Today's Card Analysis: Phantom Blaster Dragon

運命よ、我にさらなる絶望を与えよ！

"O fate, bestow unto me even further despair!"

The Japanese card of the day is an unconventional revival of Shadow Paladin's original boss card, Phantom Blaster Dragon. While the original Phantom languished in disuse for years, this new breakride incarnation of the unit supports multiple different deck types and strategies with divergent bodies of support, giving life to cards both old and new. The Dragon of Hell's second coming is upon us.

AUTO (Limit Break 4): [Soulblast 3] When a <<Shadow Paladin>> rides this unit, you may pay the cost. If paid, choose one of your vanguards, during this turn it gets Power +10000 and "AUTO (Vanguard circle): [Choose three of your rearguards, retire them] When this unit attacks a vanguard, you may pay the cost. If paid, draw two cards, choose three cards from your damage zone and turn them face-up, during that battle, your opponent cannot call grade 1 or greater cards from hand to the guardian circle."
AUTO: [Choose one of your rearguards, retire it] When this unit is placed on the vanguard circle you may pay the cost. If paid, search your deck for up to one card with "Blaster" in its card name, reveal it to your opponent, put it into your hand and shuffle that deck.

Phantom Blaster Dragon can be used with virtually any Shadow Paladin grade 3, but because he searches for Blasters units exclusively he primarily supports the Blaster subclan. It should be noted that the soulblast 3 attached to his breakride is attached to specifically prevent synergy with the clan's mass of soul-based card advantage support, from Black-winged Swordbreaker to Darkheart Trumpeter and Aurageyser Dragon. Running Blaster Dragon means surrendering most if not all of these support cards.

The general properties of Sovereign Star Dragon's Phantom Blaster Dragon are that by blocking grade 1 and greater guardians he answers the primary problem with his past incarnations, being easily blocked by perfect defense cards and special guardians like Rubidium or Guinevere. As a trade-off he has no innate critical skill of his own and instead depends on the grade 3 that you ride to achieve that. The soulblast cost makes it exceedingly difficult to use multiple Phantom Blasters in a game, so unlike with a unit like Daikaiser or Cormack there is no real option to continually threaten an opponent at 3 damage across multiple turns. Instead Phantom Blaster is made as a genuine killing move that will end the game on the turn that he is break ridden.

Considering the Blaster units chronologically, the breakride of Phantom Blaster Dragon conflicts with trying to use his original print from BT04: Eclipse of Illusionary Shadows. Even though their set numbers and skills are different, because the cards have the same name only up to four copies of either unit in combination may be included in a deck, just like with the Dragonic Overlord breakride from Infinite Rebirth. The primary reason one would want to mix the two is to for Eclipse Phantom Blaster Dragon's additional power and critical skill, which can work well in combination with the break ride's perfect defense blocking. However, compared to using Claret Sword Dragon's generation break, the only advantages this holds are that Eclipse Blaster can be searched by Sovereign Blaster, and that the skill can be used twice for a 40000 power critical 3 lane instead of a 31000 power critical 2 lane. With a booster factored in the difference should be that Phantom requires 15000 additional shield to block over Claret Sword Dragon.

The issue of space can be somewhat alleviated with Blaster Javelin, the grade 1 from Shadow Paladin's original series of evolving cards. Javelin's on-call skill allows you to discard a grade 3 Shadow Paladin to search for a unit named Phantom Blaster Dragon, and the breakride is just as eligible for this as the BT04 print. This is the reason Blaster Javelin has jumped up from being worth 20 yen and below to almost 400 yen overnight in Japan. You can run two copies of each Phantom Blaster Dragon, using Javelin to guarantee that you get the breakride in hand, then riding it and retiring Javelin to search for the Eclipse print. The trouble with this is trying to fit Blaster Javelin into the deck, as the breakride benefits from having both Hard Fighting Knight Claudas and Pitch Black Sage Charon in his grade 1 slots.

The card that Phantom Blaster Dragon has really been designed from the ground up to support is his crossride introduced in VG-BT05: Twin Swords Awakening. Searching for any Blaster on-ride assists with getting a copy of Phantom Blaster Overlord in hand, and his on-attack skill turning three damage face-up is meant to be specifically used in combination with Overlord's counterblast 3 persona blast for +10000 power and +1 critical. The timing of both skills is flexible so that they may be resolved in either order like with Dorint and Blaster Dark Revenger, but not inside the resolution of one another. So you can either persona blast with Overlord and then retire three to countercharge the damage to have resources open next turn, or you can use the retire skill first to countercharge the damage necessary for Overlord. The latter is the more likely use of the card; while most crossbreakride decks are characterized by having a central devastating breakride turn followed by several turns with just the crossride's abilities, for Overlord the breakride turn is the final one. Overlord simply doesn't stand on his own.

If you can muster the additional soul for it, Apocalypse Bat can act as a 10000-power booster for Overlord, creating a 41000 power 2 critical center. However, provided that that one soul is Sovereign Phantom Blaster Dragon, functionally the same thing could be accomplished using Claudas as a 9000-power booster while crossridden; a 42000 power center with the same critical. The primary issue with the Overlord build is the sheer number of grade 3s it requires, as the deck has to be up to the task of pulling off a breakride, persona blasting Overlord and striding for several turns to force the opponent to the 4~5 damage range where Overlord can kill.

Pitch Black Sage Charon is an essential card for mitigating the retire costs in Phantom Blaster Dragon decks, as his skill makes him count as two units as long as a grade 3 or greater Blaster vanguard is present. Given that the deck has access to Dark Night Maiden Macha for superior calling, Pitch Black Charon would be at a maximum of three copies, and more likely two. It's easy enough to pull out Charon that he doesn't need to take up too much space on his own.

First vanguard choice is a contentious issue. Bushiroad's Research & Development staff recommended using Fullbau alongside the requisite Blaster Javelin and Blaster Dark units. However, Blaster Javelin is not useful enough on his own to justify dedicating all of the component pieces of the sequence to the deck, and Fullbau ultimately goes off just 46% of the time. Judgebau Revenger is an option since both grade 3 options are Phantom units and he provides another means for searching out Charon, and one that doesn't depend on getting to generation break to pull off Macha.

Creeping Dark Goat would be another good choice for first vanguard, as he helps avoid riding Overlord before the Dragon and goes into the soul before retire skills can usually touch him. Fullbau Brave from the Legend Deck is also an option, since his generation break both returns him to the soul and adds a Blaster unit to hand. By riding Phantom Blaster Dragon and retiring a different rearguard to search for Overlord, then immediately striding with a different grade 3, you can use Brave's counterblast to add the second copy of Overlord needed for the persona blast to hand. This does leave Brave exposed to opposing control decks' skills though, whether that's Gattling Claw, Duskblade or Dragonic Burnout. While that won't interfere with the breakride's soulblast 3 necessarily, it would obstruct multiple breakrides from taking place and interfere with numbers when trying to exploit the crossride offensively with Claudas.

The soulblast cost is the biggest obstacle to using Phantom Blaster Dragon. It directly inhibits synergy with Gust Blaster, who gains power and critical dependent on the number of Blasters in the soul; this prevents Gust from becoming a true win condition capable of sending the opponent from 0 to 6 damage easily. For those that truly want to use Gust there are ways around this, but it's an uphill battle. It requires amassing a filler soul of non-Blaster units, preferably with the draw trigger Howl Owl from the Legend Deck. The Fullbau series is generally considered a prerequisite for Gust because of the lack of grade 1 Blasters; running Blaster Javelin, Dark and Nightmare Painter at their maximum amounts in the deck along with the breakride would all but guarantee the necessary three Blasters in soul to make him a destructive threat, and the only problem remaining is getting two additional filler soul over Fullbau in. This type of strategy also necessitates Charon to reduce the cost of either Phantom or Gust, so that retire 5 can get you the full effects of each.

