Kaijudo: Deck Doctor!

December 28, 2012

Categories: Christian Van Hoose, Kaijudo

by Christian Van Hoose

Hey, everybody! I'm back today with the deck doctor article I promised you guys! I got a few submissions, and narrowed it down to two to use in the article: a Water/Darkness/Fire control deck built by someone who just started playing, and a WDNL Aggro/Control deck. So, without any further ado, let's get into the decks!

Water/Darkness/Fire Control - Submitted by eldolceable on YouTube

Water:16
3 Aqua Seneschal
2 Hydro Spy
3 Reef-Eye
2 Flourogill Manta
2 Rusalka, Aqua Chaser
1 King Neptas
3 Logos Scan

Darkness: 20
3 Fumes
2 Gigastand
1 Screeching Scaradorable
1 Scaradorable of Gloom Hollow
1 Dark Scaradorable
1 Hydra Medusa
1 Razorkinder
3 Terror Pit
3 Bone Blades
1 Specter Claw
1 Dark Return
1 Death Smoke
1 Skull Shatter

Fire: 9
2 Bolt-Tail Dragon
1 Wrist-Rockets Tatsurion
1 Gilaflame the Assaulter
2 Heat Seekers
2 Rock Bite
1 Barrage

Total: 45

This is a very good start at building a traditional WDF Control deck. All the components are there, from Water's draw to Darkness's destruction and discard, and Fire for finishers such as Bolt-Tail. There are, however, some consistency issues, namely the amount of 1-ofs the pilot decided to include. I'll try to fix that while staying more or less within the card pool restrictions the user notified me of.

The Water section looks mostly fine, except for a few minor changes. First off, I would definitely replace Flourogill Manta with Frogzooka, as Frogzooka blocks a lot more major creatures being used currently, such as Gilaflame and Hydra Medusa. The extra 1000 power really makes it a better option right now. Besides that, I'd cut the Hydro Spies and replace them with more effective draw such as Spy Mission, or if the user has them, Crystal Memories. Even at its best, this deck will run 1-ofs, and Memory can search for those. If not Memories, I'd still use Spy Mission over Hydro Spy, as its also a +1 and the 1000 power body of Hydro Spy really doesn't help to deal with a whole lot right now.

There are a few things I'd change in the Darkness civilization. The deckbuilder has indicated that while he has access to multiple Hydra Medusas, he didn't feel like he had enough Evo bait to warrant their inclusion. I disagree; I think with a slight modification to the lineup, two Hydra Medusas fit perfectly. They're not always going to be live in your hand, but Medusa is extremely powerful a lot of the time, and holding them until you draw a Chimera for bait can be pretty easy. I'm assuming he doesn't have access to more Gloom Hollows or Razorkinder Puppets for the purpose of this article, so with that in mind I would add a third Gigastand. It accomplishes the purpose of providing more Evo bait for the Medusas as well as giving the deck more discard. Playing a Gigastand on turn three followed by a Fumes on turn four can be painful in some matchups, discarding cards and putting pressure on the board.

The things I would cut are a few of the 1-ofs. Specter Claw is a card I haven't really been a fan of lately, as it can be bad when your opponent has more than one or two cards in hand, and at one copy, it's easy to cut. Razorkinder and Death Smoke are both worse than Hydra Medusa in here, and neither are able to deal with Evolutions that attack the turn they're played or Fast Attackers such as Bolt-Tail Dragon. I'd take out all three of those, and add a third Gigastand and second Hydra Medusa.

In the Fire section, I would take out the Wrist-Rockets. Ideally, this spot could be filled by Tatsurion the Unchained, but Unchained is relatively hard to come by, so for this article I'll suggest the use of a "Tatsurion", from the battle decks. This space could be used for different things as well, such as a possible second Gilaflame, but all of them are more efficient uses of the space than Wrist-Rockets, which is somewhat redundant with all the removal in the deck. The last fix I'd make would be to take out the Rock Bites and use the space to max out Barrage at three copies. It shouldn't be hard to acquire them, as they're only uncommon, and they've proven in my testing to be very dangerous cards against a lot of decks right now.

Final Changes:
-2 Flourogill Manta, +2 Frogzooka
-2 Hydro Spy, +2 Crystal Memory/Spy Mission

-1 Death Smoke, -1 Razorkinder, -1 Specter Claw, +1 Gigastand, +1 Hydra Medusa

-2 Rock Bite, +2 Barrage
-1 Wrist-Rockets Tatsurion, +1 Tatsurion

This should leave the total at 44 cards. Have fun with the deck! Now, onto the second one!

