Effect(s)            : Yes, for those of you who don’t just skip my CotD, a slight surprise: I decided I really needed to cover this cards effect first, and then cover its Stats, because it really is a card that was so close to making the Harpie deck.  This Spell Card, when played, makes the ATK of all “Harpie Lady Sister” cards 2700, and it both prevents your opponent from activating any Traps and negates the effect of Trap cards that are on your opponent’s side of the field.  Now, those effects are both pretty snazzy: it makes it so Harpie Lady Sister strong enough, for a turn, to “hang with the big boys” and actually dominate most of them, like Jinzo, Dark Ruler Hades, Blowback Dragon, Mobius the Frost Monarch, etc.  Unfortunately, the effect is just for a turn, and Harpie Lady Sister is very hard to get into play, meaning that this fantastic effect will see little use, unless you are able to use it without a Harpie Lady Sister in play, and that seems unlikely.

 

Stats                : Triangle Ecstasy Spark is a Normal Spell Card.  This isn’t bad, but I would almost rather it was a Trap Card (with a slight wording change) it might be as effective or more so: my own experience has found me Setting it a lot as a bluff.  A Quick-Play Spell would have made it better yet.  After some thought, I honestly think, again with a slight revision (drop the “Until the end of this turn”, or make it “on your turn”) it needs to be a Field Spell.  By combining a potent effect (residing on a Field Spell) with a not so potent Monster, you tend to have a balanced but fierce combination.  A good example would be Gravekeeper’s Chief and Necrovalley.  Alas, this is not the case, but now you should have an incredibly clear understanding of what hurts this otherwise fantastic effect.

 

Uses and

Combinations  : This card can only be used if you can make use of the full effect.  Therefore, you need a Harpie Lady Sister, and thus you can’t make any use of it outside of a Harpie Lady Sister deck.  I wouldn’t run more than one in such a deck: it’s reserved as a coup de grace, and it’s so hard to get Harpie Lady Sister in play anyway that running more copies will usually just mean more wasted cards.

 

Ratings

 

Traditional       : 2.75/5-What on earth am I thinking?  I spent most of this CotD explaining why you shouldn’t use this card in any deck but one specific one that is weak in this format, and only if you include an undesirable card?  Well, maybe I am just being overly generous, but the card itself isn’t too bad.  It could be better, but it’s really pretty sweet: a 750 ATK bonus and one turn Jinzo-esque effect.  Try inserting a different Monster in there that isn’t so hard to summon, even if it is an otherwise sad tribute, like Mr. Volcano, a single Tribute Normal Monster.  See?  A lot better: it’s what it depends on that makes it poor.

 

Advanced        : 3/5-If you are actually running Harpie Lady Sister, you better include a copy (and just one copy) because this is the only real reason to run Harpie Lady Sister.

 

Limited            : 1/5-You can bluff with it.  You can’t actually use the card unless you run a Limited even using both Rise of Destiny and Dark Beginnings (or Metal Raiders, but I am trying to keep some connection to reality here).  RDS and Dark Beginnings wouldn’t unreasonable to run together and in that case it gets a monstrous bump up to… 1.25/5.  Yeah, not very useful here at all.

 

Summary

This is a card that fails not entirely due to its own faults, but in its reliance on what I have come to understand as poor Monster card (Harpie Lady Sister).  If you do run Harpie lady Sister, then do try to include a copy of this, but don’t run more than one.

One more thing…

I don’t think anyone has missed the rather blatant editing of the images of the new Harpie cards.  Now, I am one of the “weird” ones who usually don’t get too annoyed with the art editing, and I even like some of it.  I was hoping for a little less cartoon “skin” to be showing: even if this game wasn’t being erroneously marketed towards a younger crowd, not all of us like borderline-hentai in our TCGs.

Now, before I am stoned by angry “purists” and the like, let me say they really did a lousy job on this one. The best edits are subtle unless the subject really warrants it.  The new Harpie cards didn’t warrant such a butchering.  Dian Keto, on the other hand, did and I am sure we are all glad they edited that card in the manner they did.