Are you still Madew, Bro? Cray Erminantor Camtater Climb Ladder Dooklast

As I asked for 18 ANGERY emotes on Facebook to confirm my place as Clam Liter, and ended up getting 96 ANGERY emotes, I have decided to release my updated Clore Elmimantle dacklost.

Starter - Shining Knight, Millius

8x 5k Royal Paladin Crits
4x Thunder Elemental, Goloro (Critical)
4x Royal Paladin Heal Triggers

4x Light Elemental, Sunny
4x Air Elemental, Fwarlun
3x Light Elemental, Peaker
3x Laurel Knight, Siciilus

4x Knight of Twin Sword
4x Transmigration Knight, Brede
2x Escort Eagle
1x Earth Elemental, Pokkur

4x Knight of Mastery, Glenus
4x Gigantech Charger

GZone

4x Rain Element, Madew
3x Blazing Sword, Fides
2x Aerial Divine Knight, Altmile
1x Divine Knight of Flashing Flame, Samuel
1x Air Element, Sebreeze
1x Snow Element, Blizza
2x Dark Element, Dizmel
1x Light Element, Agleam
1x Metal Element, Scryew

The first observation you will probably make is, "Oh hey, this looks pretty much the same other than filling out the GZo-  WHERE DID STARDRIVE GO?!  YOU TRAITOR!"

Hear me out, bro.  Fides can only search for grade 2's and those grade 2's need the "Brave" keyword.  Fides draws a card, retires a unit, gets a grade 2 out of my deck, AND gives me 10k power to distribute to my board.  It's an INSANE card and the only reason it isn't played at 4 of in a bunch of decks is because those decks can't afford to run "Brave" units.  The unit that has replaced Stardrive Dragon is Knight of Mastery, Glenus.  Glenus, being a 10k power Royal Paladin unit means that it, of course, does everything Stardrive did in the deck, including being able to proc Madew.  Additionally, Glenus' skill is, "Brave: Cont: This unit gets grade -1 while in the deck."  This means we can grab him directly out of the deck with Fides (who can only grab grade 2's), and the check for his Brave keyword is done after the discard for Fides and after the cost for stride has been paid.  So, if your hand was 5 or less cards at the start of your turn, Fides into Glenus can definitely be a good move.

Now, you may be thinking, "Tim, how necessary even is that?  You're running Escort Eagles in your deck already."  Brede is mandatory at 4 of (switchable and interchangeable with Knight of Fragment who is 11k when attacking vanguards and rear guards vs. 12k vs. Vanguards only.  I'm running 2/2 at the moment, but I think Brede is better, which I'll cover shortly).  Knight of Twin Sword is our only multi-attack enabling unit in our deck (and he can grab Glenus too, if done before my Vanguard attacks or if I have 0 cards in hand at the start of the battle phase), so he's a 4-of.  We only have 3 spaces, and Pokkur is just amazing in a deck with 10 Cray strides and with the ability to grab 2's on-demand.  So Escort Eagle is down to being a 2-of.  If I draw EITHER of them pre-Fides plays, I can't proc the draw for Fides.  This is why we play Glenus.  That and he makes 21k with any non-sentinel grade 1 booster in my deck, which is icing on the cake.

Now that that's out of the way, let's discuss updates.  We added in the Cray Elemental critical trigger, Goloro.  Goloro's guard restriction ability (you can only call this card as a Guardian if you have another Guardian on the circle) is actually pretty bad, but it can be pitched with Fides, Agleam, Scryew, or used for its useful ability, to count as a grade 2 when pitched for stride.  In this deck, we can easily convert our strides into hard advantage generation.  Even just ditching Goloro and another card to stride into Madew will take our previously +2 turn and convert it into a +1 turn.  Whether or not this is mandatory isn't super important to me, I am playing it for the Cray Craze.  The vast majority of the time, you will not be impacted by its negative or positive effects.  It does have a 4k body, however, and that is why we made the next change.

Knight of Fragment and Transmigration Knight, Brede are our Brede and butter cards to call off of Knight of Twin Sword.  (NYEH HEH HEH)  With Goloro being a potential call from Gigantech Charger, Brede makes numbers with EVERYTHING where Knight of Fragment has this weakness with only being 15k with Goloro (and requiring another 2 out, which cards like Heteroround, Denial Griffin, having a locked front row, and getting Fragment called off of Charger can make difficult).  While you can easily build around this in most cases, I've found that the only advantage that Fragment gives over Brede is the ability to hit 10k+ rear guards unboosted, since the counter-charge is typically useless and the soul charge is almost detrimental.

Escort Eagle made its way into the list due to being a Brave and a Resist unit that is grade 2.  It gets Fides synergy, and helps handle a big weakness the deck has in its Link Joker match-up.  The extra shield is just icing on the cake.

Now, for the GZone, we have 8 new spots to fill.  Of course, Cray Elemental GGuardians are entering four of these spots.  Reason 1, they are all relatively powerful Guardians due to having some nice secondary effects.  Reason 2, pretty much all of the Royal Paladin GGuards have been roasted garbage on a stick.  Reason 3, they give Fwarlun power and enable Pokkur plays without having to stride into Madew and waiting a turn.  For our remaining spots, we have made the following changes.

-1 Atmos
-1 Gablade
+2 Aerial Divine Knight Altmile
+3 Fides
+1 Sebreeze

Atmos was in the deck as the designated flip target for Blizza.  We no longer need that, since Sebreeze took its place.  Gablade was never really good, but it didn't require a flip and I had one space open previously.  I actually did switch both Atmos and Gablade out for Aerial Altmile before the 16 card GZone happened, but not much else has been changed from the base list.  We added in Sebreeze because it is a Cray Elemental (procs Fwarlun and Pokkur) and the deck is very Generation Break heavy.  We also have a large amount of counterblasts available to expend where a Samuel or Sebreeze doesn't kill our resources all that badly anyway.  I feel like Fides was already covered, but I'll just recap.  You can flip Sebreeze with it for more effects with your Cray Elementals, and it's discard a card to make big numbers, draw a card, retire a unit, and call a unit.  Like, it does so much for such a tiny cost.

That covers the major changes.  I hope you don't rage on me too hard for dropping Stardrive.  On that note, the original reason I played Stardrive was due to their being NO suitable 10k Royal Paladin unit that made a meaningful difference.  Palamedes was the best one initially.  I'm not counterblasting 2 to call a grade 1.  I didn't have enough spots in my GZone to play Regalie, so I couldn't risk having a dead, vanilla stride when I missed my Sanc Guard.  There was no room to put in Jewel Knight archetype support, and Swordmy would be useless without JK grade 1's, even if I could use him with Charger.  I could have run the 10k Vanilla legion, but I don't think the 10k grade 2 was worth running at the time.  The long and short was that there wasn't much that was really useful to run, and anything that may have been useful would compromise my GZone.

That's it for now.  Clyde Ornamental Cornpattytav Clumb Looper, signing out.

Diet Cancer - All of the taste, none of the calories. A non-Wiseman Fenrir Build.

To preface this, I believe that Wiseman Loop (Thanks Science of Vanguard for the video explanation!) is currently the superior build for Genesis at the moment.  The only major stipulation to that is that Angelic Wiseman's Loop has three hard counters that stop their OTK turn.

The first has been around for a while.  Denial Griffin.  This retires Wiseman on his first swing, preventing him from restanding multiple times. 

The second has just been released for, what is arguably the most played deck in the format, Chronojet Gear Chronicles.  Heteroround Dragon places the powered up Wiseman into the deck, which is then shuffled and the Genesis player calls the top card of their deck, which is likely to be a 4k Stand Trigger or 7k grade 1.  Even if they sack into the Wiseman that was placed back into the deck, they still have to deal with it only being a 14k swing.  They could also potentially Heteroround a second time.  A single defensive trigger will shut it down, so they would have to swing with their Vanguard after putting multiple stands into their deck for the power, but that drastically cuts down on the loop's ability to restand Wiseman.  While this doesn't prevent lethal 100% of the time, it still disrupts the loop greatly.

The third is Freezeray Dragon.  It can stop the loop if the Link Joker player is at 4 or less damage, since the loop variant has few outs to give Wiseman a bonus critical, since that is almost never necessary.

Due to the Wiseman Loop typically occurring on the third stride turn after two Tyr strides, It's extremely likely that a Kagero or Gear Chronicle player will have gotten one or more heal triggers in their hand, and then held on to them understanding the match-up.  Additionally, they never need to guard the Vanguard due to extremely low critical quantities (2 or 4) and no on-hit abilities, giving them an unfavorable match-up to Freezeray.  Damage is very easily kept low early-to-mid game due to Genesis having no real rush, restanding, or superior calling mechanics that the Loop is willing to utilize, due to needing those counterblasts for higher power on the push-turn.

