YGO DDS Dueling Notes - Revised

12/13/19: Still a work in progress, need to reword a few parts I'm sure but wanted this document uploaded to go along with newest strats. So some of this may sound odd or just not from a recent perspective

YGO DDS DUELING NOTES - REVISED BY WADO_3000


TABLE OF CONTENTS: (Ctrl F is your friend. Also smart phones are too)
(1) Introduction
(2) Dueling Strategy
(3) Notes on Specific Cards
(4) Input Buffering
(5) Opponent AI
(6) Tier 1
(7) Tier 2
(8) Tier 3
(9) Tier 4/Darknite


(1): INTRODUCTION

This guide will serve as a “How to Speedrun” Yu-Gi-Oh! Dark Duel Stories (shortened to YGO DDS), mainly from my point of view. It’s one thing reading strats (your speed run strategy as you progress through the game), it’s another to *understand* how the game goes. I’ve tried to rewrite this from personal notes initially written years back, sorry if its still hard to follow throughout.

With that said, this is written under the assumption that you generally know how to play yugioh, are at least somewhat familiar with this game, and have the idea of speedrunning this game. Watching other people’s runs, and practicing on your own are of course the main ways to learn the game. This guide is made to be fairly in-depth on information and my own thought process as to how to approach the run.

As a whole this is surely too long to read in one sitting, feel free to read in parts, revisit the document as you play and take your time. I consider myself fairly knowledgeable of the game, some parts here will surely be hard to understand from a beginner point of view. Also since I’m my own editor here I dunno if some of it will seem awkward or nonsensical; my b if you get confused.

The main goal of speedrunning YGO DDS is to defeat Darknite 5 times, then input the Credits Password (42382443) to finish. You must start a New game, and beat every duelist in previous stages, or “Tiers”, 5 times each, to reach Darknite. Accomplishing this as fast as possible is the main reason to run this game.

There’s 2 key points in understanding this speedrun imo, and that’s 1: Knowing the strategy of YGO DDS, and 2: Your execution of said strategy as a runner. YGO DDS has many key differences to modern yugioh that takes plenty of time to figure out. So just mastering playing the game is one thing; getting used to playing the game fast, and executing your strategy would be the next level.

This should be obvious, but FOCUS. It helps to play the run consistently, but you can easily make stupid mistakes if you're not keeping the utmost attention. Don't get side tracked. Read these notes, and your own. Always be thinking.

TLDR: If you wanna know more about the run, read particular parts of this from time to time. I hope it helps you think critically, and run the game better overall.


(2): DUELING STRATEGY

HAND CONTROL:
- A very fundamental part of this game is utilizing the first slot in hand effectively. At the beginning of every turn, your game cursor will automatically go to this position. The ideal is using the first card in hand, or your new topdecks, to quickly go through your turn.
- A lot of this run is raw beatsticking and finding a counter for a given situation; if the game can naturally give you a good card, it’s best to use it and mash A to make things faster. Having to scroll over your hand and think wastes time, and is ideally minimized. The runner that makes use of, and gets the most raw luck out of their topdecks, will go through the game that much faster.
- To go along with this idea, the player should want to make the first slot in hand open quite often, as it would enable this ideal playstyle the best. That includes even manually discarding monsters and dead cards, just to see and depend on topdecks. It takes time and skill to identify which cards fit any given situation, the player’s judgment is crucial.
- One of the faster ways to duel is to not scroll through the hand constantly. Look at your hand if necessary, then plan out the next couple moves you want to do.
- There isn't a reason to check newly drawn cards every turn. Since your deck is mainly made of weaker cards, you can assume that your topdecks generally won't be great. Play in such a way that you know exactly what cards you want to summon through the next couple turns.
- Additionally, you want to think during the opponent's turn in terms of what plays you want to do; think of exactly which card you may need in hand on their turn rather than your own.
- In short: Minimize your inputs as much as possible. When you get used to playing, it should be easier to keep this in mind.

THE OPPONENT:
- Pay attention to the opponent's draws. With practice, you'll know their decklists, and the more annoying cards they could play individually. Closely look at their empty slot in hand; if they immediately play the new card, then that means the AI chose it as its best option, meaning that card has the highest cost, and more likely to be annoying (or its some random spell).
- If the AI hasn't played annoying cards, but drew badly, then you know that if they don't play newly drawn cards, their new sets are bad.

