Basic Deck Building Guide

Well, as Eria suggested, this time I will create a guide for basic deck building. Actually, it's not really my style to write a guide. And actually, this is the first time I actually write a guide. So... I might miss one or two things. If so, sorry about that. At the very least, I hope this guide might help you to build a deck.


Well, this is just for the basic rules of building a deck, not an advanced guide. So...


So... where do we start?



1.) How many cards I should put in my deck?


For the sake of consistency, I HIGHLY recommend you to use only 40 cards in your deck. Lately I saw some people in this forum, used more than 50 cards. I'll tell you something. 9 out of 10, you will lose the duel against nowadays decks, if you have this amount of number for your deck. Especially if the cards are irrelevant one after another and doesn't support each other. Why 40? Because you can draw needed card faster than when you used more than 40 cards. An example of basic formation of a deck with 40 cards is : 20 monsters, 13 spells and 7 traps. Choose your cards well, duelist. How? See the next point.




2.) Use cards that might give you advantage.


You see, card advantage is a very important factor for the duel. Losing advantage means you're losing. And when I'm talking about advantage, it's not about your life points, it's about how many cards you control either on your hand and on your field. Take example, you're on a pinch in a duel, and both you and your opponent has 1 card each in both you and your oppnent's hand, and that one card is, Dian Keto the Cure Master, which heals your LP by 1000. Sure. It will heal your LP by 1000. And then... what? You're only delaying the inevitable : losing.


So, what cards you should use? For beginning, I might recommend you staples. You see, there's a reason why many many duelist used them in their decks. They generate advantages and useful. Let's use cards such as Dark Hole, Mirror Force which would give you more advantage by either destroying opponent cards. And, use cards which adds more cards to your hand, and cards that allows you to unleash your combo faster. such as Pot of Duality, Reinforcement of The Army (If you run a good amount of warrior monsters in your deck). There are more utility cards you can put in your deck which might save you from an a**-kicking or set-up the combo. Like, Book of Moon, Forbidden Lance, etc. For monsters, it's preferable to use a monster which capable of special summon fast or helps you generate advantage (avoid normal monster except when your deck needs them to set up your combo). But that might also depend on what deck you're building. For example Summoner Monk, Lyla, Photon Thrasher, etc.



3.) Extra Deck.


Ah yes... this one is indeed very very important. Sadly, this is often overlooked, while this might strengthen your deck much more than you can imagine. Well of course, I was once trying not to rely on extra deck. But like it or not, you're in the era where monsters from extra deck, especially synchro and xyz are roaming around. Only using "outdated" cards like some effect monsters and even worse, normal monsters... sorry. You're like fighting machine gun with slingshot.


Well, let's just cut the speech and let's see how you can pick your extra deck. Most of the time, extra decks you might want to include could be either synchro or xyz monsters. Before picking, you should check your monster's level in your main deck. Based of their level, you can determine what kind of synchro and xyz you might want to use. For example, when your deck's majority consists of level 4 monsters, you should include more rank 4 xyz. Likewise, if there's a tuner in your deck, you can add some synchro monsters based on their level + some other non-tuner monster from your main deck. Example, if your tuner is level 3, and majority of your non-tuners are level 4, you can put a level 7 synchro monsters for your extra deck (Black Rose Dragon is highly recommended).



Next, you should see the attribute and type of your monster. Some synchro and xyz needs specific material in order to summon them. Like "1 tuner + 1 LIGHT monsters" for synchro, or "2 DARK monsters" for xyz. Some of the are actually more powerful than synchro or xyz with generic material. Therefore, you should check your main deck's monsters if you can afford to summon them, and has a very high chance to summon them. For example, if you have many level 4 WIND monsters in your deck, you can use Lightning Chidori in your deck.



But my suggestion for your extra deck is, check their material to summon them, and try to include extra deck monsters (either synchro or xyz) with generic materials, as much as possible. Even though they might be inferior to those with specific material, they are still pretty strong on their own and can be summoned at any condition. Even Stardust Dragon is still roaming around despite of being one of the 1st generation synchro. Also try to avoid synchro or xyz monsters with more than 2 material to summon them unless your main deck can afford to summon many monsters in one turn and has no problem minus-ing your advantage.



Last but not least, if your deck can afford to fusion summon, it's ok to use some fusion monsters. Cards like Instant Fusion still being use to set up more combo to speed up synchro or xyz summon or several decks which used some fusion monster as their boss monster. But remember, fusion summon might took your advantage at least by 2 if you use polymerization or any normal fusion summon method, so be careful with your pick. Also, be careful. Putting fusion monsters in your extra deck MEANS it takes your extra deck space for the synchro or xyz. So, choose the monsters wisely, duelist.





