Notes & Combos

Gaia was very relevant, for a few reasons. It's a way to get Albion in the yard if Lubellion isn't available, you can use him to juke Imperm and similar targetting-based negation, can ambush during the battle phase to push for a win, and on some rare ocassions switching monsters to defense mode was actually impactful.

Darkest Diabolos is 1 card that makes the Rikka matchup super in your favor, get him into your yard or hand however and summon him on your turn, and Rikka has a really hard time beating a 3k attacker that they can't tribute and that, if bounced to the hand by their link, can just be special summoned back if a DARK monster on your field is tributed, including by any of their shenanigans. Hard OPT, though, so get him into play on your turn ideally so you can summon him if he gets bounced during Opp's turn before the battle phase. He also frequently helps with OTK's otd, and forcing your opponent to trash a card in their hand is a nice bonus when it comes up (but IDK how big of a deal that is on average because I don't know my opponent's hands 😅).

The standout card in basically every matchup was Albaz the Ashen, he will quickly become tall enough to run over most anything and also provides targetting protection to every other monster on your board. Often, an opponent will have to deal with him ASAP on their turn before addressing the rest of your board, but if they send him to the yard and then use a card effect to remove one of your other monsters, he comes right back!

As for the extra deck, Mysterion did come up occasionally but I think replacing it would be fine. Perhaps with Masquarade, but I don't own any copies so I can't say I've tried it.

Branded Regained felt really bad for me even when I could use its effects, and often it was just a brick, so it was cut immediately and I would never consider adding it back.

Lubellion is primarily useful as a way to get Albion into the yard turn 1, Branded Lost is great to have in play but I often have it in play even before getting a chance to summon Lubellion.