Battle of the Back row Fighters
The title might give you a clue of which card I would like to look at under a microscope, but I assure you there is more than that. I will be taking various cards under the microscope and let the cards battle it out for themselves. Sounds like fun than let’s get going;
Cards I will put under my microscope will be:
• Cold Wave
• Giant Trunade
• Dust Tornado
• Trap Stun
• Mystical Space Typhoon
• Royal Decree
Of course these are not all the back row fighters in Yu-Gi-Oh, but I think these cards will see the most plays in the upcoming format due to the ne Archetypes inside KCVDS and the creative plays you can get out of them.
Cold Wave:
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This card can only be activated at the start of your Main Phase 1. Until your next turn, you and your opponent cannot play or Set any Spell or Trap Cards.
This card is actually a game winner and a game changer for sure. This card alone makes half your opponents deck invalid for a turn and a half. I say a turn and a half due to the fact you activate it on your Main Phase 1 and the set cards of your opponent are invalid for that turn but because it isn’t a real turn for your opponent I consider it to be a half turn. So this single card makes like 16-20 cards invalid/unusable for 1,5 turn. In my eyes that’s broken and broken cards should be banned but, as long as Konami decides to provide us all with a card like this why not abuse it.
There are only a few cons to this card in my opinion and those would be;
These 3 moments are the 3 basic moments to play Cold Wave and more experienced duelists will use them outside these described moments since they know how to fully use the brokenness of Cold Wave, but for the more average and novice duelists among us I strongly advise you to keep the activation of Cold Wave inside these 3 moments.
Giant Trunade:
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Return all Spell and Trap Cards on the field to their owners' hands.
Not only does this card out run Starlight Road but also makes sure not many cards will be chained to its activation due to the fact your opponent won’t lose his/her resources they only go back to their hand. Cards that might be troublesome in the upcoming format will be: Compulsory Evacuation Device, Threatening Roar and maybe cards like Hero Blast since I personally expect these cards to be played more often in the upcoming format especially in KCVDS. Of course Giant Trunade has a couple of downsides as well such as:
But Giant Trunade’s upsides are still better than the downsides and therefore you will be seeing this card a lot in your duels and in a lot if not all of your own decks upcoming format.
Dust Tornado:
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Destroy 1 Spell or Trap Card your opponent controls. You can then Set 1 Spell or Trap Card from your hand.
I personally fell in love with this card when I started using Quickdraw Deck variants, due to the massive amount of plays you make with it. I know this sound strange since it only does 2 things; destroy and let you set another Spell or Trap card. The most beautiful play I love is: activate Dust tornado in your opponents End phase and set a second Dust tornado to destroy the 2nd or just another back row card your opponent has. You outrun Starlight road with this plus it annoys your opponent so much that he might even lose focus and therefore it increases your chances of winning the duel/match. But also this cards has a con to It and in my opinion it is:
Although you can say that this con applies for a lot of cards, but these cards have a better upside to it other than just destroying 1 Spell or Trap card and letting you set one. With that in mind as I said I will still expect this card to be heavily played since as any other trap without activation requirements it’s chainable to its destruction and therefore comes in handy as those times as well.
Trap Stun:
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Negate the effects of all other Trap Cards on the field during this turn.
We have seen this card being played in all sorts of deck before as a matter of shutting down their own defenses to come out on top and then letting their defenses take over again while they remain controlling the field with their field presences. The best example would be Blackwings and in my honest opinion also Machina Gadgets. Why Machina Gadgets is simple actually; due to the fact Gadget decks have almost always been played as Anti-Meta or Stun decks and now that the Machina archetype came out people decided to combine them to have nearly the same style as Blackwings although Blackwings can still function as a beat deck due to the high attack powers of most of their monsters while Machina Gadgets decks would have their Gadgets and Machina Gearframe. Of course you all understood that I was talking about blocking the effect of Royal Oppression. But Traps stun has plenty targets in order for you to play it such as:
So Trap Stun opens up a lot of doors in order for you to come in and burst out your limits and go for the OTK or taking over control in the duel. So play this card wisely since it can also backfire quit hard.