TRAPS:
- For traps, it's valid to set beatsticks, knowing that the AI will run into it, letting you swing for damage next turn. Personally, I like to play traps when I know the opponent runs outs to your monsters. So for example, I'd love to play a trap when I have Jirai Gumo on field vs. Joey, Yugi, and Espa Roba, because I know all 3 of them run Pyros.
- When going first, it's a good idea to play good traps immediately when you see them, as you would often play them anyway by the time you set a monster. Also, it's generally faster to attack with all your monsters, and then play traps last. It's usually more inputs to play a trap and scroll back to attack with something. It's good to play traps as topdecks more often than not: even if you go second, if you set a trap, then set a monster, you'll inflict more damage overall.

GETTING GAME:
- Think ahead when it comes to attacking directly. Try to have as few attacks as possible to win the game. Manually add the damage you can do with the monsters you currently have on the field, and think of the most efficient way to win. If you need to summon something else, think "I need to top a monster with X amount of ATK to win next turn."
- When depending on 1 beatstick mainly, you can often just attack with that 1 card turn after turn. If the opponent has a bit less than 4000, then you might just need to attack directly twice or so with your strongest card, be efficient.
- When you're topping beatsticks, you'll often not need to attack in a certain order to get game next turn. So even if you top something a bit stronger than what you already have, you can simply mash A and not worry about it (I'd say, if the new top is 300 ATK or less stronger than your weakest monster, its often irrelevant to attack in a certain order). This should save a few seconds here or there.
- Additionally, it's faster to attack with weaker monsters if necessary before stronger ones, as the loss of life animation will be that much quicker. The game ends when they get to 0 life points, so inflicting the least amount of damage that still wins the game, or at least in the best order, is faster.
- Lets say you have 3 monsters, and you know you want to attack with the rightmost one. On your turn, it's faster to summon the very first card in your hand, and scroll left to that monster rather than normally scrolling to it.

RESETS:
- Try to recognize when a duel is going poorly early on, so that you can save time and reset quickly. If you get hit by multiple equips/boosts, random tribute summons, or simply don't draw a decent beatstick/fuse by turn 2, you should reset. You don't want to commit to a poor duel by turn 4 or 5, since you've likely already lost over a minute or so.

- Fun fact: 0 ATK monsters kill each other in battle.

(3): NOTES ON SPECIFIC CARDS

MONSTERS:
- Jirai + 1800 is the ideal every game, as that is a perfect 4000 dmg, which ends the game in 2-3 turns quickly.
Opening Jirai: If you open Jirai, all you need is a card to pop all their sets, and another monster with 700+ ATK. So turn 2, Jirai ATK: 5800. Next turn: Jirai - 3600, then another 700 makes that 2900. Next turn you have exact damage for game.
- Fiend's Hand and Beastking, in terms of the actual TCG, are Fissure/Smashing Ground and Dark Hole respectively. In the early game, play Fiend's Hand like a regular monster until you get to Yugi, where you want to use its effect more often. I personally like to hold Beastking until I'm confident I'm in a good place in the duel. Use it as a beatstick if you're drawing bad.
- Catapult Turtle works very differently here than in the real life game. Its effect is to tribute all monsters you control at once, except itself, and inflict damage equal to their total attack. If duels go well, it can often end games quickly mid to late game. Mentally add up the monsters' attack on field to use it the best.
- Lets say you have 3 monsters on field, the AI's life is low, and they set. If their LP is more than your highest ATK monster, then more often than not Catapult is a good bit faster. Personally, if the AI has no monsters, and you need 2 direct attacks, I simply just attack. So basically, if you would need more than 2 attacks to win, then try to use Catapult.
- You can play to set up Catapult pretty easily. If you open or draw Catapult early, you know that you want to win with its effect. So that means, you sometimes don't need to attack directly with everything, knowing that winning via Catapult is faster. You can sometimes not attack at all for a turn, but summon something you know won't die, and then simply use Catapult next turn. So just think ahead.
- Hourglass is a card that can increase the ATK of all your monsters by 500, at the cost of 1000 LP. Sometimes it makes things faster by limiting the number of attacks you need, sometimes it's irrelevant. Think about how many attacks you need with or without an Hourglass boost. For Tier 2 it's often helpful, as anyone there can draw random beatsticks or equips (also helps get over Seeker's walls)

SPELLS:
- To use a ritual, you need to sacrifice 2 monsters, and have the named monster on the card already on the field. You would never really need to use them 99% of the time, as their added to the deck as additional 0 cards, but its nice to know how they work just in case. For example, Curse of Tri-Horned requires B. Dragon Jungle. So if you want to summon Tri-Horned Dragon, just sacrifice 2 other monsters (that haven't attacked or used any effects) and B. Dragon turns into it.


