We’re only into Round 2 today, but already a number of promising decks have reared their heads. One of the first to stand out is being played by Level 3 Judge Simon Sangpukdee, who has recently returned to Yu-Gi-Oh! after a long hiatus to join Team Nexus.

And he’s playing my deck, so I admit I’m a bit biased.*

Coffin Control is an incredibly underplayed variant of Soul Control, mixing Evan Vargas’s successful archetype with a pile of Magical Hats tricks. The result is a deck that can quickly generate massive card advantage and easily destroy or pre-negate any number of the format’s obnoxious all-star cards. The key combo consists of Magical Hats and Dark Coffin. The idea is that you wait until the opponent enters the end step of his or her battle phase and then activate Hats to bring out two Coffins face down. If Magical Hats destroys the two face down Coffins with its effect, each Coffin is triggered, costing the opponent one card from the hand or field. Because you wait until the end step of their battle phase to activate Hats, they can’t attack the set Coffins to rob you of their effect; attackers can’t be declared in the end step. The result is a fast, versatile 2-for-1 trade—your Hats for their two cards. It’s a flexible combo because Dark Coffin can hit both the hand and field.

Of course, Magical Hats enables more than just one combo. In the original version of the deck, one or two copies of Statue of the Wicked were included as well, giving an alternate target for Magical Hats that would result in free board presence and tribute fodder for Mobius and Thestalos. Sangpukdee has decided to forego the card simply because, well, it can be horrible—an opening hand of Hats targets is unfortunate at the least, and depressing and hope-crushing at the worst. Not using Statue of the Wicked improves the deck’s chances in topdecking situations and gives it a stronger start.

Of course, Hats can be great for defense too, throwing up a fast wall of spells or traps you don’t really need for a given matchup. It thins your deck and defends you at the same time. Beyond that, this deck has plenty of flip effect monsters to abuse with Magical Hats too. It has a Book of Moon-type effect that can allow you to reuse Magician of Faith, Mask of Darkness, and Penguin Soldier. Sangpukdee added in a copy of Dekoichi the Battlechanted Locomotive, and it also fits the combo, netting you card advantage if you pull it off. 

Other changes to the original build include a reduction of the number of Time Seals in favor of Dust Tornado and Sakuretsu Armor. Again, Sangpukdee has traded some of the deck’s focus and specialization for a broader base of reactive answers. It makes the deck more flexible, and it was a boon to him in his first matchup of the day: Lockdown Burn. By using his one copy of Dust Tornado and recycling it through Mask of Darkness, Tsukuyomi, and Magical Hats, he was able to turn a single card into a complete spell and trap removal engine. It’s a really cool addition to the deck.

Also of note is the monster control engine. Mystic Tomato, Don  Zaloog, and Newdoria are three very popular monsters thanks to Dale Bellido’s use of them at SJC Chicago. They’re basically used the same way here. Mystic Tomato maintains board presence and searches out Newdoria if you’re at a disadvantage or Don Zaloog if you’ve got control of the field and need to close the noose. The use of Tomato Control monsters demonstrates the fact that this deck is essentially operating on the same principles as others in the current environment—it’s just doing so in very different ways.

The Soul Exchange flavor is intact, albeit with the deck’s second Mobius bumped to the side deck. This is likely due in part to the removal of Statue of the Wicked, which was incredibly good at creating tribute fodder for your Monarchs despite its terrible status as an actual draw.

The deck remains removal-heavy, packing Dark Hole and Smashing Ground to remove monsters the easy way; or using Snatch Steal, Brain Control, and Soul Exchange to tribute wayward beasties coerced into Sangpukdee’s service. The entire spell base is cohesive and focused towards field control. The lone Confiscation is a great way to pre-negate Jinzo, which is one of the deck’s Stumbling blocks.

Overall, it’s a strong take on a potentially powerful theme, albeit one that rivals Empty Jar in its steep learning curve. If Dark World takes off, this deck dies; it just can’t handle Coffining into a Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World or Silvva, War Lord of Dark World. If your local metagame doesn’t see Dark World take center stage over the coming months, give this deck a try.