Ninjaz

Card Review: Ninjitsu Art Notebook

TCG Exclusive Ninja support from The Dark Illusion.

I always love new Ninja support, and I was pretty excited to see that the TCG was actually getting there own exclusive for Ninjas. We are already getting a new Dragon Ninja in the set (but it’s not that great) so it’s not completely out of place when they make a Ninja card in the TCG exclusive section to go along with it, but it was certainly not an expected exclusive. What was even more surprising is that it’s actually a pretty good card. Here’s the card:

Ninjitsu Art Notebook

Continuous Spell

Once per turn: You can send 1 “Ninja” monster from your hand to the Graveyard; Set 1 “Ninjitsu Art” Spell/Trap Card directly from your Deck, except “Ninjitsu Art Notebook”

This card is exceedingly simple. It basically does one thing, which is turn Ninjas into Ninjitsu Arts. There’s not a whole lot to actually being doing with this card that isn’t completely apparent. Aside from that though, I mostly just wanted make you aware of a specific engine that can be made with this card. Involving this second card:

Armor Ninjitsu Art of Alchemy

Normal Spell

If you control a face-up “Ninjitsu Art” card: Destroy all face-up “Ninjitsu Art” cards you control, then draw 2 cards.

The combo is clear, if you have a Ninja and Ninjitsu Art Notebook, you can discard the Ninja to set an Armor Ninjitsu Art of Alchemy. Then you can activate the Alchemy to destroy Notebook and draw 2 cards. This play goes even, so no advantage lost or gained, which is alright I suppose. The main power of this is that it’s compact and can be made into an engine that can cycle your deck into more important cards. Here’s the basic engine I had in mind:

  • 3 Ninja Grandmaster Hanzo
  • 1 Twilight Ninja Shingetsu
  • 1 Twilight Ninja Shogun – Getsuga
  • 1 Red Dragon Ninja
  • 3 Ninjitsu Art Notebook
  • 3 Armor Ninjitsu Art of Alchemy
  • 2 Allure of Darkness
  • 1 Reinforcement of the Army

You could also add in some of the Ninjitsu Arts of Transformation to summon monster that potentially fit in the engine you’re combining the Ninjas with. Fore example, I may want to run regular Transformation and a couple Mist Valley Apex Avians if I combined this engine with Metalfoe, or perhaps I would want to run Super-Transformation a Dracoslayer monster from my deck.

Back to the engine though, with the addition of Hanzo you’re more likely to pull off the combo because Hanzo can search for the opposite half of the engine off his Normal Summon effect. Hanzo is also pretty unanimously considered the best Ninja, so it’s pretty much a gimme for the engine and is the first I think of when I need Ninja cards in some capacity, which in this case is for discarding.

I also added in 1 each of some of the other Ninjas I considered to be of some utility. I also made important point to add DARK Ninjas, because this then allows you to run Allure of Darkness, which accentuates to purpose of the engine, which is to thin your deck towards to more important pieces of itself.

Overall, I think the card adds an interesting layer to Ninjas that I hope can develop into a powerful engine in the future.

Written by: Kyle Oliver

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