Battle Sister, Cookie: Best Thing to Happen to Oracle Think Tank Since LuLu

Hello everyone, Oracle Think Tank and a few other clans will be receiving their generic Limit Breaker in set 9 of the Cardfight!! Vanguard boosters. The main topic today is Battle Sisters, Cookie.

Like all other generic Limit Breaks, a vanguard Cookie gains +5k if you have 4 or more damage when attacking a vanguard. Although the ability is a little plain, but it is powerful and applies quite a huge pressure on any kind of opposing vanguard. Cookie also has her own personal booster, Cream which can bring her attack power up to 21 or 26k. That is one of the reason generic Limit Breaks are sought for because they can make a good rear column.

In my opinion, Cookie is the best thing to ever happen to Oracles since LuLu. Cookie is a very flexible unit which can be added into any other Oracle builds. She gives quite the better alternative for Tsuku builds instead of CEO and also could increase the offensive and draw capability of CoCo builds. She is also decent in a Fromage build, being a possible 21k rear column with Battle Sister in her name. She could also be played with CEO with the consistant ability to hit 21k on rear.

Cookie is also very powerful on her own build. She has more access to Oracles cards compared to Fromage. You have the freedom to use Tom and also can have Macaron as 12k attackers. Her draw ability is also very good as it can help get you that null you might need and also help you setup a field if you need one, ditching out your draw triggers or grade 3.

Cookie is an amazing card and great addition to the Oracles. This card alone has greatly increased Oracle's offensive capabilities and also added more options to deck variations.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

I Made Some Custom Playmats!

As the title suggests, I edited some custom playmats for Cardfight!! Vanguard. Hope you guys like it! =) More can be seen in my Deviantart

Decklist & Review: Crimson Impact, Metatron

Being the first RRR to be revealed for set 9, I decided to make a deck review for the updated deck I used in a previous video. First up would be the decklist.

Grade 0 (17)
Crimson Heart, Nahas -1 (Starter)
Critical Hit Angel (Critical) -4
Rampage Cart Angel (Critical) -2
Fever Theraphy Nurse (Draw) -4
Bouqet Toss Messenger (Draw) -2
Sunny Smile Angel (Heal) -4

Grade 1 (15)
Burst Shot, Bethnael -3
Crimson Mind, Baruch -4
Pure Keeper, Prequiel -4
Thousand Ray Pegasus -4

Grade 2 (12)
Core Memory, Armaros -3
Crimson Drive, Aphrodite -4
Love Machine Gun, Nociel -2
Million Ray Pegasus -3

Grade 3 (6)
Crimson Impact, Metatron -3
The Phoenix, Calamity Flame -3

Let's start with the grade 0. Nahas herself is a great early booster and could allow you to superior ride Metatron. She can be used for Metatron's ability during late/mid game as well. I decided to go with this trigger setup for better hand advantage and critical offensive. Most of the time, I have a full field and the ability to access units from my damage zone also helps make a good field. You could also have stands instead of more draws like mine, but that is up to you.

I decided to not have any damage increase units and focuses more on power offensive. I also have Armaros as pressure unit and also to further increase hand advantage. Nociel can help with fortifying hand shields and unflip damage. Metatron can also help with recalling Nociel each turn for a +6k to each Pegasus/Calamity on the field. Having all these counted, I decided to have 4 sentinels to fully utilise the draw power and damage recycle-ability.

I decided to only have 6 grade 3 because of the possible option to superrior ride. There is a high chance that you would get either the superrior ride or Metatron herself into your hand. Even without those, Calamity Flame makes a decent defensive vanguard.

This is a very offensive based deck, it has the ability to rush early game and pegasus as early on vanguards can avoid rush strategies. Metatron Limit Break ability can be used to adjust field units, give power to your rear-guards and also help you with your hand using Nociel.

Special thanks to (DSE) Galatin for advises ;D

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

Oh My, it's a Persona Break!

I was the one who edited the image

Or, Limit Blast, however you would like to call it. Two newly revealed cards, Farah and Shirayuki was revealed with Limit Break abilities that require to discard a copy of their own from your hand as the cost. This makes the ability very restrictive but their abilities are a decent for the restrictions. The strict requirement also made it so that the damage cost is greatly reduced. Although, with the high restriction, you would most possibly only be able to use the ability 1-2 times per game.

