On her way between photo shoots in bridal dresses, the carefree Azusa gets in trouble as she finds herself lost amidst the crowd. Being a premier lady, the other younger idols look up to her as an example; however, they seem to always end up having to hold her hand to make sure she makes it to her proper destination.
IM/S21-038bU 寄り道 (center)
IM/S21-038cU 寄り道 (right)
All three arts above are alternative versions of the same card. Feel free to mix accordingly, however, you’d like. Detour is an event that allows you to perform a clock swap while also pumping the power of one of your characters for the turn. It does have a backup symbol, letting you use it as a counter during your opponent’s turn as well. After it’s used, it is sent directly to memory for other shenanigans.
Azusa is the main payoff for having Detour in memory. As an ACT effect, meaning spammable if you have the resources, Azusa can spawn a character from your clock that is level 2 or lower, and then replacing that card in clock with the top card of your deck. She also has a defensive scry during your opponent’s turn when she is front attacked. Miki is another payoff as an early play heal as long as you have two or more Detours in memory.
Ryo Watanabe takes the stage as the prime target for Azusa’s spawning effect. Ryo’s combo makes a “dazzling” impact which sends an opponent’s card from their waiting room permanently to memory if you pay her costs when she swings with her combo. With enough luck and if you can stall out the game, you can potentially rid your opponent of their entire end-game combo with either their finisher or their finisher’s climax.
Takane is our early advantage combo of choice for two main reasons. Firstly, she puts a character from our waiting room to stock for her combo letting you use this stock later to summon or pay for Ryo’s costs. Secondly, Takane carries a Taigei ability making her quite large on the field. Combined with the use of our backup event, Takane can potentially net quite a large amount of stock if she can stay on stage for more than a single turn.
IM/SP01-03S-SR M@STERS OF IDOL WORLD!! 水瀬伊織 (center)
IAS/S61-105BNP-BNP きっちりサポート 秋月律子 (right)
To fetch the detour event, we have the following cards above as a means to fetch them. Takane is an old support that lets you perform a clock swap with the event if it is in the clock zone on-play. Iori is a direct bonder, letting you discard a card to salvage the event from the waiting room. Lastly, Rinko is a Riki profile that sends herself to clock on reverse to check the top two cards of your deck and add any card to hand.
Rinko is the brainstorm of choice for a number of reasons. Rinko can grab the event off her draw ability. But furthermore, she has a static ability where if your opponent reveals a climax with a brainstorm ability, you may draw and discard a card from hand, giving you an optional filter during your opponent’s turn. Azusa returns as a level 3 assist in the late game. Furthermore, if you have two or more Detours in memory, Azusa becomes frontal assist as well that grants 1000 power.
Takane above is the last card I would like to mention due to her clock encore ability. Because the deck revolves around playing around your clock zone, Takane can act as a way to further extend the number of options with her clock encore ability. Furthermore, because the early advantage Takane does not return hand, Takane above can be a means to retaining field at a cheap cost of life.
Takane is an interesting option that acts as a drop search on attack but only for Takane (searches out Royalty (王族) trait). Given that the deck is running both bar and arc triggers, Iori can be a great hand filter. Azusa can be used to build extra stock and also compresses itself by going to memory. Iori’s level 2 assist is a climax swapper on-play if you do not wish to use Azusa. Lastly, Hibiki is an innate blind stock charger from the top of your deck whenever she reverses a level 1 or higher opponent.
Charge up your stock for the late game where your sole goal will be to deny your opponent’s finisher combo. Azusa may be lost, but she can be found and sought if you play your cards right.