Since I write decklists for a lot of archetypes, I thought it might be time to take on the challenge of building a deck with the "Dark Scorpions". The entire archetype is made up of Dark Warrior monsters with low stats, who trigger their effects whenever they deal battle damage to the opponent. The cards are fairly old, which also shows in their overall power: "Dark Scorpions" have almost no synergy, are fairly cloggy and pretty slow since most of the time they cannot summon more than one monster. Nonetheless, here is my take at making them passable.
I decided to run the "Dark Scorpions" monsters at the following ratios: Three copies of "Don Zaloog", since he is the biggest beater the archetype has to offer that you can Normal summon without a tribute while also having the best effect by forcing the opponent to discard cards if he runs through; three "Dark Scorpion - Meanae the Thorn" allow you to search other "Dark Scorpions" with relative ease while she is equipped with "Moon Mirror Shield"; two "Dark Scorpion - Cliff the Trap Remover" since he is backrow removal on legs, even though his effect is incredibly slow in comparision to other Spell/Trap removal cards; one "Dark Scorpion - Chick the Yellow", since he is probably the worst of the bunch, but the deck manipulation effect might come handy one in a while; and lastly one "Dark Scorpion - Gorg the Strong", who's bounce effect is actually pretty nice but is held back by the fact that you need to tribute a monster to summon him.
While the archetype itself might not have tons of consistency, they can get help due to the fact that they have the Dark and Warrior combination. "Destiny Hero - Malicious" is an easy Special summon and can be used as Link material, "Dark Grepher" can be Special summoned while setting up "Destiny Hero - Malicious" in the graveyard and "Armageddon Knight" is further graveyard setup in the Attribute/Type combination. The most important generic monster of the deck is definitely "Dark Armed Dragon", who can be summoned with relative ease since you can control the number of Dark monsters in the graveyard via the previously mentioned monster plus "Divine Sword - Phoenix Blade", and he can be a supreme clean-up crew who gives the "Dark Scorpions" the chance to run through unimpeded.
In terms of Spells and Traps, the "Dark Scorpions" can also make use of their typing and Attribute. "Allure of Darkness" is a powerful draw option, while the single copy of "Reinforcement of the Army" allows you to search the right Warrior monster for the case. "Raigeki" and "Harpie's Feather Duster" are obviously there to clear out front- and backrow respectively, while "Monster Reborn" serves as a swarming tool or even allows you to take opposing monsters from their graveyard to work with. The rest of the Spells consists of Equip Spells, which can boost the stats of your "Dark Scorpion" monsters into preferable regions while also ensuring that you will cause battle damage to the opponent. They can also be used for "Isolde, Two Tales of the Noble Knights", which is yet another way to gain more monsters than you would normally be able to. Trap-wise, the focus lies on stat manipulation, with both "Wall of Disruption" and "Mirror Wall" weakening opposing monsters so far that they die in battle against "Dark Scorpions" and therefore trigger their effects, and the searching of Equip Spells via "Armory Call", which can also cause any opposing monster to lose the fight by choosing "Moon Mirror Shield" or simply cause quite a lot of damage via cards like "United We Stand" or "Mage Force".
The Extra Deck tries to give the deck coverage in various situations. Backrow removal exists in form of "Tornado Dragon", "Super Quantal Mech Beast Grampulse" and "Knightmare Phoenix", cards that can deal with opposing monsters include "Number 101: Silent Honor ARK", "Castel, the Skyblaster Musketeer", "Akashic Magician" and "Knightmare Cerberus". The last effect block is themed around stat boosts, which are provided by "Wee Witch's Apprentice" and "Underclock Taker".
The deck is still pretty underwhelming in comparision to what other decks are able to do, but I think this is playable while also staying true to the "Dark Scorpion" playstyle. If you want to know more about the archetype, or other archetypes that I have reviewed so far, feel free to visit my blog under this link: https://cubiccreativity.wordpress.com/2020/06/08/archetype-analysis-dark-scorpion/
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