For Gust that's a 38000 power critical 4 center that must be blocked by 0s and can send the opponent from 2 to 6 in one attack. This last property is the only real reason to want to go through the hoops necessary for Gust, as if the opponent is already at the 4~5 damage range both Overlord and Eclipse Dragon can reach higher center lanes with less complex setup, chiefly thanks to being able to be boosted.

The natural first temptation for Revenger cardfighters--who at this point make up the majority of Shadow Paladin fighters--is to use the breakride with Revenger, Phantom Blaster “Abyss.” Like in the Gust example, both units require a retire 3 cost and that mandates using Charon to reduce the net retire to 5, but there are several factors that dissuade using the breakride with “Abyss.” The soulblast cost preemptively negates “Abyss'” strong early card advantage game, as you lose access to Swordbreaker and Trumpeter, who have been at the forefront of “Abyss'” Judgebau combos. “Abyss” also has to specifically retire Revenger units, so there need to be at least three Revengers in play and Charon must be used as the breakride's sacrifice. Moreover, the effect of "your opponent cannot call grade 1 or greater cards from hand to the guardian circle" only lasts until the end of that battle. To get the skill on the second attack you would have to hit with Judgebau on the first to superior call another Pitch Black Charon and one more unit so that you would be able to pay the breakride cost again after restanding.

However, since the opponent's grade 1 and greater guardians are blocked during that battle and “Abyss” is already attacking for 37000 power with Judgebau's boost, hitting is much easier. The opponent would have to drop ~40000 shield on the first attack for a no-pass and still have a perfect defense and discard target in hand for the second attack. At that point the act of trying to prevent “Abyss” from blocking perfect defense cards on both attacks may require dedicating so many resources that the opponent will be unable to come back from that turn. This still requires losing out on a tremendous portion of “Abyss'” support, and the combo is easily exposed to control tactics because Judgebau cannot be used until the breakride turn. Rather than ever needing to drop that amount of shield, opposing Revenger fighters can easily prevent it by retiring Judgebau with Blaster Dark Revenger “Abyss.” Ultimately using “Abyss” with Phantom Blaster Dragon is so much trouble that it's likely not worth the effort.

The final Blaster unit to consider is the breakride itself. Riding the generation rare over himself can be done as an alternative to Aurageyser to force the opponent to go to a high damage threshold where Overlord can seal the game, as while Aurageyser can attack for 36000 power unboosted and get a net +1 from retiring Charon, he can still be blocked by perfect defense card to avoid going to that threshold in the first place. The soul math for planning out a breakride over the breakride and then with Overlord is the same as for Thing Saver Dragon or The Dark Dictator; you need a minimum of 5 soul to do it because when you do your second breakride the second Phantom Blaster Dragon you rode will become soul as well. Having to ride a grade 3, retire three rearguards and then drawing two cards off of Blaster Dragon works out to a net -2 overall, which can be refunded using Macha and other counterblast units that will capitalize on his unflipping properties. Charon can reduce it to a -1. If you can't get to at least 6 soul with Howl Owl then you ultimately come 1000 power short of making a 41000+ power line with Overlord and Claudas later, which can be just enough for the opponent to guard the final turn. But using Dragon to force them to higher damage also gives you two opportunities to retire a rearguard and search for a copy of Overlord, getting both the breakride and persona blast in hand for later.

Blaster Dark “Diablo” can be break ridden over Blaster Dragon while still benefiting from Charon, but this is not especially advisable. “Diablo” has no real card effects of his own, and if you stride over him you then lose the skills given by the breakride. The main reason to use “Diablo” is to pay the cost of stride, as you can use Charon's skill to reveal a grade 3 and search for “Diablo,” then discard a non-grade 3 unit to resolve Charon and later discard the copy of Blaster Dark for stride. You can also use a Blaster Javelin exploit with this; if you start with Blaster Overlord in hand you can use Charon to search out “Diablo,” then use Javelin to discard “Diablo” and search for Blaster Dragon. When you ride Blaster Dragon you can then retire Javelin to search for a second copy of Overlord, completing the setup for the breakride and persona blast.

As for non-Blaster units, Dragruler Phantom makes a particularly strong case for himself. Dragruler differentiates himself from the other grade 3s in that he genuinely has the highest possible power threshold of any unit that can breakride over Phantom Blaster Dragon. By repeating his limit break until the opponent is at five damage--or until you are simply out of counterblast--it's possible to make Dragruler attack for up to 71000 power unboosted, 81000 power with Eloquence Revenger Glonn or Branbau Revenger. Since Dragruler ensures that the opponent is always one point away from death, attacking with him breakridden for 81000 is functionally the same as attacking with Overlord for 42000 while they are at four to five. The biggest difference is that it's possible to get a sixth damage heal out of Dragruler's attack, while if Overlord connects the opponent will usually be going to seven damage and have to get two consecutive heal triggers to survive. The problem with this setup is that it requires even more resources and setup than “Abyss;” ten Revenger rearguards to retire and three units for Blaster Dragon, and Glonn. Dragruler is much more a theoretical scenario than he is a real strategy at this time.

The final way to consider using Phantom Blaster Dragon is with the Witch subclan. Like with Dragruler this carries the downside that none of these ride targets can be searched by the breakride, but the reason to do it is for either Cultus Witch Rias or for Witch of Quests Securna. Securna's retire skill decreases the opposing vanguard's power by -5000, and Rias' on-legion skill can reduce it by up to -25000 power, which greatly exacerbates the problems with not being able to use grade 1+ guardians. However, this is extremely dependent on getting the opponent to five damage, as the Witch subclan has no additional critical vanguards. Only time will tell if G-BT03 will introduced other grade 3s that work well with Blaster Dragon, but there's a very diverse body of options available at this time.

As has been demonstrated, the major obstacles to Phantom Blaster Dragon's success are the stringent soul conditions and the necessity of keeping and using multiple grade 3s. The introduction of a Steam Breath Dragon clone to the clan in Sovereign Star Dragon may alleviate this, provided that it happens at all. Claret Sword is considered likely to receive this type of stride enabler, and it would help the Blaster deck immensely if it could co-opts the grade +2 skill to stride prior to limit break becoming active. The soulblast makes for less of a disconnect between Phantom Blaster and his original counterpart Soul Saver Dragon, as well as to Phantom Blaster and his form as the guardian dragon Thing Saver. The emptying of the soul into the drop zone also makes an elegant parallel against Majesty Lord Blaster and Religious Soul Saver's soul-squatting gameplay. But it is also the greatest obstacle to Blaster Dragon's success, and needs to be planned around carefully based on what type of deck you want to run with it. Be sure to read the card's lore at Arkadiaworks.

Today's article was made possible by the donations of our patrons at Patreon. Cardfight Pro is funded by public contributions from readers like you.

News: Japanese “Abyss” Prices Double, Raven Haired Ezel Debuts in Manga

Price charts coming out of Japan this morning have demonstrated that the average selling prices of the Shadow Paladin legion leader Phantom Blaster “Abyss” and his mate Blaster Dark Revenger “Abyss” doubled between the months of April and May. Phantom Blaster skyrocketed from a below-1500 yen average to 2500~2700 yen apiece. (Approximate conversion is going from $13 to $21~23 in US money.) For comparison, Thing Saver Dragon is current available in Japan for ~400 yen and Dragonic Overlord “The X” for ~600 yen. The “Abyss” price rise is reflective the results of the fifth Sapporo VGCS, in which “Abyss”-“Diablo” decks both dominated top spaces and accounted for 46% of all decks entered in the tournament, as well as the results of the West Japan and Kansai Spring Cup where Shadow Paladin made up 24% and 41% of the participating entries.

Blaster Dark Revenger “Abyss” has actually turned out as the more expensive of the two, starting at a similar price point and jumping up to 2600~3000 yen apiece. This is arguably based on Blaster Dark's greater utility in the “Diablo” deck, as the actual use of Phantom Blaster “Abyss'” restanding skill is low compared to Blaster Dark's cheap retire skill, which can be used to help force a win condition with “Diablo.” The original Blaster Dark Revenger has not experienced any comparable rise despite seeing similar levels of play, likely due to his widespread availability in VG-TD10: Purgatory Revenger. Both “Abyss” units were printed as triple rare cards in EB11: Requiem at Dusk, increasing their scarcity and making them subject to greater market fluctuations.

