August 2006
How to turn discarding from hand into
game-winning ultimate moves – By Paul Yeem
Hi! It’s me, Carrotizer, and I’d like to talk about
the discarding. As a part of game mechanics,
discarding from your hand is usually painful –
automatically, you lose the card and it is sent to
the graveyard immediately. It’s like drawing, except
it is opposite; you want to draw as many as you can,
and discard as few as possible. Although some cards,
such as Graceful Charity, force you to discard as a
part of an effect, you have a way of turning this
card into your advantage! (Pot of Avarice, just to
include it)
The most common card type is Dark World. As widely
known as…uh…Goldd…um…anyway, it is sometimes
splashed into Chaos + Return decks because of its
deadliness. Spirit Reapers are hard to take care of,
and they can deal more than 300 damage when they
attack directly; it forces you to discard 1 random
card from your hand. You won’t know what will be
discarded until the resolution of the effect – and
neither will they! Before Dark World was played,
people attacked with the Reapers to discard 1 or 2
last cards from the opponents to make them topdeck.
However, after Dark World monsters were released,
they figured out not to attack and get rid of those
last 2 cards – hard way. Usually it is –1 for the
receiving end, but when the ciritical scythe of the
zombie hits a Dark World card, BOOM! It’s not –1
anymore; it is +2 now, if Goldd or Silvva is
discarded, and +1 if Broww is hit. Most of the time,
it will be Goldd because duelists like the field
nuked instead of nuking the hand. Either way…ouch.
Another well-known way to use discard as your
advantage is discarding big monsters to revive them.
Dark Magician of Chaos is usually the target.
Graceful Charity + Dark Magician of Chaos +
Premature/set Call of the Haunted = Graceful + Spell
Card of your pick! Also, Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys
works incredibly well with revival engine because
even if they destroy the connected card, Phoenix
will just drop by on your next standby and nuke the
entire Spell/Trap Zone. Discard that “huge” Treeborn
Frog, or Night Assailant and you won’t lose
anything. Get that Elemental Hero Necroid into the
graveyard and summon Bladedge or Neo! If not, get
that Destiny Hero – Dasher and special summon that
Jinzo you just drew! It’s like chess, one of my
favorite board games; possibilities are limited by
only your knowledge.
Last, but possibly never so, recourse for discarding
your precious hand is for the chaos “food.” Observed
as one of the most easiest yet critical move, it
often ends game, more often than it becomes
disadvantages. Graceful Charity + discard Zaborg &
Jinzo + Chaos Sorcerer + Return from the Different
Dimension usually seal the duel for good.
I really hope September ban list is more balanced.
Not that CC (whatever they may stand for, Cookie
Cutter, Chaos Control, blah blah) is “broken,” the
game is too unbalanced, possibly NOT because Chaos
Sorcerer too good (it is good, but it’s not like BLS),
but because of the lack of supports for other
themes. (VW)XYZ needs more support =/
By Paul Yeem – Carrotizer @ paulyeem@hotmail.com
