Preparations for PH Nationals is a pain.

It's Nationals Season again.

IMO, preparing for PH Nationals is harder than most regions, especially if you can't afford meta decks or you're too attached to your weapon of choice (e.g. I'm too attached to Machine Spam based decks that I can't see myself use any other deck) Why did I say so? Because the meta here is so diverse that most maindeck and sidedeck choices against the meta decks(Prophecy, Dragons and Verz) do not work as well as planned.

For example, I've been playing with maindecked Drolls and Crows. Yes, those cards can help a lot when going against Prophecies and Dragons respectively, but how about for Rogues(which comprises the majority of PH meta)? Droll only helps if your opponent uses Maxx C (which is not widely used in PH due to scarcity and price) and if you're opponent somehow goes Gadget-Kage-Chain Summon on you. Against other decks, Droll sucks alot. But if I don't main it, I find myself scooping the whole match against Prophecy.

Crow has a lot more uses though. If you've read my previous post, dropping Crow at the right time can cripple popular Rogue decks since most of those run on Grave power. However, it does shit against Prophecy(which poses the biggest problem because Fate solves almost everything) other than decreasing the number of spells in their grave(not really a problem for them).

As for Maxx C, I dont have access to it. LOL

Against Verz, my deck of choice usually handles Verz well. Machines can summon a Rank 4 to handle Ophion and control the field from there via Redox. Most Rogues handle Verz well.

Another thing I'd like to point out is not maining MSTs. This works against Prophecy and Dragons but makes a Verz player happy, and there are more Verz decks in PH. Also, most Rogues rely on backrow and not maining MST against them is suicide(unless you're using Dragons and Prophecy)

Based on observations during weeklies, the PH meta normally consists of:

- Big 3
- both 3-axis and 4-axis FF (with 4-axis being more numerous due to relative cheapness)
- Gadgets, both Kage and Trap-based versions
- Heroes
- Agents
- Dark World
- some Bujins
- Trolls
- some anime-based deck that somehow works.

So with this diversity, what do you do?

Your best bet is to just increase your main deck's consistency(e.g. less tricks against meta, more "draw into combo pieces") while utilizing your sidedeck for the Big 3.

Or just main two copies of Book of Eclipse. Works wonders.

The Bird has landed

This is the star of my main deck right now.(other than Komachi, of course)

I'm ready to f*** you up

In my quest to battle the meta of Dragons, Magicals, 3-axis, and Verz (and a lot of rogue decks, since PH meta is too diverse), I realized maining 1-2 of this bird makes sense. From a Karakuri player perspective, I can afford to main 2 copies of this without losing consistency. I also prefer hand traps as my source of defense and Maxx C is out of my budget. Also, as a karakuri player, Maxx C doesn't really hurt Verz(the up-and-coming whore deck of PH, probably next to Gadgets and BKs) and Dragons can just negate the 4 cards I drew with LADD(unless I drew Komachi+lv 4 Karakuri), so stopping the field flood seems to be the only way to stop them.

Here are some matchup analysis for Karakuris with Crow:

• Dragons - banishing a Dragon that activated its effect to summon itself from the grave will buy you one more turn, enough to OTK them unless they had the veiler to stop the flood or you drew bad. Also banishes eclipse wyvern before it can take LADD.
• Spellbooks - the only matchup where Crow does no good. Still, Karakuris already have a good Spellbook matchup due to the high OTK rate of Karakuri and the lack of defense of Spellbooks.
• Verz - stops Cercyon from making the 2nd Ophion. The 1st Ophion can be taken down easily with Strategist+Redox+Ninja or Book of Moon or Compulse. It's the second one that hurts a lot.
• 3-Axis FF - stops Chouten from making synchros. 
• Mermails - stops Fishborg, Tidal summon from grave and Moulin if you hate him. Although I think Mind Crush seems to be a better choice against them.
• Gadgets - banishes Fortress. Though I would concentrate more on stopping their backrow more than the fortress. 
• Agents - prevents the 4th fairy from making its way to the grave. Although Kristya can be taken care of with anti-Ophion tactics anyway.
• Dark World - Crow is a bitch to Grapha.

TL:DR?

Try maining 1-2 crows in an OTK deck in Dragon Meta. Works wonders.

Flight of Blue-Impalase.

Ever since spoilers for the new Mecha Phantom Beasts in JOTL were released, I got pretty excited. Especially because of this card.

