Fearen

Kiyoko was dedicated, Hypatia realized as she ate the last apple. The entire time that they had been sitting there eating, Kiyoko hadn't said a word. Although, now that she was thinking about it, she could have said something as well if she wanted. She considered it for a moment but decided against it. She didn't really know how to go about doing that without making things even more awkward than they already were. She sat at the table for a few minutes longer before getting up slowly and pacing listlessly around the room. She had nothing better to do than go through the events of the day again, so that was what she did. Maybe it would help her to not forget them again.

"What if I forget again?"

She whispered it under her breath, horrified. It was easily the most distressing thought that she had had all day. She paced faster, opening the bag at her side and rummaging through it anxiously. She had left a note to herself earlier, so she had to have something to write with. She kept digging, eventually pulling out a notebook with a pen tucked neatly into its binding. She beamed as she held it up in front of her, spinning around with it a few times and excitedly kissing the cover as she stopped. She brought it to the table and quickly began writing every little detail of the day, occasionally stopping to pace quickly around the room or to pirouette in place before coming back and writing some more.

She had gotten about 12 pages into the book when she had to move so that the table could be set. That was probably enough for now anyway, given that she had written literally every detail she could remember. She got up and paced around the room some more, reading through what she had written again and again until the others were brought into the hall.

As the others took their seats and began to converse, she sat back for a bit, half trying to figure out who she wanted to sit with and half eavesdropping. Mr. E had asked them not to talk about any of the things that she had really wanted to ask about, and she felt like it probably wasn't a good idea to be any ruder to him than she had already. She almost wanted to ask about Hearthome, but it would probably be easier to hear about that by eavesdropping anyway. So she instead moved in the direction of who was easily the most eye-catching person in the room. She grabbed a plate of french toast and sat down next to Shannon.

"That is a very nice suit."

Hypatia

She had been mistaken about being in control of the duel. Kiyoko had made that exceedingly clear. “I’ll draw!” She took the card into her hand and looked over her options. Two counters she couldn’t use and four cards in hand, while Kiyoko had a board of monsters and cards in her hand to spare. She felt childish for it, so she didn’t let it show on her face, but Hypatia was a little upset. She had, for a brief moment, fantasized that she might be some sort of miraculous card game savant. It didn’t help that Kiyoko was so utterly stoic. Well, not entirely; Hypatia had seen her glance over her face down cards, if only for a moment. She could probably use those to bluff while she went on the offensive. That would only work if she could put pressure on Kiyoko though. She would have to get lucky here.

“I’ll summon Witch of the Black Forest, and I’ll tribute her to use Monster Gate. It lets me reveal cards from my deck until I reveal a monster, then I can special summon it.” She pulled out the cards slowly, with a steady hand, hoping for the one that would turn things around. D.D. Dynamite, Widespread Ruin, Soul Absorption, and… Hypatia threw her head back and let out an uproarious laugh which subsided into an exasperated chuckle. She sighed and revealed the card. “Bad luck! Tsukuyomi can’t be special summoned, so all four are sent to the grave.” She placed them in the slot. There wouldn’t be a comeback this time. “When my Witch is sent to the graveyard she lets me add a monster from my deck to my hand. I’ll choose Battle Fader, and then I’ll special summon Chaos Sorcerer by banishing a light and a dark monster from my grave.” She eyed Garoth disdainfully. “Would you mind removing that thing for me darling?” The Sorcerer obliged, pointing a finger at the Lightsworn without a word. It vanished just as silently. “That’ll be all for me. I end my turn.”

Kiyoko didn’t seem too bothered by the loss of her monster as she simply declared, “my turn. Draw!” Looking at the card in her hand she said, “first, I activate Raiden’s effect once again and send the top two cards of my deck to my graveyard.” As she declared this, Raiden’s blades glowed golden once more as she tossed the cards to her graveyard. However, as she did so, a column of light erupted next to Wulf as she said, “however, because one of the cards I sent to the graveyard was Felis, the Lightsworn Archer, Raiden both gains 200 attack points and I can summon Felis in defense mode.” The light disappeared, revealing a woman with feline features and bow in hand, taking a defensive posture.

