Basic Deck Building/Construction Suggestions for the Novice Player (Yugioh)

[Ashura]

Well, this is a thread to answer all the FAQ about Yu-Gi-Oh! Deck Construction. Hopefully the mods can arrange something to make this thread a little bit more permanent. For those new players reading this though, I recommend reading THE WHOLE THING.

NOTE: The rules and cards I talk about will generally be for BEAT DOWN decks, as this is the most basic style of deck, and the best for beginners. Plus, basic beat-down still wins a lot of duels.

First thing is that you DON’T COMPLAIN ABOUT CARDS. If you don’t have certain cards you need, get them! And if you’re not willing to go card hunting, then don’t complain if your deck sucks! Besides, hunting down cards is half the fun. J

Now moving onto the important stuff:

<sum> Deck Size
<sum> Card Ratios
<sum> Recommended Monster Cards.

The most fundamental necessity of a deck is its size. The deck should be NO MORE THAN 40 CARDS. Efficiency is KEY, you need to get the cards you need, fast. A GOOD DECK WILL NOT SACRIFICE EFFICIENCY FOR ANYTHING!!

The only way the deck can go over 40 cards is if it has cards that speed it up further, as in add efficiency.

<sum> Painful Choice (allow your deck to go 4 cards more than normal)
<sum> Reinforce the Army (allow 1 more card) *need warriors*
<sum> Toon Index (allow 1 more card) *need toons*

I am NOT counting pot of greed, or graceful charity, or any monster cards that slim the deck such as SANGAN of CYBER JAR. Those types of cards should be used regardless of deck size. EVERY deck should have Pot of Greed and Graceful Charity.

CARD RATIOS:

Another thing necessary in a good deck is to have appropriate numbers of different type of cards. You need a certain number so that you’ll be able to attack, defend, counter, whatever, when you need to.

Monsters:
15-17 monsters IN TOTAL

When a beat down deck gets really good, it needs fewer monsters, since its monsters are very powerful. For a weaker player though, you might need more monsters and less magic cards just to survive. The reason is that your monsters will be weaker, so you’ll have to be able to get more, and your magic cards won’t be as good, so they won’t help as much.

Ritual/High Level monsters: No More than 5!!

Having too many big monsters slows the deck down since they are harder to summon. You need lots of easy-summon monsters, and a few big bad boys.


Magic:
The Staple 13

The number of Magic cards is less clear. Most strong players use these 13 though:

Pot of Greed
Graceful Charity
Raigeki
Dark Hole
Monster Reborn
Premature Burial
Change of Heart
Snatch Steal
Harpy’s Feather Duster
Heavy Storm
Mystical Space Typhoon
Mystical Space Typhoon
Mystical Space Typhoon

Yes, I wrote MST 3 times, because you want 3 of them. They COMPLETELY out-class De-spell or Trap-remover, and are quick-play magic to boot, so you can use them in your opponent’s turn if they are set on the field.

Any magic cards after the staple 13 are up to player’s preference. Some other popular magic cards are:

Nobleman of Cross-Out
Fissure
Swords of Revealing Light
Confiscation
The Forceful Sentry
Delinquent Duo
Painful Choice

Note: A lot of the best magic cards have restrictions placed on them. MAKE SURE TO KEEP UP WITH THE RESTRICTED/LIMITED CARD LIST!!!


Traps:
About 6

Most players want about 6 traps in their deck, maybe 5 or 7 depending.

Staple Traps (highly recommended!!):

Mirror Force
Imperial Order
Call of the Haunted
Bell of Destruction

Other Popular Traps (less useful, but still pretty good):

Waboku
Torrential Tribute
Solumn Judgement
Magic Cylinders
7 Tools of Bandit
Ceasefire

Choose about 6 of those in a Basic Beat-Down deck.



RECOMMENDED MONSTER CARDS:

These will change as time goes on, and more cards are reproduced. Monster card are the ones that MOST AFFECT the style of battle the deck uses. Monster cards are also where duelists can take the greatest creative license. Ultimately, monster selection is what separates the GREAT players from the good ones.

On the date I’m writing this, 9/7/2003, these are some of the more popular monsters for the English field:

Ha Des – Ruler of Dark World
Jinzo
Freed – Undefeated General
Goblin Attack Force
Gemini Elf
Spear Dragon
Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer
Gearfreed the Iron Knight
Bazoo the Ghost Eater
Don Zaloog
Dark Jeroid
Nyudoryua
Marauding Commander
Witch of the Black Forest
Sangan
Cyber Jar
Seisaku Samurai
Fairy Injection Lily
Sinister Serpent
Kuriboh
Yatagarasu

Note that not all of these go into the same deck, these are just cards that a lot of players like to use.


Well, I hope this helps. Good luck to all you newbie players!

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

Taking a leaf out of Ashura's book, I think I'll help out some of the new players by defining the shortened versions of card names out there. Any additions are welcome by all means, and I'll edit this post to show all the additions added. BTW, this also includes online duel abbreviations.

Accursed
Mask of the Accursed

ATK
Means that monster is put in ATK mode, attacking, or used to describe monsters ATK points

AS/Soldier
Archfiend Soldier

Archer
Amazon Archer

Axe/AoD
Axe of Despair

Balter
Dark Balter the Terrible

BB
Buster Blader

BBTD
Barrel Behind the Door

BESD
Blue-Eyes Shining Dragon

BEUD
Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon

BEWD
Blue-Eyes White Dragon

Bind
Gravity Bind

BLS
Black Luster Soldier

BLS-E
Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning

Book
Book of Moon

Bow
Bowganian

Breaker
Breaker the Magical Warrior

BSD
Black Skull Dragon

Call/CoTH
Call of the Haunted

Cannon/Wave Motion
Wave Motion Cannon

CD
Card Destruction

Cease
Ceasefire

CED
Chaos Emporer Dragon - Envoy of the End

Change/CoH
Change of Heart

CK
Command Knight

Confi
Confiscation

Cyber
Cyber Jar

Dark Room/Room/DRoN/DRON
Dark Room of Nightmare

DB
Dark Blade

DDWL/DD Lady/DD
D. D. Warrior Lady

Deck-out
Term used to in place of run out of cards

Desserts
Just Desserts

DF
Dimension Fusion

Don
Don Zaloog

DM
Dark Magician

DMG
Dark Magician Girl

DMoC
Dark Magician of Chaos

Exiled
Exiled Force

Fdd
Face down Defense mode

Fiber
Fiber Jar

Forceful
The Forceful Sentry

FSMB
Fusion Sword Murasama Blade

GAF
Goblin Attack Force

GB
Gravity Bind

Geki
Raigeki

Germ
Giant Germ

GGGG
Gagagigo

Gorilla
Berserk Gorilla

Golem
Lava Golem

Graceful
Graceful Charity

GSOS
Giant Soldier of Stone

Hades/Ha Des
Dark Ruler Ha Des

Haya
Hayabusa Knight

HFD / Duster
Harpies Feather Duster

Hino
Hinotama

HMSP
Heavy Mech Support Platform

IFA
Infernalqueen Archfiend

IO
Imperial Order

Jeriod
Dark Jeriod

JoA
Judgement of Anubis

Lily / IFL
Injection Fairy Lily

LP
Life Points

M / T
Magic or Trap face down

Mad Dog
Mad Dog of Darkness

Mage
Mage Power

MC
Marauding Captain

MEB
Man Eater Bug

MoBC
Magician of Black Chaos

Mobius
Mobius the Frost Monarch

MoF
Magician of Faith

MoP
Messanger of Peace

MPZ
Mystic Plazma Zone

MST
Mystical Space Typhoon

MT
My turn

Newbie /newb
New player that is willing to accept help from others and accept their mistakes

Necro / Necrofear
Dark Necrofear

N00bie / n00b
New player that believes they are all that and is totally ignorant of any help. Or rejects any help

NoC
Nobleman of Crossout

NoE
Nobleman of Extermination

Offering
Ultimate Offering

Opti
Opticlops

Orc
Giant Orc

Paladin
Dark Paladin

Pot/PoG
Pot of Greed

Princess
Princess of Tsurugi
Fire Princess

Reaper
Spirit Reaper

Reborn
Monster Reborn

REBD
Red Eyes Black Dragon

RftDD
Return from the Different Dimension

RoD
Ring of Destruction

RoTA
Reinforcements of the Army

Sasuke
Sasuke Samurai

Scape
Scapegoat

SDM
Skilled Dark Magician

Senshi
Ryu Senshi

SFD/Solar Flare
Solar Flare Dragon

Skull/SS
Summoned Skull

Snatch
Snatch Steal

SoDM
Sorcerer of Dark Magic

Sorl
Swords of Revealing Light

Spell (S)
Magic (M)

Stealth
Stealth Bird

SWM
Skilled White Magician

TER
Thousand-Eyes Restrict

TIV/TI-Virus
Tribe Infecting Virus

Terrorking / TKA
Terrorking Archfiend

Tools
Seven Tools of the Bandit

TT
Torrential Tribute

TTTD
Tribute to the Doomed

UWS
United We Stand

V-Lord
Vampire Lord

WotBF
Witch of the Black Forest

Yata
Yata-Garasu

Yt
Your Turn

Zaborg
Zabord the Thunder Monarch

This is by no means a complete list, I just can't think of anymore. Any more you guys think of, by all means post it up.

