[Art Not Yet Available]
Type: Creature
Race: Sky Pirate
Quadrant: Affinity
Element: Wind
Cost: 2
Power: 1000
Effect: When this creature enters the conflict, you may discard a card. If you do, [Accelerate 1].
Set: Advent of Chaos (CF-01) Common
Flavor Text: not yet available
Writer Text: Onward, for the glory of Landau!
The Element
The creatures of Wind are dedicated to versatility, and Linsay is right up there with the best of them. She is one of the lowest costed creatures in Wind, and also works relatively well with other creatures and effects from her Quadrant as well as just her element. In terms of supporting her element, her low cost allows players to quickly bring forth their more effective creatures through Cost Reduction, before her effect is even considered. Wind is best at building up quickly and assisting in swarming the opponent before they can set up enough of a defense to counteract this, but sometimes there is a deficit in other abilities or power, something that is seen in Linsay as well.
The Combat Ability
Linsay is neither a hardy nor a sturdy creature, better suited to quickly scouting ahead and helping her allies, Wind or not, find their way into the conflict more quickly. Without some special effect to boost her ability in combat, she is hardly much of a fighter, and is not only easily defeated once exhausted, but is also vulnerable to many of the weaker elemental spells and destructive capabilities of creatures. For this reason, one does not generally look to Linsay to be any real help in battle unless she is part of a greater force that often increases power of its fighters. Even then, often she simply distracts enemy blockers or sometimes their attackers, long enough to get the job done. With a power rating of only one thousand, generally the lowest in the game, don't count on her much for keeping your front lines threatening except in the extremely early stages of a clash, where she is at least a match for a few similar scouting creatures.
The Effect
Linsay's effect, though not directly powerful, is where she shines. Most decks contain at least a few cards that are only situationally useful, and often, even very early in a game, a player can tell which of their cards they are not likely to need. By giving the player a chance to trade that card for acceleration, Linsay's effect is a quick way to turn a 'dead draw', especially in one's starting hand, into a useful resource. More importantly, even if all the cards in hand could be useful, simply jumping ahead one turn to the ability to put a higher cost creature into play swiftly may completely turn the tide or set things in motion for a higher pressure on the opponent overall. If the Linsay player was second and the opponent's response was to attack, this gives them a full five tempo on their third turn, enough to call even a wind creature of cost 6 into the conflict, assuming Linsay survived. More complex tactics involve the use of Wispy Shala to back her up, since even if Linsay ends up returning Shala to hand, the extra tempo allows her to be recalled immediately.
While not currently a very strong use in the early game, the additional tempo can also be simply left unused, to allow the player to use a Responcer if their opponent attacks their grid. Air Cannon in particular may give one enough time to set back a newly called threat from the opponent if it is large, and Hypothermia or Falcon Strike can dispose of smaller issues altogether, forcing the opponent to at least consider whether or not they can gain advantage by playing any creature at all. Best of all, if one simply does not need more tempo and only wishes to push forward in terms of the number of creatures they have available, Linsay's effect is optional, and choosing not to use it at some times may even be an effective bluff.
Ratings
Casual: 8/10
Acceleration is almost always good, but in an environment where removal is not very heavy and the game is not so fast paced, Linsay's lack of combat ability begins to become a hindrance as the duel stretches out, as it poses no threat to the opponent that forces them to remove it quickly.
Tournament/Ladder: 6/10
At higher competitive levels, unless Linsay is going to get you straight to a large creature that you really want, she may not be worth adding if your deck has a very cohesive strategy. Generally, unless your strategy is speed, you are better off looking for more cost reduction within your chosen elements, particularly cost reduction that will not pressure your hand size.
Random: 10/10
In the RND duel type KP offers, there are very few times where one would not be glad to see Linsay, especially early on. The capacity to discard a useless card in order to accelerate your chances of putting out something harder to stop, is wonderful, and with less removal and blockers to worry about, Linsay's low combat capacity quickly ceases to matter as long as there are other cards to somehow back up or protect her.
Overall: 8/10
A decent base card, certainly worth considering for any deck that intends to either build or swarm quickly, especially within the Affinity Quadrant, even if the deck itself is not heavily based around Wind. Suggested for use by newer players to help them test their deck ideas while giving them a fallback method for utilizing any cards that they realize are not actually useful to them.