SomeOldGuys top ten Yata-Beatdown cards
In my opinion a Yata-beatdown deck is currently the best deck in the game. The primary focus of the deck is to attack wisely almost every turn and to gain hand and field advantage over your opponent by playing cards that cause your opponent to send more cards to the graveyard than you do. This is a good strategy even if you don’t play Yata Garasu, but an eventual Yata lock is the goal. Here are my top 10 cards that help Yata get his lock:
10. Magic Drain. OK, I know most people think that this card sucks, but I play two of these in my Yata-Beatdown Deck along with imperial order. When my opponent figures out that I am trying to gain hand advantage, they frequently won’t discard a magic card and I stop all kinds of nasty magic cards dead in their tracks! I also use Magic Drain to preserve the current balance between the number of cards that I have and the number of cards that my opponent has. For example, set this card and Torrential Tribute on the field. When they use Harpie’s Feather Duster on your two trap cards, flip Magic Drain to guarantee that you and your opponent send an equal number of cards to the graveyard (either one each, or two each)! By the way, if you are trying to maintain card advantage, it is very risky to set more than two traps on the field unless perhaps one of them is Imperial Order.
9. Scapegoat. A great way to get them to summon several monsters before you use a powerful monster removal card. Activate Scapegoat against Harpies Feather Duster, Heavy Storm or Mystical Space Typhoon so that you and your opponent both send one card to the graveyard, but you still get Scapegoats effect! Your opponent will frequently start summoning monsters to get rid of your goats (ya, I know, sheep). Wait until the goats are almost gone and then take out their monsters with Raigeki, Dark Hole, Torrential Tribute, or Mirror Force. The key here is to be patient and let them bring out monsters. If they bring out Spear Dragon don’t panic. In my opinion, taking 1900 damage to get rid of several of their monsters is still worth it!
8. Witch of the
7. Torrential Tribute.
With this card, I sometimes let them do a little damage to my LP in
order to get them to summon another card.
In my opinion, trading some of your LP for the eventual destruction of more
of their cards is a reasonable strategy.
The best situation is when this card takes out two or more of their
monsters and either none of yours, or perhaps your
Witch of the
6. Mirror Force. Same strategy as Torrential Tribute. Try to wait until they have two or more monsters in attack position. Then, one of your cards goes to the graveyard but two or more of theirs are destroyed! Don’t get too greedy though. A two for one trade is a good deal!
5. Bazoo the Soul Eater. OK, let me explain. I am after hand and field advantage! I really don’t care that much about graveyard advantage. When the dual is over there is no bonus given for the cards in your graveyard. Bazoo will kill almost any of your opponents monsters all by himself. If they have something in play with an attack that is greater than 2500 then they are asking for trouble anyway! (OK, United We Stand and Injection Fairy Lily are exceptions.) Before attacking, I remove the minimum number of cards necessary to take out their monster. To be safe, I remove two cards before attacking a face down monster. If Bazoo survives his battle, then I discard more cards in Main Phase Two and leave Bazoo with an attack of 2500 for my opponent to deal with. On their turn, they will probably have a hard time killing him with a monster, and will likely have to use a Monster removal card to get rid of him. The net result is frequently that two of their cards go to the graveyard for one of mine!
4. Delinquent Duo. A straight forward trade of removing one of my cards for two of theirs. For some reason, Delinquent Duo seems to go unchallenged most of the time! Imperial Order is about the only thing that people seem to play against this card. If they are play Sinister Serpent a lot, (which is an awesome counter to both Yata and Delinquent Duo), I keep Forceful Sentry and Nobleman of Crossout in my side deck to swap out for this card. By the way, my number 10 card above is a nice counter to Delinquent Duo! Yes it is, think about it!
3. Jinzo. There is nothing quite like a Jinzo/Yata lock! The two best monsters in the game sitting side by side on your side of the field is a sight to behold!
