Since The Trinity Dragon Booster Set isn’t going to be coming out in English for another few weeks, there hasn’t been much to do on my end as an OTT player. I’m excited to try out the new units, but they aren’t here yet, and proxies just don’t cut it. As such, I’ve been spending my time recently on trying out older units and finding new applications and combos with them using the new strides. A lot of the cards that I have been trying out recently are ones that most people immediately write-off as being power crept, too old, or too weak for the current game state. Here is where I will prove them (and maybe you) wrong!

In most modern deck units are chosen due to their usefulness or ability to gain power or card advantage. As such, “weaker” units or those with a lower base stat than the average are often overlooked. How often does a 10k grade 3, an 8k grade 2, or a 6k grade 1 see play nowadays? Well, with the exception of Silent Tom, the answer is usually never. However, this is a mistake, as there are plenty of units in OTT that have a weak base stat, but a powerful ability. In fact, in the days of BT01, OTT was known for its low base stats, but powerful abilities. These low stats are one of the reasons why I argue that OTT is an offensive clan, not defensive. OTT traditionally loses power during the opponent’s turn in exchange for power during their turn. They don’t draw just to have cards to guard with, they draw to use those cards on the field, or to power up the units already on the field. This concept of OTT has been reversed in the G-era (as base stats have gone up, power-ups have almost disappeared). The low base stats balanced the ability to gain power, which OTT has been severely lacking in the G-era. Perhaps Bushiroad would consent to giving us our power increase back if our base stats are weaker. I couldn’t even think of the last time that Bushiroad gave us a good card with a weak base stat. So I decided to look it up and make a comprehensive list of all the G-era cards that have a weak base stat:

War Strike Sword Deity, Toyokuninushi (decent beater that works more as a grade 2 than a 3)

Obligate Robin (hahaha when Bushi tried to convince us that his ability deserved a CB2 cost)

Foredoom Purification Maiden, Sachi (10k power in Oracle, 10k shield intercept)

Able Neil (for the low low cost of 1 SB, you can return this to your hand!)

Precious Ophidian (SB1 to draw but only if your vanguard has Oracle, also Oracle retire to stride)

Astrologer, Miss Haze (a much much harder way to SB1 and draw… on your opponent’s turn. This card would be really good if we had a Nurse of Broken Heart, but we don’t.)

… Well that was a short list. The interesting thing here is that not only are almost all of the cards pretty underwhelming, they’re also all commons. The exceptions to both of these is Precious Ophidian (and surprisingly Obligate Robin is a rare… let that sink in). So clearly Bushiroad has decided to take our power gains away, for a better base stat, and the added ability to draw more consistently. We all know where that trend has led us (so many draws, no power to back it up). Today, I’m going to be talking about some of the oldest units in the clan, so let’s take a look back through time when base stats were low, but power was high!

CEO Amaterasu

The OG OTT boss is a 10k, but don’t let her poor stats fool you, she’s the OG for a reason. Her ability allows you to control the top card of your deck at the beginning of every turn. If it’s a trigger, leave it! If it’s a useful unit, draw it! If you don’t need it, banish it to the bottom of the deck! This will increase your chances to get a trigger (it’s not sacking if you knew it was there, after all). Furthermore, this ability is not LB4, Legion, or GB restricted, making it a great choice to keep up the pressure against Grade 1 or Grade 2 rush decks that wouldn’t let you stride anyway. Her megablast is also much better than it looks. When you have the 5 CB and 8 SB to pay, just drop a CEO on the rearguard and attack their rearguard. If it hits, you can draw 5, and they won’t see it coming! Everyone simply assumes that this ability only works Vanguard to Vanguard, but that’s just wrong. This strategy has worked for me twice already while testing this card. It’s a lot of fun to draw 5 and see the look on their faces when you do. This unit is also able to hit 14k on it own, meaning that you don’t need to waste a boost to hit a cross ride, or any other 13k Vanguard (looking at you Angel Feather). For practical use in the G-era, this card falls flat, as the ability doesn’t activate when you stride, and the Soul Charge is mandatory, which means that you can kill yourself by deck out in late game. In all, I’ll give this card a 2/5 for the G-era. Amaterasu is definitely strong, but she needs a retrain to keep up nowadays (and the revival legion doesn’t count).

