CB3 G-PR♥ISM Prototype 4

Test Build - 4

PRAISE THE SUN!

For all decks labeled as:
stable - working as intended.
test - still under tuning and some things may or may not work as intended.

*Note: Working as intended != finished build, it just means deck functions as planned and is overall consistent

FVG:
PR♥ISM-Duo, Tisza *1

Trigger: (8 crit/4 draw/4 heal):
PR♥ISM-Image, Sunshine Clear (Critical) *4
PR♥ISM-Miracle, Canary (Critical) *4
PR♥ISM-Miracle, Adria (Draw) *4
PR♥ISM-Miracle, Timor (Heal) *4

 Grade 1: (*13)
PR♥ISM-Duo, Aria (Perfect Guard)  *4
Persevering Talent, Shandi *3
PR♥ISM-Promise, Princess Leyte *4
PR♥ISM-Romance, Mercure *2

Grade 2: (*11)
Admired Sparkle, Spica *4
PR♥ISM-Promise, Princess Celtic *4
PR♥ISM-Romance, Lumiere *2
PR♥ISM-Image, Sunshine Rosa *1

Grade 3: (*9)
PR♥ISM-Image, Vert *4
Brand-New-PR♥ISM, Garnet *3
PR♥ISM-Promise, Labrador *2

G-Zone: (*16)
PR♥ISM-Promise, Princess Labrador *4
School Etoile, Olyvia *4
PR♥ISM-Image, Sunshine Vert *2
Air Element, Sebreeze *1
Hand in Hand, Leona *1
Sailor's Medley, Nasha *2
Dark Element, Dizmel *1
Metal Element, Scryew *1

    So it's been a while since the last update, and honestly after being bombarded with bad cards after bad cards that were revealed during Clan Booster's reveal month, I wasn't so sure that Prisms would make it back  alive. However, they DID manage to make it back alive and also turns out to be the only surviving deck type out of the disaster that is Clan Booster 3. PRAISE THE SUN is really all I can say as the Prism Sunshine indeed did save Clan Booster from becoming a complete train wreck.

Anyways, before I start I want to show off my swag that I pulled out of my 5 boxes of CB3  ~:3c

Coral bre... bestest!

   Alright, now back to the deck. So I've started testing since the Brand New Prisms reveal (without much success for obvious reasons), and right after Sunshine Prism's reveal, I started vigorously testing to see how the new Prisms cards would play out. The list you see here is my 4th prototype iteration I worked on and so far, and I'll explain some of the thought processes.

Earlier Prototypes

   Typically unless something is dead obvious, I sanity test most new cards before I start diving into cooking up prototypes as doing so gives me a better picture how cards are intended to work and how they actually work in practice. So yes, I have tested with Emeral and Sapphires prior to the prototypes to verify their playability, but they unfortunately don't really make it to the playable cut.

To give a brief preview of the prototypes I messed around with prior to the 4th one:

Prototype 1:
4 Garnet 4 Lab 1 Vert all in gorilla (this variant attempts to abuses the extra attacks from Sunshine Vert into Garnet/Labrador)

   Prototype 1 ends up with a lot of multi-attack, but lacks the consistency abuse Garnet/Lab's LB4 after a Sunshine Vert attack due resource issues and how Sunshine Vert is a more costly restand than your typical restanders (net -2 instead of -1). Overall I didn't like it because it is too much of a glass cannon, and the added reward didn't feel like it justified the amount of risk that's added to this variant.

Prototype 2:
4 Vert 4 Garnet 1 Lab with some Clears and Rosa (this variant attempts to abuse Sunshine Clear)

   Prototype 2 had some serious issues with Sunshine Rosa and OG Clear where both of them ends up just being vanilla and dead draws way too often. This resulted into a build where if you can't afford to abuse Clear either due to CB issues or other reasons (or, simply damage checking/drawing into your Vert/Rosa/Clears), you are stuck with cards that doesn't do much overall. It ends up being a less consistent and less powerful original gorilla.

Prototype 3: 
4 Vert 4 Garnet 1 Lab 4 Emilia and Akari over Tisza for anti-kagero/Chaos semi-advantage bruiser (this variant attempts to ignore Kagero and generate good advantage by giving up speed)

   Prototype 3 was interesting; a LOT of tempo were lost in this build because Mecure and Tisza has to be dropped with that many non-Prism G2s. The trade off while isn't terrible, is not great as it makes the deck very slow (and while being slow, does not hold up the power to other slow decks like Seven Seas or Nociel). At the same time, it reduced Sunshine Vert plays consistency considerably due to the heavy amounts of non-prisms in the deck. However, it does give Kagero some serious headaches with Emilia having Resist because as most people are aware, Kagero today tends to run 2~3 Denial Griffins and 1 Defeat Flare Dragon. What this means is if you use a Princess Labrador to pump up your Emilia lane into 26k, Kagero will have trouble guarding that lane with only 1 card because vanilla Griffins/Defeat Flares only guard for 15k shield value.

