There’s nothing better than toasting your opponent with the fiery monsters in your competitive Burn deck. Monsters like Solar Flare Dragon slowly wear down your opponent’s life points, while Raging Flame Sprite starts off by striking your opponent with a lit match. After a direct attack or two, the little Sprite can whack your opponent upside the head with a blazing torch!

Thanks to the release of Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys in the Flaming Eternity set, the environment is sizzling for Fire-attribute monsters. My first reaction when I saw Sacred Phoenix was, “Wow! A powerful Fire monster! And a powerful Winged Beast! Thank you, Konami!” Unfortunately, I fear that many duelists may throw this card into their trade binders. After all, the featured monsters of each set haven’t seen a huge amount of play. While Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8 has been played in tournaments, Horus decks are dismissed as inconsistent, because the highest-level Horus is difficult to summon. The Creator has been splashed into the occasional deck, but its high level and its drawback (you can’t summon it from the graveyard) have hurt its playability. Does the lackluster track record of other featured monsters mean that Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys should be overlooked? Of course not! Sacred Phoenix has some strong options that make summoning it more consistent, and its effect makes it more than worth summoning.

Read on for a few more minutes before you toss that brand new Nephthys you pulled at the Sneak Preview event into your trade binder, because you might want to toss a few copies into a new deck instead.

The Basic Breakdown

Jason did a great job covering the basics of Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys in his Sneak Peek of the card, but let’s go over what you need to know about this Winged Beast. Sacred Phoenix is a level 8, 2400 ATK monster. Obviously, you wouldn’t think that Sacred Phoenix is very powerful just by looking at its ATK, because many level-5 and -6 monsters have similar stats (Jinzo, for example). However, Sacred Phoenix’s effect more than makes up for the card’s so-so ATK. Whenever Sacred Phoenix is destroyed by a card effect, whether that effect is your opponent’s or your own, the Winged Beast will be special summoned to your side of the field. When Sacred Phoenix reappears on the field, it destroys all spell and trap cards on the field. This ability is insane against Burn decks, which rely on a variety of spells and traps (such as Wave-Motion Cannon and Messenger of Peace) that must remain face up on the field.

You might be wondering whether a card like Solemn Judgment could negate Sacred Phoenix’s effect. Even though Solemn Judgment can negate the special summoning of Sacred Phoenix, the counter trap also destroys the monster it targets, so the Phoenix will return to the field during your next standby phase. Watch out for Divine Wrath though, since it negates the Sacred Phoenix’s effect, it will also negate its ability to return to the field again.

Flaming Eternity has a search card that special summons Sacred Phoenix to the field from your deck. Hand of Nephthys lets you tribute two monsters (Hand of Nephthys itself and one other monster) on your side of the field to special summon the fiery Winged Beast from your hand or deck. The tribute cost isn’t hard to pay with the help of spell cards like Scapegoat and Stray Lambs, so the field presence you can get with Sacred Phoenix is even more threatening!

Combos and Counters

Let’s face it. Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys is good enough as it is. However, there are plenty of great combos that can not only summon the Phoenix more quickly, but also exploit its recursion effect. If you want to speed up your deck, try running two copies of Good Goblin Housekeeping (a new trap from Flaming Eternity). Goblin Housekeeping can be chained to your opponent’s cards, and it will eventually show you more cards than three copies of Jar of Greed would. In addition to its card-drawing effect, Good Goblin Housekeeping makes you move one card in your hand to the bottom of your deck, which can be a bonus—putting Sacred Phoenix back into your deck is never a bad thing, because Hand of Nephthys lets you summon the Phoenix from there. On top of that, your copies of Sacred Phoenix will be safer in your deck, where hand-destruction effects like Card Destruction can’t send the Phoenix to the graveyard without it being destroyed.

Assault on GHQ (another new trap from Flaming Eternity) destroys a monster on your side of the field to send two cards from the top of your opponent’s deck to the graveyard. While Assault on GHQ isn’t as useful as Interdimensional Matter Transporter in most cases, the sub-par trap turns into a force like Heavy Storm when used on the Sacred Phoenix. Plus, it’s a good idea to destroy Sacred Phoenix if your opponent attempts to take control of it with a card like Snatch Steal or Creature Swap.

Both Stray Lambs and Flame Ruler (a new monster in Flaming Eternity) can help you summon the Phoenix more quickly. While you can’t normal summon, flip summon, or special summon during the turn in which you activate Stray Lambs, you’re still allowed to set monsters. Once you summon your lamb tokens, tribute both of them to set Sacred Phoenix of Nephthyson the field. You are then free to flip summon it during your next turn. Of course, this combo requires you to protect Sacred Phoenix’s 1600 DEF—Threatening Roar, a trap you can also find in Flaming Eternity, should get the job done. The trap also helps you protect Flame Ruler, a monster that counts as two tributes when sacrificed to normal summon a FIRE Monster such as the Sacred Phoenix.

So what can you do if you’re forced to fight against Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys? When the card is summoned, there’s not a lot you can do except destroy it as a result of battle. There are, however, a few other options you can have ready. Both D. D. Warrior Lady and D. D. Assailant can remove Sacred Phoenix from play, successfully ending the threat of the blazing bird. Moving Sacred Phoenix from your opponent’s hand or deck to the graveyard will also keep you safe temporarily, as long as your opponent doesn’t use any recursion cards like Premature Burial or Call of the Haunted on the Phoenix. Your best defense against Sacred Phoenix is to prevent its summoning altogether. Make sure you have a card like Divine Wrath ready to counter the ignition effect of Hand of Nephthys, just in case your opponent has the monsters needed to special summon Sacred Phoenix from the deck.

In addition, Bottomless Trap Hole and Nobleman of Crossout can remove Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys from play. Even though Sacred Phoenix’s effect doesn’t specifically say that it has a graveyard trigger, the card can’t be special summoned from the “removed from play” pile. Be careful if you’re running Bottomless Trap Hole, however, because a few copies of Nobleman of Extermination can hurt decks that rely on conditional trap cards.

If you’re searching for a good deck theme with an advantage against Sacred Phoenix, then Zombies are what you’re looking for. The Zombie recursion spell Book of Life can remove a threatening Sacred Phoenix from the graveyard if it was moved there from an opponent’s hand or deck. Plus, Ryu Kokki has the 2400 ATK needed to destroy a Sacred Phoenix in battle, and thanks to Pyramid Turtle, summoning the Zombie is a piece of cake!

Final Thoughts

Should you toss Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys into your trade binder? Of course not! In fact, a deck based on the Phoenix has the potential to be a huge tournament threat. Sacred Phoenix by itself is a powerful weapon against any form of stall, and most removal cards in tournament decks (aside from the D. D. Warriors) will only cause the Phoenix to return to the field during your next standby phase. Don’t dismiss this card once the Flaming Eternity set hits the scene, because the Phoenix has the potential to be the key to a powerful tier 1 deck in tournaments.

Talking about Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys was just too tempting this week, right on the heels of the Flaming Eternity Sneak Preview weekend. I’ll return to the Bill and Tom’s Trade Binder column next week, when I’ll be talking about an underrated and powerful Fusion monster, XYZ-Dragon Cannon.

Do you have any questions, comments, or requests for cards to be featured in my articles? Send me an email at Mrosenberg@metagame.com!