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by Phoenix Desertsong  Dwarves fans in Magic the Gathering may be able to live the dream of playing Dwarf Tribal in Standard with Magda, Brazen Outlaw from the Kaldheim set. This Legendary Creature is just two mana to play (1 colorless, 1 Red) and gives all other Dwarves +1/+1. Also, whenever a Dwarf you control becomes tapped you create a Treasure token.
Treasure tokens are neat enough, giving you an artifact that allows you to sacrifice it for one of any color of mana. It gets better with Magda, though, as you can sacrifice five Treasure tokens in order to search your deck for any artifact or Dragon card and put it onto the battlefield! Already, the wheels are turning for Commander players eager to brew a mono-Red Dwarf deck. The problem in Standard is that before any other Dwarves are revealed in Kaldheim, only four Dwarves exist in Standard. They are Rimrock Knight, Seven Dwarves, Staunch Shieldmate, and Torbran, Thane of Red Fell. The good news is all four of these Dwarves are playable to different degrees. Rimrock Knight is an aggressive 3/1 two-drop that also has the Adventure Boulder Rush, which gives a target creature +2/+0 at instant speed. That seems like an auto-include in any Dwarf Tribal deck. Seven Dwarves is a card that you can play seven copies of in a deck, and each copy pumps other all other Seven Dwarves by +1/+1. Magda would be happy to have these guys in the fold. The other two are the one-drop 1/3 Shieldmate, who becomes a heck of a lot scarier with Magda on-board, and Torbran. As we’ve seen in mono-Red Torbran is very good and his commitment to needing 3 Red mana in his 4-mana casting cost isn’t an issue here. He makes each of your red sources deal 2 additional damage, making Dwarves already a deck to be reckoned with so far. Any additional Dwarves in Kaldheim will make Magda significantly better, and we’ll return soon to cover those Dwarves, as well. Early in the Kaldheim spoiler cycle, we did get to see a Dwarf exclusive to the Theme and Collector boosters, Warchanter Skald. He’s a three-mana White Dwarf who plays into the equipment theme. Whenever he becomes tapped, if he’s enchanted or equipped, you get a 2/1 Red Dwarf Berserker creature token. Not bad at all! Magda is a good playable Legendary already, albeit it’s hard to say how competitive it would be. However, being able to tutor up artifacts or even a Dragon is pretty spicy, especially when it goes directly into play. Standard is full of interesting Dragons, especially Leyline Tyrant and Terror of the Peaks, but neither of them has haste. Korvold, Fae-Cursed King could technically be cheated into play with this effect, but then you couldn’t hard-cast him from hand. Interestingly, Gadrak, the Crown-Scourge, a three-mana Dragon who can’t attack unless you have four artifacts in play, however, may actually be playable in this Treasure happy deck. He also creates Treasure tokens himself for each nontoken creature that died in a turn, including your opponents. This formerly unplayable 5/4 flier suddenly looks interesting, except he doesn’t seem worth cheating into play with Magda’s ability whatsoever. Magda, Brazen Outlaw in Pioneer and Modern In Pioneer, Magda, Brazen Outlaw picks up help in both Red and White, especially thanks to Kaladesh and Aether Revolt. Aerial Responder is a solid 3-drop creature with flying, lifelink, and vigilance. Depala, Pilot Exemplar gives you another Lord that’s Vehicle-friendly, playing to the artifact-theme of Magda. Of course, the best Dwarf in Pioneer is Sram, Senior Edificer, who draws you a card each time you cast an Aura, Equipment, or Vehicle spell. Toolcraft Exemplar helps with that plan, too. While Depala is nice at pumping your Dwarves, it’s most likely that you want to look to cheap Equipment instead with that plan. In Pioneer, though, the Dragons are strong with Glorybringer and Stormbreath Dragon probably your best options with Haste. It’s well worth sacrificing five Treasures to get either of those Dragons! Modern doesn’t add much to the Dwarves, but it adds incredibly to the Equipment stock, plus you could even play the Mirrodin-block and Modern Horizons Swords, plus Stoneforge Mystic (who isn’t a Dwarf but who cares). You also get the option of playing Thundermaw Hellkite, which absolutely demolishes decks with lots of fliers. The potential core already exists for Standard, Modern, and Pioneer Dwarf Tribal lists, and that’s before you ever see the rest of the Dwarves in Kaldheim! Dwarf Tribal in Commander The only issue with Magda, Brazen Outlaw in Commander is that many of the best Dwarf creatures exist in White. That means that Depala, Pilot Exemplar, for better or worse, is a strictly better Commander than Magda. Even Mono-Red has a better option with Torbran giving all of your Red sources of damage those extra 2 points of hurt. She’s plenty good, but pretty much doomed to be one of the 99, and one of the 59 even in Brawl! That being said, Magda, Brazen Outlaw is a fun Dwarf Tribal card that will definitely see play in some context. Magda is hopefully just one of many fun, potentially powerful tribal synergy cards we will see in Kaldheim!
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by Phoenix Desertsong, Magical Gatherer & Trading Card Game Enthusiast  For Magic the Gathering competitive veterans, Birthing Pod was one of the most powerful (and polarizing) cards ever printed. As a way to cheaply and quickly tutor bigger and better creatures from your deck, Birthing Pod decks dominated both the Standard and Modern scenes for quite some time. Eventually, the Pod was banned in Modern, pushed in Legacy where it never quite took off, and of course has become a solid card in Modern.
Since the Modern banning of Birthing Pod, we’ve seen several “fixed” versions of the card. The most obvious was Prime Speaker Zannifar, a very good Legendary creature who had a few flings with competitive play, and is also excellent as a Commander. To a lesser extent, Fiend Artisan from the Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths served a similar function, but on a very brittle body to begin with, so its competitive scope has thus far been a bit limited. With the release of Kaldheim spoilers, though, Magic players were greeted with a new artifact that is yet another “fixed” version of Birthing Pod. However, despite their being some new restrictions to this card, it’s not quite as “fixed” as it would first appear. Let’s dig into this very spicy Pyre of Heroes. Pyre of Heroes VS Birthing Pod Without further ado, here is what makes this artifact, Pyre of Heroes, different from Birthing Pod. 2, T: Sacrifice a creature: Search your library for a creature card that shares a creature type with the sacrificed creature and has converted mana cost equal to 1 plus that creature's converted mana cost. Put that card onto the battlefield, then shuffle your library. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery. First of all, the Pyre limits you to a specific creature type. As we’ll see in a moment, Birthing Pod didn’t have this restriction. But, before we get into the pros and cons of Pyre of Heroes, let’s see what the card that inspired it does and circle back to comparing and contrasting them. Birthing Pod was a four-mana Green artifact. The ability was somewhat inspired by a very powerful Sorcery called Natural Order, so powerful that it became banned in pretty much every competitive format except for Legacy, Vintage, and Commander. It allowed you to sacrifice a Green creature you control, then put any Green creature from your library into play. Of course, it was limited to Green creatures, but that didn’t stop it from being a ridiculous card. What made Birthing Pod special is that it’s functionally colorless, thanks to the Phyrexian mana costs associated with many New Phyrexia set cards. So, instead of paying the Green mana, you could instead pay 3 colorless mana and 2 life to cast Birthing Pod. While in Commander the Birthing Pod is restricted to Commanders with Green in their color identity, this is not the case in ordinary Constructed decks. Yes, pretty much every Birthing Pod deck played Green creatures with powerful enter-the-battlefield abilities, but you could run any deck with Birthing Pod in it. Plus, it wasn’t restricted at all to Green creatures. Still, what Birthing Pod does is powerful, but seemingly very narrow when you first read the card at face value. (1}{Green/Phyrexian Mana), (Tap), Sacrifice a creature: Search your library for a creature card with converted mana cost equal to 1 plus the sacrificed creature's converted mana cost, put that card onto the battlefield, then shuffle your library. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery. While Birthing Pod did place deck-building restrictions on those pilots who wished to play it, there are so many creatures that naturally “curve” into one another that Birthing Pod simply created a ridiculous value engine, especially in the late game. The fact that its activation cost doesn’t even require colored mana makes it even more ridiculous. About the only safety valve built into this card is that you can only use the ability whenever you would be able to cast a sorcery (a.k.a. your own turn). Of course, there are ways that you can get around the restriction of tapping it once per turn. But, Birthing Pod is so powerful that one activation per turn is plenty enough to make it a busted card in competitive play. It’s not quite as bad in Commander, where having only a single copy limits just how often it actually comes into play. Of course, in Commander where the card pool is so huge, there are enough redundancies of this sort of effect that playing a “Birthing Pod” style deck is easy to do. All that being said, what makes Pyre of Heroes so special? First of all, it costs just 2 to play and 2 mana to activate. Yes, it is limited to searching a creature of the same creature type, but with how much Wizards of the Coast has pushed tribal decks, that’s not nearly as much of a restriction as you might think. Also, many creatures have one or two subtypes, making it easier than you’d think to find “tribal” cards that all work together. Is Pyre of Heroes More Like Aether Vial Than Birthing Pod? In effect, I see Pyre of Heroes as being more similar to a powerful artifact called Aether Vial. This isn’t a comparison that I saw mentioned early on when the Pyre was first spoiled. The Vial is a one-drop artifact that has made many tribal decks possible in Modern, Legacy, and Vintage. For reference, here is what Aether Vial does: At the beginning of your upkeep, you may put a charge counter on Aether Vial. (Tap): You may put a creature card with converted mana cost equal to the number of charge counters on Aether Vial from your hand onto the battlefield. In many ways, Aether Vial and Pyre of Heroes have more in common than they do at first glance. Of course, Aether Vial isn’t at all limited to tribal decks - the popular Death and Taxes archetype in Modern, Legacy, and Vintage is far from tribal for example). The idea here is that Pyre of Heroes can serve a similar purpose in purely tribal decks. Today’s Magic scene is littered with tribal decks, such as Warriors, Soldiers, Elves, Goblins, etc. Especially in Standard, Pyre of Heroes seems like a card begging to be included in many decks. One Standard deck extremely popular prior to the release of Pyre of Heroes is Dimir Rogues, which is a deck as you would expect runs Rogue creatures. Of course, seeing a seemingly obvious place for a card to contribute begs the question if it actually works within the context of the deck. With Rogues, the deck actually wants to keep its creatures in play in order to grind out value by milling cards from the top of an opponent’s library, or even your own library depending on the circumstances. You could build a version of the deck that would be built around Pyre of Heroes, but it would be somewhat awkward. Many other top decks in Standard aren’t Tribal at all, such as Gruul Adventures, Mono-Green Food, Temur Ramp, etc. However, Tribal themes have continued to be played up in recent Standard-legal sets, and whatever Kaldheim has to offer can mean brand new decks to brew around with Pyre of Heroes as a key value engine for consistency. What Magic the Gathering Tribes Benefit the Most from Pyre of Heroes?The most popular tribes in competitive Magic, especially when it comes to formats other than Standard, are Elves, Goblins, Dragons, and Merfolk. Elves probably don’t have a need for the Pyre, Merfolk already have Aether Vial, and Dragons don’t curve out from one mana up to really be consistent in most competitive formats (although it is doable in Commander thanks to a deep card pool and Changelings who we will get to in a moment). Goblins are the one deck that may seem to benefit the most from Pyre of Heroes, as sacrificing Goblins for value is a theme of the deck to begin with. Thing is, Goblin decks are explosive enough to win the game without an added value engine like Pyre of Heroes. You could have builds, Red/Black builds for example, that become more consistent with Pyre of Heroes, but it would take a lot of testing to prove if those builds would be competitive enough to keep up with fast formats such as Modern. Where Pyre of Heroes could really shine is the Pioneer format, which has a much smaller card pool than Modern, and the Historic format on Magic Arena which has an even smaller card selection. Neither of those formats have access to Aether Vial, but do have access to cards like Fiend Artisan and Prime Speaker Vannifar that would potentially give the Pyre of Heroes some redundancy. Both Merfolk and Elf Tribal decks in those formats could be nicely boosted by Pyre of Heroes. What tribes could benefit most in Modern to me would be Allies, Slivers, and Changelings. Allies are probably the most interesting to me since Aether Vial has never really made them a winner in Modern, despite their massive support in Magic. There are enough synergies that have made them powerhouse decks in Commander, but not consistently in Modern. Yes, Allies decks have won events before, but they have often been relegated to “rogue” status. Slivers are a powerful enough deck to sometimes win an event out of the woodworks, but never consistently, even with the power of Aether Vial. Changelings are extremely deadly in Commander, and since they are all in the Modern card pool, give you plenty of options to work with. Both are at their best when you can play all five colors, which makes them often inconsistent and awkward in Modern. Pyre of Heroes, like Aether Vial, bypasses many of the mana-fixing issues that beleaguer these decks. For me, the best decks for Pyre of Heroes are tribal decks that operate best when they use the best cards they have in either four or five colors. That’s extremely easy to do in Commander, so I can see Pyre of Heroes being a staple in so many decks, as it’s purely colorless. A couple of other tribes that come to mind are Humans, Elementals, Vampires, and Zombies, but we’ll get into why I don’t immediately jump to those tribal decks in a moment. Pyre of Heroes as a “Win More” CardMany times that a card with an effect that’s been explored before is spoiled, people flock to it immediately because it’s both familiar and new. In many decks that want this sort of tutor effect, the decks are already able to find consistency with existing cards (such as Aether Vial or other tutor/recursion effects) or are synergistic within their tribes already that Pyre of Heroes is sort of just there as a “win more” card. For example, many decks have used the powerful tutor Collected Company to great effect, including Humans, Merfolk, and recently even Zombies. The aforementioned Slivers and Allies have also used Collected Company to great effect on the fringes of competitive play. As I’ve already mentioned, four and five color decks, which Humans and Elementals lend themselves to, can benefit from Pyre of Heroes. But, I’m not sure that there’s much that Pyre of Heroes can do at sorcery speed, which also costs you a creature, that Collected Company doesn’t do at instant speed, even with the obvious chance that “Co-Co” can whiff. Company decks are also very limited in that they have to play three-mana or less creatures, but in a way, that makes them inherently more consistent to begin with. Another place that I’ve considered Pyre of Heroes being good is in decks that don’t mind sacrificing, such as the aforementioned Vampires and Zombies. Clerics are another tribe that can actually benefit from sacrificing. Sacrifice-themed decks probably do well to consider Pyre of Heroes, but again, those decks (better known as Aristocrat decks) already have solid engines to power their strategy. As such, Pyre of Heroes becomes a card that’s nice to consider, but “win more” cards aren’t always good and can end up being dead draws at certain points of the game. Pyre of Heroes as a Budget Replacement for Birthing Pod (Or Even Aether Vial?)Besides four and five color tribal decks that benefit from a colorless tutor, Pyre of Heroes could also fill two other voids. One, decks that could play Birthing Pod, but don’t want to spend the extra $60+ for the play set can instead play Pyre of Heroes. The tribal restriction can actually streamline deck building choices as well as the consistency from playing tribal synergies. Colorless lords like Adaptive Automaton help that cause, too. The other voids are decks that would but can’t play Birthing Pod because of it flat-out being banned, like in Modern, or have color restrictions, such as in Commander. For example, can you imagine Mono-Brown Tribal, such as Myrs or even Constructs having access to a Birthing Pod-type effect? I’ve certainly thought about it, and Pyre of Heroes gets to benefit from artifact synergies that can abuse its tap abilities, too! I can see Wizard Tribal benefitting too, as well as other decks that may not tutor creatures as well, especially in Red and Blue - whereas White, Black, and Green naturally have many creature tutors available. Also, many colorless tutors exist, but they happen at much higher mana costs, such as Planar Bridge. Early game consistency created by Pyre of Heroes, especially in decks that can easily get back the sacrificed creatures, could be the key to helping some previously clunky decks create value where it would’ve been hardly possible before. In any case, Pyre of Heroes should be a solid budget replacement for Birthing Pod, plus give tribal decks a new weapon. Whereas Tribal decks have often won by power and toughness boosts and enter-the-battlefield synergies, Pyre of Heroes gives tribal decks an additional tutor while also enhancing the boost and ETB effects. It’s also a pseudo-draw engine that cashes in early-game plays into more value. Yes, I even expect tribes that like lots of their kind in the graveyard, such as Rogues and Zombies, will eventually develop builds that utilize Pyre of Heroes. All in all, I could write for days about Pyre of Heroes just from a speculative standpoint. I can’t wait to see some of these potential brews I’ve conceptualized actually played in real life Magic. We will definitely be revising this article in the future to see just how Pyre of Heroes fares in actual gameplay. Pyre of Heroes is one of the more fascinating “rabbit hole” type cards we’ve seen in quite some time. I’d love your thoughts on this card. Am I on to something with my esoteric ramblings about tribal deck consistency? Please let me know what you’re thinking about this and other Kaldheim cards! Happy magical gatherings! DISCLAIMER: Portions of LifeSuccessfully.com Magic the Gathering related content are unofficial Fan Content permitted under the Wizards of the Coast Fan Content Policy. The literal and graphical information presented on this site about Magic: The Gathering, including card images, the mana symbols, and Oracle text, is copyright Wizards of the Coast, LLC, a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. The content on this website is not produced by, endorsed by, supported by, or affiliated with Wizards of the Coast. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Cascade has always been one of my favorite mechanics in Magic the Gathering since the days of the Alara Reborn set. Bloodbraid Elf was the first card to become a competitive staple with the mechanic. Now, Apex Devastator from Commander Legends takes Cascade to a brand new level. What does Cascade do exactly?
When you cast this spell, exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a nonland card that costs less. You may cast it without paying its mana cost. Put the exiled cards on the bottom of your library in a random order. Yes, ten mana is a lot to cast a card. But, not only do you Cascade once when you cast him, but rather four separate times consecutively. The initial reaction from many Commander players was that this card was simply too high a mana cost to be much use to any competitive deck builders. But, is that actually true? Cascade has been a pretty good strategy in Commander, thanks to cards printed exclusively in Commander products such as Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder, as well as Maelstrom Wanderer printed in Planechase. Commander Legends took Cascade to a brand new level with a handful of new cards, including a couple of Legendary Creatures. We’ll take a look at these potential Commanders in particular and how Apex Devastator fits in with them. Averna, the Chaos Bloom and Apex Devastator A three-mana, three-color creature, Averna costs just one Green mana, one Red mana, and one Blue mana to cast. While Averna doesn’t cascade herself, her ability does directly impact other cards with Cascade in a big way. Typically, when you Cascade, any lands that you reveal are sent back to the bottom of the library. Averna now gives you the option to put a land card from among those revealed cards into play tapped. Obviously, Averna, the Chaos Bloom allows you to quickly mana ramp up to your larger cascade spells, such as Apex Devastator. But, the Devastator offers a unique opportunity to put into play not just one, but up to four land cards into play in one fell swoop. With several other key Cascade cards printed in the set all falling well below the nine-mana threshold of Apex Devastator, you can cause a ridiculous Cascade of Cascade effect, as cards played with Cascade are still technically cast. Apex Devastator appears to be an immediate auto-include in any Averna decks. Imoti, Celebrant of Bounty and Apex Devastator The second, and perhaps even more powerful of the two Cascade Commanders in the set, is Imoti, Celebrant of Bounty. This five-mana Blue/Green Legendary Creature is a mere uncommon and has Cascade herself. Being that Imoti lacks Red in her color identity, it seems she is better suited as a complement to other Cascade Commanders. However, I believe her effect covers the potential weakness of her inability to access cards outside of colorless, Blue, and Green. Any card that you cast with a converted mana cost of 6 or more automatically has Cascade when Imoti is in play. This is a perfect combination with another Commander Legends Legendary Creature called Brinelin, the Moon Kraken. The 8-mana Kraken doesn’t have Cascade itself, but has an ability that whenever you cast the Kraken or a spell that costs 6 or more mana, you can return a nonland permanent to its owner’s hand. This is good both for reusing your own Cascade creatures or obviously bouncing opponent’s cards. Apex Devastator is an auto-include in Imoti decks, since Imoti lends herself to playing many six-mana or higher cards. Being able to potentially cast four cards with that high mana cost all in a row - all of which can gain their own instances of Cascade with Imoti in play - is probably a game-ender in Imoti’s favor. While ten mana is certainly a lot, Cascade decks tend to have plenty of ramp tools available to them. It doesn’t hurt that many of the mana ramp spells and mana rocks get cast for free by Cascade triggers on a regular basis. You very likely won’t wait until your tenth turn to cast Apex Devastator. One last deck that can definitely use Apex Devastator is the Hydra Tribal Commander Gargos, Vicious Watcher. As Gargos makes Hydra spells cost 4 less to cast, this 10 mana behemoth suddenly costs just 6, but still offers his Cascade ability as a 10-drop. That’s some serious value. Many other Commander decks are giving Apex Devastator a shot as a potential blowout card. Of course, Cascade triggers are inherently random, meaning you have as much of a chance as hitting a one-mana card as an eight-mana card. But, free card advantage can never be overlooked. How would you use Apex Devastator? by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Guardian of Tazeem from Magic the Gathering’s Battle for Zendikar set may not look incredibly exciting, but this rare Sphinx creature had potential to be a pretty sweet weapon in control decks. The Guardian is a 4/5 flyer for 3UU, already solid stats for a mono-Blue creature. It also has a Landfall ability. Whenever a land comes into play on your side, you tap a target creature an opponent controls. If that land is an Island, that creature doesn't untap during its controller's next untap step.
