Wight

The Skull Servants, known as Wights in Japan, are a series of Zombie-Type monsters, released in the OCG and TCG.

The most famous monster of the Skull Servants is "Skull Servant". The archetype was originally created in response to the popular perception that Skull Servant was among the worst monster cards in the game. "Skull Servant" appears in several card artworks.

Playing style
Cards like "Armageddon Knight" and "Dark Grepher" are used to populate the Graveyard with Skulls to increase the attack points of "King of the Skull Servants". Powerful Zombie support such as "Zombie Master", "Goblin Zombie", and "Mezuki" are required. "Wightmare" can be used to get back removed-from-play cards by discarding himself, either into the Graveyard for "King of the Skull Servants" or Special Summoning "The Lady in Wight" or "King of the Skull Servants". The archetype has continued to receive support cards since the Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's era with the addition of numerous Spell and Trap Cards that involve Level 2 or lower monsters, such as "Graceful Revival" and "One for One".

Some 'Wight' monsters appear in Yu-Gi-Oh! and Yu-Gi-Oh! GX. This archetype appears too in some Video Games, as Yu-Gi-Oh! Dark Duel Stories, Yu-Gi-Oh! GX Tag Force, Yu-Gi-Oh! Nightmare Troubadour and more.

This deck's main strategy is to populate the Graveyard with "Skull Servant", "The Lady in Wight", "Wightmare" and "King of the Skull Servants" to summon a "King of the Skull Servants" with up to 11000 ATK. However, with the addition of "Wightmare", ironically, many Skull Servants decks have stopped including "Skull Servant".

The advantages of this deck include its ability to produce extremely high-ATK monsters very quickly (which may not be affected by Spells or Traps if "The Lady in Wight" is in play), as well as its resilience in summoning said monsters repeatedly. A major weakness is its total reliance on the Graveyard. If "Macro Cosmos" or "Dimensional Fissure" is in play, it can easily ruin your ability to power up "King of the Skull Servants". This was partially solved thanks to "Wightmare", which is capable of returning 'Wight' monsters from the Removed from Play Zone back to either the Graveyard or summoning them onto the field in exchange for discarding itself - especially helpful as it does not need to reach the Graveyard itself to work.

Getting Wights from the Deck
Wights are numerous in the Deck. With many copies available, Removing them quickly and placing them in the Graveyard is key. Multiple ways have been made to remove them quickly.

Direct Deck to Graveyard

 * Armageddon Knight - Capable of milling a Wight monster with no cost. When using it, you may want to consider it after Dark Grepher, however.
 * Chain Destruction - Can send up to two Wights to the Graveyard, from any Summon. It is even capable of Special Summoning from Zombie Master, One for One, Book of Life, or Graceful Revival. Particularly useful for The Lady in Wight because there are few ways to search it out of the Deck. Cannot be used on "King of the Skull Servants" if there are already more than two Wights in the Graveyard.
 * Dark Grepher - Though it creates a disadvantage of 1 DARK monster, it can effectively richen your Graveyard with ease.
 * Elemental Hero Prisma - Only sends Skull Servant, but can send 1 every turn by revealing Flame Ghost or Zombie Warrior from your Extra Deck.
 * Foolish Burial - Can send any one Wight to the Graveyard.
 * Painful Choice (traditional) - A god-send for this deck, choose 5 'Wights' and let your opponent have it soon enough.

Indirect (Milling) Deck to Graveyard
Milling the cards from your Deck can be useful when you do not have enough ways to remove the Wights from your Deck alone. Caution should be used to prevent useful cards from being lost.


 * Advanced Ritual Art - Sends a Normal Monster to the Graveyard to summon a Ritual Monster. Relinquished can work well.
 * Card Trooper
 * Fiend Comedian
 * Hidden Armory - Can be used to get Opti-Camouflage Armor
 * Jain, Lightsworn Paladin and other Lightsworns
 * Magical Merchant - Use a high ratio of monsters to mill lots of cards at once.
 * Needlebug Nest - mills five cards from your Deck.

Deck to Hand
By adding the Wights to your Hand, the cards can be discarded for card costs as well as allow you to easily use "Wightmare" to its fullest capacity.


 * Generation Shift
 * Goblin Zombie - Can add "Skull Servant", "King of the Skull Servants", and "Wightmare". Other options include Zombie Master or another Goblin Zombie.
 * Sangan - Can search for any Wight (Except King, which has "?" ATK.)

Special Summons from Deck
Special Summoning from the Deck will allow Wights to be used for tributes and also be used as a defense shield.


 * One for One - Also has a discard of one monster from the Hand. Easily can search out "King of the Skull Servants" with another 1000 Attack added.
 * Pyramid Turtle - Can search out "Skull Servant", "Wightmare" and "King of the Skull Servants".

