[Written] Neutral Saltstone - Link Monster support for non-Effect Links

[Darj]

Neutral Saltstone
Attribute: LIGHT
Type: Rock/Link/Effect
Rating: 1
Link Marker: up
ATK: ?
1 non-Effect monster
Unaffected by other card effects. This card's original ATK becomes equal to half the original ATK or DEF (whichever is higher) of its Link Material. If this card is used as Material for the Link Summon of a non-Effect Monster, that monster gains this effect. (This effect can only be gained by that monster once.)
• Unaffected by other card effects. This card gains ATK equal to 400 x its Link Rating.

 

 

A cute toy I thought about after remembering the 2 non-Effect Link Monsters announced a while ago. This is intended to support said monsters, but it's only accessible through non-Effect monsters so you got to stick with the non-Effect Monster theme to properly play it. Then again, that's not really a difficult thing to do, with stuff like Dai and Rabbit around. Also note that it's not bound to just Normal monsters, also ED monsters with no effects, namely Gem-Knight Pearl and, you know, Gem-Knight Zirconia, which can be accessed by Brilliant Fusion if you have a Rock in the Deck for it. After that, as a Link1, it's easy to trade them for this guy.

Once you get this on the board plus other monsters to spare, then you can drop a decent LANpholinkus with 2000 ATK, or Traffic Ghost with 3000, both backed up by the effect immunity and marking your MM Zones. Gaia Saber is another option, turning into a 3800-ATK immune behemoth, but its markers aren't as helpful as Traffic Ghost's and would act more of a boss.

Marker is up so you can't use it for marking MM Zones, encouraging its use as Link Material, also avoiding outclassing Link Spider.

As for the name, I wanted to give it some a neutral vibe as reference to non-Effect monsters, and I remember from chemistry that salts are neutral so that's where its flavor comes from.

 

Thoughts? I considered making it a Gem-Knight, but they already have a Link monster and I don't want to give the card an archetype bias, but any Gem-Knight support it could get would be welcomed.

 

 

Changelog:

30/12/17:

Added clause so the effect can only be gained once.

[Sleepy]

The biggest balancing trait it has is probably that horrible pointer. You'd need to make Traffic Ghost in order to get 3 of these out so that they can turn into a stacking x1200 xRating beater.

In this situation, Traffic Ghost is the biggest one right now so at max you can create a 5400 ATK vanilla. Then again, at that point one starts questioning why we'd dedicate so much from the Extra Deck to it, but still xD

 

LANpholinkus becomes decent with x1 of it, if done with 2 then it has beater status now.

 

That is, if they stack, and I think/hope they do.

 

I recommend it being something like a right pointer instead. I specifically suggest the right one because people tend to pick their own right Extra Monster Zone, which means you are kinda going against the current here, but it is still possible enough to result in 3x of it after a Gofu/Rescue Cat/Rescue Rabbit/Rescue Hamster/Scapegoat/Grinder Golem play (as suboptimal as some of these are, they still have coolness points).

 

Also, I'd love to see a Link 4 non-effect monster at some point with Barreload Dragon's pointers. That'd be pretty useful IMO.

[Darj]

Not too keen on a left or right marker because then all what it takes is a single pointer towards your MM Zone and 2+ non-Effect monsters to Summon multiples of these.

Also, didn't think about the effect stacking xD You say you hope it does, but for sake of fairness I'm leaning towards no stacking. I mean, you joke about a 5400-ATK Traffic Ghost but once you factor in the full blanket effect immunity then it's a problem, at least for the opponent. Heck, not even Utopia Lightning would be enough to take it down. Not to mention that a Gaia Saber would be much bigger.

 

Now, I just have to figure out how to write it so it doesn't stack.