Trade Cards Online

[Discuss]   [Rate] 

The last thing you saw before a brutal ass-kicking.

Artwork, aesthetics, and theme:
Black Ganveet, Temporal Soldier is a generally wicked-looking Demon Command. He looks like one of those 19th century or maybe early 20th century army generals (if you look carefully you can even see that he's holding several swords, two of which look like claws), which is kinda fitting since he is the temporal soldier.

Of course, that look has been modified to fit Darkness aesthetics. Ganveet and his horse look very skeletal (look at Ganveet's big...no, not THAT! I'm not perverted!...horse's neck, it looks like it's made out of bone).

He pretty much looks exactly like his DM-37 incarnation, Black Ganveet, Legion of Demise. Doesn't diminish the badassery, though.

Look at your man. Now back to him. Doesn't look as awesome, does he?

...I'm on a horse.



As for Darkness Ganveet, its body structure, unlike psychic Ganveet's, is rather confusing. He's a giant Demon Command wearing armor and equipped with two badass claws like you'd expect from a fictional assassin. They're probably some kind of evolution from Black Ganveet's two claw-like swords.

Ganveet's civilization, Darkness, is the civilization of destruction regardless of power, which really shows in both sides's effects. Black Ganveet, unlike most psychics, has an "enters the battle zone" effect. Many Demon Commands that have come before, like Olzekia, Deathraios, Hanzou, and of course Ballom, and Demon Commands that have come after, like Thunder Blade and Thunder Tiger, have enter-the-BZ destruction effects. Darkness Ganveet actually has an on-attack destruction effect; pretty rare, but shows how powerful Darkness Ganveet is compared to other Demon Commands.

In the psychic block, Ganveet was one of the five heroes who fought against Diabolos Zeta, Temporal Ruler / Devil Diabolos Zeta, Evil Awakened. He first appeared in DM-37 as Black Ganveet, Legion of Demise. Black Ganveet, as well as the rest of the Bloody Soul creatures, had a theme of discarding cards from your opponent's hand. While psychic Ganveet's on-destruction effect doesn't really represent that, his awakening requirement (At the end of your opponent's turn, if your opponent has no cards in their hand, flip this creature) represents Ganveet's status as the leader of the Bloody Soul creatures pretty well.

General description:
When Black Ganveet enters the battle zone, destroy one of your opponent's tapped creatures. This is a powerful and unique effect (for a psychic anyways).

As always, psychics are unusually powerful compared to other creatures. Would you expect to see:

(Power: 5000 / Cost: 5 / Civilization: Darkness / Race: Demon Command)
■ When you put this creature into the battle zone, choose one of your opponent's creatures. That creature gets -2000 power until end of turn. Then destroy one of your opponent's tapped creatures.

You think that would be rather powerful for its cost, right? Well, that's what all psychics are; a lot of bang for their buck. It's one of the reasons why psychics dominate the JP meta (the other reasons are flexibility and spell support). By the way, the above creature is what happens when Ganveet is played via Hyperspatial Emperor Hole. Emperor Hole into psychic Ganveet is really useful against rush and beatdown decks. It grants you significant card advantage; you use 1 card to destroy two of your opponent's creatures and put a creature onto the battlefield. +2, right there.

Ganveet's powerful effect makes him a great target for any spell that can play him: Revive Hole, Vice Hole, Gotsusan Hole; heck, if you're desperate for removal, it can even be used with Guard Hole and Romanoff Hole.

Heck, you can even play it with Zabi Implosion, Lord of Demons.

However, Ganveet has another purpose.

quote:

■ Awaken—At the end of your opponent's turn, if your opponent has no cards in their hand, flip this creature.

If your opponent expends their hand quickly, then, like the sword of Damocles, the threat of Darkness Ganveet hangs over the opponent's head. When faced with that threat, if your opponent is in topdecking mode, he is forced to retain cards in his hand to prevent Black Ganveet from awakening. Your opponent is forced to retain a card which might otherwise have helped his/her game state, as well as making your discard cards not completely useless later in the game. In deck types where large amounts of discard are played, like hyperspatial control, psychic Ganveet is particularly effective.

And if Black Ganveet does awaken, your opponent will never be able to maintain a field or hand again.

