Hey readers, getting right into it this week, we’re going to start off by taking a look at Troy Carvale’s “Mono-Blue” deck.

[ccDeck="Main Deck"]3 Dupe Frog:3 Fishborg Planter:3 Flip Flop Frog:1 Mobius the Frost Monarch:2 Mother Grizzly:2 Nimble Anlger:3 Nimble Manta:3 Nimble Sunfish:1 Poison Draw Frog:3 Poseidra The Atlantean Dragon:3 Rage of Deep Sea:3 Ronintoadin:2 Skreech:3 Swap Frog:3 Tidal, Dragon Ruler of Waterfalls:2 Treeborn Frog[/ccDeck]

Yup, that’s the entire list. Just 40 monsters. Definitely somewhat atypical for a high monster brew, not only are there 40 monsters, but all of them are water to help maximize [ccProd]Fishborg Planter[/ccProd]. The card that really stands out to me in this list though is [ccProd]Rage of the Deep Sea[/ccProd]. It’s absurd how fast he grows. Special summon Swap Frog twice? Rage is already 2500. Pitch Tidal and a monster to send Nimble Angler, then tribute one of the Nimbles for Rage? 2000 attack Rage just from that play alone(Or you could make [ccProd]Herald of Pure Light[/ccProd] with the two Nimbles, get some value, then tribute the Herald for a 3000 attack Rage.) With this whole deck being water monsters, it isn’t unreasonable for this guy to get as big as 4000-6000 rather easily, and he can be searched by [ccProd]Mother Grizzly[/ccProd]!

Now, the biggest problem with this deck, is that being in only water monsters, you don’t really have a lot of defensive options. Outside of [ccProd]Gachi Gachi Gantetsu[/ccProd], who is easily outed these days, you really just need to be extremely aggressive. While Flip Flop Frog is a cute attempt for a defense option, he’s just so slow, and he doesn’t really help be aggressive. I’m going to cut the 3 of them.

Poison Draw Frog looks very out of place here, I’ve seen it run in Sea Lancer builds, and it makes at least a little sense in that deck since it lets your Sea Lancers turn into draw engines. However, in this deck it looks like it’s just discard fodder for Swap Frog nine times out of ten. I’ve never seen a frog variant that actually needed all 3 copies of Ronintoadin. If you don’t have Swap Frog, then Ronintoadin is an incredibly weak card. If you do have Swap Frog, then you already have access to all your Ronintoadins. Running the 3rd just isn’t necessary. Similarly, running 2 Treeborn doesn’t tend to be necessary either. You can only special one per turn anyway, so unless one of them gets removed, there is very little to gain from having multiples in the deck. You also have very few tribute monsters in this deck, so Treeborn isn’t even filling an incredibly important role.

I’m also going to cut the 1-of Mobius. Outside of [ccProd]Vanity’s Emptiness[/ccProd], there aren’t any backrow that you really want to burn your normal summon just to destroy, and if your opponent has Emptiness up, you probably aren’t even able to summon Mobius. Mobius is certainly a fine sideboard card, but it isn’t something I want to be maining right now.

The cuts in summary:
-3 Flip Flop Frog
-1 Poison Draw Frog
-1 Treeborn Frog
-1 Ronintoadin
-1 Mobius, the Frost Monarch

Splashing Mermails was something that some Dragon lists tried to do at the beginning of this format, and it seems really interesting for this deck we well to gain easier rank 7 access. I’m going to start by adding 3 [ccProd]Mermail Abyssteus[/ccProd]. Teus can be summoned off of literally any card in your deck, and makes pretty easy 2 card rank 7s by searching either [ccProd]Mermail Abysslinde[/ccProd], or [ccProd]Mermail Abyssgunde[/ccProd], which I’m going to round out the mermail section by adding 2 of each of. Note that you can discard Abyssgunde to Swap Frog, and then Special Summon a Teus or Linde from your graveyard. Linde also helps this deck survive the early game. Everyone remembers the frustration of attacking a set Linde versus mermail, only to have it turn into another monster. Even better though, Mother Grizzly can search for Linde to make the Grizzly chains even longer.

