Believe it or not, all these Alien cards have a mommy that loves them! I know, the thought that such grotesque monsters even have a mommy is a little creepy. But the good people at Upper Deck know how to infuse that creepiness with a whole lot of cool!

Alien Mother (Dark, Level 6)

Reptile/Effect

2300 ATK/1500 DEF

If this card destroys a monster with an A-Counter as a result of battle and sends it to the Graveyard, Special Summon that monster to your side of the field at the end of the Battle Phase. When this card is removed from the field, all the monsters it Special Summoned are destroyed.

For a level 6 monster, Alien Mother has rather average ATK and DEF values. What makes this mommy special is the dangerous synergy that it brings when paired up with Cosmic Horror Gangi’el or Alien Grey.

As you can see, any monster with an A-Counter the Mother destroys (which is likely, since the A-Counter weakens a monster’s ATK/DEF when battling an Alien) is going to come back under the control of Alien Mother. Think Red-Moon Baby, but deadlier and nastier. If you have A-Counters on monsters like Chaos Sorcerer, Cyber Dragon, Zaborg the Thunder Monarch or even Jinzo, then they are all potential mind-slaves that will fall to Alien Mother in battle.

Of course, the monster that you destroy and enslave with the effect of Alien Mother will get special summoned to your side at the end of the battle phase, meaning that you won’t get to attack with it during the same turn in which you’ve destroyed it. You’ll have to wait till your next turn in order to take advantage of the new monster that you’ve just stolen from your opponent. While waiting may seem like a disadvantage, it really isn’t. Your opponent will now have to adapt and change his or her strategy to deal with this unexpected threat on the board (his or her own monster); the cool move he or she was going to pull with Snatch Steal and Heavy Storm and attacking for the win isn’t going to work anymore.

Any time you have your opponent changing his or her battle plans in order to cope with the strategy you’ve presented, then you’ve forced him or her to go on the defensive. Of course, the trick is to continually apply that pressure so your opponent cannot formulate any new plans; instead, he or she has to improvise new ones just to stay in the game. Alien Mother excels in this, especially when the metagame is defined by the amount of threats on the board. With you throwing those A-Counters around, weakening the opponent’s monsters, and then taking them with Alien Mother, you’ll be controlling the momentum of the duel, since your opponent must react to your board presence.

Of course, there will be times when your Alien Mother may fall prey to such cards like Mirror Force, Bottomless Trap Hole, or Zaborg The Thunder Monarch. Or your opponent will topdeck that Smashing Ground and your Alien Mother will be sent screaming into the graveyard pile. Not to worry. Those A-Counters infesting your opponent’s monsters won’t go to waste. Not only are these aliens creepy, but they’re inventive, too. And they have a card in their repertoire that will continue to help you steal control of opponent’s monsters.

Brainwashing Beam

Continuous Trap

Select 1 monster with 1 or more A-Counter on your opponent's side of the field and take control of it. During your End Phase, remove 1 A-Counter from this monster. If all A-Counters are removed from the monster, or if that monster is destroyed, destroy this card.

With this nifty trap card, we can take control of a monster that has an A-Counter on it. However, maintaining control of that monster comes with a price. The monster you’ve “brainwashed” will lose one A-Counter when you reach your end phase. If the monster has no more A-Counters, then you lose the Brainwashing Beam, and your opponent gets his or her monster back. Another unfortunate side-effect to this card is if the monster you brainwashed is destroyed, then Brainwashing Beam will also be destroyed.

Despite the drawbacks, with some careful planning, you can maximize the advantages of Brainwashing Beam. You may want to plan ahead and try to load up as many A-Counters as possible on one of your opponent’s monsters (preferably something he or she will miss, like Chaos Sorcerer). This can be accomplished by using the flip effect of Alien Grey and trying to recycle it either with Book of Moon or Tsukuyomi. Or you can try to keep Cosmic Horror Gangi’el out on the field for as long as you can, so it can start dumping A-Counters on your opponent’s monsters. Since Gangi’el has such a high ATK value, you can protect it from spell effects by using Pole Position to make it immune to cards like Snatch Steal, Creature Swap, or Smashing Ground. The key here is to get those monsters to churn out those A-Counters. If you can get even two A-Counters on a monster, than it’s definitely worth the effort, since you will have two turns in which to wreck your opponent’s life points with his or her own monster.

Don’t forget that Brainwashing Beam is a trap card, and that means it can be used on your opponent’s turn. While you won’t be able to do anything with the monster you take on your opponent’s turn, it’s still demoralizing to the opponent as he or she declares an attack and you activate Brainwashing Beam to take control of the attacker. Remember, the monster loses its A-Counter only in your end phase, so you’ll be keeping the monster for at least one of your turns.