I’ll admit it—ever since I saw Volcanic Rat I’ve had a strange urge to put together a revamped Human-Wave Tactics deck. I can’t help it. Belowski is my all-time favorite Yu-Gi-Oh! GX character, and the idea of dropping game-winning copies of Happy Lover and Mokey Mokey is one that occasionally occupies my daydreams. If you’re not a regular Yu-Gi-Oh! GX watcher, or just missed the episode “The Little Belowski,” go find Episode 23 right now. I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.
Tactical Evolution gave us a ton of normal monster support, and while Volcanic Rat certainly suits my whims, there are more competitive (and wacky) things the set makes possible. Today I want to look at a level 3 normal deck, partly because I find the competitive cards it can use interesting, and partly because it can be an absolute blast to play. This one won’t be the kind of thing you’d want to take to a Regional, but I’m probably going to lug it to a local or two sometime in the near future. Here’s what the deck’s submitter had to say:
Dear Jason,
I hope you can help me with a deck. I ran this strategy a couple of years ago, and when the new Forbidden/Limited list came out on September 1st, I had some ideas about revitalizing it. Its power is based on level 3 normal “beatsticks,” which can use normal monster support and Enchanting Fitting Room, plus Gravity Bind and Level Limit - Area B. So here goes nothing! Thanks in advance.
—Julius T.
Vilnius, Lithuania
Here’s the deck Julius sent me:
Vanilla Strike—42 Cards
Monsters: 19
3 Cyber Dragon
3 Jerry Beans Man
3 Sonic Duck
3 Mad Lobster
3 Hunter Dragon
1 Twin-Headed Behemoth
1 Card Trooper
1 Magician of Faith
1 Iron Blacksmith Kotetsu
Spells: 14
2 Shrink
2 Enchanting Fitting Room
2 Heart of the Underdog
1 Smashing Ground
1 Brain Control
1 United We Stand
1 Mage Power
1 Level Limit - Area B
1 Premature Burial
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Pot of Avarice
Traps: 9
3 Skill Drain
2 Justi-Break
2 Birthright
1 Call of the Haunted
1 Gravity Bind
Like a lot of the themed decks that people send me, this one’s trying to do a ton of different things. Enchanting Fitting Room, Heart of the Underdog, Skill Drain, Birthright, and the lockdown aspects of the deck are all very different, so we need to slim things down if we want the deck to run smoothly. Personally, I’m going to focus on Enchanting Fitting Room, since I think it’s a really impressive card when it goes off. Doing so will mean cutting the card count down to 40, and digging into some very old and very new material for support.
Since I want to increase my chance of hitting multiple compatible monsters with Enchanting Fitting Room, I’m going to remove all the effect monsters aside from Cyber Dragon. Iron Blacksmith Kotetsu, Twin-Headed Behemoth, Magician of Faith, and even Card Trooper will be cut, the latter being particularly difficult to fit into this strategy since it can skew the deck’s balance of monsters (see Episode 23 for emphasis on how important balance is to this issue—“It’s all about the yin and the yang, man!”). This will give me room for more level 3 normal monsters once I start adding cards.
I’m going to drop both copies of Heart of the Underdog. While Underdog’s results can be impressive, it can also totally fizzle on you, and you need to get an extra draw with it right off the bat just to even out its activation. It makes this deck even more vulnerable to Heavy Storm or Mobius the Frost Monarch, and since I won’t be adding Solemn Judgment, I really need to minimize the number of continuous spell and trap cards I’m using. There are better card-drawing options available for this theme.
Pot of Avarice will be dropped despite its ability to increase the number of monsters in the deck for Fitting Room. I’m of the opinion that if we get to the point where five monsters are in the graveyard, we’re probably doomed anyway. The deck needs to be faster than Pot of Avarice allows, or it needs to rely on lockdown cards which will stop monsters from being destroyed. It generally needs to focus on the early game . . . which means using high utility cards whenever possible. Pot of Avarice just doesn’t fit that description.
Shrink will be cut for the sake of space, and Premature Burial will be removed for two reasons. First, it’s another card that’s vulnerable to Heavy Storm. With Justi-Break being so good, we really don’t want to bait Heavy Storm out of the opponent’s hand on a perpetual basis. Second, it’s just not that good here: it doesn’t set up big tributes like it would in a Monarch deck, it doesn’t give us access to cool effect monsters, and we’re not even playing Sangan. It just doesn’t belong.
Moving onto the traps, I’ll drop Birthright and Call of the Haunted for the same reasons I dropped Premature Burial. Our special summoning power will be coming primarily from Enchanting Fitting Room, and I’ll be using the graveyard to accomplish other goals anyway. It’s important to keep the trap count down due to the threat of Jinzo and Royal Decree, too.
Finally, I’ll drop two of the three copies of Skill Drain. One copy of this awesome trap card can be a nasty and effective surprise, but multiple copies represent a commitment that requires protection in the form of spell negation or Solemn Judgment. We don’t have the space for those kinds of cards, so I’ll opt to keep just one copy of Skill Drain in the deck.
So what are we going to add?! First, a third copy of Enchanting Fitting Room is a must. I want to see this card in every duel I play, so maxing out on it is the way to go. If I can draw multiples, that’s even better. By the time I’m finished with the deck, you’ll have a fair shot at hitting two special summons per Fitting Room, and if you can drop five monsters to the field in a single turn, well, that’s a ton of damage. This is the kind of play I’ll be building the deck around.
So, I need more level 3 or lower normal monsters. The next-highest ATK in this category can be found on Dragon Zombie, a downright ancient monster found only in the original Yugi Starter Deck. Three copies will bring this deck to fifteen total normal monsters, all of which are compatible with Fitting Room and capable of swinging under our lockdown cards. Sounds good to me.