Here are a few more random notes regarding my testing during the development process for the prototypes.

Current Build

   For prototype 4, after having experimented with the new cards quite a bit and having issues over complexity, I reverted back to the simpler build that goes back in focusing on consistency and treat the new cards as a bonus rather than the main game plan. This ended up being much better than the other prototypes and is basically an extension of the original gorilla.dek.


   The deck largely plays similarly to the original gorilla, but has several new combos and options to jump into, now allowing the deck to adapt to more different hand types and situations. Other than the obvious Sunshine Vert plays, most of these combos involves Sunshine Clear. I'm still exploring new combos, but I already know that you can get some funny interactions on Sunshine Vert turns.

New Toys

PR♥ISM-Image, Sunshine Clear

You thought Flogal was strong?
Well here's our version.

   While everyone were probably hyped all over Sunshine Vert as a Prism Nextage, and she is indeed a great card, Sunshine Clear is the true MVP in my opinion of the Prism Sunshine trios. For the first obvious bit, she has Prism in her name, and that alone already did a lot. But when she was revealed, what completely blew me away was her skill; I was not expecting Prisms to receive a critical trigger as strong as this.

   Sunshine Clear is one card that fits in multiple roles rolled all into one. For starters, she gave Prisms an additional way to perform multiple attacks during battle phase, and that is huge. What this means is Prisms are now less reliant on Spica to perform multiple attacks, and it gives more ways, and hence consistency, to push in those extra attacks than before.

   She can turn into a 9k beater on a Princess Labrador turn and then turn herself into a 9~11k beater in the same turn. She can also allow Olyvia to make 5 attacks instead of the traditional 4 without a Spica (eg. attack with her boosted/boosting something, attack with the other side front row only, then Olyvia bounces Sunshine Clear column and the solo beater on the other side and calls 2 back, Clear's skill superior call a beater/attacker from deck), or even with Sunshine Vert (eg. Sunshine Vert bounce her and a front row unit, superior call Sunshine Rosa to the front, then Vert break ride to trigger Rosa twice). She also works with Spica, allowing you to call a full column, or turn into a Clear that returns to hand but gives whatever beater Spica called out a total of +7k with Spica's power boost, pushing even your 9k beaters casually to 16k. I'm sure there are more combos, but these are just a few examples (I'm still exploring other ways to abuse this card).

   She also increases your striding consistency, allowing you to almost always have stride fodders in hand once you start striding if you need to (which also conveniently adds to Sunshine Vert consistency). Besides that, due to the fact that she can transform into either an attacker or a booster, she drastically increases the consistency of providing you with a flow of attackers should you need them. Better yet, she does all this while diluting your deck of non-triggers and shuffling her back and increase your deck's trigger concentration. To make things even more favorable, Olyvia and Princess Labrador both have the ability to bounce your rear guards before they perform drive checks, so you don't even need to wait to receive increased change of hitting triggers as a nice little bonus.

   All in all, this card is ridiculously fluid and strong, and I'm sure there are more combos to be explored from this card.

PR♥ISM-Image, Sunshine Vert

   Then we have our big star of the show, the one card that attracted all the spotlight in Clan Booster 3, a card that some claim to be broken - Sunshine Vert.

A 3rd finisher-tier stride along side with
Olyvia and Labrador is great

   On first sight she seems OP and seems like another Nextage, but that's only on the surface and isn't entirely true. Once you read a little deeper, you'll notice there are several key differences: for starters, Sunshine Vert is more costly to use than your standard restanders.

   Instead of costing a net -1 like everyone else, she costs a net -2 (discard 3 + 1 from reride for a +2 from twin-drive). On top of that, she has a lot more conditions slapped onto her, requiring a Prism G3 to re-ride into, and for you to be in LB4. What this means is she's not only more costly, she's also generally harder to use than Nextage, and therefore having a much higher risk to stride into due to making you prone to take damage (she costs a net -2) when you are already at high damage. To make the matter worse, her skill is a limit break, and she doesn't activate her skill until after performing drive check, giving her a chance to fail if you happen to check a heal trigger. Lastly, unless you are already sitting on a Vert or at least going into a Labrador, the 2nd attack generated from Sunshine Vert isn't as consistently strong as Chronojet.