There is another notable aspect about Ganveet; his cost. Now, I'm not speaking in terms of what hyperspatial spells can play him, I'm also speaking of his cost in relation to playing Storm Genji Double Cross, the Super Temporal. Storm Genji XX is used as a finisher in Light/Water/Darkness hyperspatial controls (and can be used in other hyperspatial controls as well, but typically Guard Hole into Diabolos Zeta, Temporal Ruler is used as finisher in Light/Darkness/Nature hyperspatial controls, and Rumble Lecter, Terror Awakened is used in Water/Darkness/Nature hyperspatial controls), so it's important to get it out.

Suppose you have awakened Chakra, Temporal Thunder Dragon into Great Chakra, the Storm Awakened. Cost 14? Cool, 14 plus Black Ganveet's 7 is 21, enough to play Storm Genji XX. How about, after playing Black Ganveet, you have a few other cost 5 hyperspatial spells, and cast those to get 2 other 7-cost psychics out. 7+7+7=21, so you get Storm Genji XX.

Not to mention Darkness Ganveet's cost is just perfect. 13, as well as being the number of bad luck in many cultures (which is thematic), also adds with 7 to make that perfect 20.

Lastly, don't forget psychic Ganveet is a Demon Command, giving him a lot of support. He's good evolution bait for Ballcadeias, Dorballom, and Bolshack Ulpheus. Heck, just read this and this.

Decks:
There is almost no Darkness strategy that psychic Ganveet can't fit in. (The only exception I know of is rush.) He's mainly a control card, but he can be used well in beatdown/assault.

As I said, hyperspatial controls (examples) benefit from psychic Ganveet a lot, but really, ANY control deck benefits from psychic Ganveet. He is that awesome.

Many beatdown strategies involving Emperor Hole or Revive Hole, like Darkness/Fire/Nature Mad Romanoff beatdown, also use Black Ganveet.

Combos with other cards:
Black Ganveet doesn't really...combo with anything. If it counts, the hyperspatial spells that play him "combo" with him. But he's like Terror Pit or Natural Snare; he is a general purpose destruction card that doesn't really combo but is still useful.

Well, there is one card. Hundred-Strike Doll Magnum.

Now you may be thinking "Wha? The anti-psychic card combo with a psychic?" Well, yes. Most decks run only one psychic Ganveet. Once they get him out, he's stuck on the field, and you can't use him again for future Emperor Holes or Revive Holes and such. This is where Magnum comes in; he can instantly return psychic Ganveet to your hyperspatial zone, allowing you to use his effect again, and you still get to destroy a tapped creature.

You can also use Vacuum Crawler for this, and Vacuum is cool. But it's not used much these days.

Ways to counteract it:
Well, to defend against it before it hits the field, you have to use cards that disrupt spells like Fuuma Gorgonshack, Gaga Packun, and Dark Camster. You could also use Alcadeias or Queen Alcadeias to stop it altogether (Except for Guard Hole). Or, of course, if you're running control, you can just not attack. Of course, you're going to have to attack with your finisher eventually, so psychic Ganveet can come into play there and kill it. Otherwise, you can't defend against a comes-into-play ability.

Darkness Ganveet doesn't have Release, so it's vulnerable to the typical bounce spells like Spiral Gate and Hide and Seek too.

Strengths/Pros:
I just explained them, pretty much. :/

Weaknesses/Cons:
There is one weakness of psychic Ganveet. Against decks that don't attack much, like a control, you may struggle to find a good target for Ganveet. However, should you come across such a situation where your opponent isn't attacking and you have Emperor Hole or Vice Hole, then you should probably play Dias Zeta, the Temporal Suppressor instead. If you have Revive Hole, go with Rumble.

Also, in a control deck, he doesn't do much once he hits the field. Sure, he can pressure the opponent to not empty their hand, and he can counterattack into weenies, but not much else.

Overall rating:
10/10. Flexibility, destruction, great race, great cost, everything about psychic Ganveet is great.

(Oh, and silly TCO censors F u u m a _ G o r g o n s h a c k. Presumably because of the first two and last two letters of its name, which combined with the underscore linking them as one word, makes it resemble a certain profane word. You know how TCO doesn't allow half-censored bad words like f * c k and s h * t, right? Well, this is a case of that.)