Wednesday, June 13, 2012

The Vendetta against Stand triggers

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 why people hate stand triggers so much.


Well, if youre one to one to jump down to the bottom of the post when you first read it, I'll make this easy for you: You're playing them wrong.


In deck building, most decks play 4 Heals, about 4 draws, and the remainder 8 slots are fought over by STAND and CRIT triggers.


Now, the reasoning is that with CRIT, you have to deal less damage to defeat the opponent, but with STAND triggers, you have more attacks to defeat the opponent.


The reason why everyone things CRIT triggers are so much better is that they are applying the same thinking that makes CRIT triggers work best... to STAND triggers.

One crit that makes it in gives the opponent one more damage, meaning that the CRIT trigger itself, not including the 5k power, saved you one more attack of 10k/15k guard, which is massive amounts of advantage.


Stand Triggers, without the power, would stand the unit, and, the stood unit, assuming the opponent was of lower power, would only need 5k to guard that next attack. A gap of anywhere from 5k to 10k, right?


Lets take an example situation.
Your deck runs 2 Crit Stand, 4 Draw, and 4 Heal.

The opponent's 3 lanes:

Blaster Blade boosted by Toypugal.
MLB with 12k Boosted by Toypugal
MLB boosted by Maron
18k/21k/18k, for those who cannot math.
3 Damage


and Your field:
Empty slot, with Bahr Behind
DOTE with 13k, with Flame of promises Aermo behind. (17k/23k lane)
Empty slot, with Bahr Behind

And your hand: Wyvern Strike Tejas, Berserk Dragon, Hidden Dragon Striken, Wyvern Strike Gyuntul  Wyvern Guard Barri.
4 Counter blast open
2 Soul(not including Overlord)

Now, take a few seconds and think: what would you call?





If your deck was all crit, you would call out Berserk Dragon and Striken, as both would form the 17k lines you need to properly whack the opponent, and focus down the opponent's Vangaurd. Berserk would burn down the Toypugal behind Blaster Blade or behind MLB.


This isnt wrong, but this changes if you were playing in STAND.
Now, a lot of players who play in many STAND make the mistake of attacking with all of their RG before their Vanguard. 
If you were playing Nova Grapplers, where on Vangaurd's attack would wake up your whole field, then yes, this is a great idea, but not so great in our scenario.

Now, if you were playing in 6 Stand, what would you do?
In CRIT based decks, your attacks to rear guards would only be if they made lines that would force a 15k or more guard.
However, in STAND decks, you could harass the rear guard lines that only called for a 10k Guard, giving you more and more ability to guard.


In stand type decks, if you harass the 18k lines enough, they will eventually break, making them lines that either are not attacking, are a 5k guard, not able to attack you at all!(Wonderful!)


With this hand, you have several options: A Tejas, a 10k, a pinpoint removal, and a Gyundul, which will stand and attack for 11k.


So, what I would do would be to call out the Tejas and the Berserk Dragon, and Burn the Toypugal behind the MLB.
I would attack with Tejas and Bahr attacking the rear guard MLB.
I do this because the Blaster Blade 18k line is dependant on the RG MLB to become 18k. That, and if I stand the Tejas, I could potentially break the easiest access to 18k lines: 8k Boosters.



The next thing to do? Attack with DOTE, boosted by Aermo, without using Aermo's effect.
This is 17k. You dont quite need to push the 23k yet, as the opponent can willingly take the damage. You are already hitting for 15k guard.

IF you got one stand trigger, pump up the Berserk Dragon, and Stand Tejas.
If you got a second stand trigger, stand Bahr and pump up Tejas.

IF you got a DOTE followed by a stand trigger, by some miracle, you could stand up the Aermo behind the Vanguard, and attack for 28k. Crazy.

Now, why didnt we attack with Berserk Dragon first? Couldnt we stand that and gain another attack?

The reasoning behind this is that yes, you get another attack, but how effective was that one attack?
It was pretty useless. 14k? 13k? 5k guards.


However, since Berserk Dragon had a nice 10k line formed, pumping another 5k there would force a 15k guard, making the attack go through, no?