These two cards have 11k base power and the ability officially dubbed "Lord" by Bushiroad. They are also both of RR rarity. These units are great additions to their clans and their low requirement for damage makes it so that you would be able to spend more on other cards.

Farah's ability lets you soul charge 2 and call a Pale Moon from your soul. This ability is great to refill your field with boosters or intercepters. Calling out Purple Trapezist can rearrange your field a little, and possibly calling either Laquer or Partner for a 11k column with more soul to expend. Farah also works great with Fire Juggler and Midnight Bunny since you can bring them out again for consistent pressure. You could build up some soul with Robert but I would rather play her with Laquer and Alice.

Shirayuki can be said to be an improvement to Mandala Lord. With the Limit Break, Shirayuki decreases your opponent's power by 20k instead of Mandala's 10k. However, Shirayuki doesn't have Mandala's searching units. This ability is very powerful defensive wise, especially against Vermillion which has the ability to attack all your front row. You would bring down Vermillion to a mere 3k or the cross ride, 8k max, assuming that they have a 10k booster. Since power can be brought down to negative values, sometimes, you might not even have to bring out more for defenses. You could run her with the Magatsu chain for some early rush advantage and have late game defenses. I can see this build being very dangerous with stands and draws since Shirayuki herself is a great shield and the stand could really bring down the opposing forces.

These two cards has beautiful art and pretty amazing abilities. I can't wait to see them in action and maybe trying them myself. Although, I'm not too much of a Pale Moon or Murakumo player.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

A Look at the NEW Cross-Rides!

Hello everyone, I have not been writing for a while now because I have been quite busy for the past few weeks. Although I have some topics in mind, this would be the first. New cards have just been recently revealed with Amaterasu and Vermillion cross rides among the revealed cards.

I have had the privilege to test out Amaterasu myself and to be frank, she seems pretty plain and so are the other revealed x-rides this time round. One of the troubles that these x-rides share is field presence. A good hand is required for them to setup a decent field. Maybe that is my problem but, I have been struggling a bit to keep up with my opponent due to difference in field.

Amaterasu is a decent card with a decent Limit Break. She allows you to add an Oracle Think Tank from your deck to your hand when she hits at the cost of 2 damage. With an on hit ability, she is a good pressure unit and can be used along with other pressure units like Libra, Tom and Apollon. She can also easily be a 13k base with Inaba. Although so, I seem to have problem with setting up a decent field early on the game. Even if I have a decent field, protecting it takes quite a lot of effort on it's own. The reason is that Amaterasu doesn't have as much draw power as the CoCo and Tsuku builds and the fact that you need to have CEO in soul for the +2k. This problem could be slightly fixed with Dark Cat, Petal Fairy, Lulu starter and more draw triggers. She is also not much pressure without the required 4 damage, when you have reached 4 damage, the opponent would have had 4-5 damage and would rather put up a tight defense. One exception is against rush decks, where Amaterasu shines best. Although you would be in a disadvantage of damage but you would have more pressure and have the opponent in a heal lock.

The Blood, another Limit Break 5 however, the ability only looks half decent. Basically, it's a Vermillion with more power and added critical. The extra critical would force your opponent to guard the vanguard since they would most likely have 4 or more damage. Considering the cost, you would most likely be able to use it's ability for only once, unlike Platinum, you don't get to have a very powerful unflipper. The only way you would be able to use the ability twice would be through a heal trigger which I would rather use on cards like Deathscythe and the new Voltage Crow... if only Narukami had a Kimnara. Like Amaterasu, The Blood would probably be facing the same problems on rear-guards but they can make up by retiring enemy units. You would also need to wait till you have 5 damage to be able to use The Blood's ability.

Glory Maelstrom's ability is still a secret for now but other than that, there are a bunch of other very interesting cards revealed, including cards that have the ability to be treated as another clan! To sum it up, I think the x-rides this time are a little plain. They seem to have a high restriction and cost on their abilities. The abilities are powerful but somewhat, disappointing. For most of them, I would rather play them on their own than with their previous 'form' just for the +2k. That is it for now, until next time.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

Exculpate The Blaster! My Thoughts

Hours ago, a live stream of a conference was held by Bushiroad. One of the main focus of this conference is the revelation of the promo card that is to be released along with the upcoming manga volume of Cardfight!! Vanguard.

