Hey everybody! Last weekend was the sneak preview of Shadow Specters. While everyone is hyped about the Noble Knight support in the set, I don’t think it will have much of an impact on the meta. This week I want to take some time to analyze what is likely to affect the meta; Mythic Dragons.
While Dragon Rulers certainly did not need any more help, they did get a couple of new toys in the set. Here are the relevant new cards for Dragon Rulers.
Mythic Tree Dragon
Once per turn: You can target 1 WATER Dragon-Type monster you control; this card's Level becomes the current Level of that monster.
Mythic Water Dragon
If you control an EARTH monster, you can Special Summon this card (from your hand). You can only Special Summon "Mythic Water Dragon" once per turn this way.
Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand
2 Level 8 monsters
Once per turn, during either player's turn: You can detach 1 Xyz Material from this card, then target 1 face-up monster on the field; this turn, its effects are negated, but it is unaffected by other card effects.
Number 46: Dragluon
2 Level 8 Dragon-Type monsters
Once per turn, if you control no other monsters: You can detach 1 Xyz Material from this card, then activate 1 of these effects.
● Special Summon 1 Dragon-Type monster from your hand.
● Target 1 Dragon-Type monster your opponent controls; take control of that target.
● Dragon-Type monsters your opponent controls cannot activate their effects until the end of your opponent's turn.
The idea, of course, would be to remove Redox and Tidal for another Dragon Ruler to search Mythic Tree Dragon and Mythic Water Dragon to give you access to the powerful new rank 8 monsters, Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand and Number 46: Dragluon, as well as the older, yet still powerful, option of [ccProd]Hieratic Sun Dragon Overlord of Heliopolis[/ccProd]. While many people are under the assumption that these cards will automatically be played in multiples, I’m not so sure. I’m going to take some time to go over the pros and cons of these cards.
Pros
Searchable- The first big pro to running these new Dragons is that they are searchable. This means that you can run the minimum number of them which will decrease the number of times you draw them when you don’t want them, but still have access to them when you do.
Debris Dragon – Mythic Tree Dragon only has 100 attack which makes him a target for Debris Dragon. While Debris prevents you from making a Syncrho with Tree, it has no restrictions on XYZing with it. This means the Dragon deck will now have access to rank 4s. The most likely candidates are [ccProd]Diamond Dire Wolf[/ccProd], [ccProd]Gem Knight Pearl[/ccProd], and [ccProd]Queen Dragon Djinn[/ccProd]. The first two would serve primarily as outs to Ophion. While Gem Knight Pearl was my rank 4 of choice last format because it was unaffected by [ccProd]Effect Veiler[/ccProd] and [ccProd]Fiendish Chain[/ccProd], I’d be more inclined to choose Diamond Dire Wolf this format as Fiendish and Veiler are no longer popular and Diamond Dire Wolf also serves as an out to Imperial Iron Wall. Queen Dragon Djinn gives you powerful plays and leaves the possibility of creating a soft lock with it and the new Synchro, Stardust Spark Dragon.
Works with Tidal – I think the fact that Mythic Tree Dragon can copy any Water Dragon’s level is huge because it allows you to copy Tidal’s level giving you even easier access to rank 7s. Some people would argue that this does not greatly benefit the deck as it means you must summon Tidal first which is vulnerable to [ccProd]Maxx “C”[/ccProd] into[ccProd]Crimson Blader[/ccProd], but of all the weaknesses I think these cards have, that is not one of them. This can be avoided by summoning Tidal and removing either Blaster or Tempest with the Redox. Then if they Maxx “C” you can simply search Corsesca/Guard and Redox and make a level 8 that does not leave you open to Crimson Blader. If they do not Maxx “C” you can search the Tempest/Blaster and Tree and make a rank 7. The addition of Tree Dragon gives standard Dragons a reliable way of summoning Dracossack on the first turn, even if you don’t draw Ravine.
Swift Scarecrow – Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand gives a Dragon player the ability to play around Swift Scarecrow. If you use Felgrand’s effect on one of your monsters, they cannot use Scarecrow when it attacks.
Additional Ability to OTK – While playing around Scarecrow contributes to Dragon’s ability to OTK, there are other ways these guys help you OTK. Heliopolis turns unused Dragons in your hand that you can easily revive into a board wiper. Dragluon takes control of an opposing Dragon after which you can revive any Dragon of your own and attack for game.
