This card cannot declare an attack unless you return 1 card you control to its owner's hand.
While Mist Valley Falcon does sport some impressive stats - 2000 ATK for a level 4 allows it to run over almost every entry-level monster your opponent might use, including the powerhouses Flamvell Firedog and Elemental Hero Neos Alius - but, as a whole, Mist Valley Falcon's effect doesn't seem tremendously useful on its own. In fact, at a glance, one might mistake it for a drawback. A card that has to return a card you control to its hand in order to be able to attack? What use could you make of that?
As it turns out, you can make a great number of uses out of it: the combo potential available with Mist Valley's effect has enabled an entire deck which uses its name! Here, we will discuss only a few of the various cards that interact favorably with Mist Valley Falcon:
- Breaker the Magical Warrior: Breaker the Magical Warrior (and, similarly, its counterparts Fortune Lady Wind and Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress) have effects that allow you to destroy a Spell or Trap card(s) on the field just for Normal Summoning from their hand; however, their effects are either single-use (Breaker the Magical Warrior) or have difficulty maintaining field presence (Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress and Fortune Lady Wind). Mist Valley Falcon remedies this drawback by returning these monsters to your hand in order to allow you to re-use their effects at your leisure by Normal Summoning them! By doing so, you are thus enabled to activate their effects on a turn-by-turn basis, allowing for a constant stream of destruction.
Which of the three monsters you choose is up to you, but each of them can allow you to benefit from different strategies. Lyla allows you to utilize the mill mechanic to feed Graveyard-reliant Falcon Control decks; Breaker the Magical Warrior's DARK attribute allows you to ditch it for Allure of Darkness if you're done using its effect, or to use it as fodder for Dark Simorgh along with a dead Mist Valley Falcon when it's in your Graveyard! Presently, Fortune Lady Wind is not tremendously synergistic; however, its WIND attribute allows you to capitalize on Mist Valley Divine Wind (which we will discuss later), returning a spent Wind to your hand to reuse its effect later and Special Summon another useful WIND monster from your deck!
- Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind: Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind also has a unique effect; once per turn, it can halve the ATK of any one monster on the field. This means that, even with its mediocre 1300 ATK, it can run over cards with up to 2500 ATK, including all of the Monarchs, and even Stardust Dragon! Unfortunately, its low stats render it quite vulnerable during your opponent's turn outside of a Blackwing deck (as decks that splash it do not have access to Kalut); however, Mist Valley Falcon allows you to return it to your hand, where it's safe during your opponent's turn, and can be re-used again by Normal Summoning it! What this means is that you can effectively use Gale's effect to halve a problem monster, run over it with Gale, and then return Gale to hand to attack directly (or run over another monster) with Mist Valley Falcon! In addition, Blackwing - Gale the Black Whirlwind is a level 3 DARK Tuner, meaning that it can be combined with Mist Valley Falcon for the level 7 "Mist Valley" Synchro, Mist Valley Thunder Lord; then, both Gale and Falcon can be used as your DARK and WIND fodder for Dark Simorgh! Its Winged-Beast Type also allows you to Tribute it for Icarus Attack in a pinch.
- Snowman Eater: Snowman Eater also has a useful effect for Falcon Control decks. When Snowman Eater is flipped face-up (either by battle or by an effect), destroy one monster on the field! With 1900 DEF, this card makes an invaluable Set, as it will survive against almost every entry-level monster in the game (barring Mist Valley Falcon, ironically, making it bad only for a mirror match), and take care of almost anything that happens to run over it! If it survives being flipped face-up by battle, you can return it to your hand during your own Battle Phase with Mist Valley Soldier's effect, then Set it again for the opportunity to re-use its effect!
