Unexpected Dai – #KICO-EN055
If you control no monsters: Special Summon 1 Level 4 or lower Normal Monster from the Deck.
Date Reviewed: November 28th, 2024
Rating: 3.17
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,
Unexpected Dai is the Throwback Thursday choice this week, and a Happy Thanksgiving to anyone who celebrates it.
Free Special Summon of a Level 4 or lower Normal Monster from the Deck if you control no monsters. This is a way to follow up getting that last Normal Monster of a set that you run alongside Rescue Rabbit. A decent Normal Spell that thins the deck and gets you an extender, even if it’s a Normal Monster. On its own, certainly not a good card, but in decks that use the Rescue Rabbit style it can be a good tool to get as much out of your Normal Monsters as possible.
Gem Knights, Plants, E-HERO, and Advanced Ritual decks could find some use for this, but as a meta card or seeing playing time in the meta, nope. Even with thinning the deck and getting another monster for Extra Deck stuff, it will likely always stay a fun card for fun decks.
Advanced- 3/5 Art- 3.5/5
Until Next Time,
KingofLullaby
Crunch$G
With all the focus on Normal Monsters, Throwback Thursday of course was going to look at Normal Monster support, and before we had Primites to summon our Normal Monsters from the Deck, we had Unexpected Dai.
Unexpected Dai is a Normal Spell you can only activate if you control no monsters, letting you then summon any Level 4 or lower Normal Monster from the Deck. The Level restriction makes this not as good when we have Primite now, but Decks that rely on specific Normal Monsters will still like this. Any Plant pile you see is likely going to have a Sunavalon combo in it, so this will remain a staple likely cause you really want to see Sunseed Genus Loci to start your Plant plays. Gem-Knights have a plethora of monsters they can have summoned off this to serve as specific Fusion Materials or be Link fodder for Phantom Quartz. Any Deck in need of an extender could use this to get a Normal Monster with the perfect Type and/or Attribute they need it to be for a monster on field. Unexpected Dai does have a lot of uses. It does windle down when Primite does its job, but better, but Plant piles for one will likely still want this for more copies of Genus Loci for example, so it’ll still find itself some homes I’m sure.
Advanced Rating: 3/5
Art: 3.5/5 I’m always interested in the adventures of Warrior Dai Grepher.
Mighty
Vee
The Turkey Day special is none other than Unexpected Dai (what? Expected anything else?), a Normal Spell from Crossed Souls. It can only be used if you control no monsters, with a single non-once per turn effect to Special Summon any level 4 or lower Normal monster from your deck. Extremely simple, and in the right deck, extremely strong as well. Normal monsters aren’t exactly the strongest in the game, so it makes sense that we would’ve been able to effectively summon them for free eventually. Unexpected Dai is best in decks that can start their combos off of a single Normal monster; Plant pile decks have Sunseed Genius Loci and Fiendsmith hybrids can use White Duston. However, it’s also great in decks that can leverage their Normal monsters as extenders or combo pieces. We’ve already discussed how Six Samurai can use Chamberlain of the Six Samurai as a cornerstone combo starter; Gladiator Beast can also use Unexpected Dai for Gladiator Beast Andal, since one of their upcoming support cards only cares if combo pieces are Special Summoned from the deck. And, obviously, it’s a designated card for pure Primite since you can bring out a vanilla for free. Unexpected Dai is a great card for its niche; it might be kind of dead after your first turn, but the decks that can use it will appreciate the free body it provides. Tweak ratios depending on how bricky it feels; when I was testing Six Samurai, I only played 1 copy since it was awfully common to open it alongside Primite cards, but if you really, REALLY need to see a vanilla, you’ll probably like 3 copies.
+Summons a vanilla monster effectively for free
+Can be a powerful combo starter or extender in certain decks
-Requires you to control no monsters
-Vanilla monsters on their own are effectively useless in a vacuum
Advanced: 3.5/5
Art: 3.25/5 This art always kinda confused me. Did the dimensional wormhole spit Dai out into a virtual reality world or something?
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