All Hat Decks
Mermail
Mermail as a whole is a impressively versatile aggro deck with great defensive tools, heavy pushes, and a grind all decks envy. Easy to pick up, but hard to master
- 𝕬𝖚𝖙𝕺
Pros
- Extremely Versatile
- Easy Swarming
- Hard to Deal With
Cons
- Graveyard Reliant
- Very Vulnerable to Stun Game 2&3
Eugen Heidt: Mermail
One of the best decks in the format, the main focus of this deck is to use monsters that discard cards from the hand to activate effs, mainly for summoning them and searching out cards from your deck. Cards such as Genex Undine, Mermail Abysspike, or Mermail Abyssteus you'll use to keep combos going and your Atlantean's popping. Linde and spheres can easily flood your board and provide defensive pressure, undine allows for ease of spot removal and access to Dragoons or Tidal. Utilize your lv7's and moulin for hard pushes along with your XYZ toolbox to create a unstoppable push!
- 𝕬𝖚𝖙𝕺
Sylvan
Sylvan is a control deck that toolboxes the rank 8, rank 7 and level 8 synchros. It can either force answers out of trap decks with big units like Sylvan Hermitree or can end on near auto-win boards with Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand and Stardust Spark Dragon.
- Cairill
Pros
- Consistent Combos
- Time to Set up in format
- Large Field Set Up + Good Options
Cons
- Low Recursion
- Struggles with Artifacts + Traptrix
- Difficult To See Combos
Sylvan
A more traditional variant based on Patrick Hoban’s top 16 NAWCQ build with the modern innovation of Archfiend’s Oath included which was found by YCS Denver (2017) champion Andy Tsang and popularised by CRL and J.*
Archfiend’s Oath:
Archfiend’s Oath functions as an Upstart Goblin that can also proc Sylvan effects. It is a very versatile option that adds an extra layer of consistency to the deck and gives extra options with Orea hands. You can also just blind call whatever card is the biggest blow-out in any given situation if you don’t have any information about what's on top of your deck.
- Cairill
Spellbook
Prophecy is a very consistent control deck that has very diverse toolbox of cards that are easily searchable. It has one of, if not the best, grind games of any deck in the format.
Generally you will want to open Magician, Secrets, Duality, or Library in order to get your engine started. With these you will set up your grave with Spellbooks to set up Spellbook of Fate as a disruption and Spellbook Tower to recycle the one fate and give you a plus 1 each turn. By keeping this setup live, you are able to slowly remove threats each turn and gain advantage to grind out your opponent.
- BMDubUS
Pros
- Amazing control Options
- Easy Access to searchers and recycling
Cons
- Spellbook of Judgement is Banned
- Can Brick
BMDubUS: Spellbook
There are two different builds that play the deck differently, as they are built around different boss monsters. The standard, generally accepted as the best at the time being the Priestess Justice build that focuses on maintaining hand advantage and dropping multiple High Priestess of Prophecies on the field. While this build can have a higher ceiling than the other, opening with a justice play can be a problem as your fate and tower will not be live turn one.
BMDubUS: World Spellbook
The other build, which did not see much success in 2014, but did win a MM, runs The World of Prophecy as it’s main win condition. This build focuses on using temperance of prophecy to tutor out world to recycle books and blow up the field. The benefits of this build are that it has a strong turn one play going second and it is able to put more pressure by using spellbook of life and a single temperance for large plays. However this version does have to play a few brick cards and can have a lower ceiling due to temperances conditions.
Overall, in either build you usually win or lose to yourself. It is really important to see one of your 11 openers in order to get the game started and in games you don’t it is almost always a loss. The deck also struggles heavily against artifacts going second, as it is important to get a spellcaster to stick on the field and there no spellbooks that protect from monster effects. The deck has great geargia matchups, and is able to side heavily against decks like infernity and dragon to give a strong g2 and 3
-BMDubUS
Lightsworn
Lightsworn is the classic mill combo deck. The deck has a variety of engines it can tech ranging from Dragon Rulers to Chaos. The deck can gave consistency issues due to the inherent nature of bricking but at its best this deck is unstoppable.
Pros
- Insane Combos
- Crazy Graveyard Synergy
- Able to Use Synchro Summons
Cons
- Can Low Roll
- Can Brick
Marcel Burri: Lightsworn Rulers
A 2014 second place list by Marcel Burri: for a European WCQ
Blabb: Chaos Sworn
A 2022 Moraltech Monthly 4th place list by Blabb.
