More 2021 Rituals: Another Run with Drytrons

Earlier this month I wrote an article about winning the Benelux Extravaganza with the Drytron archetype. With a couple new events announced, I wanted to take the deck out for another spin. May 16th was the next Extravaganza, so I started preparing.

Together with my friend, SufferYGO, we started working on a new list. The previous list we used was a combo list with six utility cards. Three copies of and three copies of to counter as much as possible in the main deck. This flexibility helped during game one and siding and proved to work during the last Extravaganza. There were some issues with that decklist that we wanted to work out in this version. It's time for Drytron 2.1.

The Issues

The deck worked amazing during the last event. Winning says it all of course. But the list wasn't perfect. Sam and I both played the same list at that event: 43-card Drytron Vendread Megalith. The issue with 43 cards though is that we sometimes had hands that didn't do quite enough. The first objective we had was cutting the deck down to 40 cards to improve the consistency of our draws. The options were simple, but we had 43 cards for a reason and choosing what to cut was quite hard. We either had to cut the Cyclones or the Droplets. After some discussion we agreed that Droplet wasn't good enough most of the time, so we moved it to the side deck for now.

We also wanted to play more Drytrons. One Drytron in the opening hand often isn't enough, so we wanted at least two. Since we cut down the amount of cards in the main deck we already had a higher percentage of chance to draw more Drytrons in our opening hand. To increase this percentage even further, we chose to play two instead of one. The card overperformed during the first Extravaganza so we wanted another copy.

Another card we focused on was . I really liked the card, but it really only served as an extender. It didn't help make game-winning board states, it just helped finish them. It was even less useful when playing second.

We chose to play a singleton in the deck. This was now the target for the second search. During the main combo, we tribute Benten twice. The first target is and now, as a second target, we can go and grab Artifact Lancea. We figured Lancea was a great pick for the main deck because of its flexibility. During game one it can stop a lot of plays for our opponent. Even if the deck isn't focused on banishing for its engine, it might play some of the pot cards. Firing off Lancea in the Standby Phase disables , and . It also counters Dragon Link and Invoked. For the game two, we have protection from . The card was a great pick for the deck. We chose to keep it at one copy since we can search it and decided not to side more copies. Because of this main deck inclusion, we also swapped the for .

The last alteration to the main deck was that we felt like wasn't achieving enough. We cut the card for and in the extra deck as an additional copy of .

In the side deck, we changed things up a bit too. stayed, just like , , and . was moved to the side together with a new inclusion . The goal of Phantazmay was to draw more negate cards to push for a and break boards. Now we had nine cards in the side deck to break boards and nine cards (with the three Twin Twisters) for back row. The deck was ready.

The Event

The pairings started me off with a doozy of a match. Round one was against Raphael Neven, two-time YCS winner, and Worlds contender. After shaking off my bad luck, I decided to go in headfirst. It's Yu-Gi-Oh! so anything can happen and you can beat everyone.

I lost 0-2.

He won the dieroll and managed his full combo in game one. Looped a card out of my hand with and with two copies of the same Drytron, I wasn't going anywhere. I started game two only to be interrupted by and failed to combo – a quick 2-0 for the YCS champion

This already wasn't going as planned. While it isn't a great feeling to know you have immediately been eliminated from winning the whole event, you still must carry on and do what you can. You have to make the most with what you have.

The second round pitted me against Burn. After I started with my full combo, my opponent immediately countered with Mystic Mine. He then called with saying he saw my previous deck profile and knew I ran it. After two turns of stalling, I drew . A card he didn't expect and game one was in the bag. Good thing I switched it up.

For game two, I sided in more removal. After some stalling with two prohibitions, I eventually used Harpie's Feather Duster to clear the two continuous spells and removed the Mystic Mine with my one copy of Cosmic Cyclone for game.

The third round was against an up-and-coming deck – Tribrigade Zoodiac. In game one, I lost to . Since Droplet was out of the main deck, I couldn't negate its effect. Game two and three I turned it around. After a full combo and adding lancea, the Zoodiac deck went down. Game three was more back and forth, but he ended up a little trap flooded in hand, and eventually, I won the match. A rocky start, but so far so good otherwise.

In round four, I played against Dragon Link Crusadia – a heavy combo deck. In game one, he scooped to my full combo. He had shown me nothing, so I couldn't appropriately sideboard. He used this to his advantage in game two, pulling off his full combo, ending on , , and . On to game three!

In game three, I pulled off my full combo again. He had two in his hand but my third summon was . Another win in the belt put me at a 3-1 record.

Round five pitted me against Phantom Knights. The deck can't play through + Lancea, so I won game one. Game two he misplayed a bit and only ended on and a . Drytron proved to be versatile and with three different Drytron monsters in hand, I could easily go for a Zeus play and score the win.

The last round was against Shaddoll Dogmatika. This is one of the tougher Dryton matchups. The archetype has a tough time dealing with and . I luckily won the die roll and Dweller was enough to win game one. In game two, he went first. He set three cards after resolving and and ended his turn. I activated , which he responded to with . I let that slide and normal summoned Manju of the Ten Thousand Hands. I searched a Ritual Spell and link-summoned to . This was met with . I had to respond here with my Twin Twisters. I chose to destroy the There Can Be Only One and Shaddoll Schism. I knew his last card was . I linked my Kuriboh and Manju into . I had three Drytrons with different names in my graveyard at this point so Ariel would really hurt here. He chained the Dogmatika Punishment to which I responded with Forbidden Droplet. I sent his target to the graveyard and he could not resolve Punishment. After that, it was time for . Battle Phase, attack for 800 directly. Overlay for and Zeus. This won me the game and the match.

In the end, I went 5-1 with Drytron. The deck still had it!

Evaluation

The deck worked the way we wanted it to. I finished in 5th place and my friend Sam finished in 3rd place, with both of us playing the same list. Two Drytrons in the top 8. More than we could have hoped for. It wasn't a win but we both proved the deck still has what it takes to compete for trophies.

The additional Drytron and fixed total cards in the main deck worked wonderfully. I made Zeus a lot more this tournament – simply because I had the option to make it more frequently and this proved to be quite powerful. I could play through a lot of boards with just the Drytrons which was a huge improvement.

The side deck strategy worked again, just like the last event. At the last event, I played Mystic Mine, but I knew that trick would not work again. Having some cards pre-sided in also proved effective as a counter-meta strategy, winning some game ones. Having good options to side out and side in vs loads of different decks makes the sideboard process easier and more effective.

The event itself was also amazing. It was very well organized, the judges were great, and overall, I had an amazing experience. Cardguild does it right every time.

Drytron is still an amazing deck to play even after the Cyber Angel Benten limit. I'm looking forward to Lightning Overdrive. The cards in that set will pump up the power of this deck and it should be a definitive tier one deck again. I'm glad we were able to prove a lot of people wrong and that I've found success with the archetype.

Talk to you all soon.

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