BTW, here's a list of the accepted Staples of today for your convenience.

-Snatch Steal
-Raigeki
-Harpie's Feather Duster
-Mystical Space Typhoon
-Mystical Space Typhoon
-Mystical Space Typhoon
-Change of Heart
-Monster Reborn
-Premautre Burial
-Pot of Greed
-Graceful Charity
-Dark Hole
-Heavy Storm

Notice they are all Magic cards. There is NO such thing as a Trap or Monster Staple...the closest things to Monster staples (if such a monster exists) are such.

-Jinzo
-Tribe Infecting Virus
-Exiled Force
-Yata-Garasu
-Witch of the Black Forest
-Vampire Lord
-Cyber Jar
-Fiber Jar
-Sinister Serpent

There are also Trap "Staples" that most, if not, all players have in their decks...they help boost any deck.

-Mirror Force
-Magic Cylinder
-Imperial Order
-Call of the Haunted
-Waboku

There are other popular cards that take up many players decks, but those are for you to discover what they are as I'm tired...

Deck Types:
Many new players also don't know what specific themes do what, so I'm gonna describe some of the ones I can think of. Want counters of these decks? If i get asked enough to do counters of these decks I'll try to.
The cards involved in a deck are cards that are most COMMONLY involved in them. Staples I'm not gonna waste time and space mentioning them as they are in most decks.

If you would like to hear about another deck type not on here, here's my information.

E-mail: piroko_139@yahoo.com
AIM: KenshinSnake
Yahoo: bruceyboy13

Aggro/Beatdown Deck
Deck that uses stronger level 4 or less monsters, with few strong level 5+ monsters.

Burn Deck
Deck that does not usually does not use strong monsters. Uses Monsters, Magic and Trap cards that specifically decrease LP.

Deck Destruction Deck
Deck that uses cards to deplete the opponents Deck as quickly as possible.

Monster Deck
Deck that focuses on the abilities of 1 or 2 monsters to win the Duel for them. Also concentrates on any Special Summoning requirements the monster may have, so this deck type usually goes hand-in-hand with monster Decks.

God Card Deck
A deck designed to use God Cards, wether they're legal or not in a tourny. Usually based around a specific God Card.

Character-based Deck
Deck based off a character's Deck from the show.

Exodia
A deck designed to summon Exodia. High on Draw and getting Exodia into your hand while stalling.

Chaos
A deck that incorperates the Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning and/or Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End. Usually about half Light and half Dark to make summoning easier.

Type Deck
Deck that uses primarily specific types of monsters, magic and trap cards that back up that type of monster.

Fun Deck
A deck that does not really have much of a theme, but it is used to play combos and cards that are just...fun to play. (Hence the name fun deck)

Obviously this list is way incomplete, I'm just too lazy to finish it.

~~~~~~~RANDOM RANTINGS~~~~~~~
Wow, reading this list makes us realize how used to shortening things we are. We're just that lazy as human beings I guess.
~~~~~~~RANDOM RANTINGS~~~~~~~

Mataza~Mataza the Zapper
Grace~Graceful Charity
TDS~Total Defense Shogun
Barrel~Barrel Behind the Door

[X-15 Alpha]

This should be stickyed. Too bad the mods are inactive.

[Garoozis89]

Call of the Haunted= CoTH
Change of Heart=CoH
Marauding Captain=MC
Summoned Skull=SS

[~KONIG~]

Originally posted by Garoozis89
Call of the Haunted= CoTH
Change of Heart=CoH
Marauding Captain=MC
Summoned Skull=SS

...?

Reinforcements of the Army= RoTA
Imperial Order= IO

That all I can think of

[X-15 Alpha]

You forgot:

MST=Mystical Space Typhoon

That is all I can think of, for the time being.

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

OK, for those who missed it in my original post, I'm going to edit my post so everyone won't have to scroll throughout the post to see the abbriviations and additions to deck types etc. Just a reminder for those who skim through the posts

[Mitchell & Ness]

BEWD = blue eyes white dragon
REBD = red eye black dragon
BSD = black skull dragon
Paladin = dark paladin
pot = pot of greed
graceful = graceful charity
HFD/duster = harpies feather duster
axe/AoD = axe of despair
mage = mage power
GAF = goblin attack force
orc = giant orc
DMG = dark magician girl
skull/ss = summond skull (i know its up ther but i think skull shoudl be there too cuz of serpent)
hades/ha des = dark ruler ha des

all i could think of as of now..

[Crimson Chaos]

here's some more
opti=opticlops
exiled=exiled force
TT=torential tribute

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

OK! right on it. anything for the n00bs ^^

[a9voltbattery]

just a few from looking at my deck:

GSOS-giant soldier of stone
GB-gravity bind
MoP-Messenger of Peace
haya-hayabusa knight

[Crimson Chaos]

MoBC=Magician of Black Chaos
Necrofear=Dark Necrofear
BEUD=Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon (in japanese)

[Crimson Chaos]

JoA=Judgement of Anubus
Lily=Injection fairy lily

[Mitchell & Ness]

TKA = terror king archfiend
AS / soldeir = archfeind soldier
GGGG = gagagigo (lmao)
IFA = infernal queen archfeind
DDWL / dd lady / d.d. = d.d. warrior lady
DB = dark blade

all i can think of as of now.. lol

[Crimson Chaos]

CED=Chaos emperor dragon - envoy of the end (catchey, ain't it?lol)
BLS=Black luster soldier/Black luster soldier - envoy of the begining
DMoC=Dark magician of chaos

[reedj2003]

About the Black Luster Envoy...I think the abbreviation should be BLSE for that...I've also got some more:

WW-Wingweaver
JR-Jar Robber
OP-Oppressed People
DS#-Darkfire Soldier (#-Number on card)

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

Updated slightly.

Newbie /newb = New player that is willing to accept help from others

N00bie / n00b = New player that believes they are all that and is totally ignorant of any help. Or rejects any help.

Well what dyou know. There is a difference XD

[Mitchell & Ness]

Zaborg - Zaborg the Thunder Monarch
Mobius - Mobius the Frost Monarch
Offering - Ultimate Offering
NoE / Nobleman of Ex / Extermination - Nobleman of Extermination
Gorilla - Berserk Gorilla
Forceful - The Forceful Sentry
Confi - Confiscation
Reaper - Spirit Reaper
Book - Book of Moon
Snatch - Snatch Steal
Breaker - Breaker the Magical Warrior
Cylinder - Magic Cylinder
TER - Thousand-Eyes Restrict
Blater - Dark Balter the Terrible
Senshi - Ryu-Senshi
Germ - Giant Germ
RftDD - Return from the Different Dimension
Mad Dog - Mad Dog of Darkness
DF - Dimension Fusion
Necro / Necrofear - Dark Necrofear

Im pretty sure alot of them wernt here. lol.

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

Huge Update

[AngelicAura]

Desserts=Just Desserts
S/T=Spell or trap (in today's words)
Archer=Amazon archer
Bow=bowganian
Accursed=Mask of the Accursed
Golem=Lava Golem
CD=Card Destruction
Hino=Hinotama
Cannon=Wave-motion Cannon
Bind=Gravity Bind
SFD/Flare Dragon=Solar Flare Dragon (?)
Princess=princess of tsurugi/fire princess
Cease=Ceasefire
Dark Room/Room/DRoN/DRON=Dark Room of Nightmare
Stealth/Bird=Stealth Bird

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

Obviously you were going through your Burn deck when you came up with these.

[AngelicAura]

Yes, indeed I was, now time for my fairy deck:
Wall/WoRL= Wall of Revealing Light
MSB=Mystical Shine Ball
Cestus/Dagla=Cestus of Dagla
Venus=The Agent of Creation-Venus
Asura=Asura Priest
Sanc/Sanctuary/SITS=The Sanctuary in the Sky
Zera=Warrior of Zera
Joan=Guardian Angel Joan
Mars=The Agent of Force-Mars

[Himura999]

Couldn't tell if this was mentioned, but I have a few.

