How To Side Deck

[Premier Alexander Romanov]

I don't know how.

The only Deck I have ever properly used a Side Deck for is my Hieratic Ultimaya, and that's because I included extra copies of cards I already had, alternatives to cards I had in the deck, and some more ED monsters.

But for something like the Imprisoning Mirrors or Mistake, how do I know what cards of my deck I can safely exchange for them without hurting consistency?

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

Matchups have a tendency of making a lot of cards dead. Take out the cards that don't do shit, and replace with those that do.

As an incredibly random yet also contextually relevant example, using Scraps against Volcanic you would like to take out vanity's emptiness and dark hole to jam in 3 Mistake, which can outright win you the game. Same goes for the Yosenju matchup. Said matchups simply prevent those cards from doing anything useful for you.

[Premier Alexander Romanov]

Matchups have a tendency of making a lot of cards dead. Take out the cards that don't do shit, and replace with those that do.

And how do I know which cards are dead and which are not?

[ihop]

There's often a couple of your cards in your deck you can designate to side out most games - usually stuff like Upstarts and Dualities which are good in absence of any side cards because they help you draw into your actually good cards. For example, Qliphort side out Dualities a lot of the time to replace them with more powerful floodgates. There's also certain backrow that's bad in some matchups, like Mind Crush vs Shaddoll and Mirror Force vs Burning Abyss, etc. Finally, there's certain combo cards you might be able to shave off that maybe aren't as amazing in the matchup, such as siding out a Dragon in the Shaddoll vs Nekroz matchup, but that's more rare.

[Premier Alexander Romanov]

There's often a couple of your cards in your deck you can designate to side out most games - usually stuff like Upstarts and Dualities which are good in absence of any side cards because they help you draw into your actually good cards. For example, Qliphort side out Dualities a lot of the time to replace them with more powerful floodgates. There's also certain backrow that's bad in some matchups, like Mind Crush vs Shaddoll and Mirror Force vs Burning Abyss, etc. Finally, there's certain combo cards you might be able to shave off that maybe aren't as amazing in the matchup, such as siding out a Dragon in the Shaddoll vs Nekroz matchup, but that's more rare.

And how do I know which ones are which? Especially if the deck I have doesn't use Dualities or Upstarts?

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

Edited my original post with a bit of clarification. I hope it helps. Also, listen to iHop. He knows a lot more about this game than most people here, especially myself.

[Premier Alexander Romanov]

Matchups have a tendency of making a lot of cards dead. Take out the cards that don't do shit, and replace with those that do.

As an incredibly random yet also contextually relevant example, using Scraps against Volcanic you would like to take out vanity's emptiness and dark hole to jam in 3 Mistake, which can outright win you the game. Same goes for the Yosenju matchup. Said matchups simply prevent those cards from doing anything useful for you.

But I don't use Vanity's or Dark Hole.
But I'll use a deck I made as an example.
[spoiler=Example]

[/spoiler]
What cards here can be sided out for others?

[ihop]

You... just do. Look closely at what the deck's doing and if you notice the opponent isn't adding much to their hand/revealing much in their hand take out Mind Crushes, if your opponent doesn't rely on monster effects very much take out Breakthrough Skills/Veilers/Fiendish Chains, if your opponent doesn't do many special summons by cards effects take out Vanity's, if your opponent is playing a deck full of cards that float take out Mirror Forces, and so on and so forth. If you play against decks enough times you learn how they work and what's good and not good against them. It's a subtle art that takes practice, there's no black and white list of cards to side out every time.

 

edit: X-Sabers are a perfect deck for shaving off extra copies of cards - it's possible to cut a Faultroll and a Boggart, maybe, if you want to side in defensive side deck cards and make the deck less offensive and reliant on crazy Faultroll plays and more control-based with side deck cards.

[Premier Alexander Romanov]

X-Sabers are a perfect deck for shaving off extra copies of cards - it's possible to cut a Faultroll and a Boggart, maybe, if you want to side in defensive side deck cards and make the deck less offensive and reliant on crazy Faultroll plays and more control-based with side deck cards.

OK...?
Pick a hypothetical deck and tell me what to take out of the example deck and what to put in.
Side Deck can be anything.

[BANZAI!!!!]

OK...?
Pick a hypothetical deck and tell me what to take out of the example deck and what to put in.
Side Deck can be anything.

i usually just pack things that can generally stop a deck. vanity's, etc. side them in when its advantageous to do so, side them out when you would rather do your own s*** faster. im admittedly not great at this, but its generally how i operate when i actually side deck.

[(GigaDrillBreaker)]

Here is the first example to come to mind. Though early on, Nekroz decks made heavy use of Denko Sekka, the fact that it does nothing in the mirror has pushed it into the Side Deck. In matchups where it puts in work (notably Satellar, where it effectively acts as a death sentence for a control deck that runs 3 COTH) they side it in, commonly removing cards that would be most useful in the mirror match, such as outs to the Djinn lock.

[Premier Alexander Romanov]

Here is the first example to come to mind. Though early on, Nekroz decks made heavy use of Denko Sekka, the fact that it does nothing in the mirror has pushed it into the Side Deck. In matchups where it puts in work (notably Satellar, where it effectively acts as a death sentence for a control deck that runs 3 COTH) they side it in, commonly removing cards that would be most useful in the mirror match, such as outs to the Djinn lock.

I have never played Nekroz, and never have any intention of using them, so good lot that does.

[DuelSpectre]

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=How+To+Side+Effectively+In+YGO#

 

Ahem...anyways...

 

Although I am not one to talk much, Side Decks are usually dependent on the Deck that you are using and what the opponent is using. As ihop stated, you have to analyze your opponent's plays and their tendencies, as well as their deck's overall focus. Once you understand that, you can begin to decide what cards you want to add in and what cards you can take out. For example, in the below deck:

 

 

If you were to play against a Qliphort deck, you would notice that they use Scout quite a bit to get to their combo pieces, and that getting rid of it can easily cripple their momentum if they are not set up. For this reason, you would side in 3 MST and possibly the 1 Twister and 2 Fairy Wind. Fiendish Chain does little to Qliphorts compared to MST, so 2 Fiendish Chain can be taken out. In addition, Book of Moon does not do much either, so that can also be sided out.

 

If you were playing against Volcanics, you would realize that they are focused on abusing Blaze Accelerator, so you would either side in MST or Soul Release to get rid of their ammunition. To replace them, you can remove the Anti-Spell Fragance as Volcanics are much more reliant on Traps than Spells.

 

If you were playing against Burning Abyss, you would side out Mind Crush as it does nothing to Burning Abyss, and you would side in Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror as BA monsters are all DARK. Anti-Spell Fragrance can also leave as Burning Abyss appear to be predominately monsters, and are low on Spells.

 

 

EDIT: In general, it really is just siding in cards to avoid floodgates and other cards that would screw you over, as well as adding in cards that would have done better if it was *that* card instead of the one you were using in Game 1.

----------------------

 

You would usually side out about 5 cards in between games, and you would only side out the cards that have been shown in Game 1 to not have been as optimal if it would have been any other card in your Side. Siding out stuff like Upstarts, Pot of Duality, and combo pieces is usually a last resort, as you would not side out the cards you need to win just to slow down the opponent.