Since my locals has many Gear Chronicle and Kagero players, and our Link Joker players typically run Freezeray, I felt like it was a bad meta call to play the Wiseman Loop variant of Genesis, and opted instead for a more balanced version of the deck.  Here's the list.

Grade 0's

Starter - Fetter Creator, Van

4x Goddess of Sound Sleep, Tahro (Stand)
2x Dreaming Dragon (Stand)
4x Stake Fetter, Thviti (Critical)
2x Battle Maiden, Kukurihime (Critical)
4x Goddess of Youth, Hebe (Heal)

Grade 1's

4x Mythic Beast, Skoll
4x Shackle Fetter, Gelgja
4x Goddess of Decline, Hel
2x Mythic Beast, Hati

Grade 2's

4x Boulder Fetter, Gjoll
4x Battle Maiden, Kotonoha
2x Earth Elemental, Pokkur
1x Mythic Snake, Jormungand

Grade 3's

4x Mythic Beast, Fenrir
4x Ice Crest Goddess, Svava

GZone

4x Mythical Destroyer Beast, Vanargandr
2x Beast-Slayer Military Deity, Tyr
2x Mythical Hellsky Beast, Fenrir
2x Great Angel, Doom Brace
1x Air Element, Sebreeze
1x Snow Element, Blizza
3x Goddess of Seven Colors, Iris
1x Sky-dome Battle Maiden, Hanasatsuki

The first major question would be, "What does this list provide over the standard Wiseman Loop variant?"  Well, it provides a few nice things, actually.  It gives extra critical pressure on your Vanguard swing, gives you access to the Revelation mechanic for units you want to field (giving you more trigger scrying and potential soul set-up), and it also gives you access to counterblasts at all stages of the game so you can make plays on a case-by-case basis instead of going "all-in" for a single turn.  Additionally, the deck doesn't automatically lose when you miss the Fenrir ride, even though both decks would gladly ride Fenrir at a minus to have him as Vanguard.

A few cute things the deck can do:

• A combination of the stand trigger, Svava, and Vanargandr can make for a nice 21k+ multi-attacking RG row if you have excess stands in soul.  This can be boosted higher with Gelgia.
• A combination of Gjoll (called that turn) and a critical trigger can create an 18k restanding rear-guard.  I use Gjoll instead of Wiseman for my multi-attack gambit, trying to use the twin-Revelation checks from Hellsky Fenrir to set up a double trigger for Gjoll.  Additionally, Gjoll can also get bonus power from Gelgia, much like Wiseman can.  I typically have at least one game in a set where I have a 41k+ 2 crit restanding Gjoll.  This can play around Freezeray to an extent.
• I've used Revelation on Vanargandr turns using Gelgia to restand and was able to filter down 7 cards to hit a double trigger on a Gjoll turn.
• Fenrir can call Gjolls that you've intercepted with by placing them back into soul with Iris for a prolonged gambit.

Again, I'm not saying that "Revelation.dek" is superior to the Wiseman Loop.  It just trades in an auto-win in most match-ups for a not-auto-loss in other match-ups.  This is the obvious way that Bushiroad intended the deck to be played, so I'm not pretending like my list is creative or special.  I just found that by using similar concepts that the Wiseman Loop incorporates, we can get solid pressure in other facets to compensate for the Wiseman Loop's weaknesses, while losing its primary gambit in exchange.

Seven Seas Rush

So, only weeks after releasing my grade 1 rush video stating that Seeker Rush was the best rush deck and that grade 1 rushing has become largely obsolete (but still mediocre, Sanc Blaster just does everything every other grade 1 rush deck wanted to do while still riding up) in the current metagame due to effects not being as heavily restricted by generation break in this current format, we have a new grade 1 rush monstrosity.  Seven Seas Rush.

This decklist originated in Japan and quickly made its way over here after it topped.  I hadn't seen the spoilers for the set 8 cards involved by time this happened, so I am not the originator for this deck.  All credit to the guy who came up with the base idea.  I did make improvements on the base list to make it stronger, but then I was told after the fact that it may not have been the base list.  Regardless, I especially love that the Vanguard community is proving to me that it can continue to be thorough, innovative, and talented in deckbuilding unique decks without my help.  The community has grown and improved in so many ways over 2 and 4 years ago that I can't help but feel like I'm a bit obsolete.

That being said, this is something right up my alley, and I can explain how this beast of a deck works in a way that anyone can understand.  I want to preface this by saying that this list has 8 grade 2's and 2 grade 3's.  It can ride up at pretty much any point it wants to.  But, without GGuardians or Heals, you typically won't want to unless the stride will give you game.  That being said, your opponents can't Sebreeze you on your grade 2 ride, so you always have that advantage of safely negating stride and generation break outside of Twitterun plays.  Here's the list.

Starter - Rookie Pirate, Gina (Discard a grade 2 or 3 you can't normal call and scry and draw)
4x Seven Seas Apprentice, Nightrunner (bae, FREE CARDS FOR FREE, turns into a different card)
4x Rough Seas Banshee (Crit) Consistency buff in an already consistent build
4x Cody the Ghostie (Crit) MORE FREE CARDS
4x Performing Zombie (Stand) - On call, look at top 10, mill 1. Turns into a 7k pretty easily.
4x Vanilla crits

4x Greedy Mimic (9k attacker)
4x Skeleton Assault Soldier (turns into a 5k shield in the bind zone instead of being a generic sacrifice, thus, you plus when sacking it)
4x Witch Doctor of the Seven Seas, Raistutor (Primary Vanguard.  Can set up another row with its effect, then be sacked to call Nightcrow.)
4x Seven Seas Helmsman, Nightcrow (Sack any unit, call this from drop. Free row fixer. Bae.)
3x Evil Shade (Making those numbers with your Vanguard)

4x Seven Seas Pillager, Nightspinel (Discards the grade 2's and 3's you won't be using otherwise, and also puts your grade 1's and 0's into the drop zone so you can both call itself from drop and have them where you need them to be so they can activate their effects. Gets HUUUGE with enough memes)
4x Seven Seas Master Swordsman, Slash Shade (11k call from drop when your Vanguard attacks? Works on grade 1? YES PLEASE!)

2x Seven Seas Sage, Plegeton (Can be ridden from drop zone without needing a discard. You can go straight into a stride if you have enough grade in hand to try and push for game when you're ready for that.)

GZONE - Whatever you want that works on GB1. Probably the Nightmist stride. Maybe Rum if you're out of counterblasts?  Obadiah is another option. No GGuards because heals are for the weak.)


After reviewing the cards, it may not be apparent at first, so I'll make it abundantly clear.  All of your grade 2's can be called from the drop zone while you are on grade 1.  One does so by filtering out cards that you either want in your drop zone or can't use.  The other works by sacking a grade 1 or greater unit and comes in at 11k mid battle phase.  This means you can attack up to 5 times with this deck, all for 11k or more.  That's the real crux of this deck, death by a million cuts, wearing them down with a standard rush going into a much stronger mid-game rush.  It's essentially what Tachikaze Rush wants to be with infinitely more consistency.

Let's go into my current rating for the deck's statistics.


Consistency - 9.5/10

Power - 9/10 

Reach - 8/10

Rescalability -10/10

Recoverability - 10/10

Survivability - 6.5/10

Denial - 7.5/10

Let's explain why I gave these ratings, and what some of these mean.

Consistency is self-explanitory.  This deck works if you ride any Seven Seas grade 1.  It has numerous targets that help fill up the drop zone with your key cards, and can chain insane effects to get your board and drop zone set-up exactly how you want it to be.  Even if you miss your ride, you have enough advantage to just reride later.  Nightspinel also works just fine even without a Seven Seas Vanguard, and the first turn is typically set-up from hand instead of drop anyway, so you aren't even severely punished for missing the correct ride early.

Power is pretty easy to understand, too.  How strong is the deck.  Opening with 10k+ to guard from every row turn 1, sometimes 15k to guard or more if you open the nuts, can be devastatingly difficult to deal with.  Especially when this deck transitions so well into reach.  It doesn't have the row consistency of say, Seeker Rush, but its obscene mid-game and potential game ending power more than compensates for it. 

Reach is the ability to close out games.  It's how well you can finish off an opponent when you're pushing for the win.  This deck can attack up to 5 times all requiring 5-15k guard, making sentinels essentially ineffective for your opponent, and destroying their hand size.  This is only an 8 because if you want to see a 10/10, imagine a Diablo stride when the opponent has no rear guards.  You're dead, Jim.

