[JCG] Set Check: Blazing Perdition! (part 1)

[JCG] Set Check: Blazing Perdition! (part 1)

  Tuesday, August 05, 2014    byak

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Welcome to another edition of Set Check! Booster Set 17: Blazing Perdition is set to come out this Friday in Japan, and it brings a wave of new decks to challenge the current metagame! Want to know what these decks are and how they work? Read more to find out!

Blazing Perdition brings a combination of new and old support in its 102 card set. It brings new competition to the table, such as Kagero's new Perdition deck, while powering old decks up with the new Legion mechanic!

Star-vaders and Liberators were recently revived into the era of Legion with their new Trial Decks, featuring Star-vader, Garnet Star Dragon and Bluish Flame Liberator, Percival. These were particularly strong, compared to other Trial Deck bosses, and they were only supported by the rest of the new units for their decks.

Liberators Erupt from the Blue Flames!

The first card on the list for Blazing Perdition, along with first unit to create a deck revolving around it, is none other than Bluish Flame Liberator, Prominence Core! It shares a mate with Percival by using the already powerful Liberator of Oaths, Algovale, which reduces the amount of grade 2's you're required to use in your deck if you manage to include both Legions. Once per turn, you can use Prominence Core's skill to counterblast one and retire one of your rear-guards. If you do, you can check the top four cards of your deck and call a Liberator among them. Additionally, if Prominence Core is in Legion and you manage to call another copy of himself or Algovale (through his own skill or any other skill that calls from the deck), Prominence Core gains +3000 power and a critical for a turn.

The odd tone that Prominence Core comes with is that he resembles the prominent Musketeer strategy quite heavily. If you were to compare Prominence Core to Licorice Musketeer, Vera in a vacuum, where no other cards are considered, most would agree that Vera is even the stronger card due to cheaper investments. However, this is far from the case. Despite Prominence Core appearing to be quite the boring unit, it's in fact one of the strongest of this set.

The advantage that Prominence Core has over Vera is the huge pool of powerful units that Liberators have gained over the course of season 3 and this set. Reaching Algovale off of Prominence Core's skill probably gives you the most value, since you can use Algovale's skill to grab another card from your deck while giving Prominence Core an extra critical for a turn (not to mention, he already hits really hard with the 20000 base from Legion). If you throw in units like May Rain Liberator, Bruno, Physical Force Liberator, Zorron, and Fast Chase Liberator, Josephus, your deck suddenly becomes a consistent advantage engine, triggered off of the one for one skill of Prominence Core.

Prominence Core also gains allies in the form of Liberator, Lawful Trumpeter, Catchgal Liberator, and Corongal Liberator. Lawful Trumpeter adds more cost-less advantage to the Liberator formula by calling a Liberator among the top 3 cards of your deck when you Legion and Catchgal Liberator is a clone of Zorron in the form of a stand trigger, allowing you to find the units you want much easier. Additionally, Corongal Liberator is a clone of May Rain Liberator, Bruno in the form of a starting vanguard (if your vanguard is in Legion). This gives you a high power booster from the start, and you don't even have to draw into it. This onslaught of additions actually makes it difficult to find the ideal Liberator list, because you have a large amount of options to choose from.

One factor becomes prominent with this addition, however, which is the idea of creating a stack with Liberators, similarly to the old Goddess of the Full Moon, Tsukuyomi strategy from season one. When Prominence Core and Algovale call off the top of the deck, the cards you check go to the bottom instead of being shuffled in. Lawful Trumpeter, Zorron, and Catchgal have the same clause, giving you a decent cards that allow you to play a stack Liberator deck. The only problem is that you'd only really be able to use Legion once or twice when adapting to this strategy, as Legion ends up shuffling your deck and ruining your strategy. However, reaching Prominence Core as early as possible makes the stack dream quite possible.

In addition to Prominence Core, Autumn Rain Liberator, Coil takes up another RRR slot in the set. His mate is Evening Rain Liberator, Trahern, who has the ability to give two other units +3000 power when he's called from the top of the deck, making him a good target for your massive amounts of calling skills.

Coil actually functions similarly to Twin Blade Liberator, Margaux, who would, at the cost of two counterblasts and shuffling a unit to the bottom of the deck, call two units off the top of your deck and give them +5000 power as its Limit Break. In Coil's case, you still have to counterblast twice, but instead of shuffling a unit back you have to discard either a copy of himself or a Trahern from your hand. On the upside, you get to choose from among the top four cards of your deck, instead of the top two. He also works with any units, allowing you to play him in hybrid clan decks or just non-Liberator Gold Paladin decks. Is he worth playing over another Legion like Percival? I doubt it. But at the very least, he does come with a more generic payoff.