Sending 'Wights' from the Hand to the Graveyard
With twelve copies of 'Wight' cards in your deck, some will inevitably find their way into your hand. These make ideal fodder for cards with discard costs, thereby letting you populate your Graveyard with 'Wights' while taking advantage of other cards' effects. Cards like "One for One" and "Zombie Master" will even let you discard a 'Wight' from your Hand to Special Summon one from your Deck or Graveyard, respectively. It is a good idea to use other cards which benefit from being discarded or otherwise sent to Graveyard so that if you have to mill or discard them due to lack of 'Wights', you can still benefit. Some such cards include "Mezuki", "Necro Gardna", "Plaguespreader Zombie", and even "Night Assailant", who will return a "Magical Merchant" to your hand when it is discarded (even by the effect of "Veil of Darkness").

Some cards that are good for sending 'Wights' from your Hand to the Graveyard are:
 * Dark Crusader - This is a must for this deck,an absolute must. Though it does create a disadvantage of a dark monster, it's still incredibly good for this deck.
 * Card Destruction
 * Lightning Vortex
 * One for One
 * Raigeki Break
 * Snipe Hunter
 * Zombie Master

Other Helpful Strategies
The Skull Servant Deck uses lots of effects to mill, discard, and send Skulls from the Deck to the Graveyard. Naturally, it is beneficial to have cards that take advantage of the Graveyard and/or protect it from the opponent's attempts to remove your Skulls. The following cards are generally good to include in Skull Servant Decks, which help them adapt to various opponents.


 * Burial from a Different Dimension
 * Gravity Bind - Stops your opponent from attacking, but lets you still attack freely since most of your monsters will be level 3 or lower.
 * Mezuki - Helps to speed up the process of summoning a Wight Monster.
 * Opti-Camouflage Armor - lets King of the Skull Servants attack directly, even if The Lady in Wight is in play. This is because Opti-Camouflage Armor does not affect the monster card, but affects the rule that monsters cannot attack directly if the opponent controls a monster.
 * Plaguespreader Zombie - if it gets milled, just revive it with its own effect.
 * Sangan - search Snipe Hunter or Armageddon Knight.
 * Dark Armed Dragon - A highly usable card in any DARK deck. Though it is harder in this deck to use its effect than in other DARK variants, it is extremely recommended.
 * Soul Release - Can be used with Wightmare. You can not only remove from play key cards for your opponents graveyard but remove a King or a Lady to then be Special Summoned by Wightmare's effect. This tech card can disrupt your opponents strategy and give you the edge.
 * Gold Sarcophagus - This card can be used to search out key cards like your Burial from a Different Dimension, Soul Release, or you can remove a king, lady, skull, or Wightmare to then use Wightmare's effect to Special Summon the king or lady to the field or power up an existing King on the field by returning a Skull Servant or Wightmare to the Graveyard.
 * Debris Dragon - Can be used with the Lady to nuke the field. An atlernate target can be Beast of the Pharaoh to blow up the feild and then use beast of the pharoh to special summon the king for the kill or damage.
 * The Dark Creator - works well with skull servant mill engines or dark heavy skull decks. if you don't control any monsters then you can special summon him. then remove a dark monster (king or lady) to speical summon a king to the feild. you can then discard wightmare to speical summon the removed king or lady to the feild. He provides graveyard control. For example you have 5 dark monsters in your grave, you then remove one from play to special one from the graveyard which leaves you with three. Enough to special summon DAD.
 * Shutendoji- is great in this deck. he helps set up wightmare plays and provides a +1 by removing two zombies from play (the king and the lady) you draw a card. then you can discard wightmare to special summon one of them back. also he can recycle remove from play zombies by returning them to the top of your deck( mezuki, plague, wightmare for another use, or any other zombie). he can be searched out by goblin zombie and pyramid turtle. and if your using dark arm dragon, he provides much needed graveyard control. for example you have 5 dark zombies in your graveyard you can remove 2 to draw 1 card which leaves you with 3 darks. that's exactly what's needed for DAD.
 * Glow-Up Bulb - is a level one tuner that can be specialed by the One for One your already using in this deck. when specialed summoned by his own effect you send one card from the top of your deck to the graveyard which helps you mill. Also you can use him to bring out Formula Synchron for a plus one and you don't even lose your tuner.
 * Empty Space Sea Serpent Levaiel - can be summoned with two lady in wights or spirit reaper( any 2 level 3 monsters). you can use it to send a lady(as a overlay unit) to the grave yard to special a king ( and powere him up), lady, mezuki, plague, or any removed from play monster ( yours or your opponents) to your side of the feild.
 * Recurring Nightmare - is a great card to recover two monsters with 0 def. for example 1 zombie master and 1 king of the skull servant or two of each
 * Chaos Hunter - is useful when dueling macro decks. she prevents your oponnent from removing his or your monsters from play
 * Pain Painter - makes summoning Archfiend Zombie-Skull so much easier to make. for example you have zombie master on the field and discard to special zombie goblin, then you summon pain painter and use it's ability to make zombie master and goblin zombie into level 2 to then synchro for archfiend zombie-skull. but that's not all. because he can make your zombies level 2, they will be protected by the lady in wight if she is on the field.
 * Phalanx Pike - an option where all hope seems gone. Good chance for OTK, too.
 * Elemental HERO Escuridão - paired with Elemental HERO Prisma you will be able to send a dark monster every turn so filling up your grave will be faster.