Water/Nature/Light/Darkness Aggro-Control - Submitted by davior12 on YouTube

Light: 15
3 Thunder Cruiser
3 Sun-Stalk Seed
3 Jade Monitor
3 Keeper of Clouds
2 Starlight Strategist
1 Astinos, the Cloud Knight

Water: 10
2 Aqua Seneschal
2 Logos Scan
3 Spy Mission
3 Teleport

Nature: 10
2 Prickleback
3 Razorhide
3 Bronze-Arm Tribe
2 Bronze-Arm Sabertooth

Darkness:5
3 Bone Blades
2 Terror Pit

Total: 40

I'm going to start off the fixes by saying that I'm not a fan of the Darkness splash in here. I've tried splashing three Bone Blades and three Terror Pits in aggro decks, and have seen it work in certain decks, but in a deck that's already three civilizations, the five-card splash is stretching it pretty thin. I also don't feel like it's completely necessary because Nature has other alternatives which accomplish the same purpose in Root Trap and Return to the Soil. Terror Pit and Bone Blades are better of course, since they don't give your opponent more mana, but I think adding a fourth civilization just to get that slight advantage is a bit excessive. My first fix would be to remove the five card Darkness section and replace it with three Root Traps and two Return to the Soils.

That brings me to the Nature section, which is focused around the Beast Kin race. I like that, as Sabertooth and its friends can put early pressure on the opponent, while generating mana when banished to ramp up to bigger plays which can be found in the Light civilization. In addition to adding the Root Traps and the Return to the Soils, I'd put Prickleback at three and take out a Bronze-Arm Tribe. This helps to let you evolve into Sabertooth more consistently on turn four. I've also found three Bronze-Arm Tribes to lead to some bad draws late in the game when you simply don't need more mana. It's very good on turn four obviously, as you can play level six cards earlier, but late game it can be dead a lot of the time. I'd also simply add two copies of Gigahorn Charger, which are great to search out this deck's powerful creatures, this deck's strength. Sabertooth and the Skyforce Champions are prime targets.

In Water, I'd take out two copies of Spy Mission to put both Aqua Seneschal and Logos Scan at three. Generally there are better things to be doing in this deck on turn four, and Logos Scan is much better here because it can let you draw into Sabertooth before turn four, setting up that potentially huge play. Speaking of great turn four plays, I would take out the Teleports altogether for three Rusalka, Aqua Chaser. Playing this card after a Seneschal or Razorhide can allow this deck to take total control of the tempo of the game, and barring a Shield Blast, is very hard to come back from.

The deck-builder chose to use Light primarily for blockers. I respect his choosing of the Light blockers since they are the ones with Skirmisher so they can attack creatures, but I think the numbers are a little excessive. I would limit it to only three Sun-Stalk Seeds and three Keeper of Clouds. Both can help against rush decks and other aggro decks, with Keeper of Clouds holding the same purpose as Frogzooka from the previous deck. This frees up space for the use of three Stormspark Blasts, which are incredible here with the amount of large creatures this deck can put on the board. As a Shield Blast, it can save you from taking too many hits to the shields, and then allow you to clear your opponent's field. I'd also add a third Starlight Strategist, since this deck is all about playing huge threats to take control of the board after all the mana ramping, and replace Astinos with a Ra-Vu, Seeker of Lightning. For one more mana, it's a much superior card. Then, with the remaining two spaces, I'd add two copies of Keeper of Dawn to re-use the newly added Stormspark Blasts and Root Traps, as well as recycling Logos Scan and Spy Mission on turn five.

Final Changes:
-3 Bone Blades, -2 Terror Pit, +3 Root Trap, +2 Return to the Soil
-1 Bronze-Arm Tribe, +1 Prickleback, +2 Gigahorn Charger

-2 Spy Mission, +1 Aqua Seneschal, +1 Logos Scan
-3 Teleport, +3 Rusalka, Aqua Chaser

-3 Thunder Cruiser, -3 Jade Monitor, +3 Stormspark Blast, +2 Keeper of Dawn, +1 Starlight Strategist
-1 Astinos, the Cloud Knight, +1 Ra-Vu, Seeker of Lightning

This should put the grand total at 42 cards, which I feel is warranted with the large amount of draw. Hope you enjoy the changes!

Thanks for reading everybody, and thank you especially to everyone who sent me a deck for this article, it was fun to do. Perhaps I'll do another one in the future! Please leave a comment down below telling me your thoughts on the article as well as your thoughts on the decks. See you all next week!