Mystical Space Typhoon:
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Destroy 1 Spell or Trap Card on the field.
This card is a basic 1 for 1 situation if there aren’t any chains or Call of the Haunted Dandylion revival ( just an example ). Why is this a good thing:
This makes the card pretty much a staple Spell and Trap removal card in every deck. To be honest I have actually have not seen a deck which didn’t run Mystical Space Typhoon apart from pure First Turn Kill decks or Over Turn Kill decks.
Royal Decree:
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Negate the effects of all other Trap Cards on the field.
As you might have noticed this card is a lot like Jinzo and Trap Stun. Although the small differences makes a lot of changes in the deck types it is played and will be played in. Due to the fact it is let usable than Jinzo and Trap stun. Why would I say such a thing; because Royal Decree is likely to stay a while on the field although not long enough if you play this card. This means you will run less traps while if you run 2 copies of Jinzo or 2 copies of Trap Stun you will also run the “staple” trap cards in your deck which you most likely won’t do if you run 3 copies of Royal Decree ( since Konami decided to provide us with the privilege of using 3 copies in 1 deck ). So basically in my eyes that’s the first con of this card although I can also be an upside due to the fact you will have more room for Spell or Monster cards which your deck will be mostly based on. Example Jinzo OTK decks.
Royal Decree has also upsides such as negating the effects of all face-up trap cards that are currently on the field and the effect of trap cards that will be activated. This can get you out of situations like Royal Oppression, Skill Drain, Gravity Bind etc. But for example: After "Call of the Haunted" Special Summons a monster, if Call of the Haunted" is negated by an effect like "Royal Decree" or "Trap Stun", then the Special Summoned monster remains on the field and is not destroyed. "Call of the Haunted" also remains on the field, even though its effect is negated. If the effect of "Royal Decree" or "Trap Stun" is no longer applied, then the effect of "Call of the Haunted" is re-applied, so the Special Summoned monster would be destroyed if "Call of the Haunted" is removed from the field.
So keep these things in mind to not make unnecessary misplays.
Well now that I have been micro scoping the above mentioned cards there is only 1 conclusion to make in my opinion and that is that only a few cards are suited to be splashed in nearly every main deck. My choices are:
Although it’s questionable to play both Trap Stun and Cold Wave but I prefer Cold Wave over Trap Stun in most cases and therefore it is higher up in my list.
I hope this small review on the above mentioned cards gave you some extra insight in the cards themselves and how to use them in general ( advanced plays should be discovered by yourself ) and therefore improving your plays and deck building.
Have an enjoyable day,
The_Dutch_Prince
The title might give you a clue of which card I would like to look at under a microscope, but I assure you there is more than that. I will be taking various cards under the microscope and let the cards battle it out for themselves. Sounds like fun than let’s get going;
Cards I will put under my microscope will be:
• Cold Wave
• Giant Trunade
• Dust Tornado
• Trap Stun
• Mystical Space Typhoon
• Royal Decree
Of course these are not all the back row fighters in Yu-Gi-Oh, but I think these cards will see the most plays in the upcoming format due to the ne Archetypes inside KCVDS and the creative plays you can get out of them.
Cold Wave:
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This card can only be activated at the start of your Main Phase 1. Until your next turn, you and your opponent cannot play or Set any Spell or Trap Cards.
This card is actually a game winner and a game changer for sure. This card alone makes half your opponents deck invalid for a turn and a half. I say a turn and a half due to the fact you activate it on your Main Phase 1 and the set cards of your opponent are invalid for that turn but because it isn’t a real turn for your opponent I consider it to be a half turn. So this single card makes like 16-20 cards invalid/unusable for 1,5 turn. In my eyes that’s broken and broken cards should be banned but, as long as Konami decides to provide us all with a card like this why not abuse it.
