Take two parts Hydrogeddon and one part Oxygeddon, mix the three together with a Bonding – H2O, and you have yourself a Water Dragon. Bastion’s Water Dragon proved to be quite a challenge for both Jaden and Chazz. Both duelists struggled to find some way to take it down, and ultimately Jaden prevailed, after a long and difficult duel.

Using Water Dragon requires that we have an understanding of the materials that produce it, so let’s begin by looking at Hydrogeddon and Oxygeddon.

A Water Dragon just isn’t a Water Dragon without two Hydrogeddons. For reference, the text of Hydrogeddon says, “When this card destroys an opponent's monster as a result of battle and sends it to the Graveyard, you can Special Summon 1 "Hydrogeddon" from your Deck.”

Hydrogeddon’s task is a simple one: “Destroy an opponent’s monster in battle so I can find a buddy.” It does, however, have a few circumstances that warrant attention. Hydrogeddon needs to survive the battle in order for its effect to be activated. If Hydrogeddon attacks a monster with an equal ATK value, both monsters will be destroyed, and Hydrogeddon will have failed in its mission.

Hydrogeddon also needs to make sure that the opponent’s monster that it destroys in battle will actually go to the graveyard. While monster tokens might make a welcome target for Hydrogeddon’s attack, they will not go to the graveyard when they are destroyed, and thus they won’t allow Hydrogeddon’s effect to activate. The Dimensional monsters, like D. D. Warrior Lady and D. D. Warrior, can remove themselves and the attacking Hydrogeddon from play instead of being sent to the graveyard, which also ruins Hydrogeddon’s plans.

Just because it’s your opponent’s turn doesn’t mean you won’t be able to use Hydrogeddon’s effect. When your opponent attacks your attack position Hydrogeddon with his or her Cyber Dragon, one copy of Rush Recklessly is all you will need to make Hydrogeddon strong enough to destroy the Dragon. When your powered-up Hydrogeddon destroys Cyber Dragon and sends it to the graveyard, its effect is satisfied, allowing you to special summon another Hydrogeddon from your deck.

When reading the text of Hydrogeddon, some players wonder what will happen if it attacks a monster like Mystic Tomato and destroys it in battle. Since both monsters share the same timing for the activation of their effects, the two effects will both activate simultaneously. Assuming that the player controlling Hydrogeddon is the turn player, his or her effect will be placed first onto the chain, followed by the opponent’s Mystic Tomato.

With Mystic Tomato, this isn’t likely to be much of an issue, but with Shining Angel, it can easily be different. Shining Angel could be used to search for Jowgen the Spiritualist, and Hydrogeddon doesn’t want Jowgen ruining the special summon. If you see a Shining Angel, be careful.

If we want to complete our Water Dragon, we’ll need the assistance of Oxygeddon. The text for Oxygeddon says, “When this card is destroyed as a result of battle with a Pyro-Type monster and sent to the Graveyard, inflict 800 points of damage to both players' Life Points.”

Oxygeddon’s effect is interesting, because it is not often an issue in most duels. When you look over the Top 8 decklists from recent Shonen Jump Championships and the tournament reports collected by Metagame.com writer Julia Hedberg, how many Fire-attribute monsters or Pyro-type monsters do you see? The odds are good that Thestalos the Firestorm Monarch is the only one you are likely to see. Due to this, Oxygeddon’s effect is often of no consequence.

If it does happen to be destroyed by a Pyro-type monster, you and your opponent will both receive 800 points of damage. Whether this will occur is entirely up to you and the strategy of your deck.

Now that we have our Hydrogeddons and our Oxygeddon ready for battle, we need to bond them together. To do this, we use Bonding – H2O.

Bonding – H2O says, “Tribute 2 "Hydrogeddon"s and 1 "Oxygeddon" on your side of the field. Special Summon 1 "Water Dragon" from your hand, Deck or Graveyard.” It is important to keep in mind that the monsters you tribute for Bonding – H2O will be tributed to pay its activation cost. A well-timed Cursed Seal of the Forbidden Spell or Magic Jammer could ruin everything.

