Ninja Crane is Stunnin'

HEY WHAT HAPPENED TO THOSE LAST TWO MONTHS ALL MY POSTS ARE GONE

Yeah nah, I’ve been somewhat preoccupied and haven’t felt like updating in a while. Been starting to play IRL again, and as a result the majority of my attention is going to decks I can actually use there. My locals is tough as nails as well, some of the best in the UK attend there, so some of my fun builds just do not cut it.

With that in mind, I’ve been working on something for a while now. My Sacred Crane deck from a while ago has been developed into a Stun version, and it has been my main deck on here for a few weeks. So, here we have my current version.

Monsters: 17

1 Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning

1 Cyber Dragon

3 Ninja Grandmaster Hanzo

3 Sacred Crane

2 Mist Valley Falcon

3 Tour Guide From the Underworld

1 Sangan

1 Spirit Reaper

2 Effect Veiler

Spells: 12

3 Pot of Duality

2 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Allure of Darkness

1 Reinforcement of the Army

1 Monster Reborn

1 Dark Hole

1 Heavy Storm

1 Armor Ninjitsu Art of Alchemy

1 Book of Moon

Traps: 12

2 Ninjitsu Art of Transformation

2 Call of the Haunted

2 Icarus Attack

2 Torrential Tribute

2 Solemn Warning

1 Solemn Judgment

1 Starlight Road

Extra:

1 Chimeratech Fortress Dragon

1 Stardust Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier

1 Ally of Justice – Catastor

1 Armory Arm

1 Adreus, Keeper of Armageddon

1 Number C39: Utopia Ray

1 Number 39: Utopia

1 Maestroke the Symphony Djinn

1 Number 17: Leviathan Dragon

1 Number 20: Giga-Brilliant

1 Leviair the Sea Dragon

1 Temtempo the Percussion Djinn

1 Muzurhythm the String Djinn

Quick thing to mention before I get into how it works, Number 30: Acid Golem of Destruction is not legal in the UK and I don’t have Wind-Up Zenmaines. If I did, it would be run over the Mezurhythm.

The deck is fairly basic to play. The optimal opening move is to use Ninja Grandmaster Hanzo to search for Ninjitsu Art of Transformation, and then use that to special summon Sacred Crane on one of the upcoming turns in order to gain plusses. This combo is very underestimated, and I think a lot of people don’t understand why it is powerful, since you’re not going into a big beater with Transformation.

The reason it is so central is that it is allowing you to thin your deck by two cards, draw one card, and set up a light and a dark in the grave. This power all comes from drawing one Hanzo, and I consider it far superior to summoning a big beater like Apex Avian or Dark Simorgh.

That said, the deck also includes two Mist Valley Falcons. These have always been a favourite of mine, though I’ve not really seen much use for them for a long while. That has since changed with this; they can endlessly recycle the Call of the Haunteds, are 2000 point beaters, and targets for the Hanzo combo as well if it is ever needed (although I haven’t done it even once so far).

With such an easy way of ditching light and dark monsters, running Black Luster Soldier is self explanatory. It is a 3000 beater that banishes opponents cards and can win games on its own. Not running this would be an absurd choice on my part.

The Tour Guide + Sangan engine is needed in nearly everything. Even with the heavy stun and triple Duality, this deck is not an exception. It makes for extremely powerful plays, especially with Leviair, which I seem to make more than anything else in order to make use of any cards of mine that the opponent banishes. Using it to fetch Crane and getting another plus is so powerful. The only problem I have with it is that Sangan isn’t that great in this deck on its own. It can search Effect Veiler, Spirit Reaper, Tour Guide, and that’s it. They’re not bad searches by any means, but they feel rather lacklustre when it comes to power.

Effect Veiler is needed at at least two in most decks due to the current metagame. I’ve considered Fiendish Chain in its place, since I run Mist Valley Falcon at two, but that’s weak to MST and doesn’t give me a Light in grave for my BLS play. Veiler is too good.

Spirit Reaper and Cyber Dragon are techs. Reaper can stall very well, is a dark, and can make the opponent panic if he catches them with no monsters out. I ran it at two originally, but testing it at one has proven better, as it can force me on the defensive when I draw it at the wrong moment.

Cyber Dragon is unexpected game one, and I find it very effective in the Dino-Rabbit and Wind-Up match-ups. Very often the opponent will go into Zenmaines and I’ll be able to wipe it for free, while again getting a light in grave and a dark on the field.

Worth noting that the current monster count is low for the current metagame, so despite all the methods of dropping lights and darks in the grave, I am not running any copies of Chaos Sorcerer. Though I suppose it could be a tech at 1, I feel it would be dead too often for it to be worth it.

