OverviewDestiny Hero (or also called Perfect Circle in TCG) Monarchs is a versatile and flexible midrange control deck that heavily emphasizes both field control and card advantage. Considered the best deck in September 2007 in both OCG and TCG, this deck focuses on putting Raiza the Storm Monarch and another 1 (like another Monarchs, Jinzo or sometime even Vanity’s Fiend) or sometimes 2 tribute monsters (like Light and Darkness Dragon and Dark Magician of Chaos) to put pressure on your opponent’s card advantage. Due to many high level cards, this deck also generates tribute fodder by using the fast and versatile Destiny Hero engine and other monsters like Spirit Reaper, Treeborn Frog and Dandylion to ensure field presence and getting your tributes ready. Raiza the Storm Monarch has a very powerful effect, which returns 1 card from the field to the top of the owner’s deck and you can use 3 copies of Raiza the Storm Monarch in this format! Other Monarchs to consider to accompany Raiza are Thestalos and Zaborg, which help control hand and field advantage respectively. But ultimately, cards like Lightning Vortex or Phoenix Wing Wind Blast can seal the game very fast when played right with Raiza the Storm Monarch. Phoenix Wing Wind Blast and Raiza in 1 turn means your opponent doesn’t draw any new cards for 2 turns! With the ability to use both cards from the Destiny Hero engine and Tomato engine, this deck is also a great fit to use Crush Card Virus to gain even more advantage over your opponent. Also, many cards in this deck (i.e Dandylion, Destiny Hero - Malicious, Destiny Hero - Disk Commander and Treeborn Frog) are excellent discard fodder to use with discard effect cards like Snipe Hunter, Lightning Vortex, Destiny Draw and Phoenix Wing Wind Blast. Even if you use cards that aren't an ideal fit for discard cost like Monarchs, you can always recover it with Pot of Avarice or The Transmigration Prophecy. No wonder that this deck is considered the best deck in this format. While considered the best deck of this format, this doesn’t mean this deck is as easy or obvious to use as other competitive decks in this format like Gadget or Zombie, which have a very linear strategy. The Perfect Circle Monarch deck requires you to play your cards right and use each card in suitable timing. Since All Monarch monsters' trigger effect is mandatory and only activated when you tribute summon them, you have to summon them at ideal time (Be careful that cards like Zaborg or Raiza can only target themselves if there are no other targets on the field), and you don’t activate its effect if you special summon them. And other than Monarch monsters and staples like Breaker the Magical Warrior, many cards in this deck have low stats, which means there are some times you can only set your monster and especially vulnerable to cards like Nobleman of Crossout, Shield Crush, Drillroid or even Mystic Swordsman LV2. StrengthsPowerful Control Capability and Effects Monarchs are arguably monsters with the most potent effects in this format. Not only does Raiza the Storm Monarch ruin your opponent’s momentum, other monarchs like Zaborg, Thestalos or Mobius ensure you to always have control and advantage over your opponent, especially if they’re not playing Monarch deck. This is also supported by very tribute-heavy monsters line-up to ensure you can almost always do a Tribute summon in your turn. Don’t forget that this deck is also one of the best decks that use Crush Card Virus, a very potent card that can ruin your opponent’s draws or even practically instantly wins you the game sometime. And even if you ran out of monsters to use, recovery cards like Pot of Avarice or The Transmigration Prophecy will set you up once more. Versatile & Adaptable The Perfect Circle/Destiny Hero Monarch is arguably the most adaptable deck in the format. With an ace like Raiza the Storm Monarch, almost every kind of problem can be mitigated with his effect. Not only that, Destiny Hero Engine ensures you have a good hand advantage and tribute fodder to utilize. While Destiny Hero Engine is very predictable, it’s so consistent and good that there’s almost no consistent way to stop it effectively. And even if your opponent puts the stop of your engine/tribute summons, utility cards like Breaker The Magical Warrior and Snipe Hunter can save the day. With proper siding, almost any matchup is bearable. Easy to modify/sides While Destiny Hero/Perfect Circle Monarchs were practically everywhere back in 2007 (even in March 2007 Format, You can find