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Deck Master Rules and effects


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These are rules and effects for local Deck Master tournaments I run. I didn't know where else to post this, so I figure this is where they would go.

[spoiler="Deck Master format Rules"]
Choosing a Deck Master:

Your Deck Master must be 1 monster in your Deck, and 1 of that monster is removed from your Deck. (Your Deck may be a minimum of 39 cards after the removal of this Deck Master.) However, your Deck Master must be Normal Summonable (but cannot require 3 Tributes), and 1700 ATK or lower if Level 4 or lower.

After you have chosen the Deck Master, you get its Type effect and its Attribute effect.

Playing with the Deck Master:

At the beginning of the Duel, remove your Deck Master from your Deck and place it in the Deck Master Zone (separate from the hand or Extra Deck). It loses all its old text and now gains the appropriate Deck Master effects. Each Deck Master has an effect that works while it is face-up in the Deck Master Zone.

During your turn, you can replace being able to Normal Summon a monster with moving your face-up and similarly-qualified Deck Master from the Deck Master Zone to the field. (You must still Tribute as many Tributes as required for the card.) Each Deck Master has an ability that works when it is moved to the field.

If the Deck Master would go to a zone other than the Field, Deck Master Zone, or "Xyz Material Limbo Zone", it gets put into the Deck Master Zone face-down (and hence unusable) instead.

Note that the Deck Master Zone is still a zone that a monster can be destroyed in, if a card destroying it doesn't care about location (i.e. Divine Wrath). If a Deck Master would be destroyed from the Deck Master Zone, it instead gets flipped face-down, rendering it unusable.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler="Deck Master effects"]
Aqua: Fluidity
Once per turn, during your Standby Phase, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can shuffle 1 card from your hand into your Deck; draw 1 card.

Beast: Berserker Instinct
Once per turn, during your Main Phase or your opponent's Battle Phase, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can target 1 face-up monster you control, then another face-up monster you control; The first target loses half its ATK, and if any ATK is lost this way, the other monster gains an equal amount of ATK. These changes last until the End Phase.

Beast-Warrior: Fiery Passions
While this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone, monsters you control gain 100 ATK.

Dinosaur: Evolution Pills
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can activate one of the following effects.
• Put 1 Tribute Counter in your Deck Master Zone.
• Reveal 1 monster in your hand that can be Normal Summoned and remove, from your Deck Master Zone, the number of Tribute Counters equal to the number of Tributes the monster requires; this turn, that monster stays revealed in your hand and can be Normal Summoned without Tribute.
• Reveal 1 monster in your hand and remove, from your Deck Master Zone, the number of Tribute Counters equal to the revealed monster’s Level; Special Summon the revealed monster.

Dragon: Roar of the Supreme
Monsters you control inflicts Piercing Battle Damage when attacking a Defense Position monster.

Fairy: Sky’s Curry
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: you can choose 1 player; that player gains 200 Life Points.

Fiend: Puppet Magic
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can banish any number of monsters you control (min. 2), then target 1 monster in your Graveyard whose Level is equal to the total Levels of the banished monsters; Special Summon that target.

Fish: Time for School
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can target 1 face-up monster you control; banish it until the next Standby Phase.

Insect: Spider Cave
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: you can target 1 face-up monster you control; any opponent’s monster that battles with any monster targeted by this effect is changed to Defense Position at the end of the Battle Phase.

Machine: Mechanical Maneuvering
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can target 1 face-up monster on the field; change its battle position.

Plant: Synchronized Growth
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: you can target 2 monsters you control; both monsters' Levels become the combined Level of those 2 monsters.

Psychic: Life Absorption
If you pay Life Points to activate a Monster’s effect and this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: Gain Life Points equal to half the Life Points you paid.

Pyro: Sparks
Once per turn: you can inflict 200 damage to your opponent.

Reptile: Venom’s Burden
While you control a monster and this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone, each face-up monster your opponent controls loses 100 ATK × its own Level.

