Something Awesome: Mirrodin Pure/New Phyrexia

Well, To those of you who have been waiting with bated breath, I return with some new information! Apparently, things have been happening in my absence and they may require a bit of discussion. On the heels of the still quasi-new magic release Scars of Mirrodin with the upcoming Mirrodin Besieged set to be released in Feburary of 2011, I want to look ahead, long term, and take a moment to think about the final block of this set.

Why?

Because it's been announced! (sort of)

The new set will either be called Mirrodin Pure Denoted by this lovely heading:

Or, in a surprising twist, we may have a set called New Phyrexia on our hands marked off by this lovely sign:

What's the discrepancy? It depends on who wins the war. If you weren't aware, according with Magic lore, there's a war on in Mirrodin. Apparently, the descendants of the evil, bio-machine plane Phyrexia (the old spawn of Yawgmoth) have broken through to Mirrodin and want to bring the "gift" of their technology to the metal plane. This new set will culminate a heavily story-driven block and while there are no new cards for display just yet, we'll keep you updated as much as we can.

-DS

Deck Intros: Gravekeepers

So this is something of a confession. I have anxiety dreams in which I play a Necrovalley, but it doesn't work. Now these dreams makes no sense to me or anyone else, but it does set us up for a new section, Deck Intros, in which we take a look at a deck type, talk about some pros and cons, and tell you how to go about trying it out.

Now, for Gravekeepers, the first thing you need to be acquainted with is their associated field spell, as it is one of the best weapons in your deck: Necrovalley

This card is, your deck staple. A Necrovalley deck without Necrovalley is like dehydrated water. Let's take a look at the text:

All "Gravekeeper's" monsters gain 500 ATK and DEF. Cards in either player's Graveyard cannot be removed from play. Cards in either player's Graveyard cannot be affected by card effects, except for their own effects.

In addition to giving all of your Gravekeeper monsters a boost in both attack and defense, Necrovalley ensures that once something hits the graveyard, it stays there. Now, this card isn't perfect, but it does two things: it prevents your opponent from special summoning from the graveyard (for the most part) by stopping cards like Monster Reborn or Call of the Haunted. Actually, on reflection, this card really messes up gemini decks, which rely on graveyard summons for some of their more impressive monsters. Necrovalley can even be searched out of your deck by the effect of Gravekeeper's Commandant, so be sure to keep a few of those handy.

Gravekeeper's Spy

Yet another great searcher card. By allowing you to search another Gravekeeper monster from your deck, you can quicken your field advantage by a little bit more. Specifically, you want to search out Gravekeeper's Descendant so that you can tribute the spy to destroy something on the field.

Now, for your trump card: Gravekeeper's Visionary

Now, I don't really like having one specific trump card in a deck, but this guy is most definitely a win condition. Here's his text:

You can Normal Summon this card by Tributing 1 "Gravekeeper's" monster. This card gains 200 ATK for each "Gravekeeper's" monster in your Graveyard. If this face-up card on the field would be destroyed, you can discard 1 "Gravekeeper's" monster instead.

Sure he's an 8 star 2000 attacker, but you can get him out for one tribute (or no tributes, if another Gravekeeper monster attacks first and you activate Magician's circle) but he's 2500 if Necrovalley is on the field, with an additional 200 attack for every Gravekeeper in your graveyard. I'll tangent here for a momentarily explanation. In my experiences, Gravekeepers are a late-game deck, which means that you may have some trouble with faster decks, but if you can keep them at bay for a little while, you can overtake them.

Final point, if you have a Gravekeeper monster in your hand, Visionary is unbeatable. After you've got a secure Necrovalley on the field, Commandant becomes sort of a dead draw, so keep him in your hand and be ready to drop him if your opponent destroys him. By the way, this includes battle damage. Play conservatively and your Visionary can stomp all over your opponent's life points and lead you to victory.

Interested? Go take a look at the Marik Structure deck for access to these monsters.

YGO- Cookie-Cutter Netdecking and Why You Shouldn't Do It.

Well friends, today would normally be my standard "Countdown to Starstrike" post, except that it turns out that DS is a bit of an idiot and miscalculated the actual release of SB, which, amusingly enough, is November 16th, so he'll be bringing you the last preview as that day gets closer.

