Pros
-Has a very powerful field control ability
-Easy to use, with no cost

 

Cons
-Not easily chainable
-Destroys your monsters too

 

The 9/1 bannings hit Japanese players hard.  With Thunderbolt and Black Hole banned, the field clearing cards became non-existant.

 

Tidal Wave (Torrential Tribute) has become the official replacement, nearly immediately after news of the bannings became public.  This is also why it became restricted to 1 at the exact same time.

 

It is a powerful card.  Whenever a monster is summoned, normal summon, and/or special summoned, the field gets nuked.

 

The power of this card is the fact that it has very little cost.  They summon, you blow it up, now it's anyone's game.

 

The weaknesses of this card is strict though.  It is a trap.  Being a trap, is not able to be played instantly.  Being THIS trap card, even with Pharaoh's Shrine, it still can't be activated without the summon/spec summon/reverse summon of a monster.

 

With so many magic/trap removal being used (thanks to those burn decks out there) players can easily lose this card in a burst of flames.

 

Another problem that I've seen commonly with this card is the problem with triggering.  This card can ONLY be activated after a summon.  This means that it is nothing compared to, the now banned, Mirror Force. 

 

If you've used this card, how many times have you had that moment in time where your opponent had monsters attacking your lifepoints, and you have Tidal Wave sitting there like a dead-weight.  Your opponent won't summon, he just keeps attacking directly, and your kicking yourself for topdecking.

 

All and all, with all it's problems, this is a solid card with powerful points, but lack-luster weaknesses.  It's a trap... that is it's biggest weakness.

 

7.5/10- With a shortage of mass-monster-removal cards in the game, you sorta have to use this card.  Great card non-the-less.

 

-Zero