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Pojo's Yu-Gi-Oh Card of the Day
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Vampire
Lord
Secret Rare
Each
time this card inflicts Battle Damage to your
opponent, declare 1 card type (Monster, Spell or
Trap). Your opponent selects 1 card of that type
from his/her Deck and sends it to the Graveyard.
Also, when this card is destroyed and sent to your
Graveyard by your opponent's card effect, it is
Special Summoned to the field during your next
Standby Phase.
Type
- Zombie / Effect Monster
Card Number
- DCR-000
Card Ratings
Traditional: 4
Advanced: 3.65
Ratings
are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being
the worst. 3 ... average. 5 is the highest rating
Date Reviewed - 01.28.05 |
JAELOVE |
Friday: Vampire Lord
Rated For: Zombie Deck
This week's card of the day culminates in what I
feel is the best theme monster in all of Yu-Gi-Oh!
Vampire Lord is rightfully named because he
single-handedly invokes all of the fearsome
qualities of Zombies; the ability to regenerate from
the graveyard, the ability to destroy the opponent's
deck, and swift searchability.
The
fact that Vampire Lord is so easily summoned, and
the fact he's the only tribute monster in the game
who can single-handedly escape both monster effects,
trap effects, and spell effects, makes him
absolutely fearsome.
I've calculated this many times before, and Vampire
Lord is really only killable by about 5 commonly
played cards in the game. There's Magical Scientist,
Berserk Gorilla, Blade Knight, D.D Warrior Lady, and
D.D Assailant. The other monsters that can kill him
permanently are limited to tribute monsters and
special summoned monsters.
Of
these commonly played monsters, Berserk Gorilla and
Blade Knight will both also die when battling him,
as will D.D Warrior Lady. Now compare that to a card
like Airknight. Airknight will die to all of those
listed monsters, AND fall prey to both traps and
spells. Jinzo will fall prey to 3 of those 5
monsters, AND fall prey to Smashing Ground, Tribe,
Exiled Force, and others.
Simply put, Vampire Lord is a game breaker. Get him
on the field and your opponent will be hard pressed
to kill him. But that's not the entire story. Put
him in a control deck that limits your opponent's
options, and he/she'll find that Vampire Lord
becomes nearly impossible to kill in a limited
resource game. Obviously, this sort of deck type
(zombie control), requires severe dedication, but
the results are well worth it.
The
second effect (Deck Destruction) is not actually
great when you're playing experts. Always call traps
if you're winning and spells if it's even; even
then, they'll likely dump something they don't need,
though it does help reconnoiter what they're
running.
I'm
almost tempted to urge you to ignore what all the
other COTDers have to say about this card; they
haven't play tested it the way I have, and
definitely haven't bothered to unlock its fearsome
potential. Nevertheless, keep in mind he's so
consistently bashed and flamed that he's become one
of the most underrated theme support cards of all
time.
Advantage F/H:
His
self-reviving effect is one of the most broken
monster effects in the game. You can also revive him
or search him at no cost, basically getting him
through a variety of appealing options. Once he's on
the field, there's very little that can kill him.
Sub-par attack advantage, making him beatable by
Berserk Gorilla, brings him down from a perfect
score.
Traditional Format Score: 9.5/10
Advanced Format Score: 9.5/10
Best Draw for the Situation:
Obviously, as a tribute monster you don't want to draw him in the opening
hand or top-deck him. However, Spirit Reapers,
Pyramid Turtles, and Book of Life, coupled with the
standard Change of Heart, Snatch Steal, Premature
Burial, Call of the Haunted, make him a far more
appealing Tribute monster inclusion than every
other. He'll also be searched out quickly, making
the issue rather moot.
Traditional Format Score: 7.5/10
Advanced Format Score: 7.5/10
Attributes/Effect:
As
I said, his recursion effect is one of the best. Of
course, the deck destruction effect may help your
opponent, but every card in his deck should provide
him some use, given that he included it. Also, his
stats and zombie type make him searchable by 4
monsters (3 turtles and witch), and he packs two
solid effects into one fearsome package. In a zombie
deck, he's near perfect, except his low attack.
Traditional Format Score: 9.5/10
Advanced Format Score: 9.5/10
Dependability:
Compared to other monsters in this scale, he's very,
very dependable. Other tribute monsters can be wiped
clean by a timely Smashing Ground, Sakuretsu Armor,
Ring of Destruction, Torrential Tribute or such.
