Spectral Halberd

Ciao a tutti, 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 Spectral Duke Dragon... 's two play styles.

Spectral Duke Dragon's ride chain has two effects, one from the ride chain itself, and one from Spectral duke's limit break.

Now, Spectral Duke's limit break has the same cost as Damned Charging Lance from Phantom Blaster Dragon.

Is it better?

yes. yes it is.

Lets calculate!
Lets say you boost with 8k, and both are 11k power.
For Phantom Blaster, you have to feed during the main phase, pumping him up to 29k attack and 2 crit.

If the opponent is 11k, that means theyll throw 25k guard total, or a null guard.

For Spectral Duke, when you attack first, its 15k guard(2 triggers to hit), followed by him using his limit break, standing, and attacking again.

Assuming you got 0 triggers and did not put power to Spectral duke, which you should have(but stand/crit to rear guard), that would be 10k to guard.
Hence, Spectral Duke burns out 25k Guard MINIMUM, and avoids the null guard problem.

Phantom Blaster Dragon, however, has Phantom blaster overlord so its still tier 1 imbaness.

However, one time you must keep in mind is that losing 3 rear guards, no matter what stage in the game, is a heavy cost, so either effect it is best to use only once.

The second effect is the Ride chain.

When you ride G2 and G3 of the chain, by retiring one rear guard, you may call the top 2 cards of your deck(if the deck is all GP).

Hence, by sacrificing one card, you gain 2 RG. By sacrificing one of those, you gain another 2.

So, you gain 2 Rear guards for no cost(almost)

Using this effect, you can either get a bunch of boost units in early game, and start pushing in damage, or have out several G2 and G3 attackers easily.
And lets hope the opponent doesnt be on the receiving end of G2 Ride -> Call 2 Manawydan/Gigantic Destroyer.

Now, this does come with the risk. The risk of calling weak G0 triggers.

My advice, however, is to just call these guys out.

Although your deck trigger count is lower, triggers in the deck represent "potential" power, whilst cards on the field are outright THERE, and doing stuff for you already.

Like I mentioned before in Rush VS Control, early game 5k boosts are really powerful, but they just suck late game, need to be retired to replace, and hence would represent a loss in advantage.

UNLESS
You could retire them to fuel certain effects, such as Granblue, Phantom Blaster, and Spectral Duke.

Now, there are two ways to utilize Spectral Duke's limit break effect.

The first way is how most people are thinking of using it: To push damage/burn out hand in either an attempt to Final turn, or to set up for it.

In this style, people would play 6 crit/6 draw.

Since its pretty obvious how to use it, and I'm sure many of the other blogs you are reading are talking on and on about how imba it is, lets skip that.

Basically, you will see when you can limit break, identify which units you want to consider killing, and just go and attack Rear guard first, then vanguard, use limit break, killing the 3 rested, drive check again, and then attack with the trigger pumped final unit.

If, for instance, your enemy is at 4 damage, make your rear guard have critical up in order to force as many hand cards as possible, to set up final turn. dont bother trying to finish off the enemy by sticking trigger to the Vanguard(unless they no Guard, in which case they are really asking for it)

The other way of using Spectral Duke's ability is to re-construct your field.

In the early game, lower power lines are needed. Most G2 vanguards are only 9k, so in early game damage pushing, its nice to have 19k lines(Manawydan boosted by 7k, etc.)
However, once you get to G3, most units are 11k already, if not more.

Since you dont want to sacrifice units to replace them (most of the time, just a bad play), the trick is to control and attack the opponent until your hand has enough cards to replace the units you want to replace, or most of them, then limit break, kill off the weak, and replace your field and continue burning cards the next turn.

This works well if you superior call/normal call a bunch of triggers from Wortimers effect, etc.

For instance.
your field is:
Manawydan, Spectral Duke, Valkyrie(8k)
Feather Knight(4k), Raging horse(6k), and Gareth.

And your opponents Vanguard is

Draconic Overlord THE END(with Cross Ride)

As you would know, basically all your power lines are useless crap and you need to attack for more than 18k.

SO.

If your hand was:
Mark, draw trigger, Beaumans, Slaygal Dagger, and a 10k.

Attack with all the units, use limit break to kill off that Feather knight, Raging Horse, and Valkyrie, and stand again.
The next turn, you could call slaygal dagger behind the Vanguard or Manawydan to form 18k lines(but Id reccomend behind Manawydan. CB2 for 23k, anyone?). Then, call Beaumans in front of Gareth for the 18k Line.
Note that the hand was before the drive check, so youll probally be getting another G1 to boost with as well.

Thats all for today.

Arrivederci, frog.