Looking at her hand, the girl then felt a strange surge of...something, come over her, as the mark on her arm seemed to glow. She wasn’t quite sure what it meant, but she felt as though it had something to do with the other signers. Still, she could feel something from her own brand, as if her dragon wanted to be free themselves. Looking at her hand, the girl then looked back to the field muttering, “next turn.” Taking a different card she said, “now I tribute Raiden, to bring forth Gragonith, the Lightsworn Dragon!” Raiden turned in a mote of light, from which a white feathered dragon with a golden mane appeared. “With this, Gragonith’s effect activates. For every Lightsworn monster with a different name in my graveyard, Gragonith gains 300 extra attack and defense. Because I have eight such monsters, Gragonith gains 2400 attack and defense!”

As she declared this, the white dragon was enveloped in a large golden aura as its attack went from 2000 to 4400. Looking at the two set cards that Hypatia had, Kiyoko merely powered on saying, “now battle! Gragonith attacks Chaos Sorcerer!” With a golden light gathering into its mouth, the dragon let loose a large stream of golden flame, enveloping the Sorcerer and reducing it to ash.

Hypatia LP 5300 ---> 3100

“Now Wulf, attack her directly!” At her command, the beast man charged forth, swinging its golden claws towards Hypatia.

Even as her monster was incinerated and those claws rushed forward intent to snatch victory away from her, Hypatia couldn’t help but be awe struck. And then there was Kiyoko, standing there with her mark glowing bright. Altogether it was overwhelming; like staring at the sun. She raised her hand to block out the light, but there was another light there, the light of her own mark. She came back to her senses. “When a direct attack is declared I can special summon Battle Fader! Its effect lets me negate the attack and end the battle phase.”

Without missing a beat, Kiyoko stated, “I activate Felis’s effect. By sending it to the graveyard, I can destroy one face up monster you control and send the top three cards of my deck to the grave.” Declaring this, the girl sent her cards to the graveyard as Felis pulled back on her bow. With a golden arrow being formed, the feline archer fired it off, destroying both themselves and the monster at the same time. “I set one card face down and at the end of my turn, Gragonith forces me to send the top three cards of my deck to my graveyard.” Her expression not wavering as she looked to her opponent, Kiyoko sent the cards to the graveyard as she merely said, “your turn.”

Hypatia stared at her mark. She was chosen too, wasn’t she? So she couldn’t afford to look away. Not while there was Kiyoko standing across from her, shining so brilliantly. Maybe she couldn’t beat her, but she could at least take some of that light. “I’ll draw!” And that would be the card to do it with. “For my first play!” She said resolutely, her face made into a mask of confidence. “I’ll use Pot of Greed! It lets me draw 2 cards from my deck!” She pulled them out with an excessive flourish, merely glancing at them out of the corner of her eye as she continued. “Second, I’ll use the spell card Nobleman of Extermination! With this card I can banish a face down spell or trap card and all copies in our decks. And I know just the one.” She flung her hand forward to point at the one set card on her opponent’s field. A thick broadsword flew forth and destroyed the face down Lightsworn Barrier. The decklist came up once again and Hypatia brushed it aside with her finger, staring intently at the cards as they spun across the screen. “Third, I’ll play D.D. Designator! I can guess a card in your hand, and if it’s there it’s banished. If I guess wrong…” She held up the last card in her hand. “Then my card is banished instead. Of course, I won’t be guessing.” She looked at the four cards that Kiyoko had clutched in hers. “Ignoring the 13 cards that you sent from the deck to the graveyard, there are only four cards missing from your deck since the last time I checked. Raiden, Gragonith, Lightsworn Barrier and the card in your hand...  I'll choose Minerva, Lightsworn Maiden.” The cards in Kiyoko’s hand were revealed, floating in the air as a glowing dagger sliced through Minerva. Hypatia smiled, clearly pleased with herself, before closing her eyes and throwing her hand high in the air. “And for my final play!” She brought it down to press a button on her duel disk and placed her hand gently on her deck.

Hypatia LP 3100 ---> 0

“I’ll surrender.” She opened her eyes and looked at Kiyoko. “Wow, I’m a vindictive person aren’t I?” She sat down at the table and ate an apple slice. “Sorry about that.”

Hypatia

Kiyoko led Hypatia to the table where Barbatos had said that they could duel. The brutalist prison architecture was slightly oppressive, in a way that didn't really matter. It did however make the idea of playing a card game in this drab place feel a bit quaint. Sort of like playing a game at lunch while waiting for her next class. Or at least, that was what she imagined it felt like. Hypatia couldn't be sure that she had ever been in formal education, but she did at least seem to know about the concept of a school. Isn't that where these substitute signers should be now, instead of getting ready to save the world?

