Dragon Deck

Types of Dragon Decks
Dragons are one of the most supported types in Yu-Gi-Oh!. Some common decks focus on a single monster such as the Red-Eyes B. Dragon, Blue-Eyes White Dragon, Five-Headed Dragon, King Dragun, Armed Dragon, or Horus the Black Flame Dragon. There are many ways to build a Dragon Deck, and all are powerful in their own way. Here are some different types of decks based around Dragon Monsters.



LV Dragon Decks
Some dragon decks are based on the LV dragons, Armed Dragon and Horus the Black Flame Dragon. These decks usually focus on leveling up their monsters quickly. One strategy is to use Foolish Burial to send a high level evolution to the graveyard, then using Level Modulation to summon that monster (this sratagy only works with monsters that are not Nomi or Semi-Nomi monsters). To protect the high level monsters from trap cards Royal Decree, Jinzo, or King Dragun is usually used. Horus the Black Flame Dragon has added protection from Spell Cards and is well known for the infamous "Horus Decree" lockdown. Horus and Armed Dragon cards can even be combined to make a deck that not only locks down spell and trap cards, but also controls the opponents monsters that may get in your way.

Dragon Fusion Decks
These types of decks often focus on getting fusion monsters like Five-Headed Dragon, King Dragun, Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon, and sometimes even Dragon Master Knight to the field. Usually Dragon's Mirror or Future Fusion is used to accomplish these tasks. If you want to summon King Dragun quickly, The Dark - Hex-Sealed Fusion is a great choice if you don't have Future Fusion or Dragon's Mirror in hand. The same goes for Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon and The Light - Hex-Sealed Fusion if you're short on Blue-Eyes White Dragon or any fusion spell cards. Synchro Monsters like Stardust Dragon or Red Dragon Archfiend and Tuner Monsters like Magna Drago, The White Stone of Legend, and in some cases, Debris Dragon are also great choices for Synchro Summons if you can't Fusion Summon.

Rise of the Dragon Lords Structure Deck
The newest dragon deck is the Rise of the Dragon Lords Structure Deck. This deck focuses on summoning powerful dragons to the field from the graveyard, thereby activating their powerful effects. Felgrand Dragon, Tyrant Dragon and Darkblaze Dragon are good examples of this. This deck also includes Mausoleum of the Emperor to get tribute monsters out quickly. Draining Shield is used to recover life points used for Mausoleum of the Emperor and Trade-In can be used to put powerful dragons into the graveyard to revive while drawing two cards in the proccess. Decoy Dragon works exceptionally well with this deck, being able to make a powerful combo with Foolish Burial. Card of Safe Return is another great addition to this deck, since it lets you draw a card each time you summon a dragon like this. An awesome way to special summon Dragons from the grave is to use Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon since it gives you a free special summon of any dragon chilling in your hand or graveyard, no matter how high of a level it is. You can also use Van'Dalgyon the Dark Dragon Lord with Divine Wrath to special summon Dragons in the Graveyard. The best way to make this deck truly effective is to buy multiple structure decks and combine the more important cards into one deck. This structure deck can also be bought for the key cards in any dragon deck.

Dragon Beatdown
This type of deck is pretty old fashioned, but it has more variations than any of the other three decks. The deck revolves around playing abnormally powerful Dragon-Type monsters and brutally beating down the opponent's life points. High level monsters can be anything mentioned in the other decks, but smaller monsters may include Luster Dragon, Spear Dragon, and Blizzard Dragon. Even though Gray Wing is relatively weak in atk points, it can deal up to 2600 damage to the opponent if there are no monsters in its way. Monsters like Troop Dragon, Masked Dragon, and Twin-Headed Behemoth can be used to tribute summon the more powerful monsters. Another way of playing high level Dragons without tributing is to use Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon, which special summons virtually any kind of Dragon monster you want to dish out against the opponent. Mid-Level monsters often used in this build may include Kaiser Glider and Chthonian Emperor Dragon to rid the field of stubborn monsters and attack for huge damage. To protect your monsters from spell and trap effects, cards like Stamping Destruction and A Wingbeat of Giant Dragon (Which you can also combo with Montage Dragon for monsters to Discard) can help make sure that nasty traps and spells like Shrink and Dimensional Prison won't get in your way. Traps like Dragon's Rage can help drop the opponents life even quicker, especially when combined monsters that have high attack points and, in some cases, attack more than once, such as Tyrant Dragon.

