After the surprise changes on the Forbidden & Limited List last week, the metagame is primed for some new contenders, all vying to be the second best deck after Kewl Tune. To put it bluntly, everyone knows those terrifying Tuners are set to be the strategy to beat, and thus are gunning for them in any way we can. Dimensional Fissures & Soundproofed in the Side, decks with no business doing so running Dimension Shifter; the critical thing that went forgotten in the banlist changes though, was a couple vital unbannings, not cards newly hit. Both Metamorphosis & Fairy Tail Snow are now free, and alongside a suite of new cards in Blazing Dominion make up a shockingly powerful strategy that’s everything Kewl Tune isn’t. That is, of course, aside from its power level—while a number of decks tussle for second seat in the new meta, the frontrunner in my eyes is none but Fairy Tail itself. Given the changes to the banlist, I’d wager Konami intends for that to be so, as well. Let’s dive into why.
Fairy Tail was at one point a fairly-unrelated series of LIGHT Spellcasters with the shared characteristic of 1850 ATK, mirroring some of the Charmer support. Doing everything from managing Equip Spells, to FLIP effects, to caring about duplicate copies, nobody expected them to truly work as a cohesive strategy. Somehow, however, the designers at Konami have fixed essentially every issue faced by the deck, and on top of Snow being Limited, supplied enjoyers of these classic fables with a potent, consistent engine. Via the trio of Fairy Tail - Luna, Fairy Tail - Matchgiru, & Fairy Tail Ball, your entire line is available from the get-go. That line provides removal, in the form of Luna, negation via Ball, and access to some of the most pushed Extra Deck tools seen from a completely new archetype in some time. Fairy Tail’s identity has shifted now to being based around turning opposing monsters into the ‘Prince of Fairies’, a card name for a card that…doesn’t exist, making it both great fodder for Luna, and stopping opposing Extra Deck plays with specific material requirements. Beyond that, the deck even received a TCG Exclusive which really elevates things!
Genia of the Ring is a brand-new card in BLZD, working much the same as other Fairy Tails, by turning a monster into a Spellcaster to Summon itself, and adding back to hand when used as part of a Spellcaster’s cost. Go figure, the first effect makes your Super Polymerization (And Tails of the Fairy Tails) better, and the latter works when banished to activate Snow’s effect. Luna can search her, given she has the right ATK stat, and given you can Normal Luna multiple times a turn by way of Tails, it comes up to have an additional extender!
So the Fairy Tails themselves are unique, evocative, and powerful—that’s awesome, but still only serves to be about half of what a deck would need to exist on its own. Beyond Snow, Luna, & Matchgiru there’s not a ton of consistency, and it’s a hard sell to run a secondary package like Predaplant Ophrys Scorpio purely to search Instant Fusion. Luckily, there’s a suite of Spellcasters that’ve been waiting in the wings for the right deck, and with them all being Level 4, they may have found it! I’m of course talking about Magistus.
If you want to jam Level 4 Spellcasters, there’s no better way to do so outside of a Spenta package. Spenta, the Magistus Sealer can discard itself to find a relevant body, one of which is Crowley, the Gifted Magistus. Go figure, he Specials himself like Poplar when added, and in turn allows Spenta to equip him with Artemis, who searches the rest of the line. Spenta’s great as what is ostensibly a free Level 4 Spellcaster from Deck, but what else does Magistus provide? If you were expecting the answer not to be “literally just another Spellcaster from Deck”, you haven’t been paying attention. Yes, Verra Magic - Lacrima of Light allows you to react to an opposing effect by porting into your choice of Magistus, either Rillionia, the Magistus of Verre or Zoroa, the Magistus of Flame…but even if your opponent doesn’t pop a handtrap, you can use it to instead send Witchcrafter Genni to the GY, and use her effect to get the second piece of Lacrima regardless. It does, unfortunately, just work that way—you need only run a single garnet. When you apply an effect, activation requirements don’t need to be met.
