Cardfight Vanguard Deck Tech – Nightmare Dolls
Stand up! Vanguard!
It’s Serena and it’s time for that next V format article I promised! This time we’re covering Nightmare Dolls, part of the Pale Moon Circus. This is what players would know as a ‘tribal’ strategy, or a deck built around a specific subtype of unit. In this case, all Nightmare Dolls are ‘Workeroids’. These living dolls utilize the Imaginary Gift markers for ‘Accel’. Like Bermuda Triangle’s Force markers, these are generated when you ride a grade 3 with the Accel symbol. However, the effect of the Accel markers are unique. There are two types of Accel markers, Accel 1 and Accel 2. Both let you generate new front row rear-guard circles! Accel 1 also gives the unit placed on this new circle 10k power on your turn. Accel 2 only gives them 5k, but you get to draw a card. Now, on to the profile!
Our starter is Silver Thorn Assistant, Ionela, who has the standard effect of a V starter, and is one of the three starters for Pale Moon.
Our grade 1s, however, are more interesting. Starting off with one of the latest additions to the lineup, we have 4 copies of Nightmare Doll, Tosca. When placed, you look at the top 5 of your deck and put up to 1 Workeroid from them into your soul, then shuffle. This will help us set up for our combos when we hit grade 3. Now, onto our other main grade 1, 4 copies of Nightmare Doll, Abigail. When placed on vanguard circle, she will Soul Charge 1. When she’s on rearguard circle, we retire her at the end of turn to return a grade 3 Workeroid from our soul to hand. Then, if our vanguard is a Workeroid, she Counter Charges 1! Next, we include 2 copies of Nightmare Doll, Beverley. It says when another Workeroid goes in her column, they get 5k more power! Finally, we have 1 copy of Nightmare Doll, Edith, who is a solid attacker on one of our Accel 2 markers. She gains 2k power for each of your other Nightmare Dolls when she’s placed on rearguard circle.
The grade 2 lineup continues the theme of Workeroids with Nightmare Doll, Marissa, who is a mandatory 4 of. When placed from our hand, by putting a card from our hand into soul we look at the top 7 cards of our deck and reveal up to 2 non-grade 2 normal units we find there and put them into our hand before we shuffle. This helps us with more combo setup and card advantage! Next, we have 4 copies of Nightmare Doll, Rhoda, essentially a grade 2 version of Edith. Next, we use 2 copies of Jumping Jill, and while not a Nightmare Doll, she is a Workeroid. When placed onto rear from soul she puts one of our other rears into soul, then lets us call a non-grade 2 from soul to rearguard circle! This is a useful combo piece for later! Last, we have 1 Nightmare Doll, Eiln. When she attacks from the rearguard circle, we can Counterblast 1 and put another Workeroid rearguard into soul to give her 10k power and draw a card. If our grade 3s didn’t all use CB, I’d honestly think about running 2 copies!
Speaking of our grade 3s, we have 3 main ones. First, we have 4 Nightmare Doll, Chelsea. When Chelsea is our Vanguard, at the end of the battle she attacks, we can CB1 to call up to 2 Workeroids from our soul, and if our opponent’s Vanguard is grade 3 or greater, those units get 10k power! However, if Chelsea is an attacking rearguard, if our vanguard is a Workeroid, we can put Chelsea into soul to choose an opponent’s rearguard and put that into their soul. This means Chelsea can attack for damage and act as removal to get rid of annoying opposing rears! Next we use 3 copies of Nightmare Doll, Alice. When placed in the Vanguard circle, she calls a Workeroid from soul and gives it 5k power. The rearguard effect for Alice says at the end of the battle she attacked, as cost you CB1, SB1 and put her to soul to call a non-grade 3 card from soul! Our last grade 3 is 4 copies of Nightmare Doll, Carroll! Carroll has 2 vanguard abilities. The first is when she’s placed we get to peek at the top 5 of our deck and put 1 of them to soul and shuffle, then if we put a grade 3 Workeroid off of that, we can call it! Her other ability is a doozy, though, as when our grade 3 rearguard goes into our soul, CB1 and discard 2 cards to ride a Workeroid from our soul as stand and it gets -1 drive! This can enable us to swap into Alice or Chelsea to call more attackers and gives us another Accel marker! Now the last thing we’re going to talk about is our triggers!
First off, I run 5 front triggers, since we generate so many Accel markers, which means more front row rearguards, these give us a lot more pressure with multiple attacks that require guarding instead of putting all of our eggs in a high critical basket. That said, we still use 3 crit triggers. Then we have 4 Hades Hypnotist, who doubles as a draw trigger and a PG. Also, we have 1 more grade 3 to talk about, but she’s a Trigger Unit. It is Nightmare Doll, Lindy! Lindy is a special grade 3 heal trigger called a Heal Guardian! And on top of that, she’s also a Nightmare Doll and a Workeroid! Every Clan includes Heal Guardian, and they all have the same two effects: one when on Guardian Circle and the other when placed on rear. When a Heal Guardian is placed on rear from hand, if your damage zone has no cards, you put the top card from your deck to your damage zone, which can be useful if you’ve been damage denied. More importantly, when a placed on the Guardian Circle, if you didn’t ride a grade 3 or greater during this fight, you either choose one of your vanguards and it gets a 10k boost until the end of the turn, or you choose an opponent’s units and give it critical -2. That means even if they hit, they’re unlikely to damage you!
Alright, that’s it for me for now! If you want more V or even premium deck techs, let us know in the comments below.
Until next time, see ya!