Odion Trap Monsters and Serket

[Custom Cards] Odion's Trap Monster Rise Again | "You Expected Some Strong Monsters? Too Bad! They're Traps!” (9 Cards)

So, one of the stranger things in Duel Monsters was when Marik basically replaced all of Joey's deck with "strong" spells like {Hinotama} and removed nearly all of his monsters. At one point Joey says something along the lines of "I don't need monsters when I can whittle your Life Points down with these Spells." Yeah, burning 500 damage sure is amazing, do it 8 times in one duel and you might just win!

However, one character went even further with this conceit: Odion. Outside of {Mystical Beast of Serket} and {The Winged Dragon of Ra} that Marik snuck into his deck, Odion's deck was completely comprised of Spells and Traps. However, for the tournament, cards whose primary effect were dealing burn damage were banned, and unlike with Joey, this duel was being monitored. So he needed some other way to deal damage.

In came {Embodiment of Apophis}, the card that spawned what would be come to known as Trap Monsters. Not to be confused with Pseudo Trap Monsters like the Paleozoics or Phantom Knight Traps. With this, he could swing for an "astonishing" 1600 damage! My God!

Anyway, jokes aside, Trap Monsters are one of the worst mechanics in Yu-Gi-Oh!, alongside LV monsters, and have about as much support as that mechanic as well. The only one that really saw much play was Metal Reflect Slime, so you could use Metamorphosis on it to go into a high level Fusion monster, or just use it as a nigh unpenetrable wall by battle, until your opponent got an MST.

It's not hard to see why Trap Monsters fail so much. First off, not only can you kill them with monster destruction like regular monster, but you can also kill them with Spell/Trap destruction since they treat themselves as Traps even while they're monsters. Also, while monsters, you're not allowed to use the Soell & Trap Zone you activated them in, but they still take up a Monster Zone, so you can't control as many cards. Also, the real kick in the pants, if your opponent summons {Jinzo} or activates {Royal Decree} while you control 5 of them while playing a Trap Monster deck, you may as well scoop, as your Trap Monsters will return to the Spell & Trap Zone face-up, and become unusable.

So yeah, Trap monsters have a lot of weaknesses. However, one advantage they do have is their ease of summon. Just activate it, and you have a monster on board. Not to mention, some of the monsters have beefy statlines or high levels. So I decided to tack some strong effects onto these Trap Monsters in order to justify Marik's idea of playing a deck of only powerful Traps and Spells.

First off, I decided to incorporate Serket into this since it was Odion's boss monster. In the anime he had two spells that allowed him to summon it. Cup of Serket, which I decided to turn into a searchable Magic Planter rip-off so the deck could have anything in the way of consistency, and Seal of Serket, which fetches the original Serket from anywhere, or adds a Serket Trap to your hand, more on that later.

Next was Royal Temple, a retrain of Temple of the Kings. In the anime, the card was a Field Spell, so I decided to make it that to help it by being searchable with Terraforming, or even Planet Pathfinder since you don't need to worry about Normal Summon with this deck. This cards allows you to activate Trap Monsters immediately, burns for 200 upon each Trap activation since burn damage was something often employed by Marik's henchmen, and gives a somewhat neuter but also slightly buffed version of Temple of the Kings effect to allow you to summon a monster from anywhere by sending Serket to the GY.

Finally, we get to the main course, the Trap Monsters. First up is Avatar of Apophis, a retrain of Embodiment of Apophis with a swapped statline. It serves as a foot soldier, so as such it helps with your consistency to allow you to search more Trap Monsters while also preventing Targeting effects from hitting your cards.

Second is Curse of Apophis. While Odion never used {Curse of Anubis}, he did use another Anubis card, so I thought this would be a decent choice. Non-targeting permanent position changing and DEF reduction, so you can get over your opponent's monsters. In addition, I decided to add an effect in reference to {The End of Anubis} for fun.

