Nova Grapplers received further support in the eighth Extra Booster, Champions of the Cosmos, dedicated solely to their clan. The set mainly contains support for two archetypes, “Asura” and “Blau,” giving Nova Grapplers even more options when it comes to overpowering their opponents.

In this article, we will finalize our discussion of “Nova Grapplers” by discussing the remaining “Blau” support that came in this set. This includes discussion on how the cards work with one another and the synergy it may have with cards from previous sets. Because of the overwhelming amount of support being given to the “Blau” series this set, this article will be covering the RR, R and C rarity cards in this set. If you are interested in reading about the RRR “Blau” cards in the set, you can find it here and if you are interested in the coverage of the “Asura” support in this set, you can find the article here.

Blau Support

I would like to begin the article discussing the “Blau” archetype’s new starter, “Morgenrot.” This card’s effect is as follows:

[AUTO]: Forerunner



[AUTO](RC):[Counter Blast (1)] When an attack by your vanguard with “Blau” in its card name hits a vanguard, you may pay the cost. If you do, look at up to three cards from the top of your deck, search for up to one card with “Blau” in its card name, reveal it to your opponent, put it into your hand, and shuffle your deck.

With “Morgenrot” as the new forerunner for the deck, it eliminates the usage of the “Blau” ride chain that the deck originally used. Although players may feel like the “Blau” deck would be more consistent with a ride chain, I will go over the pros and cons of it here:

The ride chain for the “Blau” series, consisting of “Blaujunger,” “Blaupanzer” and “Blaukluger,” is a ride chain where the grade 0 is not a forerunner. This means that if you were to ride a grade 1 other than “Blaupanzer,” you essentially lost a free unit when almost every other deck will have a forerunner as their starting vanguard. This puts you at a disadvantage right from the start if you were to miss riding “Blaupanzer.”

If you were to successfully ride “Blaupanzer,” you would get a “Blaukluger” added to your hand and the benefits end there. With “Morgenrot,” as long as you have a “Blau” as your vanguard, throughout the entire game, anytime a vanguard attack hits, you can receive a benefit for doing so by being able to search the top 3 cards of your deck for a “Blau” unit at the cost of counterblast 1.

Some may argue that the ride chain for “Blau” will guarantee you not to be gradestuck, but that simply is not true as you are not always guaranteed to get “Blaupanzer” in your opening hand. With “Morgenrot,” as long as you have a “Blau” vanguard and open counterblasts, if you are stuck on grade 1 or 2, you can potentially get yourself out of gradestuck by trying to force the activation of “Morgenrot” to search for the card you need so you can be unstuck. In the other situation, using the ride chain, if you were stuck on 1, even if you were to draw a “Blaupanzer,” it won’t assist in helping you search for a grade 2 because you’ve already ridden over the “Blaujunger.“

Players generally do not like opponents receiving any advantages. With “Morgenrot,” the threat is always looming over the other player when a vanguard “Blau” attacks. This forces them into a situation where they either let the attack hit or be forced to use cards to guard earlier than they want to. Sometimes, the opponent has no choice but to let the attack hit due to an unfavorable starting hand.

Although players may still enjoy playing the “Blau” ride chain over “Morgenrot,” there is no doubt that “Morgenrot” is a much more versatile card to use in almost any situation. Because there are so many plays and setups associated with “Morgenrot,” they will be covered when discussing the other cards in this set.

The “Blau” archetype, like many others, received their standard grade 1 and 2 units that gain a +3000 power when attacking with a “Blau” in the vanguard. What’s interesting is that they also received “Starker Wind,” a Stand trigger that has the same effect, effectively allowing it to attack for 7000 power with a “Blau” vanguard. Excluding the Stand trigger, these cards are usually a staple in the decks of their respective archetypes. However, for the “Blau” series, it’s a little different for the following reasons:

“Starker Wind,” “Polar Stern” and “Grosse Baer” are not “Blau” units, even though they support the archetype. Because they do not have “Blau” in their name, they will not be able to activate “Galaxy Blaukluger’s” effect.

“Polar Stern” is a card you can still use 4 copies of in your deck as, after turn 3, you generally wouldn’t rely on it as an attack rear-guard and more as a booster. For turns 1 and 2, “Polar Stern” is like others of it’s kind, giving you access to a card that can either rush your opponent or leave it as an option to counter-attack your opponent’s rear-guards if they decide to rush you. The only awkward part about “Polar Stern” or the “Blau” deck in general is that there is a lack of “Blau” grade 1’s, meaning Polar Stern receives most of it’s activity on turn 2 and maybe early turn 3.