TI-Virus~Tribe Infecting Virus
CSMC~Chaos Soldier Messanger of Creation
CK~Command Knight
RES~Retrained Elven Swordsman
MC~Murading Captain
SFAD~Swordsman from another dimension
Sasuke~Sasuke Samurai
FSMB~Fusion Sword Murasama Blade
Barrel~Barrel Behind the Door
GAF~Goblin Attack Force
R/B~Ring of Destruction/Barrel Behind the door combo
Mataza~Mataza the Zapper/Surprising Mataza
Grace~Graceful Charity
Kurufu~Black Scorpion Trap Remover Kirufu
Chik~Black scropion Running Chikku
Da Don (Cheasey one we used)~Don Zaloog/Zaroog
TDS~Total Defense Shogun
IDG~Impermiable Defense General

If any were already mentioned, appologies. Just thought I'd put a few slang terms we used to use when I used to play the game seriously.

Deck Abbreviations

Pos/Neg~Positive Negative Deck Type (Also referred to as burn or Fire Princess) where your LP increases while your opponents Decreases (Uses card combo's like Fire Princess, Messanger of Peace, Solem Wishes, Cure Mermaid, and Wall of Revealing Light).

GCD~God Card Deck (A deck designed to use God Cards, weather they;re legal or not in a tournie). Normally this deck is frowned upon, because the God card effects are unknown. However if you know them and have them, the deck is designed to thin out and stall out until you can get a Magical Scientist, and three Thousand Eyes Restricts to the field to summon Obelisk, then blow your opponent up.

Exodia~Duh, a deck designed to summon Exodia. Usually high on draw power and defense and almost without offense.

Chaos~ A deck that incorperates the Chaos Soldier and Chaos Emperror Dragon. Half Dark monster's and Half Light. Uses painful choice and Grace to get your monsters to the grave.

[Himura999]

Since people are pissing and moaning. Go ahead and delete this post and the one I made after this Vivi.

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

Dude, we have edit post for a reason O.o

[Himura999]

Let me explain my reasoning for doing it in two posts....

My first post was simple abreviations for 'cards'. Then I noticed that there were a few deck types not mentioned, so I posted another time for those. Applologies for a double post. But the infor was not the same and I didn't think it prudent to put them in the same post.

[AngelicAura]

Does it matter? No, we don't want room to be used here. Besides, it's like separating 1 paragraph into 2 and this paragraph that was split was a complete paragraph......

[Lokarin]

Ok... this thread is old, so I didn't bother checking before posting... heres some deck types that I have used before (they are quite funny)

Swarm: Ok, fill the field with many monsters to go for small, multiple hits... One of the few decks that MAY use United we Stand and/or GPanda or Aqua Chorus(Not sure, the one that increases power for same name monsters)... some sub-types include

ZombieSwarm: Famous for its speed... Pyramid Turtle... Book of Life (I think) Call of the Mummy (Special summon level 6 zombies, ouch) and many other cards including Ryu Rokki

NormalSwarm: Otherwise known as HumanWave... normal swarm can make use of Dark Factory thing and various cards including delta attack (or whatever)
Coach Goblin for support (then rip your own eyes out for using it without thinking)

PsuedoSwarm: Otherwise known as KillSkill... fill the field with powerful effect summons and use skill drain and other effects to be silly... have toon world and Skill drain out? you can still SS the toons and attack... nice with scapegoats... Using Fusilier Dragon... SS and skill drain for a full power monster

ElementalSwarm: (EarthSwarm to be precise): Use Bubonic Vermin, Nimble Momonja, Scapegoat/Spirit Elimination/Gigantes combos
Elemental Swarm decks use for each element
EARTH: Gaia Power, Milus Radiant, Giant Rat
WATER: Umiruka, Starboy, Mother Grizzley
ETC.

ALO: No such thing... do either GigaBeat or WaterSwarm (or something else)... WaterSwarm makes good use of Nightmare penguin... while a lower boost than Starboy, can live longer in defense mode... but that is against the whole swarm idea... (except for the fact you get an instant bounce when summoned)... however WaterSwarm has the unique ability to MotherGrizzly out heavy attackers while under ALO... WaterSwarm also combos good with Tribe, since Starboy is also Aqua

Planter'sChoice: A combo of Water and Plant types to make use of interspecial abilities... using Lekunga and Fairy King Trusdale combos to make quick walls... Your choice of ALO or Umiruka... Lord Poison helps out too: A deck of this type can be unbeatable with proper usage (since Lord Poison can drop you ANY plant monster)
Especially weak to Tribe though (same goes for Zombie or Warrior specific decks)

TokenSwarm: Just DON'T... this deck type is IMPOSSIBLE to win with (unless you rule)... use Scapegoats, Ojama Trios, unique Creature Swap combos with very few monsters (Magician of Faith pretty much) to win with token attacks... requires use of field cards... watch out for token thanksgiving

SwarmControl: LOL... it does work... clever use of Swarm of Locusts (Scarabs) to control the field and some other bugs (or just theme it up to StealthBird and Des Lacooda)

CardSwarm: DANGEROUS... not only to you but to them... Bistro Butcher, Sasuke Samurai #3... Bubble Crash... Spatial Collapse... Ground Collapse, Fuh-Ka-Zan(the lockdown one)... Card Destruction... Cyber Jar, Morphing Jar.... Fill your opponents hand with cards and take out their WHOLE DECK IN 1 TURN!!!... don't forget classics like NeedleWorm... drop Gavekeepers Servant, cuz you will not survive an attack without thought

KickMeInTheNutsCuzIDon'tCareControl: Ok... Chain Energy and Gravekeepers Servant in triples... don't forget Staunch Defender and Ojama Trio... MAKE THEM ATTACK and regreat it

Ok, thats it for now... my top picks are definately the EarthSwarm and Water/Plant decks...

[Nanasawa Kimiko]

Split 'n' stuff (http://forums.gamewinners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=423770)

[Radant128]

Well, I feel like doing an article so I guess I will. and I think I'll devote this to the building of a Fiend deck.

Yes I know deck building was covered in the split part of the thread but I have my own ideas.

Theme of the Fiend deck:
Well, all I can say is that I run an Archfiend deck, which is something I will go into but its not something I particularly recommend because its hard to master them.

Now a regular fiend deck is basically a field control deck mixed with some beatdown that uses mostly fiend monsters. A deck might look like this (plz dont be lame and net deck this....)

1. Dark Necrofear
2. Dark Necrofear

3. Dark Ruler Ha Des
4. Dark Ruler Ha Des

5. Archfiend Soldier
6. Archfiend Soldier
7. Archfiend Soldier
8. Giant Orc
9. Giant Orc
10. Mystic Tomato
11. Mystic Tomato
12. Dark Jeroid
13. Dark Jeroid
14. Newdoria
15. Newdoria
16. Sangan
17. Cyber Jar
18. Tribe-Infecting Virus

1. Pot of Greed
2. Graceful Charity
3. Card Destruction
4. Snatch Steal
5. Creature Swap
6. Creature Swap
7. Enemy Controller
8. Mystical Space Typhoon
9. Heavy Storm
10. Lightning Vortex
11. Swords of Revealing Light
12. Premature Burial
13. Dimension Fusion
14. Monster Reincarnation
15. Monster Reincarnation

1. Call of the Haunted
2. Ring of Destruction
3. Torrential Tribute
4. Mirror Force
5. Raigeki Break
6. Sakuretsu Armor
7. Return from the Different Dimension


Now before you say "Hey! Mystic Tomato aint a fiend! wtf bbq!", I have news for ya. He helps. He can bring out the Dark Jeroid or Newdoria that is in your deck. Besides, Fiends have no searchers of thier own, but luckily all of the good fiends are Dark (yay). Dark Necrofear removes from play so an awesome combo is to summon it by removing Dark Ruler Ha Des, Dark Jeroid, and Archfiend Soldier and then spring Dimension Fusion. This will Special Summon all monsters removed from play. This means a face up monster on your opponent's side of the field gets -800 ATK while you get a set of beatsticks with ATKs of 2200, a 1900, and a 2450 respectively with Jeroid's 1200 to back you up. Return from the Different Dimension is basically used when you intend to either win right then or there, or deal the blow which will seal victory for you later. Yeah, you give up half your life points, but fiend decks arent known for being a cautious deck type to run.


Now for my specialty, the Archfiend deck.