The lights flickered off, and then came back on. "Strange." Kiyoko remarked flatly. Was it? The generators were on the fritz constantly, so it really wasn't odd for them to... The generators? A building of this size was most likely running on a power grid, not generators. Hypatia briefly wondered why that would be her first instinct, but before the thought could come together, Kiyoko grabbed her attention again.

"...Well?" Hypatia looked over at Kiyoko, who had put some sort of device on her arm. She put the plate of apples down on the table and checked her bag, finding a similar device and strapping it on her arm. She fiddled with it for a moment before pressing the right button; a pale grey light with a deep crimson trim formed into a blade on her arm. She placed her deck into a slot which had seemed made to accommodate it and looked up to Kiyoko. "Let's do this."

Gimme!

Hypatia

"Oh, cute!" Hypatia grabbed the plate and popped a rabbit apple into her mouth, angling the plate so that Kiyoko could take some if she wanted. "I'm fine with dueling at the table as well. Do people usually play card games not on tables?" The way that Kiyoko had phrased it made it sound like they would have to go somewhere specific for this, which Hypatia didn't so much mind as find a bit confusing. But then, there had been a great deal of confusing things today. They would probably sort themselves out eventually. Probably.

There was also the woman standing in front of her. She stared intently at her and thought about what she had said earlier.

You should just be able to think you're chosen right?

She was odd, certainly, but they were all a bit odd weren't they? Kiyoko the chosen warrior. Shannon the great merciful leader. Hotaru who was just... kinda creepy? Hypatia thought about the other members and realized that they were actually pretty normal. Sure Jet and Leiko seemed to have zero confidence and Zirco seemed hungry for any fight he could get, but they had apparently been through a lot. Everyone seemed to be coping their own way. Most of the people here were surprisingly normal, with the exceptions of a select few. Am I one of the odd ones? She was wearing a suit when most of her companions were in casual wear and she had done a death drop in the hallway earlier. That together with her memory thing probably tipped her into weirdo territory.

"Huh." She said out loud, a bit absentmindedly. The thought actually comforted her a little, for some reason. Maybe she wanted to stand out.

Hypatia blinked, realizing that she had gotten a bit lost in her thoughts, and shifted her focus back to Kiyoko. "What were we talking about again?"

Hypatia

Oh. Right. This was Kiyoko. She had turned down the money part of Blues' offer because she only cared about saving lives. Hypatia hadn't been so sure that someone like that could really exist. But Kiyoko seemed to be that person, or at least like she wanted to be. Hypatia took a moment to compose herself. She was approaching this wrong, she realized. For someone who spoke so surely about being chosen, friends was probably pushing it, but something more reasonable... Maybe allies? That could work. She could make that work, or at the very least she could get some information. She put on a smile and feigned a confidence that, apparently, at some point in her life she had learned to feign.

"What's up with me? Ah, I'm so glad you asked! I'm just feeling a bit overwhelmed is all..." She ended that sentence with morose lilt, while simultaneously making a contrary motion with her hand as if to dismiss her own concerns as nothing. She took the other and discreetly reached into her bag. "I do want to help you all out, I really do... But, I don't how much I can. You're all so clearly chosen that I just don't know how I can compare. Especially with all of this talk of marks and Duel Dragons while I'm not even sure that I know how these cards work." She pulled her hand out of her bag revealing her deck, free from its case, which she presented languidly before Kiyoko. "Oh! I have an idea!" She punctuated this statement with exaggerated enthusiasm, as if she had truly come up with this idea at the moment that she was suggesting she had. "Why don't we have a game at breakfast? A friendly duel. Is that what they're called?" Hypatia had felt that the cards were important without really knowing why, and, more importantly, they seemed to be tied to this project. She thought back to how Kiyoko had introduced herself. What was it she had said? Ah, that was it. "We are going to be working together after all. It would be a shame if I couldn't pull my weight..."

