Welcome back to another week of
Pojo.com's Card of the Day! Make sure to check out
my channel for some new content including a brand
new channel that was made for my team, "Ragnarok".
Today's card is one of my favorite shield blasts
from the set and quite possibly in the game. I just
love the art and color scheme! Let's take a look at
Grip of Despair!
Name:
Grip of Despair
Civilization: Water/Darkness
Type:
Spell
Race: N/A
Level: 5
Power: N/A
Flavor Text:
Just give up.
Rarity:
Rare
Set Number:
90/110 l 7CLA
Abilities:
(This card enters your mana zone tapped.)
Shield
Blast (Instead of putting this spell into your
hand from a broken shield, you may cast it for
free.)
Return target creature from the battle zone to its
owner's hand. Then that player chooses and discards
a card.
Grip of Despair is a level 5
shield blast that bounces a creature back to the
owners hand and then forces them to discard. This is
amazing if your opponent doesn't have a hand because
this card essentially becomes a Terror Pit for 2
less mana! Not to mention your opponent can't do any
Lux shenanigans with their Dragons since it's not
directly banishing their creature!
In an average circumstance this
card gets rid of a threat on board and makes your
opponent lose a card in their hand. So essentially
they're losing the mana they used to summon a
creature and they lose a resource. This is quite the
card!
For me, this card is an obvious
replacement for Death Smoke. Smoke is still a great
card in itself but Grip doesn't care if a creature
is tapped and... oh yeah, it's a shield blast! The
other aspect of this card that I love, is that it
deals with all those early bottle plays. I got hit
with a turn 4 and 5 bottle of wishes and was staring
down a Tritonus and Andromeda! It was an uphill
battle, however, Grip was able to deal with the
Tritonus on my turn 5 by returning it back to my
opponent's hand where I wouldn't need to worry about
it for another 4-5 turns!
After a while, I was able to make a comeback
and I even won that game!
I think Grip of Despair should
be a 2-3 of in every deck that runs Water and
Darkness, it's just that good. Give it a try and I'm
sure you won't be disappointed!
Ratings:
Constructed:
4.25/5.00 (A fairly cheap removal spell that
also functions as a discard engine. Amazing when
your opponent has no hand and great when you need to
deal with ridiculous bottle plays!)
Limited:
4.50/5.00 (Great removal in limited and can deal
with just about any creature.)
Stop back again tomorrow when we take a step toward
the light side of the force! Make sure to check out
my channel for new content and until next time my
fellow Kaijudo Duel Masters, keep calm and game on!