Phantom Knights Deck #766405 — Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

Deck — Deck Power Evaluation

Final Contextual Deck Power: 65/100 (±6 · Confidence: Medium)

• Primary strategy: Combo
• Secondary strategies: Midrange, Stun
• Format: master-duel

Legality

Main 40 / Extra 15 / Side 0 — status: Legal.

Identity & game plan

• Win condition: Xyz and Link bosses (Rusty Bardiche, Arc Rebellion, Dark Requiem, Four Heavenly Dragons, Malevolent Scythe, Break Sword) built through graveyard-triggered Phantom Knights Special Summons and Rank-Up-Magic chains; Board breaking through Break Sword and Four Heavenly Dragons destruction effects, supported by Ash Blossom, Droll and Maxx C disruption
• Turn 1 (going first): Open with a 3-of Phantom Knights starter (Torn Scales, Silent Boots, Decayed Cloak, Doomed Soleret) to search or Special Summon a second body, then build an Xyz or Link into a Rank-Up-Magic line
• Turn 2 (going second): Use hand traps (Ash Blossom, Droll and Lock Bird, Maxx C, Dominus Impulse, Umbrage Veil, Fog Blade) to answer the opponent's first summon, then rebuild from the graveyard with Phantom Knights effects
• Recovery: Rebuild from the graveyard and banishment: GY-triggered Phantom Knights effects re-Special Summon monsters and searchers (Silent Boots, Decayed Cloak, Ancient Cloak) refill the hand
• After siding: Not applicable: Master Duel has no side deck, so the 40-card main is the only plan across games

Why it scores here

The deck reliably opens its engine: seven Phantom Knights monsters run three copies each, and the exact-name archetype core is 29 of 40 main cards, so a starter is almost always present in the opening hand and the GY-trigger chain can start on turn one or two. Its interaction is layered rather than one-note: Ash Blossom, Droll and Lock Bird, Maxx C and Dominus Impulse are backed by Umbrage Veil, Fog Blade and Dominus Spark, which gives it several ways to answer the opponent's first summon. Conversion is strong on paper because the Extra Deck carries 12 Xyz and 3 Link bosses with 1700 to 3000 ATK and several negate or destroy effects, but no recorded boards exist, so the ceiling and median are text-based inference and the median is scored lower than the ceiling. The score comes from consistency, redundant engines and interaction on the system as a whole. Popularity did not earn points: the archetype usage stats were used only to confirm the core, and the individual card scores were not averaged.

Dimension scores

How the score was computed

Strategy profile: Combo. Structural ≈ 70, Going First ≈ 71, Going Second ≈ 66, Meta = provisional, Tournament Reliability ≈ 62. Modifiers: banlist exposure (-1); off-archetype dilution (-2). Final formula: 0.80*Structural(69.7) + 0.20*TournamentReliability(62) + ContextModifiers(-3) = 65 (Meta provisional)

Probability & combo summary

• Opening a starter: P(≥1) ≈ — · key two-card combo ≈ — · full-brick estimate ≈ — (all Inferred)
• Combo output: best PowerIndex —, median —, board-per-starter —
• Turn order: 0 going-first lines vs 0 going-second lines

Strengths

• Seven 3-of Phantom Knights starters give redundant openings and GY restarts
• Layered interaction: 6 hand traps plus Umbrage Veil, Fog Blade and Dominus cards
• Extra Deck carries 12 Xyz and 3 Link bosses with 2000 to 3000 ATK and multiple negate or destroy effects
• Rank-Up-Magic and GY recursion let the chain continue after one interruption

Weaknesses

• No side deck in Master Duel, so no post-side plan
• 26 off-archetype copies dilute engine coherence
• Several conditional hand traps can dead-draw without a board
• High pilot complexity from GY-trigger timing and Xyz chain decisions

Critical choke points

• Single Rank-Up-Magic copies (Launch and Requiem) gate the high-end Xyz conversions
• Hand-trap density (6 cards) against a going-second opponent's first summon

Recommended changes

Evidence & confidence

• Verified: Main 40 and Extra 15 are legal for master-duel (size rules 40-60 and 0-15); Maxx C, Foolish Burial and Reinforcement of the Army are Limited at one copy each; Droll and Lock Bird is Semi-Limited at two copies; Copy histogram and Extra Deck breakdown (12 Xyz, 3 Link) match the card list; Side deck count is 0, which is structurally expected in Master Duel
• Observed: Usage stats show the 25-card archetype core and 14 in-deck flags on main-deck core cards (the Extra Deck flags are inconsistent; see data_gaps)
• Inferred: Engine start probability and brick-risk reads from the hypergeometric draw table; Interaction density and going-second read from card text; Ceiling and resilience reads from card text and the GY-trigger structure
• Provisional: Median output and floor (no recorded boards); Matchup and format fit (no tournament or meta sample); Post-side adaptability (no side deck in format)
• Data gaps: no combos supplied: combo floor, median and ceiling are text-only inference (combos_evidence total_combos 0) no tournament link: archetype meta-share and per-pilot match record absent usage_statistics in_this_deck flags are inconsistent with the cards list: Extra Deck Xyz and Link cards present in this deck (for example Rusty Bardiche, Arc Rebellion, Dark Requiem, Four Heavenly Dragons, Malevolent Scythe, Shamanite, Raider's Knight, Cherubini, S:P Little Knight, Evilswarm Ophion, Dark Rebellion) are marked in_this_deck false, so the reported core_present_pct of 56 understates the real core coverage; the cards list was trusted no win-rate telemetry exists in YGOVN: going-first and going-second splits, matchup and brick rates are Inferred or Unknown Meta Power is Provisional unless a dated metagame sample is supplied deck title is null in the export