Decks of April 2014: Geargia
Geargia, Geargia, Geargia everywhere
However,
The fact that this deck always dominate the Top32/Top16 list but never won any title keep bugging me.
"Is this deck really the best deck of the format?"
Let's see what makes this deck really good
1. Geargiarmor activating its effect without disruption
2. Geargiagear activated during opp's end phase
3. Traps, lots lots of them
Geargiarmor in first turn almost always guarantee initial card advantage, not to mention the existence of Geargiagear. The traps are basically only there to fulfill the requirement of 40-card minimum in deck, since basically you only need 16 cards to play Geargia (3 Armor, 3 Arsenal, 3 Accel, 3 Geargiano2, 1 Geargiano, 3 Gear).
With all of that ability, Geargia makes a perfect grinding deck. It can win by making a guaranteed advantage little by little and flood the field in late game. However, unlike HAT or Fire Fist +1, Geargia also has winning condition. Going first turn by setting Armor and Gear almost always guarantee winning since you will get + 4 in the next turn (considering your opp doesn't react to your moves).
The problem is, those advantages that Geargia made can only be translated into maybe a lot of Gear Gigant X and 1 or 2 standard Rank 4 XYZ. With that limitation, it's almost impossible for Geargia to win against established field of Dracossack and Felgrand which is very likely to appear in matches against Sylvan and Dragon Ruler. They need to rely on their traps to prevent that kind of field, which is something that they can't decide.
Moreover, those advantages that I've been talked about is nonsense if you don't draw Armor or Gear in first turn. Therefore, Geargia really dependent on its first turn draw. This makes Geargia an inconsistent deck and hurts its ability to perform good in every matches. That's why it's hard to reach the final match with this deck moreover winning it.
But then, why are Geargia still dominates the Top32/Top16 list in any circuit series?
The answer is simple. Because a lot of players are playing it.
If there are 500 attendee that came into a circuit series and 200 of them using Geargia, then it wouldn't be strange if there are 12 Geargias in Top 32 list right?
But why are there so many players that play this deck?
The answer is yet simple again. Because this deck is very cheap.
The cost of Geargia's core deck (those 16 cards I mention before) ranged from $75 to $85. You can use almost any kind of trap to fill in the rest 24 cards. You don't need to use Black Horn of Heaven if you feel it's too expensive, you also don't need to use expensive rank 4 XYZ like 101 and Exciton, but the deck's ability won't be hampered much.
Compare it to other deck such as Sylvan, Dragon Ruler, Bujin, Madolche, HAT, that requires minimum of $200 only to buy the core deck but still beatable by cheap deck like Geargia. Rationally thinking, people would love to buy and play Geargia more then those decks since all of them has the same winning ratio in the end.
In conclusion, Geargia is not a good deck inherently because it makes you depend so much on a decent first turn draw to make this deck work. This deck dominates the Top32/Top16 list only because of its huge representation in an event which happened simply because it's the cheapest competitive deck that exists right now.
However, writing this articles doesn't mean that I undermining the effort that those Geargia players has made to get into Top 32/Top16. Because even if you already get a decent first turn draw but you made a lot of missplay, you'll still lose eventually. Playing Geargia requires a lot of grinding skills, a wise decision when to activate or not activate trap cards, and most importantly a great amount of patience to gain little by little advantage in order to flood the field in late game.
The hardest part to play Geargia is to drag your opponent into the late game, especially if your opponent plays a very fast and aggresive deck such as Lightsworn or even Dragon Ruler and Sylvan when they get Soul Charge in 1st turn. But if you can do that, you'll feel that you have a total control of the game and that moment is the most satisfying part of playing Geargia.
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