There are only a few cons to this card in my opinion and those would be;
• You have to activate this before you do anything else in your Main Phase 1, although you can still chain cards you had set already in previous turns such as Traps and Quick-play spell cards. But you cannot chain Cold Wave in a situation to undermine the effects of Bottomless Trap Hole. So in my opinion you lose some game play right there and then.
• Cold Wave does not negate continuous effects such as: Level Limit Area B, Skill Drain, Gravity Bind etc. Thus meaning it DOES negate trigger effects and Ignition effects of spell and trap cards.
• In your opponents turn you cannot activate or use the effects of your spell and trap cards you have on the field thus meaning you have less defense options and thus a con in my opinion.
Holding the above cons in mind Cold Wave is still one of the most effective Spell – Trap cards fighters in the game so far if played right. I say this due to some people tend to play Cold Wave at the wrong time in their duels. So now I hear some thoughts about ok but what are the right time to activate Cold Wave?, here they are ( according to my own experience and understandings of the game )
• When you already have a good field presence and control. By Activating Cold Wave at that time you ensure you control for at least a turn and a half and thereby you are able to push the game. Plus you interrupt the tempo of the duel towards your preference and thereby disrupting your opponent even more.
• When you know you can go full force and taking over the control in a duel by your monster effects. This you can see in X-Saber duels. With Recue Cat banned I doubt we will see the old fashioned play; Activate Cold Wave > Summon rescue Cat > Use Cats effect and summon 2 sabers ( Airbellum and Darksoul mostly ) and swing for 1700 and synchro summon a level 6 or higher monster depending on what was already on the field.
• When you opponent has cards on the field such as Royal Oppression, Blaze Accelerator, Begone, Knave etc. So that you can push for game or alter the circumstances towards your preference in meaning of field presence.
• Cold Wave does not negate continuous effects such as: Level Limit Area B, Skill Drain, Gravity Bind etc. Thus meaning it DOES negate trigger effects and Ignition effects of spell and trap cards.
• In your opponents turn you cannot activate or use the effects of your spell and trap cards you have on the field thus meaning you have less defense options and thus a con in my opinion.
Holding the above cons in mind Cold Wave is still one of the most effective Spell – Trap cards fighters in the game so far if played right. I say this due to some people tend to play Cold Wave at the wrong time in their duels. So now I hear some thoughts about ok but what are the right time to activate Cold Wave?, here they are ( according to my own experience and understandings of the game )
• When you already have a good field presence and control. By Activating Cold Wave at that time you ensure you control for at least a turn and a half and thereby you are able to push the game. Plus you interrupt the tempo of the duel towards your preference and thereby disrupting your opponent even more.
• When you know you can go full force and taking over the control in a duel by your monster effects. This you can see in X-Saber duels. With Recue Cat banned I doubt we will see the old fashioned play; Activate Cold Wave > Summon rescue Cat > Use Cats effect and summon 2 sabers ( Airbellum and Darksoul mostly ) and swing for 1700 and synchro summon a level 6 or higher monster depending on what was already on the field.
• When you opponent has cards on the field such as Royal Oppression, Blaze Accelerator, Begone, Knave etc. So that you can push for game or alter the circumstances towards your preference in meaning of field presence.
These 3 moments are the 3 basic moments to play Cold Wave and more experienced duelists will use them outside these described moments since they know how to fully use the brokenness of Cold Wave, but for the more average and novice duelists among us I strongly advise you to keep the activation of Cold Wave inside these 3 moments.
Giant Trunade:
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Return all Spell and Trap Cards on the field to their owners' hands.
