The busy holiday season is finally over, with the long slog of cold and dreary winter months ahead of us here on the East Coast. Of course, I fully intend to keep warm the way people have since time immemorial - playing my favorite trading card game in front a looping YouTube video of a roaring fireplace. But for now, I wanted to talk about one of my favorite parts of the FFTCG, and that's decks revolving around classic Final Fantasy jobs.
Despite the emergence of the usual boring super consistent Earth/Wind decks popping up at tournaments, it would seem that as a whole, people are discovering what we here at Lv.1 Onion Knight knew all along: Job-specific Tribal decks are awesome. What were once decks that were really only reserved for fun, casual play have seen a major boost in competitiveness thanks to some much-needed additions in Opus XII. As a whole, it seems that the card designers now have a more solid vision for how they want each job to play, which makes building tribal decks feel much more powerful and rewarding while also giving them that extra 'oomph' of Final Fantasy flavor that nerds like myself love.
 |
| Dragoon decks are placing in tournaments and none of us were emotionally ready to handle that. |
But just like in the games, not all jobs are created equal in terms of usability. While several jobs got support in Opus XII, some of them definitely got the better end of the deal when it comes to making their decks really powerful, while a few still need a bit more love to really push them to the next level. So today, we're going to be taking a look at how the cards from the latest set improve upon existing tribal decks, and a few combos that you can experiment with using them. To do this, I'm going to be splitting the jobs into two categories:
1) Main Jobs: These jobs feel relatively "complete" in terms of overall power and consistency and have a clear win condition they're aiming for. Reasonably competitive, even if they aren't Tier-1.
2) Sub Jobs: Definitely enough cards to make a fun deck with them, but might be missing one or two key cards to really take them to the next level. Better suited for casual play, though if you manage to win a tournament with them, all the more power to you.
I'm also only going to be talking about jobs that got direct support in Opus XII, and/or that can reasonably be played as a deck, so no Summoners, Bards, Warriors, Black Mages, Ect. And no Chocobos, because they're not really a playable job from the games, and also I didn't feel like talking about them.
So without further ado, lets take a look at some jobs!
Samurai
What started as the little archetype that could in Opus XI has now evolved into an absolute monster of a deck. The issues of its slower setup speed and limited consistency have been all but eliminated with new cards from Opus XII, and heavily benefits from the recent improvements to the Fire element.
Both aggressive and destructive, there's nothing quite as satisfying as burning your opponent's entire board for a non-targeting 7K and boosting the power of your Forwards with every swing. The deck is incredibly reliant on keeping your key cards like Cyan alive, and since they get the most power from the attack phase, the Samurai cards don't have explosive enter the field abilities. Adding Haste with cards like Belias can really help get the most mileage with your Forwards here. Still, this deck can be incredibly hard to set up against, and your opponent may quickly find themselves facing the tip of your blade with no Forwards to protect them.
Good Lord, now this is an archetype-specific Legend if I ever saw one. The fact that Tenzen will more than likely net you a card at the end of each of your turns as well as when he leaves the field (and notice that also means if he gets returned to your hand or removed from the game, not just sent to the Break Zone), it gives your opponent a very limited window of opportunity to deal with him before he nets you insane value.
Despite his high cost, playing Tenzen early can really help speed up how quickly you get access to your combo pieces and establish your board. If I can pitch two cards and play him off of two Backups by turn two or three, I'll already get a return on my investment even if my opponent destroys him next turn, assuming I don't whiff the reveal and have a properly costed Samurai in my Break Zone.
This card could have no effect and it would still be a staple in this deck due to the fact that it's a 2CP Samurai that you can play multiples of. With this, Gosetsu, and the Opus VII Samurai Backup, you're significantly less reliant on needing to keep all your Samurai Forwards alive to get the most out of Cyan's AOE burn. You probably wouldn't want to use the effect of this card since the deck is so dependent on the number of Samurai you have on the field, but it does give you some emergency removal if you need it.
While Mono-Fire decks are still fairly vulnerable to Summon-based removal, Amaterasu does a lot to help keep your vulnerable little Cyans and Irohas alive. It denies your opponent from getting any value from the entry effects of Forwards, and can shut down a devastating board wipe from Shantotto. Given how little protection the deck has, I highly recommend running three of these and maybe a Terra or two to get the back from the Break Zone.