In addition to these new Gold Paladins, Liberators gain another Perfect Guard for the sake of having one in print, due to Booster Set 10 being basically out of print at this point. There are a couple more units that benefit from Gold Paladin's style of recruitment, but aren't worth mentioning, as well as the new clones that were established in Booster Set 16. With these aside, it's definitely worth looking out for this deck in the upcoming weeks, as I believe it definitely has the consistency to start taking tournaments.

Perdition Dragons Burn Down Everything in Their Path!

Next on our list are the infamous Kagero! They've seemed to move on from Dauntless Drive, Dragonic Overlord, and Nouvelle Vague to give them a fresh start with a new deck, Perdition! While Perdition comes with the common Kagero theme of field control, they do it in a unique fashion, as they balance their retiring among the front and back rows while also focusing on whole columns, making it a bit more difficult to retire exactly what you want while being able to utilize it with more efficiency.

Perdition Dragon, Pain Laser Dragon and its mate, Perdition Dragon, Menace Laser Dragon are good examples of this. When you Legion with the two, Pain Laser Dragon lets you counterblast one to retire a rear-guard and another rear-guard in the same column as it. Additionally, when you call Menace Laser Dragon as a rear-guard, you can counterblast one to retire an opponent's rear-guard in the same column as itself, making it cheaper than the veteran Berserk Dragon.

These two already offer solid board control in the form of cycling through Legion, but they don't really offer enough, as most decks can do a lot more while only using Legion once.

And this is where I bring up the cover card of Blazing Perdition: Perdition Dragon, Vortex Dragonewt! His design strongly resembles Vortex Dragon, one of the oldest cards in Vanguard, dating all the way back to Booster Set 1. I suppose it's safe to say that his kind have come a long way, and Vortex Dragonewt hits even harder than his predecessor! When Vortex Dragonewt is in Legion with his mate, Perdition Dragon, Whirlwind Dragon, you can counterblast two and discard a copy of himself or Whirlwind Dragon to activate his anime signature "Trinity Crimson Flame!" The first strike retires a grade 2 or lower rear-guard, the second strike does the same, but the third strike is targeted at your opponent's vanguard, dealing a damage if they're at four damage or less and nullifies any trigger effects!

The Trinity Crimson Flame is one of the more flashier skills of this set, and it's good enough reason for Dragonewt to have the hype it has now. However, it might not be that good upon the first reading of the card. From a card advantage point of view, you're discarding one in six different cards in your deck to use Dragonewt's skill and retire two units. You also deal damage, but this has fluctuating value if you attempt to translate it into card advantage. So basically, it's a one for two that also costs two counterblasts. The damage here needs to be relevant or else the Trinity Crimson Flame falls short.

Obviously, the more damage your opponent has increases the value behind Dragonewt's skill. If you're ramping your opponent from four to five damage, for example, they're now attempting to block every single attack you throw at them. On the other hand, if you're ramping them from one to two damage, it doesn't create any more pressure in the battle phase, as it's still an option to let attacks go through. Basically, you have to play Dragonewt intelligently to get the most value out of it.

If you're convinced that these bosses soak up counterblasts a bit too much, think again! Bushiroad has you covered with Perdition Battler, Mareiko a unique grade 1 that effectively converts counterblasts to soul blasts! When you retire a unit in your main phase that happens to be in the same column as Mareiko, you can soul blast one to un-flip a damage. Using Dragonewt to retire two rear-guards in the same column as Mareiko would effectively make it cost no counterblasts at all, since you can soul blast twice after the skill resolves. Using Mareiko with Pain Laser Dragon would turn a single counterblast into two un-flipped damage, in the case where you spent your counterblast on something else.

Having Mareiko on both sides of the board makes surviving the flame of Perdition Dragons that much more annoying, since they can attempt to play around a single copy by placing their high value units on the other column. This makes it even more necessary to max out on copies of Mareiko. Unfortunately, this sacrifices the potential of including Calamity Tower Wyverns for consistency, but it's worth the trade-off, as Mareiko makes your skills pseudo cost-less.

