Invited Article | Author: Vampoch
Youtube Channel: VampEpoch
Introduction
With the trickling reveals of the newest expansion BT-06: Booster Double Diamond, potencial new strategies have been popping out everywhere, but as it has been the staple of every expansion, a new take on the Rookie Rush deck is always on the works. This expansion is no exception but what has been most interesting is that with only 33 revealed cards, 3 of them have given birth to a rookie strategy that may look like a meme, but with online testing it has shown quite promising results.
Commonly known in the online community as Rookie Agumon Bond of Courage (ABC for short), this deck has, as expected of any rookie rush strategy, a great number of Lv3 Digimon, a few Lv4 but what changes in contrast to other decks of the same nature is that in most iterations I’ve seen it runs no Lv6, only Lv7 Digimon. Being the cost of hard playing a Lv7 no lower than 14 memory, it would seem quite improbable that one would ever play this Digimons, but with the most extreme example of warp digivolution to date with the digivolution of a LV3 to a Lv7 can cost as little as 3 memory.
The 2 Pillars of the Deck
Examples of of warp digivolution have been seen from Lv3 to Lv5 on both the Shoutmon DX and Diaboromon line with BT5 OmniShoutmon and BT5 Infermon and in a more recent and extreme example with the latest starter decks from Lv3 to LV6 with ST7 Guilmon and ST8 Veemon to Gallantmon and UlforceVeedramon respectively, but all of them run short when compared to one of the revealed Tamer cards in the latest expansion, BT6 Tai Kamiya.
This Tamer sports 2 great effects, both very important to the objective of the deck. Its “Your Turn” effect allows you to gain 1 memory and draw 1 card every time you move from the Breeding Area to the Battle Area a Digimon with Agumon or Greymon in its name, thus giving you more memory to work with and search for the cards you need. Its “Main – Once Per Turn” effect is the basis of the whole deck, it allows you to warp digivolve any red Agumon on the battlefield to BT6 ABC for 3 memory and if you have security cards, by trashing 2 of them. Though the cost in memory is low, trashing 2 security is a steep cost to play but for the benefits you will gain it’s quite worth it
What do you get when you combine the likes of BT5 Omnimon X-Anti-body and the BT2 Gallantmon? The closest we have gotten is BT6 ABC, a Lv7 red Digimon with 2 insane effects. Its “When Attacking”, if you have a tamer of any color, allows you to delete any of your opponent Digimon with 13K or less DP, making it possible to erase any digimon short of another Lv7 or a Black boosted Lv6. Then to place the cherry on top, its “Main – Once Per Turn” effect trashes the top security card whenever an opponent Digimon is deleted.
It’s plain to see the great synergy between both effects, with the capacity to remove almost any blocker, trash a card (remember that trashed security cards don’t get their “Security”effects activated) and then go for a security check with a 14K beater is not only an almost secured -2 security on your opponent, but it also opens the way so your flood of Agumons can continue the attack.
A Build Made for Living on the Edge
A lot of different builds have been proposed for this kind of strategy and with much of BT-06: Booster Double Diamond still to be revealed very probably better decks will come out, but as of the date of the publishing of this guide this build has been the one that has given me the best results.
First are the Lv2 Digimon, which are mostly used to secure an attacking Digimon next turn but they do synergize with the deck's strategy. Since you’ll be continually warp evolving to a LV7 BT4 Sakuttomon ensures that you recover 1 memory giving you more space to memory choke your opponent and since there is a lot of deletion in the deck ST7 Gigimon can give +2K to your BT6 ABC, Greymon and Agumons to survive 15K, 6K and 3K security Digimon respectively.
Next is the heart and soul of the deck that's all the Agumons, each with a different objective but most of them with the main purpose to warp digivolve to BT6 ABC.
The BT1 and BT3 Agumons are the most straightforward on their purpose which are to search for the very needed tamers and to flood the battlefield with cheap LV3, next the [BT6-007] Agumon does double work allowing for Tai Kamiya tamer cards to be played for 1 less memory and giving +1 security as an inheritable effect to BT6 ABC. Last but not least important are the [ST7-02] Agumon that gives +2K DP (especially needed for Promo Greymon) and [ST5-03] Agumon which makes the first half of the blocker squad that allow to make the fullest use of BT6 ABC while stopping that last attack to come through.
Note: Since ST5 Agumon is Black he can’t warp digivolve to BT6 ABC with the BT6 Tai Kamiya since the tamer ignores the Level restriction but not the color restriction as BT5 Omnimon X-Anti-body does.
Though not as important, the LV4 Digimons in the deck still play a significant role in the strategy of the deck. Most of the time you will use them for cheap draw but their effects and synergies with the tamers and options still give them a crucial role in the build.
