How to Play

-Your Deck must be at least 40 cards but shouldn't be more than 70. Think of it this way, if you go 40, you'll be likely to run out of cards. If you go 70, you probably wont get your key cards. Going around 50 is good.

-Fusion cards are a part of your deck as well, even though they are placed aside if you have any. Ex: To get Flaming Swordsman, you must have Masaki the Legendary Swordsman and the Flame Manipulator out. Even if you just summoned either of them, you may fuse them into Flaming Swordsman by discarding the two monsters and placing Flaming Swordsman into play. You can do this because this is considered a special summon, not a one monster per turn normal summon.

-There is a list of restricted cards. This means you may only have two of a card in the list or some cards even limit you down to one a deck. Most are magic cards however that are very powerful like Thunderbolt and Change of Heart.

How to Win

4 Ways to be declared the victor

1. Have Exodia completed in your hand.

2. Have the Ouija Board completed. (Not out yet.)

3. Reduce opponents LP from 8000 to 0

4. Make your opponent deck out. (Run out of cards to draw)

There is a certain way for the dueling field to look.

Field Card, or battleground if any Monsters Graveyard

(EX: Toon World) (Discard Pile)

Fusion Deck Magic/Trap Cards Main Deck-Draw one

(Cards like Flaming Swordsman placed here) card a turn if possible

Both players decide who goes first, both get 8000 Life Points, and both start with a hand of 5 cards. It goes like this.

1. Draw a card.

2. Standby Phase

-Certain cards may have effects during this stage.

3. Main Phase Part 1

-You may do any of the following:

Summon a monster. *Once per turn.*

Change modes of your monsters from Attack to Defense, Defense to Attack, or Reverse Defense to Attack. *Once per turn per monster.*

Play magic/trap cards. Activate the effects of a magic/trap card.

Set magic/trap cards. Place them in the magic/trap card area.

4. Attack Phase

-During this phase, attack mode monsters may attack once.

-Players set targets to attack. If there are monsters on the field, they must be attacked before a player gets hit with direct damage unless a card states otherwise. If there are no monsters on the field, that player gets hit with direct damage to their life points.

5. Main Phase Part 2

Same as Main Phase 1 except no monsters may be summoned if one has been summoned this turn already. Monsters that have attacked during the battle phase cannot change modes.

6. End Phase

-A player declares his turn is over.

-If a player has a hand 6 cards or over, that player must discard cards down to 5 cards in his hand.

-Once done, the opponent now takes their turn and follows the same process.

*Continues back and forth until one player wins*

Restricted Cards

-This means that you can only have up to one of each of these cards in your deck instead of three. (Note: Some of these may not have come out in English yet.)

Imperial Pardon

Confiscate

Hard Choice

Coercive Sentry

Robbery

Pot of Greed

Change of Heart

Cyber Pod

Thunderbolt

Revive Dead

Android-Psycho Shocker

Holy Barrier-Mirror Force

Peace Treaty

Destruction Ring

Harpy Feather Sweep

All five Exodia parts

Black Hole

Magic Cylinder

Calls of the Living Dead

Magician's Strength

Remove Limit

Strength of Unity

Yatagarasu

That was a lot!

Pre-Restricted Cards

-This means that you can only have up to two of each of these cards in your deck instead of three. (Note: Some of these may not have come out in English yet.)

Big Storm

Mischievous Twin Demons

Critter

Black Forest Witch

Angelic Blessing

Swords of Revealing Light

Emissary of Genocide

Force

Reinforcements

Chaos Pod

Last Battle!

Whew! Certainly are a lot of restrictions, so make sure you know these cards so you don't go into a big tournament with an illegal deck. The biggest dissapointments are for super good cards like Change of Heart and Thunderbolt to be so restricted. I hear a recommended deck is 25 monsters with 1-4 stars, 10 monsters with 5-8 stars, and only 5 magic cards. A deck just can't live on all monsters! I'd say if you are a beginner and want to make a nice starting deck, go 21 1-4, 5 5-6, 5 7-8, and 9 magic/trap cards. Still more to come!