Despite this being their initial package of support, Perditions strike the battlefield with fierce intensity, creating artificial damage while having many tricks up their sleeves to empty your board. Dragonewt offers a lot in a single card package (or double card package if you count Whirlwind Dragon), but you also have access to a lot of useful cards. In addition, the deck's open to the rest of Kagero's support, creating a lot of options if you're willing to pick up Perdition Dragons.

Star-vaders Return to Lock the Competition!

Last but not least for our first part of Blazing Perdition's Set Check are the notorious Link Joker! Like Liberators, Star-vaders were given a Legion Trial Deck to adjust themselves the new Legion era. The cover card of their Trial Deck, Star-vader, Garnet Star Dragon came built in with Infinite Zero Dragon's skill when you Legion, allowing you to lock both a front row and back row rear-guard without any form of cost, which is insanely powerful due to its cost effectiveness. His mate, Companion Star Star-vader, Photon adds insult to injury with even more efficient locking. When you call Photon to the field while your opponent has a locked unit, you can lock any other rear-guard, turning Garnet Star and Photon into a triangle lock really quickly. Photon doesn't require you to have a Legion either, making him a lot more flexible and usable in a wide variety of Star-vader decks.

But if you thought that was the extend of Star-vader's new found power, you'd be wrong! Star-vaders get a grand total of three new Legions in Blazing Perdition, and all three of them have the potential to be used in their strongest decks. First off is Ionization Star-vader, Hafnium, the technical replacement for Star-vader, Nebula Lord Dragon. His mate is Unrivaled Star-vader, Radon, meaning that by playing a power attacker gives you a usable mate for Hafnium. Hafnium can counterblast two to lock a unit in your opponent's back row, which would appear very unattractive when compared to all of the "free" locking that Star-vaders have picked up recently. However, it makes up for its Legion skill. When Hafnium attacks while in Legion, you can target rear-guards you control equal to the amount of locked cards on your opponent's side of the field, and they all gain +5000 power for the turn.

Under the average triangle lock, you can stack +10000 power on one side of the board and +5000 on the other, which might be less than Nebula Lord's blanket +9000 to the whole front row, but you also need to consider the fact that your vanguard attacks with a 20000 base due to Legion. Hafnium would turn your 16000 column into a 26000 column, which is better than Nebula Lord's bonus, which would make it 25000 and 1000 off from forcing out an extra card.

There are many units that can work with Hafnium, including past Break Rides such as Star-vader, Infinite Zero Dragon and Setting Sun Star-vader, Darmstadtium. You might need the Break Rides too, because Hafnium has a hard time locking units on its own. However, new Legion support would suggest otherwise, but let's finishing going over the other bosses first.

Next on our list is Star-vader, Imaginary Plane Dragon. If Imaginary Plane Dragon is in Legion, you can counterblast two to lock units up to the amount of Star-vaders in your center column, which includes your mate, Flash Gun Star-vader, Osmium, and whatever your booster you might have at the time. What this basically says is that you can counterblast two to lock three units, allowing you an easy route to triangle locking, making this unit quite the powerful package.

In addition to Imaginary Plane Dragon's ability to mass lock, he also creates synergy with some older Link Joker units. Demon Claw Star-vader, Lanthanum and Furious Claw Star-vader, Niobium both gain +2000 whenever you lock a unit, so they'd jump from 7000 and 9000 power to 13000 power and 15000 power respectively with Imaginary Plane Dragon, creating a huge gap in power between your field and your opponent's!

The only downside to Imaginary Plane Dragon is his cost. While it's not steep, there are a lot of other Link Joker units trying to grab those counterblasts as well, making it a hindrance to use his skill more than once per game. Additionally, Link Joker don't have anything practical in terms of damage un-flipping, so you can't create a cycle of spamming Imaginary Plane Dragon over the course of several turns, chopping away at its effectiveness.

However, Imaginary Plane Dragon's mate, Osmium, is good enough to be considered staple in almost every Link Joker deck. Osmium comes with the average 9000 power for a grade 2, but with a really valuable ability. If he manages to land a hit on your opponent's vanguard, you can extend a rear-guard's lock for an additional turn, preventing your opponent from unlocking it after their next turn!

Osmium works like Prison Gate Star-vader, Palladium, but instead of waiting to kick in, Osmium creates pressure instantly. There are pro's and con's to both types of units, but Osmium would appear to be a lot more powerful because of how cheap it is to use. It should theoretically force out guard on every attack, clearing away guard for your damage pressure units to make an impact, and even if its skill doesn't come into play, you get value from it in two different ways. Not only do you take away cards from your opponent's hand, but Osmium also attracts attention from attacks and skills. Keep in mind, Star-vaders also have a grade 1 variation of Osmium in the form of Star-vader, Bolt Line, giving you twice the amount of pressure!