As of now, 6-17-05, my archfiend deck looks like this (Okay, seriously, dont net deck this. Thats not cool):
1. Dark Necrofear
2. Dark Necrofear

3. Dark Ruler Ha Des
4. Archfiend of Gilfer

5. Archfiend Soldier
6. Archfiend Soldier
7. Archfiend Soldier
8. Shadowknight Archfiend
9. Shadowknight Archfiend
10. Shadowknight Archfiend
11. Terrorking Archfiend
12. Terrorking Archfiend
13. Infernalqueen Archfiend
14. Infernalqueen Archfiend
15. Magician of Faith
16. Sangan
17. Cyber Jar
18. Tribe-Infecting Virus

1. Pandemonium
2. Pandemonium
3. Pandemonium
4. Terraforming
5. Pot of Greed
6. Graceful Charity
7. Card Destruction
8. Snatch Steal
9. Creature Swap
10. Mystical Space Typhoon
11. Heavy Storm
12. Giant Trunade
13. Dimension Fusion
14. Swords of Revealing Light
15. Premture Burial
16. Nobleman of Crossout

1. Call of the Haunted
2. Ring of Destruction
3. Torrential Tribute
4. Sakuretsu Armor
5. Raigeki Break
6. Return from the Different Dimension

First thing you'll notice is that I use very few of the DCR archfiend support such as Pandemonium Watchbear, Checkmate, Archfiend's Roar, and most of the monsters. Heres why. They suck. It took me two years to perfect the Archfiend design and I found out (the hard way) that most of the DCR support is worthless, thus giving people the idea that Archfiends somehow suck, themselves.

Second thing you will notice is that any one searcher is useless, even if they could reach the main attack monsters. Too many different attributes. So I shouldnt need to go any further as to why searchers are worthless in this deck. And of course, Sangan is the only one that made it (Search out Infernalqueen, Cyber Jar, and MoF).

Anyway, Archfiends are about beatdown. And they do it well. All of the Archfiend monsters in the deck are either 1900 or 2000 (Infernalqueen gives a 1 turn +1000 ATK pump up to any Archfiend on both players' stand-by phases. So she can make herself a 1900) in ATK. Terrorking negates effect monsters, and Shadowknight and Soldier are there as beatsticks. The one Archfiend monster who needs a sacrifice in the deck, Gilfer, is a strong beatstick and powers down monsters when he dies. This can put a Blue-Eyes within Terrorking's reach, provided he get a pump up from Infernalqueen. Dark Necrofear is in the deck because undoubtedly, fiends are gonna die. And dead fiends dont do much if they arent feeding Dark Necrofear. But its always better to create Necrofood yourself, and cards like Graceful Charity and Raigeki Break will do just that. Ha Des is in here for use as a beatstick and Necrofood (And eventual resummoning with Dimension Fusion or Return from the Different Dimension).

Okay, now I feel stupid, I just gave my whole strategy away. Bah whatever, I just felt like educating those who dont believe in Archfiends, and those who wish to start a fiend deck.

Next time I post, I'll discuss a Zombie deck.

General deck building tip:
When building a deck, give it a theme. Beatdown, Burn, Control, Deck-Out, Exodia, just make sure to put cards in that fufill those themes.

For example, Solar Flare Dragon aint a great beatstick but makes a great burner in pairs or threes. And cards like Luster Dragon dont belong in a deck out deck (Partly cuz hes a normie) because he doesnt aid your deck in that enterprise.

In summary, get a theme or strategy and stick to it.

[Radant128]

I think now its time I did the Zombie deck. I suppose if you run Shadow Ghoul, its gonna be a dump 'n pump, but most Zombie decks are about bringing out strong monsters.

Heres what a standard Zombie deck might look like:

1. Vampire Genesis
2. Despair from the Dark

3. Ryu Kokki
4. Vampire Lord
5. Vampire Lord

6. Pyramid Turtle
7. Pyramid Turtle
8. Pyramid Turtle
9. Soul-Absorbing Bone Tower
10. Spirit Reaper
11. Spirit Reaper
12. Regenerating Mummy
13. Regenerating Mummy
14. Fear from the Dark
15. Fear from the Dark
16. Sangan
17. Tribe-Infecting Virus
18. Cyber Jar

1. Book of Life
2. Book of Life
3. Book of Life
4. Premature Burial
5. Pot of Greed
6. Graceful Charity
7. Card Destruction
8. Call of the Mummy
9. Mystical Space Typhoon
10. Heavy Storm
11. Nobleman of Crossout
12. Snatch Steal
13. Creature Swap
14. Swords of Revealing Light
15. Mystic Plasma Zone

1. Call of the Haunted
2. Rope of Life
3. Ring of Destruction
4. Torrential Tribute
5. Sakuretsu Armor
6. Raigeki Break
7. Tutan Mask

So basically, Zombies are anti-hand control plus lots of revival. Also, they are fairly strong to boot, so they have alot going for them. In any case, the main idea of a Zombie deck is to dump and revive. Heck, it can even swarm. Creature Swap (hand over Pyramid Turtle), attack turtle, and bring out Vamp Lord or Ryu Kokki for more damage. Very effective. And with Vamp Lord now at two, Vamp Genesis doesnt look so bad (now if Vamp Lord got completely unrestricted, Vamp Genesis becomes standard in all Zombie decks, unless Kimiko can tell me otherwise). If nothing else, hes a beatstick.

Another thing about Zombie monsters is that they are incredibly searchable. Pyramid Turtle is awesome as is, but Sangan can search out some of the other good Zombies such as Bone Tower, Reaper, and Pryamid Turtle (yay!!). So Zombies are fairly easy to get to the field.

Overall, the original Zombie Structure deck did a good job of starting a player down the road to a good Zombie deck.

[MA16]

Dragon deck.

Easily the most underrated of all the runnable types out there, Dragons are a very solid type to run. What is so special about dragons? Magic/Trap removal and TONS of it. Dragons are actually very versatile as well as they also can do decent monster removal or burn.

In the dragon type, there are 4 monsters who can be run at the head. They are Red-Eyes Black Dragon, Blue-Eyes White Dragon, Armed Dragon, and Horus, the Black Flame Dragon. Tyrant Dragon sucks. Each of these decks do something different and if run correctly will destroy the opponent.

In beatdown, dragons have a particular edge over the vast majority of beatdown. Dragons are far better equipped to deal with stall and burn than anything else in the game. This should be incorporated in ALL Dragon decks. That having been said, lets see what they look like.

General Dragon
LV5+

1. Blue-Eyes White Dragon
2. Red-Eyes B. Dragon
3. Red-Eyes B. Dragon

LV4-
4. Luster Dragon
5. Luster Dragon
6. Luster Dragon
7. Spear Dragon
8. Spear Dragon
9. Red-Eyes Black Chic
10. Red-Eyes Black Chic
11. Masked Dragon
12. Masked Dragon
13. Masked Dragon
14. Lord of D.
15. Tribe-Infecting Virus
16. Cyber Jar
17. Magician of Faith
18. Sangan

Magics:

1. Stamping Destruction
2. Stamping Destruction
3. A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon
4. Flute of Summoning Dragon
5. Pot of Greed
6. Graceful Charity
7. Card Destruction
8. Creature Swap
9. Creature Swap
10. Mystical Space Typhoon
11. Heavy Storm
12. Premature Burial
13. Swords of Revealing Light
14. Nobleman of Crossout
15. Snatch Steal

Traps:

1. Sakuretsu Armor
2. Sakuretsu Armor
3. Ring of Destruction
4. Torrential Tribute
5. Raigeki Break
6. Call of the Haunted
7. Interdimensional Matter Transporter

Side Deck:

1. Divine Dragon - Ragnarok
2. Divine Dragon - Ragnarok
3. Divine Dragon - Ragnarok
4. Lord of D.
5. Lord of D.
6. Fusion Gate
7. Fusion Gate
8. Dimension Fusion
9. King Dragun
10. King Dragun
11. Fusiler Dragon, the Duel-Mode Beast
12. Fusiler Dragon, the Duel-Mode Beast
13. Metamorphasis
14. Metamorphasis
15. A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon


Total: 40
Side-Deck: 15

Pretty standard deck here. It can summon all the dragons that matter.

Notice that we have a strong, non-dragon in the side-deck. Why? He ain't a Dragon. True, but he's LV7, meaning he's morphable into the ultimate dragon card, King Dragun. This thing protects your dragons from opponent effects that target(fear not the Sakuretsu Armor or Raigeki Break, or even Ring) so he stops most of the really nasty stuff. Plus he is Dragon swarmage. You can Special Summon 1 Dragon from your hand each one of your turns. All because we Morphed a Machine. Well if it's any consolation, he does look like a dragon. Fusiler should be in all Dragon decks that aren't Red-Eyes, since Red-Eyes is LV7 already.

Now as to what each Dragon does, I have broken it down into each of the 4 dragons you can run a deck around.

