Cardfight Pro: Let's Translate Cardfight!! Vanguard: Lock on Victory!! Part 4: Kamui

Kamui first.

Ren: After this I'm going to go see Kai. Would you like to come too, Touya? After last time's fight, it looks like he's also interested in you.
...You don't want to? Maybe he scared you?
...That's not it? Hmm...It's bad to lie.

Ren: Hah, I'm kidding. We'll, let's go then.

Ren: Hey there. Is Kai around?

Kamui: He went off somewhere. Maybe he's napping in the park?
Ren: I see. I was hoping to see him rematch Touya, but that's too bad.
Kamui: Y-you're the guy that beat Kai the other day! Perfect timing. This will be your boom. This time the great Kamui will be your opponent!
Ren: I think you mean, "doom." Touya, will you fight him?
>>Fight
>Don't fight

Kamui's trying to say koko de atta ga hyakunenme "This will be your hundredth year," a saying that basically means you're done for. But instead he said koko de atta ga hyakunengo "This will be your hundredth after."

VS Kamui
Nova Grappler 1

We're first this time.

Our opening hand after the redraw and draw-for-turn sets us up with our grade 1 and 2 ride, but otherwise tells us we're playing a defensive game with no guaranteed grade 3.

What's more, we top 7 into nothing off of Planet Lancer. In this matchup it's fine, as we'll still end up with an advantage lead over Kamui's deck.

While initially it's easy to assume Kamui is playing a Raizer deck, his opening ride and drive check say otherwise. He goes into the 8k vanilla Tough Boy and drive checks the Screamin' and Dancin' Announcer, Shout, which (counting the 4 Sentinels we should expect) means 11~12 of his grade 1s are non-Raizers.

Battleraizer is the reason I'm not so concerned about whiffing Planet Lancer. At the end of the turn that it boosts, Battleraizer returns to the deck, negating the +1 gained through its Forerunner ability. There are legitimate advantages to running it though, as you have significantly more freedom in deckbuilding with a trigger set as your starter. If Shadow Paladin had a Battleraizer or Lozenge Magus clone, I might run it just for the extra grade 1 space.

On our grade 2 turn we topdeck Ashlei and ride into Determinator, using his skill to superior call Little Storm. With a mostly-trigger hand we're hurting for boosters right now, and it's best not to call any frontrow rearguards that his own could attack, as our 10k base will help discourage rushing in this matchup and we don't want to start losing advantage yet.

Kamui's damage check betrays what he's doing--this is an Asura Kaiser deck, modeled on Kamui's original first season build. We block his rearguard attack and take the vanguard, putting us at 2-to-1. The neutral game is now very slightly tilted in Kamui's favor.

Our drive checks give us Planetal and Claudine, putting us into position for our big turn.

Kamui damage checks the first trigger of the game, but it's a stand--he's now at 3 damage to 1 and +0 card advantage to +0, reversing the overall lead. This is essentially a back-and-forth tug that's going to go back to him in a turn, and until it's interrupted by a big play (or triggers) it will continue as such.

Kamui: The great Kamui rides...Asura Kaiser!

Asura Kaiser is a card built around early game design. It made a lot of sense in 2011, where it shared the format with Dragon Monk Goku and Crimson Butterfly Bridgette. In a format without cross ride, break ride, legion, or stride, there really was nothing to do with grade 3s you had in hand but discard them for Gojo or Iseult clones. These types of boss cards introduced effectively 7 more triggers to your deck, giving a passive benefit to make up for the poor drive check those grade 3s represented, but even in limit break format those benefits were becoming questionable. Running a card of this type effectively surrenders control of the deck to chance, setting up effects that you don't know are actually going to go off, and which may never happen. Dimension Police tried to make this into a kill mechanic you could set up reliably, but the real benefit of that was that the opponent had to guard as though your effects were always going to happen, effectively duping them into destroying themselves.

Asura gives us our limit break, and we damage into a draw trigger.

Break ride into Planetal, and superior call Storm for a booster. We can't set up another 21k column this turn with our current hand, but we can push Kamui to or near defeat.

Kamui gets his heal at the wrong time, taking our unboosted rearguard attack.

Planet is swinging for 34k 2 crit; Kamui guards with a 10k and two 5s, bringing him up to 41 for a two-pass.

Check 1 is a critical trigger. With Kamui at 4 damage, if this were any other trigger type then I would have every incentive to bank it on Planetal, as the second check only matters at this stage of the game if it is a crit. But since it's a crit, and I already know he's down to guarding with 5ks, I can instead safely put it all on my remaining Claudine, which at worst will take every card in his hand plus his intercept to block--and at best, will finish him if we get a second trigger. If it doesn't finish him off, then he has no hand to attack us with, and we're at a net +3 to his overall -6, an unrecoverable difference of nine cards. We have already won the game right here and now.

Check 2 is a Claudine.

As predicted, Kamui only has 5k shields left in hand, forcing him to empty everything on this defense or die. There is no coming back from manually guarding our breakride turn, at least not in Asura.

On his final turn Kamui topdecks a King of Sword. I take the damage to prevent him from healing on his offensive drive checks, then no-pass his vanguard with two 10ks.

Kamui drive checks a Death Metal Droid, causing both Asura Kaiser and Death Army Guy to meet their check timing; Guy stands, and Kaiser stands King of Sword. Unfortunately, his second check is also Death Metal Droid, which is completely redundant in this circumstance and also seals his fate.

Putting down any booster now guarantees that Kamui will take a sixth damage, and if he heals, a seventh. With only a single intercept, he cannot stop even one attack this turn.