Nodoka and Mai are close half-sisters, whom, after some mishaps, were able to rekindle their relationship as siblings once more. Despite their differences, the two are surprisingly close and share some similar mannerisms as well.
Nodoka presenting a gift provides the Musashi effect to both herself and another character on cancel. Do note that multiple Nodoka effects can stack, incentivizing the player to field max out on copies of Nodoka in the front stage. Keep in mind that Nodoka’s climax ability costs are on climax play which can demand quite a number of resources.
Mai, the older sister, is the early advantage engine with her modal pseudo cigarettes ability. Rather than checking levels of cards milled, Mai checks number of characters milled, letting you have a wider selection and potential to regain hand while controlling your targets sent to the waiting room.
To help compliment our strategy, we will also use some memory based cards to empower our cards and also act as deck filters. Mai’s brainstorm above grants a little incentive to reach three memory or more with a cross-turn power buff.
Both Mai cards to the left and right are great additions to maintain hand and filter our cards while sending themselves to memory for our brainstorm’s requirements.
The two Mai cards above benefit from the memory compression. Mai to the left is a large beatstick and a potential free filter. The other Mai to the right is a huge beatstick during your turn with the additional benefit of pumping one of your character’s power by a large amount on play if you meet her memory condition.
To round up the post, the 1/1 event shown above is a potential option to use as a way to ensure that you meet the Mai brainstorm’s three memory condition. It’s a hand filter with a permanent ability to boost your character’s power during your turn. The Mai on the right is shown in conjunction with this event since it is one of the only ways to actually try and filter the event to hand. Mai is a pseudo-top checker that has a modular effect that depends on what is revealed. While being able to force draw the event, she can also act as a beater and a discard outlet as well.
SBY/W64-005R 汲み取る気持ち 桜島 麻衣 (center)
SBY/W77-059U 満足度の確認 桜島 麻衣 (right)
In terms of backups, we have a couple utility options for the later game. Mai on the left acts as a level 2 J.C. profile on field. The center Mai backup is an anti-change backup with hand discard costs. Lastly, the Mai to the right is a Leafa counter.
In terms of other suggestions, Mai has plenty of options to help with further hand filtering and field control. Mai’s trial deck finisher is an expensive secondary finisher that can also help to cantrip through your deck. Level 2 Mai may be a cheap way to help ensure you grab your finisher Nodoka from your waiting room. Feel free to play around with all the tech cards that the set offers. Use the power of the sisters’ friendship to push for victory!