Blue-Eyes White Dragon:
The first dragon, the best dragon. With 3000 ATK and 2500 DEF, he does well in either position. A Blue-Eyes Strategy is field destruction oriented. So we will put in cards that relate to field destruction, while keeping a dragon theme for the M/T removal that every dragon deck should capitalize on.

Monsters:

LV5+

1. Blue-Eyes White Dragon
2. Blue-Eyes White Dragon
3. Blue-Eyes White Dragon
4. Fusiler Dragon - The Dual Mode Beast

LV4-

5. Luster Dragon
6. Luster Dragon
7. Luster Dragon
8. Spear Dragon
9. Spear Dragon
10. Paladin of White Dragon
11. Kaiser Seahorse
12. Kaiser Seahorse
13. Kaiser Seahorse
14. Kaibaman
15. Kaibaman
16. Tribe-Infecting Virus
17. Sangan
18. Cyber Jar

Magics:

1. Stamping Destruction
2. Stamping Destruction
3. White Dragon Ritual
4. A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon
5. Burst Stream of Destruction
6. Burst Stream of Destruction
7. Pot of Greed
8. Graceful Charity
9. Card Destruction
10. Premature Burial
11. Swords of Revealing Light
12. Mystical Space Typhoon
13. Heavy Storm
14. Nobleman of Crossout
15. Snatch Steal

Traps:

1. Mirror Force
2. Sakuretsu Armor
3. Ring of Destruction
4. Torrential Tribute
5. Call of the Haunted
6. Raigeki Break
7. Raigeki Break

Side Deck:

1. Metamorphasis
2. King Dragun
3. King Dragun
4. Lord of D.
5. Lord of D.
6. Flute of Summoning Dragon
7. Divine Dragon Ragnarok
8. Divine Dragon Ragnarok
9. Masked Dragon
10. Masked dragon
11. Fusion Gate
12. Fusion Gate
13. Polymerization
14. Book of Moon
15. Interdimensional Matter Transporter

Total: 40
Side Deck: 15

Blue-Eyes is completely destruction oriented as well as speed summon. Paladin of White Dragon is face down destruction, Spear and Luster Dragons are 1900 beatsticks, so they will probably kill whatever they hit. Paladin will also summon from deck(and maybe you could combo up with a Burst Stream at summon. He can't attack anyway so get something out of him). Kaiser Seahorse and Kaibaman quickly summon the beast. Fusiler is for discard engines, or if you side in a Book of Moon or IMT he can be a 2800 beatstick as well. Very expensive strategy to run, but it is more than worth every penny two fold.

The magic and traps are M/T removal as well. Notice that at max, the deck has up to 5 MST-like cards(2 Stamps, 1 MST, 2 Geki break) as well as a potential two storms(Heavy Storm, A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon) so stall burn decks stand little, if any chance against a good Blue-Eyes deck. Keep in mind the geki breaks can also be used for monster destruction aiding to that theme as well.

Red-Eyes is a tad different though..

Monsters:

LV5+
1. Red-Eyes Black Dragon
2. Red-Eyes Black Dragon
3. Red-Eyes Black Dragon

LV4-
4. Luster Dragon
5. Luster Dragon
6. Luster Dragon
7. Spear Dragon
8. Spear Dragon
9. Masked dragon
10. Masked Dragon
11. Masked Dragon
12. Red-Eyes Black Chic
13. Red-Eyes Black Chic
14. Red-Eyes Black Chic
15. Tribe-Infecting Virus
16. Cyber Jar
17. Sangan
18. Magician of Faith

Magics:

1. Stamping Destruction
2. Stamping Destruction
3. Stamping Destruction
4. A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon
5. Inferno Fire Blast
6. Inferno Fire Blast
7. Swords of Revealing Light
8. Mystical Space Typhoon
9. Heavy Storm
10. Pot of Greed
11. Graceful Charity
12. Card Destruction
13. Nobleman of Crossout
14. Premature Burial
15. Snatch Steal
16. Creature Swap

Traps:

1. Mirror Force
2. Sakuretsu Armor
3. Ring of Destruction
4. Call of the Haunted
5. Torrential Tribute
6. Raigeki Break

Side Deck:

1. Fusiler Dragon, the Dual-Mode Beast
2. Fusiler Dragon, the Dual-Mode Beast
3. Metamorphasis
4. Metamorphasis
5. Interdimensional Matter Transporter
6. Interdimensional Matter Transporter
7. King Dragun
8. King Dragun
9. Serial Spell
10. Tremendous Fire
11. Lightning Vortex
12. Ceasefire
13. Just Desserts
14. Inferno Fireblast
15. Red-Eyes Darkness Dragon

Total: 40
Side Deck: 15

Red-Eyes is very different from Blue-Eyes. Red-Eyes is more burn oriented. He himself is already Morphable into Kign Dragun, but if playability becomes an issue, Fusiler is back and ready to fulfill his duty in dragon decks. Red-Eyes can do beatdown fairly well and for decks that use stronger monsters, Red-Eyes Darkness comes to mind and usually hits the field as a 3000 attacker.

While burn oriented, the above deck still needs Red-Eyes to use all 2400 attack points it has in order to finish the job since dragons have no continuous burn cards at their disposal. While Red-Eyes support is usually weaker than Blue-Eyes, it is still an extremely powerful dragon and should not be taken lightly.

Now we get onto the two newest dragons around which your deck can be built. We'll start with Armed Dragon. I shall post my deck, since I think it's an excellent model of what Armed Dragon should be.

Monsters:

LV5+
1. Armed Dragon LV7
2. Armed Dragon LV5
3. Armed Dragon LV5
4. Fusiler Dragon, the Dual-Mode Beast

LV4-

5. Luster Dragon
6. Luster Dragon
7. Luster Dragon
8. Spear Dragon
9. Spear Dragon
10. Masked Dragon
11. Masked Dragon
12. Masked Dragon
13. Armed Dragon LV3
14. Armed Dragon LV3
15.Tribe-Infecting Virus
16. Sangan
17. Cyber Jar
18. Magician of Faith

Magics:

1. Stamping Destruction
2. Stamping Destruction
3. Stamping Destruction
4. A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon
5. The Graveyard in the Fourth Dimension
6. Lightning Vortex
7. Pot of Greed
8. Graceful Charity
9. Level Up!
10. Nobleman of Crossout
11. Snatch Steal
12. Creature Swap
13. Premature Burial
14. Swords of Revealing Light
15. Mystical Space Typhoon
16. Heavy Storm

Traps:

1. Mirror Force
2. Sakuretsu Armor
3. Ring of Destruction
4. Torrential Tribute
5. Call of the Haunted
6. Interdimensional Matter Transporter

Side Deck:

1. Fusiler Dragon, the Dual-Mode Beast
2. Metamorphasis
3. Metamorphasis
4. King Dragun
5. King Dragun
6. The Graveyard in the Fourth Dimension
7. Blue-Eyes White Dragon
8. Raigeki Break
9. Raigeki Break
10. Armed Dragon LV3
11. Armed Dragon LV5
12. Level Up!
13. Super Rejuvination
14. Nobleman of Crossout
15. Dragon's Rage

Total: 40
Side Deck: 15

Armed Dragon is fast.. Armed Dragon is VERY fast. Armed Dragon LV3 is the ONLY LV monster who auto-levels. He doesn't have to meet any special requirements, and the fun part is, your opponent may hand you an Armed Dragon LV3 when they end their battle phase only to watch it grow before their eyes into a real menace on the field.

At LV5, Armed Dragon will allow you to discard one monster and destroy ANY monster who's ATK is less than or equal to the ATK of the discarded monster(see why Blue-Eyes is in the side-deck?). This also gives Fusiler yet ANOTHER reason to show up in this deck. He is not only 1 part uber-beatstick and 1 part King Dragun morphable, but he is ALSO food for Armed Dragon to anahilate something. It gets better. When Armed Dragon grows up again, this same effect is applied to ALL monsters on your opponent's side of the field. Discard Blue-eyes to Geki the field and his effect does not prevent him from attacking, so ram into their lifepoints with all 2800 ATK points. Armed Dragon is quite frankly awesome.

Now Horus is a completely different kettle of fish.

