I’m not going to go
into great detail with this tournament report, because there’s no need. The
short story: I went undefeated (only losing 1 game in the process because I
bricked in the mirror match) until the last two rounds of the tournament. During
those rounds, 1 played 3 Nekroz, 1 Hero, 1 Traptrix Volcanic, and 1 Yosenju (in
that order). I lost 2-1 to Qliphorts because I didn’t have answers for the
floodgates game 1 and game 3, I destroyed the wrong set card with Decisive
Armor and Trishula. That final turn, he had 3 set cards, and I could OTK him
with my play. I used Trishula to hit one set card, Decisive Armor hit the
second card, then I attacked and lost to Mirror Force… Then I lost 2-1 to
Nekroz because of Djinn lock game 1, and I made a misplay game 3. I wanted to
save my resources game 3 because I only had one play, since my hand was weak. I
decided to hold off because he kept going and I wouldn’t be able to do anything
because he had Valkyrus. Sure enough, I lost because I never drew anything to
make my play more solid. Drawing multiple ritual spells with only two
possibilities to ritual summon is no good.
Over the course of the
weekend, I only completely bricked once, and semi-bricked another time. Here is
the list I used:
3 Brionac, 3 Unicore,
2 Valkryus, 2 Clausolas, 1 Gungnir, 1 Trishula,1 Decisive Armor, 3 Manju, 2
Senju, 2 Shurit, 1 Djinn
3 Upstart Goblin, 3
MST, 3 Preparation of Rites, 2 Mirror, 2 Kaleidoscope, 2 Cycle, 1 Book of
Eclipse, 1 Book of Moon, 1 Raigeki, 1 Dark Hole
2 Herald of Arc Light,
1 Leo, 1 Star Eater, 1 Dragon Master Knight, 1 Exciton Knight, 1 Lavalval
Chain, 1 Daigusto Emeral, 1 Rhapsody in Berserk, 1 Castel, 1 Ragnazero, 1 Abyss
Dweller, 1 Cairngorgan, 1 Cowboy, 1 Diamond Dire Wolf
Side: 2 Maxx C, 2
Kycoo, 1 Valkyrus, 1 Dance Princess, 3 Twister, 1 Shared Ride, 1 Book of
Eclipse, 2 Decree, 2 Emptiness
I enjoyed this list
very much on Saturday. I never wished anything was different about it. I did
some playtesting on Sunday and my opinion changed. I played 2 matches against a
Traptrix Volcanic deck (I just made), and 2 matches against Nekroz. I lost 3 of
those 4 matches with the deck, and bricked 4 times. I wasn’t able to play the
game until I drew something and at that point, it was too late or not strong
enough.
Also on Sunday,
another ARGCS passed by and Ben Leverett (one of the Hoban teammates) won the
event with a unique Nekroz deck. Basically, Armageddon Knight engine instead of
Senjus, and 3 ROTA to search the Knights, Shurits, or Clausolas. Armageddon
Knight is in there to dump a Farfa to escape the Djinn lock, or dump a Shaddoll
Dragon to get out of Emptiness. As well, it can dump the Djinn so you don’t
need to make Lavalval Chain to access the card. It is quite clever, and
consistency isn’t even hurt that much due to the ROTAs and main-decked Shared
Rides. Forbidden Lances are still in the deck as well.
This could become the
newest way to play the deck. My only concern would be drawing the Farfa and
Dragon, since they become almost unusable if Djinn Lock or Emptiness is already
active. As well, Armageddon Knight vs Skill Drain is a downhill fight, unless
you have Lance or a Book. Inevitably, I’ll try out this variant of the deck and
tweak it to my liking. If it turns out that this variant of the deck is
amazing, then I’ll have to play this variant. I only plan on building and playing
what I consider to be the best deck, and having the correct build is part of
it.
Exploiting more of
this list’s choices, there is no MST in the main deck to deal with floodgates,
and no spell/traps to directly deal with the Djinn lock. Essentially, the Armageddon
Knight play has to go through, or the game is lost. I’m not really sure how I
feel about this. In all reality, I drew MST a lot this weekend, but I feel I
drew it the most against the mirror match. Going into the regionals, if I knew
half my matchups were against Nekroz, I would have main decked 1 or 2 less MST.
