Editing Yu-Gi-Oh (section)

==How to Play==
[[File:Yu-gi-oh player.jpg|thumb]]
Yu-Gi-Oh is rather similar to [[Magic the Gathering]] in terms of play; in fact, it was introduced in the manga as a sort of Magic clone that was one of many featured games (it's even called ''Magic and Wizards''), from which point its popularity took off and changed the manga's entire focus as the game was fleshed out and became something more relatively unique. You can guess how much a [[Skub|point of contention]] this is for the respective fanbases.

Each player starts with a 40-60 card deck plus a 0-15 card extra deck (both of these ''used'' to have no maximum, but two german guys called Mike Schwei and Tobias Heiner actually took a 2222 card deck called "Mischen Impossible" (trans. Shuffle Impossible, due to being a pain in the ass (to the point of being given game losses for taking too long) to shuffle) to a tournament) and tries to take his opponent's 8000 life points down to 0. If you are playing a best 2 out of 3 match, you can also use a side deck of up to 15 cards. It also is possible to win by making the opponent run out of main deck cards, as they also lose if they must draw but have no cards left. There also are a small number of cards that allow you to win automatically by meeting a difficult condition, such as the Exodia cards, which make you win if you have all 5 of them in your hand, or Final Countdown, which makes you win in 20 turns. Players take turns to play creatures and spells, attack the opponent's creatures and deal with some of the most badass cards brought to play.

The number of cards you can have in play is currently limited as follows: you can have five monsters (and one which you summon from the extra deck!), five spells/traps and one field spell in play at the same time. If you have five monsters you cannot summon additional ones without sacrificing others; you also can't play spell/trap cards if you already have five of them active, but you can play a field card if you already have one (in which case, the former field gets destroyed).

Note that 8000 is a really fucking huge number of life points to keep track of: you might want to bring a notebook, calculator or app along to keep track of your life points. The manga and anime starts with 2000 instead (later 4000 due to power creep).

Notable compared other TCG's, Yu-Gi-Oh lacks a 'cost' mechanic the way Magic has with lands, [[Pokemon]] has energy, or Hearthstone has with mana. The limiting factor for powerful monsters in Yu-Gi-Oh are (generally) that they need other monsters to be 'spent' to bring them out, either on the field or with the aid of a spell card, you need to expend some monster to bring out a bigger one, and you can normally only normal summon once per turn. This generally makes the game really fast-paced, as winning combos only take two turns of setup at most. 

===The makeup of a card===
The three basic types of cards in Yu-Gi-Oh are Monster, Spell and Trap.