Horus the Black Flame Dragon

Monsters:

LV5+

1. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8
2. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6
3. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6
4. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6

LV4-

5. Luster Dragon
6. Luster Dragon
7. Luster Dragon
8. Spear Dragon
9. Spear Dragon
10. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV4
11. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV4
12. Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV4
13. Lord of D.
14. Lord of D.
15. Tribe-Infecting Virus
16. Sangan
17. Cyber Jar
18. Magician of Faith

Magics:

1. Stamping Destruction
2. Stamping Destruction
3. A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon
4. Molten Destruction
5. Flute of Summoning Dragon
6. Level Up!
7. Level Up!
8. Pot of Greed
9. Graceful Charity
10. Card Destruction
11. Nobleman of Crossout
12. Premature Burial
13. Swords of Revealing Light
14. Mystical Space Typhoon
15. Heavy Storm
16. Lightning Vortex

Traps:

1. Mirror Force
2. Sakuretsu Armor
3. Ring of Destruction
4. Torrential Tribute
5. Raigeki Break
6. Call of the Haunted

Side Deck:

1. Fusiler Dragon, The Dual-Mode Beast
2. Fusiler Dragon, The Dual-Mode Beast
3. Metamorphasis
4. Metamorphasis
5. Level Limit Area-B
6. Level Limit Area-B
7. Little Chimera
8. Little Chimera
9. The Graveyard in the Fourth Dimension
10. The Graveyard in the Fourth Dimension
11. Stamping Destruction
12. Serial Spell
13. Raigeki Break
14. Dust Tornado
15. Magic Jammer

Total: 40
Side Deck: 15

Horus is the odd-man-out of the 4 dragons. The other 3 are pure beatdown with a neat side strategy. Horus is..... Different. He doesn't do destruction, nor burn. He does magic negation. That's right folks, magic negation. But due to the fact Horus is not searchable through Masked Dragon, there are fewer dragons here than in the other decks posted above, as well as fewer dragon cards(2 stamps instead of 3). Horus LV6 is as high as you ever need to go, and Horus LV8 is just overkill. Horus LV6 is not affected by magic cards. One would think that bad since fields and equips don't affect him. Wrong.. Throw out a Level-Limit Area-B and watch him stay in ATK position. Of course that's if your opponent runs faster things that are strong than 2300.

Horus is slow. Very slow, but once he gets started he is unstoppable. It is VERY difficult to take control of Horus due to the fact LV4's control cannot change, LV6 ain't affected by magics, and LV8 can negate things at will. 3000 ATK makes it fairly certain that Horus will send something to the graveyard. Again, Fusiler is back in his usual role of Morph food and revived beatstick but he's in the side-deck this time.

Lord of D. is protecting him instead of Horus's servant since Lord of D. > Horus's Servant. The M/T removal for this type of deck is still fairly high though, so stall should still crumble to it.

There you have it.. Dragons in general. They aren't as crappy as many people seem to believe. The Dragon structure can give new players a good start on a good Red-Eyes or Armed Dragon deck, but for Horus and Blue-Eyes, start pack pulling.

[AngelicAura]

I need to bring my last article on burns (which has been split).

Burn Decks:

These things come in many different varieties. They are run completely different from other decks, and are usually one of the most unique decks you can run.

Mechanics:
These focus on dropping your opponent's Life Points to 0 by inflicting Direct Damage via effects. They do not focus on attacking what-so-ever. And you want to have control over a duel. If you don't, you will probably lose it with a burn. These also run a various amount of stalling cards. Stall cards are cards that stop your opponent from attacking, etc. Common ones are:
-Gravity Bind
-Level Limit-Area B
-Messenger of Peace
Also, there are staples that don't apply in burn decks. These are mostly:
-Snatch Steal
-Premature Burial
-Heavy Storm

Common Types of Burn decks:
Monster burns
These utilize monsters to inflict damage, while having back-up stallers for defense. These deck sub-themes include:
-Fire
-Mine Golem (remains untested)
-Flip
-Grave Ohja
-Fire Princess (the one burn that lets you gain life points, and yet your opponent still loses)
-Dragon

Spell burns:
These focus on using Spells to hit your opponent, while utilizing Monster, Spell, and Trap stallers for defense. While there are not many different types of Spell burns, cards that would go into one include:
-Ookazi
-Poison of the Old Man
-Tremendous Fire
-Final Flame*
-Hinotama*
*= not very useful, but are run-able.

Trap burns:
These focus on using Trap burners to chip at your opponent's life points, while slaying monsters via Spells, using monster, spells, and traps for defense, and avoiding a Jinzo that could end the duel. Trap burn deck types include:
-Monster Destruction + Skull Invitation/Fatal Abacus/Coffin Seller
-Curse of Darkness
-Anti-Spell Fragrance
-Chippers

There are many other types of burns, but these are some common ones.

Deck examples:
Monster
This is a standard monster burn that conforms to no specific sub-theme. The total is 40 cards.

Monsters Lv. 5+
1. Lava Golem
2. Lava Golem

Monsters Lv. 4-
1. Princess of Tsurugi
2. Princess of Tsurugi
3. Stealth Bird
4. Stealth Bird
5. Stealth Bird
6. Grave Ohja
7. Grave Ohja
8. Dice Jar
9. Dice Jar
10. Sangan
11. Cyber Jar
12. Des Koala
13. Des Koala
14. Des Koala
15. Bowganian
16. Bowganian

Spells:
1. Level Limit-Area B
2. Level Limit-Area B
3. Messenger of Peace
4. Messenger of Peace
5. The Shallow Grave
6. Book of Moon
7. Book of Moon
8. Tremendous Fire
9. Tremendous Fire
10. Dark Room of Nightmare
11. Dark Room of Nightmare
12. Smashing Ground
13. Smashing Ground
14. Pot of Greed
15. Graceful Charity
16. Swords of Revealing Light

Traps:
1. Magic Cylinder
2. Ring of Destruction
3. Mirror Force
4. Gravity Bind
5. Gravity Bind

Spell Burn:
This is a standard Spell Burn that does not conform to any specific sub-theme. The total is 40 cards.

Monsters Lv. 5+
1. Lava Golem
2. Lava Golem

Monsters Lv. 4-
1. Magician of Faith
2. Magician of Faith
3. Magician of Faith
4. Stealth Bird
5. Stealth Bird
6. Stealth Bird
7. Cyber Jar
8. Sangan

Spells:
1. Ookazi
2. Ookazi
3. Ookazi
4. Tremendous Fire
5. Tremendous Fire
6. Tremendous Fire
7. Poison of the Old Man
8. Poison of the Old Man
9. Poison of the Old Man
10. Final Flame
11. Final Flame
12. Dark Room of Nightmare
13. Dark Room of Nightmare
14. Level Limit-Area B
15. Level Limit-Area B
16. Pot of Greed
17. Graceful Charity
18. Swords of Revealing Light
19. Meteor of Destruction
20. Meteor of Destruction
21. Messenger of Peace
22. Messenger of Peace
23. Wave-motion Cannon
24. Wave-motion Cannon
25. Wave-motion Cannon

Traps:
1. Gravity Bind
2. Gravity Bind
3. Magic Cylinder
4. Ring of Destruction
5. Mirror Force

Trap Burn
This is a Trap Burn with no particular sub-theme.

Monsters Lv. 5+
1. Lava Golem
2. Lava Golem

Monsters Lv. 4-
1. Des Koala
2. Des Koala
3. Stealth Bird
4. Stealth Bird
5. Cyber Jar
6. Dice Jar
7. Balloon Lizard
8. Balloon Lizard
9. Mask of Darkness
10. Mask of Darkness

Spells:
1. Pot of Greed
2. Graceful Charity
3. Swords of Revealing Light
4. Level Limit-Area B
5. Level Limit-Area B
6. Messenger of Peace
7. Messenger of Peace
8. Dark Room of Nightmare
9. Dark Room of Nightmare

Traps:
1. Gravity Bind
2. Gravity Bind
3. Magic Cylinder
4. Ring of Destruction
5. Curse of Darkness
6. Curse of Darkness
7. Just Desserts
8. Just Desserts
9. Just Desserts
10. Secret Barrel
11. Secret Barrel
12. Secret Barrel
13. Nightmare Wheel
14. Nightmare Wheel
15. Ceasefire
16. Mask of Restrict
17. Torrential Tribute
18. Skull Invitation
19. Skull Invitation

(The Trap Burn isn't very good, I might add. I'll try and add to it when I can think of a better way to do it.)

Well, there ya have it. A burn deck. Have fun!

EDIT: This article only covered the basics, because I ran out of room and time. For more information on burn decks, simply PM me. I'll probably send you a copied thing from Microsoft Word that I typed myself, of course, but it's a response to help you. That is all.

[MA16]

Rock deck.

The newest runnable type out there, Rocks focus on field manipulation, primarily reusable flip summon effects like Gaurdian Statue and Medusa Worm. Two rocks come to mind when we think rocks and they are Gaurdian Sphinx, who has been out there forever, and Megarock Dragon, the newest and arguably one of the best rocks out there. Gaurdian Sphinx is massive field bounce on ypur opponent's field. Megarock is crazy stupid uber beatstick because his effect will allow him to have a mad ATK power.