Example of basic deck :

Nice read.
2 comments
Deck size, I hate hearing "Use 40". I admit, more times then not this is a good idea but it skips why this is a good idea and thus excludes times when it isn't a good idea. A deck should to me use the ammount of cards it needs, using more or less I think weakens it. Because drawing consistantly is useless if you don't have the card you need. Another good example is monster mash, this can be a very consistant and useful deck that needs more then 40. (I bet your Blasting ruin deck agrees that 40 is a bit off, right?) Another example I like to use is my gusto, I usually more then 40, not by much, but I find the ratio is off without the last few, so going back to my idea, a decks needs what it needs . I have another example too, imagine if the deck limit was 30. I bet exodia would be happy, but lets think of a different deck, six sam as example, if it used 30 it might not be as strong as 40. Because the ratio may be hurt and the deck gains consistancy but loses verstility. Since six sam is already consistant at 40, 30 may increase the consistancy but it at too great a cost.

2. Is when you mention card advantage. While agreed card advantage is very important it is quick notable to mention tactical minus. lol otherwise you may get some people to focus on +1. I like how you mention book of moon. I love that card, but it is a innate -1 but it power comes from the change of field it presences at a critical moment. Effect veiler is another example it is also a -1 but abblity to mess up an oppponent makes it more then worth it.

Wynn wrote:

Nice read.
2 comments
Deck size, I hate hearing "Use 40". I admit, more times then not this is a good idea but it skips why this is a good idea and thus excludes times when it isn't a good idea. A deck should to me use the ammount of cards it needs, using more or less I think weakens it. Because drawing consistantly is useless if you don't have the card you need. Another good example is monster mash, this can be a very consistant and useful deck that needs more then 40. (I bet your Blasting ruin deck agrees that 40 is a bit off, right?) Another example I like to use is my gusto, I usually more then 40, not by much, but I find the ratio is off without the last few, so going back to my idea, a decks needs what it needs . I have another example too, imagine if the deck limit was 30. I bet exodia would be happy, but lets think of a different deck, six sam as example, if it used 30 it might not be as strong as 40. Because the ratio may be hurt and the deck gains consistancy but loses verstility. Since six sam is already consistant at 40, 30 may increase the consistancy but it at too great a cost.


2. Is when you mention card advantage. While agreed card advantage is very important it is quick notable to mention tactical minus. lol otherwise you may get some people to focus on +1. I like how you mention book of moon. I love that card, but it is a innate -1 but it power comes from the change of field it presences at a critical moment. Effect veiler is another example it is also a -1 but abblity to mess up an oppponent makes it more then worth it.

What you've seen here is just a basic of deck building, not for an advanced one. It's the very base knowledge for those who want to build a deck. If I want to include advanced deck building guide, it could be much longer than this.

Kirikaze Fuuma wrote:

Wynn wrote:

Nice read.
2 comments
Deck size, I hate hearing "Use 40". I admit, more times then not this is a good idea but it skips why this is a good idea and thus excludes times when it isn't a good idea. A deck should to me use the ammount of cards it needs, using more or less I think weakens it. Because drawing consistantly is useless if you don't have the card you need. Another good example is monster mash, this can be a very consistant and useful deck that needs more then 40. (I bet your Blasting ruin deck agrees that 40 is a bit off, right?) Another example I like to use is my gusto, I usually more then 40, not by much, but I find the ratio is off without the last few, so going back to my idea, a decks needs what it needs . I have another example too, imagine if the deck limit was 30. I bet exodia would be happy, but lets think of a different deck, six sam as example, if it used 30 it might not be as strong as 40. Because the ratio may be hurt and the deck gains consistancy but loses verstility. Since six sam is already consistant at 40, 30 may increase the consistancy but it at too great a cost.


2. Is when you mention card advantage. While agreed card advantage is very important it is quick notable to mention tactical minus. lol otherwise you may get some people to focus on +1. I like how you mention book of moon. I love that card, but it is a innate -1 but it power comes from the change of field it presences at a critical moment. Effect veiler is another example it is also a -1 but abblity to mess up an oppponent makes it more then worth it.

What you've seen here is just a basic of deck building, not for an advanced one. It's the very base knowledge for those who want to build a deck. If I want to include advanced deck building guide, it could be much longer than this.

Oh I know. I wasn't saying bad. lol I actually thought I said "Nice read"
My comment was just that a comment, and I said it because I consider it basic. Advanced players know that veiler is useful at -1. It is beginers that might not realize that value

Can I add to this guide? I have a couple ideas for articles here.

