The stage was set for Shonen Jump Anaheim 2007. Prior to this event, Shane Scurry’s Monarch deck had just won Shonen Jump Montreal, Marc Glass used Kris Perovics Diamond Dude Turbo deck to win Shonen Jump Columbus and both of the Bellido brothers both had immensely popular Monarch builds going around that everyone was running. The expected metagame had no idea what was about to happen.

 

Theerasak Poonsombat is perhaps the most accomplished Yu-Gi-Oh player in history. His credentials are staggering. He won the 2004 U.S. National tournament and has eight (yes eight) Shonen Jump Top 8 performances. He is a monster in the game. One thing Theerasak, or “T” has always been known for is excelling with standard cookie cutter decks. He plays cookie better than perhaps any other player in the world, isn’t it ironic that the one time he creates a completely new deck it’s completely…broken?

 

Monsters

 

3 Card Trooper

3 Destiny Hero — Malicious

3 Cyber Dragon

1 Sangan

1 Destiny Hero — Disk Commander

1 Destiny Hero — Fear Monger

1 Jinzo

2 Destiny Hero — Dasher

1 Dark Magician of Chaos

2 Snipe Hunter

1 Elemental Hero Stratos

 

Spells

 

2 Brain Control

3 Destiny Draw

1 Giant Trunade

2 Metamorphosis

1 Mystical Space Typhoon

1 Scapegoat

1 Limiter Removal

1 Heavy Storm

1 Reinforcement of the Army

1 Premature Burial

1 Pot of Avarice

1 Snatch Steal

 

Traps

 

1 Ring of Destruction

1 Torrential Tribute

1 Call of the Haunted

1 Crush Card Virus

1 Mirror Force

 

Note: Decklist was borrowed from our friends at Metagame.com.

 

This is Destiny Hero Beatdown, also known as “T deck”. This deck has defined the format.

What sets it apart from anything else is its ability to “go off” so to speak, in one turn by dropping three, even four monsters at once for the win. This is usually done with a special summoned Cyber Dragon, bringing out a Malicious from the deck and using Metamorphosis to trade it for a useful fusion creature such as Ryu Senshi or Dark Blade the Dragon Knight, and of course using the normal summon for the turn. Add the fact that the deck uses cards such as Brain Control which has HUGE OTK potential and you can see why this deck wins so much. It’s fast and your opponent never sees it coming.

 

Card Trooper makes the world go ‘round. Setting it as a blocker is the optimal play, as it not only gets T another card when its destroyed, but it also saves his life points from direct attacks, which is very important in a format where life points can be decimated in a single turn at the blink of an eye. It also dumps cards such as Malicious and Disk Commander into the graveyard, where they’re supposed to be.

 

Destiny Hero -- Malicious is the back bone of the deck and it has a lot of uses here. Its here to combo with Destiny Draw which is essentially Pot of Greed (that’s a good card!) when used with Malicious and can also be discarded to help Snipe Hunter get rid of your opponents cards. You can steal opponent’s monsters with Brain Control, attack with them and tribute set Malicious. This is a common play, it lets you get a pesky monster off your opponent’s side of the field and get a Malicious in the graveyard faster, which is always a good thing.

 

Talk about putting a lot of monsters on the field in one turn, Cyber Dragon knows how that game is played. He’s a very important monster for the deck since he lets T keep up with any aggression his opponent is putting forth and in a pinch he can be morphed into a fusion monster, ideally Dark Balter the Terrible or Reaper on the Nightmare. Sometimes I go for my holographic Flame Swordsman. T also uses Destiny Hero -- Disk Commander. It’s an easy addition since he need all the discard bait for Destiny Draw he can get and bringing it back from the graveyard speeds the game up letting T draw into his game winning cards such as Dark Magician of Chaos and Brain Control. The deck runs one Fear Monger to support this strategy.

 

Destiny Hero -- Dasher is a very interesting card. It’s a high utility card that earns its spot in the deck time and time again. It’s a one tribute monster that turns Brain Control into a targeting Smashing Ground, it can tribute away the opponents monsters with Brain Control, and while its in the graveyard it has that magical ability to special summon any monster T may draw. Premium discard option for Destiny Draw.

 

T uses Dark Magician of Chaos in the deck because it’s a relatively easy card to fit in here. Between Cyber Dragons, Malicious and Brain Controls, its fairly easy to tribute summon and it has that great OTK potential if you summon it mid to late game; with a toolbox-like selection available T will probably get what he needs to win the game.

 

Snipe Hunter is another card that supports the deck really, really well. T uses it to get rid of any problem cards the opponent may have such as facedown monsters like Gravekeeper’s Spy or Spirit Reaper, and perhaps facedown spell or traps such as Sakuretsu Armor or Mirror Force. You can never be too safe; Snipe Hunter will clear the path to victory. Elemental Hero Stratos is a very, very obvious choice for this deck. It allows you to fetch any Destiny Hero monster from your deck, and is the centerpiece of one of the best openings in the game; Summon Stratos for Malicious pitch for Destiny Draw. Stratos is necessary.

 

Looking at the spells in the deck, we see that T uses two copies of Brain Control. I can’t stress the importance of Brain Control. It has literally defined the format and is ridiculous in this deck for its game winning potential alone, along with the fact that this deck has plenty of Tribute monsters and you can easily understand why T put them in. He also has three copies of Destiny Draw in the deck, which are a complete no brainer in the deck since we obviously have plenty of discard bait and it get us our game winning combo pieces such as Limiter Removal and Metamorphosis.

Speaking of the devil, T has included two copies of Metamorphosis in the deck. As if the deck wasn’t cool enough, now our fusion deck becomes accessible again? Praise the lord. T has an eight star monster in his deck for Cyber Twin Dragon and plenty of five and six star monsters that will turn into Ryu Senshi, Dark Balter and more! The deck wouldn’t be nearly as good without these guys.

 

Some of the last interesting inclusions for the deck are Giant Trunade and Limiter Removal. Both serve great purposes in a deck like this. Limiter gives us more ways to win. Remember kids, Cyber Dragon and Card Trooper with Limiter Removal is 8000 damage exactly. Giant Trunade just clears the way.

 

T deck is the hottest deck out right now. Anyone who isn’t running it or hasn’t tried it already is probably just lacking the cards that make this deck so expensive such as Malicious and Destiny Draw. Its fast and consistent, it plays like a regular deck but wins like an OTK. Cyber-Stein ain’t got nothing on T.