Toppa Bashin – Episode 17

Alright, after the fever dream that was Episode 16, I’ll use this intro to go over what the last episode decided to do extremely loosely to the point where I didn’t even want to associate with it anymore.

That is, the topic of mixing colours.

For a lot of people who only really stick to a single colour at any given time, often the topic of mixing 2 colours together can be a little bit scary. As is building any kind of deck relatively freestyle.

The reason why is because as some may notice, some cards feel better to use with others, the benefit of using a deck of a single colour effectively comes down to cost reduction.

Those annoying little dots next to the cost are honestly the most daunting thing about mixing colours.

A lot of people would rather stick to a single colour, just so they’re getting maximum reductions on their cards and playing in an “Optimal” way, and it’s a trap that limits your creativity as a new player.

Nowadays there are decks that are designated to be in a deck of more than one colour, but the cards they provide to that end very blatantly hold your hand to make it easier for players who are not so creatively blessed.

This also goes in the opposite direction, people who realise the freedom of Battle Spirits and completely ignore the concept of synergy, trying to force things that cannot function together, to do so.

Mixed colouring freely and effectively is a little difficult, you need to decide why you wish to mix those colours and what exactly you are trying to achieve with it. Why do you want to mix colours? What playstyle is each colour going to contribute? What Key spirit will you use? How does each colour help that Key spirit?

You need to think about these things before you throw yourself at the idea of mixing colours in a deck not necessarily designed to mix, because you’re going to find yourself with a loss streak if you don’t approach the topic carefully.

This may not be the best example of a deck that does this, but I’ve given an example of a Deck using mixed colours without a clear need to do so of course, it’s based on J’s own Gigantic Thor deck but using Core Boost to get it out as fast as humanly possible.

I’m using Green to try and not only synergize with the fact that both White and Green can core boost but also to act in Pseudo defense, White is a defensive colour and High Speed on MachG can be used defensively, all this contributes to a very powerful defense by using Green as a subservient colour rather than trying to make the most out of both colours at once.

That is one of the benefits of non-obvious colour mixing, you can’t make the absolute most out of both, your single coloured key spirits CAN reap the benefits of another colour.

Anyway, apologies for this happening during the start, you came to see an episode yes?

And oh god. It’s a My Sunshine episode.

Lovely, because we really needed to look at Suiren fail at doing her job because she can’t decide whether or not she wants to quit.

If this in no way directly relates to a new card or feature of the game, it’s definitely not important.

…Actually nevermind, the topic has finally come up as to what’s behind the mask that is Suiren.

That provides significantly more intrigue than I thought it would, which is fair considering Batosupi TV’s track record.

Only if you’re anyone besides the audience.

Though I’m sure some of your slower viewers may not have clicked already.

…So the Cat’s out of the bag that Suiren is infact My Sunshine then?

And now we cut to a flashback of Commentator-San spying on Suiren heading to the bathroom, apparently…

There’s a million things wrong with this, but okay.

And out comes what I can only assume to be the Janitor for the venue.

But knowing how everyone has the brain of a smaller-than-average goldfish, they’re obviously going to assume that this Janitor who has EVERY REASON TO BE THERE, is Suiren.

Commentator-chan seems to have broken the laws of this world and grown a brain.

Someone had to, eventually.

…This is grounds for the TV company he works for to begin a private investigation into this guy if he was on the lookout for 6 hours just to see who Suiren was…

Infront of the Girl’s bathroom no less.

This has 2 problems to it.:

1. You’re running off the assumption that the Janitor was not already present in the bathroom before you started your watch.
2. You’ve supposedly dismissed the possibility of anyone else leaving the Bathroom also possibly being Suiren.

And lastly, wouldn’t Suiren’s complexion immediately give that away? She’s ONLY wearing a pair of large shades to hide her identity along with a wig, you can’t expect her to be able to hide that many wrinkles.

I have separate issues with the way your eyes look.

Not that they make you old but mainly because of the fact that you have a naturally occurring pink heart shape in a set of green eyes.

And YES I refuse to believe they are contacts because she never takes them out.

You may seem proud of that now but Suiren also doubling as an Idol has caused more problems for your Idol career than it has solved.