(4): INPUT BUFFERING

This part is purely explaining the execution of timing button presses. A run that’s buffering inputs constantly is saving time, and looks “tighter” in a way aesthetically. Minimizing your inputs as much as possible, and then optimizing said inputs, is an obvious way to improve a speedrun.

A lot of this can happen basically when the game is transitioning to another screen. I refer to it as a "white screen" within these notes. It's something you may ignore more often than not, but performing certain actions (mainly using the directional buttons) during that little pause can help make things slightly faster.

PASSWORDS:
- After selecting Password in the menu, and mashing A to get to the password screen, you can hold your directional buttons during that time to make things a bit faster.
- If a password starts in a 0, hold Right during the white screen. You should immediately jump to the 2nd number position.
- If a password starts in a 1 or 9, try holding Up or Down respectively. You'll put in those numbers immediately, allowing you to continue the password slightly quicker.
- In my runs, I choose to hold Up or Down whenever I have to put in a 4, 5, or 6, as it feels faster for me. So with this idea, you can hold Up or Down during that white screen, and continue to hold it to reach those numbers a bit faster. It's all about timing things correctly.

BEFORE CHOOSING DUELS:
- When choosing "Campaign" and entering the Tier 1 duelists, you can hold Up or Down while the screen is white. If you hold Up, you instantly jump to Joey, and Down jumps to Yugi. So you can immediately just mash A while having those Up or Down buttons held to immediately choose those 2, or to simply move on to Mai or Mako a bit faster.
- Following that same idea, when you move on to Tiers 2 or 3, you should do the same thing. For instance, if you want to duel Rex, you can choose Campaign, and hold Right during the white screen before Tier 1 appears. You'll jump to Tier 2; then during that new white screen, hold Down to jump to Rex. When you get used to the motions of constantly buffering inputs between Tiers, you're saving time.

AFTER CHOOSING DUELS:
- After choosing someone to duel, and mashing A through their exposition, you can hold your directional buttons during white screens to very quickly move through the "CHEST - DECK - DUEL" screen. So you can hold Up during a white screen to immediately go to the DUEL option. Unlike most other inputs though, these can go really fast when holding your directional buttons, so you have to be careful in how you time the button presses.
- So in general for when you want to deck edit, the ideal would be to hold Right during the white screen, and mash A to instantly select DECK. If you hold Down, the game doesn't really read the A input. Make your edits, then press B to get back to the menu. During that new white screen, hold either Left or Up, and mash A to go to your trunk.

DURING DUELS:
- It's faster to hold on to directional buttons during duels rather than mash them. So if you know you want to go to a specific slot, it's best to hold on to Up, Down, Right, or Left, rather than mash.
- After attacking, it's faster to hold directional buttons to move to the next card you want, rather than waiting and mashing.


(5): OPPONENT AI:

By knowing the game’s AI, you can plan out your plays accordingly. Catching common trends and predicting plays can be incredibly beneficial.

BATTLE AI:
- The AI won't attack with monsters whose ATK is less than half of their defense. For example, Joey will always set Swordsman of Landstar, whose 1200 DEF is more than twice its 500 ATK.
- Let's say the AI has the strongest monster on the field, and it's your turn. If you already have a monster on the field, and you set a new monster, the AI will use its strongest monster to attack that new set. If it summoned a new monster, and can't attack over your other monster, it will just set.
- Let's say you have multiple monsters face up. The AI will try to attack the strongest monster it can on your field, otherwise it will set.
- With multiple monsters on its side of the field, the AI will attack with weaker monsters that it knows will destroy one of your monsters by battle. Which means, the AI might run into your traps with its weaker monsters if possible.
- The AI will often attack monsters it's guaranteed to destroy by attribute before newly set monsters.
- If the AI can inflict damage to win the game, it will.
- For tribute summon monsters, the AI will tribute summon as soon as it can. If it has multiple tribute monsters, the AI won't often tribute a 1 tribute monster for another 1 tribute, but will tribute anything for a 2 tribute monster. I believe they may tribute higher cost tribute monsters for lower ones already summoned, but not sure.

