Wow, ten years since its release. It's still one of my favorites. It definitely brings back a lot of nostalgia and makes me want to give it another go. At the time, it brought just enough new gameplay ideas without abandoning the nice classic way of gaming that I had grown accustomed to. Junctioning was really quite fun if you like to play with stats. And I loved the fact that I didn't have to level up too much. I always wanted to hold out for the stat boosting abilities before I went too far up in level.

I doubt the junction system was exploited with new players. If most players were like me, they probably didn't even bother working on their magic junctions until they were well into the game. And besides, even if it is easy to exploit, I don't see how this is any different than power leveling or simply selecting an easy mode in other games. Believe me, drawing magic or excessively playing card games takes a long time and a lot of patience. So if you're exploiting the junction system, good for you, you've earned it.