With that in mind, I want to talk about something completely different from the norm today. This is going to require a secondary tab, so get ready. Now, go to yugioh at tcgplayer and look up the regionals, pick one, it doesn't matter. Now look at the deck list, now back to me. Back to the decklist, now back to me. Sadly, the decklist isn't me, in fact, the list of decks that win any given tournament is boring.

Sure, you just checked that list, what did you see? X-sabers? Twilight? A rogue frog deck perhaps? I know most of those things were there and I didn't even need to check.

This is my biggest pet peeve with Yu-Gi-Oh today, and today I'm going to talk about what cookie-cutter netdecking is, why it's stupid, and ways you can avoid it. Let's begin:

Cookie-Cutter: (adj.)- a deck in a CCG or TCG that follows all the rules of cards that are "deck staples" and, as a result, look the same as everyone else's deck.

Netdecking: (v)- the act of searching a deck idea on the internet, and copying it for one's own. Not inherently a problem, but when it combines with cookie-cutter builds, the problem begins to surface.

For many people, Yu-Gi-Oh is a money game. You invest a good deal of money in cards, especially good cards (I'm not even being sarcastic here, this game has a few terrible deals), so you want your deck to be the best that it can be. Now, I know that tournaments are serious business and that no one, absolutely no one would ever make the heinous mistake of playing a children's card game for fun, but is that single Pot of Duality really worth $124? To this point, I really can't complain. I have that exact card somewhere in my desk at home and fully intend to take advantage of people who "need" such cards for tournaments to make a good deal of money myself, or get cards that I actually want, but in doing this, I'm only perpetuating a really stupid problem: duelists lack originality. As soon as something interesting (Frognarch Obelisk decks, I'm looking at you) happens in a metagame [the tournament scene], everyone and their one-eyed, toothless granny jumps on the bandwagon.

Re:Lightsworn
Re:Gladiator Beasts
Re:X-Sabers

Seriously! It's insane. While it makes playing an anti-meta deck far simpler, since you have a smaller pool of deck types to worry about, it creates this horrible mentality that I've recently heard called "Tier-one or no fun." This basically means that, as a duelist, you suck if you're not playing a so-called "tier-one" deck. Tier-one basically meaning the deck type that's hot right now, at this moment, with cards that everyone has to have.

You know who really gets screwed? Casual players. Same for new players, or players who just want to have fun, even in tournaments. The lack of creativity of decks causes a card like Naturia Pineapple to cost over $20 per card. Don't get me wrong, pineapple is both adorable and a decent card, but is it worth $20? Not really. And new players who see the cute little naturia monsters and think "oh, that looks cool, I'd like to play that" get screwed if they don't want to shell out the money for a good card that would help their potential decks.

Alright, enough complaining, we need some ways to beat the boredom of the tourney scene, here are a few:

1.Play off-beat deck types:

By this, I don't mean some minor variation on a twilight deck, try something like a Geartown turbo deck. Or a Watt deck. or a Six Samurai deck. Or, take a look at the new Marik Structure deck and make a Gravekeeper deck.

These are just a few of the decks that my friends and I play when we're bored. Are they tournament ready? Maybe, I don't really know. Are they fun as heck to play and play against? Absolutely. If you're still stumped, here are a few ideas off the top of my head (I'm not linking, you'll have to go look for yourself, but that's half the fun):

Elemental Hero deck (with fusions)
Beast deck (Look into the unicorn synchro monsters)
Destiny Board Deck
Rock deck (there are plenty of OTKs that use rocks, if you absolutely must)
Aqua deck (legendary ocean or otherwise)
Earthbound Immortal deck (now there's a challenge)
Fairy deck (Herald, Counter or otherwise)

2.Substitute expensive cards for cheaper ones:

Look at your deck again. Back to me. Back to your deck. Back to me. Are these Old Spice jokes working for you? No? Too bad. Here's my point, do you really really need that Solemn Warning? No, the correct answer is that you really don't. Need to stop a special summon, or a specific monster? Divine Wrath. Is the cost a little higher? Yeah. Does it cost $40? No way.

Plenty of "deck staples" have cheaper, and sometimes more fun alternatives. Also, consider your deck style. Do you use a Prime Material Dragon? Then you might consider taking out those "necessary" Magic Cylinders, since they won't do much for you. I'm not opposed to playing to the banned list, which you should, if you're a tournament player. All I'm saying is to do so smartly, and don't play solely to the banned list, and be under the impression that a single card will make or break your deck.

