New player guide: What packs to buy first? [Sept 2019 Updated]

If you have just started playing Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links and you are looking at the Shop, wondering where to start, you might be overwhelmed by how many different packs are currently available. This game has recently celebrated its 2nd anniversary and right now the Shop features 20 Mini BOXes and 22 Main BOXes; investing into every single one of these is definitely not advised as the vast majority contain outdated cards and/or archetypes that are not viable anymore, so in this guide I will try and direct you towards the ones that feature cards that are currently relevant.

For starters, let’s talk about some of the most popular cards in the game right now—mostly Spell and Trap Cards that can fit in pretty much any deck. These cards have proven to be a great investment for many players by remaining relevant for a very long time and should be one of your primary foci, if you have just started playing the game.

A Hand Trap that is used primarily to prevent OTKs and protect your monsters; Sphere Kuriboh has managed to stay mostly relevant ever since its introduction.

Generic back row removal; Cosmic Cyclone’s activation cost has synergy with a lot of Skills like KaibaCorp Bling.

Versatile Quick-Play Spell that can be used to protect your monsters and/or your Life Points or to take control of an opponent’s monster. Enemy Controller is currently Semi-Limited.

Trap Card that’s generally used to slow down the opponent by locking a monster that has just been Summoned in face-down Defense Position.

Similar to Floodgate Trap Hole, Paleozoic Canadia can flip monsters face-down, but it’s more versatile and it has an additional effect that allows you to Special Summon it from the Graveyard as Level 2 monster.

A Trap Card with a minor activation requirement and the ability to destroy two monsters on the field. Treacherous Trap Hole is currently Semi-Limited.

Yubel Fire King

Yubel Nephthys

Yubel has been sort of relevant ever since its introduction, and, if you’ve been playing this game for a while, you probably have found yourself with a Yubel - Terror Incarnate on the other side of the field and no way of getting rid of it.

Most Decks are equipped with at least a way of removing this Fiend from the field, and most people already know how to get around its floating effect, but this doesn’t make Yubel any less of an annoying or potentially problematic matchup.

If you have just started playing Duel Links and you’re already familiar with this card because of the TCG, you can forget about most of the issues it has in that format. Yubel is easy to play and cheap to build unless we are talking about specific variations of this Deck that involve the “Nephthys” archetype, and, most importantly, it can give you good results.

• Fire King Avatar Yaksha and Fire King Island are typically used to bring out Yubel - Terror Incarnate. You can Set Yaksha and wait for your opponent to destroy it by a card effect or by battle, or you can simply destroy Yubel using the effect of your Field Spell. During your Main Phase, searching Yaksha or Fire King Avatar Barong in the process.
• When Yubel is destroyed, it allows you to Special Summon Yubel - Terror Incarnate from your hand, Deck, or Graveyard. Terror Incarnate cannot be destroyed by battle and, during each of your End Phases, it destroys every other monster on the field. Even if your opponent manages to get rid of Terror Incarnate, this monster can float into its final form: Yubel - The Ultimate Nightmare. Ultimate Nightmare doesn’t wipe out every other monster on the field during your End Phase, but it can be used more offensively: you can attack your opponent’s monsters with Ultimate Nightmare to destroy them and inflict damage to your opponent equal to its ATK, ending the Duel more quickly.

• Disciple of Nephthys can notably increase the consistency of this Deck, allowing you to bring out Terror Incarnate while also searching important cards such as Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys and Cerulean Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys.
• Treacherous Trap Hole works in pretty much any deck that doesn’t run any other Trap Card.
• Enemy Controller works particularly well in the Ritual Nephthys variant of this Deck.

Triamid

Triamid is admittedly a pretty complex Deck to pilot, but, with some practice, it will certainly give you good results. This archetype has, especially recently, proven to be able to stand up against popular Decks such as Cyberdark Desperado, Cyberdark Neos, and Six Samurai Synchro. Being a relatively recent addition to Duel Links, none of the main cards used in this Deck can be found in the Duel Links Forbidden & Limited card, giving it an advantage over older Decks and making it easier to build it.