Original images donated by inaisekai.

In other news, this month's issue of Monthly Bushiroad magazine has come packaged with the latest chapter of Itou Akira's Cardfight!! Vanguard manga. Featuring a fight between Tatsunagi Kourin and Tokura Misaki, at the climax of the chapter Kourin rode a new unit "Raven Haired Ezel" in a bid to end the game. The new unit was ridden over Incandescent Lion Blond Ezel, potentially making Raven Haired a crossride of the original card. However, its actual skills were not explained before the fight ended.

Unlike in the anime series, for the manga Ezel was originally designed by Itou as one of Kourin's units, and she's used the Ezel deck since her introduction. During the Asia Circuit arc of the anime she gave her Blond Ezel to Aichi as a nod to Itou's original plan. Early on in her introduction to the manga, Kourin had a fight against Misaki in which the Magus cards debuted, and Kourin crossrode Platina Ezel over Blond Ezel; this latest chapter bringing in Raven Haired Ezel parallels their past battle.

The current arc of the manga approximately corresponds to the Link Joker arc of the anime, with Ibuki Kouji replacing Kai Toshiki and "PSY Qualia Zombies" replacing the Яeverse fighter phenomenon. (Itou had suggested the Яeverse concept to the anime staff while Link Joker was in its planning stages.) The previous chapter established Kourin to be working for "Cold Walker," an antagonist that seeks to control destiny and works from within Tatsunagi Takuto.

News: G-EB01: "Roar of the Universe" Announced, Zeal, Enigman, Dimensional Robo and Metalborg Support Incoming

Six hours ago one of Bushiroad of Japan's associated card shops, Card Kingdom, tweeted early promotional materials for the first extra booster of Cardfight!! Vanguard G, G-EB01: Roar of the Universe (宇宙の咆哮 Sora no Houkou, 宇宙 is normally read as Uchuu "Outer space" but here has the pronunciation for "Sky" Sora forced on it.) According to these first blurbs, the extra booster set will be composed entirely of Dimension Police units from the clan's various subclans, including Dimensional Robo, Zeal, Enigman, Metalborg and new units. Roar of the Universe will introduce stride cards specifically for Dimension Police that all of these decks will be able to make use of. The set will be released on March 13 2015, and will use the now-standard extra booster size of 35 cards, with 3 triple rare, 5 double rare, 8 rare, 19 commons per box and 4 special parallel reprints of cards from the set.

With so many clans to support, G-EB01 is setting up to introduce an eclectic mix of strategies both old and new much like Champions of the Cosmos last year. The revitalization of the Zeal deck has been on fans' wishlist since Dimensional Robos took hold over most of the clan's support, while the Enigmen have remained a long-forgotten piece of Dimension Police history that most cardfighters haven't touched since 2012. With limit break enabler support probable, the usable card pool for the D-Police is likely to be expanded out of its current limitations. And given the recent shift in tone of revival legions towards 2012's limit breaks grade 3s, Zeal himself may find a place in the set as the target of a second revival legion for Dimension Police. While the set blurbs make no mention of crossrides, every booster containing the Dimensional Robo subclan has introduced one since BT08: Blue Storm Armada.

News: Sakura VGCS Won with Dragonic Overlord “The X,” Phantom Blaster “Abyss” Tops FC2014 Nagoya

December 7th, Tsuchiura city, Ibaraki prefecture. The second Vanguard Championship to take place since the Japanese release of G-BT01: Generation Stride has come to a close with Dragonic Overlord “The X” in first. The Sakura VGCS champion, alias "GmfWingal" (ごまふがる Gomafugaru, from Gomafu "speckled black") is a former Chaos Breaker and Raging Form cardfighter who had been active since December 2013, had not topped in prior Fighter's Climax or VGCS tournaments. Blackgal was a native to card shop Sakura, and his decklist along with a video of the finals is presented below.

The top 4 at Sakura were “The X” in both first and second place, a Seeker cardfighter in third and a Revenger fighter in fourth. Bushiroad's Fighter's Climax 2014 Nagoya stage was taking place close to the Sakura CS' start date. Tweets shortly after the event indicate that the top 4 at Nagoya was Mordred-“Abyss” in first place, Raging Form-“Abyss” in second, Alfred XIV-Thing Saver in third, and “The X” in fourth.

Sakura's majority was split almost evenly between Royal Paladin and Kagerou cardfighters, with 13 playing Royal Paldain and 12 playing Kagerou. This was also the first time that the relative presence of Shadow Paladin fighters in a VGCS had decreased since the implementation of the most recent restricted list, with only 5 fighters (11%) playing “Abyss.”

Deck breakdown (44 participants in total)
13 Royal Paladin
1 Oracle Think Tank
5 Shadow Paladin
1 Gold Paladin
12 Kagerou
5 Nova Grappler
1 Dimensional Robo
1 Link Joker
1 Megacolony
1 Bermuda △
3 Gear Chronicle

This success of “The X” at Sakura and Nagoya has come in wake of his success at FC2014 Fukuoka, just days after the release of Generation Stride. Kagerou has been a consistent favorite for professional cardfighters throughout the game's history, due to their long-lived support across multiple formats, and just prior to the set's release “The X” was the most expensive triple rare out of the set.

The primary anomaly at Sakura is the lack of visible Nova Grappler, as the fist clan to receive a restanding stride unit, Vict Plasma. Plasma's restanding ~26000 power center lane has some advantages over the contemporary “Abyss” deck, being able to swing for higher initial numbers without the setup from Mordred Phantom and being able to do so with multiple rearguard attacks as well, in exchange for being a twice per game skill.

The tournament finals between GmfWingal and Mossan were recorded and uploaded to YouTube. GmfWingal demonstrated a clear difference in play style, prioritizing aggressive stride turns to change the flow of the game and following up with legion skills later on, while Mossan left his G-units untouched. Much of their early turns were spent mirroring one another, but in game 1 GmfWingal maintained a clear advantage throughout the fight by playing continual damage control and aggressively getting his opponent to higher damage. Mossan played a defensive game of minimizing his losses by continually restanding the Great and attacking GmfWingal's rearguards, using his Protect Orb Dragons to keep damage unflipped. GmfWingal instead used “The X's” on-legion skill to search out a copy of “The X” instead of the End; this gave his opponent an incentive to let the center lane hit and put Mossan further behind at 4 to 2 damage, which would make “The X's” persona blast become live on the next turn.

Midway through the game GmfWingal made a critical play that is in some dispute. He strode Route Flare Dragon and used its skill to turn a copy of it face-up in the generation zone, but because he did not have two face-up G units after doing so, he could not retire a column. Route Flares skills states "This ability cannot be used for the rest of the turn." but because not being able to use the ability for the rest of the turn was believed to follow from having two or more face up generation units, and it did not satisfy the condition of "If the number of face up cards in your G Zone is two or more," the remainder of the skill, including the statement that it could not be used for the rest of the turn was not implemented. A later ruling issued by Bushiroad Inc.'s support staff stated that based on as much of the skill text needing to be fulfilled as possible, "This ability cannot be used for the rest of the turn." should have taken effect. Gmfwingal issued an apology for the mistake over Twitter.

GmfWingal ultimately won game 1 by deck out, reaching the point where Mossan had no critical triggers left in his deck, no-guarding his vanguard while at 4 damage, and then passing his turn so that Mossan would draw his last card and automatically lose. This type of game is only possible with the extended time limit that VGCS tournaments afford; in Bushiroad's system both players would have hit time at the 20 minute mark and mutually lose, producing a tournament with no winner.

