Piper's Pet Cat

So with the recent YCS, Piper decks have been becoming more popular. The deck has tremendous draw power and all those sacky Chaos cards that make it oh so fun to play, and I thought I would post my version.

2 Tragoedia

1 Black Luster Soldier – Envoy of the Beginning

1 Gorz the Emissary of Darkness

2 Caius the Shadow Monarch

2 Chaos Sorcerer

3 Maxx “C”

3 Mystic Piper

3 Kinka-Byo

3 Battle Fader

3 Effect Veiler

2 D.D. Crow

1 Symphonic Warrior Basses

1 The Fabled Catsith

3 Creature Swap

2 Pot of Duality

2 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Allure of Darkness

1 Dark Hole

1 Heavy Storm

1 Monster Reborn

1 Mind Control

1 One For One

1 T.G. Blade Blaster

1 Must Wurm

1 Scrap Dragon

1 Stardust Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Arcanite Magician

1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier

1 T.G. Hyper Librarian

1 Ally of Justice – Catastor

1 The Fabled Unicore

1 Armory Arm

1 Formula Synchron

1 Number 39: Utopia

1 Leviair the Sea Dragon

1 Wind-Up Zenmaines

Now this is nothing at all like the YCS version but I’ve had it since before then so this is not too surprising, I plan to make another later on taking the YCS version into account. This build functions in an extremely passive-aggressive manner, taking advantage of the opponent’s plays to advance its own position and stockpiling with Piper and Kinka all the while.

It has a total of 16 Level 1 monsters so double draws off Piper occur frequently. Fader, Gorz, Tragoedia, Veiler, Maxx “C”, and D.D. Crow all being taken into account also gives it a total of 14 hand traps, meaning committing to the field is rarely a necessity and first turn shenanigans can be hard to get off.

Caius the Shadow Monarch is for gamewinning plays, if I can drop it properly I’ll usually win that duel. Its dead sometimes, but in that case I’ll usually just discard it for another dark in the grave. This is pretty easy to do, the deck has a massive hand the majority of the time and I often have to discard at the end phase.

Which is where my favourite bit of tech comes in, The Fabled Catsith. Just taking a turn and not seeing the need to make a commitment preps it to destroy anything the opponent has face-up that could be causing you problems.

Symphonic Warrior Basses is a recurring Tuner thanks to Kinka, and with your massive hand it can be reshaped into a pretty high level. Creature Swap and Mind Control take advantage of this further, and combined with Tragoedia you can make basically any level you like.

The rest of it seems fairly self-explanitory, with the exception of the extra deck. The Fabled Unicore is run because it can be played with Catsith, but Fabled Ragin is not because your hand is unlikely to ever diminish that much. T.G. Blade Blaster is for Formula Synchron Mind Control plays, its generic so a better choice than Shooting Star Dragon; you see Scrap Dragon just as often as Stardust Dragon these days anyway.

Peace guys.

Shuffling the Hand

Hey guys I’m going to start updating regularly now, which probably means shorter posts but more info on the whole. Yay!

This was something that occurred to me a while ago. Each time I draw a card, before I make my next play, I shuffle my hand. Often my opponent, seeing this, will shuffle their hand in response. Occasionally they will spam it, which accomplishes little and is annoying quite frankly. Usually they just won’t shuffle at all unless a card attacks their hand, like Spirit Reaper or Wind-Up Hunter.

This is not really bad play or anything like that, this isn’t really the most important thing to think about. But there is a distinct purpose to shuffling the hand, and I think a lot of the people I face are missing it.

The purpose of shuffling the hand is to give the opponent less information about your plays.

How does this work, you might ask?

Imagine I have two cards in hand. I draw a third for my turn, and then play it immediately; Tour Guide from the Underworld. The opponent activates Solemn Warning, negates and destroys it. I place one card face down and end my turn.

Looks simple enough, right? But I am giving my opponent more information than I need to right there. Since I played the card I drew and I did it pretty fast, it is likely that I do not have anything else of that nature in my hand. Furthermore, since I had the card I just set already in my hand and I didn’t set it earlier, there is a good chance that it is a bluff and he can play aggressively.

I essentially just told my opponent my hand was worthless.

Compare it to this scenario. I draw a card, shuffle my hand, and then play Tour Guide. My opponent, unless he saw my hand earlier, will not know if I drew it that turn. He activates Warning, negates and destroys it. But now he can’t just dismiss the other two cards in my hand as being worthless, so if I then set a card facedown, bluffing Mirror Force, my opponent will have to play around that. If he knew I didn’t draw it that turn, he would be easily able to deduce it wasn’t Mirror Force, as I would have set it sooner.