And you repeatedly seem to give very clear hints that you aren’t interested in appeasing your fans by constantly disappearing.

…Is he checking on My Sunshine’s room… for Suiren?

Ain’t that a tad suspicious?

…Convenient.

If there’s a way to get from one room to the other without passing through the Corridor, it would definitely be a simple matter to switch to Suiren all of a sudden.

Ugh, J is with Micheal Elliott.

The hell is Micheal Elliott even doing here?

…AND HER METHOD IS CRAWLING THROUGH THE AIR VENT.

Classy.

The only one who shouldn’t be there right now is Micheal Elliott, his existence here bothers me and I don’t like where this might be going.

I love how they use the whites of the shades to communicate how nervous Suiren looks.

Good touch on the animators.

This exchange is hilarious, I’m actively having to stifle my own laughter.

Also Suiren it’s “Mysterious Adult” to you, which is pronounced “Nazo no Otona”

Or you know, the more common phrase, “Nazo-Otona”

Oh, right we’re getting to the new year aren’t we considering it’s winter break and we just had a Christmas episode.

And J did promise a Battle System for the new year as well, I wonder if Elliott is down here because of that.

…Have an advantage for what? Why is Suiren giving him strength?

What’s stopping Suiren from beating the snot out of J’s punk ass and just ruining it for everyone?

What is the catch?

Hopefully it’s better than the last one you tried to teach.

Because you spent the entirety of that episode suggesting colour mixing, and then not showing any examples of it.

I remember it so well you’d think it was last blog post…

Because it was…

I’m VERY bitter.

To bigger and better things, possibly involving card games but most likely involving something completely and utterly stupid.

Though that is indeed a point, where the hell even is Bashin?

And secondly if you were going to turn up on a day as important as New Year’s Eve, wouldn’t it be reasonable to give some.. I dunno, ADVANCE NOTICE!?

Christ you turn up to my house unannounced on any public holiday and my family would skewer you.

…Wut?

My Sunshine has a Secret live show? That’s interesting.

Bashin spending some of his extremely limited brain points to be thoughtful here.

Whatever Bashin got, he apparently received it in enough of a short notice that he couldn’t give it to Meganeko.

So it was by invitation as well.

I imagine if Bashin was personally invited to this event then the tickets are also non-transferable.

Meaning this was set up so that it would be really difficult to give up the ticket to someone else.

Japan!

With 1 word that mean actually 2 completely different things.

Also Striker’s face here is priceless, he looks like Bashin just murdered his bird.

Thankfully that’s not the case, for Striker’s Bird is still here.

Anyway, it seems like Striker is up in arms about Commentator-san (wrongly) asserting that Suiren is infact an old cleaning lady.

I hate to break it to ya Pink! But smarter people have believed dumber things with LESS evidence!

But these two are neither smart, nor have they been given any reasonable confirmation that Suiren is infact, an old woman.

Is this the part where they try to rationalise their belief with unrelated things that don’t actually prove a thing?

Yes, Ace, Yes it is.

Or literally any kind of Himedere which is a common trope of anime.

Infact I believe we get someone EXACTLY like this in about 3 seasons time, and she’s much tinier than Suiren is (despite being canonically older)

Somehow Pink trying to hold back My Sunshine from strangling the shit out of the pair of them is hilarious to me.

Look at his FACE

Oh look it’s me on a regular day when I’m going out to University…

Also that picture of Suiren going “Give me the Radish!” is absolutely perfect.

My Sunshine’s face here is absolutely stunning, very cartoony and very well done.

Got a bit of a Scott Pilgrim vibe there too.

And now we’re finally at the “secret live”

I hope it’s not just a regular concert, I would be a bit miffed if it was.

Oh, that’s a new song, I can certainly get behind this if they play at least a TV sized segment of it-

Aaand they skipped the whole thing.

If anyone can find this song, hit me with a link, it’s called “Shinkokyuu”

And don’t gimme that shitty Naruto song either.

And J shows up to display what his surprise is.

NEW BATTLE SYSTEM! NEW BATTLE SYSTEM!