- Gravekeepers: While at first glance the Gravekeeper engine doesn't seem particularly useful for Falcon Control, it does come with certain benefits. For example, Gravekeeper's Spy is a Flip Effect monster that Special Summons another Gravekeeper's monster with 1500 or less ATK from the Deck. This does two things: the first is to allow you to pull useful monsters from the deck, such as Gravekeeper's Guard and Gravekeeper's Descendant, the former of which you can use after returning it to your hand with Mist Valley Falcon. The second is to use the Gravekeeper engine as an advantage engine by returning Gravekeeper's Spy to your hand to re-use its Special Summon effect to draw raw power from your deck with repeated Special Summons from the Deck!
Beyond their effects, the Gravekeeper cards allow you to do certain other things as well. Their DARK Attribute allows them to be removed with Allure of Darkness; their Spellcaster Type allows you to make Arcanite Magician with Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind; and the impressive DEF stats on Spy and Guard allow you to maintain field presence with their effects!
Now that we've looked at a few of the monsters that interact positively with Mist Valley Falcon, let's look at a few of the Spells and Traps!
- Swords of Revealing Light: Since the dawn of the game, this card has proven itself to be a powerful continuous stall card under the right circumstances, so much so that you are still only allowed to run one. Swords of Revealing Light allows you to remove your opponent's Battle Phase from the picture completely, for as long as it's face-up on the field! Unfortunately, it has a built-in self-destruct effect: It cannot survive on the field for more than three turns, even if your opponent fails to destroy it during that time. Fortunately, Mist Valley Falcon allows you to circumvent that nasty little problem by returning Swords of Revealing Light to your hand, effectively "refreshing" the time limit on Swords of Revealing Light!
- Big Bang Shot: Equip Spell Cards have gotten quite a haranguing over the years for being very vulnerable and having mediocre effects that can't overcome the drawbacks. Big Bang Shot is in many cases no exception: It gives the monster you equip it with only 400 ATK and a trample effect, and if it's removed from the field, the monster it's equipped to is removed from play as well. Why, then, would you want to use it in Falcon Control?
Well, you would certainly want to equip it to your opponent's monster, would you not?
In Falcon Control, Big Bang Shot is useful for its drawbacks: When you return it to your hand with Mist Valley Falcon's effect, you remove from play the monster it was equipped to. Since you can equip your own Equip Cards to your opponent's monsters, you can equip Big Bang Shot to your opponent's monster, then return Big Bang Shot to your hand with Falcon's effect, thus removing from play problem monsters in a pinch! Big Bang Shot goes to your hand, allowing you to reuse its effect next turn at your leisure, or equip it to your own monster if you need that extra 400 ATK (or Trample effect) to swing for game. If your opponent only has one monster and you remove it from play by attempting to attack it, a replay is forced, allowing you to attack directly instead!
- Future Visions and Royal Oppression: Future Visions has always been an interesting card. Originally designed as a means of triggering the effect of Fortune Lady Light, the centerpiece of the Fortune Lady engine, Future Visions has occasionally seen play in other decks for its disrupting effect. One such deck is Falcon Control, for its ability to lock down your opponent's Normal Summons. While Falcon Control does use Normal Summons for control, Mist Valley Falcon can circumvent the drawbacks by returning Future Visions to your hand in order to attack, allowing you to Normal Summon as you normally would during your Main Phase 2, and replaying Future Visions before your End Phase to lock down your opponent's Normal Summons during their turn, or forcing them to waste removal on it! If your opponent has a monster that is removed from play, by returning Future Visions to the field with Mist Valley Falcon's effect, you prevent the opponent from returning to the field, keeping it removed from play for good!
If locking down your opponent's Normal Summons is dangerous, then locking down Special Summons must be completely destructive! The newly limited Royal Oppression can be activated on your opponent's turn to negate and destroy any card your opponent uses to Special Summon, and then returned during your Battle Phase with Falcon's effect, allowing you to Special Summon during your Main Phase 2 to re-Set it!
With these cards and more at your disposal, you can use the combo potential of Mist Valley Falcon to disrupt and destroy your opponents one-by-one!
Dam Josh pretty interesting thing u got here haha
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