Spoiler:

Also, I kinda want to duel against your basic deck now, Fuuma XD

To be honest, even though I don't think the statement above are not wrong as overall, I don't think that's needed for basic deck building guide. This thread is just to give you the basic of how to build a deck, while if you enter the archetype or decks with specific theme, that means you will need an advanced guide, while this guide is just to teach the new players about the basics of deck building.

@ hippo
I got one thing I feel was said incorrectly.
"You can have a deck full of nothing but individually powerful cards, but because your plays won't be consistent, you will end up losing against someone who has thought out a full strategy and can execute it easily with cards that flow." this I feel is wrong.
See a dec made of idependant and strong cards could actually be very consistant but that won't make it good. The reason is a deck like that is just the sum of its parts because well there is no plan for team work if you select cards just because of there single ablility. No synergy. Which is quite different then consistant. A deck which works together with synergy uses cards that are inferor(most of the time) because together they bring a team work bonus or a power greater then the sum of its parts.

Kirikaze Fuuma wrote:

To be honest, even though I don't think the statement above are not wrong as overall, I don't think that's needed for basic deck building guide. This thread is just to give you the basic of how to build a deck, while if you enter the archetype or decks with specific theme, that means you will need an advanced guide, while this guide is just to teach the new players about the basics of deck building.

Well I tried to keep it basic enough; I just tend to get a bit wordy lol. I'm not telling the reader how to build a deck with a specific theme here, I'm just saying that it is better to have a theme than not, which I believe is something new players to the game should be aware of, and just giving a couple random examples that don't really have much substance but will keep players intrigued to find out more for themselves. If you want I can cut some parts or something?

Wynn wrote:

@ hippo
I got one thing I feel was said incorrectly.
"You can have a deck full of nothing but individually powerful cards, but because your plays won't be consistent, you will end up losing against someone who has thought out a full strategy and can execute it easily with cards that flow." this I feel is wrong.
See a dec made of idependant and strong cards could actually be very consistant but that won't make it good. The reason is a deck like that is just the sum of its parts because well there is no plan for team work if you select cards just because of there single ablility. No synergy. Which is quite different then consistant. A deck which works together with synergy uses cards that are inferor(most of the time) because together they bring a team work bonus or a power greater then the sum of its parts.

Ah okay, thanks. I'll have to reword that then.

Hippocampus wrote:

Kirikaze Fuuma wrote:

To be honest, even though I don't think the statement above are not wrong as overall, I don't think that's needed for basic deck building guide. This thread is just to give you the basic of how to build a deck, while if you enter the archetype or decks with specific theme, that means you will need an advanced guide, while this guide is just to teach the new players about the basics of deck building.

Well I tried to keep it basic enough; I just tend to get a bit wordy lol. I'm not telling the reader how to build a deck with a specific theme here, I'm just saying that it is better to have a theme than not, which I believe is something new players to the game should be aware of, and just giving a couple random examples that don't really have much substance but will keep players intrigued to find out more for themselves. If you want I can cut some parts or something?

Wynn wrote:

@ hippo
I got one thing I feel was said incorrectly.
"You can have a deck full of nothing but individually powerful cards, but because your plays won't be consistent, you will end up losing against someone who has thought out a full strategy and can execute it easily with cards that flow." this I feel is wrong.
See a dec made of idependant and strong cards could actually be very consistant but that won't make it good. The reason is a deck like that is just the sum of its parts because well there is no plan for team work if you select cards just because of there single ablility. No synergy. Which is quite different then consistant. A deck which works together with synergy uses cards that are inferor(most of the time) because together they bring a team work bonus or a power greater then the sum of its parts.

Ah okay, thanks. I'll have to reword that then.

While this may be subject to argue I sort of think that fuuma is right. Deck stratigy is sort of advanced. Because deck goal(in any respect more then attemping to deal attacks, burn or mill or alt win) is a bit cmplicated. A new player may benefit more from just attempting to make a "good card deck" with no clear stratigy so they can learn game mechanics. A deck with a purpose may be a bit harder to learn and take some of the fun away.

Okay well I put my article in a spoiler for now. So anyone who has finished reading Fuuma's articles and is thirsty for more can read mine lol

A good one, I remember how I make a crazy 60 card deck because I think "having more is better", but in the end, it become more of a foil deck than anything(since I play HERO back then)

Another thing to be note is that 20 monster 10 spell 10 trap is also a good ratio for beginner, since it leave ya the rate of grabbing card you want quite easy