Rock: Earthy Ward
If this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone and a monster your opponent controls battles a Defense Position monster you control: return the attacking monster to the hand at the end of the Damage Step.

Sea Serpent: Trident of Atlantis
Once per turn, if this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: you can target 2 cards you control, then target 1 card your opponent controls; send them to the Graveyard.

Spellcaster: Spells in Series
If this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone and you activate a Normal Spell Card: You can discard your hand (min. 1 card); this effect becomes the effect of the Normal Spell Card. (This is a Quick Effect.)

Thunder: Charge Generator
If you Normal Summon a monster and this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can put 1 Charge Counter in your Deck Master Zone. Once per turn: you can remove all Charge Counters from this card, then target 1 monster you control; the target gains 200 ATK for each Charge Counter removed, until the End Phase.

Warrior: Bushido Code
While this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone, if a monster you control would be destroyed, you can destroy another monster you control instead.

Winged Beast: Aerial Tag
Once per turn, if this card is in your Deck Master Zone and a face-up Attack Position monster you control is destroyed by battle, during damage calculation: You can activate this effect; reduce the Battle Damage from this battle to 0, also Special Summon 1 Level 4 or lower monster from your hand at the end of the Damage Step.

Zombie: Vampire’s Gaze
If a monster you control inflicts Battle Damage to your opponent and this face-up card is in your Deck Master Zone: You can activate this effect; your opponent sends 1 Spell/Trap card from their Deck to their Graveyard.

DARK: Mambele of Doom
When this Deck Master is moved from the Deck Master Zone to the field: If you control 3 monsters, you can target 1 card on the field; banish the target.

EARTH: Fissure
When this Deck Master is moved from the Deck Master Zone to the field: You can activate this effect; Destroy the 1 face-up monster your opponent controls that has the lowest ATK. (If it's a tie, you get to choose.)

FIRE: Rigged Explosive
When this Deck Master is moved from the Deck Master Zone to the field: You can inflict damage to your opponent equal to half this Deck Master’s original ATK. If this damage would reduce the opponent to less than 100 Life Points, it reduces them to 100 instead.

LIGHT: Shining Light from Above
When this Deck Master is moved from the Deck Master Zone to the field: You can gain Life Points equal to this Deck Master’s DEF.

WATER: Liquidation
When this Deck Master is moved from the Deck Master Zone to the field: Draw a card.

WIND: Gust of Wind
When this Deck Master is moved from the Deck Master Zone to the field: You can target 1 monster on the field whose DEF is less than this card’s DEF OR 1 Spell/Trap card on the field; return the target to the hand.
[/spoiler]

This is very much still a work in progress and it still has a great many flaws, whether in design, balance, or effect balance. If you would suggest an edit to an effect, I would request not tying the Type/Attribute effect explicitly to the Type/Attribute and not adjusting them specifically to help the newer archetypes. Thank you for any help you can give and feel free to try this out at home. These abilities can be much better rated after being tested, both with meta decks and non-meta decks.

EDIT: Very much edited and streamlined.

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Moving to Theory and Banlist because it feels like it belongs there. Also, making Deck Masters part of the game state in that they can be negated/destroyed/etc. seems really badly thought out.

 

And the fact that you designated generic effects for each and every set makes me think that you don't really want the game state to be any more flexible than anything else. It should be done on a card-by-card or deck-by-deck basis that actually takes the deck's goal into account, and requires being unbiased and knowing proper card design.

 

Can this go wrong? Yeah, but if you're actually doing this more than once, there's no issue if you try to improve the format constantly. Locking everything in just seems like you're not really trying at all, just saying that you get Generic Effects X added to the gamestate.

 

You also make the selection of DMs far too restrictive. Why on earth should it HAVE to share a common type or attribute? How do you choose one for Wind-Ups? Will you have to use a Beast-Warrior or Warrior because they have those most? It just doesn't make sense.

