Crystal Beast Archtype Review

by **Sheogorath** Thu Jun 28, 2012 8:04 am

Welcome to Archetype Analysis with Blaine. Very Happy

For my first time doing this, I’ll be discussing the Crystal Beast Archetype. In these, I will be discussing a chosen Archetype, their support, and rulings and sometimes tips for each archetype. Let’s get right into it!

Crystal Beasts center themselves around sending their Monsters to the Spell/Trap Zone. There are wide options for getting numerous Crystal Beast monsters to the field, either summoned as Monsters or putting them in the Spell/Trap Zone, and there are several draw options to speed up the deck. These options are all feeding into the Summon of the Rainbow Dragon.

Let’s talk about our field spell for just a minute. You have two options basically. Advanced Dark and Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins are both field spells that are usable with Crystal Beasts, and as a personal preference, I like Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins more, but we’ll discuss both. Ancient City gains a new, interesting effect every time you move a Crystal Beast to your Spell/Trap zone, which are listed here: You must have this many "Crystal Beast" cards in your Spell & Trap Card Zone to activate and resolve these effects: ● 1+: This card cannot be destroyed by card effects. ● 2+: Once per turn, you can halve the Battle Damage you take. ● 3+: When a Spell/Trap Card is activated: You can send 1 "Crystal Beast" monster you control to the Graveyard; negate the activation and destroy it. ● 4+: Once per turn, during your Main Phase: You can draw 1 card. ● 5+: Once per turn, during your Main Phase: You can target 1 "Crystal Beast" card in your Spell & Trap Card Zone; Special Summon that target.
I don’t particularly recommend filling up your Spell/Trap zone with Crystal Beasts, so let’s just talk about the 1-4 effects. The level 1 effect is pretty self-explanatory.. Level 2, this is a very helpful effect, but you need to be careful about what you use the effect on to make sure you take the least damage. I’d save it for Direct Attacks. Level 3 allows you to both set yourself up for Rainbow Dragons and negate a Spell/Trap card. Level 4 serves as draw power, in a small form, luckily it’s backed up by another card, which we’ll talk about later!
Now let’s go to Advanced Dark. Here is its effect: All "Crystal Beast" monsters on the field or in a Graveyard are DARK-Attribute. The effects of monsters targeted for an attack from "Rainbow Dragon" or "Rainbow Dark Dragon" are negated during the Battle Phase only. During damage calculation, if a "Crystal Beast" monster you control is battling: You can send 1 "Crystal Beast" monster from your Deck to the Graveyard; You take no battle damage from that battle.
This card is only really helpful if you’re planning on using Rainbow Dark Dragon, which personally I think is a bit harder to get out, because what happens if this card is destroyed? Rainbow Dark Dragon requires 7 DARK monsters. None of these little guys are natively DARK, so they rely on Advanced Dark to get out Rainbow Dark Dragon, so I honestly don’t recommend it!! However, this is helpful because of its effect that you can send a Crystal beast from your deck to the graveyard to take no battle damage. This helps you set up for a normal Rainbow Dragon, and saves your skin a bit. <3
Wow, one full page just covering the field spells.. Let’s start into the Monsters!