None of your surprises are actually “surprising” especially since you confirmed this was going to be a thing in an interview earlier.

It was a “secret” live for a reason, Striker.

What you thought it was just going to be a regular show?

I’d say I called it but we also knew about this from a previous episode.

So there wasn’t much to call I was going off of already available information.

Oh boy.

This is not what I thought when they mentioned a “new battle system”

I thought it was like a Tournament Battlefield or something like it. Not a new way to play.

Hoo boy… Tag Matches, if they don’t explain it well enough themselves I’ll go over the rules.

But I was so content with the single one-on-one battles, and as much as I would love the idea of tagging up with someone, these are a pain in the ass to set up in Vassal.

But welp, I’ll try my best to make sense of them.

Nice time to start a tournament I guess, and at least the weirdos are actually playing this time rather than wasting our time.

So that’s what they meant by Suiren “Giving J strength” earlier despite being offered to Battle, Elliott was asking Suiren to join J’s Team as the “King” of the Tournament bracket.

So Striker and Bashin are Teaming up of course.

Well, why not, seeing them work together on a battle would definitely be cool to watch.

Well it jumps straight into the battles later so it doesn’t actually explain the rules, so it’s down to me to do it for you.

Dual Battles

Instead of 2 players in a match, you have 4, you, your partner, and the opposing Team of 2 people.

Rather than the typical 5 life start, Tag Battles start your Team off with 8 Lives.

You still only start with 4 cores in your reserve however. Core is shared between your Team.

You and your partner’s decks cannot contain any cards that are the same colour.

When you’re performing a Refresh Step, you’re only allowed to refresh your cards, not your partner’s.

And finally, deck-outs only occur when both you and your teammate run out of cards. Not just one of you.

Unfortunately this format is no longer supported but still a fun concept to try with your friends.

And due to the monster of a field scan on there, I’ll be reviewing the field using Vassal, as per usual.

Bashin has a Level 1 Rokceratops, and 2 Level 2 Spirits in Lizardman and Metalburn.

Striker only has Level 1s, with Flyingmirage and 2 Beatbeetles.

And finally the enemy team has Hercules-Geo and 2 Xscissors, which JUST so happens to be a new card!

Also I see they haven’t included “No matching colours” rule in this variant of the Dual Battle.

I actually messed up, apparently the cards on their field weren’t Xscissors, they were Scorpedes. They looked kind of similar but I’ll leave the fuck up in there.

I ain’t perfect, so I’ll leave my mistakes for everyone to see

Chock up a fuckup tally for the Verus.

Anyway, Scorpede is a Cost 4 Green Spirit with the When summoned ability of deploying a White or Green nexus from the Trash without paying.

This is a good card to use if you rely on your Nexus, but are facing Red decks, which have Dragsaurus and Buster cards that can wipe out your Nexuses.

Scorpede blocks an attack from Lizardman.

Well I guess he wasn’t there long enough for us to care about it.

Bashin then swings with his remaining 2 Spirits and snatches 2 lives from the enemy team.

Also jesus that’s a huge life counter.

Bashin is apparently a bit too pleased to have gotten his opponents down to 1 life.

…I have a question, why is one wearing a Cap with a light strapped to it, and why does the other have a giant portable headlight sticking out of his bag?

These are some weird ass extra designs.

So the guy summons Monoqueiroz, boosting all his other Spirits BPs by +2000.

And then levels up Scorpede to Level 3 which requires 7 freaking Core.

And for all that his Scorpede is still only at 8000 BP, not very impressive.

And now the arguments begin!

Nothing like showing the weakness in a team by getting into an argument over blocking.

Striker gives in and Beatbeetle gets Skewered for Bashin’s sins.

The 2nd Beatbeetle is taken out from an attack from Hercules-Geo.

And finally Flyingmirage gets sliced in 2 by Monoqueiroz.

Striker’s lost all of his Spirits, and it’s Striker’s bloody turn as well.

Given the updated Dual Rules, he shouldn’t refresh Bashin’s spirits, but I don’t know what set of rules they’re running off of.

Elliott quickly points out that trying to take front and centre while letting your partner do the defending for you isn’t a particularly great way to play.

