Box Review: Secrets of the Ancients
This is the 16th Mini Box and was released on December 9, 2018. Secrets of the Ancients contains support for Junk, Traptrix, and Beast decks.
“What are your thoughts on the new Beast support?”
If you invested in Land of the Titans I’m sorry but your Beasts are still trash.
The only cards that seem to do anything in generic Beast decks are Kalantosa, Mystical Beast of the Forest and the new Super Rush Recklessly. Obedience Schooled can make a bad turn 1 Synchro and other than that it looks as though the deck does very little.
“What are your thoughts on Traptrix?”
They’re interesting. My initial impression is that there’s likely just not enough there to create a good enough control deck, but there’s potential for me to be proven wrong on this one. Void Trap Hole is super mediocre, Floodgate Trap Hole is a bit off-meta right now, Treacherous Trap Hole is good but can still be run in most any other deck as well if you really want to use it. Traptrix Trap Hole Nightmare may be an interesting staple as well as play a role specifically in this deck though.
The new Traptrix Trap Hole will likely see more use in the future as special summoning gets more and more common, but there’s not really enough for a deck here yet. They didn’t give the searcher and Banish Control is simply a better backrow-heavy deck right now.
“Are there any other cards that you expect to have a significant influence on the current meta?”
Gigantes is cool and has a good enough effect that it may very well see some play here or there once people get creative with it.
Armades, Keeper of Boundaries is the powerhouse of the set and Junk Synchron its main facilitator with Akiza’s skill What Grows in the Graveyard. Armades + backrow is very difficult for many decks to deal with and it will be interesting to test Junk Synchron in Banish Control decks. The splashability of Junk + What Grows is also appealing; Mistilteinn mentioned using it alongside U.A. Mighty Slugger in U.A. decks as another strong normal summon.
“Are there any other cards with significant future potential?”
Armades is interesting but I don’t really think it’s good enough to be worth hurting your deck’s consistency with crappy tuners to be able to use it right now, but it might be good once (if) we get handtrap tuners. Junk Synchron is cool but there’s really not anything good to Synchro into with it and it doesn’t work very well with any current meta deck. Worth noting though is that it could potentially be paired with Akiza’s skill that lets you start with a plant tuner in the grave. Ancient Fairy Dragon is also one of the better Synchro monsters that we’ve gotten but it just doesn’t feel like there’s a good enough fit with a current meta deck yet to be worth running. The best thing you could potentially put it into might be Vampires.
Traptrix Trap Hole Nightmare. Everything else seems like it will remain lackluster into the future or until we get more field spells to abuse with Ancient Fairy Dragon.
Dkayed's Thoughts
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