Combo Ideas
Blaze may not have the prettiest face, but it's hard to deny that he synergizes extremely well with Samurai decks. You can soften up two of your opponent's Forwards to get them in range of Cyan's burn even without a board full of Samurai, and then he can break himself to clear up space for more Backups while dealing respectable damage. But since neither of his effects specify that he needs to target your opponent's Forwards, you can also target your own Magissa to trigger her search effect.
Many of the Samurai Forwards cost 3CP, and the ability to search and play them straight from the deck is extremely powerful. Cyan would be the obvious first target for her effect since you'd be getting even more value off his search, but cards like the new Alisae/Alphinaud or Forza are also decent options should you want to include them.
If you want to go absolutely bonkers with AOE damage, then the new Bahamut Forward has an unexpectedly good amount of synergy with Samurai decks as well. This combo does require you to invest more heavily in Summons, but considering how many good options Fire now has, that's hardly a problem. Having Fang and Mootie out make your Bahamut essentially free to play, as well as making the ordinarily clunky Opus VIII Bahamut Summon playable for 1CP. With Amaterasu to prevent entry effects and Bahamut negating Break Zone effects, you also have more options for removal-based protection.
Favorite Deck Build
Kurosawa's Dragon Maximum - This deck uses the aforementioned Bahamut combo for maximum chaotic destruction. It also uses Caius after I recently talked smack about how he wasn't good, thus making me look like a buffoon. I'm all for it.
Dragoon
The dream of Dragoon fans everywhere appears to finally have been realized as one of the earliest job archetypes of the FFTCG finally looks like it's hitting its stride - and all it took was one Backup!
That may sound like a huge exaggeration, but Dragoons are now able to set up much faster thanks to the new 2CP Backup. Since Dragoons are a number-based archetype, you want as many of them on the field as possible. Thankfully, many of them are already fairly cheap, or get cheaper/more powerful with more of them in play. You need to absolutely load your deck with Dragoons to get the most out of their utility, which unfortunately means you'll have to include some members of the tribe that aren't exactly the sharpest spears on the weapon rack. But Dragoons are an incredibly straightforward archetype that is simple to pick up and play. With built in Haste with Barbara, extra draws with Alus, and the ability to wipe boards with Freya's Cherry Blossom, getting the jump on your opponent has never been easier.
I originally dismissed this card as a half-hearted attempt to buff up Dragoons at first glance, but I was a fool. A fool I tell you! It really can't be understated just how much this guy does to speed up this deck, especially since unlike Samurai, Dragoon decks don't seem to have benefited much from other Lightning cards released in this set.
You're definitely going to want your opening hand to have one of these, since he makes your Opus VIII Dragoons cost one less and makes your Opus VI Dragoons come in with 2K more power. Obviously those numbers will only continue to snowball the more job/name Dragoons you have out, and unlike the Samurai backup from Opus XII, the break ability could actually be useful to recover some of your key pieces like Barbara, though you'll most likely be using it to fetch a Freya from the Break Zone for another Cherry Blossom. Just don't forget King of Burmecia received an errata and can only search for Dragoon Forwards, so sadly this one isn't an eligible target!
Speaking of Burmecia, everybody's favorite rat waifu premiers with a new Dual element card in Opus XII. Even if you run a mono-Lightning build, you can get around her element requirement with Aranea's ability to play a 2-cost from the Break Zone. She has higher-than-average stats as well as two decently relevant abilities to either filter out your hand, or get one of your opponent's Forwards in range to get taken out by one of your Dragoons with First Strike.
...Buuuut if I'm being totally honest, this Freya will most likely never make it to the field, since you'd really want her to pay the cost for Opus III Freya's Cherry Blossom. With this and the Water Freya from Opus VIII, you have a total of 9 board wipes sitting right in your hot little hands, and unlike Cyan's effect you can use Cherry Blossom at the end of your opponent's turn. Given that you most likely have a ton of Dragoons on the field, that's not a position I would personally like to find myself in.
Early on in the game you can easily reveal a packed hand to break an opposing Forward and swing in with Haste for a quick point of damage. Plus it's also for no real cost other than giving your opponent the oh-so-valuable information that your Dragoon deck is running a lot of Dragoons. Groundbreaking I know.
