Gimmick Puppet Deck #773972 — Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links

Deck — Deck Power Evaluation

Final Contextual Deck Power: 54/100 (±7 · Confidence: Medium)

• Primary strategy: Midrange
• Secondary strategies: Combo, Xyz
• Format: duel-links

Legality

Main 30 / Extra 9 / Side 0 — status: Legal.

Identity & game plan

• Win condition: Rank 8 Gimmick Puppet Xyz beatdown (Number 40 at 3000 ATK, Number 15 Giant Grinder with burn, Fantasix Machinix as the value engine) backed by trap-speed interaction.; Number 88: Gimmick Puppet of Leo's three-Destiny-Counter alternate win, plus Giant Grinder burn damage.
• Turn 1 (going first): Open Gimmick Puppet Rouge Doll (reveal a Rank 8 Gimmick Puppet Xyz, Special Summon itself plus a Level 8 from Deck) into a Rank 8 Xyz, or bootstrap via Condolence Puppet to stock the GY, then set Xyz Block / Service Puppet Play / Puppet Parade as the interaction layer.
• Turn 2 (going second): Break the board with Forbidden Droplet and Book of Eclipse, then use Number 15 to destroy Special Summoned monsters and Gigantes Doll / Service Puppet Play to steal bodies before converting into Rank 8 damage.
• Recovery: Rebuild through the graveyard: Dreary Doll banishes another Gimmick Puppet to revive itself, Terror Baby and Fiendish Knight revive from GY, Junk Puppet re-Summons, Cattle Scream re-Summons off a detach, and Rouge Doll returns itself to hand when sent to the GY.
• After siding: Not applicable — Duel Links is played as a best-of-1 format with a 0-card Side Deck, so adaptation happens at deck-construction level only.

Why it scores here

The deck reliably opens a real Gimmick Puppet line only when Rouge Doll shows up (P(≥1 in a 5-card hand) = 0.4335); adding Little Soldiers raises raw engine access to roughly 0.70, but most of those hands still need a second card to reach a Rank 8, so the floor is a two-card bootstrap far more often than the ceiling suggests. What it converts into is honest but modest: a Rank 8 Gimmick Puppet Xyz (Number 40 at 3000 ATK, Giant Grinder, or Fantasix Machinix with its Rank-Up-Magic search and extra Normal Summon) plus one set trap, with no in-archetype negate monster anywhere in the Extra Deck. Where the list is genuinely above average is the going-second package — Forbidden Droplet ×3 and Book of Eclipse ×3 give roughly 0.77 access in a six-card hand, and Giant Grinder and Gigantes Doll turn that into removal and steals rather than raw card advantage. It survives through a broad but thin graveyard recursion set (Dreary Doll, Terror Baby, Fiendish Knight, Junk Puppet, Cattle Scream, Rouge Doll's own GY return), each at one copy, so rebuilds are available but not redundant. The score is held down by two card-construction problems the evidence makes concrete: twelve of eighteen distinct main-deck cards are singletons, and both Rank-Up-Magic spells have no visible 'Number C'/'CXyz' target in the nine-card Extra Deck, wasting slots. This score comes from the system's consistency, median output, interaction layering and construction cost — it was not produced by averaging individual card scores, and the archetype's usage statistics did not earn any points.

Dimension scores

How the score was computed

Strategy profile: { "Midrange": 0.65, "Combo": 0.35 }. Structural ≈ 58, Going First ≈ 59, Going Second ≈ 63, Meta = provisional, Tournament Reliability ≈ 58. Modifiers: Dead Rank-Up-Magic package (-3); Single conversion choke point (-2); Broad six-card board-breaking suite (1). Final formula: 0.80*Structural + 0.20*TournamentReliability (Meta provisional) + context modifiers (-4)

Probability & combo summary

• Opening a starter: P(≥1) ≈ 0.43 · key two-card combo ≈ 0.7 · full-brick estimate ≈ 0.22 (all Inferred)
• Combo output: best PowerIndex —, median —, board-per-starter —
• Turn order: 0 going-first lines vs 0 going-second lines

Strengths

• Compact one-card Rank 8 conversion through Gimmick Puppet Rouge Doll, which Special Summons itself plus a same-Rank Gimmick Puppet from Deck off a reveal.
• Fantasix Machinix doubles as a Rank-Up-Magic searcher and an extra Machine Normal Summon, extending the turn without spending a main-deck slot.
• Genuinely strong going-second interaction suite: Forbidden Droplet x3 plus Book of Eclipse x3 give roughly 0.77 access in a six-card hand.
• Deep graveyard recursion (Dreary Doll, Terror Baby, Fiendish Knight, Junk Puppet, Cattle Scream, Rouge Doll's GY return) means the deck is rarely fully out of options after its board is broken.
• Every Extra Deck slot is live and on-archetype, with three Rank 8s at two copies each providing in-archetype redundancy.
• Number 88: Gimmick Puppet of Leo gives a low-opportunity-cost alternate win condition for stalled games.