Against the Qliphort player on the weekend, I lost specifically because I
didn’t have MST during game 1. In retrospect, Armageddon Knight for a Shaddoll
Dragon would’ve been nice, since I wasn’t dealing with Skill Drain. I also had
the Book of Eclipse in that game, so even if Skill Drain was active, the dump
would’ve worked through. Going back to the winning decklist, there were no
Books; only Lances. In the above example from the Regional, Lance wouldn’t have
been necessary, since the Book would’ve accomplished the same thing.
Discussing MST again,
I really don’t like this card. I could write a whole post about this card, but
I’ll just provide my basic opinion. It only handles one threat, unless
Emptiness is face-up, and the card only gets full value against the Qliphort
matchup. I’d rather have something else that advances a combo or something more
powerful, like Cold Wave. Right now, we have Denko Sekka, which is the closest
thing to Cold Wave. It’s useful in all matchups, and can sometimes put in work
against Nekroz (if the opponent actually sets a spell/trap, then they are in
Trishula range). Denko is a card I’ve always considered, but never made it past
the “rough draft stage”. Unfortunately, it wastes the normal summon of the
turn, and if I had a Manju or Senju, I’d rather normal summon that. However,
I’m disliking MST more and more, and I’m trying to find an alternative, since I
don’t want to lose to floodgates. The Armageddon Knight engine might be the
answer, but I’ll have to test it first.
There are a few other
cards that I want to discuss before I conclude this post. One of these cards is
Nekroz of Decisive Armor. Originally, I had removed it from the deck. My
reasoning for that is because it is technically a win-more card. If you have
this card, and you are winning, it won’t do too much extra for you. Really, I
only summoned it three times during the Regional. Once was to make a
super-powerful Djinn lock, with Gungnir and Trishula in hand to protect it, the
other times were to try and destroy traps. The only other time I felt like this
card would be useful is using it with Dance Princess to beat over the Djinn
Lock (assuming they don’t use a monster that’s Trishula or stronger). The problem
with this combo is that you’ll likely need to invest Brionac searches just to
do it, and this combo loses to Valkyrus, Gungnir, opposing Decisive Armor, and
Book of Moon. I don’t main the Dance Princess anymore, so that combo is not an
option. The only reason I re-included it into the deck is because one of my
teammates told me I should. I had him play Nekroz against me when I was testing
Qliphorts, and he felt the need to use Decisive Armor a lot. However, we
swapped decks later that day and I never wanted to make it. I played it at the
Regional and barely used it.
Book of Eclipse is
another card I want to discuss. I played only one copy during the Regionals,
and I enjoyed it at a single copy. I sided in the second copy for the mirror
match. However, if I knew half my matches would be against Nekroz, I would’ve
mained the second copy. It’s good at using Manju and Senju under Skill Drain,
as well as other monster effects. I really enjoyed Book of Moon as well, and
then Raigeki and Dark Hole were okay. Book of Moon I liked in particular since
it`s another way to dodge a Valkyrus, besides Gungnir. Book of Eclipse just
happens to be the only out to the Djinn lock that’s guaranteed to work, unless
more people start playing Forbidden Lance.
Finally, I want to
discuss Upstart Goblin in the Nekroz deck. Of course, this is a combo deck, and
you have more chances in drawing your combo pieces if your deck is smaller. As
well, I didn’t realize how those extra life points affected the game state. If
the opponent has more life points in the mirror match, the opponent will be
less tempted to drop Valkyrus if you are hitting for a good chunk of damage. If
that`s the case, I can probably establish a good enough board where I can
escape Valkyrus with Gungnir and Book of Moon, then proceed to win. This card
really annoys me against Qliphorts, but even then it`s not the end of the
world. Game 2 against Qliphorts, or whenever I`m about to go into time, I`ll
side out the Goblins.
And this will conclude
another deck discussion post about Nekroz. Eventually, I`ll discover that
winning combination of 40 cards that will work for me. The ARG event on the weekend
gave me a few more toys to consider, which is always nice. As always, leave any
comments if you wish, and thanks for reading!
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