It’s Round 2 of the 2018 UDS Winter Invitational! Many Duelists got to skip the first round with a BYE since they earned enough UDS Points. Now those Duelists are joining the fray, including our last UDS Invitational winner Jeff Jones! Jeff’s using a Mekk-Knight Invoked Deck today, similar to his build from YCS Atlanta last week. He’s up against TJ Cabrales, who’s using SPYRAL. SPYRAL were thought to be done for after the newest Forbidden & Limited List, but they ended up making it to the Top 4 of YCS Atlanta; clearly, they’re still a force to be reckoned with.

Duel 1

Cabrales won the dice roll and played first. He played Terraforming for Dragon Ravine. He used it to discard SPYRAL Tough and put Destrudo the Lost Dragon’s Frisson in the Graveyard. He used SPYRAL Super Agent in his hand, correctly guessing the Performage Trick Clown on top of Jones’s Deck. He Special Summoned Destrudo and Synchro Summoned Ancient Fairy Dragon, and Jones negated its effect with Effect Veiler.

Jones had a hand of another Effect Veiler, Aleister the Invoker, Mind Control, and Brilliant Fusion; he drew the Trick Clown we saw last turn. He played Brilliant Fusion, and Cabrales used Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring. He played Mind Control to take Ancient Fairy Dragon, destroying Dragon Ravine to get Magical Meltdown! He played it to get an Aleister in his hand, and Normal Summoned that to get Invocation. He used Aleister and Ancient Fairy to play Underclock Taker, then used Invocation to play Invoked Mechaba! He attacked directly with Underclock and Mechaba, and discarded Aleister to boost Mechaba! Since Cabrales had paid half his Life Points for Destrudo, Jones took the first Duel on his first turn!

Duel 2

Cabrales began this time with SPYRAL Resort, then One for One (discarding SPYRAL Tough) to Special Summon SPYRAL Quik-Fix. Quik-Fix added SPYRAL GEAR – Drone to his hand. He Normal Summoned Drone and reordered Jones’s next three cards. He used Drone and Quik-Fix to play SPYRAL Double Helix, and “guessed” Jones’s top card – Brilliant Fusion. He added SPYRAL Sleeper to his hand. Then, he discarded SPYRAL Mission – Assault to bring back Quik-Fix, and added SPYRAL GEAR – Last Resort to his hand. He used Quik-Fix and Double Helix to play Decode Talker, then Special Summoned Sleeper and equipped it with Last Resort. He Set a card in his back row. In the End Phase, SPYRAL Resort shuffled Tough back into the Deck. Cabrales had carefully placed every one of his cards in different columns to make things more difficult for Jones’s Mekk-Knights.

Jones had a hand of Mind Control, Invocation, Terraforming, and 2 Magical Meltdown. He drew Brilliant Fusion and played it, and Cabrales used Dimensional Barrier to stop the Fusion Summon. He used Meltdown to get Aleister and played that to get Invocation. He played Mind Control, targeting Decode Talker, and Cabrales let it resolve. Jones Link Summoned Saryuja Skull Dread, then played Terraforming to get his last copy of Magical Meltdown. At the end of the turn, Cabrales used Sleeper’s effect to destroy both Skull Dread and Magical Meltdown, with Sleeper surviving the effect thanks to the protection of Last Resort.

Cabrales got SPYRAL GEAR – Drone with Resort. He attacked with Drone, then Tributed it to boost the ATK of Sleeper and attacked with that too. He Set one to his back row to finish.

Jones drew Invocation. He was just getting all the cards he’d rather be adding to his hand with other cards. “If you have Barrier I’ll scoop,” Jones said. Cabrales revealed his face-down card to show that it was, in fact, Dimensional Barrier! Cabrales had evened the score!

Duel 3

Jones opted to play second in this Duel. Cabrales used SPYRAL Super Agent, guessing correctly that Jones’s next card was a monster – Aleister the Invoker. He Special Summoned Super Agent and Normal Summoned SPYRAL Quik-Fix, adding SPYRAL GEAR – Drone to his hand. He Link Summoned SPYRAL Double Helix, then discarded Drone to bring Quik-Fix back to the field and add SPYRAL GEAR – Last Resort to his hand. He played SPYRAL GEAR – Big Red to bring Drone to the field, and rearranged Jones’s next three cards. He tried using Double Helix’s effect, but Jones used Effect Veiler. Cabrales used Quik-Fix and Drone to play Sylvan Princessprite, and its effect detached Quik-Fix and put an Effect Veiler in Cabrales’s Graveyard. He discarded SPYRAL Tough to bring Quik-Fix back once again, adding Big Red to his hand. He played Monster Reborn to get Tough to the field, and used all his monsters to play Saryuja Skull Dread – Jones used another Effect Veiler to negate that too!