Combo Ideas
Being a fairly simple deck that revolves around spamming Forwards, Dragoons aren't really what I would call a combo-heavy deck. However I had this pulled on me in a match and I thought it was an unusually clever trick. As we discussed, it can seem like a tall order to get enough Dragoons in hand to pull off Ruby Dragoon's break effect. However, if a majority or all of the Forwards in your deck are name/job Dragoon, you have an excellent chance of getting a third draw with Alus' Effect every turn, so that makes it a bit more reasonable.
But lets say you still don't have enough in your hand after that. Well, you can break your Backup Dragoon to add another one from the Break Zone to your hand. You can also use Crowe's break effect if you don't wan't to reduce the number of Dragoons on the field.
This one is an oldie but a goodie, and most Lightning players are probably already familiar with this combo even outside of Dragoon decks. Play Cid Previa by pitching King of Burmecia to pay his cost, then use Cid's effect to play King for free. You just got two backups and a search in one go, easy-peasy. If you're feeling extra spicy you can search for Opus IX Kain and put King into the Break Zone for his effect, clearing up space to play another King and presumably getting rid of one of your opponent's Forwards.
Favorite Deck Build
Shane Duckworth's Dragoon Deck - No Summons. 34 Forwards, all of them Dragoons. I hope you like heights because we're about to jump off into the stratosphere.
Ninja
Being split across a variety of elements and having very little cohesion, nobody was expecting Ninjas to come together the way it did with the addition of Edge in Opus XI. This deck is able to ramp up at breakneck speeds, playing most of its Ninja Backups for only 1 CP of any element, powering up the Eblan Four's powerful entry effects in the process. With enough Ninjas on the field, Zangetsu can easily dull your opponent's entire field for only 3CP, and Edge will have plenty of Shuriken Counters to quickly remove any Forward standing in your way.
That being said, without Edge on the field the deck can rapidly fall apart, and while it's easy to swarm the field with Ninjas, emptying your hand too quickly can leave you vulnerable to an ill-timed board wipe. Opus XII does little to drastically upgrade Ninjas' playstyle, or cover up any of its weaknesses (though much like for Samurai decks, Amaterasu definitely helps), but instead gives the deck a few new options to play around with. While it may not have seen a massive overhaul, anybody who is looking for a fast, combo heavy deck will appreciate that the Ninja archetype has more than enough tricks up its sleeve to leave your opponent seeing double.
The obvious answer would be that Ruby Ninja lets you do that more which can only be a good thing. But the thing I really like about this card is that it gives more of an incentive to run the Legend Onion Knight from Opus IV, who I (ironically) hadn't been using much before this. There goes all my credibility.
In any case you can cleanly finish off most Forwards during the Attack Phase by pumping up Onion Knight's swing damage from 3k to 8k. The more damage you have flying around with Ninjas the better, so this is definitely a 3-of staple for multi-color decks.
Now here's where things get interesting. Because so many Ninja Forwards have powerful effects, running cards like Miounne and the Chocobo Summon are a good way to get more uses out of them. But this card not only allows you to return Forwards like Tsukinowa to your hand for later use, but also lets you "upgrade" them into higher cost Forwards. Since you've just played another Ninja (and not like... Hooded Man or something, though I suppose you could), you now have an extra two Shuriken Counters on Edge and presumably another entry effect for only 3CP. Pretty sneaky sis.
Combo Ideas
One of the reasons I never really ran the Onion Knight package before Opus XII was because the Sage version kind of felt like dead weight in my hand a lot of the time. But because he costs 3CP, he's actually the perfect target for the new Ninja's effect. You can combo Sage's effect with Edge's Shuriken and then swap him out for the Ninja Onion Knight. This lets you target something else with OK's ping ability, set it up for another combo with Edge, and search for another Sage, setting up a revolving door of Onion Knights.
Don't underestimate just how effective the 1CP Ninjas can be! Edge doesn't have a clause saying that Ninja's cost can't be reduced to zero, so they're free bodies and Shuriken Counters. Also because this particular 1CP Ninja doubles the damage dealt to a Forward, it can make Ruby Ninja's effect do 10K damage on a swing.
Favorite Deck Build
Ninja's Caballero Cebolla Version - Pretty much the gold standard for multi-element Ninjas. I get that Izayoi is the least impactful member of the Eblan Four, but I like to run her for extra style points.