Triple Duality is something I’ve been hovering on. Because the deck special summons quite a lot, I’ve been using double for a long time, thinking three will clog. Now I’ve tested three though, I’m not having any real problems with it, and anything helping me get Hanzo early on is a good thing.

And getting Hanzo early is fairly easy with many of the cards in here. I run Reinforcement of the Army in order to effectively run four Hanzo, and an Allure of Darkness to dig another two cards. This, along with the Dualities and the Sacred Cranes, makes drawing happen very frequently, more so than in any other stunnish deck I know of right now.

Then we have a strange card that I’ve been running, Armor Ninjitsu Art of Alchemy. This is generally considered inferior to Magic Planter, a card that has a very similar effect but can be used on any continuous trap card. Seems better, considering that I’ve only got two other Ninjitsu Art cards.

I used to agree with this, but my testing has shown otherwise. Alchemy has one major advantage over Planter in that it can be searched by Hanzo. Since I only have two other targets for Hanzo to search, this is a great use for the third Hanzo when I draw it, clearing away my Transformation cards (which stay on the field after Sacred Crane dies) and netting me plusses. With Transformation nearly always being left out on the field, the fact that I can’t use it on other traps rarely seems to matter either, and though I occasionally draw it dead, I always seem to miss it if I ever leave it out. Great card, and very underestimated I think.

You have the staple spells, Monster Reborn, Heavy Storm, Dark Hole, MST, although I’ve left out Mind Control from the main, siding it instead. I won’t always have a monster due to my slightly lower monster count, and it’s a dead card against Chaos Dragons and a few others. I side it in for the Wind-Up and the Dino-Rabbit match-ups, but otherwise I don’t miss it at all.

MST I run at two, though these days I normally like it at three. However, because I run two Icarus Attack, I feel running two is easily compensated for, as I can wreck backrow with those and just side in the third.

Speaking of Icarus Attack, I love this card. So much. Because Sacred Crane isn’t the most useful card if you draw it, and playing Mist Valley Falcon will often get a trap used in response, it can take advantage and wipe out two cards unexpectedly. It’s just as live with Hanzo as well, as Hanzo can turn into a winged beast with Transformation anyway, so picking off cards to simplify the gamestate is very easy.

Call of the Haunted can also be used with it, turning it into a plus with Sacred Crane’s effect. As mentioned, can be used repeatedly with Sacred Crane, it is usually a +1 when the opponent hits it with something, and can be used to spring game out of nowhere at times. Though I’ve wanted to replace it with Fiendish Chain at times, I almost never find it dead so it’s sticking around.

Torrential Tribute is needed in this sort of thing right now, with swarming being as easy as it is. It might take out your field as well, but on the whole it’s definitely worth it. The Solemn brigade has to be run as well, it picks off so many threats and stops plays before they even start. If you’re not running these in this sort of deck you’re probably doing something wrong.

Starlight Road I’m running because of the deck’s low monster count and heavy backrow. Going on the aggressive is often risky with Dark Hole, Heavy Storm, and Torrential around, and drawing Starlight is like a message saying ‘Press your advantage, they can’t trap you so easily now’. The feeling of safety it grants makes it well worth playing, and when it goes off I’ll usually win the game.

Extra deck, lot of standard stuff in terms of synchros and xyzs. Stardust is run over Scrap Dragon because of the Starlight Road, and Chimeratech Fortress Dragon is needed for the Cyber Dragon in order to let it take out machines the way it does. Fairly basic there.

Adreus, Keeper of Armageddon is for when I side in Mind Control, in order to work with Cyber Dragon. Situational, but it’ll be missed if its not there. Though Tiras is the more popular choice, the fact that Adreus can pick off monsters bigger than itself without running over anything else makes me find it the better of the two if you can only run one or the other. If I had an Honest mained, I might change my mind, but as it is, Adreus is preferred.

And the Djinn, well as I mentioned before Muzurhythm would be replaced by Zenmaines if I had it. As it is, it’s a decent card for the UK with Acid Golem prohibited. Tour Guide being made into a 3000 beater is great, and can pick off many problems or just run over something for game. Temtempo I find that no one expects, and it gives Tour Guide better answers to my opponent’s Utopia, Zenmaines, and Maestroke.

So this is about it. Got multiple versions of is as you may notice from the deck picture, and I’ll probably create a great deal more.

Peace guys, hope you enjoyed the first update in ages.

"The DN Shuffler is Broke"

For the record if this is incoherent I'm writing this because I can't sleep. Just something I feel like addressing.

I hear often from people (though it happens less these days, it still occurs) that Dueling Network’s shuffling system is terrible. That it is a poor simulation of real life, where you never get such awful hands, and that is cannot truly simulate the way a human player shuffles.

This is just nonsense, and I’ve thought so for a long while now.

