Karryon Dietrich’s Spellcaster Deck is like a blast from the past. He’s packing tons of old-school favorites, like Gemini Elf and Dark Elf, along with newer cards that bring them up to a new level of competition. Check out Karryon Dietrich’s ‘Little Village’ Deck.

Monsters: 16

3x Kycoo the Ghost Destroyer

3x Breaker the Magical Warrior

3x Crusader of Endymion

3x Gravekeeper’s Spy

2x Dark Elf

1x Gravekeeper’s Descendant

1x Gemini Elf

Spells: 8

3x Secret Village of the Spellcasters

2x Terraforming

2x Solidarity

1x Mystical Space Typhoon

Traps: 16

1x Mirror Force

1x Solemn Judgment

1x Starlight Road

1x Trap Dustshoot

2x Royal Oppression

2x Dark Bribe

2x Skill Drain

2x Dimensional Prison

2x Bottomless Trap Hole

2x Dust Tornado

Every monster in Dietrich’s Deck is a Spellcaster. His Deck is all about keeping Spellcasters on the field and then activating Secret Village of the Spellcasters to prevent his opponent from using Spells. “As long as I have a Spellcaster on the field and my opponent doesn’t, he can’t activate Spells. And I doubt any major Deck in this room has a Spellcaster in it,” he said.

Infernities, X-Sabers, Quickdraw, and Herald Decks are usually built without any Spellcasters in them. Dietrich is running 2 copies of Terraforming to search out his copies of Secret Village and make sure he can lock down his opponent. The high ATK of his Spellcaster-Type monsters, boosted further by his 2 copies of Solidarity, make them tough to take down. “My favorite play is to Flip Summon Spy, Summon Gravekeeper’s Descendant, Tribute the Spy to destroy a card, and then activate Solidarity,” Dietrich said. With Gravekeeper’s Spy in his Graveyard, Solidarity will boost all of his monsters by 800 ATK.

Secret Village of the Spellcasters makes it even harder for his opponent to destroy his monsters, by preventing his opponent from using cards like Book of Moon and Smashing Ground on his powerful Spellcasters. Secret Village of the Spellcasters can also prevent Infernity Decks from starting an OTK with Infernity Launcher, since Infernity Launcher is a Spell Card that can’t be activated while Dietrich has Secret Village and a Spellcaster on the field.

Dietrich is also running a full Trap lineup, consisting of 16 Trap Cards! All of them limit the effectiveness of his opponent’s plays. He’s running Solemn Judgment and 2 copies of Dark Bribe to negate his opponents’ key cards, as well as Starlight Road to counter powerful cards like Torrential Tribute and Mirror Force. With Secret Village of the Spellcasters shutting down his opponent’s Spells, he’s not leaving his opponents a lot of options. He’s also running 2 copies of Royal Oppression to negate his opponent’s Special Summons. Dietrich’s Deck can play Royal Oppression more effectively than most other Decks, since Gravekeeper’s Spy is the only card he runs that Special Summons monsters, and its effect can be activated in the Damage Step while Royal Oppression can’t be used.

Dietrich is also running 2 copies of Skill Drain in his Deck. “Skill Drain stops all the effect monsters – this whole format is about monster effects,” he said. While the effects of his monsters are mostly insignificant (and in the case of Dark Elf, even beneficial to negate,) Dietrich knows that all of his opponents will heavily rely on their monster effects. X-Saber Duelists exploit the effects of XX-Saber Hyunlei and XX-Saber Faultroll to win, while Infernity Duelists rely on the effects of Infernity Archfiend and Infernity Necromancer. Dietrich is willing to shut down a few of his own monster effects, if it means knocking full Decks out of contention.

Dietrich’s Deck puts a new spin on traditional Stun Decks that use Thunder King Rai-Oh and Doomcaliber Knight to shut down most of their opponent’s cards. Dietrich’s access to Secret Village of the Spellcasters allows him to attack his opponent’s resources in another way, by preventing the activation of Spell Cards. Dietrich’s goal of building his Deck to beat those that are most popular may backfire if he Duels against rogue Decks running Spellcasters, but that’s the risk he took. Regardless of what happens, Dietrich will enjoy Dueling with some old favorites.