The success Mario Matheu found with Light and Darkness Dragon in Minneapolis just weeks before Nashville shed light on just how useful the Dragon could be. With so many players looking at Gladiator Beasts, Gadgets, and Monarchs as their answer to weaker Return builds, Dark Armed players shifted to a more control-oriented game. Five players made Day 2 with Light and Darkness Dragon, three of them made Top 4, and Jason Holloway took home the gold with it. While Jason’s deck was very good, Gold Sarcophagus was a crucial part of his deck, and his build is less likely to be seen in SJC St. Louis.

Instead I think it will be the decks Jerry Wang and Face2Face brought to Nashville that will see the most play. Face2Face has burst onto the tournament scene the same way Team Scoop did back in 2005. A game plan consisting of good players—with good decks that are constantly being renovated to take on an anticipated metagame—has put this team into the limelight for the past few Jumps. I myself was taken out of the tournament on Day 2 by this very deck. Here’s the monster Fili Luna and Chris Bowling took to Top 4 finishes:

When I said in my feature match against Fili that I believed his deck was superior, I wasn’t joking. This deck was bred to destroy the mirror match and control any matchup in any given situation. That’s quite a feat for one deck to accomplish, so let’s take a look at how it makes that happen.

With the likelihood of your opponent special summoning an entire field of monsters reduced to just one out of forty with the Limitation of Return, players can now be reasonably sure they won’t lose on any given turn. This makes taking time to set up a position in the duel actually worth it. Remember when Mario Matheu summoned Light and Darkness Dragon against Fili in Minneapolis and Fili won on the next turn? That’s almost never going to happen these days, and when you drop Light and Darkness Dragon, chances are your opponent’s going to be looking at how to keep him- or herself from losing, not how to pull out a victory.

Destiny Hero - Plasma is another card that required too much set-up in recent months, leaving you defenseless if it was destroyed. There was nothing like dropping Plasma, absorbing a good monster like Dark Magician of Chaos, then losing to Dark Armed Dragon, Brain Control, and Return from the Different Dimension. Since it’s now harder to win the game like that, Brain Control and Enemy Controller are only going to be temporary outs. Suddenly both of these monsters become not only playable, but viable win conditions.

Face2Face’s deck is meant to support those monsters and Dark Armed Dragon all at once. Those three monsters will solve most problems any deck can present. The trap lineup makes it clear that it’s the monsters that are supposed to deal with problems. With only five of the best traps in his deck, Fili clearly just plans on amplifying the effects of his control with them. Sometimes just one of either Crush Card Virus, Mind Crush, or Trap Dustshoot will solve the opponent’s entire hand, but most of the time it’s going to force him or her into playing a specific way. At that point Light and Darkness Dragon, Destiny Hero - Plasma, or Dark Armed Dragon will clean up the mess.

Light and Darkness Dragon is the card that will answer the uncommon problems. Say your opponent has been looping Neo-Spacian Grand Mole and you can’t really do anything about it because he or she plays an overload of weird traps. Light and Darkness Dragon drops and ruins your opponent’s day, forcing him or her to commit multiple traps—you’re able to deal with the Mole now. That’s what the Dragon is going to do for Face2Face every time. Light and Darkness also gets its revival effect when destroyed from hand by Crush Card Virus, making this deck less vulnerable to opposing power hands.

The coolest thing about Light and Darkness Dragon though, is that’s it’s a Light monster once it’s back in the graveyard. This means you don’t have to worry about the duel advancing too far because you’re slowing it down with the Dragon. The revival effect only adds more graveyard management to this strategy, giving Face2Face the ability to drop late-game Dark Armed Dragon cards while still having significant control over the opening turns.

Dark Armed Dragon is your answer to more common problems, and a field of opposing monsters, spells, or traps can be answered by one Dragon most of the time. Often you’ll want to save Dark Armed Dragon for an attempt at game, but when your opponent puts most of his or her cards onto the field, destroying them all with a Dragon is just like winning anyway. Boasting 2800 ATK and what I’d consider the best effect the game has ever seen, there’s not much more that can be said about Dark Armed Dragon without being redundant.

So let’s jump to the final answer the deck possesses. Destiny Hero - Plasma is the trump card of the deck, meant to come down after all the other cards have whittled away your opponent’s options. Negating monster effects and allowing for the destruction of any target (by turning it into an equip for Plasma) is just incredible. At the end of the game, your opponent is often just going to have no way to take Plasma out because Plasma is really only destroyed by spell and trap removal. Defeating Plasma is as easy as playing Mystical Space Typhoon and Cyber Dragon at the right time, but most players are going to use their spell and trap removal too early on in the duel.

What you’ll notice is that a lot of these cards shine only at specific times. Plasma’s a beast in the late game but not too hot at the start, and Light and Darkness Dragon is your mid-game target. Dark Magician of Chaos would like to see play as early as the first turn if possible, and Elemental Hero Stratos is right up there with him. In order to make everything fall at the right time, the right cards need to be drawn. This is why Face2Face threw in an extra two Trade-In cards on top of the already omnipresent Allure of Darkness and Destiny Draw. Plasma and Light and Darkness Dragon are also notorious for being hard to summon, which means being able to ditch them during the times when they’re least useful for two new cards is important. That kind of flexibility leads you to Day 2 finishes.

Finally, with the format slowing down slightly, both Scapegoat and Fires of Doomsday have become real options. No longer do you have to watch your opponent blow away all your tokens and attack for game anyway. Now going for game usually requires every attack possible, and flipping either of these cards is going to break your opponent’s game shot. Usually when your attempt at victory is broken, you’re hopelessly out of the duel. Considering that Light and Darkness Dragon and Destiny Hero - Plasma can seal the deal quite easily against opponents who’ve wasted most of their stuff, it’s safe to say that Fili Luna and Chris Bowling applied the strategy quite often in Nashville. In addition, both cards support Destiny Hero - Plasma, and Fires can even be used to allow a tribute summon of Dark Magician of Chaos. Again, that’s flexibility.

Clearly the key to success at Nashville was flexible control. We’ll see how that holds up against Lightsworn and the new Gladiator Beast builds in St. Louis.

—Matt Peddle