Not only does this card out run Starlight Road but also makes sure not many cards will be chained to its activation due to the fact your opponent won’t lose his/her resources they only go back to their hand. Cards that might be troublesome in the upcoming format will be: Compulsory Evacuation Device, Threatening Roar and maybe cards like Hero Blast since I personally expect these cards to be played more often in the upcoming format especially in KCVDS. Of course Giant Trunade has a couple of downsides as well such as:
• You will not find out what the back row cards where on your opponents side of the field, which was the case with Heavy Storm. Thus meaning you still don’t have a full knowledge of their resources and thus you still need to be on your toes.
• Your opponent hand size gets a boast and therefore Tragoedia can be a troublesome card to play against not to mention to opportunities you give away for Gorz plays.
• Plus in my own opinion when my opponent plays Giant Trunade it shows some weakness or fear for my back row and thus meaning that my opponent whishes to finish the duels as soon as possible due to the lack of their needed resources to make it through. But that’s how I see some Giant Trunade plays, not all of them of course.
• Your opponent hand size gets a boast and therefore Tragoedia can be a troublesome card to play against not to mention to opportunities you give away for Gorz plays.
• Plus in my own opinion when my opponent plays Giant Trunade it shows some weakness or fear for my back row and thus meaning that my opponent whishes to finish the duels as soon as possible due to the lack of their needed resources to make it through. But that’s how I see some Giant Trunade plays, not all of them of course.
But Giant Trunade’s upsides are still better than the downsides and therefore you will be seeing this card a lot in your duels and in a lot if not all of your own decks upcoming format.
Dust Tornado:
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Destroy 1 Spell or Trap Card your opponent controls. You can then Set 1 Spell or Trap Card from your hand.
I personally fell in love with this card when I started using Quickdraw Deck variants, due to the massive amount of plays you make with it. I know this sound strange since it only does 2 things; destroy and let you set another Spell or Trap card. The most beautiful play I love is: activate Dust tornado in your opponents End phase and set a second Dust tornado to destroy the 2nd or just another back row card your opponent has. You outrun Starlight road with this plus it annoys your opponent so much that he might even lose focus and therefore it increases your chances of winning the duel/match. But also this cards has a con to It and in my opinion it is:
• It’s a trap and not even a counter which means it’s slow and thus not very splashable although a lot of decks will have this in their side deck or even mained now due to the lack of Heavy Storm and to outrun Starlight Road although the fear of Starlight Road I do not understand 100% myself.
Although you can say that this con applies for a lot of cards, but these cards have a better upside to it other than just destroying 1 Spell or Trap card and letting you set one. With that in mind as I said I will still expect this card to be heavily played since as any other trap without activation requirements it’s chainable to its destruction and therefore comes in handy as those times as well.
Trap Stun:
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Negate the effects of all other Trap Cards on the field during this turn.
We have seen this card being played in all sorts of deck before as a matter of shutting down their own defenses to come out on top and then letting their defenses take over again while they remain controlling the field with their field presences. The best example would be Blackwings and in my honest opinion also Machina Gadgets. Why Machina Gadgets is simple actually; due to the fact Gadget decks have almost always been played as Anti-Meta or Stun decks and now that the Machina archetype came out people decided to combine them to have nearly the same style as Blackwings although Blackwings can still function as a beat deck due to the high attack powers of most of their monsters while Machina Gadgets decks would have their Gadgets and Machina Gearframe. Of course you all understood that I was talking about blocking the effect of Royal Oppression. But Traps stun has plenty targets in order for you to play it such as:
• Bottomless Trap Hole; you summon a high level monster which you need to set things off your opponent plays Bottomless Trap Hole and you ok I chain as well and activate your Trap Stun. Not only do you ensure the survival of your monster but also nom of the effects of all other traps that might have been activated if you didn’t play Trap stun. Example; Dimensional Prison, Mirror Force, Return from the Different Dimension, Call of The Haunted etc. But do not make the mistake of that your opponent cannot play Trap cards since Trap Stun doesn’t negate the activation thus meaning your opponent can still activate their traps but their effects don’t work. This also means they can intentionally activate their traps in order to have a clear field if you are able to attack directly so that they can summon Gorz.
