Gaming Terms you should know

1 for 1 Card - A card that you effectively sacrifice to take away 1 single card on your opponent's side of the field, or to replace one that's either on the field, or in your hand.
• Examples of one for one cards include "Confiscation", "Smashing Ground" and "Reinforcement of the Army"

Absorption - the ability to take control of a monster as an Equip Spell Card.
• Example of card with absorption include ”Relinquished” and “Destiny Hero - Plasma”

Anti-Splashable - a card that will only see use in very specific decks. These cards are neither Splashable or Semi-Splashable because of how inflexible they are. Anti-Splashable cards generally apply to only decks that focus on a specific card or a specific Archetype.
• Example: Elemental Recharge is Anti-Splashable because it will only see use in a deck dedicated mostly to the Elemental Hero archetype.

Attack Effect -An effect that is triggered whenever that particular card is involved in a battle.

Beatdown - a strategy which utilizes monsters with high ATK to overpower the opponent. It is one of the oldest Deck types.

Beatstick - a Monster Card that is used primarily to Attack due to its high ATK. Usually, a beatstick has a low Level, making it easy to Summon. Also effects that allow them to being Special Summoned without a major setup, and thus, allowing the player to summon a lot of monsters in one turn and effects that raises their own ATK points like "Amazoness Paladin and "Elemental Hero Heat".

Blitzer - a card whose effect includes clearing the field of all cards or all cards of a certain category. Such cards tend to have heavier costs or activation requirements.
• Examples: Beast King Barbaros, Black Rose Dragon, Demise, King of Armageddon, and Judgment Dragon

Bouncing - refer to the effect of returning cards on the field to player's hands. Cards like "Penguin Soldier" are considered Bounce cards.

Broken - a term used to refer to any card giving the user of the card an excessive advantage or defines the competitive metagame in a negative or imbalanced manner. the term is mostly considered subjective.
• Example: Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End - Topdeckable summoning (LIGHT and DARK in Graveyard) with overpowered stats, able to wipe the entire field and hand at the same time at only 1000 Life Points, burn damage can give the victory to player.

Card Pool - used in both the OCG and TCG, to denote how many cards in total exist for players to use.

Card Ratio - The Card Ratio is an often-disputed number of card types that should be in a Deck. The Card Ratio will be different with different kinds of decks. Different decks have varying strategies, so they will require different types of cards. Using the Minimum Deck Amount of 40 cards, the following is the common ratio used now:
• Non-Tribute Monster Cards:
• 17 Tribute Monster Cards:
• 3 Spells: 15
• Traps: 5


Cookie Cutter - is a way of referring to a Deck that is created mostly from "Splashable" cards, with little or no general theme. Often, these decks include powerful effects, monsters with high ATK and a few with high DEF, but aren't specifically themed in any way. This term is usually used in a negative context, and as such these decks are believed to generally be used by players who only want a quick, effortless win, and believe they can achieve such a win by copying (like a cookie cutter which creates duplicates of a certain cookie shape) certain tournament-winning decks. A similar term is netdecking.

Dead Draw - a card that is unusable or not helpful at the time that it is Drawn from the Deck or otherwise added to a player's Hand.

Deck Fattener - adds cards into the Deck.
• Examples : "Pot of Avarice" and "Pot of Generosity".

Deck Out - a type of deck (also called "Mill") and a term. To "deck out" an opponent means to reduce the number of cards in their deck to 0. If they must draw a card when they have 0 cards in their deck, they lose the duel.

Deck Thinner - a card that reduces the number of cards in your deck so you have a greater chance of drawing what you need.
• Examples: "Gather Your Mind", "Toon Table of Contents", "Red Gadget", "Yellow Gadget" and "Green Gadget"

Destruction Effect - a one-time effect that is activated when the particular card is destroyed, be it by battle, or via a card effect.

Double-edged Sword - a card that can stop harmful effects but also prevents helpful ones.
• Examples: "Royal Oppression", "Royal Decree", "Skill Drain", "Jinzo", "Spell Canceller," and Silent Swordsman LV7.
• "Light and Darkness Dragon" has multiple different beneficial and harmful effects working together
• The entire archetype of the "Arcana Force" monsters could also be arguably called Double-Edged Swords, since every monster in it has both a beneficial and harmful effect that is randomly determined.

