One Card Spoiler Review: Aqua Force cracks down on control tactics!

The Jolly Sailor (Who Made Everyone Cry BROKE)

GCB2 Spoiled Card; Ocean Horseman, Skiros

In any card game, there will always be aggression and control.

Though all decks cannot be summarized easily into these two blanket terms; it holds true that these two styles of playing can be seen just about everywhere. In Cardfight! Vanguard this is no exception. Decks like Kagero, Link Joker, and Gear Chronicle will attempt to win via disruption of the opponent's strategy. Controlling the game through denying opponents their best effects and endangering their resources. While on the flipside you have the decks like Aqua Force, Spike Brothers, and Nova Grappler who succeed by pressuring the opponent to protect themselves against a nonstop onslaught. Caring little about the cards their enemy has - just so long as they can trample them to death ASAP.

Both approaches have their pros and cons. Control decks can lack offensive pushes, while outright aggression can leave the user vulnerable if they burn through their hand too quickly.

Aqua Force, one of the aforementioned aggression clans, have long suffered from this problem. It's no secret that while they can output multiple attacks per turn, putting out enormous pressure on the opponent when correctly applied, the very attack-enabling units AQ pride themselves on have also been the Achilles heel of the clan. Nothing quite leaves an Aqua player with such a bitter taste in their mouth like having their Tidal Assault locked, turning your Vanguard into essentially a glorified vanilla unit due to their skill requiring a 4th attack or more to activate. Retire achieves a similar effect, slowly burning through the limited number of enablers you have, forcing you to pray that you can keep drawing into more just to be able to sustain the constant offense needed for their attrition-intensive playstyle.

But what else can you do? These mechanics will always be around, and part of becoming a better player is accepting that, and learning how to adjust your play to compensate.

...Right?

Wrong.

Ocean Horseman, Skiros

[CONT](VC) Generation Break 1:All of the units on (RC) in your front row get "[CONT](VC/RC/GC):Resist (This unit cannot be chosen by the effects of your opponent's cards)".
[AUTO]:When this unit is placed on (VC), choose up to one of your units, and until end of turn, it gets "[AUTO](VC/RC)Wave－Third or more (This ability is active by the specified amount of battles in a turn):When this unit attacks a vanguard, look at five cards from the top of your deck, search for up to one grade 3 or greater card from among them, reveal it to your opponent, put it into your hand, and shuffle your deck.".

Look at him there, with that big happy smile! It's because he knows you hate him.

In one fell swoop, Aqua Force have drawn a line in the sand. They have pulled down their regulation uniforms, turned their backs, and are now aggressively mooning every clan that could previously rely on them being an easy matchup the majority of the time.

Now, let's not get carried away. Is this card perfect? Of course not. He lacks any form of power boosting or on-hit pressure, so by himself, he will not be winning games. The value of this card is in the support he can give to existing units by essentially offering them a form of limited protection. Resist is not to be mistaken for invulnerability. There are certain clans such as Shadow Paladin's Witches (I hear you cackling already, Mawile) who target the rear guard circle itself, bypassing it. And other units like Blaster Joker with abilities that target the entire field and thus ignore the resist effect. Just because Skiros is standing on your VC with his winning smile doesn't mean you should forget about the mortality of your units.

To the majority of Link Joker and Kagero players however, this card is still a blatant middle finger to everything they once stood for. With the number of Grade 1 units already in AQ's arsenal that possess resist coupled with Skiros on the field, it would be entirely feasible to have full-field resist. Turning former menacing foes Root Flare Dragon and Big Crunch Dragon into utterly useless strides against you, while rendering Dusk Blade and Twilight Arrow dragon similarly vanilla. It can utterly cripple their game plan by removing their ability to interfere directly with yours. Left undisturbed by lock and retire, your Tidal Assault, Magnum Assault, and High Tide Snipers suddenly become that much harder to remove.

His secondary skill, which is on-call and thus likely only to happen once or twice per game, supports the stride-focused playstyle this card is made for. By targeting a Tidal Assault with it or just about anything you can restand after the third battle, you can search your deck for additional G3 units at least twice. Fetching you stride fodder in the best case scenario while also providing you an easy way to shuffle the deck, which can be useful in conjunction with some of Aqua's new Wave units that send themselves to the bottom of the pile after being used, like Nectarios and Trench Patrol. Skiros lacks in any kind of offensive ability himself, but with your arsenal of potent strides, keeping up the pressure won't present a problem. Lambros hasn't gone anywhere - he's still a terrifying threat. And now, you have the luxury of having the units on the field more consistently to take advantage of him.

In an ocean full of Thavas, Maelstroms and Blue Storm decks, it's refreshing to see an unheard of unit like this come forward with a skill that shakes up the game. I'll be doing a deck profile around the card once he hits the shelves. Until that time, I urge you to follow Skiros' example and give the next Kagero or Link Joker player you meet your best shit-eating grin. Their tyranny over your battlefield won't go unopposed for very much longer.