Tejas already has a nice attack target, so theres no real need to give more power there.

Ok. Continuing on the situation.
Lets say a very reasonable situation occured: They perfect guarded the DOTE attacking the Vanguard(Who wouldnt?) You only get 1 Stand because you dont have psyqualia. You drive check Burning Horn Dragon

Now, the opponent is still at 3 Damage, so you use your 8k Tejas to whack Maron, and use Berserk to push in the 4th damage.


Now, assuming the Tejas's attacks hit(Guarding the MLB would be a waste, Maybe not the Maron.)
So, although you only got 1 Damage through this turn, you effectively wasted the opponent's entire field.
Whether or not the opponent can mount a proper counter attack is entirely dependant on their hand. It is highly unlikely that their hand would be good enough to be able to deploy units while having the threat of instant death Via Overlord THE END hanging over them.

Guard. 5k intercept. Guard. 10k. Guard... wait cant touch this? Aww cry more. 


As you can see, by using Stand properly, you can easily ensure your own survival more than the opponent's death.

Just remember that you CAN attack rear guards, and attacking the Vanguard only is not always the best choice.

And, as always, thanks for reading.

9 comments:

  1. I don't want to hate on Stands, but look at the recent results in Japan. Even the Nova Grappler list didn't run any Stand triggers. The problem is to utilize Stand triggers you almost require 2 front rear-guards, which is not always the best play. Also the turn 1 attack if you only have Vanguard the Critical is much better than the Stand. The main problem with Stand triggers aren't the triggers themselves but the fact that you can't use abilities during the attack phase. Stand triggers would be better if in decks like Kagero you could swing then stand your Gojo.

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  3. I like your article right here. Finally, someone who knows the true value of stand triggers!

    I'm quite frustrated that whenever I post something about my deck online, very first comment by almost everyone who replied will be: "You're doing your triggers wrong! You should use critical triggers! Stands are useless and only for clans like Nova Grappler or Dimensional Police!" without even reading the rest of the recipe to see what kind of deck I'm building, for example, a Kagero deck based around Goku and field control. I find using critical triggers on this build not as useful as stands. You control the field, and almost your opponent's hands.

    Then there's my Spike Brothers deck which I'm building around Seifried and I decided to put in Stand Triggers with EB03 being out, that too got blasted for putting in stands without them actually understanding the reason why. FYI, the deck runs great, with this happening quite often: attack RG with Jugg if available (soul blast and boost for 23k or 24k) attack RG with Sky Diver boosted by 7/8k RG (call another sky diver from hand if hits), then attack VG with Seifried boosted by Wonder Boy, drive check Jugg and Stand trigger, stand sky diver (sky diver's RG), attack RG with Jugg (boosted if available), attack RG with Sky Diver (boosted if RG stands). Within that 4 attacks or 5 attacks, I managed to either reduce my opponent's hand greatly or retiring his RGs and attack relentlessly to his VG once he can't guard. But stand triggers are pretty much useless on the Dudley Emperor built though...

    I like both stand and critical triggers equally and after playing Vanguard for almost a year, I understand that both are equally strong with the right techniques. I find stands are more technical and tactical than critical triggers, which are more of hard hitters. Anyways, enough rants from me.

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    1. You are doing it wrong. Stand triggers are fun but Critical out class them in every way. The results at Japanese tournaments speak for themselves. Even the Nova Grappler list ran Critical instead of Stand. The reason is you HAVE to have two front rear guards to utilize Stands effectively.

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    2. @bloody: You are my best friend!!! Some people never learn D:< Stand Triggers are much better in those decks.
      @Jake: Shut it, you know nothing. >.>

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  4. Stands I find, are only really compatible with the following decks, Nova Grappler, Great Nature and Dark Irregular.
    But i have tested them out and I have to say, they are completely viable and are more skill orientated.
    The stand tactics are slightly more risky, but when done well will wreck the opponent.

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  5. Don`t forgot the new clan,Aqua Force which is stand,attack,stand,attack,stand and attack...

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