 

This all feels extremely convoluted yet as if you just took a single shade of paint and made the whole thing with it. I'm not claiming my DM rules were better or anything, but the main point of making formats other than the regular one is to make more creative decks while still being reasonable. This adds nothing of the sort, just puts more effects in the gamestate that cannot even be properly regulated.

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Moving to Theory and Banlist because it feels like it belongs there. Also, making Deck Masters part of the game state in that they can be negated/destroyed/etc. seems really badly thought out.

 

And the fact that you designated generic effects for each and every set makes me think that you don't really want the game state to be any more flexible than anything else. It should be done on a card-by-card or deck-by-deck basis that actually takes the deck's goal into account, and requires being unbiased and knowing proper card design.

 

Can this go wrong? Yeah, but if you're actually doing this more than once, there's no issue if you try to improve the format constantly. Locking everything in just seems like you're not really trying at all, just saying that you get Generic Effects X added to the gamestate.

 

You also make the selection of DMs far too restrictive. Why on earth should it HAVE to share a common type or attribute? How do you choose one for Wind-Ups? Will you have to use a Beast-Warrior or Warrior because they have those most? It just doesn't make sense.

 

This all feels extremely convoluted yet as if you just took a single shade of paint and made the whole thing with it. I'm not claiming my DM rules were better or anything, but the main point of making formats other than the regular one is to make more creative decks while still being reasonable. This adds nothing of the sort, just puts more effects in the gamestate that cannot even be properly regulated.


My original idea what such that the effects are non-negateable and unstoppable, but a wording for that proved to be rather difficult and, when accounting for effects like Necrovalley and such, it proved to just be plain difficult to word and would be harder to understand. In the interest to keeping the rules - and rulings - simple, I had to cut immunity out.

Making a Deck Master effect for every single monster or even every single archetype or Deck would prove to be too overwhelming and result in a document several hundred pages. And since quite a few people at my locals change their Deck often without any rhyme or reason, I would have to be ready for literally EVERYTHING.

This format is expected to happen quite often at my locals. Also, I mentioned in the first post that the effects are subject to change; these are just the ones I currently have written. I am trying to improve the format to make it as balanced as possible. (This is currently it's fourth form, if I remember correctly.) That's why I posted here - my locals can't help often enough and I need outside sources to help me as well.

Here's the reason for each restriction:
• Normal Summonable - because you get the opportunity to Normal Summon it. Letting people choose Synchros and Xyz and such, I decided was too hairy.
• Level 4 or lower - in my past experiences with this format, nobody chose a Level 5 or higher Deck Master. As such, in order to make effects less complicated, I decided to take away the scaling factor that encouraged people to choose higher-Level Deck Masters (because they were never used).
• 1700 ATK or lower - the Warrior player chose Goblin Attack Force as his Deck Master, the Dark World player chose Giant Kozaky as his Deck Master, and overall it was a load of stupid stuff happening. The Deck Masters already have a +1 effect when Normal Summoned, so I want them to have less ATK than the average floater.
Giving them a +1 effect when Normal Summoned was voted in by popular demand because there was no reason to ever summon the Deck Master otherwise and they felt that was the way to do it.
• Must share same Type or Attribute with most common, and you only get to choose that Type or Attribute effect - This was as a result of people abusing whatever effect they wanted with whatever Deck they wanted. I originally had it so Archetypes were also one such category, but Wind-Ups and Gladiator Beasts were abused completely as a result to pretty much having whatever Deck Master effect they wanted.
As for what you would choose for your Wind-Up or Gladiator Beast deck, you'd just have to personally count up which Type has the most and which attribute has the most.

I never said this format was completely done nor did I say it was perfect or close to it. I very well recognize this is a work in progress, but that's why I posted it - to get help for it. I will edit my first post to make this cry for help and recognition of flaw much more prominent.

The idea of the effects is to partly be rather generic. As I mentioned earlier, designing something for every archetype would quickly be overwhelming given my locals and I would much rather have effects that fit the flavor of the overall Type or Attribute. Granted, some of these aren't like that, but that's because I couldn't find what I felt was such an appropriate effect.

