by LightOfLife Sun Feb 13, 2011 4:31 amToday I'd like to discuss the topic of side-decking.
As we know good side decking can be a crucial key to victory in match duels.
So, to start things of here are some possible side decking strategies:
* Counter the known meta - This side decking method involves putting all the known anti meta cards into the side deck. For example a standard meta counter side deck can involve 3 Light-Imprisoning mirrors (unless you play LS yourself) , 3 Royal oppression (unless you play GBs), 3 Royal Decrees for trap heavy decks, 3 Masks of restrict for anti monarch, 3 Des-Wombats for anti-burn (less popular now as not many people play burn)
* Counter your counter deck - This involves side decking cards which can help save your deck from certain decks that have an advantage on your own deck. For example DD decks have advantage over LS decks, so a possible LS side deck will involve a lot of S/T removal cards and possibly royal decrees to help stop the opponent's RFP cards. If you play a GB deck it's also recommended to have a lot of S/T removers to handle the royal oppressions the opponent will probably side in.
* Surprise change of deck style - This involves replacing all 15 cards between duels to completely change the way your deck runs in order to surprise your opponent. For example In a tourney I've started with a D.D. Monarch build and between duels I've replaced all the D.D. cards with PCM cards which completely turned around the deck style I've used. So if the opponents side decked anti RFP cards they were surprised to find out these are not so helpful vs. PCM - this is especially good if during side decking the opponents took out their D.D. Crows. xD
* General purpose side deck - This just involves carrying all sorts of helpful cards that can help against most decks. Cards like Lightning vortes to handle swarm decks, some S/T removers for stall decks usually 3 solemns (unless you main deck them) and 3 royal decrees are also common. Other useful side deck cards include: Prohibition, Nobleman of Crossout, Waboku, Giant Trunade.
Mirror match side deck - This side deck contains some cards which are really useful against your own deck (or a similar one), to help you against a copycat deck. The idea is taking advantage when you face your same deck, but also try that it just takes down your opponent (not you too). Example: If you play a Perfect Circle Monarch deck you are likely to side deck a DD Crow (if you don't maindeck it) to counter opponent's Disk Commander. That's well but you don't take any advantage. Instead if you are playing a Dark Armed Dragon/Dark deck, if you side deck Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer or Doomsday Horror you will have gained some advantage (either a stronger lv4 monster or a monster which will be boosted by opponent's Necro Gardnas).
OK, hope this thread helps all of you to tune your side decks. Feel free to share some of your own thoughts and strategies so we can all get better in our game.