   However, this doesn't stop her from being a great card. Unlike Nextage, Sunshine Vert has tremendous synergy with other Prism G3s, typically enabling 1~2 extra attacks while being a pseudo-Nextage. This alone already gives Sunshine Vert a good chance to be deadlier than a Nextage. In additional to that, she also works well with cards like Princess Leyte or Yarmouk, making sure the quality if your extra attacks are high. Finally, unlike Nextage, she is not generation break bound, and this means if someone tries to trade damage with you and ends up high in damage, you could now dunk them with a Sunshine Vert play, which works nicely in conjunction with Labrador's LB4 (who could dunk people before if you were to ride to G3 first).

   Do keep in mind that typically Sunshine Vert forces out pretty much the same amount of cards in terms of minimum amount of cards required to guard all the attacks as a traditional Olyvia-Spica turn (although she does require higher quality otherwise), and the classic Olyvia-Spica turn is of much lower risk to perform. So make sure you stride accordingly depending on what is the best in terms of risk-reward factor based on your situation.

    In essence, she's a high risk, very high reward card. But due to her high-risk nature, it is very unlikely that you'd ever want to stride into her more than once, and that's the primary reason why you see me only running 2 at the moment.

Brand-New-PR♥ISM, Garnet

Just as we rejoice getting another G3 in Prisms,
Vert is mandatory at 4 again.

   Garnet is a new Prism G3 that Prisms received in CB3, and functions similarly to Labrador in that her LB4 allows her to call up to 3 Prisms. Unlike Labrador, she trades the +10k power and +1 critical for a LB5 triple-drive, and cannot bounce on her own. 

   The greatest difference between her and Labrador is that Garnet's LB4 can call over occupied circles. While this may not seem like much, it's actually not a small deal, because that means unlike Labrador, she can enable up to 5 attacks on her own, and on a Sunshine Vert turn, it means she can call over an existing Spica to allow you to weave in some Spica madness with Sunshine Vert that Labrador cannot do. However, unlike Labrador, she attacks for weak numbers after a Sunshine Vert if you managed to miss Vert as your initial ride, and on top of that, the bonus skill she gains through LB4 is prone to failure if you check heal triggers. And these factors together makes her not really a direct upgrade to Labrador, but rather a G3 that does similar things with different niches, and hence she's not going to be replacing Labrador directly.

   Another niche she has over Labrador is her 2nd skill can be triggered off by Leona. Honestly, this isn't something you can count on as Leona is usually rather underwhelming most of the time (card Leona calls cannot bypass guard restrictions that prevents calling from hand, and the call to guardian circle is mandatory if she chose to bounce a unit), and that the ability is very weak to controls and opens you up against control decks if you chose to try to do it. However it's still a neat little bonus if it happens.

   I'm still currenly unsure of which is the G3 of choice between Garnet and Labrador, but as of now I'm leaning towards Garnet.

PR♥ISM-Image, Sunshine Rosa

Vanilla

   The last of the Sunshine Prisms, that unlike the rest of her sisters, is unfortunately a vanilla the bulk of the time. What killed this card's utility is that requirement of having a vanguard with LB4, meaning she does not function when you are on Olyvia or on Princess Labrador. The reason she's ran is for a increased consistency for Sunshine Clear, and how she still has the niche of making some funny plays on a Sunshine Vert turn (and you can directly search her out with Sunshine Clear). Another small little niche that has yet to occur for me is that she is also triggered by Leona for more defense boost.

   Keep in mind that even if she is bounced herself, her skill can still be triggered. What this means is that for example, if you have her on the field and used Shine Vert's skill and then proceed to break ride, she can easily be triggered 3~4 times and give you a nice little power-up (just make sure that if she is bounced herself, she's bounced by the break ride and not the stride so she dips in from the bounce from the break ride).

   Overall, I can see 1~2 of her being ran in the deck, but being a vanilla really hurts her, and I'm honestly not sure if she's really worth the spot.


Emeral and Sapphire:

   Unfortunately for Emeral and Sapphine, they're not going to be used in the new Prisms for several reasons. Mostly because they are way too limited and narrow in their timing, have way too limited targets, and way too limited uses to justify running them. Emeral for example doesn't even function properly on Olyvia turns (she'd be practically vanilla), and Sapphine basically provides nothing to the deck as she bounces before main phase (meaning you not only need to have units on the field, it also doesn't synergize with Princess Leyte) and is limited to bouncing Prisms only (meaning she really isn't doing much).