Rescalability is the ability to fix your rows if you have to field weaker units.  There's no doubts here that this deck is rescalability incarnate.  You can call your size 0 from the drop zone for free, mill 4, then turn it into a 7k unit.  Have a Seven Seas in hand?  You can swap it out for Nightspinel.  Have a grade 1 Skeleton in your hand that you don't want to stay on your board?  Call it, boost it, and swing with it, then turn it into a Slash Shade (getting 5k free shield, too!).  Turning one dude into the next dude isn't difficult, and even calling over existing units on the board doesn't impact your card advantage too negatively when you can get free calls every turn that also increase your toolbox.

Recoverability is the ability to recover from mass card disadvantage.  I will just give you an example of what this deck can REALLY do.  Let's say you got boardwiped COMPLETELY.  You also had to discard EVERY CARD IN YOUR HAND.  And then you draw a GRADE 3 you can't field or ride on grade 1.  You can STILL GET A FULL BOARD FROM ONE UNUSABLE CARD IN HAND.  How, you ask?  Well, you have MULTIPLE WAYS.  Any combination of four Nightrunners or Cody the Ghosties can fill four spaces from your drop.  Then, discard your Plegeton to call Nightspinel.  After that, sack your remaining board into four Nightcrow.  Now you have 14/14/24k rows.  Attack with the 14k RG row first.  Attack with VG, sack Nightcrow for Slash Shade.  Now you get a potential trigger, an 11k attack, and a 26k attack.  FROM ONE CARD IN HAND AND NO UNITS ON THE BOARD.  HNNNNNGGGGGHHHHHH.  Sure, it cost between milling 16 cards and 1 counterblast to milling 4 cards and 4 counterblasts, but the option to recover on this level is INSANE.

Survivability is of course the ability for a deck to not die.  This deck is actually way easier to kill if you swing face than most other rush decks.  It literally can't run quintet walls because it will deck out.  It also doesn't have hand advantage for normal sentinels.  It doesn't have a happy medium defensive card outside of Skeleton Assault Soldier.  That being said, you still have a good chunk of 10k shields to work with, and you have the advantage of shutting down many spooky, scary things that might kek you.  That being said, if you face consistent 17k+ rows early or anything that can get bonus crit without needing Generation Break, you could be in for a world of hurt.

Denial is the ability to shut down the opponent's strategy.  Naturally, with many decks wanting to stride, by playing this deck, you can deny them in that aspect.  The denial here isn't as hard as it may have been previously, due to many decks opting to have an early game instead of building for late game.  It is still a powerful facet to this deck and gives it an edge over decks that can't transition into a strong early game, like Gear Chronicle.

As with every deck in the game, it has favorable match-ups and unfavorable match-ups.  Let's list out my observations for this.

Favorable Match-ups

Generation Break locked decks - These decks can't use their primary facets, are much slower, and can't impede upon the deck's strategy.

Wall decks - These decks simply can't get enough cards to weather that many attacks.  Especially since most reliable wall decks have a legion or stride engine to fuel themselves.

Retirement focused decks - Perditions aren't going to have a good time when you can poop out a field from your drop zone with no hand investment, then can rescale the board.

Anyone that thinks swinging into RG's is a good idea that isn't playing Chaos Breaker.

Unfavorable Match-ups

Chaos Breaker Dragon - Poops on every rush deck.  We also don't have the ability to choose to hollow any front row outside of with Raistutor or Skeleton.  Even if we do, we can't Slash Shade in addition to that.  This is one of the match-ups I may consider riding up.  I'm not 100% sure if that's the best idea yet, but I'm going to play around with it some more in testing.

Seeker Rush - 17k rows with insane consistency and counter-rushing are the banes of this deck.  While this deck is better than Seeker Rush, it still loses the face-off due to these factors.

Season 3 Decks - While you can recover your board easily, facing down 22k multi-crit Vanguard swings is devastating for this deck.  Minerva can out-pressure the deck if it hits a critical on the first drive check.  DDD"R" can force high numbers against it.  All of these archetype decks also get 12k attackers, which are strong against 7k base Vanguards.

Sacking Triggers - I mean, it's Vanguard.  I haven't lost a match yet that wasn't to Chaos Breaker Dragon that they didn't heal more than twice on.  But when I'm playing to 9 damage, it's a bit hard to win. 


Due to how the deck intrinsically functions, it actually does well against or breaks even with decks like Sanc Blaster and Nociel, decks that were outperforming the other rush decks in face-offs.

This is all my initial analysis.  I will probably be making a video for it with some gameplay features in the near future (still waiting on the singles to get here).  My current analysis is this:  This is the strongest grade 1 rush deck, one of the best decks in the current format (since many of the counter decks are very sparse in the current meta, unlike the other rush decks' counters of literally the metagame sans Gear Chronicle), and it will have a large impact on the metagame because many people are boarding the hype train for this deck.  Expect to see it in regionals over the next few months, especially since it has already topped.  I will update this as more information and testing is revealed.

Machining Darkface

Starter - Young Executive, Crimebug

8 Machining Crits
4 Machining Heals
4 Other Crits

4x Machining Mosquito
4x Rebel Mutant, Starshield
3x Machining Slater
3x New Face Mutant, Little Dorcas

4x Machining Red Soldier
4x Machining Mosquito mk II
3x Machining Mantis

4x Machining Warsickle
4x Intimidating Mutant, Darkface

4x Machining Destroyer
4x Poison Spear Mutant Deity, Paraspear

Machining Darkface is a deck that focuses on striding into Machining Destroyer so that Darkface will adopt the Machining name and all of your rear guard's abilities will be active while retaining Darkface's on-stride skill.  You would argue that Darkface's on-stride skill isn't as useful as Machining Destroyer's Vanguard stun ability.  You would be correct in making that argument.  However, the ability for Machining Slater to build soul in conjunction with Darkface's GB2 effect will supplement Darkface's on-stride skill so nicely that it will compensate for the lack of support the build faced in GSet4.

The nice thing about this build is that it compensates for its bad match-ups with your other ride.  Machining Warsickle is great against rush decks, grade 2 game decks, and decks where the Vanguard stun is more important than sickening amounts of card advantage.  Darkface fairs better for match-ups that dissolve your board presence, making Destroyer's skill unusable, like Link Joker, Brawlers, and other such builds with a heavy emphasis on control.  By having multiple facets to compensate for each side of the deck's bad match-ups, the deck ends up being extremely solid all-around.

While I wouldn't argue that this build is better than pure-Machining, it has several better match-ups.  Additionally, this is the optimal way to build Darkface in my opinion, due to the G-Bug support being trash tier.

MILLtiades, Deck Thinning is Deck Winning!

Starter - Starting Ripple, Alecs

Triggers
12 critical triggers (4 Ripple)
4 Heal

Grade 1s

4x Ripple Sotirio (Ride Chain/searchable)
4x Ripple Odysseus (Bae)
4x Plato (Sentinel)
2x Nicky/Penguin Soldier/Messenger Gull/8k Vanilla/Seal (All of these test well for me)

Grade 2s

4x Ripple Pavroth (Primary Vanguard)
4x Tidal Assault (Crit stacking with potential power-ups from triggers and Gull Soldier)/Ianis (Wave 3, On-hit draw for free)
3x Ripple Lavisse (12k beats)

Grade 3s

4x Ripple Genovious (For spamming legion with, the persona blast isn't that important)
4x Ripple Miltiades (Ride, mill 3, legion.  Use Odysseus to ride him again from deck.  Mill 3.  Legion.  Rinse, repeat.  Have a deck that's over 60% triggers consistently on turn 4-5, swing for game with crits.)

G Zone (Tentative)

1x Madew (If the stars align against you and you have two Genovious and no Miltiades or Odysseus, or if you've already legioned, this is your go-to stride.)
2x Commander Thavas (Versatile stride that can add to offensive pressure and cause a retire.)
2x Lambros (Good finisher later in the game.)
3x Ripple Podromos (Ran at 3 because it needs to hit to flip.  This gives us two chances.  This deck doesn't want to stride, typically, so it's not a major deal if we hit the first time and don't stride with this again.)
Tactics:

The primary idea behind this deck is to get 1-2 Odysseus on the board, then spam their skills to chain-ride all of your Miltiades. This gives you souped up rear guard grade 3s, thins your deck of units with no shield value, and lets you spam the on-ride skill of Miltiades to MILL top 3 for a Ripple unit to ADD TO HAND. This combination of effects is simply INSANE. Turn 4 I can get down to the teens in cards if I get my setup (which is easy, because both Odysseus and Miltades can fish for each other). The Ripple critical trigger is also INSANE for reaching that point, as it is incredibly easy to get its effect off, and it lets you typically trade a trigger for a non-trigger.

What does this all mean, though?

