Christmas is around the corner. So what does konami have for you?

Hello my fellow QQers, Xmas is coming faster than we thought and Santa Konami has presents for the folks in germany anyway. An ADVENT CALENDER!

Thursday, 13. October 2011

Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game Advent calendar

Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game Adventskalender


Release: Mid October 2011 (only available in Germany and Austria)

Contains:

• 1 Extreme Victory Booster Pack
• 6 Super Rare
• 7 Ultra Rare
• 1 Secret Rare

Which is pretty amazing. The EXVC is a great gift as it wasn't printed for as long over in europe as it was in britain due to ecnomic reasons. So this is konami's way of saying thanks for putting up with us I guess.

But still the rest of us europeans are asking... WHERES OUT XMAS PRESENTS! THEY GET A CALENDER WHY DONT WE!?!

Well we in britain got a YCS so we can't complain... and france and spain are next door. Italy i dunno maybe they've been forgotten. But i personally am happy germany get an extra print of EXVC because of the issues that occured. So kudos konami.

Ill see you on the dueling field

Cyn

YCS UPDATE and Weekend events at Locals. YCS BRIGHTON

Greetings ladies and gentlemen, as you know this weekend has been an important one for many many duelists as its YCS columbus.

As you know, before the actual YCS the structure deck "Gates of dark World" was released, and many people we're scared of this deck dominating the scene because of its sheer consistency and speed by using the field spell to dicard snoww/grapha to gain advantage... However people have been smart, smarter than usual anyway, and have found many good counters for the deck. So lets see what decks have teched in to stop the dominating army of grapha and his darkworlds... [source: http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=7326]

1.) Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror

Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror is one of the most popular choices for defeating Dark World Duelists. Dark World Decks rely on the effects of their monsters to carry them through Duels. But since all Dark World monsters are DARK, all of their effects are negated by Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror.

Monsters like Broww, Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World, and Snoww are helpless to use their effects while Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror is face-up on the field. Even Grapha, Dragon Lord of Dark World won’t be able to destroy any cards with its effect while Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror is up.

But as great as Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror is against Dark World Decks, it’s not an automatic win against them. Grapha has come up with ways to fight around it. Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror only negates the effects of monsters that activate. Grapha’s power to revive himself from the Graveyard by recalling a Dark World monster to the Duelist’s hand doesn’t activate. So even while Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror is face-up, Grapha can continuously Special Summon itself from the Graveyard and take control of a Duel.

2.) Debunk

Some Duelists sought a permanent answer to Grapha, instead of just a way to negate its destruction effect. That’s why they resorted to using Debunk.

Debunk has the power to negate any monster effect that activates in the hand or the Graveyard, and then banish that monster. Again, since all of the Dark World monsters have effects that activate in the Graveyard, all of their effects can be negated by Debunk. It’s just like Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror in that respect.

But unlike Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror, since Debunk banishes the monster whose effect it negates, it has the ability to get rid of Grapha for good. When an opponent discards Grapha and tries to destroy a card on the field with its effect, Debunk will negate Grapha’s effect and banish Grapha so that it can never return to the field.

Unfortunately for the valiant heroes fighting against the darkness, Debunk also has the same weakness as Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror. Since it negates monster effects that activate, it won’t work against Grapha when he Special Summons himself from the Graveyard. That Special Summon is an inherent Summon, which Debunk, like Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror, is powerless to stop. Debunk is also a sitting duck for Dark World Lightning, unlike the Mirror which can be Chained to it.

3.) D.D. Crow

Some Duelists are using D.D. Crow to try to stop Grapha’s army. D.D. Crow can banish any card from an opponent’s Graveyard, so Duelists fighting against the darkness are using it to stop Dark World monsters before they can reach the field.

Even though Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World and Sillva, Warlord of Dark World Special Summon themselves from the Graveyard when they’re discarded, their effects use the Chain. By Chaining D.D. Crow to one of their effects, a Duelist can banish the Dark World lords and prevent them from ever reaching the field.

