Ant- Archetype (Fear the desert sands) [WRITTEN]

[Tinkerer]

Hello, fine peoples!

 

Just a set that I'd made on my computer a while back.  Since I usually am on mobile though, I'd never really got around to tossing these up.

 

I planned to throw in a Link monster, but even without it, I think the Inzektor and Krawler Links (alongside Missus Radiant and the generic 2 down arrow Link as well as some others) should be enough for what this deck does.

 

[spoiler=Field Spell and Ant- Monsters]Sand Ocean
Field Spell
Once per turn: you can Special Summon 1 "Sandsink Token" (EARTH/Rock/Tuner/Level 6/ATK 0/DEF 3000). You cannot Special Summon for the rest of the turn, except Insect monsters. While that monster is equipped with an Insect monster: it becomes an Insect monster, also your opponent cannot target that monster with card effects. If this card is targeted by a card effect: you can discard 1 card; negate that effect, and if you do, draw 1 card. Attack position monsters must attack if able.

Ant-Lion
EARTH ****
Insect/Effect
If a card(s) is sent from your opponent's Deck to the GY: you can banish those cards; Special Summon this card (from your hand or Spell/Trap Zone). (Quick Effect): you can target 1 "Sandsink Token" you control; equip this card you control to that target. Until your next Standby Phase: your opponent can only target "Sandsink Tokens" you control for attacks. If this card, or a monster equipped with this card, inflicts battle damage to your opponent: send the top 5 cards from your opponent's Deck to the GY, also, until the End Phase, your opponent cannot activate effects in the GY.
1900/1500

Ant-Bear
EARTH ****
Insect/Effect
If a card(s) is added to your opponent's hand; you can Special Summon this card (from your hand or Spell/Trap Zone), and if you do, inflict 400 damage to your opponent for each card in their hand. (Quick Effect): you can target 1 "Sandsink Token" you control; equip this card you control to that target. Until your next Standby Phase: your opponent can only target "Sandsink Tokens" you control for attacks. If this card, or a monster equipped with this card, inflicts battle damage to your opponent: both players draw 1 card, then, you discard 1 card, and if you do, your opponent banishes 1 card in their hand.
1900/1500

Ant-Wolf
EARTH ****
Insect/Effect
If a card(s) is sent to your opponent's GY (except from the Deck) you can banish those cards; Special Summon this card (from your hand or Spell/Trap Zone). (Quick Effect): you can target 1 "Sandsink Token" you control; equip this card you control to that target. Until your next Standby Phase: your opponent can only target "Sandsink Tokens" you control for attacks. If this card, or a monster equipped with this card, inflicts battle damage to your opponent: your opponent sends 1 card from their hand or that they control to the GY.
1900/1500

Ant-Shark
EARTH ****
Insect/Effect
If your opponent activates an effect of a chain link of 3 or higher; Special Summon this card, and if you do, inflict 400 damage x the chain link. (Quick Effect): you can target 1 "Sandsink Token" you control; equip this card you control to that target. Until your next Standby Phase: your opponent can only target "Sandsink Tokens" you control for attacks. If this card, or a monster equipped with this card, inflicts battle damage to your opponent, until the End Phase; when your opponent activates a card effect: activate this card's effect (even if this card leaves the field):
- Inflict 200 damage to your opponent.
1900/1500

Ant-Dragon
EARTH 6*
Insect/Tuner/Effect
You can banish 3 "Ant-" cards from your hand, field or GY; Special Summon this card from your hand. If this card is Special Summoned, you can equip 1 "Ant-" monster from your GY to this card. This card cannot be equipped to a monster. Once per turn (Quick Effect): you can Special Summon 1 "Ant-" monster equipped to a monster you control. Once per turn (Quick Effect): you can Special Summon 1 monster from your Extra Deck using monsters you control as material. Monsters Special Summoned by one of this card's effects cannot attack the turn they're Summoned.
2400/1800

 

 

 

Each of the Ants has a fairly easy summoning condition that can hurt specific decks and can easily trigger themselves off their own ability.  Their playstyle is a kind of hide and seek with the Sandsink token acting as a buffer.  The token and Dragon are each level 6 tuners enabling them to go into their level 10 Synchro.

