Fire King Courtier Ulcanix

Level 4 FIRE Winged Beast

If this card is Normal or Special Summoned: You can destroy 1 other FIRE monster in your hand or face-up field, and if you do, add 1 FIRE Beast, Beast-Warrior, or Winged Beast monster from your Deck to your hand, except "Fire King Courtier Ulcanix", then you can make this card's Level become that added monster's.

If this card is destroyed and sent to the GY: You can Special Summon 1 "Fire King High Avatar Garunix" from your Deck in Defense Position.

You can only use each effect of "Fire King Courtier Ulcanix" once per turn.

ATK 800 | DEF 2000

Garunix's most trusted partner and most definitely your best starter. Her TCG debut in Rage of the Abyss gave a substantial consistency boost to the deck, ensuring access to Legendary Fire King Ponix and making Amphibious Swarmship Amblowhale even easier to make.

The 1.5-card Ulcanix combo is currently the strongest combo the deck has and you should seek to perform it every time you open Ulcanix and another FIRE.

Her first effect is what gives you access to Ponix. You'll often want to destroy a FIRE in your hand to grab him, and use his first effect to Special Summon him to the field (because a FIRE monster was destroyed by card effect).

Later on, you can make use of it to search any Fire King you might need. One great example is Fire King Avatar Rangbali, whose first effect is the same as Ponix - meaning you can immediately Special Summon him to the field for a quick Spell/Trap negate.

Ulcanix's second effect also comes in handy as her destruction brings Fire King High Avatar Garunix to the field immediately, albeit in Defense Position and without his board clear effect. Most of the time you'll intend to make use of this effect to search a card with Island without sacrificing Xyz/Link material on the field.

One last trick she can do is enabling access to Kikinagashi Fucho as a last resort if you encounter Dimension Shifter, or Ponix/Island are negated. By using her first effect to search Ponix, she becomes a Level 1, which lets you overlay into Fucho. That way you can try to survive your opponent's turn and avoid playing into Shifter.

Running 3 copies is recommended. Running 2 copies is fine too, if deck space is tight.