Understanding the Game: Six Samurai

"A field of over 1000 Duelists has been trimmed to just 2: Sean Coovert with Six Samurai, versus Nicky Lacaille with Fish!  One of these Duelists was about to become a Dueling legend!" - Jason Grabher-Meyer, March 20th, 2011, http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=5362

   If you were paying attention to YCS Charlotte, North Carolina, you would have probably read the above quote relating to the finals of it. Even if  you didn't read that quote, you would have heard Six Samurai had won. To many, Six Samurai were a deck dependent on the dice roll, which does seem to be supported by the match (Coovert went first). That  is not the point of this article though, the point is to show you how they work.


               Part One of their Strategy: A Strong First Turn

A Critical Component to their first turn shenanigans.

   A critical part of any competitive Six Samurai’s strategy is a first turn “Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En” as doing so enables them to control most of your moves. When they win the dice roll, they can summon him with ease, with three “Shien’s Smoke Signal” available to search out “Legendary Six Samurai - Kageki” and “Kagemusha of the Six Samurai” which once they have both allows them to easily synchro summon “Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En” with ease as “Legendary Six Samurai - Kageki” allows you to special summon a Six Samurai monster when it’s normal summoned from your hand, which allows for an easy “Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En” play. 

   It is a good idea to note that if they manage to get “Legendary Six Samurai - Kageki” and “Kagemusha of the Six Samurai” to their hand you can still play “Effect Veiler” on “Legendary Six Samurai - Kageki” in order to prevent them from climbing into “Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En”, which would leave them with a 200 Attack monster in attack position.

  If they manage to bring out “Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En” you can still hope they don’t have any “Solemn Warning” or “Solemn Judgment” to eliminate the chance of you fighting back. “Mirror Force” is also pretty bad, but it is easier to play around. And even if you don’t have a monster on field to use to stop them, or extra spells and traps to chuck at them, if you have an “Effect Veiler” in hand and a “Mirror Force” or “Torrential Tribute” you can still attempt to get rid of “Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En”.

Part 2: Swarming

The Second phase of their strategy is to swarm your field with huge beaters. “Legendary Six Samurai - Kizan” is especially good at doing this, as it doesn’t have a limit to how many of it they can control. “Grandmaster of the Six Samurai” is also useful, though there can be only one on the field of it. “Gateway of the Six” helps makes these swarms even worse as it allows them to search their deck for a Samurai each time they summon a mere two of them.

 This is especially brutal, but "Kinetic Soldier" or "Spirit Reaper" are good at stopping their attacks, and "Kinetic Soldier" can also attack for even more damage. "Hand of the Six Samurai" is able to get rid of them though, but it can't special summon itself, so that is a plus to that. "Gozen Match" can work, as "Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En" is dark, unlike most of the swarm. "Gozen Match" can also help prevent Kageki's effect.