Dark Magician Deck #774385 — Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links

Deck — Deck Power Evaluation

Final Contextual Deck Power: 58/100 (±6 · Confidence: Medium)

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

Legality

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

Identity & game plan

• Win condition: Dark Magician and Dark Magician Girl beatdown, closed by Extra Deck bosses (Dark Magician of Destruction, Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon, Master of Chaos listed in the Extra Deck); Fusion/Link/Synchro/Xyz extension from the Extra Deck (Chaos Angel, Underworld Goddess, Galaxy-Eyes Photon Lord, Dragon Master Knight)
• Turn 1 (going first): Search Dark Magician-named spells or monsters (Magician's Rod, Dark Magical Circle, Magician's Salvation, Soul Servant) on T1, then bring out a Dark Magician or Dark Magician Girl with Magicians' Souls or Shining Sarcophagus support (Inferred)
• Turn 2 (going second): Hold Droll & Lock Bird or Forbidden Droplet for the opponent's first add or Special Summon, then extend with the surviving Dark Magician line (Inferred)
• Recovery: Recover with Magicians' Souls and Soul Servant draw/recursion, and rebuild through Eternal Soul or Magician's Salvation revival of a Dark Magician from the GY (Inferred)
• After siding: Not applicable: Duel Links runs no Side Deck, so there is no post-side plan to evaluate

Why it scores here

The deck reliably opens a Dark Magician-based starter: 16 archetype-core copies give about 98.6% chance of at least one in a 5-card opening hand (hypergeometric, Inferred), and 11 searcher-text cards give about 92% for at least one searcher. It converts that into pressure through a Extra Deck of nine cards that covers Fusion, Link, Synchro and Xyz routes, which gives it a credible ceiling. Interaction is layered (two Forbidden Droplet, two Droll & Lock Bird, one Dark Magic Attack, Eternal Soul) but thin on going-second board-breaking, which holds the score back. Popularity and the archetype's high usage statistics confirm the list is real and accessible, but they earned no points on their own. The score comes from the system: consistency, median output and interaction were scored together, and card scores were never averaged. No combo boards, tournament data or dated meta sample exist, so Meta Power is provisional and the uncertainty band is wide.

Dimension scores

How the score was computed

Strategy profile: Midrange. Structural ≈ 58.9, Going First ≈ 60, Going Second ≈ 57, Meta = provisional, Tournament Reliability ≈ 57. Modifiers: Archetype purity below full (-2); Engine compactness (2). Final formula: 0.80*Structural + 0.20*TournamentReliability (Meta provisional)

Probability & combo summary

• Opening a starter: P(≥1) ≈ 0.43 · key two-card combo ≈ — · full-brick estimate ≈ 0.01 (all Inferred)
• Combo output: best PowerIndex —, median —, board-per-starter —
• Turn order: 0 going-first lines vs 0 going-second lines

Strengths

• Multiple searchers and a Dark Magician engine give high starter access
• Layered interaction: Forbidden Droplet, Droll & Lock Bird, Dark Magic Attack, Eternal Soul
• Full Extra Deck with four summon routes and strong bosses

Weaknesses

• No going-second board-breaking beyond Droll and Droplet
• Exact-name purity 43.6% with several off-archetype staples
• Mulcharmy Fuwalos and Droll are conditional and can brick

Critical choke points

• Dark Magician copies (3) are the only direct starter; the searcher chain depends on them
• Eternal Soul and Magician's Salvation are single-copy revival routes

Recommended changes

Evidence & confidence

• Verified: Legality: Legal, 30 Main / 9 Extra / 0 Side, all cards Unlimited; Composition: 16 monsters, 13 spells, 1 trap; Extra 4 Fusion, 3 Link, 1 Synchro, 1 Xyz; Archetype purity 43.6% exact-name
• Observed: Usage stats: core present 12 of 19 by the usage list (see data gap)
• Inferred: D1 starter probabilities via hypergeometric draws; Brick and interaction quality from card text; Going-first and going-second plans
• Provisional: Meta Power; Matchup fit and tournament reliability; Side Deck adaptability (N/A in Duel Links)
• Data gaps: no combos supplied: combo floor/median/ceiling is text-only inference no tournament link: archetype meta-share and per-pilot match record absent no win-rate telemetry exists in YGOVN: going-first/second, matchup and brick rates are Inferred Usage-stat in_this_deck flags disagree with the card list for Extra Deck cards: Master of Chaos, Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon, Dark Magician of Destruction, Underworld Goddess and S:P Little Knight are present in the Extra zone (copies 1) but marked in_this_deck=false, so the missing_core list is likely undercounted and was not used to penalise the deck Meta Power is Provisional unless a dated metagame sample is supplied