Warrior Of Light
The original multi-color archetype has seen a variety of support through the years, though no previous set has been quite so kind to the Warrior of Light job than Opus XII. With a whopping 8 new cards this set, three of which are Legends, there's definitely more to talk about with WoLs than any other archetype.
Flexible and versatile, you have options galore when it comes to Warriors of Light. Running a four-color deck can be totally viable thanks to the sheer amount of utility, cost reduction, and free plays the deck now has access to. If consistency is your aim, then dual-color decks like Fire/Water have also been used to great success. As you might expect, Warriors of Light benefit most from being a team, and can become an almost insurmountable wall when played with cards like Minwu. That being said, any deck that can specialize in ignoring power with insta-break effects, or cards like Braska's Final Aeon that can ignore damage reduction effects can quickly scatter your party of stalwart defenders. But underestimating the Warriors of Light would be a big mistake, since they now have more than enough bite to send your opponent crawling the back to the darkness from whence they came.
There have been attempts at given Warriors of Light cohesion before, mostly with Refia and the FFIII crew, but that was nowhere near as good as Faris. Keep in mind that her effect triggers every time a Warrior of Light enters the field, not just when she does, so this can lead to some absolutely massive turns where you flood the board and then cap off for some significant burn damage.
Considering how many Warriors of Light cost 3CP, this can make for some fairly explosive turns. Even in a four color WoL Build, it's not particularly hard to get around her dual-element cost requirement as long as you're running cards like Cosmos, Tyro, or Shantotto. Definitely an essential piece of giving WoL decks some much needed legs.
You would think running Haste would be essential with her in order to get her effect off, but with all of the boosting effects WoL have, she will usually come out of the gate with 10 or 11K power, making her pretty difficult to deal with using ping based removal. Once she's done her job, you almost want her to be disposed of, since she's a prime target for Opus V Light Wol's exit effect that plays a 3 cost from the Break Zone. Even if your deck becomes a bit more Light heavy, she's definitely a great inclusion.
If you were going to have a powerful 1CP Forward, it usually came with some huge drawback, but that design choice appears to have gone out the window with Sol. While he may be small in terms of his power, the amount of search power he gives to the deck can't be understated, and he's pretty much guaranteed to net you a free card on the turn he's played.
Even if he's broken through a block or removal, he's incredibly easy to recur with Lenna, and if your opponent miscalculates how many attacks they can survive, he can easily win you the game. More 1CP cards like this please!
So... this effect is absurd, right? Like we can all agree on that? The ability to play a majority of the cards in your deck for free is already a pretty gross amount of value, but he's got a huge body and helps set up your deck for party attacks with Sol. The original Opus VII Aigis was already pretty good, but I think this version blows it out of the water.
The obvious choice of target for Aigis would be Faris since you can just ignore her color requirement, but using her effect to reduce his cost by two can be a cheap way to chain together more of her burn effects. Don't feel like you're obligated to only play 4CP cards - you can get just as much value playing a majority of the 3 cost WoLs with his effect! Also it's interesting to note that his card effect specifies he can play a Job Warrior of Light, not a Forward. Currently the only backup you can play with this effect is the Opus II Arc, but it's something to keep in mind if any more get printed in the future.
My favorite thing about Krile is that she also lets you use your opponent's Break Zone as a third resource to cast Summons from. Since multi-color decks don't have any problems generating whatever CP they need, you can basically recast anything your opponent has already used without worrying about cost. You can also use her effect to "negate" any cards that recover Summons like Terra or Porom by casting them before they can get their greasy little paws on them. But you all know the best way to use Krile: Live the dream and cast that Bahamut Zero from your opponent's Break Zone.
Hoo boy, it's a pity that Warriors of Darkness didn't get this level of support, because they're just piling on the value here with Dusk. You get more heavily discounted plays with Dusk, but unlike Aigis you aren't locked into only playing Warrior of Light Forwards, so you have a lot more variety in the cards that can be played his his effect, like Alphinaud/Alisaie or even the new multi-element Y'shtola. The S-Ability is just icing on the cake of an already great card.