“Grosse Baer” is different from “Polar Stern” because on turn 2, when you ride your vanguard, you want a “Blau” name on the vanguard and that is something “Grosse Baer” is not. Because of this, you negate the advantage you want to receive from “Morgenrot” because, in order for the ability to activate, there needs to be a “Blau” vanguard.

Also, because “Grosse Baer” will take up around 3-4 spaces in your deck, replacing other potential “Blau” names, your ability to activate “Galaxy Blaukluger” is reduced. With “Galaxy Blaukluger’s” attack pattern (mentioned in the previous article), where the player would like to keep the opponent at 4 damage to maximize “Galaxy Blaukluger’s” pressure, having a non-“Blau” unit in your attacking pattern will alleviate some pressure your opponent feels because they are suddenly safe to take 1 damage from your assault without the fear of “Galaxy Blaukluger” activating.

“Starker Wind,” and stand triggers in general, are an awkward trigger to run in a “Galaxy Blaukluger” deck. Because the attack pattern you generally want with “Galaxy Blaukluger” is vanguard first, followed by your two rear-guards, you force yourself to attack with rear-guards first. If you were to attack with rear-guards first, you would be forced to attack your opponent’s rear-guards so you do not waste the chance to activate “Galaxy Blaukluger” and that may end up costing you advantages if you are forced to attack a grade 3 or spend an attack worth 10,000 guard to hit a 5,000 shield unit. Even on the turn that you break ride “Mond Blaukluger,” when your vanguard attacks, your rear-guards become stand anyway, which would lead to wasted stand triggers.

I can see “Grosse Baer” still fitting into certain deck builds that choose to use it as “Blau” decks do lack some power for hitting 13,000 power vanguards. With mainly 9,000 power units (besides the 11,000 power vanguards), the units a “Blau” deck typically runs do not hit 13,000 vanguards well.

RR Rarity “Blau” Re-Standing Units

A unique set of cards that the “Blau” archetype received are “Flower Ray Leprechaun” and “Mars Blaukluger.” These units’ effects are as follows:

[AUTO](RC):[Counter Blast(1)] When an attack by your vanguard with “Blau” in its card name hits a vanguard, you may pay the cost. If you do, [Stand] this unit, and this unit gets [Power]+5000 until the end of turn.

This effect is an incredible tool used for rushing the opponent early as they are hit with a series of attacks that may force some very bad choices when it comes to guarding (if they are able to guard at all). Here’s an example of a situation that can happen fairly often on turn 2 for a “Blau” deck running these cards:

The “Blau” player has this as his field: 1 card in the damage zone, “Blaukluger” on the vanguard, “Mars Blaukluger” in the rear-guard and “Morgenrot” behind the vanguard.

If you went 1st, you would usually be attacking a grade 1 opposing vanguard with, at most, a 8,000 power. Because of this, “Mars Blaukluger” can attack first. Whether your opponent decides to guard for 5,000 shield or not is irrelevant because you either deal them 1 damage or take away 1 card in their hand. The only negative that can occur from this is your opponent receiving a trigger in their damage check.

Now, assuming your opponent did not damage check a trigger, with a 8,000 power vanguard, your opponent has to block an attack from your vanguard “Blaukluger” boosted by “Morgenrot,” totaling 14,000 power. This attack is a very scary attack to take because of how the field is set up. If the vanguard attack were to successfully hit, 3 things happen:

“Morgenrot” can activate for counterblast 1, allowing you to search the top 3 cards of your deck for a “Blau” unit. “Blaukluger” can then activate to unflip the damage that “Morgenrot” just used. “Mars Blaukluger” can use the counterblast that “Blaukluger” just unflipped to stand and gain 5,000 power to make a third attack on the turn, hitting for 14,000 power.

This is a very powerful combo because of how efficient one counterblast ends up being because it is being used by 3 cards simultaneously. If your opponent chooses to guard the attack with a 8,000 vanguard, they would have to use 15,000 shield in order to make sure the attack does not hit. That’s a minimum of 2 cards used from their hand to guard the attack. If they choose to use 10,000 shield instead, they risk the chance of you checking a trigger, allowing the attack to go through.

If they did check a damage trigger, they will only have to use 10,000 shield to guard the “Blaukluger”/”Morgenrot” attack, which means you force them to use a card early to guard an attack. This also means your opponent will be at less or equal damage to you and with 1 counterblast, they generally cannot activate the stronger card abilities that require 2 counterblast to use.

