Stats                : Ancient Gear Golem is a Level 8 Monster.  Fast forward to the first line of the effect, you see that it says it can’t be Special Summoned.  That hurts it.  It’s got a lot to over come.  Fortunately, we see that it is Earth.  If you can’t be “Chaos Compliant” (a Light or Dark Monster), then Earth is… well, not the only way to go, but it’s got quite a bit going for it: home type of Exiled Force, Berserk Gorilla, Goblin Attack Force, D. D. Assailant, and many more useful Monsters.  Of course, this assumes you want to run a Field Spell like Gaia Power, or include some “Remove an Earth Monster to Special Summon this Monster” cards, like the Rock Spirit and Gigantes.  Personally, I am finding those MRL Field Spells to be more useful lately…  Being Earth also means The Trojan Horse can make Normal Summoning something this big a lot less painful.

 

Ancient Gear Golem is a Machine-type, of course.  Machine’s have several useful tricks, like Heavy Mech Support Platform and Limiter Removal.  So this is pretty nice.  It has an ATK and DEF of 3000 as well, which is also fantastic.  Given some Machine tricks, having a high DEF is also very important.

 

Right now, the only thing really hurting this card is the “cannot be Special Summoned” clause.

 

Effect(s)            : Let us see if the rest of the effect is worth the effort then.  First, we see the clause that indicates trample: if your ATK is higher than the DEF of the Defense Position Monster you attacked, you inflict the difference between said scores as Battle damage to the opponent’s LP.  This is pretty good.  Fortunately, there is even more: if you attack with this Monster, your opponent can’t activate any Spell or Trap cards until the end of the Damage Step.  These two clauses basically nullify most protective Spell/Trap cards that see heavy play.  Threatening Roar and Waboku are still okay, since they can be activated before attacking.  Same for Book of Moon and Enemy Controller.  What else is there?  Try Mirror Force, Magic Cylinder, and Sakuretsu Armor.  Oh, and the trample alone makes it so that you actually want your opponent to activate Scapegoat.

 

Uses and

Combinations  : The most likely deck to use this in would be an Earth/Machine, since you’d have fantastic synergy there, spiked with the appropriate “near-staples” and some cards that just fit aside from the theme (Heavy Mech Support Platform).  Good examples would be yesterday’s CotD, Ancient Gear Beast, Gear Golem the Moving Fortress, and perhaps Kinetic Soldier.  Add in some useful cards like Limiter Removal, maybe Weapon Change (helps Gear Golem the Moving Fortress, but won’t hurt the Ancients).  Ojama Trio may also be useful: make sure you have something nice to trample. ;)  As stated earlier, The Trojan Horse can make summoning easier.  So can certain “search when die Monsters” like Giant Rat and Mystic Tomato, which can get a useful Gear Golem the Moving Fortress or Heavy Mech Support Platform, respectively.  Another option would be Giant Germ and/or Nimble Momonga since they nab two copies of themselves when they die, have decent effects besides, and work with the other two I just listed.  Finally, consider Machine Duplication, especially if you decide to toss in a few other low ATK Machines like Heavy Mech Support Platform and Woodborg Inpachi.  This will get you tribute fodder. ;)

 

Ratings (Dedicated deck)

 

Traditional       : 1.75/5-Machine decks can function here, especially since they can also be Chaos Compliant… but Ancient Gear Golem doesn’t belong in those.

 

Advanced        : 4/5-I personally feel this could become quite the strong deck.  The combinations of the effects means it shouldn’t be too hard to get off one solid attack.  Two Limiter Removals would mean an attack that would kill almost any deck.  Well, given that probably half the protective Spells and Traps won’t work, and most Monsters won’t have enough DEF to block the trample damage.

 

Limited            : 4/5-Looks good to me.  Huge attack and it can trample.

 

Summary

Ancient Gear Golem is a great card in a dedicated deck, sabotaging common protective means in most mainstream decks.  It’s hard to get into play, but with great costs comes great power!  Also, the art just looks sweet.  Very Terminator 2-ish.