But unlike with the case of Aigis, I think that there's still a very strong case for using the older version of Dusk too. If you're using a more Summon heavy deck, you can use Dusk's effect to cast 1CP Cu Siths and essentially negate the cost of using Krile's Dull effect. Plus, reducing the older Dusk's cost with Faris nets you a free card for only 1CP, which is just gravy.
She may have a high cost, but I don't think I need to explain why the ability to search out two Forwards from the most pertinent Category and Job in Warrior of Light decks is a good effect. The more Warriors of Light you have in your hand, the more cards you can chain with Faris/Aigis/Dusk/ect, so this card does a lot of legwork for setting the deck up.
Having to break a Backup just to reactivate one Forward may not seem like a great secondary effect outside of avoiding a loss when your blockers are Dull/Frozen. But you can also use Sarah to reactivate Lenna or Krile to use their effects twice in one turn, and leaves a space in your back row open to generate more Arise counters.
With Party Attacks getting a stronger focus in Opus XII, Bartz plays well with a lot of the new 1CP Forwards while also reaping the benefits of all the Warrior of Light support. While Sol doesn't need Bartz's Haste, combining their Party effects lets you search out both a WoL and play a 1CP straight from the deck. Pretty good for technically one attack.
If you're going to run this Bartz, you're obviously going to want to change the build that you're running to include more 1CP Forwards. Combining Chocobos with WoLs could be an interesting combination, since Black Chocobo can let you Party attack with Sol without worrying about your fragile value-maker smashing his pretty little face against your opponent's Forwards. Chocobos of Light! Kweh!
Combo Ideas
A Backup that searches for another Backup is a great way to ramp up quickly, and since Princess Goblin can search out your key Light Forwards, you can quickly start setting up your combos. It may seem counter-intuitive to play a Backup that breaks as soon as you play the Light Forward you just fetched, but remember that Lenna will still count Princess Goblin for an Arise Token before she is sent to the Break Zone, and now you have space to generate more with another Backup.
If you're already going to be using Party Attacks with Sol, there's really no reason I can think of not to run Yuna too. The draw power she provides to this deck is pretty substantial, and you don't even need Aigis on the field to let her and Sol team up. You'll put yourself ahead with Sol's search while simultaneously setting your opponent's board state back with an 8k power reduction, AND they'll still need to deal with the party attack. Just make sure you're not decking yourself out with all this draw power!
Favorite Deck Build
Warrior of Light (Choushiryuu) Multi-element decks are just more fun. I don't know why, I don't make the rules. I tend to like running a few more Light cards in my deck, with two copies of Lenna, one Refia, one Opus V Light Wol, and Cosmos. You would think this would clog up your hand, and sometimes it does, but it's not as big of a problem as you might think.
Phew! That was a lot of cards to talk about! But lets take a bit to briefly touch on some of these Subjob archetypes and their current strengths and shortcomings.
Knight
The first official job-based archetype has gotten plenty of new members to add to its ranks over the years, but is receiving some much-needed mechanic updates for the first time since (arguably) Opus VI. But while Opus XII provides some major buffs to Knights, as a whole the archetype is starting to show its age.
All of the Knight support cards specify that they can only target Job Knights, not card name Knights. Though this is balanced out by having a lot of powerful named characters like Ramza and Agrias in their ranks, they don't have the same amount of consistency as the other archetypes that can rely on a plethora of Standard Unit cards. Combining the effects of Beatrix, Rain, and Steiner can pump your board of Forwards to dizzying heights on your turn, but right now it appears to play like a strange cross between the value of Warriors of Light and the power of Dragoons without fully realizing either.
In the future if Knights could have some way of quickly producing lots of cheap, disposable units that transform into a high-powered army on your turns, that would do a lot to sharpen the blade of these timeworn cavaliers.
All of the Knight support cards specify that they can only target Job Knights, not card name Knights. Though this is balanced out by having a lot of powerful named characters like Ramza and Agrias in their ranks, they don't have the same amount of consistency as the other archetypes that can rely on a plethora of Standard Unit cards. Combining the effects of Beatrix, Rain, and Steiner can pump your board of Forwards to dizzying heights on your turn, but right now it appears to play like a strange cross between the value of Warriors of Light and the power of Dragoons without fully realizing either.
In the future if Knights could have some way of quickly producing lots of cheap, disposable units that transform into a high-powered army on your turns, that would do a lot to sharpen the blade of these timeworn cavaliers.