the earlier version of this deck), there are always some differences between decks that can alter your strategy and deck’s consistency. You can try a few different things like more utility warriors, more recruiter engines, more Destiny Hero cards, more wall monsters like Marshmallon or Gravekeeper’s Spy even changing the Monarchs line-up into other tribute monsters, like Jinzo, Destiny HERO - Plasma and/or Light and Darkness Dragon. Also, some decks opt to use Foolish Burial rather than Card Trooper (Some decks even use both). Weaknesses .Predictable With all that powerful effects, adaptability and stuff, Perfect Circle Monarch is one of most predictable decks due to using many of the same cards even within the most obscure builds. Almost all of Perfect Monarch builds almost always use these same cards : 3 Raiza the Storm Monarch 1-2 Zaborg The Thunder Monarch 2 Destiny HERO - Malicious 1 Destiny HERO - Fear Monger 1 Elemental HERO - Stratos 1 Destiny HERO - Disk Commander 2-3 Destiny Draw 1-2 Phoenix Wing Wind Blast Even if we count the minimum amount of that average, there’s at least 12 same cards, not counting other staple monsters like Breaker the Magical Warrior. This makes it much easier to pick the most obvious answer to the deck. Cards like Pulling The Rug (Stop all Monarchs, Normal summoned Elemental HERO - Stratos, and Breaker The Magical Warrior), The Transmigration Prophecy, Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer, and D.D. Crow (All of them can interrupt Destiny Hero engines in Graveyard) are popular and strong choices to counter this deck. Difficult to pilot While considered the best deck of the format, this deck isn’t as fast and easy to use as another top contender like Zombies, Gadget, Warriors or even Dark World. Mistakes on deck building, cards ratio, or even one bad or hasty decision in a duel can cost you enormous damage or even sometimes, the duel itself, especially if you are going against a very aggressive deck like Zombies or Dark World. You have to know where and when to summon your Raiza the Storm Monarch efficiently so you can use its effect at it’s finest. Essential Cards As said before, there are many variations and builds you can create to boost the power and change your strategy with. Yet, there are some essential cards and common tech choice listed below: Raiza The Storm Monarch (3 Copies) The Ace and icon of this deck (and the format). Raiza the Storm Monarch allows you to get an upper hand in field control effectively while also ruining your opponent’s chance to draw new cards for 1 turn. Raiza the Storm Monarch has an infamous combo with Phoenix Wing Wind Blast to ruin your opponent’s draw and field for 2 turns, and can be even more devastating if you discard cards like Destiny Hero - Disk Commander, Treeborn Frog or Dandylion to make more plays next turn. Zaborg the Thunder Monarch (1-2 Copies) With the average big monsters ratio of your choice around 6-7 per deck for Perfect Circle Monarch, Zaborg the Thunder Monarch is one of most potent cards to fill this role. An effect to destroy any monster could come very handy, which can pop an opposing monarchs (return them so your opponent can re-use it’s effect could be disastrous sometimes), recruiters, or even pesky walls like Spirit Reaper or Marshmallon. Cyber Dragon (1-3 Copies) Cyber Dragon is a good card to ensure 1 turn Monarch play. While it’s a very strong beatstick with 2100-ATK, Cyber Dragon can be a mere 2100 Level 5 Monster that must be summoned with tributes when cards like Treeborn Frog or Spirit Reaper linger in the field. While any number of copy is pretty good in any monarch deck, you can always side 1-2 copies of this card in your side deck in case you found some match-up that can cripple your tribute fodder engines Destiny Hero Engines As mentioned above, Destiny Hero engines are the bread and butter of this engine. It provides draw power and tribute fodder consistently to this deck. It’s also one of the faster engines available in this format, which was the reason why this engine became more popular than the classic Gravekeeper’s Spy - Dekoichi engine seen in earlier Monarch decks. In this example, we also include 2 copies of Mystic Tomato to bring more consistency to this engine and some power cards like Spirit Reaper or Snipe Hunter. Dandylion (1 Copy - Limited) Limited in OCG as of September 2007, this card wasn’t available yet in TCG back in the day. While the tokens can’t be used as tribute fodder the turn it was summoned, Dandylion provides additional tribute