Nova Grappler Extra Study Material: Beast Deities

Photo by rawritzrichii, not to be reposted elsewhere without the original photographer's express permission.

Mythic tradition and legends are an important part of human culture. Although mechanical in nature, the Nova Grapplers are frequently designed to fuse those mechanical elements with legend to create artificial gods of the ring. While it has received nowhere near the same amount of attention, the Beast Deity subgroup is one of the most cohesive decks in pro play, on par with the interclan Blaster series for how much synergy the individual cards have with one another. Drawing its origins from BT06: Breaker of Limits, the Beast Deity cards have seen repeated revision with the progression of the game, reaching a crescendo with the coming of BT09: Clash of the Knights and Dragons and finding another leg of support in BT10: Triumphant Return of the King of Knights.

The first vanguard introduced for them in BT06 is Beast Deity, White Tiger. To recap our introductory model's treatment of him, Tiger is an important milestone in Nova Grappler play as a base 5000 power FVG that can be moved out from the soul when ridden over, providing an extra card and booster that can form basic 15-18000 lines. The other use of White Tiger, exclusive to the Beast Deity cards, is to counterblast 1 and move him back into the soul when an attack that he boosted hits a vanguard, and then stand a Beast Deity rearguard. This costs you the card advantage that Tiger gained, but it can potentially be offset by the extra defense that this draws out from the opponent, and is further intended to combo with two other cards in the Deity series, Scarlet Bird and Black Tortoise.

Together these three cards make up three fourths of the four gods, mythical rulers of the constellations. Bird and Tortoise, representing Suzaku and Genbu respectively, are base 6000 and 8000 grade 1 and 2 units that when their attack hits the vanguard can look through the top five cards of the deck for a copy of the grade 3 Beast Deity, Azure Dragon. This provides quick, counterblast-free grade security while also grabbing you card advantage and playing into Azure's own skill later on. Since all of the Beast Deities so far share the same hit condition, you can combo this early on when the opponent is not able to defend as easily, using White Tiger to stand a Beast Deity whose attack just hit to try and make use of their skill again. Grabbing that Azure Dragon from the deck can offset the advantage lost by Tiger going into the soul, and like Tsukuyomi you can also gradually form a stack of triggers at the bottom of the deck while using the Nova's cycling trigger Battleraizer to reshuffle the deck if that stack turns out badly. While the Full Moon's stacking capabilities in normal play are capped at fifteen and sixteen cards, the Beast Deities' shared ability to do this when attacks hit instead of at the beginning of the main phase leaves the potential for twenty cards with a likely cap of twenty five to be stacked instead.

Azure Dragon is the Nova Grappler analogue to the fourth god Seiryuu, dragon of the east. His 11000 base is the same strong defense that Asura Kaiser boasted, and over that when his attack hits the vanguard he can activated his persona blast, to stand two rearguards. This is where the previous Deities come in outside of just providing grade security, as a persona blast that can be searched right from grade 1 on is much more playable than it would be otherwise. Being able to guarantee that two rearguards will stand without relying on Death Army units is important, and the presence of all these on-hit skills gives the Beast Deities a very strong early to midgame. If the opponent feels pressured to block the attacks to prevent those skills from going off, then they're usually being forced into a misplay by overthinking the situation, which weakens their defense and opens them up to taking more damage and being unable to protect their rearguard lines later on. The main issue with this is that the Beast Deity deck by itself has no concrete endgame. Once the opponent is at four damage, there's very little that you can do to decide the match on subsequent turns beyond protecting your existing lead.

Entire BT09 and Azure Dragon's crossride; Ultra Beast Deity, Illuminal Dragon. Representing Ouryuu, the golden dragon of the center, Illuminal occupies a very tall throne within the Nova Grapplers as their first crossride, getting a constant +2000 power bonus for having Azure in the soul for a 13000 power defense overall. This forms a 21000 power offensive line with Tough Boy, and while the Nova Grapplers lack the soul manipulation to finalize their crossride if they miss their initial Azure ride, Illuminal's offensive power makes up for this. At limit break 4, when Illuminal attacks he can counterblast 3 to stand two Beast Deities rearguards, with no on-hit attached. This is the endgame that Azure was looking for. Being able to forcibly stand an entire column after driving the opponent to five damage with that same column beforehand is devastating, and the skill can even be repeated by sampling cards from the Nova Grappler's original unflipping engine like Claydoll Mechanic.