I get bad hands on DN sometimes. I get bad hands in real life sometimes. On the whole, I haven’t noticed that much difference, the weird occurrences where you never draw that one card your deck depends on despite using a ton of draw cards occurs in real life as well. Its just bad luck, the cards being placed in a random order that happens to inconvenience you. Nothing more.

When it happens in reality, people often blame it on themselves for just not shuffling well, or occasionally on the opponent for stacking. It may be true in some cases, but more often than not it’s just the shuffles weren’t favourable, not that they were badly done. Dueling Network it is exactly the same.

Now I suppose that there could be some credibility to the fact that the shuffler doesn’t imitate the way a human shuffles. A human shuffling will often eight-pile or something, in order to deliberately spread out the cards that got clumped together in the previous games. A lot of players find this results in better hands.

Dueling Network obviously eliminates this advantage with its auto-shuffler. I get that it’s not exactly the same, but its certainly not something worth complaining about when you happen to open badly every now and then.

I can never help feeling that complaining that the DN shuffler is truly random rather than only partially random is like complaining that DN is fairer than real life.

Walling Chaos

Recently I’ve been using a new Chaos deck of mine. Initial design was to be aggressive, but it seems to have worked out as more of a stunnish build, and rather a good one too.

1 Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning

1 Gorz the Emissary of Darkness

2 Tragoedia

2 Chaos Sorcerer

1 Cyber Dragon

2 Thunder King Rai-Oh

2 Gellenduo

3 Tour Guide from the Underworld

2 Spirit Reaper

2 Cardcar D

2 Effect Veiler

2 Maxx “C”

1 Sangan

1 Honest

2 Pot of Duality

2 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Heavy Storm

1 Dark Hole

1 Monster Reborn

1 Mind Control

1 Book of Moon

2 Torrential Tribute

2 Fiendish Chain

2 Solemn Warning

1 Solemn Judgment

1 Chimeratech Fortress Dragon

1 Mist Wurm

1 Scrap Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier

1 Ally of Justice – Catastor

1 Armory Arm

1 Tiras, Keeper of Genesis

1 Number 39: Utopia

1 Number C39: Utopia Ray

1 Number 17: Leviathan Dragon

1 Number 20: Brilliant

1 Number 30: Acid Golem of Destruction

1 Leviair the Sea Dragon

1 Wind-Up Zenmaines

Side Deck:

1 Cyber Dragon

2 Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer

2 D.D. Crow

1 Effect Veiler

1 Maxx “C”

2 Forbidden Chalice

2 Forbidden Lance

1 Mystical Space Typhoon

3 Royal Decree

So there is the list. The deck plays with the standard chaos boss cards; two Chaos Sorcerer and one Black Luster Soldier. Easy to use in this sort of thing, banish anything, just generally good.

Two Tragoedia and one Gorz the Emissary of Darkness. All three are OTK stoppers, and this deck is fairly good at stalling until you have hand advantage so Trag is often very big. On the off-chance that it isn’t, it can be used for xyz shenanigans or something. Gorz is just big all the time, and the only thing that really interferes with it being played is Fiendish Chain on occasion.

Two Spirit Reaper and two Gellenduo is what makes this deck what it is in my eyes. They can act as fantastic walls, and if I want to go on the offensive they can help with that as well. Both are chaos fodder, both are good for xyzing, Gellenduo has decent attack and Reaper can take a shot at the opponent’s hand. Great cards.

Three Tour Guide and one Sangan. Everyone knows at this point how powerful this engine is, and the chaos cards make Leviair a great option.

Cyber Dragon is mained at 1 for tech. Comes out of nowhere and can deal with Zenmaines, or just wreck if I come up against Machina or Wind-Ups. Both are fairly common decks right now, so I’ve also got a second Cydra sided for that purpose.

Two Thunder King Rai-Oh are just generally good. I think three is overkill in this case, because I can just recycle the two I have quite a lot anyway. They shut down a lot of the opponent’s plays and are a big beater. Open this with Honest and you’re in a great position immediately.

Two Cardcar D, I kind of want to put it to three but I don’t know what to replace. It’s a great card here, summon it while you have Reaper or Gellenduo guarding you and just draw two. Opponent will usually waste any resources they have on it if they can, which at least means that your other monsters will have less to deal with later.

Two Effect Veiler, two Maxx “C”, one Honest. Effect Veiler is just standard now, and a generally great card. Light fodder as well. Honest is just good at everything here because most of your actual beaters are Lights. Maxx “C”, most would say it should be sided these days but I still think it’s better mained. People are still special summoning plenty, so at the very least you can usually get a 1 for 1. If you really can’t, side it out and you’re good.

