Yu-Gi-Oh: Getting to know the current meta

In the past I've made a few threads about the Yu-Gi-Oh TCG, but I mostly just talked about the basics of the game. As I continue to fall deeper into this particular hole, I've decided to make a series of threads discussing the current meta game, with each one dedicated one of the current top decks. With the introduction out of the way, I'll introduce the current top-dog: Nekroz. As a ritual based archetype, Nekroz have a big emphasis on searching, with almost every card able to search out others. We will start by looking at the ritual monsters themselves, each of which can be summoned with any of the three Nekroz ritual spells.

Next we will take a look at the three ritual spells, all of which have an effect that, if you control no monster, allow you to banish it and one other nekroz card from your grave to add another ritual spell to your hand:

I'm gonna split this into multiple posts cuz I suck at formatting. We'll now move on to the effect monsters, spells, and the more specific extra deck cards.

I remember my good ol Gravity Bind deck. Those were the days. I haven't thought about this in years.

Are archfiend decks any good? Lol

I don't even play yugioh anymore but I continue to have a weird infatuation with that archetype since my childhood. I'm guessing it's all cause I just really loved summoned skull, my first card.

I do wanna complete a competent archfiend deck one of these days tho. What's the best site on all things competitive yugioh?

@gnatsol:

This pastebin is pretty good for both keeping up with meta and learnging/ relearning some basics. As for an Archfiend deck, the closest thing would be Burning Abyss, a TCG exclusive archetype based on Dante's Inferno.

The last deck I ran was a hybrid Lightsworn-Shadoll deck. Hard to keep up with the current metas without a local card shop and the closest one to me is 40 minute drive away from me, so rarely get a chance to visit.

The last time i even touched Yu-Gi-Oh properly was back when GX had just launched and i was still running a Dark Magicain based deck, given that a bunch of the cards i used to use are no banned and i'm looking for a way back in i might end up using something like this instead. Still dont understand all the new summons (pendulum/XYZ etc) but reading up on them just now. I've been out out of the loop for so long...

Jesus those rule blocks got dense. Or where they always that way and I just don't remember? The last Yu-Gi-Oh game I played was one of the GBA versions.

I'm not really one to keep up with the Yugioh meta, but I am having fun using the Burning Abyss archetype in the recently released Legacy of the Duelist game. What I can gather from playing people online is that the Nekroz archetype is deadly when combined with some Djinn cards.

@sunbrozak:

It was specifically Djinn, Releaser of Rituals that Nekroz ran prior to the most recent F&L list, where it was banned. That card in particular was bad for the game because it forced so many decks to side/ main really weird and kinda bad cards as outs, it also created bad habits in many Nekroz players who would just attempt to throw our the Djinn lock as quickly as possible and hope their opponent doesn't have or draw into an out.

but burning abyss has no archfiends...... I was talking about a deck centered around cards like this:

http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Skull_Archfiend_of_Lightning

I used to play like 10 years ago back when a Jinzo was the greatest card every made.

Jesus, I dipped my toes in a few years ago (actually it might be closer to 7-8 years now that I think about it) back when Blackwing decks were strong. Looking at this just makes me want another YGO game for the 3DS or something.

This reminds me of high school. I had a huge binder full of cards...didn't really play much outside of the video games but I freaking loved collecting them.

@gnatsol:

Nothing really comes to mind for that, though the new Red-Eyes support does use some archfiend stuff.

I've became sort of interested in Yugioh again (for the first time since...whenever Yugi battled Marik on the WB run? Somewhere around there) because of Legacy of the Duelist. I've gotten a lot of the new basics down (Synchro, XYZ, Pendulum), but have no idea about any of the meta, so this is neat. Nice work.

As a person that stopped playing Yu Gi Oh several years ago, the idea that Rituals are the hottest thing right now is crazy to me.

I like that I can always dip back into YuGiOh and find something interesting/cool to enjoy about it. I doubt I'll ever be able to keep up with the meta like I was when I was younger but a good number of the newer cards still catch my eye.

haven't looked at a Yugioh card in years. Intense call backs reading this post. The child in me is extremely satisfied with all the stars and shiny colours that I used to love oh so dearly. Never gonna play it again, but man I didn't realize how much I loved that game back in the day.

I loved Yugioh back in the day, but have resisted the urge to go back and start collecting/playing again multiple times since (though the last time was around the second season of 5D's so looking it up says around 2009-2010). I just know I'll end up dumping loads of money in like crazy (something I could control by being a kid with an allowance)... so this isn't helping that. However, this is pretty cool.

Hell yeah. I always thought Rituals were much less cool than Fusions in Original Yugioh.

Also, finding out that not only have their been multiple seasons of 5D's since I clocked out, but a whole other anime (Zexal) and now a new one ... crazy.

For me at least the current meta is that myself and everyone I know have quit, either for Vanguard, Magic, or moving on with their lives. The combination of power creep growing more than ever, combined with the realisation that Konami is never ever going to make the pricing more reasonable, is what led to this. Still kind of miss my Infernities though.

Fusion cards are also pretty popular these days, with the Shaddoll archetype being one of the strongest. It's cool to see that they're not being thrown to the wayside in wake of the newer card types.

@belegorm:

The current meta is definitely getting stale and, while I really like playing both Shaddoll and Nekroz, the sameness is definitely a problem, as the TCG seems to be set to continue being dominated by the same couple of decks that have been popular since last fall.

I love me some Yu-Gi-Oh!, but I have never been so into it that I am reading into the best decks and such.

Dude I remember Gravity Bind decks. I think I used clowns and monsters that would directly attack LP with that. I haven't thought about Yugioh since like my senior year of high school back in 2004. We used to use that online dueling program. I don't remember what it was called.