You wouldn’t think an Ancient Lamp could cause so many problems.

Ancient Lamp is often recognized for the duelist who played it, Seto Kaiba. It is a menacing card that can turn your opponent’s offense completely on its head. And with Nobleman of Crossout shifted down to one copy deck, the world is a safer place for Ancient Lamps to play in.

This week we will examine the basics of Ancient Lamp’s effects.

“When this face-down Defense Position card is attacked by your opponent's monster, you can make 1 opponent's monster (except the attacking monster) be attacked instead. While this card is face up on the field, you can Special Summon 1 ‘La Jinn the Mystical Genie of the Lamp’ from your hand.”

With the popularity of Cyber Dragon, two-monster offensives are quite common. It is not unexpected to have your face-down monster attacked by one monster and your life points attacked by the next. With Spirit Reaper and Gyroid removed from the equation, this becomes a very real possibility.

Ancient Lamp introduced an ability that isn’t uncommon, but gave it uncommon qualities. Cards like Magic Arm Shield cause your opponent to attack his or her own monster, but it still lies on your side of the field and thus any overflow damage is still dealt to you. With Ancient Lamp, every penalty falls upon your opponent.

How does Ancient Lamp accomplish this? It forces two of your opponent’s own monsters to engage in epic combat, with both monsters remaining on your opponent’s side of the field! By making your opponent retain control of both monsters, any life point loss that results from the battle will spill over to his or her own life points.

Ancient Lamp also grants you the ability to special summon La Jinn the Mystical Genie of the Lamp from your hand. We will return to this effect later.

The official UDE Faq lists the following step-by-step process for handling the Ancient Lamp.

1. Your opponent’s monster declares an attack.
2. “Ancient Lamp” is flipped face up during the damage step. At this time you decide if you would like to activate its effect.
3. Select a monster on your opponent’s side of the field other than the attacking one. This monster can be face up or face down and in any battle position.
4. Calculate damage between the target monster and the attacking monster. The opponent (who controls both monsters) will take any battle damage resulting from the attack.

The fun begins in the damage step when your Ancient Lamp is flipped by the attack of your opponent’s monster. At this point you can activate its effect, redirecting the attack to another of his or her monsters. Which monster it will attack is entirely your choice and, as stated in the FAQ, it does not matter what battle position the monster is in when you select it.

The monster you select for the new target is considered a target of Ancient Lamp’s effect. In many cases this isn’t a problem, but it can be when you’re facing the wrong deck. Dragon-based decks that rely on King Dragun can prevent your Ancient Lamp from selecting face-up Dragons as a target. Any face-down monster the opponent happens to control will not share any such protection.

Let’s look at a simple example of how Ancient Lamp works:

Antonio uses his first turn to set his Ancient Lamp. His opponent, Dita, begins her first turn by special summoning Cyber Dragon with its effect. She then normal summons Cannon Soldier and enters her battle phase. She decides to allow her Cyber Dragon to have a go at Antonio’s face-down monster. The attack flips Antonio’s Ancient Lamp and he decides to activate its effect. He selects Dita’s Cannon Soldier as the target of the effect, redirecting the attack of her Cyber Dragon towards her own Cannon Soldier.

Dita’s Cyber Dragon will easily destroy her Cannon Soldier, resulting in the loss of her monster and 700 of her own life points. To make matters worse, Antonio’s Ancient Lamp escapes the battle unharmed. It won’t use its effect next time, but it has already done its job and maintained field presence.

If the monster you select happens to be face down, it will be flipped by the redirected attack. You will compare the ATK value of the attacking monster against the DEF value of the defense-position monster to determine which one, if any, is destroyed and how many of your opponent’s life points are lost. In addition, the flipped monster’s flip effect will activate after damage calculation, as normal.

Aaron has a Gagagigo and a set Dekoichi the Battlechanted Locomotive on his side of the field. He attacks his opponent Jacob’s face-down monster with his Gagagigo, revealing Ancient Lamp. Jacob decides to activate his Ancient Lamp’s effect, redirecting the attack toward Aaron’s face-down monster . . . which is flipped, revealing Dekoichi the Battlechanted Locomotive. Damage is calculated, resulting in the destruction of Dekoichi. Aaron then activates and resolves the effect of his flipped Dekoichi by drawing one card.

Let’s shift focus to Ancient Lamp’s other effect: the ability to special summon La Jinn the Mystical Genie of the Lamp. You can activate this effect during any of your main phases as long as you have a La Jinn card in your hand and there is an Ancient Lamp face up on the field.

You can special summon more than one copy of La Jinn if you happen to have several in your hand, but each copy requires one separate use of Ancient Lamp’s effect. This is usually not an issue, but it does keep your opponent from using a Bottomless Trap Hole to wipe them out simultaneously.

Many decks can take advantage of Ancient Lamp’s redirecting effect, but the ability to special summon La Jinn is best reserved for decks that can use La Jinn to his fullest. Any players fond of Fiend monsters and the use of Raviel, Lord of Phantasms or Dark Necrofear will want to try this trick out in their decks.

Next week, we continue our look into Ancient Lamp with an analysis of complications its effect can encounter. Some monsters don’t function normally when Ancient Lamp redirects their attacks and you’ll want to know what to expect. Until then, send all comments and questions to Curtis@Metagame.com