You'll literally have nothing to fear from your
opponent's S/T zone with this guy. He can also be
revived. Plus, Zombie control focuses on stripping
away threats from your opponent's hand that can
handle your own monsters. Low attack, however, makes
him killable by Berserk Gorilla and others, bringing
him down to a 9.5/10.
Traditional Format Score: 9.5/10
Advanced Format Score: 9.5/10
The Bottom Line:
Anyone who suggests taking him out of a Zombie Deck
for Patrician or Kokki is insane. Take care when
placing him in other decks, however, he's not as
good.
A BAD Score-----------
Traditional Format Score: 4.5/5
Advanced Format Score: 4.5/5
FORCE System Suggestions:
++ Contributes to Field Control, On-Field
Presence, Resource Management (Changed from
Replenishment), Counter-Disruption, Enemy Disruption
(very slight)
-- Weakens Enemy Disruption (very slight).
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ExMinion OfDarkness |
Vampire
Lord
We've already reviewed Vampire Lord when DCR came
out; hence I'm going to look at the changes since
then -- Advanced Format's effects on our favorite
Zombie, along with specific cards that help or
hinder it.
Invasion of Chaos: BLS and Chaos Sorcerer hurt it
bad -- even if they don't want to attack it, they
can just remove it flat out.
Ancient Sanctuary: The commonly-played Emeny
Controller can shift it into Defense for an easier
kill, or worse, sacrifice something, take control of
V-Lord, tribute it, and it doesn't get its effect.
Rise of Destiny: Divine Wrath. Enough said.
Advanced Format as a whole: The main decks being run
right now are Warrior/Chaos, field control, aggro
control (think 3x DDWL and 3x DD Assailant), m0rph
(my personal favorite), among other things.
Warriors themselves need multiple Command Knight
boosts to overpower V-Lord directly, but always have
DDWL to rely upon to take 500 and get it out of the
game (and with Reinforcements of the Army, that's
not that hard.) The BLS can run over V-Lord for
4,000 (with the 2nd attack being direct) so it's not
foolproof here.
Field control decks use a lot of effects instead of
attack power -- Berserk Gorilla suicides with it,
the DDWLs remove it, but other cards that get rid of
it via effect just let it come back.
Aggro control is worse for it -- DDWL + DDA =
Vampire Lord not being around for very long.
m0rph has its own plethora of ways to get around the
effect -- Scientist summoning a 2100/2200 Fusion to
get rid of it, m0rph into TER to suck it up (not
destroyed when TER dies, just sent to the graveyard,
so no revival), among other things.
In Traditional, it still has a lot of power -- Dark
Hole, Raigeki, the (now-staple) Torrential Tribute,
along with other monster field-kill lets it come
back more than once a Duel if played at the right
time.
In Advanced, it's a mere shadow of its former self
-- I see why they commonized it.
3.5/5 Tradtional
2.75/5 Advanced
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Coin Flip |
VLord has seen some interesting play, and the game's
changed a lot since its first review. (Heh, not as
much as change as there was for Trap Hole's grand
second review.)
When it first was released, it was almost as hyped
as DDWL. DDWL is now worth twenty bucks a pop,
whereas you get this and 39 other good cards for 10
bucks.
Right now, we are in a time where ATK power is a
huge thing. VLord doesn't always see the graveyard
when it dies, and it doesn't always die by effect.
DDWL, BLS by attack or effect, Berserk Gorilla
suicide, Smashing + Kycoo, Blade Knight suicide, or
the dreaded pocket knife of our time, Magical
Scientist.
Or a Standard Snatch Steal. Compulsory Evacuation
Device is a funny thing. Creature Swap... Man, there
are a lot of tricks to be used.
It's not that it won't use its effect, it's just
that it's not going to use it as often as before.
The deck destruction aspect of VLord is useless as
always. Never call monster, that'll give them chaos
food or a Sinister Serpent. Trap isn't so big, but
you'd want to call Trap or Magic.
It's a solid card, but it's lost some use in the
game from its initial release.
It's best in Zombie decks, but I'll rate for
general.
4/5 Traditional
4/5 Advanced
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Tranorix |
Vampire Lord
And today we review Vampire Lord.
He’s a very well-known monster and was dramatically
over-hyped when he was initially released, but
that’s died down a bit and you’ll seldom see him
anywhere now but in a Zombie Deck (where, it should
be noted, he does very well). 2000 ATK is nice,
though not spectacular for a tribute monster. He’s
Level 5 so he Morphs into Balter, if need be. And
he can be Special Summoned via Pyramid Turtle, Book
of Life and Call of the Mummy.
