Yu-Gi-Oh! Deskbots Guide

Yu-Gi-Oh! Deskbots Guide by jiggityjeff

If you’re just here for a decklist then here you go. The Parallel Twisters are proxies for either Magic Planter or MST, it’s just personal preference. Twister actually isn’t too bad in its own right, but I digress. If you’re here for a guide, you should probably still look at the list at some point, but here we go:

INTRO

Deskbots are an EARTH Machine-Type archetype based around field swarming and ATK boosting. The deck has a surprisingly impressive grind game and the ability to attack over just about anything. Probably the best part is that they’ve been getting support since Duelist Alliance, and there’s no end in sight (but I’ll get to that later). So, here’s the deck:

CURRENT SUPPORT

Deskbot 001

EARTH Machine/Tuner/Effect, Level 1

500 ATK / 500 DEF

This card gains 500 ATK and DEF for each Machine-Type monster you control. If 2 or more Machine-Type monsters are Special Summoned at the same time while this card is in your Graveyard (except during the Damage Step): You can Special Summon this card.

This is one of the worst Deskbots released at the moment, and it’s still great. Any timeeither player summons 2+ Machines, you can special it from the graveyard. Qlis Pendulum Summon or use Disk? Get him out. Use Machine Dupe? Get him out. If you get out 5 Deskbots he’s at 3000 ATK/DEF and about to get boosted way past that. Plus, he’s a tuner! With the versatility of the Deskbot’s levels and how easy they are to get out, I’ve been able to make Synchros from Level 3 to Level 9. Oh, and a quick note before anyone messes this up and gets a judge called or something, it gains ATK from itself, putting it’s “base” ATK at 1000. Unless the effect is negated, you can’t Machine Dupe it.

Deskbot 002

EARTH Machine/Effect, Level 2

500 ATK / 500 DEF

If this card is Special Summoned: You can add 1 “Deskbot” card from your Deck to your hand. All Machine-Type monsters you control gain 500 ATK and DEF, except this card.

Notice how, despite the fact that there’s only Deskbot monsters at the moment, the effect specifies Deskbot card. This is another hint that yet more support is coming in the near future. Since the boost only affects other Deskbots it’ll stay at 500 until you get another one out, so Machine Dupe is perfect here. His effect isn’t once per turn, so if you special one (there’s a very easy way to do this) and Dupe for the next two, you just searched three cards. The fact that it boosts your other monsters is just icing on the cake.

Deskbot 003

EARTH Machine/Effect, Level 3

500 ATK / 500 DEF

When this card is Normal Summoned: You can Special Summon 1 “Deskbot” monster from your Deck, except “Deskbot 003”. Once per turn, during either player’s turn: You can target 1 “Deskbot” monster you control; it gains 500 ATK and DEF for each “Deskbot” card you currently control, until the end of this turn.

This card is incredible. Normal summoning it is a +1 no matter what you summon, if you bring out 002 that’s a +2, and if you open with this and Machine Dupe (normal 003, get 002, search 1, Dupe 002, search 2) you can go +5. The ATK boosting effect is also key, making any board with 3+ Deskbots near impossible to attack over (the effect can be used during the damage step, and with multiple 003s you can double/trible boost one of your monsters or protect yourself from 2-3 attacks). The defensive, offensive, and grindy abilities of this little guy know no bounds.

Deskbot 004

Earth Machine/Effect, Level 4

500 ATK / 500 DEF

If this card battles a monster, during damage calculation (in either player’s turn): You can send 1 “Deskbot” monster from your Deck to the Graveyard, except “Deskbot 004”, and if you do, this card gains ATK and DEF equal to the Level of the monster sent to the Graveyard by this effect x 500 during that damage calculation only. If you activated this effect, your opponent takes no further battle damage this turn. If this card destroys an opponent’s monster by battle: You can Special Summon 2 “Deskbot” monsters with different Levels from your hand and/or Graveyard in Defense Position.