In game 2, GmfWingal started at a clearer disadvantage and played more carefully to stride from the outset with Divine Dragon Knight Mahmoud, but forgot to use his on-hit skill to retire Mossan's Calamity Tower Wyvern. Mossan was able to get a stronger early game going, but multiple turns of stride shifted the pace of the fight in GmfWingal's favor; by striding Route Flare on his next turn and using his persona generation skill to retire Dragonic Overlord the Great, then using the copy of Great he discarded for stride for Burnout's skill to retire Calamity Tower, and attack Burning Horn with Burnout afterwards, GmfWingal cleared out his opponent's rearguards and set up a net four card advantage over Mossan.

In both of these games any attacks on the rearguards by “The X” were effectively unblockable because Protect Orb Dragon cannot guard for a rearguard; nevertheless, versus a 29000-power “The X” lane, GmfWingal chose to put down 30000 shield to prevent the End's persona blast from going off, trading card advantage to shut down Mossan's recovery gameplan. Without a definitive way for Mossan to overtake the match, GmfWingal won the finals 2-0.

Original image uploaded by Card Shop Sakura.

GmfWingal's decklist was similar in composition to that used by Bottan at the Nagoya tournament, including nearly identical grade 3 lineups, choice of stride units and grade 2 lineup. The primary difference between them is that GmfWingal favored Burning Horn Dragon over Neoflame in the rearguard, and their aesthetic choices over trigger units.

Sakura Vanguard Championship
First place: GmfWingal/ごまふがる
Grade 0
x1 Red Pulse Dracokid (FV)
x4 Perdition Dancer, Agafia HT
x1 Seal Dragon, Artpique DT
x4 Gattling Claw Dragon DT
x4 Demonic Dragon Mage, Apalala CT
x3 Blu-ray Dracokid CT
Grade 1
x4 Protect Orb Dragon
x4 Dragon Monk, Gojo
x4 Calamity Tower Wyvern
x1 Flame of Strength, Aetniki
Grade 2
x4 Dragonic Burnout
x3 Dragonic Neoflame
x4 Burning Horn Dragon
Grade 3
x4 Dragonic Overlord “The X”
x3 Dragonic Overlord the End
x2 Perdition Emperor Dragon, Dragonic Overlord the Great
Grade 4 (Generation Zone)
x4 Imperial Flame Dragon King, Route Flare Dragon
x1 Divine Dragon Knight, Mahmoud
x2 Miracle Element, Atomos
x1 Heat Element, Magum

Today's Card Analysis: Snowdrop Musketeer Pirkko & Paint Otter

Today's Japanese cards of the day are a pair of limit break enablers from G-BT02: Flying Flowers. Just having these cards on the field allows any limit break 4 skill to activate regardless of your damage. Snowdrop Musketeer Pirkko and Paint Otter give support to Neo Nectar and Great Nature, and like the limit break enablers for Granblue and Gold Paladin, both of these grade 1s synergize with their clan's ability to search from the deck or filter from it to get them into play more reliably.

While on the surface Pirkko may appear to be just the last bastion for Cecilia and Elvira, it should be kept in mind that limit break enablers are not subclan specific, so she can just as easily go to supporting the Venus Trap grade 3 pair. With Link Joker at its weakest point since the Nebula Lord days, Pirkko makes Maiden of Venus Trap “Яeverse” more viable than ever as an early game unit. Even if you lock Pirkko for her cost, since at the moment you performed the skill you met the conditions for limit break, you can fully resolve “Яeverse's” effects.

And since “Яeverse” is not a once per turn effect, this means that if you have two counterblast available, you can quickly swarm the field by locking a different booster to call from the top 5, then locking Pirkko after to call a second one, netting a +2 in card advantage while still attacking with three ~16000 power columns. Pirkko into “Яeverse” becomes a kind of early Judgebau play for the deck; since this all takes place beyond the point where the stride step would happen, how viable this strategy is will be determined somewhat by the quality of Neo Nectar's upcoming stride units. Even if stride is preferable however, when you first ride to grade 3 the opponent may not be at your grade yet, so Pirkko with “Яeverse” can still be good for that turn.

However, trying to use Pirkko in this way is limited by the Maiden subclan's lack of ways to superior call Pirkko. The only means to achieve it prior to 4 damage when the skill matters is with the first vanguard, Maiden of Physalis, who can call a grade 1 from the top 5 early in the fight. The Musketeers have more reliable ways to search for Pirkko, since they can repeatedly search the top 4~5 cards with the skills of Rebecca, Kaivant, Cecilia and Elvira. The latter two ensure that as long as you reach grade 3, you have a means to retire a Musketeer and check the top for Pirkko, so these grade 3s have the potential to activate their own limit breaks inherently.

Of course, the hangup to this is that the Musketeers are both the subclan that can access Pirkko the most easily and the ones that need her the least. With powerful legions like Lycoris Musketeer Vera and Peony Musketeer Martina around, what niche can Cecilia and Elvira fill? Martina's legion skill can superior call two Musketeers once per turn for a +2, which is effectively an improved version of Cecilia's limit break, while Vera gives every Musketeer on the field +3000 power in the turn that she legions for a strong finishing maneuver, creating columns that read like 22000-36000-22000. The situational advantage that Cecilia holds over Martina is that Martina has to rely on the top 4 while Cecilia just searches for two copies of herself, which can be exchanged through the Musketeers' retire-and-call skills for subclan attackers or on-hit unflippers. Cecilia gives more up front, but then requires additional skills to be used on top of hers to get the same maximum possible results as Martina, and doesn't have the same big center lane. Elvira has the stronger argument going for herself. Not only does she have a more modern 11000 power base, but Elvira's counterblast 1 limit break gives her an additional critical whenever a Musketeer is called from the deck. Early Shotgun Blow-like critical gain is not a tool that legion Musketeers have in their repertoire, and can either give you an early lead in damage or force the opponent to drop a perfect defense card much earlier than they want to, especially if her skill is repeated to give her a critical of 3 or higher. The catch to this is that Elvira has no power gain skills, and only the Musketeers' 9000-power booster to pump her up to 20000 while the opponent is at grade 2. Like with the Maidens described above, these ideas may go out the window depending on the quality of Neo Nectar's stride units.

Paint Otter offers more exciting possibilities. Great Nature's only legion thus far is a promo card distributed in this year's legion campaign. With some small exceptions, Great Nature is a clan that was born and built in limit break format, so most of its options have been locked behind the gate of limit break ever since the onset of legion format. Otter is here to set them free, and his first rescuee will invariably Honorary Professor Chatnoir. This break ride has been the backbone of Great Nature ever since her debut in BT13, to the point that most all Great Nature legion decks run her today just in case the opportunity to use her skill presents itself. Chatnoir's break ride skill gives all of the rearguards the ability to power up a rearguard by +4000 power when they attack and then retire that unit at the end of the turn, which can cause multiple columns to push for high numbers in the range of 21000+ power, as if Great Nature had its own Vera.

Since Chatnoir refunds the retired unit by drawing at the end of the turn, this also clears off the field while preserving card advantage in hand, only incurring a -1 overall from putting another grade 3 down for break ride. This was already a great limit break in BT13, Paint Otter just updates it to compete on even footing with legion, and by using cards like Coiling Duckbill to put on-retire draw effects on your rearguards, or Hammsuke as a retire target, you can actively build card advantage from using Chatnoir. The disadvantage to this is that Chatnoir is not live the moment he and Otter hit the field, so you have to position both of them beforehand and wait until next turn, leaving yourself exposed to retire and lock skills.

The second grade 3 Otter fans should be looking into is Leo-pald “Яeverse,” Great Nature's boss card from Catastrophic Outbreak. A refresher; “Яeverse's” skill locks one of the rearguards to give two rearguards +4000 power, retire them at the end of the turn, and then call them back to open rearguard circles. This is not a once-per-turn skill, so you can lock three rearguards to give both frontrow units +12000 power, and since the same principles described for Venus Trap above apply, as long as Paint Otter is the last booster that you lock you will be able to complete the limit break. Further, if you have the opportunity to use Telescope Rabbit or Tank Mouse as your lock targets, then before using “Яeverse's” limit break you can use their own skills to rest them and stack an additional +4000 power on each unit. If this strategy is used with Binoculus Tiger, who can power up the other rearguard by +4000 power when he attacks, then one column will attack for 25000 and the other for 29~31000 power depending on where it is between base 9000 and base 11000 power. This will be old hat to veteran Great Nature fans, but the perspective to put into place here is that “Яeverse” can now be done while at zero damage because he has no counterblast cost, and the enormous power of the rearguard lanes forces so much defense out of the opponent that in the early turns of the fight when resources are low, they are effectively Vortex Dragonewts dealing direct damage. Again, this comes with a weakness; Leo-pald “Яeverse” by himself can only attack for 11000 power, which lends to the idea of having Paint Otter as his booster and not locking it so that he'll attack for 18000, leaving the rearguards at a "mere" +8~12000 each, generally coming out to 21000 power if Tank Mice are available.