Trap Monsters – Last format, Dragon players had Abyssgaios as an option to defend themselves if they didn’t draw any defensive cards. Until Felgrand, Dragon players this format did not have any sort of card like Gaios that would serve as a trap from the extra deck.
Use of Unused Colors – How often will you have drawn 2 Tidals or 2 Redox’s throughout the course of the game, but not be able to use the other one to its fullest potential? Chances are a lot. Prior to this set, Redox and Tidal had no alternative searches. If you had access to 2 of them, they did not serve any purpose other than being a Dragon to remove. Now if you have access to 2 Redox, you can search Tree while still having Redox available for next turn.
Cons
2800 – 2800 is certainly the magic number this format. Anything bigger than it is very difficult to get over, while anything smaller than it only takes a Blaster to get rid of. Felgrand happens to be 2800 and he is often a big commitment as you often have to cut yourself off from Redox and/or Tidal to summon him. Blaster is completely free on their part so it forces you to have another trap to back him up, or he will just get rammed into by Blaster.
Cutting Yourself Off – Above I talked about the benefit you get by having these in your deck when you have multiple Redox or multiple Tidal in your graveyard. By the same token, what happens when you don’t have multiples? If you search out Tree or Water, you’ll cut yourself off from Tidal or Redox.
Combo Pieces – Last week I talked about how Dragons weren’t really a combo deck, but adding Tree and Water adds elements of a combo deck. They don’t really do anything by themselves. Water Dragon requires Tree to do anything and Tree requires Tidal, Water, or Debris to do anything.
Mythic Water Dragon – I’d like to take a minute to point out how incredibly awkward Mythic Water Dragon actually is. It’s a level 8, while nothing else in the deck is. It’s a pretty awful draw in a lot of situations. Its stats are completely irrelevant and it can only be used to XYZ with tree. It contributes nothing to the deck without Tree unless you are playing Trade-In.
“If You Control No Other Monsters:” – What would otherwise be a very powerful effect, Dragluon is ridiculously crippled by a “if you control no other monsters” clause. The only way to reliably summon Dragluon is to summon a Dragon first and search Tree and Water, in which case his effect is irrelevant for the entire turn.
More Normal Summons – When discussing the weaknesses of Dragons last week, one of the points that I made dealt with the notion that Dragons play too many normal summons and that having multiples in your hand is essentially a -1 for the turn. Mythic Tree Dragon adds another normal summon to the deck.
Mitigating the Cons
I want to spend a short amount of time talking about potential ways to mitigate the cons associated with these new cards.
D.D.R. – Different Dimension Reincarnation D.D.R. helps mitigate losing out on colors. It’s alright to remove your only Redox for Tree if you can get it right back with D.D.R.
Trade-In – While I don’t think this will be any kind of correct in standard Dragons, Blue Eyes Dragons already play Trade-In. This means that drawing Water Dragon is significantly less awkward if you’ve got the potential of using Trade-In on it. By the same token, adding Water Dragon to the Blue-Eyes build would give even more awkward draws with Water in addition to Blue-Eyes himself.
Cut a Normal Summon – The standard tuner lineup of Dragons is 2 Debris Dragon, 2 Dragunity Corsesca, and 1 Flamvell Guard. If you add Mythic Tree Dragon, I suggest you cut a Corsesca to reduce the number of normal summons.
Running Only Mythic Tree Dragon – Mythic Water Dragon has a lot more cons associated with it than Mythic Tree Dragon does, namely, it doesn’t do anything without Mythic Tree Dragon. Tree, on the other hand, works with Tidal and Debris as well as Mythic Water Dragon. Perhaps you could run only Mythic Tree Dragon to still give you easier access to rank 7s, some access to rank 4s, and make use of extra Redoxes.
While the rank 8s are very powerful, perhaps time will reveal that they have too many cons associated with them or that they are win more. Even if this does come to fruition, perhaps players can still make use of Mythic Wood Dragon. Even if Mythic Water Dragon does end up being played, I doubt players will use more than a single copy of the card. Will you be running 1 or both of the new cards in your Dragon deck? Leave a comment down below letting me know. The Circuit Series comes to Worcester, MA on November 16-17! Until next time, play hard or go home!
Patrick Hoban
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