Hypatia

Hypatia watched as her roommate made his way into their room. She was about to follow suit when Kiyoko turned to her. "Well...should we get something to eat?" It was polite of her to offer, but Hypatia had wanted to look around her room more than anything. "Sorry, I'm not really hungry but..." But by the time she looked back at Kiyoko she was already walking away. "Huh." Hypatia was a little dumbfounded. So that's what it feels like to have someone make a dramatic exit on you. She couldn't really be mad considering she had done the same thing today, but she didn't have much time to think about that until her stomach growled loudly. "Oh, so I am hungry..." She quickly opened the door to her new room and chucked her still damp dress shirt inside, her words grouping together as she almost shouted at Raijin. "Heycouldyouhangthatupforme? Thanksyou'rethebest!" She turned back to Kiyoko who was already making her way down the stairs, tossing the door shut and running after her. "Wait up!"

She caught up to Kiyoko in the stairwell, stumbling a bit before catching herself and getting into a somewhat casual pace next to her. "So uh... how's the weather?" Hypatia sighed. "You know what? I'm not doing small talk. I have like a billion questions, and I didn't want to ask Mr. E, but it's driving me crazy. Why are we in a prison? What the hell is Project Crimson? Who the hell is that Kaiba guy? We're just going to be his child soldiers or something? Why is Mr. E like that? There were tests apparently? What does that mean?" She counted her questions on her fingers as she listed them off before holding up the back of her hand and adding another. "Oh and I like the tattoo. It's super cool, but why did he call it the eye mark?" She looked at Kiyoko for a second. Blinking a few times and realizing that she had kind of just rapid fired way too many questions at her. That probably wasn't the best way to make friends here, and Hypatia desperately wanted a friend at this point. She cleared her throat, smiled awkwardly at Kiyoko and added. "And um, what's up with you?"

Thanks for the response! I made these forever ago so it was weird seeing sky strikers come out and feeling like the decks play in similar ways. I get what your saying about the searches and I thought that having Capsule and Speed Up! would be enough, but I've decided to take your advice and add a third to the second effect of Player 2 - Start! I didn't really want to put it on Flint Lock #2 just cause you can summon it like every turn with Speed Up! which seemed like too many searches to me without having to use it's second effect to swap out the Flints. I did also change Speed Up! to make it so that any Flint spells can be used the turn they're set to make more synergy with Player 2 and Capsule on opponent's turns.

The Xyz was mostly made for an rp so it's not really optimized, but I wouldn't be opposed to either changing it's effects or adding a link monster to the archetype as well. As for the DB thing I'd be happy to upload them, I'm just having a hard time finding card art for them.

Actually going back and thinking about this I might change it so that Player 2 stays the same and have Flint Lock #2 just search a quick-play instead of Flint since searching Flint Arm is basically the same. Or, maybe Charge could Set a spell on activation?

Hypatia

Her pool trip was proving to be far less relaxing than she had hoped. As much as she wanted to ignore her problems, they didn't seem to have the same idea. She managed to spend somewhere around 20-odd minutes floating in the pool trying to push the various questions she had out of her mind until she bumped into Mr. E's pool float. She decided it was a futile effort at that point, righting herself in the water and trying to find a conversation starter in the book he was reading. 'Magecraft, Summonings, and other Magics' was what was written on the cover. Hypatia couldn't remember enough about the world to be sure, but a distinct feeling in her stomach told her that she probably wasn't inclined to believe that magic was a real thing that actually exists. But then, given all that had happened in the short span that she could remember...

"What's it about?"

"Well, it's a book of magic theory. As the Magus of Knowledge, it's my duty to keep up on what others think of magic. Besides, it may shed a bit of light on the problem ahead of us, no?"

He definitely seemed to believe in magic. That didn't inspire as much confidence in Hypatia as she might have wanted, but on the bright side, he didn't seem to want to beat around the bush in regards to her memory... problem.

"Will it really help get my memories back?"

"Well, in theory, I could just swing my wand around, go 'bibbity, bobbity, boo,' and your memories would be restored. In practice though, using such magic on something on something as powerful yet fragile as the human mind could have many unforeseen side effects. So instead, I'll be doing 'therapy sessions,' where we'll use magic to stimulate the mind and hope they come back a little more... naturally."

Hypatia wasn't sure that she had ever been in therapy before, but if it would help get her memories back it was worth a shot.

"Alright, when do we start?"

"Well, not until after breakfast for sure. I don't want to do magic on an empty stomach you know?"

"Makes sense." Well, it made as much sense as magic should. She felt hopeful for the first time today as she climbed out of the pool. Mr. E was... eccentric... to say the least, but he certainly seemed to be knowledgeable about his craft. As she stepped to make her exit, Hypatia realized that she had been pretty rude to him earlier, and leaving without so much as a word was probably also not the kindest way to repay his help. She wasn't really good at these types of things, but she supposed she at least had to make an effort.

