YMMV / Cardfight!! Vanguard overDress

• Applicability: Many viewers were quick to pick up on the idea that the conflict between Uniformers and their opposition, namely Team Blackout, is a fitting metaphor for the divide between competitive players and casual players. The Uniformers believe in sacrificing a more individualistic playstyle in favor of a more streamlined and "uniform" style, much like competitive players will typically base their decks off of the current metagame, resulting in many players often playing copies of the same deck. Their opposition meanwhile believes in demonstrating a more individualistic playstyle and using what they feel fits them more so as to demonstrate their identity, much like how casual players will often build decks they like regardless of how "good" or "bad" they are in the metagame. What ends up driving Jinki to see the flaws in Uniformers perfectly encapsulates this, as while plenty of people did try out the Uniformers program, many are quick to leave it due to finding the playstyle too "stiff" or "soulless", a reflection of how some casual players feel about the metagame due to a lack of variety in deck types or not liking the playstyles of the meta decks compared to what they feel comfortable playing. Yu-yu's sheer hatred towards Uniformers and Gui is also reminiscent of how casual players can be just as toxic as competitive players despite their claims that they only want the game to be fun.
• Awesome Art: Kinema Citrus brings it's A-game when it comes to animating the units, showing them in detail with gorgeous looking fights.
• Broken Base:
  • Encounter Ridelines. For some they are considered a nice nostalgic throwback to older units by reintroducing them into the D-Series and bringing in their deck's/clan's signature playstyles especially for fans of a clan who have yet to be represented in the D-Series, all without them overshadowing the new cards meant to represent the D-Series due to them not appearing in the anime and only being released sparingly alongside the Cray Cross Epic cards during breaks in-between seasons. For some however, they are seen as yet another case of blatant nostalgia pandering on Bushiroad's part and them refusing to let the original series go especially when coming from the heels of the V-Series - a format which was literally nothing but nostalgia-pandering.
  • Collaboration Booster Sets are either seen as an interesting addition of nations based on popular series with fun, innovative and unique playstyles that also serve as a gateway for fans of those series to get into Vanguard, or a waste of time due to them padding out pack releases that could have been for actual Vanguard sets and have an uncertainty of being further supported due to the nature of the collaborations set in the first place. In addition, some collaboration sets may also suffer a case of No Export for You due to licensing issues with their respective IP owners, resulting them either taking too long and being released way too late in the English format past the point they were on par with the game's Power Creep that time, or not getting released at all. Later collaboration releases mitigate some of these issues by officially making some of them part of the game's main nations (such as the Mushiking collab being in Stoicheia, or the Quintessential Quintuplets being spread out to five out of the six main nations) thus allowing the collab decks access to any and all support the nation gets/will get in the future, allowing them to keep up with the current metagame.
• Diagnosed by the Audience: Many viewers have noted that Michiru shows signs of having ASD. His single minded focus on cardfighting, overall quiet demeanor unless it involves something he's passionate about upon which he gets easily excited, Innocently Insensitive nature, and semi-disheveled appearance, are all traits often associated with being on the spectrum, leading many viewers to conclude that Michiru has ASD, more specifically Asperger's Syndrome. The later revelation that he goes as far as to starve himself and deprive himself of sleep so as to focus solely on Vanguard strengthened this in the eyes of many, as well as convinced others he may also have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Several of the lesser focused Cardfighters in the Vanguard Deluxe ended up attracting attention despite their limited screen time. In particular, Himari Kanoashi for being the first Lyrical Monasterio user in the anime, and Mondo Kirishima for being a loving father and Retired Badass.
• Epileptic Trees:
  • Due to their picking their avatars by "listening" to their cards, it's common to see speculation that Yu-yu and Urara possess Psyqualia, even moreso with Yu-yu's ability to use the "shadows" Danji introduced him to for strengthening his image, and Urara's ability to harmonize with her deck to the point she enters the zone before eventually learning to harmonize with others thanks to Yu-yu. Less commonly seen but still prevalent is the idea Michiru has it too, thanks to his ability to see the aura of those he fights as colored flames.
  • Each set of the "D Format" game tends to include a "DSR" card, an extremely rare alternate art version drawn by CLAMP, of an existing unit depicting said unit with their user. When one of the "DSR" was Vairina Esperaridea, there was much confusion due to how Yu-yu is depicted on it.◊ As Yu-yu is never shown to be wearing this outfit in the anime or promotional material, many wondered just what it was meant to be. Later promotional material for Season 2 of will+Dress suggested that Jinki's ace card, Griphogila, would work well with Esperaridea, and the lyrics for the ending song, "Re-raise", have a specific, ominous sounding lyric that sounds like it could be from Yu-yu's perspective. With everything put together, many are convinced that the "DSR" was an Early-Bird Cameo for when Yu-yu has a Face–Heel Turn.