TIME TO HIT SOME TRIGGERS.

In the games that I've played, here was my WORST CASE when I got my setup. I opened 3 heal triggers and had no grade 1. I G-Assisted with two of those heals, giving up on the chance of healing that game (I also got Sotorio and missed top 7 check making me go minus with the ride chain, then I didn't ride Pavroth AND missed top 7 check AGAIN and didn't have Odysseus to fix it), then milled 2 nulls and my 4th heal on my first Miltiades check. The game ended with me checking two crits when I had 13/21 cards left in my deck as triggers. The deck thin into legioning back Miltiades into spamming multiple Odysseus for multiple legions into grabbing top cards from deck to add to hand into shuffling MORE TRIGGERS BACK is just NUTS.

Now, let's discuss the tech choices.

If you open poorly and don't get any of your pieces, the Nicky version has plenty of outs for striding to draw into those pieces. If you hit with the Ripple stride, you are borderline guaranteed to have gotten an Odysseus by this point.

The Penguin Soldier version of the deck can spam legion on the level of DOtX with an INFINITELY better milling engine. You can thin to 60-70% triggers left in deck by turn 5 reliably with the deck. And that's just... wat?!  It doubles up with Ianis for even more cards, as long as this teams up with Lavisse or a grade 3 when it boosts.  It can't do much with Tidal Assault, however.

Messenger Gull is a trade with Penguin Soldier.  It can be used multiple times if you have stridden that game and lets you soul blast out your 3's to shuffle them back into the deck to legion more.  It gives power where Penguin Soldier gives card advantage.  I recommend either of the soul blasting birds more than the other grade 1 techs.  This plays nicely with Ianis, but has MASSIVE synergy with Tidal Assault.

8k vanillas give you an out to hit 21k when you call a Miltiades from soul with Odysseus' effect.  As you can ONLY call out grade 3's, this is pretty nice.  While Messenger Gull can do this with a bit more versatility for Tidal's abilities, Theo never has to worry about Generation Break or when it was called.  It's probably the least appealing of the tech choices, but it does its job well.

Seal Soldier is another Rocket Hammerman clone.  I promise that I don't just like these cards and play them in all of my builds because I can.  This card has actual merit.  If you're using Tidal Assault, you can place this unit behind him, then rest it to give Tidal Assault 2000 power, making him hit numbers against 11k Vanguards.  The upside to this is that you can have Tidal Assault at full power and pass triggers to him with Miltiades while still getting both the stand effect and the draw effect from Miltiades' legion skill.  The downside is that you can't stand Seal Soldier and still get the draw effect, because Miltiades stands before it draws, like all good Vanguard players should.

For the grade 2's, we have Tidal Assault and Ianis.

Tidal Assault is better for early game offensive plays, but lacks synergy with Miltiades' legion ability.  This can be fixed with Messenger Gull to an extent, or Seal Soldier completely.  Its overwhelming offensive ability when you pass a critical trigger to it is simply devastating.  It makes for insane finishing plays if you stride to triple drive after you've legioned a bunch of triggers back to your deck.

Ianis is a general, all-purpose beast.  The constant pressure of free cards in a deck that already gets a bunch of free cards makes the opponent vexed with how to deal with it.  It doesn't generate any additional power or pressure outside of those free cards, though, so it's limited in usefulness to the early and midgame, as hitting with a unit late game typically ends the game.  Still, an insanely useful card.

The G-Zone is pretty straightforward in my opinion.  You can run Tidal Bore or the CB1 retirer stride, but the focus of the deck isn't typically to stride until the turn after you expected to win, and the extra deck is mostly fluff.

Holy crap this deck is awesome. You'll also notice that I've built my deck to have minimal reliance on stride and legion. Other than the act of legioning itself, this deck can play an out-advantage game to decks trying to stall on grade 2 and punish them SEVERELY with you having access to insane card advantage that pushes them too far behind.

My initial playtesting of this deck was 24W 1L.  I didn't fight many counter decks that day, and my one loss was in a mirror, but still, those are insane numbers in any initial playtesting of a deck.

Ripple Rush 3.0

Starter - Can be anything, I'm sticking with Alecs to have more outs for hitting grade 3. My back-up recommendation would be Brave Shooter for the 8k boost.

Triggers
16 critical triggers (4 Ripple)

Grade 1's

4x Ripple Sotirio (Ride Chain/searchable)
4x Ripple Odysseus (Bae)
4x Blue Storm Icefall Dragon (Quintet Wall)
4x Mission Messenger Gull Soldier (SB1, give a unit +3k when called to RG)

4x Ripple Pavroth (Primary Vanguard)
4x Ripple Lavisse (12k beats)
4x Tidal Assault (Crit stacking with potential power-ups from triggers and Gull Soldier)
3x Tidal Rescue Sea Turtle Soldier (Free Cards with high odds to get them from the skewed ratios)

2x Ripple Genovious (The plan is to not ride him unless we aren't disadvantaged by it or when we want to push. With G-Assist and the ride chain, we have solid chances to secure this when we need it without having to worry about drawing into excess copies)

G-Zone

2x Commander Thavas (Great if the opponent is at 5.  Can also empower our Tidal Assaults.)
3x Ripple Podromos (Likely the only stride you'll ever use, if you use one at all.)
3x Madew (If you don't damage check your other Genovious, striding will be free once you see it.)

Here's some specific information on the update to the deck and why we're doing what we're doing.

The first major change is that we aren't playing the deck like a normal deck that simply has skewed ratios for rushing while using the ride chain to still ride up most of the time. This deck is now fully switching over to the "Keep yourself at 2 to prevent Legion/Stride" tactic. When this deck was first conceived, there was no advantage to not riding to grade 3, so this deck was built around riding to grade 3 more games than not. Again, this is no longer the gameplan.

The second major change is that we now have enough toolboxing to make Pavroth extremely consistent. While the starter for the ride chain is now a preference only pick and can be removed, if we keep it in, it increases our odds to, "Expect yourself to have the 1 and 2 in the soul nearly every game" levels of consistent. This gives us that added layer of defense with an 8/10k grade 1/2 ride most games and can secure many positive things.

The third major change is the lowering of grade 3's in the decklist. With G-Assist being a mechanic, this deck providing an abundance of options to fill the field without needing to call from hand, and being able to "convert" units on the board to grade 2's with bonus power, we have everything we need to remove the non-3's from our deck with Odysseus and Turtle while having ample time to draw into a 3 (or excess cards to G-assist with if we absolutely need the grade 3).

The fourth major change is the addition of quintet walls over perfect guards. This is primarily a change that was made because the game has shifted to everything having massive VG row power at the expense of being locked out of that power if your opponent stays at grade 2. With only 6 cards in the deck that don't have shield value when they hit the guardian circle from deck (one of which has to be used to activate the top 5 search), quintet walls will easily take care of all of our guarding needs for one less card from hand. These cards are also our only out to expend counterblasts unless you somehow manage to persona blast with only two Genovious in your deck.

The final major change is the deck thinning mechanics. We can grab grade 2's straight from our deck with Odysseus and 1's or 2's with Turtle. We can move Turtle to soul, ride Pavroth, grab Turtle, and get another unit from deck. We can rinse and repeat this indefinitely to thin the deck of 5-6 non-triggers on the average game. This can increase our odds to hit game-ending critical triggers by a substantial amount, making a final turn push when we ride Genovious into a scary situation for our opponent.

Ashlei "R", Timmy Style

I don't often post meta or hyped decks because this game isn't hard and they tend to build themselves.  Except that grade 1 line up for Minerva, that's all over the place.



That aside, I feel like Ashlei "R" is something that can be optimized outside of the normal way to run it.  It's not as starkly opposed to the way the meta functions as Dragruler is, so these are only minor changes.

Grade 0 (17):
1x Desire Jewel Knight, Heloise (Starting Vanguard)
4x Blazing Jewel Knight, Rachelle (Critical)
2-4x Jewel Knight, Noble Stinger (Critical)
4x Jewel Knight, Opt Harpist (Stand)
0-2x Jewel Knight, Glitmy (Stand)
4x Jewel Knight, Hilmy (Heal)

Grade 1 (14):
4x Jewel Knight, Prizmy
3x Stinging Jewel Knight, Shellie
3x Security Jewel Knight, Alwain
2x Flashing Jewel Knight, Iseult (PG)
2x Summoning Jewel Knight, Gloria (QW)

Grade 2 (11):
4x Banding Jewel Knight, Miranda
4x Fellowship Jewel Knight, Tracie
3x Linking Jewel Knight, Tilda

Grade 3 (8):
4x Broken Heart Jewel Knight, Ashlei “Яeverse”
4x Pure Heart Jewel Knight, Ashlei

So, my first comment is that this deck is numbers. The magical kind of numbers that are numerous and numbery. You have 16/19 of your grade 2+ units that swing for 11k or more as RG. That's kind of really great. Additionally, if you get excess grade 3's in your drop zone, you have Alwain to give your rear guard Ashlei 5k power per usage.