"Oh and um, thanks I guess." He just gave her a thumbs up, not looking up from his book as she left the room.

---

Hypatia made her way back to the rooms, hoping that that situation had resolved itself so that she could get herself acquainted with her new living space. Those hopes were quickly dashed when she came across Raijin, Kiyoko, and Damian drawing straws.

"Wait, why is Damian drawing? Isn't he a researcher or something?" Hypatia shook her head. "You know what, it doesn't matter. I'll do you guys a favor and narrow things down a bit." She put her hand on Raijin's shoulder unceremoniously, for no other reason than that he was the closest. "I'll room with Raijin and we'll take... this room." Pointing to a door that she had once again chosen solely based on proximity.

Flint, Flint Missile, and Flint Lock are real cards based on a konami game that I thought were super cool, but they never got any real support, so I decided to make them into an archetype. There are only 3 cards in the game in this archetype, but I managed to make some support I think that fit them and the game itself pretty thematically. The archetype is broken into the Flint Lock monsters, 2 support continuous traps, some quick-play spells that are mostly used for removal and set up, and the field spell of the archetype, Planet E-Square.

Monsters

Spells

Traps

Irene had arrived just in time to hear the rules, and in time to see a new kid arrive as well. At least she wasn't the only one who was late. Something about this whole tournament seemed a bit weird to her though. Something about the way they had called out Aster, or the way the grey-haired kid was just a bit too physical with him. It reminded her of the way her brothers would playfully tease her, but it just wasn't kind in the same way that they were. It made her uneasy.

She realized she was muttering to herself as she thought intently about this, looking up to see that the duel had already started.

"Those squares of cardboard... you said we can personalize them, right?" Oh, Irene wasn't good at making decisions like that. Did she want stars? Maybe planets or a moon? She'd decide when she got them she thought.

"Why not hand them over while they're dueling, so we can start immediately after they finish?" 

Not even taking a moment to introduce herself, Irene walked towards the boy named Luna, hand out-stretched. "I'll take those." She hadn't thought to word it like a question, and her emotionless expression probably made the demand seem like a threat more than anything. Irene didn't realize this though, and after taking three pieces of cardboard she walked over to where the duel was taking place. She looked at them still very puzzled about the extremely important decision of how she wanted them to look. She sat there with her brow furled for a short while before putting them in her pocket, deciding to worry about it later. She focused her attention instead on the duel ahead of her, watching with an intent and unflinching gaze.

Hypatia

"Oh the horror of rooming with Mr. E! Who ever could endure such a cursed fate?!" Hypatia went into a death drop as she said this, one hand over her face as if hiding it from the cruel light of the world... She sprung back up just as quickly. "No, I'm kidding. I don't actually care, but the way I figure it he's going with one of the dudes. So, if anything, you Jet and Raijin will be drawing straws." She had already begun to leave the room by the time she finished talking, not waiting for Zirco's response.

---

She walked out of the locker room wearing the black dress shirt from her ensemble and a similarly black pair of swim trunks. True to his word, Mr. E floated carefree in the pool. Damn, what would it take for her to be that relaxed? He looked up as she approached as if he might say something to her.

"Hello. Don't talk to me - I'm just here to swim." She cut him off before letting herself fall into the water. She didn't really want to talk about her memories or project crimson or what happened during the experiments right now. The day had been much too long already, honestly, and she didn't even really care to think about those things. So Hypatia just floated in the water on her back, doing her best to try to relax and just sort of not exist at all.

Hypatia

Hypatia finished looking through the cards she had found in her bag and looked up to see what had caused the booming sound that reverberated through the mess hall. Seeing a man in a jet pack flying down from the ceiling, she smirked and sat herself on a table cross-legged as she waited for whatever show he had in store for his captive audience. She had to give him props for the sheer audacity of riding in on a jet pack, but introducing himself along with the family business practice of ruining lives felt a bit in bad taste. He ended his speech with an offer.

"Oh, so it's a comedy performance?" Hypatia whispered under her breath. Nearly everyone here seemed to be broken in some way or another, which was apparently the legacy of the man in front of them. Yet he was still standing there in front of them in the literal prison that he had gathered them in, offering to buy their service as child soldiers. Before Hypatia had the chance to really think about that, their self-appointed leader responded with a joke of her own.

