I think it's safe to say that back in Curse of Sand when the very first Summoning Jutsu for toads was introduced, everyone who followed the series had a fangasm and spent an entire week playing a deck with the jutsu and that awful Naruto, just to try and trick into play a pretty much unplayable five drop. Needless to say, every single one of us soon came to realize (much to our dismay) how terrible that deck actually was. Despite how heart broken we were, many of us looked to the future with hope, that one day a summoning Jutsu that didn't completely suck would come out, and we would get to win games off the of back of over sized, ninja themed, Battle Toads.

And then our our prayers were answered... Or not. "Wait, what the hell? You need to have the freaking toad in your hand for this to do anything, and it doesn't even stick? It's like a terrible Chidori."... Was pretty much the thought going through all of our minds when we read the text of the card we thought was going to help us build a deck with the newly printed version of the Boss Toad. We felt cheated and lied to, and sure we eventually got to play Toads using the Gamakichi platoon, but it wasn't the same thing, because we weren't actually summoning anything, and it sure as hell didn't make up for the two mediocre summoning jutsus we got afterward either.

Well friends, today is the day when we can finally dust off the old Narutoccg check list and check off "Summoned a Toad, and I didn't hate myself for it afterward", which is located bellow "Got to play with the correct Zabuza Momochi [Demon of the Mist village] that Bandai promised to print". Here is today's preview:

I know, it's amazing. After Tylar sent me this card I instantaneously began referring to it as Shadow Clone Jutsu, because in my mind thats what it was. "Costs two lightning? Check. Can be used early to surprise wreck a team? Check. It must be SCJ" was pretty much my entire thought process. The beauty of this card is that while it can't be used by everyone, it's benefits are higher than Shadow Clone jutsu could ever be, by getting to stick a toad in the late game.

There are some pretty sick things you can do with this card, aside from summoning Gamabunta on turn two and wrecking their team. Grabbing our favorite sword wielding snake smasher in response to an opponent's Jutsu is pretty much like using a removal jutsu, which is incredibly sick. Another tricky play you can do if you happen to draw into two copies of the card is as follows:

1) Naruto uses summoning jutsu to Fetch Gamabunta (Optional Victory Dance)

2) Gamabunta's effect to charge 2+ cards and draw 2+ cards.

3) Gamabunta plays other summoning jutsu to get Giant Ninja Toad, Mastery the Jutsu.

4) Bounce a dude with Giant Ninja toad, wreck the team.

5) End of turn Bunta bounces to your hand, but Giant Ninja Toad sticks because Bunta summoned him. Next turn you can summon another Gamabunta with Giant ninja toad via the Mastery'd copy of summoning Jutsu.

Credit goes to Tylar for that sick play, which isn't all that hard to pull off thanks to Bunta's draw and charge effect. This Summoning jutsu is incredibly powerful as well as flavorful, and I can't wait to actually get to try it out! I hope you liked our preview, and check back later in the week for more of our previews from Fangs of the Snake! Until next time.

-Andrew

Labels: Fangs of the Snake, previews, Tylar, Zero