buster blader splash 2

Fun Buster Blader deck profile

It wasn’t easy, but after a week of testing different Buster Blader builds, I’ve fallen on one that’s awesome.

Designing to solve issues

Going into this build, I asked myself questions for what I needed to get done. I wanted to solve some of the frustration both Kyle’s build and my archetype test build found with this support.

I set out to solve:

  • How to summon Buster Blader and Buster Blader the Destruction Swordsman
  • How to search for Buster Whelp
  • How to summon Buster Dragon with generic material
  • How to set up Buster Dragon and Buster Blader the Dragon Destroyer on turn 1 consistently
  • What to do when none of that works

So yeah, lots of stuff. The outcome was fun, here’s the deck.

Buster Blader and Pendulum Monsters

Buster Blader and Pendulum Monsters

Monsters (25)
3 Buster Blader
3 Buster Blader the Destruction Swordmaster
2 Dragonpit Magician
2 Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon
1 Oafdragon Magician
1 Performapal Monkeyboard
2 Stargazer Magician
1 Performapal Skullcrobat Joker
1 Timegazer Magician
1 Nobledragon Magician
3 Buster Whelp of the Destruction Swordsmaster
2 Destruction Sword – Dragon Buster Blade
1 Jet Synchron
1 Tuning Magician
1 Performapal Trump Witch

Spells (15)
1 Allure of Darkness
2 Sacred Sword of the Seven Stars
Where Arf Thou?
3 Pendulum Call
2 Terraforming
1 Foolish Burial
2 Destruction Swordmaster Fusion
1 Starlight Junktion
1 Sky Iris

Traps (0)

Extra Deck (15)
1 Rune-Eyes Pendulum Dragon
2 Buster Blader the Dragon Destroyer Swordsman
1 Beelze King of Diabolic Dragons
1 Scrap Dragon
1 Stardust Dragon
2 Buster Dragon
1 Odd-Eyes Meteorburst Dragon
1 Blackrose Dragon
1 Odd-Eyes Rebellion Dragon
1 Odd-Eyes Absolute Dragon
1 Red-Eyes Flare Metal Dragon
1 Number 11: Big Eye
1 Ebon Illusion Magician

Here’s a video

How to summon Buster Blader and Buster Blader, the Destruction Swordsmaster

Buster Blader, the Destruction Swordmaster

Buster Blader, the Destruction Swordmaster

The Destruction Swordmaster needs to be on the field or in the graveyard for it to matter,  so the deck has to have a way to discard it or summon it from the hand.

The Magician pendulum monsters, with Pendulum Call and Sacred Sword of the Seven Stars work to summon the Buster Blader’s if you have them, or get rid of them. 3 and 3 of each swordsman ensures that you can banish or discard them anytime they’re making a hand weak, and at the same time not worry that you’ll never see one again.

How to search for Buster Whelp

Buster Whelp of the Destruction Swordsman

Buster Whelp of the Destruction Swordsman

I didn’t really work this one out. Since I always want to normal summon it, I figured including one for one would conflict with that desire, so it’s not included.

I decided to go with Where Arf Thou? for search power, and Allure of Darkness and Sacred Sword for draw power. I also bet on there being enough deck thinning to increase the chance of drawing Whelp. In my other build and Kyle’s, we were using A Hero Lives to summon Prisma to make it a Buster Blader. I figure taking 2000 LP of damage isn’t that bad of bad deal.

Where Arf Thou? works with Tuning Magician, Jet Synchron, and Dragon Buster.  These level one tuners can all special summon themselves to the field under various conditions.

Thinking about it now, I’m not entirely sure I need Buster Whelp. Well, I can at least entertain the idea of not running it. There might be some way I can work in a Junk Synchron and a Synchro Fusionist to search for the fusion spell. Or I could use King of the Swamp and Polymerization if I want to give up on snatching opponent’s monsters with the Buster fusion spell.

How to summon Buster Dragon with generic material

Buster Dragon

Buster Dragon

This deck has a bunch of level seven monsters. It has a bunch of level one tuners and an open normal summon. Having so many Buster Bladers you can open with one, draw into one, search for one, or get rid of one in the expectation that another one is around the corner.

Buster Dragon is really easy to summon, but also very pointless if you don’t have a Buster Blader. Even then, ending with 2 Pendulum Scales, a Buster Blader, and a Buster Dragon is very unsafe. Logically, the play should end with a Beelze or something. But if Buster Blader and Buster Dragon are on the field for more than a turn, the deck can start to feel like it has an over abundance of fun options.

How to set up Buster Dragon and Buster Blader the Dragon Destroyer Swordsman

Buster Blader, the Dragon Destroyer Swordsman

Buster Blader, the Dragon Destroyer Swordsman

Opening a Buster Whelp or the fusion spell usually means you can set up the combo just because of the insane number of Buster Bladers you can draw into or open with. A lot of plays end with a fusion spell set face-down, a Buster Blader and Buster Dragon.

