OCG 2023.01 Metagame Report #2
Welcome to Week #2 of the OCG 2023.01 format.
This report will tabulate 99 top-performing decks from 15 tournaments that were held in Japan, China Mainland, Singapore and South Korea during 7 – 9 January 2023.
Metagame Breakdown
- 31 Tearlaments (25 Ishizu Tearlaments, 6 Ishizu Kashtira Tearlaments)
- 19 Tri-Brigade (17 Spright Tri-Brigade, 2 Scareclaw Tri-Brigade)
- 7 Labrynth (5 Labrynth, 2 Ishizu Labrynth)
- 4 Runick
- 3 Dragon Link (2 Grass Bystial Dragon Link, 1 Bystial Dragon Link)
- 3 Exosister
- 3 P.U.N.K. Bystial
- 3 Spright Evil★Twin
- 3 Spright Gishki
- 3 Tri-Brigade Lyrilusc
- 2 Adamancipator (1 Vernusylph Adamancipator, 1 Grass Ishizu Vernusylph Adamancipator)
- 2 Grass Adventurer Ishizu Eldlich
- 2 Sky Striker
- 2 Traptrix
- 1 Branded
- 1 Branded Shaddoll
- 1 Shaddoll Branded Despia
- 1 Code Talker Mathmech
- 1 Grass Branded Despia Predaplant
- 1 Grass Thunder Dragon P.U.N.K. Bystial
- 1 HERO
- 1 Kashtira
- 1 Magician
- 1 Mathmech @Ignister
- 1 Spright
- 1 Therion Sunavalon Rikka
Tearlaments
Feri (ふぇーり) (World Championship 2018 Japan Representative) went 6-0-2 and finished 1st in “KCS with Tulio CS 3v3 Team Tournament” which had 31 teams (93 participants). His teammate Yoshishin (ヨシシン) played the exact same deck list and went 6-1-1.
They ran the full Foolish package consisting of 2 Foolish Burial Goods and 1 Foolish Burial in the Main Deck to increase the amount of starters in their decks. Foolish Burial Goods could be used to send Tearlaments Sulliek which in turn could be used to fetch a Tearlaments monster. This is quite significant now that Tearlaments Reinoheart and Tearlaments Scheiren are limited.
Foolish Burial could be used to send the Ishizu, Shaddoll or Tearlaments monster to kick off. Sending Kelbek the Ancient Vanguard or Agido the Ancient Sentinel to the graveyard would send 5 cards from deck to graveyard and possibly pop off from there. Since Agido the Ancient Sentinel is limited, it is better to send it to the graveyard first with Foolish Burial, so you have a higher chance of hitting the 3 Kelbek the Ancient Vanguard.
Sending Shaddoll Squamata to the graveyard would in turn send Shaddoll Beast to draw 1 card or Helshaddoll Hollow to send more cards to the graveyard, filling up the graveyard with materials for Fusion Summoning. As Tearlaments Kitkallos is now forbidden, having a combination of only 2 Tearlaments monsters would not be able to Fusion Summon any monster. In addition to hitting a Tearlaments monster, having Shaddoll monsters or King of the Swamp is also required to perform a Fusion Summon.
As Tearlaments overtakes Spright Tri-Brigade in the metagame, players have also started switching Dark Ruler No More to Forbidden Droplet. Spright Tri-Brigade puts out all their threats on the board, allowing Dark Ruler No More to negate all their disruptions at once. However for Tearlaments, they could activate Tearlaments Havnis or Tearlaments Kashtira on your turn, and sending Tearlaments monster to the graveyard would enable a Fusion Summon to bring out additional disruptions such as Tearlaments Kaleido-Heart. Forbidden Droplet being a Quick-Play spell is more flexible and could be activated in a Chain to negate those disruptions.
Tri-Brigade
Soma (そーま) went 6-0 (excluding 1 bye) and finished 1st in “13th Lotus Cup” which had 20 teams (60 participants).
His build is heavily teched against Tearlaments, running 3 Bystial monsters and 3 D.D. Crow in the Main Deck. For other decks it is generally better to run more Bystial monsters. But for Tri-Brigade decks, D.D. Crow is a Winged-Beast and could be added to hand by Tri-Brigade Shuraig the Ominous Omen, discarded to Special Summon Tri-Brigade Kerass, and banished from the graveyard to activate a Tri-Brigade monster effect.
D.D. Crow also has some niche application over the Bystial monsters, such as banishing the WATER Attribute Tearlaments Rulkallos, banishing a Sky Striker Spell that Sky Striker Ace – Kagari is going to add to hand from the graveyard, banishing Welcome Labrynth or a Normal Trap that Lovely Labrynth of the Silver Castle is going to set on the field from the graveyard.
