Most of my Yugioh days have been spent playing rogue, unconventional
decks. That is until Return of the
Duelist, when Konami revealed a full lineup of Geargias. For the first time, I saw my deck showing up
on lists of regional and YCS tops. I got
to experience the privilege of flipping a monster and watching my opponent grouse
about the deck. Playing mirror matches
became commonplace. When asked, I could finally
give a simple, one word answer to what deck I was playing.
Now, the little gears are introducing me to a new facet of meta-life,
ban list anxiety. Konami’s insistence on
archetype-specific card design has given them the power to shut down entire
decks at will. Bujins and Fire Fists are
all one card away from becoming tomorrow’s Wind-ups and Glad Beasts. Despite the clamor to bring back Bestiari, these
cards tend to remain on the F/L list.
Most of the cards that have been brought back are generic. Konami needs you to put away your old deck
and buy something new.
Fortunately, Geargias have not been completely dominating
the meta. More importantly, they have some
new friends coming. As a result, the
little gears will probably be around for another format or two. Nevertheless, I thought I would share my
thoughts on what is to come.
By each card is a 0 to 4 scale. The bomb is the likelihood that the card will
be restricted by the F/L list (0 = No chance, 4 = extremely likely). The skull
and cross bones indicates the effect on the deck (0 = No difference, 4 = Not
playable)
Geargiagear
This card was not immediately embraced by Geargia doolists.
Many players, including myself, were hesitant
to add level three monsters and were concerned about drawing dead Geargiagears. Over time, this card proved to be one of the
most OP cards we had. I am happy to
sacrifice it to appease the F/L gods.
Removing it will likely bring some innovation and creativity to the
deck.
Geargiaccelerator
The heart of the deck revolves around this common card. Armor or Auger to Accelerator is a + 0 play
that can net you most Rank 4 XYZ monsters.
The deck plays quite well with 2 race cars and some players even prefer it. On the other hand, the deck dies if this card
is at 0 to 1.
Geargiarmor
Though Auger threatens to supplant it, I think Armor is the better
card. 1900 defense is still formidable.
More importantly, it can grab more than one Geargia per turn. Semi-limiting card would be a little sad, but
not lethal. Arsenal can get it out of
the deck and Accelerator out of the graveyard.
Geargiarsenal
I have routinely played with two copies of Arsenal without
much problem. One reason for the card’s
limited impact is that most Geargia monsters do not get effects on special
summoning. MK-III will be the exception to the rule. Nevertheless, I do not see the little tank in
Konami’s crosshairs.
Geargigant-X
Now that Konami has successfully sold their tins of Geargigants,
they can afford to limit this card and make way for the rush towards Rank 3
Gears. Semi-limiting the big cross would
have little impact in a side deck that is already stuffed. Limiting or, God forbid, forbidding it would
slow down rank 4 builds. We may see this
happen so that there is room for XG.
Genex Ally Birdman
Birdman has become the great OTK enabler. While Geargiaists have come to accept Geargiagear,
there are many who still hotly contend the value of this card. It’s a great card with Accelerator and
another Geargia on the field; it’s not if you have a handful of Traps and
Spells. I’m happy to put the card away.
Karakuris
For the sake of our machine playing brethren, I hope these
cards do not make it to the F/L list.
Konami would have to perform a rather dramatic paring down of the
Karakuris to stop the Geargias.
Eliminating Birdman would slow down the deck and these monsters could be
left alone.
Geargianos
Limiting Geargiagear makes touching the Geargianos unnecessary. Besides, Konami appears to be trying to force
adoption of the Rank 3 build. If so,
April 1st will give us another three months of play before we have
to live through the angst all over again.
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