fodder, walls and have great synergy with cards like Snipe Hunter, Phoenix Wing Wind Blast, Lightning Vortex, Foolish Burial, and Card Trooper, since the effect will be activated as long as Dandylion was sent to Graveyard, no matter the circumstances. Some tech you can use with Dandylion is Destiny HERO - Plasma, which can tribute the token immediately after being summoned because it’s special summoned, and has decent synergy with the Destiny Hero engine. Pot of Avarice (1-2 Copies - Semi-Limited) This card is a recovery and draw engine in one card. While it boasts powerful effects, this card can be a dead card in your hand if you get too much on early turns. Some decks only use 1 and it works just fine. Reinforcement of The Army (1-2 Copies - Semi-Limited) Arguably one of the best search spells in the entire Yu-Gi-Oh! History, even until now. Reinforcement of the Army is Semi-Limited in Raiza Format. While most builds only include one copy of Reinforcement of The Army, the 2nd copy could come very useful for consistency, especially if you include some utility warriors like Spell Striker. Brain Control (1 Copy - Limited) Take control of your opponent’s monster, use their effects/attack with them, and tribute them for a monarch. Use as many copies as you can. The LP cost is negligible due to the lack of major burn cards like ring of destruction in the format. Soul Exchange (1-2 Copies) Soul Exchange is a great card. It can tribute one of your opponent’s monsters regardless of their position. The drawback is you can’t conduct a battle phase in the turn you use this card. Since Brain Control is limited in Raiza format, having an extra card to tribute your opponent’s card does certainly help. Crush Card Virus (1 Copy - Limited) One of the deadliest trap cards of all time, Crush Card Virus has good synergies with Destiny Hero engines and cards like Sangan and Spirit Reaper. This card is very useful in both winning or losing conditions, since it destroys the opponent's powerful monsters while you can peek and destroy all drawn monsters with 1500 ATK or more on their hand for 3 turns. Phoenix Wing Wind Blast (1-2 Copies) One of the most versatile and powerful discard traps of this era, Phoenix Wing Wind Blast is a good trap to use with so many cards that gain advantage while in the Graveyard in this deck. This card forces your opponent to re-draw their card next turn, which means it’s very deadly if you use it alongside your Raiza the Storm Monarch. Common Tech Choices Light & Darkness Dragon
LaDD was one of the popular monsters to use with this deck back in the day. With some adjustment to accommodate even more 2 tributes like Spell Striker, Gravekeeper’s Spy or even cards like Nimble Momonga, LaDD can be easily summoned to your field. LaDD NEGATES EVERYTHING INDISCRIMINATELY that happens while reducing it’s attack, and summon your monster back if it gets destroyed (Destiny HERO - Disk Commander is a popular pick for this effect). Even if you don’t have any good monster to pick from your Graveyard, remember you can use LaDD as Crush Card Virus tribute fodder if you get it’s attack too low to negate everything since it also counts as a DARK monster in the field. Jinzo With so many powerful traps like Crush Card Virus, Phoenix Wing Wind Blast, Mirror Force and Macro Cosmos, Jinzo is a decent tech that can sometimes win you the game. Just make sure to not use too many traps yourself if you decide to include this card. Thestalos the Firestorm Monarch A powerful monarch with a pesky hand destruction effect, Thestalos the Firestorm Monarch is a solid choice to use with the Perfect Circle Monarch deck. While seemingly not as devastating as Raiza the Storm Monarch, Thestalos can push more hand advantage in your favor and while not ideal, it can even be summoned while your opponent has no cards in their hand and field, providing you 2400-ATK beatstick. Foolish Burial Foolish Burial provides a Graveyard engine just like Card Trooper, with less cards yet more accuracy. This card instantly provides you with powerful play, especially if you send cards like Destiny Hero - Malicious to tribute summon for your bigger monsters. Divine Wrath Divine Wrath is another discard trap with decent synergy in this deck. Not only you can discard a key card in your hand, it’s also much more versatile than cards like Pulling The Rug Card Trooper Having a beat-down card helps a lot in monarch deck. In addition to that, some of the cards in the deck are nice to mill as well.
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