Hey guys, Opus IX is almost upon us, and I’m here to show you all an EXPLOSIVE new spoiler that I think could see some niche plays and really BLOW UP some fields. Even though I’m usually pretty late into community spoiler season, I like to think I always go out with a BANG.

Okay I’ve run out of puns, it’s Bomb.

So Bomb’s pretty interesting, in that in your opponent’s turn he’s not actually a forward, and reverts back to being a monster – this is pretty significant as it means you don’t have to worry about him being efficiently removed by an etb ability of your opponent, and they’re probably either going to have to waste spot monster removal on him, or they’re going to have to use a summon on him, either doesn’t sound like great value for your opponent. We’ve seen this “forward during your turn” effect already on the spoiled Tonberry and Goblin cards, it seems like it might be the monster gimmick for this set – I certainly think it’s one of the more playable gimmicks monsters have had so far (please give us ones we can tap for CP I’m sure it would be balanced).

I think this guy could see play in quite a few decks, as it gives fire something that genuinely just straight up survives Fina/Valefor/Chelinka/Alhanalem onslaughts, and something that survives Shantotto. With him being a forward straight away there’s no waiting around to get value off of him like Varuna, he’s good to go straight away, and being a forward can contribute to things like Firion as soon as he enters the field.

Being element Crystal Hunt is really interesting, are we going to see Square Enix branching out into more niche properties to introduce truly new cards to the game? If that’s the case, don’t forget that the Mana series started out as a Final Fantasy game in the West 😉 – Chapters even went to far as to have a Parasite Eve card!

I can see myself definitely giving Bomb a go, especially as he’s somewhat nice vs Veritas’ on death effect, and could even be usable to enable some field wipes in some kind of Fire Monster deck that’s really heavy on Bombs, alongside the new Ifrita we have coming in this set. I know there’s a fire monster deck floating around Australia that would probably love this card – If you have enough Ifrits in your break zone, you can use Ifrita to both break your own Bomb and deal 3k to board, then deal 2k to board with Bomb’s on-death effect, and then follow up with Royal Ripeness to pull off an 8k fieldwipe! Or even combine this with the Bomb from Opus VII to go even further beyond! We can also use this to threaten up a follow up from the newly revealed Chaos (MOBIUS), to follow up with another 5k across the field if they end up blocking Bomb! I think Mono Fire monsters based around boardwipes could certainly be a viable deck, even if it’s not a cutting-edge meta deck. It still doesn’t really let fire get past Y’shtola, though..

One thing that’s worth noting though, and I know I will get asked this a lot, is that Bomb’s on-death effect does NOT work with Iroha, she can only boost things that are on the field at the time. Manasvin Warmech works, though, so go mad with that.

I think the on-death effect is certainly an odd one as you’re literally never blocking with this card, but it does have it’s uses and can help you be the aggressor to threaten “if you block my Bomb, I will blow your entire field”. I’m certainly expecting there to be a fire deck with Ifrita, Ifrits, Fritt, Royal Ripeness and a ridiculous amount of Bombs. Historically whenever I’ve used Bomb cards, I’ve used it in tandem with Blade Beam on Opus IV Cloud for really economical fieldwipes.

If you can make him die in your turn, you can also then activate Opus IX’s Shadow to do another 8k to something?

Do be aware that he does deal 2000 damage to ALL forwards though, so pay attention to that if you’re worried about losing your own things or your opponent pushing back with multiple Valefors/Alhanalem activations on your turn.

Bomb’s cool. I like the “only being a forward during your turn” mechanic we’ve seen in a couple of places now, and it’s certainly nice to see new card mechanics as we move forward throughout the game. Hoping this one sees play, if not just in limited! I’m also very interested to see if Crystal Hunt ends up being a full blown category, or if it ends up being like ‘Special’ and ‘Theatrhythm’.

Thanks for reading, Opus IX is just around the corner now!

Esufer