The cool thing about the ability is that the land in question doesn't have to be a basic Island. So, if you have dual lands such as Breeding Pool, Hallowed Fountain, or any other nonbasic land that has the land type Island, you get to freeze creatures for a turn each time you play one of them. Best of all, if you happen to make all lands Islands - such as with Stormtide Leviathan or the Enchantment Prismatic Omen if you're also in Green - every land you play has that effect. What held back Guardian of Tazeem from competitive play is that it was vying for deck space with Icefall Regent in Standard. The Regent can keep a creature tapped down as long as it's on the battlefield. While on paper the Guardian of Tazeem can tap down a lot more things, having to depend on a land-drop makes it less consistent. Also, the Regent being a Dragon made it fit better into many Dragon-centered strategies at the time. The only competitive play that Guardian of Tazeem has seen over the years was in occasional Azorius Aggro deck lists. Even in decks that relied on staying ahead on tempo and winning the game in the air, it was still relegated to sideboard action. About the only consistent home for Guardian of Tazeem came years later in Commander, with the printing of the Sphinx tribal lord, Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign. As Unesh makes Sphinx spells you cast cost 2 colorless mana less, pretty much every mono-blue Sphinx becomes playable in that context. Like many creatures who have been useful but on the fringe in competitive play, Guardian of Tazeem has found its niche in Commander. The Guardian has also found a home as a tempo piece in Patron of the Moon and Meloku, the Clouded Mirror decks, which involve a lot of Islands leaving and entering play on a regular basis. As generally weak as Battle for Zendikar was as a set, the Guardian of Tazeem was far from one of its weaker cards. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Chameleon Colossus has always been a fairly valuable Magic the Gathering card. It was originally printed in Morningtide and saw some play in Standard back then. With his versatility and power level, the Colossus has remained popular in tribal decks in casual “Kitchen Table” Magic, EDH, and even Modern.
The price of Chameleon Colossus dropped over time thanks to reprints in Archenemy, From the Vault: Twenty, and Commander 2015. But, thanks to increased play in Modern sideboards and new Tribal decks popping up in Commander all the time, all printings of Chameleon Colossus have been on a steady rise in demand. Chameleon Colossus in Elves For years, Chameleon Colossus saw a lot of play in Elf decks, thanks to the fact that he's a Changeling. The protection from black is also very useful, as a good deal of popular removal cards are black. That was especially true during his early days in competition. It also means decks with primarily black creatures can't block him. Since the Colossus can double its own power as many times as you can pay 2GG, he can deal a ton of damage, too. So, he made a great versatile companion to Elves decks since he counted as an Elf himself. While Elf decks aren’t nearly the force they once were in competitive play, Elves have never stopped being a popular tribe. But, with the printing of Craterhoof Behemoth in Avacyn Restored, Chameleon Colossus became pushed to being a sideboard option in Black-heavy matchups. Chameleon Colossus in Modern Sideboards While Chameleon Colossus is a strong, efficient creature, four mana creatures that don't have an immediate impact on the board don't see much play in Modern. But, fortunately for the Colossus, he has that protection against black going for him. As it turns out, most of the best removal spells in Modern are still predominantly black. So, has he found any home besides Elves sideboards? Red/Green Scapeshift decks began to adopt a single copy of the Colossus in the sideboard, as did Gruul Land Destruction and Tooth and Nail combo decks. These seem like somewhat odd places for him to go. But, having 4 toughness means he's out of Lightning Bolt range, plus much of the other best removal - Dismember, Fatal Push, Terminate, etc. - can't touch it. All of these decks also depend on keeping a threat on the board, which Chameleon Colossus certainly is. Four mana to double his power and toughness is very doable in these decks. Plus, Protection from Black means that Chameleon Colossus can block major threat creatures like Death's Shadow all day. For what it's worth, the Colossus can also block Bloodghast, Gurmag Angler, and Tasigur, the Golden Fang, not to mention any other Black creature that sees play in Modern. So, just to have a fairly difficult to remove wall against big Black creatures is worth playing Chameleon Colossus in the sideboard of a number of Modern decks. Chameleon Colossus in Commander / EDH According to EDHREC, Chameleon Colossus is played in over 3400 EDH decks. Being a Changeling, it's not surprising that he's found his way into a number of tribal decks. The protection from Black also means that he's somewhat tricky to remove and also can block big Black creatures from getting through on the ground. Most recently, Chameleon Colossus has been picked up by popular Tribal Commanders such as Ayula, Queen Among Bears (obviously, Bear Tribal) and Morophon, the Boundless (all sorts of Tribal). For years, the Commander deck playing Chameleon Colossus the most was Reaper King. This is somewhat unsurprising, since as a Changeling, he automatically counts as a Scarecrow, which Reaper King boosts by +1/+1. Reaper King also has another ability that whenever another Scarecrow enters the battlefield under your control, you destroy a target permanent. So, not only does the Colossus become a 5/5 for 4 mana, but he takes out a permanent when he enters. That makes him and any other Changeling an automatic play in the Reaper King deck. Kaseto, Orochi Archmage has also given Chameleon Colossus a home. Not only is the Colossus perfect for the Snake Tribal deck. but Kaseto can make creatures unblockable. If that creature is a Snake, Kaseto also gives it +2/+2. With the Colossus's ability to double his power and toughness, he can deal a whole ton of damage that can't be blocked. Ouch. Arahbo, Roar of the World, the Cat Tribal Commander, has also taken full advantage of Chameleon Colossus. Not only is the Colossus a very big Cat, but Arahbo can give the Colossus +3/+3 at the beginning of combat, plus he can give him trample AND double his power and toughness. On top of the Colossus being able to double his own power already, you get a very massive trampler. Major ouch. Other Commanders who like to have Chameleon Colossus in the deck include Ezuri, Claw of Progress, Atogatog, Seton, Krosan Protector, Xenagos, God of Revels, Ishkanah, Grafwidow, Gishath, Sun's Avatar, and more. Should I Run Out and Buy a Copy of Chameleon Colossus? Really, any printing of this card is worth having in your Magic the Gathering card collection. If you’d like a cheap foil copy, the From the Vault: Twenty version is worth considering. Anyone who plays Green in Commander or casual play should pick up at least a copy of Chameleon Colossus. It fits into many tribal strategies and will always find homes in casual and Commander decks somewhere. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Void Winnower from Magic the Gathering’s Battle for Zendikar set is quite an odd Eldrazi. All “can’t even” and other “odd” jokes aside, the mythic rare Winnower is pretty unique in its abilities. Nine mana for an 11/9 body is already pretty good. Being unable to be blocked by creatures with even converted mana costs gives it a rather unusual form of evasion.
But, Void Winnower goes even beyond that, preventing opponents from casting spells with even converted mana costs. Obviously, this is a Limited bomb that you can likely drop before turn nine in the typical draft or sealed deck, thanks to all of the colorless mana ramp available in that set. But, how good is it in Constructed? For starters, creature tokens can’t block Void Winnower, since they have a 0 CMC. According to an official judge ruling from Wizards of the Coast, 0 is considered even. Mathematical debates aside, it’s going to be fairly tough to chump block this guy. Then again, plenty of removal options exist at odd converted mana costs, so there are definitely ways to deal with this behemoth. What Void Winnower seems best at is being a metagame answer to the big even converted mana cost spells in Standard. At the time of Void Winnower's release, these were Ugin, the Spirit Dragon at 8 mana and Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger at 10 mana being the chief concerns. With Eldrazi Ramp a legitimate deck archetype, especially in Modern, Void Winnower became a legitimate candidate for sideboard play. It can randomly hose a number of decks if their key cards have even converted mana costs. Void Winnower Makes Things Not Even in Pioneer While Void Winnower made a few Top 8 appearances in 2015 and 2017 in Modern, it took awhile for the true power of Void Winnower to be realized. This was a card that for years could be had for as little as a couple of dollars. But, in 2019 with the invention of the Pioneer format - which includes cards from Return to Ravnica forward in its card pool - Void Winnower would soon find new life. It took until 2020 with the release of Fires of Invention to truly see Void Winnower suddenly become a competitive powerhouse. Fires of Invention is a silly enchantment that gives you the ability to cast just two spells in a turn, but it can be any spell with a mana cost equal to or less than the number of lands you control. That means by turn 9 you can play the Void Winnower and another card in one turn. By that point in the game, it’s going to be tricky to stop the Winnower from taking over the board. Void Winnower in Commander / EDH In EDH, Void Winnower is a “just say no” card that will lock some Commanders out of the game. It’s a pretty mean card in the format. While someone will probably find an answer to it in a multiplayer game, it will wreak havoc while it remains in play. It may come down to using Swords to Plowshares on it and gaining the controlling player 11 life. The fact it can help your team get through for extra damage is also another big consideration. Also, because it's colorless, Void Winnower can be included in a wide variety of decks. Naturally, the Commanders that will want to use Void Winnower the most are those that can sometimes cast him for free (Rakdos, Lord of Riots and Animar, Soul of Elements) or cheat him into play (Mayael the Anima and Jhoira of the Ghitu). Also, with the release of Commander Legends, Void Winnower found a new home in Belbe, Corrupted Observer decks. Belbe’s ability can net you a ton of colorless mana, making Void Winnower easy to cast. It also helps that Commander Legends also released Apex Devastator, a ten-drop Green creature that cascades 4 times - literally allowing you to play 4 spells that cost 9 mana or less for free in a row straight from your deck. Void Winnower is an obvious include in any deck that features the Devastator. Pretty much any Commander deck can make use of Void Winnower if you can somehow get him into play on the cheap. Because it doesn't have an on-cast trigger, it's actually a big threat and always worth putting into play no matter how you do it. Void Winnower is definitely a keeper. How would you use Void Winnower? by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Tainted Remedy is a Magic the Gathering card from the Magic Origins set. Time and again, this Enchantment has been compared to Sanguine Bond, a card that was once worth $10 before it was reprinted into dust. Because of how valuable Sanguine Bond became, Magic finance speculators have loved this card for years. So, what's so great about this card?
The card Tainted Remedy does something similar but something that's a bit different than Sanguine Bond. Whereas Sanguine Bond is an instant win combo with Exquisite Blood. That's because they did opposite things. Sanguine Bond would make an opponent lose life whenever you gained life and Exquisite Blood had you gain life whenever your opponent lost life. If you control both of these Enchantment cards on the field at the same time, they create an infinite loop which allows you to drain any and all opponents of all of their life totals, giving you an easy win. Tainted Remedy instead gives you the ability to build a deck that lets you play cards that would ordinarily gain life to instead cause your opponent damage. Early on, it wasn't hard to see Tainted Remedy as a sideboard card to thwart decks that gain tons of life, especially in Modern and Legacy. It also has a great synergy with Beacon of Immortality. The Beacon allows you to double a target player's life total, and with Tainted Remedy in play, it instead deals damage equal to twice that opponent's life total instead. It makes for a deadly two-card combo, especially in a typical one-on-one duel. While the Tainted Remedy combo with Beacon of Immortality isn’t quite as foolproof as the Sanguine Bond and Exquisite Blood combo. But, if you can pull it off, it’s extremely effective. The question is, would Tainted Remedy be a card that would see competitive play as the Bond/Blood combo did during its time in competitive Standard play. As predicted, Tainted Remedy did see some sideboard play, as seen in some U/R Prowess lists in Standard. Tainted Remedy even popped up in Modern a bit, too, as seen in this Abzan Midrange deck. But it wasn’t adopted to the degree that many thought it would be. Still, there’s been enough casual and Commander interest to keep this card on a steady rise over the past two years. Tainted Remedy in Pioneer With the release of Aria of Flames in Modern Horizons, Tainted Remedy found a new deck. While the deck never took off competitively in Modern, the invention of the Pioneer competitive format - which has a much more limited cardpool for deck builders to work with - brought new interest in playing with Tainted Remedy. The Aria of Flames and Tainted Remedy combo isn’t an instant win. But, since Aria of Flame gains each opponent 10 life when the Enchantment enters play, it puts your opponent at a severe disadvantage when you also have Tainted Remedy in play. An Aria of Flames deck also plays many other burn spells, which will allow you to finish off an opponent without having to put another copy of Aria of Flames into play. Tainted Remedy in EDH / Commander While Tainted Remedy hasn't taken off in competitive play, there are enough people building decks with it in EDH (more popularly known today as Commander) to give it a value of a few dollars on the secondary market. In particular, Tainted Remedy sees play in decks led by Selenia, Dark Angel, Mogis, God of Slaughter, Mathas, Fiend Seeker, Kaervek the Merciless, and Kambal, Consul of Allocation. In particular, Tainted Remedy is a great Enchantment in a Mathas, Fiend Seeker deck because of the Legendary Creature's ability. Mathas' creates bounty counters on opponent's creatures. When creatures with bounty counters on them die, each opponent draws a card and gains 2 life. But, Tainted Remedy would make each opponent take 2 damage instead. Because of how narrow its effect is, Tainted Remedy isn't a card you'd see being reprinted to death as Sanguine Bond has. What it does is pretty unique and it can hose a lot of decks that depend on lifegain effects. It’s one of those stash-away cards that could become competitively relevant all of a sudden if the right lifegain combo deck comes along in Modern or Pioneer. While Tainted Remedy likely doesn't have a price ceiling of $25 or more like Exquisite Blood, it’s not impossible for this to be worth more than a few dollars per copy in the next few years. If there’s a great combo piece to go along with Beacon of Immortality printed in the future, this card's value could rise quickly. In any case, Tainted Remedy is a great card to have in your Magic the Gathering collection. Updated 11/17/2020  How to Know What Your Pokemon and YuGiOh Cards Are Worth
As a successful reseller of Pokemon and YuGiOh cards on EBay, Amazon, and ComC, I can tell you that it takes a lot of hard work. How do you know which cards will sell VS the cards that won't sell. Here are some tips on how to successfully sell Pokemon and YuGiOh cards on eBay. How to Check Current Prices for Yu-Gi-Oh Cards For Yu-Gi-Oh cards, I tend to use the values that are listed on the TCGPlayer.com website. When you look up a card on TCGPlayer.com, it gives you a low value, a medium value, and a high value. TCGPlayer also has a Market Price, which tracks the last few average actual sales for that card. If the Market Price is close, equal to, or higher than the Mid price, it's usually a sign that the market is strong for that card. If it's significantly lower, then you'll have to price that card lower to help sell it more quickly. The low value is the lowest "near-mint" price that a seller on the TCGPlayer seller network is currently listing that card for (near-mint being a card that has no noticeable defects or play-wear). The low price is the absolute minimum that I would list a card for sale. But, the Market price is a safe price to use if you don't mind waiting for cheaper listed copies to sell. There's also another great price guide resource for Yu-Gi-Oh called Yu-Gi-Oh Prices. This site not only shows you various recent price listings from TCGPlayer, Amazon, and EBay, but also shows you price trends. This way you can see cards that are falling in price or rising in price. How to Check Current Prices for Pokemon Cards For Pokemon cards, you'd likely want to use Troll and Toad. While Troll and Toad is mostly known for Magic the Gathering cards, they also sell a great many Pokemon cards, as well. TCGPlayer does sell some Pokemon cards, but not to the degree that Troll and Toad does. The list price on Troll And Toad is generally around the price you'll see cards listed for on EBay anyway. You will find that a large number of holographic cards in Pokemon tend to only sell for about $0.50 to $1 USD. However, if you go onto EBay and find that card is actually selling for around 2-3 dollars, then it's perhaps worth a shot to sell it. On the other hand, 50 cent holos are usually better off being sold in groups of 5 or 10 as a lot, as bidding wars can ensue and end up netting you more than the lot is actually worth. If the lot sells for less than the individual Troll and Toad prices overall, as long as you make profit after fees and shipping, then you've still made out. This is simply because those holos are considered "bulk" to most people and moving them at all is a plus. All in all, Troll and Toad is the best and easiest way to see if you have a card worth $5 or more. Check eBay Completed Listings and Lowest Buy-It-Now Prices Once you've identified which cards are worth selling, you'll want to double check the completed listings on EBay to see what previous users have purchased that particular card for. Don't be too discouraged if the price is much lower than you'd expect. Sometimes buy-it-now is not used, and cards can be won at auction for far lower prices than they typically retail for. This is useful information, though, because it will tell you what the market will currently bear for that particular card. Next, check what the current lowest buy-it-now prices are (price + shipping) and see how they stack up with the completed listings. Card values can fluctuate wildly at times, but generally they stay within a range. The greatest part of looking at the completed listings is identifying what cards simply don't sell. If you see far more auctions that end without a sale than those with a sale, chances are that card isn't in particularly high demand. You may want to hold onto it and list the ones first that have the highest percentage of successful sales. It's usually pretty easy see at a glance what's selling and what isn't. Just be sure to check the auction end dates, as some cards completed listings' results will have end dates from several months ago. Chances are, if that card hasn't sold in months, it's better to hold onto it, or put it as part of a lot (more on that later!) Now that you know a card should have a good chance of being sold, the easiest way to actually sell a card on EBay is to simply list it for the lowest price. However, that is not always the best option. By checking the completed listings, you may find that people are willing to pay a bit more for a card than the lowest price currently sits at. All you have to do is wait for the cheaper copies to sell. Also, check the feedback of the seller with the lowest price. If they have little or no feedback, or have a rating below 97%, you can feel safe listing your card for perhaps a bit more than they have it for. What Cards Actually Sell? This is now the toughest part of selling cards. It's easy to find a card price and list it for around that number. However, what actually sells versus what doesn't? Believe it or not, Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon are somewhat similar in this regard, due to both collectible value and play-ability in competitive environments. Collectible Value & "Rotations" In both Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh, the cards from the first few sets of each Trading Card Game tend to have a fairly high collectible value. Even Yu-Gi-Oh cards that are banned in competitive tournaments, such as Heavy Storm or Change of Heart, or older Pokemon holos from Base Set like Charizard and Blastoise, still see lots of sales occur on EBay and other sites. It's players' particular fondness for certain cards that they used to play with or collect that drives up the value of older cards. The other cards that tend to have a lot of collectible value are what are referred to as "staples" which are cards that most competitive players in either game use in the majority of their decks. In Yu-Gi-Oh these include cards like Raigeki and Mystical Space Typhoon, which see play in most decks. Even though these cards are today heavily printed at common rarity, their original printings were not common, and as they are shiny holographic versions, they are highly sought after. In Pokemon, however, besides cards like "Pokemon Catcher" and some Supporter cards in recent years, there are not nearly as many staples as there are in Yu-Gi-Oh. This also lends itself to the fact that in Yu-Gi-Oh, besides what is on the official tournament ban list, you can use any card ever printed in the game. However, in Pokemon, outside of casual league play, only the sets from the past couple of years are considered legal. For example, cards of the Heart Gold Soul Silver series are no longer recognized as usable cards in competitive decks. While there are many advantages to this "rotation" strategy for both competitive and sales reasons, it can leave you with a LOT of worthless cardboard. Playability The one major similarity in selling Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon "staples" is that when they are being played in pretty much every deck at that time, even common and uncommon cards (Trainers and Supporters in Pokemon, Spell and Trap cards in Yu-Gi-Oh) can fetch $2-3 a piece, if not more. Some staple uncommons in Pokemon can list for over $10 USD! The important thing is to recognize their value to players and collect them to sell if you're not playing to play with them and move them quickly! The major difference in selling Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon "staples" however, is the fact that once those trainers and supporters rotate out of the Pokemon competitive scene, they become just like your Caterpie and Nidoran: bulk commons. In Yu-Gi-Oh, however, even though Lightsworn decks don't see nearly the play that they once did, staple monsters, even in common printings like Lyla and Ryko, still sell for $2-$3 a copy because of their utility in other decks. Dark World Dealings is a hot card for the Dark World deck, but because of their usefulness in other decks, such as Chaos Blackwings and Zombies, they also go for about $3 a piece. Yu-Gi-Oh "staples" retain their value far longer than Pokemon's. So if you have Pokemon staples that you're not using, it's a good idea to move them ASAP. The Liquidity of Cardboard At this moment, you may be asking yourself, what can I do with all of these older cards that I'm apparently stuck with? There are always bulk lots to consider, but first let's take a look at the most important concept in selling cardboard, liquidity. There are advantages and disadvantages to dealing in either card game. The liquidity of Yu-Gi-Oh cards tends to be higher than that of Pokemon's, merely because Yu-Gi-Oh is a highly competitive game. Many players are just looking for one or two cards to finish their deck or to take it to the next level. In Pokemon, even the more competitive players are more collectors by nature. Even if you have some of the nicest looking holos from the newest set that aren't necessarily tournament playable, they likely will sell for more than you'd expect at auction. For older sets, this is where using sites like TCGPlayer and Troll and Toad come in handy. They do the price research mostly for you. While you still need to check completed listings on Ebay to confirm that a card listed at $20 on those sites will actually sell for that when you go to list it, generally they