The Zoodiac theme from Raging Tempest has a ton of tricks up its sleeve thanks to the wide variety of monster effects it has access to. While some of their monsters help you build big fields very quickly, the rest of their monsters will help you actually defeat your opponent. Special Summoning a bunch of monsters is always fun, but this time around we’re going to focus on how Zoodiacs plan to win the game.



Zoodiac Thoroughblade is a Level 4 EARTH Beast-Warrior just like the rest of the Zoodiac Effect Monsters. With 1600 ATK and 0 DEF it’s not super strong, but solid enough where it can hold its own. When it is Normal or Special Summoned, you can discard a Zoodiac card from your hand to draw a fresh card, which is always a nice effect to have when you need to dig for something or discard something you don’t really need. Just like the other Zoodiac Effect Monsters, Zoodiac Thoroughblade has a second effect that grants a Beast-Warrior Xyz it is attached to as an Xyz Material an additional effect. Zoodiac Thoroughblade gives its Xyz Monster piercing, so you make sure to get damage through whatever pesky defender.



Zoodiac Whiptail has 1200 ATK and 400 DEF, and is a bit unique as it can attach itself as an Xyz Material to a Beast-Warrior Xyz Monster you control without any help. You can use this effect during either player’s turn, as long as Zoodiac Whiptail is either on the field or in your hand, so you can conceal it from your opponent until the right time to strike. When Zoodiac Whiptail is attached to a Beast-Warrior Xyz Monster, that Xyz Monster will gain the effect to banish whatever monster it battles after damage calculation. This can really turn a Duel in your favor by removing a resilient monster from your opponent’s side of the field, or making an attack your opponent expected to be beneficial work out for you instead.



While both Zoodiac Thoroughblade and Zoodiac Whiptail help you get through to your opponent’s Life Points quicker, it’s really the Xyz Monsters that will do the heavy lifting. Zoodiac Drident is a Rank 4 EARTH Beast-Warrior just like the other Zoodiac Xyz Monsters, and while it normally requires four Level 4 Monsters as Xyz Materials, it can be Xyz Summoned on top of any single Zoodiac you control as long as it doesn’t have the same name. It’s this ability that makes the Zoodiac Xyz Monsters so powerful, as they can be Summoned even if you’ve got nothing going on. However, the ATK and DEF of each Zoodiac Xyz Monster is calculated by combining the total ATK and DEF of all Zoodiac Monsters attached to it, so even though they’re easy to summon, you’ll need to set it up a bit more to make sure it can deal substantial damage.

What makes Zoodiac Drident so important to Zoodiac is that during either player’s turn, it can detach an Xyz Material to destroy any face-up card on the field! This can be used on your own cards if you need to free up some Monster Zones, but most of the time Zoodiac Drident is going to be the way you blow through your opponent’s defenses. It can also disrupt your opponent during their turn by destroying a key monster during their combo, or destroying an important Continuous Spell, Field Spell, or Pendulum Scale. Because you can so easily stack Zoodiac Xyz Monsters on top of each other, you can make sure Zoodiac Drident has more than enough fuel for when you need it.



Zoodiac Boarbow is the easiest way that Zoodiac has to deal game winning damage. It works just like Zoodiac Drident in terms of how it can be summoned and how to calculate its ATK and DEF, but rather than having an effect to destroy cards, it can simply attack your opponent directly. Having an effect like this is a real game changer, as monsters can no longer defend your opponent’s Life Points the way they were intended to. You can set up a game shot through even the most impressive fields, and the only hoop you need to jump through is making sure you have enough Zoodiacs attached to it for its ATK to matter.

It also has an added bonus when it deals damage and has 12 or more Xyz Materials, which sounds a little hard to set up but can seal a game if you manage to pull it off. You can already attack directly so the only real requirement is getting that many Xyz Materials, but if you do the game practically ends on the spot. Once it deals battle damage, you can send as many cards as possible from your opponent’s hand and field to the Graveyard! Running your opponent completely out of cards is a great way to win, even if you can’t manage to get Zoodiac Boarbow’s ATK high enough to actually run your opponent out of Life Points.

You can check out the Zoodiac and much more at the Raging Tempest Sneak Peek February 4th and 5th!