Now, let us pause for a moment and consider, why is Ordain Owl so overpowered? Is it because it's a bird? Maybe. Is it because the target of the power boost is a restander? Yes. Using this concept with stand triggers and rear guard Ashleis, we can come up with a reasonable assumption that stand triggers on a RG that can restand and swing for 21k unboosted is probably pretty sweet. As an avid Tri-Stinger Overlord enthusiast, I can assure you that it's extremely powerful.

So, that's cool and all Tim, but why are we running a split of quintet walls and null guards? There are many good reasons for this. Jewel Knights are an extremely low counterblast deck. Tilda can only trigger on grade 3 ride (and she has a tendency to die quickly) and Ashley "R" can only counterblast once per turn. This means that speaking from a resource standpoint, Quintet Walls are simply too good not to use. They also give us an added facet of loading up our drop zone with some potential grade 3's which we can use to abuse with our RG Ashlei (since our Vanguard Ashlei always has the threat of triggers and criticals). We can also fill up that Drop Zone with our remaining Prizmys and null guards. With only incremental amounts of card advantage and cycling that can't even really be used if you have a full field, and the ability to shove those grade 3's back on the bottom of our deck, decking out isn't a major scare. I can't find a single good reason not to run quintet walls in this deck, until Legion might reach the point where it's no longer safe to guard with quints.

All in all, I feel like this version performs better than the standard 8 crit/4 draw/4 heal version that doesn't run quints.

Blau Butler - When Cats Ride Robots!

Grade 0's

Starter - Morgenrot

4x Cat Butler
16x Nova Grappler Critical Triggers

Grade 1's

4x Tough Boy
4x Flower Lei Leprechaun
4x Blau Dunkelheir
4x Blaupanzer

Grade 2's

4x Blaukluger
4x Grosse Baer
3x Mars Blaukluger
2x Jupiter Blaukluger

The objective of this deck is to use Morgenrot to function as a selective "Twin-Drive!!" check early game so that we don't lose out on cards while using Blaukluger, Mars, and Flower Lei to pressure the opponent greatly on the first few turns swinging.  When the opponent reaches 4-5 damage, you should be able to field one or more Cat Butlers.  Every time you swing in with Blaukluger, they will have to guard the attack or risk getting crit.  Grosse Baer is very important, as it's the only unit capable of making a 16k+ row with Morgenrot and Cat Butler.  Otherwise, it's more preferable to make 16k rows in all three rows as early as possible.  Don't be afraid to call triggers if you've been over saturated with them or to call a grade 1 over Morgenrot to force more shield out when the opponent is at 4 or more damage.  Jupiter Blaukluger is the preferred back-up ride.

No Hand, No Stand!

No Hand, No Stand is a combination budget-mixed deck that focuses on making your opponents hate the two least supported (real) clans in the game, Nubatama and Megacolony.  This deck is significantly more focused on the Nubatama aspect over the Megacolony aspect.

Here's the list:

Grade 0's

Starter - Larva Mutant, Giraffa

4x  Stealth Beast, Hagakure

4x  Sharp Nail Scorpio (Critical)
4x  Shelter Beetle (Critical)
4x  Stealth Dragon, Kurogane (Critical)
4x  Stealth Fiend, Zashikihime (Heal)

Grade 1's

4x  Stealth Beast, Mijingakure (Perfect Guard)
4x  Stealth Dragon, Dreadmaster
4x  Pupa Mutant, Giraffa
2x  Megacolony Battler B

Grade 2's

4x  Stealth Rogue of a Thousand Knives, Oborozakura
2x  Elite Mutant, Giraffa
1x  Bloody Hercules

Grade 3's

4x  Stealth Fiend, Daidarahoushi
4x  Stealth Dragon, Voidmaster

Now, let's answer a few questions.

1.  Why run this over a monoclan Nubatama deck?
2.  Is Voidmaster really worth it?
3.  Why Megacolony?
4.  Why Giraffa?

1.  To answer the first question, there are many reasons.  A monoclan Nubatama deck can't run 4 Hagakure without hurting their own riding ratios.  They often lose their ability to reliably force discards, or are only able to secure on-hit pressure in one row.  There's also the unreliability of having to run rainbow triggers.

There are many good reasons to run monoclan Nubatama, like the amazing break ride, but everything is a tradeoff.  This deck does the original mission of what Nubatama was trying to do far better than the monoclan versions of the deck.

2.  Voidmaster lets you essentially double-up on the on-hit pressure total while also not having any weaknesses in a mixed deck and being a Nubatama Vanguard for Hagakure.  Remember, Hagakure is the best Nubatama card, and there's a reason he's at 4 in here.

3.  Megacolony gives me access to the 12 crit trigger line-up I want.  Stands do nothing for the on-hit pressure that Nubatama is aiming for.  This is because your opponent is likely to guard your Vanguard, and you need to twin-drive to check a stand.  This makes Voidmaster completely lack synergy with stands since if he gets restood, you almost always have more cards in hand than your opponent.

4.  Giraffa's ride chain lets me effectively count drawing the grade 1 Giraffa as drawing the grade 2 Giraffa.  This is why I can run 7 grade 2's and still ride up like a traditional 14/11/8 deck.  Additionally, generation 2 (set 4) ride chains have no downsides for you riding a non-clan unit over the starter over riding a same-clan unit over the starter.  This is the engine that allows us to run 4 Hagakure with few downsides barring a match-up against Seal Dragons.

The deck functions like Nubatama was meant to function.  Hagakure are suicide bombers.  You store them up in your hand, then when your opponent is doing their last attack for a turn, you drop them all to destroy your opponent's hand.  Even if you lose all of your cards doing this, it's still a worthwhile tactic because your opponent loses several cards right before the start of your turn.  After that, you swing in and end the game with your 12 criticals against your otherwise defenseless foe.

For early game, having a Dreadmaster row with a Nubatama attacker swinging into a RG row will force them to lose two cards if they don't guard.  Don't be afraid to call a Nubatama trigger in front of a Dreadmaster.  No matter what they choose to do, they will lose a card from hand.  That's one of the things that makes this deck so incredibly devastating.  If you have a severe card advantage lead, you can swing into their rear guards and cripple their offensive ability for the remainder of the game while using the 12 crits to force their damage up higher.  The combination of raw beat, Nubatama discarding, and a potential Battler B -> Hercules row for stunning units makes the deck a devastating combination of offense and defense.

This deck may just be on par with Tom and Jerry for being one of the most lethal mixed decks in existence.  I just hope too many people don't play it, because it's not just devastating.  It's also annoying as fuck.

Megacolony Decks

So, it surprises me that budget decks have overtaken both mixed and rush decks for the lists that you guys want to see.  Since the economy sucks and money is tight, I'm going to be releasing a quick series of budget decks.  Let's go with the cheapest, and most unreasonably underestimated clan of all, MEGACOLON.  For these budget decks, any card that costs more than a buck will be labelled with a rough pricing, so you can get a good idea of how much the deck will cost you.

Machining Deck:

The Machining build focuses around its soul.  It uses Machining units that are in soul by either giving a rear guard Mantis or Hornet +3000 power if one exists in there, or riding a Stag Beetle and choosing two of the Machining units from soul and bringing them to rear guard circles and giving Stag Beetle their power.  Since they come out at rest, Worker Ant is typically one of the units that is brought out, since it stands a Machining when it gets called.  If used in conjunction with Machining Armor Beetle, you can put Worker Ant back in the soul to stun (prevent standing) an opponent's unit while getting to call Armor Beetle and letting it stay standing, all while making your Vanguard +14000 power.  It's pretty strong.  You can also make 21k on the RG by calling a Hornet (which will be a 10k boost for that turn) behind a Tail Joe or a Mantis that was also called that turn.  Hell Spider is a strong back-up ride.  Vesper lets you get a cheap plus to compensate for using Armor Beetle (or just to be a free plus).

