Dragon’s Mirror is one of those cards that is great… and yet a problem.  On its own, it’d just be “the Dragon’s better Polymerization”, and I am open to that.  I want Fusions to be worth playing, and as long as the alternatives have reasonable drawbacks to prevent abuse, so there’s still a reason to consider running a real copy if Polymerization in the deck, I can live with that.  Three cards from the hand and field is a lot, and there’s a lot Konami would have to do (UDE might be able to do some of it, but much of it is in the cards being released themselves) to make “proper” Fusion summons worthwhile.

 

Unfortunately, there are just too many cards that can “add up” to cheap power.  Konami’s insistence on turning the “Remove From Play” pile into the auxiliary Graveyard (and the Graveyard into the auxiliary hand), Five-Headed Dragon and Future Fusion all push this from being a good Fusion alternative into a cheap-victory producing bad one.  Yes, some of us want it to take real skill to win a game.  Dimension Fusion and Return from the Different Dimension turn removing a lot of Monsters from a cost into a game win condition.  Five-Headed Dragon and Future Fusion also help “break” this card.  Any five Dragons is easy to meet in a Dragon-deck, and Future Fusion just lets you cherry pick the ones you’ll remove for Five-Headed Dragon numbers two and three.

 

When it’s easy to get something into the Graveyard, requiring it in the Graveyard as the cost of something isn’t much of a cost.  When it’s so easy to bring back removed Monsters, especially en masse, removing them from play isn’t much of a cost.  It’s very annoying when you’re dueling someone, playing your cards right, but in the end they win by using Dragon’s Mirror for Five-Headed Dragon and running over a Monarch to nail you for 2600 damage when you’re finally out of Sakurestu Armor.  Even if you do nail the resultant Fusion, it basically only cost a Spell to get into play.

 

I’d really like the next “Polymerization-alternative” to avoid this pitfall (it’s not like this was the first to do this trick) to avoid this pitfall.  Instead of allowing a Fusion from the Graveyard, maybe just an effect appropriate to the Attribute or Type of Monster.  I don’t want to turn this into a CaC session, but as an example, a Pyro Fusion alternative that gave burn damage, a Fiend Fusion alternative that allowed you to use an opponent’s Monster, etc.  Or at least make sure it makes sense for whatever you’re removing from the Graveyard to fuse: Zombies are at least in character doing that.

 

As for the actual card and how it works in the metagame, it really lets Dragon decks surprise you.  Dragons have some decent beatsticks single Tribute Monsters, and if your deck is mostly Dragons, Stamping Destruction is nice as extra S/T removal.  I haven’t been following the game closely, but if no one is making good use of Dragons, it’s probably only because even more unbalanced cards are currently ruling the metagame.  This might not be good enough to be the deck everyone takes to win a SJC, but at least a few serious players should be toying with the idea.

 

Ratings

 

Traditional: 2/5 – I don’t think there are enough good Light and Dark Dragons.  Just a few more though and this score could rocket up for Dragon Chaos.  I mean, as an alternative to “plain” Chaos.

 

Advanced: 4/5 – This score reflects what it can do in decks that are at least half “Dragon”.  It can’t bring out Cyber End Dragon, Cyber Twin Dragon, or Chimeratech Over Dragon, but a 5000 ATK beatstick Special Summoned from a single Spell is an easy way to swing the game.

 

-Otaku