The last options for Otter are School Hunter Leo-pald from BT07 and Trainee Sage Minette from Fighter's Collection 2014. Time has not been kind to other Great Nature boss cards, so Polaris and Apt are not likely to see much play. Today the original Leo-pald is the option for limit break Great Nature cardfighters that want to avoid Chatnoir's slow setup, as he makes a good pair to his crossride Leo-pald “Яeverse.” Crossride Great Nature has never enjoyed much popularity, owing to Chatnoir's once-undisputed status as the king of the clan, but Leo-pald himself once held that position and for those looking for a speedier approach he can take up the mantle once more. Leo-pald's on-attack powers up a rearguard by +4000 power and then retires it at the end of the turn, while his counterblast 1 limit break calls it back to the field when it's retired. With Otter around the tricks being pulled off are the same as in the past, using Hammsukes as retire targets and using their own counterblasts to search out copies of them while calling them back to build a +1 off of each retire. Duckbill's draw effect snowballs with Leo-pald's limit break in a similar manner, since the retire target is preserved but you still get an additional card from retiring it. Most importantly, Otter gives the opportunity for Leo-pald to interact with a support card he never had the opportunity to take advantage of before; Wash-up Racoon. Racoon behaves like a higher base power super-Hammsuke that can return grade 1 and greater units other than itself to the deck when it's retired to search for a copy of itself, building a +1 in the same way while also preventing deck out without having to resort to a legion. The downside to this is that Racoon cannot return trigger units as a legion can, by returning nontriggers he reduces the chance of drive checking triggers, and that his skill is unwieldy in conjunction with Otter Leo-pald because early on you are unlikely to have so many normal units in the drop zone.

Paint Otter provides a unique opportunity to take advantage of crossride Leo-pald, as early game you can build card advantage off of the initial limit breaks, then in the midgame force the opponent to take damage after crossriding “Яeverse” and plowing in with 21000 power columns, and at the endgame when the opponent is at 5 damage those columns suddenly become much more dangerous. This unique combination of early active defense and late game offense is only possible in Great Nature because of Paint Otter, as the original Leo-pald's late game nature was so restrictive during the game's third block that it brought nothing to the deck compared to Chatnoir.

Finally, Egg Sage Minette. Since Minette is already a unique combination of Leo-pald and an earlier card, Armed Instructor Bison, much of what he can do with Otter has already been established. With Otter out, his limit break counterblast 2 gives the standard power boost to a rearguard, retires it at the end phase, then draws a card off of it, so like with Leo-pald you can stack card advantage by stacking Duckbill's draw effect to that targeted rearguard and/or targeting Wash-up Racoon. Minette also unflips damage every time a rearguard is retired in the end phase, which lets you keep taking advantage of Otter allowing the limit break to activate at lower damage, since you can be at 3 after using Minette's limit break on the previous turn and still only have one flipped damage rather than two. Minette can effectively replace the base Leo-pald in a “Яeverse” deck if you're uncomfortable with Leo-pald's 10000 power base, but this means missing out on Great Nature's only crossride for a draw rather than a return-to-field skill. Since Minette's target does end up in the drop zone, he does have better synergy with Racoon than the base Leo-pald does.

As with Pirkko, stride hangs over any considerations of Paint Otter like a guillotine waiting to fall. None of the Great Nature cards have on-ride skills that would be able to bring out a benefit before the stride step, so the effectiveness of their stride units will greatly determine how much you will or won't want to take advantage of the old grade 3s. The last word, as typical, belongs to legion: Chatnoir with Otter into Researcher Fox.

News: Galaxy Blaukluger, Raging Form and Nouvelle Vague Place in Seventh Battle City Tournament, Link Joker Takes Third Tachikawa CS

The results from Japan's most recent unofficial team tournament have been published, with team KHP winning the seventh Battle City Sakai VG Trio ChampionShip. KHP's members played a combination of the Blau series, Raging Form and Dragonic Nouvelle Vague decks, following the recent trends of Nova Grappler's rise among the established Kagerou and Shadow Paladin decks. Unlike past Blaukluger decks, KHP forward Gocchan's build emphasized the original Blaukluger as part of a crossride-centric strategy, shifting away from the focus on Mond Blaukluger that contemporary cardfighters have made, and away from the more aggressive break ride format in general. Team midfighter Tokumicchan has card-for-card emulated the deck of reigning national champion Lee Innyeng, importing its Claudas- and Blaster Dark-centric strategies and to some degree finalizing the decklist with his success.

The seventh Battle City Sakai CS was held at 10:00 AM JST on the 16th, and conducted between 64 teams (192 persons) with an entry fee of 3000 yen per team. Each team member was required to use a different clan, but mixing clans within one deck was permitted. The first place team in the tournament received a voucher for an entire case (sixteen boxes) of VG-BT15: Infinite Rebirth, to be released in Japan on the 28th. Second place received a voucher for nine boxes of the set, while third received a voucher for six, and fourth for three boxes. The eighth Battle City CS is currently slated for March 21st.

The Third Tachikawa VGCS also concluded just recently, with Link Joker cardfighter Shiimo taking first place against all odds. Since the rise of Nouvelle Vague and Minerva in the BT14-on format, Link Joker has taken a backseat to competing decks, with usage scaling back with each tournament until it now accounts for just under 6% of the total number of decks played at Tachikawa. This is a strong contrast to the West Tokyo CS of one booster set back, where Link Joker made up one-fourth of all decks played in the tournament. So while Shiimo's Chaos Breaker deck is familiar territory to many, the circumstances are not.

The Third Tachikawa VGCS Deck Breakdown [86 Participants]
 Kagerou 23 (Nouvelle 16, Dominate 7)
Regalia 17
Jewel Knight 8
Revenger 6
Blau 6
Link Joker 5
Eradicators 3
Dimensional Robo 3
Gold Paladin 3 (Ezel 2, Liberator 1)
Beast Deity 2
Silver Thorn 2
Great Nature 2
Magus 1
Celestials 1
Hyakki Vogue 1
Bermuda 1
Aqua Force 1
Musketeers 1 

The Revengers, Link Joker and Eradicators, which not long ago had dominated competitive play at the height of their shared era, have dwindled down to just 6, 5 and 3 decks out of the 86-person tournament. Kagerou and Genesis firmly dominated the third Tachikawa VGCS, building on a string of victories for the two clans. While Genesis is unanimously held together by the Sacred Regalia series led by its restanding grade 3 Artemis and on-soulblast superior call units Chamomile and Melissa, Kagerou is divided between cardfighters playing Dauntless Dominate Dragon “Яeverse” and those using the grade 4 Dragonic Nouvelle Vague. Nouvelle's future was uncertain after the keystone first vanguard that enabled its easy Nouvelle Roman plays, Lizard Soldier Conroe, was restricted last January, but after its success in the Kansai VGCS general confidence in Nouvelle has been restored. Like faruke's Nouvelle deck before them, Shiimo and his fellow top 8 Nouvelle cardfighters were using 4 copies of Calamity Tower Wyvern to make effective use of their soul and counterbalance the loss in consistency from Conroe being hit. Contrast this with Ucchii from the seventh Battle City CS, who played a more conventional deck that ignored the core issue altogether.