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i find myself agreeing with black. the rules you have arent really conducive. especially the effects they get when normal summoned. considering most of them have effects that let them slowly accrue advantage just for playing the game (which is problematic in itself) as long as you never touch them, why would i risk that for a one shot effect while also opening myself up to torrential et al?

 

i also agree that the abilities are too restrictive in that it completely ignores the monsters own abilities in favor of some cookie cutter options. this is ESPECIALLY evident in certain cases (beast-warrior, pyro) where you clearly made the effects support one particular archetype that uses that type, to the exclusion of all others. there are pyro decks outside volcanics. there are beast-warrior decks outside fire fist. whether theyre as 'relevant' or not doesnt matter. a format like this exists to cater to rogue decks, so you should be keeping them in mind every step of the way.

 

speaking of a point of contention i have with both this ruleset and black's is the level 4 or lower restriction. i completely understand why its the case. dropping a level 5+ monster for free can be borked. im just not entirely sure heavily restricting player's choice is the best way to do it? not that i have my own format for deck masters or anything. and i would love to get into a discussion comparing the options on the matter. i just feel....that a lot of work needs to be done for this.

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i find myself agreeing with black. the rules you have arent really conducive. especially the effects they get when normal summoned. considering most of them have effects that let them slowly accrue advantage just for playing the game (which is problematic in itself) as long as you never touch them, why would i risk that for a one shot effect while also opening myself up to torrential et al?

 

i also agree that the abilities are too restrictive in that it completely ignores the monsters own abilities in favor of some cookie cutter options. this is ESPECIALLY evident in certain cases (beast-warrior, pyro) where you clearly made the effects support one particular archetype that uses that type, to the exclusion of all others. there are pyro decks outside volcanics. there are beast-warrior decks outside fire fist. whether theyre as 'relevant' or not doesnt matter. a format like this exists to cater to rogue decks, so you should be keeping them in mind every step of the way.

 

speaking of a point of contention i have with both this ruleset and black's is the level 4 or lower restriction. i completely understand why its the case. dropping a level 5+ monster for free can be borked. im just not entirely sure heavily restricting player's choice is the best way to do it? not that i have my own format for deck masters or anything. and i would love to get into a discussion comparing the options on the matter. i just feel....that a lot of work needs to be done for this.


And I'm all ears to whatever suggestions you have that aren't "throw out whole system, build new system." If you do have such response, I ask that you post it. However, since both of you stated you don't have better systems, I guess we can agree that we can work off the current model of sorts.

I find locking out the original effects to be a necessity, otherwise WAY too many Decks can abuse the system and consistently start duels the same way, and overall, that greatly reduced fun.

Okay, so how about this: each Type gets a "While this is in the Deck Master Zone" ability related its Type (though not explicitly) and each Attribute gets a "When you Normal Summon this Deck Master" ability related to its Attribute (though not explicitly). Whatever Deck Master you choose (which can be anything Normal Summonable) gets both effects. Does that sound like a good system?
However, I do want to keep the "If Level 4, 1700 or lower ATK" restriction. Letting Normal Summonable 2500 ATK monsters that essentially +2 upon summon run around sounds kinds ridiculous, don't you think?

I have a little problem devising some Type effects based on that the Type didn't really have a personality outside of that archetype and/or its personality is too closely related to a certain Attribute's personality.

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Took into account most of the concerns noted in the two hours of free time I had to think about this today, and this is how I edited it. Hopefully these abilities and new "lesser" restrictions should be a lot more appealing. Feel free to tell me about any abuses and such, and to further comment and suggest fixing.

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i find myself agreeing with black. the rules you have arent really conducive. especially the effects they get when normal summoned. considering most of them have effects that let them slowly accrue advantage just for playing the game (which is problematic in itself) as long as you never touch them, why would i risk that for a one shot effect while also opening myself up to torrential et al?

