Yugioh is a strategic game which means there is a lot of planning, thinking and of course strategizing before you even get to a duel. Normally people do this when they decide to make a new deck for themselves or for a specific tournament. By building your deck you think ahead of what you are most likely going to face in meaning the other decks you are going to duel that’s perfect to do cause you can adapt your deck to it but what many people forget is the human side of Yugioh. That’s the side The Undertaker and yours truly will provide you with.

We are cutting this side of Yugioh into 4 subjects which are:

1. Psychology and how this influences the game
2. Adapt to your opponent
3. Trick plays
4. Reading your opponent

Subject 1: Psychology and how this influences the game

Psychology is your first weapon ( even before the actual duel, match or even a war ), how can this be you ask; Psychology can be used in a million ways and in this case we tend to enlighten you with the ways to use it for Yugioh.

This can be done very easily by searching his/her past accomplishments. By looking at those accomplishments we can determine deck/theme preferences in different events. These preferences can be relayed to game play which tells us something about our opponent, with this information we can already start thinking ahead and in the best scenario gain the first advantage. Information is the key to a good preparation to a duel/match. But how to determine which information you gather is helpful; This question has a very simple answer: Everything is important.

The information you gather by searching forums, talking to people that know your opponent will bring you to a point you have summon all that information and draw a conclusion about your opponent. This is the hardest part of them since you will need trustworthy information, experience and trust in your ability to do so. With this information you should be able to sketch a profile of your opponent, that profile should be saying what type of duelist your opponent is.

This is the part of psychology you will be using for Yugioh pre-dueling, why is this important to do. It gives you the first advantage over your opponent and also the largest one in my opinion. Since if you do it correctly you can also assume his deck/theme preference for your duel and therefore already start countering.

Subject 2: Adapt to your opponent:

Example: I need to gather information about taker and the conclusion is; He is a dangerous duelist because he can come out on top in scenario’s in which you think you control his pace, creative and likes to OTK.
With this information we can already determine what type of duelist Kiryu111 is; Conservative Aggressive. Meaning he plans his big move from the start and waits until the time is right to make it while you ( normally do not know when this is going to happen ) and basically walk right into his trap he laid out from his first drawn card.

I personally am a Aggressive player by nature, I like to put pressure on my opponent the entire duel until one of us comes out on top and preferably myself obviously.

This means I have to adapt to game play of taker since my own type of play will not stand a real chance against taker’s play style. However there is a weakness of course in undertaker’s play style; If he waits too long or if I would put too much pressure on him but that will only work once with a duelist of his level ( which I already concluded ).

The way to adapt myself to taker is to preserve cards then can work ultimately aggressive and defensive cards like Bottomless Trap Hole, Mirror Force, Solemn Judgment ( although I like it more to keep my push for control alive ) Torrential Tribute and maybe even Scapegoat.
This means I have to be less aggressive and more conservative as well or go for the ultimate aggressiveness and try to OTK him within 3 turns.
My personal choice is always the OTK style against taker cause I don’t like laying back and fire everything at one point so I want to show taker I don’t have to change my style just for him ( if you know what I mean ).

But how about if taker does the same thing:

The_Dutch_Prince likes to have control by putting pressure on his opponent the entire duel, is an aggressive player, calculative and can read through most trick plays. This is a tricky opponent cause his aggressiveness towards his opponents and his calculative mind makes it even harder to go with my normal play style.

While I am playing The_Dutch_Prince I know that he likes to have full control over the duel by putting pressure on his opponent throughout the duel. Normally I’m ok with that cause a lot of duelist like to play that way, but against The_Dutch_Prince it’s a little bit different since against him you need perfect timing otherwise he counters your moves and pushes his pressure even further. When I do need to face The_Dutch_Prince I know he will most likely go for the even more aggressive way and therefore I like to have more defense to buy my time and go all out on the right time. Although this is also walking on a slippery cloak I do this because I know how he normally duels and with some trick plays ( will follow later on ) I can change the duel back to my control and go for the OTK.
The way to adapt myself to his play style is by going a little bit slower and watch my own lifepoints ( be preserving certain card in the beginning or even mid game ) normally I don’t like to slow myself down but against The_Dutch_Prince that is the only way how I can adapt and still be pretty sure I can win.

As you could read in the example above we both have to adapt a bit in order to be sure we both can win. Although there are other ways to adapt to your opponent, since there is also a thing called “reverse psychology”. Let me explain this; reversing the process to a level you do not change your style cause you know your opponent will adapt to your change ( you can only do this when you have played this opponent a lot of times or have tremendously trustworthy information about him/her ). By doing so you do the complete opposite of what you normally do and you know you have the 2nd base towards gaining advantage covered.

But what to do if this has been done against you and you haven’t done it yourself, that’s the perfect time to take out the trick plays and bluffs in order to preserve your cards and still being able to pack a good punch when needed.
This is explained in our 3rd subject.


Subject 3: Trick plays and Bluffs:

A lot of trick plays should be committed towards preserving and advantage until the time is right to use the “real” cards. For example u don’t use your Bottomless Trap Hole on the first strong monster you come across, this is a trick cause your opponent feels safe to summon more powerful monsters although this example excludes monsters that go around Bottomless Trap Hole. A huge part of succeeding in trick plays is to lure your opponent out into using his ace cards while you preserve them but you are still able to counter his/hers. That throws your opponent off balance, meaning he/she is confused about your play and only wonders what you are up to. In this case he/she doesn’t focus as well on his/her own plays as before and thereby you have gained another advantage.
Further trick plays can be done if your opponent knows what is in your hand. Let’s say you have Return from different Dimension in your hand and you need it at this point in the game. Set a Spell card which is preferably chainable or not needed anymore, your opponent will try to get rid of it as fast as possible because he/she thinks that your facedown card in Return from different Dimension ( which you need and he/she knows that you need it ). Thereby you get rid of a S/T removal card such as; Heavy Storm, Mystical Space Typhoon, Breaker the Magical warrior, Lyla Lightsworn Sorceress etc.
Of course your opponent knows by then you still have the Return from Different Dimension trap card in your hand but most likely he doesn’t have any more S/T removal cards in his hand.

