On Writing a Duel V

I’ve mentioned before that one of the advantages of writing a duel is that you have total control over the “randomized” aspect of the game. Cards and combos that are useless, impractical or very difficult to play in real life become perfectly viable here. And with fifteen thousand cards and counting there’s plenty to choose from.

However, you should be mindful of the cards you use. Let me give you an example:

Sweetie Belle takes the first turn. She activates Dragon Shrine to send two copies of Blue-Eyes White Dragon from her deck to her GY and then normal summons The King of D., discarding Trade-In to fetch Dragon Revival Rhapsody from her deck. Sweetie Belle plays Dragon Revival Rhapsody to bring back the two Blue-Eyes from her GY, then discards Sage with Eyes of Blue to send The King of D. to the GY and special summon the third Blue-Eyes straight from her deck. Satisfied, she sets Mirror Force and ends her turn.

Now it’s Diamond Tiara’s turn. She draws and immediately plays Raigeki, followed by Mystical Space Typhoon to clean Sweetie Belle’s side of the field. She continues playing Double Summon to call two copies of Alexandrite Dragon, each with 2000 attack points, and reduce Sweetie Belle’s life points to zero with two strikes.

There’s nothing wrong with DT’s plays from a technical standpoint. They’re perfectly legal and viable. But from a storytelling standpoint they’re lacking, unsatisfying. Here, allow me to illustrate with another example:

Now it’s Diamond Tiara’s turn. She draws, bringing her hand count to six. She begins playing Terraforming to retrieve Union Hangar from her deck, which she immediately activates, adding A-Assault Core from her deck to her hand with the Field Spell’s first effect. She continues with Unexpected Dai to special summon X-Head Cannon straight from her deck and Frontline Base to do the same with Y-Dragon Head from her hand, equipping it with B-Buster Drake from her deck with Union Hangar’s second effect. She normal summons Gold Gadget, special summoning Z-Metal Tank from her hand, and sends X, Y and Z to the GY to fusion summon XYZ-Dragon Cannon. Since B-Buster Drake was also sent to the GY, she adds C-Crush Wyvern to her hand from her deck.

Diamond Tiara discards A-Assault Core and C-Crush Wyvern for XYZ-Dragon Cannon’s effect and destroy one Blue-Eyes and the set Mirror Force. She banishes A, B and C to fusion summon ABC-Dragon Buster, then does it again with ABC and XYZ to bring A-to-Z-Dragon Buster Cannon. Her newest monster destroys the second Blue-Eyes, costing Sweetie Belle 1000 life points. Diamond Tiara splits A-to-Z back into XYZ-Dragon Cannon and ABC-Dragon Buster. She crashes the latter into the third Blue-Eyes, leaving the path clear to finish the job with a direct attack of XYZ-Dragon Cannon and Gold Gadget.

Much better, don’t you think? DT wins again, but she looks far more skilled than on the previous example. This is not to say you cannot use cards like Raigeki or Dark Hole ever, but having characters overwhelm their opponents or snatch victory from the jaws of defeat by using certain cards can come off as cheap and unsatisfying, especially if they’re lauded as great duelists. Imagine if, during the Virtual Arc of the first series, instead of summoning Mirage Knight to destroy the Five Headed Dragon, Yugi had just played Snatch Steal to take control of it and one-shot the Big Five.

In short, “restriction breeds creativity”.

Comments

[nightshroud96]

This advice is really great

I haven't gotten to read your YGO fic yet but I want to ask about something since I found out from the comments.
Why was Spike done so dirty there? Where he has not won a single duel and got taken out during the NMM crisis.
Why was he screwed so badly?
I know its weird asking you that right here but I really want to ask anyway.