Burn decks have seen a huge resurgence in popularity lately, partly as a result of Jasmin Gauthier’s 2nd place finish at Shonen Jump Championship Montreal, but primarily due to the fact that it’s an excellent metagame call right now. Quick burn decks like Chain Strike can wipe out combo decks or drop them below the amount of life points they require to win. Slower burn decks, on the other hand, have an easier time with the slower decks in the format, such as the many faces of Monarchs that keep cropping up all over SJCs. If you were at the Force of the Breaker Sneak Preview this past weekend, you’ve likely become somewhat acquainted with the Volcanic cards that the set introduces. The Volcanic monsters are intended to function as part of a burn deck, but unlike most burn strategies, Volcanic decks have access to a constant source of monster removal and damage in the form of the Blaze Accelerator cards. This is fortunate, considering that a Blaze Accelerator card is exactly what you get to search for when you summon the Volcanic Rocket you got for entering the Sneak Preview. Let’s have a first look at what a burn deck that uses the Volcanic monsters might be like.
Monsters: 19
3 Volcanic Shell
2 Volcanic Slicer
3 Volcanic Rocket
3 Fox Fire
2 Barrier Statue of the Inferno
3 Solar Flare Dragon
2 UFO Turtle
1 Sangan
Spells: 11
3 Chain Energy
3 Wave-Motion Cannon
2 Blaze Accelerator
1 Level Limit - Area B
2 Messenger of Peace
Traps: 10
1 Gravity Bind
1 Threatening Roar
1 Ring of Destruction
2 The Transmigration Prophecy
3 Pulling the Rug
2 Judgment of Anubis
This deck is capable of causing a lot of trouble to a lot of people, if only because it runs three copies of Chain Energy. One thing that every player certainly has to do in order win the game is play cards, and Chain Energy will force a payment for each card played that can’t be avoided by normal means. Thus, the more complex combo decks (such as Diamond Dude Turbo) can’t compete while Chain Energy is on the field due to the huge number of cards they have to play each turn. With one copy of Chain Energy out, an opponent who is using a win condition that requires a payment of 2000 life points can only play twelve cards before he or she can no longer win the game, and that doesn’t even count the various other sources of burn damage that you’ll be using. Specifically, you want to get a Wave-Motion Cannon up and running to force your opponent into hasty action, which in turn forces him or her to lose a significant amount of life points thanks to Chain Energy. It’s a situation that even MacGyver wouldn’t be able to get out of without a Heavy Storm, and even that could easily turn into disaster if it’s met by Judgment of Anubis.
That’s right, Judgment of Anubis. If you think about it, now is the perfect time to bring this forgotten counter trap into the fold, since almost no one is running Dust Tornado. After all, most cards that are set face down in a burn deck are chainable burn traps, right? So, why bother with Dust when you can play Twister, a quick-play spell that you can activate during the battle phase in response to Gravity Bind or Wall of Revealing Light without already having it set? Some people may still like Dust, but I’ve seen a major shift over to Royal Decree and Twister in side decks as of late, meaning that the primary methods of dealing with a Wave-Motion Cannon are Heavy Storm, Mobius the Frost Monarch, Mystical Space Typhoon, and Twister. All of those can be negated by this week’s deck, and you’ll score a one-sided Ring of Destruction in three out of the four cases thanks to Judgment. I saw a lot of main decked copies of Pulling the Rug over the course of SJC Anaheim, and I must say that I think it’s a really good idea at this point. Between Monarchs, Gadgets, and the fact that Demise OTK took the Jump, I’d say that Rug is going to be an incredibly useful card a lot more often than not, especially now that players are experimenting with Crystal Beast Sapphire Pegasus. Of course, we won’t know for sure how good the Crystal Beasts are until SJC Minneapolis, but I’m going to go ahead and predict that they’ll see a lot of play due to all the excellent cards they have access to.
Something interesting to think about as you look over the deck is the fact that many of the monsters in it have a rather nice ATK, something you generally don’t see in monsters played in a burn deck. While you’ll frequently have to skip your battle phase due to the effects of Blaze Accelerator and whatnot, you should definitely note that if you had a need or opportunity to beat down for some damage, you could certainly take it. You better believe your opponent will realize that very early on during game 1, making his or her side decking a lot more difficult than it would be otherwise. Normally, when you’re facing a burn deck, you can safely side out reactive removal traps like Sakuretsu Armor and Mirror Force with full confidence that your opponent isn’t going to try to attack you. With the high ATK Volcanic monsters, you don’t have that luxury. Sure, you could side everything out, but what if they start attacking you? One hit from either Volcanic Slicer or Volcanic Rocket subtracts four from the number of cards you can play while Chain Energy is on the field, and that’s a loss you really can’t afford. Similarly, if you side in your Twister cards and the like, you increase the risk of getting nailed by Judgment of Anubis, which is certainly not good. I don’t know how many of you out there have ever been hit by this particular trap card, but it’s really unpleasant and I wouldn’t recommend it. It’s a conundrum, and it’s likely to help you win matches against people who don’t expect a burn deck to start beating them up with huge-ATK level 4 monsters.
As I said above, the main reason that you would play this deck over other slow burn variants is the fact that with this one, you have access to the Blaze Accelerator cards and their search monster, Volcanic Rocket. You also get an excellent, renewable source of Pyro monsters to throw away to Blaze Accelerator if you find it difficult to bring the Tri-Blaze Accelerator online. Volcanic Shell is the monster for the job, allowing you to pay 500 life points once per turn to fetch another copy of itself from your deck as long as you have one in the graveyard already. Three copies of a card that can search itself out from your deck? Not only is it good, it also screams for use with the ever-excellent trap card, The Transmigration Prophecy! Have you used all three of your Volcanic Shells? Great! Just throw two of them back in the deck with The Transmigration Prophecy and use them again! With the current deck setup, you can fry seven monsters with Blaze Accelerator just off of Volcanic Shell discards. If you manage to get the Tri-Blaze Accelerator out, your opponent had better pray he or she can pull off an unopposed Heavy Storm, because you can now deal 3500 damage in addition to destroying seven monsters. One of the modifications you might consider making to the deck is the addition of Pot of Avarice, and if you do, the number of monsters you can fry and damage you can deal entirely off of renewable cards becomes insane. Even if you run out of Volcanic Shells, you still have plenty of Pyro monsters to pitch, some of which are still 500 ATK or less.
The main focus of the deck, once you begin locking your opponent down and putting a timer on his or her game, is to bring out Tri-Blaze Accelerator and keep it on the field while you blow away opposing monsters and deal damage. While it seems difficult to do with just two Blaze Accelerators and one Tri-Blaze Accelerator, you really shouldn’t underestimate how good Volcanic Rocket is at its job.
Speaking of cards that are good at their jobs, I’m using a pair of Barrier Statue of the Inferno cards in this deck as well. I never really liked the Barrier Statues until one of the computer AI opponents in the World Championship 2007 DS game used it against me and won off the fact that I couldn’t special summon Jinzo from the graveyard and couldn’t draw any non-Cyber Dragon monsters. You can do the same thing to your opponents with Barrier Statue of the Inferno except even more profoundly due to the prevalence and necessity of special summons nowadays. With no special summons and an effect that can destroy any monster they get to the field, your opponents will have to jump through hoops to get their big monsters out, all while spending their precious life points thanks to Chain Energy. It’s that potent level of nastiness that draws people to burn decks, and I expect that they’ll only become more popular in the future. I hope everyone enjoyed their Force of the Breaker Sneak Preview, and until next time, play hard, play fair, and most importantly, have fun!