Welcome to the first week of Enemy of Justice previews here at Metagame.com! More often than not, the first Monday preview slot is reserved for one of the new super or ultra rares in the impending set. Mike had Cyber Dragon for Cybernetic Revolution, Jason came up with Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World for Elemental Energy, and Mike was back again with Uria, Lord of Searing Flames for Shadow of Infinity. This time around, I’m here with a pair of common cards, but they aren’t just any common cards. They’re two of the most powerful cards ever printed. Let’s have a look, shall we?

Macro Cosmos

Continuous Trap

You can Special Summon "Helios - The Primordial Sun" from your Deck or hand. Any card that would go to the Graveyard is removed from play instead.

At first glance, Macro Cosmos doesn’t seem all that special. We already have something that sends cards out of play instead of to the graveyard. The thing is, Banisher of the Light is a monster. Playing it takes up your summon for the turn or forces you to use the effect of Shining Angel to bring it out in attack position (0 ATK). With Macro Cosmos, you set and flip it, and if you’re playing Helios - The Primordial Sun (from the new World Championship 2006 video game), you can special summon it from your hand or deck. That means that unlike Banisher, which actually costs you the summon for your turn, you instead get a free monster, probably from your deck, that has a synergistic effect with that of Macro Cosmos. Did I mention that monster was free? Because it is—and since it’s a special summon, you still have your normal summon to work with.

Care to summon a Monarch? Go right ahead and pick any Monarch you like. Whatever card you eliminate with its effect is gone to the removed zone. That means no Magician of Faith, no sneaky removing from Chaos Sorcerer, and even if you hit a Dark World monster with Thestalos, its effect doesn’t activate because it didn’t get discarded to the graveyard. The only thing you really have to worry about is an opposing Return from the Different Dimension, but since you’re going to be removing most of your own monsters from play anyway, why not play it yourself? Quite possibly the best thing about this card is that it lets you throw around D.D. Survivors as if they were Treeborn Frogs. Since they bypass the graveyard and go straight out of play, any face-up D.D. Survivor that’s destroyed or tributed will return to its owner’s side of the field in the end phase. That means that the real Treeborn Frog loses out because it’s removed from play, but the Survivor is not only big, unlimited, and searchable by Reinforcement of the Army, it also comes back during the end phase. This will ensure that you’ll always have a monster to defend your life points even if your tribute monster is met with Torrential Tribute or some other form of removal.

Speaking of removal, I may have been a bit too hasty in declaring the insanity that is D.D. Survivor as the best thing about a deck based around Macro Cosmos. Macro Cosmos decks also get their very own, unlimited, mass removal spell to toss around at will. It’s a card that the TV show declared to be “so powerful that it warps space itself.” It’s called Grand Convergence, and you’re going to have to get used to it: it’s going to pop up a lot in the near future.

Grand Convergence

Quick-Play Spell

This card can only be activated when you have "Macro Cosmos" on the field. Inflict 300 damage to your opponent's Life Points and destroy all monsters on the field.

I’m not joking. That’s really what it says, and yes, it is a quick-play spell. Grand Convergence is like Dark Hole on steroids, but only for those willing to dedicate their entire decks to a Macro Cosmos-based strategy. Unlike Dark Hole, Grand Convergence is completely un-splashable, but it’s also even more powerful than Dark Hole. Not only does Convergence wipe out all monsters on the field, it also deals 300 points of burn damage and does so at quick-play speed. That pushes this card from excellent to “learn how to deal with me, or else.” This makes it chainable to removal and the like, and can also be played from the hand any time during your turn just in case things get out of hand. An especially fun move is to chain Grand Convergence to Heavy Storm. Not only do you wipe out all monsters on the field, but they are also removed from play, as the Storm hasn’t resolved yet. That means that your D.D. Survivors get one more free revival before you have to find another copy of Macro Cosmos.

Grand Convergence is also an excellent card to play against Return from the Different Dimension variants. Most of these decks use Mirage Dragon or Pitch-Black Warwolf in addition to Jinzo to make absolutely certain that the opponent can’t whack them with a game-ending Ceasefire or a crippling Mirror Force. But none of those monsters can prevent you from wiping the field clean and taking out a little chunk of the opponent’s life points. The burn effect comes in really handy here, since your opponent tends to have only a little chunk of life left after playing Return.

The one major downside to this card is that you can’t get it back with Magician of Faith, since it will be removed from play along with the monsters it destroys upon resolution. In fact, when you’re playing Macro Cosmos, you can’t really use any graveyard recursion effects. It’s the price you pay to wield the power of the entire cosmos in your hands, but I for one believe that it’s far more than a simple lesson in equivalent exchange. You can easily get a lot more out of Macro Cosmos and Grand Convergence than you give up to use them, and for that reason, I expect to see strong showings by players using them at Nationals. Remember, Enemy of Justice becomes legal on June 1, so you’ll have to take all the new strategies introduced by the set into consideration during your preparation for the event.

May 13 and 14 will be the Sneak Preview weekend this time around, so make sure to look up the event that’s closest to you and get there! It’s always fun to tear open brand-new packs that aren’t yet available in any store. I’ll be judging the one in Pittsburgh, PA, so if you’re in the area, feel free to drop on by and say “Hi!”

There are still plenty of previews to go, so make sure you check back every day to see the latest new cards from Enemy of Justice. That does it for me for this week. I’ll be back in my regular time slot on Tuesday next week for another preview, so until next time, play hard, play fair, and most importantly, have fun!

Jerome McHale

jcmchale@andrew.cmu.edu