Throwing your partner under the bus will just hurt in the end, you only get 1 turn per round of 4 turns, so throwing your partner under the bus meaning you’ll just get ganged up on.

Suiren is still missing however, and Elliott ponders where she could be.

Also, Mesterius Garl intensifies.

Trouble in Paradise, everyone wants to interview My Sunshine for some odd reason, which throws a bit of a wrench into the plan of turning into Suiren.

Is the Mask all she needs to transform? She’s kind of also got a skimpy pink Idol dress and a short skirt she’d need to get rid of also.

Well that was easy, what was the point of that then?

Screen-time padding I’m watching you very closely.

Except Tag Battles follow along the typical logic of regular battle spirits, so individual skill is definitely a huge factor.

Meaning the power of all the teams are definitely not equal.

Well apparently according to that bracket, Bashin and Striker won that match.

It’s a crying shame we didn’t get to see the end of that last fight.

And apparently on that note we get thrown into another fight.

Here’s the field review.

Bashin and Striker have all Level 1 Spirits:
2 Goradons
Eyeburn
and Beatbeetle.

Meanwhile the opposing team have:
3 Lizardedge
Lizardman
and 2 Orcarias, one is at Level 2.

Should probably note that the opposing Team are a pair of security guards.

But besides that point, we have a new card to review.

This card is actually kind of cool, from BS02, It’s a Cost 3 Red Spirit from the Lava Fish family.

And at level 2, it has the ability to Target attack any spirit that isn’t exhausted.

Target Attacks are an interesting mechanic of Red, what it does is effectively skip the first flash timing and immediately force your opponent to block with any spirit you choose that meets the condition.

Normally you can’t pick what Spirits your opponent blocks with, or even decide whether your opponent gets to block or not, but this card circumvents both.

You can either use this to take out any chump blockers (cards that are weak and only serve to protect your life) or ram it into an opponent’s powerful spirit so that it ends up exhausted.

I didn’t expect to see a card like this so early.

It’s Bashin turns and he drops his X-Rare, The DragonEmperor Siegfried.

Bashin Levels up Goradon, Eyeburn, and Siegfried using all of his remaining core to do so.

Lizardedge blocks an Attack from Eyeburn and is cleaned off the field.

…What?

Eyeburn’s already attacked and won’t be able to block, there’s plenty of reason to level down Eyeburn, mostly because IT DOESN’T NEED IT!

Bashin’s spewing absolute poppycock as usual.

Anyway, Bashin ends his turn after having attacked with Eyeburn.

I assume that’s because they want to piggyback off of each other’s Core reduction, right?

Considering you’re still able to use cards on your ally’s field during your turn for attacks and such.

Apparently skipping over a turn to Striker’s, Striker plays Gather Forces to gain a core.

Right this weird “Ruby and Emerald” statement Micheal Elliott actually states here is a reference to the actual symbols on the card.

The Orcaria player plays Lizardman at Level 3.

The Policeman attacks with Lizardman and Bashin blocks with Siegfried, using Awaken on Eyeburn to Level it up to Level 3 and defeat Lizardman.

Gather forces did absolutely nothing for your Awaken strategy Bashin…

I’m not actually sure what you’re applauding him for.

You had enough core to do that ANYWAY.

This kid man, I swear.

You know what Bashin?

Neither does anyone else who is currently reading this blog.

Oh look, Suiren arrived just in time for the match she was supposed to play.

Convenient.

Despite this episode being called “My First Sunshine”, There doesn’t seem to be a lot of focus on My Sunshine whatsoever.

Starting at turn bloody 22.

Though logically Tag matches should be taking about twice as long as normal matches anyway, so I can’t really argue with them skipping ahead on this one.

Time for the field review.

Suiren has Death-Haides and a Level 2 Skulldevil on her field.

J has Icemaiden and a Level 2 Fenrircannon.

Bashin has an exhausted Goradon and Taurusknight, from the looks of their postures.

And Striker has a Level 2 Flyingmirage and a Level 2 Gowsilvia on his field.

And since there’s a 3000 marker next to Gowsilvia, Striker and Bashin have 3 cores in their reserve.

