The secret to dueling: Identity crisis

[Cloudstrife 189]

The secret to dueling: A direct correlation
The secret to dueling: Win without playing a card

So, hopefully by now, after reading my last 2 articles, you should have two things accomplished:
1) Have a deck that correlates to your play style
2) Know the key components of what you need to win a duel, prior to playing a card.
Now, this article still isn’t going to address actually playing a card (but we’re getting there), but the three last components that you need to figure out and figure out quickly.

Welcome to my next article, Identity Crisis!!!

So, you’re at a competition and you’re about to duel an opponent. There are three more things you must do to capture that final edge over your opponent. Identify, Identify, Identify!

1) Identify the player
What type of player are you dueling against?

*I have it broken down into 5 categories but I’m sure you can create your own.

Extreme Beginner- The player appears to be playing with a starter deck on a paper playmat with an unsleeved deck?

Beginner- The player is constantly asking you how to play his own cards and struggling to perform simple, basic combos (example, equip pyramid turtle with axe of despair)…He is asking to read all of your cards or an explanation of their effects.

Intermediate- The player seems to be playing with a tier 1 or 2 deck. He seems to know most of the effective combos but still misplays from time to time. He seems to know a bit of card rulings but still might not understand complex procedures like missing the timing or priority.

Advance Intermediate- The player is playing with a tier 1 deck or is backing up a tier 2 or 3 deck with some extreme skill/tech. He understands all the fundamentals of the game and knows his deck and your deck inside and out. His misplays are rare and far apart. Good luck catching him wrong with a ruling or procedural error but it does happen. Sometimes…

Expert- The player appears to be one of the best. His plays seem flawless and best suited for the situation. His demeanor will never be affected by your presence or playstyle. He knows all his card rulings and procedural rulings and seems to be constantly updated. He knows the contents of all the top tier 1 and 2 decks and has lots of experience at major competitions. His misplays seem almost nonexistent.

There might be some more characteristics to describe these players but I just expressed a quick generalization. It is very important to first identify the player. Why? Keep reading. I will tie everything together during the conclusion.

2)Identify the deck
What type of deck is your opponent playing with? Does his deck seem to be tier 1 (mainstream) or tier 2 (sub mainstream)? Is he playing with special tech (cards that don’t aren’t normally seen)? What’s his win condition? Is his deck highly combo oriented or do many cards seem to stand alone? All these questions and more should be asked to accurately identify what type of deck you’re really up against.

3)Identify the playstyle
The player will mainly be playing in one of three ways: Aggro (extremely aggressive), Stall (extremely slow), or Control (in between both extremes). Sometimes, on very rare occasions, you may get a random playstyle where it seems as the player himself doesn’t even know what he’s trying to accomplish. Regardless, quickly identify his playstyle as best as possible.

Connecting the Identities
Now, this is the most important part of the whole article. YOU CANNOT PLAY AGAISNT EVERY OPPONENT THE SAME WAY!!!! Each and every one of the above factors should determine how YOU play. By the time you sit down and finally figure out what deck you’re up against and how skillful your opponent is, it is too late to change your deck and obviously your skill level. However, you must try and change the one thing that you still have control over, and that is your playstyle. Let’s break it apart.

If you know your opponent is a beginner, playing gladiator beast, and seems to be stalling, you might want to play a little more aggressive and press for damage. If your opponent is an expert, playing a dark dad variant, and starts going aggressive, then you need to try to “control” his options and force him to make plays (like dropping DAD early) so you can counter and then react. However, I’m not saying necessarily that one playstyle directly counters another (this has been disproven). But what I am saying is that you need to figure out what your new focus should be in this match up. I see many players do the same opening time after time without taking these identity factors into account. It is much better for a glad beast player to open with Heraklinos against salvo dad, then it is against lightsworn, however, some players seem not to realize the difference. Salvo dad is heavily reliant on spell and trap cards and have little direct monster destruction, except for DAD of course, and would be highly slowed down by an early Heraklinos. On the other hand, Lightsworn decks could easily trample Heraklinos with an honest or celestia/judgement dragon and don’t rely as much on their spell/traps.