Spell line-up is pretty standard. Only two Duality because two Rai-Oh and you often want to special summon with Tour Guide or Luster/Chaos Sorc. Book of Moon is more like a trap than a spell here, and can just do so much. Considered maining Forbidden Lances, but decided against it because I don’t really care about monster destruction most of the time, and it won’t save my Spirit Reapers anyway.

Two Torrential Tribute is neat because while you’re walling, the opponent will often try to build up field presence, and you can just take it all out in one shot. Generally you can recover from resource destruction, so never really been much of an issue to use it.

The Solemn brigade is just good in this sort of build. Stop major problems before they arise, the life point costs are virtually meaningless. As a note because I’ve seen people make this mistake a couple of times, they don’t destroy Gellenduo, because they make you pay life points rather than take damage.

Two Fiendish Chain can just stop opponent’s plays almost as abruptly as Solemn Warning can. It can also negate attacks, which is neat. Couple of problems though in that they’re weak to MST, and they can clog up your Gorz as I mentioned before. Neither problem is really that big though, so running two works fine.

Extra deck, you have the standard synchros +1 Armory Arm because I like having the option of Sangan + Effect Veiler. Level 4, makes your monsters bigger, and is Light for Honest compatibility. There is also the Chimeratech Fortress Dragon because I main a Cyber Dragon, without it Cydra wouldn’t be worth maining anymore.

Xyzs are all standard save for Tiras, Brilliant, and Utopia Ray. Tiras is again because of Cyber Dragon, I need something to go into should I ever be able to drop rank 5, and Tiras is the best choice in general. Brilliant is Honest compatible and its chaos fodder, I love teching it in my extras if I have the Guide engine. And Utopia Ray makes Mind Control better and can win games if I’m on a low score. Worst case scenario, its an extra Light in grave.

Side deck, the Kycoos are for other Chaos decks, specifically Chaos Dragons. They also work fairly well against Inzektors, by taking out the Hornet, though I generally don’t like to banish any more of their Inzektors after that as it allows for Leviair shenanigans if they ever get going.

The Crows are primarily for Inzektors or anything else that abuses the grave and is weak to Crow. I don’t use them against Chaos Dragons though, they ditch too much for banishing one target to ever really be worth it.

Extra Maxx “C” and Veiler for decks that they are weak too. People might say three is too many, but I happen to disagree and have never had them clog this build up.

Remaining cards aside from the third Mystical Space Typhoon are a Royal Decree engine. Useful on their own in certain cases, but mainly to be sided in together against trap heavy decks. They have to get rid of the Decree, while it’s out you can play around freely, and with your quick-play spells ready you’re not defenceless.

So there you go, pretty much it. Enjoy.

Watts and Whys – Watt Deck Updated

Not made a post in a couple of weeks, so here is an update. I haven’t been using this deck much lately, but my old Watt build on here is woefully outdated so this is to get a better list down.

3 Wattcobra

3 Wattdragonfly

3 Watthopper

2 Wattgiraffe

1 Wattpheasant

2 Effect Veiler

2 Cardcar D

3 Magic Planter

2 Pot of Duality

2 Photon Lead

1 Heavy Storm

1 One For One

1 Monster Reborn

1 Recycling Batteries

3 Call of the Haunted

3 Fiendish Chain

2 Red Screen

2 Dark Bribe

2 The Huge Revolution is Over

1 Solemn Judgment

1 Mist Wurm

1 Scrap Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier

1 Magical Android

1 Ally of Justice – Catastor

1 Armory Arm

1 Formula Synchron

2 Number 39: Utopia

1 Number C39: Utopia Ray

1 Number 50: Black Corn

1 Gem-Knight Pearl

1 Daigusto Phoenix

1 Gachi Gachi Gantetsu

Now, the basic aim of this deck is to get up the Watt Lock through whatever means, preferable as quickly as possible and with a level of protection. The Watt Lock consists of two Watthoppers, and the way it works is that while they are both out, the opponent cannot attack or target any Watts with card effects in any way. This leaves you free to attack directly with Wattcobra, Wattgiraffe, and Wattpheasant until the opponent’s life points are depleted.

There are limited outs to this lock, the most prominent being Torrential Tribute, Black Rose Dragon, and Dark Hole; all mass destruction cards that do not target, and so can get around the lock. The Hoppers need protection against these, and here it comes in the forms of defensive traps. Dark Bribe, Fiendish Chain, Solemn Judgment, and The Huge Revolution is Over, all make excellent protection.

Little note here in that it is common for people new to Watts (myself included) to use Starlight Road instead of The Huge Revolution is Over. This is not a good choice. Not because Starlight is bad or anything, but with this deck, a Stardust out on the field will just be run over easily, and Starlight is weak to Solemn Warning and the Laggias. THRiO, being a counter trap that doesn’t special summon, has none of these issues.

