don't serve to do anything other than deck thin. If you can realistically fill out everything your deck "needs" with space to spare and there aren't better options, such cards are broken but if the card pool is large enough that players always are struggling to keep their deck size small then these sorts of cards are far less relevant. If your game has a deck size of 50 but most players can make their full strategy with 40 cards, then 0-cost draw is broken because their deck doesn't need that space, but if players are struggling to get the strategy together without going to 51 or 52 cards then 0-cost draw won't be relevant - they don't have the luxury of throwing it in.
To use the Upstart example, Yugioh is at a space where Upstart still is a moderately useful card but if you dedicate 3 spots of your deck to something else like an extra set of hand traps or a mini-engine that you get more reward out of it. Upstart was most prevalent in earlier formats where the 3 spots it would take up wouldn't individually be able to impact your strategy significantly and where you would be drawing through your deck more because games would be longer so thinning it was more relevant, but nowadays there are so many options for cards in the meta that there's always a better option to just deck thinning. The "I have space so might as well use this to fill up my 40 cards" could be better filled by stuff that impacts board state.
Yugioh's pile meta of a couple years ago can be pointed to as to why Upstart isn't really relevant any more - it's possible to make entire decks where all you do is throw together a bunch of disconnected engines and they work because each individual card just goes through its entire cycle of plays by itself. You could just play 3 Fenrir instead of Upstart and get the exact same result on total deck size, only you also get a beater that banishes cards on the field and that's just one example of an engine of a single card, there are others that are 2 or 3 cards that you might not need to run at maximum so with a little extra space you could squeeze something in.

[respectblindfolds]

Small nitpick, but Droll isn't a perfect analog here. Droll won't actually stop you from drawing off of Upstart Goblin, it will only stop you from searching off the subsequent Aliester. This is because it doesn't trigger until a card has entered the hand, and then it applies until the end of the next turn. Again, small gripe, but felt I should mention it. Ash Blossom would've been a much closer point of comparison.

[TQuantP]

I don't know about other games, but in MTG probe was a card every deck played in modern no matter the archetype or colors.

0 mana draw a card is extremely valuable and has practically no downside (you never want to counter it btw) for the purpose of filterint through your deck.

Including other synergistic minor effect like fetch lands in every deck also hepls minorly (a fetch is equal to 1 extra non-land card drawn per ~16 cards drawn for anyone that didn't know).

All in all probe as an example here made modern a turn 3 format instad of a turn 4, this means that it held significant power on it's own.

[admiralcasperr]

Cool. I like that this mildly shorter video got out so soon.

[Vexabond]

Wake up babe a new academia vid dropped

[Laezar]

they aren't inherently broken but they need a lot of caution to be made both not broken and interesting.

One of my favorite similar effects is imperative bell in mythgard. It's a 2mana card (bear with me) that's an artifact you place down and once per turn you can secretly target a minion and if that minion get killed during the opponent turn you get 2mana immediately, draw a card and get to play a card (you typically can't play cards during the opponent turn in that game).

It's really interesting because it's got a lot of advantages (interaction during opponent turn, ramp, synergy with artifacts, deck thinning) but also a lot of flaws (can only be played turn 2+, takes time to take effect and mana to invest in, opponent can play around it, if you play a card with an activated ability you can't immediately trigger it and a few others that are very specific to that game like card burning decisions or a tech card that hurt it a lot)
Even if at it's core it's 0 mana : draw 1, in term of what the general effect is, it's just really interesting to build around and play around in a game.

My favorite way to abuse it is with blight cards that wither the opponent minion at the start of it's turn, meaning I can target their own minion instead of mine and set it up so they die from the blight the turn I want the effect to trigger basically forcing it instead of relying on the opponent. While it does away with a lot of the mindgame it also requires pairing with another color (there is no blight effect in the color of that card) and can require some careful planning to set up a powerful turn you want so it's still interesting. But you can find tons of other ways to abuse it like pairing it with artifact synergy, cost reduction (making the mana refund into a net positive), or disrupting decks that rely on sacrifices (since you can hold on onto removal until they sacrifice the card you targeted to make them lose even more resources).