set prices that high due to having the demand for that particular card. The major difference between Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh from a liquidity aspect is that Yu-Gi-Oh reprints cards like crazy. Pokemon does not. In fact, usually all Pokemon does is create promo versions of certain cards (and these do have some value). With Yu-Gi-Oh, a card previously only available as ultra rare, becomes super rare, then rare, then common, especially if it's a card that sees tons of play. One thing Konami clearly does a lot of is see what cards actually get played. Many times, if they see certain ultra rare or secret rare cards from older sets no longer seeing much competitive play, they get them reprinted as common in their structure decks or reprint sets! From a collector's standpoint, this is immensely frustrating, because they see their once very rare cards go from valuable to valueless. The good news, though, is that even as common (cards such as Dark Armed Dragon, for example) still sell, but at highly deflated prices. Pokemon, on the other hand, has its rarer cards keep their value quite well. They don't usually reprint cards, except as promotional cards in collector's tins. They have, however, reprinted very powerful cards as Mewtwo EX as promotional cards, but they announce these reprints very soon after the set that they are released in comes out. Reprints in Yu-Gi-Oh just sort of happen at will based on whatever cards they think will see play in tandem with upcoming releases. While there are actually very good reasons as to why Konami decided to reprint certain cards for accessibility reasons, it makes selling the older cards very, very difficult. Older Pokemon holos, though, like even a Zapdos or Blastoise, can fetch between $5-$10 easily. Holos from the increasingly rare Skyridge and Aquapolis sets can fetch between $10-$20. Simply being out of circulation for awhile increases their value, especially if you're looking for near-mint to mint copies! This is to say, Pokemon card selling requires more patience, but the card values are far more stable, and the liquidity of selling cards of certain popular Pokemon (Charizard, for example) or ultra rare card types (EX, level X, shiny, gold star, etc) remain fairly constant. While certain EX cards currently in Black and White will see a drop in value after "rotating" out of competitive play, they will still be sought after by many collectors. Many Yu-Gi-Oh cards have been reprinted to death, however. Look at cards like Dark Necrofear that used to be extremely high-dollar cards. While Dark Necrofear has not yet hit bottom as a mere common reprint quite yet, the number of promotional printings it has had is astounding, and because it doesn't see much competitive play anymore (despite still being a pretty useful card!) older copies can sell for as low as $1! If you're lucky to have a 1st edition copy, you may eek out $3-5. However, holographic cards simply aren't worth what they used to be in Yu-Gi-Oh. They also don't sell all too well if they're not in top-tier decks. Selling in Playsets, Bulk, and Lots One of the most common ways to get rid of low-dollar cards is to sell them in playsets. In Yu-Gi-Oh, you can have three of any given card in a deck (unless it is restricted, limited or semi-limited on the official tournament ban list from Konami). In Pokemon, you can have a maximum four of any given card outside of basic energy cards. Granted, you can also sell playsets of high-value cards, as well, to get the most out of one sale. Listings with multiple cards in them always sell better than single cards. I have personally found, though, that listing two or three of a card, even those that you can only legally play one of in a deck, is still a good strategy. Yes, you may not get exactly what those cards are "worth" when you consider list prices, but they are far more likely to sell. Money is always more valuable overall than pieces of cardboard, so as long as you're profiting on less liquid assets, you're ahead of the game. This is the easiest way to put lots together, and has proven profitable for myself and thousands of other sellers again and again. There is, of course, the chance that play-set lots will sell for far lower than they would sell individually, but this is a risk you'll have to take. The best way to protect yourself from this is to NEVER start an auction at $0.99 with free shipping. I only ever use the buy-it-now option, and choose a price that's 5 to 10 percent lower than the lowest current available price (calculating for both price + shipping) and offer free shipping, If I do my research correctly, 9 times out of 10 that item will sell for either market value or about 10 to 15 percent below, a reasonable loss at which to make a sale. There are also the bulk lots you can do, by grouping together random lots of holos, commons, and uncommons. I have personally NEVER been a fan of these "random" auctions as most of the time people just get ripped off. Some sellers that provide lots, however, will always give you your money's worth, if not more. They're not all bad, certainly, but there are plenty of shady ones out there. If you're going to do a lot, my advice is to actually list the cards in said lot, even if it's random, so that at least the buyer has an idea which cards they have a chance of receiving. Honesty is the best policy, as it is in everything. Whenever I have put up lots, I simply name the cards the winner will receive. These sell better than any other lots, and provide a way to get rid of bulk holos and rares as a value-added bonus. There is of course, nothing wrong with selling off bulk commons and uncommons with a random rare thrown in. As long as you don't put in too many duplicates (excluding duplicates of common cards you know see play) you should get generally positive feedback. Bulk lots are the cheapest way for players to build up a collection. Just make sure they're getting a good value. If you know you've given them a good value while still leaving room for a healthy profit margin, you're all set. Pokemon vs Yu-Gi-Oh: Which Will Sell Better? Overall, if you know your card prices, and you know what sells, both Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh sell about the same. Pokemon you may find yourself selling in lots more often than in Yu-Gi-Oh, but there's plenty of market out there for both trading card games in singles and playsets. Just keep in mind a couple of major points. Novelty is Money Whenever a set is first released, cards that get super-hyped tend to sell for far higher values than they will after the set has been out for a bit and supply of singles has increased. This is one reason that a lot of card players and dealers alike attend pre-release events, to get their hands on cards that the general public can't go out and buy yet. These are your cash cow cards, and if you feel that card won't be highly sought after when the release date hits, sell high. Knowing what cards are really needed in the current competitive scene, though, is very, very important. Those are the ones that sell the most, bar none. Top-Tier Deck Lists One easy way to know what cards will quickly sell is by looking at winning deck lists in their respective games. Top Yu-Gi-Oh lists are everywhere, and top Pokemon lists are as well. Just by Googling top decks for Yu-Gi-Oh or Pokemon, you can tell what cards are seeing lots of play. Take special note of any holographic cards that see a lot of play, those are the ones that will sell the best! Selling off a Collection For many of you reading this, you may be looking to liquidate your collection or know someone who would like to sell off the bulk of a collection. I personally do not like the idea of selling off a collection all at once. While it's certainly doable, and plenty of people buy collections all of the time, if you do it right, selling off the more valuable singles, then selling off the bulk is probably the better way to go. There's nothing wrong with having a bidding war over a collection (happens all the time!) but bear in mind that sorting through a collection properly enough as to get the highest sale price can take just as long as selling off singles and bulk lots. If you have binders and binders of cards that you know aren't going to sell singly for more than $2-$3 and you have only a couple of big money cards, then it's probably OK to go this way. Just remember you have to include shipping costs, as well, which can get hefty when selling a collection! Best practice is, though, to sell off the bigger cards first, then sell the rest in one big lot. While you can always sell to gaming vendors, keep in mind that they need to turn a profit off of what they buy. Buy lists are definitely worth looking at, because if a vendor has a high buy price for something, chances are you could sell it for more on EBay! So while selling to a game store or vendor is OK, if you're selling off a whole collection, you're better off selling it yourself. Here's one thing, however, that you need to consider in Yu-Gi-Oh VS Pokemon. In Yu-Gi-Oh, there are a lot of "junk" cards that no one wants, whereas in Pokemon, holos of even the less popular Pokemon are wanted just for collection purposes. When you're selling a collection, keep that in mind, because Yu-Gi-Oh players buy collections to boost their trade binders, whereas Pokemon players and collections buy collections to either resell or just to boost their own collections. So if you're trying to sell a whole collection in Pokemon, it may be worth just bulking the whole thing together as long as you list all of the valuable stuff in it. In Yu-Gi-Oh, players are looking to win as cheap as possible, so getting all of the value you can out of singles is the better way to go, and perhaps keep a few bait cards to sell the rest off! Just be honest, and you'll be fine. Flipping Cards for Profit vs Liquidation This entire article has been based on the assumption that you are looking to flip cards for profit. If you are simply looking to get rid of the "money cards" or even a whole collection, everything said here still applies. However, if you're willing to take a bit lower of a profit margin, or really just want some fair value, there are a few things to keep in mind. 1. Selling the entire collection in bulk is OK if you really need the money now and you don't want to be in it for the long haul. It's also OK if you're helping a friend out so they can get money for something else. Just bear in mind to research the prices of the bigger stuff so you KNOW you'll get a fair price, rather than just stick some arbitrary number up there (25 cents a card or something). But that's just what I suggest. 2. People can make a nice little profit as a hobby buying singles on the cheap and reselling them for a premium. Bargain hunters are all over EBay, and if you're desperate to move things, put them about 2/3 of what they usually go for, and they'll snap them right up. Keep in mind that the most liquid parts of your collection (the things every one is looking for) are what you should always look to move first. The rest of it is what collection buyers will buy up, simply to restock their binders, or simply out of looking to get a lot of cards quickly and cheap. 3. If you do decide to sell off a collection, bear in mind that people going to buy them rarely will want to pay market value for it. Yes, cards are only worth what people are willing to pay for them, but there are ways to squeeze extra dollars out of them. Bear in mind that most collections won't be full of $50-100 gems or even $20 hot sellers. If you know that your collection is full of binder filler, you can afford to take below market value for it. Just keep that in mind. The reason that I have made this article so profit-oriented is that I simply see people selling off their cards all of the time by simply not doing their homework and using the excuse "I just want to get rid of them!" Flipping cards for profit is a great way to sustain the trading card collection hobby and there's a nice little economy built around it. Just be sure that you're get a fair deal, and keep in mind you can take a loss if you'd like, but more often than not, your cards are more valuable than you think! Do you have any more tips on how to sell trading card games like Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon on eBay? Let us know in the comments! Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist Toon Kingdom makes a competitive Yu-Gi-Oh Toon deck build possible. Yu-Gi-Oh. I used to play this trading card game with about the same frequency as breathing. Then, the game became all about one or two top archetypes at a time. Each would have a shelf life of about a month. After that, everything got reprinted... except some random common from like 2005 that was never reprinted and became like 10 bucks a pop. The rest of the decks could be had for a week worth of lunch money. OK, perhaps that's a slight exaggeration. But, due to the extremely erratic nature of Yu-Gi-Oh’s metagame, investing in Yu-Gi-Oh cards long-term has often not been a smart play. That is, unless you wheel and deal like a Dark Magician… (That was lame, I'm sorry.) So, why in the holy name of Dark Magician Girl would I be returning to write about the duel monsters? Toon Kingdom.  Nostalgia does strange things to our recollections of intrinsically worthless things. Toons were my introduction to Yu-Gi-Oh with the Pegasus starter deck. As much as I loved the concept of them, they cost you most of your life points just to play them. In the early days of the game their sheer power level was enough to win your local tournament by accident on occasion. But as the game grew and the power level of many other cards went berserk, Toons became a fond memory, a deck you built "Just For Fun." But, Toon Kingdom...is certainly a game changer in making Toons competitive! First introduced in the Yu-Gi-Oh GX anime, Toon Kingdom teased duel monsters fans with a potentially dangerous new way to play Toons. But they never printed it into the actual card game, until Dragons of Legends 2. They would reprint it as a rare in 2018, too, in the Legendary Duelists: Ancient Millenium set. The reprint gets you a crappier-looking version of the card for about half the price of a secret rare Dragons of Legends version when going by 2020 prices. What's particularly nuts about this version of Toon Kingdom is that it's actually better than the anime version. Compare: When you activate this card, remove from play the top 5 cards of your Deck. This face-up card's name is treated as "Toon World". If a "Toon" monster you control would be destroyed by battle, you can banish the top card of your Deck instead. With this: When this card is activated: Banish 3 cards from the top of your Deck, face-down. This card's name becomes "Toon World" while in the Field Zone. Your opponent cannot target Toon monsters you control with card effects. If a Toon monster(s) you control would be destroyed by battle or card effect, you can banish 1 card from the top of your Deck, face-down, for each of those monster(s) instead. Oh my. The original Toon World? Activate this card by paying 1000 LP. How exciting. But, to play the lovely Toon Dark Magician Girl or Toon Blue-Eyes White Dragon, you had to have this Toon World continuous spell card on the board. But now, Toon Kingdom makes them almost indestructible. There is an important distinction between the anime and “real world” versions of Toon Kingdom. The original Kingdom banishes the top 5 cards of your deck, BUT they are face-up. The new version only banishes 3, but they are face-down. Because they are face-down, you can’t do anything with them. No Different Dimension shenanigans. Once they’re banished face-down, they’re gone forever. I think the trade-off is worth it, though, just because you have Toons that basically can’t be destroyed by battle or by card effects. They can’t even be targeted by card effects. Even the classic Raigeki doesn’t kill them, as long as you banish one card for each one that would otherwise be destroyed. Another major distinction is that Toon Kingdom is a Field Spell in “real life” whereas the original was a Continuous Spell Card. This means you can use Terraforming to search it out, not just Toon Table of Contents. Since you’ll be banishing cards from your deck left and right, redundancy is important. So now the question is, are Toons now suddenly tournament-playable after so many years? Let’s see what other Toon support Dragons of Legends 2 has unleashed.  Toon Ancient Gear Golem? This is a cute card. Ancient Gear Golem was a really powerful monster back in the day. Is it going to see play? Probably not. Toon Rollback lets you attack a second time! Sounds good enough, but no one’s taking anything out to make room for it in their 40. Shadow Toon sounds pretty awesome. You can inflict damage equal to the ATK points of an opponent’s creature right to your opponent’s face. But it's a bit too situational. Toon Mask? It's a free Special Summon, even out of the deck! But like Shadow Toon, it's totally dependent is what your opponent is playing. Toon Briefcase? The Briefcase is pretty sweet, though, as it’s sort of a Trap Hole that returns the monster to the deck. Comic Hand is a Snatch Steal if you have Toon World/Toon Kingdom.  Mimicat, though? We have a winner! If you control "Toon World" and a Toon monster: Target 1 card in your opponent's Graveyard; if it is a monster, Special Summon it to your side of the field, or if it is a Spell/Trap Card, Set it to your side of the field. You can only activate 1 "Mimicat" per turn. A Monster Reborn that can bring back spell or trap cards!? WHAT!? Give me a playset right now!  Dragons of Legend 2 isn't the only newer set to provide good Toon cards, though. With the Shining Victories set, in came a powerful new Toon monster: Red-Eyes Toon Dragon. Yu-Gi-Oh players know how busted Red-Eyes Black Metal Dragon became. This is a pretty strong Red-Eyes Dragon, too, letting you Special Summon any Toon monster other than another "Red-Eyes Toon Dragon" from your hand once per turn.  With the Dark Illusion set, Toons keep getting better. Toon Dark Magician may be the best of the Toon monsters printed so far! The best part about this Dark Magician is that he can summon a Toon monster directly from your deck! He also has the ability to search out a Toon Spell or Trap card from your deck, including Toon Kingdom! It also doesn't hurt that he can attack your opponent directly for 2500 ! In particular, you're going to want to get a Red-Eyes Toon Dragon. You can then use the Toon Dragon's ability to summon yet another Toon Dark Magician from your hand and repeat the process! In effect, you can combo off a bunch of summons in one turn just like the classic Six Samurai decks and many other competitive decks today. We’ve established that Toon Kingdom and Mimicat are the main draws here. Red-Eyes Toon Dragon and Toon Dark Magician make for a great top-end boss monsters to build around. Most of the other cards are cute and sound good on paper, but don’t quite make the cut if we're going for consistency and overall power. So, what’s a cool new competitive Toon deck going to look like? Tons of people brew Toon decks constantly. But there are so many permutations, and there doesn’t seem to be an optimized, competitive Toon build out there quite yet. You’d want to start with a deck list like this: Monsters (16) 3x Toon Cannon Soldier 3x Toon Gemini Elf 3x Toon Masked Sorcerer 2x Toon Mermaid 2x Toon Cyber Dragon 3x Toon Dark Magician 3x Red-Eyes Toon Dragon Spells (17) 2x Comic Hand 3x Mimicat 3x Pot of Duality 3x Toon Kingdom 3x Toon Table of Contents Traps (7) 1x Bottomless Trap Hole 2x Call of the Haunted 2x Dimensional Prison 2x Toon Briefcase Toon Summoned Skull is a classic Toon monster that usually sees play in Toons, but Toon Cyber Dragon is a newer option you can play instead. The Cyber Dragon is probably better, though, since you can Special Summon it in the same way you could a regular Cyber Dragon. The monster line-up doesn’t look overwhelming, but since they can all attack directly if your opponent doesn’t control a Toon, they don’t have to be overwhelming on power. Also, remember that you can just banish a card face-down if they would be destroyed. There’s enough defensive cards in the deck to deal with any major offensive threats from your opponent. Answering Great Reader Feedback About Building a Toon Kingdom Deck Over time, I’ve received some great reader comments about building their own Toon Kingdom decks. One reader suggestion is to use the continuous Spell card Field Barrier to protect your Toon Kingdoms. I feel this would be a good card to consider for the sideboard, especially against decks with enough firepower to continuously blow away cards in your Spell & Trap Zones. Another reader suggestion is to use a different draw card in place of Pot of Duality. This is because you can’t Special Summon monsters in the same turn as playing Pot of Duality. However, this wouldn’t be the first Special Summon happy deck to play Duality. This is because Duality lets you choose one card from among the next three. You could use Upstart Goblin instead of Pot of Duality, which gifts your opponent 1000 LP to draw you a card. This isn’t my favorite option, but Upstart Goblin has been used for years with much success. There are other options, such as Jar of Greed. But since you can unleash some powerful direct attacks with Toon monsters, the life gain for your opponent may be a moot point. Will a Toon Kingdom Deck Be Able to Win at Local Tournaments? Frankly, I don't see Toons winning anything serious anytime soon. But, they have a chance in being a lot of fun and winning on the pure strength of Toon Kingdom on occasion. I just can't see them being consistent enough to be worth sleeving up for an actual Advanced-level tournament. While this isn’t a competitively optimized list, it is a place to start your Toon Kingdom deck. You can substitute whatever Toon monsters you find most useful. Also, keep in mind you have your XYZ monsters and Link Monsters at your disposal, something that Toons never had before. As an archetype, Toons are continuing to look a lot scarier with each new set release that includes them. Will Toons ever again become consistent enough to actually win tournaments as they could in the early days of Yu-Gi-Oh? That’s quite hard to say, considering you could end up banishing all of your Toon Kingdoms by accident. That is unlikely, though, with how many ways you have to tutor them out. Also, there's enough copies of your monsters and support cards to keep from burning through all of them. While I don’t plan on just building Toons myself and playing Yu-Gi-Oh again, it’s been a lot of fun to watch Konami continue to give one of the original Yu-Gi-Oh deck archetypes new life. You never know what they’ll reprint or support next. Of course, you can always play a Toon deck on Duel Links. But, that's a whole different article! Updated 4/22/2020 Here are some other Yu-Gi-Oh trading card game articles you may enjoy:
- Yu-Gi-Oh Blackwings Deck Profile - Can a Gladiator Beast Deck Still Be Competitive? - GOAT FORMAT! - Intro to the Format - Fire Princess Burn - Old School Yu-Gi-Oh! Deck Profile! - The Legendary Fisherman - Old School Yu-Gi-Oh Deck Profile by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  In February 2019, the most expensive Yu-Gi-Oh card was the Shonen Jump 2010 Prize Card, Stardust Divinity. The second most expensive was the Shonen Jump 2013 Prize Card, Grandopolis, The Eternal Golden City. Neither card can even be used in a Duel, due to the fact that each can win you the match if it attacks directly. In February 2019, a copy of Stardust Divinity was listed for $19,999 on eBay. What Does Stardust Divinity Do? Stardust Divinity is a Level 10 Fairy-type Synchro Monster that requires 1 LIGHT-attribute Tuner and 2 or more non-Tuner Fairy-Type monsters. It can’t be Special Summoned except by Synchro Summon. If this monster attacks your opponent directly and reduces their Life Points to 0, you win the Match. Like Grandopolis, the Eternal Golden City, which we’ll look at next, there are replica copies available on the market, as well.  What Does Grandopolis, The Eternal Golden City Do? In January 2019, a copy of Grandopolis was for listed for sale at $18,999.99 USD on eBay. This listing made Grandopolis at the time the most expensive Yu-Gi-Oh card for sale.. Grandopolis is a Rank 8 XYZ monster that needs 3 Level 8 monsters to summon. It has 2800 ATK and 3500 DEF. He must be Special Summoned by Xyz Summon and no other way. If Grandopolis attacks your opponent directly and reduces his or her life to 0, if one of the original Xyz Materials was a Machine-type monster, you win the Match. While this is somewhat difficult to actually pull off, because it can win the match, like Victory Dragon and other similar Shonen Jump Championship prize cards, it can never be used in an official Duel. There’s a replica of Grandopolis, The Eternal Golden City out there that was released in 2014. One replica copy was graded by Beckett Grading Services as a Gem Mint 9.5 and sold for an undisclosed best offer on eBay. There was another Grandopolis replica listed on eBay in January 2019 for $1200. If you absolutely want to own a Grandpolis, the Japanese version is available for $10 - $15 on eBay.  What’s the Next Most Expensive Yu-Gi-Oh Card?