Floaters - Monster Cards that have replaced themselves in some way, allowing the player using them to generate card advantage. Examples of Floaters are
• "Dekoichi the Battlechanted Locomotive." Because Dekoichi allows the player to draw a card, it has essentially replaced itself in the player's hand, losing the player no cards overall if it's destroyed or lost.
• "Gravekeeper's Spy." Spy replaces itself with a Monster on the field, as opposed to a card in hand, but the idea is the same; the player loses no overall card presence, even if the Floater is destroyed.
• "Old Vindictive Magician" and the Monarchs could be considered Floaters, since they generate card advantage as well. In general usage however, a Floater is considered to be a Monster that gains the player using it card presence
• "Reborn Tengu", a monster that Special Summons another copy of itself when it leaves the field while face-up (except if returned to the top of its owner's Deck).

Lucksack - term for top-decking, usually referring to changing the flow of the game to one's favor, potentially ending with a victory

MMR - Stands for “Mass Monster Removal” which refers to cards that can take out a lot of Monster Cards on the field at the same time.
• Examples: "Cyber Jar" "Dark Hole", "Lightning Vortex", "Mirror Force" and "Torrential Tribute"

MSTR – Stands for "Mass Spell and Trap Removal" refers to cards that can take out a lot of Spell and Trap Cards on the field at the same time.
• Examples: "Giant Trunade", "Gigantes", "Harpie's Feather Duster", "Heavy Storm", and "Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys".

MetaGame - Metagame is the way the game is currently played in a given area. Specifically, when players talk about the metagame (or 'meta', for short), they talk about which Deck styles and strategies are the most dominant in their area of play; for instance, a metagame, cards that are played the most often or used by the most people, it also can mean the cards that are available in that area (through local-leagues or casual trade circles), and the current state of the Semi-Limited/Limited/Forbidden lists.
• Current Dueling Network Meta: "Plants", "Six Samurai", "Agents", "X-Saber", "Gravekeeper's", "Dragunity", "Tengu Synchro", "Chaos", "Dark World" and “T.G.”

Mill - discarding or sending cards from the top of a Deck to the Graveyard.

Mimic - a card that can copy another card's ATK/DEF, Effects, or name. Most effects that assume another card's name are Continuous effects that usually help get the stronger monsters of its Archetype out, such as "Proto-Cyber Dragon" or "Elemental Hero Neos Alius".

Mirror Match - a match played between two people whose Decks are nearly identical.

Netdecking - the practice of copying a Championship-winning Deck as used in either Nationals, Shonen Jump Championships, World Championships, or any other high-profile event where Deck Lists are posted. Netdecking is often referred to negatively, being called "a practice that involves zero creativity and is usually done by players who are only interested in a cheap, effortless win, believing they can only achieve such a victory by copying an established winning deck" (see Cookie Cutter). For this reason, it is a practice that is considered to be shunned upon by many players. Some Duelists argue that while the decks that win major tournaments are indeed relatively the same, it is because the decks are of a tried and true method, and have shown themselves to be consistently placing high, so people who want to win will try and have the best odds they can have, as it is human nature to be competitive and wanting to be better than other people. It is also debated that there is no reason for a person who uses an Original Deck to be seen as higher than a netdecker, as it is how the individual enjoys playing that counts.

Nuke - a term used to describe the action of destroying all, or almost all, cards on the field. (See Blitzers) The first known card with a "Nuking" effect was "Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End", whose effect was used to clear the field to prepare for an OTK, known as the Chaos Emperor Dragon OTK.

Overextending - is the process of a player filling up his Monster Card Zones or Spell & Trap Card Zone, or both, with more cards than necessary, leaving the player at risk from cards such as "Mirror Force", "Straight Flush", "Heavy Storm", "Judgment Dragon". and "Gandora the Dragon of Destruction".

Proxy - a fake card that is used to take the place of a real card.

Recruiters - monsters that allow you to Special Summon monsters of the same name from the Deck when a certain condition is fulfilled (usually destruction by battle).
• Examples: "Nimble Momonga", "Giant Germ", "Nimble Musasabi", and "Mecha Bunny".

Recycling - a method in which cards from the Graveyard are often reused.