First off though the aim it to set up the lock. There are a variety of ways to do this in here. Wattdragonfly is the most important by far; it triggers very easily and immediately lets you special summon any Watt you want from the deck. You almost always want to open with Dragonfly in your hand, it’s just so good.

Alongside the Dragonfly are Monster Reborn and Call of the Haunted, in order to reuse a fallen Dragonfly and ram it to set up the lock. They’re also cool for a search with Wattcobra, which is nice for maintaining advantage. You have One for One, a -1 but a fast one that lets you get a Hopper instantly.

Then you have Photon Lead. Normally I would regard this card as awful, and in most decks it is. But here it allows a quick Hopper play from your hand, or one for any other Watt in here really, which gets you prepped and can save you with its quick-play status. Watthopper in hand is an easy thing to accomplish too, especially with three Cobras.

Last thing to mention with relation to the lock itself is the Recycling Batteries. This is a bit of a last resort, in case the lock got broken somehow, and it gives you a second chance to set it up. Running more than one results in clogging from my tests, but it is a great card and a nice +1 if you need it.

Onto the draw cards. Two Cardcar D and two Pot of Duality provide the draw power early on. I’ve tested three Duality, but it tends to slow me down at that number; I need to special summon to establish the lock, and so the limitation is a bit of a problem. Doesn’t interfere much at two though, and two Cardcar D works fine, though the cost of the normal summon is a bit of a pain sometimes.

I also run three Magic Planter, which is the main thing that separates my deck from most Watt decks. In order to support these three Planters, I run a total of eight continuous traps in the form of three Fiendish Chains, three Call of the Haunted, and two Red Screen. Planters are great once you got the lock up for replenishing your protection. Scrap the Fiendish Chain that you used to stop the now useless BRD, or remove the Red Screen that’s now doing nothing but eating away at your life points. Strictly speaking I’m not sure about the ratios I’m using here, I occasionally find them dead, so this particular area is a work in progress.

Red Screen by the way is what I use over Messenger of Peace, the preferred choice of most players. It deals me more damage and is a bit harder to get rid of, but it’s also impossible for the opponent to duck under it. Add to that the compatibility with the Planter, and I consider it a solid and underused choice.

Last thing to mention in the main is the two Effect Veilers. They’re pretty much just more traps here, I’m on the verge of replacing them now. Beginning to think there are better choices, I’ll update this if I do so.

The Extra deck isn’t something that I use an awful lot. There’s no reason to a lot of the time. But it’s better to have it there, because, well, there’s no reason not to. Better to have it for those occasions where you happen to need it.

There are the standard synchros of every level, plus Magical Android run alongside Catastor. This is to make use of the Veiler in the Chain Burn match-up, which, while infrequent, causes the deck major issues due to its need to commit to the field and all its defences being rendered meaningless.

The Xyzs are for beating (Pearl and Phoenix), stall (Utopia and Gachi), or just ridding the field of anything small but problematic (Black Corn). They come into play more often than the synchros, but I’ve never found myself in need of one that I don’t have here.

Anyway, that’s the deck. Hope you enjoyed this guys.

BWST: Updates and Techs

It was requested recently that I update my BWST guide. Seeing as I’ve learnt a lot since I did the last one, I figure that it’s worth doing, so here it is.

This is the basic frame that I now use to construct all my variations of the build.

Monsters: 19

1 Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning

1 Gorz the Emissary of Darkness

3 Armageddon Knight

3 Tour Guide from the Underworld

3 Maxx “C”

3 Effect Veiler

2 Necro Gardna

1 Blackwing – Zephyrus the Elite

1 Sangan

1 Plaguespreader Zombie

Spells: 10

2 Pot of Duality

2 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Heavy Storm

1 Dark Hole

1 Monster Reborn

1 Mind Control

1 Reinforcement of the Army

1 Allure of Darkness

Traps: 6

3 Call of the Haunted

3 Limit Reverse

Extra: 13

1 Mist Wurm

1 Scrap Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier

1 Magical Android

1 Ally of Justice – Catastor

1 Armory Arm

1 Number 39: Utopia

1 Number 17: Leviathan Dragon

1 Number 20:  Brilliant

1 Number 30: Acid Golem of Destruction

1 Leviair the Sea Dragon

1 Wind-Up Zenmaines

Side: 8

2 D.D. Warrior Lady

2 Spirit Reaper

2 D.D. Crow

1 Honest

1 Mystical Space Typhoon

For my previous explanation of what all the cards in the deck are for, see this post.

This is very similar to the previous frame I was using, but with a few improvements. The first of these is that Magical Android has replaces T.G. Hyper Librarian in the main deck. I initially thought that would be bad, but once I started using Honest engines it just felt so much better; its got the same stats, but is light, which gives the Honest compatibility and sets up BLS. After some testing of running all 3 I realised I never seemed to play Librarian after that.

