When we looked at the Top 10 tables in Round 8 last night, there was only one Herald of Perfection Deck amongst the 20 Duelists we profiled. Andrew Lindskog won his Round 8 Match, and was sitting pretty with an undefeated 8-0 record heading into Round 9. There were plenty of Duelists running Heralds in yesterday’s competition – what made Lindskog excel? It might have been his Deck’s speed. Check it out!

Monsters:

3 Herald of Perfection

3 Herald of Orange Light

3 Manju of the Ten Thousand Hands

3 Archlord Kristya

2 Honest

2 Sonic Bird

1 Dunames Dark Witch

1 Gyakutenno Megami

2 Mystic Shine Ball

3 Cloudian – Smoke Ball

Spell Cards:

3 Preparation of Rites

3 Upstart Goblin

3 Hand Destruction

3 Dark Factory of Mass Production

1 Heavy Storm

1 Advanced Ritual Art

Traps:

1 Solemn Judgment

1 Mirror Force

1 Scrap-Iron Scarecrow

Lindskog’s monster lineup is pretty familiar. Herald of Perfection and Herald of Orange Light lock down the opponent’s best effects; Manju of the Ten Thousand Hands and Sonic Bird search out Ritual Monsters and Advanced Ritual Art; and Archlord Kristya and Honest add muscle and control over the field.

But we start to see slight deviations from the expected lineup when we look at the Normal Monsters. Like other Herald Duelists this weekend, Lindskog plays the Level 6 Fairy Gyakutenno Megami. Megami’s really important in this Deck, because Lindskog doesn’t run Pot of Avarice, a card we’ve seen in almost every other Herald Deck we’ve looked at.

Plan A is to activate Advanced Ritual Art and Summon his first Herald of Perfection, using the Shine Balls and Smoke Balls in his Deck and sending them to the Graveyard. But without Pot of Avarice, he has no way to get his Shine Balls and Smoke Balls back into his Deck. If the first Herald is destroyed, Megami becomes Plan B, a one-monster payment for the Ritual Summon of a second Herald.

That backup plan is also important because Lindskog’s Deck runs so many effects that draw cards. This could cause him to draw his Shine Balls and Smoke Balls before he gets to Advanced Ritual Art. And Advanced Ritual Art needs for these monsters to be in his Deck still.

With just 2 Level 2 Shine Balls, and 3 Level 1 Smoke Balls, that’s only 7 Levels of low-Level Normal Fairies to make a Level 6 Ritual Summon. Drawing even 1 Shine Ball would throw the deck off-balance. So Megami is his fall-back plan.

He’s also playing Dunames Dark Witch! Dunames is a Level 4 Normal Monster, and she helps patch up that same concern Megami addresses: if too many Smoke Balls and Shine Balls are drawn before Advanced Ritual Art is activated, Lindskog can use Dunames Dark Witch (and either a single Shine Ball or 2 Smoke Balls) to make his Ritual Summon. And unlike Gyakutenno Megami (which is a Tribute monster), Dunames Dark Witch is easy to Summon on its own! As an 1800 ATK beatstick, Dunames can attack and destroy a number of popular monsters used by opponents. Lindskog has really pushed his Normal Monster lineup to the limit, solving challenges inherent to the Deck and making great use of his card slots.

But it’s the Spell Card choices that make this Deck really operate. Lindskog is doing everything he can to make sure he plays Herald of Perfection and Archlord Kristya as early as possible, packing 3 copies of Upstart Goblin and 3 Hand Destruction to get to his key cards. Hand Destruction helps him load his Graveyard with 4 Fairies for Archlord Kristya’s Special Summon; combined with his range of Normal Monsters, it’s extremely easy for Lindskog to get 4 Fairies to the Graveyard. With the variety in Levels of his Normal Monsters, he can use Advanced Ritual Art to send 1, 2, 3, or 4 Fairies to the Graveyard, depending on how many he needs at the moment to enable him to Summon Kristya.

Lindskog’s 3 Dark Factories of Mass Production allow him to scale back the number of Fairies as needed, if he winds up with too many Fairies in the Graveyard. Most Herald Decks play Factory almost strictly to fuel the discard effects of the Herald monsters, and while Lindskog can certainly do that, he’s also getting a lot more out of those cards.

For Traps, Lindskog doesn’t run the popular Royal Decree, which is used by many other Herald Duelists. Instead, he plays Mirror Force and Solemn Judgment, as well as Scrap-Iron Scarecrow. Scarecrow stops those rare attackers like Colossal Fighter and XX-Saber Gottoms that can battle their way through a Defense Position Herald of Perfection. Another Trap like Dimensional Prison could remove that attacker from the game entirely, but the cool thing about Scrap-Iron Scarecrow is that it can be used every turn. That means that it can be used freely in the early game against minor threats, and still stick around to block bigger problems later. Lindskog is able to protect monsters that wouldn’t normally be protected, like Sonic Bird and Manju of the Ten-Thousand Hands, meaning more monsters for him on the field.