These next few columns will look at the mechanics of the top tier decks in Yu-Gi-Oh! and why they win. This may provide some insight into side-decking against them and also some of the best strategies to use when running your particular version of the archetype.
We start this column off with the deck that has taken all of the world by storm. Cat Synchro variants have won the trinity of National tournaments: Canadian nationals, United States nationals, and the European Championships. Of these three, the latter two are undoubtedly the two hardest tournaments to win in the world. The difficulty of winning one makes the actual World Championship itself look like a local tournament.
Now I sense many players on the i-webz are ignorant of Cat Synchro. They have no idea how it works, no desire to learn, and simply attribute its wins to “sacking.” I can count dozens of players whose opinions I generally respect who thought Cat Synchro was either overrated (which is fine considering it was getting immense amounts of hype) or just plain out bad (this terrible judgment is inexcusable). If you were one of the players who thought Cat Synchro was terrible before its success, you are undoubtedly not as good at the game as you think you are.
Even to this day, after its stunning success at the three biggest tournaments in the world, you see all sorts of clueless bumble-fumbs saying nonsense like “it’s just a lucksack deck.” In fact, I bet some of you readers sarcastically read the title of this post “Why Cat Synchro Wins,” rolled your eyes, and said “because it sacks!”
Not true, I says! Let’s take a look at why the deck wins.
Why Cat Synchro Wins
On the surface, Cat Synchro decks appear to be all about creating the one turn kill. In fact if you were to poll numerous players, they would probably all mention Cat Synchro when referring to an OTK. This assessment is a bit off, however. It actually reminds me of the Tele-DaD format, where players cried about OTK’s ad-nauseum without understanding what governed the format.
Cat Synchro, in short, is not an OTK-based deck. Certainly some of its hands lead to OTK setups. However, you’ll find the vast majority of hands do not actually end up in OTK situations unless you’re playing against a stacker. Rather, Cat Synchro is backed by immutable laws of Card Advantage that create wins. Take a look at the win conditions:
Arcanite Magician, Dark Strike Fighter, Pot of Avarice, X Saber Airbellum, Rescue Cat, Summoner Monk
One of the cards on this list has nothing to do with card advantage (Dark Strike Fighter). However, all of the other cards benefit from a unique set of interactions. The primary combo is Rescue Cat into X Saber, which leads to two discards from the opponent’s hand (a two for one).
Once you have this idea set in place, the rest becomes rather easy. A standard sequence for Cat Synchro might look something like this:
You have Shura + Whirlwind + a set Mirror Force. Your opponent summons Summoner Monk, discarding a spell for its effect. Rescue Cat then gets 2 Airbellum. Opponent then synchs for Arcanite Magician. Whirlwind and Mirror Force are the popped. Your opponent then plays Mind Control taking Shura. He attacks with Airbellum discarding one card from your hand. Main phase 2, he synchro summons a Dark Strike Fighter and passes.
In this sequence, you have not been OTKed. However, look at the transaction:
Your opponent’s losses (3): Summoner Monk (1), Spell Discard (1), Mind Control (1)
Your opponent’s gains (6): Mirror Force (1), Black Whirlwind (.5), Shura (1), Arcanite Magician’s 1800 defense (.5), Dark Strike Fighter (1), card in your hand (1), three normal summons (1)
So assuming a Pot of Greed is a +1, your opponent has basically played two Pot of Greed on you. In addition, he has basically gained the equivalent of about three normal summons, since he has two monsters on the field and cost you one. What makes it even worse is that his graveyard is completely loaded for Pot of Avarice, meaning he can do this combo again and draw two cards!
1. Cat Synchro wins because of Card Advantage. Players say Airbellum is overrated. They don’t understand it’s basically a Don Zaloog that also synergizes well with Mind Control (one of the best cards in the game right now).
2. The Card Advantage is converted at a rate far more explosive than other decks. Cat can always end the game in a turn assuming a clear field, so opponent’s have to be more wary when playing against it. This doesn’t mean Cat Synchro OTK’s all the time. In fact, you’d probably be surprised to note that Cat Synchro OTK’s are relatively rare when combined with the cards in your metagame (Necro Gardna, Threatening Roar, Solemn Judgment + Bottomless Trap Hole, Scapegoat, etc).
A Synchro Cat OTK would require: one piece of mass spell/trap removal, two additional spells in hand, a Summoner Monk, a piece of monster removal. Obviously this hand is rather difficult to achieve.
So remember that the next time you’re blaming Cat Synchro for winning due to sacking or OTK’s, you’re actually blaming the fact it’s the best card advantage gainer in the game and the most explosive converter of such advantage.