Goddess of Divination, Sakuya

Sakuya is the OTT boss from the OG trial deck, but she’s never seen much play since. Everyone simply forgets about Sakuya, as her ability was subpar when she came out. Furthermore, she seems to be in the wrong clan, as her ability would make more sense in Bermuda Triangle. However, I’ve been testing this unit a lot recently, and I must say that she has definitely improved since the G-era, and she’s become one of the best on-rides in all of OTT. Due to stride, on-ride skills have definitely gotten a boost over Legion or LB4, as on-rides can be used on the same turn as you stride. The reason that her ability is so good has almost nothing to do with its ability to reuse “When this card in placed” skills. Rush decks are so good in the G-era because they allow you to abuse you GB restricted decks’ weakness: pre-stride turns. Since most G decks cannot begin gaining advantage in the early game, this is the perfect time for OTT to strike. This is because OTT will crumble if we try to start applying pressure (hahaha like we have pressure) on first stride. Playing Sakuya allows you to throw all of your cards on the field (stride fodder, triggers, PGs, whatever) in the early game and then just bounce them all back on Grade 3 (then using that Stride fodder on the field to Stride right away). Furthermore, you can use Sakuya in conjunction with LuLu to soul blast and draw, then bounce LuLu. This gives you an extra 10k shield in hand at the cost of a 5k boost on the field. This allows you to play a flexible game between early game offence, and late game Oracle. As such, Sakuya is definitely an OTT boss that has only gotten better with time, and I give her a 4.5/5 for the G-era. (plus you can always just re-ride CoCo later to CB2 and draw 2, or ride Susanoo to get the stride bonus, or whatever)

Scarlet Witch, CoCo

CoCo’s power in the G-era is already well known (CoCo/Susanoo was a thing at one time anyway). This card also has an on-ride skill, which meshes well with Stride. There’s not much to say about her that hasn’t already been said. She’s an easy, effortless engine for OTT decks, that has the flexibility to be played with almost anything. Pair her with Amaterasu, or Susanoo, CooCoo, or Sakuya! CoCo doesn’t really care! 5/5 for the G-era, obviously, though she is getting worse as Soul Blast abilities become the OTT norm and Soul Charge is hard to come by.

Battle Sister, Cookie

I’d call Cookie the poor man’s CoCo, pre-CHB02 anyway. She’s better than CoCo in only 2 situations, which is a pure Battle Sister deck, as they like to have the name, more than the extra card (also soul), and in a Spiritual Sword, Susanoo deck (again, soul). Cookie is, arguably, better than Mille-Feuille. The reason for this is that Cookie’s on-ride gives you the ability to draw 2 and drop any card from your hand, whereas Mille-Feuille only draws 1. You get the same +1, but Cookie has more quality control. It does counter blast an extra card, but it saves you Mille-Feuille’s soul blast (and Muffin/Lemonade/Madeleine make for a very solid Counter Charge engine; undeniably the best Counter Charge engine in OTT). Also considering the fact that the Battle Sister subclan is very aggressive, Cookie’s LB4 is much more useful than Mille-Feuille’s GB1, as Cookie can easily hit 22k with a boost, and Mille-Feuille is limited to 18k. Overall, I’ll give this card a 4/5 for the G-era.

Battle Sister, Fromage

Fromage offers the best draw engine in all of OTT. The 3 CBs may seem expensive, but in pure BaS, it’s easy to pull it off every. single. turn. That’s right, every turn, you can CB3 to draw 2, and sometimes you can even CB6 and draw 4 in one turn (1 Lemonade is all you need). The problem with this card is that the ability to an LB4, not an on-ride, which makes her sub-par in the G-era. Just like Ammy, Fromage is a great card that got left behind. I’ll give her another 2/5 for the G-era.