One thing that I've concluded from the new Star-vaders is that the pair of Osmium and Bolt Line, along with the pair of Lanthanum and Niobium construct an excellent core with Imaginary Plane Dragon. The idea is that you take one of each and devote them to a column once you've set up Imaginary Plane Dragon. Once you have, you can send out a triangle lock and create a 22000 column for the turn, complete with the built in pressure of extending your opponent's lock. Bolt Line also works very well behind your vanguard, since it'll be equipped with its 23000 attacking base and hard to guard. If you can utilize another source to consistently lock with, you can also replace Imaginary Plane Dragon with Hafnium to push your columns through the roof! With all of these factors combined, Link Joker becomes a headache-inducing deck that's hard to beat, since it throws massive field control and advantage pressure in a wicked combination.

But that's not all that Link Joker got! Their final boss of Blazing Perdition is Star-vader, Dark Zodiac. Dark Zodiac has a Persona Blast sort of skill similar to Coil where, if you discard a card from your hand with the same name as a unit on your vanguard circle (Meaning itself or its mate if it's in Legion), you can activate it. If you do, you can lock a front and back row rear-guard of your choice. Dark Zodiac follows the approach of cost effective locking by looking at other resources besides counterblasting, and as a result it's a fairly manageable system to work with. Granted, if you don't see other copies of Dark Zodiac or his mate, Star-vader Astro Reaper, you won't be benefiting much from Dark Zodiac. However, you should be able to see at least one once per match.

Dark Zodiac's viability stems from its other skill, which activates when you Legion with Astro Reaper. By counterblasting one, you extend all of your opponent's locks for an extra turn, which much like Star-vader, "Omega" Glendios' terrifying Limit Break. It's much easier to build a deck around Dark Zodiac, however, and it's a lot more cost efficient to reach his skill. The only downside to using Dark Zodiac is that you can only get this skill once per copy that you ride, as the skill only comes into play when you Legion. It's still nothing to scoff at though, because he can already lock two units with his own skill. Throw in a Photon and you've got a really easy triangle lock for two turns (applying Dark Zodiac's lock extension counts all other instances of locking after it resolves).

Astro Reaper, oddly enough, doesn't really have anything to do with locking units, despite being Dark Zodiac's mate. If Astro Reaper hits a vanguard, you can soul blast a card to check the top five cards of your deck and add a card from those that has the same name as a unit on your vanguard circle. You can call him as a rear and use him to search for a card to discard with Dark Zodiac, but the paradox is that you could've discarded Astro Reaper for Dark Zodiac's locking skill without having to gamble for another piece. Despite having at max five cards you'd want to see, it's still not likely to succeed with Astro Reaper's skill, making him more useful to be stored in the hand for Dark Zodiac's locking skill.

It's not as easy to synergize Dark Zodiac with other Link Joker support, since it does a bit of everything. In my opinion, the best units to use with Dark Zodiac would be Photon and Star-vader, Colony Maker. Colony Maker becomes really useful, especially with Dark Zodiac's low costs, to fill your field of potentially useful units.

In addition to all of these new powerful bosses, Link Joker get a step up from the original locking starter, Star-vader, Dust Tail Unicorn. Star-vader, Robin Knight operates very similarly to it, where it can counterblast and send itself into the soul while your opponent has a locked unit, but instead of locking one more rear-guard, you can lock two, given that your opponent is in Legion. If you don't need grade 3 tutoring from Black Ring Chain, Pleiades, Robin Knight is probably going to be your go-to starting vanguard. Being able to lock 2 is nothing to scoff at, especially for a rear-guard.

In other news, Link Joker got the same clones that other decks got, as well as a stand trigger that has the same skill as Palladium. They also got their first Quintet Wall, giving players the option to include in their builds. The biggest impacts for the deck however come from their new Legions and mates, as well as from Robin Knight, setting the deck up to be one of the big contenders in the metagame. Again.

With that being said, this concludes the first part of our Set Check for Blazing Perdition! Expect the second part to come out in the near future, which covers the smaller hits from the set, including Narukami, Aqua Force, Granblue, and Tachikaze. Also stay tuned for the last few of our deck checks for Booster Set 14, for decks such as Ezel and Dauntless Dominate Dragon! But for now, thanks for reading.