Weaknesses

• Both Rank-Up-Magic spells have no 'Number C'/'CXyz' target in the nine-card Extra Deck, making two main-deck slots functionally blank.
• Twelve of eighteen distinct main-deck cards are singletons, so extenders and recovery pieces are individually hard to draw.
• No in-engine monster negate and no omni-negate boss; the interaction layer is mostly trap-speed and therefore slow.
• Most non-Rouge openings require a second card, so the median hand underperforms the ceiling by a wide margin.
• Book of Eclipse and Forbidden Droplet cost cards at a moment when the deck wants resources for its own engine.

Critical choke points

• Gimmick Puppet Rouge Doll — the only true one-card starter; negating or removing it strands most hands.
• Fantasix Machinix — the search and extra-Normal-Summon engine; losing it caps the turn at one Rank 8.
• Condolence Puppet — the primary going-first graveyard setup; without it the Dreary Doll / Terror Baby / Junk Puppet recursion routes stay offline.
• The singleton trap line (Xyz Block, Service Puppet Play, Puppet Parade) — the only interaction outside hand cards, and unprotected once set.
• Rouge Doll's Level reveal must match a Rank already in the Extra Deck; any Extra Deck change breaks the primary line.

Recommended changes

Evidence & confidence

• Verified: Legality: 30 Main / 9 Extra / 0 Side, all within Duel Links caps (main 20-30, extra 0-9); no violations and no restricted cards.; All resolved cards report banlist status Unlimited with legal copies 3 under the BanDuelLink field.; Card text for Rouge Doll, Condolence Puppet, Fantasix Machinix, Number 40, Number 15, Number 88, Gigantes Doll, Chimera Doll, Droplet, Book of Eclipse and Droll & Lock Bird.; Extra Deck composition is complete and fully accounted for: Strings x2, Fantasix Machinix x2, Giant Grinder x2, Gigantes Doll x1, Number 88 x1, Chimera Doll x1 = 9.; Neither Rank-Up-Magic Numeron Force nor Argent Chaos Force has a matching 'Number C'/'CXyz' card in that Extra Deck list.
• Observed: CardUsageStat: 24 core rows at 100% inclusion, and the resolved card list physically contains the Extra Deck cards the usage panel flags as absent — the panel's in this deck flags conflict with the resolved list, and the list is treated as authoritative.; No combo or board records exist for this deck (combo data.total combos = 0, note 'no parseable boards').
• Inferred: P(≥1 Rouge Doll in a 5-card hand) = 0.4335; P(≥1 Rouge Doll or Little Soldiers) ≈ 0.70.; P(zero Gimmick Puppet monsters in a 5-card hand) ≈ 0.060; full-brick estimate ≈ 0.22 once two-card requirements are counted.; P(≥1 Forbidden Droplet or Book of Eclipse in a 6-card hand) ≈ 0.77 as the going-second interaction rate.; Both Rank-Up-Magic spells are functionally blank given the Extra Deck list, costing roughly 7% of the deck.; Median output is a single Rank 8 plus trap-speed interaction; the ceiling is the same board with Fantasix's extra Normal Summon layered on.
• Provisional: Matchup coverage and format fit — no tournament link, no archetype meta-share, no dated metagame sample.; Meta Power is null/Provisional by rule.; Tournament reliability under real round conditions and time rules.
• Data gaps: No combos supplied — combo floor, median and ceiling are text-only inference rather than observed board data. No tournament link — archetype meta-share and per-pilot match record absent. No win-rate telemetry exists in YGOVN (going-first/second, matchup, game-level, brick/starter/OTK rates); those signals are Inferred or Unknown. Meta Power is Provisional unless a dated metagame sample is supplied. usage statistics in this deck flags contradict the resolved card list for six Extra Deck cards; the resolved list was used.