====Monster Cards====
These cards are your warriors who will do the fighting for you. Monsters have levels, which affects how you summon them. Monsters from level 1 to 4 can be summoned normally. Monsters of level 5 and 6 require you to sacrifice one of your monsters, 7 or higher require two sacrifices. Monsters also have Attributes (think the colors from Magic the Gathering, except there are seven, and they are less important), Monster Types (like creature type, there are 23, including fish, aqua and sea serpent), Attack and Defense (Strength and Toughness). There are eight types of them (or nine if you count tokens). The first four (or five) are from the early days of the game, with the latter four being added in 2008 and onwards:
*Normal - Coloured yellow. A straightforward card with no abilities. They used to be pretty common place as the "basic" units in the earliest stages of the game, but became increasingly rare with the rise of good Effect Monsters. Has received support cards at times, and modern ones typically have higher attack for their levels, but Effect Monsters remain the most commonly used.  Note that monsters that do not have effects do not necessarily count as Normal Monsters, for example, a Fusion monster without an effect is a non-effect Fusion monster, not a Normal Fusion monster.
*Effect - Coloured orange unless they also belong to another class of monster. A monster that has a special ability. These are the most commonly used monsters. In the early days of the game the effect monsters were balanced by typically being weaker than normal monsters but eventually powerful effect monsters started showing up. It's almost a rule now that every monster must have an effect.
*Token:  Colored grey. Token monsters are a special class of monster which are not kept in any of the decks and do not required that you even have the card to play them). Although most tokens that can be summoned do exist as cards, [[Proxy| you can instead place any form of marker on the monster zone to represent it]]. Because of this, cards that have the ability to summon tokens will always tell you the token's properties. Tokens always count as normal monsters, even if the card that summoned them gives them effect-like properties. Tokens cannot be turned face down and are treated as ceasing to exist if they are removed from the field. Tokens cannot be used as overlays for summoning XYZ monsters, but they can be used to pay the cost for summoning other kinds of monsters, unless the card that summoned them puts a restriction on what they can be used for, and a few cards forbid using tokens to pay their costs.  They also cannot be used to pay an effect cost if the effect specifically says to send the paid card to a specific place, since they can't exist off the field.  For example, they can be used as a tribute to pay a cost, which would normally send the card to the graveyard, but they can't be used to pay a cost that specifically says to send the paid card to the graveyard.  Because they do not exist as actual cards in the deck, it is possible to summon more than three copies of the same token.  Most tokens are extremely weak, so their primary purpose is for stalling the opponent or for paying costs.
*Ritual - Coloured blue. A ritual monster is summoned using a ritual spell card and tributing monsters. They are placed in the main deck and cannot be summoned without a ritual spell. Usually has an effect, but not always.
*Fusion - Coloured violet. A fusion monster is one where you have to combine two or more cards in order to summon it. This combining is done by the special abilities of other cards, usually the spell card, Polymerization, though not always. Modern fusion monsters usually have effects, but rarely did early on. Since alternative extra deck monster types were created, the support they've gotten in the form of actually good fusion monsters and better Polymerization searchers and replacements has actually caused them to be ''more'' used than they originally were.
** Early Fusion Monster- In the early days of the game, nobody used them without cheating them out since, while high attack, they required at least ''three'' specific cards, generally bad/useless on their own, be in your hand/field simultaneously for what most of the time was just a normal monster with a high attack that still died to any removal and was generally still weaker than just giving [[Gemini Elf]] an axe (two cards that can be used without the other). Few still get some play because of Instant fusion giving you an easy material for another card and there are not many newer low-level Fusions, but otherwise the only one that sees any play is Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon because it's the best target for Fists of the Unrivaled Tenyi.
**Contact Fusion - A variation of Fusion that involves either sending the cards that make up the fusion material into the graveyard or the banishment zone, or shuffling them into the deck. Polymerization is not needed; this effect is inherent to the Contact Fusion monsters in question. This effect is commonly found on A-to-Z monsters, the Neos, Gladiator Beast and Ritual Beast archetypes, and a few other cards. This means that while the lack of dependency on Polymerization cards makes them easier to play, these cards require their tributes to be on the field instead of either on the field or in the player's hand.
**Transformation Summon - Limited to the Masked HERO archetype, Transformation Summons requires a tribute of one card in favor of another, more powerful one. This requires the play of a Change-type spell, of which there are three. Because all Change cards are Quick-Play, you can play them during the Battle Phase in order to avoid negative effects or targeted destruction by your opponent, as well as attack several times in a single turn.
*Synchros - Coloured white. They go in the fusion deck, now known as an extra deck, and are summoned by sending monsters with a total level equal to theirs to the graveyard, including one tuner monster. These quickly dominated the meta when they came out because of how easy they are to bring out with the number of cards that make it easy to bring the lower level monsters needed to summon them by time they were released and Konami made sure to make all the initial ones ''really'' good.
**Dark Synchros (anime and ''Tag Force'' video games only)- Used to summon Dark Synchro monsters. Instead of adding the values of the Tuner and the non-Tuner monsters together the level of the Tuner monster is ''subtracted'' from the level of the non-Tuner monster. This matters a lot more in the anime, where they are treated as their own card type. When the cards were adapted to the CCG the became just Synchro monsters that required specific materials. 
**Double Tuning - The rare Synchro monsters that require two Tuner monsters to summon. There are only five of them in the game, three of which are variants of Hot Red Dragon Archfiend (which is also home to the only three tuner monster). 
**Accel Synchro - Just like regular Synchro summoning, except all material cards have to be Synchro cards themselves.
*XYZ - Coloured black with streaking stars. Pronounced "Exceeds", and summoned by placing two or more cards of the same level on top of each other and can expend them to activate its effects. Instead of a level they have a rank that reflects the level of the monsters that must be "overlayed" to summon them from the extra deck. Like Synchros, these are largely the dominant force in competitive play with how easy it is to summon two monster of the same level.
**XYZ Evolution - XYZ Evolution monsters can be XYZ summoned as normal, but they can also use a single specific card as XYZ Material. This can be either from the effect of the XYZ monster itself or a Spell card often called "Rank-up Magic". Many XYZ Evolution monsters are either CXYZ or Number-C monsters.
*Pendulum - Coloured the same colour as the other monster type they are in their top half and green in their bottom half, with a transition between the two, to show how they're like a mix of monster and Spell. Thus you can have Normal Pendulum monsters, Effect Pendulum monsters, XYZ Pendulum, Fusion Pendulum, etc. There are currently no ritual pendulum monsters or link pendulum monsters in existence, though this may change in the future. These are monsters that can also be played as spells in the pendulum zones, and go to the extra deck when they're destroyed while on the field. With the release of Link monsters, the rules have changed to remove the Pendulum zones, so now they are played in the same zones as regular spells. They have a number called a scale, which is used when they are played as a spell card. They also allow you to summon a bunch of monsters in one turn, as long as the levels are between the scales of the two pendulum monsters you have in your pendulum zones. Newfags.
*Link - Coloured blue like Ritual monsters, but in another shade and with a hexagonal background. They have a link rating instead of a level or rank and have no DEF and can never be in defence position. They go in the extra deck, and are summoned by sending a number of monsters you control to the graveyard whose total Link Rating is equal to the summoned monster's Link Rating (monsters that do not have a link rating count as 1). They have Link markers that point to other monster zones, and you can summon other links monsters (formerly required for ''any'' extra deck monster) from the Extra Deck to the zones pointed at by the markers. Their effects often relate to the zones pointed to by the arrows. Newerfags.

