Pen Pen Pendragon

Hello everyone, and welcome to SO IMBA!,

Where we learn how to be a better card fighter.

I am your host, Rauzes, and today, we will be discussing Pendragon!


Pendragon is the new Limit Break unit for Royal Paladins.
Unlike the other limit break units, whom have counter blast to activate an extremely powerful effect, Pendragon has something else: Searching for his allies.

Obviously, the search target for Pendragon would be Soul Saviour Dragon, because of her -When Ride effect, but you can also search for another Pendragon, which sets up a Soul Saviour play, as well as gives you a 5k power boost

and another shot at his LIMIT BREAK!

Lets start with an example decklist.

8
2 Soul Saviour Dragon
3 Knight of The White Dragon, Pendragon
3 Swordsman of Exploding Flames Baromedes

10
3 Blaster Blade
3 Lamorack
2 Akane
2 Gordon

14
4 Maron
3 Isolde
2 Pongal
3 Toypgal
2 Lian

18
1 Wingal Brave(FV)
1 Barcgal
1 Llew
2 Alabaster Owl
1 Epona
1 Flogal
1 Drummer
2 Sharon
3 Margal
1 Govanon
4 Elaine
(4 Stand/4Heal/4Crit/4Draw)

As you may have noticed, its more or less KOK/Barome/Saviour build, minus the KOK and with Pendragon instead

yes its very punny, taking out the King of Knight for Pendragon.

 Anyhows, most of the card choices are very straightforwards, and the only thing to see is the G0 lineup.

Although you start with Wingal Brave, one barcgal seems to be chilling out there.

Well, Barcgal was mainly a for-fun choice.
If you start off early with no Pongal and a Pendragon to start the game, ride barcgal.
Ride, superior ride next turn, jump up to G2 when the opponent doesnt realize it, and search out another blaster blade with Wingal Brave, and set up a good offensive the next turn with Pendragon.

Otherwise, use it as a 10k Shield.
Quite frankly it could be another isolde or Pongal or Toypugal

Play it for the Aichi.

Moving on to the trigger balance.
Do you have to use this messed up balance of triggers? Maxing out the variety?
No.
You can simply play Epona/Flogal/Govanon/Elaine and be set with that.

However, Royal Paladin is a clan that has a good variety of all the triggers(3 different crit, stand, and 2 different draw).
Hence, when up against a Royal Paladin deck(or Kagerou), you must look at what triggers they are using in order to determine their trigger balace.
If they play Alabaster Owl and Epona, as well as Llew, you might be up against anywhere from 3 to 12 criticals.
(yes we are going into high-ranker level discussion here, so less-than-experienced people may skip a bit.)

Hence, when playing a deck like Royal Paladins, it is the norm to play in all the different triggers, despite it not actually affecting the trigger balance.
Like, if you were playing 8 crit/4 draw, you would play in two llew and one govanon for no reason other than hiding your true trigger balance.

In this deck, its taken to the extreme.
In the early game, your opponent will be absolutely confabulated as to what your trigger balance is.
It could be anything from 0-12 Critical, 0-12 Stand, 0-8 Draw, and 0-4 heal, drastically affecting the possibility of their "best play".
Since, as we all know, the way to FIGHT a 12 stand/4 draw is very different from a 12 Crit/4 heal or a 8 crit/4 draw.

Now, The actual real trigger balance, 4/4/4/4, is for no reason other than its standard.
The criticals help against Blonde Eizel and Narukami decks and other 10k, whilst the stand on Baromedes helps against  THE END and Phantom Blaster Overlord style decks, the other top tiers who can TANK well.

With the balanced trigger balance, you cant really go wrong.

Thats all for today.

Pendragon appears to be a very flexible and general non-combo card, so the deck is mainly non combo-esque.
The only combo to speak of is the Soul Saviour Finish. As if thats very different from usual Royal Paladin.


See ya.