Ok, it’s been a while. I’ve been busy with lots of things. I had three straight Regional events and church on Sundays, combine that with school and you get a busy Ricky. I’ve been wanting to put something new out there for the readers of Pojo.com though so I am gonna continue on with my “Metagame Shift” series, which is of course where I’ll look at new and exciting decks, strategies and more in the current metagame!

 

So today we’re taking a look at the hottest card in Yu-G-Oh right now, Card Trooper. Some say overrated, some say amazing, others say they’d rather keep the arm they’d need to sell to afford some!

 

Looking at the card itself, it’s a brilliant card. First you have its stats, while 400/400 is pretty terrible; by using its effect (which cost virtually nothing) it can be brought up to a 1900/400. What IS the effect? Well, you boost its stats by sending up to three cards from the top of your deck to your graveyard. For every card sent to the graveyard this way, it gains 500 attack. Assuming you send the maximum of three cards to the grave, Card Trooper now has 1900 attack and 400 defense, and when destroyed, whether face up, face down defense, destroyed in any way and sent to the graveyard, you get to draw a card from your deck.

 

Clearly, this is a versatile creature. You can set it in defense mode if you are looking to stabilize a bad hand by buying you some time and drawing cards, you can use it in this way to bait out Exiled Force / Zaborg the Thunder Monarch or similar cards. You can do what most do, and summon it outright in Attack mode and mill three cards.

 

Let’s look at the huge opportunity the milling effect can bring to old decks. It is a wonderful card to use in a deck using Bazoo the Soul Eater or Strike Ninja, as it helps fill up the graveyard very quickly. It’s great in Exodia, where it’ll get pieces into the graveyard so you can bring them back up with Monster Reincarnation, Backup Soldier, and Dark Factory of Mass Production. Of course when it’s destroyed, you get to draw a card which helps even more! Exodia obliterate.

 

What is the card being used in right now? Well, quite a few decks.

 

1.)    Bazooper.

 

A deck using a combination of Bazoo the Soul Eater and Card Trooper. Card Trooper puts big monsters in the graveyard with its effect, Bazoo removes them from the game and then Return from the Different Dimension brings them back to hit your opponent for huge amounts of damage. I’ve seen many top players such as Chris SoRelle use Bazooper builds that utilize Elemental Hero – Wildheart and Elemental Hero – Stratos, because when you bring back a Wildheart with Return, it doesn’t get removed from play again at the end of the turn! That’s straight filthy if you ask me.

 

2.)    Lazaro Monarchs

 

Lazaro Monarchs is the most popular deck out there right now. The deck is ridiculously consistent and monarchs were already the most viable deck before the introduction of Card Trooper, Card Trooper makes them even better! It serves as a deck thinning agent allowing you to turn otherwise dead cards such as Premature Burial and Pot of Avarice into game breakers, and it of course helps the monarch deck draw into its Soul Exchange / Brain Control combos.

 

3.)    Mike Powers’ Magical Explosion deck

 

Despite Mike Powers barely missing the cut at SJC Columbus because of an opponent dropping from the tournament to hurt Powers’ tie breakers on purpose; he proved his point that his Magical Explosion OTK deck is one of the finest and most consistent decks available at this point. If you didn’t catch his Round 8 feature match on Metagame.com, I suggest you go check it out. Card Trooper supports the main win condition (Magical Explosion) by dumping Spells into the graveyard, and if that won’t finish your opponent, the Card Trooper / Machine Duplication combo will. The deck has a million ways to win and Card Trooper plays a vital role in most all of them.

 

The list goes on and on. Card Trooper has had an incredible impact on the North American metagame. The card is only available in the Duelist Packs, and because of this the card is very rare and valuable. Prices on eBay and other e-tailers are in the $55-$65 range, and there is currently no sign of the price slowing down.

 

If you have any Card Troopers, you may want to look into using them in your deck. Depending on how your deck is supposed to win, Card Trooper could play an important role and could really help you out in tough situations!

 

Hopefully you enjoyed this article; I’ll try my hardest to get out another one later on this week. Until next time,

 

Ricky