Cardfight!! Vanguard Weekly Card Update #41

April 25, 2016Cardfight!! Vanguard, ReviewsBermuda Triangle, Cardfight!! Vanguard, cfv, Genesis, Gold Paladin, Kagero, Murakumo, Nova Grappler, NubatamaJames

Welcome back to another weekly update of the new cards for Cardfight!! Vanguard. The Fighter’s Collection 2016 cards are almost at an end and we only have five G Guardians to have revealed to us after today. We have also had a trickle of G-BT07 Gold Paladin units units spoiled this week.

Before I go into the G-BT07 Gold Paladins, there is one promo Gold Paladin to show. Knight of Morning Day, Edadus is a Grade 1 who gains +2000 power when he is United. He is actually surprisingly useful as he doesn’t need to attack for the +2000, so he is a possible 9k booster. Along with Knight of New Sun, Catillus you can make a 21k column. Not only that, but unlike Catillus, Edadus does not have GB1 so you could rush your opponent early game and get in some extra damage.

One of the new G-BT07 Gold Paladins is Dawngal, a pretty interesting Grade 3. He only has 10000 power but when he’s placed on rear-guard circle he gains the ability to boost until the end of that turn. This would work well for cards like Wolf Fang Liberator, Garmore who has the potential to call five units from the top of your deck. I’ve seen this version Garmore used a few times and the person using him usually calls more Grade 2s and Grade 3s than necessary who would usually not be able to boost, but at least you could throw Dawngal behind one of the Grade 2s now, and if you have an 11k Grade 3 or 2 in from of him then your opponent will need to start using 15k shields to block that column. Dawngal also has a GB1 Unite skill where he gains +5000 shield and intercept. Using him up like this is a good way to keep a rear-guard space free for other units and free from lock, and when against heavy retiring clans like Kagero this at least lets you retire him for a purpose that helps you.

Holy Mage, Connor is another units with good defensive capabilities. He’s a Grade 1 with 6000 power and when he is placed on the guardian circle you can Soul Blast 1 to give him +5000 shield, or when he’s placed on the rear-guard circle you can pay the same cost to give him +5000 power until the end of the turn. The blocking skill helps when using Gurguit‘s GB2 skill but the Soul Blast becomes a bit costly with Gurguit’s SB1 and CB1. So long as Golds get a lot of Soul Charging in the next set this card will be fine, but for now it can seem costly in the long run.

The only other Gold Paladin so far shown for G-BT07 is Scarface Lion, a Critical trigger. This unit has the usual effect of working with the G boss of the clan. When your unit with Gurguit in its name attacks, Scarface goes into the soul and you give Gurguit +5000 power and draw a card.

Onto the Fighter’s Collection cards we have Murakumo’s Ambush Demon Stealth Fiend, Hogen Wing. When he is placed on the guardian circle you can choose one of your Grade 1 or greater rear-guards and find another copy of it from your deck and place it on the guardian circle. Then at the end of the battle phase when the cloned card would be put into the drop zone, you put it on the bottom of your deck instead. You can use the standard perfect guards with this skill, though to do so you would need to already have a perfect guard in the rear-guard which isn’t usually advisable. Even if you did put a perfect guard on the rear-guard circle, you could always get it back into your deck by cloning it with Yasuie‘s skill and then using Homura Raider to put all three copies into the deck. This could be foretelling the future of Murakumo’s defensive skills as we may get more units like Emissary Crow that have cloning abilities that activate on the guardian circle.

Carrying on with the Japanese-theme, Jinx Stealth Hermit, Abudataishi is the G Guardian for Nubatama. If your opponent has six or less cards in their hand then Abudataishi gains +5000 shield. This kind of condition is not hard to achieve with Nubatama if using cards like Shiranui, Dreadmaster, and Gedatsurakan. Brave decks will suffer a lot against this unit unless they get a lot of end-of-turn drawing in the future.

Goddess of Seven Colors, Iris is the G Guardian who’s skill will be a huge help to any Genesis deck. When she is placed on the GC you can choose three cards from your drop zone and put them into your soul, if you do, she gains +5000 shield. With this in a Regalia deck you can recycle Mirror Regalia, Achlis and Regalia of Fate, Norn into the soul to continue to give your opponent extra power on Soul Blast. With Witches you can guard with Witch of White Rabbits, Cardamon and Witch of Quill Pens, Oneon and still have a way to get them onto the field.