 

[spoiler Spells and Traps]
Ant-Pair Trapping
Continuous Spell
You can target 1 monster you control; equip 1 "Ant-" monster from your hand or Deck to that target. You can only activate this effect of "Ant-Pair Trapping" once per turn. If an "Ant-" monster is targeted for this effect: it gains 400 ATK and DEF. If one monster equipped with 4 "Ant-" monsters declares a direct attack and inflicts battle damage to your opponent; you win the duel.

Ant-Hiding
Continuous Trap
You can only control 1 "Ant-Hiding". If an "Ant-" monster is Special Summoned, activate the appropriate effect:
- If the "Ant-" monster is in the same Zone as when this effect activates: destroy this card.
- If the "Ant-" monster is not in the same Zone as when this effect activates: add 1 "Ant-" monster with a different name from your Deck to your hand.
If this card is destroyed: draw 1 card.

Ant-Swarming
Quick-Play Spell
Target 1 monster you control equipped with an "Ant-" monster. Special Summon all monsters equipped to that target. Monsters Special Summoned by this effect cannot attack this turn. You can destroy 1 "Ant-" equip monster and banish this card from the GY; add 1 "Ant-" card from your Deck to your hand.

Ant-Snare
Counter Trap
If your opponent activates a card or effect while you control as "Ant-" equip card: negate the activation of that card or effect, and if you do, banish that card. You can target 1 monster you control and 2 "Ant-" monsters in your GY: banish this card from the GY; equip the monsters in your GY to the target you control. You can only activate this effect of this card's name once per turn.

Desert Stirring
Normal Spell
Special Summon 1 "Sandsink Token" (EARTH/Rock/Tuner/Level 6/ATK 0/DEF 3000). You can only Special Summon Insect or Rock monsters for the rest of the turn. During your Standby Phase, while this card is in the GY: you can banish 2 other cards from your GY; until the End Phase, all tokens have their original ATK and DEF swapped, but if they declare an attack, change their battle position.

Sand in the Eyes
Trap
If a Normal Monster is Summoned; banish 1 monster on the field also, after that, Set this card face-down instead of sending it to the Graveyard. You can banish this card from the GY and destroy 1 Normal Monster you control; negate the effects of your opponent's monsters.

 

 

I just want to explain Ant-Hiding as most of the rest are self-explanatory in their goals.  For Ant-Hiding, the idea is to chain the Ant- quick effect to the activation of Ant-Hiding (meaning, you need a Sandsink Token) allowing you to shift it from the place it was summoned back into the Spell/Trap zone.  In exchange for not having that monster's presence, you get another in your hand that you'd be able to use.  However, since there isn't an OPT on it, I'm not entirely sure if it is broken or not (or whether some kind of loop would happen).  The rest are just there to up consistency and provide a bit of power plays more/less.

 

[spoiler Extra Deck]
Ant-Archfiend
EARTH 10*
Insect/Effect
1 Tuner + 1 or more non-tuner Insect monsters.
Once per turn (Quick Effect): you can Special Summon 1 Insect monster from your GY in defense position. Once per turn (Quick Effect): You can target 1 "Ant-" monster treated as an equip card; Special Summon that target, and if you do, you can destroy 1 card on the field.
3200/2100

 

 

Beefy beater that helps swarm.  Basically Drident with a body.  Although, considering the restrictions on some of the other cards, I don't think it would be easily possible to board this alongside a super prohibitive board as easily as one might have been able to with Drident.

 

 

So, yeah.  I'd like to go into some of the specifics more, I might make a level 2 tuner that Marauding Captains or something, but I've gotta run right now.  Any CnC would be much appreciated!

 

[Tinkerer]

Bump~

[Dova]

I like the protection on Sand Ocean. I really like the idea of the archetype as a whole, as it strikes me as a different take on Phantasm Spiral; all focusing on one key card, in both cases a Token, except this one doesn't have a Normal monster counterpart. Regardless, although I do like the concept, I feel you don't really have that much to do. If your monsters could attack and stuff during your own turn (something akin to SHS or something), you might have some plays, but since your opponent still has two other Main Phases to do stuff in, you're sort of just sitting there hoping they'll do something. It's completely inactive unless your opponent can attack, but you do have that boss. But there's no real synergy between the cards. There's similar resource hurting, but they all rely on Sand Sink Token, and if you don't have that field...you can't really do anything.

