Gone Fishin'

Written by: James Arc AKA Luck Extreme
 James is a renowned Edison player reaching Deity Rank in FL's Ladder, he's won multiple Edison tournaments and is the co-host of the Ed, Edd, & Edison YouTube channel.

​Think of the Fish deck as Frog Monarch’s faster, more explosive cousin. Both decks play the Frog engine and control spells to abuse them, but that’s where the similarities end. Typically, the goal of the Fish deck is simple: double tribute for Coelecanth, use its effect to summon out a bunch of Fish tuners and non-tuners, and make big synchros to win the game. 

Two of the most common end boards leave the Fish player with a Colossal +1 or 2 Armory Arm, or Goyo Guardian, Black Rose Dragon, and Coelecanth (2800+2400+2800=8000 Damage). While Armory Arm was later errata’d, in Edison it inflicts damage based on attack while on field, not in the graveyard. That means Armory Arm+Colossal allows you to equip Armory to an opponents monster to put it to over 2800 ATK, ram your Colossal Fighter, and revive the same Colossal from the grave, inflicting 2800 damage in the process.

The rest of the deck tries to support this plan, whether speeding through the deck and fixing hands, stalling and setting up tribute fodder, or clearing backrow so your Coelecanth play is successful.

Monsters:

The fish deck can be broken down into 2 main groups of monster lineup:

FISH ENGINE: 3 Coelecanth, 2 Fishborg, 2 Oyster Meister, 1 Metabo Shark, 1 Royal Swamp Eel

The Fish engine allows a versatile summon off the Coelecanth, allowing you to also make boards with Stardust Dragon when the OTKs aren’t possible. Metabo Shark is simply the best LV4, Water, non-tuner Fish, with respectable attack and an effect that can (rarely) help you keep Fish in deck for Coelecanth.

FROG ENGINE: 3 Swap Frog, 3 Substitoad, 3 Dupe Frog, 2 Treeborn Frog, 1 Unifrog, 1 Flip Flop Frog

The Frogs provide stable tribute fodder, just like in the Monarch deck, whether through Treeborn or Swap Frog pitching one of your many extra Water monsters to special summon. Substitoad also gives powerful plays outside of Coelecanth, creating a board of multiple Dupe Frogs to stall out the early game while you assemble combo pieces. 

Other monsters include the defensive hand traps Battle Fader and Gorz.

Spells:

The spells primarily fulfill two roles: draw into find broken combos (Avarice, Moray, Sarcophagus) and remove backrow (Trunade, Storm, Cold Wave). Going Swap Frog Special Summon + Tribute for Coel + discard for Coel is already 4 cards, so keeping the handcount high with Salvage and Avarice becomes necessary. Moray puts dead Fish draws back in deck, and Salvage can also help combo with Swap->Substitoad, get back Substitoad early game. The control spells (Brain Control and Enemy Controller) act as monster removal and create tributes for Coel.

The Fish deck plays no traps! They conflict with Treeborn Frog, are slow in general, and are more suited to outing specific cards based on matchup (see below).

Side Deck:

In general, Fish have maindeck engine outs to a lot of potential problem cards. That being said, there are many cards players already side that have overlap with the Frog Monarch or Plant matchups that can also be dangerous to Fish. Examples include cards that banish (Dimensional Fissure, Banisher of the Radiance), floodgates (Skill Drain, Oppression, Rivalry of the Warlords), and interrupts like DD Crow and Chain Disapperance. 

These are primarily dealt with through additional Spell and Trap removal options such as Mobius, MST, and Twisters. The additional monster removal helps you handle problem monsters such as Vanity’s Fiend or Fossil Dyna. Cyber Dragon is also a great stand-alone aggressive card to press over monsters like King Tiger WangHu or RaiOh. Light and Darkness Dragon is a powerful card that can win games if the opponent has boarded to counter your OTK strategies. ​

Other Considerations:

There are other versions of this deck that add more acceleration and combo cards to the main deck, such as Upstart Goblin, Hand Destruction, Card Destruction. These versions often forego additional copies of Unifrog and Flip Flop, and cut the Eel and Shark to rely more on getting to Armory Arm + Colossal ASAP. Other options include adjusting the number of defensive traps, adjusting the ratios of recyclers (Salvage/Avarice), or even adding Monarchs to the main deck. Most of the side deck cards could arguably be mained as well. 

Overall, the Fish deck is a consistent OTK / Combo deck with the rare ability to play a control game at even pace with many top decks from Edison format. It takes the strength of Substitoad and Dupe Frog locks and adds the power of the Coelecanth combos to create a consistent win condition. Highly suggest for any players interested in combo decks or want a Frog-based deck that’s not the more linear Monarch strategy.