With two Normals for Spellcasters, at least one being for those with 1850 ATK, up to two Special Summons from Deck, and tons more beyond, what are we actually doing? Well, Fairy Tail Magistus gets over the hump of the metagame not merely by being a consistent midrange strategy, but also through uh…’fraud’. I use that term with all endearment, but the deck runs a plethora of Limited cards to make some games a non-issue when drawn. Instant Fusion to Summon Weaver of Fairy Tails for example puts you way ahead of schedule, and opens up new lines which create functionally unbreakable boards; the newly-Limited Metamorphosis is similar, porting one of your Spellcasters into either Weaver or Teller at will. Better still, we can use the formerly-banned Summon Sorceress to give our opponent a Fairy Tail and grab another body from Deck, using the card we’ve provided as Fusion Material given its relevant name. All of this is in service of setting up the new Charmer Quartet in Bloom, which gets us back endboard pieces we may have used as Link Material, like Luna or Teller.
Against commonly played handtraps, how does the Deck fair? Well, into Nibiru you have both Teller (an omni-negate) & Zoroa, the Magistus Verethragna (for monsters), both of which can be accessed at 5 Summons if played correctly. Into Mulcharmy Fuwalos, we have Verre Magic, or Called by the Grave, on top of some reasonable low-ceiling plans which only draw the opponent a single card (usually by going into Fairy Tail Wiccat and sending Snow). Really, even Droll isn’t even especially bad, because our greatest point of advantage generation is in Wiccat’s double Foolish (although losing access to the search loop of Luna->Matchgiru->Ball does hurt a bit). You are exceptionally well-prepared for the metagame, outside of occasionally just getting ‘got’ by the random Extra Deck banishes in Kewl Tune. Unfortunately, with how greedy your Extra needs to be, that’s one thing we can’t innately avoid.
In terms of our Side, you can happily run Soundproofed, given not a single Synchro appears in our Extra. I’d also recommend Cosmic Cyclone, or similar, because of the prevalence of some annoying banish-related floodgates out of the board, largely for the Kewl Tune matchup. We don’t love seeing our pieces get banished, and Wiccat’s utility is greatly reduced, but on the whole we can still play through it reasonably well. Kaijus are never a bad idea, given we do run Luna, although it requires one bait out the Kewl Tune quick Synchros first, which isn’t the easiest thing in the world; similar to that is the use of Illusion Gate, which has become a mainstay in spite of it being fairly middling against the current top deck. Broadly speaking though, you’re just worried about Kewl Tune, and the few cards that hit both yourself and that deck, the likes of which are solved readily by Spell/Trap removal.
Get ready to see a whole lot more Sea Monster of Theseus now, with Kewl Tune being the meta scourge for at least ~3 months. Indeed, Super Poly to hedge against their plays is a devastating blow, and you need only worry about it being inaccessible if you’re too quick to activate Matchgiru—she does lock you into Spellcasters for the rest of the turn, which is really the only spooky lock in the deck. Aside from that you’re feeling good, with power Spells we’re finding via Pot of Prosperity, two consistent engines that both work well together, and a reasonable non-engine count of ~13-15, depending upon how you count. Unlike Kewl Tune, there’s not a lot of ‘turn 0’ play, but that’s again not terrible given how prepared decks are for such things in the current format. Verre Magic & Triple Tac are both rising in usage, and as the best deck to use either of them, you get to feel competent. That really is the thing: Your Kewl Tune matchup is still just okay, but your matchup into decks expecting Kewl Tune are amazing. Playing into the fears of the format does you a huge service!
I’m impressed with how successful this strategy’s development has been, for such a disparate lineup of monsters previously. As one of the core tentpole strategies in Blazing Dominion, these needed to be good…and they genuinely are! Better still, the deck is budget-friendly outside of the non-engine, so in large part you could pick this up if you’ve played in the past few months, and already have the requisite staples.
How are you hybridizing Fairy Tail? We’ve also seen some use of Maliss as a secondary package, due to Snow’s effect. Is that worth covering in a full article? What else from Blazing Dominion should I cover? Let me know in the comments below!
