Six years ago the Dueling world was forever changed by The Duelist Genesis. Tuner Monsters and Synchro Monsters swerved the game in a totally different direction, but they weren’t the only ground-breaking new addition: The Duelist Genesis also marked the arrival of the Psychic-Type monsters, defined by their affinity for Synchro Summons and their Life Point-costed abilities. We haven’t seen a new monster-Type introduced since.

…Until now! In a set full of new firsts, The Yang Zing monsters are one of the biggest standouts of Duelist Alliance. They’re the first-ever Wyrm-Type monsters, and they’re all about Synchro Summons: not only are they tremendous self-replacing walls to protect your Life Points, their unending search effects make them hugely consistent and they power up your Synchro Monsters with killer effects that make them entirely new beasts. Meet the four core Yang Zings!

All the Yang Zing Main Deck monsters share some killer effects that keep the theme consistent. When you control a Yang Zing and it’s destroyed by battle or a card effect and sent to your Graveyard, you can Special Summon any other Yang Zing from your Deck. Suanni and Bi’an Summon it in Defense Position, Bixi and Pulao Summon it in Attack Position. You can use that effect with each Yang Zing once per turn. In addition, they all share the ability to let you Synchro Summon at any time during your opponent’s Main Phase or Battle Phase using “Yang Zing” monsters you control. This is a Quick Effect like Formula Synchron’s, but thanks to the added ability to also be usable during the Battle Phase, you can force your opponent to commit to a plan of action and then change the situation in an instant, depriving your opponent of their battle plans and advancing your own.

So you can chump block your opponent’s attacks, bounce back from destruction effects, or destroy your Yang Zings with your own effects, and keep protecting yourself with a string of free monsters. At the same time those Special Summon effects let you pick and choose the Yang Zings you want, and all four of the non-Tuner Yang Zings have unique effects when they’re used as Synchro Materials.

–Suanni, Fire of the Yang Zing is a Level 4 with 1900 ATK. When you use it as a Synchro Material, the Synchro Monster gains +500 ATK and +500 DEF.

–Bi’an, Earth of the Yang Zing is Level 3, with 1600 ATK. It protects your Synchro Monster from destruction by battle. Forever.

–Bixi, Water of the Yang Zing is a Level 2 with 0 ATK and 2000 DEF. Make a Synchro with it and your Synchro Monster will be unaffected by Trap effects.

–Pulao, Wind of the Yang Zing is a Level 1, packing 0 ATK and 1800 DEF. It protects your Synchro Monster from Spell effects when you use it as a Synchro Material.

Some of your favorite Synchro Monsters take on totally new contexts when you Summon them with Yang Zings. Imagine a Leo, the Keeper of the Sacred Tree Summoned with Bixi to protect it from Torrential Tribute, or with Pulao to make it immune to Dark Hole. Or both! Consider a Bixi’d Black Rose Dragon that can’t be stopped with Breakthrough Skill or Fiendish Chain, or a T.G. Hyper Librarian that can’t be destroyed in battle thanks to Bi’an, that just keeps drawing you cards. How about an Armades, Keeper of Boundaries that can’t fall to attacks, and protects itself from practically everything else anyways? The Yang Zing challenge you to think different about cards that have existed for half a decade. And those Synchros are just the beginning!

Baxia, Brightness of the Yang Zing is the boss monster of the Yang Zing theme, and you make it with any Tuner and one or more non-Tuner Wyrms. It rewards you for investing more individual Synchro Materials, because when you Synchro Summon Baxia it targets and then shuffles away cards from the field, equal to the number of Attributes of Wyrms you used for the Synchro Summon.

It works especially well with Chiwen, Light of the Yang Zing, the Level 1 Yang Zing Tuner. Chiwen has that self-replace-and-search ability all the non-Synchro Yang Zings have, but it’s also got another ability: when one of your Yang Zings is destroyed and yarded, you can revive Chiwen from your Graveyard for free; then when it leaves the field you banish it. It’s like Plaguespreader Zombie but free.

So imagine Synchro Summoning Baxia, Brightness of the Yang Zing with the Tuner Chiwen, the stat-boosting Suanni, and the battle-stopping Bi’an: in that case you’d have a 2800 ATK 3100 DEF boss monster that kicks three cards back to your opponent’s deck and can’t be destroyed with attacks. And you can do it during your opponent’s turn to massively disrupt anything they’re trying to do. Kinda crazy, and it’s super-easy to set up because all the Synchro Materials search and Special Summon each other and keep up your field presence.

But you can also make Baxia with other combos of Yang Zings! You could use the Level 1 Tuner Chiwen and the Level 4 Suanni again, but pair them with Pulao and Bixi instead of Bi’an. In that case Baxia hits the field with 2800 ATK and 3100 ATK; immunity to Trap effects; immunity to Spell effects; and it’ll punt four cards off the table and back to the Deck!

And that’s not all Baxia does! Once per turn you can target one of your own cards and a Level 4 or lower monster in your Graveyard; you destroy the card on your field, and if you do, you revive the monster you chose.

That means you can get extra use out of Continuous Traps like Fiendish Chain or Call of the Haunted, popping them for Baxia’s revival trick once they’ve already resolved. Or you can destroy one of your own Yang Zings: in that case you’ll trigger and resolve their Special Summon effects to search and Special Summon another Yang Zing for free… while still getting that Special Summon from your Graveyard. You can see how easily this deck turns one Synchro Summon into a string of Synchro Summons with terrifying speed.

The Yang Zing are an amazing force all on their own, but they’re not coming to the party unequipped: they also have some killer Spell and Trap Cards that we’ll discuss soon. Get ready, because Yang Zings are one of the most vicious monster themes of the year! You can hit up a Duelist Alliance Sneak Peek on August 9th and or 10th, and the booster set launches on August 15th!