And no Spherical lord is not another Nehalem…

So when I did my article on Overlord I mentioned maybe doing some articles on plays for the Overlord deck and I neglected to go any further because I kind of assumed it was obvious…

And then this kept coming up-

before you say anything NO this card is not good NO it is not another Nehalem and NO it is not better than the End.

Stop running this card

please.

Why Spherical Lord is bad

Well I guess I have to justify myself.

Let’s start by tearing apart Spherical, and oh boy do I have some bundled up agression for this card. I did test this guy for a while the Nehalem skill was good and it fixed your ride win/win right? Nope as it turns out CB2 to fix a ride isn’t good when CB is your most precious resource and it also happens to suck that your main finisher requires an Ovelord to be discarded. And that’s not even mentioning the chance you don’t have enough CB. The ONLY thing this card has going for it is the Nehalem skill but on a grade 3 in a clan that’s grade 3 are actually a resource of some kind that just doesn’t cut it. And even still I haven’t mentioned the lack of anti-stall/rush it has or the fact that it means you need 3 CB for the Legends on ride skill.

In summary this card is self-destructive running this is putting a noose in your deck and in a deck that lives and dies by consistency that’s just not a good idea.

So why End it all?

The fact that I’m mentioning a set 5 card in 2017 should say it all but as this is supposed to be informative I ‘ll explain why.

The End is a fantastic tempo card. In an Overlord deck that doesn’t run the End going first is pretty bad. Your grade 3 turn generates no tempo and you basically swing with your vanguard then pass into a turn that’s really gonna swing things in your opponents favour. Now while this may be the case for a lot of other clans as well they often have ways to gain tempo earlier in the game or via first stride. Overlord really doesn’t our go to first stride is Vortex who needs to hit to really do anything and apart from that most other decks outgun us on that front. Kagero however is effective at reducing the opponents tempo (which by extension raises ours) which is how we get through this issue. That said we have one excellent tempo card for this grade 3 ride turn.

Turns out having a grade 3 thats skill doesn’t have any arbritrary restrictions is good.

Obviously there is some downsides, you do need an End in hand and 2 open CB (although this isn’t an issue too often) but here’s the thing; you actually don’t. See the pressure this thing provides is normally enough, if you have the persona blast then yeah that’s awesome but if not who cares… Well your opponent does. And the thing is they don’t know if you have it or not. The End threatens your opponent with another vanguard swing if they let it hit you get two more drive checks and they still have to guard; if they don’t you just got them to guard the initial grade 3 swing an attack most people take to preserve guard for later.

Now let me shoot down a couple other ridiculous statements about the end –

Dysmel counters it… – Well technically yes but forcing my opponent to G-guard on my initial G3 swing means it’s less likely they can block my Nouvelle or Ace later on.

Old Perfect guards counter it – Again same as before maybe in the short term but really it only benefits me in the late game.

Also who said I was only swinging for the rearguards, since the main goal is to get cards out my opponents hand swinging at vanguard is just as effective.

A means to an End

So there you have it the reasons why the End should be in every Ovelord deck so for the love of all that is good please stop running Spherical lord.

thanks for reading.

Just a quick note I’m aware I’m releasing a lot of Kagero articles and I would be lying if I said I didn’t have more on the way, don’t worry though I do have non-Kagero articles on the way but whether or not they come out before or after I’m not sure yet. Until then you’re just gonna have to bear with me.