Hololive – 5th Generation Memory Shenanigans (B/R) [04/13/2022]

The 5th generation of Hololive Japan consists of four members: Yukihana Lamy, Momosuzu Nene, Shishiro Botan, and Omaru Polka. These four lovely members employ both their musical and theatrical talents to overwhelm and excite fans all around the globe.

The primary goal of this generational deck is to bring cards into memory and whittle your opponent to death. Polka is a great payoff above assuming you can meet her condition. She’s a decent early play healer with a good amount of power. Nene is a sticky finisher with encore and scry when she’s front attacked in the front row, assuming you meet her condition. Furthermore, she combos with the climax to the right to potentially ping your opponent for a large chunk of damage.

Botan is a great beater that acts as your main early game advantage engine. She combos with the climax to the right to let you search two Hololive (ホロライブ) characters upon reverse. The neat trick is, with Botan, you selectively add one of them to hand and send the other to the waiting room, helping to set-up for later shenanigans or cards to be standby’d into play.

Your primary means of putting cards in memory for other cards’ conditions are shown above. Polka lets you spawn a cost zero from your waiting room, which can be extremely beneficial, such as spawning your level one Botan for the turn. The card she summons goes to memory at the end of turn, but you’ll already get your use from that card. Nene is a great filter on-play, helping fetch any card from the top three cards of your deck. She can freely go to memory upon being reversed if her condition is met. Botan can force herself into memory to let you filter through the top three cards of your deck for a character.

Since the deck does run standby, there are a plethora of options to choose from as early targets to gain further advantage. The Lamy on the left is a great answer to early played level threes while possessing her own encore and power as well. The center Lamy is a level assist with the ability to rearrange triggers, hopefully setting up for your level three Nene. Lastly, Botan is an interesting beater with an additional ability to attack one of your opponent’s backrow, ideally hitting a crucial support to interrupt your opponent’s game plans.

Some other interesting suggestions are provided above. The Polka bounces itself back to hand when a climax is played and then pumps up the power of two of your characters, which is especially beneficial to your level one Botan. Furthermore, it’s alarm ability forces you to cycle hand at the start of your climax phase, hopefully procuring better targets for your standby triggers. Nene is a level one reverser that has a nice clock ability to force refresh your deck at the start of your main phase. Lamy can be considered to be a delayed advantage engine that forces a card to memory temporarily (which can be used to activate memory conditions). That card goes to your hand at the start of your next draw phase, so plan accordingly.

The brainstorm for the deck does carry an interesting memory bond with the event on the right. The event on the right lets you cycle a 5th Generation (5期生) character from your waiting room with a card from hand. Furthermore, it provides one of your characters a revival from the waiting room effect for the turn if it is sent there.

Considering that many of the cards in this deck go to memory at the end of turn or wish to be reversed, combined with the low power field in early game, using backups to preserve field is rather difficult. The backup above works well mostly for its secondary ability, letting you deal extra damage to your opponent during their turn. Generally speaking, the Hololive 5th Generation event is the main use of backup interaction if any at at all.

All in all, this deck comes with quite a number of powerful tools to both recur advantage and maintain power on field. Botan’s level one combo is sufficiently powerful on her own, reaching 8000 power normally with just her climax and self. Use the various tools in the set to push forward your advantage while ensuring that your memory condition is always reached. Furthermore, take notice of Botan’s smaller form which has the potential to swap itself into the level one Botan. Push forward and make Generation 5 truly shine!