So Trap Stun opens up a lot of doors in order for you to come in and burst out your limits and go for the OTK or taking over control in the duel. So play this card wisely since it can also backfire quit hard.
Mystical Space Typhoon:
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Destroy 1 Spell or Trap Card on the field.
This card is a basic 1 for 1 situation if there aren’t any chains or Call of the Haunted Dandylion revival ( just an example ). Why is this a good thing:
• It outruns Starlight Road, and thus meaning you would not have to fear it.
• You don’t lose actual advantage (might lose some bit of hand advantage but this is ignorable)
• It’s chainable due to the cards nature ( Quick-play spell card ) for example a basic play which I do not see every day: Set Mystical Space Typhoon and let your opponent set a card and let them end their turn. In their End Phase you say MST and destroy their freshly set back row card. Basically the same play as with Dust Tornado only more improved since Mystical Space Typhoon can also be played out of your hand in your own Battle Phase.
• You don’t lose actual advantage (might lose some bit of hand advantage but this is ignorable)
• It’s chainable due to the cards nature ( Quick-play spell card ) for example a basic play which I do not see every day: Set Mystical Space Typhoon and let your opponent set a card and let them end their turn. In their End Phase you say MST and destroy their freshly set back row card. Basically the same play as with Dust Tornado only more improved since Mystical Space Typhoon can also be played out of your hand in your own Battle Phase.
This makes the card pretty much a staple Spell and Trap removal card in every deck. To be honest I have actually have not seen a deck which didn’t run Mystical Space Typhoon apart from pure First Turn Kill decks or Over Turn Kill decks.
Royal Decree:
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Negate the effects of all other Trap Cards on the field.
As you might have noticed this card is a lot like Jinzo and Trap Stun. Although the small differences makes a lot of changes in the deck types it is played and will be played in. Due to the fact it is let usable than Jinzo and Trap stun. Why would I say such a thing; because Royal Decree is likely to stay a while on the field although not long enough if you play this card. This means you will run less traps while if you run 2 copies of Jinzo or 2 copies of Trap Stun you will also run the “staple” trap cards in your deck which you most likely won’t do if you run 3 copies of Royal Decree ( since Konami decided to provide us with the privilege of using 3 copies in 1 deck ). So basically in my eyes that’s the first con of this card although I can also be an upside due to the fact you will have more room for Spell or Monster cards which your deck will be mostly based on. Example Jinzo OTK decks.
Royal Decree has also upsides such as negating the effects of all face-up trap cards that are currently on the field and the effect of trap cards that will be activated. This can get you out of situations like Royal Oppression, Skill Drain, Gravity Bind etc. But for example: After "Call of the Haunted" Special Summons a monster, if Call of the Haunted" is negated by an effect like "Royal Decree" or "Trap Stun", then the Special Summoned monster remains on the field and is not destroyed. "Call of the Haunted" also remains on the field, even though its effect is negated. If the effect of "Royal Decree" or "Trap Stun" is no longer applied, then the effect of "Call of the Haunted" is re-applied, so the Special Summoned monster would be destroyed if "Call of the Haunted" is removed from the field.
So keep these things in mind to not make unnecessary misplays.
Well now that I have been micro scoping the above mentioned cards there is only 1 conclusion to make in my opinion and that is that only a few cards are suited to be splashed in nearly every main deck. My choices are:
• Giant Trunade
• Mystical Space Typhoon
• Cold Wave
• Trap Stun
• Mystical Space Typhoon
• Cold Wave
• Trap Stun
Although it’s questionable to play both Trap Stun and Cold Wave but I prefer Cold Wave over Trap Stun in most cases and therefore it is higher up in my list.
I hope this small review on the above mentioned cards gave you some extra insight in the cards themselves and how to use them in general ( advanced plays should be discovered by yourself ) and therefore improving your plays and deck building.
Have an enjoyable day,
The_Dutch_Prince