In a moment of self-aware humor, the Tachikawa CS homepage listed the Nouvelle Vagues in Tiisupin and Rabbit's decks as grade 3s--not a hard idea to grasp, considering that with the supporting grade 1 Roman in the format, this is how the majority of Japanese cardfighters have treated Nouvelle both before and after Conroe's restriction.

The VGCS tournaments are a series of unofficial tournaments organized by fans and cardshops. Unlike Bushiroad's larger official tournaments, most VGCS events are done using a best of 3, Swiss tournament model. Turnout is typically 70-80 persons, but some events see 100 or more participants, all of whom compete using pseudonyms and internet handles rather than their real names as in official events.

In our final story for tonight, the comprehensive rules for the English edition of the Cardfight!! Vanguard TCG have been amended to officially define Lock and Unlock. The most important definitions provided are that Locked cards are not treated as the same cards as they previously were, they do not have a defined stand or rest position but always Unlock as stand, and that the circle they are on is also modified into a separate type of circle. For more thorough information, see relevant sections 10.1.21 and 10.1.23.

Seventh Battle City Sakai VG Trio CS
Winning Team: KHP
Gocchan/ごっちゃん
Grade 0
x1 Morgenroet (FV)
x4 Regenbogen HT
x3 Sschneeregen DT
x1 Fighting Battleship, Prometheus CT
x4 Schones Wetter CT
x4 Red Lightning CT
Grade 1
x4 Blau Dunkelheit
x4 Tough Boy
x3 Clay-doll Mechanic
x3 Stoic Hani
Grade 2
x4 Blaukluger
x4 Jupiter Blaukluger
x3 Mars Blaukluger
Grade 3
x4 Galaxy Blaukluger
x3 Stern Blaukluger
x1 Mond Blaukluger

Tokumicchan/とくみっちゃん
Grade 0
x2 Frontline Revenger, Claudas (FV)
x4 Healing Revenger HT
x4 Freezing Revenger DT
x4 Grim Revenger CT
x4 Revenger, Air Raid Dragon CT
Grade 1
x4 Barrier Troop Revenger, Dorint
x4 Dark Revenger, Mac Lir
x3 Transient Revenger, Masquerade
x2 Revenger, Dark Bond Trumpeter
Grade 2
x4 Revenger of Nullity, Masquerade
x3 Dark Cloak Revenger, Tartu
x4 Blaster Dark Revenger
Grade 3
x4 Revenger, Raging Form Dragon
x4 Illusionary Revenger, Mordred Phantom

Ucchii/ウッチー
Grade 0
x1 Red Pulse Dracokid (FV)
x4 Dragon Dancer, Barbara HT
x3 Seal Dragon, Artpique DT
x2 Gattling Claw Dragon DT
x3 Seal Dragon, Biera CT
x3 Blue-Ray Dracokid CT
x1 Embodiment of Spear, Tahr CT
Grade 1
x2 Dragon Knight, Ashghal
x2 Dragon Monk, Gojo
x1 Demonic Dragon Mage, Kimnara
x4 Nouvelle Roman Dragon
x1 Calamity Tower Wyvern
x2 Dragon Dancer, Maria
x2 Wyvern Guard, Barri
Grade 2
x3 Nouvelle Critique Dragon
x4 Berserk Dragon
x4 Bellicosity Dragon
Grade 3
x3 Dauntless Drive Dragon
x1 Cruel Dragon
Grade 4
x4 Transcendence Dragon, Dragonic Nouvelle Vague

Third Tachikawa VGCS
First place: Shiimo/しぃも
Grade 0
x1 Star-vader, Dust Tail Unicorn (FV)
x3 Star-vader, Weiss Soldat CT
x4 Star-vader, Meteo Liger CT
x3 Star-vader, Scouting Felis DT
x2 Star-vader, Nebula Captor DT
x4 Star-vader Stellar Garage HT
Grade 1
x4 Prison Gate Star-vader, Palladium
x3 Demonic Claw Star-vader, Lanthanum
x2 Mana Shot Star-vader, Neon
x4 Barrier Star-vader, Promethium
Grade 2
x3 Strike Star-vader, Krypton
x4 Star-vader, Colony Maker
x4 Unrivaled Star-vader, Radon
Grade 3
x4 Star-vader, Infinite Zero Dragon
x4 Star-vader, Chaos Breaker Dragon
x1 Star-vader, Nebula Lord Dragon

Runner-up: Tiisupin/てぃーすぴん
Grade 0
x1 Red Pulse Dracokid (FV)
x3 Seal Dragon, Biera CT
x4 Embodiment of Spear, Tahr CT
x4 Gattling Claw Dragon DT
x1 Seal Dragon, Artpique DT
x4 Seal Dragon, Shirting HT
Grade 1
x1 Dragon Monk, Gojo
x4 Nouvelle Roman Dragon
x4 Seal Dragon, Rinocross
x4 Calamity Tower Wyvern
Grade 2
x2 Hidden Dragon, Striken
x1 Dominate Drive Dragon
x4 Nouvelle Critique Dragon
x3 Berserk Dragon
x1 Demonic Dragon Berserker, Kumbhanda
Grade 3
x1 Cruel Dragon
x4 Dauntless Drive Dragon
Grade 4
x4 Transcendence Dragon, Dragonic Nouvelle Vague

News: FR2013 Kanazawa Results, Dragonic Overlord and Ezel Return to the Fore

Even though the world of North American Cardfight is currently caught up in the crowning of Kaden Kawakami, the world outside is still turning. While Kawakami was receiving his trophy, the next branch of Fighter's Road 2013 was taking place, and Doctor O has the scoop.

In the Juniors' division, Dragonic Overlord The End is picking up steam after its mild success in Kyoto's best 8. First place was taken by a The End cardfighter, although currently it is reported to not use the Dauntless Drive support that has drawn so much professional attention. Second place went to a Gold Paladin cardfighter using an Ezel build, suspected to specifically focus on the Platina Ezel crossride and his ultimate break. The Open division remains consistently dominated by the Eradicators even in their restricted incarnation, with Gauntlet Buster Dragon taking the top spot, and a Gold Paladin Liberator build placing second.  The disparity between the results of Junior class and Open class tournaments through this current season has been noted, as previous tournaments under the Junior and Senior models were relatively uniform when it came to which decks dominated the competition. While on the surface, the Eradicator and Liberator decks appear to be the defining builds of the format, this disparity between divisions may be a sign of a lack of consensus. Neither build has been as prolific as The End or Soul Saver Dragon from 2012 and 2011.

Based on Bushiroad's previous schedule, tournament decklists should go out within the next few days. The remaining five tournaments will take place in Hiroshima, Fukuoka, Tokyo, Sapporo and Nagoya with the Hiroshima tournament being next in line on the 16th. This will be the first time that Fukuoka prefecture has been included in the national tournament, and also the first time that Okayama, Hakata and Osaka will not be participating.

Kagerou Extra Study Material: Seal Dragon, Blockade

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

Within Kagerou, there exist certain dragons that have been sealed away by the Dragon Emperor for their crimes. These criminals, normally housed in the underground Magma Prison, have been granted parole in a controversial mass counterattack against the invasion of Link Joker. BT11: Seal Dragons Unleashed discharges fourteen of their number, and while it will take skilled play for Kagerou cardfighters to properly break their seals, those very imprisoning mechanisms can also be used to enhance the fighting power of a Seal Dragon deck.

The subgroup's first vanguard is Seal Dragon, Terrycloth. Once a revolutionary that rebelled against the empire, Terrycloth in his sealed form has had his body and magic rewound three thousand years. While that seal is in theory indefinite and meant to assist a life sentence, Terrycloth still has access to some of his magical power. His especial counterblast soulcharges himself, then retires an opponent's rearguard; the opponent can then look at up to four cards from the top of their deck and superior call 1. Note that even if the opponent chooses to look at up to zero, they still have to shuffle their deck, so this ruins the deck stacking strategies of Tsukuyomi and Mandalalord.