Overall, this is a small thing, and one that you do not really need to learn. However, the little things like that can mean the difference between a win and a loss on occasion, and remembering to do this after every draw is overall a pretty easy thing to learn.

I should also note that there are three other purposes to shuffling it, but they are less important in my eyes.

The first of these is to bluff. With Veiler, Maxx “C”, and Gorz being what they are, the thought of them can put players off attempting a game-winning play simply because of how much its failure would hurt them.

I’m not really a fan of this though, because it draws the opponent’s attention to the hand, and they may make deductions based on the fact that you are shuffling it. Now I’m not saying that this method doesn’t work; it most certainly does sometimes. But bringing your hand to my attention can just as easily tell me that I’m in the clear to make my game-winning play, as if you had an out you probably wouldn’t shuffle it and draw my attention to it as such.

If you can pull this off, by all means do so. But I see it backfiring as often as it works, so I steer clear of this.

The second of these is to give yourself a new perspective on your hand. This is useful for some people I suppose, I do use this occasionally, but the vast majority of the time I do not need to do this and think the majority of people don’t either. This is far more useful when dueling in real life than on Dueling Network.

The third is entirely unnecessary if you do it after each draw. It is also the one I see most often; when an attack with something like Spirit Reaper is declared, the player shuffles the hand to randomise the discard. Since the hand would be randomised by the shuffle after each draw anyway, this would be essentially meaningless.

Peace guys.

BWST Under the new Banlist

UPDATE O.O

This was written over several days and has not been proof-read. Might have spelling errors or something.

Yah so I am frequently asked about this deck at the moment. Its the thing I am seen using on DN the vast majoriity of the time. It is versatile, fast, and I have already mentioned it before on this blog twice, but with the new banlist and my knowledge increasing I guess another couldn't hurt.

So here is the basic structure of BWST.

3 Tour Guide from the Underworld
3 Armageddon Knight
3 Effect Veiler
3 Maxx C
2 Necro Gardna
1 Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning
1 Gorz the Emissary of Darkness
1 Sangan
1 Blackwing - Zephyrus the Elite
1 Plaguespreader Zombie

2 Pot of Duality
2 Mystical Space Typhoon
1 Allure of Darkness
1 Reinforcement of the Army
1 Heavy Storm
1 Dark Hole
1 Monster Reborn
1 Mind Control

3 Call of the Haunted
3 Limit Reverse

1 Ally of Justice - Catastor
1 T.G. Hyper Librarian
1 Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier
1 Black Rose Dragon
1 Scrap Dragon
1 Mist Wurm
1 Number 17: Leviathan Dragon
1 Number 20: Brilliant
1 Leviair the Sea Dragon
1 Wind-Up Zemnaines
1 Number 39: Utopia


This deck will always, always, have most of those cards in. A few are optional, but it tends to work best with them all there. This is a very powerful, very versatile engine.

The deck revolves around Sangan. Yes Sangan is limited, but its simply so easy to search that this doesn't matter. 3 Armageddon Knight, 3 Tour Guide, 1 Reinforcement of the Army are used primarily to place Sangan in the grave as early as possible, where it can be repeatedly manipulated with Call of the Haunted and Limit Reverse.

Now obviously using Tour Guide to send Sangan to the grave is the more benificial play, but because the deck runs 2 Pot of Duality now its not always possible to do that. Go with Guide if you draw it, otherwise just use Armageddon, both do the job well enough.

After Sangan is in the grave, Tour Guide and Armageddon Knight become the fuel that powers the deck. Armageddon Knight is able to send to the grave Necro Gardna, Plaguespreader Zombie, and Blackwing - Zephyrus the Elite. Gardna is promarily for defense, but the first two of these can give you some explosive plays. Armageddon ditching Plague with either Call or Limit Reverse ready can give you either Mist Wurm and a Sangan search, Catastor/Librarian and a Sangan search, or Brionac. Usually it will be one of the first two, because Brionac is a minus.

Zephyrus is usually the play that follows the Plaguespreader play. Summon Armageddon Knight, send Zephyrus, add back the Call/Limit Reverse you used to get Sangan to SS Zephyrus, and make Utopia. So not only do you get Utopioa, but another use out of your resurrection trap.