The runner up for the most expensive Yu-Gi-Oh card is another Shonen Jump Championship Prize Card. This is the 2017 Shonen Jump Championship prize card, a Link monster called Iron Knight of Revolution. Like Grandopolis, it also cannot be used in a Duel. Iron Knight of Revolution requires 3 Machine-Type effect monsters to successfully Link Summon. When this Extra Linked card attacks your opponent directly and reduces their life points to 0, you win the Match. In many ways, this is probably the superior monster. In any case, a copy of Iron Knight of Revolution was listed on eBay for $11,999 in January 2019. What’s the Most Expensive Playable Yu-Gi-Oh Card? For a long time, the most expensive playable Yu-Gi-Oh card was Crush Card Virus. This is actually still the case in 2019. Two copies of the Shonen Jump Championship 2007 ultra rare printing were listed on eBay for about $3,000 - one of which was in lightly played condition and the other in near-mint condition. Another two copies of the Shonen Jump Crush Card Virus were listed on eBay for $4,995 each. Of course, if you really want to own a Crush Card Virus, a Gold Series 2008 copy sells for a little over $35. But in February 2019, the surprise unbanning of Cyber-Stein in a late January 2019 Forbidden & Limited update caused the Shonen Jump prize card to be listed for about $10,500 on eBay. Of course, Cyber-Stein has a rare printing in Dark Beginning 2 which sells for as low as $13, plus with the Extra Deck limited these days to 15 cards and no one really playing that many fusion monsters, Cyber-Stein was no longer broken enough to worry about. It’s still fun to summon a Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon, though - even at the cost of 5000 Life Points. What’s the Most Expensive Card in Yu-Gi-Oh History? There are many other expensive Yu-Gi-Oh cards out there, but reportedly a one-of-a-kind Black Luster Soldier printed on stainless steel is the #1 most expensive card in the game’s history. It was the prize given to the winner of the first-ever Yu-Gi-Oh tournament ever held in Japan back in 1999. According to Gemr.com, in 2016, the stainless steel Black Luster Card was valued at around $10 million and reportedly sold at one point for $2 million! The most expensive Black Luster Soldier that you can buy otherwise is the Duel Terminal 7 rare printing which you can buy for roughly $5 in 2019. In January 2019, the most expensive Yu-Gi-Oh card in competitive play was the Ultimate Rare printing of Cyber Dragon from Cybernetic Revolution, a card that was selling at the time for around $100 USD. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Once one of the most popular decks in Yu-Gi-Oh, Destiny Heroes returned to modern Yu-Gi-Oh in 2018 with the Legendary Hero Decks. Because it was included in the decks, it was decided to return Destiny Hero - Disk Commander from the Banned and Restricted List to Unlimited status. This means you can now play three copies of one of the most powerful Destiny Hero cards of all time in your deck… But, wait, there’s an errata?
That’s right. There was no way that a monster that could draw you two cards every time it returns from the graveyard to the battlefield could be brought back into play without some serious limitation on its effect. So, Konami continues their rather frustrating trend of nerfing old cards just to make them legitimate cards that can be played in tournament decks without severely warping the competitive game. The “new” Destiny Hero - Disk Commander after errata is extremely different from the original version. This little Level 1 Warrior monster originally read like this: “When this card is Special Summoned from the Graveyard, draw 2 cards.” Wow, that sounds pretty busted… It was. There’s a reason why Destiny Hero decks dominated Yu-GI-Oh for a long time. That is some nuts card advantage. So, how can they make it fair enough for it to return from the banned list? Here is the Disk Commander Errata: “Cannot be Special Summoned from the GY the turn this card was sent to the GY. If this card is Special Summoned from the GY: You can draw 2 cards. You can only use this effect of "Destiny HERO - Disk Commander" once per Duel.” Wow, that’s a lot of deck. Let’s break this down. Cannot be Special Summoned from the GY the turn this card was sent to the GY. OK, this bit is understandable. This makes the effect a bit more fair, right? You can draw 2 cards if you Monster Reborn this guy, but you can’t do it until next turn, OK? If this card is Special Summoned from the GY: You can draw 2 cards. That sounds awfully familiar. So, if that’s all, that’s not too bad of an errata. Let’s all run three copies of Disk Commander! Oh, wait, there’s more… You can only use this effect of “Destiny HERO - DIsk Commander” once per Duel. Ick. You mean we can only draw two cards ONCE? Hmm… well, that makes playing three copies rather pointless, doesn’t it? You can see why this errata was made. It’s a double-whammy, but there are many reasons why this is necessary. First of all, it’s easier to Special Summon monsters from the GY more often than ever. Drawing two cards is still obviously quite good, and being a Level 1, there are plenty of reasons to want to play this card just as material to summon a Synchro, XYZ, or Link monster. But if its effect is only good once per turn, is it still worth playing? I say yes. If you are playing a dedicated Destiny Hero deck, it’s totally worth playing one copy of Disk Commander, pitching it to Destiny Draw to draw two cards. Then, there are a myriad of ways to take advantage of him being there and Special Summoning him. Also, Elemental Hero Stratos was returned to one copy per deck in September of 2018, so he’s an obvious monster to choose with Stratos’ ability. Destiny Hero - Disk Commander is still worth playing even with this double-edged errata craziness. There is pretty much zero reason to play more than one copy in my opinion. It’s easy to hate the errata, but there’s good reasoning for adding both of those restrictions on his effect. While he hasn’t seen competitive play since the initial return of Destiny Heroes in 2018, he’s still a fun card. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  The first of the Yu-Gi-Oh ARC-V expansion sets, Duelist Alliance, introduced a brand new card type to the card game: Pendulum Monsters. After players were introduced to the Pendulum Summoning mechanic with the Space Time Showdown Super Starter Deck, we got to see the mechanic in full force in the Duelist Alliance set. Here we’ll take a look at the Sneak Peek Participation Promo, Dragon Horn Hunter. It would turn out to actually be a decent monster! What’s particularly interesting about Dragon Horn Hunter is the fact that he’s a normal Monster, a Level 6 DARK-Attribute Warrior with 2300 ATK and 1000 DEF. These stats are nothing special. However, as a Pendulum Monster, when he lives in one of your two Pendulum Zones he has a Pendulum Scale of 3 and gains this effect: “All Normal Monsters gain 200 ATK. You take no battle damage from battles involving Normal Monsters you control.” That’s a very good effect. Dragon Horn Hunter really pushes you to play Normal Monsters. As it turns out, there’s an easy way to search out this card: Summoner’s Art from Tactical Evolution. Also, being a DARK-type monster is good, as it can provide the necessary DARK component for many other cards. It also means that playing classic Normal Monsters such as Summoned Skull - also a potential target for Summoner’s Art - becomes far more plausible. The greatest con to this card is obviously the fact that he relies quite heavily on the Pendulum mechanic. You’re going to need to push out high-level Normal Monsters to simply overpower your opponent if this guy is going to make much of a difference. The ATK boost he gives isn’t much, but taking no battle damage from battles involving your Normal Monsters could make a Normal Monster based Pendulum Summoning deck a realistic option. As it turned out, Pendulum decks with Normal Pendulum Monsters would turn out to be competitive. As we saw with the Space Time Showdown Starter Deck, Normal Monsters were being pushed with the advent of the Pendulum Summoning mechanic. In 2016, this card was good enough to appear in some competitive Pendulum Magicians decks at a single copy. While it didn’t stay relevant in competitive play for long, as it would become outclassed with future sets, there were a couple of lists that took full advantage of this creature’s power. Overall, Dragon Horn Hunter was a good role player for a time in some builds of Pendulum Magicians, a deck that would go on to evolve into one of the better deck archetypes in all of Yu-Gi-Oh! For a Sneak Peek promo, that was a pretty good time in the spotlight. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  While Flash Knight may simply be a rare card from Yu-Gi-Oh’s Duelist Alliance expansion set, this Pendulum Monster would prove himself to be rather useful. He’s a Level 4 Light-Attribute Normal Monster with 1800 ATK and 600 DEF, easily search-able with Reinforcement of the Army. The most important part about the Flash Knight is the fact that he has a Pendulum Scale of 7. Combined with a creature like Dragon Horn Hunter in your opposite Pendulum Zone, you then have the ability to summon Level 4 to Level 6 monsters with ease at the beginning of each of your turns.
Was Flash Knight going to be a good option for a deck based around Pendulum Summoning high-level Normal Monsters? While the range is a bit limited, topping out at Level 6 as previously mentioned, there are plenty of strong Normal Monsters that fall in between those levels. In fact, the Knight did see some competitive play, including some Regional Top 8 Draco Performapals decks like this one. For only a mere rare, the Flash Knight actually proved himself to be a fairly useful monster. He was useful enough just as a scale, and having 1800 ATK isn't too shabby, either! As one of the first ever Pendulum monsters, the Knight held his own for awhile before being outclassed by flashier, badder Pendulum monsters. But let us never forget the exploits of this brave Level 4 Knight! by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Battle Fader is a monster that’s been around since the days of Absolute Powerforce. It was a monster that was still being played a great deal when I was still playing competitive Yu-Gi-Oh. Since then, Battle Fader has been reprinted a great many times, including in ultra rare and secret rare! Even with so many reprints, the foil versions of Battle Fader are still sought after enough to keep their price from falling too low.
While Battle Fader hasn’t seen consistent competitive play since 2016, it does see the occasional play in Domain Monarch and even Cubic decks. Of course, it still sees play in local tournaments, as well, as a card that can play many different roles. How does Battle Fader work? Here’s what Battle Fader does, using the latest errata: When an opponent's monster declares a direct attack: You can Special Summon this card from your hand, then end the Battle Phase. If Summoned this way, banish it when it leaves the field. Not only does Battle Fader negate the attack, but it ends the battle phase altogether. It also doesn’t target, so it gets around monsters that can’t be targeted with abilities or effects of cards. Unfortunately, if it leaves the battlefield in any way after being summoned this way, such as effects that would return to hand, it gets banished. This is to prevent players from simply recycling Battle Fader to continuously negate attack after attack. However, one of the coolest things you can do with Battle Fader is to play a deck that plays Imperial Iron Wall. This continuous trap card prevents cards from being removed from play. This means that it will instead go to your graveyard or your hand, meaning you can reuse it. Iron Wall was pretty popular when this card was first released, and actually still sees play in True Draco decks in 2018. Can Battle Fader be negated? Let’s cover some common spells and traps that could interact with Battle Fader. One common question is how Book of Moon works against Battle Fader. Really, it doesn’t, because Battle Fader’s ability to negate the attack and end the battle phase resolves before it’s actually face-up on the field. So, Book of Moon doesn’t negate Battle Fader, only puts it face down. The same is true for Forbidden Chalice. It’s also important to note that Skill Drain, which is an extremely popular way to shut down effect monsters, can’t stop Battle Fader’s ability. Other trap cards that miss the timing to stop Battle Fader include Breakthrough Skill and Solemn Judgment. However, Solemn Warning, which negates the Summon entirely, can prevent Battle Fader’s ability to end the Battle Phase. Besides Solemn Warning, the best ways to stop Battle Fader are Majesty Fiend and Vanity’s Emptiness. Majesty’s Fiend stops effects no matter where they are, so Battle Fader can’t be Special Summoned from the hand at all. Vanity’s Emptiness negates any Special Summons, but as of this writing, it’s forbidden in tournament play. So, in official tournaments, Solemn Warning and Majesty’s Fiend are really the best ways to stop Battle Fader. Which is Better? Battle Fader VS Swift Scarecrow Swift Scarecrow is a nice little hand trap monster that gives you the same effect as Battle Fader. However, since Battle Fader is a level 1 monster that you can Special Summon and use as material or tribute fodder to Summon a better monster, Battle Fader is going to typically be the superior card. Other Similar Cards to Battle Fader If you’re looking for a Battle Fader alternative besides Swift Scarecrow, there are a couple of other monsters that do something similar. There’s Speedroid Menko, which lets you Special Summon it in Attack Position when an opponent declares an attack. While it doesn’t negate the attack or end the battle phase, it does put all of your opponent’s monsters in Defense Position… except for Link Monsters, of course… So, against Links it’s pretty bad, because it’s only 100 ATK. Still it’s a cool card and it’s Level 4 and 2000 DEF. Construction Train Signal Red can be Special Summoned by his effect when an opponent’s monster attacks. But, if you do, you change the attack target to this card and proceed to damage calculation. While he can’t be destroyed by that battle, you can still take damage. However, he can be Special Summoned in Defense Position, and he has 1000 ATK and 1400 DEF. Also, he’s a Level 3 Earth monster. So, there are some cool things you can do with him. If you want to just stop attacks, there are the Kuriboh monsters! There’s Kuriphoton that lets you take no damage if you send it from the hand to the Graveyard, if you pay 2000 LP to do so. Of course, there’s also the old school Kuriboh cards that can negate attacks or prevent battle damage… Kuriboh only lets you not take battle damage. Winged Kuriboh lets you take no battle damage the turn that he’s sent from the field to the graveyard. But none of these guys get you a Special Summon, although there is The Flute of Summoning Kuriboh! Also, there’s the Link Monster Linkuriboh (which can actually use Battle Fader as material.) What Decks Play Battle Fader? Because it’s essentially a free Summon, Battle Fader makes awesome Tribute fodder in Monarch decks and is also great material for Ritual Monsters, Synchro Summons, Rank 1 Xyz Monsters, and even Link Summoning! (Linkuriboh, anyone?) Battle Fader has seen competitive play since 2010, way back to Shonen Jump Championship Edison in Gravekeeper Burn and Quickdraw Dandywarrior. In both those decks it helped set up Synchro plays. It saw play in Frog Monarchs as Tribute fodder. Over the years, it’s seen play in Chain Burn, Chaos Dragons, Dragon Rulers, Hieratic Dragons, Mythic Rulers, and a wide variety of other Monarch decks, plus others. It’s just a really versatile card. How would you play Battle Fader? by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Once in a while, we’ll pick a random card with YGOProDeck’s database to build around for fun. Today, it’s Pacifis, the Phantasm City! This isn’t bad at all, since it’s part of the Phantasm Spiral archetype! This Field Spell is pretty sweet! And there’s a deck out there we can tech!
