Hey everyone, this is The_SynchroGuy, and welcome to “YGO Recap Week!” The weekly series where we go over just about any and all Yu-Gi-Oh! related goodness so you don’t miss out on anything.
Not a whole lot of news to cover this week, but we do have some interesting tournament results to go over. Some of it is what we expected, but we also have a few surprises that keep things interesting. And we have one card in the game that has become a popular topic due to another card that is not a lot of people like.
This is going to be a short recap, but I still hope you enjoy it. Anyway, let’s get into it!
Yu-Gi-Oh! Meta
OCG:
https://roadoftheking.com/ocg-2022-07-metagame-report-7/
Tearlaments and Spright still continue to reign over the OCG, so let’s see how things have adapted from last week.
Tearlaments have started teching in Raigeki and Evenly Matched in the Side Deck to help deal with the boards a Spright player puts up. While these cards don’t completely ruin a Spright players day, they do help make it so the Tearlament player can play the game. Especially since Spright players have been locking them out of the Extra Deck through the effect of Dragon Buster Destruction Sword and Union Carrier.
They’ve also been main decking their Counter Trap, Tearlaments Cryme, which negates any Monster, Spell or Trap effect, and it shuffles back the card it negates. This is very helpful in the mirror match as it prevents the opponent’s Tearlaments monsters from triggering. Especially the Fusion Monsters. Not to mention, if it gets milled, they get to add back a banished Tearlaments monster, which is good since their stuff is getting banished more and more due to the new Byssted cards. And to top it off, it’s searchable by the effects of Kitkallos and Scream. If you have any copies of Tearlaments Cryme, you might want to hold onto them.
Then there’s Spright. They have started using a hand trap that hasn’t seen much play since it was first released. That card being “Ghost Reaper & Winter Cherries”.
This makes sense since the format is being run by two decks right now. Not only is this good in the mirror match for Spright, but they also have been teching in a copy of Tearlaments Kitkallos for the Tearlaments matchup. Making that much harder for Tearlaments to perform their plays.
Of course though, if Tearlaments, or any opponent really, have set up a board, well… Spright has come up with a new plan to deal with them. Spright players have suddenly started teching in a new card that goes with the theme of the deck. “Number 2: Ninja Shadow Mosquito”.
https://yugipedia.com/wiki/Number_2:_Ninja_Shadow_Mosquito
This card has given Sprights a new way to OTK their opponent. If their opponent has a monster on their field with 2700 ATK or more, then they can perform this combo. I don’t know how it’s actually performed, but the goal is not only to summon Shadow Mosquito, but to have 3 other monsters on the field as well. They attack into the opponent’s monster (and probably take some battle damage, but that’s fine), activate Shadow Mosquito’s effect to put a Hallucination Counter on the opponent’s monster, then attack with their 3 other monsters to use Shadow Mosquito’s other effect to burn the opponent equal to the ATK of the monster with a Hallucination Counter. And since that effect is not once per turn, that’s GG to the opponent.
It’s always cool to see all of these new strategies that people come up with. Though the format is still the same, how it’s played out always changes from week to week.. Somewhat. But that’s something I’m always looking forward to.
Lastly, one deck I wanted to mention here that really caught my attention was Adamancipator.
This archetype has hardly had any competitive success in the OCG when it was first released there, unlike here in the TCG. That’s why you see a card like Block Dragon in the deck list here. And it’s using the new Vernuslyph archetype, which makes sense since Adamancipator is an EARTH deck.
While this doesn’t put Adamancipator on the same playing field as Spright and Tearlaments, it’s still cool to see players trying out with other decks and doing well with them.
TCG:
The European Championship 2022 took place this past weekend, and it was quite interesting like the previous Championships that took place this year. While we did see decks like Spright and Tearlaments make the top cut, they did not win the event. The event was won by famous UK pro player, Marcus Patel, who won the event using Rikka Sunavalon.
Second place went to Zio Mundry and his Danger! Tearlaments deck. Third place went to Matteo Giugni and his Spright Evil Twin deck. And finally, in fourth place, we had Lars Junginger and his Altergeist deck. So big congratulations to these players for putting in their best effort into making it this far into the tournament!
I will admit, it was really surprising to see a deck like Rikka Sunavalon winning the event. Sunavalon Therion was already quite a strong deck, but the new Rikka support seems to have really given the Sunavalon deck a bigger push.
But it was even more surprising to see Altergeist coming in to claim one of the top 4 spots!
Altergeist can be a strong deck. And it can be especially hard to deal with if they put up something like Mystic Mine.
Speaking of Mystic Mine, apparently during one of the feature matches, someone managed to protect their Mystic Mine from destruction by using the effect of Beat Cop from the Underworld. This has caused players not only to want Mystic Mine gone, but also start memeing both it and Beat Cop together.
This has not made Beat Cop super expensive though, as it’s still sitting at around $1 per copy.
