Divine Evolution Saga

Divine Evolution Saga 神化編 (Shinka Hen)
Next:	Awakening Saga
Previous:	Sengoku Saga

Divine Evolution Saga is the 8th block of card sets in the Duel Masters trading card game.

List of Sets

It is comprised of sets released between April 25th, 2009 and June 26, 2010.

DM Sets

DMC Sets

It also features promotional cards from Year 8.

Timeline

Out of the Distortions, a mysterious asteroid appeared, which is called Original Heart. And along with it, the creatures known as Origins. As soon as the Original Heart made its place, the earth was attacked and the land was engulfed in an inferno in one night. Once the flames disappeared, the Origins, in the form of a batillion marched forward with one objective: Take over the world.
Origins, as their name suggests, these were the very first sentient life in the Creature World's history, brought back through the space-time distortions, to reclaim what was originally theirs. In response, the Light and Darkness Civilizations created factions to battle against their new adversaries, the White Knights , from Light and the Reapers from Darkness. In the Fire Civilization, The Dragons and the Fire Birds followed suit, lead by their newest addition: Bolshack NEX
Angered by the destruction caused by the invaders, Seven Creatures rose to oppose them, What made these seven so unique was that these transcended the barriers of Evolution. These Seven Lunatic Emperors gained the ability known as Ultimate Evolution . The seven clashed with the origins and managed to overwhelm them. But that was their plan all along...
With the Lunatic Emperor's powers being so overhwelming, the distortions grow larger, causing yet another being to emerge from the space-time rift, The Emperor of the Gods.
The Emperor of the Gods one-sidedly overpower the Lunatic Emperors and they are forced to retreat to avoid destruction themselves. The remaining resistance fighters realize that going up against their new enemy is a do-or-die situation. The Lunatic Emperors may have backed down, but as for the others, they didn't budge.
The White Knights and Reapers both individually decided to take on the Emperor of the Gods, their pride and the allies gained by the Sengoku Fighter Association backing them. The leaders of both factions, White Knight HEAVEN, Lord of Spirits, and Xenom, the Reaper King both lead their respected armies against their enemy. But even their strength was no match, and the Emperor of the Gods resisted them with little effort. With the leaders from both factions down for the count, the Origins continued their conquest.
Meanwhile, Bolshack NEX went through intense training to achieve the same evolutionary prowess that the Lunatic Emperors received. The Lupia protected NEX during his training and stood as a line of defense through the process. Through this, Bolshack NEX was able to evolve into Uberdragon Sunburst NEX and take a step further, achieving the goal of becoming Rising NEX, the Enlightened .
Rising NEX flew off and confronted the seemingly invincible Emperor of the Gods. After an intense fight, Rising NEX managed to somehow pull off a miracle and ultimately destroy their adversary. At the sight off this, the creatures saw the first ray of hope within this war and began to go onto the offensive, pushing the Origins back. The White Knights and the Reapers built fortresses and used them to fight back. But then, just when the war looked inevitable and in the resistance's favor, the beings known as the Genesis Gods appeared from the sky.
Adam and Eve are two gods that were shockingly Evolution Creatures. No one ever imagined such a thing to exist, let alone be before them. It was truly an "Apotheosised Beast", a being so divine that it could have the powers to change the world. The Origins began to push back with their new leader within their mist, and The Genesis Gods defeated Rising NEX. At that point, the Origins seemed unstoppable.
With the tables turned, the Lupias with their powers managed to not only keep NEX alive, but also grant him a new power. This, was the rebirth of Bolshack NEX... and the birth of Bolshack Cross NEX.
Bolshack Cross NEX was a warrior whose power rivaled that those of the Ultimate Evolution creatures. With its flaming sword shining with a brilliant fire, it confronted the Genesis Gods and their army. The Genesis Gods launched their attack, however they were no match for Bolshack Cross NEX and with its downfall, with the Origin army left in defeat. The resistance forces celebrated in victory, unknown of the true nightmare that was about to unfold...
The Original Heart continued to move about, giving birth to the strongest enemy that they will ever encounter in the war: The Original Gods. Being of six parts, this powerful creature surpassed the strength of the Four-Part God they first faced off against.
The Original God's intention was to conquer the planet and reform it into an Origin Star, which will reshape it into a world for the Origins. It then unleashed its power and began the countdown to the Creature World's destruction.
With the massive power of the God being unleashed, Civilizations were being torn apart. This didn't however stop the band of creatures from all five civilizations who took one final stand against the Origin God. Despite their final stand, they couldn't compete against the might of the powerful God. As they watched their world come to an end, one more miracle came to their aid.
Two Lunatic Emperors, Sunshine NEX, the Enlightened from Fire, and Darkness Romanoff, the Enlightened from Darkness stepped forward and with all of their powers fused together to become Romanoff Kaiser NEX, the Super Enlightened, a Ultimate MAX Creature, which surpasses the power of an Ultimate Evolution Creature.
An intense final battle ended in victory as Romanoff Kaiser NEX defeats the Original God once and for all, thus saving the Creature World from total destruction. Unfortunately, there was still the issue of the Original Heart and the threat it imposed. Romanoff Kaiser NEX sacrificed its life, taking the Original Heart with it in a massive explosion, sealing the threat of the Gods and Origins, and thus finally putting the Origin War to an end...
With the peace treaty being made within the Fiona Forests, the Five Civilizations celebrate and return to their harmonious lifestyle, looking forward to many years of peace once again. However, unknown to them, the explosion left by Original Heart ripped open another rift in its ground zero; this rift however is a Hyperspatial Rift, indicating that a new war is on the horizon...