First, we’ll look at Pacifis itself. It’s a field spell that counts as “Umi” while it’s face up on the field. For our purposes, though, this won’t matter so much. “You cannot Normal or Special Summon Effect Monsters the turn you activate either of this card's effects (even if this card leaves the field). Once per turn, if you Normal or Special Summon exactly 1 Normal Monster (and no other cards): Add 1 "Phantasm Spiral" card from your Deck to your hand. If your opponent activates a card or effect (except during the Damage Step), and you control no Tokens: You can Special Summon 1 "Phantasm Spiral Token" (Wyrm-Type/WATER/Level 8/ATK 2000/DEF 2000).” This is a really powerful card. As we’ll see, we’re really only going to be Special Summoning Normal monsters a lot of the time. So, this isn’t really an issue. The Phantasm Spiral support cards are actually quite good, too, so that first effect is actually extremely important. The second ability is also particularly awesome. I mean, who doesn’t want a free 2000 ATK and 2000 DEF monster that’s level 8? So, how do we build around this? Let’s take a look at a June 2017 regional Phantasm Spiral deck that actually fared quite well. Except… we’re going to make a couple of quick changes for it to be legal with the May 2018 Forbidden and Limited List. The changes are actually in our favor. Monsters 2x Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring 3x Ghost Ogre & Snow Rabbit 3x Kabazauls 3x Megalosmasher X 3x Phantasm Spiral Dragon 3x Rescue Rabbit Spells 1x Dark Hole 3x Fossil Dig 3x Heat Wave 3x Pacifis, the Phantasm City 1x Phantasm Spiral Crash 2x Phantasm Spiral Grip 1x Phantasm Spiral Wave 2x Pot of Desires 1x Raigeki 3x Terraforming 2x Unexpected Dai Traps 3x Phantasm Spiral Battle 1x Phantasm Spiral Power 3x Quaking Mirror Force 1x Skill Drain 2x Solemn Strike 1x Solemn Warning Extra Deck Xyz 1x Abyss Dweller 2x Bahamut Shark 1x Castel, the Skyblaster Musketeer 1x Evolzar Dolkka 1x Evolzar Laggia 1x Gem-Knight Pearl 1x Number 38: Hope Harbinger Dragon Titanic Galaxy 1x Number 39: Utopia 1x Number S39: Utopia the Lightning 1x Steelswarm Roach 2x Toadally Awesome 1x Tornado Dragon In the original list piloted by Michael Craig at the Seattle, Washington Regionals, he ran one copy of Maxx “C” and 2 Dark Holes. At the time, Rescue Rabbit was limited, as well. We gotta cut the Maxx “C” and the 2nd Dark Hole. But, Rescue Rabbit is unlimited! As it turns out, triple bunnies is actually a huge improvement for this deck! Let’s break it down. Creatures Breakdown A lot of this deck focuses around Phantasm Spiral Dragon, as we’ll see. There are a ton of ways to Special Summon him with the Phantasm Spiral Spells and Traps. He has 2900 ATK, which is PLENTY good! He also has 2900 DEF, which is actually pretty above average. He’s going to be one of your main beatstick monsters in this deck, obviously, as well as a way to Xyz into some Rank 8 Xyz monsters, especially Number 38: Hope Harbinger Dragon Titanic Galaxy. We have five hand-traps in the form of two Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring and three Ghost Ogre & Snow Rabbit. With these we can shut down shenanigans from the deck and effects on the field. Ash Blossom is the one most people play, but both are great. Rescue Rabbit is really awesome in this deck because he grabs our level 4 Normal Monsters in Kabazauls and Megalosmasher X. Being Water attribute and Dinosaur type, these monsters help us access some great Rank 4 Xyz monsters. Kabazauls is a pretty ancient 1700 ATK monster while Megalosmasher is a far more recent 2000 ATK level 4 beatstick. Really, they exist for Xyz summons, but they can do damage if you need them to. Playing 3 Rabbits gives us more consistency, which is cool. Spells Breakdown Let’s get the obvious ones out of the way. Dark Hole and Raigeki help us keep the board clear. Terraforming is obviously to get our Field Spell. Pot of Desires helps us draw out of bad hands, even with that steep 10 card banishment cost. The rest we need to look at more closely. Three copies of Fossil Dig help us dig out our Dino monsters. With three Rabbits, we may able to trim a copy, but we can always grab that third Kabazauls or Megalosmasher X. Heat Wave is actually one of the better spells in the deck. This card can only be activated at the start of Main Phase 1, but that’s OK. When you play it, neither player can Normal or Special Summon an Effect Monster, until your next Draw Phase. That’s actually extremely brutal for most decks, but not this one. Unexpected Dai is another way to Special Summon one of our Level 4 Dinos to play. It’s another consistency card, but this one is only good if you control no monsters. Still, it’s going to be good in a lot of situations. Now we’ll get into the Phantasm Spiral spells. We already covered the field spell in Pacifis. Phantasm Spiral Crash is an Equip Spell that gives the equipped Normal Monster the ability to inflict piercing battle damage. Then, when that monster deals battle damage to an opponent, you can Special Summon a Phantasm Spiral Dragon from your hand, deck, or graveyard and equip it with this card. If that wasn’t good enough, you can then switch an opponent’s monster from Attack to Defense position. You can only use this effect once per turn, because otherwise that would be pretty silly. Phantasm Spiral Grip is similar to Crash, except this deck runs two copies instead of one. Grip gives the monster 500 ATK and if that monster destroys a creature by battle, you can Special Summon a Spiral Dragon and inflict 1000 damage to your opponent. This one may actually be better in some cases as you will likely run over a lot of things. The last one is Phantasm Spiral Wave. This one is particularly strong because it makes the equipped Normal Monster unable to be destroyed once per turn. If it’s battled that turn, at the end of the Battle Phase, you can do the Spiral Dragon summoning thing. While that Dragon can’t then attack like with the other two, your opponent then has to discard a card. So, it’s still a decent card. Traps Breakdown First, we’ll get the staples out of the way. Two copies of Solemn Strike and one copy of Solemn Warning deal with summons that need to be nipped in the bud right away, and with Strike, problematic monster effects. Skill Drain is really good in this deck, and it’s too bad we can only run one. It hoses so many decks. We also run three copies of Quaking Mirror Force. If you don’t know what it does, this is how it reads: “When an opponent's monster declares an attack: Change all your opponent's Attack Position monsters to face-down Defense Position. Monsters changed to face-down Defense Position by this effect cannot change their battle positions.” This is fine because we actually want to beat on opponent’s monsters with our Phantasmal Spiral support. It’s bad against Link monsters, though, who are immune to it. Still, it’s a strong card. Phantasm Spiral Battle is a pretty awesome Trap card, as it can be activated from your hand if you control an “Umi” field spell, which Pacifis just happens to be! If you control only Normal Monsters, you can blow up one card on the field. Then, you can banish this card from your Graveyard, you can target one Normal Monster on the field and equip all Phantasm Spiral Equip cards you control to it. While very situational, it can help you live the dream of summoning all three Phantasm Spiral Dragons in one turn. The last card is Phantasm Spiral Power. Here’s what it does: “If all monsters you control are Normal Monsters (min. 1): Target 1 Effect Monster your opponent controls; until the end of this turn, it loses 1000 ATK and DEF, also it has its effects negated. If "Umi" is on the field, you can activate this card from your hand. You can banish this card from your Graveyard, then target 1 Normal Monster you control; equip 1 "Phantasm Spiral" Equip Spell Card from your hand or Graveyard to that Normal Monster.” Being able to deal with a bigger Effect Monster is great, being a hand trap is better, and recycling an Equip Spell is awesome! You only need one, but it’s great! How Competitive Are Phantasm Spirals? Before Link Summoning, this deck could be pretty good. It has a nice little Xyz Summoning engine and really messes with other decks’ strategies. That being said, it’s extremely reliant on its engine. But, when it works, it’s really tough to stop. If you tweak the Extra deck to include Links, though, it’s probably going to hold its own. Outside of the meta hand trap creatures, this deck is very cheap to build. Would you build Phantasm Spirals? by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  In North America, Yu-Gi-Oh began in late March 2002 with Starter Deck: Yugi and Starter Deck: Kaiba. Today, we’ll be looking at the Yugi deck! While Starter Deck Yugi didn’t have a monster with quite the power of Kaiba’s Blue-Eyes White Dragon, there are some sweet cards in this starter deck. Let’s get right into it! Monsters Ancient Elf Ansatsu Baron of the Fiend Sword Beaver Warrior Celtic Guardian Claw Reacher Curse of Dragon Dark Magician (Ultra Rare) Doma The Angel of Silence Dragon Zombie Feral Imp Gaia The Fierce Knight Giant Soldier of Stone Great White Magical Ghost Mammoth Graveyard Man-Eater Bug Man-Eating Treasure Chest Mystic Clown Mystical Elf Neo the Magic Swordsman Silver Fang Sorcerer of the Doomed Summoned Skull The Stern Mystic Trap Master Wall of Illusion Winged Dragon, Guardian of the Fortress #1 Witty Phantom Spells Book of Secret Arts Card Destruction (Super Rare) Change of Heart Dark Hole De-Spell Dian Keto the Cure Master Fissure Last Will Monster Reborn Remove Trap Soul Exchange (Super Rare) Sword of Dark Destruction Yami Traps Castle Walls Dragon Capture Jar Reinforcements Reverse Trap Trap Hole Two-Pronged Attack Ultimate Offering Waboku Monsters Breakdown First, we’ll look at the “boss” monsters of the deck: Dark Magician, Summoned Skull, Gaia the Dragon Champion, and Curse of Dragon. Dark Magician is only 2500 ATK for two tributes, but he’s iconic, and would later have a lot more support. There are actually many ways in this deck for him to actually beat Blue-Eyes and his 3000 ATK, too. Meanwhile, Summoned Skull is 2500 ATK for only one tribute. While he has far less defense, you’re not looking to play these guys in defense mode! Gaia the Fierce Knight (2300 ATK) and Curse of Dragon (2000 ATK) are pretty underwhelming tribute monsters, but if you happen to have Gaia the Dragon Champion and Polymerization, they make a decent Fusion monster. Even with only 2600 ATK, you could summon him with the necessary monsters in hand, not just on the field. Also, they happen to be pretty sweet ways to get rid of opposing monsters that you steal with Change of Heart or Tribute with Soul Exchange. At this point, they were still very playable monsters, too. Ancient Elf is a 1450 ATK, 1200 DEF Light Spellcaster, which at the time was pretty average. Ansatsu is a level 5 Earth Warrior with only 1700 ATK and 1200 DEF. He’d be one of the first monsters out of every Yugi deck as I remember. Baron of the Fiend Sword was decent though, a level 4 Fiend with 1550 ATK and 800 DEF. Beaver Warrior is familiar to many Yu-Gi-Oh anime fans, but with only 1200 ATK and 1500 DEF, this Beast-Warrior had trouble being competitive. Celtic Guardian is also an iconic Yugi monster, with only 1400 ATK and 1200 DEF. Still, a lot of people played him just because of Yugi. Despite being one of the worst creatures in the deck, Claw Reacher and his 1000 ATK and 800 DEF is actually one of the more sought after creatures from the Yugi deck! It’s because this is his only printing. So, this is a card you may have been pretty quick to toss in the old days, but he’s pretty collectible now, especially in 1st edition Doma the Angel of Silence isn’t particularly good, but people still collect her in 1st edition. 1600 ATK and 1400 DEF aren’t bad, but she’s a level 5, requiring a Tribute to Normal Summon. That’s not really so good. Dragon Zombie has a whopping 0 DEF, but with 1600 ATK for a level 3 monster, he was certainly playable at the time. People really loved this guy, I remember. Feral Imp is yet another iconic Yugi monster, but his stats are pretty mediocre: 1300 ATK and 1400 DEF. He was playable in the LOB days, though. Giant Soldier of Stone is an iconic Yugi monster that was actually very playable. With 1300 ATK and 2000 DEF, he’d actually get some attacks in sometimes. This big guy actually saw play for quite awhile. Great White was a pretty fair monster, too, with 1600 ATK. The 800 DEF was bad, but you didn’t play the Shark to be in defense, of course. Magical Ghost actually has the same stats as Feral Imp, but a Dark Zombie. He’s mediocre As bad as Mammoth Graveyard is, with only 1200 ATK and 800 DEF, I always really liked the art on this guy. I think a lot of people did. Man-Eater Bug is one of the really good effect monsters in this deck. There weren’t a bunch back then, and plenty of people would run three of this guy. He’s a flip effect monster that destroys a monster on the field. Just make sure your opponent has something to blow up, or he eats one of your own guys or even himself - which is kind of weird. If you needed an answer for Blue-Eyes, he’s one. I’ve always loved the flavor of Man-Eating Treasure Chest and with 1600 ATK, he was actually a decent monster at that time. Mystic Clown has 1500 ATK and 1000 DEF. Those aren’t great stats, but he’d beat a lot of stuff at that time. Mystical Elf has a lot in common with Giant Soldier of Stone, not only a classic Yugi card, but she also has 2000 DEF. 800 ATK is pretty lousy, but she held down the fort. Neo the Magic Swordsman was one of my favorite monsters in Yu-Gi-Oh for a long time, and with 1700 ATK, he was playable. Silver Fang is the Wolf version of Mammoth Graveyard. Great art, and really mediocre stats: 1200 ATK / 800 DEF. Sorcerer of the Doomed 1450 ATK / 1200 DEF The Stern Mystic is a Yugi deck exclusive. With 1500 ATK and 1200 DEF, his stats aren’’t that bad, but he’s a flip effect monster. His effect is interesting, in that he turns all face-down cards face-up so you can look at them, then puts them back without any effects activating. It’s actually an interesting card in the context of the time, as he could prevent you from falling into something bad. He’s also better than most of the other monsters in the deck. Trap Master was actually extremely good at the time this deck was printed. You didn’t have Heavy Storm, which was in Metal Raiders, or Mystical Space Typhoon in Spell Ruler. His 500 / 1100 stats are pretty blah, but his effect was really good at the time. You had to be careful, though, because if your opponent had nothing face-down, you’d have to select one of your own face-down cards when he’s flipped. But that’s usually not going to be an issue. Wall of Illusion is one of the best monsters in the Yugi deck. With 1850 DEF, he was a really nice wall, but his effect made him even better. Any monster that attacks him returns to the hand. The Wall was a staple stall card for a very long time, I believe until 1900 ATK level 4 monsters with drawbacks came later beginning with Gemini Elf. Sure, most tribute monsters people actually played ran it over, but at a major loss in tempo. One of my favorite Yugi cards and strangely would still be annoying to run into in modern Yu-Gi-Oh! (Some link monsters wouldn’t even kill it, mind you.) Winged Dragon, Guardian of the Fortress #1 is Blue and he’s a Dragon. Sure, he only has 1400 ATK and 1200 DEF, but… well, he looks nice in a binder. The last creature in the deck is Witty Phantom, an OK fiend with 1400 ATK and 1300 DEF. Nothing special Wow, monsters were pretty underwhelming back then, weren’t they? Spells Breakdown Book of Secret Arts was a pretty popular equip spell at the time, as a Spellcaster-Type monster equipped with this card increases its ATK and DEF by 300 points. It made Neo the Magic Swordsman 2000 ATK, which is pretty nuts. Of course, Kaiba’s La Jinn the Mystical Genie of the Lamp (the best level 4 beater at the time with 1800 ATK) got up to 2100 ATK. (People stuck this on Maha Vailo later to great effect, too.) Card Destruction was an awesome spell that would be later semi-limited and then limited to one copy per deck. While it could technically benefit your opponent, discarding your hand and drawing that many cards could be greatly advantageous to you. You had to be careful in trying to hold onto things in your hand because you never knew when this was coming. Change of Heart was one of the more busted Yu-Gi-Oh cards of all time. And I loved it. You could steal any monster of your opponent’s until the end of turn. It didn’t even matter if it was face-down. This was particularly fun with flip effect monsters. Your opponent’s Man-Eater Bug could eat itself. (Again that’s horrible). Really, though, you basically used this to get a free Tribute monster or to steal your opponent’s boss monster and whack them in the face with it… before turning it into a free Tribute monster. Dark Hole literally sucks all of the monsters into a black hole and there’s much sadness, usually mostly for your opponent. I’ve never really liked De-Spell, because it targets Spell Cards on the field. At this point there weren’t many that you’d play face-up other than Equip spells. But before things like Mystical Space Typhoon, this was actually really playable. Heck, I think people played it into Spell Ruler era to get rid of Mage Powers and Axe of Despairs and what not. But in these early days, you were just using it to kill Swords of Revealing Light. That’s really it. Dian Keto the Cure Master gives you 1000 LP, which is honestly pretty good if you’re stalling. They say life gain doesn’t win games, but as someone who used to play one of these in like every deck ever, it actually does. Fissure was one of the best removal cards at the time. In fact, it really was the only one besides Dark Hole and Raigeki in spell form. It destroyed the monster with the least ATK that your opponent had, but a lot of times, that was still something you needed gone. Many a Blue-Eyes have fallen to a lowly Fissure. Last Will is actually an extremely good card. If a monster on your side of the field was sent to your Graveyard this turn, your can Special Summon 1 monster with 1500 or less ATK from your Deck once during that turn. You could play 3 copies of this for awhile, and it’s been banned forever. While it doesn’t look that bad on the surface, play with three copies of it and you’ll see why it’s so good. Monster Reborn is one of the most iconic Yu-GI-Oh cards, and it was rightly banned for years. Bringing back a monster from your own graveyard is fine, but from your opponent’s graveyard? In Modern Yu-Gi-Oh, this card was unbanned simply because it’s just not as busted anymore. This was pretty dumb when it wasn’t limited. Fortunately, that was like for a month - if you cared about lists, which most people didn’t. Soul Exchange is a card that saw play in competitive Yu-GI-Oh for years, especially during the Monarch Control era. I’m pretty sure it was limited to one per deck at one point, because using your opponent’s Monsters to summon Monarchs is pretty mean. Sure, you don’t get a Battle Phase during the turn you use it, but that price is worth paying. Sword of Destruction is a pretty good Equip spell that gives a Dark monster 400 ATK, but it loses 200 DEF. Who even cares about the DEF? Yami increases the ATK and DEF of all Fiend and Spellcaster-Type monsters by 200 points. That’s pretty important in this deck. This field spell alo decreases the ATK and DEF of all Fairy-Type monsters by 200 points. That can be relevant, I suppose. Suddenly, a lot of those weaker monsters become incredibly average. Trap Cards Breakdown Dragon Capture Jar was specifically made for the Kaiba matchup. This continuous trap card was actually pretty good at keeping the mighty Blue-Eyes White Dragon at bay. Reinforcements was a pretty sweet combat trick kind of trap. Giving a monster 500 ATK until end of turn was going to win you a lot of battles. It would make Dark Magician trade with Blue-Eyes at the very least. Remove Trap looks great until you realize that it only destroys face-up trap cards. Bye, bye, Dragon Capture Jar! Although, there’s another really good continuous trap card we’ll get to in a moment. Reverse Trap is actually a pretty nasty card. I’m not sure how many people played this competitively, but it’s actually really, really mean. It turns all increases into decreases and decreases into increases. It could really screw your opponent over, which is awesome. In this very early meta, this was actually a really good card. Trap Hole was actually really powerful at this point in Yu-Gi-Oh. Face-down traps were so hard to get rid of that this was a great way to deal with bigger monsters being Normal Summoned. It didn’t hit special summons, but if you happened to have three of these, you could make your opponent miserable. Ultimate Offering is probably the best trap card in the whole deck, and it got pretty busted later on. It’s been banned for a long time. With a low cost of only 500 LP, you can Normal Summon or Set an additional monster. This card was super busted until it finally got an errata that said you could only use this effect during your own main phase or your opponent’s battle phase. Otherwise you could just use it whenever you felt like, which is pretty stupid. This card would be out of control in today’s Yu-Gi-Oh, which is why it’s going to stay banned. Back then, it wasn’t broken, just really good in the right deck. This card could help you catch up from behind on the field very easily. The cost was just so low. Waboku is a card that’s still good, actually. It stops all Battle Damage inflicted by opponent’s monsters. However, your monster still does. So, when battling two creatures with equal ATK, you’d actually win the battle. It’s such a good card that’s seen competitive play forever. Improving the Yugi Starter Deck For about a month after this and the Kaiba deck were released, you could play 3 of any card. But in May 2002, there was the May 2002 Limited list, which covered these decks and Legend of Blue-Eyes White Dragon. Limited were Exodia the Forbidden One and the Exodia pieces, plus Change of Heart, Dark Hole, Monster Reborn, Pot of Greed and Raigeki. Limited to two copies were Card Destruction and Swords of Revealing Light. So, if you were to improve this deck, what would you do? First, you’d want to bring the deck down to 40 cards. We also really only have LOB to work with. There’s a few ways we could decide to go. We could choose a defensive strategy to stall out until we draw 5 pieces of Exodia, or we can try being more offensive and summon Gaia the Dragon Champion. Thing is, Card Destruction is just going to kill your Exodia pieces. Gaia beats everything but Blue-Eyes, but those two Tribute monsters are going to clog up your hand.. Really. the best way to go is actually to buy 3 copies of the Kaiba deck and get 3 La Jinn and 3 Battle Ox, which were the best level 4 beatstick monsters back then. Make sure you get staples like Raigeki and . Then, buy 2 more copies of the Yugi deck so you can load up on Fissures, Giant Soldiers of Stone, Man-Eater Bugs, Neo the Magic Swordsman, Trap Masters, Trap Holes, and Wabokus. You’ll only play like one Summoned Skull for a tribute monster and just play a grindy game that can stop more complex strategies easily. Believe it or not, Blue-Eyes, great as he is, was pretty easy to stop back then. This great May 2002 deck list from the Format Library is probably the best deck you could build back when it was just Starter Decks: Yugi and Kaiba and Legend of Blue-Eyes White Dragon. Monsters 3 Battle Ox 2 Giant Soldier of Stone 3 La Jinn Mystical Genie of the Lamp 3 Neo the Magic Swordsman 1 Summoned Skull 3 Man-Eater Bug 3 Trap Master 2 Wall of Illusion Spells 1 Change of Heart 1 Dark Hole 1 De-Spell 3 Fissure 1 Monster Reborn 1 Pot of Greed 1 Raigeki 2 Swords of Revealing Light Traps 2 Reinforcements 3 Trap Hole 3 Waboku This deck can pretty much deal with anything you’d run into. Bigger creatures would usually fall into Trap Holes or be done away with by Fissure or Raigeki. It’s actually a really skill-intensive format since people who played competitively were usually playing pretty much the same deck. The game’s early days were actually pretty interesting. How would you build a place a deck based off of Starter Deck: Yugi? by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  I only have one thing to say about Pharaoh's Servant… JINZO! Also, the card quality of the fourth expansion set for Yugioh is WAY higher than the first three… So, let’s head over to Yu-Gi-Oh Pack Simulator and see what we can pull from this classic set!