A Duelist can also use D.D. Crow to banish Grapha, Dragon Lord of Dark World from the Duel! But unlike Goldd and Sillva, Grapha’s effect doesn’t use the Chain, so D.D. Crow needs to be used to stop it before Grapha tries to Special Summon itself from the Graveyard. 

4.) Gemini Imps

Some Duelists have chosen to use Gemini Imps against Dark World Decks. By discardingGemini Imps from the hand, a Duelist can stop any card effect that would force him to discard a card. Plus, the Duelist who uses Gemini Imps gets to draw a card. Unlike the previous 3 tech cards, Gemini Imps can completely stop Dragged Down into the Grave, Morphing Jar, and Card Destruction. Many Duelists consider these to be Dark Worlds’ strongest cards, so by stopping them, they think they can triumph over the Dark World beings.

So basically as a result of this crafty tech, Dark worlds arnt even in the TOP 32. Which makes me weep with happyness. Well dont lads, keeping the synchro monster deck dominating for another format. However in march I can see a limitation of Junk synchron... maybe even a ban of dandylion... but we will wait and see!!!

ONTO LOCAL NEWS!!!

This weekend at my locals I decided to run a different deck, considering that Krystia is a super I found her easy to obtain and played Angel Stun/ Also known as counter fairy for you old skool duelists like myself. The deck did well defeating Synchro monsters and DARK WORLDS! As the trap card Divine Punishemnt can negate their effects when the try to activate in the grave, creating a huge advantage for me. 

My featured duel (which is on my youtube channel youtube.com/channel/thecynicalduelist) was infernity's ran by my team mate L (Dane Pearse) against synchro monsters. What was brilliant was the domination he had all weekend due to the sheer speed of his deck... Next time I play him I have shadow imprisoning mirror ready for him muahaha.

Anyway, my best duel of the day  was against flamvell sworn played by Benjamin Frost... incredibly close last game where Krystia Royally saved my ass from a rekindling as did my dark bribes. The deck thought still needs work, snowman eater, fissures and Thunder kings are my main wants for the deck so if you have any guys let me know ^^. 

The duelist league is looking close woth 2 weeks to go, with first place tied between benjamin frost and James (i forget his surname) but he plays a mean swap burn deck... beat me 2-0 as I didnt see it comming, one hillarious moment was when I dark bribed his creature swap... only for him to draw another costing me the game... sad times.

NOW ONTO THE BEST NEWS! 

The next euro YCS has been announced as YCS brighton the party capital of Britain (ignoring newcastle cuz those geordies are retarded on taht show... and possibly not human... :/) So I will be heading down there with my deck of choice, WIND-UP STUN. Due to there being a ton of new wind-up stuff comming out from photon shockwave Im torn between playing Rabbit stun/ Wind-up stun... or maybe even just go with synchro monsters. Depends what I can aqquire in that time. May play scraps but they are so easily countered these days it will take some work...

Hopefully I will see you guys there :D

See you on the duelling field folks. PEACE

YCS COLUMBUS

This weekend is the emergence of YCS columbus, the biggest YCS of the year... Also the first where we will see XYZ's at their first fullest usage since release and the new darkworld cards.

Many of the big decks that we will see will be Agents, tech genus, twilight in many forms, hero's, gadgets and of course as mentioned Dark worlds and lets not for get plants doppel variants and quickdraw variants.

All these people will battle it out for a fantastic prise of a world championship qualification and a crimson mefist. A beautiful synchro card that should be seen more on dueling network in my opinion.

I will provide a full overview of my thoughts and opinions on the decks seen and how the YCS turns out in a full report on monday.

Till then duelists ^^

Cyn

EXCEED RABBIT!

Recently I've been looking at the new cards from photon shockwave and have seen some interesting cards. Back in the 09 era I was a dedicated synchro Cat player, loved the deck, loved everything about it then it got banned. T-T

THEN! I saw this...


Enlarge this image 
 and my heart missed a beat. So I looked up every normal level 4 or lower TUNER and normal monster and got to this idea... Genex controller will be awesome with this card. along with the Rank 3 exceed Empty Space Sea Serpent Levaiel and my mind exploded.

we have a new version of synchro cat. EXCEED RABBIT! Now, I don't know how broken this deck can be or what potential it has, however... it can exceed AND synchro A LOT! and from my proxy testing I can tell you the meta better be ready for this bad boy, so here we go.