Suiren seems… troubled by something outside of the game itself.

Apparently Suiren had to be reminded it was her turn.

Is she just tired or is something actually bothering her?

Suiren attacks with Skulldevil but J apparently notices a mistake with that move.

Striker blocks Skulldevil with Flyingmirage but it results in mutually assured destruction for both Spirits.

I was a bit confused but apparently Flyingmirage has 3000 BP at Level 2 on closer inspection, I seem to have forgotten the details on the card itself…

Suiren tries to attack with Death-Haides but is blocked by Gowsilvia with 7000 BP, Death-Haides doesn’t stand a chance with the 4000 BP it has at Level 1.

Suiren didn’t achieve much with this turn other than destroying both her Spirits.

Everyone’s picked up on the fact that Suiren made a serious blunder by attacking so carelessly.

Gotta give it to the players for good sportsmanship and putting Suiren’s health over the game itself.

Suiren starts having thoughts about the Paparazzi, and being declared an old lady.

I mean there are SEVERAL ways you could possibly solve this problem, Suiren, it’s called unveiling your identity.

Might have an impact on your idol life but to be fair you haven’t been treating it all that well to begin with.

Suiren finally has an emotional breakdown out of fear of people thinking that she’s secretly an old lady.

Poor Suiren, she needs a hug.

It’s not nice to accuse people of things on live television.

And as a Battle Spirits fan, of course she’d be paying attention to what’s on Batosupi TV.

And if she wasn’t infact an Old lady, of course she would be worried about it.

While Bashin is totally in the right to stop Suiren here.

Fuck you Bashin. This would fix a significant amount of problems in Suiren’s life right now.

My Sunshine’s scheduling issues, maybe give her some free time, increase her publicity amongst the Battle Spirits community.

Like come on man, quit being a White Knight, you play Red for fuck sake.

No concern to you.

Definite concern to Suiren who’s having horrible things being said about her with no grounds other than a perverted old man hiding infront of the girl’s bathroom for 6 hours saying so.

Bashin carries on, playing Double Draw.

There’s a Pot of Greed joke in there somewhere but I’m better than that.

After looking at the cards he drew, Bashin makes… this face.

Someone fucking caption this shit. Bashin makes these weird expressions across this whole show.

Bashin summons The DragonEmperor Siegfried at Level 2 (What a surprise!)

Bashin then immediately attacks with Siegfried.

…Did I miss something? There wasn’t a Queen-Valkyrie on your field before J…

And they didn’t skip any turns either, Suiren just had hers.

ADD IT TO THE FUCKUP TALLY!

J then plays Defensive Aura to boost his blocking spirits BPs by 3000.

You know, the one that didn’t exist during the field review?

Anyway, that aside, Queen-Valkyrie at Level 2 has 4000 BP, with Defensive Aura giving +3000, that’s a total of 7000 BP which beats Siegfried’s 6000 BP at Level 2.

Meaning if nothing occurs here, Queen-Valkyrie will be serving Siegfried his own sloppy seconds.

And that good sirs is a new card.

A Cost 3 Green Magic from BS02.

During the Flash timing, this card moves all the Cores in your Trash to any of your spirits, you can’t use it during your main phase.

Turn away now nutjobs, this card is banned from competitive play in Japan.

This card is all kinds of broken, too many good flash effects to abuse nowadays, I’m sure many would love to just use this card to get all their core back for free.

So Striker uses Nature Forces to just slap 10 Core onto Siegfried, bringing it to Level 3 with 10,000 BP.

Queen-Valkyrie is overpowered by Siegfried’s immense power and is destroyed.

I think he means “Role” but yes, Strikers assist each other in getting goals.

I don’t think football logic is something he should be spouting however, given that he will never become a pro football player.

D’awww they’re having a touching moment…

…Which can be dealt with later, back to the fight ya lovebirds!

Icemaiden blocks an attack from Taurusknight and is destroyed.

OTHER THAN A FENRIRCANNON WHICH WAS SHOWN TO BE ON HIS FIELD DURING THE FIELD REVIEW.