Of course, the Beast Deity restriction means that you need stronger rearguards to be able to actually use that limit break with. Clash of the Knights and Dragons brings us Golden Anglet and Yamatano Drake, grade 2 and 3 variations on the same core skill of gaining +3000 power when they stand in the battle phase, over respective 9000 and 10000 power bases. With Illuminal Dragon these cards are guaranteed to hit even opposing crossrides for relevant numbers, and versus other decks by lining the new Deities up with Tough Boy you can ensure that the lines will go for 20-21000 power so that their second attack will always be tougher than their first.

BT09 also brings us Blank Marsh, a functional grade 1 variation on White Tiger with 7000 power. While Yamatano was the Beast Deity incarnation of the eightheaded serpent Yamata no Orochi, and Anglet was a representation of the "dragon horse" Ryuuma, Marsh is analogous to a Hakutaku ("White Marsh"), a legendary beast whose image was used to ward off disease. When an attack that Marsh boosted hits a vanguard, he can counterblast 1 and move to the soul to stand a rearguard. White Tiger and Marsh can both do the same jobs, standing Anglet and bumping him up to 12000 power to ready him for an independent attack or using this with one of the older Deities to perform another Azure search. Damage triggers are generally the biggest hazard to these skills, so it is important to read the situation and be aware of when it isn't the right time to use the Deities' stand skills. Fortunately, the timing of them is such that you don't have to actually choose to activate them or not until after your opponent has completed all of their damage checks.

Scheduled for an October release, BT10: Triumphant Return of the King of Knights introduces a series of Beast Deities derived from the two zodiacs and a new first vanguard in Beast Deity, Riot Horn. Representing Taurus and the Ox, Riot Horn is like White Tiger before him a base 5000 first vanguard that moves out from the soul when ridden over with a unit of the same clan. Horn's autoskill is designed so that when a Beast Deity in the same column as Horn stands, he can also stand, allowing for a full-power attack using Blank Marsh, and multiplying Illuminal's impact on the game by allowing for two columns to attack, one unboosted and one with Horn to assist it.

Sagittarius and the Horse are represented by Hilarity Destroyer, a base 7000 grade 1 that can discard a card to draw one when his attack hits. While Destroyer won't see a heavy amount of play later on in a match, he can be good for the early game if you want to replace Scarlet Bird in your Beast Deity deck, as he forms an anticrossride 18000 line with any of the Grapplers' many 11000 power units, makes for a good grade 1 ride and can help improve your deck's consistency.

At grade 2, Hatred Chaos is affiliated with both Leo and the Tiger. With a 9000 power base, Chaos gets +3000 power when he attacks from the rearguard if there is a Beast Deity vanguard, although unlike with Golden Anglet this power bonus only lasts through the battle that he attacks in. Because of that, Chaos' power increases cannot be stacked. Instead, he and Anglet act as complementary rearguards that can be used in place of one another. Hatred Chaos' imagery is a little looser than past Deities, as while his face and nose are based on a lion, and he has stripes taken from the Tiger zodiac, his appearance is also derived from the thunder god Raijin and the ring of drums that Raijin uses to summon storms.

Finally, Ethics Buster. This Beast Deity is unique, based on the unused thirteenth sign of the Cat from the Chinese zodiac. Like Azure Dragon and Illuminal Dragon, Ethics Buster has an 11000 power base, but he differs from them in that he is a break ride, harbinger of a highly explosive endgame but being limited in what he can do by himself. Ethics gets +2000 power in the vanguard cricle when he is boosted by a Nova Grappler, creating a 20-21000 line. But when you ride a Nova Grappler over him while at limit break, Ethics Buster gives your vanguard +10000 power and an autoskill that stands all of your front row Nova Grapplers when that vanguard attacks. Using Illuminal Dragon with this skill, you can unfailingly stand all of your rearguard columns while having a center line in the range of 21-31000 power, taking around six cards to block all of the attacks without any triggers coming through. This makes both decks that use Azure with Illuminal and Ethics Buster viable, as well as just Illuminal-Ethics decks, and while Ethics Buster is a Beast Deity, his break ride skill is compatible with all Nova Grapplers, effectively updating Illuminal Dragon, Stern Blaukluger and Asura Kaiser all at once.