Monsters

 * 'Wights'
 * King of the Skull Servants
 * The Lady in Wight
 * Wightmare
 * Armageddon Knight
 * Dark Grepher
 * Goblin Zombie
 * Mezuki
 * Plaguespreader Zombie
 * Zombie Master

Spells

 * Allure of Darkness - This card allows you to draw a card, and gives Wightmare a card to target.
 * Book of Life - King of the Skull Servants cannot revive itself unless it is destroyed by battle. This will help regain a King if an effect destroys it.
 * Burial from a Different Dimension - Returns removed from play Skull Servants back to the grave to be revived and to increase King of the Skull Servants' attack.
 * Creature Swap - Any Wight in Attack Mode ("King" will have 0 Attack), Goblin Zombie, Pyramid Turtle.
 * Foolish Burial - Allows you to send any of the Wights to the grave.
 * Hidden Armory - Mill one and get an Opti-Camouflage Armor
 * Level Limit - Area B - This card can make it impossible for your opponent to attack, leaving you free to build up your attack strength.
 * Lightning Vortex - Send a Wight to the Graveyard for the cost.
 * One for One - You can both send a Wight to the graveyard and special summon a King of the Skull Servants
 * Opti-Camouflage Armor - Allows an equipped monster to attack directly, use on "King of the Skull Servants" to allow a possible Direct Attack kill.

Traps

 * Call of the Haunted
 * Chain Destruction - Allows you to send multiple Wights to the grave at once.
 * Graceful Revival - A tematic card to Special Summon "King of the Skull Servants".
 * Gravity Bind - Skull Servants are unaffected by this card's effect, giving you an advantage and some protection.
 * Return from the Different Dimension - Use this when there at least one King of the Skull Servants removed from play, and a few Wights in the graveyard, and you can make an OTK.

Extra Deck

 * Archfiend Zombie-Skull - Plaguespreader + "The Lady in Wight" + one other Wight. Will protect your Zombies from being destroyed by card effects.
 * Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier - Ditch 'Wights' to clear the field and attack with "King of the Skull Servants" for a possible OTK.
 * Flame Ghost - Use Elemental Hero Prisma's effect and this card to send a "Skull Servant" from your deck to the Graveyard.
 * Zombie Warrior - See Flame Ghost above.
 * Doomkaiser Dragon
 * Revived King Ha Des - Plaguespreader + "The Lady in Wight" + one other Wight OR Level 4 Zombie like Pyramid Turtle or Zombie Master. Useful to prevent many abilities of monsters destroyed by battle. Such abilities include searchers like Mystic Tomato and bothers like FLIP Effects and "Treeborn Frog".
 * Stardust Dragon
 * Dark End Dragon

Wightsworns
This deck utilizes the milling effects of the Lightsworns to drop multiple Wight monsters. Given all Lightsworns are LIGHT, you can also use Chaos Sorcerer with ease. You may want to lessen the number of Spells and Traps to about 3 to 8 in order to use "Magical Merchant" as a very abusable deck engine. In this case, it is highly recommended to only use "Royal Decree" in Traps, in order to stop possible counters against your moves. Many common Spells and Traps will have to be taken out in this case, leaving only those such as "One for One", "Monster Reborn", "Dark Hole", and "Giant Trunade".

Monsters

 * 'Wights'
 * King of the Skull Servants
 * Skull Servant
 * The Lady in Wight
 * Wightmare
 * Chaos Sorcerer
 * Plaguespreader Zombie
 * Zombie Master
 * Mezuki
 * Jain, Lightsworn Paladin
 * Ryko, Lightsworn Hunter
 * Lyla, Lightsworn Sorceress
 * Judgment Dragon
 * Card Trooper
 * Glow-Up Bulb
 * Magical Merchant
 * Ehren, Lightsworn Monk

Spells

 * One for One

Traps

 * Royal Decree

Extra Deck

 * Ally of Justice Catastor - Perfect against non-DARK decks.
 * Brionac, Dragon of the Ice Barrier - Ditch Skulls and Lady in Wights to clear the field and attack with King for a possible OTK.]
 * Revived King Ha Des - negates effects of monsters destroyed by battle by zombie monsters.
 * Stardust Dragon - Protect your monsters from being destroyed once per turn.