You've seen Frog decks since Stardust Overdrive, but have you ever seen a Frog deck that doesn't use D.3.S. Frog? How about one with Shining Flare Wingman? Loukas tackles an odd creation today, in this week's Rerouting!

I swear, I will hunt down and destroy the next person that submits a Shaddoll deck.

When it comes to Satellarknights, I've been both on the fence and on either side of it. After drifting out of the competitive scene, into the competitive scene, and finally out of it again, I don't really know what to make of Satellarknights and their erratic history. The deck's seen plenty of popular trends and developments, yet there's never been much of a consensus as to how it should move forward.

Play Satellarknights long enough and you'll notice that the deck's one huge Catch-22. Every innovation, restriction or mandate you put on the deck come back to bite you in someway. You can easily lock your opponent out with Vanity's Emptiness, but that inhibits Stellarnova Alpha. Satellarknight Altair's great, but sometimes you screw yourself over and can't make an attack when you really need to.


Satellarknight Vega sets up early game power plays and it's typically a one-way ticket to Stellarknight Triverr, but running more than one copy means you're going to draw it at the wrong time way too often. Satellarknight Skybridge helps you be explosive, but contradicts Pot of Duality. Oh, the humanity.

I hate to say it, but everything comes down to a hard choice. Honest is super swell, but you can't go into most of your Xyz if you're trying to surprise your opponent with it. Constellar Stellarknight Diamond can wreck several strategies, but it also blocks some of your best defensive effects. Today's deck bites the bullet and dedicates itself to chaos. Jed R. from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma writes…

With the rise of so many other decks that are unbeatable and have pinned themselves as must have, my wallet protested - I already spent enough money on other decks, so I want to renovate them. One project I'm working on is an Atlantean build with Poseidra, but the more competitive deck I want to explore is Satellarknights! I bought the cards when they came out and watched the price of Deneb rollercoaster across the last six months. I think I made the right choice in keeping them.

My roots in the game started with Invasion of Chaos; I pulled both Chaos monsters out of one box, thankfully! Nothing's really matched my love for the game since then, but maybe we'll see Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End return to the game one day. Hopefully, right? But I digress - I combined Chaos and Satellarknights to make Chaostellar Knights!

Jed R. from Broken Arrow

I don't want to rain on your parade, but I don't want Envoy of the End to ever come back. I've about had enough heart attacks with all the recent stuff coming off the Forbidden & Limited list, so don't get me started on anything else. Dark Magician of Chaos might be long overdue for its return, but let's look at the deck list instead of starting a squabble.

DECKID=101823To the readers - it may seem like a lot of monsters because it is a lot of monsters. I totally started typing that sentence prepared to defend the high monster count, but that may be all sorts of excessive. Even just 20 monsters would have been overkill.

Did Someone Say Chaos?
I did. So did Jed.

The Chaos factors sans Envoy of the End are just Chaos Sorcerer and Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning; two of my personal favorites. I like Chaos Sorcerer about 400 times more, because it's far more balanced and you can turn it into Norito the Moral Leader pretty easily. You'll rarely (read that as "never") do that with just two Chaos Sorcerers, and you'll barely manage it in a deck like this despite my best efforts make Norito every game. That said, it is possible.

With Satellarknights the crux of the deck, Light monsters are plentiful to banish for your Chaos Summons; that half of the puzzle is never missing. Actually, the deck's oversaturated with them. Conversely, the dark monsters aren't as abundant, nor are they as easily searched as the Light Knights (though their Levels and effects pair well). In a way, Jed's Dark monster choices are like inverted copies of Vega. When you Summon Vega, you can Special Summon a Satellarknight from your hand. Kagetokage can't be Normal Summoned, but makes a Rank 4 if it leeches into another Summon. Doggy Diver's a less restrictive Kagetokage but pigeonholes you into making Warrior Xyz.

My first thought was to change up the Level 4 Dark monsters but keep the theme the same. Kagetokage and Doggy Diver strive to make quick and dirty Rank 4's while fueling your Chaos Summons - it's a kind of specific niche, but there are several cards that do the job better. Well, perhaps not strictly better, but I think the pros outweigh the cons: Summoner Monk and Mountain Butterspy' rel=" Mountain Butterspy">Blue Mountain Butterspy.