Closing

   I believe this prototype variant will be the core where my stable builds will stem from as it's got the best all-rounded performance overall. However I do feel there is still room for some tweaking, namely the deck could use a bit more finishing power (I'd probably run a bit more crits), and I'm kinda iffy with running Princess Celtic now that she's lost the bulk of her power with Sebreeze being a thing. I'm also still juggling between Mecure and the original Clear, although so far Mecure seems to have been better. G-zone might see some tweaking too, such as Sebreeze may not be necessary (need to test it out really), and due to how Sunshine Vert can whiff, I've been considering running 3 or 4 Verts. But that boils down to if a more diverse G-zone benefits me more often, or if adding in more Verts benefits me more often.

   This time I also chose to list out the other routes and prototypes I've gone through to hopefully give you guys a better understanding of my thought process, which I hope helps make that more transparent.

   As usual, if you have any questions, comments, wants to let me know if I'm missing something, etc, let me know in the comment section below.

G-PR♥ISM, the Ultimate Gorilla

Stable Build - 1

Olivia murdered my walled.... but I still gotta say
/all WORTH

For all decks labeled as:
stable - working as intended.
test - still under tuning and some things may or may not work as intended.

*Note: Working as intended != finished build, it just means deck functions as planned and is overall consistent

FVG:
PR♥ISM-Duo, Tisza *1

Trigger: (10 crit/2 draw/4 heal):
Duo Pride Crown, Madeira (Critical) *1
Duo Grampus Turn, Shannon (Critical) *1
Comical Rainie (Critical) *1
Gunslinger Star, Florida (Critical) *1
Morning Impact, Lyps (Critical) *1
Drive Quartet, Shuplu (Critical) *1
PR♥ISM-Miracle, Canary (Critical) *4
PR♥ISM-Miracle, Adria (Draw) *2
PR♥ISM-Miracle, Timor (Heal) *4

 Grade 1: (*14)
PR♥ISM-Duo, Aria (Perfect Guard)  *4
Persevering Talent, Shandi *3
PR♥ISM-Promise, Princess Leyte *4
PR♥ISM-Romance, Mercure *3

Grade 2: (*11)
Admired Sparkle, Spica *4
PR♥ISM-Promise, Princess Celtic *4
PR♥ISM-Romance, Lumiere *3

Grade 3: (*8)
PR♥ISM-Image, Vert *4
PR♥ISM-Promise, Labrador *4

G-Zone: (*8)
PR♥ISM-Promise, Princess Labrador *4
School Etoile, Olyvia *4



    Alright, as I mentioned in my last blog post, this is the deck that I have been messing around with for the most part recently. After testing various Duo builds vigorously and deciding that the new Duos isn't my cup of tea, I set my attention on Princess Celtic because of her incredible br... well, lets put it as "obvious reasons" for now, and from there started playing with Prisms. On a side note, this is a very long post, so bear with me.

Overview

   Prisms has been know to be rather different from the rest of their clan, focusing on power and having a basically non-existent advantage engine, which is quite the opposite the rest of their sisters in the clan. In the Clan Booster, in addition to the generic support Bermuda Triangles received, Prisms also got an updated version of their main trio. While their direct advantage engine is still below average and didn't get improved much with the Clan Booster, their capabilities to wrap games up and kill people in the late game got buffed tremendously. I would actually go as far as saying that, they probably have one of the best sustained finishing power and kill potential with their Stride units in the game right now; the combination of having access to Princess Labrador, Olivia, and Spica is just ridiculous. Being a traditional sub clan that has access to the 10k and 12k beaters also means they will not suffer from a bad early game, and has the most basic means to be able to answer to faster decks, or to suppress slower decks.

She's great at keeping up the tempo
and forcing guards early on, as well
as playing the sit-on-G2 game

   The concept behind this build is actually quite simple - you try your best to play the tempo and momentum game early on, and then once you hit the post-G3 game, you start to "finish" the game every single turn until either you or your opponent dies. Execution is slightly more complex: due to how different skills interact and the timing they return to your hand is also directly tied to their positioning, every turn must be properly planned out as to how to form your field to obtain your ideal attack pattern, and also at the same time be able to bounce the correct/priority targets in the correct order with such positioning. Also, due to how the deck bounces quite a lot, it is totally reasonable and possible to drop trigger units and PGs to boost, drop 2 boosters together to attack, drop Stride enablers and G3s to swing, all while being able to pull them back into the hand to use them the way they were originally intended for.


