I’ve always been a HUGE fan of Gladiator Beasts. That’s why I was pretty happy when I heard that there would be at least one new Gladiator Beast in Primal Origin. But can you imagine how thrilled I was when I found out that, not only would there in fact be two Gladiator Beasts in Primal Origin, but one of them is a Fusion monster that will find a place in nearly every competitive Gladiator Beast Extra Deck!?

Gladiator Beast Nerokius is the latest easy-to-Summon Gladiator Beast Fusion Monster. Like every Gladiator Beast Fusion Monster before it, you don’t use Polymerization to Summon Nerokius. Instead, you just shuffle some of your on-field Gladiator Beasts back into your Deck to Special Summon it from your Extra Deck.

Once Summoned, Gladiator Beast Nerokius has an impressive 2800 ATK and can’t be destroyed in battle. That means it can take down nearly any monster in battle, and the monsters that it doesn’t have enough ATK to destroy are equally unable to destroy Nerokius. Perhaps even more importantly, since Gladiator Beast Nerokius can’t be destroyed in battle, you can Special Summon it in Defense Mode in Main Phase 2 to make it impervious to the attack and effect of an opponent’s Number 101: Silent Honor ARK.

In addition to protecting itself from monster attacks, Nerokius can protect itself from card effects. If your Nerokius attacks or is attacked, your opponent cannot activate cards or effects until the end of the Damage Step. That means popular cards like Dimensional Prison and Mirror Force are useless against Nerokius. You can always be confident that once you declare an attack with Nerokius, it will be able to successfully complete its attack.

That’s especially important because at the end of any Battle Phase, if Nerokius attacked or was attacked, you can send it back to your Extra Deck to Special Summon 2 more Gladiator Beast monsters from your Deck. There’s no restriction on which Gladiator Beasts you can Special Summon from your Deck with Nerokius’s effect.

Here are some plays you can make after battling with Nerokius:

-You can Special Summon Gladiator Beast Bestiari and Gladiator Beast Equeste to activate their effects. Then you can fuse them together to Summon Gladiator Beast Gyzarus in Main Phase 2.

-You can Special Summon Gladiator Beast Darius and Gladiator Beast Laquari. Then you can activate Darius’s effect to Special Summon a third Gladiator Beast from your Graveyard and Special Summon Gladiator Beast Heraklinos or Gladiator Beast Nerokius in Main Phase 2.

-You can Special Summon Gladiator Beast Retiari and Gladiator Beast Equeste to banish a pesky card from an opponent’s Graveyard and add Gladiator Beast War Chariot from your Graveyard to your hand.

-You can Special Summon any other combination of two Gladiator Beasts to deal with just about anything an opponent throws at you!

Whether you Summon Gladiator Beast Nerokius in Main Phase 1 to prepare a tough-to-stop attack, or Summon it in Main Phase 2 to defend yourself with a tough-to-destroy monster, you can put Gladiator Beast Nerokius to incredible use.

You might be wondering, “Which Gladiator Beasts do I need to shuffle back into my Deck from my field to Summon this amazing Fusion monster with so many different effects?” (You also might be hoping Gladiator Beast Torax isn’t one of them.) Here’s the answer: ANY three of them.

With defensive Trap Cards like Waboku, Mirror Force, and Dimensional Prison making it easy to keep Gladiator Beasts on the field in most Gladiator Beast Decks, and effects from cards like Gladiator Beast Darius and Soul Charge making it easy to Special Summon Gladiator Beasts, Gladiator Beast Duelists commonly find themselves with 3 or more Gladiator Beasts on their field. When they do, they now have the option of fusing 3 of those Gladiator Beasts together to Summon Gladiator Beast Nerokius.

If you’re looking for one more way to swarm the field with Gladiator Beast monsters, you might want to try out Gladiator Beast Augustus.

Gladiator Beast Augustus is a Level 8 Gladiator Beast with 2600 ATK. When it’s Special Summoned by the effect of a Gladiator Beast, you can Special Summon 1 Gladiator Beast monster from your hand in face-up Defense Position and shuffle that monster into your Deck during the End Phase. Like most other Gladiator Beasts, Augustus can also return itself to your Deck after it battles, and replace itself with a new Gladiator Beast.

Augustus can do a bunch of different things that Gladiator Beast Decks sometimes want to do.

First, since Gladiator Beast Augustus is a Gladiator Beast monster with an effect that Special Summons other Gladiator Beasts from your hand, it can help activate the effects of Gladiator Beasts that you draw. Normally, it’s tough to activate the effects of your in-hand Gladiator Beasts. That’s because most Gladiator Beasts can only Special Summon other Gladiator Beasts from the Deck with their effects. Augustus can Special Summon a Gladiator Beast from the Deck at the end of a Battle Phase in which it battles, but it can also Special Summon a Gladiator Beast from your hand when it’s Special Summoned by the effect of another Gladiator Beast. Since nearly all Gladiator Beasts have effects that activate when they’re Special Summoned by the effects of other Gladiator Beasts, this versatility makes Augustus very powerful.

Second, Gladiator Beast Augustus can help swarm the field with Gladiator Beasts, so that you can Special Summon Fusion Monsters like Nerokius, Gyzarus, and Heraklinos. Do you want to Special Summon Gladiator Beast Gyzarus, but have Gladiator Beast Bestiari in your hand with no Gladiator Beasts on the field? No problem! Special Summon Gladiator Beast Augustus from your Deck by using the effect of Test Tiger or another Gladiator Beast, and then use Augustus’s effect to Special Summon Bestiari from your hand. Bestiari’s effect will activate to destroy an opponent’s Spell or Trap Card. Then you can fuse your two Gladiator Beasts together to Special Summon Gladiator Beast Gyzarus.

Third, Gladiator Beast Augustus can help destroy powerful monsters in battle. Augustus’s 2600 ATK makes it the only Gladiator Beast that you can Special Summon from your Main Deck to destroy an opponent’s Stardust Dragon in battle without your own monster getting destroyed.

Gladiator Beast Decks have access to lots of effects at all different times during a Duel. The addition of Gladiator Beast Nerokius and Gladiator Beast Augustus to the Gladiator Beast arsenal makes Gladiator Beast Decks more powerful than ever before! You can add Nerokius to your Extra Deck and Augustus to your Main Deck when Primal Origin is released on May 16^th!