I thought I could build this deck and then explain how it works, but it gets relatively complex when you open with a hand that requires decision making.

Inconsistencies

Field Spells

I’m running a Sky Iris because it can destroy the Perfomapal pendulum monsters that get stuck in the pendulum zones. It also searches Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon in case it needs to be used as fusion or synchro material.

Synchronized junction is in here for when I have Terraforming and don’t need Sky Iris. There aren’t many times this happens, but this can tribute Nobledragon Magician and summon Jet Synchron. Since the Magician is searchable by Pendulum Call.

Performapal Monsters

I feel like they do more harm than good. Performapal Skullcrobat Joker can’t be used to summon Buster Blader. It also takes up the normal summon. It’s great at fixing hands and setting up some of the deck’s combos, but it’s not a part of any of those combos.

Perfomapal Monkey Board is less useful because everytime I have it, I forget it becomes a 4 scale when it’s paired with a non-Performapal scale. It’s only purpose is to get Joker, and I already think that’s not entirely worth it. But, this is what you get when you build a deck with low pendulum knowledge and with an archetype that’s difficult haha.

Performapal Trump Witch should be Performapal Trump Magician. It would make like so much easier. It’s here as a secondary target for Mokey Board and it helps the fusion combo along in case you can’t get to the fusion spell.

Now I’m done

I can safely say I’ve had my fun with the new Buster Blader support. Fun note, I’d never played with any of the magician pendulum monsters before. My introduction to the pendulum mechanic was through Dinomists. Dinomists are fairly restrictive, but these magicians are quite useful and provide a lot of flexibility. I’m not sure how I feel about that. Perhaps I’ll write an article on it!

If you’ve tested or are running the new BB support, what did you do differently? What have you found amazing/annoying? I’d love to hear about your experiences down in the comments, or you can reach out to me on twitter @mattcarterwa.

Blue Eyes Splash

Blue Eyes Support – Deck Testing

This new stuff is fun. I was very inclined to put together a Blue Eyes deck after having so much fun with the Dark Magician support that released a while ago. The main difference is that this new Blue Eyes support drops 3000 attack monsters everywhere, like an unrelenting tide of dragons trying to drown the opponent. Mix in my own brand of entertainment, and shenanigans ensued.

Ancient White Stone

Ancient White Stone

Ancient White Stone

During the end phase it gets sent to the graveyard (in any way), it special summons a Blue Eyes monster from the deck. I usually like to grab White Spirit Dragon first. I like to have it accessible early on for graveyard recovery cards. Ancient Stone can pull out the Normal Blue Eyes, Blue Eyes Alternative White Dragon , and White Spirit Dragon.

Ancient White Stone’s second effect banishes itself from the graveyard to add a Blue Eyes monster from your graveyard to your hand. This is most important for Blue Eyes Alternative Dragon because of it’s inherent special summon condition of revealing a Blue Eyes. So either you grab Alternative B or Vanilla B, depending on what you need.

White Spirit Dragon

White Spirit Dragon

White Spirit Dragon

Probably the second most fun card of the new support, and the most interesting. White Spirit Dragon is an effect monster that is treated as a normal monster in the graveyard and is always treated as a “Blue Eyes” monster. It can be brought out with normal monster support. This is important because it’s effect banishes a spell or trap card when it’s normal or special summoned. This effect is great for hitting active pendulum monsters.

Sad thing is, this effect is a”When/You Can” effect. So if it is summoned as chain link 2 or higher, it won’t get it’s effect.

It’s secondary effect tributes itself to special summon the vanilla Blue Eyes White Dragon from your hand. While not spectacular, it does help deter the opponent from using effects that target it. This effect also helps to maintain field presence. There’s no real reason why you’d want a real Blue Eyes on the field, since so many of these other cards are treated as Blue Eyes, but this effect adds to the feeling of an unrelenting Blue-Eyes assault.

Blue Eyes Alternative Dragon

Blue Eyes Alternative White Dragon

Blue-Eyes Alternative White Dragon

If this card had been made at any other time, it would have been so good. It’s inherently special summoned by revealing a Blue Eyes White Dragon, and once per turn, you can destroy a monster, but it can’t attack. It’s like a psuedo-Dark Armed Dragon. Because it’s kind of a fast card, it flows into Rank 8s and Synchroing really well. Its speed helps to ignore it not being able to attack.

Blue Eyes Spirit Dragon

Blue Eyes Spirit Dragon

Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon

This level 9 Synchro Monster requires 1 Tuner and 1+ non-tuner Blue Eyes monster. It’s fairly easy to summon and has some pretty decent effects. The first is that neither player can Special Summon 2+ monsters at the same time. So basically, no heavy pendulum summoning. With only 2500 attack, this Spirit Dragon isn’t very threatening, so it’s not going to be attacking over and “locking away” pendulum monsters behind its own effect. It’s going to sit on its 3000 booty and try not to let anything get to you.