Evil-eye Princess, Euryale

Oh Euryale. This card was amazing in Tsukuyomi and Amaterasu decks back in the day. Bushiroad even tried to bring her back by having Misaki play her during the GIRS crisis arc. As a rearguard ability, this card isn’t negatively affected by stride. However, the issue is that the abundance of Soul Blast abilities in the G-era makes the premise of hoarding 6 cards in the soul for the whole game unrealistic. There also aren’t enough Soul Charge abilities in the G-era to gain 6 in the soul and some to spare. As such, Euryale has been left in the dust. I’ll give her a 1/5 for the G-era.

Battle Sister, Mocha

This card is single handedly the best grade 2 in all of OTT (except maybe Silent Tom). The reason for this is in its flexibility. It requires 4 or more in hand, works on the Vanguard and Rearguard circle, isn’t limited by Generation Break, Legion, or LB4, and activates no matter what she attacks. She can hit a standard Vanguard on her own, and even allows you to hit a Grade 3 Vanguard at Grade 2 (without boost), if you’ve fallen behind. Paired with a 6k boost (minimum), Mocha can easily hit 21k on a Dragon Battle, Kamususanoo turn. She’s also a great target for Wakahirume to stack a stand trigger and have her re-stand (this is pretty much the only way OTT has to multi-attack). She’s a consistent 11k attacker, and that makes her the best. 5/5 for the G-era.

Battle Sister, Glace

The much less consistent version of Mocha. Glace doesn’t care for hand size, only soul. However, it’s much less consistent to have no cards in soul, than 4 cards in hand. And especially with the new Amaterasu G-Guard, and OTT’s dependence on Soul, Glace has gotten worse in the G-era. 2/5

Silent Tom

Silent Tom is a card gets a lot of flack for being the reason that Bushroad won’t give OTT good support. However, G-Guardians have reduced this card to a mere shadow (hehe get it?) of its former self. This card may have gotten worse in the G-era, but it is still really good if you use it to snipe pesky rearguards (we no longer need to get Tom to 16k, 15k is good enough for a rearguard to rearguard attack). Also this card is a great ride for an offensive grade 2 turn when you’re going first, as it forces your opponent to drop 2 cards, take the damage, or drop 1 card and risk getting hit anyway. This card is also a great distraction to your opponent, as most people want to get rid of it as fast as possible, and don’t recognize that Mocha is the real threat between the two. Overall, I’ll give this card a 4/5 for the G-era. Tom is nice, and fun to play, but he’s not the be-all, end-all of OTT anymore.



Onmyoji of the Moonlit Night

Also a less consistent version of Mocha. This card is dependent on your opponent’s hand

size, which works against Nubatama, but becomes vanilla when you’re losing, or even just falling behind. 1/5 for the G-era (actually for every era, as this card will never be consistent).

Battle Sister, Cocoa

Finally, Cocoa is an amazing card in the G-era. It’s flexible, as it can be used as a Grade 1 ride to dig through the deck for a card that you need. Just like Amaterasu, her ability allows you to control the top card of your deck at the beginning of every turn. If it’s a trigger, leave it! If it’s a useful unit, draw it! If you don’t need it, banish it to the bottom of the deck! This will increase your chances to get a trigger (it’s not sacking if you knew it was there, after all). You get the idea. The 6k doesn’t hurt Cocoa at all, as previously stated, 6k is all you need to make a 17k or 21k column when paired with any Grade 2 (or 3 for that matter) that can hit 11k on its own. Or you can make a 14k column with Tom, which is good enough to snipe a rearguard. Though a 7k would be better in this situation, to hit 19k on a Kamususanoo turn. Cocoa is also abusable with Sakuya. Overall, I’ll give her a 3.5/5 for the G-era. The only reason I didn’t rate it higher, is because Grade 1 space is tight in the G-era due to Stride Fodder.

And there you have it. Don’t be afraid to incorporate low stat units in OTT, as they often have better abilities than their standard stat counterparts. Never stop experimenting!~