I've always been a huge fan of the first YGO series. There's something that's so distinct about Kazuki Takahashi's style, even today (despite how censored the anime is, even in the Japanese version). So I thought it would be fun to take some of the weird, and often completely situational, anime-only cards and imagine what they might need to do to stand a chance in the incredibly fast-paced modern game. This time the theme of choice is Joey's Landstar monsters that only appear 1 time in the filler arc during his battle against Siegfried von Schroeder and his Valkyries.
This whole deck starts with the real life card Swordsman of Landstar, or the much more relevant retrain, Comrade Swordsman of Landstar. To me this means that the Landstar archetype should be one that supports either Warriors, EARTH monsters, or just the idea of maintaining board presence the entire Duel. The fact that it is a Tuner offers some support, but I wasn't about to spend time trying to draw a Level 6 Landstar Synchro monster because I suck at drawing. https://yugioh.fandom.com/wiki/Comrade_Swordsman_of_Landstar
Rifleman of Landstar
Rifleman is the first to attack. It makes sense that as the marksman of the group, he makes his move, and that signals his fellow warriors to battle. Thus he can attack directly and freely, in order to guarantee his effect will go off at least one time. He cannot summon copies of himself, his attack points are low enough that they're only significant if allowed to continue for multiple turns, and because he needs to attack, any further advantage needs to wait for Main Phase 2. All of these strengths and weakness put together, I think, make for interesting card design that encourages strategy and interaction.
Grappler of Landstar:
When I see Grappler and how he's dressed, its very clear he's designed after the US Army Special Forces (aka the "Green Berets"). That makes me think he needs to know how to hurt monsters and not get hurt back. Each of his abilities gives him a good mix of offensive and defense, and combined with the next card "Knight of Landstar", allows him to keep picking off monsters 1 after another (or at least removing them as a threat when attacking).
Knight of Landstar:
Knight needs to be able to protect his fellow Landstarians. In order to do that in a competitive sense, he needs to be flexible enough to adapt to the situation. While on the field, he blocks attacks on the typically weak monsters, while also preventing them from being picked off by efficient spot removal effects that would kill this strategy instantly. While in the hand, he provides an opportunity for surprise and gives a window for Grappler to safely take down a big threat that might otherwise also have been protected by effects that target. Lastly, being able to Special Summon himself is invaluable, as he otherwise has no use once he's discarded and there are no other means use this effect again.
I wish I could've made his text smaller, but when looking for cards as reference, I really only saw that first effect written as is on newer cards, and I do believe all of the effects are necessary.
Landstar Forces:
This is a hard card to balance. In the anime, it pretty much has the same effect but with no restrictions. Even with only Fusion monsters in the Extra Deck, that is still a pretty powerful effect when you consider Tribute Summons. That being said, even with the work I've done here, this archetype is not that powerful and needs a card like this to help them maintain board presence. I think just keeping it to EARTH Warriors is fair enough. There are not very many good Level 6 Synchro monsters that qualify, M-X-Saber Invoker is banned, and relevant Link monsters are pretty much limited to Gouki. It's possible that this card would still be underpowered if they could attack too, but its probably best to keep the card future-proof from power creeps.
Landstar Shot:
Probably the weirdest of the Landstar cards, this one could originally only be equipped to Rifleman. That sucked so I changed it ?. Now it can be equipped to any Landstar monster, gives the DEF boost too (because why not?) and accomplishes the goal of protecting other cards that need to attack (like Grappler) while still making Rifleman more of a problem (1500 per turn is starting to become painful, even in a meta where LP don't matter very much). The last effect is to give it some utility in cases where it is destroyed immediately (or a similar situation where it can't be used). You just cannot run cards like this without some back up effect, and honestly nothing else felt right when I designed it. A little arbitrary, but I think its forgivable.
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