DM7FGD's Look Into the Future

Article #13 - Majestic Magicians

Let me first begin today’s article with a little note to point out a mistake in a past article of mine..

In my Tenacious Traps article, I stated that Judgment of Anubis may be used on Dust Tornado. Well, quite simply, I don’t know why I said that, because JoA can not be used on Dust Tornado, as JoA works only on Magic Cards.

Now that that’s taken care of, let’s begin today’s article. Stay with me, because this is going to be quite a lengthy one. Today we take a look at 4 interesting Spellcasters of the future English game and current Japanese game. We begin with a look at the Dark Paladin, which is coming very soon in Magician’s Force. Probably a card that a CotD will also be done on soon after Magician’s Force is released.

*That may not be the exact text on the English card.*

This Monster’s certainly one of the more powerful Fusion Monsters. It’s likely to be a bit overrated, and widely-played, but it’s really not too great of a card as some make it out to be. It’s pretty darn good, though, and that much is obvious. The first part of its Effect, that it can only be Summoned by a Fusion Summon, does not mean that Fusion subs (Such as Versago the Destroyer) can not be used with Dark Paladin. Fusion Sub Monsters can indeed be used with Dark Paladin. A Fusion Sub + Dark Magician, Fusion Sub + Buster Blader, or Buster Blader + Dark Magician are the ways to Fusion Summon for the Dark Paladin.

Dark Paladin’s like a continuous Magic Jammer in Monster form. Great with Sinister Serpent, obviously. Opponent activates a Magic Card, you chain by discarding a card from your hand, and that Magic Card is negated and destroyed. It’s as simple as that, really. That Effect can certainly come in handy in various points in a duel. You may think that Dark Paladin’s quite hard to get around if you can get it out onto the Field. Well, there are still plenty of Trap Cards and Monsters that could easily take care of the Dark Paladin. One, for example, since it’s coming in the same set, being the Tribe-Infecting Virus. (Exclusitivity Virus - Check Troublesome Trio article)

Although it’s not too likely for either you or your opponent to have many Dragon Monsters on your Fields/in your Graveyards, that Effect of gaining 500 ATK points for each Dragon could be a pretty useful power-up. Could be nice to use a Spear Dragon or two in a deck using the Dark Paladin, even though you’d probably want to use it in a Spellcaster-based Deck.

Dark Paladin’s pretty fun to play and try out in some decks, but like I said earlier, although it is powerful, it’s not as powerful as most make it out to be. It’s not exactly too easy to Fusion Summon it, due to its requirements, but if you can, it’s certainly a Monster to reckon with. Overall, I’d rate the Dark Paladin a 7.2/10.

Next, we’ll be taking a look at a card that was released as a Japanese Secret Rare promo card from the GB5 game, and that was reprinted as an Ultimate Rare in the DL1 set; The Dark Sage.

Another Monster dealing with Time Wizard.. Simply because of that, it tells you that this Monster’s not too great =/. Its stats aren’t too impressive, though they would be perhaps if the ATK and DEF were switched around.

In case the text on the Dark Sage is confusing, here’s how to get it out onto the Field..

You need Dark Magician on the Field. Get out Time Wizard and use its Effect. Call the flip right, and destroy all the opponent’s Monsters. Sacrifice your Dark Magician that you have on the Field, and Special Summon the Dark Sage from either your Hand or your Deck. When it’s Special Summoned, you then search your deck for a Magic Card and put it into your hand, then shuffle your deck.

It may seem pretty easy, but it really isn’t all too easy. You need to somehow get a Dark Magician out onto the Field, preferably by discard + revival, then Summon Time Wizard at the same time your DM’s on the Field. You then need to successfully use Time Wizard’s Effect, which you only have a 50/50 chance of doing. It’s pretty hard to pull off, but if you do, it can be pretty effective.

It’s nice to do all that, get out the Dark Sage, then search your deck for a Revival card to revive another Monster and do even more damage. Search for a Draw card, etc. That Effect’s always going to be pretty useful.

I really wouldn’t recommend including the Dark Sage in even a Spellcaster-based deck. It could be fun to try out, but there are plenty of other worthy Monsters to use before wanting to use the Dark Sage. If you use this Monster, I’d suggest basing the deck around getting it out onto the Field as easily as possible. You will indeed have a tough time playing this Monster if you do try it out. Overall I would rate this card a 6/10 at most.

Next is a Ritual Monster. Not too much to say about it, but the next featured card of this article is the Magician of Black Chaos.

Ritual of Black Chaos

Ritual Magic

Effect: Used to Summon a Magician of Black Chaos.

Tribute Monsters from your hand and/or Field with total levels of 8 or more to Summon the Magician of Black Chaos.

Just another Ritual Monster here. Just like any other Ritual Monster, except quite a bit weaker than some others, such as Black Luster Soldier or Masked Hellraiser, and of course the Ritual Monster I reviewed in my Ritual Monsters article; Dark Master - Zork and Shinato - Ruler of Heavens.

Compared to the others, 2800 ATK isn’t that great. Having to Sacrifice 8 Levels worth of Monsters to bring out this Magician isn’t exactly something I’d want to do, so this certainly is not a card I’d recommend even for Spellcaster decks. I just thought I’d include this Monster and its Ritual in this article because this is indeed an article on future Spellcasters, and this is the only future Spellcaster Ritual Monster.

Nothing special here. I’d rate the Magician of Black Chaos a 4/10. It was released as a Super Rare/Parallel Rare promo card in the Japanese Premium Pack 3, then reprinted as an Ultimate Rare in the 306 set, so there‘s not telling when this Monster will be released in English. For the last featured card of this article, let’s take a look at the Dark Magician’s Knight..