Now onto the stuff that rock decks use. Rocks use a lot of flip summoning so we want to use stuff that works off of it. Also since the good rocks we will be using have little defense, we shall also shlep in some face-down protection.

Monsters:

LV5+
1. Megarock Dragon
2. Heira Sphinx
3. Criosphinx
4. Gaurdian Sphinx

LV4-

5. Grave Ohja
6. Grave Ohja
7. Medusa Worm
8. Medusa Worm
9. Medusa Worm
10. Gaurdian Statue
11. Gaurdian Statue
12. Gaurdian Statue
13. Cyber Jar
14. Arsenal Summoner
15. Gigantes
16. Tribe-Infecting Virus
17. Sangan
18. Magician of Faith

Magics:

1. Pot of Greed
2. Graceful Charity
3. Card Destruction
4. Swords of Revealing Light
5. Mystical Space Typhoon
6. Heavy Storm
7. Messenger of Peace
8. Messenger of Peace
9. Last Will
10. Scapegoat
11. Lightning Vortex
12. The Shallow Grave
13. Premature Burial
14. Snatch Steal
15. Creature Swap

Traps:

1. Rock Bombardment
2. Rock Bombardment
3. Sakuretsu Armor
4. Ring of Destruction
5. Torrential Tribute
6. Call of the Haunted
7. Raigeki Break

Side Deck:

1. Dimension Fusion
2. Granmarg the Rock Monarch
3. Sakuretsu Armor
4. Raigeki Break
5. Grave Ohja
6. Rock Bombardment
7. Rope of Life
8. Dark Core
9. Golem Sentry
10. Golem Sentry
11. Golem Sentry
12. Heirasphinx
13. Monster Reincarnation
14. Monster Reincarnation
15. Messenger of Peace

Total: 40
Side Deck: 15

Now first we'll look at our monster compliment. Naturally we have Megarock Dragon as a finishing move, Gaurdian SPhinx as uber broken bounce but what about Criosphinx and Hierasphinx? What do they do that's so great? Well Hierasphinx prevents face down monsters from being attack targets, which means you will be pulling off a lot of Gaurdian Sphinx if your opponent didn't stop the Sphinx before. Criosphinx forces them to dump a card from the hand, however this is an event effect so no matter how many are returned to the hand, only 1 card is discarded.

As for the non-sac creatures, Grave Ohja is similar to Hierasphinx except that he cannot be attacked if there are face down monsters. He also burns your opponent for 300 every time a monster you control is flip summoned. Medusa Worm and Gaurdian Statue put down some piss off factor by destroying or bouncing cards back to the hand.

Notice a monster who doesn't seem to belong, but does. Arsenal Summoner makes Gaurdian Sphinx SEARCHABLE!!! That's right ladies and gentlemen, a debatably broken card that is legally searchable. It's nuts I tell you. He is also 1600 beatstick.

This is a stall/field control deck which waits for Megarock Dragon to consume enough monsters to become all powerful and go for the kill.

Now for the magics. The magic portion should be similar to a stall, except no Level Limit. Messenger of Peace is fine since when you're ready for the final attack, you want Megarock Dragon to be able to attack. You also want to stall your opponent's big beat monsters so your Medusa Worms and Gaurdian Statues can wreak havoc on their field. Another portion of the magics should be put into Destruction. Lightning Vortex is brutal and gets rid of everything when you feel your ready to finish them off.

Shallow Grave is also a good card to play if Gaurdian Sphinx was killed, but Hierasphinx is out. This protects Gaurdian Sphinx from being an attack target and stuff has to go through Hierasphinx to get at it. This also lends itself out to even more combos.

Traps are all destruction oriented except for 3. Rock Bombardment burns and sends rocks to the graveyard to either be revived later or feed the insatiable hunger of the Megarock Dragon. Raigeki Break is monster/s/t destruction + rock dumpage.

There you have it. The inner workings of a good rock deck. Essentially it will be about pulling out Megarock for the kill. A card that is side-decked that you should consider comboing with this card is Dimension Fusion. It'll bring back EVERYTHING that you removed from play to summon Megarock to the field and Megarock won't weaken. This means you will be able to attack with an overwhelming swarm of monsters, with Megarock at the head.

[Radant128]

This has been posted before, but it was such a long time ago and things have changed.

There are many deck types in Yu-Gi-Oh. Most people could easily point out Beatdown and Burn, but there are certainly others. And they each do something different. Some decks mix these elements together to form a combination that is potentially devestating to a one-dimensional deck.

Primary deck types in YGO:
Beatdown:
The big suckers of the game, and easily the most identifiable. Beatdown decks specialize in.... beating up stuff. The average strength of an attacker tends to be anywhere from 1800 - 2200 in the level 4 area. Popular monsters of the beatdown genre include:

LV5+
Jinzo
Dark Ruler - Ha Des
Zaborg the Thunder Monarch
Mobius the Frost Monarch
Granmarg the Rock Monarch

LV4
Archfiend Soldier
Goblin Attack Force
Giant Orc
Spear Dragon
Berserk Gorilla
Skilled Dark Magician
Breaker the Magical Warrior

The big issue with a beatdown deck is that they are built primarily to fight other beatdowns. While that might not seem like too much since most decks are probably beatdown decks at thier core, beatdowns are inheritly vunerable to stall decks. Cards like Gravity Bind and Level Limit - Area B, but argueably the most anti-beatdown card in the game is Messenger of Peace. And with MST at 1 per deck, beatdown decks really should look at Raigeki Break for thier main deck and Dust Tornado for a side deck.

Control:
Lots of cards fall under this category. Anything that would change the layout of the field and hand outside of battle is control. Cards like Dark Necrofear, Snatch Steal, Swarm of Scarabs/Locust, Compulsory Evacuation Device, and Delinquint Duo are all control cards. One thing most control cards have in common is that if they are monsters, they have a low ATK rating for thier star level, or they are fairly low level to begin with. Control decks rely entirely on the effects of monsters to win. Hand control decks basically win by eliminating the hand. Because of the discard abilities of the monsters, the deck doesnt need many strong monsters. Monster control basically deals with changing control of monsters. Field control is about bouncing and blowing up stuff. Then there is the Clown Control... Yes, Angelic Aura loves this deck :D . Basically it revolves around the abilities of Crass Clown and Dream Clown. Level Limit - Area B, Labirnyth of Nightmare, and Zero Gravity work really well because they will activate these abilities. The win condition of the deck is Mataza the Zapper or Gray Wing because they are low level and thus get under LLAB and can decrease your opponent's lps by alot. These decks might be a little Flip heavy, though.

Burners:
AA is the guy I talk to about burn decks and he already covered it above so read that. And if you are lazy, just know this..... Playing with Fire can be fun.


Deck Out:
We dont really see alot of these because at some point your opponent will top deck something useful and.... will use it. As a win condition, its usually unstable but some decks do it really really good. A few months ago, I read about a deck-out strategy that made it to regionals. Hell, my Zombie deck does some deck out (three bone towers and plenty of monsters to be special summoned with lots of stuff that does special summon), but not as a win condition. Its always funny to nail thier uber big creature or to take out thier win condition altogether. When deck out became feasible, it put a fairly large dent in Exodia decks, FINAL decks, and really any OTK deck. This deck will incorporate some stall stuff such as Level Limit and Gravity Bind. Look at cards like Assault on GHQ, Giant Trunade+Card Destruction is always nasty, Needle Worm (DB2), Vamp Lord, Vamp Lady, amoung many others.


OTK (One Turn Kill):
Not a lot of these left now that Scientist got axed. OTKs depelete the opponent's life points in one turn. Wave Motion Cannon is a great example. I cant really think of one thats not banned but we could look at ones that got banned. Scientist+Catapault Turtle/Cannon Soldier (with Ojama King) and Makuyra+Chick the Yellow+Call of the Haunted. Again, there probably arent many left, which is fine cuz I see them as unfair in general. Possibly the one that escaped the ban list was Jowgen+Wall of Revealing Light+Last Turn (Thats legal?! O.o)


Insane Life Gain
This is a deck type that is not seen too often. Typically they are stall decks that use monsters to pump up your life points. Since the oh so forgotten Dian Keto the Cure Master is not on the limited/semi-limited lists, its a great card to run. Solemn Wishes is also good as you will be drawing every turn and thats 500+ to your life points. Not exactly sure what the Win Condition is here. Maybe just reach a point where your opponent will deck out before they can hit your life points in time. Fire Princess might help a little as will Assault on GHQ. But why do this when you can do regular deck out?