   While the deck has no built-in advantage engine other than Princess Celtic, the deck competes and gains advantage through momentum and assault. One thing people often forget is that there is direct advantage generated through battle advantage, and not just purely from skill; and that's where momentum plays comes in. You start pushing for 3 attacks a turn, or force bad guard early where most other decks wouldn't have to do otherwise; making 3 attacks is a direct additional -1 inflicted on your opponent when compared to only making 2 attacks, for example. Against decks that cannot consistently make 3 attacks a turn since early game, for every additional attack I am hitting, I'm gaining advantage over my opponent. Then you have Princess Celtic that works similarly to Rhone; the opponent must choose to guard her or risk being snowballed by Princess Celtic's ability since your G2 turn, because it will become harder to slow down Prism's assault the more cards they acquire.

Imagine if Conquest Dragon is an initial
stride. Yup, that's basically what Labrador is.

   Now when you couple that with the late game G-Prisms has access to, the deck can be very overwhelming to play against since Princess Labrador basically guarantees quality attack regardless of hand - even PGs can boost or swing for 11k solo, and it becomes very easy to form 21~26k rear columns ever since Prism's 1st stride. For example, a lot of people will choose to no guard a 26~31k stride VG that does not have an on-hit effect at 3 damage. However due to how Princess Labrador works similarly to Conquest Dragon, this means at 3 damage if they choose to no guard, even if you only check 1 critical trigger, it immediately puts them at 5 damage and forces them to guard your remaining 2 21~26k columns on your initial stride turn. That is a massive gain of tempo advantage on your end, and a massive loss in both card and tempo advantage to your opponent as now they're pretty much guaranteed to be forced into the catch-up-and-survival game for the rest of the game at a relatively early point in the game. Even if you don't check any triggers, they still have to choose how to deal with your remaining 21~26k columns after being sent to 4 damage, all while that is just your initial stride, where you can easily repeat the same play the next turn, or have a more deadly Olivia turn coming right after this. And due to how insanely overwhelming this deck's stride works, being at 4 damage is well within the potential kill zone.



   Another unique and interesting thing to point out for this deck is that due to its nature of bouncing cards back to the hand, it gives the deck 2 very unique attributes over other tempo/aggro decks or even just decks that are highly RG reliant in general:

1.) It is highly resistant to retires and locks in general if you know what you are doing. This deck does not auto-scoop to locks and retires and instead can often force them to scoop. Some even claim that this deck is such pain and terrible match up for Link Jokers to the point that it's almost auto-scoop for them.

2.) While the deck rarely generates direct advantage, you are actually quite tanky and not as fragile as other decks without an avantage engine because of how many cards can return to your hand as shields to allow you to guard more efficiently. If you have played things like RPBA or Aura Geyser, I think you'll know what I mean by this.

Card Choices

   I'll be going over my choices in this section, although I will not go over cards that I feel are very self explanatory unless by request. If you want to know why a specific card is ran/not ran, post in the comments section below or find a way to shoot me a message in some way.

Triggers

Prisms have incredible synergy with
crits. A shame they don't have a 2nd set.

   First of all, the trigger lineup. There are no stands due to how unlike most decks, Prisms can't effectively and consistently attack with an attack patter that support stands. Regardless of it being with original Labrador, Princess Labrador, or Olivia, you always run into the same issue with stands - you cannot consistently guarantee at least one stand target without gimping your optimized attack pattern. The only time stands are great for this deck is in the early game before you ride to G3, and once you hit G3, Stand triggers forces this deck into some extremely awkward and risky attack patterns that simply doesn't perform as well as the crit attack patter IF you check no stand triggers. This is a great shame because both the Prism stand and the new stand from the clan booster have incredible skills. Irish can function as additional Princess Leyte, and Krk can chain and weave more attacks into your already heavy assault, such as resetting Spica again for a net total of another 2 attacks.

   Then the next part with the triggers is that I am maximizing Prism triggers, and that is for simple ECB purposes for Princess Celtic. Princess Celtic's most optimal use and threat happens in a very narrow window of opportunity - your turn 2. Due to how the deck is quite Stride reliant and how much power Spica brings, as well as how there are no 2nd set of Prism crit or draw triggers, this already forces the deck into running, at the very least, a whooping 11 non-Prism cards. If we are expecting to take 1 damage and we need that 1 damage to be a Prism card for Princess Celtic to use, even at 11 non-Prism cards, as we can see with this handy tool, we are looking at a 22.45% failure rate for that 1 damage to be a Prism, which already means you will fail more than 1 in 5 times. If we bump the non-Prism card count even by just a very slight amount, say by 2 cards to make it 13 non-Prism cards total, we will end up looking at a 26.53% failure rate. This bumps up your chance of failure from a already-high over 1 in 5 games to a whooping over 1 in 4 games, which I simply cannot justify for consistency reasons.

   Lastly, some will also notice I run a 1-of for the remaining crit triggers in the deck, and there are 2 simple reasons for this: 1.) They make Olivia more consistent and 2.) they make it harder to count triggers for your opponent.