Dark World
Dark World is an aggro combo/beatdown deck and notorious for the bossmonster Grapha, which is hard to out due to high ATK stat and can revive itself every turn from the GY. The deck can also maindeck powerfull floatgates like Skill Drain and control the hand of the opponent with Dragged Down.
Pros
- Huge draw engine, extremely fast deck
- Easy spammable 3k beat stick as boss monster
- Can achieve hand knowledge and hand control
Cons
- can brick very hard sometimes
- Struggles against side decking
- Struggles to play around Hands
- Struggles to progess without the field spell
Ley Murphy: Dark World
The deck list is similar to the list of Gleb Trubitcoi (4th place Portugal Nationals), the most successful Dark World deck during HAT format.
- Ley Murphy
While deck had a couple YCS tops in previous formats, Dark World has become less popular in HAT format because of the increase of spell/trap destruction and the increase of D.D. Crows in the side decks.
- Ley Murphy
Evilswarm
Evilswarm are a rank 4 spam deck with access to one of the best rank 4 cards in the game. Evilswarm Ophion. Ophion turns off the summoning of all level 5 or higher monsters as well has searching for protection.
Pros
- Ophion
- Decent Access to Rank 4's
Cons
- Struggles with A Lot of Matches
- Slower Rank 4 Engine
Piyal Peiris: Evilswarm
A classic list from 2014, which made top 8 at a European WCQ
Bujin
Win the die roll, summon Yamato, put up your floodgate of choice
Congrats, you win
Your opponent was simply a worse player
- Poison
Pros
- Excellent Stall Power
- Synergy with Floodgates
- Access to Rank 4s
Cons
- Widely Considered Boring
- Has to Grind
MonkeyFight TCG: Bujin
Noble Knights
Noble Knights are a rank 4/5 equip deck. The goal is to make a massive untargetable, indestructible boss monster. While combining it with some other floodgates.
Pros
- Massive Resilient Boss Monster
- Equip Spell Recursion
-
Cons
- 1 Trick Pony
- Vulnerable to Spellbooks
- Inconsistent
MonkeyFight: Artifact Noble Knights
Noble Knights as a deck revolve around making the XYZs and having a bunch of equips. To do that we need to always ensure two Noble Knight monsters on the field, and some equips. This list is taking advantage of the standard Medraut-Borz combo but also Noble Knight Brothers as a back-up plan. Kaiser Coliseum is an additional layer of disruption.
Backing up the main engine is an artifact core for rank 5 plays and additional lines of play if the deck would brick. Eachtar makes grind games significantly easier.
Constellar
Constellar's are a rank 4, and 5 deck with special access to powerful boss monsters such as Constellar Pleiades and Constellar Ptolemy M7. The deck does suffer from some consistency issues but more than makes up for it thanks to outside engines like Artifacts and Fire Fists.
Pros
- Pleiades is a strong boss monster
- Synergy with Artifacts & Fire Fists
- Rank 3, 4, & 5 Access
-
Cons
- Inconsistent
- Vulnerable to Disruption
Aureum: Constellar Artifacts
Artifacts can be utilized to provide incredible backrow disruption to the opponent's field, as well as incredible ease of access to pleidas and the rank 5 toolbox with less risk. Artifacts will also provide far more swarming potential, allowing easier access to bigger pushes and endboards.
Battlin' Boxer
Battln' Boxers are a toolbox rank 4 deck with a tool for every situation. between the Warrior only XYZ and Battln Boxer's own XYZs, Battln Boxer are a surprisingly underrated deck this format.
Pros
- Very Strong Rank 4 Toolbox
- Decent Field Swarming
Cons
- Middling Disruptions
- Main Deck Boxers Have Restrictions
Graf: Boxer
So, the main card this deck evolves around is Battlin' Boxer Lead Yoke, a very easy to make rank 4 monster that is hard to out for a lot of decks. The main benefit of this game plan are, that making Lead Yoke is incredibly easy to do, and in a late game you have multiple cards that make lead yoke on their own, while also putting a lot of damage on field to have offensive pressure. This strategy also doesn't need that much space in the deck, so you can dedicate a lot of space to traps cards and general utility cards like the hands.
- Graff