Yu-Gi-Oh! Deck Debut: Argostar Kashtira
I am not a betting man, but if there’s one thing I feel is a sure thing, it’d be the brutality of the next Yugioh banlist. We know that the meta is going to be reshaped soon, and with the upcoming release of both Maliss & Ryzeal in Crossover Breakers, and the anemic new cards from Supreme Darkness, Konami has to shake things up to keep the meta interesting. It’s a time-honored tradition to see a new year emerge with a so-called ‘slaughter list’, upending the best decks by hitting many of their core cards, and chief among them is likely to be Fiendsmith (alongside Yubel, and Snake-Eye).
Since Matthieu Bricard’s win at YCS Bologna, Kashtira has become a point of focus for deckbuilding, as it clearly still has legs in such a powerful format. To that end, I want to examine what I believe will be the best build for that strategy, come SUDA, if the banlist lops the heads off of the reigning champs. Presenting: Argostar Kashtira.
Card names are not final
Argostars are the culmination, in theory, of all of the recent Trap Monster support that’s been printed for the TCG. Much like Invoked, the strategy surrounds Normal Summoning a Level 4 starter, being Argostars - Glorious Adra. She in turn banishes herself to place 2 “Argostars” Traps face-up, which then have a variety of effects. Not only is Adra a 1 card Rank 4 that leaves a card in banishment, but she can also line up negation via their archetypal Field Spell, Argostars - Home Stadium, or removal via Argostars - Eteo the Dragon Slayer. All of this is self-contained, and recursive, so as long as you’re able to cycle through the cards you can somewhat reset your combo for the next turn. Crucially, because of how the ratios work out, you can only pivot between Xyz Play into removal+negation, or vice versa, and cannot perform the same half of that sequence twice in a row. The upside, compared to Fiendsmith or Magical Musket, is that this allows you to layer your interaction in such a way that your opponent needs to answer both monsters, and Spell/Traps, especially given Eteo bounces as part of its summon effect.
The thing that wraps this all up with a neat bow alongside Kashtira, however, is the new card coming out in Maze of the Master, Seventh Tachyon. By revealing a Number monster between 101-107 in your Extra, you can search for a monster with the same Level/Rank, and that shares either a type and/or attribute. Naturally, by way of Number 105: Battlin' Boxer Star Cestus, we can search for either Adra, or Kashtira Riseheart. Riseheart is of course an accessible Level 4 which opens up a bit of the Kashtira gameplan, and critically allows your Kashtira Fenrir to instead grab Kashtira Unicorn with its search, rather than the defacto Riseheart. This, alongside Reinforcements of the Army, makes Adra quite a bit more consistent. In addition, a third micro-package played here is that of the Nemeses, as surprise surprise, 2 Level 4s by way of Adra and herself banished means Infernal Flame Banshee can take center stage and lock out unwary opponents. Your Trap Monsters are LIGHT, which means you can name LIGHT off of Protos, then return one to the backrow, retaining that lock while losing nothing. In the next format, LIGHT, DARK, & FIRE are the core lock points, and this deck accesses them all readily.
This strategy feels like a natural evolution of Kashtira at present, which has been so used because of its ability to be entirely self-reliant. Of course, while Kash is currently doing Dracossack lines that end up at Moon of the Closed Sky into full Fiendsmith combo, this deck does something of a similar approximation. By lining up Link Spiders, we can make Silhouhatte Rabbit, and find Argostars - Tydel the Purple Lightning, which is full Argostar combo, albeit a turn late.
The Extra Deck is full of additional synergy, one example being Time Thief Redoer, which when made with Trap Monsters, becomes a fantastic means of removal. In fact, there’s potentially a build of this strategy which leans even more heavily into Time Thieves, if only there existed a better way to make use of Power Reserve. Generally going first, this deck aims to end on either the Protos lock if the opponent’s deck is known, or a more flexible layered board of Kashtira Shangri-Ira and a Rank 4.
The amount of non-engine this deck is afforded is higher than normal, but lower than truly dedicated lists like Ryzeal, with around 13-15 slots. Here, we’re making use of all that is good in the format, such as Ash, Fuwalos, and Imperm, but also Dimension Shifter, which most builds are forced to forgo. Luckily, Argostars don’t care about the GY whatsoever, meaning it slots in neatly.
The actual ratios of the Argostars cards is something I’ve played with, and seen vast differences when comparing the list with other players. Here, I’ve settled on a 1:2:2 of Capane to Tydel to Eteo, to allow us to open exactly 1 of either Tydel or Eteo, and still perform the line twice. Capane is simply a bad card which we’re forced to play, but it being a mediocre Level 4 body is enough sometimes. It is perhaps the only soft garnet in the list, but opening it feels rough. In addition, just a single copy of the Field Spell might seem strange, but given it doesn’t actually start our plays whatsoever, it’s closer to an extension piece. In most hands, we’re pivoting Adra into Capane + Tydel, and using Tydel to search Home Stadium, Stadium itself then grabbing back either Adra (if not going for Protos) or Tydel (if we are).
The one unfortunate facet of this deck is that it combines the two things the next top strategies lose to, as a single pain point. This is an Xyz-reliant strategy like Ryzeal, losing to similar things, but also requires extensive use of your banishment, ergo losing to a card like Lancea which is set to spike in usage following the release of Maliss. Some things can be done to mitigate this, such as siding cards like the Triple Tactics, but ultimately neither your Kashtira cards nor Adra really function under Lancea, or with Xyz called by Dimensional Barrier.
This is going to be a deck which ‘catches strays’ and gets hit by the cards already sided against the meta, and I would assume that the game 2/3 winrate is going to be a lot lower than game 1, for that reason. Still, if we for example see a difference in the best deck, such as Maliss perhaps flopping, I could have hope. This is unlikely to be something you run Crossout Designator in, but if Lancea stocks rise, that may be an unfortunate necessity.
This list uses all of the tools described above to execute a consistent gameplan which has both a superb ceiling, and a consistent floor through all but Lancea. There will be games where you play Fenrir control with the help of the Argostar Continuous Traps, much like Altergeist or Guru played Pankratops control. In some funny way, the more Yugioh changes, the more it stays the same — the play patterns present here are much the same as those midrange/control piles of the Vrains era, just with updated components.
I think one reality could be that Maze of the Master includes even more support for Trap Monsters, given Odion is one of the recipients of TCG Exclusives, which might propel the deck forward in a way we haven’t yet seen. There’s been a clear push for Trap Monsters recently, and while Argostars is certainly the most consistent package containing those such monsters, the surrounding support still really isn’t good enough.
What do you want to see out of all the upcoming Trap Monster support? Is there something we’re missing which might appear in Maze of the Master? What’s next for the exclusives available to English-speaking players? I’d love to hear what you’ve been thinking in the comments below!
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