Information leaked through Japanese twitter accounts has prematurely revealed that Gotou Kiyomi of Sendai is the new senior class Fighter's Road 2012 champion and the overall national champion for Japan. His King of Knights, Alfred deck has surmounted the dominant crossride and limit break decks of this format, using an overall strategy previously criticized as a relic of BT01. For the second consecutive year, Royal Paladin has come in as the top deck of Japan's national tournament.
Furthermore, the junior national champion used a Sakuya and CoCo-based Oracle Think Tank deck, and is rumored to be Rikino Sakura. How she entered the competition is not currently known, however misreporting is a possibility; until today it was widely believed that only the first-place winners in the Fighter's Road participated in the national championship, as was the case with most 2011 events, but the rules may have been amended since then to include second-place winners as ruled in the current North American competitions. If this were the case, or if the Nagoya regional champion was somehow rendered ineligible for participation, then Rikino has indeed qualified for the championship and may be the junior champion. Additionally, she would be the first person in Cardfight's history to defend a national title in consecutive years. The switch to Oracle Think Tank would be extremely surprising however, given her consistent track record with Kagerou decks.