On top of that, there are several secondary monster types that said monsters have on top of their normal type:
*Flip - When a Flip monster is attacked when it is face down or turned up by its controller or an effect, it triggers its own effect. Having the monster destroyed or exiled outside of being attacked, the effect does not trigger. Can trigger multiple times if an effect turns it face down.
*Gemini - A Gemini monster is played as a regular Normal monster. It can later (either a later turn or outright, depending on what other cards its controller plays) be summoned again as if it entered the field from a player's hand. When it is, it triggers its effect. And no, [[Gemini Elf]] is not a Gemini monster.
*Spirit - When a Spirit monster is summoned, it returns to its owner's hand from the field during the End Phase. This means that Spirit monsters have little staying power, and they cannot be Special Summoned.
*Toon - Toon monsters resemble existing monsters in the game in a cartoony style. They rely on the Toon World card, and they are frequently destroyed if Toon World is.
*Tuner - These monsters are mandatory if you want to run a Synchros deck. While it is tempting to make a deck of nothing but Tuner monsters to make sure you always have one, most Synchros monsters require at least one non-Tuner monster or a monster of a particular type instead. 
*Union - Often weak on their own, Union monsters can equip themselves to another monster to grant said monster a special effect. If that monster were to be destroyed, its equipped Union monster is destroyed instead.

====Spell Cards====
These cards are for support, augmenting monsters, giving you more cards or life points, stunning the opponent...etc, anything to give you an upper hand in the battle. They are coloured green. They have have six subtypes:
*Normal - A one-time use card that is discarded after its effect is completed
*Continuous - The effect persists, so long as the card is still in play
*Equip - Equipped on a monster card to augment their stats or give them special abilities
*Quick-Play - Like a normal spell, but can be played in response to other card or card effect activations. If they are set they can also be activated during the opponent's turn like a trap card..
*Ritual - A card which lets you sacrifice monsters whose total levels are a certain amount in order to bring forth the patron of the ritual, a ritual monster (see above).
*Field - Changes the attribute of the playing field, which can give certain monsters buffs or penalties (I.E: Water monsters benefit from Umi and Dark monsters benefit from Yami). It used to be that only 1 field spell may be active at a time, but later rules made it that each player may have their own field spell at the same time.  Unlike other types of spell cards, you can place a field spell on the field even if your field spell zone is already occupied, which destroys the card in it.