Also note that Terrycloth is the key to a specific Seal Dragon combo. The majority of Seal Dragons specialize in retiring grade 2 units for cheaper costs than standard Kagerou cards would pay to retire any unit, attempting to pay less and then gamble that the opponent does not get a different grade 2 off the top of their deck. However, Terrycloth can retire any unit, allowing you to force the opponent to replace a grade 0 or 1 in a boosting position with a grade 2, which locks up their field. Furthermore, the Vanishing Field skill of this deck's key card prevents the opponent from intercepting, which completes the lock by forcing them to guarantee you a cheap retire by removing the grade 2 that your skill called.

The point to be wary about with Seal Dragon retire skills is that they will also activate "when this unit is called" autoskills; so you could for example, end up superior calling a Blaster Blade that then retires one of your units, or a Nemain that reinforces the opponent's hand, or even end up helping the opponent to superior ride on your turn by calling a Lop Ear Shooter that they then combo with Pellinore. There's a lot of risk involved with sealed magic, and part of the reason that the magic of these cards is forbidden in the first place is because it operates in a completely different way from every other skill type in the game.

To better feed its consistency, the Seal Dragons have imported LaLa's skill for their own purposes. Seal Dragon, Kersey is a base 7000 grade 1 that when called can drop a card from your hand to draw one if the opponent has a grade 2 vanguard or rearguard. This condition plays back into the mechanics of sealed magic, letting you play the same old Kagerou tricks of concealing the cards in your hand by card changing drive checks and searching for key parts of your strategy without having to leave it in the opponent's hands with Aermo or losing out on a booster through Gojo. Kersey is also important as a damage check, as Seal Dragons are reliant on counterblasts of units with "Seal Dragon" in their name to use their skills.

Offensively the Seal Dragons have grade 1 and grade 2 units that match each other's skills, both getting +3000 power on-attack when you have a Seal Dragon vanguard. Flannel and Jakado operate off of 7000 and 9000-power bases, which assists in making flexible 18000-power lines for assailing crossrides as well as forming a 20000 line between Jakado and Bahr for fighting CoCo and contemporary base 10000 vanguards. Note that while this last point is the traditional application of Masquerade copies, BT10, BT11 and DG01 have all reinstated 11000 bases as the competitive power of the format and base 10000 grade 3s are rare. Because of this and the proliferation of subgroups, early game offense is more of a priority and you will likely need Flannel more than you will Jakado.

Corduroy is the star of this build's grade 2s. An insane dragon, Corduroy was dissatisfied with run-of-the-mill dragon magic and turned to investigating the cursed black arts to feed his unending greed. When called or ridden he can counterblast 1 Seal Dragon to retire one of the opponent's rearguards, and from there the skill operates exactly the same as Terrycloth. This is important because while Terrycloth interacts as turning your advantage from +1 to 0 to either give the opponent a -1 or -0 with weaker field setup, which means that at most you can get no card lead out of it and at worst be put behind two cards--even more if the grade 2 the opponent calls retires one of your units--but Corduroy is always a -1 or -0 to the opponent without giving an inherent loss to your own advantage. Mirror matches with him get silly fast though, because you can end up with scenarios where you Corduroy an opponent's rearguard and they respond by Corduroying your Corduroy and you're Corduroying their Corduroy and it goes in a loop until you're both out of Corduroys and counterblast or someone fails to find a grade 2 in the top 4, because neither one of you wants to miss a chance to put the other behind one card.

The vanguard that ties the deck together is Seal Dragon, Blockade. While he only has a 10000 power base in a clan of 11000-power units, Blockade's Vanishing Field stops the opponent from intercepting during your own turn. Blockade is paired with Seal Dragon Chambray as his custom booster. While not strong individually, Chambray is the servant of Blockade whose research serves to fuel control and the expansion of the Vanishing Field, and when he boosts Blockade he can soulblast 1 to give the Seal Dragon an additional +6000 power over Chambray's 4000 base, in the style of Apocalypse Bat. When coupled with the 3 soul from Terrycloth returning below your vanguard, this allows for several turns of a consistent 20000-power line. Unlike Apocalypse however, the Seal Dragons have no Macha to run Chambray as a tech with, so actually getting that line out is much more difficult.

Blockade himself has two forms. In his sealed form the Vanishing Field can only be momentarily expressed, but BT11 finally opens up the ability to unseal the original Sealed Dragon. In his crossridden form as Hellfire Seal Dragon, Blockade Inferno, his cursed magic runs wild and the Vanishing Field with that. Having a continuous 13000 power base for having the original Seal Dragon in the soul means a 21-23000 power line offensively and a defense that shrugs away anything under 18000 power, but thanks to the developments of the format up to Blockade Inferno's release, this is no longer as useful a bonus as it once was. Within the break ride format, where the same setup that is given to crossrides can guarantee +10000 power to the vanguard on multiple turns and similar gains be applied to the rearguards between most clans, where every clan has access to easy 18000+ lines as a matter of course instead of as a special exception, crossride defense is simply not relevant anymore. Most break rides gain +2000 power on-attack while having an 11000 base to work with, which means 23000 with base 10000 boosters that are becoming increasingly common, their subgroup rearguards are base 9000 units that jump up to 12000 on-attack and can go for 18000 with very nearly any grade 1, and as a whole crossrides no longer have an impact.

That said, Blockade Inferno is one of the few units to actively benefit from this mechanic even in the postcrossride era, because his only other skill is a limit break 4. Since this skill isn't accessible until the middle to the end of the game, being able to use Blockade first to lock down those grade 2s on the opponent's field helps pace him and prevent you from overextending yourself too early. Missing the initial form of a limit break crossrides is a critical problem because you are working with an 11000-power vanilla and are completely at the opponent's mercy to activate that unit's skills. The faster pace of the break ride format helps ease the problems associated with this, but because of these characteristics the card is not timeless. Future formats may see the pace cool down once again while continuing to make crossride defense a broken shield, decreasing Inferno's playability.

Blockade Inferno's limit break is to counterblast 2 Seal Dragons, then retire all of the opponent's grade 2 rearguards and get +10000 power until the end of turn. With Bahr, that's a 31000 power line, but the field control is the more important factor here. The setup that has been established thus far is to use Terrycloth and Corduroy to retire the opponent's grade 1 and grade 0 units, replacing them with grade 2s that help lock down the field, then keep them trapped there with Blockade. After crossriding Blockade Inferno, you then take advantage of this through his especial counterblast to destroy those units that you locked into the opponent's field, giving them up to a -3 in a good game and potential field wipe on the extreme end. As a radical evolution of Berserk Dragon's mechanics, this is easily one of the best control skills in Cardfight as a whole and a prime example of how a limit break can be used to its greatest effect. Certain clans like Tachikaze can counteract this strategy by retiring their units on the preceding turns to pay costs, but because the setup is flexible enough to be conducted either throughout the game or on-the-spot by saving Corduroy and Terrycloth for the moments before your limit break it's very difficult to fight back against a skilled Seal Dragon cardfighter.

While Blockade Inferno is the boss card of the Seal Dragon build, it is not the end-all source of the play style's momentum. The deck is very firmly a combo deck that demands both rapid and smart play, defined by how its rearguards work together with the vanguard. Because the counterblasts that the deck is reliant on are all especial counterblasts, finding the right mix of sealed and nonsealed units takes practice and experimentation. The deck has been relatively slow to be adapted by Japanese pros, but in the month since BT11's Japanese release it has already begun to compete at higher levels than The End is capable of.

Two pros use this build.

News: May 11th Restricted List Brings Back the End, Dragonic Descendant Restricted

Updated May 4th, 2013: Bushiroad has issued a statement through their official blog that the below restrictions were made due to more than 50% of the top decks in the Asia Circuit Memorial Tournament, Fighter's Cup and Fight Royale 2013 having used Dragonic Descendant, while the cards that were unrestricted did not appear in great numbers within the top 16 of the Royale. The Royale operated under special rules in which the Fighter's Rule restricted list did not apply; it can be inferred from these statements that Majesty Lord Blaster and Tsukuyomi did have such a presence justifying their continued restriction. It has been stated that Descendant was added to "prevent the deck builds from heading towards only one direction".