One Dark Factory of Mass Production will give us a little extra hand presence: the perfect support for two copies of Lightning Vortex. Let’s be reasonable: 1700 ATK won’t swing over any Monarchs, so we need to do what we can to ensure that our monsters can attack directly. Vortex is a great way of doing that, as well as a nice way to even out rough draws. Got a useless normal monster? Justi-Break not doing you any good? Pitch it for Lightning Vortex. It’s a proven strategy that works time and again.
The last spell I’ll add is Heavy Storm. If we’re going to be aiming for OTKs based on one or more copies of Enchanting Fitting Room, we need to be able to clear away problem cards like Torrential Tribute or Mirror Force. While Julius avoided this potent spell in his original build, we’ve eased off the emphasis on continuous spell and trap cards, so Heavy Storm is a lot easier to play. A bit awkward at times? Sure. But it’ll also let us win in a ton of situations where that wouldn’t be possible otherwise.
Mirror Force and Torrential Tribute are two easy additions to make, providing more openings for direct attacks in their wake. Again, monster removal is key to our success, so these two cards are no-brainers.
Finally, three copies of the new trap card Common Charity will finish off the deck. Common Charity doesn’t offer extra cards unless it’s chained to an opposing effect like Mystical Space Typhoon, but it does offer very powerful card filtering, meaning that it can get us to those all-important copies of Enchanting Fitting Room. It’s a powerful tool for drawing out Heavy Storm (setting two copies of Charity is just mean), and it’ll let us really take advantage of that single Dark Factory. Common Charity is a must for any normal monster deck that’s based around key combos, and this deck is a great example of just that.
So, here are the changes I made:
-1 Iron Blacksmith Kotetsu
-1 Twin-Headed Behemoth
-1 Magician of Faith
-1 Card Trooper
-2 Heart of the Underdog
-1 Pot of Avarice
-2 Shrink
-1 Premature Burial
-2 Birthright
-1 Call of the Haunted
-2 Skill Drain
+3 Dragon Zombie
+1 Enchanting Fitting Room
+1 Dark Factory of Mass Production
+2 Lightning Vortex
+1 Heavy Storm
+1 Mirror Force
+1 Torrential Tribute
+3 Common Charity
The final build looks like this:
Vanilla Strike—Jason’s Fix—40 Cards
Monsters: 18
3 Cyber Dragon
3 Jerry Beans Man
3 Sonic Duck
3 Mad Lobster
3 Hunter Dragon
3 Dragon Zombie
Spells: 13
3 Enchanting Fitting Room
1 Smashing Ground
1 Brain Control
1 Level Limit - Area B
1 United We Stand
1 Mage Power
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Heavy Storm
1 Dark Factory of Mass Production
2 Lightning Vortex
Traps: 9
1 Skill Drain
2 Justi-Break
3 Common Charity
1 Gravity Bind
1 Mirror Force
1 Torrential Tribute
Opening monsters? What opening monsters? You won’t find any recruiters, Sangan, Card Trooper, or anything else that’s good to set on turn 1 here, and you might just want to eschew your normal summon for the turn when you win that die roll. Gravity Bind, Mirror Force, Torrential Tribute, Level Limit, or Common Charity are all acceptable plays though, and they can catch your opponent off guard. If you have Justi-Break, you can always set it and summon a monster, but that’s usually a bit ambitious. If your opponent has Cyber Dragon and knows what he or she is doing, that player will likely just swing with it without playing another monster. Ideally, you’ll be destroying more than one monster with each copy of Justi-Break, so don’t be afraid to take a hit early on in order to set up bigger plays down the road.
The key to this deck is to keep the opponent off the field while working your way to Enchanting Fitting Room. My earlier builds actually included Spell Reclamation as a brutal combo for the Room, but that proved a bit narrow even for this context. Luckily, many of the decks in this format are painfully slow, so you’ll frequently have the time you need. Gravity Bind, Level Limit, and Lightning Vortex can buy those extra turns when you need them.
Once you get Gravity Bind or Level Limit into play, take advantage of them by developing your field presence. Remember to play everything face up: failure to do so only leaves you vulnerable to those copies of Nobleman of Crossout that your opponent really wants to use, and while Brain Control remains a threat, the ability to garner massive swings in momentum (thanks to Justi-Break) balances that out pretty nicely. Between Mirror Force, Torrential Tribute, Vortex, and Justi-Break you’ve got six cards that can wipe your opponent clean off the field, and those kinds of openings are what let you win. Take your attacks when you can get them: you don’t need to wait for Enchanting Fitting Room in order to score a quick shot, and even 1600 or 1700 damage can mean the game in the long run. Just remember to hold Mystical Space Typhoon and Heavy Storm for those times when you can cause serious havoc.
Mage Power and United We Stand are both surprisingly worthwhile in this strategy, providing that extra oomph you need to finish off your opponent or simply letting you attack over a troublesome monster. A single Fitting Room will often mean an additional 3300 or 3400 damage on the table, and adding United We Stand to that quickly ups the damage total to around 5000. At that point, a third normal monster can mean game. Still, don’t be shortsighted: losing two cards to Sakuretsu Armor is still painful, so pick your spots and play your equip spells carefully.
Is this deck reliable? Uhh . . . sure! As much as something like this can be. Can it win? Yes—with surprising frequency. Is it fun? You tell me. Does Enchanting Fitting Room for game seem amusing?
I thought so! See you next week.
—Jason Grabher-Meyer
Got a cool deck that you think could benefit from some advice? Send me a deck list in the format shown in this article, along with your name, location, and a couple of paragraphs describing how the deck works. You can reach me at jdgmetagame@gmail.com.