Nova Grappler’s Righteous Superhuman, Blue Prison gets +5000 shield when you have more or equal damage to your opponent. It doesn’t seem very Nova Grappler-ish and I’m sure if you told someone about this ability they would think it was just some Cray Elemental, but with the new Rush keyword they definitely focus more on offence than defence. This will probably seem like an “okay” card to use in any of the older Nova Grappler decks but it’s generally an easy condition to meet so it shouldn’t cause too much of a problem.

Another G Guardian that is easy to beef up to 20k is Selene Medley, Nadja, a Bermuda Triangle unit. When she hits the GC you can reveal a card from your hand and if you have a unit on your field with the same grade as the revealed card then she gets +5000 shield. Duos help a lot with this skill, especially with cards like Duo Gorgeous Lady, Kazuha, Duo Lovely Devil, Vepar, and Duo Mini Heart, Rhone who have the potential to search your deck for cards and put them into your hand.

Kagero get Flame Emperor Dragon King, Asile Orb Dragon who gets his +5000 shield when your opponent has four or less rear-guards. This works great against Shadow Paladin, Tachikaze, Murakumo, Nubatama, Magia, Hollow, and many other decks, though doesn’t do so well against Kagero’s natural enemy, Royal Paladin.

Lastly we have a promo for Bermuda Triangle, Wonder Frill, Nanoka. Nanoka is a Grade 2 with 9000 power and Harmony and if her attack hits and she is in Harmony then you can Counter Charge 1, and if you do you may bounce her into your hand. This unit would make a nice rear-guard for a Riviere deck or a Lauris deck as both Riviere and Lauris can give +10000 power to a column, giving this unit a better chance at hitting, and as Riviere has a high Counter Blast, the Counter Charge this card gives will prove especially useful.

Join me again for next week for more spoilers on the latest sets, decks, and promos.

Cardfight Vanguard singles are available to purchase at Big Orbit Cards: Cardfight Vangua r d

Cardfight!! Vanguard Weekly Card Update #34

March 4, 2016Cardfight!! Vanguard, ReviewsBermuda Triangle, Entrager, Gear Chronicle, Genesis, Neo Nectar, Nova Grappler, Nubatama, Royal Paladin, Shadow Paladin, TachikazeJames

Welcome back to another weekly update of the new cards for Cardfight!! Vanguard. This week we get a better look at what the new Fighter’s Collection has to offer so let’s dive right in a see if there are any cards that can help your clan.

First off is Tachikaze with their new stride, Destruction Tyrant, Grado Gigant. When this unit attacks you can activate its Engorge ability which will give it +5000 power for each unit it consumes and if the number of units is three or more then you get to draw a card. This works especially well with Gaia Emperor allowing you to attack once again with two of the retired units and the draw will help you defend next turn just by getting rid of something minor like a draw trigger in your hand. This generally makes for a great first stride for Tachis and I would highly recommend having at least one of these in a Gaia Emperor deck.

Next up we have a Genesis stride who acts like a mini Vanargandr. This new unit, Vanquishing Beast War Deity, Tyr, has an ACT that has you Soul Blast 3 to check the top card of your deck and choose whether to put it on the top or bottom of your deck. The Soul Blast gives you an additional skill where every time you are to reveal a Grade 1 or greater in your drive check then you Soul Charge 3. With this high amount of Soul Charging you will want to be careful on how many times you use this guy, I’d say using him once for your first stride would be good for a game but you may want a second one as backup. This is also a nice way to give cards like Mythic Beast, Hati and Mythic Snake, Jormungand a good power boost early, though Doom Brace can be an equally good unit to use for your first stride.

Time for Nova Grapplers and they finally get the stride people were waiting for with Meteokaiser, Bustered. People are saying that this new card is a replacement for Victoplasma and I can see why. When Bustered attacks you can Counter Blast 1 and G Blast one G unit and you can restand an amount of rear-guards equal to the amount of face-up Meteokaiser, Bustereds in your G zone. If you do this then at the end of the battle, if you have five rear-guards, you can Counter Blast 1 again and drop two cards from your hand to restand Bustered but he only gets one drive check. Being to stand up himself and up to four rear-guards will be devastating for your opponent, especially with the new Rush skills but I’ve also heard that this works great for Beast Deities by them just constantly standing, forcing your opponent further and further back. There certainly seems to be a wide gap between GRs and RRRs in this set.