Tisza

   The next is Tisza. Some people might wonder, "What does Tisza even do for you? She nets you no advantage, and isn't she just like a vanilla 5k booster?". The answer to that is yes and no. While Coro offers some utility in the late game and allows you to always have her to boost and guarantees her to fly back into the hand, she does that far too late. Tisza is excellent at keeping up the pressure and momentum in the early game, as she basically tells your opponent this - "If you let me hit, I will have a 10k shield in hand that can keep my valuable RGs alive even if you try to attack them to slow me down." Essentially, Tisza is there to keep you ahead of the tempo game - she protects your RGs for you to continue you assault, making it harder for your opponent to slow you down. She also provides an extra 10k shield in hand in cases where your opponent checks a critical trigger of some sort, allowing you to maintain the choice of keeping your damage low to stay ahead of the game in prep for what is yet to come. A small example would be, that things like Phantom Blaster 'Diablo' aren't very scary when you are sitting on 2 damage.

Princess Leyte

She's incredible. 'nuff said.

   Then we have Princess Leyte. I feel she's pretty self explanatory as to why she is ran, but I doubt it's clear to everyone what she is capable of. Princess Leyte is a very stable 7k booster and by default has no drawbacks. To top off that, she regenerates resources and turns Olivia + Spica turns from a net CB3 play into a net CB2 play for free while still being a Clear. She combos with Olivia and Princess Labrador to pass power to another unit during your relentless assault. She also combos nicely with Spica where Spica's +3k power when Leyte's +4k power adds up to +7k power, which is enough to put even a 9k solo beater into a 16k solo beater. She puts your 17k+ columns that can result from 10k beater + 7k booster, 12k beater + 5k trigger booster, 11k beater + 6k PG boost columns into 21k columns. She makes your 12k beater a solo 16k beater. She with Spica, turns a 19k column you have into a 26k column on your Princess Labrador and Olivia turns. She makes 5k triggers into 9k beaters, which is enough to swing for 16k when boosted by a 7k booster. She gives your opponent a very strong incentive to guard your Princess Celtic early on to prevent free advantage. She powers up units for free with original Labrador, and even allows you to make 20k Princess Celtic columns against opponents still sitting on G2s. All in all, she is a free magic number machine that regenerates resources for free, combos with virtually everything, all while having zero drawback. Literally a zero risk high reward card.

Mercure

I've come to love 10k beaters a lot in the
Stride era. Prisms is no exception.

   Some might also wonder why I run Mercure. Answer is, that she brings so much to the table in this deck, that she's basically too good not to run. First of all, as we all know, in the Stride era, a lot of decks are given strong cards in the late game. However, not many decks shine in the early game. 10k beaters exploits that weakness many decks have, and gives you an edge over slower decks. 10k beaters also gives you a way to retaliate faster decks that actually have an early game rather than just passively drop cards to guard in attempt to survive.

   Then in decks like Prisms where there are no direct advantage engines, 10k beaters increases deck consistency by adding more beaters into the deck to allow you to keep the attack flowing, all while still keeping the benefit of it acting as a 7k booster. 10k beaters also gives allows you to punish players that tries to sit on G2, and is compatible with your own sit-on-G2 game. Last but not least, in Prisms specifically, 10k beaters forms 21k columns with other 7k boosters when they get that 4000 power boost from Princess Leyte, which is quite a big deal.

Lumiere 

Simple is marvelous.
And she makes complex also marvelous.

   The reasons for this one is actually quite similar to Mercure, Lumiere gives us an edge in the early game, punishes G2 opponents with 19k columns, combos incredibly well with Princess Leyte and Spica's power-ups, and adds a TON of consistency to the deck. 12k is 17k even when boosted by triggers or powered up by Princess Labrador when you lack any boosters. Also, in a deck that lacks advantage engine, a beater that can solo hit almost anything is a very welcome addition to consistency. She's also currently the only card that can form 26k columns with a 7k booster when powered up by Princess Leyte and Spica at the same time.

Spica

She is beast. Literally everyone I played knows that
sh*t just hits the fan when she appears on my Stride turns.

   Spica is absolutely incredible in the deck. Spica is crazy and Olivia is crazy, and when added together is insanity. Add Leyte to the picture on power up and attack order and bounce and call back and drive check into alternative call targets, and you end up with multi-attack-and-power-boost insanity beyond insanity. Yes. Sanity points -398475689. Spica is also the only card that costs CBs aside from Olivia, when none of the rest of the deck even touches CBs remotely and you have your Leyte doing unflipping when you don't even need more unflippings. Spica alone makes the deck feel like you are playing Aqua Force. And if you are familiar with Crayon Tiger? Imagine a Crayon Tiger that doesn't have the once-per-turn clause, and can be reset. Yes, that's Spica in a nutshell. She makes life very hard for your opponent and amplifies Princess Labrador and Olivia's kill potential significantly.

