I’m a huge fan of old horror movies. Whether it’s the pioneering greats like Romero’s 1968 classic Night of the Living Dead*, or campy kitsch like Stuart Gordon’s Dolls** from 1987, you can count on me to watch it with you when no one else will. Matt C., from Peachtree City, happens to have similar tastes, and his love for films like The Blob*** has earned his deck a trip to the Apotheosis!
Hey, Jason!
We've all seen at least one movie where the town is in danger of being destroyed by a giant thing of slime. Just imagine if slime was being made once per turn and then being launched for damage! Horrifying!
This deck is meant for fun, but I would really like to see it be at least a bit more competitive. The whole idea came from when I watched The Blob, and then a Yu-Gi-Oh! commercial came on TV (true story) and for some reason I remembered those little slime-making machines. I know it's not perfect, or even close to it, because I'm sure there are some cards that I didn't think of. Care to help out a slime friend in need?
—Matt C., Peachtree City, Georgia
Poor slime. It’s always getting the short end of the stick. In both movies and the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game, slime has always been outclassed by vampires, zombies, skeletons, and other stock horror archetypes. Well, Matt and I are putting an end to that disturbing trend here today! Here’s the goo-flinging behemoth that he submitted.
Attack of the Slime Tokens!
40 Cards
Monsters: 12
3 Cannon Soldier
3 Toon Cannon Soldier
3 Mystic Tomato
3 Spirit Reaper
Spells: 21
2 Emergency Provisions
1 Heavy Storm
3 Jam Breeding Machine
2 Level Limit – Area B
3 Messenger of Peace
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Scapegoat
1 Snatch Steal
2 Stray Lambs
3 Toon Table of Contents
2 Wave-Motion Cannon
Traps: 7
1 Call of the Haunted
2 Gravity Bind
1 Judgment of Anubis
2 Spirit Barrier
1 Torrential Tribute
For a deck that tries to accomplish nothing but hurl slime tokens at the opponent for the win, it’s actually a pretty solid effort. I don’t think this thing will ever win a tournament, but sometimes your goal isn’t to win. Sometimes the real goal is just to hurl as much goo as possible at a series of opponents, and . . . um . . . surprise! This is one of those times.
That said, we can definitely improve the deck and help Matt dish out a little more hurt when he decides to throw down his partners in slime. In order to do that, though, we’re going to have to make some cuts.
Right off the bat, I’m not seeing a great deal of point to playing Spirit Barrier. Sure, if this deck ends up losing its lockdown engine, Spirit Barrier can ensure that attack position Slime tokens don’t cost you the game, but Matt’s already packing a ton of defense. His Lockdown arsenal is packed with extra copies of standbys like Gravity Bind, Level Limit – Area B, and Messenger of Peace, and he’s got three copies of Spirit Reaper to protect his life points. Because those Reapers are going to be spending virtually all of their time in defense position, I think it’s safe to cut Spirit Barrier from the deck.
Next, we need to acknowledge something about Matt’s strategy. Though Jam Breeding Machine provides you with a constant source of tokens to tribute for Cannon Soldier’s effect, they also prevent you from summoning and can fill your field at a surprisingly fast rate. Because of that, you’ll often want to get rid of your own Breeding Machines. Matt knows this, as well. He’s using Emergency Provisions and Heavy Storm to get the Machines off the field when he’d rather not deal with them. But with that said, I’m not sure that the Machines are best sent to the graveyard. I’m going to drop one of the two Emergency Provisions, as well as Heavy Storm, and search for a better solution.
Though the deck needs to be able to draw Cannon Soldier reliably, Matt’s basically running nine copies of it—three Cannon Soldier, three Toon Cannon Soldier, and three Toon Table of Contents. Though the Tables will usually clear themselves out and not clog up your draws, I just don’t think we need more than six Soldiers to make the deck work. We’ve got Mystic Tomato in the deck, and it can seek out Cannon Soldier too. Because of that, I’m going to remove all three copies of Toon Table of Contents.
