Nothing too formal this week, a smattering of ideas followed by a short Lightsworn Ruler update.
I know I’m not alone in saying I’m not all too fond if this format, so I’m a little shy on ideas since most of anything I would think of I can shoot down almost immediately unless it turns into some deck that’s seer insanity due to the formats speed. Because of this almost all my ideas that are any good right now usually use Dragon Rulers, since they’re just about the fastest thing we all have to work with at the moment. So sorry to anyone who’s not interested in them, but that’s really all I’ve got at the moment!
I’ve been pretty interested in one particular new idea that the Dragon Rulers have brought to the table, a thing that I’ve desired in the past and disregarded because I didn’t think it was possible. That “thing” is the ability to reliably have monsters banished and even better than that, the ability to have specific monsters banished. I’ve long forgone any ideas relating to that and have basically forgot those many ideas I may have had so because of that I’ve recently been trying to recoup on those ideas with the new realization of the ideas plausibility using Dragon Rulers. With this new ability we’ve been given we’re now allowed to rely on any cards to use Banished monsters. Cards like D.D.R. – Different Dimension Reincarnation are extremely plausible cards and I’ve been looking for more like it.
One of the ones I find most interesting is the card Oh F!sh!. I had really wanted to use the card right after it came out, but quickly found that it wasn’t really going to work because you couldn’t reliably meet its condition, which is having at least 1 Fish, Sea Serpent or Aqua type monster banished. Now it’s a new story; you can feasibly be running Oh! F!sh in decks like Tidal Mermails and recycle copies of Dragoons back into the deck as well have incredibly powerful monster effect negation equivalent to the highly sought after power of Gladiator’s War Chariot, which can be claimed by very few cards.
The other card I looked into was Dimensional Alchemist. I wrote about him last week and his amazing synergy with the new Dragon Rulers. In tandem they allow you to backwards toolbox any monster with an elemental attribute, although I haven’t thought of the optimal monster for this role yet. I’ve thought about using it in my Lightsworn Ruler deck simply for its ability to re-use Judgment Dragons to just about no end. This could technically be put to use with any Dragon type monster out their; potentially we could have a Chaos deck that plays similar to the Dimensional Alchemist looping Chaos build except you banish cards like Lightpulsar Dragon and Darkflare Dragon to summon Dragon Rulers and take back the Lightpulsars and Darkflares using Dimensional Alchemist.
Speaking of which, I had an idea which I mentioned on the most recent Evilswarm Podcast, about a strange Rank 8 XYZ Dragon Ruler deck. Both Dimensional Alchemist and Darkflare Dragon could hold strong spots in the deck. The basic idea of the deck is similar to how the Lightsworn Ruler deck functions in that you’re using Dragon Rulers more as an engine to support Eclipse Wyvern and the monster it searches as priority 1, but the general utility of the Dragon Rulers also adds a highly effective bonus to the deck. The difference in this idea though is that we don’t want Judgment Dragon we want 1 of two monsters: Malefic Stardust Dragon and this kind of dumb card from Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy; Parsec, the Interstellar Dragon. Parsec is a Level 8 LIGHT Dragon monster with 800 ATK and DEF. You can Normal Summon it with no tributes if you control a Level 8 monster.
Here’s the deck idea’s main players:
- Tidal, Dragon Ruler of Waterfalls
- Tempest, Dragon Ruler of Storms
- Stream, Dragon Ruler of Droplets
- Lightning, Dragon Ruler of Drafts
- Eclipse Wyvern
- Malefic Stardust Dragon
- Parsec the Interstellar Dragon
- Dimensional Alchemist
- Darkflare Dragon
- Debris Dragon
- Heraldic Beast Aberconway
- Dragon Ravine
The idea is you use this Dragon Ruler backbone of Tidal and Tempest to search the Stardusts and Parsecs from the deck using Eclipse Wyvern. Also, Tidal and Tempest are the most helpful in terms of moving Eclipse Wyvern and other Dragons because their effects could be considered searching effects as compared to Redox and Blaster who more have a Swarm and Control effect respectively. This ideally allows the easiest and most versatile searching. To make even more advantage is the Dimensional Alchemist, ideally it helps even out hands and recycle copies of Parsec and Malefic Stardust and to be a general thorn in the opponent’s side. Darkflare does some interesting looping and searching using his effect to banish Eclipse Wyverns as well as Dragon Rulers for searching and can be banished and recurred for Dimensional Alchemist. The idea was to keep a constant motion of cards.
As an added bonus I thought Debris Dragon and Aberconway would make nice additions as well. Debris can revive Lightning, the baby WIND dragon, to make Level 7 Synchros to control the game or simply search your Field Spell card using Ancient Fairy Dragon. An awesome addition would be Exploder Dragonwing, a card I’ve probably never summoned. He’s a Level 7 Synchro that requires a Dragon non-tuner, which has never really been a thing until now. He’s also DARK meaning he can be revived with Lightpulsar if you choose to run him. Aberconway is just another way to make up for discarding. It’s a Dragon, so it can be discarded for the baby Dragon Rulers, Tempest and Darkflare. Aberconway is also WIND meaning it can searched when Tempest is banished (similarly so is Debris Dragon) and it banishes copies of itself keeping up with the banishment theme. All very cool.
To round it all out I kind of needed a Field Spell card and Dragon Ravine seemed best. Its effect to send Dragons to the graveyard wasn’t bad and I’m not opposed to running copies of Dragunity Corsesca which could be searched with Ravine or Tempest and be used for Level 8 Synchros which can in turn be used for Rank 8 XYZ.
