Top Player Council Thoughts

With the arrival of the box Blackstorm Rising, we have two new additions to High Potential: Bujins and Dragunities. The rest of the meta continues to slowly shift as we head towards MCS XIII this weekend.

The official Duel Links Meta format has returned to 1 deck + 5-card side and the Tier List is applicable only for that format. However, before every KC cup the Top Player Council will do a special "KC Cup edition" Tier List that will be a prediction of the meta at the top of the KC Cup.


Tier 1

After a brief stint in Tier 2, Vampires have risen back to Tier 1. The reason for their demotion was a bad match-up with the other Tier 1 deck, Masked Heroes. Loading... 's pierce effect combined with Loading... 's ability to destroy Loading... or Loading... put a lot of early pressure on Vampire players and left little room for comeback plays. However, many Vampire players have found success by going beyond 20 cards with additional helpful defensive traps (like Loading... and Loading... ), while not hurting the consistency of the deck. In addition, Vampires' excellent versatility and recovery continue to make it a popular choice for all competitive events and keep it a step above the Tier 2 decks.

Masked Heroes remain in Tier 1. Backrow hate like Loading... and Loading... has become mandatory to deal with hard counters like Banish Control.

TPC Comments:

Jason:

The two best decks. They have answers to the rest of the meta, forcing many decks to play defensive cards which hurt their consistency. These two decks have both defensive plays and very strong offensive plays.

Sasuke:

Vampires do extremely well in a side format, having such a consistent and strong core with few tech slots, they can easily utilize their 5-card side to focus on and improve their most difficult match ups. Loading... allows the deck to easily OTK, returning all backrow and then having frontrow removal with Loading... + Loading... . Heroes continue to do well in both formats, being overwhelmingly powerful and too fast for some decks. Games are usually ended swiftly with a Loading... play, especially after returning, or locking, the opponents backrow with either Trunade or Loading... .

monkeyboy44:

Heroes remain in Tier 1 due to a highly adaptable backrow lineup that only gets better with running Balance in side-deck format, allowing you an increased chance to start with your side-deck cards, particularly if you sided in multiples of the same card.


Tier 2