Goat Format Championship 3v3 Deck Tech: Gravekeeper's!
This article provides a deck tech for the Gravekeeper's strategy, highlighting its strengths and weaknesses in the current meta, as played by Kyosuke Kiryu in the Goat Format Championship 3v3 event.
The Goat Format Championship 3v3 event is a go, and boy has it been exciting! Once again, we've got an incredibly successful event with 51 participating teams! That's 153 players, a new record! Kyosuke Kiryu is one such player, and today he's brought his trusty Gravekeeper's deck with the goal of reaching the top! Gravekeeper's is one of the most popular tribal decks in the format. Gravekeeper's Spy is a powerful wall against aggro decks, and Necrovalley makes summoning chaos monsters a nightmare. How will they perform in today's meta, though?
Deck List
Overview
Gravekeeper's is an aggro deck that is centered on Necorvalley and the core Gravekeeper's monsters: Gravekeeper's Spy, Gravekeeper's Spear Soldier, and Gravekeeper's Assailant. While uncommon enough to be considered a rogue strategy by most measurements, the deck is not infrequently seen when the meta calls for it.As previously mentioned, Gravekeeper's Spy is a powerful stall card that can shut down aggressive strategies for multiple turns, while also filling the board with potential threats. Additionally, Necrovalley is a hard counter to most chaos strategies. It is for these reasons that the deck is usually seen as a response to metas that are full of these and similar decks.
With the ability to swarm the field quickly and provide powerful 500 ATK and DEF bonuses to its core monsters, Gravekeeper's is also known to push in large (sometimes game-ending) attacks seemingly out of nowhere.
Player Insight
In talking about their list, Kiryu mentioned that they've been playing the strategy since they were a "young lad"! Even so, they did say that they practiced quite a bit on the ranked Dueling Book ladder in order to prepare for the event, tailoring the deck to better match or combat the meta seen there. When asked about specific insights to the deck, Kiryu had this to say:
I have some techs like My Body as a Shield, which is a card that does not let me down. I can potentially play my deck super aggressive when I have that card in hand or set. It helps me versus commonly played cards, like Nobleman of Crossout. I run triple Solemn Judgement to stop my opponent's plays. It helps me versus Burn, Library FTK, and other decks that rely on specific resources.I tech one Royal Tribute and side the other one to help me against Warriors and decks that carry heavy monster counts. It also helps me face Chaos decks when they have used up their MSTs, Heavy Storms, and other spell/trap removal cards. Sometimes, Tribute is a card I will save for later. Other times, will play it when I have it in opening hand with Necrovalley.I main three Rite of Spirit so I can use it as tribute for my two tech monarchs. I do like to also use it to save me from a tight spot if I need to summon Spy in defense. My side Deck is pretty standard, I am prepared for Burn, Gate, Library FTKs, and other potential mirror matches.
Conclusion
At the time this article was written, Kiryu had an impressive 2-1 record with the rest of his team. Discussing how they felt the tournament was going, they said:
So far, I have played two Chaos variant decks, which I have dominated in games one and three. Since that is the most common deck in ladder, I know how to play around it, and save resources when needed. Looking forward to more games if my team and I advance.
From this, it looks like Gravekeeper's may have been the right meta call after all! Here's to hoping we see Kiryu and their team in the finals!