SPELL AI:
- The AI will play many spells after summoning a monster, such as field spells, Crush Card, Swords, Raigeki, etc. I believe for Swords, you must have a monster on the field for the AI to use it.
- Change of Heart doesn't necessarily get the highest ATK monster, but the highest cost. For instance, if you have 7 Colored Fish & Jirai Gumo on field, Change of Heart gets 7 Colored Fish since its cost is higher. I believe that if you have 2 monsters with even cost, it would get the leftmost one, but that's just a guess. With Dunames & Dark Elf on field, I've seen the game snatch Dunames.
- For Raigeki, I believe they play it either as a random top deck, or when they can't roll over your strongest monster. So with something like Anti-Raigeki, you don't want to use it the second it's drawn to protect a weak card; wait for a beatstick, then play it and hope for the best.
- The AI won't play Dark Hole unless they have no monsters on the field. So if the AI has a clear field and can't summon, or gets destroyed after attacking, then it will use Dark Hole. The AI isn't smart enough to use Dark Hole before attacking with something weaker.


(6): TIER 1

Ideally, your first turn would be to quickly scan your hand, and identify the best fusion to go for if possible. If it's a high level fusion, you want to summon/set one of the materials, and the very next turn fuse for that card. If you think the materials could get destroyed, fuse them in hand and summon/set a different card you know will not get destroyed, and tribute summon (not for 2 tribute fusions, namely Stone D.). If you can get a low level fusion, you can fuse for it in hand, summon/set something else, then normal summon that fusioned card next turn.

Following that, if you have 2 beatsticks out, then you can usually summon something weaker that you know can generally run over any set the opponent has. You usually don't need more than 3 monsters on the field. If you open 2 of the high ATK Zombie cards, you probably don't need to fuse (except for Mai, and maybe Yugi).

Play risky with this section of the run. Do plays that can lead to a sizeable payoff and save time; you want a huge lead here, so that you can deal with poor luck in Tier 2 or Tier 3 much better.

Here’s a link with a fusions document I follow, but Exarion’s notes and the Fusion Guide on speedrun.com are likely much more useful: https://pastebin.com/7ESgk17p

TRISTAN
Don't attack his sets with Winds, as he runs a lot of Forest cards. If games go longer for whatever reason, he'll eventually draw Unhappy Maiden, a Light, so you don't want to attack it with Fiends. He'll always set it if he has it. Hesitate to make Metal Dragon, as it's a Pyro and he runs plenty of Aquas.

MAKO
This is pretty simple for the most part, I often draw beatsticks a lot of the time to simplify the game. I'll often risk it and set a beatstick, so that he'll attack and I'll inflict more damage. If he draws an equip at the very start, or really any part of the game it's annoying. He runs a ton of Earth monsters, so you can set Yamatano or Petit sometimes. It sucks here to draw poorly or watch him play Umi or equips, but ideally this goes 10 mins or less.

YUGI
The key to Yugi is knowing that he runs 2 Dark Hole, and will always use it if you have 3 or more monsters on field if he draws it. So dealing with it well if it comes is crucial.
- One strategy is to "bait" the Dark Hole; play in a way that if he does have it, you have another beater to summon next turn. Ideally you want at least 3 beatsticks available, between drawing well and fusing. The ideal is to draw 3 good attackers, so you can summon 2 of them, then simply use a weaker 3rd monster. If he has Dark Hole, you'll have a backup option while at least trying to win as fast as you reasonably can.
- Another slower, less risky strat is having 1 good beatstick on the field, then summon a 2nd monster you know rolls over all his sets, and use that 1 beatstick to inflict damage turn after turn. You can hold off summoning a 3rd monster until you know you have game. With this style, some Yugi duels consist of either fusing or summoning a beatstick, then summoning something weak, or a conveniently drawn 2nd beatstick to attack. I'll have only those 2 for a while, and eventually your hand will fill up to 5. You can look at your hand, and hope to either have a beastick, or fuse if necessary. You can sometimes discard the 1st card in my hand if its weak, hoping to draw a relevant card.
- There are a few ways to know for sure if he has Dark Hole; if his monster gets destroyed when attacking your set via attribute, or if he runs into your traps. After that, you'll be able to play regularly and summon as you want. Of course, he can always top deck it randomly, and if he has a clear field he'll use it even with just 2 monsters on your field. When this happen, I've seen him attack with Kuriboh? So basically, hope he doesn't have it at all lmao
- If the highest beatstick you have is under 1500 ATK, you might as well take the chance to summon a 3rd monster to attack with, as the game is already going slowly by that point.
- If you open Dark Elf or Jirai, the plan should be to attack directly with them over and over again.
- Theoretically, attack sets with Fiends before Forests, as Flame Viper would be set before his Lights with its higher cost.
- Fiend's Hand is a great card vs Yugi, as it destroys any set and leaves the field, and leaves you out of Dark Hole range.
- Small note: Is there a split where Joey and/or Yugi open double Flame Viper?

