Trap
NormalDark Advance
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3865
During either player's Main Phase or Battle Phase: Target 1 monster in your Graveyard with 2400 or more ATK and 1000 DEF; add it to your hand, then immediately after this effect resolves, you can Tribute Summon 1 monster with 2400 or more ATK and 1000 DEF in face-up Attack Position. You can only activate 1 "Dark Advance" per turn.
Dark Advance — Power Evaluation
Final Score: 50 ± 8 · Confidence: Medium
- Intrinsic: 48 · Deck: 51 · Meta: provisional
- Primary role: Recovery/Recursion · Secondary: Extender
Why it scores here
Dark Advance converts a Graveyard monster with 2400+ ATK and 1000+ DEF into a card in hand and can follow up with a Tribute Summon of a qualifying monster, which gives it real recovery and extension value once a qualifying monster is already in the Graveyard. It has no interaction, no material value and a conditional, once-per-turn activation, so its score is held near the middle. Its 17-deck presence and Monarch co-occurrence confirm it is a practical, run-able card, but the high ATK and DEF thresholds are conditions the card requires, not power it earns, and the absence of combo and guide evidence keeps confidence at Medium.
Axis scores
| Axis | Score | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Accessibility | 40 | It is a set trap that needs a qualifying 2400+ ATK / 1000+ DEF monster already in the Graveyard, with no searcher evidence in the pack; it is played in 17 of 17 sampled decks, so the route is live in practice (verified text; observed deck count). |
| Combo & Conversion | 55 | The text recovers one monster and can add a second body via Tribute Summon, a two-body conversion, but no combo boards were recorded to confirm the typical outcome (inferred from text). |
| Resource Economy | 60 | Returning a Graveyard monster to hand and summoning another gives roughly +1 card per use, limited to once per turn (verified text; inferred net value). |
| Effect & Interaction | 5 | The card has no negation, removal or disruption against the opponent (verified text). |
| Material Utility | 10 | The card is a trap with no body of its own, so it contributes no material value (verified text). |
| Resilience & Flexibility | 35 | It is a single trap that can be negated, and its value depends on a specific Graveyard target; decks support it across several homes but there is no redundancy evidence (inferred). |
| Deck-Building Efficiency | 65 | It is run at an average of 1.94 copies with a maximum of 3, costing one trap slot with no garnet or lock restriction, so it is cheap to include (observed deck data; verified text). |
Calculation
Weight profile: 0.7 Recovery/Recursion + 0.3 Extender. Intrinsic ≈ 48, Deck ≈ 51, Meta = provisional. Modifiers: none. Final formula: 0.40*Intrinsic + 0.60*Deck
Strengths
- Recovers a high-ATK Graveyard monster to hand, a two-body conversion with a Tribute Summon follow-up
- Cheap to run: one trap slot at about 2 copies per deck
- Practically played across 17 sampled decks, with stable Monarch co-occurrence
Weaknesses
- Needs a qualifying 2400+ ATK / 1000+ DEF monster already in the Graveyard, so it is dead early in a game
- Once per turn, with no searcher to find it
- No interaction against the opponent and no material value
Counters / choke points
- Generic trap negation, which blanks the effect while the card is set
- Graveyard removal or banishment of qualifying monsters, which removes its target
Best use
Recovery/Recursion. Decks: Monarch (archetype 622), Monarch (archetype 170). Suggested copies: 2.
Evidence & gaps
- Verified: Text: targets 1 Graveyard monster with 2400+ ATK and 1000+ DEF, adds it to hand, then optional Tribute Summon of a qualifying monster; Text: once per turn, activated during either player's Main Phase or Battle Phase; Played in 17 of 17 sampled decks, average 1.94 copies, maximum 3
- Observed: Monarch archetypes 622 and 170 account for 10 of 17 decks (35.3% and 23.5%); Top partners are Monarch-named cards at 35% to 71% co-occurrence
- Inferred: Recovery plus Tribute Summon yields roughly +1 card and a board presence on a good Graveyard hit; The threshold is stat-based, not archetype-locked, so the card is portable across homes; Practical use depends on a qualifying monster having already been played into the Graveyard
- Data gaps: no combos supplied — combo conversion is text-only inference no guides supplied no banlist token — assumed 3 copies (unlimited) no usage statistics (StatisticsCard) — archetype inclusion % inferred from deck sample only type reads 'Trap Card' with race 'Normal', but the description gives Main/Battle Phase activation timing; verify the card type and activation speed in the DB top-card data has no rankings — popularity cannot be used to confirm accessibility