Nekroz: Breaking Down Card Choices

This is a follow-up to the writing I produced a few days ago regarding the perfect Nekroz deck. I’ve had a few more days to fiddle around with different card choices, and unfortunately, I still haven’t found a deck list I would be comfortable playing at a higher level tournament. On Saturday, there is an OTS which I should be participating in, and I need something concrete before Saturday morning.

A fair portion of this difficulty has arisen because deck space is extremely tight. There is a significant amount of cards that are mandatory for the deck to be consistent and functional. Here is the list of cards I believe are mandatory:

3 Brionac, 3 Unicore, 2 Valkyrus, 1 Clausolas, 1 Trishula, 1 Gungnir, 3 Manju, 2 Shurit, 3 Senju, 1 Djinn Releaser, 3 Prepration of Rites, 2 Mirror, 2 Cycle, 2 Kaleidoscope

For those you don’t really feel like counting, that’s 29 cards. Essentially, 72.5% percent of the deck is mandatory. These numbers originate from any deck profiles and lists with a legitimate credential (YCS Tacoma, Regional and ARG tops). I believe 95% of all the deck lists I’ve gathered play these 29 cards consistently. Some players have added additional cards to provide extra consistency to the deck (2^nd and 3^rd Clausolas, 3^rd Shurit, 2^nd Trishula, 3^rd Valkyrus, Great Sorcerer, ROTA, etc).

That first part is the skeleton, the base that the entire deck is structured. The rest of the deck contains the cards that will either defend you, or prevent you from auto-losing the game, which is the meat. Gathered from many deck lists, here are the cards that players have chosen to include into their decks:

2-3 Effect Veiler, 2-3 Maxx C, 1 Dance Princess, 1 Raigeki, 2 Dark Hole, 1 Book of Moon,  2-3 Book of Eclipse, 3 Shared Ride, 3 MST

That`s an additional 16-19 cards, which if added to the skeleton I`ve supplied, that`s a 45-48 card deck (and that`s not include adding extra copies of skeleton cards that aren`t necessary, but are nice to have). The reason that there are so many card choices is because people have built their Nekroz deck to tailor certain match-ups in their favour.

Today, the current tier 1 decks are Nekroz, Burning Abyss and Qliphort. All of the mentioned cards above are strong against 1-2 of the three tier 1 decks, but are less effective against the other deck. I believe the guide to building the perfect deck is defining which of these cards is the most optimal, and then weeding out the less powerful and useful cards.

I’ll dedicate some time to relay each of these cards and state their strengths and weaknesses amongst the top decks, in an attempt to figure out which of these cards reign supreme.

Effect Veiler – This card is strong against Nekroz. If you can save it for a Trishula, or perhaps an extra deck monster, that would be the most useful chouce. Waisting it on a Manju or Senju might be useless because the opponent may be able to search what they need, depending on their hand. Against Burning Abyss, it’s really strong against Tour Guide, and Virgil. Against Qliphorts, this card is ineffective… On a side-note, you can use Veiler to synchro with Trishula to make a Leo, if that ever becomes relevant.

Maxx C – This card is the strongest against Burning Abyss, stopping their special summons or letting you draw a lot of cards. This card can also generate some card advantage against Nekroz, which can help draw outs to whatever they establish. Unfortunately, it cannot stop their plays, and if they can play a Trishula, it could provide permanent damage. As well, this card is almost useless against Qliphort. You can chain it to Disk’s effect, or pre-emptively activate it before they pendulum summon.

Dance Princess – This card is particularly useful against Burning Abyss and Qliphorts, as your opponent cannot active cards in response to ritual spell activations. As well, don’t forget Princess protects Nekroz ritual monsters from targeting effects. Usually, the opponent will have to waist something on the Princess so they can do something about your ritual monsters. Against Nekroz, that card along with Decisive Armor is a potential out to Djinn lock, as well as Vanity’s Fiend. The ability to unlock your rank 4 toolbox and add a banished Nekroz to you hand is useful. However, playing more than one of this card wouldn’t be useful; it’s just a one shot card, and wastes your normal summon.

Raigeki/Dark Hole – In Nekroz, these cards are an answer to the Djinn Lock, assuming the opponent doesn’t have Gungnir. Against Qliphorts, it clears their field so you can OTK. Against Burning Abyss, it provides similar behaviour. It’s also not difficult to create an Abyss Dweller first then activate one of these cards to decrease their advantage significantly. Finally, these cards are outs to Emptiness (against Qliphorts, one of their monsters need a Saqlifice on it), and other floodgate monsters (Dark Law, Vanity’s Fiend, Thunder King, etc).

Book of Moon – You could almost copy and paste my previous explanation of Raigeki and Dark hole, minus the ability to clear all monsters. Against the Djinn Lock, they need Trishula instead of Gungnir. Against Burning Abyss, this card can flip a monster down to destroy other regular Burning Abyss Monster, and can be activated on the opponent’s turn to mess them up. Against Qliphorts, this card isn’t as useful as Raigeki, but has its applications (like activating a Manju or Trishula under Skill Drain).

Book of Eclipse – This card is the ultimate answer to the Djinn Lock. Other than that, it has random uses similar to Book of Moon. As long as you don’t let the opponent draw cards, you won’t land yourself in a negative situation.