2. Harpies Feather Duster. You really need to be patient and try to wait for two or more cards in their M/T Zone before you play this card. At the same time, don’t be too stupid. If they just set a lone Trap card and you are making a crucial attack, go ahead and play this card to protect your attacking monster(s). This is especially true if you have to summon in order to attack. Harpies Feather Duster can be devastating against novice players who set way too many magic and trap cards on the field without any protection whatsoever.
1. Raigeki. As always, be patient. I try to take out two or more of their monsters with Raigeki. This card can be devastating after I let them build up an army taking out my Witch, Sangan, and Scapegoats. Again, don’t be too greedy. For example, I would not hesitate to use Raigeki to get rid of a single face down monster that my opponent placed against an open field. Most people don’t set a face down monster against an open field unless it is going to do something nasty to you.
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Honarable Mention:
Sangan. I play it, it’s just that Witch is better.
Pot of Greed. The net effect is that my hand advantage goes up by one card. Should probably be in my top ten, but it doesn’t get rid of any of my opponents cards.
Injection Fairy Lily. Kills just about any monster! Great way to finish them off with or without Yata.
Heavy Storm. A great card, it’s just that Harpie’s Feather Duster is better.
Dark Hole. Another great card, but Rageki is better. Should be in my top ten, but I wanted some variety.
Confiscation and Forceful Sentry. The main advantage to these cards is that you get to see your opponents hand and get rid of their best card. Knowing what they have in their hand can tell you when it is safe to bring out Yata. Other than that, you both land up sending one card to the graveyard/deck, so it doesn’t give you any hand advantage directly. Of course their card could be their Yata!
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Cards that others might play, but I don’t think work that well in a Yata-Beatdown deck are:
Robbin’ Goblin. It is just a bit too slow. You can’t use it until the turn after you set it, and you have to use its effect two times before it is destroyed to get any card advantage out of it.
White Magical Hat. If you use equip cards to power him up then you are setting yourself up for card disadvantage. Your opponents Bazoo or Goblin Attack Force will easily kill your White Magical Hat equipped along with that pretty Axe of Despair. And who is to say that you will have these two cards at the same time anyway! (Side Note: Always shuffle your opponents cards every duel! A common trick is to stick two cards like these together in the deck!) If you don’t power White Magical Hat up and manage to get off a direct attack, you do 1000 damage to your opponent and discard one of their cards to their graveyard. Next turn he’ll die against almost any monster that your opponent summons and you’ll take 800 to 1500 damage. In my opinion, this just isn’t helping you much! He works better late in the game, but at that point I would probably rather bring out Yata.
Don Zaloog. (Braces for
Hate Mail) I haven’t play tested this
card, but it seems to have the same problems as White Magical Hat. Its attack is only 1400 so Don will need equip help (bad idea) to kill most monsters, or
Don must attack directly. If you direct
attack, your opponent will take 1400 damage and you will probably take 400 to 1100
on the next turn. Better than White
Magical Hat, but I don’t see how you gain hand advantage! You have to pull it off two turns in a row to
gain hand advantage. This is slow and
hard to pull off. By the way, in my
opinion his second effect is almost worthless.
You’re not going to deck your opponent and there is no way of knowing if
their next two cards are better than any others in their deck. If anything you just give them more card options
to revive into play with Magician of Faith or Call of the Haunted, Premature
Burial, etc.
Magic Cylinder. You trade your card for your opponents life points. OK, this causes them to loose LP, but they also gain card advantage. In my opinion this is not worth it.
Cyber Jar. This card does not complement Yata at all. You work hard to get your opponents card count down and then Cyber Jar gives you both 5 more cards. The fewer cards that your opponent has, the better for Yata.
Fiber Jar. OK, I know that you can work Yata back into the game from the graveyard with this card, but when Yata goes to my graveyard I would rather play beatdown and hand destruction for the rest of the duel. When you have card advantage, drawing this card does you no good at all with or without Yata.
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Well, there it is. This list was sent in by Lance Lana a.k.a. SomeOldGuy. Send email to: lwlana@attbi.com
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