Giant Soldier of Stone Ritual Retrain: Giant Soldier of Granite

[gmaster1991]

 

You can Ritual Summon this card with "Earth Chant". If this card is Ritual Summoned using a "Soldier of Stone" monster as a Material, declare 1 card type (Monster, Spell, or Trap); all cards you control are unaffected by your opponent's card effects of the same type while this card is on the field. Once per turn, during the Battle Phase (Quick Effect): You can change the battle positions of all face-up monsters on the field. If this card is sent to the GY: You can add 1 Rock monster from your Deck to your hand.

 

The competitive value of this card comes from the following:

 

I. The protection effect can stop certain decks (Sky Striker, rokket, etc.) from touching your field. Also, you can easily use a 'Sentry Soldier of Stone' as the material, and then just revive it.

 

II. The protection effect can be combined with other cards like 'Imperial Order' or 'Royal Decree'. The protection effect can also stack if you have multiple copies of this card on the field (that were all Ritual Summoned with a 'Soldier of Stone' monster).

 

III. The battle position effect can not only protect your monsters from a single powerful (non-Link) monster's attack, but also proc 'Attack the Moon!' during your opponent's turn.

 

IV. The search effect doesn't care how this card is sent to the GY. Destroyed by battle, Ritual material to summon another copy, Link material for 'Missus Radiant', discarded as a cost, milled by 'Foolish Burial', etc. It's not locked at once per turn like so many other search effects, either.

 

V. Even if you don't intend to Ritual Summon this, it can still be useful. For example, play this card in a 'Lightsworn' Deck, mill or discard this card ('Lumina, Lightsworn Summoner' can help with the latter), search 'Gigantes', banish this card (or 'Gem-Knight Seraphinite') from your GY to summon it, and then ram 'Gigantes' in an opponent's stronger monster to basically 'Heavy Storm' the field.

[Dova]

There's a lot I like about this card. Unfortunately, there's also an amount I don't like. Let's get the negative parts out of the way first, shall we?

 

Firstly, no Pre-Prep plays ;-; as it searches off of the Ritual Spell, not the Ritual Monster. Really hurts it when you generally want both this card, Earth Chant AND the og Soldier all in your hand to actually do much. I don't really know what to suggest here, because one of the things I love about it is the fact that it relies on Earth Chant, an already made Ritual Spell. At least you have regular Preparations of Rites, right? (great jokes ftw)

Second flaw is the searching. A bit too wide of a search field, imo, especially with cards like Zefraath in the pool. Also, if it gets discarded, you just search another, meaning it's a great alternative to upstart in discard-heavy decks, and can refuel itself if used in mill-decks that use Knightmares, or anything that uses Knightmares. On the other hand, it's so simply, so I don't really want to contaminate it with a hard once per turn. Perhaps just limit it from searching itself AND allow it to only grab Level 4 or lower? That way, still Gigantes plays while not having a couple hundred cards to grab! 

 

In each of the above paragraphs, I also managed to say a bit what I liked, so might as well continue here with THE REST OF THE CARD. Main effect is super powerful but also reliant on a card, which, being Level 3 or lower, is relatively searchable in the field of Normals. Decently splashable while also being restrictive, coolio. Battle swapping effect is pure perfection, save for, well, Link monsters. Perhaps change it it to as many monsters on the field as possible to satisfy my card grammar side, and also negate the effects or smthn of monsters it is unable to change? A little extra for my Linky bois >:3

 

Yup yup, really love the idea. Just falls a little flat in execution imo, but only a little.

[gmaster1991]

There's a lot I like about this card. Unfortunately, there's also an amount I don't like. Let's get the negative parts out of the way first, shall we?

 

Firstly, no Pre-Prep plays ;-; as it searches off of the Ritual Spell, not the Ritual Monster. Really hurts it when you generally want both this card, Earth Chant AND the og Soldier all in your hand to actually do much. I don't really know what to suggest here, because one of the things I love about it is the fact that it relies on Earth Chant, an already made Ritual Spell. At least you have regular Preparations of Rites, right? (great jokes ftw)

 

Second flaw is the searching. A bit too wide of a search field, imo, especially with cards like Zefraath in the pool. Also, if it gets discarded, you just search another, meaning it's a great alternative to upstart in discard-heavy decks, and can refuel itself if used in mill-decks that use Knightmares, or anything that uses Knightmares. On the other hand, it's so simply, so I don't really want to contaminate it with a hard once per turn. Perhaps just limit it from searching itself AND allow it to only grab Level 4 or lower? That way, still Gigantes plays while not having a couple hundred cards to grab! 

 

In each of the above paragraphs, I also managed to say a bit what I liked, so might as well continue here with THE REST OF THE CARD. Main effect is super powerful but also reliant on a card, which, being Level 3 or lower, is relatively searchable in the field of Normals. Decently splashable while also being restrictive, coolio. Battle swapping effect is pure perfection, save for, well, Link monsters. Perhaps change it it to as many monsters on the field as possible to satisfy my card grammar side, and also negate the effects or smthn of monsters it is unable to change? A little extra for my Linky bois >:3

 

Yup yup, really love the idea. Just falls a little flat in execution imo, but only a little.

Noted. I actually considered Triamid Decks to benefit from this. I didn't think of Zefraath...

[Bringerofcake]

Agreed with Dova regarding the searching, though when I first saw it, my immediate reaction was Block Dragon, which synergizes really well with this, vanilla!Soldier of stone, and Advanced Ritual Art, which fulfills the card's "unaffected by 1 thing" effect. Given the amount of protection, I'm honestly (IMO of course) fine without pre-prep, but it may not hurt to have an in-theme ritual spell, but the number of times one can search using this card (especially since there isn't a downside to running max copies) and the breadth of targets is such that some kind of restriction would need to be placed on it.