Subject: Mirage of Nightmare v. Painful Choice - Siphon_X

Hi,

I am SiphonX and I am here to debate the usage of two of the most played cards in the game, and their effectiveness, Mirage of Nightmare and Painful Choice.

Article #7: Mirage of Nightmare v. Painful Choice

Mirage of Nightmare

Continuous Spell Card

During your opponent’s Standby Phase, draw cards until your hand has 4 cards. During your Standby Phase, randomly discard the same number of cards you drew with this card’s effect to the Graveyard.

Painful Choice

Normal Spell Card

Select 5 cards from your Deck and show them to your opponent. Your opponent must select 1 card that will be added to your hand. Discard the remaining cards in the Graveyard.

Now, at first when we look at both these cards, we cannot see much coming from them. Without a strategy behind them, they both suck, as all the do is cause deck thinning. But, as we delve deeper into the subject matter, we can see why they can be such great cards to use.

Mirage of Nightmare - Basically, the thinking behind this is to continually empty you hand until you draw an MST, which, upon playing, would stop the discarding effect from being active. You can obtain immense hand advantage through this card. Upon obtaining these 3-4 cards, your opponent might as well give up because of your immense hand advantage, as the same thing happens with a card called Sixth Sense, but that isnt released in English yet. It does seem like an amazing card, but there are several flaws behind this.

Your opponent can draw MST. Remember, in BOTH your and your opponent's Draw Phase, quickplay spells can be activated, meaning that...your opponent can destroy MoN before you get its effect. Kind of a bummer, eh? Not only this, but you may fail to draw MST in the five cards in your hand, which is absolutely devastating.* It forces you to discard those precious 2-4 cards you drew with it, which actually leaves you in a worse situation than before. In addition to this, it makes you wait for those precious cards.

You, when you manage to successfully pull off a Mirage draw, also have to wait a full turn before being able to use those cards. Finally, it says randomly discard, which means it can hurt rather than help you.

Now it seems that MoN's downsides negate its upsides, but it still is an overall good card, as a successful Mirage draw is killer in a game of YGO.

You will, when you run it, be able to appreciate drawing 4 cards per turn instead of 1. I give it an overall rating of 7.8/10

Painful Choice - In contrast to MoN, this card is a one hit wonder. Use it to pull out Jinzo, Airknight, or Serpent and follow up with some recursion.

It is absolutely perfect for Exodia decks, as it speeds up drawing those pieces. It also helps dump monsters in the grave for recursion OR effect removal (Soul of Purity and Light, Dark Necrofear, Mudora, etc...). It can help pull off some wicked effect summons and boost up cards like Mudora and Shadow Ghoul. In addition to this, when in a sticky situation, you can use it to pull out some cards that would help. Ex: Opponent has 1 m/t fd, 1 fd monster, 2 cards in hand. Take out X-Force, DDWL, 2x MST, and Del Duo.

Simple as that. Now, with all this said, you may be enlightened about some new combo or something. Trust me, there are TONS. But there are also some downsides to it:

Painful Choice is entirely based on your opponent's decision. They can choose to manipulate what you obtain to better suit the situation they are in, because usually they have a way of countering that strategy. This came from a real duel: Opponent played Painful, took RotA, Zombyra, Sangan, Confiscation, and DDWL. I told him to take Sangan, then on my turn, I played NoC on it... Also, you are dumping cards that could help greatly into the graveyard where they are of no more use to you. In addition, it thins the deck out greatly. It came close to decking me out before. It may have extreme combination possibilities, but remember, it is solely based upon the choice of your opponent.

Though it has some downsides, I believe it to be helpful at times, and for this reason, I give it a 8.3/10. I also believe it to be a staple in nearly every control deck.

Now, Mirage comes in handy not anywhere nearly as much as Painful does simply because you have absolutely no control over the cards you are about to draw. Also, it will deck you out 4x faster than normal, while Painful takes a mere 5 cards out. Also, some of the veterans choose to regard Mirage as a "n00b"'s card because it takes no skill whatsoever to use. I highly disagree, as it is sometimes hard to know when to destroy it. And, if I may copy a bit, Ng Yu Leung used Mirage in his WORLD CHAMPION's deck, but I am not suggesting its right for everyone. I prefer to use Painful over Mirage simply because I have little, but SOME control over what cards I will get.

Overall rating: Painful Choice>Mirage of Nightmare

Thanks for reading!

Send all munchies, hate mail, love mail, criticism, bashings, comments and or questions to:

AIM: mrfilbertiert

Email: pyroboy72@hotmail.com

* - I figured 5 cards from the original 4 during your opponent's Standby and the fifth during your Draw phase.

~Siphon_X~

_________________________________________________________________

Check out the new MSN 9 Dial-up — fast & reliable Internet access with prime features! http://join.msn.com/?pgmarket=en-us&page=dialup/home&ST=1