His discard effect is mediocre at
best – usually, it’ll help your opponent more than
it’ll help you. If you’re damaging him with V-Lord
and you call Trap or Spell, all he has to do is pick
one Trap or Spell he really doesn’t want to draw
next turn. If you call monster – well, just don’t
ever call monster, unless you really have a good
reason, because that’d just be rentsy.
His recursion effect is what makes
V-Lord a gem. If your opponent nukes this with Ring
of Destruction, Smashing Ground, Torrential Tribute,
Tribe-Infecting Virus or anything similar, he’ll
just come back. This was even nicer in Traditional
Format when we also had Mirror Force, Dark Hole and
Raigeki; but the effect is still quite useful in the
Advanced Format. And now, V-Lord can be used to
summon Vampire Genesis, giving him another purpose.
A general rule to keep in mind is this: V-Lord will
only return if he’s destroyed on YOUR side of the
field by your opponent’s card effect. If he dies
while under your opponent’s control, he WILL NOT
come back at all.
Run him in a Zombie Deck by all
means; and feel free to try him out in your Cookie
Cutters, because he’s still quite good, but he’s
definitely not a necessity.
Traditional – CCCC: 3.5/5
Traditional – Zombie: 4.5/5
Advanced – CCWC: 3/5
Advanced – Zombie: 4.5/5
OVERALL RATING: 3.9/5
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Snapper |
Vampire Lord
Oh joy! Our final card this week is Vampire Lord,
the monster every one is hating UDE er- Konami er-
somebody over! Why? Their once precious DCR Secret
Rare version is now as easy to get as a Dark Hole.
Vampire Lord has relatively lackluster stats; for a
Level 5 monster, 2000 ATK is a little less than
ideal. It is a Zombie though, giving it numerous
ways to be Special Summoned. Still, Vampire Lord’s
unspectacular ATK haunts him a little when thinking
of his effect.
Vampire Lord’s primary use comes from his
self-recursion ability; whenever he is destroyed and
sent to the Graveyard by an opponent’s card effect,
Vampire Lord Special Summons itself from the
Graveyard during the owner’s next Standby Phase. It
is truly a unique effect that cannot be matched by
any other monster. If an opponent’s Hammer Shot,
Torrential Tribute, Tribe-Infecting Virus, Cyber
Jar, or the like destroys it, Vampire Lord returns
from the grave to wreck havoc on the opponent once
more, giving Vampire Lord the rare sense of
immortality. Fortunately for all opposition to
Vampire Lord, it has one weakness; it’s ATK. As said
before, 2000 ATK is a pain in the side for a card
such as Vampire Lord. Mobius, Goblin Attack Force,
Berserk Gorilla, as well as many other beatdown
oriented and Tribute monsters cause Vampire Lord’s
effect to only be a small obstacle on the path to
victory, owing to the fact that destruction in
battle is not a card effect. But it’s all for the
best; if Vampire Lord was any stronger it would be
top choice for Banning. So why not make do with what
you have and give it an ATK boost? It’s somewhat
unconventional but it does the trick.
The second effect (well actually first if you want
to be accurate) of Vampire Lord allows you to thin
your opponent’s Deck of either a Spell, Trap, or
Monster whenever Vampire Lord does damage to their
Life Points.
Deck thinning isn’t something you really want to
freely give to your opponent as it’s often something
your opponent is trying to accomplish on their own.
Nevertheless, the effect can be beneficial; most
will recommend you force your foe to send one of
their Traps to the Graveyard, then Spells, and
finally monsters. Using the effect in this manner
will help prevent your opponent from having
something in their Graveyard that they want in their
Graveyard.
Vampire Lord is one of those rare monsters that fit
in most Decks, but to stay in the spirit of themed
Decks, keep with Zombies.
Advanced Format: 4/5. Give it a nice power boost and
your opponent has a nice thorn in their side.
Traditional Format: 4/5. Give it a nice power boost
and your opponent has a nice thorn in their side.
Overall: 4/5.
Art: 4/5. Not how I pictured the Lord of Vampires,
but it won’t be giving anyone nightmares. Not that
that’s something to be proud of, but…
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f00b |
Vampire Lord aka "Blue"
OMG I’m back. You all DO remember me, right? That’s
fsho, your boy f00b is back, bringing the heat to
the Card of the Day reviews. We’re talking bout the
pioneer here ;-)
So it only seems fitting that I get to come back to
re-review Vampire Lord, a card that we checked out a
little over a year ago when he was a star in my
[then-traditional] morph deck, and I, like him, have
“returned” (but not from the graveyard). A few
things have changed about him in the Advanced
format, but otherwise, Vampire Lord is pretty much
the same blue-haired pimp he always was. Anyway,
let’s get down to business.
