Looking Under the Bed: Hydro Monarch

Welcome again to our series “Looking Under the Bed,” where we feature a rather off-the-wall deck idea that may or may not work. We’ve studied Exodia, Amazoness, Gren Maju da Eiza, and many more, but today we’ll be looking at a deck that both my good friend and I have piloted to multiple tournament wins in our local area. It’s called the Hydro Monarch deck, and the idea is simple: gather a massive amount of monsters and beat face.

The deck revolves around two key points: Hydrogeddon and Monarch monsters. Before we delve into the deck, however, let’s discuss Hydrogeddon a bit – more to the point, why he is so good in the deck. Hydrogeddon’s effect is a simple one: each time he destroys a monster in battle, you can Special Summon another Hydrogeddon to the field. It’s a simple effect that can have devastating results if used properly, and with the majority of decks relying on small Tuner monsters and other low-ATK monsters for support, it’s easy to simply run over your opponents with Hydrogeddon.

Not only that, but Hydrogeddon promotes both numerical and situational advantage as well as gives you more options for the future. You can use one of your Hydrogeddons to perform a Tribute or Synchro Summon, you can utilize Creature Swap to get a higher-ATK monster, and many other options are further opened to you with multiple Hydrogeddons on the field.

The other aspect of the deck is the Monarch aspect. Monarchs have always been a great deck to fall back on because of their power. With Monarchs, you really don’t need to rely on fancy combos and the like to win the game – the Monarch effects pretty much do the trick for you. There are many ways to go about building a great Monarch deck, but by far the most effective that I have encountered is utilizing your Monarchs along with your Hydrogeddons to keep the flow of momentum in your favor as opposed to your opponents, which is why they work so well in tandem. So without further ado, let’s go over the monster lineup and break it down:

Monsters (22):

3x Raiza the Storm Monarch

2x Zaborg the Thunder Monarch

1x Cyber Dragon

3x Hydrogeddon

2x Mystic Tomato

2x Breaker the Magical Warrior

1x Spirit Reaper

1x Treeborn Frog

2x Krebons

1x Sangan

2x Don Zaloog

1x Neo-Spacian Grand Mole

1x Marshmallon

As stated earlier, the point of the monster lineup is to control the field utilizing several different methods: the two methods explained above, and the additional method of Krebons/Mystic Tomato. Mystic Tomato is an incredibly versatile card in this lineup because you can search out Don Zaloog, Sangan, Krebons and Spirit Reaper, and Krebons is one of the best cards in this deck because of its ability to be searched out with Sangan, Mystic Tomato, and its status as a Tuner Monster, not to mention the effect itself.

The Monster lineup in the deck is designed the maintain control of the field by utilizing Hydrogeddon, Mystic Tomato, Breaker the Magical Warrior and the Monarch monsters. Raiza is a great card due to its ability to spin a card back to the top of your opponent’s deck. This is an amazing ability because it forces your opponent to draw a card over again, effectively making your opponent lose their draw phase. Ultimately your focus is to bide time and whittle away at your opponent before bringing out the big boys, and with Krebons you always have those Synchro monsters at your command.

Spells (15):

3x Shrink

2x Enemy Controller

1x Mystical Space Typhoon

1x Emergency Teleport

2x Nobleman of Crossout

1x Allure of Darkness

1x Pot of Avarice

2x Creature Swap

1x Brain Control

1x Heavy Storm

The beauty of the Spell lineup is, again, its simplicity. It is designed for raw power and versatility, not necessarily for combo purposes. Shrink can be used in a multitude of ways, not the least of which involves Don Zaloog and some awesome hand control. Allure of Darkness is a great addition because of the amount of Dark monsters in the deck, though two Allure of Darkness seems excessive considering the amount of damage you will be able to cause with your slew of monsters at your beck and call. The Spell lineup is designed to compliment your monsters and work in tandem with them as opposed to trying to do separate things, like many decks have a tendency to do.

Choices such as Pot of Avarice, Creature Swap and Nobleman of Crossout may seem strange at first, but upon closer inspection they are great choices in this deck for several reasons. First, Pot of Avarice is a stand-up choice because you blow through monsters quickly in this deck. Whether it’s Hydrogeddon, Mystic Tomato or Raiza the Storm Monarch, your monsters will not be seeing much time on the field. This makes it all the more important to have a mechanism to bring them back, and Pot of Avarice is the perfect choice for that. Creature Swap is another great choice because of the recruiters that you are employing, not to mention the Treeborn Frog and the used-up Hydrogeddons that will be on your field once you’ve exhausted their searching abilities. Creature Swap allows you to give up a weak monster for a much larger monster that you can then use at your discretion and convenience, and it makes Mystic Tomato an offensive weapon because you can Swap your Tomato for a larger monster and then pull a Don Zaloog out with the Tomato that conveniently dies on your opponent’s side of the field. And Nobleman is good because…well, it’s a great addition in any deck and frankly is almost at staple-status, in my opinion.

Traps (5):

2x Phoenix Wing Wind Blast

1x Mirror Force

1x Torrential Tribute

1x Call of the Haunted

The Trap lineup is fairly standard. You have your Mirror Force, Torrential and Call as well as two Phoenix Wing Wind Blasts to help clear the field of cards that could wreck your game plan. There’s not a whole lot to explain here.

The entire deck runs on the basis that you need to control the game all the time, and the entire deck works together to make sure that you do. From Hydrogeddon to Raiza the Storm Monarch, you should be able to fend off any attempt to counter your onslaught, and the introduction of the Synchro mechanic to a fairly standard Monarch deck can spell devastation for your opponent. You have a variety of options at your disposal here, and the deck is fairly advanced despite its simplicity. It draws on many former great Monarch builds while forging a new path for straight Aggro decks all around.

The side deck for the Hydro Monarch build is entirely up to you. There are few weaknesses to the deck, but they are there, and they include bad draws and weak monsters in the mid-to-late game, though Krebons helps make up for that one. I run Book of Moon, Jinzo, Mobius the Frost Monarch, Soul Exchange and Lightning Vortex in my Hydro Monarch build, but like I said there are many different routes to choose.

Anyway, if you have questions or comments about this article or any others I have written, please don’t hesitate to contact me at anteaus44@hotmail.com. Thanks for reading!

Thanks,

Anteaus