A great debate has been sparked in the dueling communities. Players coming back from FET previews have come out in great troves to speak about a card that could replace waboku. From the very moment Waboku was released in the first starters to hit US shores, its been so very close to staple status its entire existence. With a majority of monsters not caring about battle damage to get off their spectacular effects, it’s been on the decline in decks sence the release of DCR, but why is that?

While Waboku and Threatening Roar both mean that your monsters won’t be destroyed as a result of battle (barring being attacked by grave keeper’s vassal in waboku’s case). Let’s look at why each one has a particular advantage. Waboku has the tried and true "anti suicide" barrier built right in. If your Gemini attacks your opponent's archfiend soldier, your Gemini will live and their archfiend will die. Also, waboku has a hand in slapping lily in the face. If lily goes to attack your Airknight, and you activate waboku in response. They can either pay 2000 and not lose lily, or lose lily, 1500 Life Points, and you draw a card.

Threatening roar on the other hand, stops three complete sets of cards. The first set of cards it stops is the searchers of any tier. Tier one searchers (just sangan now) can’t suicide and give you hand advantage, tier twos can’t fetch you a new monster, and tier threes can’t get more of them. The second family of monsters that Threatening Roar stops is the DD family of monsters. All of their effects involve attacking, and without it they can’t remove your monster from play. This is quite nice when waboku can’t stop such things. Lastly, Threatening Roar also stops any monster with an effect like Mystic Swordsmen, or Sasuke Samurai #1. They might not need battle damage, but they do need to attack.


Another reason for each would be the monsters that change positions after battle. Goblin Attack Force, Giant Orc, and Spear Dragon will change to def mode even if Waboku is activated, basically wasting your opponent's strong attackers. Threatening roar is better if you are running Big Shield Guardna, as you'll be able to keep him in defense mode the entirety of the turn.


Did I say even? Threatening roar is far superior to waboku, and I can’t believe it’s happened. With threatening roar being able to respond to your opponent entering the battle step (not battle phase mind you) you can effectively respond in the same way as waboku with better results.

i agree with u on the fact that threatening roar is better mage. however, i can see too many ppl miss-using it. most kids or inexperienced players will try to activate it in response to an attack declaration, like many would for waboku (using it correctly means using it in response to movement to battle step, as u stated). however, activating in reaction to THAT battle declaration cannot stop that attack from going through.
just wanted to clear that up, something important i thought u missed.
thats my 2 cents

Well, also wanted to mention that Threatening Roar is mostly the same concept as Thunder of Ruler which states:

"You can only activate this card during your opponent’s Standby Phase. During the turn this card is activated your opponent cannot perform his/her Battle Phase."

Which skips their battle phase entirely and also has it's advantage, such as if Jinzo is summoned in MP1 Waboku and Threatening Roar are useless, as Thunder of Ruler has already been activated.

Thanks..

i think you guys are forgetting some of the issue.

waboku has so many more positives (some already mentioned):

1900 vs 1900, play waboku and your monster lives theirs dies.

lilly attacks your monster (which has more than 400atk) and lilly dies or they pay 2000lp.

they have 1900 atker and attack your MoF (or any other flip monster) and it flips, you get effect and its in defence rather than atk if you had to flip it in your own turn.

also with waboku if they have a few monsters and you have a few monsters. you might want some of the attacks to happen but not all. so you can chain waboku if they attack with the monster you didnt want them to. (but if it was threatning roar you couldnt chain to the attack).

all threatning roar can do differently is stop your flip monsters etc geting touchd when it doesnt even matter.

the most important part of this debate is the fact that people will get in to arguments because no normal players declare the "battle step".

so when people declare an attack and their opponents plays threatning roar they will say "you cant play it when i declare an attack" when they actualy never declared the "attack step".

Well, you CAN play Threatening Roar when they declare an attack, it just won't stop that one attack.

From RONIN:

• You can activate "Threatening Roar" in response to an attack, but the attack has already been declared so it will resolve normally. After that, your opponent cannot attack for the rest of the turn.

Now, I'll just reserve judgement on the matter. Personally I only use these kind of cards in decks where I want the monsters to stick around for a while anyway (like Level decks)
In my standard decks, I'll take Sak Armor and Mirror Force over these two any day.

BTW, yet another great article, agentmage :cool:

My thanks dragon. Most of the time, just activate threatening roar in response to them entering their battle phase, as its legal to do so (and so much more effective).

I used to run Waboku, but with DDWL and Sasuke Samurai/MSLV246 not requiring battle damage, I found Negate Attack to actually serve me much better. I will now replace Negate Attack with Threatening Roar.

I think arguments like "other people don't know how to play Yugioh properly so I won't use this card" are idiotic. It is simple. If your opponent destroys it during their draw, standby or main phase 1 you activate it in a chain. If your opponent says "I attack with my Giant Attack" you say "Wait, when you enter your battle phase, before you attack I activate Threatening Roar" and now you can't attack. And that's that. That is how the game works.

Say you have a face down Gardna, and want your opponent to attack it but not destroy it (since they have two attackers), you simple activate Threatening Roar when they declare their first attack. The first attack goes through, but they can't declare the second.

If my guardna is face down, I'll likely want to KEEP it face down. Only monster in the game that cant get crossed out.

In the case of Big Shield Gardna, when he's face down, having him not be attacked might be better so that he can use his effect. But unless they summoned Mystic Swordsman or someone with the same effect, I think it would be better to save Threatening Roar for after Gardna is face up and has already been attacked.

Often times people will just ram a monster into Gardna to get him into attack mode so that their second monster can beat him. Both Threatening Roar and Waboku would be helpful after that, though. Basically there's a lot both cards can do and can't do, but in the end they both can give you an edge.

I have a question: How is it that 1900 vs 1900 monster attack, I activate waboku and their monster dies?
-My brother has always been telling me, that BATTLE DAMAGE becomes 0 or is it the ATK of the monster that becomes 0?

It means that Waboku makes their monsters 0 attakers while I get to keep mine with their original ATK?

also, I do agree at some point with threatening roar. Just not too stilish to use in deck made of dark. :D

Dark Magician of Chaos, 2 Dark Magicians, Chaos Command Magician, Buster Blader, Vampire Lord, 3 Gemini elfs, 3 Skilled Dark Magicians, 3 Mad Dog of Darkness, 3 Luster Dragons, Obnoxious Celtic Gaurdian, Twin-Headed Behemoth, Magician of Faith, Trap Master, Time Wizard, Dark Magic Attack, Double Spell, Change of Heart, Axe of Despair, Mystical Space Typhoon, Sword of Revealing Light, Black Pendant, Raigeki, United We Stand, Horn of the Unicorn, Nobleman of Extermination, Monster Reborn, Trap Hole, Magic Cylinder, Magical Hats, 2 Shadow Spells, Michizure, Torrential Tribute, Draining Shield, Horn of Heaven, Raigeki Break, Dust Tornado......That should be 46 cards, I plan on adding Dark Magician Girl in place of buster blader, Harpes Feather Duster, dedication to light and darkness, Sorceror of dark magic inplace of vampire lord, and 2 more 1900 atk monsters