Shadow's rogue deck of the week #2

[Kira Yoshikage]

I'd like to touch up on a deck that I have much experience with, and several Mada members like as well this week. We are going into the realm of Blackwings!
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Fast, aggressive and controlling, only meta players have something negative to say about this deck.
Strengths: This deck has some of the best themed support in the game, varying in Black Whirlwind, Black Sonic, and Delta Crow - Anti Reverse. This deck's true strength lies within it's inherent ability to swarm the field and summon Synchro monsters and rank-4 Xyz monsters. The deck has seen play in various forms and formats, and is virtually untouched on the banlist with the January 2015 list. Did I mention that they also have 3 Honest in the form of Kalut the Moon Shadow? This deck really puts the pressure on your opponent, and it is very easy to get into their heads. They have an amazing toolbox reaching from Master Key Beetle and Ice Beast Zerofyne, to Beelze of the Diabolical Dragons and even the occasional Dark Armed Dragon. Icarus Attack is also the bread and butter of any Blackwing trap lineup. They have an inherent ability to main/side Vanity's and Skill Drain, as well as other anti-meta options, as well as access to Crush Card and Eradicator Virus.
Weaknesses: Ohh, the irony. Their blessings are also part of their curse. They may have an amazing searcher, and a great toolbox, but herein lies part of their weakness. Blackwings are a glass cannon. Their recovery isn't too great, and their searcher is prone to MST. Also, their DARK typing allows for them to be hard-countered by Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror. Mind Crush makes their searcher work against them, making them potentially minus, and any form of removal or negation, when well-timed, makes Blackwing players cry. Cards that control, while can be played in Blackwings, really hit hard when used against them. Vanity's Emptiness shuts down many of their options, and Royal Decree/Trap Stun is really deadly against them. Raigeki and Dark Hole can take away a Blackwing player's advantage within an instant, allowing a full-on assault. Also, they have an inherent tendency to brick once in a while.
However, even with these weaknesses, Blackwings manage to top a regionals once a format normally, even back when they were almost dead to the game. This deck is still very powerful, and is great at what it does. Also, you can stop many of their hard-counters easily when they are used against you.
From my experience, these are how your matchups are within the meta and/or common decks:
Nekroz:+1. Soft counter.
Yosenju:-2. Hard countered.
Satellarknight:0. Even matchup.
Shaddolls:-1. Soft countered.
Qliphorts:+1. Soft counter.
Burning Abyss:0. Even matchup.
Volcanics:+2. Hard counter.
Mermails:-1. Soft countered.
3.5 Axis Fire Fist:+2. Hard counter.
Batteryman:-2. Hard countered.
HERO:+1. Soft counter.
Lightsworn:+1. Soft counter.
Blackwing:0. Mirror Match.
Sadly, a Blackwing player's worst matchup is the mirror match.

[Kira Yoshikage]

I'd also like to add that many of the tuners have low stats, making them dead draws in certain cases where you desperately need a Whirlwind search. Also, the topdeck game for this deck is........ Very bad.

[Legendary Kabingo]

So much learning X_X

[Stardog]

You'd think the worst possible matchup is the matchup against Burning Abyss eh? Icarus Attack is a slightly weaker Fire Lake of the Burning Abyss, and the destruction of monsters only helps more so to BA. Knowing the matchup is very key when facing against any deck, even decks that have good matchups against Blackwings.

[Kira Yoshikage]

Well you see, BA in it's more consistent form has a heavy reliance on backrow. It's this reliance on backrow that Blackwings take advantage of and pick away at their weaker monsters. Once they lose their Fire Lakes and other stronger backrow, they are left with a few spells and a bunch of weaker monsters. Icarus can pick away at the ones that don't replace themselves, and if you side in Flying "C" or Stygian Dirge, you have one dead BA player. And if you look at the variant that doesn't use much backrow, here is how you deal with them:
Flying "C" or Stygian Dirge
+
Removal to the point of where BA can't do much to replace their stuff
=
Blackwing dominance.
Allthough many would say this is a 50/50 matchup, I personally can say that Blackwings have a good matchup with them.

[Flint]

Looks a lot like the Melee data I do with the match-ups and Star's Combating the Format jam-packed together. Which only reminds me of having to do Melee posts.

On to the point. I know a lot of what you're listing is the most common decks that are expected to see but I think Worms do have a proper match-up against Blackwings. Since Worms can punish aggressive plays and is a very ambiguous match-up to come against which seems to be a good recipe going against Blackwings since Blackwings are indeed aggressive and Worms being an ambiguous match-up.

[(Frost) Ying Yang]

So much knowledge! Its to much to hold in, but nice job on the summaryish thing!

[Arc V Yuto]

Controling the battle field and swarm those are the tactics

[Khina Bree]

Volcanics are a thing?

[α27theDemonKnight]

If Volcanics are getting that good out of the blue. Then that makes them a rogue deck as well?
I'd like to see a Volcanics article before a Ninja article then o_o
I used to use Volcanics a lot in the GX era. 4000LP battles were a breeze with them.

[Flip Flapper]

i kind of want to see the ninja though, i use ninja part time so it would be fun seeing it talked about

[α27theDemonKnight]

^What he said

[Kira Yoshikage]

I havent covered Ninjas yet because they have soooo many builds. In fact, there are still insane builds out there that haven't even been touched! Let me list off the builds I know of that are good.
Karakuri Ninja Flip Control
Mist Valley Ninja
Blackwing Ninja Quasar
Armor Ninja Control
Safezone Ninja Lock
Dark Simorgh Ninja

[Flip Flapper]

also the one i run, a rank 4 based ninja deck, and there is the ninja deck using super transformation a lot and yea your right a lot of them

[α27theDemonKnight]

I run a Karakuri Ninja Flip Control variant that utilizes Ninjitsu Art of Duplication mostly. And Super Transformation is the most fun I've had since Super Polymerization.

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