====[[Trap]] Cards====
Trap cards can't be played directly and have to be deployed in the face-down position. As their name implies; they're traps for your opponent, which can be triggered either by your decision or once your opponent meets certain conditions. Thanks to the animu's flair for the dramatic, you're required to say "[[Meme|YOU'VE ACTIVATED MY TRAP CARD!]]" in a loud and smug fashion when activating, while dramatically flipping your trap card. Verbally explaining the trap's effects in a dramatic fashion is optional. They are coloured <s>pink</s> <s>purple</s> magenta. Trap Cards exist in three kinds:
*Normal - This sort of card can be used once and discarded after its effect is completed
*Continuous - This kind of trap persists so long as the card is still on the field.
*Counter Trap - A trap used to counter other cards; the only thing that can stop a counter trap is another counter trap. Also single-use like normal traps.
*Trap Monster - A trap card that has the ability to summon itself and become a monster. They may be treated as a normal monster or an effect monster depending on the text of the card. Most trap monsters are continuous traps and are treated as a monster and a trap at the same time while they are on the field, and take up two zones instead of one (a monster zone and a spell/trap zone). A few which may be called pseudo trap monsters are normal traps instead and are not treated as a trap at the same time when summoned as a monster and only take up one zone. This changed in the 2020 rules and now ''all'' trap monsters don't take up a trap card space when activated.

===The Turn===
*The turn starts with a '''Begin of Turn''' phase where some things can happen depending on the cards in play, but most of the time this turn is just filler.
*The '''Draw Phase''' allows you to draw 1 card from your deck. Again, some abilities might be triggered in this phase, but it's not all that flashy.
*The '''Standby Phase''' the phase that happens between the Draw and Main Phase. Nothing really happens here, but many abilities use this as part of their trigger requirements. 
*The '''First Main Phase''' is where it all happens: you can play 1 monster and as many magic/trap cards as you like. Monsters can either be '''Summoned''' or '''Set'''. Summoning means they are placed in a face-up upright position; this makes their Attack stat the number used in the combat phase. If a monster is set it is placed in a face-down position turned 90 degrees to the right; this makes their Defense stat the number used in combat. You can only summon one monster normally, although card effects may allow you to conduct a "special summon" which is basically the same except that they are almost always summoned face-up and they don't take up your normal summon
*The '''Battle Phase''' has four sub phases. Again it has a Start and End step in which some effects trigger, but most of the time they're just there to look pretty. The big part of this is the Battle and Damage steps: you choose one of your monsters and attack one of your opponent's monsters. You then compare your monster's Attack to the other monster's opposing stat. If it is in Attack Position you compare the two Attack scores: the monster with the lowest Attack is destroyed and its controller loses life equal to the difference in Attack. If the scores are equal both monsters are destroyed. If the monster is in Defense Position you compare your Attack to the other's Defense: if yours is lower or equal then you lose life (but not your monster) equal to the difference (obviously you can't lose zero life), if yours is higher the other monster is destroyed but the opponent does not lose life. If the scores are equal nothing happens. If you attack a face-down monster this way then it flips up: either to reveal a weak monster that your opponent put down to stall for time, an effect monster that does something beneficial when flipped or destroyed, or a large blocker that might deal you damage. All monsters you control may attack only once (Unless an effect says otherwise), one by one; you are allowed to attack the same monster several times.
*After this is the '''Second Main Phase''', which is identical to the First Main Phase. You don't get another summon, so you can't usually summon unless you never summoned in your first main phase (generally done to avoid certain effects that can only be activated in the battle phase, or because you only got a monster in your hand after an effect in the battle phase), so it's mostly just used to set traps and quick play spells to use in your opponent's turn. 
*Finally there is the '''End Phase''' where effects might be triggered and where you have to discard cards from your hand if your hand is over the current hand size cap of six to meet it.