When you resolve the effect of Bonding – H2O, special summon one Water Dragon from your hand, deck, or graveyard. Normally, cards like Bonding – H2O only allow you to special summon from your hand or your deck. The added ability to special summon one Water Dragon from your graveyard will make it much easier for you to use your Water Dragon, because you won’t have a reason to fear losing it to your graveyard. Even if the Water Dragon in your graveyard was discarded by a card effect, you can still use Bonding – H2O to special summon it. This utility allows you to play with only one or two copies of Water Dragon in your deck and decreases your odds of drawing one at an inopportune time.

Now that you’ve placed your Water Dragon onto the battlefield, the real fun can begin. For quick reference, the text of Water Dragon reads, “This card cannot be Normal Summoned or Set. This card cannot be Special Summoned except by the effect of "Bonding - H2O". While this card is face-up on the field, the ATK of FIRE monsters and Pyro-Type monsters become 0. When this card is destroyed and sent to the Graveyard, you can Special Summon 2 "Hydrogeddon"s and 1 "Oxygeddon" from your Graveyard.”

As long as Water Dragon remains face-up on the field, all Fire-attribute monsters and all Pyro-type monsters will have ATK values of 0. The ATK values of the affected monsters will remain at 0 even if your opponent tries to use other cards to increase their ATK values. Ultimately, if the opponent wants his or her Fire-attribute and/or Pyro-type monsters to have any chance at all, he or she will need to eliminate Water Dragon.

This is where Water Dragon’s second effect comes into play. When your  is destroyed, if you have three open monster zone spaces on your side of the field, you can activate its effect to special summon two Hydrogeddons and one Oxygeddon from your graveyard. This works quite well, allowing you to use another copy of Bonding – H2O to bring Water Dragon right back again.

Think about it this way. When you attack with Water Dragon and your opponent is lacking monsters, will it make sense for him or her to use Sakuretsu Armor or Widespread Ruin? Doing so would replace one strong monster with three monsters that all have a decent ATK value. Their combined attacks would inflict even more damage than Water Dragon would have done on its own. Then, during the second main phase, your opponent risks the possibility that you’ll just use Bonding – H20 once more, forcing him or her to face your strongest monster again.

Water Dragon’s splitting effect isn’t without weakness. As an optional trigger effect, it’s possible to miss the timing window for Water Dragon’s effect. If it’s destroyed at an inopportune time during a chain’s resolution, that will prevent it from special summoning any of its base components. This isn’t something you will run into often, but you do need to be aware of it.

Bastion activates Heavy Storm to destroy the face-down cards in his opponent Chazz’s spell and trap zone. In response, Chazz activates one of his set cards, revealing Ring of Destruction. He chooses to target Bastion’s Water Dragon with its effect.

When the chain resolves, Ring of Destruction resolves first and destroys Bastion’s Water Dragon. At this point, Bastion would need to activate Water Dragon’s effect if he wanted to use it, but he can’t activate it, because a chain is still resolving. Next, his Heavy Storm resolves and destroys all spell and trap cards on the field. Now that the chain has finished resolving, Bastion would like to activate Water Dragon’s effect, but he can’t, because the timing window has already passed.

Wrapping up our look at Water Dragon, allow me to make a suggestion for its effect. Given that you will have a hard time running into Fire-attribute monsters in the current game environment, there are ways you can trick your opponent into having a Fire-attribute monster under his or her control.

With Lava Golem, you can replace two of your opponent’s monsters with a Fire-attribute monster that is completely wrecked by Water Dragon. Also, with the equip spell card Scroll of Bewitchment you can alter the attribute of one specific monster, changing it to Fire. This equipped monster will be weakened by Water Dragon and become easy pickings.

Until next week, send all questions and comments to Curtis@metagame.com.