Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon – #RA02-EN030
1 Tuner + 1+ non-Tuner “Blue-Eyes” monsters
Neither player can Special Summon 2 or more monsters at the same time. Once per turn, when an effect of a card in the GY is activated (Quick Effect): You can negate the activation. (Quick Effect): You can Tribute this Synchro Summoned card; Special Summon 1 LIGHT Dragon Synchro Monster from your Extra Deck in Defense Position, except “Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon”, but destroy it during the End Phase of this turn.
Date Reviewed: October 24th, 2024
Rating: 3.83
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is awful. 3 is average. 5 is excellent.
Reviews Below:
King of
Lullaby
Hello Pojo Fans,
Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon is our Throwback Thursday choice with the newest Blue-Eyes card coming tomorrow.
From 2016, BESD is easily summoned in the Blue-Eyes strategy with any of your Level 1 Tuner “Eyes of Blue” monsters and a Blue-Eyes monsters. Easiest way of summoning this was to target Maiden to Special Summon Blue-Eyes and then Synchro Summon this. Locking out Special Summons of two or more at the same time doesn’t have as much utility as it used to. Dimensional Fusion, Return From the Different Dimension, and Pendulum Summons come to mind, as do Rekindling and Machine Duplication back then. Now though that effect isn’t very good.
Once per turn negation of a grave effect activation though plays heavily in today’s meta. Graveyard is used more than ever and you can have a long chain of monster effects coming from the grave depending on the archetype. Stopping that chain before it can link together will halt your opponent’s plays. Even the simplest negation like negating a searcher that triggered because something hit the grave off an Extra Deck summon can pay big dividends.
Tributing BESD for a LIGHT Dragon Synchro Monster has some uses. It being in Defense Position doesn’t help with summoning to attack with it, but as a Quick Effect you can save BESD during your opponent’s turn while still having some interaction with them by summoning Black Rose Moonlight Dragon to bounce a Special Summoned monster back to their hand, or Shooting Riser Dragon to Synchro Summon during their turn. On your turn, Azure-Eyes Silver Dragon offers Dragon protection for the turn, Black Rose Moonlight Dragon is a great option here as well, and even something niche like Michael, the Arch-Lightsworn (banishes a card for 1000LP). You lose the monster in the End Phase, so make sure to get the most out of it through Extra Deck means.
Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon can do more in the Blue-Eyes Deck than in 2016, but even then it was a good card. Its negation ability is more important than ever, and, as long as you Synchro Summoned BESD, you can get yourself a new Dragon Synchro Monster for the turn. Interacting during your opponent’s turn will likely get the most out of this ability, however, if you can Synchro Summon more during your turn, your options are many.
Advanced- 3.5/5 Art- 4.5/5
Until Next Time,
KingofLullaby
Crunch$G
The Blue-Eyes Structure Deck is coming soon and we got another Blue-Eyes retrain to look at tomorrow, so Throwback Thursday this week is one of earlier support cards for Blue-Eyes: Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon.