I currently play with a dark variant and I constantly tend to open with hands like cyber valley, reinforcement of the army, machine duplication, mind control, destiny draw and gold sarc. I have a billion different openings I can open with. However, if I know I’m going against an expert playing a lightsworn deck with a control style, I will have to decide on my tactic quickly. Will I choose to stall until he decks out by using rota to search for armageddon knight, drop a necro gardna in grave and gold sarc for burial from the different dimension? Will I choose to rota for stratos, search for malicious, play destiny draw and then gold sarc for dad to be more aggressive? Or will I open with cyber valley and machine duplication and go on that way for a more control based strategy?

This is where my first article comes into play, a direct correlation. In this article, I expressed the importance of having a deck to go with your playstyle. If I may elaborate, I still believe that you should have a primary playstyle. You need to have a deck that correlates to how you plan to play a majority of the time. However, after taking these identity factors into account, you need to decide if you should change for this duel. You have to ask yourself a very hard question, “Am I better off playing the way I usually play against this player/deck/playstyle lineup or will I have more advantage to change?” You will have strength doing your usual plays because you know the usual outcome and how to do it successfully. However it could be more advantageous to slow the duel down or speed it up or pace it somewhere in between. It is up to you. But the point of this article is to inform you that you do have a choice! Options are everything in life, and I just wanted to inform you of another option that I don’t see people utilize enough.

So in summary, Identify, Identify, Identify and then make a choice. Will you change your third identity (your playstyle) or will you keep it the same? It’s up to you. However, each identity should play a small but effective part in your duel against your opponent. Whoever can figure out the three identities first, has a slight edge. This is why lots of players try to catch their next opponent in a duel, if they can. This way they can quickly piece together these identities and begin their round with a slight advantage. But I don’t want to end on such a serious note. Try to have some fun in the process. Sometimes it’s fun to play your “lightsworn” deck really defensively by setting lots of monsters face down. It could even prove to be effective by masking the type of deck you’re playing temporarily and appearing like a beginner. They might shift their own playstyle to “aggressive” and then you could explode back with double JD and punish their over extensions. So just remember that options are always out there. The worst thing you could do is fail to think….or think to fail for that matter lol…

Until next time,
Cloudstrife 189

P.S.

Who likes the new sig and avatar? I know I do! Thanks again [Genesis]

P.P.S.

Whoever wants, can hit me up on messenger or pm me. I appreciate discussing YGO and maybe get some advice/tips/ideas for upcoming articles.

[! ACALC !]

First post, at least when I started reading

Great read

[Xu, Lightsworn Sage]

Good article, I appreciate your insights. However your signature is ******ed. FFX FTW!

[Potatosack]

Originally Posted by Xu, Lightsworn Sage

Good article, I appreciate your insights. However your signature is ******ed. FFX FTW!

I have to agree. lol

Your articles are well thought out. But the Playstyles should be more of a sliding scale for variation.

[Jynx]

I'd like to talk to you privately about this post if you could pm me sometime. If you don't wanna no big deal.

[LordeOurMother]

Nice article. ^_^

[Haseo]

i like this article, keep them coming.

[Cloudstrife 189]

Originally Posted by Xu, Lightsworn Sage

Good article, I appreciate your insights. However your signature is ******ed. FFX FTW!

Come on though, I had to have a sig that matched my username lol...

Originally Posted by Fallen_Asher

I'd like to talk to you privately about this post if you could pm me sometime. If you don't wanna no big deal.

Will do

Originally Posted by Haseo

i like this article, keep them coming.

Yes sir

[Scruffy_07]

cloud is good, i love the articles and think you are very helpful to new and old players both, hey trademaster, i would love to hear some helpful advise from u instead of how you cant win your local cause the 'pros' play there, maybe u would win if u read one of clouds articles...

[Triflingdork]

cool artical. Good Job

[Delphy]

I find that there doesn't tend to be a huge amount of strategy in any given match. You know what your cards do, you know what they can kill, what they can negate, and what they die to. So you just sort of play what you have, and hope that what you have is better than what you opponent can do.

Or am I doing it wrong?

I mean there's only a certain number of interactions with any given hand/graveyard etc.

[Cloudstrife 189]

Originally Posted by Delphy

I find that there doesn't tend to be a huge amount of strategy in any given match. You know what your cards do, you know what they can kill, what they can negate, and what they die to. So you just sort of play what you have, and hope that what you have is better than what you opponent can do.

