Academy: I’m a Duel Master In Training (Kaijudo Sonic Blast and Rocket Storm)

Mike Eaton, Play Unplugged

Well, Wizards of the Coast? You got me. Your humble CCG writer is training to be a Duel Master.

Kaijudo is a TCG (Trading-Card Game) based on the animated series of the same name. And it’s launched a few new pre-made decks since the last time we tried it.

Since then, I’ve learned a few very important things about the game. For starters:

• There are way more Blocker creatures than I knew about.
• Never underestimate a good Shield Blast card!
• The Dojo Edition actually had 60 cards in it, not 55! (Yikes! Thanks to our friends on Twitter for that correction!)
• Once again, my favorite type of card is Light / White.
• And more to come — read on!

The two decks for the latest core set are Sonic Blast, which features the Darkness and Water civilizations, and Rocket Storm, centered around Fire, Nature, and Lightning. These are the two latest decks before Tornado Generator comes out for the new Evo Fury set on November 13 — they’re hitting hard and fast with the product, since these were just released in September!

Out of the box, Sonic Blast‘s strategy is a concept called disruption. This means that, whatever you’re doing, the deck wants to stop it, whether it’s bouncing your creatures back to your hand, banishing them from the game completely, or making you discard them before you get a chance to play them.

Rocket Storm uses Fire creatures to attack super-fast, Nature effects to boost your creatures and to grab more mana for bigger ones, and Light creatures to stand back and defend while your others are busy attacking.

Out of these two decks and the other one we reviewed, Rocket Storm seemed to be the most powerful — but we’re new at this! Still, the power of blockers was pretty intense. And the way these decks were set up, I just wasn’t feeling it, yet . . .

. . . So I did what I had to do. I took all three decks — broke them apart — sorted them by civilization and creatures and spells and mana cost — and built my own.

Building your first deck in a new card game is always a milestone on your journey. It means you’re not just playing something that’s been handed to you, a deck that someone else decided how it works. In the case of Kaijudo, it means you picked your creatures, you picked your spells, and you picked your strategy!

It means that you are your own Duel Master!

So, here’s my decklist! I put it together using the cards from the three decks I’ve written about, plus cards from the booster packs that came with them.

NOTE: I can’t find a good, quick card list to link to. If any lovely readers know where we can go to show you each card, please let us know!

Darkness

• 3 Marrow Ooze
• 1 Skeeter Swarmer
• 2 Skull Cutter
• 1 Dream Pirate
• 3 Bone Blades
• 1 Rupture Spider
• 1 Grave Scrounger
• 2 Death Smoke
• 1 Acid-Tongue Chimera
• 1 Quakes the Unclean
• 1 Voidwing
• 1 Dark Scaradorable
• 1 Terror Pit

Light

• 3 Sun-Stalk Seed
• 3 Jade Monitor
• 1 Star Lantern
• 1 Orbital Observer
• 1 Spyweb Scurrier
• 3 Keeper of Clouds
• 1 Halon
• 1 Astinos, the Cloud Knight
• 1 Grand Gure, Tower Keeper

Nature

• 3 Razorhide
• 2 Return to Soil
• 1 Brave Giant

And here’s what it does!

The deck has 32 creatures and 8 spells. Six of the spells banish creatures, and two (Return to Soil) put them in the opponent’s mana zone. Six of them (everything but Death Smoke) are Shield Blast cards — so, if I’m lucky enough to get them as some of my shields, my opponent’s early attacks will end up taking care of her own creatures!

Of the creatures, eighteen of them (18!) have Blocker. That means that they can protect my shields in time for me to draw a banishing spell. All of the Light creatures with Blocker (12) also have Skirmisher. This means they can only attack other creatures, and not shields. But this is worth it, because their power is always a little higher than other creatures of their level.

While I’m protecting myself with this shield of creatures and spells, so that I have a good position to hold and work with (called “stabilizing” in CCG/TCGs), I can draw into my attacking creatures. Three copies of Razorhide are there to attack and get me more early cards to drop my big, heavy creatures. Five of my Darkness creatures either have or give the ability Slayer, which means that even if a creature loses a battle, it still banishes the creature it was fighting. And three of my creatures (one in each Civilization) have Double Breaker, which means when they hit the opponent, they break two shields, instead of one!

Let’s talk for just a second about one of those creatures: Dark Scaradorable. The last time I looked at Kaijudo, I mentioned the Dojo Edition version of this character, and I didn’t know what to make of it. Here’s what I thought:

Oh, I get it, it’s this cute little creature but WHEN IT ATTACKS, WATCH OUT, GRRRR lol whatever

Yeah. Well. Let me tell you how Dark Scaradorable  became my favorite card in this game.

In the TV show, Scaradorable of Gloom Hollow is called Squeaky by her battling partner, Allie. She is a chimera — which makes sense, since there are already several forms of Squeaky in the card game. This particular form, from the Rise of the Duel Masters Core Set — and which comes in the Sonic Blast deck — is a level six creature, which means she costs six mana to play. She has 6000 power, which is nothing to sneeze at in this game. And when she enters the battle zone, she immediately breaks an opponent’s shield, without even needing to attack, yet. Oh, and when she does attack? Yeah, she has Double Breaker, remember?

If you pair her with the right nature cards, you might even be able to get her out on turn four. The best this deck can do on its own is turn five, but you know what? I’m not complaining. Every time I get to play Dark Scaradorable, I’m really not too far off from winning.

So, that’s my Kaijudo adventure! Have you been training to be a Duel Master? Any tips or tricks? Excited for the new set coming so soon? Let us know on the Forums! And once again, thanks for cracking open a pack or two and Playing Unplugged!