As tradition with Neo Nectar our all-powerful stride is a cute little animal, and of course it looks like a cat with wings but apparently that makes it a dragon, this being Omniscience Dragon, Hrimthurs. At the end of the battle that this unit attacked a Vanguard you may Soul Blast 1 to give a rear-guard +4000 power, you may give them a second +4000 power and if you do they are retired at the end of the turn, if that unit had 20000 power or more when it was retired then you also get to draw a card. Combine this guy with Bigbelly and Crayon Tiger for more drawing and better chances of getting that 20000 power and luckily Hrimthurs doesn’t use and Counter Blasts which will help out the deck a lot. I’d recommend aiming the power boost at Guru Wolf and you can defend yourself for days with the amount of cards you’ll have in your hand.

Rikudo Stealth Dragon, Gonrakan is a new stride for Nubatama that forces your opponent to choose two of their rear-guards when he hits the Vanguard circle and they have to put all other rear-guards in their bind zone. If three cards were put into the bind zone through this then your opponent chooses two cards in their bind zone and puts them into the drop zone and puts anything that wasn’t put into the drop zone into their hand at the end of the turn. To weed away their rear-guards further you can use Shiranui’s on-stride ability to stop those intercepts.

Lastly for this week’s Fighter’s Collection cards is Lucky Rise, Elprina the Bermuda Triangle stride who simple but so, so effective. With the ACT to Soul Blast 1 you can bounce two units back to your hand. You can only use this once per turn but it is crazy to let you sort out your field and then get amazing bounce benefits and will let you re-establish your Harmony skills. This can also be used to refuel yourself by bouncing units that will give you Soul Charges and Counter Charges.

So for the new DAIGO deck coming out, along with Sanctuary Guard Dragon and Sanctuary Guard Guarantee we were promised a new Sanctuary Guard Grade 3, Sanctuary Guard Arc, and his skills have finally been revealed. Firstly his GB2 skill gives all Grade 1 and lower units +5000 power. So unlike Sanctuary Guard tradition of Grade 1s giving power, the power is given to the Grade 1s. He also gets an on-stride ability to discard one card and search your deck for one Grade 1 or less and bring it onto the field, on top of that, the newly called unit and your Vanguard get +3000 power. As you can probably tell, this works amazingly well with Sanctuary Guard Regalie and we have yet to see what the skill of the new Sanctuary Guard Imperial stride but we can only guess that it will most likely word with having a large amount of Grade 1s as is Sanctuary Guard tradition.

Daigo himself even gets a promo stride for Entrager. Sanctuary Guard DAIGO is just a vanilla stride unfortunately but due to him being Entrager the chances of us actually getting him in English is extremely slim.

Continuing with the promo cards we have a Gear Chronicle card, Steam Maiden, Kuluracina. When she is placed on the rear-guard circle each player may put a card from their drop zone into their deck. If both players do put a card away then the player controlling Kuluracina gets to Counter Charge 1. Having to rely on your opponent to put one back into the deck is very risky. They may want to put their triggers or perfect guards back but they will probably think it’s not worth it if you’ll be able to pull off more deadly skills.

For Kagero we have Dragon Knight, Pharrell, a 15k booster for Blazing units. He’s usually a 5k Grade 1 but if he’s boosting a unit with Blaze he boosts 10k and if that unit is Blazing then he gives 15k! This can lead to some very strong columns but we’ll have to see what kind of cards will have Blaze in the future.

Lastly we have a Blaster Dark promo which has alternate art similar to the Blaster Blade promo recently. Blaster Blade’s art showed him with Thing Saver in the background where the new Blaster Dark has Phantom Blaster in the background.

That’s everything for this week. Join me again for next week where there will most likely be more showing for Kagero’s new cards as well as more Fighter’s Collection cards and perhaps even some G-BT07 spoilers.

Cardfight Vanguard singles are available to purchase at Big Orbit Cards: Cardfight Vangua r d.

