Kagero Pre-Game Discussion

So even before the game starts there are already a couple of choices you can make like if you'll be doing a loser picks the order of turns on a best of 3 match scenario or like during your mulligan phase on what cards to keep on certain match ups.

So for turn order, you would mostly prefer to go second because of the following reasons:

• You get first Stride
• You get to attack first
• You essentially can rush out of your bad matchups
• You get to see what they ride on all grades first

This is ideal for you because it could tell you what cards should you save or use and of course you almost always will get to GB 2 first.

Now comes the mulligan phase, this is where you get to decide what to keep in your hand. Now keep in mind that this deck does not have the optimal number of Grade 2's in it so if you're missing a Grade 2 and you have non-triggers of an extra grade in your hand, then I would still mulligan away the extra card and keep the best ride target.

Good Ride Targets by grades are:

Grade 1: anything not a Sentinel (Bellog is bad but not too bad)

Grade 2: Legion Mate (Depending on the matchup) anything that's not Nehalem

Grade 3: any of your 2 Overlords but Legend is most of the time better

Next, if you have the liberty of opening without your triggers (except heal triggers which would be useful if going first), there are cards worth considering keeping and tossing back against certain matchups but for right now I'm only going to talk about your bad matchups.

Against Granblue

• So in this matchup what you want to do is be really aggressive from the start and try to finish them with Ace. So to finish them with Ace, you would need Overlords meaning you might want to keep Conroe. Then another aggressive card is Burning Horn Dragon which makes for a pretty good beater pre GB. Then there's Nehalem and Spherical Lord which is pretty much the next best thing you can have to go with your Ace kill turn.

• TL;DR : Conroe, Burning Horn, Nehalem, Spherical Lord (In that order)

Against Gear Chronicle

• In this matchup there are some niche ways to build advantage really early into the game and it sometimes is the key to winning, this involves using Gattling Claw Dragon on their starter or Using Dragonic Burnout on their Starter as well as any other unit. There's also Neoflame which you can use usually after they make a column to one of the sides. Most importantly, there's Bellog which stops their loops with Melem as Bellog can retire whatever they call rested with Melem. If you stop enough of their plays you might win but it's not an easy matchup. 

• TL;DR : Early Game retirers, Bellog

Against Bermuda Triangle

• Against mermaids, there's a pretty annoying thing they can do which is they bounce back from the field to their hand before you can retire them. Pretty much this renders a bit of your advantage engine useless, however they do have a pretty strong defense and aside from their Strides which a lot of them have extra criticals on them and or can restand, their rear guards don't really have much pressure, One way I knew to beat them was to play really conservatively and either win by just sheer defensiveness using your handtrap mechanics and trying to just outlast them until you get to play your pressure Strides safely again and again.

• TL;DR : Consider keeping your Legion, Heal Triggers, Other defensive options

Against Pale Moon

• Like Bermudas, Pale Moon has a bad habit of disappearing rear-guards before you can retire them. Luckily you have the best mechanic in the game with Handtrap cards like Bellog, Denial Griffin and most importantly Defeat Flare. I know I've brushed on this before but you want to make Defeat Flare live ASAP (search and dump Blademaster) and you need to look for the Defeat Flare turn that's the most optimal pretty quickly before they can overrun you with multiple attacks and disappearing rear-guards. On the bright side, Blaze would almost always be active.

• TL;DR : Any Handtrap and Grade 3 Drop Zone Fillers

Great Nature

• This is a frustrating matchup because a lot of their units they either retire themselves or cannot be retired or have resist. Which means again, that your advantage engine does not work. They also have a very powerful stride against your deck called Afanc and that makes it so none of their rearguards can't be retired on their turn meaning handtrap does not work either. This makes it so you have to be smart about your targets and most of the time if you see a Caryon Tiger, you kill it not by attacking because they have Dizmel but with an effect. Just overall try to snipe key rear guards and you shouldn't have a problem. (Also while I'm on the topic of GN, don't use your starter while they have the can't be retired rear-guard.)

• TL;DR : Keep specific rear-guard snipers

That's about it on what to keep against bad matchups and hopefully you would get to see some success in your mulligans after reading this. Next up would be the early game and how you should play it.

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