Spell
NormalGift Exchange
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3885
Both players banish 1 card from their Decks, face-down, and if they do, during the End Phase of this turn, both players add to their hands the card their opponent banished by this effect.
Gift Exchange — Power Evaluation
Final Score: 42 ± 8 · Confidence: Medium
- Intrinsic: 41 · Deck: 42 · Meta: provisional
- Primary role: Utility
Why it scores here
Gift Exchange is a symmetric, roughly card-neutral exchange: it costs the spell itself and each player banishes one card from their Deck, and the card the opponent banishes comes back to you in the End Phase. Its value depends on the opponent's choice of banished card, so it converts little on its own and has no interaction or body value. The 45-deck presence, the 82% co-occurrence with Allure of Darkness, and the 21 archetypes confirm it is a live, portable card (accessibility and deckbuilding), not that it is strong; high view count and top-card status earned no points.
Axis scores
| Axis | Score | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Accessibility | 50 | Reached only by draw or Allure-style draw, which the 45-deck sample supports as live but not searchable (observed). |
| Combo & Conversion | 25 | No combo boards recorded; the only conversion is one exchanged card, so the score is text-only (inferred). |
| Resource Economy | 40 | Costs the spell and one Deck card per player, and the return is the opponent's chosen card, so net advantage is roughly even at best (inferred from text). |
| Effect & Interaction | 5 | No negation, removal or hand-trap effect; it is symmetric and offers the opponent nothing to fear (verified from text). |
| Material Utility | 0 | A Normal Spell with no material or body value (verified from card type). |
| Resilience & Flexibility | 35 | A single spell with no recovery or multi-zone presence; the End Phase return is exposed to a single spell negate (inferred). |
| Deck-Building Efficiency | 70 | Mostly one copy per deck (31 of 45 decks), with no garnet or lock restriction (observed, decks_evidence.copies_per_deck). |
Calculation
Weight profile: Utility default weights, no secondary blend. Intrinsic ≈ 41, Deck ≈ 42, Meta = provisional. Modifiers: none. Final formula: 0.40*Intrinsic + 0.60*Deck
Strengths
- Live in 45 sampled decks across 21 archetypes, so it is portable and not a forgotten niche pick
- Cheap to run at one copy with no garnet or lock restriction
- Thins the Deck for the player who banishes
Weaknesses
- Net card advantage is roughly zero because the returned card is chosen by the opponent
- No interaction, no body value and no searchability
- No combo evidence, so the conversion score rests on text alone
Best use
Utility mutual card exchange in Allure of Darkness-based lists. Decks: Exodia, Greed. Suggested copies: 1.
Evidence & gaps
- Verified: Both players banish 1 card from their Deck face-down; the card the opponent banishes returns to hand in the End Phase (card text); Normal Spell, no ATK/DEF, formats TCG/OCG/MasterDuel/DuelLinks
- Observed: Present in 45 sampled decks, 82% with Allure of Darkness and 80% with Upstart Goblin; 31 of 45 decks run a single copy (avg 1.53)
- Inferred: Card advantage roughly neutral because the returned card is the opponent's choice; Exposed to a single spell negate on the End Phase return
- 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 no rulings supplied for the simultaneous banish and End Phase return timing