February 2023
Top 4:
What made you choose your deck? What does your deck do?
While I was playtesting, I got destroyed by Walrus's rituals, so I decided to play rituals myself. My deck tries to get as much advantage as possible, and summon powerful Nekroz ritual monsters.
What were some tech choices you made? Would you make any changes to the list moving forward?
The most unique thing about my deck is that I chose to mostly focus on Nekroz, opting not to play other rituals like Megaliths or Shinobirds. The list was really solid, although moving forward I would probably cut Treacherous and add a few better traps. Also, since Dogmatikamatrix is probably getting banned, the list will need more significant changes.
How did your tournament experience go? Any notable moments?
I went 2-2 and just barely managed to make it into to top cut. But then I proceeded to 2-0 the two people who I lost to in swiss. One thing that's pretty notable is that I don't think I ever drew pot of extravagance throughout the whole tourney.
What rules/philosophies do you try to follow when building/playing?
In general I think playing 40-45 card is optimal, because it provides a good balance of consistency and power. Also, I don't like to play cards that are only sometimes good. Bad cards that are situationally very good are still bad, and I try to avoid playing them.
If you had $300, what would you buy?
I guess a new phone.
Icysion
Cinosrepus
What made you choose your deck? What does your deck do?
I didn't have a deck ready so I asked Veiss to give me one and he gave me zombies. I like it because it uses both graveyard and banish as resources, similar to the chaos decks I've used in the past. I had to learn some of the plays but it was fun.
What were some tech choices you made? Would you make any changes to the list moving forward?
I didn't make any of the choices, but I added Maxx C to the deck since it became unlim and I added the Bystials to the side. I would definitely make a few changes to this deck but it's mostly good. I think changing the side deck to add at least Vampire Sucker is good, and maybe focusing more on Haunted Zombies since that card was pretty good when it went off.
How did your tournament experience go? Any notable moments?
It was good, no notable moments.
What rules/philosophies do you try to follow when building/playing?
I like slow resource play so that I don't automatically lose if something happens to my board.
If you had $300, what would you buy?
I would put it in the Trinity trust fund or use it to shill for Trinity Classic mode
Burrito
What made you choose your deck? What does your deck do?
I ended up choosing my deck because I felt like playing a deck that didn't have any integral pieces that could get banished by Bystials, so Beetroopers fit the bill.
Overall, the deck operates by focusing on early combos and agro, finding lines into Seraphim Papillon and Inzektor Picofalena to either search monsters I need, or provide revival on my opponent's turn to further my gameplan. It does possess a few wincons, in the form of either Link climbing into Invincible Atlas, Fusion Summoning Absolute Hercules, providing beatdowns with the numerous high ATK main deck monsters, or utilizing monster removal via Gokipole and Infinite Antlion.
What were some tech choices you made? Would you make any changes to the list moving forward?
For the list, I'd say that I'm rather happy with the build, with the only real adjustments being including Traptantalizing Tune and Triple Tactics Thrust in the Main, and Knightmare Unicorn in the Extra. Unfortunately, this would mean I'd have to drop my 2 tech choices of Parasite Paranoid and Cocoon of Ultra Evolution. The idea behind them was to use Parasite to prevent cards like Bystial Baldrake from interacting w/ my face-up Insect monsters, and then tutoring a high level Insect from hand, and Cocoon of Ultra Evolution to tutor out any Insect I wanted to from Deck, and to recycle a monster back to draw a card. The real synergy was when you would draw both of them, since you would be able to equip to an opponent's monster and then Tribute it to summon a bug from the Deck and from the hand.
How did your tournament experience go? Any notable moments?
What rules/philosophies do you try to follow when building/playing?
If you had $300, what would you buy?
Walrus
What made you choose your deck? What does your deck do?
Noble Knight are my favorite deck in this format and Mikanko have been on the horizon as a sizable buff to them for quite some time. I tested a ton for this event with many different decks and I was surprised that NK was about as good as even the more blatantly broken decks.
Most of the community have seen NK before, but the Mikanko element gives the deck a huge threat of being able to steal games out of nowhere. Mikanko Promise for Ni-Ni also gives the archetype a quick effect monster steal, which is pretty broken for disruption. In all, it's a really difficult deck to pilot with all of the decision making and generic searches. It's super satisfying to play.
What were some tech choices you made? Would you make any changes to the list moving forward?
Infinite Antlion and Therion "Bull" Ain are cool in NK with their synergy with Infernoble Knight Ogier. The burn traps are also a bit unique, but they facilitate the Mikanko burn win condition.
How did your tournament experience go? Any notable moments?
In my game 3 against Stephen during round 1, I managed to steal the match using Ignoble Knight of High Laundsallyn to equip "Infernoble Arms - Hauteclere" from deck, and then using Hauteclere to give Ha-Re a double attack for game. That line was hard to spot and super satisfying.
What rules/philosophies do you try to follow when building/playing?
Hm. I put a lot of stock in having cards that are as versatile as possible. I think that a lot of Trinity duels are lost to not being able to play out of the opening hand, so I always try to play as few cards as possible that aren't good right out the gate. Obviously you need some payoff for your engines, so it's a hard balance to strike, but I generally lean toward trying to maximize my percentage of games where I can play, even if it means giving my deck a lower ceiling.
If you had $300, what would you buy?
Peanut butter