The Beast Deities are an extremely diverse subgroup with a heavy amount of support, and there is a lot of freedom of choice between how you want to build your deck, whether you choose to go for a four deities or zodiac deities model, or some combination therein. Next time that we revisit the Nova Grapplers I will be discussing the new Death Army series cards from EB04: Infinite Phantom Legion and the ultimate lifeform, Cosmo Lord.

Oracle Think Tank Extra Study Material: Goddess of the Sun, Amaterasu

Photo by rawritzrichii, not to be reposted elsewhere without the original photographer's express permission.

Since BT03, Amaterasu has lacked a concrete deck of her own. The spotlight has fallen on the Full Moon and Witch decks, with CEO as a supporting unit for the former and one that is run less and less commonly with each passing day. While there was never anything objectively wrong with Amaterasu as a boss card, it is nevertheless true that as an independent build she has been undersupported and lacking in a separate identity. BT09: Clash of the Knights and Dragons remedies this by taking Amaterasu to her maximum potential as the supreme face of Oracle Think Tank.

The first vanguard for the Amaterasu deck is not universally agreed upon. Befitting of the definitive deck of Oracle Think Tank's leader, the deck has high synergy with almost every other card in the clan. Little Witch, LuLu from the soulless build can be used and is certainly an efficient choice as one of the only FVGs in the game that can give a +2 the moment her skills are triggered, and as CEO Amaterasu's megablast is even less likely to go off in this build than in her original one, this is a good use of the soul. Lozenge Magus can still be used as the first vanguard if you desire the extra deck space, but BT09 has generally outmoded her by introducing Supple Bamboo Princess, Kaguya. Based on the character of the same name from The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, Kaguya is a base 4000 Forerunner that can be returned to the soul to give an OraThin +3000 power, fulfilling the same basic function as Lozenge while opening the field to call another unit and keeping another card in the soul, turning Kaguya into fuel for a megablast, Luck Bird's soulblast or to promote play with six soul units.

With regards to those, because of CEO Amaterasu being a soulcharge-based unit, she has natural synergy with Tsukuyomi's six soul cards, and so it would also be a wise choice to use Godhawk Ichibyoshi from the Full Moon deck as the FVG. This imports the potential for a card gain each turn, the ability to control the deck through the formation of a trigger stack, and to use Half Moon's soulcharge to get CEO Amaterasu into the soul faster, while also giving Amaterasu access to Tagitsuhime as a 12000 power attacker. On that front, Amaterasu can also use her tsundere brother Battle Deity Susanoo, who has the exact same stats as Tagitsuhime, but his +3000 power comes from having a vanguard with "Amaterasu" in its card name, where Tagitsuhime operates off of just having six soul. A deck that uses Ichibyoshi and the Crescent through Half Moon cards is likely to run at least one copy of the Full Moon for a complete Goddess deck, and because of the ease with which six soul can be set up, Tagitsuhime may be the wiser choice over Susanoo.

Amaterasu's personal supporting grade 1 is Battle Maiden, Sayorihime, a base 7000 unit that gets +3000 when she attacks if the vanguard has "Amaterasu" in its card name. Since there is no grade 1 equivalent to Tagitsuhime, Sayorihime is a good supporting piece for the build, but lacks the midgame presence of Kay and other decks with these types of units. The grade 1 space is more likely to be reserved for Oracle Think Tank's old mainstays like Dark Cat, Weather Girl Milk and Gemini, but you may find room among your tech cards for her.