"Surely you could spare a billion each?"

Hypatia let out a short cackle at that before catching herself. Something about Ms. Sparkles standing up to the rich kid on the jet pack made her very happy. Maybe she wouldn't be such a bad leader after all. Kiyoko seemed to disagree with Shannon's methods, but the two of them seemed equally eager to be the hero of this story.

Two of the others added another condition to the offer. Octavia and Natsumi both expressed their concern about the state of something called Hearthome. Hypatia didn't know what that was, but it made her feel a distinctly distant sadness that she imagined one might feel upon hearing that a close friend's parent had died. She tried not to think about that too much as the quiet guy stammered out his response.

Seriously, was he going to be okay? Maybe she should say something to him? She pushed that thought out of her head. There were plenty of people to worry about in this small group, but now didn't seem to be the time nor the place. She thought about the situation for a moment before pushing herself off of the table and landing from a short leap. She took a few steps closer to Blues before beginning in a sarcastic tone.

"Well, you certainly drive a hard bargain Mr. Kaiba, but I care a bit less about the money than I do the fact that I can't remember a single thing past this morning. Don't get me wrong - I do care about the money." She gave a little half-shrug motion and a slightly insincere, conciliatory expression before taking a more solemn tone. "I'm just a little more concerned that yesterday and beyond is just sort of..." She punctuated the last word with an exaggerated 'poof' motion with her hands. "Blank."

I did mine. I don't know what it says about me tbh.

Hypatia

Hypatia sat patiently as the Mr. E introduced everyone, focusing her attention on remembering everyone's names and faces. It was a motley crew that she had found herself to be a part of, but for some reason, that only seemed to comfort Hypatia. She smiled in spite of the odd events that had made up the day, even when the man poked her in the forehead. He began to say something else but Hypatia had begun to zone out at this point, still a bit drowsy from the medicine. She was just beginning to doze off when-

"Sluuuuuuuuuuumber paaaaaaarty!!!"

She was awoken for the third time in the day, jumping in her seat as the loud music filled the room. The man finished saying something else and Hypatia got up from her chair, pacing a bit to make sure that she wouldn't fall asleep again until she was absolutely sure that it was safe to do so. A couple of laps into her path around the room it seemed that her companions were making a bit of show and tell, talking about something called Duel Dragons. It appeared to be some sort of card. Did Hypatia even have those? She rooted around her bag for a moment before pulling out a deck-box which she found did indeed contain a deck of cards. She flipped through them quickly as she walked over to the others, finding the only one that could conceivably be called a dragon.

"Hi, I'm Hypatia. Although I think I might have said that already." She was just a bit too tired for her normal flair, yawning before continuing. "I'm from um... Hm... Not sure about that, but anyway, I think that mine's Void Ogre Dragon." She held up the card for a second for the others to see before putting it back in the deck and looking through its cards for the first time.

Hey Dova! I just looked at your review and made some small changes to the Flotsam cards. I put the changes in the thread if you'd wanna give them a quick look?

On 1/23/2019 at 6:49 PM, Dova said:

Sorry for the late post! Entirely my own fault.

Not really much to say here, the archetype is fully functional in its own right, with a neat little array of effects letting it be consistent when it comes to making fields while not being entirely stuck on gimmicks. Flotsam Tools is lacking a means to get it into the Pendulum Zone, but other than that you do have a nice lack of on-field effects to create an interesting theme of staying off the field. I do have 2 big complaints though.

First is the lack of genericness. Not something that has to be "fixed", but Yu-Gi-Oh has such a wide card pool going for it; why not take advantage of many of the other numerous cards they have available? Maybe some WATER monsters, or an effect that requires you to have a certain amount of different Types but the same attribute in your GY. You don't have too many cards here, and that just opens the door for deck building.

Secondly, opponent interaction. You have all of two effects that can do something to your opponent, and they're both on one card, Voyaging Flotasm. Maybe you could say Raft does something, but it rather defensive, working only when you go first. The problem is that the metagame for the past decade as revolve around creating something with a ton of negates and removal, meaning your deck needs removal and counters to deal with this. All your opponent needs is 1 floodgate, and your archetype can do nothing without outside support. Even your Flotasm can only negate certain things, and it requires to ladder into its negating form first AND a ton of materials beforehand. If your opponent negates your Fusion Summon, what are you supposed to do about it?

