About
Black Luster Soldier 2 Event - Philippines Meta Report
BLS 2 PH Top Decks Representation
Champion: Chito Racimo [Chimera Horus]
Calleja, Martin Owen [Snake-Eyes Diabellestar]
Vidad, Louren [Vanquished Soul]
Fat, Walter [Snake-Eyes Diabellestar]
Sy, John Mark [Snake-Eyes Diabellestar]
Febra, Kenneth [Snake-Eyes Fire King]
Lorenzo, Jan Zedric [Snake-Eyes Fire King]
Odate, Hiroshi [Snake-Eyes Fire King]
Rodriguez, Alvin Dave [Pendulum Magician]
Deladia, Nazario Jesus [Pendulum Z-Arc Magician]
Balboa, Aaron Joshua [Voiceless Voice]
Mercado, Gerald Jay [Swordsoul Tenyi]
Canete, Edmar [Mathmech Spirit]
Burton, Mark Patrick [Snake-Eyes Fire King]
Curiano, Cris Joshua [Snake-Eyes Fire King]
Laderas, John Edward [Spright]
ABOUT THE TOURNAMENT
SEVEN TOTAL ROUNDS
Players are pitched in a 7-round total of matches, each with a maximum match time limit of 50 minutes.
BEST OUT-OF-3
Each match is best out of three and consists of 40 minutes of duels, with 10 minutes last three turns.
Top 16 OUT OF 110
Only the Top 16 out of the 110 players will be crowned to get the Black Luster Soldier Normal Monster Prize Card.
About Power
The Best Decks so far
What the Data Suggests
The Tiers represent the capability of each archetype to outperform other decks in terms of tournaments and the likeliness of them to enter top cuts and win as top 2 to 1. It also represents their strength when matched with specific other tiers. However, in this tier, we are going to focus only on the deck performance in the BLS tournament.
The Black Luster Soldier 2 Event was held at Estancia Mall on the 20th of January 2024 which gathered a total of 110 participants. These players fiercely fought on five (7) rounds of Swiss with the Top 16 being the Top Cut.
Fire King and Snake Eyes sit atop on S tier, with 50% overall participation in the BLS2 Event. both archetypes synergize with one another to perform an incredibly consistent, powerful, and easy-to-maneuver deck. Rescue ACE, on the other hand, dropped to A from which Rescue ACE - Emergency was cut down to limited.
About
Deck Highlights
1st, Chito Racimo [Chimera Horus]
Chito Racimo was hailed as a champion in the 2024 Black Luster Soldier 2 Normal Monster Event held at Estancia Malls, on January 20, 2024, using Chimera Horus. It was a bit unusual for Chimera to top with the current dominance of Fire King and Sinful Spoils, but Racimo proved it wrong. He went 6-1-0 in the whole tournament, which was a draw against Fire Kings. Chimera features "illusionists", Yu-Gi-Oh!'s latest Monster type, which debuted in Duelist Nexus last 2023.
He included the Horus archetype as an engine to boost the deck's performance but only included Imsety and Duamutef to make sure it would not compromise his combo pieces. At the same time, he took time to insanely boost the archetype's consistency by adding Patchwork Engine as well as running 2 Super Polymerization and 3 Chimera Fusion just, JUST to make sure he would always open the fusion combo. Although it took him overnight to actually master the deck, the time he spent and dedication really paid off.
2nd, Martin Owen Calleja
[Snake-Eyes Diabellestar]
Martin Owen was previously hailed as a champion in the 2023 Asia Campus League Philippines held at Robinson's Galleria, Ortigas on October 28, 2023, using Fire King Diabellestar. This time, he decided to instead use a pure variant of Snake-Eyes despite the extreme popularity of Fire King in the current metagame. Fire King focuses on destroying their cards to facilitate combos and generate advantages, which involves disrupting the opponent's board with board breakers and destructions.
The deck's power increased its potency with the release of Bonfire along with Snake-Eye Populus. Also, the Diabellestar engine is an archetype of the Sinful Spoils that work together by summoning Diabellestar just by sending 1 card from hand or field. With the hefty monetary value of Bonfire currently, no doubt having 3 in the deck proved worth the price.
9th, Alvin Dave Rodriguez
[Pendulum Magician]
Alvin Dave went Top 9 using pure Pendulum Magician. Apart from other builds that utilize Supreme King Gate Magician, he decided to use the pure variant, which he found more comfortable to play with.
