That’s why I’m excited about Power of the Duelist: it’s got Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs, and they’re not just good-looking pictures of Dinosaurs. I honestly can’t wait to play with these guys. I always look forward to the new sets, but wow, I really can’t wait for this one.

And I get to review the biggest Dinosaur of them all, Ultimate Tyranno! What a name! I want eight of them! Sure, there’s Black Tyranno—of course I love it—and Tyranno Infinity—yes, it’s awesome—but Ultimate Tyranno? You know what, I’ll take ten. Just look at it! It reminds me of American Godzilla!* Actually, I think I want to make a shirt out of these guys.

Anyway, since you should never judge a T-rex by superlatives alone, we should begin by taking a look at what it can actually do.

Ultimate Tyranno is an Earth-type Dinosaur, and a level 8 monster with 3000 ATK and 2200 DEF. It’s not just big, though—it’s also got an especially carnivorous effect. If it’s in attack position when your battle phase begins, you have to attack each of your opponent’s monsters with it, once apiece.

Now that’s a Tyrannosaur. It’s big, it’s angry, and it’s not afraid of anything that your opponent might have on the field. This is the real deal destroy-the-park, eat-the-tourists, keep-the-island-for-yourself kind of Tyrannosaur, decked out in fancy armor to boot.

The first thing most players will think after looking at the card (apart from, “That is one super-sized order of T-rex”) is, “But this is a level 8 monster. It’ll be too hard to fit it into a deck.” I agree that two-tribute monsters need to offer more than just bulked-up stats to earn a spot in a deck. Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys was the first two-tribute monster I played consistently, and it was its effect that made it so attractive. After all, a single tribute monster like Mobius or Zaborg could smoke it. But that effect! There’s so much that you can do with it!

Ultimate Tyranno has it all, though: a brutally high ATK, a solid DEF, and an effect that can give you a shot at instantly dominating the field. It has no special summoning requirements either, so you never have to worry about summoning it correctly before you can resuscitate it from the graveyard with Call of the Haunted or Premature Burial.

Let’s talk a bit more about its effect. If it’s in attack position when you enter your battle phase, the first attacks you declare have to be with Ultimate Tyranno. You can’t attack with other monsters in between, or choose not to attack something. If it’s pointed at your opponent when the battle phase begins, there’s just no holding it back. You can certainly clear out a lot of monsters this way, and if you’re playing someone who’s running a lot of search monsters, it’s going to be a long battle phase. Whatever hits the field, Tyranno is going to go after it. Watch out for Injection Fairy Lily, because it’s got the potential to stand up to him.

On to the good stuff. I can think of plenty of cards I want to try with this T-rex. I like piercing damage, so Fairy Meteor Crush or Big Bang Shot both intrigue me. I do believe I’d enjoy attacking everything and blasting right through it, especially if it’s Spirit Reaper. Or three Spirit Reapers, all in a row. Ooh, that’s 8400 damage right there.

You could try running Final Attack Orders or Windstorm of Etaqua against an opponent who’s playing a defensive game with a lineup of weenie little flip effect monsters. Or Scapegoat—Ultimate Tyranno would love to have a little lamb. Or maybe some Ojama tokens—let your opponent get good and mad that you’ve filled up three of his or her monster zones with creepy little guys in Speedos, then switch them to attack position and unleash Tyranno. Ojama trauma just reached a new high.

You’re going to want to avoid running into Sakuretsu Armor, Mirror Force, or Magic Cylinder, so include some spell and trap removal. Mirage Dragon and Pitch-Black Warwolf probably aren’t strangers to you, and either one would be happy to stand behind Ultimate Tyranno and yell, “Yeah? Whachugonnadoabouddit!” at your opponent.

Ceasefire would make a nice pre-game show, so when you’re ready to start chomping away at your opponent’s face-down lineup, you’ll do it with the added enjoyment of inflicting some additional damage that the opponent probably cannot now afford while obliterating all hope of drawing extra cards, destroying one monster on the field, or any of the other great things he or she was anticipating.

If you’ve experimented with Dino Return (and good old Tyranno Infinity) you might want to rearrange your build and give this guy a try. If your opponent hasn’t got anything to stop the Return attack, you can probably clear out the entire field with Tyranno and strip away any remaining life points with whatever else you’ve got. If you’re interested in playing it with Return, remember that Big Bang Shot can give you both an extra boost of damage, and a way to get the big guy out of play.

But this is the combo that I’d dream about the night before a preview event—the great Fossil Excavation/Ultimate Tyranno pas de deux.

Fossil Excavation is a continuous trap, also due out in Power of the Duelist. It lets you discard one card from your hand, then pick a Dinosaur out of your graveyard and special summon it. If that dinosaur has an effect, the effect will be negated, and when Fossil Excavation is removed from the field, the monster is destroyed.

Anyone with any sense immediately wants to know, “Can I special summon the card I just discarded?” and the answer is the good answer—yes, you can! You can pitch Ultimate Tyranno from your hand, then summon it right to the field. You’ll give up the effect of attacking every monster, but still you’ve got a free 3000 ATK attacker, and there may be situations where you don’t want to have to attack everything.

No one should ever think that they’ve got the total upper hand with a Tyrannosaurus, so there can be some drawbacks to the card. You probably don’t want it in your opening hand (unless you’ve got Fossil Excavation, maybe) and sadly, Smashing Ground will not be able to leave it alone. Turning it to defense position leaves it vulnerable to Monarchs or Jinzo, although if you can put out a copy of Wasteland (I bet you’ve forgotten all about that card), it’s an even match.

There’s a gloomy side to everything if you prefer to be a pessimist, so you might as well look on the sunny side of the saurian and give it a go. Come on! It’s a two-tribute monster that’s actually worthy of competitive play, and what’s more, it benefits from being a Dinosaur-type monster. It could give one of the game’s most neglected monster types a strong reason to see some table time. Treeborn Frog and Gravekeeper’s Spy are already providing tribute support for big monsters, so bringing a whopper like this to the field is a lot easier than it used to be. It can hardly get easier . . .

 . . . or can it? Next week, I’ll show you another Dinosaur that will prove that it can! Dinosaurs want to get this big brute out on their side, and with that aim in mind, there’s an excellent tributing boost lurking within the set. Check back next week, and I’ll show you what I mean!