Jones started with Pot of Desires, Gameciel, the Sea Turtle Kaiju, and Aleister the Invoker, and drew Ghost Ogre & Snow Rabbit for his turn. He played Pot of Desires to draw Invocation and another Pot of Desires. He Normal Summoned Aleister, but he had banished all his spare copies of Invocation. He still had the one in his hand, however – he played it and fused Aleister with Cabrales’s Effect Veiler to play Invoked Mechaba, and used Invocation’s effect in the Graveyard. He Tributed Skull Dread to Special Summon Gameciel to his opponent’s side of the field. Mechaba attacked and destroyed Gameciel.

Cabrales banished Drone, along with Big Red, to get Tough back to his hand. Jones thought a long while, but chose not to use Mechaba’s effect. Cabrales used Super Agent in his hand, guessing Monster Card, but it was Invocation. Cabrales Normal Summoned Tough and used its effect this time, but Mechaba negated it by discarding Aleister. Cabrales used Big Red to get back Double Helix, and equipped it with Last Resort! He used its effect, guessing Spell Card correctly this time, and Special Summoned SPYRAL Master Plan! He added SPYRAL MISSION – Rescue to his hand. Cabrales used all of his cards on the field to play Decode Talker, and Master Plan’s effect put Sleeper and SPYRAL Resort in his hand. He activated Resort, and Jones destroyed it with Ghost Ogre & Snow Rabbit. Cabrales Special Summoned Sleeper. Sleeper destroyed Mechaba in battle, then Decode Talker attacked directly. Cabrales Set one card in his back row.

Jones had only Pot of Desires and the Invocation he just drew. He played Desires, drawing another Desires and Mekk-Knight Purple Nightfall. Cabrales flipped Rescue to get Last Resort back in his hand. Jones played Invocation, fusing Aleister with Princessprite for another Mechaba. He used Invocation in the Graveyard, Cabrales responded with Sleeper, and Mechaba negated and banished Sleeper! Jones discarded Purple Nightfall for the cost. Now with Aleister in hand, he Normal Summoned it to get Invocation back again. Jones thought a while, and had Mechaba simply attack Decode Talker. Aleister attacked directly.

Cabrales used Rescue to get Super Agent back to his hand. He guessed monster with its effect, but Jones had Brilliant Fusion on top of his Deck. He Normal Summoned Super Agent and equipped it with Last Resort, destroying Aleister in battle.

Jones drew Brilliant Fusion. He played Invocation first, fusing Aleister with Mechaba for Invoked Elysium! He used the effect of Invocation to get Aleister back to his hand. Elysium attacked Super Agent, which survived the battle thanks to Last Resort. Cabrales used Rescue to put Double Helix back in his Extra Deck.

Cabrales guessed monster for Super Agent, this time correctly – Jones had Mekk-Knight Blue Sky on top. He Special Summoned it and Link Summoned Double Helix, then used Rescue to get Last Resort back. He equipped it to Double Helix, then used Double Helix to Special Summon Tough. Tough’s effect activated, and Jones had Elysium banish itself to banish all of Cabrales’s monsters! Before Cabrales could end his turn, the round timer ended. Cabrales was leading in Life Points, 5200 to 4000. SPYRAL MISSION – Rescue was destroyed in the End Phase.

Jones drew Mekk-Knight Blue Sky. He played Aleister, and Cabrales had Effect Veiler. He played Brilliant Fusion, and Cabrales had Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring! Jones had no move but to attack with Aleister. He couldn’t use his third Pot of Desires with so few cards in his Deck.

Cabrales used Rescue’s effect in the Graveyard and brought back Super Agent. He Normal Summoned Supreme King Dragon Darkwurm, and attacked with both monsters, dropping Jones to 1300 Life Points. In Main Phase 2 he Xyz Summoned Number 41: Bagooska the Terribly Tired Tapir in Defense Position.

Jones drew Invocation, and played it to banish Aleister and Cabrales’s Ash Blossom for Invoked Purgatrio. Jones put Invocation back in his Deck to get Aleister back. Bagooska and Brilliant Fusion were in the same column, so Jones Special Summoned Blue Sky. He Link Summoned Decode Talker, and destroyed Bagooska in battle!

Cabrales Special Summoned Darkwurm in Defense Position and Set a back row card.

Jones drew Invocation yet again. He activated it, but Cabrales had Dimensional Barrier! Jones had no way to deal enough damage  to get ahead – Cabrales wins the Duel and the Match!