Exculpate is a Grade 3 Royal Paladin with a base power of 12k!! It also has an incredible ability to attack all your opponent's rear-guards! However, he has quite a few limitations. Here is his massive amount of text of skills translated.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Continuous [Hand]: If you do not have a Grade 3 <Royal Paladin> vanguard, you cannot normal ride this unit.

Continuous [V]: If you do not have a card named "Blaster Blade" in your soul, this unit cannot attack.

Auto: When this unit is placed on the rear-guard circle, retire this unit.

Activate [V]: [Counter Blast(3)] Until end of turn, this unit battles with every unit on your opponent's field in one attack.

Auto [V]: When this unit attacks, place all the cards in your soul except cards named "Blaster Blade" to the drop zone. For each card placed onto the drop zone, this unit gets Power +2000 until end of turn.

Auto [V]: At the end of the battle when this unit attacked, choose 1 card named "Blaster Blade" from your soul or drop zone, ride it at rest position, and place all your soul onto the drop zone.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This card is a double edged sword, in return for dealing an immense amount of damage to your opponent's offensive and defensive powers, you are forced to return to a grade 2 at the end of the attack. This means that you would most possibly need to keep a grade 3 of your own for a re-ride. Besides that, the high cost would allow you only 2 more spare damage to use, and you would need an extra grade 3 before riding this unit. 

To play this unit, you would most possibly need more grade 3 to have a higher guarantee rides and re-ride. You could have at most, up to 3 of this card in your deck however, I would recommend not going higher than 2, since Wingal Brave can help bring out Exculpate. Having more grade 3 would also mean that you should have cards which can help you exchange your hand like Lien and Miru Biru. Those would help you get rid of unnecessary grade 3 for better cards that can be used for guarding. Miru Biru would be very useful since you can swap out a card for each hit Exculpate does.

For the grade 3s, Gancelot is a great card to be used with this card, not only that it can secure you a Blaster Blade ride, you could also apply an early critical pressure with the extra 2 damage counterblast. With the increase in grade 3s, Brigitte is also a good cheap option for the deck. Pendragon is also a decent choice. Pendragon could decrease the amount of grade 3 left in your deck and also have a chance at bringing out Exculpate. Pendragon's power increase when ride also works great since your opponent should be pretty worn out after Exculpate's attack. Lohengrin is also an option, it stacks up soul for Exculpate to use and could possibly soul charge a Blaster Blade for you. Majesty is not bad but, without decent toolkit, Majesty won't apply much pressure, and I doubt anyone would really want to ride Exculpate over a Majesty with 12k defense and 2 crit attacks.

Trigger wise, I would use Criticals as Exculpate battles with every unit on the field, Exculpate should launch the first attack. Draw Triggers could also help with getting Exculpate faster and grade 3 for re-rides. Gordon could help fill the extra shields needed due to having more grade 3 and draw triggers. You could skip using Heal Triggers for more offensive power but I won't recommend it.

Though the damage usable is scarce but it's there, you should plan what you want to use them for. It could be used by Blade to retire more units. Akane could help call out units for a little hand and field advantage. Garmore is another unit to help fill your field in exchange for a card in your hand.

I think this is a very interesting card, and is very excited to be able to test it. This card is also the best card to use against Platinum, it would deplete your opponent's field before they can use the limit break.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

Megacolony With Draw Power!

Hello everyone, today I'm going to write on a Megacolony build. Instead of focusing on keeping opposing units at bay, this build focuses on draw power.

Megacolony is one of the clans with the most amount of draw on hit pressure. This deck build takes the most out of that mechanic to pressure your opponent. As you can see from the image to the right, one of the key cards of this deck build is Master Fraude. Some other cards that has similar abilities is, Water Gang and Transmutated Thief, Steal Spider.

These units lets you draw cards when they hit, they apply pressure on the opponent to guard or let you gain an increase in hand. This especially applies to Fraude and Gang which enables you to draw no matter if you hit a rear-guard or a vanguard. Fraude's draw ability also works when it is a rear-guard so having more of it will also apply more pressure. You can even have Antlion, on the vanguard circle to supply the soul needed. Madfly can also be used to remove unnecessary cards. You might compare Fraude to Sphira, but Fraude has better soul support with a grade 1 soul charger.