Blue Mountain Butterspy isn't anything to write home about, I just find it marginally better than Kagetokage. Both are useless on their own but pair with Normal Summoned Level 4 monsters. The only real difference is that Butterspy's a Warrior instead of a Reptile, which means you search it with Reinforcement of the Army instead of King of the Feral Imps. Well, I shouldn't say only real difference. I'll get to the other one shortly.


Summoner Monk's definitely something to be more wary about, but I liked the change of pace. Obviously, your initial pull with Monk should be Satellarknight Deneb. Unlike the Satellarknight Unukalhai plus Call Of The Haunted combo, you score an instant Rank 4 monster plus you set up a Light and a Dark in the graveyard, while being less vulnerable to spell and trap destruction. The trade-off means your Stellarnova Alpha won't be quite as powerful, but I'll address that next.

By Next I Mean Now
Don't get me wrong - Stellarnova Alpha's an amazing card. It's a pseudo-Infernity Barrier that trades your monster for a card while negating an effect. Sadly, it doesn't always net you a card because you actually have to destroy whatever you're negating to draw. Negating effects in the graveyard is literally a straight up two card loss for you. And it destroys your Vanity's Emptiness. In other words, blegh.

The other added benefit of Butterspy over Kagetokage is that Summoner Monk can snag the aforementioned insect. Stacking two Dark monsters gives you access to a few different Xyz, but the only relevant one is Number 66: Master Key Beetle. If you haven't got the point I've been all but hammering into your head, I'm trying to squeeze in the Vanity's Emptiness Key Beetle lock, since it completely shuts out strategies like Nekroz and Burning Abyss. The lock's not nearly so formidable against Qliphorts, but not every strategy punishes every key match-up in the same way.

The best Satellarknight monsters came out in Duelist Alliance. No doubt. Satellarknight Sirius and Satellarknight Procyon were decent, coming from the next set, and Secrets of Eternity gave us, what, Satellarknight Rigel… a way to get over El Shaddoll Winda? I guess? My point is, I think you should largely stick to the better Satellarknight monsters. I fret at even putting two Vega in this deck, and that's one of the better Satellarknights. You don't want to clog your deck with too many cards you can't abuse on Turn 1.

I'm very conflicted on Honest, but in the end I opted out of using the once-Limited powerhouse. Since we shifted the deck to cater to Summoner Monk and Chaos Sorcerer, you'll have fewer opportunities to abuse Honest. I dare say that it was actually dead more often than not, because my end field would be a Castel, the Skyblaster Musketeer, Number 66: Master Key Beetle, or a Light monster my opponent would blast away before the Battle Phase.

The most successful Satellarknight builds have generally been heavy on defense, and Satellarknight Altair's the reason behind that. In short, it's really hard to OTK with Satellarknights unless you clear your opponent's fields with Dark Hole or Raigeki and go all-in to abuse every Satellarknight effect you can on Turn 1. It's certainly unconventional, but my changes to Jed's build kept the strategy in the same vein as he'd intended.

-2 Satellarknight Unukalhai
-1 Satellarknight Procyon
-1 Satellarknight Alsahm
-1 Satellarknight Rigel
-3 Kagetokage
-2 Doggy Diver
-2 Honest
-1 Mystical Space Typhoon
-1 Dark Hole
-3 Stellarnova Alpha
-1 Fiendish Chain

-1 Stellarknight Delteros
-2 Stellarknight Triverr
-1 Stellarknight Constellar Diamond

+2 Summoner Monk
+3 Mountain Butterspy' rel=" Mountain Butterspy">Blue Mountain Butterspy
+2 Soul Release
+1 Raigeki
+1 Soul Charge
+1 Snatch Steal
+2 Breakthrough Skill
+3 Mirror Force
+3 Call Of The Haunted

+1 Abyss Dweller
+1 Daigusto Emeral
+1 Number 103: Ragnazero
+1 Number 66: Master Key Beetle

Here's the rerouted deck!

DECKID=101825I couldn't dedicate an entire section to it, but one card I want to touch on is Soul Release – an effect that could win you the duel or may only be useful as a Summoner Monk target, depending on your match-up and situation. Obviously, the card's best in a mid or late game scenario, but it's an overwhelmingly powerful answer to Burning Abyss and Nekroz and it can't be stopped by a Mystical Space Typhoon.

Just remember, beat your opponent before they beat you.

-Loukas Peterson



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