I already talked about the cards effects in parts one and two, so I won't be going too in-depth into everything that isn't needed for discussion.
Editor Note
When I was writing, the Darklord English names had yet to be released and since writing this article, their English names have been revealed. The names are as follows:
- Darklord Lucifer = Darklord Morningstar
- Darklord Ixtab = Darklord Ixchel
- Darklord Mastema = Darklord Nasten
- Darklord Amdusias = Darklord Amdusc
- Casting out the Darklords = Banishment of the Darklords
- Altar of the Darklords = Darklord Contact
- Darklords' Temptation = Darklord Enchantment
Playing Style
From all my play-testing of the deck, I’ve come to the conclusion that the deck either goes off first turn or super bricks. With running a deck full of nothing but high level monsters, it can cause problems if you don't have your draw power cards to get rid of them (to extend your plays). If you open up with nothing but your Spell cards with no targets to use them on, it also leads to a brick. The deck plays like a Rube Goldberh machine, where once you start off the first part, you'll continue on and on until you reach the final result.
The deck plays with intense draw power while filling up your grave with your Darklord Spell/Trap cards that you can access during either players turn. Grave manipulation is a key part of the deck, as you'll be discarding a lot of your Darklord cards to the grave, that can then be revived back later.
Darklord Ixchel and Darklord Superbia are one of the most important monsters in the card, as Darklord Ixchel fills up your grave by discarding her and another Darklord card to get 2 draws, while Darklord Superbia can revive any of your Fallen Angels.
The deck doesn't swarm that hard due to the fact that the new Darklord monsters can only be special summoned once per turn. The inclusion of setting up a Vanity's Fiend or Archlord Kristya as fast as you can, can shortly hinder you but will also stop your opponent in the long run.
Deck Building
Throughout all the different deck builds, the decklist remains consistent with one another. Only your personal tech choices are what changes depending on how you want to play the deck.
The extra deck will also remain the same, with the only changes being whether you would want Ghost Reaper and Winter Cherries targets.
I'll go through 4 possible theory-crafted builds that you might want to consider testing out and modifying.
This is the "pure" build of the deck, based on OCG decklists. With maximizing out your draw power cards and stunning your opponent with Vanity's Fiends. The main core of the deck comes from here if you want to change it to your liking.
Next we'll be looking into the build with the Speedroid engine. The Speedroid engine allows access to Dante, Traveler of the Burning Abyss to mill through your deck and also allows either Dante or your Speedroid monsters to be used as tribute fodder for Vanity's Fiend.
The Kaiju engine allows you to safely go second against opponents who have an established board with monsters such as Masked HERO Dark Law, ABC-Dragon Buster, or other problem cards. I already explained in my previous article which Kaiju monsters are the best to use if you choose to run this engine.
Finally, we'll be looking at the last theory build: an Anti-Meta turbo build that focuses on setting up either Archlord Krystya or Vanity's Fiend with Anti-Spell Fragrance or Dimensional Barrier to hinder your opponents plays even further.
Strength
The deck strengths I have discussed before is the ability to draw and search out your combo cards.
The high ATK power of the Darklord serves as a threat if your opponent doesn't take them seriously. Being a powerful beatstick with nearly every monster being over 2500 ATK, they can inflict massive damage if you're opponent isn't careful.
Banishment of the Darklords is an amazing card to have in the deck as it can search out any of your Darklord cards for any situation. Need to draw? Search out Darklord Ixchel. Need to bring something back from the grave? Search out Darklord Contact. How about if you already have Darklord Ixchel and Darklord Contact in your hand? Search out Darklord Superbia; Use Darklord Ixchel's effect to discard herself and Darklord Superbia to get 2 draws, then use Darklord Contact to bring back your discarded Darklord Superbia, use his effect to bring back Darklord Ixchel and then use Darklord Ixchel's second effect to copy your Banishment of the Darklords from grave to gain another search before finally getting either your Darklord Tezcatlipoca for protection or your Darklord Trap cards to disrupt your opponent's play. The utility of this card is amazing and something that shouldn't be underestimated.
Next, on the power of their Trap cards. Darklord Enchantment and Darklord Rebellion and their effect of being non-targeted is a powerful thing. They're a breath of fresh air as their effects can allow non-targetables to be targetable.
Finally, one of the strong points of the deck is its "Anti-Meta" value. It can summon Vanity's Fiend or Archlord Kristya to stop opponents if they don't have an out. They also back the Darklord's disruptions effect if you set up a board to your advantage.
Weakness
As a deck that required a lot of reliant on the graveyard, cutting access from the grave will hinder the deck a lot. Cards like Macro Cosmo, Dimensional Fissure, or Masked HERO Dark Law will stop the deck.
Since the deck plays a lot of Spell cards, Anti-Spell Fragrance stops the deck too if you can't deal with it.
But one of the biggest weaknesses that Darklord faces is itself as a deck. The deck runs on the synergy of high level monsters along with its draw and searching power, so this causes a brick in the road for the deck to overcome if you don't open up right.
If you open up with nothing but high level Darklord monsters with no Darklord Ixchel or Darklord Nasten to draw or summon as protection, you'll be left wide open. The same thing with the mass amount of spells, if you open up with nothing but your draw Spells and no targets, you won't be able to do much.
Finally one of the last weaknesses of the deck is the ability to interact and disrupt during your opponent's turn which heavily relies on you setting up your grave with either Darklord Enchantment or Darklord Rebellion to ensure survival.
So thanks for reading all this, hope this was informative and helps you all who wants to play Darklord.
Until next time, k, thanks, bye.