You can see that a trick play is often needed and extremely helpful in those kind of situations, therefore you also have to have some skill in pulling them off. This is a little bit different for bluffs since bluffs are sets you just want to scare you opponent with in meaning to slow him down and draw into your counter cards. So how do we pull of bluffs is as followed;

Bluffing is meant to let your opponent think you have a game changer but in reality you don’t have anything your opponent should worry about. This often changes the control in the game ( if bluffed correctly ) because your opponent will think twice before making a big move causing him/her to hesitate even more. And this is precisely the time you have been waiting for ( if bluffed at the right moment ) since now you can open up and go for taking the control back or an OTK.
A bluff has several purposes in which everything should be taken into account before you can make a successful bluff. For instance by bluffing you can create a 1 for 1 situation.
Example: You set Foolish Burial, your opponent uses Mystical Space Typhoon ( this is a 1 for 1 situation but in reality its more to your advantage than for your opponent).

You have the stalling Bluff, you set a card and your opponent is afraid of a Torrential Tribute, Bottomless Trap Hole, Mirror Force or even Solemn Judgment.
And then you have the gaining advantage bluff ( meaning you bluff but at the same time you will gain advantage out of it if your opponent decides to play MST, Heavy storm etc. )

Example: You set Scapegoat and your opponent uses MST on it. Meaning a basic 1 for 1 but you gain 4 tokens on your field which is a plus 4 for your field presence which can be extremely important to lure out destructive cards like Lightning Vortex causing you opponent to go -2 to their hand and you gain hand advantage by just 1 card ( a Bluff card ).

Both a bluff and a trick play should make sure you gain some sort of advantage, Field presence, hand advantage or advantage on the long terms by letting your opponent waste their Heavy Storm, MST etc. So think before you try to pull off a bluff or a trick play, and even if you say you are thinking to your opponent your opponent will think that you are thinking about a counter and when you only set a S/T and a monster your opponent will think that is part of your counter move and will be sure to get rid of it before you “can use it”. That’s the key to pull off these types of bluff and trick plays.
How to make sure your opponent isn’t bluffing or tricking you in a duel, this is part of reading your opponent. Which is explained in the following subject.

Subject 4: Reading your opponent:

This is actually a skill you require by dueling a lot, this skill has to be earned or has t come naturally ( in case of The_Dutch_Prince ).
Reading your opponent will become easier when you inform yourself about all sorts of deck and most importantly the Meta of the current time. Meta decks are often used to make different hybrid decks to use since normally Meta is banned from tournaments and wars although lately it becomes less and less banned.

It is important to know Meta decks from the inside out since Meta deck normally only have a difference of like 4 cards. This has to do with preference of spell and trap cards for each individual ( which we already determined via subject 1 ). In order to know the Meta decks from inside out it is wise to use them for yourself. By using Meta yourself you will learn their weaknesses, plays and side deck capabilities.

By knowing these plays you can anticipate your opponent and will provide you with even more advantage over your opponent if not makes you win the game.

Example:

Your opponent graveyard counts: 1x Bottomless Trap Hole, Torrential Tribute, 2x Dimensional Prison, 1x Book of Moon, 1x Dandylion, 1x Ryko, 2x Hamster, 1x Sangan, 2x Lonefire, 1x Tytanial and 1x Pot of avarice.

Opponent has 2 S/T face down on the field along with a face down defense positioned monster.

By looking into the graveyard of your opponent you can learn a lot about his pay style, deck and combo’s so it is important to look in his/her grave when you think you can change them game but you aren’t sure about his/hers face down cards ( in meaning if they are bluffs or part of his/her strategy ).
When looking at this example I would say his/her Facedown monster is most likely a Ryko LS Hunter so it’s important not to let it flip causing you for a -1 field presence. About his/her face down S/T I would say that those are most likely 1x Book of Moon and a D Prison or Bottomless Trap Hole.

To be sure you should remember how your opponent plays in normal conditions, does he/she normally set 2 card that can both be dangerous or is 1 to trick into a slow play. This part requires the experience and it the actual reading your opponent trick. Now it’s your choice if you want to kill that Ryko and lose a card of your own or if you want to remove it in case if you have the option to summon Caius the Shadow Monarch, or use Mind control ( in case you have ) in order to destroy a spell or trap card your opponent has face down on the field.
These moments in the game often decide who is going to win the duel or even the match, so be sure of your read or as myself ( The_Dutch_Prince ) also like to gamble a bit by preserving a Caius, Mind Control for later and just swing into that monster and if it so happens to be a Ryko I still have Caius and or Mind Control waiting for a different time.

Well now you have information about the human side of dueling divided into 4 subjects which are all just as important as the others. Now it’s time to try it out for yourself and get the experience needed for subject 3 and 4 in order to complete the human side of dueling.

I hope this helped all of you to improve or understanding some plays better.

Have an enjoyable day,

This is a good article but i already seen it....

nice articule teached me a lot

are u TheDutchPrince? or copy his article?

I woulda had some good pointers and comments to say to this post but seeing as u personally didn't write it theirs no need for my pointers and comments

he posted that 2 months btw ... and he's not even active ... so don't bother with comments ^^ !