So not only did they just completely bullshit Queen-Valkyrie onto the field, but apparently Fenrircannon just doesn’t fucking exist anymore.

Since that’s 2 individual changes, that’s an Extra fuckup for whatever the fuckup tally is on.

I swear it’s something like 17 right now.

Suiren’s STILL hung up over her previous mistake due to her embarassment of people thinking she’s an old lady.

J re-assures Suiren by telling her that HE was the one who selected Suiren to be his partner, not the other way around.

And that had absolutely nothing to do with her identity or age.

FINALLY THE SOB STORY IS OVER. FIGHT TIME!

Apparently we’ve skipped a few turns ahead because it’s Suiren’s turn again.

And she plays The SevenShogun Desperado.

It seems that when Taurusknight swung, Bashin moved several core over to it using it’s Awaken ability.

Given that Siegfried had a whole 10 core it would be weird to suddenly have 6 the turn directly after without them moving.

But also I’m curious as to how much Bashin actually moved, both had 6 core for a total of 12 (as they have 5 each now after the core removal)

Meaning Bashin moved 4 core from Siegfried. But that logic doesn’t make much sense because that would mean Taurusknight had 2 core.

Though Taurusknight could have pulled from the neighbouring Goradon Bashin had on his field, so possibly that’s where the extra core showed up from.

Striker isn’t so lucky, Monoqueiroz gets depleted.

Suiren summons Skulldevil and then throws 4 Core onto Desperado, putting it to Level 2.

I’m pretty curious as to why she left it with 6 core though.

And Suiren plays one of my aesthetically favourite cards, Chaos Draw, also I notice how Suiren has The Shackles of Doom on her field that was never brought up, mentioned or alluded to.

He’s right, say hello to a Purple Draw card.

It’s not a great card since it relies on an aggressive opponent, or you’re playing a Green/Purple mix. But it is certainly one of the most visually appealing cards in the game.

But since that’s just a main effect, they’ve given it a +3000 BP power boost flash effect to give it some usefulness incase it’s situational scenario doesn’t come about, you’ll see this a lot with cards like this, and its another reason why I love Battle Spirits. There’s a way for situational cards to be useful to you if their intended scenario doesn’t arrive.

YOU CAN DO THAT!?

Nowhere in the Dual Battle rules did it ever say I could give my Tag partner my main effect…

But that’s cool if so.

I’ve never heard of this being a thing up until now and I’ve watched the Battle Spirits anime multiple times.

This is why re-watches are valuable, all the information you had before gets refreshed, and you notice details you didn’t before.

That stock background gradient looks reeaaaaal obvious here.

Also since there’s a total of 3 Exhausted spirits on Bashin and Striker’s fields, J gets 3 cards.

Giving Draw to J is beneficial too, since White is a Core Boosting Colour, not a Drawing Colour.

Skulldevil is brought up to Level 2.

Suiren swings with both Desperado and Skulldevil, snatching 2 lives from Striker and Bashin, leaving them with only 3 left.

Striker quickly summons Flyingmirage at Level 2, and attacks with it

But it seems that Suiren was right to give J those cards, as one of them turned out to be Silent Wall. Which will end Striker’s turn after Flyingmirage finishes attacking.

“Crap!” indeed, given that until super recently, there are no cards that can put a stop to your opponent full on ending your attack step.

You just kind of have to take it and hope your opponent doesn’t use their next turn to rip your chances of winning to shreds.

J takes a life, leaving the J/Suiren Team with only a single life left.

J will draw a card leaving him with 3 cards in his hand, those 3 cards have to do enough to take 3 lives.

BUT OF COURSE HE SUMMONS 2 MJOLNIRS AND A THOR!

J puts 2 Core onto The Gigantic Thor, I think I see why they’re applying Extra Core, The Shackles of Doom is at Level 2, so they need to remove Core when swinging.

Anyway, Thor is risen up to Level 2.

At what is I assume to be the Flash Timing stage of Thor’s attack, Suiren plays Evil Aura.

New Card, Moar Reviews.

Apparently the English translated version of this card is referred to as “Cemetary Aura,” but I’ll be calling it Evil Aura because English is Dead.