Starter - Machining Worker Ant

Triggers - 8 crit, 4 draw, 4 heal

Grade 1's

4x Paralyze Maddonna ($6)
4x Machining Hornet
4x Machining Mosquito
2x Megacolony Battler, B <- Best grade 1 MEGACOLON

Grade 2's

4x Machining Armor Beetle ($3, in the current promo packs) <- Best grade 2 MEGACOLON
4x Machining Mantis
3x Tail Joe

Grade 3's

4x Machining Stag Beetle ($2)
2x Hell Spider
2x Violent Vesper

COST - $44 + R's and C's


Giraffa Deck:

This deck is really strong at tanking early game.  Generation 2 (set 4) ride chains are over 50% likely to hit their grade 1 and secure you an 8k and 10k Vanguard for your first two turns.  If you miss the grade 1, 3/10 of your back-up rides are 8k, which can give you reasonable tanking early regardless.  If you go first with this deck, it's very easy to shut down any deck that doesn't have the ability to rush you by dropping a 10000 power shield to negate the first attacks they do.  This is because (especially with archetypes) most people will have a 7000 power Vanguard boosted by a 5000 power forerunner, which, even with a trigger, isn't strong enough to break through 8000 + 10000.  Late game, you're all sad that you managed to miss the grade 2, even though the odds of that happening are terrible.  NO WORRIES!  Toss the grade 2 into soul later in the game with Armor Beetle, problem solved.  :D  Okay, now that early guarding and stuff is out of the way, let's talk about the deck.

The grade 1 Giraffa allows you to discard a grade 3 to search your deck for the grade 3 Giraffa.  You have the ability to make 20000 rows with your rear guards by using Iron Cutter, or 18k with Iron Cutter and a Battler B/Giraffa boost.  Both the grade 2 and the grade 3 Giraffa have good on-hit effects.  But there's plenty of tactics with the deck, too.  If your opponent is low in damage, you can disrupt their field heavily if Giraffa hits (retire 2 of your units, retire two of their grade 1's).  If it's boosted by a Battler B, you can also stun one of their front row units.  Priority of stuns should typically be:  Grade 3's > Grade 1's > Grade 2's.  Unless you're against Musketeers.  Then you just don't stun.  Fuck those guys.

Starter - Larva Mutant, Giraffa

Triggers - 8 crit, 4 draw, 4 heal

Grade 1's

4x Pupa Mutant, Giraffa
4x Paralyze Maddonna ($6)
2x Stealth Millipede (NOW we can make 21k, so this is stronk) 
2x Phantom Black
2x Megacolony Battler, B <- Best grade 1 MEGACOLON
 
Grade 2's

4x Elite Mutant, Giraffa ($6 for all 4)
4x Iron Cutter Beetle
3x Machining Armor Beetle ($3, in the current promo packs) <- Best grade 2 MEGACOLON

Grade 3's
4x Evil Armor General, Giraffa ($6 for all 4)
4x Violent Vesper

COST - $39 + R's and C's


MegaDRAWlony Deck:

This deck focuses on building soul and attacking rear guards with Fraude, typically supported by Battler C initially.  For those unfamiliar with the grade 3's in this list, Ant Lion is their megablast unit.  We use him to feed our soul for rear guard Fraudes.  Fraude's effect is, if he hits anything, you can soul blast 3 and draw.  If you swing with him and a 5k boost into a rear guard, they'll be annoyed.  They have to drop 10000 to guard their rear guard, or lose that rear guard, give me an extra card, and I can choose to stun a unit.  Sadly, even though Battler B is the best grade 1 MEGACOLON, his effect only works if the attack hits the Vanguard.  So place him behind the Vanguard, and if you have extras, behind your other row.  This deck is all about on-hit pressure, so remember, if your opponent doesn't hate their life after playing against this deck, you aren't trolling them hard enough.

The combination of draw power, stalling, and annoying-bugginess is enough to make this deck legitimately close to as likely to lose by decking out as it is by hitting 6 damage.

Starter - Megacolony Battler C

Triggers - WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU WANT SINCE THEY'RE ALL GREAT FOR THIS DECK

Grade 1's
4x Paralyze Maddonna ($6)
4x Machining Mosquito
3x Megacolony Battler, B <- Best grade 1 MEGACOLON
3x Phantom Black

Grade 2's

4x Machining Armor Beetle ($3, in the current promo packs) <- Best grade 2 MEGACOLON
4x Tail Joe
2x Bloody Hercules
1x Water Gang

Grade 3's

4x Death Warden Ant Lion
4x Master Fraude

COST - $36 + R's and C's

Catapult, Standby!

Grateful Catapult

So, I really liked Chrome Jailer Dragon's persona blast. I thought that CB1, -1 grade 3, +2 units that you get to pick from is nice, even if the selection is limited. It dawned on me that this card is an 11k Chrome Jailer Dragon, only instead of it searching the top 4 cards, it searches the top 40 cards (but costs one more counterblast). With this ability to be an 11k wall and optimize your field at will, Grateful Catapult has been a sorely overlooked card for too long, and that's largely because people are typically afraid to try and play Spike Brothers in a more conservative fashion.

Here's the decklist:

Starter - Mecha Trainer - Mecha Trainer embodies everything this deck tries to do. Optimizing that field. You can choose whatever grade 1's you are in need of, even a perfect guard. You can off Mecha Trainer with its ability to open up a spot to call a unit with Catapult, as well.

Triggers: 8 critical, 4 stand, 4 heal OR 8 critical, 4 draw, 4 heal

I've been enjoying stands in the build. Getting the persona blast off is going to be fairly inconsistent, and really, not much more consistent if you run draws. I'd rather abuse high base-power RG attackers with stands since this deck doesn't focus on sending rear guards back to the deck.

Grade 1's:

4x Wonder Boy
4x Cheer Girl, Marilyn
3x Dudley Daisy (12k when called with Catapult for a turn)
3x Tyrant Receiver (If running Rabbit House)/3 Reckless Express (If Running Dudley or Dragger)

Grade 2's:

4x MVP Black Panther
4x Charging Bill Collector (11k with Limit Break VG/RG)
3x Panzer Gale (10k interceptor)

Grade 3's

4x Grateful Catapult
4x Rabbit House OR 2x Dudley Emperor, 2x Dragger


Both version offer different things. Rabbit House hits for big numbers as Vanguard, and can even hit 21k as a rear-guard with the right booster (and since every unit is searchable, setting these rows up with a Catapult persona blast is pretty easy). Dudley lets you net 0 for the field optimization and has less defense in exchange for it being more consistent and him swinging harder. Dragger is in the Dudley build as it is a safe fall-back plan, and also hits for 13k as Vanguard like Dudley, but keeps the 11k defense. The go-for-broke plan is still there as a back-up option if your opponent is running out of steam or if you have no other hope to win. Stands are significantly less suggested in the Dudley/Dragger build. Reckless Express is in there to clear out extra room on the field while the Rabbit House build tries to keep optimized units on the field (while intercepting with Gales).

All in all, the build has proven very consistent in getting good rows and applying good pressure. Being able to convert an excess grade 3 into two extra RG's of choice is pretty much one of the best trades you can do in this game.

Drawqua Force

Note: This is a troll deck. It's 110% fun and super non-competitive.

Grade 0's

4x Bubble Edge Dracokid (Starter)
16x Mass Production Sailor

Grade 1's (12)

4x Nicholas
3x Paschal
3x Accelerated Commando (Use on your Benedicts and Tidals to make their base power 11/12k)
2x Wheel Assault

Grade 2's (10)

4x Tidal Assault
4x Damon
2x Basil

Grade 3's (8)

4x Cobalt Wave Dragon
4x Benedict

Now, the purpose of this deck is to get as many attacks in as possible before you attack with Cobalt Wave. It's possible to have a 25k 6 crit Cobalt Wave Dragon, and that's cute. But mostly, you keep tossing Dracokids into the soul and applying the effects on your Benedicts/Tidal Assaults. In doing so, by swinging with your other RG's first, you get to draw 2 times per Dracokid that goes into the soul. Additionally, if you hit a stand, you can increase this amount to 3 times.

In Magical Fairytale Christmasland where you hit 4 Dracokids and get a 4th attack going on the Benedict/Assault and hit a stand, you can draw 13 times in one turn, not counting the drive check. Make dem OTT players jealous while swinging for 5-6 crit every turn with your Vanguard.

Tom and Jerry

Decklist:

Starter - Flask Marmoset

4x Ruler Chameleon (Crit) - When it gets retired, you can counterblast 1, search your deck for another one, and add it to your hand. This only works if you have a Great Nature vanguard, so this is a viable tactic for a grade 1/2 rush if you didn't secure Libra as a ride.
4x Triangle Cobra (Crit)
4x Psychic Bird (Crit) - Move to soul, draw.
4x Oracle Guardian, Nike (Crit)

Grade 1's

4x Silver Wolf (Makes tom 20k with one dope)
4x Coiling Duckbill (Draw when a unit is retired, 23k with two dopes and Tom)
3x Tank Mouse (Tap him, give a unit +4k.  You can call over him to play a booster for Binoculus for a push or leave him behind a VG Cookie for 21k.)
2x Chocolate (Perfect Guard.  Sucks if you have to ride it, but still very easy to get late game since you mill through your deck very quickly.)
1x Tic-Toc Flamingo (Unflips a damage since almost everything is CB2.  A single tech because we don't really need it, but it's still better to have around than an excess of Tank Mouse's 6k body.)

