Ratings are
based on a 1 to 5 scale.
1 being the worst.
3 = average.
5 is the highest rating.
Beastly Mage
Sasuke
Uchiha
Everybody's favorite Emo Ninja makes a new
appearance in this new SJ promo card. The stats and
first effect are pretty good. Sharingan Eye is
always good for Fire decks, but no growth can be a
problem for some. He's pretty strong for a turn-1
Genin (healthy, I mean) and protection from effects
is always welcome. Too bad it's only from Ninjas
with up to 2 turn cost and only from damage effects.
The second effect is one that's a bit situational,
but will show up over half the time. If your
opponent has a Naruto Uzumaki out Sasuke gets +2/+0,
turning him into a 6/0 heavy hitter. Too bad the
effect is not valid.
Ratings:
Limited: Promo/5
Constructed: 2.5/5
Art: EMO!/5
Alucard of the Abyss
Today we continue to look
at recently revealed cards from The Chosen as well
as promo cards and today we get a recently released
promo. Today's card is Sasuke [Firm Determination].
His stats are normal for a Turn 1 Sasuke starting
with a 4/0 Healthy and Injuring to 0/0. He has
Sharingan Eye like most Sasuke do, but he is missing
one thing that most the other Sasuke have. He has a
lack of Growth. Now the first thing that strikes me
about his effect is that it's an attempt by Bandai
to curb the use of Gaara [Tragic Name] by releasing
counter cards to it's effect. I won't go into detail
about why that isn't the best idea here, but if you
want to know why pop over to the Naruto main page
and check out my article. The first part of his
effect is that he can't receive damage by your
opponent's Ninja effects of Turn 2 or lower Ninja.
The only Ninja I can think of that this effect is
even useful against are Gaara [TN] and it does a
decent job to counter him but if you decide to go
this route you are forced to dedicate space in your
deck to him. Other than countering Gaara he really
doesn't have much use. The second part is that he
gets +2/+0 while he's battling against Naruto. It's
a decent enough effect that another Sasuke that
shares that effect has been seeing play lately,
[Rivalry].
Now, here's the downsides to Sasuke and there are a
couple. First is the fact that he is lacking Growth.
That makes him pretty bad to play in more than one
copy since you can't Growth one over the other. The
second is his Turn Count. He is a Turn 1 and has to
jockey for position with the all important triple
Shikamaru and double Temari not to mention if you
play on type Ninjas. If you're playing Mono-Fire you
could try one, but even then unless you're super
paranoid about Gaara just run Rivalry. If you're not
running Mono-Fire stay away from him since he won't
be on type and most likely your 1 spot is already
off type enough.
In Limited he is pretty nice. His stats are nice and
all the sets so far have had a Naruto in them either
common or uncommon so the frequency of seeing Naruto
here is high. Not a bad choice at all no matter what
type you are basing your deck on.
The art is pretty cool. I think the pictures of
Sasuke doing Chidori are getting overdone by now
though.
Constructed: 3/5 (he's really just average, maybe
try one copy, depends on if you find the room)
Limited: 4/5 (much better here)
Art: 3/5 (would've rated him higher but Sasuke using
Chidori is overused as far as card art goes)
Our last card of the day this week happens to be my
favorite of the new tin promos so be sure to come
back and check it out.
Sasuke Uchiha(Firm
Determination). The new promo Sasuke from Shonen
Jump. This is a great card, it is a turn 1 Sasuke
with 4 combat, and no downside. There have been turn
1 Sasukes with 4 combat before, and all of them had
some sort of downside to them. Not this one, it
actually has good effects. First of all, it can't
take damage from the effect of a ninja turn 2 or
less, meaning Naruto(OLA), Dosu(SI or TP) and
Gaara(TN) all can't touch him. This is a very nice
effect in the current meta, since at least 1 of
those is likely to be found in any deck. True,
Shikamaru(Formation) can negate his effect allowing
your opponent to still damage him, but that can be
true of pretty much any card nowadays. Also, he has
a second effect that gives him +2/+0 when he is
battling against Naruto Uzumaki, making him a 6/0 on
turn 1 against a Naruto. Unfortunately he has to be
battling against that Naruto to get the bonus, but
still, it is a nice bonus, especially against
Naruto(OLA). He doesn't have growth, but if he did,
he would be just too good.
Constructed:4/5(add a little bit in a fire deck)
Limited:N/A/5.(if you could somehow use this in a
limited tournament, 4.5/5).