Instant Win
There are only three decks that could be called Instant Wins. Last Turn, Exodia, and FINAL/Destiny Board. Basically, they revolve around cards whose effect includes ending the duel when a certain hand or field condition is met.

Exodia = When the five pieces are in the hand
Last Turn = Jowgen is on the field when this card is played.
FINAL/Destiny Board = When the five pieces are on the field.

All of them demand uber draw power and while all of them need stall, FINAL needs the m/t zones so monster stall is the only option (Reaper, Labyrnith Wall, Thousand-Eyes Restrict, anything that will keep your opponent from attacking or thier attacks away from your life points). They dont really care about your opponent's life points so Upstart Goblin will work well.

I didn't include type or theme based decks because they fall under one of these categories. There may be others but they might be loosely connected to one of the above categories.

[Radant128]

I'm going to discuss the ban list.... Yeah, its popular here, but in my area, it is not (Consequently, the competition in my area is incredibly poor)

There are two formats in the game of Yu-Gi-Oh. There is Traditional Format, and then there is Advanced Format. The Traditional Format runs the game as it was pre-Febuary 2004 with no banned cards. However, advanced format had the banned cards. As of now, there is no incentive to play advanced format over traditional format other than a little more respect from other players. Now if you are a beginner, you may think that banning cards is dumb. I hear this all the time, "why make cards to ban them?". Simple. The makers do not yet know if a card or strategy are gonna be abused. Although some cards are very obvious. Raigeki, Lightning Vortex, Mystical Space Typhoon, Yata-Garasu. Those are cards that without restrictions can be played in such a way that completely makes a duel one sided, and if the strategy spreads, makes the game unbalanced and unfair. There are literally no advantages to the traditional format except access to cards that are excessively gamebreaking. The Advanced Format allows for more creativity and balances the card game quite a bit. Even if you dont go to tournaments, it is still alot more fun to play with the ban list in play. To win, your strategy must work. In traditional format, its less about the strategy and more about when you can spring Raigeki and then summon Yata-Garasu for the win. Also, even though UDE and Konami do not separate player rankings based on format, the tourneys that actually matter are held in the advanced format so if you intend to go to big tournaments (such as Konami sanctioned Regionals or Nationals) you will be comfortable with thier format.

Traditional Format, while stale and unbalanced to holy hell, is a great way to start out. You might not have the experience to know what would go into an advanced deck so you use cards that'll make up for your lack of experience. Raigeki, Harpie's Feather Duster, Dark Hole, Yata-Garasu, etc. But when you really understand the mechanics of the game, its about time to switch to the advanced format. Although this arguement is less usable now that Konami and UDE are marketting Advanced Format starter decks. They are excellent for beginners and vets alike because they contain cards that can be the base of a future deck or you can strip em for parts for your own decks.

Here at Game Winners, the advanced format is THE format we prefer. You can go ahead and post a traditional deck and we'll help you switch formats. Kimiko, Angelic Aura, myself, we're all willing to help you change your deck if you ask. And usually, the deck can be changed without any blow back to the deck itself. I'll give some basic examples to change a deck...

Raigeki - Lighting Vortex
Monster Reborn - Premature Burial/Call of the Haunted (These should be run regaurdless of the format. One revival card doesnt have much impact)
Harpie's Feather Duster - Heavy Storm (Should be in your deck, anyway unless its a burner)
Yata/Chaos Emporer Dragon/Magical Scientist - Some cards are just too broken to replace.
Dark Hole - Torrential Tribute

Keep up with the ban list. It is updated roughly every 6 months.

[Neo Matrix]

Just a thought... shouldn't someone update the first post? It's over 2 years old.

[darq_dragon243]

Rock deck.

The newest runnable type out there, Rocks focus on field manipulation, primarily reusable flip summon effects like Gaurdian Statue and Medusa Worm. Two rocks come to mind when we think rocks and they are Gaurdian Sphinx, who has been out there forever, and Megarock Dragon, the newest and arguably one of the best rocks out there. Gaurdian Sphinx is massive field bounce on ypur opponent's field. Megarock is crazy stupid uber beatstick because his effect will allow him to have a mad ATK power.

Now onto the stuff that rock decks use. Rocks use a lot of flip summoning so we want to use stuff that works off of it. Also since the good rocks we will be using have little defense, we shall also shlep in some face-down protection.

Monsters:

LV5+
1. Megarock Dragon
2. Heira Sphinx
3. Criosphinx
4. Gaurdian Sphinx

LV4-

5. Grave Ohja
6. Grave Ohja
7. Medusa Worm
8. Medusa Worm
9. Medusa Worm
10. Gaurdian Statue
11. Gaurdian Statue
12. Gaurdian Statue
13. Cyber Jar
14. Arsenal Summoner
15. Gigantes
16. Tribe-Infecting Virus
17. Sangan
18. Magician of Faith

Magics:

1. Pot of Greed
2. Graceful Charity
3. Card Destruction
4. Swords of Revealing Light
5. Mystical Space Typhoon
6. Heavy Storm
7. Messenger of Peace
8. Messenger of Peace
9. Last Will
10. Scapegoat
11. Lightning Vortex
12. The Shallow Grave
13. Premature Burial
14. Snatch Steal
15. Creature Swap

Traps:

1. Rock Bombardment
2. Rock Bombardment
3. Sakuretsu Armor
4. Ring of Destruction
5. Torrential Tribute
6. Call of the Haunted
7. Raigeki Break

Side Deck:

1. Dimension Fusion
2. Granmarg the Rock Monarch
3. Sakuretsu Armor
4. Raigeki Break
5. Grave Ohja
6. Rock Bombardment
7. Rope of Life
8. Dark Core
9. Golem Sentry
10. Golem Sentry
11. Golem Sentry
12. Heirasphinx
13. Monster Reincarnation
14. Monster Reincarnation
15. Messenger of Peace

Total: 40
Side Deck: 15

Now first we'll look at our monster compliment. Naturally we have Megarock Dragon as a finishing move, Gaurdian SPhinx as uber broken bounce but what about Criosphinx and Hierasphinx? What do they do that's so great? Well Hierasphinx prevents face down monsters from being attack targets, which means you will be pulling off a lot of Gaurdian Sphinx if your opponent didn't stop the Sphinx before. Criosphinx forces them to dump a card from the hand, however this is an event effect so no matter how many are returned to the hand, only 1 card is discarded.

As for the non-sac creatures, Grave Ohja is similar to Hierasphinx except that he cannot be attacked if there are face down monsters. He also burns your opponent for 300 every time a monster you control is flip summoned. Medusa Worm and Gaurdian Statue put down some piss off factor by destroying or bouncing cards back to the hand.

Notice a monster who doesn't seem to belong, but does. Arsenal Summoner makes Gaurdian Sphinx SEARCHABLE!!! That's right ladies and gentlemen, a debatably broken card that is legally searchable. It's nuts I tell you. He is also 1600 beatstick.

This is a stall/field control deck which waits for Megarock Dragon to consume enough monsters to become all powerful and go for the kill.

Now for the magics. The magic portion should be similar to a stall, except no Level Limit. Messenger of Peace is fine since when you're ready for the final attack, you want Megarock Dragon to be able to attack. You also want to stall your opponent's big beat monsters so your Medusa Worms and Gaurdian Statues can wreak havoc on their field. Another portion of the magics should be put into Destruction. Lightning Vortex is brutal and gets rid of everything when you feel your ready to finish them off.

Shallow Grave is also a good card to play if Gaurdian Sphinx was killed, but Hierasphinx is out. This protects Gaurdian Sphinx from being an attack target and stuff has to go through Hierasphinx to get at it. This also lends itself out to even more combos.

Traps are all destruction oriented except for 3. Rock Bombardment burns and sends rocks to the graveyard to either be revived later or feed the insatiable hunger of the Megarock Dragon. Raigeki Break is monster/s/t destruction + rock dumpage.

There you have it. The inner workings of a good rock deck. Essentially it will be about pulling out Megarock for the kill. A card that is side-decked that you should consider comboing with this card is Dimension Fusion. It'll bring back EVERYTHING that you removed from play to summon Megarock to the field and Megarock won't weaken. This means you will be able to attack with an overwhelming swarm of monsters, with Megarock at the head.


A good trap to have in here for the protection of your face-downs is a feint plan. The effect is that facedown monsters cannot be attacked during this turn

[MetalPikachu]

Well, I have a crapload of Yugioh cards, but I don't have a deck yet. My feelings are caught between "Seriously, who plays that unless you're like, ten" and "Well, it's a good TCG". I have some cards that are fine for flanker decks and some that are suitable for beatdown. A few of them suck though.

[OmgRawr]

i would say to update this, since even the op was dead wrong about the game at the time of the post, but this forum is pretty dead.