Effect is:(from Wikia)
"Cannot be used as a Synchro Material Monster, except for the Synchro Summon of a Machine-Type monster, and all other Synchro Material Monsters must be "Mecha Phantom Beast" monsters. If this card is used as a Synchro Material Monster, you can use monsters in your hand as non-Tuner Synchro Material Monsters. This card cannot be destroyed by battle or by card effects while you control a Token. If your opponent controls a monster and you control no monsters: You can banish this card from your Graveyard; Special Summon 1 "Mecha Phantom Beast Token" (Machine-Type/WIND/Level 3/ATK 0/DEF 0)." 

Along with Tether-Wolf(probably the best MPB in LTGY), this makes Burei, which makes this card a nice addition to the Karakuri 6-draw deck(from DuelingDays), probably as a replacement for Ninishi and friends. Or this could be a reason for the birth of a full-on Machine Monster Mash that is legal in Asia Format. The only upside to Ninishi is she can make Naturia Beast with Bolt Hedgehog, while Blu-impalase cannot.

Other than that, this card is the easiest way to make Conco-ruda, the MPB Synchro. Though I still can't find ways to abuse that card.

I'll try to come up with a pure Mecha Phantom Beast decklist once I finish sorting out some stuff in real life.

PH Asian Championship Qualifier 2013: Tourney Report, New Deck and Lessons I Learned

I was supposed to run Diva Chaos deck for this tourney but decided against it because Macro Cosmos, D.Fissure and Verz exist. I opened my entry packs and pulled two Geargiagears and a Drago-Sac. All my memories of playing Geargia flashed before me and I knew what deck I would be playing now.

On to the Tourney Report:

Participants: 1-0-4!!!! record-breaking attendance for a PH tournament!!!
Format: 7 rounds of Swiss then cut to top 16.
Deck Used - Geargia-Karakuri-Machina

About the deck: It was missing a lot of things. The crucial thing was that I didn't have Maestroke with me(Forgot to borrow one before I had my deck checked)

Rose among the Thorns

I have been tinkering with Chaos Dragons since I abandoned my dreams of piloting Fire Fists and surrendered the deck to my little bro(who pilots the deck WAAAAAYYYYYY better than I do).

Last week, as I was trying to think of cards that can fill up the last three slots* in my new CD deck, a card suddenly popped out of my unclassified cards.

I call my three divas Mary, Louise and Rose.

Sudden Realization about PBPs

They aren't as fast-paced as I expected them to be.

During testing, most of my games were grind games were I sat behind tokens a lot and only won because I drew my 1 copy of Token Sundae. Possible reason for this is the abundance of token-generating cards in the builds I am using.(dandylion, scapegoat, hamstrato, aerial charge)

Also, Hamstrato needs to be set first, like Armor, and I don't even like Armor. I might just drop Hamster in favor of more flexible cards.

Tether-wolf(TW) and Megaraptor(MR) are the two Planes that I'll probably test more. Black falcon(BF)'s only redeeming factor is that he is level 4. BF would've been good if he can change defense position monsters to attack position, to make him more flexible. Raystealth(RS) is not even remotely good, unless you want a Debris target, or something to set turn1.

TW is a staple. He can probably fit in Pure Machina Beat as a means to summon a turn 1 Drago-Sac. Will probably test that out. And the 2.5k power helps. MR+Aerial Charge/Dandy/Goat = profit! Aerial Charge is quite good.

There may be something wrong with my build right now, or I'm not doing something right. But right now, the only build I find consistent and powerful enough(for Asia format, at least) is Drago-Sac Turbo with a full Machina Engine (Peacekeepers and Roll Outs are the shit), and Debris Dandy PBP(not really that consistent, but FUN!!!). I might tweak the Karakuri build though, just to see if it's worth it.

If you have any suggestions for PBPs, please comment or something.

HIGH HIGH! I'M SO HIGH!!!

Here's my current Airplanes deck list. Will probably edit this with analysis and some changes when I get enough time. All I can say is, given the right hand(and by that, I mean no multiple tuners in hand), The deck can OTK with ease. Or I'm just lucky with Dnet right now, since all my wins today were with OTKs.

I'm loving Tether-Wolf + One-for-One.

This reminds me of some deck I ran before
 a certain plant got banned. Hmmmm.

Extra deck is still iffy. I just put in some good stuff I wanted to summon with these planes. I want to put in Dyson Sphere just because I can. :)))