• Triamid Master provides back row and monster removal while also enabling the Graveyard effects of your Field Spell Cards, Triamid Hunter gives you an additional Normal Summon per turn, allowing you to quickly take control of the field, and Triamid Dancer allows you to shuffle any “Triamid” card in your Graveyard back into the Deck, preventing you from running out of cards and ensuring that you always have a Field Spell Card to activate from your Deck, increasing the ATK and DEF of your monsters in the process.
• Triamid Cruiser can be used to search any “Triamid” monster using the effect that all of them share, via Triamid Master’s unique effect, or by simply activating a new Field Spell on top of it. This Field Spell will make you gain 500 Life Points each time you Normal Summon a Rock-Type monster, and it will also allow you to draw and then discard a card whenever a “Triamid” monster is Normal Summoned. Gaining Life Points will allow you to survive multiple direct attacks from Cyberdark Edge, and filling the Graveyard with numerous Field Spell Cards and Rock-Type monsters will give Triamid Pulse more value.
• Triamid Kingolem will give all of your “Triamid” monsters the ability to disable your opponent’s cards and effects on attack declaration.
• Triamid Fortress will prevent your monsters from being destroyed by card effects. You can chain the effect of Master, Hunter or Triamid Dancer to the activation of the effect of Desperado Barrel Dragon or Treacherous Trap Hole, activating Triamid Fortress directly from the Deck, in order to save your monsters.

• World Legacy Clash can be used to close the gap between monsters like Blue-Eyes White Dragon and Ancient Gear Reactor Dragon and yours. This Quick-Play Spell also allows you to utilize the effect of the banished monster one more time when it’s returned to the field.
• Treacherous Trap Hole is a really powerful Trap Card that is capable of disabling Synchro Decks like Six Samurai, preventing them from Summoning their main monsters. Triamid Master can easily get rid of any Set card on your opponent’s side of the field, most of which are going to be Spell and Trap Cards, and Treacherous will deal with any potential threat that may come from your opponent’s Monster Card Zones.

Six Samurai Synchro

Warriors Unite, the 19th Main Box, has greatly improved the “Six Samurai” archetype, giving it a powerful Synchro Monster that can be Summoned with ease thanks to a variety of Tuners and non-Tuners that can be Special Summoned from the hand or directly from the Deck.

The fact that we are advising both new and returning players to build this deck should come as no surprise: Six Samurai Synchro is strong, consistent and also relatively cheap to build.

• Secret Six Samurai - Fuma can be Special Summoned directly from your Deck via Shien’s Dojo and be used as Synchro Material together with any Level 4 non-Tuner “Six Samurai” monster to Summon Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En. Any Six Samurai Synchro deck should run three copies of this card.
• Legendary Six Samurai - Kizan can be Special Summoned from your hand if you control another “Six Samurai” monster.
• Legendary Six Samurai - Enishi can return a monster your opponent controls to their hand and/or be used as Synchro Material for Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En.
• Six Samurai United is used to replenish the resources spent to Synchro Summon Shi En and draw into Six Style - Dual Wield, World Legacy Clash, and Enemy Controller.
• Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En can negate the activation of Spell/Trap Cards such as Hey, Trunade!, preventing your opponent from getting rid of your back row.

• Six Style - Dual Wield allows you to disrupt your opponent’s plays and can act both as back row and monster removal, enabling early OTKs.
• Armades, Keeper of Boundaries is used as an answer to Karakuri Ninja mdl 339 "Sazank" and Cipher Soldier. You don’t need Armades in order to play this deck, but, since it’s arguably the best generic Level 5 Synchro in the game, I would definitely advise you to get at least one copy of it.
• Giganticastle is used to get rid of Lava Golem. Since you can obtain it from the Card Trader and we now have more space in the Extra Deck, I would advise running at least one.

Darklord

How much of an impact can the release of a single Spell Card have? Well, if said Spell Card gives you direct access to an entire archetype, enough to bring it back to relevance apparently. To be fair, it’s not the first time this happens, and it’s likely not going to be the last one.

We have already experienced this exact situation when Diamond Core of Koa'ki Meiru was released back in Revolution Beginning, and it’s fair to assume that Banishment of the Darklords will maintain Darklords competitively viable for as long as its predecessor did with Koa'ki Meiru. If you have resources to invest, then why not going for what’s hot right now?

