How To: Gaming THE HOW TO CO. — EDITION 10

A violet detonation of light erupting across a ruined stone arena, embers thrown into the dark

● DOOR 02 · YU-GI-OH! — THE COMBO TURN

DECKS & STRATEGY it is all one turn.

A modern duel is decided inside one long turn. Here is how that turn is built, exactly where it snaps, and what to do when it's pointed at you.

▸ WHERE THE TURN SNAPS

A combo turn is a chain of links. Break the first one and the whole thing never happens.

One card finds the next, which summons the next, which builds the board. That is the whole engine, and it is why decks run so many copies of the same few effects. It also means the card you use to stop it — a monster whose effect you activate straight from your hand, on your opponent's turn — is worth wildly different amounts depending on when you use it. Same card. Same cost. Two different games.

◆ CUT AT THE FIRST LINKBEST CASE

The turn never starts.

Stop the card that finds everything else and there is nothing behind it. They are left holding a hand of pieces that only work together, and none of them work alone.

1 CARD SPENT · A WHOLE TURN GONE

◆ CUT AT THE LAST LINKWORST CASE

They lose one piece.

Wait until the board is nearly built and the same card removes a single monster from it. Everything that came before is already on the table and staying there.

1 CARD SPENT · ONE PIECE GONE

◆ DIAGRAM IS AN ABSTRACTION — REAL CHAINS BRANCH UNEVENLY. THE EARLIEST CUT IS USUALLY THE BEST ONE, BUT ONLY IF IT CUTS SOMETHING THE DECK CANNOT SIMPLY REPLACE. THAT JUDGEMENT IS THE HARDEST THING IN THE GAME.

Three ways in.

BUILD IT · HOLD IT · BREAK IT

HOW IT CHAINS

How a Combo Deck Actually Chains

Every combo turn is the same shape: a card that finds a card that summons a card. Learn the shape and the turn stops being magic.

▸What a starter actually is
▸Why decks run so many copies of one effect
▸Where the turn is fragile

◆ GUIDE COMING SOON

A burst of fine gold filaments radiating out from a single point on a dark stone slab

THE BOARD

Building a Board That Holds

Five monsters that do nothing is not a board. A board is a set of answers pointed at what your opponent is about to do.

▸What each piece is actually stopping
▸Overextending, and how to tell
▸Holding something back on purpose

◆ GUIDE COMING SOON

Ten blank cards laid out in two neat rows on rough stone, edges lit violet

BREAKING IT

Breaking a Board on Your Turn

You went second and they built a wall. There is almost always a seam — the trick is finding it before you commit.

▸Reading a board before you touch it
▸Which piece to remove first
▸What to do when there is no seam

◆ GUIDE COMING SOON

$A carved stone tablet split down the middle, violet light pouring out of the fracture$

Two players' hands meeting over a dark table, one lit violet and one lit orange, a single card between them

▸ THE HARDEST DECISION

Everyone knows to hold the answer. Almost nobody knows when to spend it.

▸ ONE DECK, TWO GAMES

Going first and going second are not the same game — and most decks are secretly built for one of them.

A single blank card suspended in a swirling ribbon of violet and gold energy above wet stone

◆ GOING FIRST

You build the wall.

No draw, no attacks — the whole turn is setup. You spend it turning one Normal Summon into as many answers as you can leave standing, then pass.

WINS BY BEING UNBREAKABLE

A hand slamming a blank card down into a burst of embers on a scorched stone floor

◆ GOING SECOND

You take it down.

You get the extra card and the first attack, and you need both. Your hand is built to remove things — and to survive the turn you just watched happen.

WINS BY FINDING THE SEAM

Who goes first in the opening duel is settled at random — the rulebook says rock-paper-scissors or a coin flip — and the winner chooses. After that, the loser of the previous duel chooses. So a deck that only knows how to go first is exposed in game one, and then hands the choice to its opponent every time it wins. That is what the side deck is for.

A heavy gold chain stretched taut, its centre link glowing white-hot orange while violet lightning arcs across the charred links on either side

▸ FROM THE ARCHIVIST · IAN

"New players hold their answer all the way to the end because it feels safer. It isn't. You didn't save the card — you paid full price for it and got nothing."

Essays for the table

PLAYING WITH OTHER PEOPLE

Three neat stacks of blank cards of different heights on a dark violet surface

IAN · ESSAY● LIVE Trade Up Without Burning Friends How to move up a tier without becoming the person nobody at the shop wants to deal with. READ THE ESSAY POPPY · ESSAY● LIVE Win Game Night Without Making Enemies READ POPPY · ESSAY● LIVE Sell Part of a Collection Without Regret READ

▸ WHY THESE THREEChasing a format means buying and selling constantly. These are the three ways people get that wrong.

The how-to guides

Written for the turn you're about to sit through, not the one you'd like to be having.

◆ START WITH SURVIVING ONE. BREAKING ONE COMES AFTER.

ROUTE 02 · DUEL

Surviving the turn, and taking one back.

◆How to Survive a Combo TurnSOON ◆How to Break a Board on Your TurnSOON ◆How to Choose Between Going First and SecondSOON

▸ WHERE TO NEXT

You know where it breaks.

▸ DOOR 03 Sets & Chase Cards The cards that make these turns possible are also the ones people chase. Here's what they're worth. ENTER ▸ DOOR 01 Getting Started Six phases, one Normal Summon, and a first deck you built yourself. The ground floor. ENTER ▸ BACK TO THE CHAPTER Yu-Gi-Oh! The chain, the six common attributes, and the three doors into the fastest game in cards. ENTER

▸ PULL RATE · THE COMPANION BOARD Building toward a deck? Pull Rate shows what a Yu-Gi-Oh! set actually delivers — and what the pieces cost this week. CHECK THE BOARD