Anyway, this is ANOTHER banned card, I’m not particularly sure why this one was banned but it allows you to give 4 cores to a spirit directly from the void, but at the end of your turn you’ll have to send those cores back to the void.

You can’t use it during main step either to pay for main step magic costs.

I assume this was banned for the same reason Nature forces was, because it nets you far more core than it costs.

Which means that Suiren can no longer interfere with J’s turn to help him, J’s gotta go the distance by himself.

Apparently Evil Aura was at the flash timing of a Mjolnir attack, a little out of time but I doubt there is any issues with J swinging with a Mjolnir first and Suiren using Evil Aura then.

So I won’t treat it as a fuckup, the card itself does state it can’t be used during the main step.

A life is snatched, leaving them with 2 left.

But I believe J still has a single Gowsilvia remaining, J still has 2 spirits.

A Refresh is in order…

Striker’s face here is absolutely impeccable, good damn job on the animators for this expression right here.

Absolutely love it. It radiates awesome.

I love how Thor just throws a fucking Mjolnir at Striker.

Just swats Gowsilvia out of the god damn sky.

Well okay then.

This declaration seems a bit odd, but he’s activating The Gigantic Thor’s level 3 ability, if you don’t remember what that is, well.

“[LV3] (When Attacks) When the battle ends, by destroying one of your Spirits in family “Armed Machine,” this Spirit refreshes.”

So with this, J can attack with a Mjolnir, attack with Thor, destroy the already exhausted Mjolnir and refresh Thor.

That turns a board of 3 spirits into 5 attacks.

And J’s currently attacked twice, giving him 3 more…

But he only really needs 2.

The Gigantic Thor is refreshed, and he’s acquired a new Hammer.

J makes 2 swift attacks with Thor, destroying his remaining Mjolnir in the process.

And the Bashin/Striker Team lose all their lives.

Leaving J and Suiren the winners… I’d say of the Tag Tournament but they barely even played in it.

Well we’ve still got a bit of episode time left, where do we go from here?

Apparently a cut to Battle Spirits TV.

Since the Live was secret I doubt any details about it would be on Batosupi News, so this is probably going to be quelling the rumour about Suiren

I guess that’s one way to do it, just ask the woman herself and see how she responds.

…If you want an answer that is definitely not the way to get it Commentator-San.

Let the woman breathe at least.

HAH.

Commentator-San got the bucket.

If he ever pulls something as blatantly dumb and creepy as that again you can be damn sure I hope he kicks it.

Good, since you’re done with that little segment, how about hiring a fact-checker that isn’t a creepy old man who spies near women’s bathrooms for 6-hours a day.

Apparently Striker and Bashin were called to a rooftop by Suiren. Could this mean what I think it means?

Apparently J is there as well, and so are all their Cornerstone pets.

So the gang’s all here, all 4 Cornerstone holders.

Hopefully something relevant to the overarching plot occurs.

Well, people’s serious faces and their angry faces tend to result in the same thing. I’ve been deadly focused on something and apparently had people worry that I was angry.

Oh bugger off Aibou, she’s a full time Idol who just really wants to play Battle Spirits at super inconvenient times.

She ain’t got the time to factor in a Boyfriend, plus Idols either aren’t allowed Boyfriends or have to keep them secret, and there’s 3 of you here.

Infact why would she call all 3 of you if it was a confession she wanted?

J takes the initiative and apologises for the misunderstanding concerning her being an old lady.

…And apparently Bashin and Striker get mad for J apologising first?

Also look at J’s shit eating glee on his face, someone should definitely caption that beauty.

I’M YOUR SUPERIOR.

Holy moly I did NOT take J for someone narcissistic, but after the pictures he gave Striker in the hospital I’m no longer surprised. That is 50-feet up-ones-own-posterior level prideful.

Suiren finally speaks and ends this little spat that has revealed far more to me about J than I would have liked.

AND THE GLASSES FINALLY COME OFF.

FINALLY WE CAN PUT THIS STUPID SUBPLOT TO REST AND THEY CAN BE MORE ACCOMMODATING OF SUIREN’S NEED TO TRANSFORM.