Cardfight!! Vanguard Weekly Card Update #26

January 8, 2016Cardfight!! Vanguard, ReviewsAqua Force, Genesis, Megacolony, Narukami, Nubatama, Spike BrothersJames

Welcome back to the weekly Vanguard update! All the Fighter’s Collection cards have finally been revealed! I will go over the last bits of the Fighter’s Collection as well as some awesome new cards for Reckless Rampage.

Believe it or not, Giraffa finally got the support people have been asking for. With a Counter Blast 1 Evil Armor Mutant Deity, Goliath gives +5000 power up to six of your units with Giraffa in their names. With this it could be wise to have four of every unit in the ride chain, maybe even 3-4 of the Grade 0, if Goliath then hits the opponent’s Vanguard you paralyse one of their rear-guards. This card partners up really well with the Grade 1, Elite Mutant, Trighoul. At the beginning of the opponent’s ride phase, if they have a paralysed unit, you look at the top five cards for a Giraffa card and put it into your hand. This can ensure that you can pull the ride chain off and that you have a lot of rear-guards for Goliath’s skill. The only two downsides to this is that he doesn’t have Giraffa in his name and it can be hard to paralyse units with Giraffa units so having a couple of Sweet Cocktails may not hurt.

Another card that helps you get the cards you want is Amphibian Dragon for Aqua Force. When Amphibian Dragon attacks a Vanguard on the third turn or more then you search your deck for a card with Trans-core in it’s name and bind it. This will allow you to always ride Trans-core with Amphibian’s second ability to Counter Blast 1 at the beginning of your ride phase to ride with a Trans-core from your bind zone, allowing you to break ride easily four times in a game. You may need a bit of Counter Charging but if the break rides are going to be your main strategy then it may be good to save your face-up damage for this card.

Conquering Supreme Dragon, Dragonic Kaiser Warning is a stride for the old Kaisers of Narukami. With a GB2, CB1, and a G Persona Blast with a heart of “Kaiser” he attacks the whole front row and when his attack hits you give two rear-guards +5000 power. Because he’s attacking three units he has the potential to hit all three and give two units +15000 power! The power can get even higher with the Grade 1 Crown Holder Dragon. When your Vanguard with “Kaiser” in its name hits with an attack then you can give another unit +2000 power, making +6000 if your Vanguard hits all three. Having two or three of these on the back row will really stack up the power quickly and make a big difference late game.

Witch of Quill Pen, Onion is a Grade 1 version of the recent Witch of White Rabbits, Cardamon. If you have a Vanguard with “Witch” in its name and Onion is Soul Blasted then you can Counter Blast 1 to bring her onto the field with +2000 power. With all the powering up Genesis Witches do to the rear-guards it makes it extremely useful to have a consistent field.

The last card for Fighter’s Collection is the Murakumo Grade 2, Stealth Dragon, Oboro Keeper. At the end of your turn you may choose two units names Stealth Dragon, Oboro Keeper and put them on the top of your deck to search your deck for a Grade 3 to put in your hand. I’m glad that this is another Fighter’s Collection card that can work in everything but it works especially well for Shirayuki to get Persona Blast fuel.

Onto the Reckless Rampage cards Dudley get a new Grade 3 with Dudley Jessica. Jessica is a very defensive unit for Spike Brothers with the GB2 to give the front row +2000 power at all times, allowing her to have the defence of a cross ride. When a unit with “Dudley” strides over this unit you search your deck for a card with “Dudley” in its name and you call it to a rear-guard circle with +5000 power. It’s good to finally have a solid Grade 3 for Dudleys so Geronimo will hopefully see more use.

Assault Dragon, Assault Rex gets +2000 power when there is a “Rex” in the bind zone and when a unit with “Rex” in its name is put into the drop zone then you draw a card. This is hopefully a sign that there will be more Rex Grade 2 and 1 support in the Reckless Rampage to help pull off the draw ability. The ability to gain power should already be easy for Rexes and with Dark Rex you can start to pull off some powerful combos.

