News: Ozan Fincan Wins May BeNeLux Tournament with Chaos Breaker Dragon

Yesterday's BeNeLux ended with the fan-favorite Link Joker clan in first place, played by European cardfighter Ozan Fincan. Unusually for a fan competition, this month's BeNeLux was the first major tournament of the BT13-on format, with its top 8 showcasing several of the competitive favorites from Catastrophic Outbreak, in particular Link Joker's new trump card Chaos Breaker Dragon and the Nova Grappler Reverse unit, Ethics Buster "Яeverse." The BeNeLux tournaments are a line of unofficial competitions organized by the joint vanguard community of Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. Although open to being held in any of the three countries' major cities, it is typically held in Antwerp, Belgium on a monthly to bimonthly basis.

Participation this month was high in spite of the latent controversies surrounding the last BeNeLux winner. With an Xbox 360 for first place as an incentive to participate, a total 28 participants joined the tournament, with clan usage breaking down as follows;

May 4th BeNeLux Clan Breakdown
6 Shadow Paladin
5 Narukami
4 Link Joker
3 Nova Grappler
2 Kagero
2 Dimension Police
1 Dark Irregulars
1 Genesis
1 Gold paladin
1 Angel Feather
1 Murakumo
1 Aqua Force

Chaos Breaker's successful debut was well forecasted by the greater community, as the card's unique ability to slow the pace of the game by cheaply Locking the opponent's cards, preserving Locks with its support unit Palladium, and then later retire those cards as they unlock to draw allows it to control the general flow of card advantage throughout a fight and prevent opponents from efficiently fighting back. Despite the presence of the new decks, the top 8 was generally dominated by Eradicator cardfighters, with Dragonic Descendant-Gauntlet Buster as the most played build of the top 8, and the tournament as a whole saw heavier Shadow Paladin presence than anything else.

May 4th BeNeLux Top 8
1. Ozan Fincan (Link joker - Chaos Breaker Dragon)
2. Daniel Gallardo (Eradicator - Descendant/Gauntlet)
3. Vincent De Baere (Eradicator - Descendant/Gauntlet)
4. Gillian van Sande (Dark Irregulars - Amon Reverse)
5. Frederik De Baere (Nova Grappler - Ethics Buster Reverse)
6. Corentin Janssens (Eradicator - Descendant/Gauntlet)
7. Andy Van den Ouwelant (Link Joker - Chaos Breaker Dragon)
8. Kim Geerinckx (Genesis - Fortuna)

Seventh place in the tournament is a familiar face for professional play, taken by none other than 2012 French regional champion Andy Van den Ouwelant. Van den Ouwelant made a strong showing in World Championship 2012, winning his regional title with a Spectral Duke Dragon deck played against William Astoul's Dragonic Lawkeeper, and after two years has continued to persevere in modern play by adapting to Link Joker alongside a host of other international cardfighters. Chaos Breaker's international tenure is projected to be short-lived, as VGE-EB09: Divine Dragon Progression is due early next month alongside the grade 4 unit that has proved to be the terror of Japanese play.

News: Gauntlet Buster and Sweep Command Dragon Storm Fukuoka

This morning Doctor O tweeted the results of the Fukuoka branch of Fighters Road 2013, Japan's ongoing national championship. The Junior class champion took first place using a Narukami deck, with second place going to a Kagerou cardfighter.  The Open class tournament had both its first and second place spots taken by Narukami fighters, one using a now-standard Gauntlet Buster Dragon and Descendant deck, with the other using a different Eradicator build that combined Spark Horn and Sweep Command Dragon, using cards from the eleventh booster set, BT11: Seal Dragon Unleashed. Spark Horn has drawn some attention as a variation on the Eradicator formula, as when his attack hits a vanguard he can use an especial counterblast to retire an opponent's rearguard--without needing to be at limit break. This gives a Narukami fighter a stronger midgame, pressuring the opponent to drop cards for defense earlier in a fight, weakening their overall presence when the time comes for Sweep Command to hit the field, simultaneously retiring the opponent's rearguards and drawing new cards through his limit break and a combo with the Eradicators' many retire skills.

The Eradicators' continued dominance throughout this tournament season has drawn criticism, as the Narukami clan as a whole has continued to receive support from every core booster set since BT08, with multiple cards coming out as definitively competitive decks of their own, and this trend will not be broken until VG-BT13: Catastrophic Outbreak. With Descendant having come out as a competitive deck surpassing Dragonic Overlord The End in threat, the restricted list having done little to stop his reign, currently accounting for five of the eight Open class decks currently being used to contend for the national title and 32% of all 2013 tournament decks, an extremely powerful crossbreak Reverse unit coming for the clan in VG-BT12: Binding Force of the Black Rings, and the build only becoming stronger as a counter to the new Lock mechanic, many are calling for the plug to be pulled on the clan altogether. For some however, Spike Brothers having broken the Eradicator's stranglehold on the format at Hiroshima has inspired new hope.

The remaining three tournaments will take place in Tokyo, Sapporo and Nagoya with the Tokyo tournament being next in line on the 7th of July. This will be the first time that Okayama, Hakata and Osaka will not be participating.