• Darklord Ixchel allows you to draw through your Deck while also setting up the Graveyard.
• Banishment of the Darklords significantly increases the consistency of the Deck, allowing you to search Ixchel, Nasten, Tezcatlipoca for protection, Contact, or even The Sanctified Darklord.
• Darklord Superbia and Darklord Contact are pretty much mandatory: they allow you to swarm the field without necessarily taking up your Normal Summon, which you can then use for Darklord Desire or Darklord Morningstar.
• Darklord Nasten can be Special Summoned from your hand with relative ease. Send Superbia to the GY and then activate Contact. Never apply Contact’s effect via Nasten, Ixchel, or Darklord Tezcatlipoca’s effect.

• Darklord Morningstar is a powerful monster that can instantly replenish the resources you used in order to bring it out. A 3000 ATK monster that cannot be targeted by your opponent’s card effects as long as you control another “Darklord” monster, and the ability to gain you a few Life Points while also setting up your Graveyard.
• Darklord Ukoback can send Superbia directly from your Deck to the Graveyard, setting up for Darklord Contact. Since you are able to apply the effects of any “Darklord” Spell/Trap Cards in your Graveyard, you can use Ukoback to send Banishment, Contact, or The Sanctified Darklord to the Graveyard.
• World Legacy Clash allows you to take advantage of the incredibly high stats of your monsters while giving you the chance of possibly avoiding removal e

Cyberdark Desperado

EX Structure Decks have historically been very impactful and Full Metal Desperado is no exception. While Desperado Barrel Dragon is not even comparable to Neos Fusion when it comes to versatility, it cannot be denied that it’s a really powerful card. Cyberdark Desperado is a Deck that’s relatively easy to build, since most of the cards you need are either contained in the Structure Deck EX or obtainable without spending Gems, and it’s also pretty easy to pilot.

• Desperado Barrel Dragon is a Level 8 monster that you can Special Summon from your hand if a face-up DARK Machine monster you control is destroyed by battle or card effect. Aside from having a respectable amount of ATK, Desperado also has the ability to destroy up to three face-up monsters on the field during each Battle Phase, making quite threatening in Duel Links. You can choose to run Master of Destiny in order to make its effect more reliable or LP Boost α in combination with Card of the Soul to be able to search it.
• BM-4 Blast Spider is your most reliable way of Summoning Desperado Barrel Dragon.
• Cyberdark Edge is a DARK Machine monster that can attack your opponent directly. You can search Edge via Cyberdark Cannon and then equip Cannon to it from the Graveyard when you Normal Summon it.

• In order to enable Master of Destiny, you need to have at least 5 cards with different names in your Deck that have coin-tossing effects. Your best options are Twin-Barrel Dragon, which can destroy a card on the field on Summon, Arcana Force XIV - Temperance, which is pretty much a Kuriboh, Time Wizard, which can destroy all monsters on your opponent’s side of the field, and Cup of Ace, which Master of Destiny essentially turns into Pot of Greed. All great options and all obtainable without spending any Gems.
• World Legacy Clash comes from Blazing Rose and diving into a Main Box to get a Rare can be unexpectedly expensive, but this Quick-Play Spell is arguably one of the best additions you can make to this Deck.
• Neos Fusion is the easiest way of sending Leng Ling to the Graveyard, it quickly thins your Deck and it also gives you a 2600 ATK monster that cannot be destroyed by battle or card effect once.

Which packs should a new player open first? This is the question I want to answer in this section.

While there are certainly a lot of great cards in almost every single one of these BOXes, not all of them are currently relevant: a certain card or even a whole archetype might become very good in the future, but what I will mention here are mostly the ones that are staples in current meta decks and cards that are extremely versatile in general.

In order to properly understand how important these cards are, I will assign each one of them a number that represents the priority a player should give to them from 1 to 3 (1 being high priority and likely relevant in the current meta and 3 low priority and not currently relevant, but worth mentioning because of its versatility).

Duelist Chronicle GX: Yubel Event

DSOD World

Pick-a-Gift Campaign!

Valhalla Calling

Full Metal Desperado

Train Your Kuriboh! Campaign

2nd Anniversary Campaign