BECAUSE SWEET EVERLOVING JESUS! I WAS GETTING TIRED OF IT.

…Alright I should probably state this right now, she does NOT look bad with the shades off. I think her design would be significantly better left like this.

But any further compliments and I’m going to sound as bad as Commentator-San, so moving on!

I’d dismiss this question out of “Well it’s fucking obvious think of the ramifications of an idol disappearing every so often to play a game of personal interest” would be but to be fair they are all Cornerstone holders and have a duty to not keep secrets from each other if they’re going to figure out what “being chosen” means in the bigger picture.

Striker has a revelation that all his communications with Suiren up until now were actually with a super famous (and by his blush, super cute) idol that he’s really into.

I don’t care how Pink you are as an Idol.

You’re a filthy Purple user and I don’t trust your apologies.

Meanwhile apparently Bashin is so slow he’d go backwards on a Formula 1 track, that he somehow comes to the odd conclusion that this means “My Sunshine” is an Old lady.

SOMEONE. CAPTION. THIS. SHIT.

Yawl are letting these memes go to waste, and I SEE THE POTENTIAL!

Not fair Suiren! I want to choke the life out of Bashin!

But given that 2D characters on a screen are slightly intangible to the real world, I guess this will have to do.

And Striker just admits he’s super into BDSM.

This kid is fucking 12.

I’m not even projecting anything here! What am I supposed to do!?

Right I will let you have your weird tastes in what gets you off Striker but DO NOT project that shit onto J.

He’s already weird enough as it is, we don’t need to drive him further over the edge.

Suiren fails at fulfilling the one goal I’ve wanted to achieve because she was distracted by the Sunrise.

And now Bashin is going to live with his windpipe intact.

Well there won’t be a Bashin Toppa in about 33 episodes so I guess it’s not all bad-

Shit there are still 33 more episodes? And that’s about double the amount I’ve already done…

Hey guys! We’re officially a 3rd of the way through Bashin Toppa!

You’re talking absolute nonsense, what does this poetic statement have to do with revealing your identity to the sausage party?

Dammit Suiren now look what you made me do.

Now I’m agreeing with Bashin!

Whew, this took a tad longer than usual, had a lot of breaks in between but at least I don’t feel absolutely knackered at the end like I usually do.

Episode Review! Well it was pretty consequential, 2 major things occurred.

The first is that the new “Battle System” has been added, the Tag Battle, I’ll go over that later.

the second is the fact that Suiren’s identity has been revealed to the main cast now, and that’s a good thing for several reasons.

The first being that now Suiren can be a bigger part of J, Bashin and Striker’s antics without needing to be Suiren to be involved, the second is also that the plot can focus on the fact of Suiren and My Sunshine being the same person a lot less.

This gives more room to solve and add other areas of plot without needing to arbitrarily focus on the Suiren’s Identity subplot just to fit Suiren in.

And that makes me happy, that such a thing has been done and dusted.

As for the Tag matches, they are certainly an interesting concept, and also gives an excuse to introduce more characters and new cards all at once without having to do several fights an episode, however the main downside is that there is usually a LOT going on at once and it puts a strain on me to provide the information clearly to the readers.

So while I do like their concept, it’s putting a damper on my ability to execute these reviews properly. But if you think I’m going to give up because there’s a significantly more information to take in then you have no bloody idea who BlackAce is.

That aside, I enjoyed this significantly more than the last episode, currently my most hated episodes are 7, and 16.

16 because it is effectively a skippable episode, and 7 because it does nothing for the entirety of it, and is not skippable.

For those who get this far, please PM me whether or not I should check whether or not an Episode is “Skippable” before deciding to post a blog on it? Of course if you enjoy my rage-infused suffering then of course feel free to support the idea of “no skipping”

Anyway, with that out of the way, time to check the Card of the day.

Uh… Shit, there isn’t one.

Well I need to put something down so that the link doesn’t look fugly on Discord, so I’ll go with the last card used before the end of the final match!

Evil Aura shall decorate our ending for now.

I’ll see you guys next episode!

Also celebrate! We’re officially a 3rd of the way through Toppa! Only 33 more episodes to go before the next season!