Weaknesses of Decks and Players
This article will be quite short, but informative (I hope). I want to talk about weaknesses of decks, so I want to show you how you can beat decks without someone else telling you what to do or what to use against certain decks.
First, you must see figure out the main strategy of the deck. You can see it through the cards your opponent plays: For example a lot of traps may point to a control/ defensive deck, none at all or few make OTK decks more likely. This is not necessarily true though, Wind-Ups for example run a lot of Traps and still are mostly built to OTK. If you figured out the play style of your opponent’s deck, you can think of cards to counter them: For example you can use Fossil Dyna to counter special summon heavy decks. Nowadays most deck's engines are based on the effects of the monsters it runs, you can pick any Meta-deck to see that. So if your deck can handle it, a card like Skill Drain is awesome. Also Effect Veiler is a common card to prevent monster effects leading to big combos (for example Wind-Up Magician). Another weakness of a lot of Meta-decks is, that their monsters have either different attributes (e.g.: Dino/Macro Rabbit, Wind-Up) or different types (Wind-Up, Mermail, Dino/Macro Rabbit). You can exploit this weakness by using either Gozen Match or Rivalry of the Warlords. Chose whichever is playable in your deck (only IF they are playable) for the side deck.
Next you figure out the resources your opponent has and where they come from. Does he focus on the graveyard? Or does he search a lot? Maybe even use the Banished-Zone a lot? Think of cards to counter that again: Use Necrovalley or Macro Cosmos to counter actions in the graveyard and so on.
This was the pretty obvious part of getting your opponent at his weak side. Now you also have to figure out your opponent. Is he playing safe or taking risks a lot? Adapt to the way he is playing by setting up for moves your opponent will most likely make. If he is a safe player he won’t try to get off his main combo to OTK you if you only have a single backrow. Since he doesn’t know what it is you even could use an MST for it (although a Warning will most likely be more efficient). Be aware that a safe-player will also set up to counter your moves, while a risk-taking player will be more easly surprised. Note: This is a general rule, BUT it is not always true, there are all kinds of duelists out there, most importantly, try to get adapted to the situation.
This article will be quite short, but informative (I hope). I want to talk about weaknesses of decks, so I want to show you how you can beat decks without someone else telling you what to do or what to use against certain decks.
First, you must see figure out the main strategy of the deck. You can see it through the cards your opponent plays: For example a lot of traps may point to a control/ defensive deck, none at all or few make OTK decks more likely. This is not necessarily true though, Wind-Ups for example run a lot of Traps and still are mostly built to OTK. If you figured out the play style of your opponent’s deck, you can think of cards to counter them: For example you can use Fossil Dyna to counter special summon heavy decks. Nowadays most deck's engines are based on the effects of the monsters it runs, you can pick any Meta-deck to see that. So if your deck can handle it, a card like Skill Drain is awesome. Also Effect Veiler is a common card to prevent monster effects leading to big combos (for example Wind-Up Magician). Another weakness of a lot of Meta-decks is, that their monsters have either different attributes (e.g.: Dino/Macro Rabbit, Wind-Up) or different types (Wind-Up, Mermail, Dino/Macro Rabbit). You can exploit this weakness by using either Gozen Match or Rivalry of the Warlords. Chose whichever is playable in your deck (only IF they are playable) for the side deck.
Next you figure out the resources your opponent has and where they come from. Does he focus on the graveyard? Or does he search a lot? Maybe even use the Banished-Zone a lot? Think of cards to counter that again: Use Necrovalley or Macro Cosmos to counter actions in the graveyard and so on.
This was the pretty obvious part of getting your opponent at his weak side. Now you also have to figure out your opponent. Is he playing safe or taking risks a lot? Adapt to the way he is playing by setting up for moves your opponent will most likely make. If he is a safe player he won’t try to get off his main combo to OTK you if you only have a single backrow. Since he doesn’t know what it is you even could use an MST for it (although a Warning will most likely be more efficient). Be aware that a safe-player will also set up to counter your moves, while a risk-taking player will be more easly surprised. Note: This is a general rule, BUT it is not always true, there are all kinds of duelists out there, most importantly, try to get adapted to the situation.
