Japan Nationals have passed and the winner is: I dont know his name. On Shriek its Sobbat -.- BUT the important thing is what deck won.
Here's the decklist:
deck: skill drain plant
19 monster
3 lonefire blossom
3 beast king barbaros
3 tytannial, princess of camelias
1 Gorz, the emissiary of darkness
3 Doom Calibur Knight
1 Cyber dragon
1 sangan
1 natural rose whip
1 dandylion
1 Plaquespreader zombie
1 card trooper
14 magic
3 cold wave
3 pot of avarice
1 giant trunade
1 mystical space typhoon
1 monster reborn
1 grass fertiliser
1 foolish burial
3 trade in
1 lightning vortex
1 scapegoat
1 enemy controller
10 trap
3 skill drain
2 threatening roar
1 torrential tribute
1 mirror force
2 compulsory evacuation device
1 raigeki break
I think the first thing we can see is that this deck is just crazy. Firstly, its an aggresive deck that plays in an anti meta strategy and a quick synchro beatdown strategy, meaning one thing: it can do a whole lot of thing. Its focus was made for two or three not just one. Most decks like Black Wings just swarm swarm synchro end game. LL just swarm swarm, dump , JD then win. Forest GB is negate, control, tag, game. And AKB is cold wave, cat game.
This deck however reminds me of the old Chaos or Cyber stein deck-it was game changing, and it was certainly unpredictable. Now, in a format like this, most decks have only one aim, as i stated above. You dont find an AKB deck mixing skill drain or oppresion or a forest GB playing cold wave. It simply kills everything. There lies the weakness: with a few cards sided up, u can safely say u got the deck handled and taken care of. AKB dies to Deck Devastation virus, Dimensional Fissure bla bla bla and the list goes on.
Now you can try siding cards into your deck but you just cant kill the deck above. Simply, u could but you would have to side SO many cards till it takes away your own strategy and kills the main idea. That way, ur at a big disadvantage because ur deck cant move.
To start it off, the deck is a skill drain beatdown deck playing on a plant engine- yadda yadda bla..lets look at the monster lineup:
3 barbaros are just so so so good, i could go on about it but there's no need because u guys know it too. Its the main backbone for a skill drain based deck. 3 lonefires speed up the deck , while providing fuel for pot of avarice. It also gives u Camellia Tytannial- something that is hard to be up against. 2800 attack isnt easy to clear and with skill drain active, ur monster effects just dont function so its twice or thrice as hard to kill her. Gorz is simple, and a staple. sangan netts u lonefire so its nice.
Now card trooper is an interesting choice. It mills ur cards, giving you a chance to get skill drain or fuel the grave for Pots or to throw away that zombie carrier. 3Doom Calibur Knight lets you keep the beatdown with its 1900 attack and lets Sobbat negate those pesky rescue cat or synchro summons. It kills the Black wing special summon and stops GB altogther. With its 1900 atk, not even laquari can run it through. Dont forget its not negated by skill drain. It sacs itself and apparently the timing and whatsoever lets it pull through. Same with lonefire.
Dandylion is gold. It gives you two free tokens. Sure you cant tribute them but nothing goes against using them as monsters for synchro. Being level one, its easy to manipulate which synchro u want to call out- be it lvl 6 , 7 , or even 8. It also gives you protection and in the sidedeck lies 3 debris dragon so Sobbat can recycle dandylion. Do watch out for d.d crow though
The last piece of tech in monsters is natural rose whip. In case u guys never heard of it (neither have i) its a 1700 defense earth tuner with the following effect: Your opponent can only activate 1
Spell or
Trap Card per turn.
Needless to say: the negation effect is strong. Its like Cold wave- just not as annoying or good_ reminds me of Great Shogun Shien. and his effect just wins out. Your opponent has to consider which spell or trap he or she wants to play, and which will help out more. Some will make mistakes in making decision, and mindplay is always an asset in YuGiOh as it benefits both parties- you as u can win, and ur opponent can learn from his mistakes =) Its a plant too(dont forget) so lonefire is practically a tuner, a token bringer, a big fat flower lady (shes no princess) or another copy of itself.
Spells now =)
3 cold wave stops everything so u can go and attack, so it helps u to win and succeed in attacking. Dont forget that its used as an otk method too. Although its telling AKB : hey! im helping u, come n kill me, pls dont forget that its another mind trick. Let AKB do something and waste his cards, and next turn go in and play around it for the kill.
Dont forget Cold Wave doesnt do anything to continuous effects like Dimension Fissure and meaning the Skill drain Sobbat played is still active. Trade in is fuel for the deck as it discards useless barbaros and camelias for more cards from the deck, needless to say it fuels pot too. Scapegoat is another awesome tech as most decks otk alot. And besides that it is a synchro fuel too. Rose+ goat= DDB or Black Rose dragon
Lightning vortex and e-con is one of those cards that totally susprise ur opponent. Wont AKB and BWs feel bummed when they set up a winning field, stopped by a Roar, and thenkilled by e-con or vortex. Vortex lets u discard a card again- another friend the pot.
What makes me wonder is why there is no solemn judgment in here, and then it struck me. DDBis running too rampant and although this deck finds it very very easy to stand by and survive, if they pay life points for solemn, DDb will just kill through. Black wings whole field swarm n one DDB doesnt even have to attack and although all the tokens, threatenings are good, it doesnt help if u have a whole chunk of ur own life points taken off yourself. Solemn was made for anti meta decks and this deck just doesnt utilise it well enough. The monsters are soon taken care of by the spells, the syncrhos and certainly with skill drain out, what are they to fear of monsters? With raigeki break n C.E.Device u just arent scared of anything. As for the spells and traps, besides trunade, MST n heavy, nothing else worrys sobbat. I mean, Tytannial princess negates any spells and traps for a plant (u got dandy, lonefire, tokens, and lots more crap) and the only thing the deck fears is spell/trap removal. With MST, heavy storm , trunade, the possibility of seeing it is one or if lucky two per game and if tytannial is out u control the game. delta crow doesnt affect skill drain because its face up and the face down spells and traps are mostly chainable.
Now, C.E. Device is played over Dimension Prison for a few reasons. although (quoted by HR) D prison is an anti meta staple, i see that C.E Device has an advantage over d.prison. D. prison requires it theopponent's monster to attack: and that is one monent. C.E device can do it at anytime regardless of step/phase. Do u want a syncrho like DDB, Arcanite magician, Dark End dragon or Brionac to wreck havoc and then ur left with a prison to attack? DDb might have finished u off there already and with Arcanite and Brionac, D prison is gone before u can play it ini the battle phase. C.E.device lets u take it out while their effect is being used (just chain it). And, it can still do the normal things like taking out monsters/ tuners before their effects resolve or just return things that u dont want on the field. As for threatening roar, its just good, it prevents OTK so there will be a next turn. And thats a pretty good deal for me. Its also chainable and stops ur opponent right there.
Sobbat has created a machine of destruction- but it requires pure skill to utilise the deck to know its ins and outs, what not to do, what to do, and to use it to its max potential. This is the deck that took Japan's Nationals. Good day all.
till next time, play fair n enjoy the game =)
Side note: which makes me wonder, what happened to GB forest in the tourney =P