It’s second effect can go off during either player’s turn and lets you negate the activation of an effect that activates in the graveyard – pretty ok.

There is some fun business to be done with it’s third effect. During either turn, you can tribute it to special summon 1 Light Dragon-type synchro monster from the Extra Deck in Defense (except itself), but destroy it during the End Phase of that turn.

There are 3 monsters directly summonable by this effect: Azure-Eyes Silver Dragon, Stardust Spark Dragon, who both protect themselves from Spirit Dragon’s destruction effect, and Michael, the Arch-Lightsworn.

One monster, Crystal Wing Synchro Dragon, can be summoned with Michael and Maiden with Eyes of Blue.

It’s pretty good for what it does, except it’s attack is rather low. It seems too geared towards being a floater monster. On

Ignoring the Blue Eyed Keepers

With this new blue-eyes support comes 4 new with Eyes of Blue monster cards: a Priest, a Priestess, a Guard, and a Sage. They all “target an effect monster you control//send it to the graveyard to:” do something involving a Blue Eyes monster.

So they all target Maiden to set of her effect, thereby special summoning 2 Blue Eyes from various locations. But what happens if you can’t target maiden? You have to target another effect monster you control and send it to the graveyard. Rather than deal with that complexity, I just went straight for the blue-eyes monsters themselves. There’s just a wealth of support for them already.

Dragon Draw

Blue Eyes has some of the best draw support in the game, but I didn’t feel like it meshed well with the new support, or my play-style. Now with 2 Dragon-Tuners, Cards of Consonance becomes ever more viable. With so many new Level 8 Blue Eyes monsters, Trade-In seems like a great inclusion.

But what do these draw cards add, more Blue Eyes cards?

Trade-in provides a way to discard all of the heavy blue-eyes monsters and sets them up for graveyard recovery cards like call of the haunted and Silver’s Cry. But Cards of Consonance moves around tuners that you never want in you hand. I’m not convinced that the right direction to go for blue-eyes involves banking on drawing Ancient White Stone and White Stone of Legend to discard them.

Matchups

I didn’t get a lot of duels in to to really understand match ups. I played against Burning Abyss, Kozmos, and Machinas.

The Burning Abyss Match up is ok if Azure-Eyes got onto the field so that it can protect dragon monsters from targeting and destruction effects.

It was not super good against Kozmos. One thing I found interesting was with the fusion, Blue-Eyes Twin Burst Dragon. It’s a fusion of 2 Blue Eyes White Dragons, which can be done the traditional way (Polymerization) or inherently by tributing 2 BEWDs. It can attack twice if it attacks monsters, and it cannot be destroyed by battle. It also banishes monsters that aren’t destroyed by its attack. This 3000 attack double attacker helped wade through the Kozmo fleet of monsters.

My duels against Machinas didn’t provide much useful information, other than solidifying my strategy of focusing on Azure Eyes for protection and ramping-up offensively.

Final Thoughts

There is so much more to Blue-Eyes, I barely scratched the surface. I mean, I haven’t even touched Queen Dragun Djinn, Galaxy-Eyes Dark Matter Dragon, Heretic support, and the Blue Eyed Keepers. Overall, I think the strength of these 3000 attack monsters, the floatiness of Whtie Spirit Dragon, and the synergy dragons have in general, makes the Blue Eyes archetype a fun one. It’s hard to want more with so much support to play with.

Blue Eyes Deck of Testing

Blue-Eyes Testing

Blue-Eyes Testing

Monsters (18)
3 Blue-Eyes White Dragon
3 Blue-Eyes Alternative White Dragon
3 White Spirit Dragon
1 Elemental Hero Prisma
3 Ancient White Stone
2 White Stone of Legend
3 Maiden with Eyes of Blue

Spells (15)
1 One for One
1 Raigeki
1 Reinforcement of the Army
3 Trade-In
2 Dragon Shrine
2 Claw of Hermos
2 Mystical Space Typhoon
3 Silver’s Cry

Traps (7)
1 Mirror Force
1 Compulsory Evacuation Device
1 Birthright
3 Call of the Haunted
1 Solemn Warning

Extra Deck (15)
1 Blue-Eyes Twin Burst Dragon
2 Red-Eyes Black Dragon Sword
1 Time Magic Hammer
2 Azure Eyes Silver Dragon
2 Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon
1 Cloudcastle
1 Crystal Wing Synchro Dragon
1 Michael, the Arch-Lightsworn
1 Number 38: Hope Harbinger Dragon Titanic Galaxy
1 Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand
1 Alsei, the Sylvan High Protector
1 Number 23: Ghost Knight of the Underworld

Duels Video:
Here’s a test drive of the deck against Dinomists, ironically.

Have you tried out any of the Blue Eyes support? What did you do differently, what have you liked about them so far? I’d love to hear from anyone who’s been playing with the new support, especially if you’ve liked the keepers. You can also reach out to me on twitter @mattcarterwa.