What I Did Not Run

Celtic

   One thing people will notice immediately is the lack of the original Celtic. The reason for that is actually quite simple - the card is slow and doesn't come into play until much later, does not contribute to your momentum early on, gets lower bounce priority than Princess Leyte, and is NOT a very independent card. And by not-independent, what I mean is that the card absolutely require other cards to function and does nothing on its own. Some might argue that Princess Leyte is the same in that boat, and while I agree to some degree, Princess Leyte does not have nearly as high as an opportunity cost attached. What the original Celtic has to compete against for deck space are all absolutely incredible cards that you can almost say are crucial to this deck's success. There simply is no room for Celtic at this point.


Other strides that's not Princess Labrador or Olivia

"The opponents will not forget that one hot day."

   I did not run any on-hit strides because PRISM's on-hit strides enables an extra attack, which translates to 1 lost card to guard or 1 damage IF you land a hit. Princess Labrador just does (largely) the same apply-damage job better and more reliable. I also didn't run any Amoris because I don't know why I would ever even want to stride into her (Leyte can't even be called back for example). Princess Labrador and Olivia also are both very important strides that closes the game for you, and they are suited for different situations where you may need to use one of them twice in a row.

   For example, if I somehow got a column locked via something like Big Crunch Dragon, I may want to stride into Princess Labrador again due to both how it still hits like a truck, but also how it leaves my column empty afterwards to prevent my whole field being locked down. Same cannot be said with Olivia.

   On the flip side, if I did a Olivia turn and my opponent didn't die, often times striding into Olivia again yields stronger kill potential than striding into Labrador; Olivia enables more attacks, and usually by the time where you can stride into your 2nd Olivia, your opponent is probably sitting at 5 damage. Guarding 4~7 attacks from Olivia when you are @5 is no simple task, and usually Olivia will be able seal the fate right there.

Closing

   Unfortunately, it's kinda hard to explain exactly how the deck is played and how you should position your field since this deck is designed to have combo pieces that all work independently, and due to how this deck does not have any direct search engine, it's really about making plays and combos by reacting to both your opponent's moves and what you draw into, while always keeping tempo in mind. So I figured it might be easier to directly upload some videos to show rather than to tell.

   Here's a sample video of one of my games against a DOtX deck that captures the core idea of the deck - tempo and forcing your opponent to play the catch-up game.

    I have several other replays too, such as games against Glendios or Gear Chronicle, Messia Link Joker, that can give a pretty good idea how I handle against lock and "retires". Let me know if there is like a particular one you would like to see in that regard. And as usual, if there are any questions, comments, requests, etc, feel free to leave a comment below!

Legion Duo

Stable 1

For all decks labeled as:
stable - working as intended.
test - still under tuning and some things may or may not work as intended.


Grade 3 *8:
Duo, Fall in Heart Victoria *4
Duo True Sister, Meer *2
Duo Temptation, Reit *2

Grade 2 *12:
Duo, Fall in Heart Quincy *4
Duo Mini Heart, Rhone *4
Duo Kelpie Jockey, Syr Darya *3

Grade 1 *13:
PR♥ISM-Duo, Aria *4 (PG)
Duo Beast Ear, Loulou *4
Duo Afternoon Tea, Parana *3
Duo Pretty Horn, Ural *2

Grade 0 *1:
Duo Lovers' Singer, Darling *1

Triggers *16: (8 Crit/4 Draw/4 Heal)
Duo Tropical Healer, Mejelda (Heal) *4
Duo Lamplight Melody, Tigris (Draw) *2
Duo Morning Charm, Liffey (Draw) *2
Duo Gran Pasturn, Syanon (Critical) *4
Duo Pride Crown, Madeira (Critical) *4

FVG:
Duo Lovers' Singer, Darling *1


   I guess this is kind of a random post lol. But I like the deck, and I think it works fairly well (not perfect, but pretty well), so I'm just posting it because I'm stuck on the witches and can't find anything to go further with them right now for the lols. Why did I build the deck? Because I like the PG too much that I had to build it Duos have fun, interesting, and engaging mechanics that also revolves a lot of combo and rewards good play pretty well. Anyways, let's get to the deck.