 

Okay, the above really seems like rambling, but I'm going to leave it there in case there's anything I don't cover now. There is FAR too much reliance on the field spell. Outside of Desert Stirring, you have no way to Summon your Sandsink Token, meaning your monsters aren't active at all, you can't Summon the boss, and most of your S/T are rather useless. Yes, equipped monsters can still deal battle damage, but then you have my second point: stats. For defensive power, all you have is 3k DEF, and potentially 3.2k ATK with your boss...except your Ants don't really synergize with it. Even so, you have next to no ways to deal with a card like the 3.5k Lunalight boss, let alone UTL, and you don't have that much recovery in your S/T to reset up your field. Returning to Phantasm Spiral, if you lose your token granted by the field: You can get another one! In this archetype, not so much. Also, returning to Stirring, it hints towards an offensive archetype...which could actually work really well in a Deck like this, again akin to SHS. However, I don't think that was what you intending for, as this theme is completely absent otherwise, and besides, I do prefer the focus on your opponent attacking you more than the other way around. How can you make this more of a thing? Why, by limiting your opponent's plays of course! We don't want basic banishment, we don't want destruction or spinning either; WE WANT LOCKDOWN >:3 This is a Sand-themed deck; pull your opponent down into the quicksand! I would suggest reworking the archetype as a whole to work more with a single theme in mind (including variations of course to keep it interesting).

I can't really comment on the rest of the cards, as well, I hope that you change most of them, but the effects seem really solid by themselves. Just lacking stuff to work with. I will say, however, that I wish you could change the stats of the Ants to not all be 1900/1500...it's a little boring tbh, and I would be expecting low stats for ants. Sand in the Eyes is also a card I don't really like. I mean, as a generic, HOOORAY! NORMAL SUPPORT! But it doesn't really fit here. Yes, you have your token, but you aren't spamming it out. Judging from your continuous Spell (i.e. Win Condition) you're going to be focusing on having one single Token out, so it's not like its an opportunistic Trap, and considering both effects are Normal themed...although it works here, it will be almost exclusively played outside of this deck.

 

Again, sorry if I rambled on and repeated myself too much. Tbh it's hard to reread this, as it doesn't really follow a consistent structure, but I'm really tired, and I've had this review on hold for FAR too long. If you do rework it, I'd be happy to take another look at it, but regardless, I hope my input was helpful!

[Tinkerer]

Thanks for the comment.  I guess when I wrote 'em up, I had a certain idea in my head that I don't think translated when one looks at them from an outside perspective.  Further, I never really hinted at how I really looked at how they'd be used.

 

Let me throw it out this way: think of this archetype like Kaijus, except hand traps.

 

Like Kaijus, they are actually meant to help out decks a bit more generically.  However, the ability for them to be run as their own deck is there, but amusingly weaker than their potential to be run separately (for example, imagine running Ant-Bear alongside Trickstar, or siding Ant-Lion against B.A./Infernoid/Lightsworn).  The continuous Spell also happens to allow you to equip any monster with any Ant- monster, so you could pull your pieces together against your opponent's strategy quicker and without having to run Sandsink Tokens (i.e. it's like this archetype's Kaiju Slumber in relation to other decks).

 

Looking at how you see the archetype as a whole, though, I can see where you're coming from in the sense of lack of synergy and overall ineffectiveness.  I'm not sure if I want to re-work it into something that works a bit better as a deck itself, or keep its general utility as it is now (I mean, it isn't mutually exclusive but...).  Stats both meant to pay homage to Insect Knight, but also reflect the Koa'ki Mieru Rocks in all having the same stats and stun playstyle (Plus, there needed to be a way for the monsters to trigger their own effects besides hoping the opponent would crash into your token).

 

Thanks again, Dov!  I'ma give this a bit of thought and decide later.