The Promo [P-010] Greymon is a great counter to other Rookie Rush strategies since it can very consistently get his “+1 Security” effect, made more possible with the ST7 Agumon inheritable effect giving him 7K DP on attack, and even though it can’t evolve to BT6 ABC, it still activates the “Your Turn” effect of the BT6 Tai Kamiya. Then is the other half of the blocker squad with ST1 Coredramon which most of the time you’ll want to hard play for 5 memory which isn’t to expensive for a blocker, but the reason I use this blocker instead of cheaper ones is for his capacity to evolve easily and the great synergy it has with BT4 Heir of Dragons.
When we talk Options in this deck there must be 2 main objectives in mind, first is draw power to get as fast as possible to the BT6 Tai Kamiya and BT6 ABC, and second field removal, be it to delete blockers or big threats, a big amount of Lv3 Digimon going for your security and to synergize with BT6 ABC “Main – Once Per Turn” effect to trash opponents security cards without attacking.
BT4 Heir of Dragons is the complete package if played when Greymon or/and Coredramon are on the battlefield with 4K or less removal and at its worst is a non conditional draw +2. Next is the Promo Tai, You Sure Have Gotten Big, that gives the most draw in the deck with draw +3 but since it conditional to having both an Agumon (no matter the color) and a Tai Kamiya tamer in play it’s the only card I don’t run 4 of in the deck. Last is, depending in the situation, the best or worst Option in the deck, ST1 Gaia Force, few options are better to be checked in your security but to draw it in hand can feel as the heaviest brick ever but given its non conditional removal and synergy with BT6 ABC, it’s the best removal to have in the deck.
Last we come on the most controversial pick of the whole deck, the other tamer card BT1 Tai Kamiya. Being base 4 memory to play and having an effect that will never be activated since at most your Digimons will have 2 digivolution sources, many other tamers come to mind to play more to the strengths of the deck or the meta. Even with all this said I still think this is the best tamer for this build since for every BT6 Agumon you have out its cost gets cut by 1, it fulfils the first condition to play Promo Tai, You Sure Have Gotten Big, but most important of all it secures that you have 3 memory on the beginning of your turn to evolve an Agumon to BT6 ABC every turn.
As you can see from my card choices in the deck I prefer to run a more risky kind of strategy, going quickly to 0 security to keep BT6 ABC at the end of the turn and from there use my 8 blockers and consistent removal to prevent a final attack from happening, while all the Agumons, Promo Greymon and BT6 ABC go for game. It’s a very high risk, high reward kind of strategy that for now has found good success against other Rookie Rush and even heavy control decks like Security Recovery MegaZoo. To run this deck at its best you’ll need to know what kind of removal and win condition your opponent has, once you have a basis of what to expect you can go full aggro or stockpile resources for the late game to beat your opponent with overwhelming card advantage and field presence.
Possible Alternatives
Even though this is the build I had most success with, there are plenty of other ways you can customize the deck to suit more to your play style.
On the Red spectrum of cards the Option BT4 Trident Revolver is great match for the deck to delete 6K and lower Digimon and play for free your so needed tamers, from which a possible substitute for the BT1 Tai Kamiya is the ST1 Tai Kamiya, that with a play cost of 2 memory, an effect that will help your Digimon to more constantly survive attacking security with +1K DP and allowing all the synergies in the deck, looks like a very good contender for the build.
In a very different but absolutely intriguing direction we go to 2 Purple cards, first being the tamer BT3 Mimi Tachikawa that in both turns whenever you or your opponent play an Option card you can suspend her to gain 1 memory. This allows you to gain memory if used with the Option Promo Tai, You Sure Have Gotten Big (you must also have a Tai Kamiya tamer) and have the memory to evolve to BT6 ABC, which so happens to work great with the Purple Option card BT3 Rematch! since on its deletion on the end of the turn it will be played from the trash for free. We can use this card to retrieve Agumon-Bond of Courage when he is destroyed due to tamer Tai Kamiya "Main" effect (when we have 1 or more security card).
Final Thoughts and See the Deck in Action
It’s plain to see the great potential this kind of strategy has and that’s only with 3 cards from the new expansion. Even more than with other decks that have been highlighted, it has one of the greatest capacity for further evolution, nothing has been set in stone and as you can see from the cards not in the deck profile that the playstyle can change and even more combos could still be discovered.
If you wanna try my build out but you want a more visual representation of how to play the deck, you can check my Youtube channel in which I share and explain in video format my deck profile and show a game with this deck against a Security Recovery MegaZoo. Hope you enjoyed the deck review, it motivates you to try it out, change it to your liking but most of all to continue having fun playing such a great game.
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