Hello! This is the final in my triad of articles to help you prepare for the upcoming Genesys WCQs. You can find the first article on flexible cards here, and the second on board breakers here. This last one will be taking a bit more of a pessimistic route; These are the cards that create non-games, and how to best avoid them from cancelling your ability to play an actual duel of Genesys post-side.
This card is the absolute boogeyman that haunts not only my nightmares, but my side of the field on my opponent’s turn. Artifact Mjollnir(0) has no cost, unlike his partner in crime Gimmick Puppet Nightmare(70). With Constellarknights picking up as a deck, and their starters Constellar Castor(6) and Tellarknight Cygnian(6) both picking up points, the deck’s pilots are shying off using Number 86: Heroic Champion – Rhongomyniad(68) and instead opting for this free pseudo-FTK.
The grossest thing about it? The Tellarknight deck only gives up one interaction to make this, they get to set up everything else as normal. So while stopping Mjollnir coming down can be quite trivial, through cards like Ghost Ogre & Snow Rabbit(4) on Cygnian’s effect to increase level(this stops access to Imperial Princess Quinquery(0)) or D.D. Crow(1) on Mjollnir to stop it coming out of the GY, it’s merely a stopgap for the deck setting up a pretty tough endboard, and you’ll be going into it one card down. Failing to stop it costs you the entire game, though, which is the general theme of all the cards on this list. If they resolve, you lose.
Another top deck in the format is HERO. Not only was Elemental HERO Stratos(0) freed of his 3 point chains in the March update, Miracle Ejector(5) has come along and promised the entire world to every HERO player. It being an e-HERO gives it some crazy synergies with existing HERO cards that would have always been so good if they had something as good as ejector to search or summon. Now that they do, we know what they’re doing with all that insane consistency; Elemental HERO Cosmo Neos(21). Even though it was recognised by the Genesys team in their June points update, they’ve still chosen to let it stick around at a pretty low cost for a total turnskip you cant respond to.
The issue with dealing with the HERO deck going first is they have a massive amount of redundant cards; they all go into a card that searches a card that searches a card. That wouldn’t be so bad; like with Tistina, if you stop the actual relevant card from getting to their hand or resolving its effect at the end of the conga line, it’s okay. The relevant card for HERO being Favorite Contact(0). Unfortunately, there are actually three separate ways to search it! Ghost Belle & Haunted Mansion(6) is the de-facto easiest way to stop Contact resolving; It negates because contact can shuffle things from GY or banished into deck, but the deck is able to weave in access to Neo-Spacian Aqua Dolphin(0), who actually has a good effect in the modern age; he gets to see your hand and eat that ghost belle right up. Should you have an Effect Veiler(8) to even stop dolphin, the HERO combo can still easily include a search for Masked HERO Dusk Crow(0), who pairs with Masked HERO Furnace(0) to make Contrast HERO Chaos(0), a targeted omni negate. If they’ve had another way to fuse two heroes, they can search Miracle Fusion(0) with Elemental HERO Sunrise(0) and make a second Chaos, sporting an endboard of two Omni negates through your interruptions to stop Cosmo.
This is the deck’s entire gameplan, which means you must expect it game one, before you’ve even prepped for it with siding. Decks like this make strategies wanting to use cheaper breakers and go second a lot harder to utilise. It’s super engine heavy too, so the “right” places to hand trap may not always be correct, because there’s a high chance your opponent either has an extende that gets into the next step of the combo, or has that next step anyway in hand. My plan for HERO is that there are no competent HERO players at the EUWCQ, or they lose the die roll too often before they face me. Though, with my usual event trends, I will pair against HERO round one. Wish me luck on my die roll...
Synchro decks have taken a bit of a backseat in the build-up to the Genesys WCQ. Synchro endboards are strong, but their reliance on using a tuner to get to a summon can make them struggle to push into boards. Kewl Tune’s heavy pointing really made it hard to succeed with the strategy, as well. Elfnote can make strong boards, but they’re not great at using their engine to go second. Still, Clown Crew has Clown Crew Meteor(0), usually cheated out with Clown Crew Malabarisme(10), to suit its needs as a raw synchro monster to send to activate Gravity Collapse(0).
It’s also possible for Resonator RDA to play collapse as well; the deck doesn’t need it when you consider its powerful endboard, but when it has to play into fuwa? It’d really like a card that lets them win with just one synchro summon before they start playing next turn.
This card is brutal, and the outplay potential for it is lacking. A lot of decks in genesys need an inherent summon to function, and that’s not necessarily a normal summon. Getting that negated and then not being able to summon in any way for the rest of the turn? Black Horn of Heaven(0) is fine. Black Horn of heaven, then Summon Limit(100), is not. In a format where backrow removal is sparse, especially backrow removal independent of using your engine, Gravity Collapse is a killer post-side. If your opponent ends their turn with sets and a synchro, try to err on a normal summon until you’re completely safe. You don’t want to lose your turn because they drew a card with 100 too few points on it.
On the surface, Number F0: Utopic Future Zexal(5) is a fine card, and appropriately costed. He’s not as inherently powerful as Number F0: Utopic Draco Future(25), who has a monster negate attached to him, but he’s powerful in his own ways, through things like natural internal protection, and targeting protection for the rest of your board. That second part comes in especially strong with cards like Mask of Restrict(0).
If your opponent’s deck relies on any major mechanic, and you specifically don’t want them to do that, you’re siding one of many unpointed floodgate cards: Non-Fusion Area(0), Mask of Restrict, Imperial Iron Wall(0), or maybe a simple and humble Mimighoul Dungeon(5) is on your side of the field. Being able to block common forms of targeted backrow removal post-side makes this card extremely strong. It makes it a magnet for Kaiju monsters, too, but now you’re demanding your opponent see two side cards to even begin playing, instead of just one to clear a backrow floodgate.
For that last one, you might be asking “so what?”. And you might be right; even when trying to mention the most non-game cards in Genesys, it’s hard to dig much farther than a handful of problematic strategies. There are about this many actual FTKs in Advanced right now that are topping events, and the fourth worst thing to expect in Genesys is UFZ and Mimighoul Dungeon holding hands. That’s honestly not so bad as I felt it would be when I was putting this series together!
Still, you should be recognising that Mjollnir and Cosmo Neos are going to be a major part of two top strategies’ post-side gameplan. You should either be equipped to stop these from coming down when they start, or ready to pass on a couple backrow and play on the opponent’s next turn.
So, this was a definite downer to finish writing on, but it’s just as important as the last two posts; you need to know how people are going to be exploiting the expected deckbuilding of other players influenced by the point difference between hand traps and breaker cards; breaker cards are all much cheaper; one copy of Ghost Belle is worth as much as a playset of Dark Ruler No More(2). Board breakers don’t do anything to Cosmo Neos or Mjollnir though, so when you’re finalising your deck in the next few days, keep these cards in mind.
Finally, thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed all three of the articles I’ve written in the lead up to the WCQ, and if you missed any, do make sure to check them out! All that’s left for me to say is; I wish you the best of luck at the WCQ!
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