Today, we continue our examination of Crystal Beast support cards with Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins. Jesse Anderson’s field card is quite a trip . . . or vacation, depending on what you’re looking at.

Moon Recliner with a View

For the first time in the history of the TCG, you can spontaneously activate a field spell card from your deck. The card that makes this all possible is Last Resort. It also has some of the strangest artwork I’ve ever seen. A vacation resort on the moon? What does that have to do with ancient ruins?

“Activate only when your opponent’s monster declares an attack. You can select 1 ‘Ancient City — Rainbow Ruins’ from your Deck and activate it. If your opponent had an active Field Spell Card when this card was activated, they can draw 1 card.”

The last line of this card was put into place because the Ancient City — Rainbow Ruins that is activated when resolving Last Resort will destroy any face-up field spell card your opponent has at the time. That said, let’s be honest with ourselves and call into question the number of times our opponent even has an active field spell card. Unless his or her deck has a specific intended purpose for a field spell, it isn’t happening. Most often, this “drawback” is hardly a concern.

Now some of you may be thinking, “I have to use this card when my opponent attacks, so that means I can’t use Sakuretsu Armor.” It may seem that way, but it isn’t true. The timing windows for Last Resort and Sakuretsu Armor are the same. So long as no one activates a counter trap card, you can activate both effects in the same chain (a counter trap would put the chain at spell speed 3, higher than both Sakuretsu and Last Resort). By doing so, you can use Sakuretsu Armor to protect your monster and also put Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins into play.

Ruins and Riches

Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins opens up an entirely different aspect of the Crystal Beast deck.

“This card gets these effects, based on the number of ‘Crystal Beast’ monsters in your Spell & Trap Card Zone. 1+: This card cannot be destroyed by a card effect. 2+: Once per turn, you can halve the Battle Damage you take. 3+: You can send 1 ‘Crystal Beast’ monster you control to the Graveyard to negate the activation of a Spell or Trap Card and destroy it. 4+: Once per turn, during your Main Phase, you can draw 1 card. 5+: Once per turn, during your Main Phase, you can Special Summon 1 ‘Crystal Beast’ card from your Spell & Trap Card Zone.”

Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins has several effects that become active and accumulate as the number of Crystal Beasts in your spell and trap card zone increases. The Crystal Beasts have a tendency to build up over the course of a duel just from the regular exchange of battle and removal effects, so it isn’t like you have to work all that hard to make it happen.

Right off, just having one Crystal Beast in your spell and trap card zone is enough to keep your Ancient City from being destroyed by card effects. This cuts removal out of the equation for the most part, but doesn’t do much to stop non-destructive effects like Giant Trunade. It also won’t prevent your opponent from activating a new field spell card, and when he or she does, your Ancient City will still be destroyed (it is being threatened by a game mechanic, not a card’s effect).

The second effect of Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins can be applied once per turn, which means you can only use it for one attack. When you decide to take advantage of it is up to you, so you are free to save it for the battle you know will result in the most damage to your life points. You just can’t rely on it to save you from multiple attacks, even if they all come from the same monster.

The third effect can be misleading if you overlook what it is asking for. As a cost, this effect asks you to send one Crystal Beast monster you control to the graveyard. The text is referring to a Crystal Beast that is in your monster card zone and not in your spell and trap card zone. Why does this matter? Well, as it turns out, this effect will disappear if you end up with two or fewer Crystal Beasts in your spell and trap card zone at the time it tries to resolve. Using one of your three Crystal Beasts in “crystallized” form to pay the cost wouldn’t have worked out well anyway.

By its nature, this effect is actually multi-trigger. It pretty much has to be, or it wouldn’t be capable of countering the activation of spell and trap cards. This is precisely why your opponent will think to wipe out a “crystallized” Crystal Beast, because he or she certainly can’t count on destroying the Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins. This effect isn’t limited to a specific number of activations per turn: as long as you can pay the cost, you can keep on negating your opponent’s cards. Don’t forget, though, that the Crystal Beast monster you give up for the cost is not destroyed, so you won’t have the option of placing it into your spell and trap card zone.

The fourth effect is the simplest by far and quite possibly the most popular. Who can argue with drawing a free card? That’s the stuff of dreams, right there. The final effect is intended to give you a way to free up a spot in your spell and trap card zone by special summoning one of the Crystal Beasts occupying it. After hitting five Crystal Beasts, it is good to have some way to make use of them.

Re-gather the Effects

As Crystal Beasts are moved into and out of your spell and trap card zone, the effects of Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins will turn on and off accordingly, but the effects will always remember if you have used them during the turn.

Suppose you have four Crystal Beasts in your spell and trap card zone. During your first main phase, you use the fourth effect of Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins to draw a card. The card you draw is Rare Value, so you activate it, and when it resolves, your opponent selects one of your Crystal Beasts from your spell and trap card zone and sends it to your graveyard. This leaves you with three Crystal Beasts in your spell and trap card zone.

During the battle phase, one of your Crystal Beasts is destroyed and you decide to place it onto your spell and trap card zone. This gives you four Crystal Beasts in your spell and trap card zone. At this point, some players might think that they can use the “draw one card” effect again, because they dropped below four “crystallized” Crystal Beasts and then went back to four again. This is not possible, because Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins remembers that you activated the effect, even if the number of “crystallized” Crystal Beasts has changed.

What happens if you use the “draw one card” effect and then activate a different copy of Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins? The new copy you activate will know that it has not yet used this effect, so it will allow you to draw another card. This can come in handy if you find yourself with two copies and you’re more then happy to move one card deeper into your deck.

Until next time, send all comments and questions to Curtis@metagame.com.