Over the past year, no Shonen Jump Championship regular has given us more highs and more lows than Jon Moore. From his incredible, and frankly insightful victory over Adam Corn at Shonen Jump Championship Houston, to face-palm worthy play errors at Shonen Jump Championship Nashville, Moore has defined himself as one of the most unique star players in this game. He’s here to have fun, he’s here to win, and he’s going to do it his way whenever he can. Win or lose, I’ve never seen the guy lose his cool, and he may be the most resilient player in the game today. His success is controversial, but no matter what you think of him you can’t dispute his utter mastery over the Six Samurai.

Nobody is as good with this deck as Jon Moore. Absolutely nobody.

So when Moore told me he was planning an all-new Samurai build for the National Championships, I leapt on the opportunity to cover it. Moore set a trend in February when he played three copies of Great Shogun Shien to beat the metagame at Houston. Now, he’s bucking convention yet again, and the result is a whole new breed of Samurai. Check it out:

If you’re reading this coverage live on Day 1, you won’t be able to see Moore’s complete decklist yet — it’ll be up once the Swiss rounds are over. That’s a shame, because you really don’t get the full impact of just how different this deck is until you can read the entire thing in one go. With that said, let’s look at some of the unconventional choices piece by piece.

First, the deck has leveraged its emphasis on Great Shogun Shien into more copies of Enishi, Shien’s Chancellor. Great Shogun was excellent in Houston due to the high number of Dark Armed Return decks and OTK strategies, both of which needed to play multiple spells each turn in order to work towards a win. With OTK’s largely out of the picture, Dark Armed Dragon’s speed diminished, and Gladiator Beasts dominant by a hair, the Shogun’s importance just isn’t what it used to be. While it was once a game-shaping card, the upswing in Bottomless Trap Hole and the ability of Gladiator Beast Gyzarus to just shrug Shogun Shien right off the field has rendered it sub-optimal. In its place, Enishi, Shien’s Chancellor becomes an excellent call for the expected metagame.

Games often come down to who can play his or her biggest monster first and keep it on the field to retain control: Dark Armed Dragon, Judgment Dragon, and Gladiator Beast Gyzarus into Gladiator Beast Heraklinos all create plays where the field is suddenly wrested from the opponent, and if executed properly, control over the remainder of the duel is retained and the game is won moments later. But Enishi, Shien’s Chancellor is different. While most decks will find it difficult to come back from a push fuelled by any of these three big monsters, Enishi trumps them all by destroying any of them off a single special summon. If the opponent over-extended in order to play his or her big monster, that player will be highly vulnerable to follow-up attacks from the Samurai.

This creates a situation much like the one often witnessed in Chaos mirror matches back in the era of Goat Control. In that format, conventional wisdom amongst top players was to play Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning only after the opponent had played his or hers first, wiping away the opponent’s Envoy and leaving you in control. The methodology here is similar to that. While a Goat Control player would usually create pressure with Thousand-Eyes Restrict to draw out that Black Luster Soldier, Moore plans to do so with sheer brute force, making his signature early-game presses with a horde of angry Samurai. That forces out answers like Dark Armed and Heraklinos, which in turn get utterly smashed by Enishi. This is going to be even more effective than one would suspect, since Moore’s reputation for risky over-extensions may fool his opponents into believing they’re safe as long as Moore can be wiped off the field. Somebody’s going to assume that today, and he or she is going to get a rude awakening.

Moore keeps his average ATK high, maxing out on copies of The Six Samurai – Zanji and The Six Samurai – Irou. With six main decked beat sticks to normal summon, and more where that came from thanks to special summons, he’s going to be able to swing over the average Gladiator or Dark Armed deck with ease. If his opponent should be running a lower-utility Lightsworn deck he’ll have the same luxury, and I really can’t over-emphasize how much that’s worth. The ability to reliably attack and destroy your opponent’s monsters may not be sophisticated, but it’s dangerous nonetheless, and it’s a factor most duelists seem to be underestimating.

The heavy use of Irou is a strong choice. With Gladiator Beasts often setting monsters in order to generate Gyzarus plays or combo with Waboku, and other decks packing Legendary Jujitsu Master, there’s no shortage of monsters being set here today. Irou taps into that trend and exploits it, turning what appeared to be safe plays into utter disappointments.

Moore himself is playing two copies of Legendary Jujitsu Master, a call made chiefly for Gladiator Beasts but good in other matchups. It’s a great choice, providing yet another backup plan for Moore’s over-extensions as well as a stronger opening than might otherwise be possible in a Samurai deck. “Three out of four times the deck opens beautifully,” explained Moore. “When it doesn’t, it plays out of [the rough opening] in two turns.” Jujitsu Master is a big part of that, mucking up the opponent’s plans and creating openings for direct attacks.

Moving on to the spells and traps, one might notice that Moore has made yet another innovative decision. At a time when Reasoning was a debated card for Samurai, it was Moore’s Championship win that made it a staple for the archetype. Now, he’s decided to throw chance out the window and not run a single copy. A strong lineup of defensive traps helps him maintain his field presence instead, and makes the deck much more stable in the long run. Bottomless Trap Hole is a top pick this weekend, since all the top decks play into it hard and tend to come out on the losing side of the exchange. Here, Moore will use it just like Jujitsu Master, protecting early plays and creating holes in the opponent’s defense.

The deck taps into a lot of insightful metagame reads and works to exploit trends that will definitely be seen in today’s competition. Moore’s confident today without being vain. “Think of it like this” he told me. “A splash-able tool box that allows for monsters other than Warriors, with a 2100 ATK reverse Marauding Captain that has a better effect for the special summon factor, three Pot of Greed, two Chaos Sorcerer.” It’s an accurate description that does a lot to express the power level of this strategy.

Will Jon Moore’s Samurai survive the onslaught of Dark Armed Dragon, Lightsworn, Monarchs, and the Gladiator Beasts? Anything could happen here today, but with so many of Moore’s metagame calls seemingly spot-on, I like his chances of a Day 2 finish.