“But you need to have a ton of these guys out for them to be any good!”, some chump screams in the background. “If the best one only gets one other guy out, how do you expect to outpace any meta deck?” If Crossed Souls hadn’t been released, I would shrug my shoulders and tell this chump that they’re right and Deskbots are absolute garbage. But since it is I can slap them in the face and yell, “LOOK AT THIS CARD, IT’S LITERALLY THE MOST PERFECT THING THIS DECK COULD HAVE ASKED FOR AND MORE.” …Really though, card’s great. Every time you attack your opponent’s monster or they attack you (which they shouldn’t be doing, if they read the card), you get to send any Deskbot but 004 to the graveyard – during damage calculation! – and have this guy gain ATK equal to it’s level times 500 (right now there’s levels 1-5, so it can be boosted anything between 1,000 and 3,000) for the very small cost of your opponent taking no battle damage until the next turn. If it kills anything in battle, you get to special two – NOT up to two, so if you don’t have enough targets or enough monster zones the effect won’t go through -Deskbots with different levels from your hand or graveyard (including itself!), which allows for reuse of 002’s search effect, very effective field swarming, and synchro plays with 001 (VERY important note: 001 specifies that it can be summoned from the grave when two machines are special summoned outside of the damage step, so if you want to get him out you’ll have to specifically target him with 004’s effect). Basically, if you summon this off of 003 and resolve an attack, you end up having four Deskbots on board, which requires a huge amount of effort to attack over. These four on their own make a suprisingly powerful core, but Konami threw the deck a curveball with this next card:

Deskbot 005

EARTH Machine/Pendulum/Effect, Level 5, Pend. Scale 10

500 ATK / 500 DEF

Pendulum Effect

You cannot Pendulum Summon monsters, except “Deskbot” monsters. This effect cannot be negated.

Monster Effect

If this card is Normal or Special Summoned: You can target 1 Spell/Trap Card on the field; destroy it. This card gains 500 ATK for each face-up “Deskbot” monster in your Extra Deck. If this card in the Pendulum Zone is destroyed: You can target 1 “Deskbot” monster in your Graveyard; Special Summon it. You can only use this effect of “Deskbot 005” once per turn.

Looking back at 001 and 002, it kinda makes sense that there’d end up being Pendulum support for Deskbots; before this, the only way to activate 001 was to use Machine Dupe, and getting 002’s effect from your hand required you to use 004 and summon it from there (which is a less than optimal play). Unfortunately, since this is the only on-theme Pendulum released at the moment, all of its effects are pretty lackluster. However, the card is almost necessary to use simply because it’s a level 5. Up until 005’s release, 004 could only hit 2,000 ATK without the help of other Deskbots. Now it can hit 3,000, getting over virtually every threat in the game! It doesn’t hurt that you can special it from the grave after sending it there with 004 and pop a Spell/Trap, either. Oh, and notice how it has a Pendulum scale of ten and a restriction on only being able to Pendulum Deskbots. The only reason Konami would print a card like this would be to hint that there will be Deskbots going all the way up to level 9! Besides the possibilities for crazy boss monsters and Pendulum plays, this means that 004 will be able to hit 5,000 ATK. If that doesn’t scare you just a little bit, don’t know what will.

EDIT: Since it’s a level 5 machine and a Machine Dupe target, it’s crazy easy to make Cyber Dragon Nova, which of course lets you make Infinity. GG Konami

PLAYS, COMBOS, AND INTERACTIONS

Since the deck to beat right now is Nekroz, my personal build is designed to win game 1 and savage game 2. How? Well, see, Deskbots are low-level EARTH monsters with access to synchro plays. That means they can make Naturia Beast. That means you win. Here are the opening hands that make that possible:

Deskbot 004 + Foolish Burial

Foolish Glow-Up Bulb, normal 004, special Glow-Up, make Naturia Beast, GG.

Deskbot 003 + Machine Dupe

Normal 003, use his effect to get out 004. Activate Machine Dupe to get out 1-2 003. Overlay two 003s to make Meliae of the Trees, use it’s effect to send Glow-Up, special Glow-Up, synch with 004 for Naturia Beast, GG.

Deskbot 003, Machine Dupe, Foolish Burial

(This is pretty much the same play but with more plussing)

Normal 003, get out 002, search any Deskbot, Dupe for more 002s, search for 003 (for a followup play next turn) and any Deskbot, foolish for Glow-Up, special Glow-Up, make Beast with two 002s, GG.