All in all, just have fun. Isn't that the point? My ideas might not win a tournament for you, but isn't beating that $400 Gladiator Beast deck with a team of frogs just oh so satisfying?

-DS

YGO- Countdown to Starstrike T-minus 2 days: Genex Ally Axel

Here at Card Games on the Internet, we like to talk about card games, and often on the internet. Occasionally, however, DS gets sick, or lazy, or whatever, and blog posts don't happen as often as they should. With that in mind, you're here for card preview for Starstrike Blast which should hit stores this Saturday, so let's see a new card:

Funny looking guy, eh? That'd be Genex Ally Axel the first synchro monster in your new favorite machine archetype.

A solid 2600 attacker for an eight star synchro cost he has the following text as ability:

1 "Genex" Tuner + 1 or more non-Tuner monsters.
Once per turn, you can discard 1 card to select and Special Summon 1 Level 4 or lower Machine-Type monster from your Graveyard. Double that monster's ATK until the End Phase. It cannot attack your opponent directly, and is removed from play during your End Phase.

Taking a quick look at that ability, which is basically a weakened, or more contained version of Limiter Removal. Why is he worth playing? For a synchro monster, he's absurdly easy to summon.

Since Axel belongs best in a machine deck, or a deck with machine support, a special summoned Cyber Dragon and a normal summoned Genex Controller can summon him right away, and you can then proceed to discard machine monsters to the graveyard to be used as powered up monster destruction. Once your opponent's field is clear, you can always R.D.D all of those monsters to finish your opponent off, especially when combined with the previously mentioned Limiter Removal.

As it stands, Machina/gadget/genex builds are beginning to surface as the face of machine monsters begins to evolve, so look for Genex Ally Axel to invade your deck in a few days.

-DS

As usual, images and info courtesy of the Yu-Gi-Oh Wikia

YGO- Countdown to Starstrike T-minus4 days: Red Nova Dragon

Loyal readers! I'll make you a deal. It's a once in a 24-hour period deal, but I'll make it all the same. You keep on reading, and I'll show you something awesome.

With Starstrike Blast finally hitting stores at the end of this week, it looks like it's time to bring out the big guns for your viewing pleasure. Here's today's offering, the Red Nova Dragon:

All I can say, at first glance is...wow. There's actually an English translation of this card on the internet, that's really impressive. But, of course, I'm just being absurd, this card is really fantastic for a whole host of reasons.

At first glance, this massive guy is a 3500 attack beatstick, which makes him one of the most terrifying things around, and he does come with some hefty summoning requirements. Like all of the cards involving the Red Dragon Archfiend, you'll need to have him on the field in order to pull off this spiffy summon, and you'll need two one star tuners. I'm actually fairly certain that this is the first monster that specifically calls for two tuners, but a closer look at the text will tell us more about this bruiser:

2 Tuners + "Red Dragon Archfiend"
This card gains 500 ATK for each Tuner monster in your Graveyard. This card cannot be destroyed by the effects of your opponent's Spells, Traps, or monsters. When your opponent's monster declares an attack, you can select it, then remove this card from play and negate the attack. During the End Phase, Special Summon this card that was removed from play by this effect.

First of all, this monster gains 500 attack for each tuner in your graveyard. This means that if the only tuners you have there are ones you used to summon him, his attack is 5000. That's, quite frankly, insane. The only monsters that can rival him in pure power are cards like Five-headed dragon, but he's (comparably) far easier to summon.

Second effect, he can't be destroyed by anything other than battle. Not that he can't be targeted, he can't be destroyed by your opponent's cards. So, well, good luck dealing with him if your opponent has him on the field.

Finally, he has an ability to similar to Stardust Dragon in that he can remove himself from play for a turn to negate an attack, but then he comes right back.

To sum it all up, he the Red Nova Dragon, basically...run

-DS

YGO- Countdown to Starstrike T-minus Weekend: Naturia Pumpkin and Extra Preview

Do you feel the rush of chill autumn air? Are you noticing the days shortening? That must mean that fall is upon us, and with only a few days to go before the magic day of November 6th and the release of Starstrike Blast, we bring you, the Naturia Pumpkin:

This odd-looking little guy, clocking in at a 4-star 1400 attacker isn't really much to look at on the basis of stats, but as any good duelist knows, it's the effect often times that makes the card, here's the effect for the pumpkin:

If your opponent controls a monster when you Normal Summon this card, you can Special Summon 1 "Naturia" monster from your hand.