Grade 2's

4x Binoculus Tiger (When it attacks a VG, give 4k to the unit boosting Tom.  If you miss Tom, he can dope his own booster, which if it's 8k, can make 21k.  All kinds of combo play here.)
4x Silent Tom (Can't be guarded by grade 0's)
3x Maiden of Libra (CB2, draw on hit)

Grade 3's

4x CEO Amaterasu (Scries top card, makes it a 70% chance to crit.  Thins deck.  Potential megablast.  Makes 21k with the 7k units, and you typically want to call Coiling behind her anyway.)
4x Battle Sister, Cookie (CB2, draw 2, discard 1.  Synergizes greatly with the fast paced draw and mill of the deck to get out all of your Toms.  Swings for 21k with Tank Mouse and 23k with Silver Wolf.)

Tom and Jerry is a Great Nature and Oracle Think Tank mixed deck that focuses on using the power doping of Great Nature to increase the power of a booster behind Silent Tom while having an Oracle Think Tank vanguard, so that he becomes incredibly difficult to guard against, requiring either 3 or more cards, or a perfect guard.  The Vanguards of the deck, Cookie and CEO also swing for over 21k pretty easily, so this makes opponents want to drop multiple nulls per turn, but instead they have to also 2 to pass your Vanguard with grade 0's, which really burns out their resources and can open up 2-to-pass victories in a lot of cases.  The deck also uses its counterblasts on Libra and Cookie to draw, or if the game goes on for a while, CEO to Megablast.  Flask Marmoset is also an option.  Since we have the OTT card draw, deck thinning, and trigger scrying to go with Great Nature's unflipping (Tic-Toc), drawing (Duckbill), and doping (Tank Mouse, Binoculus), the deck lets you burn through itself to consistently get out what you need.  Typically, by time they can kill a Tom, I'll have another one ready to play.  Additionally, with 16 criticals and Amaterasu scrying the top card for them, we get a 70% chance to crit.  That's right, Tom gets even deadlier.

Link to Youtube video of the deck.

Platinum Rush Wins a Locals

I was messing around with this deck at locals this week and I managed to pick up a locals win with it. It's one of those decks that is very consistent, but when you can't get out the cards you need, it falls apart quickly. The deck can rack up 1-8 damage on turn two depending on how good/bad your setup is. I'll talk more about how the deck works, but first, the list.

Grade 0's
Starter - Goyusha
8 Crits
8 Stands (one should be Guide Dolphin)

Grade 1's
4x Karenroid Daisy
4x Commander Laurel (Key card)
4x Speedster
3x Diamond Ace
2x Daimariner

Grade 2's
4x Platinum Ace (Key card)
4x Cosmic Rider
4x Cosmo Beak

Grade 3's
4x Super Dimensional Robo, Daiyusha (Key card)

The focus of the deck is to get Platinum Ace out on turn 2 with a Laurel in the back. Use your other DPolice units to give +power to Platinum and give him that bonus crit. Since this is turn 2, your opponent likely isn't established enough to guard the hit. If he lets the attack hit, you get to stand your Vanguard that already has bonus crit and swing again. You also get two drive checks. If you hit a crit on the first drive check, and they can't block you again, you just dealt 6 damage on your first turn attacking. If not, you could hit a stand and stand the booster for the Vanguard to keep the attacks hard to block. Either way, the deck hits the ground running from the start of the match and doesn't really fall off.

Hitting Daiyusha is a luxury that should happen after 3-5 turns, typically. You will miss him some games, but that's the nature of a 4 g3 rush deck. Since he's essentially a 1k stronger Platinum Ace with Twin-Drive!!, there's no reason not to hold onto one if you get one in your opening hand, even though you're rushing.

The deck can generate its own weird form of card advantage by getting more drive checks. Other than that, you try to sit on your guard, letting yourself take 2 damage early for Cosmo, then more later if you need it. It really banks on your opponent not being able to guard everything all the time and punishes them heavily for any attacks hitting.

As for the tournament, here's the match breakdown:

Round 1: Narukami (2W - 1L)

First game I drew into crap. Roasted crap with sprinkles. Got a solid rush game two. Got an amazing rush game 3, securing the win.

Round 2: OTT (2W - 0L)

He played Dark Cats both games and I drew into my perfect setup. One game was over before he could ride grade 3. Flawless rushes. He had to do a 1-to-pass on a 2 crit Platinum Ace, and I hit a crit to seal the second game.

Round 3: Shadow Paladins (2W - 1L)

Game one I got out a beautiful 2 crit Platinum Ace. He couldn't guard it. I stood. He couldn't guard it. I hit a stand, and took out a rear-guard. He saw instantly that he was boned and told me that the deck was terrifying. I lost the second game (which was close) and pulled out a solid win in the third game.

Round 4: Spike Brothers (2W - 1L)

I would have digipwned him each game, but he drew into no less than 3 nulls each game, which slowed me down, even though I had a perfect setup games one and two. I won by not standing my Vanguard with Laurel and hitting with rears in game one (when I had to explain to him that Dudley can only call to open RG slots, which he didn't know, and had out a full front row of Emperors, which I refused to swing into). Second game I needed a trigger on my last drive check to win and missed it, so he got me. Third game I was gradelocked. At 0. In a deck with 17 grade 1's. O_O The game goes late, and I hit with a 1 crit Daiyusha, bringing him to 4 damage. I hit a stand. I stand my booster, give the power to Daiyusha, stand him with Laurel, and swing with a now 20k 2 crit Vanguard. He no passes me. I think to myself, "Welp, I'm fucked. No way I'm winning this now." First check, Justice Cobalt. I give the effects to my Platinum Ace rear guard. I'm like, "Wait, if I hit a stand..." Second check, Guide Dolphin. I stand Platinum Ace, which now has 2 crits. He has 0 guard and a 15k Vanguard. I swing and he hits no heals.

So, in a fit of turbosacking (even though if he had just stopped drawing all of those damn nulls I wouldn't have had to sack), I was able to pull away with my first locals victory at this card shop. xD

I got 6 packs for winning. I waited for the 2nd place guy (Shadow Paladin player I played earlier) to pick his packs. He got set 5. Pulled nothing. I get 6 packs of set 5, get one Kay. Next person got a random prize drawing, gets only one set 5, SP Wingal Brave. ;__;

So, I give the Kay to a friend who needed it and gave the rest of the cards to some kid who was just starting to play. I log on when I get home and see that yet another person brought Kageroyals to their locals and won. :D Good day today, except for the pulls and the nulls. ~_~

(If there are any questions on the deck or why I put the cards I did in the deck, feel free to ask me.)

Link to a video of two 6 damage turns with Platinum Rush

Official Monoclan Kageroyals Variants

Kageroadhouse

Starter - Lizard Solider Conroe

16 Kagero Critical Triggers

4 Bahr
4 Perfect Guard
6 8k's from other clans

11 Kagero 10k vanillas

4 Waterfall
4 Graphite Cannon Dragon

Revenge Tastes Vanilla

Starter - Spinbau Revenger

16 Shadow Paladin Critical Triggers

4x Sharron
4x Revenger Mac Lir (Perfect Guard)
6x 8k's from other clans

11x Shadow Paladin Vanilla 10k's, max out on the Revenger Rugos.
OR
4x Revenger Rugos
4x Revenger Masquerade
3x Shadow Paladin Vanilla 10k

4x Curse Spear Revenger, Diarmuid
4x Revenger of Labyrinth, Araun

Diarmuid offers a few things to the Kageroyals playstyle: Late game finishing power, and consistency. No matter how you slice the cake, Waterfall is a -1 from hand, and this is a -1 from the field to apply that extra pressure. The trade off is that you have more targets in this version, but they have to be sacked from the field. If you're feeling brave, you can sack one of the 8 crits for Revengers or just off a grade 2 that swung at a RG. There's plenty of combo play here, and while it is a Limit Break, 26k 2 crit is just too juicy to pass up, and he is on equal grounds with Waterfall most of the time. We also get the archetype grade 3's to enable the use of 12k beaters in the deck to hit 20k in some rows. This comes with its own risks (harder to guard if you're forced to ride, easier to attack on the RG by unboosted units) and rewards (great attacking uboosted or boosted vs. 10k Vanguards). That decision is player preference.