Firstly to get the synchro engine going, I decided to adopt the "UNDINE ENGINE" into it, as this makes getting genex controller to hand easy but also makes it less dependent on Rabbit SO!

2x Genex Undine
1x Fishborg Blaster
2x Treeborn Frog
3x Genex controller.

Then I decided to look at other normal monsters which can be easily used in decks today that are flexible and also a viable tuner that can be used with rabbit that were around level 4 there weren't any... so i thought, hey what what dark monsters can be searched that would be interesting in this deck to help the flow? So I decided on 2 hunter dragon because its a good beatstick and is dark so it fits with the deck, then the water monsters chosen we're of course water based to fit the theme... so mad lobster was also added, this allows for better synergy with fishborg as its a level 3 water monster so abuse is made better. and again is a brilliant level 3 beater.

3x Hunter dragon.
3x Mad lobster

Now you're thinking, "BUT HOW DOES THIS ALL WORK!?! there's no search..." Well i have that covered too, TOUR GUIDE! This card is amazing in this deck... it allows for fantastic search for itself for level 3 exceeding, or for sangan to have it be abused for its effect to search for Rabbit. So...

2 tour guide from the underworld
1 sangan

after this I have some room for other cards... so I added in some interesting "techs" of my own...

2x card trooper
1x glow-up bulb
1x dark armed dragon

Then of course 2 rescue rabbit so the list so far with the deck is as follows.

2x Genex Undine
1x Fishborg Blaster
2x Treeborn Frog
3x Genex controller.
3x Hunter dragon.
3x Mad lobster
2x tour guide from the underworld
1x sangan
1x dark armed dragon
2x caius, the shadow monarch

so here we have 24 monsters which all work well together in a deck that is incredibly versatie and also can do lost of things in a single turn. There is a chaos variant of this deck but I found this version to be much more versatile and effective compared to that of other build Idea's I've had.

So what about spells? Well... theres the obvious staples... reborn, dark hole, trunade etc etc... but thats boring...

so I mixed it up a little with some interesting ideas.

#1 CREATURE SWAP! using this card to get controller and steal an opponents monster for a synchro/exceed summon is the nuts! Not only this but it combo's well with Tour guide.

#2 Enemy controller, with treeborn in this deck, you will have nothing to fear using this card to control your opponents monster line up.

#3 Moray of greed: With so many water monsters you DONT want in the hand moray of greed is a good way of putting them into the deck for re-use and also a more consistent play within the deck.

#4 D.D.R. Different Dimensional Rebirth: With this card Rescue rabbit is just as spammable, and with a discard cost, its not much of a loss getting back your rabbit, because he gets you two monsters anyway and at one along with Leviath, its a very powerful card in this deck to kick combo's off!

So the spell line up is as follows:

2 pot of avarice
1 monster reborn
1 dark hole
1 giant trunade
1 D.D.R Different Dimension Re-incarnation
1 moray of greed
1 creature swap
2 enemy controller
1 mind control
1 book of moon

WHICH makes our line up come to 35 cards so far!

This leaves the traps... now trying to be clever here... because you're rabbit removes itself... Limit reverse isnt advised this is also the case because you play treeborn frog as the draw engine within the deck... SO!!! What do we use? Well... its rather simple.

1 mirror force
1 torrential tribute
2 common charity
1 solemn warning

This allows for draw power and the final flow of synergy between the removal in this deck and also the amount of hand and grave control you can have.

Finally we have out extra deck! YAAAAY this is what you've been waiting for isn't it haha. Well it was a long process but its sorted after 3 weeks of proxy testing...

