Konami Special
You're in for a treat this week, everyone. I'm pulling out one of my personal decks to show you all this time. In my case, I've always been a huge video game fanatic. I usually don't like side-scrolling shooters, but there is one such game that stands head and shoulders above the rest. That game is Gradius. First created by none other than Konami in 1985, this game boasted some of the most unique stages and enemies in any game to that point. To this day, Gradius has a special place in my heart. As such, I present to you the Konami Special.
-=Monsters=-
3 - Victory Viper XX032 - Cyber Phoenix
2 - Shining Angel
2 - Reflect Bounder
2 - Dekoichi the Battlechanted Locomotive
1 - Breaker the Magical Warrior
1 - D.D. Warrior Lady
1 - Tsukuyomi
1 - Sangan
2 - Cyber Dragon
1 - Jinzo
-=Spells=-
3 - Power Capsule2 - Rush Recklessly
2 - Nobleman of Crossout
1 - Book of Moon
1 - Brain Control
1 - Graceful Charity
1 - Heavy Storm
1 - Limiter Removal
1 - Mystical Space Typhoon
1 - Premature Burial
1 - Scapegoat
1 - Snatch Steal
-=Traps=-
2 - Sakuretsu Armor1 - Mirror Wall
1 - Mirror Force
1 - Call of the Haunted
1 - Torrential Tribute
This deck specializes in combat tricks. This involves surprising your opponent during battle, especially on your opponent's turn. Nothin irritates an opponent more than not only losing a monster, but having on of Vic Viper's effects activate. The deck can also play defensively, building an effective wall until things look more in your favor. However, the deck by design is offensive, and should be played as such. I'll go over the highlights of the deck.
Victory Viper XX03: The core (no pun intended) of the deck. At 1200 ATK, he's a bit fragile, but that can easily be remedied with a few well-placed attacks. For the first couple successful attacks, focus on increasing Vic's ATK until he's a respectable beatstick. After that, the tokens start coming out in full force, taking time to destroy any troublesome Spells or Traps.
Cyber Phoenix: A true godsend for the Viper, this beauty of a card makes your Vic Viper untargetable. This shuts off many of the 1-for-1 Monster destruction Spells. Plus, when he inevitably gets destroyed in battle, you get to draw a card. It's win-win with this guy.
Reflect Bounder: An effective staller and a decent attacker all in a nice Machine package. When this got semi-restricted, it was a happy day for me. It should have been for you too.
Power Capsule: Being able to summon Vic Viper, then immediately raise his ATK, then kill a Monster and raise his ATK again is a very nice trick. Power Capsule is also useful for when you absolutely, positively have to kill that Spell or Trap and don't have a Mystical Space Typhoon handy. Last but not least, the only thing better than Vic Viper is two Vic Vipers, and this card does the job nicely.
Rush Recklessly: A neat combat trick, at least until Shrink becomes more easily accessible. A surprise 700 ATK on the Viper is nothing to sneeze at, especially when that Viper gets off an effect.
Mirror Wall: Another mini-Shrink combat trick, used for no other purpose than to make Vic bigger. Notice a trend here? Yeah, Vic needs to kill Monsters to be an effective Monster. Once he is, though, he is nigh unstoppable.
Overall, this deck requires a bit of forethought and strategy to play effective, but when piloted correctly, it can be an unstoppable death squad of pain. If you like, try it out. You may just learn to love Gradius as much as me.
Questions? Comments? Death threats? Send them my way at seth@johnnyceecards.com. See you next week!