A later post will address side-decking and incorporating tech in the main to counter Cat Synchro.
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Nice article, I like how you stressed everything and you made good points.
Yeah Cat is good at doing that, but its still quite possible to mitigate the advantage they create. As well, don’t blow up whirlwind until after you attack. xD .
Nonetheless, solid post. =P
Thats why I love the deck except for the trash hands I have to play out of.
Good stuff, keep it coming
i find your idea hand:
A Synchro Cat OTK would require: one piece of mass spell/trap removal, two additional spells in hand, a Summoner Monk, a piece of monster removal. Obviously this hand is rather difficult to achieve.
to be actually very common. actually it seems that i otk more often then i activate PoA
cat itself is a beast of a card because it restricts all future card design.
i feel that cold wave is the card that most needs to be hit in order to make the deck play out slightly fairer. cold wave and trunade act as heavy storms 2-5, and any redundant copies are pitched to monk. even if opponent activates roar in response you still have options. cold wave is a great card that often takes some skill to use correctly but it is just as powerful as trunade and should be limited to 1 copy for similar reasons.
The fact of the matter is that Cat Synchro cannot win without drawing Cold Wave, Heavy Storm or Giant Trunade. In the case of Trunade, an OTK IS necessary. It’s also true that when Cat Synchro does draw Cold Wave it will almost always win via OTK or two-turn kill.
Also Cat Synchro certainly does not win with Card Advantage. In that same scenario you posted there, what next? You have Dark Strike Fighter and Arcanite Magician out with 3 cards in hand. I have 3 cards in hand (4 after my draw) and you, because you’re playing Cat Synchro, have no defense to protect your field. It will be the easiest thing in the world to bring back the card advantage in this case. Blizzard would do it by itself, so would Brain Control. Since I had a Whirlwind search last turn I have either Kalut or Gale in hand and should easily be able to take care of that Strike Fighter.
You’re also assuming my hand was complete trash. Setting Mirror Force is about the only thing that’s going to let you get away with that plan. Icarus Attack, Solemn Judgment, Book of Moon, Bottomless Trap Hole, even Torrential Tribute will completely ruin your plans and leave me with a Whirlwind and ready to rip you apart with a deck that successfully gets and maintains Card Advantage. Regardless, since I clearly didn’t have any of these cards I must have a bunch of monsters. That means I have the Sirocco/Gale/Bora or Shura/Gale/Bora or Blizzard/Gale/Kalut or whatever combos to completely clear your board and put up my own Synchros that you CANT deal with because you’re playing Cat Synchro. Your only hope is to win with Pot of Avarice. So to win without s/t removal you needed the PERFECT hand and I needed to have NO responsive spell or trap cards.
Funny thing is, if you add m/t removal to your scenario, you OTK me. Hence, the deck can’t win unless it sacks, because you either OTK me or you need the perfect scenario to play out.
I agree I though SCat was dumb until i builded the deck before nats to see what it was all about. I could believe how many tools and options the deck could use when playing it. It could OTK but at the same control a match though card advantage. Playtesting with and against the deck my the GB deck i play at nationals much better due to that. very well written article sir.
finally you tell everyone its a control deck with otk built in
Frankly the ability for synchro cat to generate and maintain field presence/control and card advantage is so glaring powerful, I am at a total loss for why anyone couldn’t foresee its dominance. The second I learned of Airbellums existence, I knew it and rescue cat would create an advantage generating synchro engine that could easily come to dominate the game in the wake of Tele-DAD’ s dismantling. I think many people have yet to fully grasp the impact and significance the synchro mechanic has had and will continue have on the game. Any deck that can support them has access to the most powerful toolbox the game has seen and that toolbox is getting bigger and more versatile with each release. This means that any time you can special tuners at a 1 for 1 ratio you the means to generate highly abuseable combos and when can do it at a 2 for one ratio you the means to generate game breaking combos.
While Synchro Cat is a ridiculous advantage engine, yes, can it be out done by Blackwings if Dark Strike is taken out of the picture by the September ban list? If only through consistency?
Something I’ve been wondering.
Yes, CatSynchro is a deck about getting pluses everywhere, but the general YGO public looks at the deck otherwise. The thing is that so many people play CatSynchro like it is an OTK deck, which is the wrong way to play it.
[...] 3 by “Matt Peddle/Haymaker” in Why Cat Synchro Wins The fact of the matter is that Cat Synchro cannot win without drawing Cold Wave, Heavy Storm or [...]