The upgrade that CEO Amaterasu has been waiting for is the Goddess of the Sun, Amaterasu, the solar counterpart to Tsukuyomi. With her full power unleashed, this incarnation of Amaterasu gets +2000 power for having CEO in the soul, over an 11000 base to create a very consistent crossride defense. Since Oracle Think Tank has a deep access to the deck and sees more cards per game than other clans, and can also modify the cards in the soul using Hare of Inaba and the Moon series soulcharges, this 13000 power is stable enough that it should come out in every game. With Milk's boost this comes out to a 23000 power total, accomplishing the offense of CoCo with a defense surpassing that of Tsukuyomi and Imperial Daughter.

Furthermore, at limit break 4 the Goddess of the Sun can counterblast 2 when her attack hits the vanguard to choose any any Oracle Think Tank in the deck and add it to her hand. This skill has an immediate problem, in that for it to go off you generally need to be at higher damage than the opponent, as they are not likely to no-guard it unless they are at three damage or less and the number of cards under their control have been lowered significantly enough for defending to be impractical, and as a general trend the fighter who hits limit break first is more likely to lose. Even so, the skill is not unplayable. Oracle Think Tank is one of the best clans at playing defense because of its card drawing skills, and with a crossride defense Goddess Amaterasu is even better than past iterations of the clan. As a result, the Sun can afford to accept hitting limit break first in order to get the skill off.

The real question associated with this skill is what to use it for. At the moment that Goddess of the Sun's attack hits the vanguard and you have paid the cost, you can do anything, but that freedom is paralyzing. More cynical cardfighters have pointed out that the skill would most commonly be used to search for a copy of Battle Sister Chocolat to have access to a perfect defense card, but your choice should be adjusted to account for the situation. There are cards in Vanguard that can prevent you from defending with grade 1s; against those decks you would want to search for other units with high shield, typically grade 0s. There are also situations where a perfect defense would be excessive due to already having one or more in hand, and in that scenario searching a card like Battle Sister Vanilla would be better. Since you can search for anything in the deck, you're also free to run more tech cards, giving you direct access to those techs through the Goddess' limit break while not needing to clog up deck space with extra copies of a card that you're realistically only going to use once.

If you choose to use the Godhawk and Tsukuyomi line for its soul support, then probably the perfect card to match this limit break is Goddess of the Full Moon, Tsukuyomi. In this version of Amaterasu, after the initial grade 1-2 Tsukuyomi rides you would go directly to the Goddess, getting CEO into the soul through other means, and then using the limit break within the next few turns to fetch Tsukuyomi directly and ride her after that, reinforcing your hand with her counterblast. Because of how it cuts down on the amount of cards in the deck through repeated draw, superior ride, search and soulcharge skills, the deck's endgame is begun by switching back into the original Amaterasu. As there are typically only ten to thirteen cards left by the time this deck hits its endgame, CEO Amaterasu's future prediction will work within a terrifying margin to bring out the last triggers remaining. This kind of unprecedented control over the deck is only made possible by the synergistic fusion of the Sun and Moon, and it highlights all of Oracle Think Tank's best qualities.

Other than using the limit break to search directly, it can also be used purely to force the opponent into bad decisions. If the opponent's choices are between letting Maiden of Libra hit and letting Goddess Amaterasu hit, they will choose Libra every time, and with your vanguard line at 21-23000, that will be at least a three card difference that you have carved out by drawing one with Libra and taking two away with their defense. The card isn't easy to use, but it does reward smart play.

Goddess Amaterasu is one of the more difficult of the Oracle Think Tank decks to compose because there are multiple good ways to build her with no perfect answer. She complements almost everything, and because of that there are almost too many things that she can become. To strategize for her at high level play requires complete mastery of Oracle Think Tank and a deep understanding of the card pool. Next time that I revisit OraThin, it will be to discuss the Battle Sister deck reinforced by VGE-EB05: Celestial Valkyries, focusing towards more offensive play combined with draw draw power.

News: Kira Kira Cards to Host Free Tournament at AX2013, Clash of the Knights and Dragons Box as Prize

An employee of the card shop Kira Kira Cards, based out of Monterey Park, California, has informed us that the store will be hosting a double elimination Cardfight!! Vanguard TCG tournament at Anime Expo 2013 in Los Angeles. AX2013 will be taking place from July 4th-7th.