(Slight variation that gets the engine going a little bit better)

Normal 003, get out 002, search 1, Foolish 001, Dupe for two 002s, search two Deskbots, special 001, make Beast with two 002s, GG.

Every other turn 1 play involves Soul Charge, and I’d rather not get into those. Here’s the two somewhat obvious mid-late game plays that are also auto-win:

Deskbot 004, 001 anywhere

Attack, special 001 and some other Deskbot, use 004 and 001 to make Beast, GG.

Mathematician/Scrap Recycler, Powerful Rebirth

Normal Mathematician, send Glow-Up or 001, special with Powerful Rebirth (level goes up by one), synch 3+2 for Beast, GG. This can also be done with Glow-Up or 001 in hand and Mathematician/Peropero Cerberus/003 in grave. I’d also like to take a second to give a shoutout to Powerful Rebirth for being an amazingly underrated card, helps this deck in more ways than I can count.

002 in grave, Powerful Rebirth

Activate Rebirth, grab 002, search 003, normal 003, grab 004, overlay 002 and 003 for Meliae, send Glow-Up, special Glow-up, synch with 004, GG.

I know that’s not a huge amount of combos, but they come around often enough to be relevant. If you’re not going for Naturia Beast, here are some of the other plays worth doing turn 1:

Deskbot 003, Machine Dupe

I mentioned this earlier: normal 003, get 002, search 1, Dupe 002, search 2. Another good option (if you opened with two 002s or just want to do something else) is to get 004 off of its effect and then Dupe 003, giving you a field with three separate, chainable 2,000 ATK boosts. If you do this while your opponent has a monster on board it might be better to just Dupe out one 003 so that you have two zones free for 004 to fill up with his effect.

Mathematician/Scrap Recycler, CoTH/Powerful Rebirth

With Mathematician you can send Glow-Up for some later plays, Peropero for Djinn outs/easy advantage, or 002 to summon on your opponent’s end phase and get a search, usually for 003. Recycler’s usually limited to the 002 play, but you can get it’s Foolish Burial effect off of normal and special summons, making it worthwhile to play at one (it also recycles 004s).

Deskbot 002 + Machine Dupe

Normal, Dupe, search 003 and any Deskbot, usually 004. Just gets the ball rolling.

Deskbot 003

If you go first and your opponent reads cards, normal 003 and get 002, search another 003 or 004. If they don’t read cards or you’re going second and they leave a monster on board, normal 003, get 004, attack with 004, boost by 1000 ATK with 003 and send whatever you want to summon off of 004 with its own effect, special what you sent and one Deskbot from your hand.

Deskbot 004

Just normal it. I know it sounds like a joke but it works, especially in game 1.

ISSUES/WEAKNESSES

I’ve mentioned how hard it is to attack over an established Deskbot board enough times to establish that that’s not a weakness. But non-attacking removal like Raigeki, Dark Hole, Torrential, or Trishula? No matter how many 2,500 ATK boosts a Deskbot has, those cards can still cause problems. That’s why running so much revival (3 CoTH, 3 Rebirth, 1 Soul Charge, 3 Deskbot 004) and negation (Fiendish, Veiler, Naturia Beast/Barkion) is vital to keeping the deck moving. And if you can’t swarm the field in one or two turns, attacking can actually be an issue; that’s the main reason to play any copies of Mirror Force and a big reason to play Fiendish Chain over additional Veilers.

Your normal summon is very important; if Solemn, Veiler, or any similar card stops your Mathematician, 003, or 004, there goes your play. If this happens 2+ turns in a row, you may as well scoop.

OVERALL THOUGHTS

Deskbot’s ability to plus, push, defend, control, swarm, grind, and abuse its versatile extra deck options with a relatively low monster count makes the deck’s few weaknesses seem pretty insignificant. Unless you brick incredibly hard (which is rare), a strong board is easy to make turn 1 or 2 and virtually guaranteed turn 3, and there’s only going to be more options as more support is released. If you have any questions, comments, or want help with the deck, leave a comment or PM me, I’m more than happy to help out!