JOEY
He runs multiple copies of Flame Viper, Hane Hane, and Time Wizard, so be cautious to attack with Forest, Earth, and Shadow respectively. That basically means he can draw an out to your big fusions :( The more annoying high DEF sets he has are Air Marmot (600 DEF), Mountain Warrior (1000 DEF Earth), and Swordsman of Landstar (1200 DEF Light). He can sometimes play Meadow, which will boost Mountain's DEF to 1300, and Landstar's to 1560. He'll always set Landstar if he has it. He does run 1 copy of Dark Hole; I've sometimes seen him hold it, and play it if you have 4 monsters on the field. He'll also use it if the only monster he can summon is at 6 cost or lower.

MAI
She likes to hold back cards until she draws Harpie Lady, then goes apeshit lol. A scary combination of cards would be Equip, Mountain, and Harpie Lady at 2190 ATK. Sometimes, she'll get off multiple equips, or Elegant Egotist, but rarely. Mai runs plenty of Forests and Lights, so be wary of using Winds and Fiends. She draws Feather Duster a lot, so it makes using traps feel stupid a lot of the time. She also runs 2 Witch's Apprentice, so Dunames and Gemini Elf in particular are vulnerable to it, as well as your weaker cards. She has Unhappy Maiden, and will always set it if she has it.


(7) TIER 2

A lot of this simplifies to opening a beatstick, or a certain out for the opponent's deck. Most of them are reliant on specific types (aside from Seeker and Kaiba I guess), so what you can play depends on your draws and general knowledge of the opponent. You really don't want to take a loss at this point of the game; if you ever run into double equip it's just annoying and unlucky.
- For Tier 2 and on, if you have a weak monster with an attribute good against their deck, and they're just setting, then it's often a good idea to attack that set with the weak monster.

ESPA ROBA
If you go first and open an Earth monster, set it immediately. Try to attack sets with monsters over 1000 ATK, because Psychic Kappa is annoying as fuck lol. He'll always set it if he has it. He likes to draw Equip spells, but your beatsticks/fusions make them irrelevant for the most part.

SEEKER
Similar to Yugi, it's best to have a particular playstyle when it comes to him. Basically, hope to draw beatsticks, and hope you don't run into Stone Statue. Hold onto your Winds just for this reason, don't fuse with them immediately. If I get a beaststick on the field, the first thing I'll usually do on my turn is to scroll up, attack with that beatstick, then afterwards look through my hand to see what my best option is. Play carefully, as playing risky against him can really cost you.
- Use very weak monsters you’ve set while going first to attack into and check his set monsters; don’t worry about conserving LP. Running random beatsticks into Stone Statue or whatever saves LP, but makes the game turns longer. Checking his sets and summoning the right counter furthers the game.
- It's best to attack with Seasnake or 7 Colored over other 1800 or lower beatsticks since they get over Piper.
- Traps generally aren't great the first few turns, as he only attacks with monsters with ATK less than half their DEF, which isn't a ton. You can try to set Bear Trap or higher, hoping for a Hannibal tribute in spots. Otherwise, hold onto traps for when he already played a card he would attack with, or to protect a Wind monster out for his random Forest cards.
- Because of draw luck, and Raigeki, you can easily have a bad duel where you're scraping to get over his monsters, or inflict damage. Beastking is a really good out if he's building a field full of large DEF monsters. Hourglass is also great as well.
- Anti-Raigeki can be really good if you draw it, and if played correctly. I like to play it turn 1 if possible, because he'll often use Raigeki immediately if he has it. Otherwise, I like to use it when I have a good field, mainly protecting 2 or 3 monsters.
- Lastly, I'll mention that he can fuse for Flame Cerberus, and you don't run Pyros 0_0

