Looking Towards Evo Fury: My Predictions

November 9, 2012

Categories: Christian Van Hoose, Kaijudo

by Christian Van Hoose

Hey, everybody! I'm back with another exciting Kaijudo article, about something I'm sure you all are looking forward to greatly - the release of Evo Fury next Tuesday, November 13th! I decided to wait until the last possible moment to write this article with the hopes of getting as many spoilers as possible, and in a stroke of good luck, someone was actually able to buy a box early and spoiled everything he pulled. The cards were compiled and now on the Kaijudo wiki page, there is a complete list of all the cards we'll be finding in Evo Fury, though without pictures for the time being. For this article, I'm going to start going over what I think are the most interesting cards of the set, much like I did for the release of RIS, and sort of pre-emptively talk about the different directions I think the metagame could take.

Cyber Lords

Water's Cyber Lords are already one of the most commonly played races in a variety of decks. The race contains some of the best creatures that Water has to offer, a lot of them giving decks the ever sought-after draw power which so many require. In addition to cards like Aqua Seneschal, which I'm sure will continue to see a ton of play, we also got more support in the form of Cyber Sprite and Cyber Trader! These two cards are amazing because of their low cost. Cyber Sprite is a simple Level 1, 2000 power blocker with Guard, meaning it can't attack, and Cyber Trader is a level 2, 1000 power creature with an ability that lets you draw one card from your deck, and then discard one card from your hand. Trader itself doesn't generate card advantage, but considering how early it can be played, that's completely fine. It helps you filter through your deck early on to get a nice progression going. Cyber Trader of course has the strength of stopping aggressive decks early on, which is great considering those types of decks look to be gaining a lot from this set. Both of these cards would also be prime targets for any early Cyber Lord Evolution...

...which we have, in the form of Emperor Neuron! There are two other Cyber Lord Evolutions in this set which could see play in some decks, but Neuron is by far the most playable and all-around best out of them in my opinion. At level 3, it could potentially come out on the third turn if you were able to start off with a Cyber Sprite or Trader, and when it does, it's going to start causing damage. The "Master Tactician" ability makes Neuron unable to be blocked, and this goes perfectly with "Extract Data", the effect which states that you may draw a card whenever it attacks! This creature is truly a powerhouse, and it could re-define the way some duelists play Water. Getting a couple of attacks off with Neuron before your opponent has an answer can give you some very strong momentum that your opponent is going to have to work hard to overcome.

Beast Kin

Beast King are another cool race that I expected to see an Evolution, and I wasn't disappointed; as a matter of fact, two have been revealed! Flamespike Tatsurion is the Nature Civilization's Super Rare from the set, and it's a powerhouse. At level 6 for 8000 power, it fits in well with Nature's role of providing creatures with a lot of power, and of course it has Double Breaker as well. It only gets bigger, as it has an effect that increases its power by 6000 whenever it battles. This is truly threatening, as the 14,000 power total is above any other creature's base power at this time, allowing it to even attack over the mighty Evo Fury Tatsurion, which I'll discuss later.

The real treasure in Nature I think is the other Evolution, an uncommon, Bronze-Arm Sabertooth. It comes out even earlier, at level 4 for 7000 power with Double Breaker, and whenever it's banished, you can put it in your mana zone instead of the discard pile. For those who might not know, Evolutions are treated as 1 creature when they're in the battle zone, though you place them over a creature card of the same race. Therefore, when the Evolution moves anywhere such as the mana zone or back to your hand, both cards move together, and then the cards separate. This means that even if your opponent can get rid of Sabertooth before it does serious damage, you're getting two more mana and are now in a position to play multiple creatures per turn, or even bigger creatures such as Flamespike! Both of these Evolutions are undoubtedly helped out by the great low-level creatures found in the Beast Kin race such as Razorhide, Bronze-Arm Tribe, and Moonhowler Tribe. The first two I just mentioned can also accelerate your mana to bring out the evolutions earlier!

Drakons

How could I not talk about Drakons, the signature race of the Fire civilization? There are two very cool Evolutions coming out for this race, one of which I already spoiled in a previous article, Blastforge Captain (be sure to check it out if you haven't seen it!). The other is Laser-Arm Drakon, a level 3, 4000 power creature with Double Breaker and Powerful Attack +2000. It's able to be hit by a lot of removal like Bone Blades and Tornado Flame, but it packs a definite punch and having an early double breaker like this that's so easy to play opens up a lot of possibilities for aggressive decks. There's a bunch of low-level Drakons out there, so even playing one of them and evolving it in the same turn isn't far-fetched at all. Drakons have made a real impact on the metagame before Evo Fury, and though now we have other races that can give them a run for the money, I predict they'll still be a big threat.