EXCEEDS = 4

2 Empty Space Sea Serpent Levaiel
1 Number 17: Leviath Dragon
1 Number 34: Computer-Beast Tera Byte

Synchro = 11

2 formula synchron
1 T.g. Hyper Librarian
1 Orient dragon
1 brionac, dragon of the Ice barrier
1 Gungnir Dragon of the Ice barrier
1 Black Rose Dragon
1 scrap dragon
1 stardust dragon
1 thought ruler archfiend
1 trishula, dragon of the Ice barrier.

well thats the whole deck, I hope you like it and test it in the future, NOT ONLY THIS but constructive criticism is advised to make this deck flow better, but for now it seems to work very consitantly.

there is debate over using ryko and hamster over the tour guides, but the extra darks makes this deck really good at getting DAD for a guaranteed GG but let me know what you think 

THE CYNICAL DUELIST

Neo-Spacian Grand Mole review

Here we go guys with another review this week 

Now the suggestions this week we're interesting but I decided to go with this guy...



So these days grand mole hasn't been seeing much plat apart from Stun variants... 

But basically this guy is at one for a reason because before damage calculation occurs he can bounce himself and another monster back to the owners hands. so he gets around those nasty synchro's. So thats a good thing about him. 

Another awesome thing about this card is his ability to "LOCK DOWN" your opponents. He can restrict your opponents field by just constantly bouncing them off the field and you attacking them with another monster.

So how do we stop him? HOUSE OF ADHESIVE TAPE OF COURSE! Im serious this card stop mole in his tracks. And so does D- Prison and the other generic ways of killing monsters nowadays... If he does die, use your limit reverse's to get him back, call of the haunted and monster reborn are also good, BUT THEY AINT NO FUN!

If you use a Grand-Mole in your deck he can't be searched out by a lot... infact only 3 cards can truly search him out and stick him on the field, "Sangan", "Sphere of Chaos" and "Giant Rat". But if "Neo Space" is face-up on the field, this card can be searched via "Chrysalis Mole".

So he's a rather limited (geddit?) card when it comes to flexability in a deck, hence the massive use in stun decks which generate 1 for 1s and only really have pot of duality or your draw phase...

But when you get him "Neo-Spacian Grand Mole" can be used in many situations, including delivering the killing blow to your opponent, or just getting rid of a monster on their side of the field. Basically, only card effects can destroy this monster outright, or flip it face down, at which point "Neo-Spacian Grand Mole"'s effect cannot be used, meaning that it can be destroyed by battle easily.

However using him still takes some thought, if say you bounce a dark armed dragon back to your oppoenets hand... he can easily special summon it again, not only this but this applies for any an ALL monsters than can special summon themselves from the hand so be careful when using mole... HIS DRILL MAY PIERCE THE HEAVENS, but if you go too high you fall like a sack of bricks...

well there ya go, sorry it's 2 days late but IRL stiff is annoying hahah. CIAO FOR NOW and see you on the duel field :DD

The Cynical Duelist

Super Rare Duality!?!

Well in my days of playing yugioh I've known of cards being reprinted at different rarity's. We've seen the fall of the great judgment dragon and the fall of the powerful Dark armed dragon reduced to a mere super rare and respectively JD as a Gold rare...

Not only this but other fantastic cards have fallen in rarity over the years, fantastic traps becomming commons, powerful and beautiful secret rares like Athena, Speldid venus, valhalla hall of the fallen and so on... Now with the recent post on the Konami webiste we have seen the greatest NERF in rarity and value of a Yugioh card in a long long time. Pot of Duality, the great $120/£100 card reduced too, a super rare from a collectors tin...

OH THE HUMANITY, konami congratz why couldn't it have been solemn warning or archlord kristya, BUT DUALITY REALLY!?! I gotta say this has become I believe the fastest price drop ever, on ebay at 9am on the morning after the announcement i saw a Pot of Duality for £25!!! BARGAIN! But not really... its depressing.