That's just how Deck Masters worked in the anime. Plus, some Deck Masters would force you to summon them after their effects were activated, if the effect was strong enough.

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That's just how Deck Masters worked in the anime. Plus, some Deck Masters would force you to summon them after their effects were activated, if the effect was strong enough.

 

but they werent NORMAL SUMMONS. they couldnt be responded to. they were "moved to the field". no cards that work on a summon would work on them (presumably). making it a normal summon is an absolutely atrocious move, because its useless. no one will do it, because the majority of them had (and still have) effects that dont require it in the slightest. why give up your summon for the turn for a mediocre monster that cant even be used again once it leaves the field when just keeping it there is much better 90% of the time?

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but they werent NORMAL SUMMONS. they couldnt be responded to. they were "moved to the field". no cards that work on a summon would work on them (presumably). making it a normal summon is an absolutely atrocious move, because its useless. no one will do it, because the majority of them had (and still have) effects that dont require it in the slightest. why give up your summon for the turn for a mediocre monster that cant even be used again once it leaves the field when just keeping it there is much better 90% of the time?


Fine, I will adjust it so that they are moved to the field but still use a Normal Summon (and still require Tributes, if any). I don't like the idea of virtually Special Summoning the Deck Master out of nowhere, though.

EDIT: Adjusted that rule. Also, effects formatted differently, and some are a lot more cautiously made than previously.

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  • 2 weeks later...

     While I do have a few disagreements with the system, most of them have already been said. I understand that you can't create a rule for every single monster in existence, but it might help if you use both attributes and typing while having multiple effects for each one selectable before you begin a mach.

 

For example, lets say you have a light fairy-type monster on the field. you could have something that works life this;

 

LIGHT-Type Eff1: blah blah blah.

LIGHT-Type Eff2: blah blah blah

then

FAIRY-Type Eff1; blah blah blah

FAIRY-Type Eff2: blah blah blah

 

If you chose this type of card as your deck master you can select 1 effect for each category (1 from light and 1 from fairy), for the rest of this duel your deck master shall have the effects that you chose.

 

     That way there's 4 possible effects for every kind of monster, and you could also carry and use a card from your extra deck just for the purpose of having a specific effect when you play by deck master rules.

     Doing it this way would allow for at least 92 different effect interactions. that's a large enough effect range that nobody I know would have anything to complain about so long as the effects balanced out (like only getting to use 1 of the 2 effects per turn, or a longer cooldown period/ harsher drawback for the more powerful effects) I always wondered if anybody had written out some sort of system for the deckmaster system.

     another thing that might increase the flexibility of this concept would be if you tribute a deckmaster for another monster, the new monster becomes the deckmaster and gains not only the effect you chose for the old deckmaster, but gets an effect based on it's own typing. in return for that mechanic though, the new monster cannot be placed in the deckmaster zone like the old one could.

I know I'm missing something(s), but I don't care at the moment so if you find any issues you can call me out on them and I'll adjust my advice accordingly

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     While I do have a few disagreements with the system, most of them have already been said. I understand that you can't create a rule for every single monster in existence, but it might help if you use both attributes and typing while having multiple effects for each one selectable before you begin a mach.

 

For example, lets say you have a light fairy-type monster on the field. you could have something that works life this;

 

LIGHT-Type Eff1: blah blah blah.

LIGHT-Type Eff2: blah blah blah

then

FAIRY-Type Eff1; blah blah blah

FAIRY-Type Eff2: blah blah blah

 

If you chose this type of card as your deck master you can select 1 effect for each category (1 from light and 1 from fairy), for the rest of this duel your deck master shall have the effects that you chose.

 

     That way there's 4 possible effects for every kind of monster, and you could also carry and use a card from your extra deck just for the purpose of having a specific effect when you play by deck master rules.