Title of a Knight

Normal Magic

Effect: Tribute one face up Dark Magician on your Field to activate this card.

Special Summon one Dark Magician Knight from your hand, deck, or Graveyard.

Quite an interesting Monster here. I know it’s not a Spellcaster, but it certainly relates with the theme, as it works with the Dark Magician. Has the same stats as Dark Magician, yet has a nice Effect, but a bit of a downside in its Summoning requirement.

It can only be Special Summoned, and only by Title of a Knight. Not being able to be Normal Summoned or Special Summoned any other way is a pretty big downside. It can not be Revived no matter what, or anything. The only way you’ll get this Monster out onto the Field is by the Effect of Title of a Knight. So, what you need to do is get a Dark Magician out onto the Field, and have Title of a Knight ready to play. The Tribute of the Dark Magician is an activation cost. Sort of like Premature Burial’s activation cost is to pay the 800 LP, and if that is chained by an opponent’s Imperial Order or something, you would have paid 800 LP for absolutely nothing, and you could not have revived even a Sangan/Witch to get to search your deck for a Monster. It’s similar with the Knight here. You need to Tribute your Dark Magician to activate Title of a Knight. If it is then chained to by an opponent’s IO, you would have Sacrificed your Dark Magician for absolutely nothing, and 2 of your cards would have been wasted. If this happens, just hope you have an MST ready to play in response to the opponent’s IO.

If you can safely get through that, you’ll have a pretty good Monster being Special Summoned out onto the Field. Bring out the Dark Magician’s Knight, and destroy one of your opponent’s cards on the Field, whether it be a face down M/T card, a face up Monster, or anything. So that’s pretty useful right there. Other than that, this Monster really doesn’t have much going for it, with only the same stats as the Dark Magician.

Dark Magician Knight could be fun to use and try out, but I wouldn’t recommend it for too many Spellcaster/Dark Magician decks. It’s another one of those cards that you’d want to base the deck around completely to utilize it to its full potential. Overall, I’d rate the Dark Magician Knight a 6/10.

Now for a deck example using just the Dark Paladin and the Dark Magician Knight. It’d be extremely, and I mean extremely hard to utilize a deck using all 4 of the featured Monsters in this article. It’s pretty hard to utilize the deck below, as well. I’m just posting it to give a new deck idea, as I do in the rest of my articles.

3x Dark Magician

1x Dark Magician Knight

1x Buster Blader

1x Jinzo

2x Versago the Destroyer

2x Skilled Dark Magician (In Magician’s Force. Look below the deck for its info)

1x Magic Warrior-Breaker (Check Troublesome Trio article)

1x Tribe-Infecting Virus (Check Troublesome Trio; E-Virus)

1x Spirit Reaper

1x Cyber Jar/Fiber Jar (Doesn’t really matter which one in here. Use what you like)

1x Black Forest Witch

1x Sangan

1x Sinister Serpent

3x Toon Index (Works well with Skilled DM. Look below deck for its info)

2x Polymerization

1x Title of a Knight

1x Painful Choice

1x Raigeki

1x Dark Hole

1x Harpy Feather Duster

1x Heavy Storm

3x MST

1x Mirage of Nightmares

1x Pot of Greed

1x Graceful Charity

1x Change of Heart

1x Snatch Steal

1x Monster Reborn

1x Premature Burial

1x Imperial Order

1x Ring of Destruction

1x Waboku

1x Call of the Haunted

1x Mirror Force

2x Dark Paladin

With 43 cards in the deck, Mirage of Nightmares and Painful Choice provide speed, along with of course the other Draw cards. I know this deck isn’t the best you’ve seen me post, but I just thought some of you would want to see a deck example, so I gave it =/.

All 3 Toon Index are meant to be used together, all at the same time during the same turn. So having 3 of those certainly doesn’t slow down the deck. Here are the Effects of Toon Index and Skilled Dark Magician, courtesy of Edo’s Yu-Gi-Oh Page. A link to Edo’s can be found in a few of my other articles, if you‘re interested.

Skilled Dark Magician

Dark/Spellcaster - Level 4 - 1900/1700

Effect: Whenever you or your opponent activates a Magic card, put 1 Magic counter on this card (to a maximum of 3). If this card has 3 Magic counters on it, you can sacrifice this Monster to Special Summon 1 Dark Magician from your hand, deck or Cemetery.

Toon Index

Normal Magic

Effect: Search your deck for one card with Toon in its name and put it into your hand.

*No telling when English release will be*

See, you simply get Skilled DM onto the Field, then play one Toon Index. Skilled DM gains a Magic Counter. Search your deck for another Toon Index, and play that one. Skilled DM now has 2 Magic Counters. Search your deck for the last Toon Index, and play that one. (You don’t need to have a card in your deck with Toon in its name to play the card. You just activate it and search your deck. You see that your deck has no cards with Toon in its name, so although you activated to Toon Index, giving your Skilled DM its third and final Magic Counter, it ends up being useless) Skilled DM gets all the Magic Counters it needs to bring out a Dark Magician, so you then do so.

Magical Scientist could also work well in a Spellcaster deck, but there’s just no real room for it in a deck such as the one above.

Here’s a picture of the 4 Monsters, followed by links to pictures of Title of a Knight and Ritual of Black Chaos.

http://cardhaus.com/images/gb8-002.jpg

http://store5.yimg.com/I/my1stop2shop_1761_88772883

And that’ll do it for today’s article. You can reach me with any questions or comments at dm7fgd32@hotmail.com

Until Next Time..