Heads turned this morning as Bushiroad put out its new restricted list, effective May 11th 2013. Stated by Doctor O to "provide a more interesting fight environment," the list will bring sweeping changes to professional play just five months after its predecessor. According to the new list, Eradicator Dragonic Descendant, Majesty Lord Blaster and Goddess of the Full Moon Tsukuyomi have all been restricted to a maximum of two copies per deck in any combination. As with all previous lists, Barcgal cannot be set as the first vanguard. The previous list that took effect four months prior will be annulled by the new one, meaning that Tsukuyomi may now be run at 2 copies instead of just 1, the original Alfred and Wingal Brave may be used freely among other cards on the list, and most alarmingly of all, Dragonic Overlord The End has been completely opened up for free use once again.

The news is shocking to many because The End is generally regarded as the most controversial card in the history of the game, surpassing even Barcgal in notoriety for his enduring versatility as a self-standing vanguard and for still having a deck of his own with the previous restricted list, due to Dauntless Drive Dragon being such an effective support card in his restricted incarnation. Dauntless' break ride skill lets any Kagerou ridden over him stand again by discarding three cards after an attack, if it has not stood already in that turn. While crossriding The End was impractical in Dauntless because of the hard setup of the break ride, it is now once again possible for fighters to have a consistent 13000 power base on their self-standing vanguard. Bushiroad may have decided to free up The End precisely because of the break ride's valuable support, as many fighters now feel compelled to run Dauntless instead of the original Overlord.

Most telling of all is Descendant's presence on the list. This is very clearly a reaction to the results of the Asia Circuit Memorial Tournaments, where Descendant dominated as the new pro deck of choice. Like The End--and in the English format, Spectral Duke Dragon--Descendant's great strength is his self-standing skill, which in this incarnation can only be activated when his attack did not hit, and gives him an extra critical to ensure that if the first attack is guarded, so must the second.

Previously the list had only been modified once per year, with the September 5th restriction (announced August 3rd) of 2011 putting Barcgal behind bars, and the January 1st list (announced December 10, 2012) of 2013 putting an end to The End, as well as the Tsukuyomi and Majesty Lord Blaster decks that had dominated for the entire year up to that point. This is the most rapidfire response Bushiroad has ever made. While some appreciate the swift reaction to the change in format, others consider the sudden change a sign of instability and more cynically, an artificial incentive to compel fighters to buy BT11: Seal Dragons Unleashed, a booster set that was just released in Japan five days ago and contains the aforementioned Dauntless Drive Dragon as well as new Narukami units. Along with the Electric Shaper Dragon break ride from the upcoming Fighter's Collection 2013 extra booster, Sweep Command Dragon from BT11 is predicted to succeed Descendant as the new Narukami deck of choice, this time focusing on completely wiping out the opponent's field rather than on standing the vanguard.

Interview: World Champion Brandon Smith

Thursday morning we at Cardfight Pro were able to sit down with the reigning Cardfight!! Vanguard world champion Brandon Smith for an interview. Since his crowning in December 2012, Smith has become a noted celebrity in the greater community of Cardfight!!, opening his doors to the press and riding the wave of publicity that followed his seizing of the first international title. However, his skill is more than what's seen on camera. Played against in person, Smith is the genuine article; after a string of victories in casual matches, Smith temporarily traded decks with our editor and played a flawless game, turning the editor's personal build against him after only brief observation of how it played. This ability to pick up and play any deck has been recognized as one of Smith's greatest strengths.

Smith's store, Collectible Investments in Berkley, MI, is one of the busiest we have ever seen. In addition to selling the Cardfight!! Vanguard Trading Card Game and other TCG properties, the store does double duty as a seller of collectables and curios, with Beatles memorabilia and rotary dial telephones stacked high along the shelves. The merchandise moves in and out--what you see in the store one night is likely not there the next. While most local shops see a regular turnout of six to eight people a week, on tournament night at Collectible Investments as many as twenty-five or thirty people will be crammed into the tables of the long, corridor-like card shop. Collectible Investments serves as the epicenter of eastern Michigan's professional scene, and a gathering ground of strong cardfighters, who are currently preparing for their regional tournament in April.

CFP: Up to now we've heard the story of you becoming the world champion, the road to the championship and how the match with Henry Suharto went. The story not yet told is the story coming home. How has that impacted you, coming back to your store and your hometown, and has your life changed any by becoming world champion?

Smith: It's been a lot of fun. [Being in] Japan, the tournament was a lot of fun, but being back home was good. I got a celebration when I got back, had this tournament and whatnot. I've gotten a lot of offers for sponsorship....at nationals I got sponsored by CoreTCG, I also got a lot of opportunities to create games, so it's a lot of different things that have been offered. I got a lot of congratulations from all around the world. I'd like to thank everybody for being supportive. It's been great.

CFP: Now that we're headed into the Stand Up Challenge Cup--you've already qualified for regionals--in this new crossride format, Dragonic Overlord The End and Majesty Lord Blaster are expect to do very well, but how are you going to face this [next] championship?

Smith: I haven't quite decided yet. I have an arsenal of decks. I still have my Spectral Duke Dragon deck and it's very formidable against this format. I also have The End and MLB as well to playtest against, so I don't wanna say what I think will happen at the Stand Up Cup finals or championship. The End is very formidable as an opponent, very hard to beat, hard to deal with and if you don't play against it correctly you can lose easily. But even though those two are getting the limelight, the glory, I think that the Shadow Paladin guy [Phantom Blaster Overlord] could step up and cause some unsuspected damage to the tournament scene.

CFP: There's been a lot of talk about a restricted list like Japan currently has, with certain decks being restricted, what do you think of this idea?

Smith: [It's] like you said earlier, about everyone having a deck in their backpack, but then the decks that hit the table were MLB and DOTE. (While setting up for the interview, I had commented offhandedly about the qualifier tournament Collectible Investments had held on Sunday night. Everyone in Smith's store had two decks--their regular deck, and their "tournament" deck that was either Majesty Lord Blaster or Dragonic Overlord The End.) So I'm in favor of the restriction list. Unfortunately it does hurt [Oracle Think Tank] and they're not seeing as much play in America, so it does seem like--and a lot of people said [this]--they didn't get justly hit. I'm in favor of Bushiroad and their restriction list, especially if the tournament scene ends up like Japan. When I was in Japan I played about twelve matches against Japanese-only decks and even though they were at like set 10--it had just come out that weekend--everyone played Majesty Lord Blaster and DOTE. So it just seems like Bushiroad did themselves a favor and what's best for the game by making the restricted list, especially targeting MLB and DOTE. Unfortunately MLB is really consistent and the fact that it can pull itself out with just the one [and] Wingal Brave, overall I'm in favor of the restrictions.

CFP: In Japan right now we have the break ride format going on that's predicted to make crossrides irrelevant. Of course, we don't have those yet in the English format so you haven't had the chance to playtest [yet], but what's your view?

Smith: Theoretically I think they're good, but I think that a lot of players are overhyping them. Yes they're devastating, but you also have to have them in the correct order. So if you're playing the Kagerou ride break [Dauntless Drive Dragon], if you ride DOTE--or however it plays out if we get a restriction list--then it may not be as good, because you'll just sit there with ride break grade 3s later. Or if you play the Gold Paladin version [Gancelot], if you choose to play like Duke or Ezel, [and] you ride those first then they're just rearguards. So it all depends on how it plays out, I think they have really great potential and that's why they were introduced to the game, but I don't think they're as strong as people give them credit to be.

The Challenge Cup regional tournaments will start up on April 12th and last through April 28th, with twenty-seven regionals spread out across the continent deciding who will go on to the finals in Orlando, Florida, to be held this June. As the previous year's titleholder, Smith is among the favorites for the North American title, but the competition even at the regional level will be fierce and Michigan is one of the most difficult states to qualify in. With many cardfighters eager to either champion or defeat the crossride decks of this format, 2013 is promising to be an unpredictable year.