Second improvement is putting in Acid Golem. I disregarded it previously, but after tests with and without it I found the option to go into it was something I really missed. 3000 beater from Guide is good stuff.

Third is setting more of the Side Deck in stone. I have decided that if not mained, Honest, D.D. Warrior Lady, and Spirit Reaper should be at least sided because of how powerful they all are in the deck. Reaper baits and stalls, Warrior Lady picks off pesky cards while prepping Leviair plays, and Honest is just broken.

 Now, some of my more recent tech variations.

Diva Variant

Main Deck:

3 Deep Sea Diva

2 Lost Blue Breaker

2 Snowman Eater (-1 Necro Gardna, -1 Limit Reverse)

Extra Deck:

1 Sea Dragon Lord Gishilnodon

1 Number 16: Shock Master

This is a fast, aggressive version. It can drop LV5 with incredible ease, not relying on resurrection for it as it has the Diva into Lost Blue Breaker play. If you do have a Call or a Limit Reverse ready, you can just summon Diva, pick off a backrow with Breaker, and then sync the Sangan with the Diva for a LV5 anyway.

Snowman Eater is a wall that picks off pesky monsters, but I run it primarily to stop Lost Blue Breaker being dead in hand. The original version didn’t run it and as a result I had major problems when I drew Breaker. Now I at least have more of a chance to make it live.

Sea Dragon Lord is a card rarely seen these days which I just rather liked because of the ease at which a LV3 can be sent to the grave in this deck. You got Call or Limit Reverse set and the opponent plays MST, they are gonna have a hard time running over a 3000 beater.

Shock Master is something I’m testing out. Most match-ups its going to be useless, but I keep finding the Chain Burn and Final Countdown match-ups to be a pain, so something like Shock Master that can make them weak is going to be worth it.

I suppose I could probably run the T.G. Hyper Librarian I mentioned earlier in this build. Its LV5 and lets me plus off synchros. But the fact is I never miss it, and I rarely seem to synchro with another synchro monster already out. If I’m doing that, Librarian would just be a ‘win more’ card.

One thing I sort of want to test in it is Gachi Gachi Gantetsu, which I could probably run over Shock Master. If you’re running low on Diva targets through bad draws, could be nice to make a temporary wall. I’ll be testing it soon, probably over Shock Master.

Chaos Birdman Variant

Main Deck:

2 D.D. Warrior Lady

2 Genex Ally Birdman

1 Gellenduo

1 Honest (-1 Limit Reverse)

Extra Deck:

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Genex Ally Triforce

A versatile, but primarily aggressive build. Definitely one of my best so far.

Warrior Lady and Honest again because of the sheer power of the cards which I have emphasised over and over. Genex Ally Birdman is run because of high synergy with the rest of the cards in the deck; it can allow Armageddon Knight to be reused, can bounce back a Veiler’d Tour Guide for next turn, and is a very fast LV3 tuner. It is used primarily to make LV7 synchro monsters, which I will come to in a moment.

Gellenduo is a light LV4 wall that can fend off attacks for a fair while in tests. 1700 ATK and Honest compatibility can make it a small beater if it comes to it, and it can allow for Rank 4 plays. The only issue I have with it is it’ll destroy itself if I use Zephyrus effect to return any card other than Gellenduo, but I can work around this easily enough.

For the Extra Deck, a second Black Rose Dragon is run because nuking with this build is fairly easy and having a second seems to be worth it so far, though strictly speaking it’s not really needed.

There is also a favourite card of mine, Genex Ally Triforce. A LV7, 2500 beater that is easy to summon with Birdman and can recycle any light monsters you have in the grave, this is something that if you have it out, the opponent will have to deal with it fast. True it’s not too useful the first turn it comes out because the Light monster must be face down, but +1 every turn is not bad by any means and bringing Honest, Gellenduo, or Warrior Lady (if it gets hit by Warning or something) back can be brutal.

Some things I might want for the Side Deck are Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter, and Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress, but I’ve put them aside for now because I don’t really like the milling as it disrupts the flow of the deck. Will probably make another variant incorporating them and Birdman though, because Triforce with Ryko would be fantastic.

Necrofear Variant

Main Deck:

2 Dark Necrofear

2 Newdoria

1 Night Assailant

Extra Deck:

1 Maestroke the Symphony Djinn

1 Melomelody the Brass Djinn

More of a fun variation than the other two, but still pretty capable of winning in my tests so far. It has a defensive style early on, which it trades up later in the game for a more aggressive style.