Tour Guide's plays are well known of course. Leviathan for a 2500 beater, Leviair for toolboxing banished cards, Zenmaines for either stall or attacking to rid them of a pesky monster. But outside of Wind-Ups and Inzektors, Brilliant is usually ignored, and here it is surprisingly effective. It can make your opponent think twice about using their Rai-Oh on it, can set up for or bluff BLS-EotB, and 2100 beater is not bad at all. Its as viable an option as Leviathan Dragon is turn 1, more so in certain cases. And yes, turn 1 you are going to want to make either Leviathan or Brilliant, in order to set up your Calls/Limit Reverses quickly.

Effect Veiler and Maxx "C" are pro as ever and should always be run at 3. With the only backrow in the deck being resurrection cards, both are invaluable. Both are also searchable; one of this deck's greatest assets is that with Sangan in the grave, all backrow becomes very chainable, and a Heavy Storm or MST can let you add a Veiler or Maxx C to screw with the opponent's plays. It can also add Armageddon Knight and Tour Guide, for aggressive plays next turn.

Black Luster Soldier is run because despite only 3 Lights in the main deck, said lights are very easy to add and send to graveyard, Utopia and Brilliant are easy to play, and it just wins games.

The spells are mostly staples. Allure of Darkness is staple in a deck with this many darks, Reinforcement of the Army adds your Armageddon Knight. Only card that isn't really a staple is Pot of Duality at 2, and that's just because it adds a little consistency early game. I originally ran 3 Upstart instead, and still do in a couple of versions, but certain cards are just not good if they are drawn. See Necro Gardna and Zephyrus.

Gorz is a big beater. It can be fantastic, or it can be dead because you have a dead Limit Reverse on the field. I've deliberated removing it now Call is at 3, but it has proven to be a great card time and time again and can just win games on its own like BLS, so right now its needed.

Extra deck, Utopia is the only rank 4 you need. It is a 2500 beater, light, easy to play, and great for both beating and stalling. The Rank 3s are all Tour Guide toolboxes.

The synchros are fairly standard. Only thing worth mentioning is a lack of Stardust Dragon, because its hard to make LV8 with this deck and when its possible its not worth it if all you're getting is a Stardust.

Now, onto the tech.

This is what defines each and every version of the deck. There are a great many options for what to put in here, and it will basically be what the Sangan engine tries to fall back on. It can be aggressive or defensive, control or beatdown style. The only important thing is that it actually helps the rest of the deck. The tech in your main will be what defines the remaining slots in your extra deck.

If you want to run more than 5 tech cards, I recommend removing 1 Necro Gardna and/or 1 Limit Reverse. Which you do depends on what play style you have in mind.

A few of my favourite techs right now.

3 Wattdragonfly
2 Wattmeter Dragon
1 Honest (-1 Limit Reverse)
1 Magical Android

2 DD Warrior Lady
2 Spirit Reaper
1 Honest
1 Magical Android

3 Caius the Shadow Monarch
2 Battle Fader

3 Chaos End Master
2 Sphere of Chaos
1 Byser Shock (-1 Limit Reverse)
1 Honest (-1 Necro Gardna)
1 Magical Android

I have lots of others but these are my favourites right now. Caius and Fader is great for match-ups where the opponent plays explosively; Holy Marks for example. Fader's searchability prevents OTKs, which is awesome. The Watt engine is just a massive surprise; no one expects anything big from Wattdragonfly. As a bonus, Wattmeter Dragon is a normal monster, and thus has immunity to Fiendish Chain. Warrior Lady and Reaper can make for some awesome disruption plays, being useful both aggressively and defensively. Chaos End Master makes for instant Stardust or Scrap plays, is RotA searchable, and can be used with Honest to amazing effect.

Honest is awesome, although you need to run at least two more light monsters to make it worth it. It most definitely is worth it when you do though. Honest is the most powerful hand trap in the game, and is Sangan searchable. This can make for some explosive plays, especially when you drew BLS-EotB and are prepping an OTK. Magical Android must always go in the Extra Deck if you use Honest.

Because these deck defining cards only take up about five deck slots, it is possible to completely change your deck when it comes to Side-Decking. I almost always have the Caius engine sided, along with whatever other engines I feel would be useful. Being able to swap to a different deck at siding time can really throw an opponent off I find.

Staples in side deck are 2 D.D. Crow (for Inzektors and Wind-Up), 1 Mystical Space Typhoon (backrow heavy decks) and 2 Spirit Reaper (Dino-Rabbit). This leaves space for two engines, so you have the potential to switch between three different decks.

Any questions about this deck, feel free to message me on DN, but this I feel should cover the basics.

Peace.