Glad we finally got the DLC to the last list finally released. Hello Pojo Readers, Crunch$G here to discuss what is 99.99% most likely the final Forbidden and Limited list for 2022. I know there was a call for a list with Tearlaments becoming a Tier 0 strategy, so Konami decided to go ahead and do something small to try and keep things more in check until a more proper list in 2023. There isn’t much happening on this list, as only 3 cards were hit and 6 were bumped up. Let’s look at these few changes and see what will come of the meta with these cards.
Curious, the Lightsworn Dominion
From Unlimited to Forbidden
This felt like something that would of been more timely last list when the card saw more play with Fairy Tail – Snow, but it never truly is too late to hit a Lavalval Chain, to be honest. That’s really the only reason this got hit, it’s Lavalval Chain 2.0 basically. We know how powerful Lavalval Chain himself is, and we saw how good the Link version of it could be when Curious is in the metagame. It is harder to summon, I will say that, but not by much. It’s most certainly not hard at all to summon still, it’s fairly generic, and I don’t think Konami will want another Lavalval Chain running around and causing more issues after we’ve already seen what Curious could do. It might not make sense in terms of the timing, but one day I feel we’ll be thankful it went.
Mystic Mine
From Unlimited to Forbidden
Now here I don’t think anybody really cared when the card got banned, they just wanted the card out of the game. Even if it might be nice to have in a Tier 0 format, it doesn’t completely solve the problem on its own, and once we’re out of it you know it’ll be annoying to deal with again. The card of course is Mystic Mine. A simple Field Spell you can slap on the board and as a result cause turns of turns of a Duel to just becoming drawing and passing is not healthy to have in any format. It took longer than it honestly should have taken, but we finally got Mystic Mine out of the format like the OCG did and hopefully it stays gone for good, to be honest.
Herald of Orange Light
From Unlimited to Limited
The final hit on the list, and the one that most directly affects Tearlaments, is Herald of Orange Light going from 3 to 1. I can 100% understand the hit at least. It’s a monster negation in the hand just as long as you got another Fairy alongside it in your hand, which can be pretty hard to play around. It does affect Tear slightly, but it wasn’t something that was always put into the Main Deck. If it was, now those players just go from 3 to 1 and continue on with their day playing Tearlaments with the Ishizu cards, cause this card getting hit won’t change how strong those cards are on their own. It does make sense, but doesn’t really affect the problem all that much.
Lyrilusc – Recital Starling
From Limited to Semi-Limited
Now we start to clean things up on this list, staring with the lone Semi-Limit to Lyrilusc – Recital Starling. Lyrilusc variants won’t really do much no matter how much they make Number F0: Utopic Draco Future, so the card going from 1 to 2 does make sense. It’s a nice boost to Lyrilusc Tri-Brigade mainly since that’s the best version of the Deck, and there’ll be another buff to it in a bit, but it won’t be what brings the strategy back into the metagame. We’ve gone long past the point of that Deck being a Tier 1 contender due to insane power creep, but it could remain a rogue option. I just don’t know why this card only went from 1 to 2 instead of straight to 3 when considering, if I recall, you only needed 2 of this card anyways.
Tellarknight Ptolemaeus
From Forbidden to Unlimited
Now to really make Recital Starling only going from 1 to 2 funny, Tellarknight Ptolemaeus here got to go straight from 0 to 3. To be fair, this was only ever ran at 1 in most Decks anyways, so it doesn’t make a difference except maybe for Satellarknights. It’s kind of insane we’re at a point where giving Rank 4s access to the entire Rank 5 pool is fine now, but to be honest all the Rank 5s aren’t too broken on their own. You just give every Deck a Constellar Pleiades, Cyber Dragon Infinity (through Nova), and mainly Stellarknight Constellar Diamond for this format since that card literally has all the effects needed to counter Tearlaments. I can see Diamond being the main reason to bring this back now, give us a strong counter to Tear that a lot of Decks can use. Overall, I think it’s fair to bring this back with Rank 4 spam not being what it once was.
Dimensional Fissure
From Limited to Unlimited
OCG has had this one for a long time now, so I guess it was a matter of time before the TCG decided to finally bring back Dimensional Fissure to 3. It’s another case of bringing a card back to help counter Tearlaments, as this banishes every monster that would go to the graveyard. It’s a more niche card since not all Decks can make use of it considering how many value cards in their graveyard in 2022. It’s a more niche floodgate compared to others, so bringing it back to 3 does feel fair. The Decks that are able to use it honestly needed some sort of buff, and anything able to use a card like this does give them some sort of an advantage in this meta compared to those that aren’t able to do such, but we also got another card like this going from 1 to 3 in a bit.
Fire Formation – Tenki
From Semi-Limited to Unlimited
The other buff to Lyrilusc Tri-Brigade, and honestly Tri-Brigade in general, is Fire Formation – Tenki going from 2 to 3. This is pretty much standard for cards that go from 1 to 2 at some point, they all typically later come back to 3. In this metagame, having 3 copies of Tenki won’t do much to bring anything back into the limelight of the metagame considering what we’re dealing with right now, but a buff to Decks like Tri-Brigade, Fire Fist, Bujins, and others is well appreciated, though I wouldn’t be shocked if we ever got another Beast-Warrior centric archetype to put this card back on the list, similar to how Reinforcements of the Army just lives in the limited section for the rest of time most likely.
Macro Cosmos
From Limited to Unlimited
Hope you liked Dimensional Fissure coming to 3, cause you had to have a feeling that Macro Cosmos would follow shortly behind. This card is more powerful than Dimensional Fissure in terms of the fact that it banishes all cards, not just monsters, but the balance here is that the card is a Trap and it has more outs due to the effect that summons Helios – The Primordial Sun, even if nobody ever uses that effect at all. Having both the main banish cards come back to 3 just before Kashtira, another banish-centric archetype, comes out does make sense, plus it gives the meta more counters to Tearlaments for the few archetypes and Decks that can use cards like Dimensional Fissure and Macro Cosmos.
Metaverse
From Limited to Unlimited
The final change of the list is a result of Mystic Mine finally leaving the game, and that’s Metaverse being able to return to 3 copies per Deck. This was a pretty fun card that helped several Field Spell-centric archetypes like PSY-Frames, Lair of Darkness, and more, but it was always going to be a problem if Mystic Mine was allowed to stay in the game. Now with that card gone, there’s no more broken Field Spells that will really take advantage of Metaverse, hence why this gets to return to 3 while Terraforming remains at 1. Being a Trap really does help balance things out, just hope now that Konami has learned to not make any more Field Spells that are as strong as Mystic Mine.
In Conclusion
This is a fine small list to help take care of a few things. We hit two cards that Tearlaments could use in Curious and Herald while also bringing a few things back like Ptolemaeus, D-Fissure, and Macro to help counter the Deck as well. We got some other things cleaned up with Mystic Mine finally getting the ban it deserves and as a result, Metaverse being able to come off the list. We also got a buff to Lyriluscs and Beast-Warrior archetypes with Recital Starling and Tenki both getting the boost up the list, and I’m sure Recital will be back at 3 soon enough. I assume we’ll get a massive clean-up list in 2023 to take care of Tearlaments and the Ishizu cards, but I understand now Konami doesn’t want to hit those cards directly as they are way too new.
Thanks for reading,
Crunch$G