First of all, why should you run him? Let me name
off a few reasons…First, he’s a zombie with < 2000
Def, which means he’s already worth running with
Pyramid Turtle, not to mention when combined with
Book of Life he becomes a house. Additionally, he
does have that unusual effect of ‘thinning’ your
opponent’s deck of 1 card when he deals damage.
However, this effect usually will only be used to
call out your opponent’s remaining traps from their
deck and limit their defensive options, thus forcing
them to remove this guy using bigger, stronger
monsters – a difficult task. But most of all, he’s
got amazing ability to maintain board control via
his recursion effect, which is quite a unique
ability in this game…it’s tough to get rid of this
guy by conventional removal methods. Also relevant
is the fact he is a 5-star tribute monster, which
used to matter back in the days where Dark Balter
ruled the earth, now it only makes a slight
difference if you run metamorphosis.
To tie in yesterday’s card of the day, Vampire Lord
was the original reason anyone thought of using
Interdimensional Matter Transporter, solely because
since he is so hard to get rid of, ‘negating’ one of
only a few answers your opponent might have to him
is a very solid play.
As far as his uses with Vampire Genesis (Tuesday’s
cotd) and what not go...I just wouldn’t chance that
route. Vampire Lord is far more useful in his own
right and doesn’t necessitate running a nomi monster
like that. Remember, consistency is key in this
game, so stick with running V-lord to actually run
V-lord.
Still, he has his downfalls. The ‘normal’ deck right
now runs anywhere from
5-6 combined copies of D.D. Warrior Lady and Berserk
Gorilla…both being normal summons that take card of
Vampire Lord and his pesky recursion effect.
Additionally, Black Luster Soldier, Jinzo, Snatch
Steal, Bottomless Trap Hole, Magical Scientist, and
Dark Magician of Chaos are a few of the more
commonly played counters to Vampire Lord.
However, with all the readily available zombie cards
in the Zombie Madness structure decks, this guy is
as playable as ever (although how playable that
means is…). I still wouldn’t recommend him for just
any deck. Obviously a full-fledged zombie deck will
have the support needed to all-out abuse him, but
also any deck that attempts to maintain field
control will benefit from this guy’s inherent
ability to return to the field.
Zombie – 4/5 You pretty much have to run him here,
he’s invaluable when Pyramid Turtle, Call of the
Mummy, Book of Life, etc are thrown into the mix.
Advanced – 2/5 This guy is still playable but there
are too many DDWL/Gorillas out there.
Traditional – 2.5/5 There are slightly less monster
answers to him, not to mention fewer traps so
calling that with his effect is likely to hit an
Imperial, Call, Decree, or Mirror Force.
It’s good to be back, hope I can help out along with
the rest of the great Pojo reviewers to give insight
for all of you to become better players and
especially better deck-builders.
~f00b
And as always, you can reach me for whatever you
like at f00b1337@hotmail.com
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sHecKii |
Vampire Lord
AHHH!!! the card I
ALWAYS run in the Traditional Format...and I
only run 1 Pyramid Turtle (no spirit reaper) and
1 Vampire Lord because that combo is JUST THAT
GOOD.
...But i hate the
old format and never want to play that format
again SOOO here I am trying to think why Vampire
Lord is good still...
Well since everyone
seems to be on the band-wagon of Berserk Gorilla
. DECKS!!! Vampire Lord seems to be getting
jankier and jankier everyday. Though people
that run 2/3 Smashing Grounds and/or Exiled
Force seems to have a LOT of trouble with this
dude, I still don't believe he is good enough
because of the Berserk Gorilla
...why'd they make
that card? I mean seriously, a) it kills
Airknight Parshath, b) any other beatdown
monster besides 2100+ ones (obvious but u know
what i mean), c) it's seriously one of the best
top decks and something to shove into magical
scientist for damage...
soo back to
v-lord...In this format, even if you are running
zombies, he's not the most stable. I mean
seriously, he's only 2000 attack with an okay
effect. the thing is, it won't be able to kill
much and if you EVER go against a burner, he
REALLLLY doesn't do anything. *sigh* soo
annoying, sooo stupid....who thought of a deck
that basically just deals u damage?
BUT nonetheless,
Vampire Lord is not a strong one in this
format...