We have a new legion with Shura Stealth Dragon, Hokagecongo who legions with Shura Stealth Dragon, Murasamecongo. When these two units perform legion you can Counter Blast 1 to bind all of your opponent’s rear-guards face up and your opponent binds a card from their hand face-down. At the end of the turn all the cards go back into your opponent’s hand. He also has the power up ability to Soul Blast 1 to gain +2000 power. With Murasamecongo’s skill you will be able to search your deck for the Hokagecongo and put it into your hand as long as you discard a card, if you do all pay the cost your opponent is also forced to retire a card in their bind zone and Murasamecongo gets +2000 power.

A new keyword for Nubatama has been revealed, firstly shown with the new card Stealth Dragon, Hashiribi. The new keyword is Afterimage and allows you to put a unit with this keyword back into hand after the turn if your opponent has a bound card and you have six or less cards in hand. This will allow you to pull off all the low hand abilities for the turn while still being able to defend next turn. Hashiribi also drop and draw when he’s called if your opponent has a card in the bind zone.

Lastly we have the Nubatama Grade 2, Stealth Dragon, Nibikatabira. He also has Afterimage and another ability with GB1, CB1, and SB1 when he’s placed on rear-guard to give another rear-guard +3000 power and Afterimage. This only works if you have a Vanguard with Shiranui in its name but it is still an extremely useful card for Nubatama to have.

That’s all for this weekly update of Fighter’s Collection and Technical Booster cards. Be sure to check back next week for the next one!

Cardfight Vanguard singles are available to purchase at Big Orbit Cards: Cardfight Vanguard

Cardfight!! Vanguard Weekly Card Update #25

December 11, 2015Cardfight!! Vanguard, ReviewsAngel Feather, Aqua Force, Genesis, Granblue, Great Nature, Neo Nectar, Nubatama, Royal Paladin, Spike Brothers, TachikazeJames

Welcome back to the weekly Vanguard update! All the Fighter’s Collection cards are almost completely spoiled. We received some great spoils this week including some support I’m especially looking forward to!

First we have the Neo Nectar stride for the “Maiden of” support. Yggdrasil Protection Maiden of Lotus is almost like a quicker version of Dream-spinning Ranunculus, Ahsha. If you have a heart with “Maiden of” in it’s name and with a Counter Blast and Soul Blast of 1 you can give up to three units with “Maiden of” in their name in the front row +5000 power. If their attacks hit a Vanguard then you search the top five cards of the deck for a card with the same name as a card on your Vanguard circle or rear-guard circle and call it to rear-guard. This works great for Maiden of Trailing Rose and Maiden of Rambling Rose with their goal of cloning themselves on the rear-guard circles, allowing for the easy power boost. It may be useful if you only have one Hollyhock Knight on the field to get a good chance of cloning him for your turns when you can’t stride.

Next we have Omniscience Dragon, Cath Palug, the Great Nature stride supporting “Honorary Professor” (AKA Chatnoir). Whenever a rear-guard attacks and you have a heart with “Honorary Professor” in the name, you may CB1 to give one unit +4000 power. At the end of that turn draw a card and retire that unit. This stacks really nicely if you keep giving the power to one unit and being able to stand that unit back up to allow you to draw multiple cards for one retire. This is where Crayon Tiger will help you to stand other units and let you draw even more! The downside to this is that those Counter Blasts are going to rack up quickly, though luckily Great Nature are quite good at Counter Charging.

Okay, it’s time for the cards I’m really looking forward to… Jewel Knight support! Climax Jewel Knight Lord, Evangeline does wonders for Jewel Knights by letting you turn any G unit face up if you have a Jewel Knight heart and giving every card with Jewel Knight in its name +3000 power for every face up Climax Jewel Knight Lord, Evangeline in the G zone. If you’re using a pure Jewel Knight deck like my own then you can easily see how the power of this will rack up. Many Jewel Knight cards allow you to superior call other units granting you the chance to easily have a powerful full field. With a drawn out game against a defensive deck you will be able to use this lady up to three times, first giving everything +3000, next +6000, and after that +9000 to all of your units! Making +18000 power columns!

A Grade 1 for Jewel Knights was also revealed. Bringing Calling Jewel Knight, Christine onto the field when there are three or more other rear-guards with “Jewel Knight” in their name allows you to Counter Blast 1 and reveal a Grade 3 from your hand to search your deck for a Grade 3 Jewel Knight and call it to a rear-guard circle. At the end of the turn that you use this skill you put the newly called Grade 3 into your hand and then discard a card. You can use this to ensure you can continue to break ride with Pure Heart Jewel Knight, Ashlei or you may want to do it just to have something to use to stride next turn. With no Generation Break you can use this before you’ve even hit Grade 3 to guarantee you ride the card you want.

