TSHD Part 5: Dark Twinkle Moss

Other than the random anime Cards used by Aki(za) in Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's, Plants received some additional support in The Shining Darkness as well. Let's take a look at what they have to offer:

The first plant Card is Revival Rose:

If a Level 5 or higher Plant-type monster  you control  is destroyed, you can Special Summon this card from your Graveyard.

Rose has an Optional Trigger Effect. But do not fear: Rose is actually one of the few Trigger Effects that cannot miss the timing, due to the "if" before its trigger. If your Plant-type monster is destroyed in the middle of a chain, or during an effect that isn't done resolving (such as Garlandolf's), then you can simply start a new chain with Revival Rose. Also note how Rose doesn't need that the Plant monster is sent to the Graveyard, so you can even use it if your Tytannial is destroyed by Bottomless Trap Hole. Furthermore, you can also activate Rose when a Plant whose Level has been increased is destroyed, so you can even use it if your Level 6 Copyplant is destroyed. You can even activate multiple copies of Revival Rose out of a single monster. Despite all these liberties, you are not allowed to activate Rose's effect during the Damage Step, much like other similar monsters like Green Baboon.

The next Plant Support is Bird of Roses:

When this face-up Attack Position card is destroyed by battle with an opponent's attacking monster and sent to the Graveyard, you can special Summon 2 Plant-type Tuner monsters from your Deck in face-up Defense Position.

Bird of Roses has an Optional Trigger Effect, and with such a long Trigger, you can figure out that it has a lot of problems activating its effect. It doesn't have timing issues, since it activates at the End of the Damage Step, but meeting every other requirement can be pretty annoying:

1) It has to be in face-up Attack Position during Damage Calculation, so not only you can't Set it an expect it to be attacked, but also, the opponent can switch its position with Book of Moon and prevent its effect.

2) It must be destroyed in battle by an opponent's attacking monster, which means that you cannot attack a bigger monster with Bird of Roses to activate its effect, and you also cannot activate its effect if you use Creature Swap to give your Bird of Roses to your opponent and attack it yourself.

3) The effect's activation is optional, but you must have at least 2 Plant-type Tuners in your Deck. You cannot Special Summon only 1.

Moving on, we have Spore:

If this card is in your Graveyard, you can remove from play 1 other Plant-Type monster from your Graveyard to Special Summon this card from your Graveyard, and increase its Level by the Level of the monster removed from play to activate this effect. Each player can only use the effect of "Spore" once per Duel.

Spore's effect is quite peculiar. It derivates from the new ruling on Twin-Headed Behemoth, which we'll discuss in a minute. In the case of Spore, it has an Ignition Effect whose cost is Removing from Play another Plant-type monster in your Graveyard. This effect can only be activated once per Duel, which is what happened with the Behemoth. You may remember that Behemoth had been Limited since its release, and when Behemoth became Unlimited on March 09, it created some confusion on how to keep track on which Behemoths had activated their effect or not, specially if one shuffled them back in the Deck with Pot of Avarice and the like. This lead to an extension of the restriction, which stopped every copy of Behemoth from activating once you activate the effect of one of them. This is the same case for Spore: You can only activate the effect of a single copy of Spore through the Duel. Even if the activation of the effect is negated, no Spore can activate its effect. As for gaining the Level, Spore is Summoned with its effect already modified. Skill Drain cannot negate this.

Shenanigans aside, let's continue with Cherry Inmato:

When this card is destroyed by battle and sent to the Graveyard, you can Special Summon up to 2 "Inmato" monsters from your Deck. They cannot be used as Synchro Material Monsters this turn.

Now this is a simple monster. Cherry Inmato has an Optional Trigger Effect that you activate at the End of the Damage Step. If you activate its effect, you can Special Summon 1 or 2 monsters with "Inmato" on its name, meaning "Inmato" itself, or another copy of Cherry Inmato. The restriction that prevents a Synchro Summon can be erased by flipping the monster face-down.

We also have a Normal Trap Card for Plants: Blossom Bombardment:

Activate only when a Plant-type monster you control destroys an opponent's mosnter by battle and sends it to the Graveyard. Inflict damage to your oppoennt equal to the destroy monster's original ATK.

Bombardment is activated at the End of the Damage Step. Your Plant-type monster needs to remain face-up until that time, but not when Bombardment starts resolving. The rest is surprisingly explicit on the text itself.

Plants also received a TCG exclusive, which is not actually a Plant itself. I'm talking about Snyffus:

Once per turn, you can Tribute 1 Plant-Type monster to select and destroy  1 face-up  card your opponent controls. When a Plant-Type monster(s) on the field is destroyed  while this card is in the Graveyard, you can Special Summon this card from the Graveyard. If you do, it is removed from play when it is removed from the field.

Snyffus has two effects. The first is an Ignition Effect. Tributing a Plant is a cost, and you can use face-down Plants. It targets any face-up Card on your opponent's side of the Field. The second effect is an Optional Trigger Effect. Does it sound familiar? Yes, Snyffus is slightly based on Revival Rose's effect, except that due to the lack of the word "if", Snyffus CAN miss the timing. Removing itself from Play can be erased if you flip Snyffus face-down.

The last Card for Plants is the Synchro Monster Splendid Rose:

1 Tuner + 1 or more non-Tuner monsters
Once per turn, you can remove from play 1 Plant-Type monster in your Graveyard to halve the ATK of 1 face-up monster your opponent controls, until the End Phase of this turn. If this card attacks, during the same Battle Phase you can remove from play 1 Plant-Type monster in your Graveyard to halve the ATK of this card (until the End Phase) and attack once again.

Splendid Rose has two Ignition Effects. Yup, the second effect is an Ignition Effect that you can activate during the Battle Phase. Weird, huh? Both effects have a cost of Removing from Play a Plant-type monster. The first effect works like most Ignition Effects, so it's limited to your Main Phases. It works similarly to Gale the Whirlwind, only that it's not permanent. The second effect is activated during the Battle Phase in which Rose has declared an attack, and you activate it when you aren't doing anything during the Battle Phase (in other words, you don't activate it while attacking, or during the Damage Step, or anything like that). Rose can only gain one additional attack (even if mixed with other effects that grant more attacks), so you can only activate this effect once. You don't have to attack if you don't want to.

Well, that's all for the plants in The Shining Darkness. Stay tuned for more Cards from this set! If you have any questions, feel free to drop me an e-mail at ness00[at]gmail[dot]com.