Although he lost against the Pendulum Z-Arc Magician mirror match, he was still able to reclaim a higher position with his build. Rather, he focused instead on making his side deck options as versatile as possible, utilizing Vanity's fiend in which he can cripple most decks. He also opts to main 3 Nibiru to make sure he can compensate for turns in which he cannot interact much with the opponent's combos.
At the same time, he used Apex Avian as a tech card to further increase his deck's firepower, as it grants an Omni negate, and Skill Drain just to make sure the opponent won't be able to perform well.
10th, Nazario Jesus
[Pendulum Z Arc Magician]
Jesus Nazario went 5-2 and landed Top 10 using Pendulum Z-Arc Magician, the same deck he used when he won Top 6 in Black Luster Soldier 1 Tournamnent last December 2023. He slightly modified his previous build, removing Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon in his main deck and focused more on its consistency.
The only time he lost a match was when he was matched up against Ice Barrier, an archetype quite known to have a strategy that focuses on control of the opponent's actions, and Sinful Snake-Eyes, the most recent archetype that currently dominates Japan's meta.
Pendulum Magicians, despite it being less likely played in the current metagame state still boosts immense power when played correctly, according to him, and his record proved that it still has the competitive edge even with the dominance of fire attributes this season.
13th, Edmar Canete [Mathmech]
Edmar Canete Mathmech and went 5-2 in the event. Apart from other decks, he chooses to play Mathmech despite of the current metagame. With Mathmech Circular being restricted to 1, the deck fell off the metagame chart last 2023 December Banlist, and players decided to utilize Spirit cards such as Sakitama and Aratama, to compensate.
He included a hefty amount of hand traps in the side deck to make sure he can deliberately control the games, such as Ghost Ogre and Drolls.
It was a bit unusual indeed to see a Mathmech emerge victorious amidst the extreme popularity of current decks, but according to him, he wanted to prove that it is still possible to top without using a meta deck.
14th, Mark Patrick Burton
[Snake-Eyes Fire King]
Patrick Burton went 5 - 2 using Snake-Eyes Fire King earning Top 14th and is the only non-central Luzon player who topped during the event, representing Region V - Bicol (Albay). Patrick is a member of ODA, also known as Order of the Duelists in Albay, a community of duelists residing in the Bicol Region, in Southern Luzon. Burton was considered to be one of the top contending players in Bicol, especially in the ODA ranking events, as well as the most active player among them.
Fire King has been consistently topping in the last months tracing back to November 2023 since ever the release of its latest support in the Fire King Structure Deck. With the combination of the Snake-Eye engine and Bonfire, the deck had already reached its peak of power in the meta and had been consuming already 25-40% of the overall deck population during events in the Philippines.
16th, John Edward Laderas [Spright]
John Edward successfully snatched top 16 using Spright. His build and deck choice was unusual for the current metagame, but was still able to pull it off. Spright was heavily nerfed from the past 2 years, leaving Spright Blue and Starter to 1, and Elf being banned for long.
Fire King has been consistently topping in the last months tracing back to November 2023 since ever the release of its latest support in the Fire King Structure Deck. With the combination of the Snake-Eye engine and Bonfire, the deck had already reached its peak of power in the meta and had been consuming already 25-40% of the overall deck population during events in the Philippines.
Final Thoughts
Conclusions
It was already evident that Snake-eyes and Fire King had already been dominating the Philippines Meta for the month of December and January, and there are no signs of it being extinguished sooner. Droll is becoming a bit of a problem as well, having around 30-40% of overall appearance in the main deck and side deck of most players. At the same time, although the Labrynth is still going nearly at its own full potential, there had been a visible decline in its popularity in the metagame due to Fire Kings being an inherent counter to it. Purrely is officially out of the meta, and although it serves powerful, the decline in the use of Purrely is on its severe status already, and the ban of Calamity had made Centur-Ion decline as well.
Overall, the next incoming booster support, Legacy of Destruction is coming this 27th of January. We'll have to see the impact' this will give in PH Meta in the next few months.
Partners
Special Thanks to:
Pixelate!
Official Merch PartnerReferences
Top 20 BLS Normal Monster Event 2 2024 | Raw Data
Al Fredo The Duelist | Official YouTube
(The rest of the Decklist and Information are directly gathered from the players of the event)