     Doing it this way would allow for at least 92 different effect interactions. that's a large enough effect range that nobody I know would have anything to complain about so long as the effects balanced out (like only getting to use 1 of the 2 effects per turn, or a longer cooldown period/ harsher drawback for the more powerful effects) I always wondered if anybody had written out some sort of system for the deckmaster system.

     another thing that might increase the flexibility of this concept would be if you tribute a deckmaster for another monster, the new monster becomes the deckmaster and gains not only the effect you chose for the old deckmaster, but gets an effect based on it's own typing. in return for that mechanic though, the new monster cannot be placed in the deckmaster zone like the old one could.

I know I'm missing something(s), but I don't care at the moment so if you find any issues you can call me out on them and I'll adjust my advice accordingly


I like your ideas. I shall get working on the required adjustments when I next have spare time, which unfortunately doesn't come up often, what with the end of the college term coming up. I should have much free time during the summer. In said timeframe, I will periodically update this based on these ideas.

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Thanks. I always hoped to see the deckmaster system get introduced to the real game, and I still hope somebody at konami (they are the ones with the rights now right?) hop on the ball and at least try to make this an official type of gameplay. it can't be that hard, seeing as they created Synchros and Xyz monster types, why can't they add something like this in to add a brand new dimension to the game?

 

Also, I think Synchro, Fusion, Xyz, and Rituals could have a different effect that could be chosen instead of either typing or attribute. like instead of choosing an attribute or a typing you could choose the third option instead, and the cost for moving the monster to the field could be along the lines of their original summon condition. actually, I might be able to draw up a chart or something if you need help with it?

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Thanks. I always hoped to see the deckmaster system get introduced to the real game, and I still hope somebody at konami (they are the ones with the rights now right?) hop on the ball and at least try to make this an official type of gameplay. it can't be that hard, seeing as they created Synchros and Xyz monster types, why can't they add something like this in to add a brand new dimension to the game?

 

Also, I thing Synchro, Fusion, Xyz, and Rituals could have a different effect that could be chosen instead of either typing or attribute. like instead of choosing an attribute or a typing you could choose the third option instead, and the cost for moving the monster to the field could be along the lines of their original summon condition. actually, I might be able to draw up a chart or something if you need help with it?


I'm always happy to see suggestions. Currently, I am not able to work on this matter, so I don't know if I will need help with it. However, you drawing up some ideas would be of great convenience to me and greatly appreciated.

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Right now I'm horribly not busy, so I might be able to draft something up if I still don't get any job interviews in the next few days.

 

Other than that I can put everything on this page into some kind of word document by tomorrow I guess.

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Warrior's effect should only affect warriors (to keep with its theme.) otherwise, it seems like it could be overpowered somehow.


Originally the format was basically like that; Deck Master choice was greatly restricted based on what kind of deck you were currently using. However, the first suggestion was to get rid of the Deck Master limitations and decks able to use as much as possible as Deck Masters. Making the Deck Master abilities specific to the Type/Attribute defeats the entire purpose of letting people use any Deck Master.

I don't even see why it would be overpowered. It's worded the exact same way as the original Six Samurai, so it functions similarly (i.e. no saving monsters from board nuke).

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Am wondering (if nobody's mentioned this yet) shouldn't their be a rule where if the Deck master was used as a tribute, Fusion, Synchro, Xyz for a new monster that would become the deck master instead where it follows the tribute rules based on material cost when summoned from the deck master zone.

Example 1: Tribute 2 monsters to summon E-HERO Absolute Zero who requires 2 fusion material monsters to summon.
Example 2: Tribute monsters that equal the combined level of a Deck master that is a synchro monster (no tuner is required).
Example 3: Tribute monsters same to the material requirement to an XYZ monster (Tribute 2 level 4 monsters to summon Rank for Number 39 Utopia.)

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say you WANT to have something destroyed; you can target the card you want destroyed (or banished in a macro deck). maybe it should be once per turn? or restricted to either card effect destruction OR battle. Maybe make it only select a face-up monster you control? IDK just seems... eh. Like its balanced but some kind of deck could take advantage...

 

I like your idea though. I wish konami made a game with deck masters.

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