Lastly, I think Judgment of Anubis is a bit too conditional. Though every Lockdown deck needs to protect the cards that it’s using to control the field, there are more versatile options than Anubis.
We’ve removed eight cards, and that definitely gives us enough elbow room. First, any Burn deck has serious problems with Des Wombat. Its effect does nothing but shut down Burn strategies, and since Lockdown Burn saw so much success at Shonen Jump Championship San Francisco, it’s a good bet that the Wombat will see play in many side decks. Snatch Steal can feed a Wombat to Cannon Soldier for tribute, but Dust Tornado and Mystical Space Typhoon can prevent that trick from working reliably. In addition, a single card can’t be relied upon to stymie two or three copies of Des Wombat. Luckily, Lockdown Burn has a card that’s perfect for this situation.
Lava Golem eats Wombats. That’s pretty much its job in the current environment. And boy, is it ever good at what it does! With all the extra Lockdown power that Matt’s crammed into Attack of the Slime Tokens, we can rest assured that the Golem won’t get much of a chance to turn on its creator, so we’ll add a pair. It’ll give the deck a nice edge and ensure that it usually has an answer for Des Wombat. Remember to hold it back in duels where you believe your opponent has used his or her side deck. You’ll often be able to play it freely in game one, but you’ll need to reserve it for Wombats in games two and three of many matches.
Magician of Faith and Magical Merchant will both help this deck achieve its goals. The Magician can retrieve destroyed copies of Level Limit – Area B, Messenger of Peace, or Jam Breeding Machine, while the Merchant can dig through your deck to find them in the first place. While these pint-sized effect monsters are useless in most decks once their effects resolve, in this deck you can easily load them into Cannon Soldier to recoup your investment. They’ll add reliability and a bit of speed to the build.
Remember the Emergency Provisions and Heavy Storm that we removed? I’m going to replace them with a copy of Giant Trunade. That will bounce the cards we no longer want on the field, allowing us to reuse them at a later time in the duel. In addition, I’m going to add one copy of Dark Hole. Not only can it keep the opponent’s numbers down, it can also clear out your field if you ever find yourself stuck with five token monsters. While a field full of Sheep and Slimes is adorable in theory, it causes problems when you can’t drop a Cannon Soldier to clear them. You never want to use Dark Hole on a field full of tokens, but if you have to, you’ll be able to do so.
Finally, I need to replace the negation power of Judgment of Anubis, and I’m going to add two copies of Solemn Judgment to the deck in order to do that. Not only is Judgment infinitely easier to use than Judgment of Anubis, it can also accomplish more than just protecting your spells and traps. It’s a nice answer to Return from the Different Dimension, it can block big summons when you’re having trouble locking the field, and it’s a versatile all-purpose tool.
Here are the final changes that I made to the deck.
-1 Emergency Provisions
-1 Judgment of Anubis
-2 Spirit Barrier
-3 Toon Table of Contents
-1 Heavy Storm
+2 Lava Golem
+1 Magician of Faith
+1 Magical Merchant
+1 Giant Trunade
+1 Dark Hole
+2 Solemn Judgment
The final build looks like this!
Attack of the Slime Tokens!
Jason’s Fix
40 Cards
Monsters: 16
2 Lava Golem
1 Magician of Faith
1 Magical Merchant
3 Cannon Soldier
3 Toon Cannon Soldier
3 Mystic Tomato
3 Spirit Reaper
Spells: 18
1 Giant Trunade
1 Dark Hole
1 Emergency Provisions
3 Jam Breeding Machine
2 Level Limit – Area B
3 Messenger of Peace
1 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Scapegoat
1 Snatch Steal
2 Stray Lambs
2 Wave-Motion Cannon
Traps: 6
2 Solemn Judgment
1 Call of the Haunted
2 Gravity Bind
1 Torrential Tribute
At its heart, this deck plays just like any other Lockdown strategy. You want to fend off the opponent until you can get your hands on a Level Limit, Messenger of Peace, or Gravity Bind, and once you limit the opponent’s offensive abilities, you can begin working towards a win. Your target opening plays are Mystic Tomato or Spirit Reaper, because all you’re looking to do is protect yourself from damage while you draw cards. Magical Merchant is also acceptable, since it will help you aggressively proceed towards your target spell and trap cards.
