Meta-Game Analysis

About halfway through every format, the dust always seems to clear and a couple of decks emerge as the ones to beat.  Last format it was Six Samurai and Gravekeepers.   When your opponent opened up with Necrovalley, 4 set cards and a face down Gravekeeper’s Spy the game was more or less over.  This format the deck that is taking shape to be that deck is plant synchro.  The opening of Thunder King or a Tour Guide into a Sangan and passing turn is not exactly easy to get through.  The good news is that there is no real clear second place right now and that couldn’t be better for the game, as it allows a lot of freedom for players to implement some creativity into trying to create good matchups against the rest of the metagame.

Plant Synchro is without a doubt a money deck.  If you have the money to build it you either are working on it, already have, or maybe you have some allegiance to a certain deck like myself, but if you aren’t going to join them you need to be able to beat them.  The best way to beat a deck with the potential of plany synchro is to know it thoroughly.   The build seems to have stabilized now and with some preparation you can know exactly what to expect.

Breaking down this deck you see a couple of things that are very consistent.  There is the 4 card plant engine, the Tour Guide engine, the Tengu engine, and then there’s also the constant threat of Black Luster Soldier.  The deck also runs a good amount of anti-meta type cards focusing on field control and removal such as Thunder King, Caius, Spirit Reaper, Enemy Controller, and the dreaded Maxx C.  The deck successfully neutralizes your pushes and then pushes back harder the next turn.  Dealing with decks like this either take a good matchup based on the deck you are using, or knowing exactly what your opponent is capable of and not letting them go off the way they want to.   

The release of Rescue Rabbit has brought about the creation of the Dino Rabbit decks, and these are poised to take the role of that second place deck.  I wouldn’t put my money on it for a couple of reasons.  They are plenty good enough to be in the top tier, if not perhaps the most potent deck around right now, but a couple of things hold them back.  The first thing is the most obvious one and that’s cost.  The deck is downright expensive; perhaps beyond reason as everyone knows Rabbit will be limited in the near future.  It’s not a sure thing but if the past is any indicator of the future then you have to look at similar cards like Rescue Cat, which was limited before it was banned.  If you don’t know this, then I’ll explain.  Every format you will get a couple of really overpowering cards and then Konami will go about banning/limiting them, as it feels appropriate.  For example Shien’s Smoke Signal, Legendary Six Samurai-Shi-En, Fishborg Blaster, T.G. Hyper Librarian, and Trishula from last format and I could go back but there really isn’t any need to it’s the same story as far back as you look.  The next thing that hampers the deck is the potential to dead draw a lot.  If you open up with two Kabazuls in hand you’re really in a bind, and in big tournaments this is bound to happen and the more consistent decks in the meta will jump on the opportunity when they sense their opponent is sitting on a hand they can’t play.

The other popular decks that are running around and competing at the highest level right now are Hyperion, Dark World, and my personal favorite Karakuri.  

Hyperion is powerful in the fact that it can dump giant monsters on the field at little to no cost with relatively high consistency, while using cards like Gachi Gachi to lengthen the game while they get to the point where they can drop Hyperion and Kristya and swarm you.  Agents pack a pretty consistent engine, and are among the most played and consistent decks being played right now as there are many attractions to this deck.  The first being its price tag, its just not that expensive.  A couple of structure decks and a few cards from newly released tins, and you have one of the most potent decks in the game.  The problems with this deck lie in the problems with every deck with a boss card, you can play around it.  Similar to Judgment Dragon in Lightsworn decks, it’s a dead card before they have 4 Lightsworn monsters in the graveyard.  In the same way Kristya needs 4 light, fairy monsters and Hyperion needs 2.  It’s not just some unbelievably easy task, but a well timed Trishula or saving your negation cards for the right time can amount to very easy and lopsided wins.  Graveyard removal keeps Kristya and Hyperion off the field and they can only stall so much before you break through.  When you examine the build of many of the Hyperion-based decks you can’t help but notice that it’s a deck that runs very few defensive cards.  Just like knowing the ins and outs of any meta deck, this is a huge advantage, because once you clear the field of monsters the likelihood of you having to deal with any kind of substantial defense is relatively low.

Dark World is another potent and relatively inexpensive deck to put together this format.  The deck’s sole purpose is to gain card advantage via monster effects that activate upon being discarded. A very simple premise, and the ease with which you can bring out a card like Grapha makes the deck one to fear this format.  The deck does have an ability to overwhelm and with cards like Dragged Down to the Grave, which is Trap Dustshoot and Mind Crush put together, the deck can put together a lot of very explosive plays.  This being due to the fact that they either know all of or part of your hand and know exactly what they are up against, which is a huge advantage.  It does however rely on a large amount of combination plays and two cards are necessary to make almost every play.  Whether that be with cards like Dark World Dealings or the field spell card, every single play does in fact need a trigger of some sort to allow the discard to happen.  Identifying these triggers and using effective negation when necessary can really allow you to sidestep the major threats this deck puts out.  Using MST on the field spell when they activate the effect pulls a card out of their graveyard while not allowing a discard can set your opponent back for a turn if not longer and allow you the time to make your push.

Karakuri is a whole different animal in this format.  The whole purpose is to dump out the themed synchro’s allowing you to dig into your deck over and over again, and then by manipulating battle positions draw a ton of cards with Bureido.  The deck has a ton of versatility and can go into cards like Naturia Beast and Naturia Barkion to make an offensive impossible, or one can opt to use more traditional level 7 & 8 synchro monsters instead of their themed ones, such as Stardust Dragon to neutralize power cards like Heavy Storm and Dark Hole.  The deck relies on monster effects and a couple of search cards to get started and then the continued use of the synchro monsters to keep the deck’s engine running.  Of all the decks on this list it does tend to look more like decks of past formats in that the main goal is to flood the field with synchro monsters, and thus it runs into many of the same problems.  Cards like Effect Veiler can throw a giant wrench in their gears especially when used on Ninishi.  Being able to recognize a play for one of their Synchro monsters, and rather than negating one of their normal monsters waiting until they play one of their synchro monsters and using your negation then will maximize your card advantage.

At the end of the day the game comes down to getting to your opponent’s life points to 0 before your opponent can get yours there.  Whatever method one takes to get there is acceptable if it does the trick.  The meta decks tend to be the best of getting that goal accomplished, but anyone with enough creativity and knowledge can come up with a better idea.  As far as the rest of the format goes I think plants will continue to stay on top, and all of the decks listed will remain prominent.  One of the underdogs to watch for are Heroes.  My main reason for this opinion is Super Polymerization.  Its just an awesome card all the way around, seeing as how it can’t be negated you can turn your hero monster and their Laggia into your own Fusion monster and their isn’t anything they can do about it.  Also on the horizon is the release of some of the Laval monsters.  All of them won’t come out in Hidden Arsenal 5, but a few will and some competitive builds will be out very soon afterward, and its definitely a deck worth knowing about in the near future.

If you have any questions you want addressed on this blog just email the team at 99misplays@gmail.com and we will be happy to address them for you.  Thanks for reading.


Happy Dueling,
Michael