Strengths
Dragons have been known to have the most powerful attacks and, in some cases, broken effects. An attack from a good sized Dragon like Five-Headed Dragon can take a good chunk out of an opponent's life points. Since most good dragons have atk points that can overpower popular cards like Goyo Guardian, Thought Ruler Archfiend, Dark Armed Dragon, Judgment Dragon, and even Gladiator Beast Heraklinos, the only way to bring down a sizeable dragon is to use effects. Sometimes even that becomes hard though, since cards like Prime Material Dragon, Stardust Dragon, and even King Dragun will help prevent any vital Dragons from being destroyed or targeted by effects, not to mention Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8 will block out any spell cards from wreaking havoc on your field while a Royal Decree blocks out the trap cards (Tyrant Dragon can even protect himself from most trap cards without the help of either of the other dragons). Plus, even if you do end up losing one of your dragons, you can bring it back just as easy with the help of Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon. If you do not have any of those monsters out, Dragonic Knight can special summon himself from your hand if the opponent tries to destroy your monsters with monster card effects. A well built Dragon Fusion Deck can also bring trouble since King Dragun has the power to protect all dragons you control from targeting effects like Dark Armed Dragon and Brain Control plus special summon powerful dragons like Tyrant Dragon or Blue-Eyes White Dragon from the hand. Montage Dragon also has the power to become a powerhouse monster if you discard high level dragons from your hand, sometimes becoming even stronger than the all powerful Five-Headed Dragon (the strongest dragon AND monster in the entire game next to Dragon Master Knight).

Weaknesses
However, there are major weaknesses with Dragon decks, and all have one in common: Summoning the Dragons. Since Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8 cannot be special summoned except with it's own effect, cards like Level Up! and Level Modulation are usually used to override this problem, but Counter Trap Cards like Solemn Judgment or Dark Bribe can impede your progress. Plus; Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6 has only 2300 ATK points, leaving it vulnerable to monsters like Goyo Guardian or any of the Monarchs. In Dragon Fusion Decks, it's highly important to be able to keep King Dragun on the field to be able to summon the bigger dragons, but it's 2400 Atk is low enough for any Monarch to destroy in battle. A good way to counter this kind of move is to use traps like Waboku or Threatening Roar to prevent the opponent from attacking or dealing battle damage. If your opponent knows you have a Dragon Fusion Deck, he or she may try to use Chthonian Polymer to gain control of any Dragon you fusion summon, which is deadly when playing Five-Headed Dragon. If King Dragun ends up getting destroyed, level 5 or higher dragons you draw later will become dead draws and slow the deck down to a crawl. A good counter measure for this would be to use Trade-In on level 8 monsters you draw but cannot play. Card effects that do not target like Judgment Dragon or Mirror Force cannot be negated with King Dragun and would therefore require a Prime Material Dragon or Stardust Dragon to stop them. Finally, cards like Royal Oppression and Fossil Dyna Pachycephalo can also prevent any of these dragons from being summoned at all and will need to be removed from the field in order to summon your cards.