Stand trigger in this build could increase the pressure and also your hand size. Even if your opponent manage to guard and keep your hand at a reasonable size, you could plan to use Antlion's megablast and deplete some of their attacking power.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

Comparing the Ezels

A while ago, some cards for set 9 was revealed and one of them is the cross-ride for Blond Ezel, the Platinum Ezel. Although I'm not too big of a Gold Paladin player, I would like to write my opinion on the comparisons of the two cards.

Let's begin with their base power. Blond has a base power of 10k and Platinum, 11k with a possibility of being a 13k base. Defense wise, Platinum would be a better vanguard. Your opponent would have to line up units which can hit a higher power value to gain pressure from power difference.

What Blond lacks, he makes up with being a more offensive unit. It gains power for each of your Gold Paladin rear-guards and gains even more power when you use his Limit Break. His Limit Break also brings out more unit onto your field and increases your field's offensive powers. Unlike Platinum, you won't possibly need to use units from your hand to maintain a full field.

Skill wise, they are both equal in usability and how they can help you in a game. Blond can bring in earlier offensive pressure and field filling. Platinum has the late game defenses and field power increase. However, they each have their own weaknesses. Blond would require an empty rear-guard and can only call out the top card of your deck. You might not be able to call out an ideal unit to the field. Platinum needs to have 5 damage, and has a higher cost. The efficiency of the skill also highly relies on the units on your field, you might need to protect your rears before being able to pull off the limit break to reach the skill's full potential.

Blond would have more flexibility than Platinum. Blond has the extra damage to spare for the usage of other units. Platinum however, doesn't really have much to spare, especially when you plan to activate his skill more than once in a game. Blond can also easily be mixed with any other builds and be able to use multiple different vanguards. Platinum has more constricted options and would not be able to utilise some of the abilities in the Gold Paladin clan.

I have yet to see Platinum in actual action, but I have seen people proxy him. He seems to be highly reliant on getting triggers and also the need for damage unflippers. He is a powerful unit but seems to be a one trick pony. In other news, more units will be revealed in two weeks time, and I'm really excited for them.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

Majesty Lord Blaster Decklist

Decided to make a post of the deck I used in my recent video as someone requested it. =)

Grade 0 (17)
Wingal Brave -1
Bringer of Good Luck, Epona (Critical) -4
Margal (Draw) -4
Weapons Dealer, Govannon (Draw) -4
Yggdrasil Maiden, Elain (Heal) -4

Grade 1 (15)
Flash Shield, Iseult -4
Little Sage, Marron -4
Toypuggal -3
Dream Painter -2
Lake Maiden Lien -2

Grade 2 (12)
Blaster Blade -4
Blaster Dark -4
Starcall Trumpetter -2
Knight of Loyalty, Bedivere -2

Grade 3 (6)
Majesty Lord Blaster -3
Swordsman of the Explosive Flames, Palamedes -3

About Triggers: Draw Trigger is Best Trigger!!

Hello everyone, today I decided to write about triggers. I will write about how they are useful and why you should have them.

A little image to enjoy!

As stated in the title, I think that draw triggers are the best triggers in the game. They let you gain advantage no matter when the are checked and also plays an important role in some builds. In basic, draw triggers let's you draw a card and also give a unit 5k power increase when they are checked. Draw triggers are mainly used in decks to increase their hand advantage and also field consistency. Draw triggers however, only has 5k points worth of shield; compared to most of the grade 0 cards, which have 10k points shield. Some of the draw triggers are also used because of their skills.

Draw triggers are also good to be used as boosters on the field, as they only have 5k shield, you don't have to worry about losing out on guards. They are great to increase your total attacking power when you don't have enough. They are also great to be used for sacrifice and cost paying. Some cards require you to discard cards from your hand or sacrifice a unit on your field, draw triggers could be used for these situations which would most possibly give you a better card in return. Draw triggers are also a very good card to be used to guard lower powered attacks. This means that you don't have to waste additional shields to guard. More rear-guards also means you have more consistency to get your perfect guards out.