Details

Many effects based on Evolution were in these sets, leading to the Ultimate evolution and Ultimate evolution MAX abilities. High costing God Link creatures also featured throughout, leading to a series of cards with a High-risk but also High-return elements.

Cards in these sets often focused on higher power on creatures rather then using control.

Old races such as Fish and Living Dead re-appeared which were often thought to have been discounted and forgotten about by players.

Each Civilization had a race they focused on more than others. Light was Light Bringer, Water was the Cyber archetype, Darkness was Parasite Worm, Fire was Fire Bird and Nature using Dreammate.

Graveyard evolution creatures were seen as very powerful due to not needing additional cards in your hand or battle zone to evolve from. The popularity of these cards continued though the sagas after their release.

More Heroes Cards were printed and featured more cards with Characters from the anime being printed on the artwork.

Competitive Environment

DM-32 Stage

The decks continued to follow a wide variety of decks in the metagame. Various Water Cyber Evolution Creatures appeared, such as Emperor Tina gave strength to the mono-Water Civilization decks.

With Death March, Reaper of Death and Worm Gowarski, Masked Insect the Darkness / Nature Graveyard Evolution rush decktype began to form causing multiple forms of rush decks to appear.

While DM-32 released Emperor Chirico and many new deck types based on it were created, it did not yet lead to a powerful decktype.

A rulings change involving the File:Shieldtrigger.jpg Shield Trigger interaction between Marshall Queen and Memories of the Planetary Dragon led to it being the main deck in the competitive scene for a long period of time.

DM-33 Stage

With Soulswap in the Hall of Fame and Crest of Mother restricted to 1, it led players to experiment with the newly released Sanctuary of the Mother. However, due to it requiring an evolution creature decks were made using King Alcadeias, Holy Gaia and Romanesk, the Dragon Wizard.

In these decks, Emperor Chirico and Amaterasu, Founder of the Blue Wolves created great compatibility by arranging strong creatures and "put in the battle zone effects".

The new Hall of Fame changes were declared on December 19. 2009. The restriction of King Alcadeias, Holy Gaia, Perfect Galaxy, Spirit of Immortality weakened the "Galaxy Control" deck. With the restriction of Inferno Sign and addition of Inferno Gate on the premium banlist also lead to a decline of "Reanimate" decks.

This caused the mono-water rush and Dolgazer based decks to lead again.

DM-34 Stage

With Bolshack Cross NEX released, the Chirico / Romanesk deck was enhanced. The additional Emperor Maribel to the Water rush decks caused problems for Dolgazer, due to bouncing back Kirino Giant and slowing them down.

Since decks involving Soul Advantage had shifted to Hand Destruction decks involving Jenny, the Dismantling Puppet, a rise of decks utilizing Baiken, Blue Dragon of the Hidden Blade and Shinobi creatures arose to counter it.

With Fire/Nature, Water and Graveyard Evolution rush decks no long apparent on the meta, the Hydro Hurricane deck gained popularity in the metagame.

DM-35 Stage

The national tournament Master Class shown that while Emperor Chirico decks were thought to win, instead 1st and 2nd place were taken by anti-meta control decks: Water/Darkness/Light and Light/Darkness/Nature respectively. This 1st deck used Belfegius, Emperor of Death and Svengali Crawler which caused a small lock on your opponents creatures.

May 15, 2010 announced additional changes to the Hall of Fame, completely banning King Alcadeias, Holy Gaia and stopping the King-Queen lock. Water decks also started to fall in usage With Paradise Aroma being limited to 1 copy.

This lead to Mad Romanoff and Graveyard decks to rise in the meta-game once again. However, in a later May tournament the first place was taken by a Bolmeteus Steel Dragon control deck, second place being a deck based on Fernando the 7th, Emperor of Mystic Light and the third and fourth place taken by Beginning Romanoff, Lord of the Demonic Eye decks.

Competitive Decks

Mono Water Rush / Beatdown (W)
Dolgazer / Shinobi (W/N)
Marshall Queen / Memories combo deck. (L/W)
Chirico Romanesk (L/W/F/N)
Chirico King Alcadeias lock (L/W/D)
Hydro Hurricane (L/W/D)
Heavy Death Metal (D/F)
Meta Control (L/W/D, L/D/N, L/W/D/N or L/W/D/F)
Mad Romanoff / Miraculous Meltdown (D/F)
Bolmeteus Control (L/W/F)
Sir Viginia / Inferno Gate (D/N)

Important Cards

Emperor Tina
Romanesk, the Dragon Wizard
Emperor Chirico
Amaterasu, Founder of the Blue Wolves
Crest of Mother
Perfect Galaxy, Spirit of Immortality
Dolgazer, Veteran of Hard Battle
Rose Castle
Submarine Fortress Lair
Lord Reis, Spirit of Wisdom