The game of Yu-Gi-Oh! has always encouraged alternate paths to victory. A smattering of Burn, Exodia, and low-level archetypes have consistently mixed it up with the traditional Beatdown and Chaos decks at Regional tournaments and Shonen Jump Championships. However, the playability of such builds has ebbed and flowed with the state of the Forbidden and Limited lists.

After the October 2004 Forbidden list, many duelists believed that the removal of Harpie’s Feather Duster and the limiting of Mystical Space Typhoon would signal the rise of the Burn archetype as the dominating force on the map. For a number of reasons, including Dust Tornado and Mobius the Frost Monarch, this never happened. Burn remained tantalizingly close to the top tier, but it never quite ascended to the Top 8 of a Shonen Jump Championship.

April’s return of Delinquent Duo and Graceful Charity certainly didn’t help. The former hurt all Combo decks (traps and monsters working in unison), one of which was Burn, while the latter made drawing copies of Heavy Storm and other spell or trap removal far easier, especially when used in conjunction with Magician of Faith. Burn and other low-level monster strategies had to bide their time for a more favorable Limited list.

Countering the Expected Rise of Burn (Again)

The new Forbidden list has broadened the field and enables almost any deck to win. The lack of true two-for-one combinations in the game has led many a duelist to revisit Lava Golem, a literal hottie that removes two of your opponent’s monsters for the price of one. In conjunction with great Lockdown cards such as Gravity Bind and Messenger of Peace, it becomes very difficult to break the pain without the aid of a side deck. However, there are many more incredible combinations that can be used by enterprising duelists.

Old-school flavors such as Dream Clown plus Stumbling, which automatically destroys an opponent’s monster, and Swarm of Locusts/Swarm of Scarabs-type builds have resurfaced as well, leading many duelists to tear out their hair in frustration. The environment seems to be clamoring for a new hero to repel these low-level hordes, and Elemental Energy has just the card to do it!

EEN-EN060, henceforth referred to by its code name “Alpha Zone Delta Barrier 2005,” is a continuous trap card that forces all monsters of level 3 or lower into face-up attack position. The immediate ramifications of such a card have hit you like a sledgehammer, I’m certain.

What Does It Do?

Some of the more frustrating monsters of level 3 or lower can be countered immediately by the use of this simple card. The card is akin to the Lockdown deck’s staple Level Limit – Area B and can be just as powerful. But while Level Limit – Area B was created to make monsters of level 4 and higher suffer, this new card does the opposite. It enables your stronger monsters to stand up to the weaker hordes of smaller monsters. These small monsters often work in unison with combo strategies to prevent higher-level monsters from attacking, and then use their effects to clear the board and receive advantages.

In effect, when faced with a card like Gravity Bind or Level Limit – Area B, this card will create a stand-off. While you may not be able to attack for a brief spell, your opponent certainly cannot hide his or her weaker monsters defensively! Those monsters will automatically be switched to attack position.

You can then watch pesky cards like Stealth Bird and Des Koala melt away under the lovely banner of this new trap card. The extremely high defense scores of these monsters, especially when compared to their level 3 status, makes it difficult for even level 4 monsters to punch through them. Now, however, you can simply smash a face-down Stealth Bird with your D. D. Assailant, shifting it to attack position. Your next attack will devastate the beast.

Other cards like the aforementioned Dream Clown will now have their effects disabled. Clown Control will lose its Control element because of the presence of Alpha Zone Delta Barrier 2005. Run through the list of low-level monster decks, and you can immediately see this new card disturbing their strategy.

A key point that helps this card’s case is that flip effects have become much more pricey, mainly because the weaker flip effect monsters will immediately be forced to switch to attack position. Your opponent wants to flip a Magical Merchant to gain a resource? I sure hope that he or she can handle protection duties for a puny 200 ATK monster! This type of strain placed on your opponent’s defenses might force him or her to prematurely use defensive traps like Sakuretsu Armor, clearing the way for your future pushes.

Not Just a Sidedeck Card

Most people who read the description might think that this is simply a card to be stashed in the side deck and brought in against specific matchups. However, it must be said that this card works effectively against support cards for almost every deck type. First, it provides a blanket disruption effect against the ubiquitous Scapegoat that everyone seems to be running. Those defensive walls lose a lot of their luster when they’re forced to move to attack position. You can smack your opponent’s for quite a bit of damage with this new card—it’s almost like a continuous Windstorm of Etaqua.

Then there are the multiple copies of Spirit Reaper that almost every deck also seems to be running, not to mention those defense position Sangans that are all over the place. Both of these nifty effect monsters suffer when they’re forced to face direct frontal assaults. Moving Spirit Reaper to attack position might lead to thousands of points of damage in a single turn! You can definitely bank on your opponent running these cards in this new environment. Literally every deck in the Top 8 at Shonen Jump Atlanta had a copy of the powerful Zombie.

Next, you can start thinking about the themed decks that this card counters. For example, Earth decks will suffer if they are running any copies of Nimble Momonga, as the life point gains to be received by such a card are negated. Players choosing Spellcaster-centric decks that run copies of Apprentice Magician will also suffer life point losses, and switching monsters that have only 400 ATK to attack position will lead to swift defeat. Water decks, too, will be forced to switch their Poison Draw Frogs and other monsters to attack position.

The bottom line is that packing Alpha Zone Delta Barrier 2005 will enable you to automatically counter at least four or five monsters in your opponent’s deck. Take two copies of Spirit Reaper, one Sangan, and one Magician of Faith, and move them to attack position. Throw in some of your own powerful level 3 monsters, like Injection Fairy Lily, and even some of the new commons from Cybernetic Revolution, like the infamous Jerry Beans Man, and you won’t suffer from the drawbacks of the card at all!