So why has this happened? Well really it comes down to Konami losing too much money from the card itself, people were purposely purchasing boxes of duelist revolution and getting more money for the card than what the spent on the box! Not only this but retailer's had started selling boxes of Duelist revolution for way over the RRP! Meaning Konami we're losing money, so basically this has been a drastic move to slow this down and also the make the more wanted cards in the game more accessable for new players. Which is good i guess, but konami needs to remember that us as yugioh players want to make money so we can buy their latest products to keep our decks up to date. Duality is out dated now in the "Tengu" era because decks at the top level need to special summon so much the cost of playing it is too high that only anti meta decks have needed to play it now. Also with this release there has been speculations floating around that pot of duality in the September ban-list may be in line for restriction... making people panic, so buy your duality's whilst you can while sellers panic to get rid of them while they're still valuable, you can get a good bargain and when that ban-list comes round and Duality doesn't get hit and you have a page of POD's who's laughing then? Hahaha.

But seriously people are going mad over this but its no different to gold rare Dark Armed Dragon back in the tele-dad era and its no different to when there was a re-release of Judgment dragon or Honest as an ultra promo in a special edition box. So all we have to do now is wait for the reprint of Tour-guide from the underworld and the Gold rare solemn warning and we'll be fine :D

Thanks for reading guys I'll bring more news reviews and daily blues about yugioh in the future!

The Cynical Duelist

Zephyros the Elite Card review

So, its been another week and there were many suggestions this week but the one I saw the most potential of was of course Zephyros the elite.

At first i thought this card was a pile of crap, the cost was weird and he's not even a tuner, so I never looked into him. 

Lately however I've seen him getting a lot of play in Meta decks and in decks at my locals when it hit me, this card is game breaking... Lets have a look at it. I personally wouldn't run it but others like it. But what you gunna do?

So basically what he does is:

"If this card is in the Graveyard, you can return 1 face-up card you control to the hand to Special Summon this card from your Graveyard, and take 400 damage. Each player can only use the effect of "Blackwing - Zephyros the Elite" once per Duel."

So I'm sure that at this point you're thinking the same as me... "Why is he that good. He looks crap to me." Well lets have a look at the cards that can be reused with his effect...

All the mainsprings... Fortune lady lighty, wind, call of the haunted limit reverse, Tour guide from the underworld... the list goes on, this basically allows decks to have more flow if he's in the graveyard... He's also quite searchable, this card can be searched via "Raptor Wing Strike", "Swallow's Nest", "Black Whirlwind", "Soul Rope", "Summoner Monk", "Resonator Engine", and "Witch of the Black Forest". So pretty average search not a lot that can get him.

However if used in a deck that relies on milling like zombies and chaos tengu plant he then comes into his own... In a black wing deck is where he is most effective however because of some sick plays you can make. Summon "Blackwing - Bora the Spear" or "Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind", and return it to your hand to Special Summon "Blackwing - Zephyrus the Elite". Then Special Summon either monster back to the field. If done with "Gale", you'll be able to use its effect twice and Synchro Summon a Level 7 monster like "Blackwing Armor Master" or "Black Rose Dragon" for an easy nuke to gain control.

More things you can do with this deck are bouncing a "Blackwing - Blizzard the Far North" to reuse its effect or the monster it recovers. Bounce "Blackwing - Kalut the Moon Shadow" for its effect. Discard with the effect of "Dark Grepher" and another "Blackwing" monster (to be used with "Blackwing - Vayu the Emblem of Honor") or use this card with "Icarus Attack" as a safety precaution before attempting to swarm the field by other means theres so many uses in blackwing'ss its rediculous! Thank god for the once a duel limit otherwise blackwings may have been tier 0 with this guy.

You can use it in non-Blackwing Decks for Tribute, Synchro, Ritual, or Xyz Material as well. In monarchs you can bounce a monarch back from the field to tribute this guy to use it again!

In absolute zero, bounce stratos or prisma to use their effects again OR bounce absolute zero to abuse him!
In Infernity Decks, retrieve a card like "Infernity Necromancer" to reuse its effect for another level 8 or 9 synchro which is pretty powerful

In Dragunity Decks (this is where I've learned its power by using it in my dragunitys), pay for the effect of "Dragon Ravine" by discarding "Blackwing - Zephyrus the Elite", and return "Dragon Ravine" in your hand to activate the effect of "Zephyrus". Re-activate "Dragon Ravine" to use it again. Also, "Zephyrus" is a Winged-Beast-Type Monster and can be used as Synchro Material Monster for "Dragunity" Synchro Monsters.
You could also return "Dragunity Legionnaire" after he's used his effect to destroy more cards with Dragunity Aklys, or Summon "Dragunity Phalanx" to Synchro Summon "Trishula, Dragon of the Ice Barrier".