Ratings:
Constructed (in Traditional) - 4.5/5
Constructed (in Advanced) - 3/5
Limited - 5/5
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Otaku |
Stats :
Vampire Lord is a Level 5 Dark/Zombie
Effect Monster. Being a Level 5 means two
things: it has some good options for
Metamorphosis… but (d’uh) normal Summoning
it tends to be a pain since it requires one
tribute. Fortunately, it’s not a nomi Monster,
so it can be brought out via the normal
dump-and-revive tricks. It is a Dark Monster,
which means that it can be used as Chaos food,
at the very least. It is a Zombie type Monster,
which adds some serious support to it. Now we
get to the stats. We have a 2000 ATK. This is
worse than it should be; unfortunately, it
appears someone with authority for YGO card
creation feels that they can “reinvigorate” the
game not by creating exciting new game mechanics
or tweaking old ones… but by releasing the same
old stuff with just a slight power boost. At
least the current top offender, Berserk
Gorilla, appears to have been an
accident: they tried to make it balanced.
Anyway, thanks to that card, the 2000 ATK that
should be reasonable ends up being sub-par for a
Level 5. It has a 1500 DEF, perfect for
Traditional, where it remains a legal target to
be searched out via the effect of Witch of
the Black Forest. Basically, this is the
“perfect” DEF for Traditional. For Advanced, it
is still enough to handle most supporting
monsters, but more importantly, it is low enough
to allow you to Special Summon via the effect of
Pyramid Turtle. So (since we know the
effect is good) the only thing really hurting it
is the ATK being just a hair low… or rather
Berserk Gorilla’s ATK being just a hair
high.
Abilities :
Vampire Lord’s “low” ATK score is off set
by not one but two great effects. First,
if your attack with it manages to damage your
opponent’s LP, you get to name a card type
(Monster, Spell, or Trap) and force said
opponent to search his or her deck for a card
and chuck it. This is a very nice touch of
control/depletion, as long as you are careful
(they get to choose the actual card from amongst
the type you name). The second effect is what
really makes the card though: if it is destroyed
and sent to the Graveyard by an opponent’s card
effect, it is Special Summoned to the field
during your next Standby Phase. In other words,
unless your opponent can out muscle it or remove
it from play, it’s not going anywhere. Fun
fact: this is one of the Monsters that Solemn
Judgment and Horn of Heaven really
hate. You see, they are worded in a manner to
say they destroy whatever it was they negated…
and that means that even if they use one of
those cards to negate Vampire Lord’s
initial Summoning… he gets to use his effect to
return the next turn. Sadly, this effect has
often suffered from certain overpowered Level 4
Monsters being prevalent. When it was new,
Goblin Attack Force, while in no way a
staple, was commonly played. Needless to say,
2300 beats 2000. Now Berserk Gorilla is
not a staple either, it too is very common and
can easily “suicide” a Vampire Lord.
Uses and
Combinations :
This used to see a lot of play as the “token”
Tribute Monster (outside of Jinzo) you’d
see in a lot of decks (competing mostly with
Dark Ruler Ha Des and Airknight Parshath).
Now, while it is still a great Monster, it has
to stick with decks that can actually support it
well. Those decks would be nearly any Zombie
variant, most control variants, most depletion
decks, and I suppose any deck that has a method
of protecting its Monsters from attacks without
inhibiting the attack of Vampire Lord. That may
still work though: with Gravity Bind or
Messenger of Peace, Vampire Lord would be
a very hard to dispose of offensive wall, though
it would be useless for attacking. Any hybrids
of the above types have almost no reason
to not run Vampire Lord. Yes, there are
things like Control/Depletion/Zombie decks…
though I can’t say they are that good, as I
haven’t heard a lot about them nor have I ever
encountered one.
Ratings
Traditional :
4/5-This score only applies to the “tribute
Monster” slot many decks allow for. However, it
does face steep competition for this slot, so it
is really more like the fourth best choice… out
of twenty.
Advanced :
3.5/5-Don’t include him if he doesn’t match your
theme. If he does match your theme, then you
have to find a reason to not run him.
Limited :
4/5-Let us assume you
actually get this in a normal “Limited” even
where you are pulling cards from packs, and that
you are willing to risk damaging it by playing
it. As long as you can get it out before
your opponent can successfully summon a big
Tribute Monster, the game is probably yours. If
it shows up late though, it won’t be useful
until you have the advantage in ATK strength
with something else. Now, if you have the
Zombie Madness theme deck for a starter deck
event (does YGO even do those)… it’s still
great, but faces better competition keeping it
the same.
Summary
The only reason Vampire Lord isn’t an
obvious good card is the unfortunate stat
elevation that plagues this game. As is, it has
two great effects and should see play in any
deck that works well with either of its
abilities or its stats.
…
Wouldn’t this thing be sick as a Machine?
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