However, this event did show how strong the new decks, Spright and Tearlaments, can be. No doubt this tournament has reassured everyone that investing into these decks, and preparing for them, was not a mistake. But now players are definitely going to be looking at Sunavalon decks. At least for a while. Overall though, I will say that Spright and Tearlaments have come to do what they were set out to do.
Thankfully we’re not in a format where you have to play one of these two decks, but these decks are getting more support in the future. And how everything plays out all depends on what Konami is going to do on the next upcoming banlist.
If you want to checkout the top 4 decks from this event click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYVFWghe1Mc
Or, if you want a little more in depth explanation, then head on over to Lithium2300’s channel, and/or Farfa’s channel.
https://www.yugioh-card.com/en/events-item/ycs-riodejaneiro-2022/
And as a reminder, YCS Rio de Janerio will be taking place this weekend. Now that everyone has gotten a taste of what this format holds, let’s see if this will affect how this YCS will go down. Sprights and Tearlaments are definitely gonna be things that everyone will be focusing on, considering how well these decks managed to top. But since cards like Mystic Mine and Rivalry of Warlords made a big impact at the European Championship, let’s see if players will be preparing for them as well.
Card Reveals
https://ygorganization.com/vjmp-the-next-v-jump-promo-6/
We got a look at the next VJump promo card the OCG will be getting soon. But as always, they are keeping the card’s effect a secret until we get closer to the release date of the next VJump magazine. All we know so far is that it’s part of the “Mystical Beast of the Forest” archetype. The only hint we’re given is that its effect will help support Beast, Beast-Warrior, Winged Beast, Plant, and Insect monsters. No telling if this card will be good, but it is a Level 2 monster, so it has a little Spright synergy right there.
Meanwhile, I’m sitting over here thinking if we’ll ever get a focused Mystical Beast of the Forest deck. Konami seems to be giving this archetype a little more attention lately, so it would be cool to see this archetype be able to function as its own deck.
Miscellaneous
https://www.yugioh-card.com/en/products/accessories/
Well it took Konami long enough, but we are finally getting some new, standalone, Dark Magician Girl accessories. These accessories being: Deck boxes, card sleeves, play mat and trade binder. If you’re a fan of Dark Magician Girl, which chances are you are, you can get these lovely accessories at your local OTS store on February 9/10 of next year.
https://ygorganization.com/reference-art-deck-build-pack-amazing-defenders-reps/
If you enjoy seeing some of the reference art on Yu-Gi-Oh! cards, here’s some for the new archetypes from Amazing Defenders. It’s always cool to see the details on certain cards and how creative the artists can be. And I enjoy the little story/gags thrown into them. Gives you an idea on what personality the monsters have.
Decks To Checkout
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odmpbgeqblY
El Exordio gives us a first take on the new Purery archetype and what the deck can do. While so far this deck is not a tier 1 potential, from my view at least, it’s a fun deck with an interesting gimmick. And it can definitely hold its own if you play your cards right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbR8DpQ9YRE
Finally, Duel Evolution gives us their current version of the Runick archetype, which will be released later this week. This archetype has managed to top a bit in the OCG in the past, so there’s definitely something about this archetype that makes it really strong. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see it appear at upcoming Regional/YCS events. (Won’t be seeing this deck at YCS Rio since it’s being released right around when the event starts, so it wouldn’t be fair since not many players would be ready for it.)
Favorite Content of the Week
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqqYc7dnEfg&list=WL&index=2
DistantCoder has started season 2 of his YugiTuber Ruling Quiz! Knowing the rules on how your cards work is very important. Even YugiTubers need to know their rulings. You will enjoy this either for learning something new about the rules of the game, or just for watching your favorite YugiTuber struggle and give out some weird reasoning to their answer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuN7yyNSrb8
Dzeef shares some highlights of him training the voice actor of Yuya, Mike Liscio, on how to play Yu-Gi-Oh! in Duel Links. It’s always fun to see the voice actors of our favorite show trying to learn how to play the game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4QBGGPVZQY
Then finally, we have Ruggles making his return to Yu-Gi-Oh!, again. His content is simply amazing to watch. He puts in a lot of effort when it comes to filming and editing his videos. And in case you haven’t noticed, the dude is jacked. Like, if you asked me who would win in a boxing match between him and Triff Gaming, my money is on Ruggles all the way.
Conclusion
Thank you guys for reading this! As I said, this was going to be a short one, but we still had some interesting stuff happen this past week. And we’re probably going to get more once YCS Rio starts up. And probably more the week after if we see any of the new archetypes from Tactical Masters topping any OTS or Regional tournaments. And maybe due to the European Championship we can finally expect Mystic Mine to finally get the boot. Might have to do well in YCS Rio for that to happen, so I’m kind of hoping to see Mystic Mine do well at YCS Rio.
I’ll see you guys in the next one! Hope you have/had an awesome day today! 