With the new Aqua Force Clan Booster you may have been worried because Trans-core didn’t get a new card. Luckily the Fighter’s Collection come bearing merciful gifts. Blue Flight Marshal Dragon, Mithril-core Dragon works only if you have a “Trans-core” heart (Currently only Blue Flight Dragon, Trans-core Dragon). When any of your unit’s attacks hit a Vanguard on the third wave or more your opponent must choose between discarding a card or having you draw a card. This can get pretty intense with the amount of times Aqua Force can stand up and have enough power to land a hit.

Stealth Rogue of Night Fog, Agitomaru is a Grade 2 for Nubatama with no specific support (Probably because the support for Nubatama in general is very slim) but his skill can prove to be very useful. When Agitomaru’s attack hits a Vanguard, retire a card in your opponent’s bind zone. Sweet and simple. This will work well in many Nubatama builds but what they really need now is a way to power up this guy to make sure that attack hits. This is the second rear-guard ability that allows you to retire from the bind zone but I feel Nubas deserve more so here’s hoping to more bind zone retiring in the Technical Booster!

In this set there has been OTT Witch support, Shadow Witch support, and now we have Genesis Witch support. Sacred Water Witch Queen, Clove is just what you’d expect from a Genesis Witch, by Soul Blasting 6 you can give all units with “Witch” in their name +5000 power, and if you have two or more hearts she gains an extra crit. Like Evangeline, you can get some seriously strong columns with this. Not as big as Evangeline’s potential but with Clove you get the higher power quicker, you can use her four times in total, and she gets the extra critical.

For the “Bad End” Spike Brothers rear-guard support we get the Grade 1 Death Flag Dragger. If he is placed on a rear-guard circle during your battle step then you may reveal a Grade 3 from your hand, and then search your deck for a “Bad End” card (Bad End Dragger) and put it into your hand. This will be good for getting the initial Bad End Dragger but with Hand of Deity, Good End Dragger you won’t be using Death Flag Dragger’s skill much late game.

Love Sniper, Nociel is the Grade 3 that the “Nociel”s deserve. You may CB1 when a card with “Nociel” in its name is put into the damage zone, if the card that was put in the damage zone is still face up then you can put it into you hand and put the top card of your deck into your damage zone. She also has a second ability that allows you to put a card from the damage zone into the hand when she’s placed on Vanguard circle if you put a card from your hand into the damage zone. This is really the kind of thing you would expect from a Nociel card and now that she’s got a form in every Grade you can finally make a proper deck around her.

Lastly for Fighter’s Collection we have the Granblue Grade 3 for “Seven Seas”. Seven Seas Sage, Purgeton has your classic Granblue skill of Riding from the drop zone. At the beginning of the ride phase, if you have a Grade 2 or greater Vanguard with “Seven Seas” in its name you can CB2 to bring this guy from the drop zone onto the Vanguard circle. Also, when he is placed on the Vanguard circle you can bring another card from your drop zone and put it on the rear-guard circle. This may be good to bring out King Serpent to essentially make the Ride and call a CB1 but using things like Sea Strolling Banshee for hand advantage may also be a good idea.

That is all for Fighter’s Collection for this week however there are a few more cards to go over.

Cheer Girl, Lucy is a new promo for Spike Brothers. We’re not sure how it will be distributed in the west yet but it has a neat ability to give a boosted unit with the “Charge” keyword +5000 power on top of the boosted power already given by her and then at the end of the battle that the boosted unit attacks you put them on the bottom of your deck.

Lastly we have been shown the three stride fodders for the Technical Booster. Prism Bird (Tachikaze), Acrobat Verdi (Spike Brothers), and Stealth Beast, Katarigitsune (Nubatama). The only one that we know the Grade 3s name for is Katarigitsune who helps you find a card with “Shiranui” in its name.

That’s all for this weekly update of Fighter’s Collection, promo, and Technical Booster cards. Be sure to check back next week for the next one!

Cardfight Vanguard singles are available to purchase at Big Orbit Cards: Cardfight Vanguard