Chemicritter Deck

This is my take at a "Chemicritter" deck. Before starting to talk about what the deck actually does, I want to clarify two things: First off, this is a Gemini deck, which means that you need to normally summon monsters twice to give them their printed effects; they also count as Normal monsters in the graveyard, which the deck makes use off quite a lot. Secondly, I use a small "Red-Eyes" and a small "Tenyi" engine to make the deck run smoother; I will further explain what cards I use and for what reasons I use them, but I can tell you from the start that a pure "Chemicritter" deck faces a few hurdles that I would rather like to solve with outside support.

Which brings me straight to the deck: The "Chemicritter" core consists of two copies of "Chemicritter Carbo Crab", which is both graveyard setup and a searcher as soon as you get its effects live. "Chemicritter Oxy Ox" also clocks in at three copies, since it is the most convinient way to get Rank 7 and Rank 8 monsters on the board. "Poly-Chemicritter Dioxogre" is the main beater, who is able to make the summons of Gemini monsters unnegatable while also sporting a removal effect, while the single copy of "Poly-Chemicritter Hydragon" is less powerful, but can have uses by boosting and protecting your monsters. You need both to make the most out of the copies of "Burnout" in the deck, which can be very helpful in a pinch while also having a seriously useful effect when banished from the graveyard. Three copies of "Catalyst Field" since you need this Field Spell on the board to make any respectable plays, and while the previous build had both one copy of "Terraforming" and "Metaverse", I have take them both out in this version due to the new "Chemicritter" support card in form of "Dimer Synthesis", which is better than the Field Spell searchers by a mile in this deck. The combination of being able to summon Level 5 or higher Gemini monsters without tribute, summon Gemini monsters twice and also have a removal effect at your disposal is very powerful and pretty much needed at any point during the game.

Engine-wise, the "Red-Eyes" engine is mostly there to fill the graveyard with revivable monsters. The pure version of "Chemicritters" always suffered from not having enough targets in the graveyard to work with, a problem that is easily solved by the "Red-Eyes" cards. The main idea is to either draw the single "Red-Eyes Insight" to search for "Red-Eyes Fusion", or simply start the combo with the Fusion spell. Do not worry if you think that this is simply going to end up in "Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon" again like in pretty much any other deck in existence at the moment: In this deck, the combo is summoning "Meteor Black Comet Dragon" via "Red-Eyes Fusion" by using a "Red-Eyes Black Flare Dragon" and a copy of "Mana Dragon Zirnitron" from the deck and then using the effect of the Fusion monster to ditch the single "Red-Eyes Archfiend of Lightning" for 1250 burn damage and further graveyard setup. If you started by playing "Red-Eyes Insight", you end up with the Fusion monster and every single "Red-Eyes" card in the deck in the graveyard, ready for numerous revival effects to target them. Drawing into the "Red-Eyes" monsters is no big deal, since you can use them with "Chemicritter Oxy Ox" and "Catalyst Field" and both of the Main Deck options are rather helpful when their effects go live. Only drawing "Red-Eyes Insight" after using the Fusion Spell has no further use, but that is a small price to pay.

The "Tenyi" cards in the deck are two copies of "Tenyi Spirit - Vishuda", who combines an easy summoning effects for some swarming, another monster for Rank 7 plays and a handy bounce effect in one card. The deck also runs two copies of "Fists of the Unrivaled Tenyi" to stop your opponent from doing certain things to the board. The Extra Deck monster "Berserker of the Tenyi" is only really in the deck if the opponent triggers the second effect of "Fists of the Unrivaled Tenyi", but it can technically be summoned using the normal way aswell. I included a few Gemini support cards, namely "Supervise" and "Gemini Ablation", into the mix since they help the deck with consistency and tempo. The only generic monsters in the deck are "Darkstorm Dragon", who is a technically a "Heavy Storm" on legs and therefore very helpful in certain situations, and "Mana Dragon Zirnitron", a monster that not only serves as Fusion material for "Red-Eyes Fusion", but also has an extremely helpful summoning condition while also recycling backrow. Since the opponent will try to destroy "Catalyst Field" to slow down the deck, you will often have a chance to summon this monsters and plus off its effect.

The Extra Deck is mostly a colorful mix of options you can use in various situations. The two Fusion monsters I have not talked about so far are "Superalloy Beast Raptinus", who gives all Gemini monsters their effects as long as it is on the field, and "First of the Dragons" who is helpful against deck with a lot of Effect monsters; so all the time, really. They can be summoned via "Dragon's Mirror", which makes use of the monsters in the graveyard. The Xyz options are the archetypal boss monster "Vola-Chemicritter Methydraco" (revive effect, removal and attack/target protection for Gemini monsters), "Number 38: Hope Harbinger Dragon Titanic Galaxy" (beater with added Spell negate), "Number 107: Galaxy-Eyes Tachyon Dragon" (beater with effect negation, ATK boost and bonus attacks), "Thunder End Dragon" ("Raigeki" on legs), "Red-Eyes Metal Flare Dragon" (burn card with added revive for "Red-Eyes" Normal monsters) and "Number 11: Big Eye" (steals the opposing monsters for the cost of one material and "Big Eye" attacking in the same turn). "Defender of the Labyrinth" is a surprisingly good card that provides attack boosts for your board, lowers the ATK of opposing monsters and revives a non-Effect monster (and therefore, you guessed it, a Gemini monster) from your graveyard when it leaves the field. "Knightmare Phoenix" is handy backrow removal, while "Barricadeborg Blocker" can help with issues with the Field Spell.

I personally think that "Chemicritters" are very fun to play in a more casually-minded environment. The deck has little to no reaction to the opposing plays on its own, but very much likes to just do its own stuff and see how it works out. The problem with Geminis in general is that every monster over Level 5 is a potential brick that you can only really get around by drawing into another copy of your Field Spell. In addition to that, they cannot keep up with decks that carefully manage their resources and will recover cards on a regular basis, since they will run out of cards rather quickly. But despite being Geminis and therefore being the slowest possible summons in the game, the archetype works rather well and is certainly quirky.

If you want to know more about the "Chemicritter" archetype (or other archetypes for that matter), please feel free to visit my blog here: https://cubiccreativity.wordpress.com/2020/09/19/archetype-analysis-chemicritters/