The tournament will have no entry fee, will allow for up to 64 cardfighters to participate, and one box of the soon to be released VGE-BT09: Clash of the Knights and Dragons booster set will be given to the fighter that takes first place, with a second box being split among second through eighth place. Playmats may also be given out as additional prizes.

Registration will take place throughout the first day of AX at the shop's booth, #1432 in the exhibition hall, with the actual tournament taking place on the second day at the Table Top Gaming Room. On-site registration may also be done from 10:00-10:30 AM of the second day.

News: VG-BT09 Clash of the Knights & Dragons

Set for a December 8th Japanese release, Cardfight's eighth booster set, Clash of the Knights & Dragons (竜騎激突 Ryuukigekitou lit. "Dragon Cavalry Clash" with the "Cavalry" being the same kanji from EB03) was announced yesterday evening. So far the set is to feature new cards for Murakumo, Aqua Force, Oracle Think Tank, Nova Grappler, Angel Feather, Great Nature, Narukami, Pale Moon and the Gold Paladins that its set image makes clear. Additionally, the possibility of unmentioned clans receiving support has been brought up in the ad itself. There will be 102 cards with 2 reprints from previous sets, 8 RRR, 12 RR, 22 R, 60 C and 12 SP-rarity cards.

The limit breaks of three key units are confirmed to play a role from the pack advertisement (アイチ、櫂、レオンが使う最強ユニットがついに登場！ 限界を超越した三戦士の力がキミの手に！/ "The introduction of Aichi, Kai and Leon's strongest units! Hold the power of three warriors in your hands and rise above the limit!") Set 9 is being touted as an "all-star" pack that will reinforce multiple major characters' decks. As Japanese fans have been quick to note, set 9 seems to be a Circuit-era counterpart to set 5. Given that the set size is still BT06-on, and that this pack's season 1 counterpart was able to include support for ten clans with major support being devoted to five of those, BT09 leaves room for at least one or two more clans with major support for six in all or an equal division of support between all nine of the clans revealed. Gold Paladin, Narukami and Aqua Force are confirmed for major by the poster, while of the clans currently known Murakumo and Great Nature are arguably the ones most in need of updating. Since Nova Grappler and Oracle Think Tank are receiving their next updates in Infinite Phantom Legion and Celestial Valkyries, that leaves two slots open if the former approach is taken. Dark Irregulars is a possible unannounced candidate, as Tetsu will likely need to get screentime late in the season for his final confrontation with Kamui just as Asaka is bound to get the same for Misaki.

Other speculation is that BT09 will feature a crossride for Incandescent Lion, Blond Ezel; given how similar speculation regarding BT08 and EB04 turned out, this may well be the case. The artwork definitely looks like Ezel, and Ito is credited for the illustration at the bottom right. His body armor also has aesthetic similarities to both Majesty Lord Blaster and the manga-exclusive Excalipetoza Blaster/Exculpate the Blaster (uncertain translations with no official name) possibly being a clue to this unit being its storyline equivalent. If the speculation proves correct, then this will be Sendou's first crossride, as Lord Blaster of the previous season did not meet the full criteria. While Great Daiyusha has certainly set a precedent through which 10000-power units can receive a crossride, the 13000 power of a prospective Ezel crossride would most likely be restricted by limit break, putting into question if it would really interact with the game in the same fashion as its season 1 predecessors.

Alternate speculations include that this Ezel be a darker counterpart for Takuto, or a simple alternate artwork reprint of Ezel. However, while alternate artwork cards have been issued in the past, they have only ever been cover cards in the set that their regular artwork debuted in. More interestingly this set's December release (set four days before BT05 was released last year) seems to suggest that the Asia Circuit will conclude in the same time frame as the first season, in March. As of this writing, that leaves around 28 episodes left in the season, for a 50 episode total rather than the 65 of the first season. While this is not concrete confirmation of the episode count, there is definitely a precedent for the inferred information.