If there is one thing we learned from Shonen Jump Championship Anaheim, it’s that Dark World is indeed a competitive force. It’s hard to dislike a deck theme that benefits from discarding cards. It’s also hard to dislike a theme that outright punishes your opponent for thinking any form of discard is going to be a good thing.

However, one of the key reasons why Dark World monsters see play for only brief periods of time is that players are concerned about monsters like Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World clogging up their draws. Many of the monsters rely on combos with other cards in order to be effective. However, Dark World monsters themselves can also act as a worthwhile solution to this problem. Brron, Mad King of Dark World is one of the theme’s key discard outlets, and yet many players seem to forget it exists.

When players run Dark World monsters, there are two general routes that they typically take to trigger the effects. The first is to run monsters like Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World and Sillva, Warlord of Dark World as counter-measures against discard effects. This was very popular when Spirit Reaper was allowed at three copies per deck. However, it was also a very inconsistent and unstable strategy, since even the full effects of these monsters could not guarantee you a win. There was also the chance that your opponent could discard one, out of maybe four or five different cards in your hand. The only other discard outlet that these decks had to trigger a special summoned Dark World monster was Graceful Charity.

The other route was to run Dark World monsters like Goldd and Sillva as a side deck strategy against these discard decks, just as an extra measure of protection against effects ranging from Spirit Reaper to Thestalos the Firestorm Monarch. As a side deck strategy, the Dark World monsters are less likely to cost you games in a premiere event, since you never actually have to bring them into your main deck.

At SJC Anaheim, however, Comic Odyssey’s Theeresak “T” Poonsombat piloted a Dark World focused deck to a Top 4 finish. T’s strategy focused less on the Dark World aggro strategy that is encouraged by the mass special summons that can be generated with the deck, and more on being a foil to the Monarch control deck. Thestalos the Firestorm Monarch has remained one of the control deck’s key monsters, and T’s deck punishes a player for running that specific Monarch. A badly timed Thestalos could wind up discarding a Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World or Sillva, Warlord of Dark World from T’s hand, landing the Monarch player in hot water.

However, what if you don’t have the ability to press the advantage that you generate with these combos? Sometimes, the three Dark World Lightning cards, Card Destruction, Graceful Charity, and Morphing Jar just aren’t enough. This is especially true of Morphing Jar, since it is so fragile, and of Dark World Lightning, since its effect can be fizzled if the initial target is removed from the field or turned face up (thus keeping the discard portion of the effect from resolving). This is where Brron comes in. Brron, Mad King of Dark World specializes in pitching beaters like Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World from your hand.

Brron is already a solid monster. It has a solid 1800 ATK, which is huge in a control-dominant environment like this one. The Advanced format’s premiere non-tribute aggro monster, Hydrogeddon, needs help to get over Brron, Mad King of Dark World. More importantly, Brron gives you an easy ability to discard Dark World monsters from your hand. Sometimes, one-shot discard effects such as Dark World Lightning just aren’t enough to get Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World and Sillva, Warlord of Dark World onto the field. Brron, Mad King of Dark World gives you the option of discarding a card from your hand every time you inflict battle damage to your opponent with it. This gives you a solid and constant discard outlet.

However, what makes Brron such a powerful discard outlet is that its effect triggers during the damage step. Veteran players know that only counter-traps and stat modifiers can be played during the damage step, so effects that trigger at this point will typically resolve without any real problems. In this case, your opponent won’t get an opportunity to respond to the special summoning of a Goldd or Sillva with a Torrential Tribute or Bottomless Trap Hole, because Brron, Mad King of Dark World makes sure the discard takes place during that key damage step. This creates a window for your 2300 ATK beaters to safely hit the field, and can easily set up some fast and efficient beats. A direct attack with Brron, followed by the special summoning and attack of a Goldd or Sillva, is powerful. It puts the pressure on your opponent to deal with your huge field during his or her turn, or risk losing the duel immediately.

What’s most important about Brron, Mad King of Dark World is that it encourages an aggressive strategy with the Dark World monsters. One of the best ways to beat a control deck is to push it into a situation that it would not be comfortable with. Dealing around 4000 life point damage and showcasing a field of two or three relatively large monsters can do that to a control deck. Brron, Mad King of Dark World allows the Dark World deck to blow some strategies clear out of the water with its sheer power and brute force. Its discard effect will still set up Deck Devastation Virus shenanigans with Goldd or Sillva, so it’s not like the deck is giving up on any of its tricks.

Brron simply makes things move faster: one of the most important elements to making Dark World succeed as this Advanced format expands. As decks adapt to Goldd and Sillva as a part of the format, there will be fewer chances for your Dark World monsters to be discarded by your opponent’s card effects. This means that Brron, Mad King of Dark World will be very important in adapting T’s deck to the changing format. If Dark World makes an SJC Top 8 appearance again, I wouldn’t be surprised if Brron saw a place in the deck. It’s a key factor in aggressively taking games away from many of the decks in this format.

Next week, I’ll be looking at the Chain Burn deck that I keep promising to cover. I’m serious this time!

—Mike Rosenberg