The early game is just a matter of patience. You want to lock the field and you’ll wait as long as it takes. However, this is where the deck starts to get a little different from its more traditional contemporaries. While you’re waiting for that Level Limit or Messenger of Peace, you can also churn out Slime tokens. They can sop up hits from an opponent, but in an ideal situation, they might be appearing faster than they can be destroyed. If the opponent drops a couple of monsters to deal with your Slimes, feel free to pop off Torrential Tribute—you may as well damage their plans in any way possible. However, remember that any Slime tokens surviving on the field once the lock comes down will suddenly become ammo. You want to do everything in your power to bluff the opponent into not attacking those tokens, simply because doing so will let you win faster once your evil plan is revealed.
Once it does, the deck is very different from other Burn builds. Most competitive Lockdown Burn players rely primarily on non-renewable burn effects to seal the win. Think Ceasefire, Wave-Motion Cannon, and many other one-shots. Though Stealth Bird and Solar Flare Dragon do provide a constant source of damage, they’re easier to disrupt. Just attacking or destroying one knocks out its ability to deal damage. While Cannon Soldier is the backbone of the deck, you’ve got six of them, plus Call of the Haunted. You probably won’t be running out of them very often.
Keep in mind that while a Breeding Machine or two is a great source of ammunition, you’ll often deal far more damage by removing your Machines from play. Doing so can often open up the chance for a Stray Lambs or Scapegoat, and each is worth 1000 and 2000 damage, respectively.
Overall, this deck can be incredibly entertaining or incredibly boring. It all depends on how you play it. If you’re a reserved, shy duelist, then this probably won’t be as thrilling for you as it is for me. If, however, you’re willing to take on the persona of an evil genius (or a complete maniac), you might find the following tips helpful.
1: Practice an evil laugh. Use it whenever you launch a Slime token. Talk about how your “maniacal genius is all finally paying off,” and frequently make reference to your “abominable plans for world domination.”
2: Sing the theme song from The Blob. Yes, the movie had a theme song. Thanks to your vocal talents and a marketing team from 1958, this deck can have one, too!
3: If your opponent is playing a Cookie Cutter deck and things start coming together for you, try and remind him or her that he or she is being thumped down by a Slime token deck. Etiquette normally forbids gloating, but we’ll make an exception for a strategy that revolves around such a terrible idea.
Hopefully the fix helps Matt with his very own abominable plans, and hopefully it inspires you to respect Slimes a little bit more! Believe me, those poor little underappreciated globs of gelatinous sorrow need all the love they can get. Won’t you hug a Slime today?
—Jason Grabher-Meyer
*The quintessential zombie movie, this film showed us everything that made the genre frightening. Zombies are slow-moving, persistent beasts, and even for those who can deal with them physically, there’s always the mental strain of looking into the eyes of someone you once knew. Mix that with stellar acting and a plot that’s based around complicated, flawed characters, and you’ve got one of the best horror movies of all time.
**Think Resident Evil, but with more killer dolls and fewer zombies. It’s a potentially horrifying romp that goes terribly wrong, simply because the film’s antagonists are way too cute to be scary. Here’s hoping for a remake!
***The Blob was, for all purposes, a passable horror film until you hit the last ten minutes. Centered on a menacing, featureless, completely un-human force of evil that devours everything in its path, the movie suddenly becomes, um . . . well, let’s say it collapses entirely when the Blob’s secret weakness is discovered. Apparently it just can’t handle being stuffed in a crate and parachuted into the Antarctic! Yup. 84 minutes of the filmmakers telling us how unstoppable the Blob is, and then they spend the last two sticking it in a box and dropping it into a snow bank. It’s actually possible to spot the exact moment where the project ran out of funding.