Third is Eye of Aphosis. This is in reference to a Wdjat card he used in the anime to redirect an attack of Joey's monster, and it does something similar here. Since there's only {A Man with Wdjat}, I decided to also let it see your opponent's Set cards and gave it his statline.

Next is Judgment of Apophis. In the anime Odion used {Judgment of Anubis} to negate Giant Trunade from returning his Spells/Traps to his hand. This instead protects your Trap Monsters from being destriyed by card effect or banished, since they're double weak to either, especially with Cosmic Cyclone. I also tacked on a Necrovalley type effect since Odion is a Gravekeeper.

Then we have Odion's boss monster retrain, Serket of Apophis. It banishes monsters destroyed by battle, gains half their ATK, and by devouring one of your Traps, is able to attack again. The thing will be your OTK machine, and if you don't OTK, you can just send it to the GY to summon a monster of your choice.

Finally, we got Slime of Apophis, based on Marik. Just a simple battle hand trap that you can use to deal some minor damage and prevent your opponent from attacking your other monsters.

That's everything. As always, be sure to tell me any PSCT or balancing errors you may see. Without further ado, here they are:

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Spells (3 Cards)

Cup of Serket
Normal Spell
Send 1 Trap in your Monster Zone that was Special Summoned from your Spell & Trap Zone to the GY, and if you do, draw 2 cards. You can banish this card from your GY, then target 1 face-up Trap you control and 1 card your opponent controls; return them to the hand. You can only use each effect of "Cup of Serket" once per turn.

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Seal of Serket
Normal Spell
Activate 1 of the following effects:
● Add 1 "Apophis" Trap from your Deck or GY to your hand.
● Special Summon 1 "Mystical Beast of Serket" from your hand, Deck, or GY.
If a "Temple of the Kings(s)" on the field would be destroyed by a card effect, you can banish this card from your GY instead. You can only activate 1 “Seal of Setket” oer turn.

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Royal Temple
Field Spell
This card's name becomes "Temple of the Kings" while on the field or in the GY. When this card is activated: You can add 1 "Serket" card from your Deck to your hand. You can only use this effect of “Royal Temple” once per turn. If you control no monsters Special Summoned from the Extra Deck, you can activate Continuous Traps that have an effect to Special Summon themselves as monsters when activated, from your hand. Each time you activate a Trap Card or effect, inflict 400 damage to your opponent. During your Main Phase: You can send this card and 1 "Serket" monster with 4000 or more ATK to the GY, and if you do, Special Summon 1 monster from your hand, Deck, or Extra Deck.

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Traps (6 Cards)

Avatar of Apophis
Continuous Trap
Special Summon this card as an Effect Monster (Reptile/EARTH/Level 4/ATK 1800/DEF 1600) (this card is also still a Trap), and if you do, until the end of this turn, "Mystical Beast of Serket", "Temple of the Kings", and face-up Traps you control are unaffected by your opponent's card effects. Once per turn, if a card is Special Summoned from your Spell & Trap Zone to the Monster Zone while this card is in your Monster Zone: You can add 1 “Apophis” card from your Deck to your hand.

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Curse of Apophis
Continuous Trap
During the Battle Phase: Special Summon this card as an Effect Monster (Fiend/DARK/Level 6/ATK 0/DEF 2500) (this card is also still a Trap), then change as many Effect Monsters as possible to Defense Position, except Traps that are monsters, and if you do, the original DEF of those monsters become 0. If your Trap that is a monster attacks a Defense Position monster while this card is in your Monster Zone, inflict piercing battle damage to your opponent.

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Eye of Apophis
Continuous Trap
When your opponent activates a monster effect: Target 1 monster your opponent controls (other than that card); Special Summon this card as an Effect Monster (Spellcaster/DARK/Level 4/ATK 1600/DEF 1600) (this card is also still a Trap), and if you do, negate the activation, and if you do that, destroy that target. If Summoned this way, your opponent must keep their hand revealed.