Not going anywhere with this just wanted to share that neat card and how a very simple effect can have a great deal of depth if given enough to work with.

[chrisshorten]

Just like every other war criminal, Pekora WOULD be arrested for something that wasn't a war crime.

[yusheitslv]

Something I think should be kept in mind is how much raw card advantage means in a game, or even a given format.

Coming primarily from Yu-Gi-Oh (still play it, and I'm very much a YugiZoomer): raw vard advantage IS Yugioh's resource system, and it's a bit of an adjustment when learning a game where raw card advantage is secondary to something else. In Yugioh communities, people often talk about cards or combos in terms of how much you "plus" off of it. Meaning: how many cards are there between your hand and board before & after resolving an effect or finishing a combo.

I picked up Digimon earlier this year, and I still find myself chuckling because of how much raw card advantage seemingly doesn't matter, rather the contents of your hand matters. You could have the right stuff in hand to combo off given the board state...but then your opponent passes turn, giving you only 1 memory and you don't have a memory setter and/or not enough ways to reduce costs/gain memory. On the flip side, you draw a card every time you use the game's primary gameplan progression mechanic (evolution/digivolution), and there's no hand size rule. Ending turn with 10 cards in hand isn't a flex.

[Yinyanyeow]

If it helps, the game's rules can poke how much a card effect can hit. I mean drawing cards is different if you can draw up to hand size per turn or that certain cards gain cards at the end. Then search is stronger.

[bobboberson]

Also something I didn't see mentioned is that playing disruption can basically be free draw too. If you live extra turns you draw more cards. If you force of will your opponent's removal spell, you get to keep generating value with your cards in play, so it's not really a 2 for 1 and cantrips are competing for these spots in your deck.

[jasonking]

Man I really miss your videos, could you do a individual deep dive video on some of the top/up and coming tcg.
I want see what make these tcg great and what make pple drawn to them.
(to tell you the truth i could do this myself but im too lazy and plus i love ur video 😂) keep it up sensie

[TempestDacine]

Id say its also a critical mass issue. Upstart on its own is no problem but when ygo had 20+ cantrip spells you had ftk combo decks. And like you said in a more structured game like wixoss you often can't afford to disrupt your curve for something like that.

[altrivotzck]

Patches the Pirate is pretty similar, but slightly different from the rest of these, in interesting ways.

It doesn't clog up space in your mulligan, since you don't need it in your hand to use its effect, except that having it in your hand is a pretty large downside, since it has to be in your library for its "free card draw + 1/1" effect to activate, otherwise only being a vanilla 1/1 for 1. Also, you have to be playing a certain tribe/creature type to even use its effect.

[tcoren]

Upstart goblin is such a bad card in modern yugioh. Imagine playing upstart going second and drawing an handtrap that could've helped you during opponent's turn. Imagine getting drolled on a cantrip. Imagine getting walled by anti spell, naturia beast, and stuff like herald boards. Imagine losing in time due to your cantrip. Imagine playing 37 cards when arguably for a lot of deck something like 42 is optimal (due to garnets, searchable 1-ofs, and just the general more engine = better grind game).
I would argue even in the olden days the deck thinning was just as marginal a gain as 1000 LP was a marginal lost, unless you were playing something truly unfair

[wickederebus]

Good news, Upstart Goblin is back to 3, and Pot of Desires is back to 3 as well.

[Bubblenuts]

I feel like jar of greed would be better if traps were much more of a key part of the game, and combos were less reliable. The way I see it is it’s a useful bluff when they want to interact with one of your several traps. They go to destroy it and you just cycle it into something else. That’s a two for one. Not to mention the deck thinning. However, maybe I’m too magic brained, thinking about two for one advantages in that way. 😅

[kered]

Every other TCG: Zero cost draw 1 cards must be carefully balanced with drawbacks.
Pokemon: Zero cost draw 1 with no drawbacks is unplayable.