Pay half of your Life Points when your opponent
either activates a Magic or Trap Card or summons a
monster (including Special Summon) to negate the
action and destroy the Magic Card, Trap Card or
summoned monster.
Type - Trap
Card Number - DB2-EN073
Card Ratings
Traditional: 3.95
Advanced:
4.6
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale 1 being the worst.
3 ... average. 5 is the highest rating.
Date Reviewed - 06.27.06
ExMinion OfDarkness
Solemn Judgment
Sorry, but this review's gonna be rather short. Not
much I can say about it that hasn't already been
said.
Best side-deck card ever, great for dedicated
control builds, and just an answer to anything you
couldn't counter otherwise. Players are more apt to
pay half their life points if it will win them the
game or stop the opponent from doing so; if you
don't believe me, count the number of copies of
Return from the Different Dimension played at your
next Regionals. Burn, Last Turn, and lockdown have
all seen the benefit of this card for some time.
We
reviewed this card last year, on the 4th of July.
Everything I said then pertains to now, so this is
my review from then, slightly modified. Today brings
us to one of my all time favorite trap cards:
Solemn Judgment
One of the most versatile trap cards ever. Now, most
people know what Solemn Judgment can do, but they
steer clear just because of the little text that
states "pay half of your lifepoints..."
Now, I admit, early or even mid game, this card can
be quite damaging on accounts of you have far too
many lifepoints. Obviously, this card is meant to be
used late game, when you have say 1000 or less
lifepoints and negating the opponents Mirror Force
for 500 points will win you the duel.
I love Solemn Judgment just because of all it can
do. It negates the summoning of Jinzo which is
important at least in my eyes. Also, as I said, it
negates EVERYTHING else. Obviously, this thing is a
counter trap, so it can be a fairly deadly surprise
to your opponent.
Ratings:
Traditional: 4.0/5
Advanced: 4.5/5
Art: 5/5
I may have rated this card just a tad higher than it
should've been, but it is a personal favorite, and
it can do anything, so yea...
This isn't quite as broad spectrum, "Screw that," as
Magic's Counterspell is, but Solem does its job well
enough. Does a combo deck fear S/T destruction? Does
an aggro deck fear Mirror Force? Does a control deck
fear a OTK blowing up in its face? Solemn can stop
all of these.
Yes, it's cost is rather high, but generally Solemn
should be used in make-or-break situations where you
avoid or cause the end of the game. Does it really
matter if your LP are halved if you are still in the
game? Not really.
Today's card is Solemn Judgement, and its a personal
favorite of mine. This card is a Spell Speed 3 trap,
which means it can even be activated in the Damage
step, if for some reason you'd want to negate
something there.
The cost of this card is Half of your life points,
and the effect is you get to negate...just about
everything. Even Jinzo! Do you have out a monster
and a Solemn Judgement, and they have nothing and
are low on life? Unless they topdeck a defensive
monster, the game is yours.
I'm actually testing a deck that uses 3 Copies of
Solemn Judgement, so watch out for that as I may
release the list someday. I used to run Solemns in a
burn deck, it was just great. Graceful Charity into
your second Solemn, play Wave Motion Cannon, set 2
Solemns, Stall card, and Stealth Bird or something
:D. It was pretty hot.
Overall its a very good and interesting card to play
with, try it out if you think your deck could
support its use, and you may like it!
Traditional: Not sure.
Advanced: 4/5. Its insanely good against Zaborgs and
such.
The ‘Hand of God’ itself. Otherwise known in some
circles as ‘Maradona ‘ , Solemn Judgement has rose
to be one of the best techs in the game today,
essentially negating anything.
Solemn Judgement has always been a good card, giving
near complete negation to everything, Spell, Trap or
summoning with the sometimes huge, other times tiny,
always - payable cost that previously was the only
reason this card didn’t see as much use.
Nowadays, life points have been deemed more
expendable , and so this cards use has been on the
up rise. Half your lp is pretty handy for negating
the half lp RftDD that has pestered so many this
format, although arguably Waboku does this for free.
It’s also noteworthy that Solemn Judgement is one of
the few trap cards that are tournament worthy which
can take on Jinzo. Always a great extra feature.
Overall, a solid card with great versatility.
Traditional : 4/5 A negated CED is always nice, half
you lp instead of all.
Advanced : 4/5 The same can be said to counter RftDD
Art : 3/5 God, you ’re such a player!!!
MPS : 3.5/5
Otaku
God says “No.”
Today we look at my favorite card in the entire
game: Solemn Judgment. If you can’t tell
in my CotD pic,
that’s me holding my three copies I’ve had since
early Magic Ruler (yes, I know it’s from
Metal Raiders – I wasn’t made of money, and
only pulled one naturally so it did take a
little time to accumulate them). For more
an in depth look at
how to use the card (and an “interesting”
comment by EMoD),
just read the 07/04/05 CotD.
Why am I not going to cover that here? Because
this is a re-review, and its more practical I
give you new material on how the card affects
the game now. Sadly, even though this is my
favorite card, I find I can rarely work a copy
into my decks like I used to (and for a long,
long time I always main-decked three). It isn’t
that Solemn Judgment is less useful;
quite the contrary, it’s now more versatile than
ever. The problem is the list of staples/near
staples/power cards/whatever you call those
cards nearly every sane, successful deck runs,
has been growing. More over, at least for now
we have some cards that aren’t even semi-Limited
that have graduated to that status (hello
Cyber Dragon, Spirit Reaper, and
Smashing Ground).
The one upside is that Return from the
Different Dimension, now that Remove From
Play is such a commonly seen mechanic, is quite,
quite potent and has taught people that half
your LP is usually a bargain if you have any
actual skill in the game (or rather, have
learned how to play such cards and have a decent
level of skill). So now people know that hey,
if I am about to be put into a hopeless scenario
or take over 2000 or more points of damage…
negating something for 4000 LP is a good deal.
And of course, we all know that once you hit
2000 LP or less, it’s almost always a bargain.
Negate a Mobius the Frost Monarch, and
you basically paid one card and half your LP to
destroy an opponent’s Monster,
negate their Normal
Summon for the turn, and discard a Mobius
from their hand. That’s an incredible bargain
when its at 1000 LP
or less (and let’s not forget possibly
protecting two Spell/Traps that will win you the
game by next turn).
Definitely add at least one copy to your side
deck, and honestly I don’t think that’s enough:
two means a 1 in 20 chance of drawing into it
from a full deck (which isn’t realistic, opening
hands and all). Three might be overkill. Main
decked, if at all possible, please
add one. The game is
getting pretty crazy right now. Sadly, it’s not
the good kind of diversity based craziness
(where most things are honestly viable), but
rather we have a great “crutch” engine that
supports many questionable cards. Still, things
need to be countered and Solemn Judgment
does it. And with style.
Ratings
Traditional :
3/5 – It’s great it can negate the variety of
cards played here, but deck space is really at a
premium.
Advanced :
3.5/5 – If you can make room for even a single
copy in the main deck, do it. Definitely side
at least one.
