The introduction of Phantom Knights to the game forces a restructure of the Tier List, and will continue to shape the format going forward, likely becoming Tier 1 in the near future. Having a strong presence in the KC Cup, Phantom Knights have a consistent resource loop, removal tools, and searchable disruption. Decks that beat PK do so by winning on an axis PK is not well equipped to deal with; Abyss Actors shut off the graveyard with Sealed Tombs , Buster Blader banishes monsters with Loading... , and Ritual Beast mitigates the destruction effects with Loading... and Loading... .
Tier 1
TPC Comments
Magnet Warriors are still performing quite well, but their days at the top might be numbered. Between the rise of poorer matchups to combat Phantom Knights, and the less-than-ideal matchup with Phantom Knights themselves, I'm personally unsure where Magnets will end up once this post-KC Cup meta has settled.
Tier 2
TPC Comments
Abyss Actors have won the February 2022 KC Cup! With all the Phantom Knights running around, there is no doubt that you should play Sealed Tombs . The deck abuses this by activating your Loading... , bringing down your LP to meet the skill requirements. Now that we return to side format, the deck will have to face their Loading... s again. For now, we promote it to Tier 2, as it is a balanced deck which abuses a skill that halts your opponent's plays.
Abyss Actors has been benefiting a lot from the meta shift through the past month or so towards decks like Magnet Warriors and Phantom Knights. That shift away from decks like Harpies and Gaia (which were bad matchups) allowed the deck to use Sealed Tombs , making the matchup vs grave-oriented decks much easier.
In terms of deckbuilding trends, most people have stopped using the Loading... variant. People finally realized Iris only helps strengthen your combo when facing no backrow removal, but that doesn't work with every deck running Loading... or Loading... . This pure variant of Abyss Actors won the KCC thanks to the extra tech space, allowing it to have more ways to destroy the opponent's MST before committing to Loading...
The deck is in a good spot in the meta currently and it's only hindered by the weakness to Side Deck cards such as Loading... .
Buster Blader has been promoted to Tier 2. The deck has proven itself in the las KCC and in regular tournaments. The deck is a very strong control deck that stalls the opponents out with traps to give themselves time to make plays. All the deck really needs to pop off is Loading... , as it usually leads to the summon of Loading... and Loading... , which basically locks the opponent and puts them in a bad position. The Trap being able to do all that from the graveyard, with basically no downside, is a very powerful mechanism of this deck, as it enables the deck to push offensive plays with the a beatstick and force the opponent to react to that, only to follow-up with a fusion from grave. So put shortly, this deck is a very strong candidate in the current meta as it gives most opponents a hard time to dealing with it. A potential downside of this deck is its very reliant on Loading... , as if u don't draw it your deck is a lot weaker. However, Loading... s into Draw Sense: Low-Level make consistency much less of an issue for this deck. Between the opponent lockdown power and the limited consistency issues that this deck has, it sits at Tier 2 for now as we wait and see how adapts to its matchups overall.