The main problem is that right now all we really have for Rank 8 XYZ is Heliopolis, Tachyon Dragon and Zombiestein. All 3 of which are very good, but not exactly a toolbox. Luckily though, in the next two sets we’ll be getting some pretty sweet Rank 8 support which will amp up that specific level. Specifically it’s 2 cards from Shadow Specters: No. 46 Ethereal Drago – Draggluong and Felgrand the Divine Dragon Knight. (names pending) Particularly the second of those 2 could be a huge and difficult force for some decks to surmount and worthy of building a deck around. If you want to know what they do, feel free to check the Yu-Gi-Oh! Wikia.
Lightsworn Ruler Update:
Just a quick update of what I’ve done for the deck so far:
- -1 Gragonith, Lightsworn Dragon
- -1 Stream, Dragon Ruler of Droplets
- -1 Wulf, Lightsworn Beast
- -1 Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter
- -1 Breakthrough Skill
Gragonith and Wulf kept causing most of my bad hands, so I decided to forgo running them and my hands have been a lot better since. I only really needed 2 Wulfs in the deck to ensure Foolish Burial and using Tidal’s pitching effect where live. I’m not especially interesting in milling Wulf during the End Phase, but doing so is just a nice bonus.
Stream was taken out to make room for other cards and I haven’t missed it since. Using Blaster to toolbox extra Water Dragon Ruler monsters has proved to be enough of a way to get WATER monsters to the hand to activate Tidal’s pitch effect. With 2 I also draw it enough to use its effect as well and don’t dead draw it late game nearly as much.
Ryko is interesting. He’s great against really specific decks that most people aren’t running. I ended up taking it out for a 3rd Lyla simply because Lyla mills on the turn she’s summoned. The slowness of Ryko really debilitated my first turn if I drew it since I rarely get the time with this format’s speed to utilize it. I’ll keep 3 copies in the side for Evilswarms and Macro decks though.
Breakthrough Skill never really did anything particularly special for me and drawing it was buttz since it doesn’t help you go forward at all. I was looking for space to test another card out and this was an easy card to cut.
- +1 Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress
- +1 Ehren, Lightsworn Monk
- +3 Hand Destruction
Lyla really just gives the deck a butt-load more pushing power and forces the opponent to act early which I really could deny. Also, when taking out Ryko I felt I still want the same amount of control cards. I will have to learn to hold back my desire to summon her into a bunch of back row though in situations where if I don’t mill I might lose.
Ehren was added back in again because the reoccurring problem with my bad hands was I was having trouble getting to milling on turn 1. First, I have a magic ability to draw Ehren turn 1 (online and in real life)so that adds consistency by dumb luck. Second, she’s the only other mill 3 Lightsworn left that I’m not maxing out on (Lyla and Lumina being the others. Third, she’s incredibly expendable so I can kind of just throw her around without caring making her the best monster to plop on field turn 1 when I have no other desire than milling. Fourth, extra Lightsworn names is an extra bonus.
Not gonna lie, Hand Destruction is a total noob card, but at the end of the day it does everything that my deck desired. It gets dead cards from my hand into the graveyard ex. Wulf, Necro Gardna and Eclipse Wyvern. It dumps Tidal and Blaster to the graveyard which practically is like keeping them in your hand. It searches deeper in to the deck and draws a fairly significant amount of cards meaning I can see more of my deck turn 1. It can turn 1 get a Lightsworn into the graveyard without drawing Solar Recharge making Lumina Garoth happen all the more. The card does neg 1, but more often than not that advantage is almost immediately gotten back because of the consistency it adds. It also bluffs traps, which has never come up yet, but its good to know everything you can possibly do with a card.
Hey Kyle!!
It make me happy to again read about cards I have also been thinking about! Helps me know my deck building is heading in the right direction!
In regard to the lvl8 XYZ deck, what do you think about this card?
http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Radius,_the_Half-Moon_Dragon
Also a common in LTGY seems like he was meant to combo with Parsec! And with splashed Dragon Rulers you can always just banish him if you can’t special summon him with his effect!
Also Lightsworn Ruler don’t care about your field!! I love how much this deck just doesn’t care about what your opponent has or is doing! Just mill and mill some more and often times you just say “oh look at that, I won.”
Have a good one!
I’ve seen Radius and I like the idea of Special Summoning a Level 8, but I hate relying on the opponent to do something that doesn’t always happen. Imagine, I play against Prophecy, they don’t XYZ all too much so he’s useless and I don’t like that. Radius also can’t be searched with Eclipse Wyvern, which isn’t nearly as awesome.
Thanks for replying Kyle appreciate it! I agree counting on your opponent to something isn’t the best strategy…but man if they do, the freeness!
For real. The same goes for this card from the next set: Schwarzschild, the Limit Dragon. You can special summon it if the opponent controls a 2000 ATK or more monster and it’s a Level 8 DARK Dragon. I declined its usage for the same reason as Radius.
Do you think Konami is looking to make Lvl8’s the new lvl7 as far as easy access to said lvls XYZ’s? I’ve only been back in the game for a year or so I don’t have a good idea on how Konami has been moving the game along set after set.
could you give us another deck list of your lightsworn rulers. i love the deck and want to see what you still have main deck. Also what would you side with it, i have bad match ups with evilswarm and want to make them better, any tips.
I was thinking of doing another update for next week’s article since I’ve changed a lot since this article and I’ve had a couple weird ideas for the deck. The current deck I have really “thins the fat” as you could say in a style that could be described as Kyle-esque. So in short, yes I can do that.
As far as Evilswarms go, I actually feel like this deck has a very strong match-up against Evilswarm from my testing, especially going into game 2 and 3 with the right side deck cards. Palidynamo plays a huge roll in this deck and less emphasis is put on JD. I’ll go into match-ups next week to help everyone out if you’re all interested.