OK, this pack is pretty bad. Then again, Lightforce Sword was a highly sought-after card because it was one Yugi Moto used on the anime. It may be worth less than $0.25 today but there’s a Super Rare version out there, just because it’s an iconic Yugi card. It also wasn’t a terrible card back in the day. Removing a card from your opponent’s hand at random is super annoying, and it could’ve been your opponent’s best card for all you know. You also had ways to really mess up your opponent’s hand with cards like Confiscation, Delinquent Duo, and The Forceful Sentry that all saw plenty of play at the time. So, Lightforce Sword was pretty good in a deck that just wanted to ruin your opponent’s day and make them hate you. Fortunately, there are some good commons in this pack. 7 Completed is a pretty sweet equip spell for Machine-type monsters. You could use to have a Machine-type monster gain 700 ATK or 700 DEF. Guardian of the Throne Room from Magic Ruler was a pretty awesome target for this Equip Spell, making him 2350 ATK or 2300 DEF. Even today, this card is worth north of $0.25 and some of its reprints are worth more than $0.50! Dokuroyaiba is worth $0.05 just for this flavor text: “A boomerang with brains that will pursue a target to the ends of the earth.” Earthshaker isn’t the most exciting way to blow up monsters. But it’s interesting. You choose 2 Monster attributes and your opponent chooses 1. All Face-Up Monsters on the field with the chosen attribute are destroyed. Timed correctly, though, it could be pretty miserable for your opponent, as they could lose one or more monsters and you may be out nothing. It’s worth somewhere between $0.10 and $0.20 because who would play it now? Back then, though, you could sneak this in and no one would see it coming. Bubonic Vermin was a cute card back in the day. Still worth roughly $0.25 today, this little guy could flip and give you another Vermin from your deck in face-down Defense Position. These guys were great Tribute fodder back in the day, although they may not really do much now. Darkfire Soldier #2 was easily one of the best cards in this pack back in the day, as 1700 ATK for a level 4 monster was awesome! I remember people actually playing this card. He’s worth $0.10 today, but back then, I think he was actually a card that people wanted on a regular basis! Flame Champion is a level 5 monster with 1900 ATK. Meh. Even back then, this isn’t a monster you’d play unless you were going all dedicated Fire monsters or something. I think people back in the day may have played Type Zero Magic Crusher. It’s worth about nothing now. But a continuous trap card that let you discard a Spell Card to deal 500 damage to your opponent was nothing to sneeze at. Those could be the last few Life Points you needed for the win. Was it a great card? Not really, but it could win you a game here and there. Insect Imitation is a $0.25 common we may not think much of today, but Insects were a real deck back in the day. This was a good way to get a better monster into play very quickly. The cool thing about this card was that you could summon the monster in attack position or FACE DOWN defense position. It was a cute way to get a Man-Eater Bug into play face down, if you had a level 1 insect to tribute. This is a card that’s actually way better now, but who would play it? Well, it does see play in Duel Links… This is a pretty garbage pack, unless you like collecting the old sets. Also, back then Lightforce Sword was worth the pack, as well as the 7 Completed and Darkfire Soldier. You can’t win ‘em all! If you want me to “open” a particular pack that’s available on Yu-Gi-Oh Pack Simulator, let me know in the comments! by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Today we’re taking a look at a Yu-Gi-Oh! Beatdown deck from the 2003 Legacy of Darkness (LOD) Advanced format. The list is from the Old School Expert on YouTube. Monsters 1 Airknight Parshath 1 Cyber Jar 1 Fiber Jar 1 Jinzo 1 Exiled Force 3 Gemini Elf 1 Injection Fairy Lily 1 Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer 1 Magician of Faith 1 Sangan 3 Spear Dragon 1 Witch of the Black Forest 1 Yata-Garasu Spells 1 Confiscation 1 United We Stand 1 Premature Burial 1 Monster Reborn 1 Change of Heart 1 Snatch Steal 1 Dark Hole 1 Raigeki 1 Heavy Storm 2 Mystical Space Typhoon 1 The Forceful Sentry 1 Delinquent Duo 1 Pot of Greed 2 Graceful Charity 1 Painful Choice Traps 2 Bottomless Trap Hole 1 Magic Cylinder 1 Mirror Force 1 Imperial Order 1 Torrential Tribute SIDEBOARD 1 Axe of Despair 1 Dark Ruler Ha Des 2 Fissure 1 Magic Jammer 1 Mage Power 2 Magic Drain 2 Nobleman of Crossout 1 Solemn Judgment 1 Penguin Soldier 1 Swords of Revealing Light 1 Trap Hole 1 Waboku Here’s the breakdown video from the Old School Expert on YouTube!  Monster Cards Breakdown
Airknight Parshath was a meta monster for a long time. While 1900 ATK doesn’t seem that great on a Level 5 monster, his effects make up for that. The piercing battle damage and card draw when he did battle damage were the reasons you played him. Oh, and he was one of the few good Light monsters back then. Cyber Jar and Fiber Jar are busted cards. Fiber Jar, honestly, was an awesome reset button, something that was great against the beatdown mirror match. Cyber Jar was a great way to swing the game back in your favor, too. It could help your opponent more than it could help you, so you had to time playing it correctly. I usually did. I played a LOT with Cyber Jar. Jinzo is awesome, and the only reason I didn’t play him back then was I didn’t have one for years. He shut down all traps, which meant your monsters could usually attack pretty freely. Exiled Force is an amazing monster. He was limited to one copy per deck for good reason. You’d play him and tribute him to kill any monster your opponent had, even face-down! He saw play deep into my own time playing, and when Warriors became better and better, Reinforcement of the Army often searched him up. He actually got better over the years, when there were more ways to special summon him. Even having to use your Normal Summon was often worth it. Gemini Elf is actually one of my favorite monsters in Yu-Gi-Oh based on flavor. I played the lovely Elf twins later in Spellcaster decks, but not really in my early decks. She was awesome. Injection Fairy Lily was another card I never owned early on. I did play her at one point, and man, paying 2000 LP for her to gain 3000 ATK was simply pretty dumb. I played her in Spellcasters later, and she was pretty busted. (I’ll write about my awesome Spellcasters at some point, believe me!) Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer was an awesome meta monster for years. Oddly, he’s really still pretty decent in Modern Yu-Gi-Oh, too. But, man, I loved this guy. Removing monsters from your opponent’s Graveyard and keeping them from banishing things (a big deal back then, too) was pretty sick. Having 1800 ATK was good too. I think I played two back then, and that’s my preference. But one is good. Magician of Faith was just good. Get back the spell card you needed. I think they only banned her because she just became too much of a staple. Magical Dimension made her busted, too; oh, that card… Sangan got you a lot of good stuff, anything with 1500 ATK or less. Even with his errata, he’s still actually playable; you just have to be choosy with what you get. Spear Dragon was the other premier beatstick monster at the time - other than Goblin Attack Force. Like Attack Force, Spear Dragon went into defense after attacking. The advantage of the Dragon was that he would inflict piercing battle damage. Soon after the time that this deck would’ve been built, Final Attack Orders from Dark Crisis suddenly made these monsters good; they also got the 1900 ATK Archfiend Soldier to back them up. I never played that deck myself, but it actually was pretty good. And Spear Dragon was good enough that even with the drawback he was still very playable. Witch of the Black Forest was banned in tournament play when I played, but dang she could get almost anything good back then: anything with 1500 DEF or less. She’s playable in Modern Yu-Gi-Oh, with a similar errata to Sangan, but still not bad. Yata-Garasu was in every competitive deck back then because of the “Yata-Lock.” Making your opponent skip a draw phase and have the Spirit Bird bounce back to your hand was just too busted. Yata was banned by the time I played, thankfully. Spell Cards Breakdown Like many decks at the time, the spell cards are all pretty much what you’d expect to see in many decks. There was the hand control trio of Confiscation, Delinquent Duo, and The Forceful Sentry, all of which would eventually be banned. There were your grave reanimation cards like Monster Reborn and Premature Burial. You had your monster stealing cards in Change of Heart and Snatch Steal. Monster destruction came in the form of Dark Hole and Raigeki. The spell and trap destruction suite ran 1 Heavy Storm and 2 Mystical Space Typhoon. The draw cards were a Pot of Greed and 2 Graceful Charity. Also, Painful Choice was a pretty sweet card to fill your graveyard, and was later banned for all of the crazy stuff you could do with it. The card that’s really unique to Beatdown is United We Stand, Actually, most beatdown decks, including the one I used to play, played Axe of Despair and Mage Power in the main deck. (This deck has them in the sideboard). United We Stand gives the equipped monster 800 ATK for each face-up monster you control! It would actually be banned for some time due to its power level. Maha Vailo decks were a thing at the time, too, and this was at least 1300 ATK just with that crazy powerful guy. Trap Cards Breakdown You didn’t really play many maindeck traps in this deck, since you run Jinzo, of course. But you played the staples: 2 Bottomless Trap Hole, 1 Magic Cylinder, 1 Mirror Force, 1 Imperial Order, and 1 Torrential Tribute. Imperial Order was a stupid card and I’m glad they banned it; that spell-cancelling card was just way too unfair. Sideboard Breakdown The Old School Expert’s list runs Axe of Despair and Mage Power, beatdown staples, in the sideboard. Honestly, I understand why. This deck isn’t based around Maha Vailo, the 1550 ATK Light Monster that gains 500 ATK for each Equip Card equipped to this card. A lot of beatdown decks were. But a heavy reliance on Equips isn’t always the best way to go, as MST would often just blow them up during combat and 2-for-1, or even 3 or 4-for-1 you if you had multiple copies on the board. Fortunately, you had ways to stop people from blowing up your equips: Magic Jammer and Magic Drain. Magic Drain saw play far longer than Magic Jammer, despite the fact that Drain is in some ways worse than Jammer. Magic Jammer requires a discard from you, though, and Drain gives your opponent the option to discard a Spell Card of their own to counter the Drain. Nobleman of Crossout is a card that I usually played in the maindeck, but at this point, a lot of people were playing beatdown, so this card was better in the sideboard. Later, everyone would play two Noblemans main board. Not only did it banish the facedown monster, but it also was murder to flip effect monsters. The interesting thing is that both players had to reveal their decks to remove any copies of that flip effect monster. So, you got to learn a lot about each other’s decks. And if you were playing the same monster, it could actually backfire on you. Usually, though, I rarely ever had this happen to me. Solemn Judgment wasn’t a card many people played in the early days of Yu-Gi-Oh. You could run three. But one copy in the sideboard makes sense, as an answer to something that you couldn’t otherwise deal with. Fissure was probably some of the best removal available at the time. It wasn’t always the best card, but hey, it was playable. Smashing Ground would be way better later. Trap Hole was in the sideboard for extra monster removal. Swords of Revealing Light and Waboku were good in the beatdown mirror. Swords gave you both an option to stall while you build your position back up and Waboku could help you “win” some unfavorable battles. The two monsters in the sideboard are two that I played in my main board. Dark Ruler Ha Des could run over anything except Blue-Eyes White Dragon, Dark Magician, and Summoned Skull at the time. Believe it or not, none of them saw a ton of meta play. While you couldn’t special summon Dark Ruler Ha Des from the grave, his effect made up for that: he negates the effects of any monsters he destroys, including things like flip effect monsters, Sangan, and Witch. Penguin Soldier seems weird in a beatdown deck, but if you were going up a deck that ran big fusion monsters or ritual monsters, this little guy was huge. Also, he really could set your opponent back a turn or two, especially if you bounced two of your opponent’s guys back. People wouldn’t see it coming. It was pretty sweet. My Thoughts on Beatdown I used to run a deck with a similar theme to this beatdown deck. But, as I played a little bit later than this, I had access to some cheaper beatdown monsters, such as Archfiend Soldier and Skilled Dark Magician, instead of the much more expensive (at the time) Gemini Elf and Spear Dragon. They were also Dark monsters. Don’t get me wrong. I love Gemini Elf. But they were a lot harder to get back then. I also didn’t own a Jinzo. So I played Dark Ruler Ha Des instead. Actually, he was a really good card in those days, as he shut down so many effects. He also ran over Jinzo and Monarchs, which made “good players” mad. Lolz. I used to play Summoned Skull, too, because I was both good and bad at the game at the same time. I never played much Airknight Parshath. I thought he was too weak for a tribute monster bad then. I feel differently about him now. I think he’s pretty sweet now, especially for the piercing battle damage and card draw. Fiber Jar wasn’t legal in tournament play by that point - although I owned a really beat up copy that I played in Traditional duels (those without the forbidden cards). Cyber Jar, on the other hand, was one of my best friends. I also didn’t get to play the hand control spells like Confiscation, Delinquent Duo, and The Forceful Sentry, although I think Duo was available. I didn’t think Duo was all that great. All three together are devastating, though. That’s especially true when you’re playing beatdown, because you can really slow your opponent down picking apart their hand. Had I been playing when a lot of these cards weren’t banned, I’m sure I would’ve played them in tournaments. I was still playing Traditional at this time, as I didn’t like the idea of forbidden cards. That’s why I played Chaos...and a lot of people still do! I really like the Old School Expert’s deck and personally I’d only make a couple of changes, like two copies of Kycoo instead of one. I wouldn’t ever have been able to afford Mechanical Chasers, which were no joke $200 at that point. So, I would’ve settled for Spear Dragon. Like him, I never really liked playing Goblin Attack Force. This probably is the deck I would’ve played pretty much. Did you ever play beatdown? It was such a fun, innocent deck that just doesn’t really play well in today’s Yu-Gi-Oh. But it still needed a ton of strategy, and everyone’s beatdown deck was a little different. So much fun! . by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Goat Format is probably the best way ever to play Yu-Gi-Oh! It’s based off of the April 2005 Forbidden/Limited List, often better known as the “banlist” and includes cards up until before Cybernetic Revolution. The reason Cybernetic Revolution isn’t included is because of Cyber Dragon and Cyber Twin Dragon, which badly warped the game at the time. So, Goat Format is considered the best format of all time. The best deck at the time was Goat Control, a deck built around Scapegoat, Thousand Eyes Restrict, and Metamorphosis. By the time I started playing seriously, I didn’t play in organized tournaments right away, and I was using the October 2005 list for Traditional format, which has no banned cards. I didn’t start playing seriously until Enemy of Justice in 2006. So, I never built a Goat Format deck, but many cards I used were a big part of the format. Let’s take a look at the banlist that defined the format: April 2005 Forbidden/Limited List Forbidden: Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End Fiber Jar Magical Scientist Makyura the Destructor Witch of the Black Forest Yata-Garasu Butterfly Dagger - Elma Change of Heart Confiscation Dark Hole Harpie's Feather Duster Mirage of Nightmare Monster Reborn Painful Choice Raigeki The Forceful Sentry Imperial Order Limited: Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning Breaker the Magical Warrior Cyber Jar D.D. Warrior Lady Dark Magician of Chaos Exiled Force Exodia the Forbidden One Injection Fairy Lily Jinzo Left Arm of the Forbidden One Left Leg of the Forbidden One Morphing Jar Protector of the Sanctuary Reflect Bounder Right Arm of the Forbidden One Right Leg of the Forbidden One Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys Sangan Sinister Serpent Tribe-Infecting Virus Twin-Headed Behemoth Card Destruction Delinquent Duo Graceful Charity Heavy Storm Lightning Vortex Mage Power Mystical Space Typhoon Pot of Greed Premature Burial Snatch Steal Swords of Revealing Light United We Stand Call Of The Haunted Ceasefire Deck Devastation Virus Magic Cylinder Mirror Force Reckless Greed Ring of Destruction Torrential Tribute Semi-Limited: Abyss Soldier Dark Scorpion - Chick the Yellow Manticore of Darkness Marauding Captain Night Assailant Vampire Lord Creature Swap Emergency Provisions Level Limit - Area B Nobleman of Crossout Reinforcement of the Army Upstart Goblin Good Goblin Housekeeping Gravity Bind Last Turn Notably, Metamorphosis, Scapegoat, and Thousand-Eyes Restrict weren’t restricted to one copy per deck yet. While Goat Control wasn’t the ONLY deck in the format, it was like 90 percent of the format or something. I never played more than one Scapegoat in my decks, and I typically played a blend of Beatdown and what I like to call Aggro Control. It was sort of random but strangely effective. I didn’t have the money for the best cards at the time, but I ran enough meta cards that I usually won more than I lost. So, had I begun playing Tournament play during Goat Format, which is strangely enough when I started actually playing seriously, what would I have been up against? Here’s a typical Goat Format deck, based on a list from Format Library: Monsters 2 Airknight Parshath 1 Asura Priest 1 Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning 1 Breaker the Magical Warrior 1 D.D. Warrior Lady 2 Magical Merchant 2 Magician of Faith 1 Morphing Jar 1 Sangan 1 Sinister Serpent 1 Tribe Infecting Virus 2 Tsukuyomi Spells 2 Book of Moon 1 Delinquent Duo 1 Graceful Charity 1 Heavy Storm 1 Mystical Space Typhoon 2 Nobleman of Crossout 1 Pot of Greed 1 Premature Burial 2 Scapegoat 1 Snatch Steal Traps 1 Call of the Haunted 2 Dust Tornado 1 Mirror Force 1 Ring of Destruction 2 Sakuretsu Armor 1 Torrential Tribute SIDEBOARD 2 Legendary Jujitsu Master 2 Mystic Swordsman Lv2 1 Book of Moon 2 Creature Swap 1 Dust Tornado 2 Seven Tools of the Bandit 3 Trap Dustshoot FUSIONS 3 Thousand-Eyes Restrict 1 Dragoness the Wicked Knight 1 Darkfire Dragon 2 Dark Balter the Terrible 1 Fiend Skull Dragon 1 Giltia the D. Knight 1 Reaper on the Nightmare 1 Ryu Senshi 1 Dark Blade the Dragon Knight 1 The Last Warrior from Another Planet 1 Gatling Dragon One point of contention with the Goat Format is the legality of Exarion Universe. He was a tin promo during 2005, and a monster I ran with regularity. However, many Goat Format players forbid it from being played. If you can play it, though, it’s a 1800 ATK / 1900 DEF monster with the Dark Attribute. It has an interesting secondary effect that you can choose to activate if you attack a Defense Position monster. You can have it lose 400 ATK and inflict piercing Battle Damage. This is an ability I actually used a lot. That was 1000 piercing damage if I attacked a Magician of Faith. Owie. So, personally, I love that guy. But to be honest, he was pretty busted - which is why I played him. I made a LOT of people running Apprentice Magician Engines at the time MAD! Blade Knight was a great one, too, a tin promo that many people disallow in Goat Format. I played him, too.  My Take on Goat Format - The Aggro Control Deck!
