Friday Stride: Conquering Supreme Dragon, Dragonic Vanquisher "VOLTAGE"

Well, that's all the clans I haven't covered before out of the way, now onto the repeat offenders. This week it's Narukami's turn to get another look in, as we explore what happens when you take a new mechanic that began as much to make two cans distinct and run so far with it you create a monster. The ultimate powerhouse for his deck, I give you Conquering Supreme Dragon, Dragonic Vanquisher "VOLTAGE".

Does it involve free gold or fiery death?

Narukami have in the past struggled to make themselves distinct from Kagero. Upon the clan's release it was only Dragonic Kaiser Vermillion which did anything significantly different from Kagero, and the later dominance of the Eradicator subclan didn't help. During this time, what really set them apart was Kagero having more tools to pick off boosters whilst Narukami had to mostly beat at the front row, either with effects or multi-target attacks. Bushiroad haven't been slacking here - during the Legion Mate arc Narukami's Brawlers eventually centred around the Big Bang multi-attackers whilst Kagero's Perdition tended to target columns. By the time Vanguard G came around, Kagero were mostly back to their old tricks of picking off whatever they wanted, but that left an issue for Narukami - any changes to the targeting of these skills would inherently weaken them, whereas giving them exactly the same skills goes against giving the clans their own identities.

Cue binding. The bind zone is relatively under-utilised in vanguard, and generally used as a holding area, however G era Narukami took it to a new level. By binding the cards it retired as well as cards already in the drop zone, it created new problems for decks which use their drop zone (which includes anything using a perfect guard which needs another copy in the drop zone for an effect), whilst allowing it to become further distinct from Kagero. The first wave was nice facing these opponents, but against anything else the lack of presicion retirement meant it couldn't control as well as Kagero, especially in the back row.

Thus we reach Moonlit Dragonfang, where the bind playstyle was built upon. The new Thunderstrike keyword on several cards gives rewards for binding your opponent's cards even if it doesn't hurt them directly, and although VOLTAGE doesn't have the keyword himself, his skill works along much the same lines. By turning another copy face-up, he gains two skills. The first is a direct copy of the skill of Lightning Dragon Knight, Zorras - if he hits, your opponent retires one, and you bind two cards from their drop zone. Given that you could just stride Zorras and have the skill without the flip, as first stride he's only useful to activate Dragonic Vanquisher's GB2 sooner - and since Vanquisher's GB2 is pretty bad you'll very rarely need to do this.

What we're really after is the GB3, which gives your front row 3000 power for every bound card your opponent has. Whilst decks binding cards for use on later turns or time leap units stranded in the bind zone can sometimes give you a boost, you'll usually have to fill out their bind zone yourself. The on-hit skills will help, as will that of the Zorras you'll have gone into first, and from the first round of support you have Vanquisher and Voltage Horn Dragon retiring, as well as Demonic Dragon Berserker, Chatura's on-hit to empty the drop from the early game. More recent cards are Rockclimb Dragoon, a Vanquisher-exclusive grade 2 with an on-call retire & bind, and Blitz-spear Dragoon, a new backup ride who can bind a front-row on ride. Helping empty out the drop zone is Chain-bolt Dragoon, who can make the opponent follow up a bind with another one, as well as gaining 2000 power for the turn - not a lot, but could tip you over a shield stage with VOLTAGE. For a soul blast Dragon Dancer, Bernadette can, once you bind two cards, become a 9k booster which threatens to retire & bind some more if the attack hits, which can be especially dangerous once your attacks get big. Finally, Wildrun Dragoon, the new starter, can move to soul to bind something and hand out a 5000 power boost for the turn to another unit, provided you can have another card bound by that unit's attack.

With all this binding, and much of it able to activate regardless of your opponent, it's rather easy to get a good pile of cards bound - 9-10 or even more is not unreasonable, except maybe against decks which don't leave a field for you to retire & bind from, which means VOLTAGE can be putting 30000 power or more on top of that columns base power. For perspective, Sanctuary Guard Regalie can only give half this at most, and if you do you lose a lot of options and those columns will often lack base power. VOLTAGE can be 30000 with a Voltage Horn in the front row to add even more power as soon as the rear-guard attacks, or a Chatura for extra on-hit pressure - even VOLTAGE himself will give another 6000 if he can hit and the opponent still has a rear-guard. These numbers are somewhat ridiculous on what's nominally a generic G unit, and it's only the fact that you need Vanquisher's support to reach them that keeps VOLTAGE from becoming a monster in other Narukami decks. In it's own deck, however, it utterly outclasses Conquest Dragon as a finisher outside of some very bad luck, and whilst the older G unit still has it's roles (killing off a problem card, those games you just can't bind anything), VOLTAGE is what's going to give G Narukami the push it needs to stand alongside the clan's other decks.