    if it'll gently save me from this crazy world, then reaching that hand in the darkness doesn't sound too bad
  • A lesser seen theory was that, with Jinki having expressed interest in Yu-yu and Urara, Sophie desiring to show Raika her "true magic", and Jinki successfully convincing Michiru to hear him out after beating him, was that Jinki planned on recruiting the four of them to "Project Uniformers", with Season 1 of will+Dress meant to serve as the initial stages of their Protagonist Journey to Villain. With each of them using each of the Nations sans Brandt Gate, some believed either Sam or Zakusa would be recruited too, the former because He Knows Too Much, the latter out of a desire to protect Yu-yu and/or to act as The Mole. By the end of will+Dress Season 2, this proved only partially correct. Urara, Michiru, and Zakusa were all recruited into Project Uniformers, the former two willingly, the latter forced to by Masanori under threat of targeting Mirei should he refuse. Yu-yu was never approached though, with Halona viewing him more as a threat if anything, and Raika actively refused the attempts by Sophie and Michiru. Urara would end up Brainwashed and Crazy but freed by Yu-yu shortly after, while Michiru would end up suffering a Heroic RRoD with his mind now lost to cyberspace and his body now comatose.
• Growing the Beard:
  • For many, the series' first seven episodes were generic Slice of Life at worst, the only real standout being Episode 6 due to developing Tohya. Episode 8 however is when many consider the series to hit it's stride, giving more focus to fan fav's Zakusa and Tomari, the return of Tohya, and the beginning of a greater plot, a seeming gang war between Cardfight teams.
  • Season 2 is considered a vast improvement over Season 1. The Slice of Life episodes are better constructed, there are more cardfighting episodes, and there is a more cohesive storyline.
• It's Short, So It Sucks!: One of the bigger criticisms against the series is that each season is restricted to a single cour,^*A "cour" refers to a unit of production in Japanese television, with a single cour for an anime being roughly 11-13 episodes which can very easily cause the pacing to feel rushed in an effort to condense each seasons plot into the allotted cour. While it tries counterbalancing this by having plots occur across multiple seasons,^*overDress having two seasons and will+Dress having three seasons a first for Vanguard,^*Prior seasons of Vanguard typically consisted of several cours and had their own unique titles to denote which season it is. Ex: Asia Circuit, Link Joker, Legion Mate it doesn't help that each cour ends up having a climatic boss of sorts, and that by prioritizing said boss over other aspects that reasonably need time to flesh out, not helped by moments that can otherwise feel like padding, it causes the pacing to suffer. will+Dress Season 1 is often cited as an example, due to most of the cardfights in the Vanguard Deluxe being relegated to offscreen, with the ones actually shown revolving around the main quartet the season wants to focus on: Yu-yu, Raika, Urara, and Michiru, making returning characters from prior seasons and other new characters feel neglected as a result, which then carries over to their depictions in seasons 2 and 3.
• Low-Tier Letdown: The Nirvana Jheva/X-Overdress deck. Despite it being the main protagonist's deck, its overall performance in the real-life game falls in comparison to the anime where it has the benefit of Plot Armor on its side to fix its glaring issues. This is because mechanics-wise, it requires players to lose a lot of card advantage (Trickstar, a Prayer Dragon, and the X-Overdress unit itself) all for a unit that is easily susceptible to any sort of removal. Furthermore, most if not all of its skills cost Counter Blast to use yet the deck has no internal ways to Counter Charge whatsoever. This got even worse with the release of Set 9 which gave it support that not only didn't fix its issues, but arguably making them worse by releasing support meant to promote a hybrid build between itself the original Overdress mechanic which only adds to the consistency issue as it does not have the Magic Poker Equation the anime has.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Using meta cards and reading comprehension is EVIL.^ExplanationAfter Urara was brainwashed by Uniformers, their first onscreen match, against Tomari, shows them now using staple cards like Inlet Pulse Dragon and altering their strategy to match their opponent's playstyle. Many jokingly began claiming what made Uniformers "evil" is that they bother to read their cards and adjust to the metagame, and that the show is making a blatant jab at real life players using "meta" decks rather than finding their own styles.
  • "No major changes can be seen"/Brandt Gate is blind ^Explanation The lore for Lianorn Masques is an incident report from Brandt Gate that notes that, despite her having gone missing and returned with a Masque of Hydragrum, that Lianorn seems to have no major changes to herself or her personality. Many immediately called bull considering Lianorn Masques' new Obviously Evil Costume Switch, more depressed expression, and use of dark magic in her artwork, with many asking if the investigators for the Masque incidents are completely blind to the obvious foul play going on.
  • CAC ^ExplanationAn acronym meaning "create a card", referring to certain usually high-rarity or promo cards that single-handedly shore up a particular deck's weaknesses and often end up being a Wall of Text in the process. So named for their uncanny resemblance to common fan-made card design trends (Wall of Text, suspiciously targeted at fixing a deck's problems), Operate Master, Freiheit is generally regarded as the first example with many more following in recent D sets.
  • Masques for Everyone!^Explanationwill+Dress saw the introduction of the "Masque" units, corrupted versions of existing units in a similar vein to the "Яeverse" units. Many began hoping for units to get Masque versions so as to make their decks better, to the point that when Haruka and Megumi were defeated, many hoped that would mean they'd get Masque units too and finally start getting focus and story relevance.