Mono-Color Decks

Something that hasn't quite been possible before this set was building a deck using only one civilization - or rather, building a consistent one. It would appear as if this set could change that. Every civilization has gotten cards that get huge boosts if all the cards in your mana zone are of their civilization, and of course the idea of having a deck focused around a particular race with Evolutions makes it easier to focus on one civilization. The two that I think have the most potential for a mono-civ deck are Water and Nature.

Water is an obvious choice because it is (and probably always will be) the civilization with the best and most card drawing capabilities. Cards like Aqua Seneschal and Logos Scan have always been making decks consistent, and Reef Gladiator's "Heart of Water" effect basically means that if you're running a mono-Water deck, it's a level 3, 6000 power blocker with Guard that allows you to draw a card whenever it blocks. With Cyber Lords on the rise, Water could definitely see play as the only civilization in a deck. Nature is a different story, as the civilization focuses on raw power and mana acceleration as opposed to card advantage. With finishers such as Flamespike Tatsurion and Bronze-Arm Sabertooth, as well as a ton of smaller Beast Kin and a double breaking Silver Fist, Nature has a bunch of ways to keep the pressure on an opponent. For card draw the deck has The Great Arena to allow you to benefit from dropping a series of those beatsticks, and the newly introduced Reap and Sow, a card which has generated a lot of hype around the forums. With Sprout to accelerate to these cards and other acceleration to reach the cards such as Flamespike earlier, I predict mono Nature to definitely gain some footing in the coming weeks.

The Future of Current Decks

Until now, aggro and control (and the many, many variants of both) were the only decks really found to have consistently good performances. I believe rush finally has what it needs to see play without the support of higher-level cards and draw power. Nature got a good level 1 attacker in the form of Prickleback, and it's a Beast Kin so it could see play in a bunch of decks. Fire also got a boost, getting the great level 2 attacker Lava Leaper and the first ever level 3 Fast Attacker, Jet-Thrust Darter. Combine those with the cards we already have and I think we have a potent deck.

Control is something I see taking many forms, a lot of them more aggressive than the pre-Evo Fury builds have been. Specifically, Blurple, or Water/Darkness control, now has Hydra Medusa to play with, along with the ever-strengthening Cyber Lord lineup. Hydra Medusa is a Terror Pit on wheels and can evolve from any of the Scaradorables as well as Gigastand. With Neuron in the mix, the deck is going to have to attack earlier on to reach its full potential, but Hydra Medusa could prove to be an amazing card at clearing away threats. Return from Beyond is also a very interesting card for this type of deck and I can't wait to see how it affects things.

As for more traditional control builds such as Water/Darkness/Fire and variants using Nature and Light, I expect them to stay strong. The deck is so versatile that even though there aren't too many new cards to help out those types of decks in this set, it can easily adapt. The disruption found in control and the ability to constantly maintain card advantage will always make sure they're tier 1. They'll have to adapt to all these new cards, but that's the challenge and the fun! Who knows, maybe traditional control decks will find some amazing new tech cards - I know I'll be experimenting.

Armored Dragons are definitely going to still be a big thing; though they didn't get too many cards to help the already strong deck, they got Evo Fury Tatsurion, which some might say is enough. It might not see play very often because it's relatively tough to get out, evolving from high-level creatures, but when it does hit the battle zone it could easily be a game-ender, triple breaking and locking down one of your opponent's creatures with the effect. It's also fairly gigantic at 12,000 power, even though Flamespike Tatsurion can still attack over it.

Conclusion

Evo Fury is a crazy set. In a good way, for sure. We've received the first wave of Evolutions, along with some other great support cards. If the metagame was diverse before, it just got exponentially more so, and I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on these new cards and testing out some of these theories. Of course, there's even more I didn't mention, such as Enforcers and the increased potential for a Rally the Reserves deck with all the level 1 blockers, but I think I hit on the most obviously standout parts of the set, and I hope it gave you all some ideas! Please leave a comment below with your thoughts on the article and Evo Fury, and I'll see you all next week!