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Leon's Featured Articles
Gear Up!
August 3, 2005

Welcome everyone to the first addition of my main site articles. Fresh off a temp ban too. I just want to say that it is truly a pleasure to be writing for you all and I hope to pass on a little knowledge along the way. Enjoy.

In keeping with the spirit of new-ness (Is that even a word?) I wanted to discuss the emergence of the new season of Yu-Gi-Oh! Premier events. That’s right. Nationals are a thing of the past and only four people in the nation need bother with anything else in last season. Now its time for all of us to gear up for the next batch of Regionals. A fresh start to, hopefully, a better record*.

How do we get ourselves ready? What steps do I take now to ensure that I have the best chance at doing well? Glad that you asked! Oh wait. You didn’t ask?

First and foremost in importance is experience. Play testing is good.
Wherever you live you need to make it a priority to find out which card/hobby shops are in your area. Go to them. Find out a schedule of tournaments. Get to know the people and get to understanding the flow of tournament play. Play test. Over and over and over again. Seek help from those with more experience. Be friendly and respectful and you may just make the right friends to help you along the way.

As an obvious rule you need to make sure that your deck and side deck are tournament legal. What does this entail? All decks must have a minimum size of 40 cards. Though no maximum limit is officially given, for any deck with a real chance of success I’ll set one at around 42 cards. If you choose to use a side deck it must be 15 cards exactly. No more. No less. After siding in or out between duels your side deck must remain at 15 cards. No more. No less. Its always funny to see the one guy get DQ’d for a 16 card side deck in round three. Finally, all premier events are done in Advanced Format - which means a ban list is implemented along with a restricted and semi-restricted list. For complete info you can check out the official site.

Now that we got that out of the way lets get to the real preparation. So many places to start.

Sleeves. You may think your sleeves with the dragon biting the head off a pigmy are cool. You may have spent a lot of time carefully printing out the sleeves that say “I eat n00bs”. You will, however, have to leave those home.
Judges do not like flashy and positively hate homemade sleeves. They prefer nifty designs like “black” or “blue” or “white”. Get it? They also like them clean. Bent up? Torn up? Marked? Scrap it. Buy two packs of sleeves while your at it. Why? Though not required it is highly recommended that you sleeve your deck and side deck the same. It saves time between duels and avoids confusion. My recommendation: Dragon Sleeves. Just make sure their the Yu-Gi-Oh! sized ones.

We, as casual card players, cannot expect you to be a walking encyclopedia of every judges ruling ever made in the game. However, you should work to achieve an adequate knowledge of the mechanics and rules of cards commonly seen in the meta. What you do not know will hurt you when your sitting at those tables. Judges refuse to offer you “what if” advice while you play.
They will tell you to make your move first then determine the legality of it. It is solely up to you to be prepared mentally.

I Bottomless Trap Hole’d his Jinzo, right? Because he skipped his priority,
right?**

As another recommendation. The Q & A section of the message boards is great for this. Just make sure it is the right section and you read the sticky first.

I already mentioned this before, but I’ll say it again because it is that important. Play test. After your deck is constructed as consistent, competitive, and synergetic as it can be you should be doing this. A lot.
There is no way, I repeat, no way to adequately plan for all the situations of this game without having first experienced them. Get together with your team or with your buddies. Play casually. Play in a fun tourney. I really do not care. Just play.

It’s the day before the tournament. What should I be doing now?

Try your hardest not to stress out. I know how you feel though. You know that there will be a lot of good people there and you know that things may get tough. What you need to do now is sit back and gain some confidence inside that your preparations were enough. However, do not put the whole event out of your mind.

Know the area. Mapquest is your friend. Be on time. Be prepared with everything you need. I would recommend:

1. Your deck
2. Your trade binder
3. Your UDE card (for returning members) - If you do not have one you need not worry, the TO will provide one for you. Just show up early to make time to fill out the form.
4. A printed out complete deck list (side and fusion included) - This saves a lot of time as you do not have to use their form. Just turn in the paper.
5. Directions to the location and times of the events.
6. 3 bottles of water (you’ll thank me later).
7. Money - Bring about $20 bucks more than you think you need.
8. A backpack or bag to securely hold items 1 through 7. Thefts do occur and UDE is not liable. Your at your own risk.

Go ahead. Take some time to write this list down. Then get it ready.
Afterwards, go to bed. A full nights sleep is vital. Sleep deprivation (even
minor) has been proven to affect you mentally. Have the alarm clock set and worry about tomorrow when tomorrow gets here.

Now I’m at the events. Anything else I should know?

There are certain steps that should be taken to make the rounds go smoothly.
Bring dice. Its easy and fast for deciding who goes first, and people laugh at you for playing rock-paper-scissors. You may not notice it, but they do.
Even your friends - behind your back. Bring a calculator. You need the solid means to keep track of your life points. I also recommend using it to keep track of your opponents life points.

There is also something that judges call “being prepared for your deck”. Its not just annoying not to be. It can get you disqualified. If your deck runs a card with an effect involving chance - like a die roll or a coin toss - have those items ready and on the table. Nothing sucks more then to ask spectators to borrow a coin for Blowback. You run it don’t you? Scapegoat and other token-producing cards also require you have adequate objects to physically represent the tokens. Do not have one die with a number “4” on it to represent 4 sheep tokens. Have four separate dice. Get creative if you want to. I see people using Pokemon cards and printed out sheep.

Finally, during the rounds there is a certain respect play that must be observed. Players conduct themselves professionally. It has nothing to do with arrogance or taking the game too seriously. It’s just the way things are done for premier events. After every shuffle your opponent is entitled to cut your deck. After every search effect that involves you looking through your deck you must shuffle and offer your opponent the cut. Not optional. Graveyards are free domain for both players to look through. If an opponent asks to look through your graveyard you do so willingly. You must announce each play clearly and give your opponent the adequate chance to respond before moving on. Priorities for ignition effects must be announced, whether they choose to use or pass it. Requests like “Cards in hand?” must be answered truthfully, and your hand must remain on top of the table at all times.

Take your time with each match. Do not let others rush you. Think carefully and remember everything you have learned. You may stop play to think over a response. Look for the chances to establish advantage. This is the single biggest piece of advice I can give you. That Torrential would be much more useful if I take out two opponent’s monsters instead of just one. Do not be afraid to take a little damage if that’s what it takes.

Play hard. Play well. Have fun. Until next time.

Peace.

*This is a reference to my frustration over not reaching Top 8.
**Would be funnier if it did not actually happen to me before.

You may reach me for comments, advice, deck fixes at Leon-D@hotmail.com