So…
So if my understandng of the new rules is correct the new Link summon is gonna change the following things in the game:
- Limited extra deck monsters amount and bound to their link value in order to summon them.
- You HAVE to use the Link Summon (Whaat?) or… (sorry I’m not sure I understood that part)
- Now Monsters area is divided on normal summons and extra deck monsters.
- Link Monsters have no defense value.
So… on theory it sounds logical, I can understand that after Pendulum Summon - a summon explicitely made to ease the use of Extra Deck Summons - there would be a new one meant to limit its overuse and abuse or whatever in order to balance things out.
But the actual rules played out seem weird in the actual execution, and apparently hinder more than balance the game, but given that both the OCG and the anime has yet to show us the actual summon I’m gonna wait to give my pov on this.
I am seeing a lot of confusion about this so lets summarize and explain everything one by one.
The new rules:
Suppose you want to summon a Clear Wing Synchro Dragon, so you summon a level 3 tuner and a level 4 non- tuner somehow on the field, which are now summoned in your Standard Monster Zone (the usual 5 Monster Zones) now renamed as “Normal Monster Zones”, and tune them into Clear Wing Synchro Dragon. Now this Clear Wing that is summoned from extra deck takes up the new Zone called “Extra Monster Zone” exclusively for Extra Deck Monsters, that is different and separate than your Normal Monster Zone now there are only 2 of these Zones and you can only use one of them and if neither you or your opponent isn’t using any of these Zones and you summon an extra deck monster first you can choose which Zone you get, while the other goes to the opponent (you can’t use both), also these Zones are stationed above the 2nd and 4th Normal Monster Zone. Any and all Extra Deck Monsters (except pendulums…. maybe, not enough information about that) go to this Zone and you can not summon more than one Extra Deck Monster simultaneously since a Monster is already occupying it, in this case, Clear Wing is already occupying your only Extra Monster Zone space and if Clear Wing somehow gets removed from that Zone you can again occupy that zone with another Extra Deck Monster summoned from the Extra Deck. But the Extra Deck Monsters summoned from Graveyard and the like are summoned on the Main Monster Zone, and don’t get summoned to the Extra Monster Zone. So all in all this limits the Extra Deck spam that most current Meta Decks are doing. You can still summon Extra Deck monsters but only one at a time. The Extra Deck Monster now acts like a Boss monster/Deck Master (you can still use the current Extra Deck Monster as a material for another Extra Deck Monster like Ranking up to Ultimate Falcon or Synchro climbing into Crystal Wing Synchro Dragon, but Accel Synchro has sadly taken a hit since you can’t control 2 Extra Deck summoned Monsters… Normally anyways), and in my opinion the main focus should be on protecting it. Although its frustrating and extremely slow for most decks, remember that the opponent also has the same restriction as you and can only play one extra deck monster in their Extra Monster Zone.
Now the new “Link Monsters” helps with summoning multiple Extra Deck Monsters because of their specialty in linking with other zones(using their Red Link markers on their Card Frames seen as arrows). they are also an Extra Deck Monster so they also take up your Extra Deck space and initial and only Extra Monster Zone, but they help expand your Extra Monster Zone using their Link Markers. (Note that the link markers are different than the Link number on them such as link 3 on Decode Talker, although the number written on them and the number of arrows are the same so far, the arrows indicate Links while the number is used in summon of the Link Monsters)
How to summon them? (Link Summon):
They are summoned by using the Materials(Monsters) they describe on their card text and the number of Materials used are equal to their Link number, so for example: Decode Talker has “Link 3″ and requires “Effect Monsters” so you need 3 Effect Monsters as Materials sent to graveyard for its summon. You may notice that it also has the “2 or more Effect Monsters” in its requirements and we will get to that in a bit.
Now Link Monsters themselves can be used to Link summon obviously but you can use a link monster to decrease the number of Materials by using their Link number as the number of materials, for example and as also mentioned in the magazine you can use a “Link 2″ Link/Effect Monster(since Effect Monsters are the Material requirements for Decode Talker) and another Effect Monster to Summon him and by doing so you decrease the Material cost of Decode Talker by one, from 3 Materials to 2 Materials (Link 2+1=3, as seemingly non-link monsters have an inherent link value of 1). Now its material text comes into play in the form that you can’t just use only a link 3 Link/Effect Monster to summon Decode Talker as you need 2 Monsters at the minimum according to its Material text. If for example it had said 3 Effect Monsters then using a Link 2 Monster to decrease a Material won’t be possible as you need to use 3 Effect Monsters for its summon (you can still use a link 2 monster in its summon but the total number of materials has to be 3).
Reminder that Materials are sent to graveyard like Synchro Monsters and are different form the Links of the Summoned card and any Effect text that specifies a Linked Monster is referring to the Monster Zones the summoned card is pointing at with it’s Link Arrows and not the materials used for its summon.
How they affect the Extra Deck?
Link monsters “Link” to your Main Monster Zones by using their Link arrows in red on their frames. Those Linked Zones can be used to special summon Extra Deck Monsters in those Main Monster Zones. Basically the Linked Zones overlaps your Main Monster Zone and Extra Monster Zone(except the original Extra Monster Zone, that can only have Extra Deck Monsters) So you can keep building Chains of Links from one monster to another to be able to summon Extra deck Monsters continuously. Linked Zones disappear once the Link Monster is gone but Monsters already on those Zones are unaffected(unless a card effect says so otherwise) and Extra Deck Monsters already on the Linked Main Monster Zone don’t need to change Zones as the condition is only for the Initial Summon. Also any of your spells/trap zone that the Link monster might be pointing at can’t be used for any Summons, since they are not considered a Linked or even Monster Zones, and I guess I need to mention this, that no you also can’t summon a monster in your Opponents Monster Zone because even if you can Link to them, they are not yours.
So if you want to Summon multiple Extra Deck Monsters Simultaneously you need to start of with Link Monsters and the expanded Linked Zones giving you extra space so to speak. In our above example in order to Summon Clear Wing Synchro Dragon and Dark Rebellion Xyz Dragon simultaneously we need to Summon a Decode Talker first in the Extra Deck Monster Zone for an access to the Linked Zones diagonally down from it as both the Dimensional dragons can be summoned on those Zones. In addition of course you also need their good old Summoning conditions of one tuner and one non-tuner equaling level 7 and 2 level 4 monsters respectively to the above Dragons.
There are still a lot of questions regarding many card interactions but so far from what has been revealed, this is my understanding of the new mechanic. Hope this helps other people