I know that Rescue Cat is very powerful, but seeing you trying to sell it as a deck that wins by ‘slowly accumulating card advantage’ or whatever is laughable. All the deck does it summon monsters, synchro them, and beat face.
Unless you get the OTK, it’s rather easy to fight back since you’ve lumped all your card advantage into synchros that are useless on my turn. The only useful thing on your field at the end of your turn is Dark Strike Fighter. And anyway, you’re forgetting that everyone plays Threatening Roar and Skill Drain. I know Rescue cat bypasses Skill Drain, but most of your other monsters don’t.
I dont see cat sync as slowly accumulating advantage; however, I do see it as a deck that can generate massive advantage and attempts to punish for over extending. It is a deck that is full of direct removal and can make the game state very simple. It runs many +1′s that harken back the monarch days of old with effects that may even be more punishing.
On the other hand, very few decks can take a decent gamestate for your opponent (specifically gb, bw, and dark decks) into one that is completely useless without much harm to itself. This portion of the deck is what I feel links it in the minds of many to a lucksack deck.
ZonMan in the future please keep your comments to one post.
It is very spammy to continue your comment in another post when it could simply fit in the first one. Thanks.
This article completely changed my outlook on SynchCat.
HydroDragon, I disagree; Sure, the concept of the Deck is indeed perform multiple Synchro Summons, but this is simply due to the fact that the Extra Deck is an all-purpose toolbox that, along with Rescue Cat, can be used easily. I would compare this to the same method that made TeleDAD popular (a Special Summon of Malicious, and either a Normal Summon or Special Summon of Krebons), but Rescue Cat is simply more powerful, and much more simple to use.
The thing is, that if you build the Rescue Cat-Synchro Deck to just perform the infamous OTK, you should have no chance to consistently X-1 in a major tournament. I have already seen people moving toward more control-oriented builds, packing Mystic Tomato, Nobleman of Extermination, etc… So, even I do not have Summoner Monk and two Spells to win the Duel that turn, I can play it safely with Gravekeeper’s Guard and Mystic Tomato.
It is VERY similar to the Monarch Decks of 2007, when we had Brain Controls and Snatch Steal: If you had enough of those Spells, you could win the Duel in a single turn, manipulating multiple Malicious, Card Troopers or whatever. If you did not, you just Set Dekoichi, Gravekeeper’s Spy and slowly gained advantage through those “floater” Monsters. In a Rescue Cat-Synchro Deck, you can do the same thing: Normal Summon an X-Saber to defeat Monsters through battle or reduce the size of the opponent’s hand; attack safely with Mysic Tomato any of your opponent’s Gale, Blizzard, Aurkus, Lumina; and finally, Set Gravekeeper’s Guard which is, in my opinion, one of the best Monsters nowadays, as it blocks everything. Even a Wulf attacking it means a dead card to your opponent, not to mention a Synchro Monster attacking it.
Then, instead of he Monarchs of 2007, we have Tuner Monsters of 2009: the amazing Gale and the neo-Don Zaloog X-Saber Airbellum, to instantly Synchro Summon Arcanite Magician. In fact, I believe Jae pharsed it better than I did: “A Don Zaloog that also synergizes well with Mind Control”: all cards just happen to have an amazing synergy with each other, one that is also common to Blackwing and Zombie Decks. Resuce Cat just does it better than they do.
Meow.
You write a good argument. The comparison to the Monarch deck made it very clear to me what you’re trying to articulate.
But can you see what I’m saying about easily fighting back easily? At the moment I play an off-beat deck that revolves around battling with Victory Viper XX03 and Blue Thunder T-45 while using Riryoku, Honest and Limiter Removal to boost their attacks to ridiculous levels. (I actually use Luminous Spark as my field spell, with decent results!!)
In this scenario just summoning a Victory Viper with an Honest in hand and attacking Dark Strike Fighter would get me two 3800 monsters on the field. And if I happened to play a Luminous Spark we’re getting dangerously close to an OTK.
Just out of interest, do you use X-Saber Urbellum?
[...] Peddle in his post of week (here) and Dale Bellido in his interview (here) both disagree with the general idea that Cat Synchro wins [...]
I strongly disagree with synchro cat entire play style. Yes it does take some skill to not sack to win. The reasons why this deck CAN win is the Extra deck with how versatile it can be.
cat is at 1 =(. It can still work though. I run this deck with 3 debris dragon, so i can get out a cool otk… Despite cat is at 1 i managed to beat ls. gbs and x-sabers but got smashed 0-2 against skill-drain so ill work on that. Keep in mind, CAT IS STILL AWESOME!!!