Draw triggers are also good in conditions of either the opponent retiring your units or just focusing on dealing damage to you. You would be able to draw units to replace the retired units and have a chance to gain hand advantage when you damage check a draw trigger. Draw triggers however do have their own weaknesses and having too many of them might be bad for you. One weakness to having too many draw triggers is that you will deck out faster with the increased draw power.

Another weakness to running more draw triggers is that it only has 5k shield. This means that the total shield value of your deck will drop by a little. This problem can be solved in a few ways. One is to play high powered units. You create columns of high powered rear-guards and attack your opponent so they would waste more of their hand than you would. Another solution would be to have alternative 10k shields, like special intercepts or grade 1 cards which can be 10k when placed on the guard zone. This would balance out the shield deficit and possibly increase your hand advantage. The last solution would be to have a stand based deck. Stands allow you to attack again, which would decrease your opponent's hand advantage over yours and balance out the difference in shields. Besides those, having a vanguard with a high base power also helps, and pressuring units to force your opponent to guard is also good.

In conclusion, I would recommend everyone to play draw triggers. Seriously, they are the best trigger in the game! Make consistent fields and increases options to what you can play. The difference in hand size can also make your opponent think twice before they decide to play more boosters or place out more guards.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out

Perfect Raizer Deck Review

With more Raizer units coming up, Perfect Raizer seems to be very dangerous foe to go against. With Cardfight Capital just recently updated with the new Raizers, I decided to test them out myself and they were amazing. The build has amazing consistency to get the required soul for the extra critical. This build is also great to go against megablast builds, and maybe even the upcoming Platinum Ezel.

Previously, great as they are, Raizers build seems to have a problem with reaching the required soul and losing out on hand and field advantage. They also lacked the pressuring critical trigger to make up for consistency. This however is changed with the recently revealed Raizer units. Three new units are added to the Raizer family and they are great for the build.

First of all, this is the decklist I made in Cardfight Capital.

Grade 0 (18)
Evolving Reincarnation, Miraioh -2 (Starter Vanguard)
Battleraizer (Stand Trigger) -4
Minimum Raizer (Critical Trigger) -4
The Gong (Draw Trigger) -4
Wall Boy (Heal Trigger) -4

Grade 1 (15)
Burstraizer -4
Raizer Custom -4
Tough Boy -4
Twin Blader -3

Grade 2 (13)
Brutal Jack -2
High Powered Raizer Custom -4
Street Bouncer -3
Transraizer -4

Grade 3 (4)
Perfect Raizer -4

Yes, this build only has 4 Grade 3. It has a decent focus on defenses and might need to depend on Miraioh to get the grade 3. The basic strategy would be to ride 2 Raizers and calling 2 more Raizer before riding Perfect Raizer. It would be best if you can keep the rear-guard Raizers on the back row. Most of the time, you should be able to get what you need, if not, you would at least have 3 Raizers in your soul and would just need to ride again the next turn for the extra critical.

Without boosters, Perfect Raizer with 4 Raizer in soul can attack on 23k, with a Tough Boy it would be 31. This build highly relies on the vanguard to be the powerhouse as you would, most of the time, have pretty weak rear-guards. Street Bouncer is used to increase the hand advantage and also, chances to drawing into another Raizer, along with Transraizer, they are both great as deck thinner. Also, with only 4 grade 3, Transraizer has a high probability to increase your field advantage. This build also works great against x-rides. The vanguard is a consistent 23k with 2 crits, Jacks can also be easily boosted to 18k with a 7k booster.

I also highly recommend killing rear-guards with your rear-guard units when the opponent is at 4 damage. This would decrease their amount of attacks, or decrease their hand size. It also provides a heal lock, if you're at 5 damage.

Some of the weakness for this deck is that it highly relies on the vanguard. With a decent amount of perfect guards, the opponent won't be losing any hand advantage for a while. Raizers also have low powered grade 1 and 2 units. This would give your opponent a high chance to make an early rush to pressure you. Since you can't really afford to lose out on Raizer units or any other units at all, you're forced to take the damage. At late game however, you gain a pretty decent advantage with the 11k vanguard.

Overall, the new addition of Raizer units are amazing. It not only increases the chance for having the required soul in the soul, it also makes it consistent to have Raizers on the field, decent deck thinning and field advantage.

----------------
CoCo 4 Lyf
Peace Out