So if I were building a Goat Format deck, it would not play Metamorphosis. I never really got into that sort of deck. I’d play something more like the decks I used to play. This list doesn’t have Blade Knight or Exarion Universe, but if I were allowed to play them, I would! Here goes: Monsters (18) 1 Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning 1 Airknight Parshath 1 Dark Ruler Ha Des 1 Jinzo 1 Asura Priest 1 Breaker the Magical Warrior 1 D.D. Warrior Lady 1 Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer 1 Old Vindictive Magician 1 Gravekeeper’s Guard 2 Gravekeeper’s Spy 1 Skilled Dark Magician 1 Skilled White Magician 1 Night Assailant 1 Magician of Faith 1 Sangan 1 Spirit Reaper Spells (13) 1 Brain Control 1 Book of Moon 1 Enemy Controller 1 Graceful Charity 1 Lightning Vortex 1 Heavy Storm 2 Nobleman of Crossout 1 Pot of Greed 1 Premature Burial 1 Scapegoat 1 Smashing Ground 1 Snatch Steal Traps (9) 1 Bottomless Trap Hole 1 Call of the Haunted 1 Dust Tornado 1 Mirror Force 1 Ring of Destruction 2 Sakuretsu Armor 1 Torrential Tribute 1 Trap Dustshoot SIDEBOARD 1 Cyber Jar 2 Legendary Jujitsu Master 2 Mystic Swordsman Lv2 1 Mobius the Frost Monarch 1 Zaborg the Thunder Monarch 1 Magician of Faith 1 Night Assailant 1 Gravekeeper’s Spy 1 Gravekeeper’s Guard 2 Necrovalley 1 Magic Cylinder Back in the day, I didn’t have Jinzo or Mirror Force. But nowadays, they’re so easy to get, so why not have them? I also used to run 42 or 43 cards and never had a problem. In a Goat Format with Exarion and Blade Knight, they’d be two extra cards. But I’m going to go without them because some people don’t like them in the format. And that’s OK with me. So my approach to the meta may be rather unorthodox, and I’ve applied what I know now. This particular list needs to be play-tested heavily, but in general this is the way I’d go. The sideboard looks really strange, but the beauty of Yu-Gi-Oh is that your sideboard can transform your entire deck. And a few of these cards actually were in my sideboard back then, even though back then it was literally 15 good random cards. There’s a reason Cyber Jar is in there, by the way. Let’s break it down. Monster Cards Breakdown I don’t think Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning needs any introduction. He and Breaker the Magical Warrior (very much in this deck) flip-flopped being my favorite card of all time. BLS is now and forever. When I sold off my entire Yu-Gi-Oh collection, I kept my Gold Rare copy that I got played for about $10. Not a great financial move in hindsight, but he actually won me tournaments with Blackwings and Gravekeeper Twilight nonsense. So, he’s seen real battle, and that’s worth keeping him for me. This is the guy that wins me the game when he drops. I have NEVER LOST a game of Yu-Gi-Oh where he came down. Ever. I’m serious. My secret rare one had the same success rate. He was stolen. It was very sad. Airknight Parshath is a card that I liked but never played much. But he’s vital as a Light Monster. There were more Light monsters I played like Kaiser Sea Horse, but I only played him to summon Blue-Eyes White dragon or later on the almighty Super Conductor Tyranno (which won me a lot of games, actually) with a single Tribute. The card draw is nice. Dark Ruler Ha Des was one of my favorite monsters back in the day. Why not? He beat Jinzo! He also negated the effects of monsters he killed, including Sangan. So badass. I played him in a Dark World deck later and just, wow. He also murders Flip Effect monsters and especially the Gravekeeper flips. Ironically, I play a lot of those. Jinzo is Jinzo. He stops all traps. Plain and simple. That’s four tribute monsters, which sounds like a lot, but as you’ll see, I always have tribute fodder. Asura Priest was never one of my favorite monsters. But a Light monster with 1700 ATK that could attack all your opponent’s monsters is pretty good. I had a common DB2 copy back then. Great spirit monster, though. Breaker the Magical Warrior is a freaking awesome monster, and besides Envoy of the Beginning, he is my favorite Yu-Gi-Oh card of all-time. He’s a 1600 ATK monster, technically, but the spell counter gives him 300 ATK. Later, decks that abused Spell Counters would make him super special awesome. But even on his own, he was a staple of a lot of decks. Removing that spell counter to essentially be a Mystical Space Typhoon was sweet. D.D. Warrior Lady was a staple at the time because she could just get rid of stuff. She was a great rattlesnake when you played her face-down. 1500 ATK and 1600 DEF are kind of meh stats. But she’s worth playing in this format. Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer was one of my favorite monsters at the time, too. Turns out I was right to play him, because he was a format destroyer! He actually shut down Chaos decks at one time! He stops your opponent from banishing stuff from either graveyard, so he stops opponents from summoning BLS, but not you! (I guess Chaos Sorcerer is legal in Goat Format, and I used to play him, too!) He also allowed you to remove up to 2 monsters from your opponent’s graveyard each time he dealt Battle Damage. Ouch. I could run two, but one is usually enough. This is when you start seeing how obsessed I was with Spellcasters back then. Sure, Breaker was a staple, but I went way beyond. Old Vindictive Magician was an awesome common back in the day from Magician’s Force. I think I opened a pack with both this AND Wave-Motion Cannon in it and Skilled White Magician. Pretty sure that pack was Dark Revelation 1 because the Magician was rare. I think I traded the Wave-Motion Cannon to my brother. Anyway, Old Vindictive Magician was the Dark Spellcaster version of Man-Eater Bug. She saw a lot of play back in the day in Apprentice Magician decks. But she was pretty good just as a random one-of, too, especially in this kind of deck, as you’ll see. Also, her flip effect monster destroys a monster of the field, BUT it can only be one of your opponent’s. This is a HUGE advantage over Man-Eater Bug, which would have to destroy one of your monsters if your opponent didn’t have any and it was flipped. When I first started playing competitive Yu-Gi-Oh, one of the first decks I played was Gravekeeper’s. I thought the Gravekeeper monsters were awesome! So, I later built the Gravekeeper engine into my decks. In most decks I’d build with Gravekeeper’s, I’d play 3 Spies, 2 Guards, and 3 Spear Soldiers, plus 2 or 3 Necrovalley. But in this Goat Format deck, I play just 2 Spies and 1 Guard. This isn’t uncommon from what I’ve seen of top decks in the format. Usually, when you flip Spy, you’d get another Spy, then flip the other Spy for the Guard. If you had both Spies in hand, that kind of blew, but it became discard fodder to Graceful Charity, Lightning Vortex, etc. If you flipped the Spy and had no targets left, the opponent could look at your deck to confirm and that was an annoying amount of information to give up. (I’m not sure if you can just say “fail to search” nowadays in Yu-Gi-Oh like you can in Magic the Gathering.). Still, you played these guys for a couple of reasons. Firstly, Spy has 2000 DEF and Guard has 1900 DEF. That is higher or the same as many other monsters in the Goat Format. That means your opponent is often taking Battle Damage and you’re getting value. The Spy gets you a special summon, and the Guard returns a monster to the hand. That’s DEVASTATING against Fusion Monsters, for example. Also, you are almost guaranteed to have a Tribute available for your boss monsters. There’s another reason they’re in here, too, as we’ll get to later. Speaking of Skilled White Magician, I played a couple of them back in the day. Actually, I played one of them and Neo the Magic Swordsman for a long time. Neo was one of my favorite Old School cards, and by this time he wasn’t as big, and I actually did play a second White Magician later because 1900 DEF is pretty sweet. But in this deck, I like the trade-off that D.D. Warrior Lady gives me. The 1700 ATK is usually “good enough” and I really needed the Light monsters. I actually don’t find Asura Priest all that good in some matchups, but it is good against Goat Control, after all. Skilled White Magician is somebody I could play face-down, potentially have a tie or even a battle in my favor. Then I could turn him into attack and do some damage! There’s only one Skilled Dark Magician in the list because I really wanted a 1900 beater but beatdown isn’t really what this deck is about. He deals with a lot, though, and I really liked this guy back in the day. Night Assailant is very much like Old Vindictive Magician, but with an added effect if he’s discarded from the hand. You get to get a Flip effect monster back to your hand, except this card. At the time you could play two copies, and if I remember correctly, he was limited because you could get another Night Assailant back and keep looping them. It was sort of like a weird Sinister Serpent effect, a card I chose not to play in this particular Goat Format deck. There’s a reason I don’t, that I’ll get to in a minute. (It’s not his unfortunate recent errata, either.) Magician of Faith is self-explanatory. You could play two back then, and sometimes, this deck does play two, because there’s a copy in the sideboard. There’s a reason why that you’ll see when we look at this deck’s sideboard. Sangan gets you any monster with 1500 or less ATK in your deck. He was a popular target for Metamorphosis to pull out Dragoness the Wicked Knight. He’s actually legal in today’s Yu-gi-oh with an errata that I feel doesn’t matter that much. Basically when you search something, “...you cannot activate cards, or the effects of cards, with that name for the rest of this turn. You can only use this effect of "Sangan" once per turn.” Honestly, that errata is relevant, but hardly makes it bad. But, good to keep in mind. The last monster is Spirit Reaper. Honestly, I feel like he’s better than Sinister Serpent in this deck. He’s really hard to get rid of in defense position, and can occasionally discard cards from your opponent’s hand when he attacks. In Goat Control, Serpent is better because he gets you Thousand-Eyes Restrict with Metamorphosis. Also, his errata that banishes him from the Graveyard at the end of turn after end of turn makes him really meh. If Goat Format players prefer to use him with his original busted text, then I’d play him as a 41st card in this deck. Spell Cards Breakdown Onto the spells, I actually play a lot of good stuff kind of cards. These are mostly cards I actually played back in the day. I was mad that Monster Reborn was banned at this point, but I had all of these other cards already. I actually had an ultimate rare Brain Control back in the day. Brain Control was so busted back then. Then they recently gave it an errata that you can only steal monsters that can be Normal Summoned, basically level 4 or lower monsters. Even with that restriction, though, paying 800 LP to steal an opponent’s monster is awesome, especially if you then tribute it. It’s pretty lousy in today’s game, but even with the errata it’s good in Goat Format. Book of Moon is so good. Not only does it recycle your flip effect monsters, but it’s great to flip down your opponent’s attacking monsters. It’s also a great way to deal with Jinzo or Summoned Skull or other big stuff you may not be able to run over. I’m fine running one. I don’t think I’ve ever played more in my deck. Also, this kills Spirit Reaper as soon as he’s targeted. Book of Moon is just sweet. Enemy Controller is good for two reasons: changing battle positions of your opponent’s monsters, and stealing monsters. You have to tribute a monster to steal your opponent’s monster, but grabbing an opposing BLS is pretty insane. Really, this card is just good, and I ran one most of the time. Graceful Charity is busted good draw power. Yeah, you have to discard two cards, but most of the time, you had a reason to discard one card or another. You had Call of the Haunted and Premature Burial to bring dudes back. Tossing a Jinzo in the grave was always fun. Drawing three cards was worth the discards anyway. Lightning Vortex was basically the Raigeki of the format. It destroyed all of your opponent’s face-up monsters. The drawback was that you had to discard. But most of the time, I’d just toss a Light or Dark monster, whichever I needed to summon BLS (or Chaos Sorcerer that I often played) and went to town. Pretty busted. Heavy Storm is sweet. Blow up all of the spells and traps. Have a nice day. Nobleman of Crossout is a card a lot of people played two of, because of flip-effect monsters, and all of the other monsters that people played face-down. Against certain decks I’d side out one copy, like Beatdown. But hitting a Cyber Jar, Gravekeeper’s Spy/Guard, Night Assailant, or even just a Magician of Faith is pretty sweet. And if it’s a flip effect monster, you get to banish the others from their deck with that name. This card made scoops happen for me back in the day, because I made them mad. Pot of Greed: draw 2 cards. Simple as that. Everyone ever everywhere ran it. Premature Burial is an equip spell that costs 800 LP to summon a monster from your Graveyard. You usually saved this for your Tribute monsters. This is my favorite way to bring out Jinzo or Airknight. Dark Ruler doesn’t work, because he can’t be summoned from the Graveyard. But this is a good card that usually brought something important back, like Sangan. This isn’t Goat Control so why is there one copy of Scapegoat? It’s purely in there for stall purposes. I like it better than Swords of Revealing Light, honestly. You can’t tribute summon with them. The card’s actually better in today’s game, believe it or not. Really, Scapegoat just buys me time to answer things like Thousand-Eyes Restrict. Who’s going to steal a token? Smashing Ground smashes all of the grounds. Really, smashing the thing with the highest defense is very relevant. That was an expensive short print common back in the day. It’s one of my favorite all-time cards. Against some decks it wasn’t as good, but that’s what you have a sideboard for, and I always played it game one. Snatch Steal is busted. Even though you have to give your opponent a free 1000 LP every one of your opponent’s Standby phases. It’s still banned, and for good reason. You could steal one of your opponent’s Fusion Monsters, like Gatling Dragon or whatever, and bash them in the face with it. I usually saved it for a big monster, sort of like Enemy Controller. Trap Cards Breakdown Onto the traps, I play nine, which is kind of a lot in a format with Jinzo everywhere. But I have so many ways to deal with Jinzo. These are all worth playing. One may surprise you but they’re all really strong, ‘Bottomless Trap Hole is what I saved for something big I couldn’t deal with. It’s awesome. It’s STILL good. Solemn Warning is better, but Bottomless is classic. Call of the Haunted is great monster revival, but it also has that cute interaction with Jinzo. If you bring out Jinzo, the effect of Call of the Haunted is negated. So, if you or your opponent then plays Heavy Storm, your Jinzo stays. Dust Tornado saw a lot of play because Mystical Space Typhoon was at one. But what’s cool about this card is that after you blow something up, you can set a spell or trap from your hand. That’s nifty, so you can set Call of the Haunted or something you can activate next turn. I didn’t have Mirror Force back in the day, but this card swings the game in your favor so often you have to play it. This card was banned for awhile just because of how powerful it is. It’s so good that it STILL sees play in Modern Yu-Gi-Oh. You just played it. I used to hold this card in my hand until I REALLY needed it, too, once I had it later. I had a promo Ring of Destruction back in the day, and this card won me a lot of games on its own. It’s a pretty symmetrical effect: target 1 monster your monster controls and destroy it, then deal damage equal to its ATK to both players. Trouble is, when they reprinted this card a few years ago, they added an errata to it so they could unban it. That errata said that the monster has to have ATK less than or equal to your opponent’s LP. Basically, they nerfed it a lot. Still, it’s actually still playable. Funny thing is, back in the day, I used to do exact damage with this card. But, honestly, it was pretty busted when you could just go: hey, this monster has more ATK than you have LP… bye-bye! Two copies of Sakuretsu Armor was pretty standard back in the day, even if you had a Mirror Force. I think I ran three copies at one time, because this card was pretty easy to get. It made attacking sort of scary because you could always hit a Sakuretsu Armor. Great card that’s way too slow in today’s Yu-Gi-Oh. Torrential Tribute was always a sweet card and at this time it was limited to one. You really only ever played Tribute when it benefited you. It also had a nice interaction with Gravekeeper’s Spy, because even after you blew everything up, the monster still Special Summoned… after everything else was gone. This was actually really important, because then you could just drop Jinzo, and yeah… Yes, I play one main deck Trap Dustshoot. Sending a monster back to the deck from the hand is awesome. People used to play 3 in the sideboard, and I really never liked that. I used to play Mind Crush, too, but honestly, in this format, I think one Trap Dustshoot is better than Delinquent Duo because you get to see what your opponent has. That information tells me what I’m looking at, and sometimes it’s enough to know what I’m playing against. If I pull it game one, as long as my opponent has at least 4 cards, it’s pretty much always good. I always felt like siding into three copies would result in dead draws. That’s my experience. Oftentimes I’d side it out in game two or three. It always worked for me, honestly. So that’s the deck. Those choices I made are based on my experience from playing in the formats immediately following Goat Format and just knowing what those cards in the Goat Control deck do. I’ll go over my strategy for the deck, because there is a certain way to pilot the deck. But first, the transformational sideboard… my favorite crap to do in Yu-Gi-Oh! I may have been ahead of my time with the Transformational Sideboard. I actually would stick Exodia in my sideboard sometimes, too. I actually won games that way sometimes. Pretty hilarious. But in this format, even without Confiscation and The Forceful Sentry running around, I didn’t want to do the Exodia troll in Goat Control. It’s too cutthroat a format, honestly. But I did transformational sideboards a lot, mostly because I love making people mad when they sideboard for a certain matchup, only to face a totally different matchup. So in this case, I switch into a Gravekeeper Monarch deck. I bet no one sees that coming. Then, when they go to pop Mask of Restrict and other stuff into the deck, I go back to the old strategy. The Transformational Sideboard Here’s how this works. Cyber Jar is in my sideboard. That’s because I find Cyber Jar to be horrendous against Goat Control. It was awesome when I played because Metamorphosis was at one. But if I’m playing a deck where my monsters are consistently going to be better, Cyber Jar is awesome. I really just don’t want to give the Goat player more cards. It’s why I don’t play Morphing Jar, a card I played as soon as it was cheap enough to get financially when I played competitively. Why give your opponent free cards unless you know they’re going to get monsters strictly worse than yours? Legendary Jujitsu Master was an awesome sideboard card back in the day. I played them, actually. They were great. They bounce any monster that attacks them to the hand. They made an awesome play against Goat Control’s bigger monsters. Mystic Swordsman Lv2 was awesome against face-down monsters, killing them without even flipping them. I had one of these back in the day. For some reason I never bothered to have two. My brother had an ultimate rare one. So far, the board looks pretty normal. This is when it gets weird. I have a Mobius the Frost Monarch and a Zaborg the Thunder Monarch. Mobius is a boss, killing up to two spells and traps on the field. Zaborg the Thunder Monarch killed a monster, as long as your opponent had one… otherwise he’d just kill one of yours or himself. It wasn’t optional. So why these guys? Yeah, they’re good. But they’re part of the puzzle. We have an extra copy of Night Assailant and Magician of Faith. Ok, that’s interesting. I can loop Night Assailants through discards. The extra Magician gives me an extra Light monster and easier ways to get Spell cards back. Then there’s another Gravekeeper’s Spy and Gravekeeper’s Guard. That’s right. There’s more ways to Tribute Monsters easily and this deck can stall even better. Then, two copies of Necrovalley. You see where this is going. Suddenly, beatdown decks run into a wall. The graveyard gets shut down. It does shut out my BLS, but that’s worth the price. It also makes my Gravekeeper’s guys huge walls. Then there’s a Magic Cylinder. Sometimes, this card is just better than Ring. I won a lot of games with Cylinder back in the day. But it’s so dead with Jinzo and I don’t like it as much in Goat Format. Not that it’s bad, mind you. I just like to pick my spots with it. So, what’s great about a transformational sideboard is that I can go all out, because I love the Gravekeepers/Monarch mix. I’m usually going to board out Scapegoat in that case. Goats are really in my deck to stall. This deck is built for the long game, as we’ll see in a moment. Deck Strategy My strategy with Yu-Gi-Oh is the same as it is for me in Magic the Gathering: passive-aggressive. I never overextend myself. I let my opponent play into my hands. I have so many answers that work on offense and defense. They say defense doesn’t win games of Yu-Gi-Oh, but in my experience, a balance of offense and defense does. I’ve always been the type to play face-down monsters and maybe one trap card and see what happens. When I get a similar response, I just wait things out. If I have answers, I’m just going to hold them. Sure, they could have a Morphing Jar, and that would suck. But that’s what I have Nobleman of Crossout for, and why I have two of them - facedown monsters. And if I do hit a flip effect monster, I get to see their Deck! Woo-hoo! If I’m playing against Goat Control I can even guess their hand to some degree. When I first started playing, I was very aggressive. But whenever I’ve played aggressive decks, especially in Magic, I just burn out too quickly. Even when I played a swarm deck like Blackwings, I was pretty passive-aggressive, and that served me well. I have a lot of decent ATK monsters, some decent DEF monsters, and a bunch of monsters that blow stuff up or get stuff back. If I start too slow and fall behind, I can usually come back pretty quickly. In Magic, this is what you call a “mid-range” deck. I’m not sure you can do that in today’s Yu-Gi-Oh with how fast things happen with all the special summoning. But in old school Yu-Gi-Oh, this strategy served me well. Heck, it worked into my E-Hero days at the end. Why Don’t I Just Play Goat Control? In Goat Format, most people play the top deck, like most people in Yu-Gi-Oh do - really any competitive card game. I hate doing that. That being said, I love Goat Control. But I wanted to do something different. This deck isn’t exactly anti-meta, but my monsters beat a lot of Goat’s monsters. I have Asura Priest to clear away goats. I have lots of ways to kill monsters I can’t otherwise beat. Nobleman of Crossout does minimal damage to my deck. It can ruin my Gravekeepers, but I can win without them anyway, even after boarding. Also, this deck looks a lot like Goat Control. If I really wanted to, I could build a Transformational sideboard into Goat Control. Maybe not doing so makes me a bad player. I dare to be different, though. The Monarchs do a lot of work, and the added Gravekeeper pieces help me consistently have Tribute fodder. The monster destruction package, for me, is really satisfying. People played some of these cards in various builds of Goat Control. Tribe Infecting Virus looks good against my deck, because I have so many Spellcasters. But not really. Most of my Spellcasters are role players. The other thing is that this deck is not doing one thing. It does several things, and while that sounds bad, everything works together. Really, my deck’s win condition is winning a war of attrition. And dropping Black Luster Soldier, Envoy of the Beginning when I know you don’t have an answer. That, too. The deck is designed to baffle you, really. If you don’t know what’s in my deck, you really won’t after I’m done sideboarding. If I know I’m off to a bad start, I’m gonna learn what you have without giving away much. You’ll sideboard based on what you’ve seen, and I can tune my deck with tech based on what I expect you’ll side in and out. I feel like sideboarding is really a huge part of Goat Format because that’s where the decks really differ the most. That being said, I’m playing to basically sit back and let you run into my answers for stuff. I’m gonna be bluffing a lot, most likely. I love that mind game, and that’s what’s so awesome about this time in Yu-Gi-Oh! Then again, I think that’s still a big part of the game; the better player is usually still going to win. But, having the best meta deck certainly helps. And, you’ll probably see me play a deck that transforms into Goat Control. Because I’m a troll like that... A Last Bit of Advice on Goat Format If you really want to be involved in Goat Format, you really want to have the main deck on hand. Still, it’s good to know what else was good in the meta. And, while Goat Control is actually an awesome mid-range type deck, I really want to see how my passive-aggressive Aggro Control does in the format. If you build this deck, or something like it, let me know how you do!
by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist 
With Magic the Gathering, I’ve done a few simulated booster pack openings and they were a lot of fun. So I decided why not do it with Yu-Gi-Oh using the Yu-Gi-Oh Pack Simulator? At the time of this writing, it doesn’t have every Yu-Gi-Oh set, but it has a ton of them. We’ll first open a Legend of Blue-Eyes White Dragon pack, and see what we get. Then, we can see what value we may be able to get out of it.