Reduced Functionality - cards that rely on other cards (some of which are Forbidden) so heavily that their usefulness is greatly reduced. These cards are often specially-designed to take out a specific card, and only that card, but are rendered useless in the Advanced and OCG formats, as the cards they are designed to go against are banned. Even in the Traditional format, or before the cards were placed on the Forbidden list, many duelists don't consider them to be very good, as they only work against a single, solitary card, and it could be considered a waste of resources to add them in for precisely that reason, in lieu of other, more universal and generic negation or removal cards.
• Examples:
o "Mystical Beast Serket" (Relies on "Temple of the Kings")
o Spirit of the Pot of Greed" (Relies on "Pot of Greed")
o "Guardian Elma" (Relies on "Butterfly Dagger - Elma")
o "Dedication through Light and Darkness" (Relies on "Dark Magician of Chaos")
o "Anti Raigeki" (Relies on "Raigeki")
o "Gryphon Wing" (Relies on "Harpie's Feather Duster")

Scoop - is to forfeit the duel. This usually happens when a player knows for certain that they are going to lose. Scooping is often done to save time or hide face down cards that your opponent would have destroyed and seen had you not scooped, which would give your opponent more information about your deck during the next round. Scooping got its name because right after a player forfeits, they "Scoop" up their cards and shuffle them all back together.

Searcher - any card, upon meeting of its effect requirements (assuming the card has any), that is capable of letting you select a specific card(s) from your Deck to Special Summon onto your side of the field, to add to your hand (the card added must be shown to your opponent), to place on top of your Deck, to send to the Graveyard or to remove from play.

Splashable refers to any card that is capable of boosting any Deck it is placed in, since the effect of that card works well, no matter what monsters complement it in the Deck. For a card to be Splashable, it must function well in a deck regardless of what other cards are in that deck. A card that is considered Splashable generally does not apply to any specific Type, Attribute, Archetype, or other factor that applies to only a specific group of cards. For example, "Limiter Removal" is not splashable as it is only useful in a deck that uses mostly Machine monsters, but "Shrink" is splashable because it can be played independently of other cards in the deck.
• Semi-Splashable - a card that is sometimes capable of boosting a deck it is placed in. they are easily Side Deckable, making them a common occurrence in many duels but not always used because they may not be the most compatible with a Duelist's Deck.

Stall - are cards that are used to prevent your opponent from attacking you.
• Examples: "Spirit Reaper", "Marshmallon", "Swords of Revealing Light", "Gravity Bind", and "Scrap-Iron Scarecrow".

Staple - a card that is considered so splashable that it is included in almost any Deck the owner chooses to construct.
• Examples: “Dark Hole”, “Heavy Storm”, “Mystical Space Typhoon” , and “Effect Veiler”

Suicide - al term used to describe when a monster purposely attacks another with an equal or greater ATK. This is also commonly called Ramming, Kamikaze or in cases when the monsters have equal ATK, a Double KO.

Swarming - the process of rapidly Summoning monsters to your side of the field in an attempt to overwhelm your opponent. "Double Summon", "Ultimate Offering", "Cyber Dragon", "The Tricky", and "Gilasaurus" are examples of cards with swarm capabilities. The Six Samurai Archetype is designed to swarm the field to gain power and effects. "Frogs", "Infernity", "Blackwing", "Zombies", "X-Saber", "Dark World" and "Fabled" are also swarm Archetypes.

Tech - refers to a card placed in a Main Deck or Side Deck for no other purpose than to examine how well it plays in a Deck or to combat a specific threat in the current Metagame.
• Examples of Good tech cards: “D.D. Crow”, Nobleman Of Crossout and Extermination, “Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror”

Toolbox - is shorthand to describe any Deck where monsters can be searched to fit a specific situation. Search Yugioh Wikia for more Info.

Top-Decking - the condition where there are no cards in your hand, and often, none on your field either, resulting in every card you draw potentially being crucial. The term "believing in the Heart of the Cards" is used by some players to describe top-decking, as a parody of the 4Kids dub of the second series anime.
• "Judgment Dragon", "Infernity Archfiend", "Spirit Reaper", "Pot of Avarice", and "Debris Dragon" are considered lucky top-decking cards, although this is not an exhaustive list.

Tribute Fodder - term for a monster(s) used most often as Tribute materials for stronger monsters, card effects, etc. Monsters that swarm the field quickly, such as Recruiters or the Six Samurai are good choices, as are most Token monsters, like those of Stray Lambs or Synthetic Seraphim, and cards that can Special Summon themselves like Cyber Dragon or Treeborn Frog.

Thanks for this article it may be helpful to beginner yugioh players

so long. so not new. but i suppose we could turn this into a nerd's dictionary, or something. Btw you forgot scrub. and scoop.

ahhh my troll reply got deleted.

anyways scoop is up there, and scrub is just like, noob, pwn'd, and AFK, they are everywhere and don't really have anything to do with yugimonz