Hello again,

           

            Before I start, I would like to apologize for my last article. In reading it after the fact, I realized that in my exuberance, I neglected to speak on important issues like the deck’s consistency. I do appreciate all of the e-mail’s I have received on the article though.

 

It seems now that I don’t have any school or work to attend for another week, I’ve been playing and reading a whole lot about YGO. Why, you might ask? Well, because my PS2 is in a different city, and all I really have at my disposal is my laptop. But back on topic, as everyone knows, this is Sneak Preview season. By the time this article is posted (I am writing it on a Friday afternoon), I’m sure that a bunch of you have already hoarded a few Cyber Phoenixes, Diamond Dudes, and the like.

 

So, if I were to write on them, it wouldn’t be very exciting now would it? And while I am looking forward to snatching up as many Phoenixes as I can, I have set my sights on a card to be released a little later. Namely, Future Fusion. For those of you who don’t know, Future Fusion is a card set to be released in the next set, POD.

 

POTD-JP044 Future Fusion Magic - Continuous Choose Fusion materials from your deck for a Fusion monsters and send them to Graveyard, and choose a Fusion monster from your Fusion deck. At the 2nd of your Standby Phase after this card is activate special summon that Fusion monster onto your field (this special summon is treated as Fusion Summon). When this card is not on the field, destroy that monster. When that monster is destroy, destroy this card. Rare

 

A quick disclaimer: a lot of what I write from here on out will be based upon my reading of the card, and the rulings on it that I can reasonably anticipate. As it has yet to be released, it has yet to be ruled upon. So, if I’m wrong on a few aspects, or a lot of them, that’s life.

 

            Recently, I have heard a number of people on different forums grumbling that POD and EOJ really won’t have released anything that will have any impact on the meta. Things like Cyber Dragon and Treeborn Frog, obviously, have had an immediate impact, since they are incredibly splashable, and fairly powerful. I will concede to their argument in part; there doesn’t appear to be any single splashable monster in these sets. However, POD has two spell cards worth noting. [One of them being Future Fusion the other being Mausoleum of Deceased Emperor, which has received some more attention.]

           

I think that Future Fusion has a chance to impact the meta right away in the correct build in what I like to call a Fusebox. Akin to the infamous Warrior Toolbox popularized by writer Jae Kim and heavily played in the past format, this Fusebox will provide a Swiss Army knife of Fusion Monsters. Warriors in a Toolbox were readily accessible via Reinforcement of the Army, and you could call to hand whichever warrior you needed in the particular situation. These warriors could serve as facedown removal, face up removal, s/t removal, stall, beatsticks, etc. Fusion monsters provide all of these same functions, except the do the job better.

 

Typically, Fusion monsters are very big, and they are very powerful. However, because they are so strong, the are a massive pain to summon. Gamers have leapt at every chance they can to shortcut and summon these cards without Polymerization: Magical Scientist, Metamorphosis, Miracle Fusion, and Cyber Stein. With the exception of Miracle Fusion, all of these shortcuts have proven very effective, and as such, they have been banned and limited. [I anticipate Cyber Stein will be banned/limited since the powers that be seem to hate effective OTK’s] Enter Future Fusion, another solid shortcut.

 

What makes this card such a great fusion shortcut is that it only requires that you have this card in hand, and that somewhere in the bowls of your deck, you have the monsters needed for the appropriate fusion in your fusion deck. Think about it, this isn’t very hard to accomplish. Fusion decks are unlimited in size, therefore you can stuff every fusion in the game into it without penalty. As for the monsters in your deck, there are a few competitive cards that everyone plays which share immediate synergy with Future Fusion: Cyber Dragon, Spirit Reaper, and Sangan. To fill in the holes, all we need to do is to look at all of those fusion substitute monsters that we have laying in the bottom of our boxes.

 

Here is a quick list of some of the monsters that Future Fusion could hypothetically allow you easily to play:

 

Cyber End Dragon Cyber Twin Dragon Reaper on the Nightmare Sanwitch Dark Paladin All E-Hero fusions Gatling Dragon Master of Oz Last Warrior from Another Planet Twin-Headed Thunder Dragon

 

Clearly, the Cyber Dragon fusions are a first choice. But you can also tech a Zombyra into the deck, and you have an access LwfAP. If you’re running Blowback, you can get a hold of Gatling Dragon. You can tech an E-Hero Wildheart, and continue going to town. What is best about this is that none of the 3 aforementioned monsters are all that terrible. In addition, you could summon any one of the vanilla fusion monsters, like Sanwitch, then morph it into something like Senshi.

 

            What is stellar about the card is that this fusion counts as a fusion summon. Therefore, if your Cyber End or Twin is sent to the graveyard for one reason or another, you can easily return them to play with Premature or Call of the Haunted. Another nice benefit, and this goes along with tech-ing Zombyra and Blowback Dragon, is that a number of the monsters you will summon in this deck are Dark monsters with an ATK over 2000. I think I smell Deck Devastation Virus. Also, if you are using say Goddess with the Third Eye as your fusion substitute, you suddenly find yourself with a very Chaos friendly deck.

 

Of course, there are going to be drawbacks to the card. As is the case with Call of the Haunted or Premature Burial, if Future Fusion is destroyed, the monster likewise is destroyed. However, this downside is relatively easy to overcome by running Book of Moon, or Tsukuyomi to flip the fusion face down so that it will no longer be effected by Future Fusion. Or, like people used to do with Scientist fusions, you could Morph it into the same monster in order to keep it.

 

 The most serious downside of Future Fusion is that it requires you to wait. While this is necessary to balance out the card [immediate turn 1 access to Cyber End Dragon would be ridiculous], it does cause some difficulty. There really isn’t anyway to turn this into a positive. All I can say in the cards defense is that people have found success with Different Dimension Capsule, and that I believe the reward far outweighs the risk. It is possible to argue that by waiting, you have given your opponent a chance to prepare. However, you can still revive that Cyber End Dragon with Call a turn later. In the worst case scenario, you have at least forced your opponent to use a s/t removal card [141] and you have thinned your deck, playing into a potential Pot of Avarice play.

 

I know a lot of this discussion is speculative, but I couldn’t help but get a little excited. The Fusebox deck, I feel, could legitimately impact the meta. If anything, Future Fusion could be tech-d into a deck. Just think, mid or late game, when a fair bit of the s/t removal has been played, you play future fusion, dump 2 Cyber Dragons, and a few turns later get Cyber Twin. I’m not entirely sure what the future for YGO holds, but I am hopeful that it contains a heavy dose of Future Fusion.