Additions in summary:
+3 [ccProd]Mermail Abussteus[/ccProd] +2 [ccProd]Mermail Abysslinde[/ccProd] +2 [ccProd]Mermail Abyssgunde[/ccProd]

Next, we’re going to take a look at Brandon Lumsden’s Scrap list:

[ccDeck="Main Deck"]3 Scrap Beast:3 Scrap Chimera:2 Scrap Goblin:1 Scrap Golem:3 Redox, Dragon Ruler of Boulders:2 Crane Crane:2 Card Trooper:2 Maxx "C":2 Effect Veiler:1 Grandsoil The Elemental Lord:1 Meklord Emperor Wisel:3 Scrapstorm:2 Scrapyard:3 Pot of Duality:2 Mystical Space Typhoon:2 Forbidden Lance:1 Dark Hole:1 Mind Control:1 Scapegoat:3 Call of the Haunted:3 Fiendish Chain:1 Solemn Warning[/ccDeck]

Scraps are one of my favorite decks of all time. For those unfamiliar, the scrap deck largely revolves around [ccProd]Scrapstorm[/ccProd], which helps accelerate you towards your plan of spamming Scrap Dragons. One of the crazy parts about this deck, is that [ccProd]Scrap Dragon[/ccProd] has an effect that it seems almost everybody forgets about, especially nowadays, where if he dies, you get to special summon a scrap monster from your graveyard. This includes if he gets Solemn Warninged. Now, the major problem I see with this deck is that it’s 44 cards, so the primary goal is to thin that number down, and then we’ll see if there is room to add more cards.

[ccProd]Meklord Emperor Wisel[/ccProd] was always a bit too situational for me to like in this deck. Where on paper it looks great, because you have so many options for destroying your own cards through Scrapstorm, or Scrap Dragon, but in reality by the time those cards resolve you’re already in a pretty solid position, and shouldn’t need Wisel. I don’t want to call it win-more, but it certainly doesn’t help in those games where you’re losing.

[ccProd]Mind Control[/ccProd] looks like a pretty mediocre card right now. Versus both Dragons and Prophecy, there isn’t anything you’d enjoy Mind Controlling due to the high levels of all their monsters. Sure, you can Mind Control a Dragon Ruler, and make [ccProd]Star Eater[/ccProd] with Scrap Beast, but that hardly seems like what this deck wants to be doing.

Grandsoil is incredibly hard for this deck to make live, outside of Redox summons, and [ccProd]Card Trooper[/ccProd] plays this deck can pretty much only put one monster in the graveyard per turn. By the time Grandsoil is live, the game will often already be decided. Five earths is a lot.

I’m not really sure what Forbidden Lance is doing for this deck. Scrap Beast is already weak enough to get run over by practically everything relevant, even through a Lance, and Scrap Dragon has bigger (eye) problems to worry about than dying in battle. Trap cards are also pretty irrelevant right now. I don’t see Lance filling much of a role in this deck.

Maxing out Call of the Haunted feels a little excessive. While I definitely like the card in this deck, it isn’t really a card you want to draw multiples of early on. I’m going to cut one of them.

I think I deleted this paragraph two or three times now, I’m just not sure what to do about this Card Trooper + Crane Crane engine. On one hand, I really like how it gives this deck easy access to Soul of Silvermountain, who is obviously extremely powerful in this deck. On the other hand, it takes away from the main focus of this deck, and uses up quite a bit of space. For the sake of this article, I’m going to cut it because it gives me room to add some interesting cards.

The cuts in summary:
-1 Meklord Emperor Wisel
-1 Mind Control
-1 Grandsoil, The Elemental Lord
-2 Forbidden Lance
-1 Call of the Haunted
-2 Card Trooper
-2 Crane Crane

The first thing I want to add is a package I’ve been toying around with in a variety of decks, 3 copies of Vanity’s Emptiness, and 2 copies of [ccProd]Summoner Monk[/ccProd]. Emptiness, on it’s own is an incredibly powerful card right now, as I’ve stated in I’m pretty sure every article I’ve written since the beginning of this format. Monk helps by allowing you to make early game Scrap Dragons, with how slow this deck is early on, this is definitely an important role. However, Monk and Emptiness together makes Emptiness + [ccProd]Number 66 Master Key Beetle[/ccProd], one of the strongest locks in the game right now! Two cards that are both great standalone cards, but also combine together to basically win the game on the spot in a lot of situations.

With the last slot, I want to add the 3rd copy of Scrapyard, nothing crazy, just making the deck more consistent, I’d rather have 8 targets for Scrapstorm than 7.

Additions in summary:
+2 Summoner Monk
+3 Vanity’s Emptiness
+1 Scrapyard

 

Well, that’s it for this week. Be sure to check out the ARGCS in Columbus this weekend (October 12-13). Also, if you have a deck you’d like doctored by either Johnny or myself, send us a message at https://www.facebook.com/ArgDeckDoctor
And remember to Play Hard or Go Home!

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