Short. Sweet. Simple. Much like candy corn, this card is a surge of awesome with minimal bitter aftertaste. Imagine a scenario like this. You're staring down a Zaborg, the Thunder Monarch and your only monster was detroyed last turn. But, you have pumpkin and a Naturia Tulip in your hand. Naturally you thrown down the pumpkin, special summon the tulip, synchro summon into Naturia Barkion and you're instantly back on top.

Between the impressive rushing capability of pumpkin, giving you the ability to pull extra monsters on the field when you start with nothing, in addition to the possibility of quick synchro summons, Pumpkin may be a handy gourd to throw into your new, post-SB deck.

Special Weekend Preview: Delg, the Dark Monarch

Curiously enough, Starstrike Blast is including Monarch support in the form of (what is for now) the final Monarch to round off the series. Delg, the Dark Monarch shares a good deal with the other lords, but has a few extra tricks up his sleeve. Let's take a quick look at him:

He looks pretty standard for a Monarch, six stars and the typical 2400 attack and 1000 defense, it's his abilities that make him unique. Abilities? Why yes, he has more than one, in a sense, but, enough stalling, let's study him!

When this card is Normal or Special Summoned, you can select and remove from play up to 2 cards from your opponent's Graveyard. For each card removed, send 1 card from the top of your opponent's Deck to the Graveyard. This card cannot attack during the turn it is Normal or Special Summoned.

Now, Delg removes cards from your opponent's graveyard when he hits the field, much in the same way that d.d. crow might, but instead of going to the graveyard himself, you get a face-squishing monster. Even if he can't attack on the turn he's summoned, you needn't worry, he can protect himself, with the second part of his effect going off, which forces your opponent to take two cards from the top of their deck and throw them into the graveyard.

The possibilities are endless here. While Delg might not work well against a zombie deck, he works exceptionally well against a macro deck, if there are cards in the graveyard, which even the fastest macro player will run into at a time. Perhaps the biggest punishment comes against a Lightsworn deck if your opponent mills their trump card, the amazingly powerful Judgment Dragon. The look on your opponent's face will truly be a haunting memory as Delg helps you mow your way to victory.

YGO- Countdown to Starstrike T-minus 7 days: Wattcastle

Good morning and welcome to another installment of "Countdown to Starstrike" where we take a daily look at an upcoming card from the November 6th set: Starstrike Blast, and riff on it if it's terrible, drool if it's wonderful, or unlock hidden potential if it's weird. Speaking of weirdness, here's a little ditty you might not know:

This cartoonish thing is Wattcastle and, if you're playing watts, it's your new best friend. If you're playing against watts, welcome to your new nightmare. Let me try to explain the watt archetype a bit first, before going into why this card is absurdly awesome.

Watts are, what you might call, an annoyance deck. The monsters dont look all that intimidating, but let me tell you, from my experiences playing against a well built Watt deck, that they are obnoxiously good and incredibly difficult to beat. When you lose the game 16,000 LP to 0 (and I have), you know this archetype is going somewhere.

That's where Wattcastle comes in, a new field spell for the Watt type. The text looks a little like this:

If a monster attacks a "Watt" monster or "Oscillo Hero #2", it loses 1000 ATK after damage calculation.

Cards like this make me laugh a little. Due to the japanese phrase "Ereki" or "Eleki," which is the Japanese prefix which appears in all Watt monsters and Oscillo Hero #2, the latter can benefit in a deck consisting of the former. The pure randomness is somewhat amusing though.

Alright, down to the nitty-gritty. It's a field spell, so naturally you might want to avoid using it against an Ancient-Gear turbo deck, but, the benefit of having a field spell constantly in play allows for the use of something like one of my favorite monsters, Earthbound Immortal Googly-Eyes.

If a Watt monster is attacked while this card is on the field, the attacker loses 1000 attack after damage calculation. On one hand, your monster might die, on the other hand...did we mention that this effect appears to be permanent? Yes, that's right, Konami has effectively given Watts the Magic: the Gathering ability, wither. This effect knocks down the attack of cards like Maximus and makes them easier to deal with for Watt players.

All in all, great defensive card, and it's nice to see Konami providing support for Watt monsters, they're a cool little archetype that deserve to do well.

-DS

All links and images provided, as usual, by the Yu-Gi-Oh wikia