Looking at how strong “Mars Blaukluger” is, this would mean that “Flower Ray Leprechaun” is the same, right? Not exactly.

Because “Flower Ray Leprechaun” is a grade 1 unit with 7,000 power and is not a “Blau” name, it is essentially relegated to being a booster. Although standing a rear-guard column with “Flower Ray Leprechaun” and “Mars Blaukluger” sounds enticing, having them attack for 26,000 power without triggers, it comes at a cost of counterblast 2 in a very heavy counterblast deck. Because of this, “Flower Ray Leprechaun” may not be as useful as “Mars Blaukluger” because, even if the vanguard attack connects, “Flower Ray Leprechaun” may be able to stand, but if the unit that it is boosting is rested, it essentially means nothing is gained by having this unit on the field.

Other “Blau” Support Worth Mentioning

“Blade Arm Leprechaun” is a grade 1 that can boost any “Blau” unit for 10,000 power at the cost of 1 soulblast. Although this is a powerful card in theory, “Blau” has no reliable way to build soul to consistently abuse the usage of this card. However, the idea of “Blau” rear-guards and vanguards attacking for numbers ranging from 19,000 power to 23,000 power is something to consider. Just keep in mind that if you happen to be gradestuck on 1 or have no more cards in your soul to use as a cost, a grade 1 unit with only 4,000 power and no effect isn’t something really desirable.

“Jupiter Blaukluger” is the standard 10,000 power grade 2 with no effect. Because it has “Blau” in it’s name, it comes with all the benefits that support the “Blau” archetype, allowing the usage of “Polar Stern,” “Morgenrot,” “Mars Blaukluger” and of course, allowing an attack from “Jupiter Blaukluger” to activate “Galaxy Blaukluger’s” effect. Besides “Blaukluger,” “Jupiter Blaukluger” is the best card to ride on your vanguard on turn 2 because of it’s 10,000 power. Also, if you were to play against a deck where their vanguard can reach 13,000 power, if you deck were to run “Tough Boy,” they can create a 18,000 power column to hit their vanguard for a good number.

Lastly, “Blau Dunkelheit” is the sentinel given to the “Blau” archetype in this set. Although there are no especial counterblasts in the “Blau” deck, you would still run this sentinel over others because of it’s name. Having the “Blau” name gives this access to the following situations, all that have to do with “Morgenrot,” which shows just how strong the new forerunner is for this archetype:

If a successful attack from a “Blau” vanguard hits, “Morgenrot” gets to activate and search for a “Blau” unit. “Blau Dunkelheit” fits that category, unlike “Twin Blader” or “Beast Deity, Solar Falcon.” Although it doesn’t change the deck much if you are forced to use either of those two, you are certainly putting yourself at a disadvantage by not using “Blau Dunkelheit” instead.

If you were gradestuck on 1 without any grade 2 unit in sight, if “Blau Dunkelheit” is your vanguard, it is actually able to activate “Morgenrot’s” effect if your vanguard attack hits, allowing you to search your deck for a grade 2 “Blau” unit. Also, if “Blau Dunkelheit” is your vanguard, it allows you to use “Polar Stern” as a rear-guard attacker if you have them in your hand to potentially stop your opponent from rushing you as hard because you are gradestuck. The threat of you getting yourself out of gradestuck is may also be scary enough that it forces your opponent to guard your grade 1 vanguard attacks. This lets you still attempt to maintain an advantage even if you are gradestuck.

Recommended Support from Other Sets

A card I must mention is “Clay-doll Mechanic” because of how the heavy usage of counterblasts in this deck. If you are holding one in your hand, you may let yourself get a little crazier with activations of “Morgenrot” and “Mars Blaukluger.”

In order to make sure you get certain pieces to your hand, besides “Moregenrot,” you may consider running a card like “Energy Charger” to try and fish for more pieces of your combo early. You never know when you may draw into a copy of “Clay-doll Mechanic” that’ll allow you to scare your opponent by having 2 open counterblasts and a “Galaxy Blaukluger” vanguard.

In Conclusion

The “Blau” archetype definitely received a lot of support from this set and I imagine it will be a very strong deck due to how much overwhelming power it has in the early and mid-game. With careful management of counterblasts, keeping your opponent in a tight spot and managing your rear-guards properly, this deck is definitely a force to be reckoned with.

Did we miss something? Is there something you else you would like to hear about from us? Contact us on our twitter or email us your suggestions at vongola11undici@gmail.com.

Thank you again for your support. – Namian