One thing that many players are noticing
about the game is that damage to the
lifepoints is what really counts when it
comes to winning, not necessarily the number
of cards that you have on the field and in
your hand. This is why OTK's keep on popping
up (curse you Demise!) and people are making
the switch from Mobius and Thestalos to
Raiza and Zaborg in their monarch decks. The
last two enable the player to make quick
strikes of damage against an opponent rather
than taking out cards, which is what the
first two do best.
What this means is that your win condition
is making your opponent's lifepoints 0 by
any means necessary, and not to beat them to
death with card advantage. This indicates a
needed shift to tempo setting, damage
dealing, speedy decks. We see this in the
new Machine beatdown build especially, and
as a bonus, many of the cards generate
advantage as well.
What is Tempo? And how do I use it?
This is a very hard question to answer, as
differing situations and people refer to the
term in different ways. I define it as the
ability of a player to force an opponent
into a reactionary situation, where they are
responding to whatever it is that you are
doing, essentially keeping constant pressure
on the opponent. Forcing an opponent to
react to you would be to something like this
situation below:
Player One-"I sacrifice Bealze Frog to
summon my Zaborg the Thunder Monarch.
Response?"
Player Two-"No."
Player One-"Zaborg is summoned, activating
his effect. I target your face up Mobius the
Frost Monarch and it is destroyed. Zaborg
Attacks directly. End turn"
Player Two-"I play Smashing Ground to
destroy Zaborg and end."
Player One-"I activate Premature Burial to
Special Summon Zaborg the Thunder Monarch.
Zaborg Attacks directly. End turn."
Player one is able to keep a constant amount
of pressure on Player Two in the above
example because of his clever use of Zaborg.
He forces his opponent to play his game
instead of allowing an opponent to develop
field presence in order to synchronize a
counter attack. This not only keeps Player
Two from winning the game, but depletes his
lifepoints in the mean time. This is more of
a play style change rather than a deck style
change, as many decks can keep pressure on
the opponent, it is just a matter of whether
the player plays conservatively or
aggressively.
How do I make my deck faster? How do
I win using speed?
There are tons and tons of cards out there
that make decks faster. To create a complete
list would take far too long, but the more
prominent cards are:
These cards all thin your deck in order to
make it more likely that you will draw a
card that you need when the time comes. They
also accelerate you into getting more cards
in different places. Merchant gives you a
spell or trap and Reasoning trades a spell
for a monster The Recruiting cards also
summon a monster to the field, adding to
your tempo. If you can manage many special
summons in a turn, then you will likely win
the game. We see this with Destiny Hero
decks as well as the Trooper/Machine
Duplication combo. By the time that these
cards hit the table, your tempo is an
unstoppable juggernaut. This is how you use
speed to win.
How do I deal damage to end the
game?
Well obviously summoning 3 monsters in a
turn is and attacking is one way that you
can do this, but there are also burn cards
that inflict damage to your opponent's
lifepoints. Here is a list of these cards
and some others that will deal massive
damage to your opponent.
Injection Fairy Lily
Ring of Destruction
Trooper/Duplication combo
Magic Cylinder
Ring of Destruction
Many of these cards are already seen in many
decks. This is because these are the money
cards that win games.
So how do I put it all together?
Well, there are very many strategies out
there right now for bringing together all of
these things. The machine beatdown deck,
Justin Womack's deck and a fast warrior deck
all have these things together. However,
these decks (except for the machine deck)
all have the problem of running out of cards
as well as being vulnerable to counter
attack. It is not very hard to put all of
these things together, but making it work is
the kicker. I would go ahead and look at the
feature matches on
www.Metagame.com featuring these speedy
decks. Then you can look and see what works
for them and then try it out for yourself
and then tweak it as needed for your play
style. If you need more speed, add
Reasoning. If you need less vulnerability to
counter attack, Spirit Reaper is needed
there. SUit the deck to your play speed, but
it better be fast, because if you aren't,
you will be left in the dust.