  • Raika please run Sequana ^Explanation Witch of Accumulation, Sequana is a staple of real life Youthberk decks due to it's ability to give RevolDress forms extra drive checks... that Raika has notably never been shown using in the anime. Considering a big part of his arc is his drive to become stronger, many groan every time Raika fights and still uses the same old cards like Painkiller Angel or clearly inferior Vanguard boosters like Sfilt instead of properly upgrading his deck, to the point where premieres of new episodes where he fights are usually full of people begging him to just run the card already. It's even gotten to the point that people joke that the card he received from his Tirnabog Youth junior wasn't going to be Revol Form: Full Blast (even though it was), but instead a playset of Sequanas instead.
  • Where's Breaking the Rock? ^Explanation When Raika debuted the much anticipated "RevolForm: Full Blast", it was expected that it would come with a Theme Music Power-Up from his signature song. When for some reason this didn't happen, fans were highly disappointed, to the point that some took it on themselves to make videos of the scene with Breaking the Rock edited in.
• Memetic Loser:
  • Eugene is treated as this by the majority of the playerbase due to its extremely underwhelming skills even for its time that seems to get even worse as Power Creep starts kicking in via new support and/or stronger decks being introduced. Thus whenever a new Vanguard or even rear-guard with a skill remotely similar to Eugene's function/ability-wise (or in some cases even better) comes around, except mockery at the Eugene's expense to not be far behind.
  • Nirvana Jaeva for a while was rather infamous in the player base due to reasons listed under Low-Tier Letdown, but what really rubbed salt in the wound was the lack of a reliable countercharge card for a deck that uses them for damn near everything. This hit its peak after the Scarlet Flame rideline got a archetypal countercharger in the same set they were introduced, whereas Jaeva fans have been begging for one for at least 5 sets prior. Thankfully Bushiroad finally solved the issue by giving them Mirrors Vairina, ironically part of the same set as Bausen but revealed after it.
• No Yay: Due to Yu-yu looking rather young for a 15-year old, many fans are hesitant to put him in pairings with older characters. Not helping matters is that, due to this being a Clamp series, there is Ho Yay abound, in particular between Yu-yu and Danji, which many object to due to Danji being in his 20's. Masanori's behavior in the hot-springs with him likewise caused many to cry out in disgust.
• Questionable Casting: While the English Dub voice acting has always been divisive, Urara's voice is sometimes hard to take seriously due to her sounding like she's slurring her words. While Urara is voiced by Karin Kagami in both English and Japanese, and she does improve somewhat over time, for many Karin's English voice acting leaves much to be desired, noting her native Japanese is more her strong suit.
• Scrappy Mechanic: The Over Trigger. To discuss anything about it would get a very toxic discussion about it from any part of the fandom. For anyone that does not know about it, it is a one per deck trigger which also takes up one of the 16 trigger spots. Upon triggering it, one of your units gains 100 Million power and you draw a card where in which the trigger is removed for the remainder of the fight. Then, if you Drive Checked it, you gain an additional effect depending on the nation you are using, or the generic one which gives another unit 100 Million power. Considering that most decks don't even reach the 100,000 mark, you understand where most of the issue is coming from. Hit it on your turn and you have nearly secured the win, check in on your opponent's turn and you no longer take any more damage from that point onward. While it is an issue in Standard, the issue is more evident and vocal in the Premium format due to Premium having a lot more card interactions that were not intended by the game itself due to every card in Vanguard's existence being allowed there.
• Strawman Has a Point: A not-insignificant portion of the viewers feel this way about Gui's arguments about Project Uniformers. While characters like Yu-yu, Danji, and Michiru oppose the Uniformers due to stripping players of their identities in favor of making them clones of Gui, plenty of viewers agree with the overall ideology of the Uniformers: sacrificing an individualistic playstyle in favor of a more "ideal" and "uniform" playstyle, largely due to real life players already doing something similar when following the metagame, with the heroes arguments fundamentally flawed by virtue of their decks not being good irl.^*While Raika plays the powerful "Youthberk" deck, he uses very few of the cards considered actually useful like Sequona or Wayward Therapy Angel, and focuses on "Revolform: Gust" over the stronger "Revolform: Tempest". Yu-yu meanwhile uses the Low Tier Let Down Nirvana X-overDress deck, and even when it finally got a Countercharger in Mirrors Vairina, a subsequent release of Yu-yu's decklist just made many cringe since he plays only one of each major card.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: Many fans are disappointed that the units are rarely shown fighting during a cardfight and that said cardfights are generally skipped over compared to the previous anime series. Also not helping is that the fight scenes that are shown tend to be rather confusing since instead of showing the actual units attacking, it shows their avatars battling each other.
• The Woobie: Mirei was born blind and bullied because of it, her only support being her older brother Nadatsugu, aka, Danji. For years she was lied to by her family and told he had died, which forced her to become both the family heir and leader of Team Daybreak. Her caretaker Haruka and the people around her brainwashed her to become distrustful of the outside world, leaving her traumatized and lonely, and right when Nadatsugu finally returns, Haruka forces him to lie about his identity to her, leaving her unaware that the one person who truly loves her was right by her side the entire time, and making her think he was just lying to her when she finds out.