Open a Can of Worms
 
If there is one thing that I have seen in the game from reading the results of YCS San Mateo and talking to people that went are that Dragon Rulers were dominant. Up to 80% of all the decks that players went up against were a form of Drgon ruler variant. This tells me two things. The first is that Konami's attempts to nerf the deck were not enough. Each individual Dragon Ruler is too easy to bring out and swing for massive damage, and the fact that they generate card advantage and comeback plays is just the icing on the cake. Dragons will get hit, HARD. The second thing I learned is that the format is based more on advantage of cards and ATK points than at any other time in recent history as opposed to making an unbeatable beast or swarming the field.
 
You would think that this would create an ideal opportunity for control decks to thrive, but there wasn't a single control deck anywhere near the top tables all day, and that is because the trap cards aren't really there to support a dedicated control deck. That got me started thinking along two veins, what are the most successful Trap cards in the game that we can still use and what deck would not have a chance in hell of being hit AT ALL by the banlist.
 
The two cards I thought of were Icarus Attack and Memory of an Adversary. Unfortunately , Blackwings are the only good deck that can use Icarus and that deck is far too tight to play around with too much, not to mention too close to the banlist hammer already. The two decks that I thought up that didn't come close to being hit with a list and were fairly successful in the past were Monarchs and Worms. As I have built Monarch decks in th epast and they are not the worlds best control version, I decided to go with Worms.

 

Imagine my horror and disappointment to discover that i owned no W Nebula Meteorite, the best card in the Worm arsenal. Well I decided to make the deck anyway, and was completely surprised by the beast that emerged. The deck not only thrived without Meteorite, I think it is better without it. I was able to fit in more utility cards, as most of my cards remove a threat from your field or add threats or answers to mine and not have to worry about playing a Worm King and whether or not I will draw it and make my Meteorites almost worthless.

 

This deck has answers to many different things, slows down the game so that my traps and monsters can deal with my opponent and is still nimble and consistent enough to deal with rogue decks and can consistently pull off an acceptable opening hand. Who knew that worms could be so good?

 

Worm Ridden Filth

 

Monsters-18

 

2x Worm Prince

 

3x Worm Yagan

3x Worm Xex

3x Worm Cartaros

2x Worm Dimikles

1x Worm Tentacles

1x Worm Linx

1x Thunderking Rai-Oh

1x Honest

 

Spells-9

 

3x Mystical Space Typhoon

2x Pot of Duality

2x Black Garden

1x Dark Hole

1x Terraforming

 

Traps-14

 

3x Offering to the Snake Deity

2x Memory of an Adversary

2x Phoenix Wing Wind Blast

2x Fiendish Chain

2x Mirror Force

1x Solemn Warning

1x Torrential Tribute

1x Bottomless Trap Hole

 

Extra- 15

 

2x Maestroke the Symphony Djinn

2x Starliege Paladynamo

1x Number 39: Utopia

1x Number c39: Utopia Ray

1x Steelswarm Roach

1x Number 91: Thunder Spark Dragon

1x Evilswarm Ouroboros

1x Gem-Knight Pearl

1x Diamond Dire Wolf

1x Photon Papilloperative

1x Number 85: Crazy Box

1x Gagaga Cowboy

1x Stardust Dragon

 

Worm Food

 

Now that you have had a chance to look this over, it does look like a random piece of junk huh? But in actually it is an adaptability machine, able to take on a surprisingly large amount of situations and come out on top via the Traps and monster recovery. The worms are pretty self explanatory. I opted for one Linx so that I could play a Thunderking and Prince instead of King because he is better in more situations and helps gain advantage.

 

Honest is surprising to many players as they don't realize that they are LIGHT monsters. I can even use Honest offensively with Tentacles, able to inflict massive damage and take out multiple opposing monsters. Tentacles is especially good at killing Black Garden Tokens.

 

Speaking of Black Garden, my spells are fairly minimal, giving mor eimportance to Traps to stop opponents actions. Garden slows the game down and forces an opponent to use their precious Typhoons on them while my Traps keep hounding them.

 

The Traps are there to keep my opponent off the board. Memory adds a threat to my board and stops an opposing offensive and is very good early to mid game. Wind Blast is great for getting rid of anything I want as well as disrupting my opponent's next draw. At worst it is a costly Compulsory, at best it is a complete deck stoppper.

 

Offerings is where my mind went after Icarus Attack. Offerings is actually better, as it destroys all three cards at the same time while not requiring a cost and there are few Reptiles I wouldn't mind throwing at it. Mirror Force is great at stopping an offensive and is pretty much a standard defensive option now.

 

Starliege Paladynamo i smy winning card, able to push through massive damage, stopping annoying effects and then netting me a card when he dies. All awesome. I almost never make anything other than Maestroke or Paladynamo, the others are there for options.

 

Inchworming to Victory

 

The deck has many favorable matchups. Machines, Mermails and Dark World are particularly susceptible as they rely on playing many monsters at once. The deck is alright against Dragon Ruler Variants, Chaos Dragons and Burn. They in general make too many big monsters for my little worms to deal with or just don't play any.

 

The deck can actually do fairly well with a Meteorite Suite put in, but I just don't like the inconsistency of it. Worm King can also be very effective instead of Prince, or even Victory or Warlord should you prefer. I decided against Hand Traps, as Maxx "C" doesn't save me too much and Effect Veiler is not quite as good as Black Garden or Fiendish Chain.

 

The deck has a 57% win ratio against the decks above as an average. I have not tested against Blackwings, although I do think it will be a bad matchup against the deck. After Game two, depending on the player, the win percentage drops to 42%. Keep in mind that these figures are done with limited games played and against different players, so they should not be taken out of context.

 

My recommendation is to try the deck out. It is super cheap to make, and if you already have the extra deck it is even cheaper. It is also a ton of fun to play, disrupting a cocky opponent to the point they pull hair or just overwhelming an opponent with cards they don't know.

 

Well that is it for this article, I hope you all enjoyed it and learned something. I fyou have any questions, ideas, decks fixes or comments, please email me at alarbios@live.com and put YGO in the title so I don't spam it.

 

Thanx for Reading!

GZ