Bison Overlord

I've been tinkering around with this deck lately. I've had some very pleasing results with it. Normally, I'd say skip the Great Nature side of things and play the Tri-Stinger version of Overlord (since multi-attacks and stand triggers synergize more with Aqua Force) but I just had to try this version out because Soft Tank Sloth is adorable, and unflipping 4 damage is just crazy.

There has to be a certain balance to the deck since you need at least one other Kagero out for Dragonic Overlord to be 11k, but you also need certain Great Nature grade 1's to secure the damage unflip (Soft Tank) and protect yourself (Perfect Guard). Here's the list I eventually settled on.

Starter - Conroe

Triggers 8 Stand, 4 Draw, 4 Crit (all Great Nature)

Grade 1's
4x Soft Tank
4x Bahr
3x Cable Sheep
3x Gojo

Grade 2's
4x Binoculus
2x Lamp Camel
2x Tejas
2x Nehalem
1x Compass Lion (functions similarly to Binoculus for securing the damage unflip, hits 18k with Gojo)

Grade 3's
4x Bison
4x Overlord


This deck doesn't really try to hide that it minuses itself to minus the opponent. Using Overlord's effect is always at least 2 cards that my opponent will lose, so trading a Soft Tank Sloth for that ability every turn is the justification to the deck's playstyle. The trigger line-up has 4 crits to threaten my opponent with some early damage with 8 stands to double-up the threat of Overlord and 4 draws to give a one-turn boost to one Great Nature unit or to sacrifice with Binoculus for Bison's damage unflip.

I'm still tweaking the deck and trying to form as few dependencies on same-type vanguard units as I can (thus, no Hammsuke, since they're useless with an Overlord Vanguard even though I still have to sacrifice a unit for Binoculus and Compass, and they also partially counteract my large-scale damage unflip). Naturally, if a deck has 8 stands and access to a Kirara clone, it's a given to play that unit to put even more pressure on the opponent, especially if you haven't secured an Overlord.

Riding Overlord isn't super great for this deck, but it can still play like a generic beat down deck pretty well with fairly high base power for all of the units in the deck, coupled with Binoculus not needing a Great Nature Vanguard to use his skill. All in all, I found this deck to be incredibly fun to play, and Overlord having his threat on any given turn is terrifying.

Hellfire Ritual (Complete)

Grade 0's

Greedy Hand (Starter)
4x Dark Knight (Crit)
4x Blitz Ritter (Crit)
4x Hysteric Shirley (Draw)
4x Cursed Doctor/Cheshire Cat (Heal)

Grade 1's
4x Doreen the Thrustor
4x March Rabbit (Perfect Guard)
3x Demonic Dragon Sage, Mahoraga
3x Alluring Succubus

Grade 2's
4x Demon of Aspiration, Amon 
4x Flirtatious Succubus  
3x Gwynn the Ripper

Grade 3's
4x Amon
3x Evil Eye, Basilisk (Makes perfect guarding more consistent and hits for 12k without needing a retire from Amon)
1x Blazing Flare Dragon (This is a Kagero card, it gains 3k every time a RG is destroyed.

This deck uses the same tactics as Hellfire Ritual, only it utilizes Demonic Dragon Mage, Mahoraga as a powerful booster over Blazing Flare Dragon as an attacker. I've altered the list with Gwynn the Ripper to give targetted retirement without having to neg yourself.  Additionally, this also lets Basilisk enable power boosts for Mahoragas on the field.  There's less 20k rows since I took out Seiger, but still the same access to powerful 21k+ rows.  And, honestly, the 20/21k deals are if you only soul charge or retire once, but this is a build that waits until the opponent is on their last legs, then goes all-in, so you will be doing multiples of each, to the point where the difference between a Seiger or Gwynn won't be that large.

Hellfire Ritual (Incomplete)

Grade 0's

Greedy Hand (Starter)
4x Dark Knight (Crit)
4x Blitz Ritter (Crit)
4x Mad Hatter/Hysteric Shirley (Draw, Shirley is set 5)
4x Cursed Doctor/Cheshire Cat (Heal)

Grade 1's
4x Doreen the Thrustor
4x Alluring Succubus
3x March Rabbit (Perfect Guard)
3x Yellow Bolts

Grade 2's
4x Flirtatious Succubus
4x Werewolf Seiger
2x Blue Dust (You want to save your counterblasts for Amon)
2x Cyber Beast (Only use him as a turn two VG to force your opponent to block or get a free card. You also fish him out with Greedy Hand if you need a target so you don't have to deal with his weakness as a RG later. He also makes good Perfect Shield fodder, a 5k guard, or a good sack for Amon's skill)

Grade 3's
4x Amon
3x Blazing Flare Dragon (This is a Kagero card, it gains 3k every time a RG is destroyed.)

The idea here is to be able to push for stronger RG rows more consistently by having multiple units that get power with Amon's skill. Every retire you do with Amon gives both Doreen and Blazing Flare 3k. I put them both on opposite RG rows, have them boosting/boosted by a Werewolf/Succubus and then cycle through cards in the space behind Amon to retire my opponent's RG's. Greedy Hand is the first card you get rid of. Then you call Yellow Bolts, tap them, and sack them. Then Flirtatious. Then Amon (who is a vanilla 10k RG). Each time you soul charge with a Flirtatious/Alluring/Yellow Bolt, you are giving Doreen 3k more. It's very easy to have all of your rows swing for over 30k using this tactic, and it makes a powerful final push.

If the worst case scenario happens and you have to ride Blazing Flare Dragon, then your soul should be built up enough to use his skill. You can still use two cards to soul charge with a non-Dark Irregulars vanguard, Greedy Hand and Dark Knight of Nightmareland. If you can use those to get 10 soul with BFD, it's possible to use his skill twice to snipe any two RGs your opponent has and as long as you still have any RGs out, you will still be able to use your triggers. You can still perfect guard, but you can't use them on Blazing Flare. Since this is the case, I would just play them as RGs if they're needed, or hold onto them for the hopes of getting an Amon.

Galahad Rush (Conjurer Mithril)

Grade 0's Drangal
4x Alabaster Owl (Crit)
4x Bringer of Good Luck, Epona (Crit)
4x Margal (Draw)
4x Yggdrasil Maiden, Elaine (Heal)

Grade 1's
4x Knight of Tribulation, Galahad
4x Little Sage, Marron
4x Lake Maiden, Lien
4x Flash Shield, Isuelt

Grade 2's
4x Conjurer Mithril
4x Knight of Tribulations, Galahad
3x Knight of Determination, Lamorak
2x Blaster Blade

Grade 3's
4x Knight of Godly Speeds, Galahad

This deck focuses on a heavy field presence early game with a potential 11k Vanguard late game.  This deck can potentially thin you of non-triggers fairly quickly between Galahads searching for more Galahads and Conjurer Mithril calling a grade 1 or 2 off the top of the deck.  It has Margal to help build soul for Galahad.  This list is by no means set in stone.  Borgal would make an excellent addition to the deck to make Mithril swing for 16k.  Since almost 60% of your deck can be called by Conjurer Mithril, you are very likely to be able to get a large field presence and maintain some hand presence.  The consistency of successfully making it to grade 3 also gives it a 1-up on other rush decks.  It does have the weakness of not having as much raw power as the clan is capable of, but hopefully you can generate enough early pressure with the rush to compensate.

Royal Novas (How the Alfred Stole Christmas)

Grade 0's - Lionet Heat (One turn 21k Mr. Invincible)
4x Red Lightning (Damage unflip)
4x Shining Lady
4x Epona
4x Alabaster Owl

Grade 1's
4x Marron
4x Claydoll Mechanic (Damage unflip)
3x Twin-Blader
3x Lionmane Stallion (Boosts Alfred for 10k)

Grade 2's
4x Blaster Blade Spirit (Call with Alfred and CB1 a bunch of times to retire stuff)
4x Hungry Dumpty (Damage unflip)
3x Gallatin

Grade 3's
4x Alfred (CB 3 to call Blaster Blade Spirit/Lionmane to make him 20k as RG)
4x Mr. Invincible (Damage unflip, soul charge one for Lionmane Stallion every turn)

This deck is really lulzy and trollzy. If you can manage to get Mr. Invincible as VG and Alfred in the RG, then once you have four damage, you can call a Blaster Blade Spirit for three counterblasts, retire a unit with another counterblast, then the following turn you soul charge unflipping a damage, and then call a Claydoll or Dumpty (using BBS to intercept to open the spaces) and then wait one more turn and do it again, then call another BBS. Pretty much every other turn you can straight up grab a card from the deck. O_O Playtested it and it's consistent in hitting triggers (Same as Kageroyals) and all you need is one Alfred to secure your field set-up. I'd say it's about an 8/10 when you hit your setup, which for a mixed deck is pretty awesome.  When you miss it though, it drops to like a 3/10.  xD