YCS Austin: Mono Mermails win, but OMG at Electrum OTK

Last weekend was another YCS (the first one of the new format, I guess?), at Austin, Texas. This YCS gave us a look at how the current March format is, before any of the important releases come out (HA7 and Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy). This YCS is important, because the next 2 YCS’s will be similar to this one (San Diego & San José). Not to mention, a lot of Regional qualifiers / nationals will be similar as well.

The current format will change from April 19th onward, with Hidden Arsenal 7 becoming legal (first YCS with HA7 legal is YCS Lille (France)) and in May we’ll also have Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy, which will revolutionize the meta.

So, how is the current meta? Well, we all know Mermails (both Merlantean & the new Mono Mermail) is the top deck, with Fire Fists gaining more territory (as seen in Bochum). On the other hand, both Macro Rabbit & Wind-ups took serious hits, but are not down for the count yet.

YCS Austin Top breakdown

Top 32:

• 16x Mermail
• 5x Fire Fist
• 3x Macro Rabbit
• 2x Geargia
• 2x Karakuri
• Wind-up
• Frog Monarch
• Electrum OTK
• Elemental HERO

WOW. I know Mermails was the deck to beat, but 16/32? That’s a LOT! Fire Fists took 5 tops, which was about what I expected. And the rest is just random. The biggest surprises in this top are Wind-ups (still 1 top, considering all cards they lost? That’s great), Frog Monarchs (lol, wut?) and Electrum OTK (Seriously, WHAT THE EFF?).

Top 16

• 8x Mermail
• Macro Rabbit
• Wind-up
• Fire Fist (Rabbit version)
• Frog Monarch
• Geargia
• Karakuri
• Electrum OTK
• Elemental HERO

As expected, half of the Mermails crashed, but 8 decks still survived. 4/5 Fire Fist gangs split up and Only 1 of the Macro Rabbit, Geargia and Karakuri decks survived. But all 9 different decks are still there.

Top 8:

• 4x Mermail
• Macro Rabbit
• Wind-up
• Fire Fist (Rabbit version)
• Frog Monarch

In this top, Mermails got cut in half again, the Machine decks are all gone, together with the HERO deck and Electrum OTK (again, WTF?). What’s more surprising is that the lone Frog Monarch deck is still there!

Top 4 and end result:

• 2x Mono Mermail
• Fire Fist (Rabbit version)
• Frog Monarchs (Monarchs in top 4, for real?)

Mermails cut in half again and both the Macro Rabbit and the Wind-up deck had to yield. After the semi-finals and finals (Feature match), the end result was the following:

• 1st place: Oscar Zelaya – Mono Mermails. Click this link for the decklist.
• 2nd Place: Alfredo Tiznado – Fire Fists. Click this link for the decklist.
• 3rd place: Alexander Reynolds – Mono Mermails (no decklist found yet, but the deck is similar to first place)
• 4th place: Alexander Chavir - Frog Monarchs. Click this link for the decklist.

Electrum OTK

I personally didn’t catch on with this deck yet, but it’s a deck that has been floating around ever since Gustav Max & Cardcar D came out. Due to massive use of Veiler, Warning and Maxx “C” the deck never really got any spotlight. New format clearly changed that, allowing the deck to massively gain territory and catch everyone by surprise.

This week, I’ll give you a look as to why this deck is so powerful (including the deck profile).

Afterword

If you prepare for San Diego or San José, then prepare your side deck mostly for Mermails, Fire Fists and then Machine + Warrior decks (Electrum OTK is now hyped and will get following in the next few YCS’s). But don’t forget, Macro Rabbit and Wind-ups are not dead yet. They will see a further decrease in play, but they’re still there and they’re still good decks.

Note: Credits go to Vexacus4666 for providing all the necessary information on his youtube channel.

The Seal of Orichalcos - The Full effect

If you're following the Konamy Strategy blog, you might have picked up a few lines of the effect of the Seal of Orichalcos. for those that didn't, check this blog out.

Thanks to a few people online (both on TCGPlayer & Pojo), the effect has been fully 'revealed'.

Now there IS an effect!

The effect

The effect goes as follows:

• All monsters you control gain 500 ATK.
• Once per turn, this card cannot be destroyed by card effects.
• While you control 2 or more face-up attack position monsters, your opponent cannot target your monster(s) with the lowest ATK for an attack.
• When this card is activated: destroy all Special Summoned monsters you control.
• You cannot Special Summon monsters from your Extra Deck.
• You can only activate "The Seal of Orichalcos" once per duel.

Good or bad?

Well, Konami made sure this card wouldn't make all other field spells useless and wouldn't be abused as hell. But in return, this card has become useless in most decks that are used nowadays. Destroying special summoned monsters? Not being able to summon from the extra deck? Those are huge draw-backs for most decks nowadays.

But there are a few decks that might profit from this card.

• Frog Monarchs: What's more dangerous than 2400 attack monarchs? 2900 attack monarchs! Monarchs's only special summon treeborn Frog. And even if the frog is blocked by this spell, the fact that your opponent cannot attack monsters with lower attack is a good blocker and helps build up your defenses/tributes.
• Malefic Style decks. Malefics remove cards from the extra deck, but don't special summon them. And they require a field spell to stay alive. Having a field spell that cannot be destroyed (once per turn) is a powerful asset. Having lower attack monsters that cannot attack, yet cannot be attacked are great assets as well.
• Eartbound Immortals: You remember those big level 10 monsters from the 5D's era? Powerful cards, but with a big drawback as they required two tributes and needed a field spell to stay alive. With this card, they might make a come-back (though they might require a little more than just this card).

I'm sure more original decks will pop up in the future that might find a use for this card, but for now that's all I could think of.

Well, I'll try to post up some more test results near the end of the week. Until then, V out.