The Man with the Mark – #MZTM-EN001
If this card is Normal or Special Summoned: You can take 1 “Temple of the Kings”, or 1 Spell/Trap that mentions it, from your Deck and either add it to your hand or send it to the GY. You can only use this effect of “The Man with the Mark” once per turn. While you control “Temple of the Kings”, this card and “Apophis” monsters you control cannot be destroyed by battle or card effects. “Temple of the Kings” you control cannot be destroyed by card effects.
Date Reviewed: April 28th, 2025
Rating: 3.92
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is awful. 3 is average. 5 is excellent.
Reviews Below:
King of
Lullaby
Hello Pojo Fans,
The Man with the Mark begins our week looking at the new Odion cards in Maze of the Master. Retrains can be really fun and even excel in the TCG…ask Ishizu.
The card you need to see in your first hand, The Man with the Mark is the card that really helps the archetype get going. Searchable with Anubis the Last Judge, TMwtM is your Temple of the Kings searcher or something that mentions it. Four targets that can be run and while Temple of the Kings didn’t get any support to make its Special Summon ability any better, it still allows you to activate a trap you set this turn. Treasures of the Kings is going to be the card you search most of the time, as it will get you an Apophis Trap Card from the Deck and set it immediately. On top of that, Treasures of the Kings can get you even more if you happen to have a Trap Card in your grave or two set cards (1 of which it just gave you). This card is a setup card for sure and it isn’t entirely useless on the ATK/DEF either at 1000 a piece.
When you have a Temple of the Kings (Treasures of the Kings is Temple of the Kings on the field), The Man here and your Apophis monsters gain destruction protection from battle and card effects. In exchange, Temple of the Kings cannot be destroyed by card effects. This is a fantastic exchange of protections. The Apophis monsters you will have are 2000ATK and above (Trap and Fusion Monsters), while The Man only has 1000ATK, but because he’s protecting everything you are willing to let this guy sit in defense and keep everybody safe. Temple of The Kings will let you activate a set Trap Card each turn, which is your Apophis trap monster, but can also be something you search using generic search abilities or a hard draw. Treasures of the Kings will keep getting you a search if you can fulfill the two set cards or a trap in your grave, which is the entire strategy of the archetype to have that stuff readily available so this card needs to stay on the field to keep getting you resources.
Protection for itself if you have one of the ace cards of the archetype on the field, and in exchange this card gets to stay on board despite its low stats. Search option to start the strategy of the archetype up off its summon and that search in question will get you something more. You need to make sure this card’s summon is not negated or its effect not negated as it is your starter as well as board protection for your best cards. Your opponent will be focusing The Man with the Mark so that everything else can be brought down.
Advanced- 4/5 Art- 4/5
Until Next Time,
KingofLullaby
Crunch$G
Now we move to Maze of the Master, where we finally get cards to play a proper Odion Deck, and we start the week with a card based on Odion himself: The Man with the Mark.
The Man with the Mark is a Level 4 EARTH Spellcaster with 1000 ATK and DEF. Stats aren’t the greatest for a Level 4 monster, but EARTH and Spellcaster isn’t bad. First effect triggers upon Normal or Special Summon to let you add a Temple of the Kings or any Spell/Trap that mentions it from your Deck to your hand or you can send said card from the Deck to the graveyard. It’s nice to be able to search for the classic Temple to activate a Trap the same turn you set it along with all the new support. You got Treasures of the Kings to set your Apophis monsters and search more Temple of the Kings related cards, Defense of the Temple to make your Fusion Monsters and search for Dangers of the Divine if you wish to play Ra, and Verdict of Anubis for a Spell/Trap negate that can also destroy the opponent’s monsters and deal a ton of burn damage. I assume we’ll get more later this year into early next year when the OCG gets these cards, so future potential is there. The search effect is a HOPT, of course, with the other effect being live while you control Temple of the Kings, making this card and Apophis monsters you control from being unable to be destroyed by battle or card effects, and also Temple of the Kings cannot be destroyed by card effects. Nice protection on your monsters to keep them safe from destruction if you choose to keep this on the field and not use it to go into Silhouhatte Rabbit, plus it helps make sure Temple of the Kings doesn’t go anywhere. The Man with the Mark is solid for the Odion Deck, mainly since it’s your searcher for all your Temple of the Kings stuff, plus keeping it on the field offers some protection to said Temple and your Apophis monsters. Play 3 and with all the consistency you have for this Deck, you should see it often.
Advanced Rating: 4/5
Art: 4/5 Yeah, it’s just Odion.
Mighty
Vee
While not in the upper echelons of the meta, Odion (or as Konami likes to refer to the deck as, “Tombkeeper”) has proven to be a surprise rogue hit since its debut in Maze of the Master, and that’s what we’ll be covering this week! The Man with the Mark (can I just call it Odion? No? Okay, Man it is) starts us off, a level 4 EARTH Spellcaster. The easiest and most direct way to search it is Anubis the Last Judge, though Treasures of the Kings can also access it if necessary. To match with Odion’s Trap monsters and Yugioh’s tendency to make humans Spellcasters, the parameters make sense, and it can help make Rank 4s in a pinch. Statwise, Man is not at all impressive, with only 1000 attack and defense, which is a little surprising since they actually want you to keep in around. Not that it’d be much better if it had the stats of Embodiment of Apophis, mind you.
Man’s first effect is its only activated effect, a hard once per turn effect that triggers on Normal or Special Summon to either search or dump a Temple of the Kings or a Spell or Trap that mentions it from your deck. Depending on your combo line, most of the time you’ll either be searching Treasures of the Kings or Temple of the Kings itself, since you’ll need them to start summoning your Trap monsters immediately and get your combos going. If you already have both of them, you can alternatively send Apophis the Serpent to get its Graveyard effect to search an Embodiment of Apophis for either another Trap monster or more Fusion or Link fodder. Man’s other 2 effects might as well be rolled into a single one, protecting Temple of the Kings (and by extension Treasures of the Kings since it’ll take Temple’s name) from destruction by card effect and protecting your Apophis monsters from destruction by battle and card effect as long as you control Temple. As the Apophis monsters aren’t exactly known for their staying power, it’s nice protection for them, especially Divine Serpent Apophis which is effectively your boss monster in pure builds. Again, I’m a little surprised Man’s stats aren’t great for keeping it alive, but in any case, using it as Link fodder for Silhouhatte Rabbit isn’t the end of the world either, since Divine Serpent Apophis is still great for recycling your Apophis Trap monsters if they die. Speaking of fodder, I don’t like that it can’t be used for Divine Serpent Apophis’s alternate summoning condition, which specifically requires Apophis monsters, but I guess that would make things too easy, now wouldn’t it? Overall, still an essential combo piece for Odion decks; it might not combo on its own, but it’ll get you to your 2 card combos as long as you open a Trap or Treasures of the Kings. Pure builds should absolutely play 3, and honestly even hybrids should too.
+Excellent 2 card combo starter that searches key combo pieces
+Protects your key cards from destruction
-Can’t be Tributed for Divine Serpent Apophis
-Limited combo potential by itself
Advanced: 3.75/5
Art: 3.75/5 It’s Odion! Or “Rishid”, if you want to consider yourself beyond dub peasants.
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