Normally I see cards which are super self-supportive with boring effects, but fortunately while yours has the former it lacks the latter. All you need to do is adjust some of the more mediocre cards, like Rubbish, to actually do something to help set up when your opponent can deal with your plays.

First of all thank you for the review! I've been mulling over this archetype for a long time and it's good to get some feedback. I'm going to address your points one by one because I do think that you bring up some good ones.

Flotsam Tools doesn't have an effect to get itself into the extra deck because Flotsam Fusion has an effect that lets you put a Flotsam monster from the ED into the pendulum zone, but I thought about what you said about rubbish as well and decided to make it a bit less, well, rubbish by changing it's pendulum effect.

Flotsam Rubbish Pendulum Effect changed from "If a "Flotsam" card(s) you control would be destroyed by battle or by card effect, you can destroy 1 card in your Pendulum Zones instead." to "You can place 1 face-up "Flotsam" monster from your Extra Deck into your Pendulum Zone. You can only use this effect of "Flotsam Rubbish" once per turn." The destruction redirection doesn't matter so much in a pendulum archetype, and I wanted the deck to have a theme of using the extra deck as sort of a 'supply storage' of sorts. I think that by making this effect slightly more prominent it will solidify a bit more of the mechanical themes of the archetype.

I also changed Flotsam Tools' Monster Effect from "If this card is Special Summoned: You can add up to 1 "Flotsam" card from your Pendulum Zone to your hand, also place 1 "Flotsam" Pendulum Monster from your Deck in your Pendulum Zone. You can only use this effect of "Flotsam Tools" once per turn." to "If this card is Special Summoned: You can add up to 1 "Flotsam" card from your Pendulum Zone to your hand, also place 1 "Flotsam" Pendulum Monster from your Deck or face-up in your Extra Deck in your Pendulum Zone. You can only use this effect of "Flotsam Tools" once per turn." I think that this doesn't change the power level too much while letting the deck be a bit more consistent once it's into it's plays.

As for the genericness of the deck, I had designed this deck as being an archetype that's meant to be mixed with other archetypes (metalfoes being what I had in mind making this deck) so I didn't think that it should be too supportive of the water typing, but I do like the idea of the different types thing. I don't really know how to implement it though. I will say that water cards do have some decent support that help this deck a lot (salvage and white howling being the best).

Opponent interaction was a bit less strong when I designed this archetype, but I do think that it's extremely important in the current meta-game. I designed the typing of this archetype so that it could go into both Toadally Awesome and Cyber Dragon Infinity with Rubbish and Vessel Respectively, and I think that between the ability of this archetype to churn out monsters for material, the ease with which you can combine it with other archetypes, and traps such as White Howling and Infinite Impermanence that this archetype shouldn't have too much dedicated interaction in its main kit. I'm not worried about the fusion summons of the Deck being negated since they're mostly free when summoned with Flotsam Fusion, but I do think that the interaction that it does have in Voyaging Flotsam should be stronger to reflect the current meta game. This is why I changed Voyaging Flotsams Pendulum Effect to include Trap cards. I felt full fledged removal would be too strong at that point, but now I think it probably needs it. I also changed its Monster Effect from "(Quick Effect): You can target 1 other card on the field; place this card in your Pendulum Zone, and if you do, return it to the hand." to "(Quick Effect): Return 1 face-up card on the field to the hand, and if you do, you can place this card in your Pendulum Zone." Being forced to have an empty Pendulum Zone to use the effect is just unrealistic, and too many cards have anti-targeting for a return to hand effect to be powerful.

Your review left me a lot to think about to really solidify the deck and it's themes, and I hope that these changes help the deck to fulfill its role as a supporting archetype.

The Masked Stranger

I was wondering if you could review my archetype and if I could sign up to review too.

Flotsam is an Water Pendulum Fusion archetype that I rediscovered while looking at old archetypes I had made before link summons were a thing. I don't think I ever posted them and their mechanics work pretty well with the new pendulum rules so I thought I might as well now. They're loosely based on the movie "Cast Away" and focus on recovering monsters "lost at sea" in the extra deck and graveyard. They don't have much removal, but they have powerful board swarming with pendulum summons and their fusion cards. I had a lot of fun designing this archetype and I hope that it shows in the cards.

Main Deck Monsters

Spell Cards

Extra Deck Monsters

I am here too!