Shared Ride – Against Nekroz, this card is amazing. This will force the opponent to stop for the turn, or you’ll draw some cards. Against Qliphort, you’ll draw a card or two at most, but it could be quite helpful. If the opponent does activate Summoner’s Ar t and you chain Shared Ride, they may not search with Scout that turn. Against Burning Abyss, the most you can do is chain it to a Scarm search or Dante activation from Graveyard.

MST – This card is enticing. This card is almost useless against Nekroz, but there’s the odd time where a Nekroz player will set a card into the spell/trap zone, and maybe you can blind MST it at the End Phase. I wouldn’t place money on that happening, though. Against Qliphorts, I try to use this card on a Skill Drain or Emptiness, as opposed to a Scout. My reasoning is because I have a harder time dealing with their traps then their monsters. I would only MST the Scout if I knew it wouldn’t be better used on something else, and I was sure there would be no negative reprocussions. Against Burning Abyss, saving it for Emptiness is pretty good, or an end phase MST on a single set card can sometimes be just as good (especially if you fear Fire Lake).

Now that I’ve explained all these optional cards, I’ll sort them out in a chart to rate their effective using a scale between 0 and 2.

	Nekroz	Burning Abyss	Qliphort	Total Score
Effect Veiler vs	2	2	0	4
Maxx C vs	2	2	0	4
Dance Princess vs	1	2	2	5
Book of Moon vs	2	2	1	5
Book of Eclipse vs	2	2	1	5
Shared Ride vs	2	0	1	3
Dark Hole/Raigeki vs	1	1	2	4
MST vs	0	2	2	4

 

I believe Dance Princess, Book of Moon and Book of Eclipse are the most versatile cards, with everything else just following behind in usefulness. Since Dance Princess is a monster, and the deck should be summoning Manju and Senju the most (for the sake of consistency), Dance Princess should be played at 1. It’s also searchable via Brionac, which is useful. Book of Moon will be played at 1 and I’ll probably play Book of Eclipse at 2 (unless I can’t get another one, since I only have 1). It’s a fantastic card, but it does have its drawbacks.

Now, what about the rest of the cards? We know that floodgates will murder this deck, and building the best deck would contain answers to these floodgates. We also need cards that will make life easier in winning the game through the main condition: Inflicting 8000 damage. Raigeki should be included since it can clear Emptiness and enable OTK plays. I’ll also choose to include a single copy of Dark Hole. In all honestly, you shouldn’t need to resolve Raigeki and 2 Dark Holes in a single game. Additionally, I’ve drawn hands in testing where I drew both Dark Holes and Raigeki, or just two of those, and I lost some of those games because I didn’t have enough combo pieces, since I had those mass removal cards instead. Finally, 3 MST should probably be included to deal with troubling spells and traps. Don’t forget Emptiness and Skill Drain exists, but there are other floodgates running around in the main deck. Anti-Spell Fragrance is picking up popularity in the decks that can afford it, and you need that MST as soon as it’s activated, or you’re screwed.

It’s time to do some basic mathematics. The basic skeleton is 29 cards, and I’ve opted to add 1 Princess, 1 Book of Moon, 2 Book of Eclipse, 1 Raigeki, 1 Dark Hole and 3 MST. That’s 9 more cards, putting the total deck count to 38. I have 2 more spots to go, and these might be the hardest spots to fill! Here are the options I’ve decided to pick from:

1 Clausolas, 1 Valkyrus, 2 Effect Veiler, and 2 Maxx C

If I were to include all of these cards, that would bring me up to 44 cards, which is a negative in my books. I suppose further thinking is required to pick the final two cards.

Clausolas isn’t a bad card. It makes your deck 2% more consistent, which adds up over multiple games and matches. You’ll probably never summon it anyway, unless it’s for Djinn lock, or to push for damage.

Valkyrus is pretty good, being the archtype’s Swift Scarecrow, and provides solid draw and attack power. My biggest challenge is obtaining a 3^rd copy of this card… Every deck now has OTK potential, so Valkyrus at 3 is better than at 2.

Effect Veiler is great at negating monster effects, but sometimes, playing it at the wrong time could cost you the game. As well, it will be a dead card in your hand until it’s useful.

Maxx C is the final option. Honestly, this card shines when you are going second, and your opponent wants to special summon turn one. Even against Burning Abyss, I’ve drawn this card too late and it was no better than a Jar of Greed.

Based on the above information, I feel Clausolas and Valkyrus should be the final two cards. Out of the above options, those cards are usually never dead, whereas Effect Veiler and Maxx C can be dead, especially if I’m playing against Qliphorts. If for some reason I can’t obtain another Book of Eclipse and Valkyrus, I’ll have to decide between Effect Veiler and Maxx C.

I’ll end this discussion now. Writing this out (while I was at work) helped me sort through my own convoluted thought process, and I have a more strategic basis to building the perfect Nekroz deck. Obviously this discussion of cards can be applied to building whichever deck you wish, though keep in mind you’ll need to make the correct card choices to maximize your chances of victory. Let me know what you readers think, and thanks for reading!