Being the first English Yu-Gi-Oh set, it’s highly collectible. Even some of the commons are valuable! Here we go:
If only we could scale the packs and only open the heavier ones for foils…Then again, we actually have a good rare… 
Dragoness the Wicked Knight is a $1 card for unlimited copies (as of 10/2019). 1st edition copies are pricier, though. A near-mint copy could command $8 or more, which is what we'd have here in this pack. While a 1200 ATK level 3 fusion monster doesn’t seem too exciting, she’s one of the first Yu-Gi-Oh cards ever printed. She’s never been reprinted either. And believe it or not, she DOES see play!
That’s right. Dragoness the Wicked Knight sees play because A) she’s an Instant Fusion target being a Level 4 or lower Fusion monster, B) she’s a Warrior, which is always a relevant tribe, and C) she’s Level 3. In this Gouki deck from 2018, she’s a key piece in summoning the Link monster Isolde, Two Tales of the Noble Knights and the Xyz monster M-X-Saber Invoker, among other things. Also, she used to see play in the famous Goat Control deck of 2005. So, with Goat Format being its own cool little format, this card sees play in most extra decks in that format, since you can use Metamorphosis to tribute your Sangan and get his effect while getting a 1200 ATK Fusion into play. The eight other commons are normal monsters worth about $0.10 each. Most likely, if you actually opened this pack, you probably paid $10 or more for it. But if you paid $7 or less, you made out with a useful rare. From this set, that’s never a bad thing! How would you get the most value out of this pack? I’d find a trade partner who’s looking for this fusion monster at a fair price and get some solid deck-building pieces in return. This is a case of “trading down” where you can end up ahead. Of course, were this a 1st edition pack, I’d be holding onto it for my retirement. These cards in 1st edition get so pricey! Hope you enjoyed this virtual pack opening! If there’s a set you’d like to see me open, let me know in the comments! by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  Many old school Yu-Gi-Oh players will say that 2003 to 2005 was the “golden age” of the competitive game. As I came into Yu-Gi-Oh around the time of Dark Beginning 1, the first major reprint set, I enjoyed the tailend of this “golden age.” The last “old school” set of Ancient Sanctuary had recently come out, along with the first ultimate rare set with Soul of the Duelist. I’d say those early days of Yu-Gi-Oh were my favorite, too. While the years since have had their ups and down, the game was a lot of fun back then. Today, we’re going back to 2003, though. Around the release of Labyrinth of Nightmare - a freaking awesome set, by the way - the competitive game was actually based mostly in two archetypes, beatdown and burn. There were various permutations of both, but those were basically the best decks in the format. The competitive game would expand a bit in the next year or so, but the Labyrinth of Nightmare Advanced format is very nostalgic for we older Yu-Gi-Oh players. One of the best Yu-Gi-Oh decks in 2003 was Fire Princess Burn. The Old School Expert on YouTube did we Old School Yu-Gi-Oh fans a favor by sharing a Fire Princess Burn deck list from 2003. Interestingly enough, a lot of this deck is still playable today. Then again, it’s way too slow for today’s format. Let’s take a look at this classic Yu-Gi-Oh burn deck! Monsters 1 Cure Mermaid 1 Cyber Jar 3 Darklord Marie (Marie the Fallen One) 3 Fire Princess 1 Morphing Jar 3 Nimble Momonga 1 Sangan 2 UFO Turtle 1 Witch of the Black Forest Spell Cards 1 Card Destruction 1 Dark Hole 2 Graceful Charity 2 Messenger of Peace 1 Monster Reborn 1 Painful Choice 1 Pot of Greed 1 Premature Burial 1 Raigeki 1 Swords of Revealing Light 1 Tribute to the Doomed Trap Cards 1 Call of the Haunted 1 Ceasefire 3 Gravity Bind 1 Imperial Order 1 Magic Cylinder 1 Magic Jammer 1 Mirror Force 2 Solemn Wishes Thanks to the Old School Expert for featuring these Yu-Gi-Oh decks on his YouTube channel! Here’s his video: The strategy of this deck is very straightforward. Get your Darklord Maries (formerly Marie the Fallen Ones) into the graveyard (GY) and one or more Fire Princesses on the field. Let’s see how this deck does this.
Monster Card Breakdown In this Fire Princess deck profile, we’ll split the cards into what’s banned today and what isn’t. First, we’ll start with the meat of the deck, all but one card of which is still legal in tournament play in 2018. Three copies of Fire Princess make up the heart of the deck and about half of the overall strategy. Back in Labyrinth of Nightmare, the Princess was a super rare and much more valuable. She was a common in DB1, meaning she was easier to get, but still just as powerful. Having 1300 ATK and 1500 DEF as a four-star monster is fairly underwhelming, but her effect is awesome: any time you gain Life Points, inflict 500 points of damage to your opponent. This is really strong, as unlike some other burn decks, this deck is actually based on YOU gaining life while using Fire Princess to do the dirty work. Building that life point gap in your favor is how this deck can be fairly consistent. Two copies of UFO Turtle serve as a way to get your Fire Princess into play. When the Turtle is destroyed by battle, you pull a Fire monster with 1500 or less ATK from your deck and Special Summon it in attack position. There are only two copies, since the other Turtle and the three Princesses are your only legal targets. Three copies of Darklord Marie make up the other half of this deck’s main burn engine. But, as they are level 5 monsters, to summon her you have to Tribute a monster. Fortunately, there are enough ways to discard her into the graveyard to take advantage of the real reason you play her. During each Standby phase that Darklord Marie is in the graveyard, you gain 200 LP. You gain this 200 LP for each one in the graveyard, too. Cure Mermaid is only at one copy in this list, although people were known to run more. This 1500 ATK water monster had this ability: “As long as this card remains face-up on your side of the field, increase your Life Points by 800 points during each of your Standby Phases.” While not a bad card at all, she’s fine as a one-of in the deck, although I remember people playing two copies or even three. Nimble Momonga is the other big life gain card in the deck. There are three copies. The cool thing about Momonga is that when he’s destroyed you gain 1000 LP, but then you get to summon up to two other copies from your deck. This is great for defense, but it’s also good to thin your deck out by a couple of cards, too. This guy was actually played in a variety of different decks because of his versatility. Sangan and Witch of the Black Forest were seen in almost every deck of the day. When he’s sent from the field to the graveyard, Sangan searches out any monster from your deck that has 1500 or less ATK and adds it to your hand. Witch of the Black Forest is similar, but she finds a monster that has 1500 or less DEF. Back then, each of these tutor monsters were limited to one per deck. There was a time you could even play two Witches! These guys were always great for deck consistency. It wasn’t until later when you could bring them back again and again and abuse their effects that they were finally banned - although Sangan was legal for far longer than the Witch. But in 2018, Konami not only unbanned these two, but unlimited them! Hurray for old school cards coming back! Onto what’s banned, the first was legal for quite some time until recently. Morphing Jar was an extremely expensive card when this deck was being played, and it was restricted to one copy per deck. It would actually be banned for a time while I was playing, although it’s unlimited to three copies now. This is a great card in the deck because not only does it let you reload your hand by discarding what you have and drawing five new cards, but it gets Marie in the graveyard. This is a pretty solid card, but it’s not legal in tournament play as of May 2018. The only other monster that’s banned in tournament play is for good reason. Cyber Jar is one of the meanest, most lopsided cards of all time, in my opinion. It was even legal when I first started playing tournaments. It’s a flip effect monster that destroys all monsters on the field, then you and your opponent reveal the top 5 cards of each of your decks. You special summon any monsters level 4 or lower from among them to the field and add the other cards to your hand. Of course, Cyber Jar could backfire on you, but it was also a way to get Fire Princess and your other key monsters into play. Spell Card Breakdown We’ll start with the banned cards in the deck, most of which were deck staples at the time. Painful Choice is probably the most important of these. This spell card let you search out 5 cards from your deck and reveal them. Your opponent chooses one to put into your hand and the other 4 go to your graveyard. Getting this early in the game was always great, because you could potentially choose all three of your Darklord Maries to get them out of your deck. If you had a Monster Reborn or something to get your Fire Princess back right away, you could toss one of them to Painful Choice, too. Painful Choice helped you get your deck going very quickly. Because of how many decks could use it to great advantage, it eventually was banned. In the 2018 game, it would be the most broken card ever because of how important the graveyard is to today’s game. Pot of Greed and Graceful Charity were extremely powerful draw cards that would eventually be banned as well. There’s no strategy to Pot of Greed; you just draw two cards. Graceful Charity, which would be at two copies for some time, was a bit more strategic, since although you draw three cards, you have to discard two. However, in this Fire Princess deck, you hope to be able to just toss two Maries. Card Destruction was legal for years but banned in recent years. This card forces you and your opponent to discard your hand and draw new cards equal to the number you discarded. It was pretty good for reloading a dead hand, but it could help your opponent out, too. It’s just too good in today’s game for filling the graveyard. The last banned card is Premature Burial. This card wasn’t really worthy of being banned at the time because as an equip spell, it could be destroyed very easily. But, people would discover how easy it was to abuse this card in later years. Other cards would come that allowed you to abuse Equipment cards, which would lead to Premature Burial being banned. But, it’s a great card, because if you have to toss one of your Fire Princesses, you can get it back easily. Now, onto the unbanned cards, we look at perhaps the best card in the deck: Messenger of Peace! Honestly, the Messenger is one of the best old-school cards that still has seen play in recent years. This continuous Spell Card says: “Monsters with 1500 or more ATK cannot declare an attack. Once per turn, during your Standby Phase, pay 100 LP or destroy this card.” That 100 LP price is so tiny for what it does. There are two copies in the deck, as while you probably want a third copy, drawing into a third can make it a dead card. Personally, though, I’d run three and just run 41 cards. It’s that good, and you want to make sure you get it ASAP. The monster destruction package in the deck is all still legal in 2018: Dark Hole, Raigeki, and Tribute to the Doomed. While Tribute to the Doomed was often considered a pretty underwhelming card, it can target. The drawback of discarding a card isn’t even a big deal, as you can pitch a Marie or other unneeded card. Decks that played big tribute monsters, like Blue-Eyes White Dragon, also played this card so they could bring back the Dragon with something like Monster Reborn. Of course, Monster Reborn is legal in 2018, too. Not only can he revive one of your monsters, but he can get one of your opponent’s monsters, too! Nifty. Trap Card Breakdown The trap cards are all pretty vital to this deck, and the only one banned today is Imperial Order. That’s because Imperial Order is a nasty, dirty card that was banned before I even started playing. Imperial Order negates the effects and activation of all Spell cards. While Imperial Order has a drawback of requiring the owner to pay 700 LP during each standby phase, this isn’t really a drawback, because you can just choose to destroy it when it no longer suits you. It allowed lesser decks to win games all the time, which is why it was banned. Onto the cards that make the deck tick… Solemn Wishes is a sweet little Continuous Trap card that gains you 500 LP each time you would draw cards. While it’s not for each card you draw, this card is going to gain you a lot of life. While three copies would seem better, as having two gains you 500 LP twice, three just clogs up your Spell and Trap zones too much. That’s because there’s another important Continuous Trap card in the deck, three copies of Gravity Bind. If you can’t get Messenger of Peace to stick, Gravity Bind prevents all monsters Level 4 or higher from attacking. You don’t care about attacking in this deck, anyway. Gravity Bind will often win you the game by itself, and it’s nearly as good in 2018 as it was then - although XYZ and Link monsters get around it by lacking levels. Ceasefire is a burn deck staple, dealing 500 damage to your opponent for each effect monster on the field, including your opponent’s! It even flips up face-down monsters and negates the effects when they flip. This is a great card for many reasons and it continues to see play in Chain Burn in modern Yu-Gi-Oh! In 2018, you can even run three copies! Back then, and rightly so, you could only play one copy. Magic Jammer was a card a lot of people were actually not using as much by 2003, but the Old School Expert (and myself) still loved this card. It stops any Spell Card from being activated, for the cost of a discard. Again, that discard can still be to your advantage. Magic Cylinder was a staple in many decks at the time, but was particularly powerful in burn for obvious reasons. Not only does this Labyrinth of Nightmare secret rare - reprinted since a billion times - negate the attack, but it sends the damage right back at your opponent. Oftentimes, Magic Cylinder could finish a game on its own. One of my favorite Yu-Gi-Oh cards of all time, you can play three copies in 2018! But back then, you could only run one, because this card is nasty. Really, it still is. The last two are format staples: Call of the Haunted and Mirror Force. While Call of the Haunted isn’t played nearly as much in the modern game, it was a great way to revive a Monster that you pitched into the Graveyard earlier. Mirror Force, today at two copies, still is in many modern decks, sometimes in the sideboard. If I Were Playing This Fire Princess Burn Deck… Really, the only thing I’d change if I were playing this burn deck in the format that it was made for, is a third copy of Messenger of Peace. There are enough discard outlets in this deck that if I find that third copy as a dead card, it’s not a big deal. I really just want to make sure that I get a Gravity Bind or Messenger of Peace to stick. Otherwise you’re going to be in trouble. The other thing about this deck is consistency. If you can’t get one of your Fire Princess to stick, it can be miserable. Still, I wouldn’t play a third UFO Turtle, because it’s going to be dead more often than not. This deck is pretty much good as it is. There were many other burn variants at the time, but they were usually somewhat similar to this. Many people played the full three copies of Cure Mermaid, for example. There was also Skull Invitation, a trap card from Pharaoh's Servant that would deal 300 damage for each card that went to the graveyard to the owner of the card. You’d be ahead enough in Life Points where this was actually more in your favor. For me, it would’ve been a decent sideboard card, and it was a common by the time I played. Another Trap card I remember being played sometimes, often in the sideboard, was a short print also from Pharaoh’s Servant called Numinous Healer. This trap card could be activated whenever you took damage to your Life Points. You’d increase your life points by 1000, and for each Numinous Healer already in your Graveyard, it would give you an additional 500 LP. There’s actually a cute combo with Skull Invitation, since the damage you’d take from Invitation could let you activate Healer. While this combo is cool, it’s very reliant on trap cards, so Jinzo would give you a very bad day. Not long later, Magician’s Force would give the deck Wave-Motion Cannon, a card so powerful it would even be banned for a time. When I started playing Yu-Gi-Oh “for real” the Fire Princess deck had a lot of new tools. Ancient Sanctuary was the set that was just released when I began playing seriously. This set would give the deck some new ways to go. There were so many great burn cards in the set. Some people opted to run a Solar Flare Dragon package in addition to Fire Princess for extra burn damage. There was also a Spell Card called Goblin Thief which heals you 500 LP and inflicts 500 damage on your opponent. It was a pretty nasty card with one or more Fire Princess in play. Spell Absorption would come much later with Flaming Eternity. Way later, in Light of Destruction, there was Golden Ladybug. These cards are awesome, but they’re way out of this era. If you were burning this sort of deck today, though, they’d be highly considered. There’s also “Nurse Burn,” a totally different kind of deck that still sees some play in Modern Yu-Gi-Oh. Burn has continued to be an awesome archetype in Yu-Gi-Oh! While Fire Princess Burn is much too slow in the Modern game, it was an awesome deck back in its day, and still an awesomely fun deck to play. Have you ever played with or against Fire Princess? Would you build a Fire Princess burn deck today? by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist  I’m not sure what surprises me more: that there’s a Yu-Gi-Oh card called Cockadoodledoo, or that a card called Cockadoodledoo is actually good. Originally printed in the Judgment of the Light set and reprinted in the 2014 Mega-Tins Mega Pack, this Ultra Rare Level 5 Tuner is much more than it first appears.
With 1600 ATK and 2000 DEF, the Winged Beast Cockadoodledoo seems nothing to write home about, not for a Level 5 monster. But, the effects on this monster is where this rooster gets interesting. If there are no monsters on the field, you can special summon Cockadoodledoo from your hand as a Level 3 monster! That’s pretty neat. But, if your opponent controls a monster, and you don’t, you can special summon Cockadoodledoo as a Level 4 monster! There’s only one drawback to Cockadoodledoo. If he leaves the field for any reason, you banish him instead of sending him to the graveyard. This is sad, but considering how versatile he is, it’s worth the cost. As a tuner, he can help summon just about any Synchro Monster there is. Unsurprisingly, Cockadoodledoo has seen some competitive play, from way back in late 2014 in Qliphorts decks to ABC-Dragon Buster decks in 2018. Being able to be Level 3, Level 4, or Level 5 depending on the situation is quite a boon in any Synchro-happy deck. This is a very good card, despite how silly the name and art would make it seem. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist An Old School Duelist’s Review of a New School “Fur Hire” Yu-Gi-Oh! Card  Beat, Bladesman Fur Hire has really caught my attention from the Yu-Gi-Oh Dark Saviors set. Dark Saviors introduces the “Fur Hire” archetype to the game, and in many ways, they remind me of Blackwings, except potentially more consistent! The Fur Hire monsters are great at swarming, which can lead to all sorts of shenanigans. In particular the Porcupine Warrior, Beat, who looks rather like a cat with a porcupine suit to me, is very important to the deck’s strategy.
Like other Fur Hire monsters, Beat allows you during your Main Phase, you can special summon another Fur Hire monster from your hand, as long as it’s not another copy of Beat. What makes Beat special is that if any monster "Fur Hire" is special summoned while Beat’s in play, you can add another “Fur Hire” monster, except another Beat, from your Deck to your hand. This is really solid, because it means you can always keep loading up on monsters into your hand. While you can only use either effect once per turn, that’s more than good enough. As a secret rare from Dark Saviors, a set in which cards are either Super Rare or Secret Rare, Beat, Bladesman Fur Hire is one of the more sought-after cards in the set. While Beat has a really powerful second effect, his stats are a bit underwhelming, a Level 3 warrior with 1200 ATK and 500 DEF. Still, no “Fur Hire” deck should go without playing the full three copies of Beat, Bladesman Fur Hire, just because he helps your deck’s consistency in adding monsters to your hand for a constant onslaught. Do you like the “Fur Hire” monsters? They seem pretty cool to me. Yu-Gi-Oh - Solemn Judgment and Monster Reborn No Longer Banned in Tournament Play (February 2018)2/4/2018 Classic Yu-Gi-Oh cards Solemn Judgment and Monster Reborn are unbanned from the Forbidden List.
by Phoenix Desertsong
Solemn Judgment and Monster Reborn were staples in almost every Yu-Gi-Oh for many years. But there came a time when Konami decided that these cards were too powerful and too much of an auto-include to remain legal in tournament play. For years, these two cards weren't allowed in tournament play. But in Feburary 2018, Solemn Judgment and Monster Reborn were removed from the Yu-Gi-Oh Forbidden List and moved to the Limited list. This means that you may now play one copy of each of these cards in any deck in tournament play – effective February 5th, 2018. Plus, after July 15th, 2019, Solemn Judgment was unrestricted, meaning you could play up to three copies in a deck! So should everyone go out and grab some copies of Solemn Judgment and Monster Reborn to slot into their decks? Absolutely! 
Solemn Judgment is an awesome counter trap card originally printed in Metal Raiders, but has been reprinted many times over the years. It allows you stop a summon or the activation a spell or trap card. The cost is half of your Life Points. While this seems like a hefty cost, later in the game when your life points are already low, this isn't a huge cost.
Once, many decks would play three copies of this card. One copy is perfectly fine to have as a catch-all counter. But, now that it's again unlimited, it will be interesting to see just how many people play three copies again. It's a great card for just about any Yu-Gi-Oh deck and a classic Yu-Gi-Oh card. 
While Solemn Judgment was always a good card in competitive play, Monster Reborn is easily the more iconic Yu-Gi-Oh card of the two. Monster Reborn saw tons of play in the anime and what it does is extremely straightforward: special summon a monster from either player's graveyard. Yes, that's extremely powerful. But Konami decided that it was time to bring back this classic card to competitive play to see how it fares.
Both of these cards will be showing up all over the places. It will be interesting to see how these two cards fit into today's top Yu-Gi-Oh decks. by Phoenix Desertsong, Old School Duelist
Kizan is very straightforward. If you control another Six Samurai monster other than Kizan, you can special summon Kizan from your hand. If you control two other Six Samurai monsters, he gains 300 ATK and DEF. He’s been a staple in Six Samurai decks since his release in Storm of Ragnarok.
With Spirit Warriors releasing new Secret Six Samurai monsters, I’m excited to see a classic Yu-Gi-Oh deck get some new blood! |
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