Labrynth
He Abusi Tietie (和阿不斯贴贴) went 6-2-1 and finished 3 – 4th in “China City Tournament Haikou 2023” which had 130 participants.
Lady Labrynth of the Silver Castle ③ effect could search out a Normal Trap from deck and set it on the field, allowing the deck to run a variety of situational Normal Traps in the Side Deck. Simul Archfiends is an interesting tech choice that she ran in her Side Deck.
Simul Archfiends effect makes both players unable to Special Summon monster with the same card types (Ritual, Fusion, Synchro, Xyz, or Link) that they already control. Dimensional Barrier and Simul Archfiends are functionally comparable, they have Ritual, Fusion, Synchro, Xyz in common, but Dimensional Barrier also covers Pendulum while Simul Archfiends also covers Link.
Against Ritual, Fusion, Synchro and Xyz, Dimensional Barrier is arguably better since it could be activated pre-emptively to stop Synchro Summon or Xyz Summon, or Chaining to a Ritual Summon or Fusion Summon effect, effectively preventing the summon altogether. Whereas Simul Archfiends would only prevent further summons of the card types already on field. Simul Archfiends main purpose is being able to be used against Link.
Conclusion
Tearlaments takes a bigger slice of the pie and holds strong to their first position. Tri-Brigade retains their second spot.
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References
- 2023-01-09 | 165th Taiyo CS (2v2 Team Tournament)
- 2023-01-08 | KCS with Tulio CS 3v3 Team Tournament (1st: A, B, C | 2nd: A, B, C | 3rd: A, B, C | 4th: A, B, C)
- 2023-01-08 | Akisha Cup with TOYGER Vol.6
- 2023-01-08 | 13th Lotus Cup (1st: A, B, C | 2nd: A, B, C)
- 2023-01-08 | 1923CS 3v3 Team Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | Wayo Matsuri (3v3 Team Tournament) (1st: A, B, C | 2nd: A, B, C | 3 – 4th: A, B, C | 3 – 4th: A, B, C)
- 2023-01-07 | Yushin Cup with MSC 3v3 Team Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | Black Luster Soldier Tournament Singapore
- 2023-01-07 | China City Tournament Haikou 2023
- 2023-01-07 | Satisfaction Cards Ranking Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | Cosmos TCG Ranking Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | DDD Different Dimension Cards Ranking Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | Huanxiangbingtuan Card Store Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | Youyou Cards Ranking Tournament
- 2023-01-07 | 1923CS Individual Tournament
Tears always clears. Absolute chad archetype.
Most of those Tear decks are probably old guards who can’t find a better decks to play after that slaughterfest of a banlist. Kash would be up there. But they got popped on graduation day. Couldn’t even make it across the stage…
@UndeadYahzarah
unlikely, if they were we would’ve seen more tear at the beginning of the format not after its shaped, people are slowly realizing its still the strongest deck
This is the first OCG Labrynth list, that does not give me an aneurysm
Did anyone manage to find the Traptrix list?
Tear may have 7 cards legal but its still by far the best deck. Konamy never learns, this is the strongest arctipe of all time and has to be banned completely, not like Zoo and Spyral hiting it periodically!
why is solemn jugment so popular in OCG?
most top decks atm are vulnerable to either drnm or evenly
so ppl side solemn judgment to counter those 2 board breakers
How do you separate Ishizu Tear / Ishizu Kashtira Tear? Since every Tearlaments runs Fenrir, is running only an extra Unicorn considered Kashtira Tear or running Unicorn & Birth?
OCG 2023.01 Ishizu Kashtira Tearlaments would imply running “Kashtira Unicorn” with “Kashtira Birth” and/or “Kashtira Papiyas”. “Kashtira Unicorn” is always ran with “Kashtira Birth” or “Kashtira Papiyas” so that Unicorn could at least search something.
Thank you for the information! iirc some player would run only Unicorn, without any Kashtira spells except Prime Planet Paraisos when 23.01 banlist just applied. So this only-unicorn build is basically eliminated?
I do not have records of Unicorn without Kashtira Spell builds, at least among the top cut lists.
Kashtira decklist where? 👀
Thank you akira for your hard work!
It’s dead son, that deck is dead on the last Banlist, you can only play it whit Tear now (pepecry)
Ban every single Tear card, now.
Where can we check the Gishki decklists?
the main reason tear is so dominant and the ban of kitkalos is the existence of the ishizu cards in the current meta game . 4 quick effect shuffle any 3 you want into a deck and 4 quick effect mill 5 WITH the ability to not be a dead card in hand and is able to deal with boards as hand traps . you get a mill half yourdeck shuffle a third of the graveyard for free on a simple resolution of any tear card . yet tears get the short end of the stick in banlists
Where is the Therions Sunavalon Rikka deck located
anyone got any of the punk lists?