Dark Necrofear is run as the signature card of this variant. In order to play it you will usually be banishing two Tour Guides and one other Fiend. Almost never will that fiend be Sangan unless you are sure that you can get a Leviair play in straight afterwards. Necrofear is unexpected, and its effect makes the opponent nervous about destroying it.

Newdoria serves a similar purpose to D.D. Warrior Lady. It’s a dark Fiend that helps prepare for Dark Necrofear and pick off certain unwelcome monsters. Its okay, but I do have to admit that it doesn’t do the job as well as I’d initially hoped. Still a cool card though.

Night Assailant is just a nice card. It can pick off pesky monsters, and is a LV3 Fiend, thus making it a Tour Guide target and potentially allowing for more uses of the Guide. It has weak stats, but those tend not to matter as you’ll never be attacking with it.

The Djinn cards in the extra are, strictly speaking, run because they are Fiends and help set up Necrofear. With Melomelody, a single Tour Guide can make Dark Necrofear ready very quickly. I picked it because I think it’s the best of the Rank 3 Djinn; its Light, can attack twice, and doesn’t rely on the opponent having monsters to be useful. It’s also got some rather nice synergy with Honest if I side that in.

Maestroke is just a great card in general. It has an effect that can guard itself, and that can make opposing monsters vulnerable to attacks. I’m really liking it against Hero decks, which are rather a hard match-up for this most of the time.

Anyway, that’s all from me today. Peace out guys, hope you enjoyed this.

Ignition Priority has been Removed from the TCG

So, I have to make a post here because of this, because this is pretty major. The Yu-Gi-Oh TCG no longer has ignition priority upon summons.

For those who were not aware, the TCG (basically America and Europe) and the OCG (Asia and Japan) have long had metagames that were slowly growing apart, with the TCG becoming widely regarded as faster and more 'broken' than the OCG. There have been a number of factors in this, but one of the main ones was the existence of a rule in the TCG that did not exist in the OCG; ignition priority, the ability to use an ignition monster effect immediately after a monster was summoned.

Ignition priority has been a major factor in the TCG in what decks made it to the top. Dino-Rabbit, which this format has been fairly dominant as the best deck, was extremely capable of abusing it. The signature card, Rescue Rabbit, avoided a great deal of the most common counter cards to it, most notably Effect Veiler, by banishing itself before they could be used.

With it gone, Rescue Rabbit decks become much easier to counter. Veiler can be dropped on Rescue Rabbit to prevent a turn 1 Laggia play, which is fantastic news in general (though maybe not so much for Rabbit players).

Of the others two decks in the big three this format, Wind-Ups are also nerfed. Hunter and Zenmaighty losing their priority effects is a fairly major hit, though not quite as major. Inzektors though, previously the weakest of the big three, are virtually unaffected by the new ruling, and have the potential to gain power from this.

May seem a bit of a downside, considering how hated Inzektors are anyway, but I’m viewing this as a very good thing on the whole. This will give rogue decks more of a chance against the big decks, and create more variety. I personally am greatly looking forward to the changes coming from this rule.

Source: http://www.konami.com/yugioh/articles/?p=3799

Have fun guys!

Chaos Gallis

Not come up with anything I feel is really notable this week, so I’m going to post a deck I said I would I while back but never got around to. This is kind of old, but I tested it fairly recently and it is still powerful and really fun to play.

2 Tragoedia

1 Gorz the Emissary of Darkness

1 Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning

3 Chaos Sorcerer

1 Caius the Shadow Monarch

3 Dimensional Alchemist

3 Gallis the Star Beast

3 Genex Ally Birdman

3 Tour Guide from the Underworld

3 Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter

3 Maxx “C”

3 Effect Veiler

2 Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress

2 Card Trooper

2 Necro Gardna

1 Witch of the Black Rose

1 Blackwing – Zephyrus the Elite

1 Sangan

1 Tour Bus from the Underworld

1 Plaguespreader Zombie

1 Mist Wurm

1 Locomotion R-Genex

1 Red Dragon Archfiend

1 Scrap Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier

1 T.G. Hyper Librarian

1 Ally of Justice – Catastor

1 Armory Arm

1 Number 39: Utopia

2 Wind-Up Zenmaines

1 Number 30: Acid Golem of Destruction

1 Number 17: Leviathan Dragon

1 Leviair the Sea Dragon

Something I think I’ll mention first off as a running trend of mine is I often make bad choices in terms of the side deck, so I’ll generally leave that out of these lists. If I do include it, it’s because I’m very confident in it. This side deck though is frankly bad though, so I advise you to disregard it.

So this is an all monster chaos deck built around Gallis the Star Beast, a card which I first decided to mess with a while back and absolutely loved. It is a three star monster that can be special summoned by sending the top card of your deck to the grave, then deal damage equal to the sent monster’s level multiplied by 200. Although, it is destroyed if the card you sent is not a monster. As a result I think it is only really a good choice in pure monster builds (although I occasionally see it being run in Windzectors alongside spells for some reason.)