Fan-favorite Beatrix makes a long-awaited return to the FFTCG, and with some amazing exclusive artwork to boot. There's no denying that she's intended to provide a similar boost to Knights as Edge did to Ninjas, being cheap, low power Forwards that enable you to play more archetype-specific cards.
Boosting your entire board by 2k every time a Knight is played can quickly make your board overwhelming, especially when combined with similar boosting effects. But the fact that you can only use her cost-reduction ability once per turn seems to infer that you'd get the most benefit out of it by making your big, expensive Knights like Agrias, Jegran, or Garland cheaper, rather than playing a lot of smaller Knights in one turn. Still, there are a lot of interesting ways to generate value with her effect, and this effect will only continue to get better as more Knights are produced.
Weirdly enough Steiner is not compatible with Beatrix's cost reduction effect since it has the "can't become zero" clause. Still, he does pair quite nicely with her boosting effect, since for only 2CP you can boost your entire board by a whopping 4k. Combined with cards like Rain and Ovelia, Stiener can become a huge 14k, and if you can also use Rain's Leadership S-Ability to provide Haste, that quickly becomes a frightening prospect.
There are a ton of pertinent 3CP Forwards, so the option to temporarily remove a threat from the board is also a pretty valuable option. My one gripe with this card is that as good as he is, it can be a tough choice between him and the old 5CP Search Steiner depending on your build.
Gawain is definitely one of the best targets for Beatrix's cost reduction, since getting to search out two cards for only 2CP is pretty darn massive. Of course the biggest elephant in the room with his effect is that there aren't really a whole lot of Fire Knights, with Garland, Fire Rain, and Steiner being the only viable targets. Being able to fetch more fodder for Light Rain's S-Abilities isn't really a bad use for Gawain's search if you don't mind taking up deck space.
Gawain's search will definitely get more powerful as more sets are released, and he can even search for Backups if they ever print any. But for now it feels a bit like you'd be going out of your way to make Tricolor Knights work.
Just so we didn't forget that a good chunk of Knight's primary support is in Lightning, here we have Jegran. Six is a rather hefty cost for a Forward, so saving your Beatrix cost reduction for him would also be wise, especially since he both searches and plays a Job Princess (yet another odd piece of Synergy being pushed for Knights) from the deck.
If you're going to run Jegran you might as well go full hog and also run Opus VI Garland so all your Knights get Brave. I'm not sure if it will actually help you win more games, but hey why not?
Fan-favorite Beatrix makes a long-awaited return to the FFTCG, and with some amazing exclusive artwork to boot. There's no denying that she's intended to provide a similar boost to Knights as Edge did to Ninjas, being cheap, low power Forwards that enable you to play more archetype-specific cards.
Weirdly enough Steiner is not compatible with Beatrix's cost reduction effect since it has the "can't become zero" clause. Still, he does pair quite nicely with her boosting effect, since for only 2CP you can boost your entire board by a whopping 4k. Combined with cards like Rain and Ovelia, Stiener can become a huge 14k, and if you can also use Rain's Leadership S-Ability to provide Haste, that quickly becomes a frightening prospect.
Just so we didn't forget that a good chunk of Knight's primary support is in Lightning, here we have Jegran. Six is a rather hefty cost for a Forward, so saving your Beatrix cost reduction for him would also be wise, especially since he both searches and plays a Job Princess (yet another odd piece of Synergy being pushed for Knights) from the deck.
Combo Ideas
The popularity of people running Ritz in Mono Fire decks made me see how including an off-color card that can be played by another card's effect is pretty good. There are no other Wind knights, so Jornee is a bit of an odd choice, but she's a searcher that can be played for free, and Gawain just so happens to be a target for her. Bonus points if you reduce Jegran's cost with Beatrix, as mentioned earlier.
As powerful as 6CP Ramza can be, I actually think that the old Opus IV Ramza better suits the playstyle of swarming the board with smaller Knights to keep triggering Beatrix's boost. If you don't want to have to rely on filling your deck with Fire Rain cards just so you can use Rain's S-Ability more frequently, Ramza can also be used as a substitute to provide haste to your recently pumped up weenies.
You can use the effect at least twice per turn using Claidie's activation effect and arrange for more destructive turns, and potentially more than that if your cards break using your turn. If only there were a Lightning Knight that broke your own cards... Water/Lightning/Earth Ranperre Knights anyone?
