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After not managing to Top 8 on his home turf at Shonen Jump Championship Hamilton, Dale Bellido is back with one of the most interesting decks I’ve seen thus far here today. It uses the classic Bellido Tomato engine lineup of two Mystic Tomato and two Don Zaloog, in an era where Don’s talents are more powerful and more unique than ever before.

This time around it’s retrofitted with a whole bag of new tricks. Hydrogeddon keeps the deck aggressive, Airknight Parshath lets it capitalize, and a ton of tricky chainables in the damage step let it pull off some ridiculous moves. Top it off with a Shrink, and you’ve got a deck that’s a top prospect for Day 2 qualification. Check it out!

Monsters: 23

3 Hydrogeddon

2 Mystic Tomato

2 Zaborg the Thunder Monarch

1 Breaker the Magical Warrior

1 Newdoria

1 Sangan

Spells: 12

1 Reinforcement of the Army

1 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Shrink (!)

1 Nobleman of Crossout

Traps: 7

2 Blast with Chain

2 Sakuretsu Armor

1 Mirror Force

1 Ring of Destruction

1 Torrential Tribute

The monster lineup is exceptionally aggressive, maintaining and developing field presence with Mystic Tomato, Hydrogeddon, and D. D. Warrior Lady. Exiled Force, Newdoria, and Zaborg the Thunder Monarch control the opponent’s field presence, while Airknight Parshath and Don Zaloog create disparities in hand presence. This deck is all about control; it exercises a huge amount of it over both its own hand and field, and the opponent’s. It uses a mix of aggression and damage step tricks to stay unpredictable.

Those damage step tricks are all worth reviewing. Each acts at spell speed 2, so they can be executed at any time on Bellido’s turn or his opponent’s. Shrink, Rush Recklessly, and Blast with Chain all manipulate ATK to protect smaller monsters and create unexpected hits with Airknight Parshath and Don Zaloog. Blast with Chain also doubles as protection against Mobius the Frost Monarch, which many competitors are running today despite concern about the card’s viability in this format.

Pot of Avarice lets Bellido recycle his Tomato engine and Hydrogeddons, while also building on the theme of hand development. Reinforcement of the Army increases the deck’s overall utility of its five Warriors too: two Don Zaloog, two Exiled Force, and D. D. Warrior Lady become all the more useful when they can be pulled to the hand at will. Enemy Controller opens up more opportunities for Don and Airknight, keeps Don on the field when it would otherwise be attacked, and even helps Bellido manage the Scapegoat tokens that a Machine OTK deck would happily let him keep in order to stall. Creature Swap lets Mystic Tomato become even better combo material, and also opens up shocking plays with Hydrogeddon and Don Zaloog.

Some random points of discussion. First, the single Newdoria creates a convenient answer to Asura Priest, which would otherwise tear through the Tomato engine. Asura Priest is seeing some serious play here today, so Newdoria is a strong choice. Not only can this deck deal with tech designed to act as a silver bullet against recruiter, but it can also rock the recruiter matchup itself. Hydrogeddon, two Exiled Force, two Zaborg, and two Sakuretsu Armor all lay out elemental recruiters. Clearly, Bellido has made a metagame read about the field here today and has committed himself to it.