Dark Magician Deck: The Story So Far

The Dark Magician is one of the most iconic cards in the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise, and has been a

fan favorite since the original series. This level 7 monster has 2500 ATK and 2100 DEF, making it a force to be reckoned with on the battlefield. In addition, he has many supports and fusions wich powerful effects that can help you take down your opponent.

He is the boss monster of the main protagonist of the first season of the anime, Yugi Muto.

Despite being the most powerful card in the deck of the first protagonist of the anime and manga (and the favorite of fans all over the world), in the early years of his life, the Dark Magician did not receive much support from Konami, relegating him to for fun deck and unable to be competitive. In reality, the spellcasters in general in the early years of the game were not strong at all and all the structure decks dedicated to them contained only good cards for a collector but nothing on which to build something strong and consistent. Especially for the annoying "habit" of implementing spell counters in the style of play of collecting spell counters that once collected in quantity could activate many devastating effects, but in the end, all proved useless as the collection of tokens was a slow and cumbersome process and the opponent almost always managed to win even before suffering the effects of the various Endymion, Magical Citadel, Arcanite Magician, etc.

It was a really frustrating time for us spellcasters lovers looking for absurd ways to summon our favorite monsters: "Sorcerer of Dark Magic" and "Dark Paladin".

In our imagery, there was a field that contained these two monsters that nullify both spells and traps. A control deck where you can do whatever you want while the opponent can only use monster effects.

Beautiful, is not it?

Absolutely yes, especially if we think of a meta where hand traps did not exist. I feel like I'm talking about millions of years ago. Now I am going to show you the strategy I thought of implementing to summon the Sorcerer of Dark Magic and the Dark Paladin (please don't laugh at me but understand the desperation of a man who has been trying for years to quickly summon his two favorite monsters.

Everything was based on the use of the "Chain Material" card, which allows you to summon the fusions directly using the monsters inside the deck. Instead of Polymerization, I wanted to use the "Fusion Gate" field spell card. These two cards on the field can have you summon virtually all of the extra deck in one turn as there is no limit to using their effects.

So the combo was: activate Fusion Gate, activate Chain Material, remove 3 Dark magicians and 3 Buster Bladers in order to summon 3 Dark Paladins. Sacrifice 2 Dark Paladins to summon Sorcerer of Dark Magic that you must have in your hand before the combo and that's it. The dream came true, I have my 2 favorite monsters on the ground.

Unfortunately, the remaining Dark Paladin would have been destroyed at the end of the turn by the effect of Chain Material but I could have resurrected him with Monster Reborn.

It was therefore a combo of despair that needed 4 cards to be in hand as soon as possible (Sorcerer of Dark Magic, Monster Reborn, Fusion Gate, and Chain Material). A good idea, but impossible to implement as it took too long and too many turns to have the 4 cards in hand, and even if you managed to have them you had to pray that the opponent did nothing to counter you.

Anyway, the years pass, and Konami seems to change his mind (fortunately) and the spellcasters no longer receive much support for the spell counter strategy, but our dear Dark Magician gets the much loved and hated "Eternal Soul".

This card allows you to summon Dark Magicians from your hand or graveyard and protect them from card effects. The problem was that Eternal Soul, once it leaves the field, destroys all monsters on its field. I let you imagine my face when I managed to summon Sorcerer of Dark Magic by sacrificing a Dark Magician summoned through Eternal Soul and a Gagaga Magician who with his own effect had reached level 6. I was happy. Then in the same turn, my opponent activated Mystical Space Typhoon on Eternal Soul, all my monsters were destroyed and I just have to cry and put aside again the idea of ​​creating a Spellcasters\Dark Magician-themed deck and dedicate myself to something more consistent like my beloved Destiny Heroes during the advent of Synchro summons and the terrific Tele-Dad that ruled the meta of that period.

If I remember correctly, around the same time, the "Ebon Illusion Magician" card was put on the market. This blond Dark Magician XYZ has the power to summon a Dark Magician directly from the deck, and if it declares an attack, it is possible to remove a card from the opponent's field.

If we add to all this the effect of "Dark Magic Circle" that removes a card on the opponent's field every time a Dark Magician is summoned, it seems that Konami wants to give the deck a "removal style".

Consequently, the presence of Eternal Soul and Dark Magic Circle became the basis for building the deck as it was the engine that made it all work.

Supports have also arrived that include "Dark Magician Girl" as an important part of the deck and that allows you to activate excellent combos if there are at least one Dark Magician and one Dark Magician Girl on the ground.

These supports are first of all the "Magician's Salvation" field spell card which allows you to set an Eternal Soul directly from the deck. This card also allows you to summon a Dark Magician or a Dark Magician Girl from the graveyard whenever one of the two wizards is summoned.

This makes it easy to have the two minimum level 6 spellcasters required for my beloved Sorcerer of Dark Magic on the ground.

Another useful way to have our two favorite spellcasters on the field at the same time is the "Bond Between Teacher and Student" card which combined with the phenomenal "Dark Burning Attack" allows you to clear the opponent's terrain.

The first one let us summon a Dark Magician Girl when a Dark Magician is on the field and immediatly set  the Dark Burning Magic so we can wipe out the opponent's field. 

After the chapter dedicated to the main deck, let's focus on the extra deck of our beloved Dark Magician.

The Eye of Timaeus has given us the ability to summon any fusion monster involving the Dark Magician and although my favorite remains the Dark Paladin, we now have access to "Dark Magician the Dragon Knight", "Dark Cavalry", "Master of Chaos" and "Mr. Auto-Win "aka" Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon ".

In terms of lore, these three cards represent the Dark Magician's fusions with four other iconic monsters of game king Yugi Muto, namely "Timaeus, the Legendary Dragon", "Gaia the Fierce Knight", "Black Luster Soldier", and "Red-Eyes Black Dragon" ; the latter represents the favorite monster of Yugi's best friend, Joey Wheeler.

Dark Magician the Dragon Knight makes spell and trap cards indestructible and in this way our dear Eternal Soul cannot leave the field.

Dark Cavalry, in addition to the ability to nullify the effects of the cards it targets, can inflict piercing

damage.

Master of Chaos removes the opponent monsters and recycle spell cards.

Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon instead makes all the above fusions useless because it is the central pivot and one of the strongest cards ever created for this game (which in my opinion puts it on the edge of the Forbidden and Limited List). This monster, in addition to the ability to be summoned with a single spell, is indestructible and cannot be targeted. He can negate an opponent's card per turn and if he does so he gains 1000 points of ATK, in addition, he can also destroy a monster on the opponent's field and inflict damage to the latter equal to the ATK of the just destroyed monster.

And what if I say this monster can be summoned with only one spell card in your hand?

This is possible thanks to "Red-Eyes Fusion".

So in a hypothetical deck based on the Dark Magician it became essential to summon Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon as soon as possible and then all the other cards mentioned above that become only support for this phenomenal monster, a symbol of the friendship between Yugi and Joey. Being able to summon it as soon as possible allows us to play with peace of mind and set the stage for the Dark Magian, the Dark Magician Girl and all their transformations and evolutions.