In my own Crystal Beast deck, I run 2 of every Crystal Beast, but 3 of Sapphire Pegasus. We’ll talk about that in just a minute! You’ll find that really every one of them has a very useful effect. One of your best combos will be to get out Sapphire Pegasus as quickly as possible, and use its effect to place Cobalt Eagle in the Spell/Trap zone. You’ll then want to use Eagle’s effect and place Pegasus back on top of the deck. Your next turn, you’ll draw Pegasus again, summon him. Use his effect again and then set Ruby Carbuncle in your Spell/Trap zone, you don’t really have to put Pegasus back on top of the deck, keep him out for defense! Amber Mammoth, I don’t particularly find his effect THAT helpful, but he’s still a very strong contender, and can take care of a few cards that may be trouble later, or are just in your way, and if he gets destroyed, well that’s just more fuel from your backrow! Amethyst Cat is my personal favorite, though I admit the effect isn’t THAT helpful unless you’re in a rut and it’s all you’ve got. You’re able to direct attack, but you can only deal half of its current attack.. So in most cases, only 600 damage. Topaz Tiger has an interesting effect, when it attacks a monster your opponent controls, it gains 400 ATK in the Damage Step, giving it 2000 Base Attack when it attacks, but this is only when YOU attack, not when it is attacked. I mentioned Ruby Carbuncle in short a few sentences ago, but lets talk about her effect. If she is special summoned in ANY way, you can special summon every one of your Crystal Beasts in your Spell/Trap Zone, which could POSSIBLY be used for XYZ functionality, but only if you’re in a real rut, but I added in XYZ’s anyway in my deck. The main function of my deck is to get out Rainbow Dragon, as well as Hamon, Lord of Striking Thunder. Crystal Beasts, I’ve found, are one of the best archetypes to use if you want to use Hamon, as they can quickly get in and out of the Spell/Trap zone.

Now that we’ve gone through most of the monsters that are usable in a Crystal Beast deck, let’s go into rulings.
If a "Crystal Beast" monster is destroyed while a card like "Macro Cosmos", "Banisher of the Radiance", "Banisher of the Light", or "Dimensional Fissure" is face up on the field, the player controlling the "Crystal Beasts" is given the usual choice. In this situation, the "Crystal Beasts" can either become a Continuous Spell card or be banished. The effect of the "Crystal Beast" monster still activates.
You may choose whether or not to use the Crystal Beast effect at the time the destroyed monster would be sent to the graveyard.
A Crystal Beast cannot be sent to the Spell/Trap zone as a result of its effect if it was face-down.
If multiple Crystal Beast monsters are destroyed at the same time, and you do not have enough open Spell/Trap Card Zones to place them all in as Spells, you choose which (if any at all) to place in your Spell/Trap Zone.
If your opponent controls one of your Crystal beast monsters and it is destroyed, your opponent can choose to place it in their Spell/Trap zone. If they choose not to, it is sent to your graveyard.

If a Crystal Beast is destroyed by Bottomless Trap hole, it will be removed from play and you cannot activate its effect.
If a Crystal Beast battles with a monsters such as Dark Magician of Chaos or D.D. Warrior, it will be removed from play by that monster’s effect, you cannot activate your Crystal Beasts effect.
You can use a Crystal Beast that is being treated as a Continuous Spell Card for the cost to Special Summon Hamon, Lord of Striking Thunder, or Anteatereatingant.

Now we’re done with our Monsters, let’s move into Spell/Trap support!

We’ve already talked about our field spells, so we can skip those! Crystal Beacon, Crystal Blessing, Crystal Promise, Crystal Release, Crystal Counter, Crystal Raigeki, Rainbow Gravity, and Rainbow Path are all GREAT cards to use in this type of deck! I LOVE using Crystal Raigeki on someone’s card that they just brought out, makes them mad. Razz

Plus it makes some room for a new spell/trap or some more Crystal Beasts! Crystal Counter should really only be used if you don’t have much of a field and you have 5 Crystal Beasts in your graveyard. Rare Value is one of your most useful Spell cards, as it allows you to dump a Crystal Beast (Of your opponents choice) from your Spell/Trap zone, and then you draw two cards, giving you some more of the needed Draw Power if you haven’t been able to pull Rainbow Ruins yet throughout the duel.

I don’t recommend using Heavy Storm or Mystical Space Typhoon, but your other staples you’ll want to run at the usual rate.

Thank you all for reading! Of course if you have any suggestions for archetypes for the next review, or suggestions of what I can add in, feel free to send them to me in PM!

by **Sheogorath** Mon Jul 16, 2012 4:55 pm

I decided to post the deck list, credit goes to Alpha (Though I changed it around in some of the tech choices.)

Crystal Beast Archtype Review

Crystal Beast Archtype Review

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