Cards of the Week! 8th & 9th editions!

Sorry about the week delay, I took a very small break from the blog, just to chill a little and collect my thoughts. I apologize for not informing you.

Now onto new cards, and boy in the last two weeks have we had some great ones!

8th Edition:

New Card

Interdimensional Beast, Mettalica Phoenix

Our weapon? It is all of Time itself!

[Stride]

[Auto] [VC] [Choose a card in your G-Zone, and turn it face up] When this unit attacks a vanguard, you may pay the cost. if you do, Time-Leap one of your rearguards. (Bind that rearguard face up, search your deck for a card 1 grade higher, call it to [RC], shuffle your deck, at the end of that turn, return the card called with this text to the bottom of your deck, and call the card bound with this skill.)

Gear Chronicle's second G-Trial Deck stride, Mettalica Phoenix is the revealing of Gear Chronicles key word: Time Leap. By binding a rearguard, they can call a card from their deck a grade higher, but at the end of the turn, the card "turns back" into it's form before time leap. This allows for many powerful offensive formations, and essentially turns Gear Chronicle from a control clan into a Midrange clan, like Shadow Paladin. (If you didn't know, Midrange is a playstyle where you control during the early game, and become aggressive with powerful columns during the mid-end game.)

But what do I think of the card itself? Well it can activate Chronojet's GB2 on your first stride, which is always nice, but that isn't this card's strong point. It can enable an extra attack for no cost, whilst allowing you to use any rearguard of a higher grade in the deck.

Ultimately, this card's potential is in what it can combo with. and so far, Gear Chronicle has received everything it could have wanted as combo pieces, including what I'm about to talk about next...

Verdict: A great G-Unit.

Old Card:

Upstream Dragon

Time itself does not move forward.
Instead, we actually move through time.

[Auto] [RC] [GB1] When this unit attacks a vanguard, you may have this unit get [power] +4000, if you do, return this unit to your deck, search your deck fo up tor one grade 1 card, call it to [RC] at rest, and shuffle your deck.

Upstream Dragon is a unique card. It can change itself into a lower form after attacking, giving Gear Chronicle much more consistent Grade 1 tutoring. This card gives instant access to cards like Gigi, Dah-nish and Masergear

This was already pretty damn amazing, but thanks to Time-Leap, this card's capabilities has expanded ever further. It, in combination with Mettalica Phoenix can make a column that can attack twice, whilst doing the above.

If you Time-Leap into Kalibum, you can Reverse Time-Leap one of your opponent's rearguards. If you Time-Leap into History Maker Dragon, for a counterblast you can do another Time-Leap. The flexibility is astounding!

Verdict: Exceptional. A must have in every Gear Chronicle deck, just because of it's sheer utility.

9th Edition

New card

Stealth Dragon, Shiranui

To see a Shinobi is in itself a death
sentence.

[Auto] [VC] [GB2] When this unit attacks, if you have less cards then your opponent, this unit gains [Power] +5000 & [Critical] +1 until end of that battle.

[Auto] [VC] [CB1] When your G-Unit [Stride], you may pay the cost. If you do, choose one of your opponent's rearguards, bind it face up, your opponent chooses a card from his or her hand. and discards it. At the end of the turn, your opponent puts the card bound with this effect into his or her hand.

I'm sure many of you know that after Aqua Force, Nubatama is my favourite clan, and I was highly excited for the Technical booster, which we now know is called "The Reckless Rampage" but I didn't expect any cards to leak so soon! Enough digressing, lets get onto the actual card.

The GB2 might seem extremely bad at first. Only 5+ and a Crit? That's all? However, anyone saying that has clearly forgot that Nubatama can easily reduce the amount of cards in the opponent's hand, therefore making this much harder to guard, and gives Nubatama a consistent way of finishing the opponent on 4 damage, something that has been a big issue for a while. It's also worth noting that the GB2 actives before the attack, which means the drive check will not affect your hand size, which is usually very annoying with this specific restriction. (I'm looking at you, Dreadmaster. You're still amazing though!)  In short, the GB2 effect is absolutely brutal.

The On-Stride skill is even better! CB1 to force a discard, the best quality control in the game, as well as more soft control bind a rearguard? Amazing. Remember that there is no restricting to what rearguard we bind, which we can tailor to the situation in hand. Have a pesking card in the back row you want Kuroko to snipe? bind that. Want to finish your opponent this turn, and reduce his shield as much as possible?  bind an interceptor.

And  this is not considering Kujikiricongo, which when rode at 4 or more damage forces your opponent to bind a card, and discard a card, whilst increasing the vanguard's power by 10k! The finishing potential is exceptional in this card, both if you want to stride and if you don't.

Verdict: This card is very, very scary. There really is no better way of putting it.

Old Card

Rikudo Stealth Dragon, Gedatsurakan

Shinobi are masters in the art of
making things disappearing.

[Stride] 

[Auto] [VC] When this unit's attack hits a vanguard, your opponent chooses a card from his or her hand, and discards it.

Nubatama's On-Hit stride. It is really simple, but extremely effective. It puts your opponent in a Lose-Lose situation, Lose cards guarding, Lose cards not guarding. This strode over Shiranui will increase the amount of disruption you do to your opponent's hand on that turn, and also reduce how much shield they can guard with until they can no longer guard.

This card can only become more effective with new cards introduced in GTB-01!

Verdict: A great early game pressure card.