   So, as the title suggests, this is a Legion focused Duo deck. Since Duo (and Bermuda as a whole) only received 1 Legion boss, this deck('s G3s) is still half stuck in the LB4 era. However, Victoria is a fairly good Legion. She may not be the best, but she is good enough to carry her own weight. She swings for very high numbers for free (something that's fairly valuable for Bermudas), and her 'cloning' capabilities gives her huge combo and toolbox potential, as well as incredible ability to adapt to the situation. Basically, as long as you can perform Legion, you can duplicate anything you have at your disposal based off the situation. Missing an attacker? Clone one. Have Rhone and want to apply more on-hit pressure as well as clone more? Clone one. Want to prep 2 PGs? Clone one. Want to push for big numbers with Loulou? Clone one. Need more 10k shields? Clone one. Hack, if you are bored, even if you just want to Legion for the sake of Legion or shuffle back a bunch of triggers, you can even clone herself (if you have a 2nd copy).

   What makes her cloning ability even better is the fact that she does it on Legion, so you can shuffle back the thing you want to clone, essentially kinda looping yourself over and over again especially if you use soul blasting units like Pretty Horn. For example, say you have 2 Darlings. You guard with one. Now you can call the other Darling, perform Legion, shuffle back and search for the Darling you just shuffled back. This is also why I run 2 Darlings (one as FVG, one as tech); she makes this deck very tanky as it's very easy to always maintain having 10k shields in hand. Just that 1 extra copy of Darling gives this deck so much more utility and flexibility as well as tankyness, she's well worth the spot (and I would even argue that this 1 card spot is the most cost efficient spot spent for the deck). Darling also still has that great FVG utility (bounce back Loulous to re-call for 3 21k+ columns), and is completely reusable, and completely searchable, allowing you juggle the 2 copies of her in your deck and guard or use the ability as you please. She also makes an awesome early game Rhone target.

   Victoria guaranteeing a bounce also allows you to go more aggressive early game and call down units you normally wouldn't, as you won't be committing to that field. Call down a PG to boost? That's fine, as you can bounce it back and clone one later. Call a Loulou as a temporary 9k attacker? That's fine as well, as you can bounce it back and clone one later, and enjoy Loulou's powerful skill the more you have her.

   Rhone is also a very important unit in this deck. She amplifies the amount of cloning the deck does and provides precious on-hit pressure, and can snowball your advantage if she lands a hit.

   Loulou is the powerhouse of the deck for RGs. She can be used as a temporary 9k attacker. Behind Syr Darya, she creates 21k columns. When you call 2 Loulous, she creats 21k columns behind any 10k+ attackers, like any of the G3s or Parana. So say you have 12k attacker, Victoria, and a 11k attacker in your front row. Call down 2 Loulous in the order of behind 11k attacker first, and then behind the 12k attacker, you just formed yourself a 21/28/22 field. The deck's extremely high cloning proficiency also makes Loulou very easy to use as well as very easy to setup.

   Ural is also very good, especially for a Legion based deck due to her soul blasting cost. She allows for easier way to get 4 cards in drop zone, and she cleans out your soul for more Legion looping with her cost, all while also providing a +1 on the spot. I didn't run Peace because I still find Peace's 6k to hurt too much in general, and she doesn't synergize well with Rhone. When you still want and need advantage, you won't have enough CBs to bounce her and draw (typically on your 2nd turn). And she forming 15k column with Rhone definitely doesn't help at all. Ural shall take the job of direct drawing, and she gets the draw right away rather than relying on something else to do it for her.

   I also didn't use Chicora because she is just too hard to use and too inconsistent. Parana on the other hand is surprisingly good in this deck, and very very good at that. A cloned Parana serves both as an attacker and a booster, and she provides early game attacking.

   Meer is a good ride to settle on if you miss Victoria early on. She's just an awesome break ride overall and her full field bounce is also pretty awesome. Reit, while a re-stander, is more often used for her 2nd ability of bouncing units back to hand.

   Oh and lastly, I'm only running 4 draws because I love those 4 different art. If I actually want to go serious and wreck faces for this deck, I'd run 12 crits lol. So feel free to change the draws to crits as this deck has immense synergy with crits. High power, strong pressure and momentum all make this deck work exceptionally well with crits.

   Overall, this is a very aggressive deck, and can snowball in advantage. This deck swings for high numbers fairly easily and consistently, and can very easily throw out 3 attacks per turn since early turns, all while still having Bermuda's trait of not needing to commit to a bad field due to bouncing, as well as a decent advantage engine and search engine to make it a bulky and tanky deck as well as remain fluid and adapt to the situation. It also has many combos to punishes misplay greatly as well as reward good planning, prediction, and good plays greatly, giving it a decently high skill cap and making it very fun to play.