YGO Preview: Starstrike Blast

What's that you say, It's nearly November? What else is that, there's a new Yu-Gi-Oh set coming out? Huzzah!
Yes, it's nearly November and for you Yu-Gi-Oh players, that can only mean that Starstrike Blast is on the rise, with new changes to both new and old archetypes and the freshest cards about the hit the emergency banned list. Now, I only have access to limited information at this time, but here's what I have for you so far:

Release Date:November 16th 2010
Sneak Preview:November 6th and 7th

I'd recommend hitting up your local game stores to find out if preview events are happening in your area. Why, you ask? Here's why:

That'd be the hard-hitting, nearly unkillable Archfiend Empress, which is (allegedly) a freebie at Sneak Preview events. Picture not pretty enough for ya? Sure she takes two tributes (fires of doomsday anyone?), but if she hits the field she becomes obnoxious.

Here's the full write up, courtesy of the Yu-Gi-Oh wikia:
If (exactly) 1 face-up DARK Fiend-Type monster on the field, except this card, would be destroyed, you can remove from play 1 DARK Fiend-Type monster from your Graveyard, instead. When this card is destroyed and sent from the field to the Graveyard, you can select 1 Level 6 or higher DARK Fiend-Type monster in your Graveyard, except "Archfiend Empress", and Special Summon it.

Now, that's just what you get for showing up to any event, actual cards in the set are even more impressive (read: horrifying). All you Yusei fans can play around with the Shooting Star Dragon who, though he comes with some hefty summoning requirements, is a complete monster on the field. "But DS," you say, "I don't play the synchron archetype in my deck, what does SB have for me?" Do you really need to ask? Of course you do! Play Monarchs? Have a new one! Love spellcasters? Have we got a fusion summon for you. If you're tooling around with the Marik Structure deck, there may even be some new gravekeeper support, though we can't confirm that just yet. Watt players, (yes, all six of you, enjoy your insanely clever decks for now, until they become meta and everyone plays them) tons of new support, including the new field spell wattcastle.

Now, sadly, the set isn't all awesomeness and rainbows, and as a fan of machine decks, it's a bit of a mixed bag. Allegedly, we're getting new Genex support, (hopefully some of the Real-genex monsters, but who knows, they aren't listed just yet) but the real main course for SB for Machine players is the new red-headed stepchild of the machine monster world: the Karakuri archetype. Karakuri monsters are a few things: generally weak, required to attack each turn if able, and generally weird. Looks like we might need to tool around with these guys to really understand how to they work, but they might turn out to be a solid type, hard to tell at this point.

Now of course, this is only a sample of the information we could get our hands on as of late October, and there are plenty of new cards coming in this set to keeping the YGO players coming back for more, so check it out November 16th

Links and images, courtesy of the Yu-Gi-Oh wikia.