ON USING COCOON:
Starting at Rex, you put Cocoon of Evolution in the deck, which by itself is literally the fastest way to win any duel. So really, you hope the game simplifies to opening it turns 1-3; after turn 4, unless you're having a bad duel, your other beatsticks should be good enough.
- The entire route depends on you getting off Cocoon as early and often as possible. Check your entire hand on your first turn every time just to see it. When starting 2nd in a duel, you should often summon a beatstick to attack over sets, as most opponents in Tier 2 and on have tribute monsters that could possibly get over Cocoon’s 2000 DEF.

REX
If you go first and open a Wind monster, set it immediately. If you open a 1600+ ATK card, you can be risky and play it in ATK as well. He does run some Forests, and off type dinos like Crawling Dragon and Two-Mouth Darkruler which is annoying. So for this reason, you might want to play traps to protect Winds. Not much else to say, the only way you lose is if you draw horrible, or he plays multiple equips and Wasteland, and you have no outs.

WEEVIL
If you go first and open a Pyro, set it immediately. You put in 2 Pyros, as well as cheap pyros dropped during the run. If you open a 1600+ ATK card, you can be risky and play it in ATK as well. At this point, you want to attack set monsters with 1500+ ATK beaters, as there are various random monsters with 1500 DEF from here on. If he plays Forest, try to attack sets with monsters over 1800 ATK. Obviously his strongest card is Cocoon, if he draws that or Skull Mark Ladybug he'll set them immediately.
- The AI reads its own Cocoon as a 20 cost card rather than 60, so it wont usually be played early. It may very well be in the middle of a duel, when he has no other cards above 20. Also a note for way later in the game: if you have a decent beatstick and Cocoon set on field, Change of Heart will take the beatstick instead of Cocoon.
- It may be helpful to set Eatgaboon for cards like Insect Soldiers of the Sky, since it can destroy Earth monsters such as Neo and Stone D.

PANDORA
If you go first and open a Dreams, or maybe a Light like Magician of Faith, set them immediately. He tends to play his field spell pretty consistently, so you'll find that his monsters are often in the 1500-1950 ATK range. Similar to Weevil, if he plays his field, try to attack with monsters over 1800 ATK. Hesitate using Gemini Elf, as he runs a ton of Shadows, tho it's pretty huge under Yami. He runs 1 Dark Hole, which is annoying. I've lost to him the most overall in Tier 2, but I wouldn't call him overly difficult.
- Theoretically, you can save him and duel Kaiba first, but in my route I wouldn't usually plan on his drops or anything being added to the deck, so it's player preference

KAIBA
The main things to look out for are La Jinn, Battle Ox, and his tribute monsters. Not much else is scary, though if he sets Mystic Horseman or Saggi it can be annoying. If he draws Saggi he'll always set it. You can try to set Pyros if you go first, because he does run at least Battle Ox and Horseman in multiples. He plays Dragon Treasure, which can equip to Grappler, or of course Blue-Eyes. If you're not doing well (hopefully, you always are), and he has 2 monsters on the field, you can try to set a Shadow, and hope he tributes for Blue-Eyes.


(8) TIER 3

This part of the game takes much more thought; really, you could say the first 2 tiers were 1 half of the game, and this is an entirely different beast. Prepare for hax everywhere lol, it's likely you'll take a loss or two.

GENERAL NOTES;
- Usually, if you open Trap Master, play it immediately and use its effect. You should be able to bait a few things hopefully.
- Think critically about what card drops you want to add during Tier 3. It's a waste of time to only think about drops before and after duels. Imagine what card you want to take out, and what card you want to add in while dueling.
- For Raigeki, I believe they play it either as a random top deck, or when they can't roll over your strongest monster. So with something like Anti-Raigeki, you don't want to use it the second it's drawn on a weak card; wait for a beatstick, then play it and hope for the best.
- If you're in a really good spot, or basically in a position to win, hesitate to use traps or Trap Master to bait something. It may lead to something like Dark Hole, which could wreck a game winning field.
- Unlike the first 2 tiers, go ahead and attack directly with weak monsters when possible. It may feel slower but you never know what they may topdeck; inflicting guaranteed damage, even just a little, is safer in the long run.