Spirit Dragon is a Level 9 LIGHT Dragon Synchro with 2500 ATK and 3000 DEF. Blue-Eyes stats being swapped is fine here, plus LIGHT Dragons are great. Materials are any Tuner and any non-Tuner Blue-Eyes monster(s), so dedicated to Blue-Eyes of course, which is easy with all your Level 8 Dragons and Level 1 Tuners dedicated to the archetype. The effects this has are basically counters to the meta at the time. The first one is a floodgate effect to prevent players from Special Summoning 2 or more monsters at the same time, which is a counter to Pendulums since it was 2016. It’s still a fine effect in 2024, can stop Flamberge Dragon from bringing back Level 1 monsters for one. The other effect is a Quick Effect once per turn when the opponent activates the effect of a card in the graveyard, letting you negate that effect. Back in the day, this countered a lot from Burning Abyss to Phantom Knights, to Kozmo floating effects, to some of the Monarch Spells and Traps. Now, you still got a ton of graveyard effects to negate with this from Yubel effects to some of the Snake-Eye cards. Finally, you can tribute this Synchro Summoned card to summon a LIGHT Dragon Synchro from the Extra Deck, besides another Spirit Dragon, but it’s destroyed during the End Phase. Used back in the day to dodge Kozmo Dark Destroyer from targeting and destroying it, now it might not have as much to dodge as non-targeting removal is more plentiful than in 2016, but targeting removal is still here with cards like S:P Little Knight. You would used to summon Azure-Eyes Silver Dragon to prevent your board from being targeted or destroyed for two turns, protecting it from the destruction that Spirit would have otherwise enforced on it. Now, you’ll probably be summoning Spirit Ultimate Dragon for omni-negation and floating back into this from the graveyard once it’s destroyed, unless you got Stardust Sifr Divine Dragon on the field via Crimson Dragon (he is a LIGHT Dragon) to protect it and other monsters from destruction. Spirit Dragon was a product of its time, but the effects it has does age well to where it’s still a useful card in 2024. It’s going to be more important than ever in Blue-Eyes soon, to a point where it’s a 3-of, but you should almost always be playing this if running Blue-Eyes.
Advanced Rating: 4/5
Art: 5/5 This is some of the sleekest artwork in the entire game.
Mighty
Vee
With the Blue-Eyes structure deck coming up (and as a hint to tomorrow’s card), it’s only fitting that this week’s Throwback Thursday card is Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon, a level 9 LIGHT Dragon Synchro monster. It’ll take a Tuner and any number of non-Tuner Blue-Eyes monsters, so the main way you’ll make it is with a combination of Blue-Eyes’ level 1 Tuners and their wide array of level 8 monsters, naturally including Blue-Eyes White Dragon itself. Like its companion card, Azure-Eyes Silver Dragon, Spirit oddly has inverted stats from Blue-Eyes, switching its 3000 attack stat for 2500 and vice-versa. It’s still a good stat spread, but I would’ve preferred if it kept the higher attack. Thankfully, with all the Blue-Eyes support over the years, especially in the structure deck, the deck isn’t exactly wanting for more offensive pressure.
Spirit’s claim to fame is its first effect, which prevents both players from Special Summoning two or more monsters at once. This famously (and conveniently) allowed Blue-Eyes to counter Pendulum decks at the time and pushed it to win the 2016 Worlds Tournament. Today, while a few relevant decks are harmed by it (for example, Snake-Eyes Flamberge Dragon), it’s nowhere near common enough to make this effect worth it on its own. That brings us to Spirit’s second effect, a soft once per turn Quick Effect that responds to any effect activated in the Graveyard and negates the activation. Again, not a fantastic effect by itself even if it does have relevant uses, but I would say it’s more versatile than the first effect. Graveyard effects are still very common, after all! Finally, as long as it’s Synchro Summoned Spirit has a non-once per turn Quick Effect to tribute itself and Special Summon a LIGHT Dragon Synchro monster directly from your Extra Deck in defense position except itself, though that monster will destroy itself during the End Phase. In ancient times, you’d just use this to tag out into Azure-Eyes, but with the structure deck, you’ll almost always use this to cheat out the new Synchro boss. There are other options, including Crimson Dragon for even more tag out nonsense or Ancient Fairy Dragon for some nasty combos involving Masoleum of White (hint hint). Tragically, the new boss doesn’t loop with Spirit on its own because Spirit can only tribute itself while Synchro Summoned, but at least you’re not totally out of the count since Spirit still has its other two effects. Spirit was an amazing card that lost its job after MR3, but with a new Synchro monster on the horizon, it’s once again employed for a completely different (dare I say, better) reason.
+Can cheat out the new Blue-Eyes boss monster
+Negate can hit many key combo pieces in modern decks
-Can’t loop the new boss monster because it must be Synchro Summoned
-Floodgate is much less relevant than before
Advanced: 4/5 (post structure deck)
Art: 3.5/5 This is one of those cards that I think looks a lot better from far away if you don’t look at the fine details, but it still looks pretty good. More than I can say for its evolved version…
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