In Mist Valley Decks (i use this in my "Bounce!" deck on DN), "Divine Wind of Mist Valley", since you can return a WIND monster back to your hand, Special Summon this card, and use the Field Spell's effect to Special Summon a WIND monster from the Deck, potentially providing you 2 or 3 monsters in a single turn which is just unreal!

Special Summon "Genex Blastfan" with "Divine Wind". Use "Blastfan" to search for "Genex Ally Birdman". Return "Divine Wind" to your hand for this monster. Activate "Divine Wind" again, then bounce "Blastfan" for "Birdman". You can easily Synchro Summon monsters of any Level in this way making genex slowly claw their way into Tier 2 HURRAY! Its about time these guys got play.

You can use his effect to re-equip an Equip Card to a different monster. In a Deck that uses "Supervise" (this is for Psycho turtle specifically), use "Blackwing - Zephyrus the Elite" in the Graveyard to retrieve an equipped "Supervise" and Special Summon "Zephyrus". Then, use "Supervise" for another Gemini monster.

Defensively he's very effective aswell, you can "Mind Control" one of your opponent's powerful monsters and return it to the hand to Special Summon this card which is really REALLY funny many rage quits with this move 

You can also use Zephyros to retrieve useful cards that can be reused like "Dragon Ravine" (like I said before), "Swords of Revealing Light", "Call of the Haunted", "Black Whirlwind", "Royal Oppression", "Morphing Jar", "Supervise" and "Pitch-Black Power Stone.

You can fill your field in 1 turn by having this card and "Blackwing - Bora the Spear" in your Graveyard while "Blackwing - Blizzard the Far North", "Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind", and "Blackwing - Gust the Backblast" are in your hand (such a play allow me to explain). First, make sure you control no cards on your field so you can Special Summon "Gust" using its effect. Then, Normal Summon "Blizzard" and use its effect to Special Summon "Bora" from your Graveyard. Return "Bora" to your hand to Special Summon this card and take 400 damage. After that, Special Summon "Bora" again, then "Gale" from your hand. For an OTK (like my blackwings), use "Blackwing - Sirocco the Dawn", "Blackwing - Zephyrus the Elite" and 3 "Blackwing - Bora the Spear". (Note: use 1 "Gale" if you cannot assemble 3 "Bora" in time.)

Use the effect of "Future Fusion", and target "Elemental HERO Escuridao", and send "Blackwing - Zephyros the Elite", and another "HERO" monster. Use the effect of Zephros to return Future Fusion to your hand, so you can reuse Future Fusion bloody ace play I use in my Chaos Spacian's deck, seriously this card makes game play so much more powerful, he's rediculous I've OTK'd so many times because of him that 400 damage makes all the difference I mean hell in "Lightsworn" Variants, I use this card to return "Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress", and reuse it's effect for Spell/Trap Destruction. Return "Lumina, Lightsworn Summoner", to Special Summon another "Lightsworn". Return "Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter", to mill 6 cards and destroy 2 cards its awesome!

If you have a "Wulf, Lightsworn Beast" on the field, use "Blackwing - Zephros the Elite" to return it to your hand.Use plaguespreader zombie to place him ontop of your deck, Use "Zephyros" To return Wulf to your hand, and use "Glow-Up Bulb" to mill Wulf, and Special Summon both of them. With your field, you can Synchro Summon into a Level 5 and a Level 6, or a Level 9 Synchro Monster stupid plays are stupid.

So in the end... this card isnt crap like I initially posted he's retarded, thats right not broken not OP, he's retarded...

I give him a 4/5 because his cost is a bit iffy because if you cant return it to the hand he can't be summoned. So returning opponents synchro's is out of the question. Plus his effect can only be used once per duel.

Kudos Konami another shitty broken card to add to the ban list.

The Cynical Duelist.