Favorite Deck Build
Knight 3-Color (KrijsKriser) If you're making an effort to include Fire in a deck that uses IX characters, there's no reason not to run Water-L Zidane with some extra haste support. That turn one combo never gets old.
Monk
Monks made quite the splash in Opus XI, finally getting a Legend that solidified them into a more concrete archetype. Using Monks as resources for Ursula's ability gives the job a fairly unique mechanic. If a win is within reach, you can break as many cards as you need to wipe out your opponent's Forwards, giving it a high-risk, high-reward playstyle. However even with Legend support, Monk's footwork was still a bit lacking, and Opus XII did little to improve their form, adding only a single Backup.
Despite the new set not doing much to drastically improve an archetype that was finally beginning to show promise, that isn't to say that they don't have any new tricks under their black belts. The final piece of the puzzle that makes Monks super competitive is still missing, but some much needed recursion helps a deck that burns through your own cards to win. While it may take a few more sets of meditating under waterfalls and punching mountains with their bare hands, Monks are an archetype with interesting potential.
With only one new card, there isn't too much to talk about with Monks, but as Dragoons and Samurai showed, sometimes that can be enough. It goes without saying that this is one of the best Monk Backups as far as contributing to the deck's overall win condition. The fact that it recovers both Forwards and Backups is great, considering how self sacrificial the archetype is. It's frustrating that the cost doesn't allow this one to be played onto the field with Ursula's effect, but there are a few neat combos you can do with this card even without her.
If it just had the recursion effect then it would still be a perfectly serviceable addition to the deck, but the secondary effect is both great removal and a nice bit of flavor, triggering a "combat" effect that we've seen on a few cards before this. Despite it not being as cheap as the other Monk Backups, I'd say this is too important not to run 3 of.
Combo Ideas
I'm genuinely surprised that these cards didn't come out in the same set, considering that they have some truly excellent synergy together. Now Luca not only helps put another Monk onto the field after you break her, but she now has a target with a valuable entry effect. Obviously recursion is the name of the game with Monks, so I'd recommend playing Luca as early as possible. Now if only there was a Category IV searcher in Earth, this deck would get a lot more consistent. There's always Opus XIII right?
At first glance, I thought that White Mage was just a subpar version of Devout that was limited to Earth Forwards. But on second glance it actually has a rather large advantage: You can use its effect on your opponents turn. This card can not only help you recover after a nasty board wipe. But considering that Yang can get you a free Ursula, who can then get play a 2 cost Monk from the Break Zone, you can quickly get three Monks on the field just by sacrificing one Backup, and have them ready to attack once your opponent's turn ends.
Fenrir is a card that could provide some valuable options for Monk decks - in theory anyway. The main problem with Monk Forwards (and I suppose Earth Forwards in general) is that there aren't a whole lot of impactful 2-Costs available. For Monks, your only job-specific option is the vanilla monk from Opus I, which won't feel great to replay with Fenrir, but it can at least help you extend your plays.
Still, in a deck that wants as much recursion as possible, including Krile is definitely a viable second target, so you can keep reusing your Cu Sith's or Amaterasu's. Plus it's a versatile enough summon that you will probably get use out of one of the other effects. I only hope we finally see more 2CP Monks that are more than just cannon (Chi-blast?) fodder in the future.
Since a few of the Monks are on the smaller side, Gippal can be a great way to give them a little extra kick, if you'll pardon the pun. In addition, party attacking with Ursula will make it so that you don't have to sacrifice two Monks on your turn in order to get the most damage out of her second ability. Definitely makes your attack phase a much more frightening prospect!
Favorite Deck Build
Ursula Opus XII (victorgar) Simple and to the point, there's a good mix of power boosts and protection in this deck. I prefer to run Fire/Earth, and it has nothing it all to do with the fact that I'm a big gay simp for Sabin and Duncan.
And that concludes our breakdown of job improvements from Opus XII! Which jobs have you tested out this set and which ones are you hoping get more support in the future? Am I a big friggin' idiot and Monks and Knights are actually amazing while Ninjas are trash? I'll be here dreading the answer to that question while I triple sleeve my full art Ursula.
Until next time - keep on grinding,