HOW TO PLAY UNDER SWORDS:
- The biggest time waster can be multiple Swords of Revealing Light. If you have a monster that you think they can run over, or if you can possibly destroy their monsters via attribute, it's best to set turn after turn while under Swords.
- If you think they won't run over your monster during the 3 turns, then simply pass and end your turns quickly. It's also viable to discard cards in hand, hoping for good draws. er.
- If you're under Swords and have Beastking, try to play it on the 3rd turn, so you know you can attack with your best beatstick next turn.
- If you want to be risky, or maybe against Slysheen, you can try to simply summon decent monsters in ATK that you think won't be destroyed, so that by the time Swords is over, you can attack with all those monsters at once.

P. SETO
He runs max copies of Raigeki, Change of Heart, Dark Hole, and Megamorph. So basically, if he draws his stronger monsters, and just a few of these staples, then he rolls straight through you. Duel him first, because it doesn't make sense to wait, lose more than 2-3 times against this guy and have your time look bad. Hes the main run killer, so just hope all goes well. If you get past him with a good time, you know the run can go well. Plus, he has some pretty good card drops you can add to the deck.
- On your first turn, play something weak, hope he uses a powerful spell on it. Throughout the duel, try to conserve your cards, play the weakest card necessary to deal with whatever he has.

ISHIZU
She probably has the best monster line up, in that it's diverse type wise, and she runs beatsticks such as Dunames, Gemini Elf, Dark Elf, Harpie's Lady Sisters, Mystical Sand, Performance of Swords, and Cosmo Queen. If she draws Mystical Elf she'll always set it. She doesn't run any cards to steal your monsters, but runs 3 Dark Hole, 3 Spellbinding Circle, and namely, 3 Swords of Revealing Light. Swords by itself can waste a bunch of time, so if you happen to get it over and over in dueling her, you were super unlucky. At the very least, she can give you some good drops sometimes. Her and P. Seto are extremely annoying, but if you go through them well enough you should have some confidence in the run.
- If you go first, set a Shadow or weak monster. If her monster gets destroyed, she'll play a powerful spell if she has it.
- When she plays Swords, sometimes I like to immediately end my turn, regardless of what's on my field or in hand. If you get lucky, she may play nothing for a series of turns.
- Small note: is there a split when she opens double Dark Hole, or topdecks it back to back?

PARADOX
He runs 3 Brain Control, 3 Spellbinding Circle, and 3 Crush Card, so play conservatively. Don't play something very strong turn 1, since he likes to Brain Control and tribute summon often. He runs 2 types of monsters: Light and Dreams. So with the answers to those types being Shadow and Fiend respectively, it can be really annoying to try to play direct outs to what he has. His stronger cards are definitely Light though, so play your Shadows as best you can. Don't make Blackland Fire Dragon (Dragon + Shadow), as that will probably be hit by a Dreams or Crushed at some point.

SLYSHEEN
If you go first and open a Light, set it immediately. He runs 3 Swords, 3 Megamorph, and maybe 2-3 Raigeki (?). Most of his monsters are awful, watch out for Treasure Chest and Dream Clown, as Dreams cards can destroy your Shadows. Toon Alligator has 1600 DEF which is annoying. His tributes are fairly strong, in that he has multiple Divine monsters and some Fiends with decent ATK, such as Mask of Shine & Darkness, and Toon Summoned Skull. He'll sometimes double tribute for Manga Ryu Ran, Bickuribox, or Psycho Puppet. Overall though having a hard duel against him is just unlucky.


(9) TIER 4 - DARKNITE
Obviously this is the most difficult, and luck dependent part of the run. He runs max copies of Change of Heart, Brain Control, Raigeki, Dark Hole, Shadow Spell, and probably other spells I'm missing. It's realistic to lose and have to reset over and over. Just like the past 4 duels, play conservatively and hold back as much as you can. His monster count is somewhat diverse, with Jirai Gumo being the standout of course. You'll mainly want to set weaker Wind and Shadow monsters turn 1, hoping for his Earth monsters, and Guardian. Hold back your Lights and Pyros. You could try setting a Light if he has 2 monsters on the field, hoping that he summons Wall Shadow. When you finally beat him 5 times, put in the credits password and GG.