Welcome to Week #9 of the OCG 2017.10 format.

Into the LINK VRAINS.

This report will cover 32 top-performing decks from 7 tournaments that were held in Japan and Indonesia during 25 – 28 November 2017.

New Product Release

LINK VRAINS PACK

Metagame Breakdown

10 SPYRAL: 6 Grinder SPYRAL 4 Mono SPYRAL

4 Zefra: 3 Mono Zefra 1 Predaplant Zefra

3 Burning Abyss

2 Trickstar: 1 Artifact Grinder Kaiju Trickstar 1 Mono Trickstar

1 Artifact Halqifibrax

1 Brilliant Venus World Chalice

1 Greener Predaplant Infernoid

1 Infernity

1 Invoked

1 Junk Doppel

1 Kaiju Fluffal

1 Magical Musket

1 Patchwork Yang Zing HERO

1 Performapal Magician

1 Shiranui

1 Windwitch Kaiju Invoked Luna

1 Yang Zing Dinosaur

SPYRAL

SPYRAL is still holding onto the lead, but they no longer have a strong dominance over the competitive scene.

Most of the SPYRAL decks are still running the same build, and are not prepared against the upcoming metagame shift.

Zefra

(This portion was revised to reflect a more accurate playstyle for Zefra.)

While the old Zefra playstyle is reliant on Draconnet to bring out Denglong, First of the Yang Zing, the new Zefra playstyle uses Heavymetalfoes Electrumite and Crystron Halqifibrax.

Not only does Heavymetalfoes Electrumite search for a Pendulum Monster Card such as Zefraath, its two Link Arrows allows Zefra to Pendulum Summon two Pendulum Monsters from the Extra Deck. Both Zefraniu, Secret of the Yang Zing and Zefraxi, Treasure of the Yang Zing could then be Pendulum Summoned from the Extra Deck together. Zefraniu would add Zefra Divine Strike from deck to hand.

As Zefraniu is treated as a Tuner through the effect of Zefraxi, Electrum and Zefraniu can then be used to Link Summon Crystron Halqifibrax. Crystron Halqifibrax would Special Summon a Level 2 Tuner monster. Zefraxi and the Level 2 Tuner would then become Denglong, First of the Yang Zing, and add Nine Pillars of Yang Zing.

On the opponent’s turn, Crystron Halqifibrax‘s effect can be used to Special Summon T.G. Wonder Magician to destroy the opponent’s Spell/Trap Card such as SPYRAL Resort or SPYRAL Gear – Big Red. When Nine Pillars negates an opponent’s card or effect activation and destroys Denglong, Denglong would then Special Summon Zefraxi. Wonder Magician’s effect could then be used to perform a Synchro Summon on the opponent’s turn, using itself and Zefraxi to bring out Baxia, Brightness of the Yang Zing. Baxia could then shuffle 1 card on the field back into the deck.

Burning Abyss

Cherubini, Ebon Angel of the Burning Abyss improves the consistency of Burning Abyss. By sending Cir, Malebranche of the Burning Abyss for the (3) effect, Cir could then revive Dante, Traveler of the Burning Abyss. With Dante limited to 1, having an efficient method to recur Dante becomes crucial for Burning Abyss as it opens up multiple potential plays, and makes bringing out the second or third Beatrice, Lady of the Eternal much easier.

The current popular Burning Abyss build takes a control approach using Skill Drain and Unending Nightmare.

Skill Drain is simply good in the current Monster Effect heavy format.

Against SPYRAL, Unending Nightmare hits SPYRAL Resort and SPYRAL Gear – Big Red, and against Zefra, Unending Nightmare goes for the Pendulum Scale.

Conclusion

The release of LINK VRAINS PACK saw a lot of players switching away from SPYRAL to try out various decks revitalised by the new Link Monsters.

It is too early to tell if SPYRAL would be dethroned. Zefra and Burning Abyss had the element of surprise as no one had an adequate Side Deck prepared against them. We would have to observe the next few weeks to see if SPYRAL could adapt to the metagame shift, and whether Zefra and Burning Abyss are resilient enough to hold their ground.

Across the board, the tournaments in this week’s report have a relatively lower participant count, so the margin of error is wider.