Every Shonen Jump Championship brings some kind of change to the game. Originality comes in all shapes and sizes. Some tournaments bring us interesting new deck ideas, others show us new tech or styles of playing, and some even give us funny or amazing stories to tell our friends or post on the internet. Chicago’s legacy may not bring the newest killer deck type, but it certainly has had its fair share of excellent plays, cool tech, and quite a few stories that seem absolutely unreal. Let’s start with some interesting tech.

Legendary Jujitsu Master—The Master has been getting a lot of hype on the internet, a lot of it from judges due to the card’s interactions with Drillroid. In terms of gameplay, the Jujitsu Master is one of the best monsters you can play on turn 1, setting yourself up to spin their first attacker to the top of their deck and clear the field for an attack with Don Zaloog or Spirit Reaper on the next turn. Just watch out for those copies of Cyber Dragon and Zombyra the Dark, as they tend to not mind being bounced til next turn.

Power Bond—I’ve been ranting and raving at anyone who would listen to me about this card for a good couple of weeks now. It’s good to see that it’s finally seeing a little play, if only in side decks. Power Bond is used as a side deck card in Cyber Dragon/Warrior decks against other Cyber Dragon/Warrior decks, along with a couple of control stealing cards such as Brain Control. It certainly isn’t the most reliable combination in the world, but it can certainly end the game in one turn. Personally, I’d save Power Bond for your Machine deck, but if you can work it, work it.

Pyramid Turtle—Usually only seen in Zombie decks, a single copy of Pyramid Turtle has been finding its way into decks where the only zombies are two Spirit Reapers and a Vampire Lord. It’s been quite successful today, and I’m sure it’ll continue to appear as the metagame evolves.

I’d like to finish up with the stories of a couple interesting decks I heard about today. Apparently Dale Bellido played against a Kuriboh-Chaos deck in round 2. Incredulous? So was I. The deck was reported to run thee copies of both Kuriboh and Winged Kuriboh in order to avoid the damage from Don Zaloog, and control what hit the graveyard when. It should also be noted that a Kuriboh and a Winged Kuriboh are all you need to special summon Chaos Sorceror. I looked into this and found that the player in question was Betty Ruth-Black, and that she was indeed playing Kuriboh-Chaos. Sadly, she only had one win after three rounds, effectively eliminating her from contention.

Finally, I personally saw a player using an Exodia/Burn lockdown deck. He had game 3 just about wrapped up with Level Limit – Area B down, four pieces of Exodia in his hand, and a Lava Golem on his opponent’s field. The Lava Golem would have easily won the game, but the reeling opponent topdecked Book of Moon and managed to hang in there long enough to win the game with a Wave-Motion Cannon. The names of both players are unknown. Stay tuned for more feature matches, and watch out for those Kuribohs!