Well, now that I've been there and done it, I have a bit of a different outlook on the cards.
The Crystal Beasts have some wonderful potential and special summonable ability. I remember in the sneak the other 3-0 player I played for 1st did excellent. He didn't have any of the big crystal support, but he could get the 2 crystals in the back fairly quick, and then he would go into Special Summoning madness, tributing for the real power in the set. Overall, they're alright, but don't have enough punch by themselves. So the question is what to play them with, but you have to realize if you integrate too many of the wrong cards, the theme will become too slow and if you can't keep at least the 2 crystal back rows, you'll be in trouble. Random cards I saw that were very effective were "Gravi-Crush Dragon" and "Magna Slash Dragon", both of which took spare beasts and turn them into +1's, and then cleared the way for a decent sized assault.
Volcanics did well, but I think they're missing a few key elements. They're pretty easy to understand, some good burn damage to do alot of the damage, and then battle monsters to hold their own, mix in with a trump card that includes monster destruction, and you have almost a clear cut path to victory. The problems I see are fundamental to other deck types that are played around a certain card, in this case, "Blaze Accellerator". It's only one card, and you'll need to get it out quick if you want to win and have a use for the potentially bad hands you can draw. "Volcanic Rocket" is defiantly a wonderful card for this, but you have to be careful, as you still only have 3 copies that you don't always have an idea of how fast they'll come, and if the opponent happens to have the right amount of spell & trap support, you're in trouble (Or an Invicil XD). The other problem I see is that the battle-themed volcanics are mediocre, scoring alright attacks, but that's all they are, attacks, field controlling effects be not here, just raw damage. To be effective, you'll have to clear your opponent's field.
I feel the set produced exactly what every Field Spell card deck needed- Spell & Trap destruction and reliable searchability. Those are some problems the fields had, but this set addressed those clauses accurately and fulfilled a quota of fields to be the "competable" level over just the "fun" level. The searches get the field if you need it, and become "Cyber Dragon" accomplice beat-sticks when you don't, something "Terraforming" well never do. Besides that, "Field Barrier" is not necessary for some field decks, but the Gravekeeper's deck I'm now building due to the exciting new support has to have "Necrovalley" on the field quick and for a good amount of time. Goal complete.
Random deck types see some new support, such as Winged Beasts, Dragons, Aliens, and Six Samurai, and I'm very pleased with them all. This was not a set of anything useless, all of it has its potential, I highly approve of this set. Although, still not more than STON ;P.
