Apart from the counter-tech war going on between Dragon Rulers and Prophecy, there’s also an ongoing debate – or perhaps more of an arms race – about how best to increase the odds of hitting a first turn Spellbook of Secrets + Spellbook of Judgment combo. In the early days of the post-Tachyon Prophecy deck, competitors dabbled with Upstart Goblin and Toon Table of Contents to create deck thinning and get to their power cards a little faster. Unfortunately, neither measure was terribly effective: Toon Table required the Prophecy player to run Toon Gemini Elf, a painful topdeck, and didn’t actually get you to Secrets or Judgment on its own. Upstart Goblin could draw you into your combo, but each copy only boosts your chance of drawing what you need by about 1%. Not hugely impressive.
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Prophecy Duelists dropped High Priestess of Prophecy to put more emphasis on Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer and Jowgen the Spiritualist (and eliminating dead draws). Dragon Ruler players are firing back, now running Dark Hole, Lightning Vortex, and Last Day of Witch for more monster removal, attempting to destroy those two monsters and free the field from their deadly control effects. So what are Prophecy Duelists doing to escalate the fight?
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The single most-discussed card here at Navy Pier today is easily DNA Surgery. Wander the tournament floor, and somebody’s going to be talking about it within earshot. While we’ve largely discussed Main Deck picks up until this point, Surgery is poised to be the breakthrough Side Deck tech of the weekend. While we saw competitors dabble with the card before the release of Tachyon Galaxy, largely to prevent Dino Rabbit Decks from Xyz Summoning Evolzar Laggia and Evolzar Dolkka, it’s making a comeback this weekend as an answer to Prophecy.
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The last ongoing debate that’s setting the stage for the weekend has been ongoing since Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy unleashed the Dragon Rulers. Light and Darkness Dragon is easily one of the most debated cards in tournament play today: it’s pretty easy to Summon via the safe method of Special Summoning two Dragon Rulers as Tribute, or Special Summoning two Mecha Phantom Beast Tokens with Mecha Phantom Beast Dracossack. Searchable with Eclipse Wyvern, it’s never been more consistent, either. Playing Light and Darkness Dragon (LADD) means accepting a certain degree of duplicity and risk: it’s amazing against certain cards and certain builds of popular strategies, but easily trumped by others.
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Don’t believe the hype – there’s a lot more to the Dragon Rulers versus Prophecy matchup than some might suspect, and the past two weeks has seen a flurry of single card innovations. Those individual choices will make or break hundreds of efforts at the Championship title this weekend, so today we want to take some time to show you the hottest, most debated cards on the tournament floor. As you read the Feature Match coverage this weekend, watch out for these promising tech choices, and try to consider what they could mean for your tournaments moving forward.
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