Anti-Dragon Cards
Another major weakness is that quite a few cards have been specially made for destroying or weakening dragons, otherwise known as Anti-Dragon cards. Not only does Buster Blader get stronger as dragon after dragon gets summoned and destroyed, but it is also the perfect candidate for Sword of Dragon's Soul. If Buster Blader was equipped with that plus Mist Body, it could take out virtually any dragon you throw at it, even the mighty Five-Headed Dragon who normally can't be destroyed in battle by anything not of the LIGHT Attribute. Also, a fairly new card called Victoria can special summon your dragons to the opponents field to be used agianst you, and dealing with your own dragons usually isn't an easy task to accomplish, especially if the monster the opponent took is a Tuner Monster like Magna Drago or The White Stone of Legend. Plus there's Dark Paladin, which can be used for/or against dragons and negate key spell cards like Dragon's Mirror and Trade-In. Dragon Manipulator and Dragon Seeker can be tricky to deal with, but can be easily overcome with King Dragun. Dragon Capture Jar can wreak severe havoc on any and all of your Dragons since King Dragun, Stardust Dragon, and Prime Material Dragon cannot stop it.

Solutions to Anti-Dragon cards
However, there are ways of getting around Anti-Dragon cards. One quick and easy method of accomplishing this is to use Exploder Dragon. Since he kills anything that destroys him in battle, he can overpower cards like Buster Blader and even Dark Paladin, while at the same time taking no battle damage. You may also use the Armed Dragon cards to destroy Dragon Seeker since it has relatively weak Atk points, and Armed Dragon LV10 can just wipe out all your opponents face-up monsters no matter how much Atk points they poccess. Montage Dragon can also be used to potentially become more powerful than Dark Paladin or Buster Blader by discarding high level monsters like Blue-Eyes White Dragon or Tyrant Dragon. Dragon Piper can be used to rid the field of any Dragon Capture Jar cards on the field that are preventing you from attacking. If the opponent tries to play Victoria and gains control of some of your dragons, a good spell to counter this kind of move is Owner's Seal. With this, you can gain control of your dragons agian and use them to get rid of Victoria. Finnaly, the spell card Dragon's Mirror can be doubly effective by removing any Dragons in your graveyard to fusion summon Five-Headed Dragon plus power down Buster Blader and Dark Paladin in the process (this is assuming that there are no cards to discard for Dark Paladin's effect).

Monsters

 * Armed Dragon LV3
 * Armed Dragon LV5
 * Armed Dragon LV7
 * Armed Dragon LV10
 * Blue-Eyes White Dragon
 * Paladin of White Dragon
 * Exploder Dragon
 * Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV4
 * Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6
 * Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8
 * Kaibaman
 * Lord of D.
 * Light and Darkness Dragon
 * Masked Dragon
 * Mirage Dragon
 * Montage Dragon
 * Red-Eyes B. Chick
 * Red-Eyes B. Dragon
 * Red-Eyes Wyvern
 * Twin-Headed Behemoth
 * Tyrant Dragon
 * White-Horned Dragon
 * The White Stone of Legend
 * Chthonian Emperor Dragon
 * Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon
 * Debris Dragon

Fusion Monsters

 * Five-Headed Dragon
 * B. Skull Dragon
 * Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon
 * King Dragun
 * Dragon Master Knight

Synchro Monsters

 * Stardust Dragon
 * Red Dragon Archfiend
 * Light End Dragon (OCG only)
 * Dark End Dragon (OCG only)
 * Explode Wing Dragon (OCG only)

Monsters

 * Armed Dragon LV3 x2
 * Armed Dragon LV5 x2
 * Armed Dragon LV7 x2
 * Armed Dragon LV10
 * Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV4
 * Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6
 * Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8
 * Prime Material Dragon
 * Cyber Dragon
 * Mirage Dragon
 * Twin-Headed Behemoth
 * Masked Dragon x3
 * Montage Dragon
 * Blizzard Dragon
 * Luster Dragon

Spells

 * Level Up!
 * Monster Reborn
 * Mystical Space Typhoon
 * Magical Mallet
 * Swords of Revealing Light
 * Pot of Avarice
 * Heavy Storm
 * Brain Control
 * Level Modulation
 * Lightning Vortex
 * Nobleman of Crossout

Traps

 * Mirror Force
 * Magic Cylinder
 * Shadow Spell
 * Call of the Haunted
 * Sakuretsu Armor
 * Draining Shield
 * Bottomless Trap Hole
 * Torrential Tribute