The last couple of months have been really exciting at my local. People just keep coming up with new and different decks, and most of them are actually pretty good. There were two in particular that I really liked and wanted to make sure got some attention outside the cold, snowy city I call home. I’ve already looked at the Beast-Oppression deck, so this time I’ll give my impressions on the deck Brian Winkleblech has been toting around: pure Psychics. Like Plant decks, Psychic decks have the ability to run an effective six copies of Solemn Judgment. Unlike Plant decks, however, Psychics can’t pump out free monsters like Plants can. This makes it difficult to keep expendable monsters available for use with Mind Over Matter, but there are a few tricks we can steal from the playbooks of the top decks in the format that’ll make this and many other tasks much simpler.

In and of themselves, the Psychics are a strange monster type. While most decks can do almost anything they want without regard to their current life points, Psychic decks absolutely do not have this luxury. Their newest cards, Overdrive Teleporter and Psychokinesis, each have a heavy life-point cost attached to them, as does Destructotron and, to a lesser extent, Krebons. It’s no surprise that these are the best effects in the Psychic arsenal (at least before we dive into the Extra deck). While 800 or 1000 life points may not seem like very much at the start of the game, remember that part of the goal of the deck is to get away with running Solemn Judgment in addition to Mind Over Matter, and that complicates things immensely. To make matters worse, there’s no real guarantee that you’ll draw the cards in the correct order to get the maximum possible use out of them. Playing Solemn Judgment early basically makes the rest of your deck a whole lot worse, since you can only play half as many cards and effects as you could have otherwise. Fortunately, there is a solution: life point gain. While life point gain has never been a viable strategy, if you can gain life points as a byproduct of doing the things you need to do to win the game, it can be a valuable tool in your arsenal.

Think of it this way. If I play Dian Keto the Cure Master and Red Medicine, I gain 1500 life points at the cost of two cards. If I instead play Emergency Teleport to fetch Krebons from the deck, then do a Synchro summon with a spent Overdrive Teleporter or the cards it brought out for Thought Ruler Archfiend, then send the Archfiend to take out my opponent’s Elemental Hero Stratos, I gain 1800, get a huge monster, and eliminate my opponent’s on-field monster. The extra life points were just a bonus, but since I’m playing Psychics, they could be the difference between playing my cards and winning the game, or losing because all my draws are dead.

Monsters: 21

2 Overdrive Teleporter
3 Mind Protector
3 Psychic Commander
3 Krebons
3 Destructotron
3 Nimble Momonga
1 Mind Master
2 Cyber Valley
1 Sangan

Extra Deck: 15

I’m of the opinion that the best setup you can have with a Psychic deck is Magical Android and Thought Ruler Archfiend out with either a counter trap or a Threatening Roar set. This lets you gain 1200 life points a turn from the Android—plus anything the Archfiend gets you—while remaining safe from any opposing spell and trap cards that demand a target. That means no Phoenix Wing Wind Blast, Dimensional Prison, Brain Control, Mind Control, or Shrink for your opponent, ever. You can negate one per cycle of turns while still turning a profit in life points: leaving you open to clear the way of your opponent’s monsters with Psychokinesis. If it’s spells and traps you need taken care of, you can just drop Destructotron and destroy up to two back-row cards, and still be up 400 points when the turn ends. The entire setup is devastating, but there are issues, the biggest of which is Goyo Guardian.

Goyo Guardian is an absolute beating against this deck. Basically the only good thing about seeing your opponent Synchro summon a Goyo Guardian is that it isn’t a Colossal Fighter. This is why you absolutely need to run the six counter traps in addition to a pair of Threatening Roar cards. It’s possible to deal with both Synchros, but you need your guys to make it to your turn in order to do so. Psychokinesis will wipe out Goyo Guardian or Colossal Fighter, and Stardust Dragon falls to Thought Ruler Archfiend or a Goyo Guardian of your own. Red Dragon Archfiend isn’t likely to see play against you because Mind Protector is the only thing that could feasibly go in defense mode. You’ve got solid answers to every Synchro . . . with the important exception of Black Rose Dragon. Once again, negation is key, but if you can’t negate Black Rose Dragon you’d better hope that you have Threatening Roar or the tools required to summon your own Black Rose Dragon. Not many people are playing Psychic Commander in their Teleport Dark Armed Dragon decks yet, but after Steven Harris’s performance at Shonen Jump Championship Detroit, it’s only a matter of time before every deck out there gives itself the option to wipe the field at the drop of a hat.

This deck can do it too, of course, but it also has the option to bring out Psychic Lifetrancer if you need a level-7 Synchro that won’t obliterate the rest of your cards. Like all the Psychic Synchros, it can also refill your life points in a pinch to help you use more of your effects. Synchro summoning is a huge part of the Psychic deck. With seven Tuners and three copies of Emergency Teleport, non-Tuner monsters can sometimes seem hard to find. That’s why you pack theft cards in the form of Brain Control and a pair of Mind Control cards. Mind Control with a Tuner or a Cyber Valley is yet another answer to many troublesome cards and another way to further your strategy at the expense of the opponent’s, a concept that many players seem to be shying away from in favor of simply bombing the field and starting fresh.

Personally, I’m not a fan of the bomb-and-build method of problem solving. In many decks, the amount of cards and effort put into wiping the field basically forces you to win the game in the same turn or else face the prospect of your opponent simply repairing his or her field and beating you down anyway. An example of this would be in my Blackest Garden deck from Detroit. I can summon Black Rose Dragon . . . but using it to destroy every card on the field would almost certainly come at great personal cost and leave me at a severe disadvantage anyway. In order for bomb-and-build to successfully cope with a problem, you basically need to ensure that your opponent has lost a lot more than you have and isn’t in a position to do anything to stop you from turning the tables.

That leaves two potentially viable scenarios. First, you could be playing against Lightsworn and really need the field to be cleared. This still requires that you have Threatening Roar down to save you from Judgment Dragon and pals, but the result will be that your opponent simply doesn’t carry out the rest of his or her game-winning rush. It makes the whole thing moot unless you win right there, which you won’t because of Necro Gardna. That leaves the Teleport Dark Armed Dragon mirror match as the only realistic situation where bomb-and-build is viable. We just talked about why it isn’t the greatest against Lightsworn, and it barely ever works against decks that run counter traps and Phoenix Wing Wind Blast. Teleport Dark Armed Dragon is the only thing left, and we know it works there from looking at the feature matches from Detroit.

While Magical Android and Thought Ruler Archfiend might comprise your ideal setup for the Psychic deck, your outright most powerful move stems from the incredible effect of Overdrive Teleporter. Overdrive Teleporter and Emergency Teleport together allow you to bring a level-8 Synchro of your choice and Goyo Guardian to the field. It’s good for rushing through a weak opening or pushing back after your opponent drops Stardust Dragon, and if all else fails, you can just leave the Psychic Commander and Mind Protector there on the field. Protector forces your opponent to Synchro summon earlier than he or she might like to in order to try and break up your field, while Psychic Commander lets you win battles that you’d otherwise lose. They’re powerful cards, and if any more level-3 Psychic monsters get released in the future, the possibilities with Overdrive Teleporter will be even better.

It’s been a hectic year, but I’d like to thank all of you who read each and every week for your continued support. Happy holidays from the ‘Burgh, and until next time, play hard, play fair, and most importantly, have fun!

—Jerome McHale