Anyway, Gallis at three and Genex Ally Birdman at three is the foundation. They can be used in combination with each other or various other cards for devastating effect. Adding Gallis back to hand to special summon Birdman allows for easy rank three plays, and potentially some rather hefty burn damage and mills, depending on how your luck is. I get good and bad with it, but the bad rarely bothers me and milling a Tragoedia for 2000 damage is very satisfying when it happens.

There are the standard chaos cards in here in the form of Black Luster Soldier and Chaos Sorcerer. Both have fantastic synergy with Genex Ally Birdman, although especially in the case of Chaos Sorcerer – not only can it allow for double removal very fast, but it can also synchro with it for Locomotion R-Genex. This means Sorcerer and Birdman together can effectively eliminate any three monsters before the battle phase has even come up. Milling is almost never a problem, stuff goes to the graveyard very fast in this deck, so playing these cards is very easy.

Hand traps exist in the form of three Effect Veiler, three Maxx “C”, two Tragoedia, and one Gorz. Maxx “C” is starting to prove a little more dead as of late, but I’m still happy with it at three. Veiler is useful against so many things, Tragoedia is extremely versatile, and Gorz will never have problems being dropped because you play no backrow. You need these really, because aside from Necro Gardna, the deck has no way of actually defending from attacks.

Tour Guide at three, Sangan at one, and Tour Bus at one makes for another rank three engine. The engine is backed up by Gallis and Birdman, which provide some rather useful outs in case of Veiler. Gallis can simply special summon and make for a rank 3 anyway, and Birdman can add the Guide back for another go next turn.

Tour Bus is tech really, not strictly needed, but I find it useful because this deck has a habit of milling my other Tour Guide targets, and milling a little random graveyard control is rather nice. Drawing into it is rarely a problem, again you can just use it with the Gallis or any other level three, its pretty easy to have one out.

Dimensional Alchemist is run at three for a couple of reasons. First off its effect will always hit a monster if used, so he will be able to get something back every time. This can make him useful from turn one; summon Alchemist, banish, pass. Even without that though, the chaos monsters among other things mean that you’re banishing like crazy anyway, and that makes Alchemist a very useful recycling card that the opponent isn’t that willing to kill a lot of the time.

The mill engine of three Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter, two Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress, two Card Trooper, and the Gallis’, is pretty fast, and because every possible target for your milling is a monster, even more so. Ryko at three was something I’d originally declined, but the deck needs it as outs to certain problematic cards, and three mained is best from my testing. Lyla is great bait for certain backrow, something that you’ll want to get rid of before you drop your big boss monsters, and Trooper mills and lets you draw when destroyed, so you don’t lose a thing.

Random benefits from the milling can be found in the form of Necro Gardna, Plaguespreader Zombie, Blackwing – Zephyrus the Elite, and Tour Bus from the Underworld. None of these are really dead in hand either, at worst you can just throw them out when you have nothing better to play. Gardna is fantastic for controlling the tempo of the game, Plaguespreader is great for random synchro shenanigans, and Zephyrus serves a similar role to Birdman in recycling cards back to hand.

The last two cards in the main deck are just my personal tech choices, Caius the Shadow Monarch and Witch of the Black Rose. Witch is a level four dark tuner, and with its effect to self-destruct no longer being a risk, becomes a plus one on summon. Caius is used as additional control, taking out anything that’s being pesky and blocking your plays.

The extra deck consists for the most part of fairly standard stuff. The usual synchros are there, and there’s the rank three xyzs for the deck to make use of. I’ve wanted two Leviair but cannot find the space for it at this time, might take out Hyper Librarian for it but Librarian is actually pretty good in this build, if only as a beater.

Locomotion R-Genex can put things heavily in your favour, and the opponent will struggle quite a bit to recover from it. I usually treat summoning it as a win condition, as, even if the win isn’t instant, it’ll leave the opponent tapped out of resources while you can just keep going.

Bit of a WTF factor in there though is Red Dragon Archfiend run in place of Stardust Dragon. This is something I opted for to help me against Skill Drain decks, which are a very, very difficult match-up. A 3000 beater can help a great deal, and Stardust is something I have never needed here anyway – this deck recycles so much that destruction really doesn’t bother me even when I overextend.

Similarly hated match-up alongside Skill Drain is Macro, or any deck that banishes excessively. Best hope really there is to take out the banishing cards with Ryko and Lyla. Although, fun little ruling, Macro Cosmos will not stop Gallis effect. The mill for its effect is not a cost, and it will just be banished instead, while damage will still be inflicted.

Might add more on this later, but that’s it for now.