Or am I doing it wrong?

I mean there's only a certain number of interactions with any given hand/graveyard etc.

My articles are meant to express the "finer" details of dueling. Obviously, some duels are out of your control, but for those other duels, those are what these articles are for. If you're trying to up your skill level drasticlly, or just a little, then these articles will help.

Additional Comment:

Originally Posted by Scruffy_07

o sorry one win and that makes you good, im sorry but one win is luck, two is coincidence, once you manage to win three times you can b***h about how bad other players are in your opinion but im almost positive that since all you can do is tell people not to listen to advice from a good player, than you prob dont have time to think of a good deck and have netdecked some of your locals decks, best of luck to you in tryin to be a better player

Originally Posted by teamgrumpyfish

hmph, elitist much? Id say so

Thanks you guys but please don't respond to trademaster. He is trying to drag this thread way off topic. Please just ignore him.

[TravisIV.]

Despite other post i enjoyed this. Its better then most posted on pojo and im sure is a big help to newer players. Its good to see people take the time to do somthing like this.

The only thing i would add is a 6th lvl of player btween Beginner and Inter. but im just picky. Maybe even add more demensions to the player identity.

[Cloudstrife 189]

Originally Posted by TravisIV.

Despite other post i enjoyed this. Its better then most posted on pojo and im sure is a big help to newer players. Its good to see people take the time to do somthing like this.

The only thing i would add is a 6th lvl of player btween Beginner and Inter. but im just picky. Maybe even add more demensions to the player identity.

Cool...thanks for the advice...always feel free to hit me up on messenger some time if you want to talk ygo. I like talking to more players across the nation/globe...They help encourage my articles

[Drakx]

I really enjoyed the article and found it quite insightful. I never really thought about categorizing these things, but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense.

It really made me think and I appreciate it. Great read, will recommend it to others.

[Scaled Wurm]

Once again I enjoyed the read. Keep them coming =)

Scaled Wurm

[Cloudstrife 189]

Originally Posted by Darko88

I really enjoyed the article and found it quite insightful. I never really thought about categorizing these things, but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense.

It really made me think and I appreciate it. Great read, will recommend it to others.

Thanks, I appreciate the positive input

Originally Posted by wtfotkd

You best be trollin'



Great read, btw. Keep them coming.

Will do

Originally Posted by Scaled Wurm

Once again I enjoyed the read. Keep them coming =)

Scaled Wurm

yes sir...

[Arekkusu]

Wow. Really great article cloud. Impressive. Keep it up, can't wait til your next one.

[Morleh]

I wonder how many "really good article" posts actually read it. Haha, hopefully all of them.

The article's good. There's a few things I disagree with, but they aren't worth getting into. This is the first one of your articles I read / heard of. I'll go ahead and check out your other two right now.

[Cloudstrife 189]

I like to think that everyone really read it but obviously some people skimmed...

[Raven Tobias]

Subbing, excellent as always Cloud.

[PJ]

Yo Cloud, PM Pojo himself and get these on the main site

[camille7688]

Awesome read. The only problem with this maybe is actually remembering and applying them in actual duels. Maybe an article about practice would help?

[Ryokoie]

Awesome Articles, I enjoyed reading all of them. My head hurts now from all the info but good reads and really helpful.

[Cloudstrife 189]

Originally Posted by Raven Tobias

Subbing, excellent as always Cloud.

Thanks raven. You helped a lot, especially when I got bashed so hard at that deck cycle theory article. You helped keep my confidence up. Thanks a lot friend.

Originally Posted by camille7688

Awesome read. The only problem with this maybe is actually remembering and applying them in actual duels. Maybe an article about practice would help?

Hmm.. I will defintely consider. Thanks for the input..

Additional Comment:

Originally Posted by PJ

Yo Cloud, PM Pojo himself and get these on the main site

Wow. You really think they're good enough? Thanks, I'm flattered really. I never thought about writing professionally but maybe I'll start.

Additional Comment:

Originally Posted by Ryokoie

Awesome Articles, I enjoyed reading all of them. My head hurts now from all the info but good reads and really helpful.

Take some asprin and hang tight for my next article. When do you want me to post it?