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Judgment of Apophis
Continuous Trap
When your opponent activates a Spell/Trap Card, or monster effect that would destroy or banish a face-up Trap(s): Discard 1 Trap; Special Summon this card as an Effect Monster (Fiend/DARK/Level 6/ATK 2500/DEF 0) (this card is also still a Trap), and if you do, negate the activation, then you can destroy as many face-up monsters your opponent controls as possible, and if you do that, inflict damage to your opponent equal to the highest original ATK on the field among those destroyed monsters (your choice, if tied). If Summoned this way, monsters that are banished, as well as monsters in the GY, cannot activate their effects.

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Serket of Apophis
Continuous Trap
If you control "Temple of the Kings": Special Summon this card as an Effect Monster (Fairy/EARTH/Level 6/ATK 2500/DEF 2000). (This card is also still a Trap.) When a monster(s) is sent to your opponent's GY, even during the Damage Step, while this card is in your Monster Zone: You can send 1 other Trap from your hand or face-up field to the GY; banish that monster(s), and if you do, this card gains ATK equal to half the original ATK of 1 of those banished monsters, also, if this effect was activated between this card's attack declaration and the end of the Damage Step, this card can make another attack in a row.

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Slime of Apophis
Continuous Trap
Special Summon this card in Defense Position as an Effect Monster (Aqua/WATER/Level 10/ATK 0/DEF 3000) (this card is also still a Trap), then, if this card was activated during the Battle Phase, monsters your opponent controls must attack this card during that Battle Phase, if able. If Summoned this way, your opponent cannot target cards you control, except "Slime of Apophis".





Scrapped:

Cup: Some kind of GY effect? Mutual bounce or something else?
Can’t summon monsters, e ceot from your spell and trap zone

Temple of the Forgotten Kings
Field Spell
This card's name becomes "Temple of the Kings" while on the field or in the GY. When this card is activated: You can add 1 "Mystical Beast of Serket" from your Deck to your hand. You can activate Continuous Traps that Special Summon themselves as monsters from your hand. During your Main Phase: You can send this card and 1 "Mystical Beast of Serket" with 4000 or more ATK to the GY, and if you do, Special Summon 1 monster from your hand, Deck, or Extra Deck.

Then activate 1 if these effects
Card after “apophis”?
If you control no monsters, except Traps that are monsters
Just activate Apophis traps from hand without issue, but pust specification for them
You cannot summon from extra deck the turn this card is activated?

Eye of Apophis

When your opponent declares an attack: Target 1 monster your opponent controls, except the attacking monster; Special Summon this card as an Effect Monster (Spellcaster/DARK/Level 4/ATK 1600/DEF 1600) (this card is also still a Trap), then the attacking monster attacks that target instead, and you proceed to damage calculation.

Curse of Aophis

While this card is an Effect Monster, any card effects that activate in your opponent's GY cannot be activated.

Avatar of Apophis

Loop?
If summoned this way, so both effects aren’t same type?
Maybe instead makes them unaffected that turn?

While this card is an Effect Monster, "Mystical Beast of Serket", "Temple of the Kings", and face-up Traps you control cannot be targeted by your opponent's card effects.

Judgment of Anubis
While this card is an Effect Monster, negate any card effect that would move a card in your opponent's GY to a different place.

Serket
While this card is an Effect Monster, monsters destroyed by battle with a Trap that is a monster you control are banished instead of going to the GY.

Metal Reflect Slie]me
and if you do, change the attack target to this card and proceed to damage calculation
If summoned this way, during the Battle Ohase, all monster your opponent must attack this turn, if able

monsters your opponent controls cannot attack monsters you control, except this one.

Targeting protection for this one?

Reveal their hand too?
Opponent must play with hand revealed, and set cards too
Deckares an attack right wording?

If Summoned this way, if your Trap in your Monster Zone attacks a Defense Position monster, inflict piercing battle damage to your opponent.